When Nagisa left her in the interrogation room with with Sara, Ushio completely ignored her, fiddling with the holes at the rim of her shirt. Then her hand drifted to the scarf on her neck. It was so warm... And fluffy. She'd told herself more than once she'd give it back whenever she could, but the more she held on to it, the more she didn't want to surrender it's fluffiness.

  "Hey Ushio..." The ice haired lady returned, snapping her from her thoughts.

  "Anything?" Sara asked and she shook her head. Then she faced Ushio again.

  "We can't keep her until we find something. She's not a criminal."

  "We don't know that."

  "Sara!" Her friend snapped as Ushio looked on.

Strangely, she didn't feel offended.

Sara scratched her head, "We could put her in foster car—"

  "–NO!" Ushio yelled, gaining their attention. Images spun in her head of unpleasant memories she'd grown to associate that word with. They were blurry, but unpleasant either way. She didn't like that word. Not one bit. She hated it. Despised it.

Loathed it.

Both adults let out sighs, realising this would be a bit harder than they thought. There was a silence, and then Sara snapped her figures like she'd just had a eureka moment.

  "Nagisa you have a big house yes?"

  "Yes, plus I just came from a six hour long flight across the timezones. Yes, meaning jet lag, which is why I wanted to receive calls for work all day today."

  "Geez, no need for sarcasm."

  "All I wanted was a nap. Is one little nap too much to ask for?"

  "You can get your nap when we figure out how to handle this." She didn't point at her, but even a moron could figure out that Sara message Ushio.

  "Okay look!" Nagisa exclaimed, the sleep deprivation hitting her heard, "I will take her with me, while you talk to the chief and get the other effort inducing things done."

  "You'll take her with you?"

She pointed at herself, "I will take her home with me, okay? Home. With me. I don't care much what you do with the formalities, so long as you leave me to take my damned nap in peace!"

Sara grinned at her friend in a way that, Ushio thought, said she had called her friend knowing they'd end up in this situation.

Sneaky witch... Ushio thought calmly.

And just like that, Ushio found herself walking down the streets next to a sleep deprived woman, heading goodness knows where.

They rounded a corner in a neighborhood of semi modern houses. They passed at least three other houses before stopping in front of a two story house, and Nagisa let out a groan.

  "Urrgh... I forgot to do shopping..." She sighed and reached for her keys, "Why is it always me?"

  "Someone's in the house." Ushio said abruptly, bringing Nagisa out of her complaining trance. They both looked at the door, and sure enough, it was slightly open. Nagisa immediately pulled out a small blade from the long sleeves of her shirt and stalked to the door, Ushio following lazily behind.

  "Ms. Sabito, you're back!" a voice from behind called.

  "HECK!" Nagisa shrieked when she almost stabbed the woman. She flicked her wrist and the blade disappeared up her sleeve again, "Mrs. Fukisawa what are you doing? I almost hurt you."

Ushio looked at the lady next to them, in her early forties maybe, with pale blond hair that had streaks of silver.  Crinkles around her eyes formed as she held up her gloves hands and smiled.

  "I heard you came back from your trip and was coming over with a little homecoming curry, but you were gone... and you left the house open." The ice haired lady palmed her forehead at her carelessness, "Quite a mess in there, so I took the liberty to clean it up. You know I can't resist a good clean."

Nagisa chuckled nervously, "Thank you so much. You have saved me, quite the trouble—"

  "—Good Lord! Who is this pretty little lady?"

Ushio blinked as Mrs. Fukisawa pointed a gloved finger at her.

Pretty...? Little... lady?

  "Oh, this is Ushio—"

  "—A housemate?"

  "...Something like that..."

  "Dammit Nagi-chan! Look at her!" The lady yelled, surprising Nagisa and Ushio both, "You need to take better care of your guests! Both of you, upstairs for a bath, NOW!"

  "Yes ma'am..." Ushio found herself meeping warily with Nagisa in unison.

☆ﾟ.*･｡ﾟ☆ﾟ.*･｡ﾟ☆ﾟ.*･｡ﾟ☆ﾟ.*･｡ﾟ

  "She's... interesting."

Ushio sat on a stool in the bath while Nagisa waged war on the knots and tangles in her hair. The shampoo and bubbles trickled down her head and into her face. She cupped a handful and blew at them, fascinated at some that floated while others sank.

  "How long have you known her?" She asked.

Nagisa sighed, "As long as I can remember... She practically raised me and my sister."

  "Where's your sister?"

  "She's... not around."

She finished with the last of the tangles and picked up a wooden bucket of water.

  "Close your eyes."

Ushio just barely missed the murderous soap as water came crashing down on her head. Her hair, all cold and wet now, clung to her sides and pooled on the floor. Nagisa picked up the wet mass of black.

Wow. She thought, it's way longer than I expected.

She sank into the bath, leaning on the edge, and watched as Ushio scrubbed herself down. Kaleidoscope eyes blank, the more she scrubbed, the more dirt washed off, and more Nagisa saw how pale her skin was. But she couldn't really see her arms and legs. The kid was bathing with the bandages on.

And there's that damn headpiece. The whole point of bathing is to get clean everywhere you know... She thought.

She shook her head and stood up, "I'm going to find you some fresh clothes. The old lady will kill us if we don't get out soon, so don't take too long okay?"

Ushio dumped another bucket of water on her head, seeming not to have heard anything. Nagisa rolled her eyes and sighed.

Nevermind.

She got dressed and headed downstairs, where she found Mrs. Fukisawa fussing over how she would've kept the house sanitary if Nagisa had left her the keys.

  "—and another thing!" She added as Nagisa massaged her temples, "The food in your fridge is barely edible, most of it expired! If you're going to leave for nearly a year, then have someone look after the house! Who knows what you would've fed that poor girl upstairs!"

Nagisa groaned, "I didn't mean to be gone for a year..."

  "But you were anyway!" a spoon was flicked at her head, making pull her hands up protectively, "What on earth were you doing in foreign lands anyway? What kind of mission was it this time?"

The personal kind. You know, where I make some life changing choices that I know I'll regret in the not so distant future...

  "It's classified." She muttered as she rubbed the back of her neck.

  "Your entire fridge is about to become classified." Mrs. Fukisawa snapped back, "What kind of hero work do you do, always snooping around, putting yourself in danger without being able to tell a single soul? That's why I left hero work to people who had the time for such, where as I—"

Nagisa was not mentally prepared to start listening to the old lady's life story on how she chose cleaning over hero work.

  "I will go and buy more groceries to get you to stop talking!" She offered, "Fair enough?"

  "Your tired butt better not buy anymore expired food." was the reply she got as she walked out the door.

So much for her nap.

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A/N: there marks the end of the first three chapters. I will be doing these author notes every three chapters if necessary. Kelo, I hope you're happy with  me finally getting round to posting the fanfic and I hope everyone else enjoys it too.

Read, comment, vote and enjoy!