Roses in Rain
a Weiss Kreuz fanfiction by laila

Part 2 – Scared of Girls

The timing was wrong. Retrospectively, Omi admitted it freely. The timing was so wrong it would have been hard to think of a less appropriate moment, domestically speaking anyway, for Omi to decide to share his little bit of good news. The problem was that Omi had been so eager to get it out and over with – he knew Ken wasn't going to like it; why spin it out? – that he hadn't been paying enough attention to what Ken (said information's sole recipient) was actually doing. He hadn't even been looking at him.

This, as it would turn out, was a mistake. The news had damn near finished Ken. Literally.

"Omi," Youji said wryly as he got to his feet, "promise me you'll never go into medicine."

And he stepped casually around the table to go and slap Ken quickly and forcefully between the shoulder blades, getting in four good blows before Ken, doubled over coughing, managed to elbow him away, quickly sitting upright in an unsuccessful bid to deter Youji from his mission of mercy. Omi sighed, exchanging glances with Aya. That, he thought sadly, could have stood to go a lot better…

"You do realize," Aya pointed out dryly after a further minute or so, "that the aim of slapping him on the back is to stop him choking to death, not to help the process along?"
Youji straightened, smiling ingenuously, his demeanor all innocent bewilderment. "Aya, I'm just helping out here…"
"Fuck off, Kudou!" Ken managed hoarsely, glaring at Youji and hoping like Hell the fact his eyes were watering wouldn't be held against him. "It's water, okay? I'm fine!" And tried, and tried desperately, to pretend he wasn't about to start coughing again. "What was that about Rain?"
Omi swallowed. He smiled nervously. "Um… just that since she obviously can't go home, we thought it'd be nice if she stayed here. Just for a little while, until she finds her feet again…"

Well, at least he hadn't been halfway through trying to drink this time.

"You want her to what?" Ken demanded (though nowhere near as loudly or forcefully as he would have liked; had Omi done this deliberately?) for what must have been the ten thousandth time since Rain had abruptly walked, or rather been carried, into his life. He didn't quite know why he stood up, knocking the chair backward with an obnoxiously dramatic skitter, except that it seemed like the right thing to do. Christ, as if he hadn't been counting the days until they could get shot of the bloody girl!
"Stay." Aya replied infuriatingly calmly. "Here. We can't throw her out onto the streets."
Omi nodded earnestly. "It's not like she has anywhere else to go, Ken-kun…"
"And," Youji said, with the manner of a man revealing the card to trump all trump cards, who'd just pulled an entire warren's worth of bunnies out of his tastefully elegant silk hat, "you can't deny it'll be nice to have a beautiful woman round the place."

Omi couldn't quite forbear to giggle. From the look on Ken's face, he could have done just that only too easily.

"She's got to have somewhere to go!" Ken said desperately. "She'll have come from somewhere, right? Why can't she go back there?"
"That could be a bit, ah… tricky, Kenken." Youji said, and though his words were flippant, his voice was all too grave. "You see, as far as we can work out, she was running away from something, or someone, when Aya here found her. If we send her back out there, there'd be nothing to stop whatever – or whoever – it was from hurting her again…"
"Sorry, Youji," Ken said irreverently, "what was that? I couldn't hear you for the doom-filled violins. Stop it with the fucking theatrics for five minutes and be straight with me, okay? Haven't you actually asked the goddamned woman?"
Omi looked awkward. "We have tried, but she won't say."

He bit his lip anxiously, remembering the hunted look that had crept across Rain's face earlier that morning when he asked her, apropos of nothing at all, if there was anyone they could contact, anyone who would want to know that she was safe and well – no, she had said quietly, her beautiful amethyst eyes growing troubled, her smile becoming brittle, forced… false. Nobody. It had been all Omi could do, as he gazed upon the girl as she gazed out of the window of the spare room, the room Omi already thought of as hers, to keep himself from reaching out and resting one hand on her shoulder. You're not alone, Rain, he had wanted to say…

(And he had wondered when he left the girl's room – but vaguely, distantly – where thoughts like that came from. Strange. Being around Rain made him feel different, somehow.)

"I think," he added anxiously, "she's too afraid to."

