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Providence and Happenstance	By : CrystalEllinon Category: +G through L > G.I. Joe Views: 2565 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own G.I. Joe. I do not own any of the characters of G.I. Joe. I make no money from this work.

Chapter List
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The old freight elevator was, to all appearances, as decrepit as the warehouse they were standing in. All around them was splotchy cement, rusting metal, and broken glass. But when Tommy pressed the button, the elevator hissed to life. Junko eyed it doubtfully as the doors opened; the interior didn’t appear to be in much better shape than anything else around them.
            Tommy wheeled his motorcycle inside. Junko, after a long few moments, somewhat reluctantly followed. Tommy pressed the button labeled ‘basement’, and held it.
            The two thousand square foot subbasement had originally served as the secret headquarters of the man who’d once owned this warehouse. It wasn’t on any blueprints (Tommy had checked) but then, when you ran an international smuggling business it was helpful to have someplace off the grid to hide. Unfortunately for the merchant, his name had become well enough known and hated to warrant a contract being taken out on his life. A seventeen year old Thomas Arashikage had been the agent assigned to that contract.
            The location had been too good to let it go to waste, and safe hiding-holes were always a useful thing to have. Since he’d killed the previous owner, Tommy had done some redecorating. As the elevator door slid open, he heard Junko take a deep breath of surprise, and then hiss in pain.
            “Like I said.” Tommy dialed the entry code into the heavy steel door. It slid open noiselessly; he wheeled his motorcycle inside and left it there in the hall. “A safe place.”
            “Who are you?” Junko’s eyes had gone wide; she looked around at the comfortably appointed apartment in mild shock. Her eyes fixed on the living area wall, where Tommy kept a stash of extra weapons. “Are those throwing stars?”
            “Yes.” Tommy took her by the elbow and guided her towards the couch. “Sit down. I’ll get my first aid supplies and be right back.”
            One thing ninja got fairly good at was patching themselves up, at least long enough to get somewhere where the doctors didn’t ask searching questions such as “what happened?” “Could you fill out these personal history forms for our records?” or “why is there a knife blade broken off in your shin and a bullet in your shoulder?”
            Tommy’s stash of first aid equipment, therefore, was fairly extensive. When he got back to the living room, Junko was sitting on the very edge of the couch, shoulders hunched, arms wrapped around her ribs, staring blankly at the wall. It wasn’t cold in the room, but she was shivering.
            Tommy wasn’t used to comforting people. He settled for retrieving a blanket from the bedroom and draping it around her shoulders before he started inspecting her injuries. She barely reacted to the disinfectant he dabbed on her cuts, though he knew that it stung.
            “Who are you?” Her voice was quiet. “What are you?”
            She’d find out sooner or later. Tommy mentally shrugged and opted for brutal honesty. “I told you my name. I’m a ninja.”
            That at least served to shake her out of her state of shock. “What?”
            “Ninja.” Tommy applied several wound closure strips to the nasty cut on her cheekbone. “You know…silent assassin, vanishing into shadows, throwing stars. Ninja. If you want clean clothes you can borrow some of mine. The bedroom is down the hall to the right. Do you have any injuries I can’t see right now aside from your ribs?”
            “No.” She was still staring at him. “Ninja.”
            “Ninja. You wouldn’t be the first not to believe it.”
            She was quiet for a long moment, still staring at him. “No…I do believe you.” Another long silence. “Why did you save me? Really? And why are you helping me now?”
            Because he needed to be needed. He needed to help someone. He’d wanted to hurt someone, to punish someone, to save someone. Because he needed to prove to himself that he could do something right.
            “I saved you because I didn’t like the look of the men attacking you, and because I was having a bad day and needed a fight. I’m helping you now because…well, because you interest me.” Honest enough.
            “Fair enough.” She stood, somewhat stiffly. “I don’t suppose ninja have a cure for broken ribs?”
