Haise was happy. He really, really was.

Yeah, each member of the Quinx squad was a knife in his heart in their own special way, but that was family for you. Even artificial family.

And, yes, the endless grind of feeling like an outsider at the CCG, feeling like a failure at the Chateau, and poor sleep was starting to wear him down.

He found himself feeling so frustrated. He cared, deeply, and yet most days he felt like a nuisance who only bothered everyone around him.

Late at night, as he was drifting to sleep, Haise sometimes wondered if he'd always been this way. If he'd always felt this alone.

There was a sense that his life wasn't supposed to turn out this way, that he had been robbed somehow of the life he was supposed to be living. That things should be better than they were. He pushed it away when it crept in, before it could drag him down.

He had a home, a family (kind of), work that he found meaningful…he should be happy with that much.

So many people got so much less.

That café he discovered, and the barista who worked there, were a breath of fresh air. If he could, he would spend all day watching her—ordering around her employees, handling a surprise rush of customers, putting out the endless fires that came with running a business—all without losing her cool. If only he could look so effortless in his own life.

She was magical to him. He wondered if her feet even touched the ground, she seemed so perfect.

Akira ordered him to ask her out, so the next day he came in. He was practically shaking with nerves when he approached the counter.

"I'd like a black coffee, please. And…only if you're interested, I'd like to take you out on a date. But only if you want," he rushed to repeat. Maybe if he hedged his invitation enough and accepted his rejection with dignity, it wouldn't be too embarrassing when he kept coming by.

She stared at him for a long moment, mouth open, blinking, looking shocked. He could practically see smoke coming out of her ears from how hard she was working to process what he said.

"Do you really want to go out with me?"

"Yes," he said with far more confidence than he felt.

After a moment that took years off his life, she took a deep breath. And…smiled? "Then yes. I'd love to go on a date with you. Nothing fancy, though. Maybe just a walk through the park?"

Stunned, Haise nodded. Thank goodness she took the lead. He never expected to get that far so he had no plan. "Yeah, that sounds nice."

As he drank his coffee, they discussed which park and when.

He thought the date went well. She was very different from him, but he liked that. It made her interesting. She kept to herself, but she didn't seem to feel any angst about it the way he did. She didn't care too much what other people thought of her, she was independent and confident, she had her feet on the ground. And she had a knack for saying irreverent things that made him laugh.

He thought, if it ever happened, he'd end up with a girl who shared his love of books. Touka was certainly whip-smart—it was easy to tell after talking to her for a few minutes—albeit on the other end of the spectrum from his book-smart fantasy. But…that was so much more interesting, listening to the way her brain worked when it came to practical decisions about which coffee beans to stock or compensating for budgeting shortfalls.

Soon they had been on several dates. Even though she hesitated at the end of the night when he asked if they could see each other again—if he could finally take her out to a fancy restaurant or make her a home-cooked meal instead of the cheap dates she kept suggesting—as long as she kept saying yes to any time with him, he'd keep asking.

She was a bit of a mystery when she was the pretty barista he watched from afar. Now that he knew her more, as a person, he felt more infatuated than he'd ever been.

It was the Auction Raid that changed everything. There was nothing like a near death experience to sweep away all the meaningless nonsense and shine a light on what really mattered. And the thought in his head as he was limping back to the CCG transport van was that Touka felt like home.

So instead of heading back to the Chateau with everyone else, he ducked away and grabbed a taxi to her café. He managed bang on the door as she was setting the alarms to leave for the night.

After unlocking to let him in, she looked him up and down, noticing how roughed up he was. "What is it? You look…"

He opened his mouth to say something, explain, but his heart was in his throat and all he could really do in the end was rush up to her and wrap his arms around her. She stiffened with a squeak, but quickly melted and returned the embrace.

Nothing like a near-death experience to make you want to prove to yourself that you're still alive, either…which was maybe why things got so out of control so quickly.

Not that Touka was hitting the brakes. If anything, she was the instigator—Haise just wanted some human comfort, to hold the girl he was falling in love with and remind himself that they were both alive and they had some sort of future. He certainly got that much and then some.

