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As far as Noi was concerned, what En did was his business.
It wasn’t her job to question him, though she often did. En was a great source of petty gossip to share with Shin over a meal—it was no secret she hated the bastard, but there weren’t too many gigs that were as rewarding as being a cleaner. Not only did she get spacious quarters and plenty of meals, but she also got to fight with the best partner in the world. That was enough to keep her satisfied, regardless of the latest of En’s annoying frivolities.
So, she didn’t stick her nose in his plans, and she followed orders well enough, even the ones she thought were stupid.
For the most part, anyway.
With no new reports of Cross-Eye activity, it was a slow day for the cleaners, and Noi had taken it upon herself to fetch lunch for herself and Shin: two medium-sized boxes of gyoza—mushroom-free, of course. She was developing a distaste for mushrooms lately, so the prospect of a dish which didn’t include them seemed especially tantalizing. She didn’t have to ask Shin to know he shared the sentiment.
Rounding a corner in the labyrinthine mansion the En family called home, Noi whistled an airy tune and ruminated on the meal she was about to have. How long had it been since she had gyoza? Shin liked them steamed, right? She hoped so. Any gyoza was good gyoza—boiled, steamed, fried, it made no difference to her so long as it wasn’t a goddamn mushroom. But pork sounded awfully good today—
Her thoughts and her person came to a halt when she saw Nikaido standing alone at the window of the long hallway.
Nikaido was interesting. Keyword: was. There weren’t many who could go toe-to-toe with Noi and live to tell the tale… especially not more than once. But ever since En had taken her as his partner, she had grown quiet, dull, and boring—not that Noi could really blame her. Just the very thought of being En’s partner made Noi’s fists twitch in a compulsory urge to disembowel someone.
Nikaido also wasn’t supposed to be alone. She was too valuable (and volatile) an asset for En to allow her to wander off without supervision. Yet here she was. Noi stood there for a moment, weighing her options. She mostly just wanted to pass by without a word and pretend she saw nothing, because damn she was hungry. But it seemed unwise to leave Nikaido to her own devices, even if she was just sullenly staring out the window.
“Hey!”
When Nikaido turned to regard her listlessly, it occurred to Noi that she had not thought about what she would say. ‘Go to your room’? ‘How are you’? ‘Nice weather today’?
“Uh… you hungry?”
Noi didn’t wait for Nikaido to respond, partly because she knew that she wouldn’t. She rifled in the bag containing their lunch and opened the box meant for Shin—it wasn’t like he bought this meal anyway, the bastard—to retrieve one gyoza, which she quickly tossed to Nikaido. Nikaido’s blank expression did not change, but the ease with which she caught the gyoza belied her impressive reflexes.
Okay, maybe she was still a little interesting.
“You can have it,” Noi said. “Bet you’re tired of eating mushrooms too.”
Nikaido shifted her weight and looked at the gyoza in her hand. She was probably wary; it wasn’t like her induction into the En family had been terribly friendly. Noi tried to kill her more than once, after all. But before Noi could think to offer any words of encouragement, Nikaido took a hesitant bite.
Noi beamed. “Yeah-ha! I knew it. Everyone likes gyoza.”
Her smile faltered when Nikaido did not take another bite. In fact, it looked as though she might drop it on the floor. The thought of wasted food pissed Noi off, so she was quick to close the distance between them and hold out a gloved hand.
“Well, maybe not. Whatever,” she huffed. “C’mon, you need to go back to your room before En freaks out.”
Nikaido mechanically returned the gyoza and allowed herself to be gently corralled towards her room. Noi, in the meantime, didn’t hide her growing agitation.
“Now I’m going to be late for lunch because you need an escort, and Senpai is gonna nag me about cold food, and I have this stupid half-eaten gyoza that’s—”
“... Bland.”
“Eh?”
Noi blinked in surprise. Since En had given her that devil’s mask, Nikaido rarely spoke, if ever, and Noi had begun to suspect she was slowly losing her will the longer that contract settled in her stomach. Now here she was, telling Noi that her lunch was bland. How much was she really aware of? Was her newfound subservience an act? Was En aware of it? But rather than raise these questions...
“You’re from Hole. What do you know?” Noi sneered haughtily. “This is the best place to get gyoza here! What, like you can do better?”
