Book 1: Simplicitatem

Chapter 3: Persona

"It's not justice if you don't go overboard."
-Unzen Myouri (Medaka Box)

Quietly, purposefully, a silhouette crouched low under the cover of the long fearsome shadows that stretched from the junkyard city's dilapidated buildings. The shadow shook with anger and found that it had to sheathe its knife in order to keep from swinging it around wildly.

It had been three days since Mike, his caporegime, had been killed. Mike had told him that it was coming. The Mafia had had other, more pressing matters to deal with at the moments, but soon, they would be hot on their heel again. Rats and snitches were dealt with accordingly in their institution, and were punished with nothing less than death.

Mike's death had been a sign, a sign that a string of murders would soon be taking place.

It was not as if there were no factions within the Mafia; they just happened to be one of the more moralistic ones. Unfortunately, the Mafia had morals that differed from theirs, and so, they were labeled to be killed.

Slowly, the silhouette breathed, silently calming himself. Soon, he thought to himself. This was his city when night fell, and the newly formed Phantom Troupe, composed of justice-seeking, idealistic twenty-two year olds would have nothing on him.

He breathed again.

Soon.

"Revenge is cold, sweet, and somehow, it is not fattening."
-Alfred Hitchcock

Kuroro Lucifer was flying.

The sentence was debatable, but that was the closest he could come to describing the sensation. From buildingtop to buildingtop he leapt, wind slashing his own hair against his face.

"It's worth noting that the targets are proficient in zetsu." The pink-haired female next to him commented, her tone as cold as ever.

"Zetsu is often learned unconsciously," Kuroro said, "so it's usually an inaccurate representation of an opponent's skill." Then he paused for a moment, coming to stop on top of a dilapidated rooftop, blinking twice and questioning his sanity. "Do you think it's important?" He asked, casting a sidelong glance her way. If Macchi has broken her usual silence to mention something, of course it was important.

Macchi came to a halt beside him, stopping swiftly. She only shrugged. "It's just a hunch."

A hunch. Riiight.

"No," he responded, "I trust your instincts."

Kuroro sighed and made a mental note to brace himself for a surprise attack, possibly an ambush sometime in the near future. Machi's quote-unquote hunches, were very rarely proved incorrect, and he had the feeling he would regret it if he failed to heed it now.

"Boss?" She questioned, eyes showing well-concealed curiosity. "Is something the matter?"

He stifled a chuckle and started moving again. She followed closely behind.

"Nothing's wrong, Macchi." He smirked gently.

"If you say so." The female answered.

"Let's hear that report." He said, shifting into his dancho persona.

"They're not all that much trouble. The Mafia's made up of pampered corrupts that are all bark and no bite, if they can't even take care of these scoundrels." Her eyes narrowed.

"That's good to hear." He almost laughed at the sight of her animosity. "So he's been taken care of?"

She nodded in affirmation. "I'll get rid of the other one tomorrow. He's good at hiding." She mentioned more quietly. "I can smell his apprehension."

"Mine seemed content to sit there." Kuroro slowed his pace. "I thought it would be more entertaining since he was caporegime."

"Pampered." Macchi repeated. "Appearances are deceiving."

"Does anyone else have anything to report?"

"I'm not their messenger."

Kuroro nodded. "Go get some sleep. Sunrise is in three hours."

Without another word Macchi sped ahead, leaving him behind.

The leader stopped again, this time coming to a halt on the sandy ground of the city. It was nighttime once again, and the streetlights were flickering.

Meteor City was such an utterly boring town, listlessly repeating the same routine day by day. The same streetlights never worked, the same bars were always full, and so the others always empty. Shouts filled the streets as drunken men gambled their lives away-

Silently, Kuroro slowly and deliberately inhaled, closing his eyes, hands in his pockets. Smell the apprehension, huh?

"I'm sorry," he murmured. "Did I keep you waiting?"

The emotion Macchi had been detecting had not been apprehension.

"It wasn't a problem at all." The answer came.

It had been anxiety; anxiousness and irrepressible bloodlust.