He thought, as he was drifting off to sleep in the spare room above the café while Touka played with his hair, that it must be the most perfect moment of his life. Haise had no idea if he'd ever gone on any dates in his forgotten past, but at least he was sure that he'd never felt this way before.

Too much happiness made him nervous, though. He had a visceral fear that if he became too content, if things became too perfect, if they got too close, it was only a matter of time before it all got ripped away from him.

When he tried to apologize for letting things go too far too fast, she laughed at him and told him to shut up. She agreed, though, that it would probably be best to dial it back to the more innocent path of courtship they'd been on.

He would have been fine with that if he believed she felt that way for same reasons he gave her: he thought their relationship was promising, but new and fragile, and he wanted to nurture it the right way because he saw a future with her.

Instead, he worried that she was holding a part of herself, her life, back from him and she wanted to reclaim some of the distance between them that had been lost the night of the Auction Raid.

He buried that thought as fast as he could.

A hard pressure suddenly turned into a slicing pain by his collarbone. He looked up—at Touka, blood on her mouth—she'd taken a chunk out of his neck. And he was so proud of her. He hoped one day he could be as strong as she was.

His alarm went off at the Chateau. The dream started fading as soon as he shut off the beeping. He remembered something about being proud of Touka, which he was, but also blood, which was more troubling.

Were his work and his personal life getting tangled in his subconscious? His fears that some ghoul would follow him to the café and attack Touka leaking out in dreams? Yeah, that must be it.

They both had jobs that ate up all their time. He was okay with that. He liked going to Café :re when he had a free moment and watching her self-assured mastery in the little world she had created there.

And with all the work he was putting in at the CCG, he was building up a nice nest egg. He had started daydreaming about some day in the not-too-distant future, when they could both afford to work more reasonable hours and spend more time together…

As it stood, they could only carve out the occasional evening here and there. A little voice in his head kept thinking how pathetic he was—settling for scraps of attention from her, accepting the way she held him at arm's length and remained a bit standoffish no matter what he did or said. He was just happy for anything that almost felt like a real connection.

And he wanted to be loved, just like everyone else, but more than that, he didn't want to be rejected, so he allowed the status quo to stand. As long as Touka never pushed them to get more serious, to spend more time together, he wouldn't have to reveal anything too dangerous…his past, his condition…and they could stay in that safe, comfortable limbo.

But then, sometimes she'd smile at him or lean her head against his shoulder, and all of those gloomy thoughts would get burned right out of his skull.

It was more than he had ever hoped for, so he was happy. Really.

Her fridge was empty. "Is it grocery day?" There was a flash of doubt that tried to worm its way into the cozy domestic evening, but he didn't let it.

"Uh, yeah, tomorrow," she said absentmindedly. She was folding a load of laundry while she watched a movie in her living room. "I usually just have the unsold food at the café. It's quick and easy, and it'll go to waste if I don't eat it. Why, were you hoping to mooch some dinner?"

"No. I was going to make you something."

"Oh. I'm not too hungry right now."

The next time he peeked in her fridge, it was full of food.

He had a brief meeting with Arima about his current caseload and how he was handling the Quinx. As he was leaving, he opened his mouth to brag about his girlfriend. Surely Arima would take some fatherly pride in the fact that Haise was acting enough like a well-adjusted human to not scare off a pretty, smart, kind girl like Touka.

Wait, a little voice in his head said. Keep quiet about her a little while longer. There was something special about keeping their relationship all to themselves, and once they told everyone that would be gone forever. Better to cherish their privacy.

He tried walking by Akira's office, but she was staring so hard at her computer that he didn't dare interrupt her. She'd seemed so distant lately.

The dreams continued. Were they nightmares? They didn't always feel like nightmares, even though the only elements he remembered were Touka and blood.

And he had headaches, too, that snuck up on him when he least expected. His vision would blur with auras, and the dull pain of an ice pick jammed behind his eyes would build until he had a hard time focusing.

"It sounds like a run-of-the-mill migraine," Dr. Shiba told him. "Nothing unusual about it at all. Just get some blue light blocking glasses."

