Bodominjarvi: Thanks for the review!
A/N: It's kunimitsu time! Always liked her. Just want to say I'm happy that Kuni the first found love and happiness in Tekken. Got sad for her when she was kicked out of the Manji clan.
Anyway 'Tamaki' is taken from Kunimitsu's command list which translates to Jewel.
Chapter Fifteen – Tamaki
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Jin opened the door and walked in. Nina followed him and shut the door. Their room was spacious. It was rustic Japanese with bamboo décor, colors of beige and green plants painted on walls giving an earthy ornate feeling. There were scrolls hanging with Japanese letters on it. Made of out of the same material as sushi mats.
"So what do you think?" Jin asked, taking a deep inhale and feeling himself blush.
He was going to share a bed with a woman. Not just any woman. A woman he kind of….liked. Oh god, she was going to be near him. Her warmth and her scent at night. What if she put her leg on him, mistaking him for a sausage pillow? What was he going to do about that. Her soft leg….
"The bed looks sturdy enough for wild intercourse between a married couple." Nina commented, testing the bed by shaking the headboard.
Jin felt his face go completely tight and his breath got stuck in his throat. In that split second, he imagined that they were the couple having the wild intercourse in that poor bed and he mentally scolded himself for being as naughty at the blonde. He had a feeling that she was romantically interested in him but didn't know how to go about it. Her soft snicker got his attention.
"Why you tease me?" He scoffed at her.
She took another step toward him with a smirk and wrapped an arm around his shoulder. "Because I'm done pretending that you're boring. You're actually extremely fun to me."
"So you do like me." He said, still confused.
She was nervous too. He saw it in her eyes. This woman was trying to hide that she too was just as flustered as he was.
"I'm sharing a room and a bed with you aren't I?" Nina whispered and caressed his cheek. She pulled back. "This is our home for the next few months. Our home."
In those months, she was going to train Jin on demon hunting and this place was perfect for it. Yakushima was beautiful but it was pure and free from monsters. While Nina was serving time on the Island, not once had her radar gone off. Here though, it was starting to be on alert. Who knows, they might even encounter the dreaded green giant here? She'd also have to tell Jin the truth about his heritage.
She and Jin went to their respective sides of the bed and looked at each other softly. Both had blushed. Both had smiled at each other in reassurance as they got onto the bed.
They lay beside each other. On their sides, facing each other.
In silence and without thinking why, Nina lay out her hand for him. Jin slowly reached for her hand and clasped it, he felt the ring he gifted her on her finger.
"I'm happy to be here with you." Jin admitted. "And if you put your leg on me at night, mistaking me for a sausage pillow, I won't mind."
He put a smile on her lips. Always.
"You're such a sweetheart."
I am. I am your sweetheart, Jin thought with a smile. Yours.
Tamaki.
It meant jewel and she, Kunimitsu, was the jewel of the Manji Clan.
The ring on that blonde woman's finger was not of mere silver but of platinum. Worth so much money. Kunimitsu had to get her hands on it. No one had such a trained eye like Kunimitsu. Many in her clan couldn't tell the difference between metals or gold and gold plated.
She touched her pendant. Of a scorpion.
Kuni's favorite creature was the scorpion. She likened herself to one. A kitsune with a venom laced sting attached to her tail. Cross her and she'd sting you with her brand of poison. It would be so painful. Which is why even Yoshimitsu always had to listen to her in the end.
Yoshimitsu was on some mission and the team he left in charge were running things. She of course wasn't on the team but that didn't stop her from giving her input. Yoshi didn't trust her with him or without him. His father too was the same. Always advising his son to keep an eye on her. She was their best thief and they didn't value her. Even if they knew she was wise and clever.
Bastards.
His father was still here and surprisingly did not reject her input that they accept the wayward four who turned up at their doorstep. Of course she didn't believe any of them were actually married to each other but successfully convinced the others that they were.
"Look at that woman's ring." She said to Yoshimitsu's father. "It's clearly a wedding ring."
Worn on the wrong hand or not, that blondie's body language told Kuni that she and that handsome Kazama were emotionally close. She wasn't the only one who felt this Jin Kazama was extremely attractive. Of course he had to be taken, by some ice queen. Kunimitsu wondered if the blonde actually knew how to satisfy Kazama. He had this virgin vibe to him but plenty of fire that had to be unleashed. There was a sexy beast in that man! A Lion! The blonde also felt like a prude too. She's so blind, Kunimitsu thought pitifully.
It was so tempting to just give Kazama a shoulder massage.
