AN: Okay, I REALLY need some help here. In chapter 12, Raizo's touching Mika's hair. One problem – beyond the fact that it's soft, possibly somewhat stiff, as the style that Naomi Harris wears in the movie looks like it might be a little bit... I dunno how to describe it. And I've looked around online, trying to answer the question "What does a WoC's hair feel like?" or "What is the general texture for chemically treated WoC's hair?" which made me feel stupid even as I tried to be as politically correct about it, like I was evil for being white on the few places I found any real info, or simply ashamed at how people of my ethnic group acted (and from some of the blogs I read, they really should be drawn up and quartered – someone went up to a woman's kid and was petting him like he was a dog, commenting on his hair...) and mostly it was the 'some white woman came up and patted my afro without asking' kind of blog. Which, again, made me feel guilty for being curious, as y'know, I like detail, and I like to be accurate. So. If someone could possibly answer my question, and hopefully not be offended by it, please do so! Cuz I know what cornrows feel like (pretty freakin' spiffy if you ask me) as that's how my friend Kayla always wore hers back in elementary school (she would distract me in class by doing my hair nonstop as she sat behind me, very, very soothing, and I had to beg her to let me touch hers, which she was always saying 'don't mess it up, mom spent lots of time on it', and I never did, I figured hey, she played with mine for four hours which were wonderful, why not lemme play with hers if it feels so nice? - :wonders:Would Raizo find it soothing to have Mika playing with his hair like that at some point? All brushing it out, playing with it, brushing it some more?), and dreadlocks courtesy of my friend Micah from high school. So, feeling painfully ignorant and praying to not be offensive, somebody answer this for me, please? Do it for the story, do it for Raizo who's currently fiddling with a sleeping Mika's hair...!
Also, the pattern has been broken, seventy visitors to chapter 6, and no reviews. That's also more than most of the other chapters got initially visitor wise I may add. Not beggin' for reviews, just sad that the five then two then five then two review pattern that was going was broken.
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Wake Up 7
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Opening one of the suitcases he had brought from his apartment Raizo pulled out a set of clean clothes. He had left Mika only long enough to take them, and check to see if any messages had been waiting for him. There had been none. His contact in China wasn't due to message him for another three days anyway, and the yakuza spy had already handed over the information he had needed to find the most recent assassin sent after Mika. The heavy, titanium chased case held neatly folded clothes, the sort cut for mobility, and the sort that helped Raizo blend into the masses. Almost anyone looking at him would simply assume he was a college student, all his visas declared the same. It was all completely contrived, purchased with blood-soaked money.
He had almost forgotten for a moment that he didn't belong in Mika's world in any capacity. Maslow's visit had reminded him of that fact very clearly. Raizo's life was ordered, everything in it's place, everything exactly where it should be, filled with targets, goals, and money. It afforded him some luxury, a studio apartment, practical clothing, and ways of purchasing new weapons as needed, or any tools necessary to carry out a hit. Cars, bought and discarded as need dictated, phones – again, thrown away when he was finished with them, anything in his life was like this. There were no silky blankets, no clutter. No mechanical fly swatters, no ficus bushes that went from residence to residence with him.
Nothing like Mika existed in his life.
A neon pink scarf held her hair up, a pair of black leggings and teal t-shirt along with one of her cardigans covered Mika where she sat, reading as he changed. When Raizo had returned, she had been panicky, even though it had only been an hour and he had warned her it may take two. Since then she hadn't let him go anywhere in her home without her being practically on top of him. He even had to leave the door to the bathroom open. But Raizo had found himself acquiescing before he even could think to say no. That was a problem, he couldn't stay here, in her world, and Raizo would never try to bring her into his, it was a place that would only hurt Mika, a place she would never belong.
"Wow, even your socks are folded," Raizo glanced up to see Mika watching him, the book, with it's painting of some sort of space ship emblazoned brightly on it, sitting atop her knee. "Can I keep you? I mean, the butt kicking aside, you do laundry. I hate laundry day. You can be Lucy and I can be Ricky Ricardo. I mean wow, really folding everything so neatly, not even Mom does that." Gesturing like she was throwing something into a container, "Panties, bras, socks, boxers – whoomp! All in a big mess in your drawer. And don't get me started on what she does to shoes..."
Again, Raizo was reminded how foreign he was, "I don't use drawers. Only suitcases."
"Makes it easier to pick up and go," nodding her understanding. "You could put some of your stuff in one of my drawers. That way you always have a place to return to, so no matter how often you have to pick up and go, you can come back somewhere at least." She popped off the bed, and went to her chest, tossing things out of the top drawer and into the next, "You can use this one."
She couldn't know what she was offering him.
Uncomfortable, a state he had been in almost constantly, Raizo ignored the offer, "I am going to meditate."