But there was hesitation in the doctor's words. Like he was stopping himself from saying something he shouldn't have.

He spent the rest of the day trying to move past the bitterness he felt at the secrets being kept from him.

Both Akira and Touka seemed to be lost in their heads any time he wasn't actively talking to them. He tried to convince himself that their mysterious moodiness was just the way women were sometimes, but deep down he knew that wasn't the case.

He knew the causes of his own moodiness, and he feared what could be disturbing the two most important women in his life.

The mystery for Touka was solved on accident, the day he tried to take her out to a movie.

"Oh, when is the due date?" An older woman in line behind them at the ticket counter asked.

Touka turned red. Her hand had been absentmindedly rubbing her stomach. She dropped it to her side, looking guilty.

"I'm sorry, I don't mean to be rude, I just love seeing young couples. Such a special time. You two will make such cute babies."

Haise's heart stuttered, then took off at a gallop. He plastered a very fake smile on his face. "Thanks. Enjoy your movie."

The young couple in question stepped out of line.

Looking up at him through her bangs, with that steady gaze that always pinned him in place, Touka said, "Let's go back to my place. I think I need to talk to you about some stuff."

She seemed calm and self-assured, like always, and that calmed him down.

"Yeah," he agreed. "Let's go."

"There's some conditions that run in my family…I honestly didn't think it was possible, and if it did happen, I really didn't think I'd get this far without a miscarriage…I'm so sorry. I didn't want to bother you since I thought it could only end badly…and then when I started to think maybe it wouldn't I didn't know how to bring it up…"

Maybe his condition had cancelled hers out or something. Oh, wait, he'd never told her about his condition…but that would have to be a problem for another day.

His brain was a bit scrambled. "Oh. I never thought you looked…you know, pregnant." Though maybe, now that he was actually looking, there was something a little different about her silhouette.

She shrugged, looking a bit awkward. "They say it's not so obvious until later if it's your first kid and you're in decent shape…"

"Oh. Okay." He didn't know enough to add anything else.

He knew almost nothing about pregnancy—if he'd ever known anything, no one at the CCG had thought to refresh his knowledge between training him on how to run an investigation and how to use a quinque.

At this revelation, he felt…like an idiot. Sure, she often wore loose-fitting sweaters and shirts that drowned her in fabric, and he wasn't exactly seeing her in much less lately…him for his own reasons, and…well, he hadn't really understood Touka's reasons, but he'd been afraid to ask.

But at the same time he felt such intense relief. It was only when there was a safe explanation for what she was hiding…why she was so finicky about eating around him, why she wanted that little bit of restraint between them…that he realized how much he had been suppressing his fears on that matter.

It was a shock, yeah, but he could only feel joy at the thought of having a child with Touka. The alternative explanation—that she was a ghoul—was too terrible to countenance.

He looked at her. He felt so weary, and so scared, but he loved her. "I'm happy," he said. "Let's get married."

"What?!"

"Yeah. This weekend. Let's do it." He looked away in embarrassment. "I don't have any rings, and I'm not sure what paperwork we'll need or any of that, but I can figure it out. Working at the CCG has some pull, so I'm sure I can make it happen fast. If…you want."

The way she looked at him, with that same sad, unsure smile she'd worn when he first walked into her café, worried him for a moment. "Alright. If that's what you want."

"It is."

For a split second after he spoke, he thought he saw a flash of fear cross her face. But then—maybe he was seeing things. Now she looked the way he felt…nervous and happy.

He thought his face would crack from how wide he smiled back.

Yes, there was always that sense of distance between them, but it was impossible to truly know another person inside and out. It was normal to feel that way about your girlfriend, right? And anyways, he was happy so what did it matter?

It wasn't too long after their hasty elopement when Akira barged into his office and interrogated him about Touka, then ordered him to tell her the truth.

He didn't understand what was going on, but it seemed like she had suddenly been switched back on and he was glad to have her back.

When he went to Touka's apartment that night, he sat her on her couch and then paced back and forth anxiously for five minutes.

She tapped her foot impatiently as she watched him. "Well? Spit it out. I don't have all night."

