Chapter Text
Shin was exhausted, but that was fine. His head hurt, but that was fine. He'd done something to his ankle, but that was fine. It was too damn hot for October, but that was fine. He’d kind of fucked up.
But that was fine.
When Shin turned fourteen, Sakamoto got him an assassin’s permit, meaning he could officially work with Sakamoto. Then, when he turned fifteen, he’d gotten a full license so he was allowed to do his own jobs, too. He didn’t want to be a burden to Sakamoto and he didn’t want to rely too heavily on him, so even though he still usually worked with Sakamoto, he took some of his own jobs, too.
He’d managed to take out the target easily, but it was after that that the problems started. The security in this place was better than he thought, so his first two plans for getting out had been completely cut off. Now he was trying to get out through the abandoned part of the building, but that was slow going. The building was dangerous even without armed men following him, so he needed to be careful. One wrong move and he could fall through a rotted out part of the floor. But that meant it would slow down his pursuers, too, so as long as he was careful, it wasn’t the biggest issue.
The building groaned loudly and he stopped, looking at his feet. It didn’t look like the floor was giving way, so he took another step, when he heard the sound again, this time accompanied by bits of wood falling on his head. He suddenly realized it wasn’t the floor that was making the noises, but before he could react, the ceiling gave way and something landed on him, sending him to the ground.
Shin groaned and started to push the debris off of himself when he realized the ‘something’ was muttering to itself.
“I hate this so much,” a small voice said. “This is the worst.”
Shin managed to get out from under the person who’d fallen on him and the was shocked when he realized they were, in fact, a child. He didn’t have experience dealing with kids, so he wasn’t an expert of judging ages, but he was pretty sure this kid was younger than he’d been when he left the lab. He had straight but messy black hair that was on the longer side and he was wearing a face mask that was surprisingly clean considering he just fell through the floor of an abandoned building.
“What the hell?” Shin finally asked. “What are you doing here?”
“Huh?” The kid blinked at him. “Who’re you?”
“The guy who just broke your fall. Where–?” The sound of footsteps let Shin know they’d run out of time for this conversation. “Forget it. Come with me.”
“What? Why?”
“Because I don’t think you’re with those guys and if they find you here, they’ll probably kill you. Now come on.”
The kid had been able to keep up surprisingly well, but Shin guessed that if a kid this young was on his own, he had to be a little street-smart. Or at least athletic.
He also hadn’t put up much of a fight which was surprising, but Shin was glad for it. He didn’t want to have to decide between fighting with a child and saving his own skin.
They only stopped running when Shin was sure they’d lost his pursuers.
“Okay, Kid,” Shin said as they sat on a park bench, both still catching their breath. “What were you doing in that building?”
“Why should I tell you?” He asked, looking at Shin through narrowed eyes.
“You're suspicious now? Why'd you follow me?”
“I had nowhere else to go. Why'd you take me with you?”
“I mean, you're a little young to be on your own. I was worried.”
“Shut up, I'm not that young.”
“What are you? Five?”
“Five? I'm not a baby, I’m eight!”
“Well I'm 15 and eight is totally a baby.” Shin crossed his arms. “So, what were you doing in there?”
The kid looked like he was going to continue refusing to speak, but after a huff, he softened a little.
“I was supposed to meet up with my stupid brother, but he never showed up.” Shin realized that despite his flat tone, the kid was starting to tear up. “He’s a big, stupid liar. He said we'd run away together, but that I had to go first and we'd meet up later, but he never came.”
“You planned to meet in an abandoned building?”
“Well, no, but he never showed up where we were supposed to meet. I didn’t want to keep going there in case someone found out about it, but I didn’t want to stop looking.” The kid sniffled. “I thought maybe he'd need to look for work. He didn't want to be an assassin, but it don’t know what else he can do.”
“You're assassins? Or, your brother is?”
“Not really, but our dad wants us to be.” He hunched his shoulders like he was trying to make himself smaller. “My brother said we should run away. We were gonna do it together.”
Up to this point, Shin had been trying his best not to listen into his thoughts, but they were starting to get too big for him to ignore, the swirl of conflicted emotion telling him he should stop asking so many questions.
“Alright, Kid, I'm sure he's looking for you too.”
“He's stupid,” he muttered, sniffling again. “He should’ve just come.”
Shin didn't totally get it–it wasn't like he had any siblings–but he thought he might understand a little bit. Sure, his dad turned out to be… well, it had been what it was, but he knew how it felt when he was wondering why his dad left him at the lab.
