Stepping out the convenient store with a pack of groceries for everyone. Lighting a cigarette as he trots through the streets, taking right turns, ignoring the moving cars as he skips over to the other side. Abruptly, a man yelled towards him, poking his head out while banging violently at him.

"Can't you see I'm driving here" the driver managed to scream before falling silent. Hand hanging off the window with his head lazily press on his shoulder. The center of his forehead, a distinct hole. "Its rude to be loud in public" DW responded, dusting his coat before whistling away.

"Hey! What took you so long!! " a woman with shoulder length hair, standing tall close by to a restaurant. "You got ban from that store" DW response pushing pass her into the building-" I got your sandwich Blythe!" he calls out towards the other two inside the restaurant. Boots soaked in the blood of many dead customers, leaving him annoyed at the fact, that they killed people without him. "Morrigan said your not allowed too" the woman announced to him.

"How long do I need to wait!!!" he questions, slamming the groceries on the table in front for all to see. "If you were organized like yours truly. Maybe you would get too!!" she retorts, pressing her hand onto her chest in pride. "I'll tear apart that skin your wearing" he quietly answered, handing the store sandwiches to Blythe. "I got store ice cream for you too. V"-handing a cup of ice cream to the nervous man seated on top the last remaining waiter with a tight grimace on his face.

"Nice chair" DW thought before pulling a seat over. Watching the two guys casually devour the meals he had gotten for them, he sighs-lighting a cigarette for himself and another for the woman. "So how long do we need to wait?" he asked.

"A few more weeks, heard its getting pushed to an earlier period" Blythe answered, struggling to remove the packaging.

Watching Blythe receiving help in opening his sandwich. DW sat there ruminating to the first time he meet him-the Morrigan-"Do you like crazy?" he recalled him saying those words to him, behind bars. Remembering the feeling of being shackled up in an iron box, he rubbed against his wrist. "I'll have you someone crazy enough to satisfy" the Morrigan told him-he could still hear his weak voice in his head, dry and rusted from confinement-he agrees.

Those gaps in his memories, hand reaching out towards the Morrigan, guiding him out from his chains. "Don't kill till I bring your gift" he recalled him saying.

Rubbing his fingers between locks of blonde. Noticing his cigarette had died out, huffing out all the smoked build up inside his artificial lungs, he sighs-" I'm the Joker". Looking at the confused looks at all three of his comrades, each showing a deeper level of concern and confusion-"What?" he asked, crushing the dead cigarette bud in his palms. "I'm Morrigan's wild card aren't I?".

"Y-you me th-the boss?" V profusely corrects him. "Yeah whatever" DW brushes him off, "I'm his first choice". "And what does that have to do with anything, your messy and inefficient" she argues back, shoving Blythe away from stopping her. "Like you knew anything Zhang-Min. For all I know you were chosen third!".

"Well security was easier there because your not a threat!" slamming the table. "Bitch you wanna fight!!" DW yells back, adjusting his glasses.

"If wolves are civilized so can you two" an exhausted voiced spoked, followed by a tapping of a cane. "Zhang-Min. DW. Blythe. V." Morri called out to them. Immediately the four of them got down to their knees, heads down facing the floor. "Pretty messy here" he acknowledge the bloody place, "You didn't kill anyone here DW?". A simple "no" DW answered.

"Good good" he taps against his shoulder. "I've secured your crazy" his boss whispered.

.....

2am? 4am? Fuck who knows! Hino panics, laying seated against the door, far from home and surrounded by the current rain. He at there helplessly waiting. "Thank god" he said to himself, his mouth quivering in guilt, thank goodness his hands had stopped shaking.

Embarrassingly. He sat there trying to hold the pain inside. "Would I really kill a person?" "I can't kill a person." "Can I?" All these questions seemed to bother him, trying to figure out how to navigate around all these thoughts. Pressing his fingers into his head.......

"Hino?" her voice pulled him to attention. "Mari?" he automatically spoked, an invisible string seem to tucked against him, leading him forward-towards her. Hands stretching towards such unreachable lengths-somehow she seem to drift further and further from him, into a blur-before collapsing beneath her feet. Her footstep's ran steadfast towards him, her touch seem to wrap across his being as the doors opened.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

"This is uncalled for!!" she annoyingly stated as she drags him in. The smell of earl grey seem to fill the air as they entered. "I just when out for groceries and before I had night school and now you" she chuckles, getting comfortable laying against the wall. "You must really be in love with me" she jokes, looming her face over Hino's.

Blood boiled below skin of of cheek, now glowing a bright red as he desperately covers himself. "Wait here for me" Mariko pokes the tip of his nose. "Where you going too?" Hino in a lower tone. "To freshen up. Of course" she said, making her way to the bath.