In a rush he explained everything, ending with the fact that he was worried about what her diet might have to be. Expecting to be screamed at and kicked out, he was shocked when she patted the couch next to her.

"That was…a lot."

He sat down and nodded.

She took a deep breath. "But none of that changes any of the important things, right? Besides…if it comes to it and I have to eat…you know…I have a strong stomach. I'm sure I could do it, for the baby."

The relief that flooded him was indescribable. He wished he could go back in time to experience that moment over and over.

They talked a while longer. She gifted him a family heirloom—a ring to mark their hasty marriage—and he had nothing in return. No heirlooms, no sentimental gifts, no past.

Another observation crept in…he didn't speak of his childhood because there wasn't much to say. Why did everything he knew about Touka's youth and family come from oblique comments and vague tidbits? Surely she had a lot more on the subject than he did.

Akira stopping by was a strange coda to the evening.

It wasn't until the next day that a hole in her story occurred to him. If she was just following the location of his phone on a map, how did she happen to pick the right floor? Had she worked her way from the ground floor up?

That must be it. Akira wouldn't do anything to hurt him, right? She kept secrets from him but it was for his own good, right?

He was working late on updating some files—keeping the Quinx project in good standing required so much behind-the-scenes work from him that his team would probably never know about or appreciate—when the call came through. Eyepatch and Rabbit were spotted wandering around in a sketchy neighborhood, and was anyone available to follow the lead before it went cold? Haise got a queasy feeling in his stomach. It had to be a trap.

A couple of other investigators were still around the office and available to go check it out, but he pulled rank and rushed out before anyone could stop him. After lecturing the Quinx so often about how dangerous it was to work alone, he didn't think twice about doing so himself.

Whatever was going on, it was personal in some way.

The group of ghouls weren't too hard to sneak up on. A couple he didn't recognize. Then there were Orochi and Rabbit, though he could quickly tell that this wasn't Aogiri's Rabbit from the Auction. She looked like a shorter female ghoul in a differently styled white mask. He'd figure out the deal with the two Rabbits later.

Their fight was quick and rough, and he couldn't escape the feeling that he'd done this before. Not just with Orochi—he felt sure that he'd fought this Rabbit, too. And the Raven. He found himself pulling his punches against his will, and he could tell they weren't attacking with all they had, either.

Then Rabbit tackled him to the ground, called him Eyepatch, and just lowered her fist when she could have easily hit him with a haymaker to the jaw.

The jumble of emotion that swamped him turned everything into a blur. Rage at hearing that name, the voice in the back of his head—a former self?—screaming not to hurt her, a confused flash of Rabbit taking a bite out of him from a memory or a dream…

The next thing he knew, he was flying through the air and slamming into a dumpster. He was stunned and couldn't move for a couple of seconds. There was blood in his mouth and it wasn't his. When he was finally able to climb out of the dumpster and look down the alley, he saw that the ghouls were already gone.

Because he was closer to Touka's apartment than the Chateau, he headed that way to get cleaned up.

The lights were out and no one was there when he arrived. An uneasy feeling took root in him. What could she be doing at this time of night? Who knew what kind of sick freaks would see a pregnant woman walking alone down a dark street and think she was an easy target?

He took a quick shower to get rid of any trace of the trash he'd landed in. The shower principle struck as he was shampooing his hair and going over the fight in his head.

Rabbit knew him. Rabbit didn't want to hurt him. And—it all happened so fast, he couldn't really be sure—but when she took him down and they were rolling across the alley…he could swear that under her loose jacket he'd felt…

The water was warm, but he suddenly felt very, very cold.

He quickly finished up his shower and changed into some casual clothes he had stashed there.

She still wasn't back.

With shaking hands, he grabbed his phone and called her. She picked up, sounding sleepy but happy to hear from him, and explained she was dealing with a false alarm at the café. Without hesitation, he offered to escort her back to her place.

He had to know.

After she let him in the locked door, he just looked at her for a moment. She was still so beautiful to him. She still felt like home. That hadn't changed.

