"The manchineel tree, also called the beach apple, or more appropriately, the death apple, is known for, besides resembling a crabapple tree, its incredible toxicity."

Duo Lon stirred on the couch, the TV in the background. The documentary continued:

"Besides its sap being highly irritating to skin and its smoke irritating both the lungs and the eyes, sometimes severely, the apples themselves contain enough poison to easily kill a person, possibly more than one."

Blinking once and opening his eyes, the assassin shook his head; he had drifted off on the couch that evening. It wasn't usual, but he had decided to rest earlier so he could perhaps work through the night.

Turning toward the documentary that was going on about dangerous plants, he smirked slightly at the trees with the red paint applied to their trunks, warning people about their danger. They didn't grow everywhere-mostly in the tropics, though they could be found as far south as Florida, but more in the Caribbean or South America-but the fruits were easy enough to get, especially for the clan.

He had found the apples to be somewhat sweet even, and could easily see where people would mistake them for something edible…that is, until the unpleasant peppery feeling would hit someone's mouth and their throat would start to close up. Given they looked exactly like crabapples, it was easy enough to get someone to partake of one once he took a bite himself…though of course, the people involved had no clue about the Hizoku poison immunity.

Rubbing his eyes for a moment before absently grabbing the pipe on the table, he filled it with some of his new tobacco; one of the sweet, mild blends that might be nice to wake up to. Most of his clothes were tossed onto the easy chair on the side(a habit he no doubt picked up from Shen during his travels, at least when he wasn't sharing a room with someone.) The safehouse apartment wasn't the most insulated, but weather extremes didn't bother him much. He could reside in only his jeans fairly comfortably; he even preferred it on the cooler side.

After he lit it and blew some smoke out of his nose like one of the long, winding dragons he had seen in textbooks as a child at school, he absently rubbed the scars on his chest and looked toward the ominous note on the table. Picking it up, his eyes traced the black letters, clearly letting the authorities-including whomever his benefactor was-know that they were onto him.

Not that it would be a secret, of course. The nightly news always had some sort of update, even if it was mostly confused drivel, trying to paint over the fact the authorities had no clue. But Duo Lon knew this meant he would likely strike again soon-if he hadn't already-but chances were, he'd not be able to find him in time, barring some sort of miracle.

He had to formulate a few plans, and quickly. Planning on going back to Galaxy Three, the arcade that housed the token he found, he would hang out there for awhile tonight, as it was open late. Afterward, he would perhaps head toward a bar in that neighborhood to see what he could discover; he wasn't sure yet. Now that he had at least some sort of potential location, he could easily listen into bar conversations; mostly, of course, rumor mill, but truth could be derived, at times, from things. When you were working a job from almost nothing but a few reports-the equivalent of being handed a few boards and being told to build a house-you had to build the foundation yourself.

His gut told him he was on the right path, at least, and he tended to listen to it.

Reaching down to absently grab his socks to slide on, he flipped off the TV afterward and stood, grabbing his pipe and walking over to the window. Cracking it open, the freezing night air perked him up somewhat. He could wake and move perfectly well, but he was still, at least mostly, technically human.

At least for now.

Adjusting his braid-he would probably rebraid it this week-he finished his pipe, sliding it into the pocket of his leather jacket that hung on the hangar near the door. Sliding on his sleeveless shirt and boots, he grabbed the jacket, his wallet, a bit of the tobacco and headed out, planning on walking down the main streets this time on his way to the arcade.

Duo Lon became accustomed to cities quickly, out of necessity; by now he felt like he had lived here for some time, instead of just a week. Comfortable enough with the neighborhoods and restaurants around, he had found favorite places, had regular stores he'd visit to restock his fridge, and even made a bit of small talk with the shopkeepers and the like, which helped in gleaning information, as did listening in on whoever else was talking.

Of course, he also kept an eye out for anyone suspicious. He figured he might not be able to pinpoint whoever it is right away-oftentimes, these types would be able to keep themselves relatively low-key unless certain buttons were pressed, or they were getting sloppy.

Glancing around as he moved through the crowds-the city still seemed as busy as ever, despite what was going on-he eventually reached Galaxy Three. As he looked at the doors and the people milling in and out, he noticed a few apparently taking part in some shadier business, of which he had zero interest in. Mostly, it was just people looking for evening gaming.