A young man stepped out of an alleyway. His face was angular and his eyes were wide with malice.

"You're the one that slaughtered Mike?"

Now that he was speaking more clearly, Kuroro could detect a well hidden Italian accent. Japanese was apparently not an easy language to pick up for the Europeans. Macchi's well-concealed target.

"Such an aesthetically displeasing word," he frowned, "slaughtered. We were only doing our job."

"You were," Macchi's target corrected, eyes narrowing, "not we."

The phrase carried with it an interesting sense of finality, and Kuroro realized that those were the last words he would say before their battle ensued.

When he saw the man go in for a lunge, Kuroro reared back and delivered a kick that left the Italian skidding backwards a good fifteen feet.

After a few moments he straightened up, and Kuroro repressed the twitching at the corners of his lips. He kick had been meant to cripple, and the Leader had to admit, he was impressed. Or perhaps he had been expecting less, judging from Mike's lack of retaliation.

The Italian soon brandished a dagger. His grip was interesting to say the least, with the blade pointing upwards in favor of the more versatile horizontal slant. Kuroro exhaled exasperatedly; that usually meant that the blade was poisoned.

He was one of those.

Inexperienced, naive, and completely at the mercy of his emotions.

Again, they leaped toward each other after a brief moment of respite. Kuroro didn't like carrying weapons around with him. He always had one or two, but they had never been his specialty –did he even have a specialty?- and so his dodging skills had been forced to advance quite thoroughly.

After a brief jabbing session, the Italian seemed to become even more vengeful than before, and his strokes and swings began to lose their finesse. They became wider, stronger, and lost control.

Forcing himself to concentrate, the Leader ducked swiftly beneath the assault and slammed his hand into the Italian's sternum. Momentarily having shocked him, Kuroro grabbed the back of his head and slammed it mercilessly against the dusty ground.

When blood began to pool around his feet, Kuroro clapped his hands together, cleaning the grime off of them. He slowly began to realize a stinging sensation gathering in his left forearm.

Frowning, he examined it and saw a deep gash running along it.

Well when the hell had that happened?

Kuroro Lucifer resisted the urge to slam his own head against the nearest streetlight. Enjoying his battles was something he needed to stop doing. It made him reckless and the adrenaline output made his oblivious to pain.

Kuroro tried to clench his left hand, and hissed when he realized that he was having trouble doing so.

It was poison judging from the sensation, and Kuroro made a mental note not to move it anymore and keep calm to prevent its spreading.

He could always cut it off and ask Macchi to reattach it, but the female was not above asking for millions of zenny, so it was cost-defective, and besides, when would he next see her? They had just parted ways.

He did his best to squeeze the bad blood out of the wound, but it was beginning to coagulate, and try as he might, Kuroro couldn't think of a better solution. Kuroro nearly rolled his eyes as he focused his nen into his good arm, preparing to sever the left just below the elbow, and sighing deeply, he-

"Don't do that."

He paused, blinking. He hadn't sensed anyone approach him.

From the alleyway behind the one the now-incapacitated Italian had come from emerged the little girl Feitan had messed around with. Who was this brat, and why was she popping up everywhere?

"You shouldn't do that."

He relaxed his posture. "Enlighten me."

Without a word she began to scuttle over toward him.

Kuroro resisted the urge to jerk his arm back when she put her small hands on it. He watched her cautiously, eyes narrowing slightly as they took in her appearance.

She was short, and in surprisingly good shape for a street orphan. Her hair, originally brunette, had been lightened slightly by the scorching sun, and it was long, but slightly unruly. She wouldn't turn her eyes toward him.

"What are you doing?"

"I don't know," came the response.

An interesting sensation ensued. The pressure building up in his forearm was suddenly released, and Kuroro found that he could move it again, albeit weakly. He turned his gaze toward the girl once again as she removed her hands.

Well, removed was not the right word. Her arms had slid off of his.

"Did you just absorb it?" He asked, brows coming together in confusion. Upon examining her hands, Kuroro found that her fingers were slightly discolored.

The girl shrugged. "Who knows?"

"Why?" He asked, for once, at a loss for words. "Don't you hate me?"