When he wrapped his arms around her and buried his face in her neck, though…past the comforting smell of coffee that constantly permeated her hair and clothes, under the scent of fresh soap and water, there was the faintest hint of blood on her skin.

And it was familiar—after all, he'd gotten a taste of it less than an hour ago.

He walked her back to her apartment, where she quickly fell asleep. He tried, but his own racing thoughts kept him from getting any rest.

What anonymous person called in that tip? An enemy who knew too much. In hindsight, it seemed designed to trick him into attacking his pregnant wife.

That thought—that he was married to a ghoul—caught in his head and played on repeat for several minutes before the shock wore off and he could think about anything else.

Nothing about their life together looked the way he would expect it to look if she was just trying to seduce her way into an investigator's good graces.

After all, he had been the one to ask her out. She even double-checked that he was sure. He'd been the one to go to her after the Auction raid, the one to suggest they get married…Was it really all just to use him, then?

Surely a ghoul wouldn't risk going out with an investigator on the off chance they'd fall in love and he'd betray everything he believed in to protect her. Maybe he could believe that of some femme fatale ghouls he'd run across, but not Touka. She barely noticed when the customers at her café were flirting with her, and when she did notice she seemed so uncomfortable with the attention she changed the subject immediately.

She'd held him at arm's length for so long, and she'd blush and turn quiet every time he called her beautiful. Sometimes she was shy, or awkward, or embarrassed—vulnerable in a way only he got to see. It never felt like there was manipulation behind those moments. So no, she'd never done any calculated tugging on his heartstrings to make him fall in love. He was pretty sure it was real.

That was worse, though, wasn't it? If what they had was real enough, and she liked—loved—him enough to knowingly risk her life so they could be together for however long it lasted before she was killed? How could he do anything but stand by her if that was the case?

His thoughts screeched to a halt.

He looked over at her, sleeping peacefully next to him.

Yeah, that was worse.

The next day at work, he ran into Akira and was more confused than ever. He trusted her, he wanted someone to tell him it would be alright. Akira, I think Touka is Rabbit, but I can't hurt her and I don't know what to do, he wanted to say. Instead he left feeling like she'd condescended to him until she could get away from him. Her words felt like more empty lies.

And that slip she made…how could she have known they were married?

As he was leaving that day, he spotted her walking through the lobby on her way out. She stopped to yawn, then closed her eyes before she shook her head and kept walking. Strange. Why was she so tired?

The Rosé extermination came and went, taking Haise Sasaki with it. When he finally got back to his room at the Chateau, once lively but now silent and mourning, he sat on his bed and tried to organize the thoughts in his racing mind.

Touka had known the whole time. She must have known that she was living on borrowed time from the moment she accepted his invitation to go out.

A part of him was outraged at the position she'd put herself in, and him along with her. Another part understood why she'd taken what she could get, even if that meant accepting dire consequences down the line.

Once upon a time he had pondered how little ghouls like her valued life—the lives of others, and their own.

He did value her life, though. He counted it as priceless. And now he had the crushing weight of her life and the life of their child in his hands, the burden of keeping his little family safe on his shoulders. A seemingly impossible feat when they all lived in the penumbra of the CCG.

There was one thing he could do. He was the biggest link between Touka and the CCG, which meant that he was the biggest danger to her. If he could keep his distance, maybe that would be enough. He certainly couldn't outrun the CCG, and they'd probably never let him go willingly. And if keeping his distance wasn't enough…she wouldn't be tied to the CCG if he died.

He should make her his beneficiary on a new bank account that the CCG didn't know about and quietly begin moving money into it. As much as he thought he could get away with. She would be savvy enough to take the money and run if anything happened to him. He just hoped it wouldn't come to that until after the baby was born. He wanted that one selfish thing for himself.

So—he would stay away from her as much as possible, especially in any way that would put her on the CCG's radar. He already kept quiet about her at work, ironically for the sake of protecting her from ghouls, and though her name was on a few personal documents, almost everyone except Akira had no idea she existed. All that remained was to avoid being seen with her.