"Okay, you ah, do that then, and I'm going to read my book, and I'll be very quiet." Just when Raizo had settled into position, "So, hey you know I have a lot of books. All kinds, military history, anthropology, science fiction, fantasy, sociological studies, some trashy romances chock full of bad euphemisms... If you get bored you could read one of those, feel free. Lots of cheesy movies too, bet there's something in my collection that would interest you if you dug around. Mi casa es la suya and all that."
Raizo's Spanish wasn't very good, but he had done enough traveling in South America for work that he knew what she said. 'My home is yours.' How was he supposed to clear his mind when Mika kept offering him these things? Unsettled, Raizo focused on his own heart beat, hoping it would drown out the frantic mumblings of his brain. But, it didn't work. Couldn't, not with the tantalizing concept of a home hanging like a single bright red apple from a barren tree before him. That wasn't an option, a home, a home could be found and destroyed. Taken away, dashed, ruined.
Allowing his eyes to slip closed, Raizo breathed deep, thinking of red apples, drawers, bookshelves lined with knickknacks and all manner of clutter. Suddenly Raizo wanted very much to place his belongings amongst the insanity that was Mika's possessions, to mix his things with hers. He didn't, but Raizo wanted to so very badly. At no point in his life had Raizo had a place to return to that could be called a home. Keiko had been his only real family, and with her death, he had been alone. No family, no home – and here Mika was, virtually demanding that he accept her home as his, and her as his family.
Memory assaulted him, the stink of overflowing gutters, stained tenement buildings that leaned drunkenly, far too outdated to be safe, and the apartment where his first years had taken place. Concrete floors, peeled paint, a mother who was drunk when she was home, ready to smack him around if he bothered her too much. She would laugh at him when she called him 'seki', other times the desiccated whore would lament that having given birth to him was the source of all her problems. That she could have gone to school if it weren't for him, that she could have made something of herself. At some point she had shoved him outside and left the tenement, never returning. From then on he had been on his own, filching food when he could, begging for it when he couldn't, and going hungry when neither tactic worked. People had kicked him, spat on him, ignored him. No one had welcomed Raizo, a filthy, nameless child. In the end, Raizo didn't know anything more about that time before, other than Korean had been his first language. Learning Japanese hadn't been easy, but at the Ozunu compound there was a hefty price for failure, and food was the reward for success early on. Eventually he had been given a name once deemed 'fit' enough to join the other children who had names.
Even now, whenever Raizo went to Korean speaking areas while working if he heard someone say seki, he almost responded. Or when he felt he had succeeded at something, Raizo felt no shame in eating until he could eat no more for a single meal. And he never drank a drop of alcohol. Ever. The very smell of soju made Raizo sick. It was good for nothing except for use in making certain poisons, but any highly concentrated alcohol would do in those cases, so no rice alcohol of any sort was kept on hand. For any reason.
Mika, true to her word didn't do anything else to interrupt him but it didn't mean her movements were quiet. The clear sound of one of his suitcases opening was loud, which was followed by the top drawer being opened. Tensing, Raizo knew exactly what Mika was doing.
"That's enough Mika," taking action, "put them where they belong."
"Okay," that iron was back in her voice, the soft thud of cloth hitting the wooden bottom of her dresser, and then the drawer was slid home. "I put them where they belong, and you can go back to meditating."
Unfolding himself, "Move aside Mika."
"No," hopping onto the top of the chest, her legs locking over it. "It's just a pair of boxers and a shirt Raizo. Leave it here so you know you can come back."
Lip curling, "I know I can come back whenever you need me Mika."
"You can come back any time Raizo," Mika's voice was hard, and Raizo realized that she wasn't going to be moved short of him physically picking her up and throwing her. "And so you don't wind up stuck wearing my clothes if you come here and decide to stay for any period unprepared, you're going to leave some of yours here."
The logic may be sound, but there was more than logic to what Mika was saying. It appeared she had laid claim to him in more ways than just his life. His life was something he could give up easily to protect Mika, and others lives were even easier for Raizo to use to pay for Mika's protection. Mika wasn't going to give him a choice in the matter, even if he lived after the threats to Mika were canceled out and never returned to Mika's physical sphere of influence – she would always own him. Suddenly feeling trapped, Raizo clenched his fists, staring her down.
"I told you," grinding it out, "that that's enough Mika. This is not your decision to make."
Mika only kept looking him in the eye steadily, her heart speeding up then slowing down the only indication of her nervousness, "There'll always be space here for you. It'd be a shame to let it go to waste Raizo. You can come and go as you please, that's your prerogative, but you have a place here too. You can't change my mind." Crossing her arms, "Someone once said that once you save someone's life, you're responsible for that person forever."
Like a slap in the face, that's what that felt like.
Recoiling without having intended on it, "The clans will be killed. I already said I would watch over you."
"I wasn't talking about you being responsible for me, Raizo," another blow.