Ken didn't reply. He'd been staying, as far as he could help it, out of Rain's way since that first afternoon; an easy enough task since all it involved was keeping well clear of the spare room. Admittedly, it had also meant volunteering for extra shifts in the shop and running every errand going and then some, but anything beat playing nursemaid to some girl he couldn't quite think straight round. He hadn't quite managed to avoid her altogether, though, and the more time he spent around her, the less he found to admire in her.

He didn't like those silences of hers. The horribly dramatic way her face would cloud when he mentioned something that didn't want to talk of and which had, in the first day or so, provoked feelings of sudden and terrible remorse – as if he should have known before times what a near-stranger didn't want mentioned! – were becoming only irritating. Not least of which because they happened all the damn time. Pretty much every time he tried to talk to the bloody woman he'd touch on something that would have her eyes becoming suddenly shadowed, her gaze distant…

He didn't like the way she looked at him, either. Funny thing was, Ken found he couldn't recall what he didn't like about it.

"You didn't see what we saw when we were cleaning her up, Ken-kun," Omi was saying, his expression painfully earnest, his eyes pleading as a puppy's. "There were older injuries there… scars… she's been badly hurt before, and recently. Wherever she's come from, we obviously can't send her back there under those circumstances, and we can't throw her out. She's got to stay here."
"She can't stay here." Ken said forcefully, ignoring the way Omi gasped and the juvenile Icy Death Glare that was Aya's sudden glower. Youji just raised his eyes heavenward and sighed. It was almost more unsettling.
"Why on Earth not?" Aya asked dangerously.
"Because I don't like it, that's why!" Ken shouted, slamming his hands forcefully down onto the table, making the plates and cups bearing the remnants of their abortive evening meal clatter and jump. Pointless, but it made him feel fractionally better for a fraction of a second. "What the Hell's wrong with you three at the moment? There's something very, very weird about that woman! She can't be for real! And what about our fucking cover!"
"Temper, temper." Youji said far too smoothly, through a smile Ken thought grounds for justifiable homicide. Youji didn't know how lucky he was Ken didn't have his bugnuks anywhere to hand; how the guy stood the temptation that was having that damned watch on his wrist all the damned time Ken thought he would never know. "What about our fucking cover?"
"Oh, nothing, really," Ken retorted, ignoring the tease, "just that I happen to like it where it is!"
"Stop acting like a child, Hidaka." Aya said briskly; his violet eyes, shining out from beneath his tumbled crimson fringe, were angry. "That won't be a problem. Rain is staying."
"For Christ's sakes, Aya! Can't you see it's not goddamned safe—"

Aya wasn't listening. Aya had already got to his feet, turned his back and started stalking out, with Omi – and even he looked exasperated – following. Clearly the discussion, as far as he was concerned, was over. Ken watched them go, scowling at their turned backs (Good Christ, didn't Fujimiya realize his word wasn't goddamned law? Of course, Ken reflected, this would have been a rather more useful line of argument if Omi, whose word was law, a quiet, polite kind of law a body didn't even consider transgressing if he had the slightest fondness for breathing, hadn't been marching in step with the guy) then, sighing, walked back over to the table and started collecting up the dinner plates. Youji gave him a funny look as he left, a look Ken scrupulously pretended not to notice.

"You're not the boss here, Fujimiya," Ken pointed out to the dinner service. "You're just fucking bossy."

When Aya dropped the next bombshell over breakfast three days later, Ken wondered if perhaps he shouldn't give up food for the duration.

That morning had found Ken setting Rain a place at the breakfast table and muttering a discontented something about why stupid goddamn girls couldn't just live their own goddamn lives and not crash other people's when it was obvious they weren't goddamn wanted and equally stupid goddamn tables with only four goddamn sides. He wasn't used to cooking for five and he resented it, especially when all the recipes he knew were for four, the cookbook worked in fours and so did the goddamned groceries. Well, that or sixes. He needed five and everything was out of whack. He resented having to have fun with math just to get dinner out the way. Hell, he resented having to be the one to do it in the first place. Christ, for this he had skipped going running.

(That was another thing, since when had they started doing breakfast? And since when had Youji willingly dragged himself out of his pit before midday? If Rain was moving in, couldn't they just be normal round her? Why in the Hell did Aya want them all treating her like a goddamned house guest?)

It wasn't like the meals themselves were much fun either. Screw liking cookery, he thought, poking moodily at the rice he suddenly didn't feel like eating. They were going back to the damned rota until Rain got her ass out the door and Little Miss Angsty-and-Mysterious (yeah, like that was so uncommon around here!) was going to take her turn like everyone else, now she'd quite literally got her feet under the table. It took all Ken's self-control to resist the urge to kick her.