Though Akira could be a problem. Her slip of the tongue right before the Rosé extermination, that time she'd shown up at Touka's apartment with her quinque…Then there was the anonymous call designed to trick him into attacking Rabbit and how strangely exhausted she was the next day. He felt like he was going crazy, but something told him that Akira was involved in that.

Almost like Akira knew a lot more about Touka than she let on. And rather than risk Haise's wrath by taking care of it herself, she was trying to lead Haise to the realization that his wife was a ghoul and must be exterminated? Was that it?

He added "Stay away from Akira at all costs" to his plans.

Since he was no longer the leader of his own team, he was assigned a partner.

His new partner Furuta was…fine. That was the most he could say on the matter. He was determined to take down Eto and at least Furuta didn't get in his way too much on that front.

"Have you heard the gossip, Haise?!" Furuta leaned back in his chair and kicked his feet up on his desk. He had an annoying habit of chitchatting whenever he got bored with paperwork.

"No." He was busy cross-referencing Takatsuki's book tours with sightings of Eto, to make sure she wouldn't have any easy alibis.

"They're going to redo the cafeteria and hire a new chef! I can't wait. I've gotten so bored of lunch here lately."

Haise kept reading through the files on his computer screen. "That's nice."

Furuta pouted. "Oh yeah. I forgot, you don't care much about that sort of thing. Say, have you seen Mado around? I need to ask her about a case she worked a couple of years ago, but every time I try to grab a word with her, she's busy with Arima."

"Email exists."

He waved away Haise's practical solution. "It's the sort of thing that's too complicated to explain in writing. I'm much better face-to-face, anyways. But…while we're on that topic, have you heard about whatever Arima's cooking up in Squad Zero with Hirako and Mado?"

"No."

"Oh, it's all very hush-hush. From what little I've heard, it might be some sort of top squad he's putting together. Better watch out, or they'll displace your Quinx squad."

Haise sighed and kept scrolling through the page he was on. "I'm not attached to the Quinx Squad anymore."

His partner frowned. "Well, you're one of Arima's protégés. I was hoping you'd have an inside scoop for me. I was always a bit jealous of Arima's crew. You look like a boy band when you all stroll in wearing matching white coats."

"Nope, sorry." Haise took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. The migraines just kept coming. Some days he could barely see straight.

After Furuta mentioned whatever Akira and Arima were up to, Haise couldn't get it out of his head. He joined in on a happy hour with Ito and Kuroiwa when the opportunity presented itself. Being the only one who couldn't drink, he quickly got his answers from his old squad mates.

Yes, Mado and Hirako were having plenty of hush-hush meetings and training sessions together. No, no one knew exactly what it was about, except that it was at Arima's direction. It was very need-to-know, and Arima had decided that very few people needed to know.

While Ito razzed Kuroiwa about the lunches his girlfriend packed him, Haise sipped his glass of water and thought.

So Akira and Arima were in league together on something.

That made his blood run cold. Did that mean that Arima knew everything Akira knew?

As far as he could figure, the two biggest threats to his family were Eto, nom de plume Sen Takatsuki, and Arima, nom de guerre White Reaper. Eto, he could at least neutralize using the full force of the CCG. Arima was a much bigger, more complicated problem. One he was still puzzling out.

The next day, Akira finally caught him alone on the elevator and warned him against trusting Furuta.

Funny, considering it was looking more and more like she was the one who had betrayed his trust the worst of all.

It was critically important that he not be spotted anywhere around Café :re or Touka. As long as he kept up appearances, though, he didn't want to leave her totally alone.

He barely slept as it was. On nights when he knew he wouldn't be getting any rest, he ended up watching Touka's apartment to make sure no one else—CCG, ghoul, or otherwise—was lurking around her. Not often, of course—he didn't want anyone to notice that he was sneaking off to see her or that would defeat the whole purpose of creating distance from her.

He was watching through her window one night from the roof opposite when she curled up on the couch and fell asleep. He should have left, but he couldn't get past the thought that she would be so uncomfortable if she stayed in that position all night.

With utmost caution, he entered the building and then her apartment.

He whispered, "Touka?"