While the body language between the Korean and the bob cut girl didn't scream emotionally close, Kuni felt those two have already sucked face. There was no wedding ring with them either and she chalked it down to the Korean guy being a stingy one. Couldn't even be bothered to get a cheap ring.
The woman with the long red hair had most eyes on her and even Jin was curious about the enigma. Why she talked less and why she let them all in. Was she the real leader? A real leader wouldn't be serving juice to people sat outdoors by the fire. The tray she was holding was full of brass, wooden and steel goblets. There was also a bottle too. He finished his drink and settled his goblet down on the little table next to him.
"Who is that woman?" Jin asked a ninja sitting close by.
"That young woman is a result of her mother failing her own judgement. Many years ago, we opened our doors to a mercenary from Fuji. Her mother opened her legs for him. He left her pregnant. And the result of that failed tryst, is her."
Jin looked at the kitsune again, her eyes fell on him for a moment before they turned away.
So Kunimitsu was the same as Jin. Both were fathered by useless men who couldn't be bothered to raise their own offspring. She wore a short purple kimono adorned in little lilac flowers. Her kitsune mask rested on her head.
Another ninja coughed, "She thinks she's the jewel of this Manji Clan, but I beg to differ. Tamaki! Hahaha."
There was bitterness laced in the man's tone. Suddenly the woman appear next to Jin with a bottle. His brass goblet was empty and needed refilling. She smelled like spice and flowers. Very strong perfume and he'd never seen such a vivid red on full lips before. He wondered how red would look on Nina's lips…
Other ninjas around the fire began talking of earthquakes and how Northern Japan seemed to get them the most. They began talking about roots of century age old trees that had been shaken with the core of the ground. Yakushima never suffered from earthquakes. Jin never experienced such a thing before.
"Nothing can compare to the shaking of the earth!" A ninja bellowed as he danced by the fire.
Hwoarang cackled.
"The love does shooketh the heart." Kunimitsu said sultrily to Jin as she poured him some grape juice while going around the ones sitting by the fire. Oh had he been single, oh lalala, Kunimitsu would have had some fun with the Kazama.
"Shooketh! I love that word!" Anna laughed, almost choking on her drink.
"It's not even Shakespearean." Kunimitsu shrugged. She pulled it out of her ass while reading a Shakespearean play with a foreigner who was a guest here before.
"She speaks!" Hwoarang cheered. "I was wondering why you so mute."
"Careful there, little kimchi." Kunimitsu playfully warned Hwoarang.
"Little kimchi!" Jin snorted at the word and smirked when he saw Hwoarang's face react to the nickname.
"Some of us here are actually mute." The enigmatic thief drawled. "But sharp with our poison dipped daggers."
Anna just stared at the woman, in awe of how dangerously feminine she presented herself. Never in all her travels did she come across a woman who mastered the art of dark femineity without being cringe or overboard. She needed to take lessons from this Kunimitsu. It would get her a lot of victims for sure. She wanted to be Kunimitsu when she was older.
"I would love to break a lot of hearts." Anna suddenly said with newfound confidence. "I bet you do that, don't you? Break a lot of hearts?"
"You don't want to become your sister when you grow up?" Kunimitsu asked her.
"Nah, she's too cold." Anna said. "Imagine being someone who constantly needs another person's flame to light up. Bor-ing!"
"Ouch." Nina said as she joined them by the fire. "My own little sister doesn't want to be me when she grows up."
Nina took her rightful place besides Jin. Surprisingly he handed her his cup. It was half filled with grape juice. Normally she wouldn't drink from other people's cups. But she took it and drank from it and before she did, she was sure to give him a kiss on the cheek right in front of these people as a thank you.
What did Anna say? She was too cold and needed someone elses' flame to light up?
Nina looked at her darling. Her flame.
"Behave." Jin mouthed to her, his eyes twinkling at her.
Later that night, Nina was just coming back to the room she and Jin shared. It was dark and she thought she'd sharpen her nocturnal patrol skills. Being in prison kind of made her a bit rusty. She could hear the crickets chirp, a sound she honestly hated. She kept looking down at her feet to make sure she didn't have any bugs on her boots or in her path. The lighting was shit. There was rustling of leaves and she had that feeling of being watched.
Her heart thudded harder. Being watched caused anxiety.
Nina felt her ring being plucked from her finger by a shadow. Panic seized her. She saw the kitsune masked woman dart up with her claddagh ring. The gift from Jin…!
Without another thought, she chased after the thief.
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