Backing away, cornered, Raizo growled, "Enough Mika. Enough."
Using the skills he knew best, Raizo appeared to vanish before her eyes. He couldn't remain in the apartment with Mika. Not right now. Raizo didn't want stay long enough to hear Mika beg him to stay.
Rather than beg, Mika only called out, "Please come home soon."
Slipping from shadow to shadow, the late day sun affording him more than enough for him to use, Raizo burned energy to move so quickly. There was a cost to forcing the mind to control the body, strength sapped from his limbs with each gliding step. This was not the intended use for the skills Raizo had, but they served, preventing him from having to go onto the sidewalks and be jostled by those on Berlin's streets. He would be left no choice but to consume a large quantity of calories when he returned to his own apartment. It was the only place Raizo could think to retreat to, the only place that he could stretch out, could burn energy. Except he was burning energy at a truly phenomenal rate. Seven kilometers he traveled via shadow, approaching one, stepping into it, and gliding to the next. If anyone saw him they'd think he was just another shadow amongst the shadows, rendering him functionally invisible. But the body wasn't meant to do that, it was a mind thing, thinking of oneself as shadow, of dimness, gray – a state of mind, a state of will ordered the body to action. Minute control of every muscle, coiling and uncoiling, contracting and relaxing upon a flash of thought. Extreme awareness of each molecule in his body, in the chemicals of his brain, down to the smallest twitch was what allowed Raizo to move like that.
He had gotten far more practice than the Ozunu clan could have ever given him, out in the real world rather than practicing in the dojos, in the gardens – the 'security' if not 'safety' no longer there, Raizo had been forced to truly learn. Ozunu had only given him the basis for his skills, planted ideas, and out here among so many people Raizo thought their very existence appalling he honed everything his mind contained.
Sink or swim, life had given Raizo crash courses in functioning and surviving from the very start. When he had fallen to the water, it had been like a messed up reenactment of birth as he struggled to heave his way to air. From there life only became more difficult, and now Mika had been thrown into the mix. She had saved his life. Irrefutable fact, one he had admitted to before witnesses even. Did that mean she wanted him to live in her world?
Cursing internally, Raizo sprang over a dumpster. The more time he spent in her world, the less Raizo could keep his skills sharp. Life had made it very clear that he had to keep those abilities ready at all times, Mika's softness would destroy his resolve, the strength she relied on would evaporate if he acted like she wanted. Only out here, where people were just obstacles or targets could Raizo do what was necessary. All Raizo should do was serve as Mika's buffer against the harshness that was behind those facts and figures she knew so well. If she were to be his purpose, his responsibility, Raizo would need to recenter himself to get through what would come soon enough.
Pushing himself the last bit, Raizo sped up his buildings' stairwell and into his studio. Closing the door, locking it, Raizo pressed his back against the wood, panting. Limbs heavy, Raizo sank to the floor slowly, if he was to be Mika's protector he couldn't let himself be her responsibility. But Mika was determined to countermand his ability to do his duty. To break down the armor that protected him so that he could protect her.
Raizo couldn't let Mika do that. Resolved firmed, Raizo changed into the lose pants he wore to train his body. Work first, food second Raizo ignored his body's demands with practiced ease. And with long familiarity with the fact that the will and mind superseded it's requests, his body ceased complaining, relinquishing with little fight the needed strength for his training. Over too quickly, Raizo finished after a brief forty minutes, unable to take too long. It was almost dark, and that would be the time Mika was most vulnerable.
Wiping sweat from his brow, Raizo neatly set the katana back in their hidden area that flipped out from the bottom of the wall. Again setting aside his need for food, Raizo moved to his bathroom. He wasn't going to return to Mika filthy, he doubted she'd appreciate it. And her facilities weren't exactly set up the way he preferred. Soap was a harsh way to clean oneself, the chemicals leaving behind distinct, easily followed smells, and stripped the skin. Unable to remember the last time he had used soap, Raizo tossed his pants aside, grabbing the bucket of safflower oil that sat beside his tub he pulled it closer. Virtually odorless, safflower oil left little residue behind, and removed dirt just as well as soap, it merely required a little more effort. Much better than the heavily perfumed stuff most people used. It was also useful for not marking Raizo with a strong, distinctive scent.
Stepping into the tub, squatting, Raizo ladled oil over his body, then rubbed it in. Once it had begun to absorb into his skin, he poured more over himself, then took the small wooden scraper in hand that he used to remove dirt and oil from his body. With long smooth passes, clean skin was left behind, and like the oil that he shook off with a flick of his wrist, Raizo was able to shake off his disquiet. Finished for the most part, Raizo moved to rinse himself free of the last of the oil. Deciding to indulge, he added cool water to the mostly scalding that was his usual, allowing it to cascade down his body once he flipped the shower on.
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