World Of Fur: Legacy of Shadows

Kira

In a small town is a certain house. The garage of the house is open and someone is currently working on restoring an old, pre war Mustang.

"Hey Kira!" Chris says, catching the attention of the person.

Without saying anything she steps away from the vehicle and turns to him.

"Chris. Good to see ya." She greets with a large smile and a hand on his shoulder.

"How'd you find my address?" Kira asks returning to her work.

"I have my connections." He replies.

"Ahhh, I see. Well then, might I ask what brings you all the way out here."

As she works Chris finds himself unable to look away from her. Something about a woman under the hood of a car appealed to him. Though to be fair, tough women in general appealed to him.

"I'm going after Eden and I'm gonna need a lot of help doing it." He tells her.

"Are these orders from higher up?"

"I don't listen to higher up. The only authority I work for is my own conscience and or whoever pays the most. Provided they don't undermine my conscience." Chris tells her.

"So your actually a mercenary." Kira comments, suddenly stopping her work.

"Mercenary slash private detective. The company I work for is dedicated to wiping out Eden as well as high level corruption." Chris explains.

"What exactly do you need me for?" She asks.

"I need specialists I can rely on."

"I'll understand if you need to think this through." He adds.

"I'll do it." She says, turning to face him once more.

"No hesitation?" He asks.

"That day on the mountain I genuinely thought you'd died." Kira says.

Chris knows what she's talking about.

She was the first person to show up looking for them. He could hear her terrified calls from some distance. And when she did find them, she was crying both tears of worry and joy. The same thing with Eve and Jill. The three of them had held him for about an hour straight that day.

"To be fair, I still have no idea how you survived unscathed like that." Kira adds.

"And I refuse to ask. You know why?" She asks him.

He shakes his head in response.

"It's because I trust you Chris. So of course I didn't hesitate. Why would I need to think this through. You told me what the mission is and I believe you. It's as simple as that." Kira explains to him.

"I see. Well, thank you Kira. Having you around is gonna make my job a lot easier." He says, smiling for the first time since the incident that killed Pressley.

"In any case. It's getting dark. Wanna stay for dinner?" Kira asks, pointing to the sky that had started turning orange.

Chris is once again reminded why you should plan your flights better. He had hoped to speak to one other person by this time. But he didn't get on the plane on time due to oversleeping a few hours.

"I'll take you up on that offer. So long as I'm not a burden that is." He responds.

"Not at all. Come on." She says, walking to the door that leads into the house.

"Aren't you gonna close tha garage?" Chris asks.

"Nah. We don't have thieves in this town. Here you'd get your ass kicked for even trying to get something without working for it." She says.

Chris can't help but think how well that explains why Kira has such outstanding work ethic.

"Ma! We have a guest for dinner!" Kira says, loud enough for the entire house to hear.

"Anyway, I'm gonna clean up. My mom will show you to the table in a moment." Kira says, before jogging up the stairs.

Looking around, Chris sees a bunch of odds and ends. Pistons, racing medals and a lot of photos. Photos that show a young Kira happy next to a man he assumes is her father.

"Martin. He was Kira's father. A great man." A woman suddenly says, as she approaches Chris.

Looking at her, Chris sees that she looks almost exactly like Kira would if you aged Kira up by about twenty years.

"You must be Kira's mother. I'm Chris, it's a pleasure to meet you." Chris introduces himself.

"Please young man, the pleasure is all mine. You may call me Agatha. If you would come with me?" Agatha says, leading Chris away.

"I never thought Kira would bring a human boy home." Agatha comments.

"You make it sound like she doesn't bring guys home at all." Chris replies.

"That too. While she has gotten many proposals, she'd never accept. So I was surprised to learn about you." Agatha explains.

"I take it she's mentioned me?" Chris asks, sitting down in the chair Agatha gestures to him to use.

"She's more than mentioned you young man. I'd even say my daughter is rather smitten with you." Agatha replies.

This causes Chris to chuckle.

When Agatha raises her eyebrow Chris explains.

"I apologize ma'am. It's just that I wasn't expecting anybody to still use the word smitten."

"I suppose that makes sense. Even among old folks like myself it isn't a word that is often used. In fact, the only reason I started using it was because it was my beloved Martin's favourite word." Agatha tells him.

Just then Kira shows up.

Together the three of them enjoy a delicious meal before Chris returns to his plane where he decides to sleep during the flight.

All the while a few things are stuck in his mind.

The first being what he should do about Kira's feelings for him.

When he was honest with himself he knew he didn't mind them. He himself didn't understand what it felt like to be in love as multiple people had described it in vastly different ways.

The second thing was whether the other girls felt the same way towards him. Excluding Eve and Jill as he was certain they did feel that way.

But despite these things confusing him he did know one thing for sure.

That he wanted them watching his back. He didn't want anyone else.

And he would never allow anybody to harm them in any way. If someone did, he'd kill them.

He'd protect them.

No matter what.