His hands in the pockets of his jacket-the one that he favored when he went to his favorite heavy music bars or other casual places on his downtime-he walked toward the back to feed a few bills into the change machine, pulling out a handful of tokens which he shoved absently into one of his pockets. He scanned the dim room, looking for a couple of games that he might recognize from the few times he had visited them.

Noticing one-a beat-em-up of sorts-he wandered over, seeing it in a nicely spaced part of the arcade, not close enough for him to be annoyed by too many people, but close enough to some of the more popular games that he could overhear things here and there.

Plopping a token in, he looked at the available characters, picking the fellow that looked closely like someone he'd fight like(somewhat of a deadly looking style)and went to work maneuvering around and beating up random mooks. He chuckled at the sloppy moves in the game, finding them rather amusing. He didn't do too badly for someone who barely played-his reflexes and such were good enough that he was able to pick it up quickly-but the buttons were somewhat annoying for his sharp nails, as he tried not to damage the machine.

Getting a couple of stages in before finally losing to a bit of a crowded situation where he had allowed himself to get surrounded by mooks, he let the timer tick down of the grim continue screen-his character was seemingly getting lowered into an electrified, barbed wire filled piranha tank or some such nonsense-and he wandered over to check out another game.

As he milled about, over in the corner, a group had gathered. There were four or five guys, all of which seemed to exude the air of troublemakers. Keeping an eye on them, he moved over to a slightly closer game-this one was some puzzle type deal-and decided to play it, seeing if he could overhear anything coming from that group instead. He didn't think they were involved in anything, but they might, at least, know something.

And if they didn't, he didn't quite like the vibe they gave anyway, so he thought sticking around-just in case-might not have been a bad idea.

Actually getting quite far into this game-he was quite good when it came to these, naturally-he had overheard the bunch was planning on heading out and about for something. Peeking at them out of the corner of his eye, he noticed one of them scoping him out; he wondered if the thug thought him a target. He was a bit out of place with his hair and nails, and he wore a real leather jacket; while it was of a casual design, they were not cheap.

Duo Lon was not worried about this, of course, but he wondered how far things would go tonight.

Mostly trying to find some other sort of hint, he knew that he'd have to probably come back here a few nights, possibly in a row, to see if he could find who the regulars were. So far, there was no one there that he recognized from earlier in the day, at least yet. Not that he saw too many, but he remembered faces easily.

He would have to come back here more often, though. As he wandered over to yet another game, he decided that this was going to be something he did almost every night, turning himself into a regular there.

After walking around the place again for a few more minutes, he decided to go watch a few people playing what seemed to be a fighting game. Standing nonchalantly in the back, he folded his arms as he stood, his heavy braid swaying behind him. No one at the game paid him much attention, as they were too involved in the action happening on the screen at the moment. As Duo Lon's eyes traced the two fighters, he could see one of the styles that was reminiscent of some of the Chinese martial arts he had learned during his life, Bajiquan to be exact. One of his brothers was particularly skilled at the art, though he had not gotten to spar very much with him. Most of them had been trained separately due to their age.

He never quite got into fighting games during the times Shen would drag him to a South Town arcade during the last tournament or something, given he found too many weird things about them(which one might find ironic, given some of the things that the assassin could pull off), but he found himself enjoying this little spectacle. He figured the fellow on the right side was a regular here, given how many people were cheering for him; he wasn't sure about the other.

As he beat the other guy again, he finally decided to give his stick up to a friend of his and wander off, seemingly wanting to hit the refreshment machine in the back. Duo Lon nodded to him as he walked by.

"Nice job."

"Thanks! Yeah, I play here too damn often," he said. He looked around. "Usually much more crowded here."

"Not tonight?"

"Nah." He shook his head sadly, seemingly implying that the pall was cast over many parts of the city at this point. "Anyway, good luck." He turned and continued toward the machine.

Looking around some more and wandering past the louder, more rowdy crowd-whom the arcade workers were starting to look at a bit narrow-eyed, seemingly wishing they'd either go away, or do something that would force them to eject them-he decided to give one more game a try; a shooter this time, the kind where there seemed to be a million bullets on the screen at once. While his reflexes were incredibly honed, and he made it far further than any new player would have a right to, he wasn't too practiced at these yet, either. He was mostly just trying to not look out of place, but he didn't particularly pick up too much tonight, at least, with the exception of reading between the lines of the one young man's comment.

Finishing his game, he started to move past the group of more unruly types, one of which seemed to try to bump him on the way out.