"Every time I come into her home. I feel I lack something in mine. Its small but somethings missing?". Staring at the ceiling with the buzzing of the fan in the back of his mind, he wonders what does he even feel? "I nearly killed a person" he repeated to himself. "I feel happy being here" he admits it.

Stretching his arms out. "I have a house. I live comfortably, no need to pay rent just dinner. I get to pick dinner." "Why do I feel not enough?"

Stuck in thought, abruptly the bathroom door burst opened with Mariko walking out with a towel wrapped around their hair. "I said wait for me, not staying on the floor for 10 minutes" she laughs. "I'll make tea!" Hino abruptly sprout up from the floor. "Err Ok?" she agreed "The top carboard" she said. "Ok"

.....

"The water is a bit cold" she judge "That's ok". Dressed in comfortable clothes, with the look of admiration in her eyes. "W-what were you doing out?" throwing out a regular question as he looks at her processing his words. "The latest news got out on the paper" she pointed towards the stacks of paper, poking out from the bag she carried. "There's the news of chairman Phillip's upcoming announcement to the public" she further adds.

"Right". He could only answered that, recalling what Andi briefed him about, the bodyguard thing. Looking over towards Mariko, taking in her presence and everything around her. He couldn't help but feel this sense of confidence being closed to her, suddenly and those negative thoughts and feelings don't seem to exist, when he has eyes on her. "You Ok?" Hino asked, noticing the look of lost all over her face. "Just thinking about-" she paused, swallowing down her throat and picking the words carefully. "Everything".

"I've read an article about monsters getting smarter these days" she pointed out to Hino, "And the rise of people turning into monsters", her look of now concern. "Do you believe those monsters, could still be considered people?" she asked, drawing a circle around the rim of her coffee cup. "Did I struck a conundrum?".

"What?" was all that was present in his head. What was he supposed to say? He sure doesn't know alot about a topic these hard to grasp. The look on her face seem to really want an answer from him, all he could do was look at her lips. "Look at her eyes" he warned himself.

"That's all right" she responded. "Oh look the storm is still on. Looks like you wouldn't be able to go home." she said, hands held together. Leaning in, she whispered in a soft tone "Do you wanna sleep with me?".

The question sounded simple, but the response couldn't reach him.

"How did this happened?"

"Wasn't I confused earlier"

"Am I confused?"

"Someone help tell me what to do?!!!!"

She yawns, getting up to put the two of their cups in the sink. "Oh" she responded to herself, staring at a calendar. Memories must have flooded inside her, noticing that tears were seemingly forming in her eyes. "Do you recall that disaster incident?" she asked "The day the Walking Wind and the Living Ocean made a visit?". Hino nods, with his own memories trying to break to the surface. "My parents died" he admits facing the wall.

"Me too" he was shocked to hear. "My parent left me this house right here" she added.

The sensation of eyes looking at him, brings fright to Hino. "Red eyes" he recalled in his head, red eyes-their owner killed his parents. How was he even able to survive that? "How did you kept going?" Hino asked, restraining his voice and so as his words from flooding out to chaos over Mariko.

"I didn't"

Thud.....His back braced the fall. Hand gripping against his chest, his breath chaotic. Rubbing his feet against the ground, breaking into tears of guilt. "What's wrong" Mariko came over, holding Hino still as she comforts him. "The daughter of all this is in my home" his words echoed in his mind, from deep within his thoughts. An image of Remi with the same, red colored eyes staring with a sadistic smile in his home, another of Mariko's severed head cuddle between Remi's arm and a laugh that stretches horizons.

"Would would you take revenge?" he asked between the tears. Pushing away both of his arms and sandwiching her's on either side of his head. She pulled closer. "No"

"I survived"

"I'll live my life"

"And so should you!"

Seeing this closeness shared between them, all these tears pouring out just for him. Why wasn't he strong like her? "I'm sorry" Hino begs, only for it all to be ignored by her-silencing him with a tight embrace between the two of them.

"Can you stand?" she asked. Hino nods.

Walking side by side through the narrow hallways with Mariko leading him an inch forward towards her room. "Its quite small" she chuckle about her room. "It's bigger then mine" Hino said.

Laying in bed with blankets over them. The idea of being in the same bed with a girl would have excited anyone of his age but somehow those feelings seem to non- existing. What happened to me? Was all he wished to know. "Am I broken?" he turned his head towards a dead corpse staring back at him. "No" her voiced spoked, snapping him back "There's no such thing as broken".

"There's not even such a thing as perfect" she added.

"If I had another house" Hino said, eyes up towards the ceiling, deep in his thoughts. "I would love it to be cozy and be able to afford enough that the only thing I worry was what to eat or wear." he admitted. "It sounds lonely living like that forever, I wouldn't mind living with someone like you".

Facing her back towards him, she chuckles "That's a nice dream". Those words seem to brought a deep soothing feeling, finally the tears stop and sleep can finally reach him once more.