Now if my translations are correct (which they may not be...) Arashi means storm, where Futame means harmful. So Arashi Futame would mean Harmful Storm. I think it suits Arashi-chan.

I would like to thank the Invisible Author and Dear4Life for your inspiring reviews after each chapter. xD I really like how this one turned out, so I'm eagerly anticipating your opinions. Thank you, enjoy!

Mission 4

"Damn." I felt a cold emotion wash through me, something that had been building for the past three hours. I was angry, not to mention confused. There couldn't have been another skyscraper my mysterious messenger had in mind? Another 12 am? It didn't seem likely. So then…, where the hell were they?

"I don't like this," I said to myself. "Why call me out and not show up?" Were they toying with me? Was I being watched at that moment? It didn't make sense. The only thing that seemed normal about the situation was that I was seriously pissed off.

"Fine," I said out loud. "I'm leaving." I turned to go, waiting for something. Anything. No one answered. No one tried to stop me. I swore and leapt from the building. As disappointing as the experience had been… I returned the next night at midnight. And the night after that.

It was almost two weeks later that I was finally visited up on my skyscraper; however it was not by my messenger. It was shocking how surprised I was to see him, The Black Reaper appearing behind me in his white mask. I had been too preoccupied with my situation to recall what I had been looking for in the first place. The fact that I had wanted to search for The Reaper had completely fled my mind.

Upon seeing him and realizing my stupidity I was filled with an intense rage towards myself. How could I have forgotten something so crucial? Was I really that pathetic? Had I let so much of my wit go? I stood up and faced him, but my body and mind felt exhausted. I had no desire to fight him. Not tonight. I cursed myself again for giving up so easily.

"VI-714," he addressed me. "What are you after?" The same question. The exact same question. Was it really that important? When he tensed I realized that I had asked the question out loud.

"Is it because you don't understand me? You can't judge my motives? Well we're in the same position. Who knows what I'll do next?" I wanted to hit myself. What the hell was I talking about? I felt so tired. My resolve was virtually non-existent. After only a couple of months I was reduced to something this pitiful.

"I guess if I had to tell you what I was after…it would be the same thing I said to you before. I want answers."

"What answers," he responded quickly.

"If I knew that then I wouldn't need to ask questions, now would I?" I could tell that I had stretched his patience too thin. He lunged with his blade and I wasn't ready for him. My movements were slow-no- his were fast. Faster than before.

For the billionth time I found myself falling off of the familiar building, my body knowing just where and how to land. I straightened and was instantly caught off guard. The Reaper was already there beside me. He lashed out at me and sent a jolt of electricity into his attack. I cried out as I felt the current rush through me. I was thrown back into the wall of the next building, but he did not pull back there. His hand came up and caught me across the face. I stumbled right into his knee as he raised it and caught me in the stomach. With the breath knocked out of me I crumpled onto the ground at his feet. He stopped and looked down at me. That was his mistake. In his one moment of hesitation I was able to send a blast of air straight at his face. He dodged, which was lucky for him. The force behind my blow would have snapped his neck, but now I had the footing I needed to fight back.

He moved immediately into the offence again and I dodged all of his attacks. We were progressing into an ally, which was not a good place for a fight. Most alleys in this city all seemed to be comparable to the space between two close parallel doors opened simultaneously. The space we fought in was no wider then both of my arms spread out. This was a great advantage to me however. There was finally a break in his relentless attack and I used this chance to condense as much air as possible into the narrow space before sending it all out in a massive blast of wind.

The Reaper was thrown clear across the street and into the building opposite. It was understandable, seeing as I had hit him with the force of a small hurricane. With a power this flexible, though, it took quite a toll on my own body. I was breathing heavily and I could feel my legs quivering beneath me. As for my opponent: he was unmoving, his body heaped on the ground.

I released a huge sigh and began to move towards the reaper. When I reached him I felt the air change before he acted. I jumped up and his hand closed where my ankle had previously been. After a quick moment of relief I realized that I hadn't escaped his trap entirely. In one fluid movement his weapon came hurtling up towards me. I was unable to dodge in midair and the blade sliced deep into my left arm.

I landed opposite him and fell back onto my skyscraper for support. I held my arm, biting back the pain. There was a lot of blood seeping out of my body. I glared at him before throwing up my right arm and blinding him with another blast of air. By the time he was free of it I was already far over his head, propelling myself towards the next street over.

Unlike the silent street I had just been on, this one was much more lively. Late nighters and party goers crowded the streets. Colourful lights flashed from every corner and the constant hum of the city at night filled the air. It was the prefect place to blend in. That is, it would be if I weren't trailing a river of blood. Hiding in the shadows was only going to conceal me for so long.

I decided the only rational thing to do would be…

The pedestrian didn't know what hit him. Actually it had been me, but all I had done was knocked him on the head. He'd be fine in an hour. Not that it mattered. I dragged him into the darkness of a dead-end alley and quickly stole his jacket. Having done that I made hasty work of binding my arm in my own sweater and hiding my wound under the unruined fabric. I immediately decided I looked horrible in orange. I wasn't about to complain though. I pulled my mask off and shoved it into my pocket. With both of my bloody hands hidden, my wound undetectable, and my hair straightened out a bit I looked like any average kid, out for a late night.