Duo Lon didn't budge, nor did he even give the man the time of day. This, of course, seemed to annoy him. Turning to look back over the place again, he stepped out, still holding onto the old token he had found in his other pocket.

Scanning the streets-which were mostly empty with a few stragglers who were heading out toward the city proper-he started to move, trying to think of somewhere else to go tonight.

As he made his way around, his sensitive ears picked up a few sets of footsteps walking. Not that his followers were trying to keep quiet; and Duo Lon wasn't surprised, anyway. He could tell by the way the men were eyeing him in the arcade that this was likely going to happen.

Subconsciously, he may have decided to take the slightly more out of the way route as it was. He knew the type; while he had no plans to kill any of them, he figured this was nothing unknown to the rowdy group, and perhaps, without realizing it, he thought maybe a lesson might cause them to fly a little straighter after this.

"Hey, buddy!" he heard behind him. "Hang on a sec. Think you dropped something back there."

Duo Lon stopped, his lack of concern not visible from this far away. The thugs really didn't pay attention…or seem to notice. A more prudent person might notice the fact he was completely blasé to the situation and think twice, but this bunch was clearly not the brightest.

"Hmm?" he asked, turning his head to the side, slipping a hand into his pocket nonchalantly.

The men caught up rather quickly. He was taller than them all, though one was just about his height. They were of average build, mostly seemingly relying on their numbers and the element of surprise to probably do most of their dirty work…not to mention the fact the typical person they'd corner had no combat skills, anyway, and the ones who did were purely rudimentary bar scrappers.

"Like we said, I think you dropped a token back there." He folded his arms, clearly trying to put on a usual intimidating glare. To be fair, the fellow probably would have looked intimidating to a typical arcade goer in the same predicament, especially with the extra backup. "Maybe you could give us a little reward for finding it for ya?"

Duo Lon calmly leaned against the wall, folding his arms. He fixed the man next to the leader with a quick glare that caused the man's stomach to sink for a moment; he took a single step back…but looked around at his other mates and said nothing. For a split second, he started to think that maybe there was something…different about this one.

"I don't really need it back," he replied quietly.

"I'm not sure if you realize what you're doing here…but you don't really have too much of a choice."

"You may keep it," the assassin said, not budging. "And leave. That will be your reward."

The slightly more intelligent man in the group took this as a hint that they somehow managed to mess with the wrong person this time; stepping back, he tugged at the leaders' arm.

"He…he probably has nothin' to give, man. Let's go."

Shaking his partners' hand off violently and giving him a look somewhere between irritated, pissed, and confused, he turned back.

"Nah, I think we need to finish what we started." To him, this guy-albeit a rather tall one-was some out-of-town weirdo who didn't look like a threat. The man's leather jacket-which was half zipped-covered his clearly strong musculature, making him look slim and unassuming rather than the sinewy fighter he was. It also covered the scars he held, far more than any of this lot. And his nails looked manicured and delicate-not like the specially-hardened clawlike things that they were, able to rip through skin, muscle, and even gouge bone. Nor did he give any air of having any sort of special training or abilities. Duo Lon could look incredibly low-key and unassuming, even if he was still a little strange.

In other words, he had no idea what he was getting himself and his buddies into.

He moved forward, attempting to grab Duo Lon by the collar of his jacket; all the assassin did was snap his hand out, grabbing his wrist in a grip of iron. He squeezed, pulling the man's arm back. He stopped short of snapping the bone, which he could have done easily…at least, for now.

"I told you I was going to let you leave," he said quietly.

The bravado started to drain out of the man; the one fellow who had second thoughts took this time to run off, leaving the others there. Duo Lon did not pursue; he was the smart one, after all.

"G…what the fuck? Let go of me, you freak!" He lashed out with his free hand, backhanding Duo Lon across the face; the assassin simply stared at him coldly before twisting and throwing him against the wall. Eyeing the other men for a moment, he narrowed his eyes and drew back his hand…focusing his strength, he drove his hand forward…

…and cracked some of the wall next to his head, almost like he had that one fateful night when an old drinking partner of his had accidentally gotten him into an altercation.

The man shrieked in fear for a moment; his arm not in the best shape, but his adrenaline sort of blocked the pain of it for the moment.

His friends, completely unnerved from the display, stood there, unsure of what to do. One of them finally grabbed a nearby pipe, thinking he could get a sneak attack on the assassin.

