"You're as good with women as ever..."
Since the wind kicked up Fushimi had wrapped himself in the Red King's jacket and trailed along as close at his heels as possible. Keeping up took a good bit of hustle. It didn't actually matter that people were glaring at them; once Yata had it in his head to get something done it didn't actually matter what stood in his way.
Like following a bull tearing through the sidewalk's passing crowds.

"She always picks up," Yata shoved his cell back in his pocket after the fourth or fifth time trying to call her and shoved past another bystander. "Barely says anything but she always answers."

"Here's an idea- why not leave her alone and let her cool off on her own?"

"Don't even talk if you don't even know what the fuck you're talking about. Y'know why we can't just let her roam around without knowing where she is," the Red King fussed.

Fushimi was beginning to tire of being dragged around. He had been so patient thus far, understanding even, having to remind himself over and over that he chose this.

He chose this over a cushy office... his every need well tended to...
"We'll keep dogging the lost little girl in your head then. Treating her like an adult makes too much sense."

"I'm just trying to hold everything together here. It's not like we never give her time to herself. Quit makin' me sound like the bad cop," Yata's shoulders scrunched, "I mean what am I s'posed to think when she's out having these... these weird meetings on their turf and hiding things from me. It's dangerous. It doesn't make sense."

Nothing made sense. The bottom of the Red King's shoes scuffed the ground especially loud. Another gust of wind mussed auburn hair. "Out of everybody I always thought I'd have her on my side. At least."

Sounding honestly hurt, he paused on the edge of a corner of pavement while cars sped past within reach in the street before them.

Fushimi refused to indulge him with pity for his clingy fault in reasoning. Still, he couldn't help thinking into the sick sense that a big, heaping slice of his partner's abandonment issues were thanks to him.
Too bad he had no time to waste on guilt.

Yata didn't bother waiting for the signal to cross.

"So, let's say you succeed at keeping her and the rest of us," Fushimi emphasized, "under your loving, smothering protection. No one gets dead. You run yourself ragged. Then what?"

"That's my job. There's no 'then what'."
The Red King's eyes were dead set on scanning around them for any trace of her.

"Glorified babysitter is not your job, Misaki. That's not why you can shoot fire out of your goddamn hands-"

"Listen good. I'm going to find her. And you're helping me. That's the 'then what' and it's happening right now. Protecting this clan. So get used to it- got it?"

Speechless, Saruhiko Fushimi still watched in vain while his King called out to Anna, as if she'd hear her name over the street noise and come running into his arms.

It was the fact that he had been the one to run her off that bothered Yata the most.

There was something else starting to get to him: people were watching, judging. Only now they all pissed him off. They must have known who he was. No one would approach an escaped wild animal in the street, even within his own territory. No one was going to help find her. No one was going to give the new Red King the benefit of the doubt.

So the 'off' switch to his defensive mode appeared to be permanently jammed the other way.

After taking in a deep breath to call out to her again, Yata stopped himself and completely deflated.

"Just, nevermind. Let's just... call and let the guys know she's missing or whatever. She could've gone back."

"Something that should have been done four blocks ago,"Fushimi muttered to himself. But the other always managed to hear.

"I was gonna' !"

"You weren't."

"Yeah, must be my stupid pride again. You don't think I can admit I screwed up!"

"When exactly did this become about you? And quit shouting."

In the moment verbally nipping at each other was more important than noticing the next thin figure they brushed past without a second glance.

She stopped. She let them go by.

The further away she watched them carry on the less she even cared. Still, Anna took a generous moment to glare at their backs before altering her route. The little park – so small it barely qualified as a park at all – just across the street was calling to her. Promising it would be free of the presence of bratty kings and their strange consorts.

Fushimi was, naturally, the first to realize.

He'd whipped around just in time to see the tips of wispy white hair disappear around the corner of a high concrete wall.

Tch.

How finished he was with wandering around showed in way he grabbed Yata by the crease of one arm and dragged him into the street.
"You are such a distraction," he snarled, unused to missing even the most minute details.

The Red King answered with a shove and was suddenly poised to start an embarrassing scuffle in the middle of the semi-busy street. Aggressive car horns blared around them. Disregarding all else, Fushimi shouldered him off and kept after their objective. This round of chase and injured expectations could not go on.

They found her on a park bench. Legs crossed neatly. Unblinking. Unmoving.

Refusing to recognize their approach or the way Fushimi slid in next to her so casually. This kept happening. It was terribly annoying.

The young king confronted her with arms crossed, frustrated energy welling up beneath the surface. Enough to cause a few sparks. Just when he looked ready to come down on her for putting herself in danger, for making them chase after her through an unsafe part of town:

"C'mon Anna-chan. We can talk about this, right?"

Suddenly his voice took on the tonal quality of a whining puppy. The aggressive stance melted; he might as well have rolled over to show his belly.

"You won't listen."

Anna intended that last word to prick.

She wanted nothing more in that moment than to be forgotten about. Alone.

The Red King tried to straighten himself up. Only to start playing guessing games with what exactly her issue was.

"Look, I know Kusanagi must've chewed you out already for what happened last night."

Anna admitted the truth with a stubborn turn of her head. That conversation had gone over worse than this one was going.

"Not to say he shouldn't have. I mean it's reckless, don't do it again- y'know, the whole act. That's not what I'm here for," Yata fidgeted, trying his best; he wasn't used to giving these kinds of talks. If only he could just coax her back home without an interrogation session.

