"They're home," Hei said quietly, walking up to lean against the fence next to his sister. "Watching TV in the living room."

Bai stared intently at the house down the street. Despite her Japanese middle school uniform and pig-tailed hair, she looked out of place; she hadn't quite mastered passing for a normal human. Hei had initially been against her idea of taking out a streetlight - though she was much better at regulating her payments than she had been a year ago, it was still risky for her to expend any power so early in the mission - but now he was glad of the shadows that hid them from the casual observer.

"We should go now, while they're occupied," she said, and started to head towards the house. She stopped when she saw that Hei wasn't following. "Brother, what's wrong?"

"The daughter."

"Is she home? She was supposed to be staying over at a friend's house." Bai said the word 'friend' as if she'd never heard it before.

"I didn't see her in the house," Hei admitted. "But we didn't see her leave either. What if she's still there?"

"You kill her while I kill the Shinoda couple," Bai said matter-of-factly.

But Hei was still hesitant. "If she's there, I think we should wait for a better opportunity."

"We won't know until we go in; and once we go in, we should finish the assignment. That's the logical thing to do." Bai regarded Hei with an expression he couldn't read. "She's only a teenager, she should be easy to deal with."

Only a teenager…Bai's tenth birthday had been three days ago. Hei hadn't brought it up; he knew that she would only say that celebrating birthdays was irrational. He hated it when Bai started talking about logic and rationality. But she was right - killing the daughter would be the rational thing to do, if he wanted to keep Bai safe. If he failed to follow through on their first field mission, the Syndicate would separate them. He couldn't leave her on her own.

Emotions are useless distractions. The words had become sort of a mantra for him in the past year, that he clung to like a drowning boy clinging to a piece of driftwood.

"Alright," he said. "I'll pick the lock on the back door; you take out the lights as soon as we're in. Careful you don't use too much power killing them, it'll be harder to run if I have to carry you -"

"I know," Bai said, walking calmly towards the back of the Shinoda house. "We both know the plan, there's no reason to go over it again."

Hei caught up with her. She was cool and collected, no different than she was during training, while Hei could feel his hands shaking from adrenaline already. His dagger, concealed beneath the jacket of his school uniform, pressed uncomfortably against his ribs. He focused on his breathing and ran through the plan and all possible contingencies in his mind for the hundredth time, and by the time they reached the door, he was as steady as she was.

Bai killed the couple quickly and silently. The man, surprised by the sudden blackout, was first, just like they'd planned. The woman was dead before she could even comprehend what had happened to her husband. They saw no sign of the daughter.

When it was done, Hei led his sister back out of the house and down the street, walking briskly but not so fast as to draw attention from any curious neighbors. Just two school kids on their way home for dinner. He thought he could still feel the tingle of electricity in her hand, but knew it was just his imagination.

Their handler had a car waiting around the corner. Bai was asleep almost as soon as they climbed into the backseat. Hei pulled his sister against his chest and held onto her protectively. Only once they were on the highway headed out of Kyoto did he allow himself to relax and feel the guilt of what they'd done, closing his eyes and resting his head against the window.

"You knew I was in the house the whole time, didn't you?"

Hei opened his eyes. A brown-haired girl in a high school uniform, a year or two older than himself, was sitting on the seat beside him, staring out her window with her chin resting in her hand.

"Of course not," he told her, closing his eyes again. "I would have killed you if I'd known."

"Hm, maybe that's true," she said. "Then again, contractors are liars - you told me that yourself, and you were right. You're such a good liar, you even believe your own lies."

"What lies?"

"How should I know? You killed me."

Hei shook his head. "I didn't, remember?"

The girl only shrugged, watching the dark landscape rush by as the car sped down the highway. "I'm dead now, because you didn't kill me then. It's all the same. You let your emotions get involved."

"I don't have emotions," he told her.

"Then what's she doing here?"

Hei looked down at his sister, to find that it was no longer Bai in his arms, but his cousin. She was sleeping fitfully, a frown on her face. "I don't know."

