1: Puppeteers

Inspiration: Karakuri Burst and the PV.

Summary: He'd play her game, as long as he didn't have to have her blood on his hands. Hinted Rin/Len.

Genre: Drama, Friendship, Angst, General, hint of Romance and maybe a dash of Crime and Sci-Fi.

A/N: Based on two things; my headcanon that Miku and Kaito knew each other in Karakuri burst and that Rin and Len are projects - genetically modified humans meant to be weapons, hence the AU because Hitoshizuku didn't go down that road. Thus, I own nothing.

Posted: 23/02/2013

He's eighteen and fresh out of public school and she's sixteen and fresh out of wherever she came from and they're both in the Secret Police Academy learning just how to be the most effective person they can possibly be for the government and the Secret Police when they meet as desk mates in the science class.

"Hey," he nods as he puts down his books and his notes. He does not approve of the educational materials in this academy, not for people like him anyways because some people are meant for action in the fields, not desk work. He's definitely a field type of person and as such he does not belong here where brains are superior to brawn.

She gives him a distracted smile as she skims over the text in the books and the writing of the solemn, serious professor on the board. She doesn't take notes like he has to; yet later in the year it is she that gets the highest scores in the class with perfect averages. No errors whatsoever.

The reason she skipped two years, he learns later, is because of her eidetic memory. Useful if you're being groomed to work in the labs.

Well, she's an odd one, with her ever-present reading glasses distorting but not quite hiding the sight of her sharply dreaming eyes and her long teal hair held back with a strange pin, but they are partners for either the unit or the year (the time frame he will call unknown) and he thinks there could be worse things in the world than being partnered up with the genius girl in the class.

They become good friends in the end. She helps him with the blasted science mumbo jumbo, he helps her with her shooting skills and both of them survive.

. . .

Time flies and soon enough they're graduating the academy and officially becoming a part of the Secret Police. He goes right to the sector that keeps justice and last he heard she was in the drug development.

Occasionally, whenever he's reminded of science or that miserable but mandatory time spent in the academics section of the Academy he remembers her, the girl who could remember everything she saw or read.

But he's busy trying to learn how to wield the sword that gives him the authority of the Secret Police, and trying hard to get used to the crisp uniform that seems too formal for someone to fight in, and she remains a memory of someone who sat next to him and helped him out of that hellhole called school.

. . .

There's one way to get up in the Secret Police, and that's by standing out. Doing something. Action, as long as it results in progress and success, is rewarded. Applauded. Rewarded.

There is no need to talk about failures. He has not failed and he doesn't plan on it.

He advances up when he runs into a spy in the Secret Police. He handles it well; he makes sure the mole can't kill his worthless self before he alerts his superiors of this. The traitor is taken away to the chambers where he'll be interrogated for the sake and safety of their citizens.

They praise him. Call him a hero. Brings out his spotless, outstanding records and marvel at just how perfect of a soldier he is.

The higher ups come to a unanimous agreement; he'd make a perfect example. A male, military Cinderella story.

Before he knows it he's a Commander.

At his first meeting as a Commander he sees her again and instantly remembers her. Hard not to forget the glasses trying and failing to hide the dreamy wild eyes thinking of everything and nothing all at the same time, hard to forget that huge amount of teal hair.

She remembers him too and gives her usual dreamy smile and a small wave before taking a seat in one of the spaces reserved for the heads of the drug developments. Of course she remembers. She remembers everything.

It's nice to see a familiar face. The meeting goes by smoothly and everyone there approves of him.

. . .

They get along well. Go out for coffee. Occasional meals when both of them have a spot available in their schedules, which isn't that often but are always memorable. Ten years fly by.

She's good at her job. So young, but nearly taking over the department. Now she's head of drug development, bio-weapons, chemical weapons and genetic enhancement. Two sectors remain not under her lead but she's already in those sectors as a high ranking scientist.

He's good at his job, too. There are whispers of making him Head Commander. The whispers become louder and turn into murmurs when the current Head Commander keeps taking him out with him on missions and outings, and then the word in Headquarters are full out common knowledge by the time they announce his retirement at the assembly.

He only has a polite look on his face as he is called upon the stage and awarded the Head Commander's badge. It's not a surprise, since Head Commander Hiyama has already told him of his plans weeks ago.

They manage to make time and hit a café a few days later where she laughs and claps him on his shoulder over their over-frosted giant red velvet cupcakes. Her way of celebrating.

He doesn't complain. The cupcake is overly sweet with heavy cream cheese frosting and vanilla filling and he eats every last bit.

. . .