Maybe try to lift her up on his shoulders like 'back then', end up falling over, laughing, bruised. Anna would always forgive his clumsy transgressions.

What about now?

He faltered, "but at least we have somebody around here trying to... um..."

"Take some initiative," Saru had to help him along. He'd begun to slump a bit in his seat, arms crossed, growing bored already.

"Yeah. That," the King's proud look resurfaced, "I heard you told him what's what about us to his face. You wanted answers, you got 'em, right. That's what matters."

Fondly he reached to touch the still-dusty fur trim of the coat wrapped around her shoulders. And they witnessed the light of reassurance return to the young king's eyes, touching faith he thought had been lost to them forever.

He'd been looking for a sign that things were going the right direction. This could have been it. First he had to fix this.

Neither of the other two present seemed even remotely as enchanted as he was in the moment.

"Something like that," Anna replied. "But he has nothing to hide. I know. I have seen."

Trying to feel out the way to react, Yata visibly flinched. Munakata's potential benevolence was something he hadn't fully come to terms with yet. That was what she was asking him to understand. He had no reason to doubt her powers, her intuition.

"At least listen to what he has to say."

Fushimi countered with only a critical smile. Adorable. The Blue King's declining to take her as a bargaining chip for his own return- or for whatever reason if that wasn't enough- was no indication that the man could be trusted. Not even considering the seasoned tricks Reisi had up his sleeve for alleviating the effects of a strain's power; there was so much he could be spreading his "protective" wing over to hide.

Fushimi's former superior was the most shrewd man he'd ever come to know. And for that reason he could never truly hate Reisi Munakata.

"You really want me to go to this thing?" Yata accidentally sighed hard enough to visibly sink his chest. With Anna he always found himself trying to conceal his exhaustion, his irritability, anything negative. Only he had a tendency to it out on everything and everyone else around him.

"I don't want you to have to do anything."

Her reply came heavily loaded.

"But I am afraid."

Yata could have sworn the corners of her eyes began to water. She'd let him see and let him sense the same looming fear the Blue King had instilled in her.

"I'm sorry that I am," she added.

Fushimi tapped a restless heel, leaned back and watched the Red King bend to her will.

Yata knelt down and enveloped the elegant hands she'd settled in her lap in his own. His messy grin promised that yes, the idiot kid he'd always been was still there, still nagging him to make shitty decisions.

"D'you remember when I was gone?" With his head tilted he tried meeting her gaze kind of sideways. "Took something bigger than myself to push me back to you guys. I can't take the credit. That's really pathetic but it's true. But then I wanted to be here."

Against her better judgement, Anna grazed her thumb lightly against his roughened palm but would not look at him directly; a sign of reserved affection.

"Point is, you got it right. I need to start listening better to someone besides myself."

Neither of them could tell if he meant it, only that he was trying terribly hard. Yata was so bad at this...

"And what happens, happens. It's not like I have to let those bastards scare me into hiding."

Watching him try to sweet talk her caused Fushimi turn the other way, resting his cheek in one palm to wait out their sugary moment. So it was kind of cute... no big deal.

In spite of his objections to the young lady's plan of action he'd let them have their moment. Sweetness only went so far; once he had the young king alone there was no way he'd lose this argument to her.
There was something permanent about the soreness of afterward, the ache of want that could nail a point in like nothing else.
He would not be tried for desertion. Yata would not be handing himself over so easy. That was final.

But for now Anna was too strong of a force to be reckoned with. The way she seemed to look to the Red King as nothing less than an idiot older brother and could press him to be so gentle without saying a word. He would defend her, always.

Fushimi wondered how easily her favor could be stolen.

"But if their little coronation party's Kings-only, you're gonna' have to take care've him for me while I'm out," Yata gestured over.

He smiled his warmest at her in response to the 'I'm sitting right-fucking-here' look he knew he was receiving from behind a certain pair of glasses.

"Arrangements will be made," the strain nodded.

"That's my girl. See, there's no way we can do this without you," Yata leaned up and back on his heels, confident, "and you wanna' watch me be King, right?"

A blank stare replaced the glare Anna cast up at him. He still counted it as a win. She then removed her little notebook from the pocket of Mikoto's old jacket, slid the pen out from its holder in the binding, checked something off from one of her lists and answered, "Very well."

"I promise, ok," Yata added extraneous encouragement.

When he tried leaning in to see what else she was scribbling down, she clapped it shut. The glare returned.

"Agreed then? Yes? Yes."
Fushimi's overbearing voice shoved its way between them before the Red King could dig himself in any deeper.

Broken promises liked to end in ugly ways.

Deciding enough was enough he stood and offered a hand out to Anna, "Let's get you out of here."

After a curious flitter of her eyes she took it and let him help her up. Honestly she was as done with this as he was.

If one looked close enough they could have seen the same riled sparks of unkempt energy sizzle off the tips of the Red King's wild hair, watching his vassal apply a little gentlemanly finesse to do what he couldn't quite.
Anna wrapped her arm around the crook of Fushimi's own and played along with the escort charade.

"Are you coming?"

A rooftop corner made an excellent perch for the slinking form that watched over them. It hung its head over the edge, twitching ears, mismatched eyes aglow and trained on the three making their way home.

"Stay together, please please. And look after each other," begged the guardian shadow pacing back and forth. "Then they won't dare try to take you."