A/N: Since people are actually reading this, I thought it'd be fair to put more effort into it. Enjoy! (and try to ignore the discrepancies, I'm doing my best.)

::

"Hi honey, what'll you be having this evening?"

Mamoru glared up darkly at the waitress' term of endearment and pursed his lips tightly to keep from snapping at her. He preferred not to be called names like "sugar" and "honey" as older women did so much in these types of cafes, but even he could admit it was far more endurable than being blatantly stared at as most others did.

Just because he was blind didn't mean he couldn't feel them staring.

"Coffee. Black." He replied curtly, and she nodded, unaffected by his brooding.

"Runa, sweetheart! Could you get this nice young man a black coffee?"

He grimaced, but, surprisingly, everyone else in the cafe seemed unaffected by her loudness.

"She'll be right with you, dear." The woman informed him sweetly before collecting his menu and disappearing behind the counter. He sighed and lifted his glasses with his forefinger to wipe at his eyes.

His eyes felt particularly irritated as of late, as he was only given short intervals of rest between his constant work with Igawa. He could tell his relationship with the techie was growing increasingly strained due to their frequent bickering.

The Elements Network had recruited them several months ago to, in short, help them with their dirty laundry. They seemed to have some sort of history with his partner, otherwise he never would have agreed to it.

He got along fine with their commander, Alpha, but it was the other members that irked him; especially one woman in particular.

He scowled as "image" of the woman resurfaced in his mind. The woman, Sierra, was strong and very skilled—all admirable qualities. However, she was also headstrong, stubborn, and far too abrasive for her own good—which was a good enough reason for them to constantly butt heads as they so often did.

After working on countless operations, he and Igawa had mutually decided on taking a brief rest from their duties. Even he needed a break after their constant work, or else his senses would grow dull and compromise the two of them.

He was also sick and tired of eating Igawa's crappy cooking for months on end, so he sought out a local diner where he could simply relax and think in peace. Unfortunately, their most recent location was fixed in the center of one of the busiest cities in the country: Tokyo. It was advantageous in the sense that he could blend in easily, but he found that all of the noise overwhelmed his senses.

Of course, it was more than a little difficult to find a quiet diner to spend some time alone in, so he spent the majority of his morning searching the area for a secluded cafe.

Luckily, he eventually found himself in a plain, little cafe with several other teenagers hunched over some card game on a table. He presumed it was safe enough, and now here he was, surrounded by the smell of coffee and pollution. It would have to do.

"Black coffee?"

He was jostled out of his thoughts and he reached for his cane instinctively, holding it close by his thigh. A different waitress, much younger than the other one, held out an empty mug and a jug of what he assumed from the bitter aroma was his coffee.

How the hell did she get so close without him noticing? How long had she been standing there? Fuck, he needed a break for this exact reason.

Mamoru stared at her and she returned his gaze, but she seemed to freeze when he made eye contact with her. He narrowed his eyes slowly, his suspicion growing, and his fingers tightened around the hilt of his cane.

Did she recognize him? It was possible that rumors of the "demon swordsman" had spread around even to those who weren't a part of the police force or yakuza. Damn it, he should have been more careful, more aware of his surroundings. It was too late now, though. She had already seen him and he had no choice but to hope that she was too afraid to sell him out.

He stood up abruptly and she stepped back in turn, leaving the mug on the table but still clenching the jug of hot coffee tightly in her grip. His eyes grazed over her features, inspecting her carefully down his nose. He couldn't follow her gaze, but he knew that they were measuring each other up.

She was slender and of average height for a woman her age—no less than twenty based off of the curvature of her face and body—with long hair pulled back into a loose ponytail.

She certainly was attractive.

He scrunched his nose up, immediately shutting the thought out of his mind because he had other priorities; namely, the fact that she was most likely currently considering how much she was going to get by turning him in.

He wasn't able to determine her facial expression exactly, but Igawa's technology had improved enough for him to be able to catch minute facial features, such as her clenched jaw and pursed lips.