            “Just time. How bad are they?”
            She shook her head. “I don’t know. I’ve never broken ribs before; it hurts. That’s all I know.”
            “May I?” He raised an eyebrow. “I have broken ribs before. Job hazard, you might say.”
            She raised her arms in answer, wincing slightly, and let him gently probe the damage.
            “Just cracked.” He reassured her. “And bruised. You’ll be fine. Take a couple of Ibuprofen; it’ll help with the pain and the swelling from the bruises.”
            She obediently took the offered bottle and dry-swallowed three pills. “I think I want that clean clothes.” She inspected the sleeve of her bodysuit; it was torn and bloodstained. She glanced back at him. “Thank you. For everything so far. I really didn’t plan to survive the night.”
            “About that. Why did you kill Hyata?”
“Because he needed killing.” She started down the hall. “I’m probably only one of dozens who wanted him dead.”
He considered this for a moment. “So what particular crime amongst his many were you willing to sacrifice your life to get revenge for?”
            She paused, halfway down the hall. “I didn’t tell you it was revenge.”
            “I know a little about vendettas.” Tommy said shortly. “Who’d he kill?”
            Another long pause. “My mother and father. I was fourteen. I hid when he was killing my mother. After he left, I held her head in my lap and watched her die.” The look she turned on him was almost challenging. “I promised her that I’d kill him, whatever it took.”
            Ah. Yes, that made sense. That glint in her eyes…he’d known that glint. It was the look of someone who’s seen bad things, survived bad things, but come out of it all the stronger, if maybe a little battered. He saw that same glitter in the eyes of his sword brother. He saw that same glitter in the eyes of many of his former comrades-in-arms. He saw that same look in the mirror every morning.
            “I’m sorry.” It seemed the only thing to say.
            “I imagine he is too, now.” She smiled for the first time; just a little quirk at the corners of her mouth, and not a particularly nice expression, but still a smile.
            Despite the blood, and the dirt from the alley, and the bandages, he realized suddenly that she was very pretty. He’d wondered how she’d gotten so close to Hyata; suddenly that piece fell into place as well. He smiled as she vanished into his bedroom. Clever girl…if you’d been born into a clan, you’d have been a good kunoichi.
            He heard the shower running. He smiled a bit more widely; he knew, only too well, how once you were someplace safe it suddenly became important to scrub the dried blood and grime off. It always made him feel better, no matter how long and miserable a mission had been.
            When she emerged from his room an hour later, she was wearing a pair of his sweatpants and a tee shirt. Both were far too big for her. Damp hair was piled haphazardly on top of her head and secured with a pencil. She was still moving stiffly, but she seemed to have regained a measure of composure.
            “Hungry?” Tommy nodded towards the tiny kitchenette. “I can cook if you’d like. Or don’t you feel like food?” He raised an eyebrow. “You’d never killed anyone before. How are you doing?”
            She raised her chin slightly and looked him dead in the eyes. “You know, I keep seeing his face, and I can still feel my knife going in.” She smiled slightly, that same mirthless little half-smile. “I think I shall treasure that memory forever. I’m starving.”
Tommy’s eyebrows crept a bit higher. “No regrets at all? You just killed…” He thought back. “…four men.”
“All of them deserved to die.” Her voice was flat. “And those last three would have killed me if I’d not killed them. Should I feel guilty? You killed more men than I did. Do you feel guilt?”
“No.” Tommy shrugged. “But I’m…well, let’s just say I’ve had a lot of practice. After a while you go numb to it. But the first time…well, that’s the one you remember.”
“And did you hate your first target? Did you see his face in your nightmares every night for five years and imagine his death a thousand times”
“No.” No, that honor was reserved for another man. Tommy still had a split second of pure Pavlovian panic response whenever he saw a monocle.
“There you go, then.” This seemed to settle the matter as far as she was concerned.
“Fair enough.”
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Providence and Happenstance