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All in all, Kenshin supposed he kind of deserved that punch.

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“So, this Kaoru chick’s a friend of yours, huh?”

“Patient,” Megumi corrected frostily, doing her best to look irritated at the intrusion of the two armed soldiers in her clinic.  It wasn’t hard.  Kaoru’s reckless actions combined with Sagara Sanosuke’s abject stupidity meant her patience was already stretched to breaking point.  She tapped her fingernails on the small table and kept her gaze fixed resolutely on the two of them so she wouldn’t have to look at the blood stains still left behind by her emergency work on Sano’s hand.

He’s probably ruined it already.  The thought added an extra edge to her scowl.

 
( Early Afternoon, Lesser Tokyo, Chinatown )

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All in all, it had been a rather unproductive morning.

The street was a mess.  The lanterns had come down entirely now, torn apart and crunched underfoot by rioters.  It had been a riot, in the end – far outstripping the earlier fighting, the chaos had encompassed the entirety of the street and begun spilling over into other blocks.  Kamiya Kaoru’s dramatic entrance into Chinatown at sunrise had apparently caused many old grudges to simmer anew, coming to a head when Himura Kenshin became an unwitting catalyst for the growing tension.  Just why Himura had caused such an outcry was something that bore looking into – but for now, Soujiro was otherwise occupied.

( Early Afternoon, Lesser Tokyo, Chinatown )

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He came skidding around the corner of the alleyway and straight into a crowd, and fought to keep his grip on Kaoru with sweaty fingers.  His right hand was still numb, but even Sano knew he was using it in a way that was going to be seriously bad once the painkillers wore off.  He didn’t have much choice.  Just had to hope he was strong enough to keep on running until they were all safe.

The street was a blur of faces both curious and uncaring, flickering strangely under the dim orange light given off from the gently waving Chinese lanterns above them.  The middle of the day and they were still in use; wasn’t it pointless?  Sano blinked and tried to focus, ploughing through people roughly, ignoring the shouts and insults as he upset carts and toddlers and couples in his mad dash through the street, weaving his way around the vendor stalls.  Not like he had time to stop and be polite; the suits wouldn’t fire into a crowd, but they’d still be able to run him down. 

( Noon, Lesser Tokyo, Chinatown )

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Kaoru wasn’t easy to carry.  Megumi hadn’t time to do anything about his back, and hugging her to his chest was causing the blistered skin to pull and tug painfully.  God knew what hauling her through the streets was going to do to Sano’s hand.  It was something he wasn’t going to think about.  Wasn’t much point. 

If he didn’t get them out of there, he wouldn’t be alive long enough to worry about it.  He might get out of here in one piece without Kaoru, but that was also something that he didn’t need to dwell on. 

Leaving her just wasn’t an option. 

( Late Morning, Lesser Tokyo, Chinatown )

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Sano was exhausted by the time he made it to Chinatown.  Bad enough that some psycho kid had rammed a knife through his hand, but he was beginning to think the explosion had done more than just crispy-fry his back.  Come to think of it, the grenade had pretty much sucker punched him down the stairs.  He was aching all over, muscles in his shoulders and arms stiff to the point of making him cringe every time he put out his good hand to keep his balance.  The hangover still lurking in his system wasn’t helping, either.  Some bed rest would be nice. 

He passed the adult vid store and turned right, weaving down the narrow alley way and doing his best not to trip over the homeless guy by the dumpster now staring at him with interest.  The tattered jacket wadded around his hand was soaked through and he felt light headed enough that he knew he’d lost a little too much blood.  Well, Megumi would take care of him.  She’d done it before.  This was just another Sano visit, needing another patch job after a fight.  Nothing out of the ordinary.  Certainly nothing to scream at him over.

Right?

( Late Morning, Lesser Tokyo, Undisclosed Surgery )

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The line between netrunner and programmer was often smudged, but it was there.  Kenshin could open himself a straight passage between the outer shell of Sumitomo and its inner core and create any number of programs like magic tricks.   Protection of the system was a programmer’s specialty. It was their job to understand the ins and outs of the netrunner trade, whereas the specialty of the netrunner was the theft and sale of information.  Of any kind.  There were hackers that specialized in collecting things as trivial as electronic purchase receipts because someone, somewhere, would eventually find it useful. 

( Morning, Restricted Net Address )

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“Are you sure you should be doing this?”

“No.”

Kenshin settled into the metal-backed chair and relaxed against the headrest, pausing long enough to smile at the coffee girl and place his order.  Inside the delicately ordered café, he felt at ease enough to shake the hood from his hair.  The windows were tinted glass, not to mention bulletproof, and even if someone from their earlier days should try to come inside, the bouncer at the door would be both armed and armoured enough to stop him.    The owners took their safe and sterile environment quite seriously. 

Net cafes had come a long way in twenty years.

 
( Morning, Lesser Tokyo, Kimiko's Eat And Run )