"Coffee to go, then." She spoke quietly, her voice soft and feminine yet edged with a hardness that sounded all too familiar. He felt his eyebrows scrunch together in thought because a part of his brain clicked in recognition, but he couldn't place her at all.

She turned to leave without waiting for his response, but he caught her arm and drew her close to him swiftly. She inhaled sharply through her nostrils and tensed up as he leaned into her.

His eyebrows twitched again as he was suddenly distracted by the sweet aroma of honey intermingled with coffee beans. He blinked hard to clear his head and she glanced up curiously at him.

"Actually, I'm kind of in a hurry. Could you show me to the door?"

She paused and swallowed, seeming to consider her options. Her eyes darted toward the counter, but the other waitress had her back turned to her. She slowly turned her gaze back to him and he flashed her a menacing smile.

"Amara!" She shouted suddenly, eyes still on him. "Could you show this gentleman to the door?" Mamoru's hold on her arm tightened, but the younger woman paid no attention to him.

"Of course. Is your shift already over, Runa?" The waitress dropped her rag into the trash bin and made her way toward them.

"I'm not feeling well. I think I'm going to take my break now, if that's all right with you." The waitress—Runa—subtly shook his hold off of her before untying her apron.

"Take your time." Amara patted the younger woman's cheek affectionately, and she smiled back at her in return. "Come, dear," The older woman took Mamoru's arm and led him to the door.

He looked back to briefly exchange glances with the woman—Runa—just before she turned to disappear behind the counter. The lens on his glasses focused in on her, setting a small plus sign at the very center of her face.

"Save. Runa." He murmured under his breath.

He could see her chest rise quickly as she inhaled sharply, looking like a deer in headlights. She hastily dropped the jug onto the counter and made for the back door.

"What was that, dear?" The older woman inquired.

"I appreciate the help."

She smiled, swinging the door open with a high-pitched creak before adding, "Of course, dear. You have a wonderful day, now," to which he nodded curtly.

He tucked the collar of his jacket up to protect his neck from the cold winter air and craned his head to glance through the glass windows, but the waitress was nowhere to be seen.

::

"Nah, bro, you're just delusional. In case you haven't noticed, you're not exactly the easiest person to talk to."

Mamoru sighed and removed his glasses, massaging his eyes with his thumb and forefinger. He leaned back in his seat and tried to control his growing impatience with his partner.

"There was something off about her. If you had been there, you'd understand."

Igawa sighed and lifted the screen to his laptop. "All right, if you're really worried then we can look her up." He offered. "Not sure why you're so preoccupied with a girl, though."

"I'm telling you she recognized me, Igawa, even when I saved her inf—"

"Actually, I think I know." Igawa's annoyed tone switched over to a more curious one, and he spun around in his chair to face Mamoru with a shit-eating grin spread across his face.

"You know, I always thought you were gay, but I guess you just have a thing for high school girls dressed up as maids." He snickered, folding his arms and leaning his chin over the top of his chair.

That did it. Mamoru stood up slowly in his chair, unsheathing his katana from its hilt, and Igawa began to panic.

"Waitress," Mamoru corrected him with a low growl from the back of his throat. "And she wasn't in high school."

"Relax, man! I was just kidding." He scrambled off the computer chair ungracefully and plopped onto the couch on the other side of the room.

Mamoru counted the three precious seconds of silence he was given before Igawa started up again.

"But was she hot? In all honesty?"

Mamoru scowled at him darkly, but the techie was barely fazed by his usual temperament.

"In case you've forgotten, dumbshit, I'm blind."

"Bullshit, you and I both know that those new specs I developed can show you almost everything but exact human emotion and color."

"Don't exaggerate," Mamoru narrowed his eyes at him, but his partner wouldn't have any of it.

"Come on, man. If you don't give me anything, I'm gonna have to assume you're gay—which is totally OK by me if that's the case, you have my full support—" Igawa was cut off by a near blow to his jaw as a heavy piece of his equipment almost connected with his face.