It was a rhetorical question, but Noi stuttered to a halt when she glared over at Nikaido and met her gaze. Those blue eyes, so dull and empty lately, now had a fiery glint to them, piercing through Noi’s soul like she had the first time they met.
...Woof.
The corners of Noi’s mouth instinctively twisted upward despite herself, and she looked as if she was about to speak—but the commotion at the end of the hall snapped the both of them to attention. Hurried footsteps and panting breath announced the arrival of two panicked grunts, scrambling to meet Noi and snatch away Nikaido.
“M-miss Noi, sir! We’ve got this under control! We will take the target back to her room,” the taller one said, his voice trembling. “Thank you for apprehending her! Please excuse us!”
Without even the slightest glance in Noi’s direction, Nikaido was silently ushered away, unresponsive to the jeers of the grunts responsible for keeping her under lock-and-key. Noi watched them until they disappeared round the corner, trying to ignore the conflict stirring in her chest.
“The food is cold, Noi.”
They were sprawled out in Shin’s cramped room, where they typically took their lunch when they had the opportunity. Any time away from the performative hustle and bustle of the En manor was time well-spent.
Shin poked around in his gyoza box, unamused. “And I thought there were supposed to be twelve in here.”
“What? Oh. That’s weird,” Noi said. “Uh, I mean, your missing gyoza. The food’s cold because I got wrapped up in dumb bullshit.”
“Like?”
Noi frowned at the box in her hands, her lunch untouched and growing colder by the second. “You know. The usual...”
Shin snorted as he popped a whole gyoza into his mouth. “Well, if you’re not going to eat, you can fork over a replacement for my missing food.”
“Oh, shut up, Senpai! You won’t starve!” Noi quickly stuffed two gyoza into her mouth, mostly for posturing and for goading Shin into saying something else. Yes, they were cold, but that didn’t stop them from being… from being…
Bland.
Noi’s frown deepened into a scowl.
“God damnit!!”
With a childish stamp of her foot, Noi lobbed one of her gyoza at Shin with all her might, her appetite and mood soured.
When Noi returned to her own room that evening, she was tired and aggravated. She often felt stir-crazy when she just had to sit around the mansion for a day; compounded with her weird Nikaido encounter and disastrous lunch, Noi wanted nothing more than to crush some skulls and go to bed.
Unfortunately, there were no skulls to be crushed. So bed it was.
She flopped unceremoniously onto her bed, not even bothering to take her shoes off. Noi let out a long sigh and buried her face into her pillow, snaking her arms underneath it and stretching towards her headboard. She was fully prepared to fall asleep like this, but the quiet crinkling of paper underneath her pillow as it lightly brushed her hands made her sit up to take a look. Probably a receipt that fell out of her pocket or something.
Noi took a moment to grope around for it and, once acquired, glanced carelessly. It was not a receipt. It was a small scrap of paper, crumpled and torn, with an unfamiliar, looping handwriting. Ink blots stained the rushed script, so Noi had to roll over and bring it to the light to get a better look at what it said:
CABBAGE VEGOIL SPRONION GARLIC GINGER SOYSAUCE GRNDPORK EGG WRAPPERS SAKE
What was this, an ingredients list? She flipped it over.
NEXT THURS 2200 LOWER KITCHEN BRING INGR SECRET
Noi’s heart skipped a beat. She carefully pored over the ingredients and the instructions, committing them to memory before shredding the scrap of paper completely.
That night, she lulled herself to sleep by tracing in her mind’s eye the looping and aggressive, yet still strangely elegant, handwriting of her former enemy.
The following week went by at an agonizing pace.
At least she finally had some work to do, and it helped take her mind off things. But as the anticipated date approached, her focus began to wane.
“Noi, get up,” Shin hissed, a note of concern audible in his tone. Covered in blood and panting heavily, he crouched beside her and put a stitched hand to the gushing hole where her cheek once was.
Noi groaned. “Senpai…”
“I took care of the last one. But what’s wrong with you? It’s like you haven’t been here lately. You just let that guy tear into your mask… and face… like that.”
Eyes closed, Noi shook her head, splattering Shin with more blood in the process. Already the muscles in her cheek were beginning to reconnect, so it wasn’t the severity of the wound that troubled Shin.