Three years after taking the position of Head Commander he's in his office reading the blasted reports that are like mountains of paper on his desk when the alarms start to blare. Not a fire alarm, and certainly not a drill. Something is wrong on a titanic scale in Headquarters right now. "What the Hell is going on?" he demands to his lieutenant who has just run into the room to repot or inform him of the alarms.

"Sir, there's been an uprising," she replies grimly, pushing back her long pink hair. For a split second she is his genius friend that happens to be a girl and he freezes for a micro or nanosecond, whichever one is the shorter time period before he's slapped himself out of that ridiculous daydream. The hair length and color is wrong. So is the uniform.

And Lieutenant Megurine looks nothing like his former classmate.

Her next words, though, makes him pause visibly. "The science department has revolted."

And who was the head of the science department in the Secret Police?

Shades of teal and dreamy eyes flashing in his memories, he gives a curt order for reinforcements as he straps on his sword. There is a reason why traitors are dealt with harshly and that's because the human emotion is capable of changing greatly. Love turns into hate so easily and betrayal never fails to turn.

When the squad of men comes he personally leads them to the building that was once the home of the most brilliant minds in the country, where those brilliant minds are now killing those that were their own.

She's amongst them with one of the projects in her hand – a gun that can be reloaded within seconds and a flick of her thumb. Every shot is fatal, striking down one of his men and making them stay down with their brains blown out through a hole in their heads. Her long hair is dragging in the blood pooling around her feet and the tips are stained reddish brown.

He notices that all her shots are right between the eyes like he once taught her many years ago back when they were barely out of teen ages and can't help but feel a slight brush of pride in his hardened heart as he continues to advance towards her, sword ready in his hand.

She sees him – he knows it and more than once he caught her eye – but she continues to shoot at everyone other than him. She even shoots at one of her scientists when the techie fires a bullet that scratches his cheekbone. He falls to the ground, never to get up again.

"What took you so long?" she asks so casually when he's in hearing distance. He swings down, the uniform as stiff and proper as ever yet now comfortable as he moves. She blocks with the gun and fires – deliberately leading the bullet away from hitting him.

"Paperwork," he answers back. She swings the gun and he barely dodges the blur of heavy metal before swinging down with his sword again. She leaps aside with surprising grace in her ridiculous high heels and short skirt.

"Mm. Well, that's the reason why we," she gestured at the fighting scientists. Over her thin shoulders he sees some of them loading things onto hovercrafts. "Are quitting. We're tired of all this."

"This?" he knows he's going easy on her. She knows too, which is why her answer comes with an easy smile.

"The Secret Police. The system. Everything," she begins to shoot at his feet and he knows that to step into the path of the bullets would ensure his legs being permanently out of commission. He tries to go around the side, but she peppers the ground there with a blast of bullets as she continues to move backwards, heading to the hovercrafts. "But I'm someone who likes games. So let's make a deal."

"A deal?" he raises his voice as he tries to advance.

"A deal," she confirms, not letting him come closer as the distance between them grows. "I'm taking one, and you can have the other. Let's see whose protégé is stronger."

"What are the conditions?" there is no deal without some kind of compensation at the end.

"I don't kill you," she proposes. "And you don't kill me. But those under us have that right."

"Agreed."

She picks up an unconscious blonde – female and dressed in the clothes of a bio-weapon – before giving him a wink and boarding the hovercraft.

. . .

His assigned protégé isn't hard to find; all the other bio-weapons have been either killed or taken and the only one remaining could be a twin to the girl she took, only this one is male. He grits his teeth when he sees the bleeding hole in the place of one eye but he understands that these are the terms he has agreed to.

Anything to keep his hands free of her blood because somewhere along those twenty odd years he might have learned to care, just a bit. Might have. No guarantees.

He gives orders that the boy is to be brought to him when he recovers and leaves the hospital area. Paperwork waits for no one and becomes a bigger pain the longer it is stalled.

. . .

When rumours of a female assassin with hair like spun gold come to his ears he calls the last bio-weapon to him and silently hands him his sword.

The boy is startled out of his usual stoic face and tries to protest but he waves it away and makes him take it. Reports talk of a gun that never runs out of bullets in the hands of the mad assassin and he remembers the rain of bullets that kept him from going after her. He has a good idea of what is in her hands.

The one-eyed boy bows and leaves. He knows that one will die, or they will remember that they once knew each other. Maybe they will remember that they were once something that could have been more.

He is more than aware of the fact that they are still nothing but children, even younger than when he and the genius girl met that one faithful day in a class.

But he can't really find it within himself to care about the puppets because he wants to triumph over the other puppeteer.