No response. She was out cold. He sighed and carried her to her bed, wincing that every bit of jostling would wake her up. She stirred a little and mumbled something unintelligible but stayed asleep. She must have been exhausted.

He knew it was risky—what happened to keeping his distance to keep her safe?—but he warmed up to the idea that he might as well spend time near her. Who knew how much longer he had, after all.

The night she'd left an ultrasound on the table, his heart nearly stopped. The racing questions of how she made that happen wouldn't be answered without talking to her, and at this point he wasn't talking to her because if anyone could derail him from his course…

If anyone could make him want to stay, it was her.

He had to trust that she was wise enough to the ways of the world to get that ultrasound without compromising her safety. And he read the message she intended loud and clear: I know you're there, and you're not as sneaky as you think you are.

He took the printout back to his home and stared at it for a long time, holding it in the hand that had grown back wrong.

At first, he thought he might leave it in the pages of Monochrome of Rainbows on his bookshelf.

He couldn't ignore the bitter truth.

It would spell disaster if it was ever found among his personal effects.

With a heavy heart, he brought it over to the kitchen stove and burned it to ashes in a pan. The whole time, he thought about how no matter how hard he tried to hold on to the people and places and things he cared about, they all slipped away from him eventually.

Gone like the smoke wafting out his kitchen window.

It was in the early hours of the morning, after he'd snuck in late and drifted off into a fitful sleep on Touka's couch, that he was startled awake.

At first, he couldn't figure out what woke him. A moment later, a quiet, "Oh boy," followed by a gasp came from the bedroom.

He cautiously cracked open the door to see Touka sitting up in bed, taking deep breaths and rubbing her very large stomach. She noticed him peeking in.

"Oh, what the hell are you doing here, you jackass?"

He actually laughed, for the first time in who knew how long. "Are you okay?"

A pillow flew at his head. He barely dodged it in time. "No. These contractions are ruining a perfectly good night's sleep and it's all your fault!"

That shocked him enough to open the door fully and step into the room. "Should I…drive you to the hospital?"

The look she shot him said it all: How could someone as stupid as you possibly survive this long? It had been a long time since he'd gotten a look like that from her. He felt strangely nostalgic about it.

"No…there's a notepad on the dresser over there. I wrote a number down. Call and ask what I should do." Then, quieter, "Please don't leave me alone."

He scrambled to find the piece of paper, then dialed the number. Was that a slight shake in his hand?

The woman who answered sounded like she'd been woken out of a dead sleep when she asked who was calling.

"Tell her it's the patient Ogura sent her way," Touka said before gritting her teeth and closing her eyes again. "Oooh, I'm gonna kill you, I can't believe you let me jump you…"

Relaying that bit of information perked up the mystery contact. Suddenly sounding a lot more awake, she started rattling off orders to Kaneki and then had him hand off the phone to Touka.

What followed was a few whirlwind hours where the doctor on the phone talked Kaneki and Touka through everything. At one point, Touka squeezed his hand so hard, she snapped several metatarsals and then burst into tears. He found the heightened emotions funny more than anything—the way he was cradling his healing hand and trying to comfort her—though he was smart enough to keep that observation to himself.

When it was all over with, the doctor cheerfully assured them that it was a very quick and easy birth as far as these things go, then yawned and hung up.

Small blessings.

The only hiccup was when he attempted to cut the umbilical cord with a pair of scissors. It didn't work.

"You have a kagune," Touka reminded him.

His stomach sank. A big part of him was hoping that the child would be more human than not. This was a bad omen for the life she would live.

Holding his daughter was surreal. She was small and warm and made quiet little snuffling noises as she slept. He knew he had a few people who might miss him when he was gone, maybe remember him fondly…but this was someone who wouldn't even exist if not for him. It was a strange thought, and as scary as it was comforting.

His legacy would be more than a few nice memories.

"What should we name her? I suck at kanji."

He thought about it for a moment and handed the swaddled baby back to her mother. Grabbing the notepad from earlier, found a pen, and started writing out a couple of names he'd thought about, but didn't like the way they looked or sounded in the moment.

"What about…Ichika," he said as he wrote. It was a name that he'd kept coming back to, and it felt right. He showed Touka the written name, circled with a flourish for good measure.