"Such a liar."

Hei woke with a start. It took him a moment to realize that he wasn't in a car, but had fallen asleep sitting against the wall in his apartment. The sun was just beginning to rise over the wall of the Gate to the east, and the room was still shadowed. Jiao-tu was across the room, sleeping on the futon from Shinoda Chiaki's former apartment. Hei's futon was next to her, unslept in.

He hadn't been thinking straight, bringing her back here - he should have taken her directly to Huang to have the Syndicate erase her memory of running into him. So what if the police realized her memory had been tampered with? Kirihara already knew why that would be necessary, and apparently didn't have a problem with it.

Hei's life used to be so simple. He did his job, he didn't get involved with other people unless it was necessary for the mission, and even then it was always under an alias and a false persona. How had things gotten so complicated?

Jiao-tu mumbled something incomprehensible and rolled over in her sleep, the blanket tangling around her legs. Bai had always slept as still and unmoving as a corpse; sometimes only the shallow expansion of her ribcage as she breathed assured Hei that she was even alive. He was never sure that she would wake at all after her payments.

Jiao-tu made another noise, that sounded almost like a cry. Hei stood and stretched his neck until it popped - sleeping sitting up hadn't been the brightest idea - then walked over to her side and put a hand on her shoulder. He had to shake her almost roughly before she woke.

"Tian?" she mumbled sleepily.

"Yes. Sorry. It sounded like you were having a bad dream."

"Mm. I dreamed the man in black, the one from the park, was chasing me." She sat up, yawning. "Ugh. It's so early."

"It's not that early. Get dressed, I'll make you breakfast."

"Hm. Hey Tian, is that cat yours?"

Hei looked up; Mao was sitting in the window looking at them with an expression that would have been amusement, if cats could look amused. "No," Hei said, casting Mao a dark glance. "Just a stray. I'd better get that futon back before my landlady notices it's missing."

He left Jiao-tu to get dressed, and, with a significant look at the cat, exited his apartment for the one next door. He opened the window and Mao hopped inside.

"Well, this isn't something I thought I'd ever see," Mao said. "The Black Reaper, inviting a girl back to his place? I know this is probably a foreign concept to you, but usually when a man and a woman have a sleepover, there are fewer clothes involved, and only one bed."

Hei stowed the bedding away in a closet and ignored the cat's comment. Mao wouldn't report anything to Huang, as long as Hei stayed on task. "I have the item." He pulled the flash drive from his pocket; he was still wearing his waiter's uniform from the night before.

"What? Oh, the item." Mao sounded a little disappointed that he wasn't going to get an explanation; but if he had expected one, he didn't know Hei very well. "Huang's instructions are to drop it off with Yin; Huang will pick it up later. I can't be seen running around with that in broad daylight, too risky. We still don't know who those contractors last night were working for; there could still be someone coming after it."

"What about our contact?"

"Took off as soon as the contractors attacked; I lost him when he got into a car. Hopefully we won't need to deal with him again, but Yin is monitoring his office just in case." Mao jumped onto the windowsill. "Is this visitor of yours going to be a problem?"

Hei just looked at him.

"I'm just asking," the cat said. "You haven't been very focused lately."

"If you're talking about Chief Kirihara, I'm not the one who let her follow me to the safe house."

Mao snorted. "That's true. And I admit, killing the chief of Section 4 probably wouldn't have been the best idea - wiping her memory was more prudent. Still, watch yourself." Mao turned to go, then let out a curse and jumped back into the room.

"What is it?" Hei moved to the side of the window, suddenly alert.

"Your landlady," Mao muttered, crouching under the sill. "What's she doing up so early?"

It was Hei's turn to snort. "You've faced how many dangerous contractors in this city, yet one little old lady with a broom…"

"Shut up."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Misaki swam almost every morning before work. It was her way of meditating. By focusing on the timing of her breaths and the form of her strokes, she could push away all her work-related thoughts and stress and give her mind a break. This morning she was in the pool even earlier than usual; she'd hardly been able to sleep at all for thinking about her run-in with Hei. But so far, swimming wasn't helping.