Throwing the lead punk into the man without the pipe, the two bowled over and slammed into the alley wall, dazed and lost to sense. Turning, he caught the pipe as the man swung it, wrenching it uselessly from his hand and flinging it into the wall before lashing out with his other hand, grabbing the man's head and lifting him effortlessly off the ground, holding him there as he struggled, attempting to escape but a squeeze of the assassin's hand got him to stop.

"If I see you here again, you may not leave this alley in one piece," he said quietly. Carrying the man over toward the others, he tossed him down unceremoniously, pausing to give the leader a boot to the side of the face-not enough to actually kill the man, but a stream of blood flew out, some of the only blood shed in the alley, almost as a reminder.

The men were too dazed to leave at this moment, but Duo Lon trusted they would not be an issue anymore. Indeed, they would not be seen at that arcade again, realizing that they escaped with their life that night after the encounter with the inhuman assassin. The one fellow who ran early was convinced he was a demon sent to punish them, but he was also coming down from a pretty wicked high.

Walking off with his hands in his pockets, Duo Lon sighed. The thugs weren't even enough to get his adrenaline up even a little, and he was no closer to finding his quarry, it would seem. He knew that he would not have slain that bunch, as they weren't that kind of evil.

Plus, no one had hired him.

Still, he had a gut feeling that something around this part of town would clue him in. He couldn't explain it; but gut feeling went a long way. The fact that the game store was not terribly far away from this place hinted toward that.

Rubbing his chin for a moment, he stopped after he rounded another corner, seemingly having completely moved on from the pile of wannabe attackers he had left in a pile(who had mostly managed to crawl or stumble out of the place by now.)

His eyes trailed to a library; one that was still open. Apparently it was open twenty-four hours. He had seen such a thing in some of the larger cities in the US once or twice-mostly, they were university libraries, where people could go after hours to study or pull all-nighters. They weren't common, but they existed.

Being the night owl that he was, he suddenly got the idea to go search some of the old newspaper articles. Not even super old; mostly stuff over the past year or three. He had an idea that perhaps this killer had been responsible for a death or something even before this, and if his little bit of gut instinct proved right…

Before going inside, he grabbed his pipe to have a quick smoke. He debated getting something to drink first from a nearby bodega, but figured they wouldn't want him to be drinking near the computers.

As he smoked and watched a couple of people walking in and out of the place-all students, by the look-he started to think to himself how he was glad that he and his clan were raised into the 'old ways', and that they continued doing so. While they did learn technology as they got older-the main village had electricity, running water, telephones, a library, a few computers, internet, and everything of that nature-they were not allowed to use any of it until they were older and had reached the city for the first time, which was around ten or eleven. As babies, they did enjoy the comfort of the main village, but once they reached three or so years old they started to get schooling in the smaller clan villages around.

And of course, they were taught how to use all of the old-fashioned ways of investigating. He did recall a few times in his youth-especially after he visited the city the first time-that he wondered if the clan shouldn't move on somewhat and upgrade their methods, but to that, his old master answered that they did.

They just made sure to keep the old ways ingrained, first and foremost.

Chuckling to himself as he emptied the ash from his pipe after one more puff, he wandered inside, thinking how even microfiche was incredibly modern, compared to trying to figure out footprints in the dust and track singular blood drops in a dark forest.

Making his way through the quiet library, a few of the late-night librarians remained, mostly just keeping to themselves reading their own books, or reshuffling the shelves for the morning. A couple of security guards remained, of course, since they were in a big city, though it was unlikely anything would transpire. Some bleary-eyed students were hitting the books, coffee in thermoses nearby, which the librarians seemed to be fine with so long as they didn't spill any.

Heading right to the main computer room, he went over to the microfiche shelf and started to search for the local major newspapers. Mostly he was looking for things over the past few years; there were many there, but he was mostly just scanning for headlines anyway. Grabbing several folders, he went toward a desk, sliding his leather jacket off and hanging it from the chair behind him. Turning on the machine, he sat back and started flipping through the pages of film, seeing if there were any that caught his eye right away as the machines turned on.

As he searched, he figured that there were also actual, hard-copy papers filed away too, but those were likely more recent, from the past year or so. He'd look here first, given he had a feeling that he'd be here longer.

There was a lot of nothing, at first; some crimes around the city, of course, but nothing beyond muggings, an odd shooting, a carjacking, drug deals gone bad, the usual. He chuckled to himself as he searched, imagining how long it would take Shen to fall asleep doing this. It was a mind-numbing investigation, to be sure, but with only a coin and a card to go on, he'd take what he could get.