The jostling crowd nearly caused me to give myself away, but I didn't even wince as I was pushed this way and that. Trying to keep a lookout for The Reaper while also trying to keep my wound from bleeding through my jacket was stressful, especially when I became distracted by the sound of sirens. Most people continued on their way, but some people stopped and watched as a cop car slid onto a curb nearby and a woman and two men jumped out. The woman was familiar. I remembered seeing her before.

"Yes," I heard her say into the phone in her hand. "Both VI-714 and BK-201 have been reported as active in this area. We're on the scene now." With a slight shock I remembered meeting her before one day with Li Shen Shung. So she was with the police. I thought that knowing this the best thing to do would be to not linger. I walked right past her and began heading in the direction of home.

I arrived there without being intercepted, so my alias, I decided, must still be unknown to The Black Reaper. My losing him had been lucky on my part. Any other way and I might have revealed myself accidentally. I leaned against the door to my apartment and glanced up at the fake stars. It was undeniable that they were beautiful…

There was no way I was going to let myself fall so far again. Forget the stupid message. My goal was to find my answers and the one I had chosen to answer them was BK-201, The Black Reaper. I promised myself that from this night on I would not stray from my path.

"Oh?" I jumped and turned to my right quickly. Li Shen Shung was looking at me, surprised as I was one hand on the rail of the stairs. "Arashi-san? What are you doing out so late?" Despite the fact I could ask him the exact same thing I answered with a friendly smile.

"Just watching the stars."

"It's a nice night," Li said coming up beside me. I turned my body ever so slightly to hide the blood that was slowly seeping through my jacket. He didn't seem to notice. As long as he didn't come around my other side…

"You like the stars too Li-san? Even though they're fake," I asked, making the reasonable assumption.

"But they're not fake," he said, his eyes fixed on the dark sky. "They're just not the same." I watched him out of the corner of my eye. There was something deep in his expression.

"Yeah," I answered seriously. "That's right. We stood there, just looking at the sky for a longer time then I would have expected. When I finally made it into my apartment something in me felt better than it had before. I felt almost…happy.

***

I was beginning to really like Li Shen Shung. As dangerous as it was I felt we were almost becoming…friends. We seemed to meet outside our doors nearly every day, sometimes more than once. Li was not somebody who was hard to find in a crowd. He would pop up everywhere, not to mention the multiple jobs he was somehow supporting. I'd seen him at a local ramen shop, the batting cages, a pet store…it was almost unbelievable. No matter where or when I ran into him however, we always seemed to find something else that we had in common. Like the stars. We both liked the stars.

It was one day that I was headed to the nearby mall that I literally smacked into him and landed us both on the ground, him with a bag of groceries scattered everywhere and me with some nice, fresh, hot coffee in my lap.

"Ak!"

"Sorry, sorry! I'm very sorry," he apologized as he lifted his head to look at me. "Ah. Arashi-san…"

"Ow, ow, ow, ow…hot. Man! My pants…," I moaned as we both stood up and exchanged nervous laughs. I cursed myself just as Li's eyes slid over to my arm. I had made an effort not to use it when I stood and had afterward massaged it from habit.

"Is your arm alright Arashi-san," Li asked, concern etched into his features.

"Yes! It's just a bruise. Nothing you did Li-san." He had been the one with his head down. An uncertain look crossed his face.

"I feel really bad. Maybe I can do something to make it up to you?"

"No need Li-san. Everything's fine. I wasn't paying attention either. Too bad about all your groceries though…" Li had a blank look on his face before looking down at the strewn produce and exclaiming: "Oh! That was only dinner." A sheepish smile crept onto his visage. I stared at him in disbelief. That much for one person…for one meal?

"How about I treat you to lunch," he asked kindly.

"Uh. No, that's fine. It wasn't really your fault." The look he gave me made me feel like I'd kicked a kitten.

"I feel really bad."

"Well…er…Why not, then? After all you offered," I said, wondering why I'd felt guilty about refusing him.

When we reached the small buffet I nearly choked on my food when I saw the amount he collected. We managed to have a nice conversation, despite how awkward we both seemed. When we (he) had finally finished we placed our empty dishes on the table and slid out of the booth. On Li's way out he managed to bump my arm with more force than I imagined anyone else could have mustered and I slipped, crying out quickly.

"I'm sorry Arashi-san!"

"No. It's fine," I said shortly. I looked over to see him staring at me, his eyes worried, but something beneath that set off my internal alarms. I could almost sense that Li was hiding something, some deeper emotion. I thanked him for the meal and made my way back home.

On my way I walked past a black cat, sleeping on a wall. I recognized the bell around its neck and something about my previous encounter with Li and seeing this particular cat so close to home sent a chill down my spine. Could Li…could he know? If he knew about my wound, and he suspected who I was, then could that mean that Li was actually…

My mind was overworked. It seemed like I was jumping to conclusions. Who said Li even knew anything about my wound? Maybe he really had bumped me by accident. Maybe I had imagined that look behind his eyes. Maybe…

Ding… The barely audible sound of a tiny bell followed me all the way home.