He had no idea why the others were being so weird about it, though. He never had liked newcomers much and Aya and Youji had the bruises to prove it. Why should he suddenly come over all sweetness and light just because Aya bloody Fujimiya (who he still wasn't liking much, actually) had taken it upon himself to import a female and dote on her?

Oh well, at least the others hadn't insisted the girl join Weiss. Though even that was probably coming…

"Shopping?" Ken said incredulously.

And Omi and Youji traded yet another glance. That had to be, what, about the thousandth since Rain had gotten here? Ken had come to think of it as their Don't-Mind-Ken Glance, and he had already been given ample opportunity to become heartily sick of it. You, that glance said, are being exceptionally exasperating and equally perverse so we have both decided to ignore you until you stop shouting and start making a bit more sense. Never mind that as far as he was concerned they were the crazy bastards who weren't making sense.

"Aya, you're seriously suggesting we take her shopping on Kr—" Youji, or at least Ken assumed it was Youji, kicked him under the table and he quickly changed tack, "someone else's goddamned credit card?"

Persia is gonna have a fit, he wanted to add, but prudence suggested now might not be the time. But that card was for mission-related expenses, or for buying detonators and extra razor wire and bullets for the gun Aya kept in his coat and thought Ken didn't know he had. Stuff like that. It was not for buying women's underwear! Never mind that he didn't know what the guy looked like in anything but the vaguest terms (big mother; got a beard) Ken found he could imagine perfectly the look on Persia's face if Omi put in an expense claim for two dozen pairs of bras and panties. Right down to the beads of sweat and the throbbing vein at the temple. Oh, God, never mind Persia, if Manx saw something like this…

"Aya," he said firmly, "you use that card to buy girls' clothes with and Erika's gonna have a stroke."
Rain blinked. "Erika? Aya, who's that?"
"Someone who's not gonna like us buying clothes on a business credit card." Ken replied.
"She does our expenses." Aya explained far too calmly, accompanying his words with another And-Don't-Say-A-Bloody-Word-Hidaka glare. "I'm sure she'll understand, Ken." He made it sound as if the possibility that she wouldn't was so remote it didn't even exist. They were thinking about the same Erika here, right? Manx Erika?
Rain looked doubtful, giving Ken a strange look out of the corners of her impossibly purple eyes. "Are you sure she won't mind if you buy me new clothes on that?"
"We'll square it with her, Rain-san." Omi said, smiling sweetly at the girl. "Don't worry."

Maybe, Ken thought, if he staged a trip while clearing the table he could get away with dropping natto down her front. Maybe not, though; for now, the girl was wearing one of his few formal shirts and a pair of knee-length khaki shorts Ken recognized as coming from Omi's wardrobe, her long, wavy hair pulled back in a high ponytail with a few loose strands framing her heart-shaped face, and looking so irritatingly effortlessly lovely that Omi had declared she could keep the shorts seeing how much better they looked on her.

Ken wanted his shirt back, preferably yesterday. Not that he was planning on wearing it, it was the principle of the thing. It was his shirt, God damn it.

Honestly though, shopping? Abandoning the store on a Saturday, one of the busiest days of the week, just so they could go watch Rain trying on jeans and carry her damned bags home for her? Clearly Rain thought it was a great way to spend the day, but Ken sure didn't. Tokyo on Saturday afternoon – if the Koneko was anything to go by it was going to be a foretaste of Hell even without adding Rain. It wasn't until after the girl had headed back upstairs, and Ken was trying to bully Youji into admitting that yes, it was about time he did something about the house for once and that he could make a start on it by doing the washing-up now, that Youji dropped the next bombshell.

"If it's the money that's bothering you, Kenken," Youji said in a far-too-casual tone that had Ken immediately on his guard; the money wasn't the half of it and Youji knew it just as well as he did, "don't sweat it. Rain'll be working in the shop with us as of next week, so she'll be able to— what's the problem now, kid?"