"Hate?" She repeated. "That's a pretty strong word." She sighed, and after a brief silence, she said, "No, I've decided that I don't. You said so yourself; you were just doing your job, right?"

"Is this the same thing you did to Feitan?" Kuroro lifted his arm slightly.

She frowned. "I think."

He waited for her to go on.

"All I'm really good for is sort of taking energy from people. And things." Still, she wouldn't make eye contact with him.

And obviously, if she can take life energy, she'll get everything that's mixed in with it too. Kuroro realized. Why wasn't she being affected by the poison?

Kuroro immediately took a step back, examining the girl again. The micropyles on her body had already been opened, and her nen was warm and gentle. A Specialist? Was her power even nen related?

"You took my life energy?"

She looked away angrily. "I can give it back if you want."

Kuroro nearly chuckled as her cheekiness. "Why?" He asked again.

"Why do you murder people?" She shot back.

He could have easily said for the money, but truthfully, that wasn't his motivation.

"Because," she answered first after a moment's worth of thought, calming her bristling, "It's the only thing I'm good at. And if someone could have been saved if I had done something within my power," she shrugged, "I guess I'd have trouble living with myself the next morning."

Kuroro looked at her curiously. Fifteen? Sixteen? She couldn't have been much younger than him.

"I owe you one." He looked at his arm again. He was slowly beginning to feel some strength return to it.

"Play chess with me then."

The girl in front of him froze, looking confused with herself, and her hands shot to her mouth. She looked mortified.

Was that really all she wanted? He tilted his head slightly. "Every day at 10 o'clock sharp, was it?"

She only nodded, color flooding her cheeks.

"I'll be here tomorrow then." He shrugged.

Turning around, he picked up the body beside him. "Thank you." He said quietly, and deftly began his flight again.

"This world isn't as bad as you think."
-Celty Sturluson (Durarara!)

He destroyed her in the first match. Aika should have known that those cold and calculating eyes were good at what they did.

They were cunning and icy, difficult to read, unnerving. She made it a habit never to look into his eyes. She didn't like his, and she didn't like her own.

His moves were always deliberate, confident, and they had a quality that made her second-guess herself. Every once in awhile Aika would sneak a glance his way, but whenever she did, he seemed to notice. Not obviously either, but with subtlety, with a muffled snort or a slight upward turning of the corners of his lips.

He was so charismatic it made her sick, voice flowing and kind, deceiving and conniving. For god's sake, people wrote novels about the charisma he carried with him wherever he went.

Unlike Mike, he hadn't made a habit of scaring her every time he made an appearance. He purposely made his footsteps audible, and Kuroro's tone was soft, almost soothing; not what one would expect from the leader of a pack of ruthless, bloodthirsty thieves. Whenever he came by, he brought something, whether it was a pack of crackers or a new book.

He brought big ones too, ones with yellowed pages and musty aromas of fine and settled dust, like Jane Eyre, War and Peace, Don Quixote, well-known classics that Aika had never heard of.

Aika grew to enjoy Kuroro Lucifer's company, if for no other reason than the fact that he brought entertainment, a makeshift pillow, and a compacted alternate universe, all simultaneously (those goddamn books though) along with him. He was intelligent, and lo and behold, intelligence was a trait Aika really seemed to enjoy as well; perhaps because she was naturally inquisitive and intelligent too, in spite of the fact that she had received no proper education. Then again, neither had he.

Kuroro is normally the kind of guy that Aika would usually really dislike. He was a perfectionist, someone who did everything he did with an unmistakable passion, a fire.

Aika wonders what it would be like to do something with as much passion as him, and she vaguely realizes that one day, she hopes to be every bit as in love with being alive as he is.

END

"What makes us the most normal is knowing that we're not normal."
-Haruki Murakami,Norwegian Wood

A/N: Hey, thanks for reading guys. Sorry, the ending was rushed and didn't make any sense; it's 2:13 am and I'm really sorry I haven't updated in awhile I'm just banging things out on my keyboard.

Please review, this stuff makes my entire life!

Thanks!