"Oi, not the machinery!" He cried, waving his arms out as a truce. Mamoru paused, sensing another presence approach the room and palmed his seat for his glasses.

"What's your problem now, Blade?" A familiar, irritating voice seethed from across the room.

"Nothing of your fucking concern,Sierra." He responded heatedly, positioning his glasses back into place. The woman was standing by the door frame, arms crossed, with a serious scowl on her face. Fuck, and Igawa said he never smiled.

"Well whenever you're done fucking around, we're having a briefing in the basement." She deadpanned before turning the corner and slamming the door shut to leave. What the hell's her problem? He bit back a retort. He wasn't going to bicker with her like some juvenile. She seems more of a bitch today than she usually is.

"Not today, man." Igawa warned him, sensing the tension between the two. Mamoru sheathed his katana and sat back down into the sofa chair.

"And why's that?" He asked under his breath, clearly uninterested. Igawa rubbed at his jaw worriedly and bit his bottom lip with his teeth, uncharacteristically quiet. Mamoru raised an eyebrow, puzzled by his partner's hesitance to answer.

"Remember how I told you that everyone has a reason that they're here? With the Elements Network, I mean." He began uneasily. He glanced at Mamoru's half-interested expression and took it as a means to continue.

"Kind of like how I lost my sister…" Igawa thumbed his lip briefly, lost in thought, and Mamoru shifted to sit up straighter in his seat.

"Yeah, well… As strange as it sounds to put it this way, Sierra lost her reason to fight ten years ago today."

Mamoru furrowed his eyebrows and opened his mouth to deliver a retort about his partner's poor abilities to tell stories, but Igawa lifted a hand to stop him.

"She had a family before that—her own family—but that doesn't matter right now. What I mean is, the only family she had left was her sister's family after her kid…" He winced and Mamoru could tell that he was trying not to let on too much about her private life, which he could respect.

"I get it. Just get to the point."

"Right," Igawa sighed. "After that, she joined the Network, and it became her life. That, and her sister's family became her family, and she had this niece that became, like, everything to her. She was this adorable little twelve year-old kid who always wore star-shaped jewelry, I remember." A small smile pulled at the corners of his lips when he envisioned this memory, and Mamoru noted that this must have been back when he had briefly worked with the Elements Network.

"Ten years ago she was kidnapped and her whole family was slaughtered in her house. As if losing her own family wasn't enough, it was like losing her kid all over again—same fuckin' age and everything—and she just…" He trailed off and shrugged, his eyes boring into the carpeted floors.

"She blamed herself." Mamoru finished for him, but Igawa immediately shook his head. "It wasn't her fault that she was kidnapped, but…We haven't found her since."

"They didn't kidnap the girl because Sierra worked with the Network?"

"No, the girl, she…" He leaned back against his seat and stared at the ceiling like it held the answers to everything. "She had circumstances that led to her kidnapping, something that Sierra became aware of too late."

Mamoru quirked an eyebrow and stood up again, curling his fingers securely around his katana. "Nothing good ever comes out of too much power or money." He moved to exit the room, pausing briefly to glance over at Igawa, who was still frozen in his seat.

"Some things you just can't control." He murmured, with a strange expression on his face that, oddly enough, indicated that Mamoru was in fact wrong in this case.

Mamoru paused and opened his mouth to speak somewhat reluctantly. "You knew her personally," His words were more of a statement than a question and Igawa nodded slowly, his expression grim.

"She was just a kid, man—a good kid. Kept her grades up, pretty quiet, really curious. Freakin' adorable. It was just…bad luck." He murmured this last part more to himself, but Mamoru still picked up on it.

"Anyway," Igawa grunted and lifted himself off of the couch to join Mamoru at the door. "Briefing. Or else Sierra'll chew our asses off. And now you know why…Sorta."

"…Right."

Igawa sighed, stretching his arms out above his head, and they exited the room silently.