Ken had started hunting through one of the kitchen drawers. When he straightened and turned back to Youji, he was holding a large kitchen knife casually between forefinger and thumb. The blade glinted slightly in the light as Ken far-too-casually threw it upright. Then he smiled. It wouldn't have been a reassuring sight from anyone, not just an impulsive assassin with marked aggressive tendencies… never mind one with a (admittedly somewhat unfair) reputation for erring on the clumsy side. Come on, he was a goalkeeper, Youji reminded himself. He spent years catching stuff. He's not about to stab himself.

Not, of course, that Ken stabbing himself was his primary concern.

"Christ, Ken," Youji said tightly, "Didn't your mother tell you not to play with knives? What's this in aid of?"
"Shall I kill myself here," Ken asked brightly, "or would you rather I waited until I got back upstairs?"

"So," Rain said curiously, "where's this mall you're taking me to?"

Rain might have been forgiven for thinking she'd asked her companions to work out the root of pi, or who had said 'Now is the winter of our discontent'. She might, in fact, have got a rather prompter answer if she had. As it was, she received no response, unless Aya's eyes flickering, momentarily, from the bumper of the car in front of his (the road, of course, well and truly cluttered with all the typical Saturday-morning traffic – he'd known they should have taken the train and would have done had he not suspected that trying to get Rain's new wardrobe back home would be like struggling with an army requisition even with the help of four guys and two cars) could be counted as a response.

She winced when Ken laughed briefly and incredulously, her eyes darkening briefly as she frowned. The young girl hadn't missed the way Ken had tried his utmost to avoid her since she'd woken up, or the way he alone out of her four rescuers had taken an obvious dislike to her… Omi had been nothing but kindness to her during her recovery and she had quickly found herself warming to the sweet, innocent boy; Youji, though she couldn't believe the man thought she was the kind of girl who could actually fall for those cheesy lines of his, seemed nice enough. And Aya – well, Aya had, after the first day, been aloof almost to the point of rudeness, but she could tell there was something else there, that he had a reason for keeping his distance from her.

So what made Ken so different? Why, if the others were falling all over themselves trying to be nice to her in their fashion, was that one the odd man out? What did he have against her that made him act so hostilely?

"Mall?" Ken asked, staring hard at the back of Rain's head.
Omi blinked, exchanged a glance with Ken (who was so surprised Omi was choosing to trade glances with him for once that he damn near fell off his seat) and leant forward, peering at the girl's trim profile through the gap between the seats. "You want to go to a mall, Rain-san?" He asked.
"Well, if we're going shopping…" The girl said a trifle defensively, only to be interrupted by Ken.
"A shopping mall? You want to go to a shopping mall when there's an entire freakin' city out there? That's stupid—"
"Ken-kun, please." Now Omi interrupted Ken, his frown an obvious reproach. Could you at least try to be pleasant? "Um, Rain-san? We could take you to a mall if you liked, but it would mean going out of the city… Ken-kun's right, it would be a bit strange to go to a shopping center when we're so close to the city."
"Really? Don't you guys go to malls?"
"No, not really," Ken replied straightforwardly. "People who live in big cities don't exactly need to."

Rain couldn't say she'd really thought about it that way before. She guessed it did make rather more sense… "I guess I'm just not used to living here yet," She offered with an apologetic smile.

It still seemed strange to wake up knowing that this strange city, this Tokyo, was her home now… and, before she had run into the arms of these four young men, she hadn't ever been given the opportunity to find her feet here. Hadn't ever, really, been allowed to acclimatize herself to her new home. It hadn't mattered to them that she hadn't known where she was, and was too disoriented to remember the Japanese her mother had taught her; they had delighted in her confusion and in keeping her an outsider, an unknown quantity… just for a moment her eyes grew troubled, and she felt a little homesick. A little afraid.

"Rain-san?" Omi said in consternation, "are you all right?"
Rain started, flinching. "Ah! Oh, yes… fine, fine! I was just thinking about— oh, nothing, really." She smiled at the anxious boy, expertly changing the subject. "So, um, if we're going to the shops, where will you be taking me? I never used to like really conventional things, so…" Her smile dimmed slightly at the lie. It had been seldom she'd received new clothes and never allowed to choose them, but she'd often imagined how she would dress once she had the freedom to do as she chose… but now, she supposed, she could wear whatever she liked. She could reinvent herself, become the person she'd always dreamed of being… "I always used to like Hot Topic, so…"

She broke off. Aya's eyes had flickered across to her face again, and this time he frowned.