“Okay, why don't you come back to my place for now. You shouldn't be sleeping on the streets.”
“Why should I trust you?”
“I mean, you don't have to. I'm just offering.”
“I don't know you…”
Shin sighed, wondering why he was even offering to help this kid. He should just leave him alone.
“I'm Shin.”
The kid looked at Shin, his mind quietly working through his choices. Even if he was eight, he was clearly pretty smart.
“Alright… I guess I'll come with you.”
“Great.” Shin stood and gestured for him to follow. “Let's go.”
He nodded and stood, following Shin obediently, his previous uncertainty gone.
“You got a name?” Shin asked after a minute of walking in silence.
“Mafuyu.”
Shin let them both into his apartment just as his phone started to ring.
“One second,” he said, seeing it was the JAA. “Yeah?”
“Have you completed your assignment?” The woman on the other end had the usual uncomfortably bright customer service voice that Shin still wasn't used to. He was barely used to it at the convenience store, so from the JAA it felt wrong.
“Yeah, it's complete.” He hadn't really done it cleanly, but she didn't need to know that. Or, she probably knew, but he wasn't going to admit it.
“Great! Payment will be sent by the end of the day tomorrow. Thank you for your work.”
“Yeah, sure,” he mumbled. “Umm, bye.”
“Goodbye!”
With that taken care of, Shin turned his attention to Mafuyu. He was looking around Shin's small apartment with a grimace on his face that was obvious just from his eyes.
“You live here?” He asked.
“Umm, yeah? Is that a problem?”
“Do you ever clean?”
“Listen, kid, I do my best,” he answered, feeling defensive. He kept his apartment relatively clean, it was just a little messy. “What would a little kid know about cleaning?”
“Seems like more than you,” he shot back.
“You don't have to stay here if you hate it so much.”
“No, it's whatever,” Mafuyu mumbled.
Shin's phone started ringing and Mafuyu raised an eyebrow.
“You're popular.”
“Shut up,” he said, picking up. “Hello?”
“It's Sakamoto.”
“Oh, Sakamoto-san. Is everything alright?”
“Do you have time tonight?”
Shin looked at Mafuyu for a while before sighing.
“Yeah, I have time. But I twisted my ankle so I can't really run.”
“If you're hurt-”
“It's fine,” Shin insisted. “When do you need me?”
“Just come to the usual place.”
“Alright. See you.”
Sakamoto hung up without responding. That was typical, but it still stung a little. He could at least say ‘okay’.
He's leaving me? Already?
Shin wouldn't have guessed Mafuyu was worried without hearing his thoughts. For someone so young, he was good at doctoring his expression.
“Sorry, I have to go, but I’ll be back. I'll get something to eat on my way back.” He paused, then added. “If you get hungry I have a few boxes of CalorieMate in the cabinet.”
Shin walked to his bathroom, getting some bandages to brace his ankle with. Given he could still walk on it, he didn’t think he’d sprained it. It still hurt like hell.
But he couldn’t let Sakamoto think he wasn’t worth his time. He had to keep up.
Leaving the bathroom, he saw that Mafuyu was still standing in the middle of the room, his mind swirling even as his face remained mostly placid.
“Umm… I’ll be back soon, but if you get tired, you can use my bed…” Shin paused, not sure what else to say. “Yeah, so, I’ll see you.”
He didn’t wait for a response, suddenly realizing how out of his depth he was. He’d brought some kid back to his place without any sort of plan and now what? He couldn’t exactly kick him out. He could maybe bring him to the police, but not only did he suspect Mafuyu would be very upset if he tried, but bringing him to the police would also put Shin under a microscope and he didn’t need that. He wasn’t exactly old enough to be on his own, either.
Which all meant, for now, he would probably have to keep the kid around. It wouldn’t be right to do anything else at this point. Maybe he’d be able to find the kid’s brother. They were old enough that there should be some record of the two of them somewhere.
By the time he met up with Sakamoto, his mind had tied itself up worrying what he should do about Mafuyu. He’d considered asking Sakamoto, but quickly threw that idea away. Sakamoto already had to deal with Shin, he didn’t need another kid weighing him down. And, realistically, he’d probably just say to turn the kid over to the police.
“You’re okay?” Sakamoto asked after giving him a quick once over.
“Yeah, I’m fine,” Shin told him. “My ankle’s a little sore, that’s it.”
“Your clothes are a mess.”