She just couldn't figure him out. She'd been almost angry when he first showed up in the park (once she'd gotten over her initial jolt of surprise at seeing him so unexpectedly), smiling innocently despite having just murdered two men, and not caring that she knew it. That anger had helped to remind her that he wasn't really the man she'd known as Li. Contractors were liars - she couldn't let herself forget that.

So knowing that he was a liar, and an especially good one at that - what was she to make of the witness, Xu? Was she really his cousin? A girl just happened to witness BK-201's activity without him seeing her, and she just happened to be his long-lost relative?

On the surface, it was completely ridiculous, too unlikely to be just a coincidence. Yet…he had seemed genuinely shocked to see Xu there.

Of course, Misaki thought as she pushed off from the wall for another lap, just because Hei was shocked to see the young woman, didn't mean she was actually his cousin. She could be an operative too, from his own organization or another, that he recognized, and calling her his cousin was some sort of code. Misaki itched to get her hands on a transcript of their conversation; Kouno was taking the recording over to the Chinese Embassy as soon as it opened.

She wished she knew who Hei was working for. Given that he was Chinese (she was pretty sure he was, anyway), and that the code names for his team were all Chinese, she had briefly entertained the idea that he was employed by the Chinese Ministry of State Security.

But that didn't fit. The MSS was notoriously poorly organized, and the thought of them employing an elite contractor like BK-201 was almost laughable. Despite her promise to Hei to voluntarily forget what she saw that night, she had gone into Section 4's archives and found the report on Huang's former partner's murder and discovered his real name: Kuno Kiyoshi. Which didn't tell her anything useful; it would make sense for any intelligence organization to recruit a Japanese citizen for operations in Japan. And any further investigation into him would surely tip them off that she knew more than she should.

But now a young Chinese woman with connections to Hei had shown up… Was Xu really his cousin? He had acted brotherly toward her - putting his arm around her when she was upset, giving her his jacket… Misaki had been a little jealous watching them leave the park together, Xu's arms wrapped around his.

Interestingly, his 'Li' act had definitely slipped while he was translating - the more frightened the girl sounded, the less emotion Misaki heard in his voice, as if he was closing himself off to her fear. That was how he had acted in the presence of his team, when they had caught KV-464: cold and emotionless. It was only when he and Misaki had been alone that his guard had dropped a bit, and she saw hints of actual emotion and humanity.

Had she seen that in the park last night? Misaki completed three full laps while she pondered the question. His surprise at seeing Xu had seemed genuine…but that was a reaction, not an emotion. And it was easy to feign emotion with actions, like giving the girl his coat.

He'd been pretending at humanity when he first arrived, then retreated into his guarded contractor personality during Xu's story - but he had displayed signs of true emotion when she'd been speaking alone with him. It had been subtle, but he had gotten genuinely angry when she was questioning him about the dead contractors.

No…he'd been angry before that. When she asked whether or not his cousin would be safe with him. It was the same sort of reaction he'd had when she had asked him about Yin, before she realized he was BK-201. Whoever Xu was, they did have a personal connection. He cared about her; that's why Misaki had believed him when he claimed the girl would be safe in his company.

It was so strange, Misaki mused. She paused at the edge of the pool to adjust her goggles before starting another set of laps. He hadn't been warning her to back off her questions about the men he had killed; like with Yin, he had wanted to protect someone. She should have felt threatened: the Black Reaper had been angry with her, could and would have killed her easily if he decided it was necessary - but instead of feeling afraid, she had been turned on.

That sudden thought caused her to miss-time her breath, and she swallowed a mouthful of water. Misaki halted in the middle of the pool, coughing as the chlorine stung her throat. What the hell was wrong with her? He was a contractor, a remorseless killer who pretended to comfort a girl that he had terrified in the first place. One or two misplaced human emotions did not negate the rest of his character.

