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Last Revised: Never

   The faint music of a songbird trilled in the distance as Amefuri slowly forced herself towards full consciousness. Most of the battle had been reduced to a blur of action and nothing that she attempted to commit to memory had remained, except for the stranger's name. Shinigami, a God of Death. It didn't matter how hard she tried to remember since everything else was lost to memory of the electric blue light. 

    However, she was still alive and, after a courtesy glance, she was still in her room. That was all probably thanks to Shinigami's battle prowess. There was no shame in admitting that she would have been in trouble without his help. After all, Amefuri thought, somehow the barriers that sealed the shrine away from intruders had been tampered with. There was no other way for the shadows to get in as far as she could tell.

    Amefuri stopped, then frowned. 'Didn't I collapse outside?'

    She compared this knowledge with the information still retained from the night before and cursed internally. It was foolish to assume that there were going to be no consequences for fighting with her senshi powers after so many years of retirement. She knew this. That was the exact reason that she was reluctant to use her powers at all. However, the problem remained that Shinigami was the only person that could have brought her inside. Therefore, he must have seen her change back. 

    She threw off the blankets so she could leap to her feet to do... something. Anything. Exactly what that was, she honestly didn't know. Hunting down Shinigami and possibly murdering him in his sleep if no other way of guaranteeing his silence presented itself seemed like an attractive idea. Amefuri knew that lying in bed would do no good but, as she soon found out, blindly leaping out of bed wasn't a better idea. 

    Stars exploded into her vision as her head came into contact with something quite solid and unyielding. Amefuri fell back onto the bed and rubbed the tender spot, a bruise would probably develop there she thought, before twisting to glare at whatever delayed her from her plans to deal with Shinigami. Much to her surprise, Yorukai sat on the floor and rubbing an equally tender spot on his forehead.

    "Good morning, Ame-chan!" Yorukai said with an amused smile. "We should really stop meeting in such painful ways."

    "What are you doing here?" Amefuri fixed him with a suspicious look. "How did you get into the shrine... into my room?"

    "Oh, no need to worry about that!" He gave her a cheery grin. "There will be plenty of time for me to answer your questions later. For now, I think that you need to drink something and have some breakfast"

    Yorukai picked up a wooden tray that had been sitting, unnoticed, next to the sliding door and set it down on the small table in the centre of the room. Any further questions from Amefuri were ignored completely as he unloaded cups, a teapot, plates.... and something that vaguely resembled rice balls. She stared at him with no small amount of surprise. 

    'Does Chikawa know where my things are?'

    As if he had heard her thoughts, Yorukai met her gaze with a mysterious smile before tilting his head to one side with a wide-eyed look of pure innocence. She narrowed her eyes but remained silent. Not only was he wandering around her home while she was asleep but he had actually found her home. She did not remember giving him (or anyone currently among the living, for that matter) her address. 

    "Ame-chan." Yorukai smiled gently at her. "There's plenty of time for speculations and questions later. You should eat something first."

    "...Very well." 

    She climbed out of bed to join him at the table.

    They ate the food that he had prepared for the two of them and, to her surprise, the meal was quite good. Amefuri did not like being surprised. There was something unusual about Yorukai that she couldn't figure out so she was constantly on guard against any possible ulterior motives the man had. But it didn't seem to matter how closely she watched him, he retained that irritatingly cheerful air about him and refused to allow her intimidation tactics to work on him. He was smart, and she didn't like that either.

    "Now explain, Chikawa. How did you find me?" Amefuri said.

    Yorukai set his tea cup back on the table before he answered her.

    "It was all really simple, you see. I noticed that the bus you got on yesterday was the same one that goes past the school and grabbed a schedule for that route. Of course, I didn't know what stop you get off at so I went back to the school and pulled your profile out of the school's database and checked for your home address. I guess you forgot to update your profile because the house I went to was your classmate, Shinzui's. I can change it for you the next time I'm at school."

    She gazed at him in amazement, but he didn't seem to notice and continued speaking.

    "Anyway, I asked if there was a way to find out where to find you and was directed to a restaurant downtown. So, after going there, there was this really nice old couple that told me that you worked there and if I wanted to find you, I should go to the countryside since you seemed to hate being in the city. I went back to school and checked the map and compared to to the bus map and noticed that the bus stopped near an abandoned settlement and a couple shrines."

    Amefuri grimaced. Yes, she thought to herself, this guy was definitely too smart for her liking.

    "Then, lo and behold, within view of the bus stop were some recently swept stairs to one of the shrines. After climbing up all those stairs I saw that the grounds were being tended I knew that I found the right place." Yorukai shrugged and leaned back. "No big deal."

    "Well," Amefuri said slowly, "you found me. What do you plan to do now?"

    "Nothing really." Yorukai smiled again. "I just want to be friends. That's it."

    "Friends?!" Amefuri turned away. "Now that's just stupid."

    "Is it?" Yorukai said.

    "Simple." Amefuri snapped, and fell silent.

    Yorukai prompted her. "Would you please explain it to me?"

    "No."

    "Why not?"

    "None of your business."

    "But I don't understand..." Yorukai protested. "Why?"

    "It doesn't concern you," Amefuri said coldly and gave him a withering look. "So I suggest that you go back into town and forget about tutoring me."

    "But I can't do that! I gave my word to the principal that I'd keep you out of trouble." Yorukai watched Amefuri, half expecting her to shout at him, and continued when she failed to reply. "I'm not the kind of guy that gives up that easily."

    "Che..." Amefuri tucked a strand of hair behind an ear. "That's for sure."

    "...And," Yorukai paused to look at her. "I'm not the kind of guy that gives up on my friends."

    "Friends? You think that we are friends??" Amefuri turned and pinned him a glare. "Let me tell you something about friends, Chikawa. Friends are tools to be manipulated against you.  Friends are opponents that try to gain your trust with kind words.  Friends are not to be trusted.  Friends will betray you and all of your ideals by getting in the way.  They're just weaknesses waiting to be exploited."

    Yorukai stared at her silently. "What enemies?"

    Amefuri shook her head in disbelief.

    "Why everything out there is a threat. You can be sure that no one, NO ONE will protect you in the end. When it all boils down to it, they'll condemn you for what you've done to fulfill your ideals and your dreams to save their own skin."

    Whatever words Yorukai had planned to speak fled from his mind.

    "They will all just betray you..." Amefuri whispered venomously.

    Yorukai shivered slightly from the chill of the words Amefuri had spoken.  'What could have happened to her?'

    Yorukai watched her slouched form silently for a few minutes. He could tell that nothing was registering in her mind anymore and her deep violet eyes were clouded over as she seemed to be reliving some kind of personal hell. He silently gathered the dishes and stood to leave. She was sitting perfectly still while staring blankly into her cup of tea. With a soft sigh, he slid the door to her room shut with a soft click.