"Hot Topic?" Ken and Omi said in near-perfect unison, Ken tripping slightly over the English and topping it with, "what's that?"
"Something you'd see on a forum?" Omi volunteered.
"Forum?"
"On the internet, Ken-kun."
"Oh, right. Well," Ken said thoughtfully, "that can't be right…"
"You don't have them?" Rain asked, and she looked disappointed. "Um, so if you wanted to wear something different, where would you go to buy it?"

Omi glanced about himself at his companions – at Aya, a vision in basic black, then at Ken whose tee-shirt, at a conservative estimate, was at least two sizes too large – and then down at his slightly scuffed trainers. Youji might have been rather more help, but Youji was about three cars behind them and in such an obvious (though highly circumspect) sulk at Rain passing up a ride in Seven in favor of Aya's Porsche that even Ken hadn't felt up to catching a lift with him.

"Um, well…" Omi began hesitantly, "we probably aren't the ones to ask, Rain-san."

Saturday. The stores, as ever, crowded with extras there to buy or browse, with crowds of gossiping girls, with young women and their bored or hostile or overbearingly solicitous escorts, with families bickering lightly over this and that. And here or there, a weary weekend father uncomfortable in his leisure clothes, his eyes both awkward and furtive as if he couldn't quite work out how he'd gotten here in the first place and wishing he were back in the safety of his office.

And on this particular Saturday there was Ken Hidaka, caught between two overburdened racks of black mini-skirts and looking horribly lost there.

This felt like the five millionth crowded clothing store he'd been in since they'd arrived at the shops and the four of them were already overburdened with bags full of clothes and art supplies and CDs and various other things Rain had seen and taken a fancy to and Aya had made Kritiker buy for her. Rain already owned more clothes and accessories than Ken did and they hadn't even stopped for lunch yet. Manx, Ken thought, was going to blow a blood vessel. She'd take one look at the statement when it came in and stroke out on the spot. He understood perfectly and would hardly have blamed her.

(Thankfully, Rain had been too wrapped up in debating the various demerits of two practically identical pairs of black ankle boots to overhear the whispered conversation – well, argument really – between Aya and Ken about credit card bills, budget cuts and the availability or otherwise of second-hand crossbow bolts.)

Right now, Rain was modeling a black top with an elaborate red Chinese dragon screen-printed onto its front and a black asymmetrically cut mini-skirt which fastened with a belt at one side while Omi, encircled by carrier bags, looked admiringly on. Even Aya seemed to be having difficulty keeping his eyes to himself. Youji just looked bored and was whiling away the time in desultorily hitting on one of the equally bored shop girls, but that meant nothing because Youji was waiting in breathless anticipation for them to hit the underwear shops and saw an ordinary clothing store as just another delay.

Ken wasn't at all sure who he'd rather kill – Rain, Youji, or himself, he'd done quite enough already that he really didn't think offing himself was going to make the slightest bit of difference any more – and wasn't sure whether he should thank God he'd left his bugnuks at home, or curse the guy likewise for allowing him to forget them.

"Do you guys think this suits me?" Rain asked after a while, turning to the four of them.
"Suits you?" Omi asked in surprise.
Ran nodded. "I mean, I like it, but it's a bit low-cut… the top, I mean. You don't think it's too revealing for someone like me?"
Omi flushed awkwardly and glanced over to Youji for help, but he was exchanging name cards with the shop girl and didn't notice. Ken pulled a face. "I dunno," he said uninterestedly.
Omi gave him a Look. "It looks nice, " he volunteered. "If you like it, Rain-san, you should get it."
"You think?" Rain said uncertainly. "I never… I mean, I wasn't sure I could wear things like this…"

Great, Ken thought, all this and she's fishing for compliments. Look, God, I'm a sinner. Mortal, venal, you name it I do it, I kill for money and I'm the world's leading expert on Youji Kudou's back, and certain parts lower down. However You want to cut it I'm guilty. So, if You've any spare thunderbolts up there and You're feeling at all Old Testament and in the mood for a random smiting, lay it on me. Just as long as I don't have to watch bloody Rain play Pretty Princess Dress-Me-Up all day.

"It looks great." Omi assured her with a bright smile. "If you're happy with it, that's all that matters."
"Well… okay!" Rain smiled back at him and turned back into the changing rooms, closing the curtains behind her with an unnecessary flourish.
"Please tell me that was the last damned outfit she's got in there," Ken said.