He decided to start looking over the current year, before going back a year, combing through the months' headlines, from January to December. He was a fairly quick reader, so it didn't take long-and he was mostly keeping an eye on any headline that was pertinent to his current investigation.

After some time-three years before, to be exact-he came across something. A headline, dated back to September.

Two bodies were found close to a chess park, both of them covered with stab wounds. Authorities had no lead at the time, and they couldn't tell a motive; robbery, anger, or something unknown.

A couple months later, a body was found near an arcade…somewhat close to the neighborhood he was in, though it wasn't Galaxy Three.

Did this killer start three years ago? he thought to himself.

That year, one more body had been found…but they seemed to calm down after that, he had noticed. According to an article, they had seemingly almost pinpointed someone; if he had to guess, they decided to withdraw while they still could.

But why wait so long to come back out?

Shaking his head, he went to go make printouts of any articles he could to take back to the hotel to read more in earnest.

He felt like he was getting just a bit closer.

Coming out of the library, he looked up and noticed the sky starting to turn a deep blue; checking his watch, he indeed confirmed it was about five-thirty in the morning. The sun would be rising soon, and he thought about grabbing a nap when he got back to his apartment. Not unhappy with what he found, he started to think about just what sort of secrets some of those places he visited held.

He debated calling Shen, but knew he'd be sleeping for awhile, so decided to let him go there. He likely was out at a bar drinking last night, given that he was getting restless.

Getting one of his…feelings, he decided to head back the long way, walking through the neighborhood that he had visited the other day that Sloate's and The Pipe Dream were located around, just on principle.

As he walked down the street, getting closer to Sloate's, he noticed someone heading out of a building; there was nothing terribly off about the man, and he was too far away to tell, anyhow. All he could tell was that he was wearing a gray jacket, some sort of jeans and a baseball hat, but he couldn't get a look at his face.

He stopped when he noticed him look around, seemingly pat his pockets as if he forgot something, and headed back inside.

This caused the assassin to stop for a moment. While it's just as well that the man could have forgotten his wallet or some such thing, there was something about the fellow's body language that stood out to him. It was almost like he had noticed him walking, and decided to walk back in suddenly.

Rubbing his chin, he examined the place for a moment to see if the person came back out or not. It was one of those subconscious things; somehow, he just felt like he needed to see.

Moments passed, and nothing.

Shaking his head, Duo Lon decided to file this bit of information away. If this guy had forgotten something, he'd have just come back out after getting it. Of course, he could have gotten a phone call or something of that nature…but the assassin knew how to trust his gut.

He was pretty convinced that the man saw him, and did not want to be recognized. Duo Lon himself, despite having sharp eyesight, couldn't quite make the man out from that far away; he wondered if, perhaps, he was the thug who ran off the night before, since he was in the vicinity, but he didn't think so.

For now, he would continue back to put together the information he had collected so far, to see what linked together.

Not only did he feel closer, he felt like whatever it was, was almost right in front of him.

A/N: Well, an alley fight-even if he's not really a fan-got his blood pumping some though he tried to avoid it…and the entire night wasn't entirely useless, either. Okay, more of an outside of the bar fight. A few shout-outs to an old story(Forbidden Knowledge), where he had to do some 'competitions' that he got tied up into(one of which had him shattering a brick much like that.)

24h libraries DO exist; they are rare, though. And, well, in KOF-land(which as I've said, I treat as sort of 'off-brand real world', I figured it's fine.

The microfiche/microfilm also still exists nowadays, but back during the time of this story(KOFs timeline works…strangely, in a bubble, so I try to run with it the best I can), it probably would have been used a bit more often than it does now. Internet was common in the early 2000s, but not as one-touch extensive as it is now. Forums, chatrooms, and websites were still a thing. So a lot of stuff was likely still archived this way(and in good old fashioned hard copies.)

Hizoku training and their lifestyle was not really mentioned very much in the official lore; just bits and pieces. There was a village, and I saw in various stories that they live in villages and go off and train on their own; but I like to imagine the 'main village' as being perfectly capable for its time(which technically, in the KOF world, would be 2000s level tech…with, of course, stuff like the Sky Noah and NESTS and…lol, yeah. BUT, if you notice, the average person doesn't have access to this crazy stuff, so I tend to write cities and everything as 'typical 2000s tech.)

Might things start to get a little more…intense soon?