Shin looked down at himself, realizing Sakamoto was right. When Mafuyu landed on him, it had really messed up his clothes, but he’d been so caught up in not making Sakamoto wait for him that he hadn’t noticed.
“I had trouble with some rotted floors,” Shin explained. “But I’m really fine.”
Sakamoto almost looked like he was going to argue, but in the end he didn’t make any more comments.
“Let’s go.”
"Roger that,” Shin replied, following Sakamoto and hoping this job wouldn’t be too hard.
He got back later than expected. The job hadn’t been difficult, but it had been boring. They had just been staking out the target’s office to gather information. At one point, his stomach growled loudly and Sakamoto sent him to get something from the convenience store, making Shin feel pretty useless. Shin wasn’t even sure why Sakamoto asked him to come along until, finally, someone came close enough to them for Shin to read their mind.
By the time they finished and he’d stopped by the store to get something for Mafuyu to eat, it was almost 9. He was pretty sure that was past the bedtime for an 8-year-old, but he couldn’t be sure. He also wasn’t totally convinced Mafuyu would still be there when he got home.
The lights in his apartment were on, but it was quiet. Shin did his best to match that quiet in case Mafuyu was sleeping, but when he fully stepped into his room, he couldn’t help but let out a surprised yelp.
In the hours since Shin left, Mafuyu had apparently taken it upon himself to clean Shin’s apartment. Surfaces had been dusted, his manga piled neatly near the wall, and his clothes put away. A quick look in the bathroom showed that Mafuyu hadn’t stopped with the living area.
The quiet of the apartment was explained when Shin realized Mafuyu was curled up at the end of his bed, which had been stripped of it’s bedding. Checking his tiny balcony, Shin saw that the bedding had been washed and was now out to dry. Shin didn’t know how he’d done that since the apartment didn’t have a washer. Had he washed them in the bathtub?
The bedding was still damp–maybe he needed to get a second set of bedding–so he didn’t see much point in waking him up. He probably needed the sleep and Shin was worried that if he woke him up, the kid might not be able to fall back asleep.
Mafuyu was sleeping with his mask still on and Shin wasn’t sure if that was by choice or an accident, so he let him be. Instead, he found a blanket that had apparently been clean enough to be passed over in Mafuyu’s cleaning and draped it over him.
Mafuyu must have been exhausted. Not only was it late, but he had seemingly been through a lot. Being a runaway was one thing, but also trying to find his brother had to be hard. Shin knew a thing or two about chasing after someone who was little more than a ghost. He knew how much that took out of a person.
Next to the bed was the small backpack Mafuyu had with him and after silently apologizing, Shin opened it and looked at the contents.
There was an empty water bottle, a pencil case, a notebook, a book, and a change of clothes. Pulling out the notebook, Shin saw his instincts were right–Mafuyu’s full name was on the notebook, though only his given name was written in kanji.
Still Seba Mafuyu was a good place to start so, putting the book back, Shin turned off the lights and opened his computer.
Even with just the reading, Seba was a good place to start since that wasn’t the most common name. Neither was Mafuyu, for that matter.
Mafuyu’s name didn’t turn up anything of note, but that was probably to be expected. Even the JAA wouldn’t have information about a random 8-year-old. The name Seba, on the other hand, did have information. A lot of information.
Mafuyu apparently came from a family with a long history as assassins–Shin hadn’t known that was a thing–with both his mother and father coming from families with plenty of information in the JAA’s databases. That said, his parents didn’t seem to have done much of note themselves.
His father–Seba Kazuhiro–was originally from Mie Prefecture, but moved to the Tokyo area to start working as an assassin. He’d nearly been killed some time before Mafuyu was born. He was lucky to be alive, but it left him unable to continue as an assassin, so he was assigned to work at the JAA Tokyo Headquarters.
Kazuhiro met his now wife–maiden name, Sekimoto Akiko–while working in Chiba Prefecture and they married not long after meeting. She disappeared from the record for about a year, presumably corresponding to Mafuyu’s brother’s birth. Then a few years later, she disappeared again, seeming to have stopped working all together.
Shin yawned, propping himself up with one arm while trying to will his eyes to stop getting so heavy. He still had more to do. He couldn’t fall asleep.
But his eyes were heavy and he couldn’t fight the part of his mind saying he should just rest his eyes a little.
The last thing he saw before he fell asleep was another name, the one he sure he’d been looking for.
Seba Natsuki, 13: enrolled in the JCC, effective April 1.