::

Before they even entered the briefing room Mamoru could almost feel Sierra giving him the evil eye. He let out an annoyed sound under his breath and the entirety of the room paused as Alpha stopped talking mid-sentence.

Nice going, he mused dryly to himself. His eyes flitted across the room and acknowledged an unusually small amount of Elements members crowded around the table and screen.

Hmm, interesting.

"Hijikata. Igawa." Alpha addressed them with a brief nod, which Mamoru returned civilly.

"Why so late, boys?" A voice dripping of sweetness that could only be distinguished as Juliett's voice drawled from across the room. "Did you get yourselves into a little scuffle again?"

Mamoru could almost feel Igawa roll his eyes beside him and he snorted. The techie had a serious hard-on for the woman.

"Let's just start this thing. Is this everyone?" Igawa scanned the room skeptically. So he wasn't the only one, Mamoru noted to himself.

"Affirmative." Alpha cleared his throat. "We're here to discuss a long-term concern of the Network."

Mamoru casually glanced around at the others, who seemed tense and uncomfortable, their heads bowed as if they were grieving. Ah, this is about the niece, he realized.

"As of today, it's been ten years since Haruka Tooyama was abducted on her way home from school." He announced. A few of the members shifted beside him, including Igawa, but Sierra was noticeably still.

Alpha retrieved a small remote from his pocket and gestured at a projector on the table beside him. A 3D hologram of a young girl flickered onto the center of the table, her form slowly rotating counter-clockwise.

Mamoru's eyebrows rose slightly in surprise. His new specs had really improved considerably if he was able to see a holographic projection. He made a mental note to order Igawa's choice of dinner tonight.

The girl was young, her shoulder-length hair parted at the middle and fastened by two tiny clips. She had a loose jeans jacket pulled over shoulders with a tank top, a frilly skirt, and a pair of sneakers. He pursed his lips grimly. She really had been just a kid.

"Now we're here to confirm the fact that we haven't stopped searching for her." Alpha paused and glanced at Mamoru patiently, but he subtly gave the older man a nod to continue. Sierra flashed him a glare from across the room and he exhaled in a long huff, pointedly ignoring her.

"Our sources indicate that the yakuza haven't ceased their search for her either, which can only mean that she's still out there."

Mamoru frowned. They were all blatantly ignoring the fact that if the yakuza didn't have her, then she was probably d—

A small circular, spinning icon popped up in the center of his vision, causing him to blink in surprise. Was it trying to identify the girl?

"Now, she would currently be about twenty-two," Alpha paused, reaching for his remote again. He played with the buttons and the hologram morphed, elongating her body until her baby fat filled into the slender curve of her now-adult body.

A chorus of hushed gasps sounded around him and Mamoru pursed his lips in thought. He finally understood what it was about this girl that unnerved everyone—she wasn't just another civilian caught in the line of duty.

She was family. And not just to Sierra; to all of them.

The icon was still blocking his field of vision, much to his annoyance. He tapped on the glasses impatiently, earning a questioning look from a few of the men. He ignored them and fiddled with it until the icon finally disappeared.

Suddenly, a bubble popped up in his place that read match.

Mamoru froze. What? That couldn't be right.

He screwed up his face and unintentionally attracted Igawa's attention. Igawa gave him a head tilt that Mamoru recognized as his signal for, what the fuck, man? Mamoru glared at him in return, muttering, "I think we have a problem."

"Do you have something important to contribute to the report, Blade?" Sierra demanded, rounding on him. Mamoru considered letting it go, but knew it would be against his better judgment.

A series of letters popped up into the bubble and he furrowed his eyebrows, scrutinizing the name.

Runa.

"Well, fuck." He swore flatly. That was probably the last thing he'd expected to see.

"What?" Sierra snapped. "What is it?"

Mamoru glanced at her and looked between Igawa and Alpha gravely, contemplating how he should break the news to them.

"Your girl—Haruka; I've seen her before."