Touka nodded. "Ichika. I like it. It suits her." She looked down at their baby, opened her mouth as if to say something, hesitated. Finally, she spoke. "I want you to know that…"

He cut her off before she could finish the thought. "I have to go now. Be safe." He really had to leave them alone from here on out, for their safety. Even if that was the very last thing he wanted to do.

He looked at the two of them as he backed out of the room, tried to fix it in his memory. He felt like he was made of glass and he'd just shatter if he stayed any longer.

"You should stay, you idiot," she muttered.

Akira continued to confound him.

He often had the uneasy thought that he might need to do something about her if she continued to hang around Café :re and Touka, but at the same time…whatever her angle was, she hadn't acted on it yet.

And Touka was a survivor. If she felt like she was in danger from Akira getting coffee and stopping by to see the baby, she would have found a way to take care of it herself by now. He could do something, but if Akira turned up dead or even just disappeared quietly, one of the first things people would do to investigate was retrace her steps right back to the café.

So he stayed ready to act if needed but decided to let it ride for now.

Too soon, conditions started looking more and more right for his grand finale.

After waiting and waiting to pull the trigger, he knew it was time. Eto was arrested, most of the CCG's forces were headed to Rushima, he would be positioned in Cochlea. He'd even run into Ayato at Eto's press conference. Shortly after, in a flash of inspiration, he'd managed to track him down and hand off a key card to Cochlea.

His brother-in-law (did Ayato even know that?) stared at the card in his hand like he couldn't make sense of it.

"What?"

"The CCG sure is a mess behind the scenes, isn't it?" Ayato started laughing to himself.

The Black Reaper was out of patience. There was so little time left. "Just help get Hinami out, and get her back to Touka."

After getting through the security checkpoint, he walked through the entrance to Cochlea's main building. Arima was there, getting a quick sitrep from one of the security personnel.

Haise held the door for his superior, and they both entered the hallway leading to the main body of the building.

"Are you prepared for this," asked Arima.

"Of course. It should be a routine detail, but I'm ready." He rubbed at his chin compulsively.

Arima spoke as they walked. "Perhaps not so routine. I just received word of some eleventh-hour prisoners that were recently transferred here by Investigator Mado. Sounds like a strange story."

He replied calmly, "Is that so strange? She's very efficient when she wants to be." On the inside, though, something uneasy rattled in the back of his mind. Anything involving Mado set him off like that anymore, though.

The White Reaper smiled quietly. "Maybe it's not so strange. We can discuss the particulars later, if you like. After we get settled in for the 'routine detail.'"

Haise nodded, and swallowed back the rising tide of anguish.

It wouldn't be routine at all, would it?

If he was going to go out with a bang and clear a path for Touka and Ichika, now was the time.

He couldn't bring himself to imagine killing Arima. He wasn't sure if he would even be able to. Would it be enough to wound Arima, take him out of action for a while? Get Hinami out, and send her to Touka with the message to disappear fast while Arima was incapacitated.

His death might buy them all just enough safety. That was all he was asking for.

And…he was okay with it. He thought maybe something in him broke when he was tortured by Jason, when he'd just given up and begged for death. There was something about crossing that line that had changed him, like he could never forget how easy it was to just stop fighting and accept the final escape from suffering that death offered.

Touka and Ichika were virtually unknown amongst investigators. Once he was out of the picture, they would be as safe as he could ever make them. The thought brought him a deep sadness, but also conviction.

He'd gotten a little bit of time with Touka, but she'd never really been herself and he'd never really been himself when they were together. Some of it was real but most of it wasn't. He tried not to imagine what could have been. There were still some nice moments, a few memories he lingered on when he was trying to fall asleep.

His life had been short and tragic, but there had been some bright spots. In the middle of so much loss and so many mistakes, he had been given something, too. He would be leaving something good behind, so it hadn't all been totally meaningless.

He was ready enough. This is what he'd been holding on for.

Cochlea was waiting.

Still not heading back to Rushima with Akira, because next week, it's Touka's turn…

Next week: Cochlea