He clearly hadn't been trying to flirt with her…but he had flirted, hadn't he? And he realized it - or else he wouldn't have suddenly been so embarrassed. That's why she had laughed; BK-201 had been embarrassed.

He must think she was out of her mind. She was out of her mind.

Deciding she was only going to end up drowning herself if she stayed in the pool with this train of thought, Misaki climbed out and headed back to the locker room to shower.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Wow, you have such a great view!"

Hei looked up from his breakfast. Jiao-tu was leaning out the window, bowl of noodles forgotten in her hands.

"There's nothing out there," Hei told her.

"There's the Gate - it's so big!"

"That's not the Gate, just the wall around it."

"It's the same thing," Jiao-tu said, walking back over to the table. "Mom didn't want me coming to Tokyo at all; she thought it would be too dangerous, with the Gate here. But I've been here over a year, and nothing's happened. Well," she corrected herself, "nothing happened until last night. But that had nothing to do with the Gate."

"You remember what I told you last night?" Hei said, letting a serious note enter his voice. "You can't talk about what happened in the park, not to anyone. It won't be safe for you."

"I know, I won't," she promised. "I don't really want to talk about it anyway." Jiao-tu finished her egg and noodles, then sat down against the wall, pulled her book bag over, and upended it onto the floor.

"What are you doing?" Hei asked, watching her sort through a pile of papers, folders, pens, and makeup.

"Looking for my phone. I couldn't find it last night…and I still don't see it here."

Hei stood and started clearing the breakfast dishes. "When was the last time you saw it?"

"Um…I texted Mei-li before I went to Iwakara's office. Oh, that's right, I dropped my bag outside his office, and my phone fell out - but Arakawa picked it up for me." She sighed dreamily.

"Who's Arakawa?"

Jiao-tu laughed. "Don't look at me like that; you look like Jiang! I'm not ten years old anymore, I can think about boys if I want." She gave him a sly grin. "I can even -"

"Did you see your phone after that?" Hei interrupted.

"Um, I put it back in my bag; I went to the park right after that, and I didn't even try to look for it after…after what I saw, because I was too scared. Stupid rabbit," she muttered to herself.

"You probably dropped it in the park," Hei told her. "The police will have found it."

"Hm, you're probably right." Jiao-tu began gathering up her things and stuffing them back into her bag. "Can I use your phone then? I have the studio number memorized, I'll pay you back for the international call charges. We could Skype, but I left my tablet at home, and I'm guessing you don't have WiFi here."

"Studio?"

"The kung fu studio - Grandfather supposedly retired last year, we had a huge party and everything, but he's still there every day, it drives Dad crazy. It's early, but I'm sure he's already there; you know how he is."

Hei felt a knot forming in the pit of his stomach. "Jiao-tu, I don't want you telling anyone you've seen me."

She stared at him blankly. "What do you mean? Tian, everyone thinks you're dead! They'll be so happy to know you're alive - especially Grandfather! Don't you want to talk to him?"

"If I wanted to talk to him, I could call anytime; I still know the number too." He did, he realized; he'd thought he'd forgotten that along with everything else.

"But, Tian -"

"No!" He hadn't meant to speak so sharply; Jiao-tu recoiled as though she'd been slapped. He sighed, and slid down the wall to sit next to her on the floor, so he didn't appear as threatening, and fished for an excuse.

"I just…I don't know what to tell him about my sister. I don't want him to think that I failed, that I couldn't protect her."

Jiao-tu's expression softened, and she wrapped her arms around his neck in a warm hug. "He'll understand; it would mean so much for him to know you're ok."

Hei returned the hug with one arm. "Give me a few days, alright? Then we'll call together." Tonight, he decided, after she gets her phone back from the police. I'll take her to Huang to have her memory erased. If Kirihara wants more time for her investigation, too bad.