When the curtains opened again Rain was once again dressed in the black hooded sweater, stone-washed blue jeans and black lace-up basketball boots she had bought at the first store they visited, handing Aya the new outfit as she stepped back over to them. Aya nodded at her, his expression softening slightly, as he took them from her then headed to the tills, Omi trailing behind him. Guy hadn't even glanced at the price tags… Oh well, it could be worse. At least Ken had his shirt back and wearing the damned thing round his waist for the rest of the afternoon was, he thought, a small price to pay to see it stayed that way.

Rain watched them go, smiling, but her smile faded as they moved away. She was beginning to feel a little uncomfortable and she soon realized why. Her trained instincts told her that she was being watched. Turning around, instantly on her guard and tensing herself to spring into an attack, Rain found herself confronted with three rather sluttily-dressed girls of about her own age, all three of them staring daggers at her. She only just managed to stop herself from bursting out laughing.

"Can I help you?" She asked, her voice filled with amusement.
"You're here with Omi-san, right?" the tallest of the three said, taking a step forward.
Rain nodded in agreement. "Yes, I'm living with him." She said offhandedly, and grinned at the horror-struck look that passed across the faces of the three girls. "His friends took me in."
"You're living with him?" The slutty girl said in amazement. "Don't tell me you're his girlfriend. If you're messing with him, you'll regret it!"

Rain just watched her for a moment or two, her arms folded and her violet eyes slightly narrowed in amusement and a smile curling the corners of her full, shell-pink lips. These little girls might not have known it, but they had picked the worst possible person to pick a fight with. Fighting was in Rain's blood and the lovely brunette never backed down from a challenge. As she watched, the slutty girl's friends exchanged anxious glances then melted into the background. This new girl was a lot taller and stronger than their leader. If she was planning to fight her, she was on her own!

"I'm not Omi's girlfriend, actually." Rain replied sweetly. "But I certainly wouldn't need your permission if I wanted to be."

And she turned gracefully on her heel, her dark curls swirling about her, then walked away with her head held high, leaving the girls dumbstruck. She smiled to herself as she browsed quickly through a rack of shirts, blithely unconcerned about the dark looks the girl shot her as her two friends hurried her out of the store.

Ken didn't think he'd ever seen a more nauseating display in his life.

"When you've quite finished being Queen Bitch," he said irritably, "can you get on with it so we can go, please?"
"Queen Bitch?" Rain asked incredulously. Her eyes darkened with anger as she glared at the boy. "How dare you speak to me like that!"
"What else would you call coming over all high and mighty with those girls just because you've crashed Omi's life?"
"I didn't 'crash anyone's life', Aya took me in." Rain retorted coldly. "I didn't force him to, nor did I order him to let me stay. Just because you don't want me around doesn't mean your friends don't. And don't you think that makes me an object of pity! I don't want your pity!"
Ken bridled. "Christ! It's not about you! Didn't it even occur to you what you—"
"I haven't finished yet," the girl snapped; Ken fell resentfully silent more from surprise than any real desire to hear her out, glaring at her from beneath his fringe. "You know I can't go back where I came from. Do you really think I'd ever impose myself on anybody if I knew I wasn't wanted? Do you think I'd ever have agreed to let Aya take me in if I had anywhere else to go, anywhere at all? You don't know me, Ken Hidaka," Rain hissed furiously, her lilac eyes flashing her defiance. "How dare you? How dare you believe you understand me on the basis of the little you've seen? You never even gave me a chance! You know nothing about me or my past, you don't understand what I've been through to make me the person I am, so don't you dare assume you can condemn me!"
Ken laughed. He couldn't help himself. "The Hell was that all about, Rain?" He asked incredulously. "You don't exactly know where I'm at either!"

Rain said nothing. She merely glared at Ken for a long moment, her narrowed orbs blazing with angry amethyst fire and her lovely features scored with the unmistakable marks of her righteous fury. Even when she was angry she looked disarmingly beautiful. Then she backhanded him across the cheek, hard, and stalked away to join Aya and Omi by the checkouts, her pale face full of cold disdain.

Counterproductive to say the least. All it did was leave Ken, absently rubbing at his damaged cheek, wondering quite why Rain assumed that ranting about how misunderstood she was then smacking him round the face would rid him of the idea that she was an annoying bitch.

"Hate to say it, Kenken," Youji said from somewhere him, "but you had that coming."