“Sorry.” She let out a breathy chuckle. “I’m just a little distracted. And hungry. I’ll be better soon.”
Shin sighed and sat back on his heels, shoulders relaxing. “Well, just don’t be an idiot. I guess I can buy dinner today.”
Noi grinned up at him.
Good. She still needed to buy the ground pork.
Finally, the night arrived. Noi had collected everything as she was instructed, discreetly supplying the scarcely-used lower kitchen throughout the week. The benefit of such a large mansion, she realized, was the many unused locations under its roof; though, as she quietly made her way down the last corridor before the kitchen, she supposed that could also be a pretty significant weakness, too. After all, she wasn’t exactly being a good lap dog for En right now. Nikaido was precious and, above all else, dangerous. Rather than indulging her curiosity, Noi should apprehend Nikaido—should return her to her cage, should report her propensity for scheming to En.
But when Noi pushed open the double doors and saw Nikaido at the stove-top, mincing garlic and onions and seeming utterly relaxed?
Yeah. En could go fuck himself.
Nikaido did not turn to regard Noi, but she didn’t need to look to know that it was her. Noi’s sheer physical presence was not easily ignored. Instead, Nikaido pointed across the way, where Noi had hidden the ground pork.
“You, uh, want me to get that?”
Nikaido nodded. Noi obliged, taking a position beside her to intently watch her cook. Nikaido’s fingers moved so nimbly, like this was something she had done hundreds upon thousands of times, like this was something she could do in her sleep. Noi was willing to believe it. Though her expression remained as cool as ever, never shaking its enforced blankness, Nikaido just seemed happier.
“Wow, the head chefs could learn a thing or two from you. You’re so fast! I didn’t know you could cook...”
Nikaido didn’t respond as she mashed the pork Noi gave her.
“... Though, I guess I don’t know much of anything about you,” Noi said sheepishly, scratching the side of her face. “Probably better to keep it that way, huh?”
Noi could have sworn that the corner of Nikaido’s mouth twitched upward, if only for a nanosecond.
They lapsed into a comfortable silence as Nikaido finished her prep and began the process of wrapping and steaming her gyoza, Noi occasionally helping out where wordlessly directed. Otherwise, Noi was content to just watch, though she found herself watching Nikaido more than the cooking. An hour and a half passed since Noi had arrived, and she briefly wondered why there were no guards hunting for Nikaido’s absence. She must have memorized their schedules… must have memorized the downtime between each shift and who the least competent grunt was to make her escape. Noi suppressed a shiver. Yes, Nikaido was dangerous, even subdued like this. She should be more wary.
But that was neither here nor there, because Nikaido was serving her a plate of freshly-steamed gyoza right now, and, man, they looked delicious. Nikaido tilted her head, indicating Noi to eat, and Noi positively sparkled as she took a bite.
No question. Best gyoza she’d ever had.
“Holy shit!” Noi leapt to her feet, punctuating her exclamation with an airy bounce. “These are amazing!”
If you asked her, Nikaido looked rather smug despite her stony features. It was the slight twinkling in her eyes that did it. Her jaw clicked into place, like she was a machine slowly booting, and she may have even chuckled—Noi was no longer paying attention, too busy ravenously devouring the rest of the gyoza to notice the microscopic changes to Nikaido’s face.
“Can do better,” Nikaido murmured, after a significant silence.
“You’re damn right you can! I’m never gonna doubt you again!”
Noi pushed Nikaido’s shoulder and laughed heartily, pleased beyond comparison. Nikaido tilted her head, watching Noi with a curious intensity, like she was watching an old friend. Friend. Amidst her mirth, Noi felt a sudden constriction in her chest, something between frustration and… sadness. Wouldn’t it be nice if they could really be friends? If Noi just took that mask off of her right now, Nikaido could show her that enticing, fiery spirit in earnest…
The clock struck midnight, chimes ringing through the mansion, and Nikaido straightened. It was unspoken: time for her to go. She really must have memorized their schedules after all.
“Um... Thank you,” Noi said, more somber than usual. Nikaido bowed and took her leave.
Noi watched her quietly slip away, not once thinking that the hole in their defense was something she should share with En. Well, some things just weren’t meant to be, she supposed. Work was work, and any partner of En’s had no business making friends, especially not one of Nikaido’s caliber.
At least Noi would always have this moment to cherish.