Afterwards: The Fourth Tekken Novel

Mulling and Informing

Harper was this close to swapping her meal with Steve's and it was a good thing that the two of them returned. Steve quickly pulled his plate towards him with a frown on his face and started eating.
"What's that?" Harper asked, looking very interested with a smirk on her face. "Looks good."
"Your grilled salmon looks better than my Parmesan chicken," Steve quickly countered. "You love fish, don't you?"
Harper shrugged. "Well, I do... but..." she grinned. "Your chicken looks pretty good too."
Steve sighed. "You wanna try some?"
Harper nodded gleefully. "Don't mind if I do."
The same time she dove into his chicken, he dove into her salmon. The rest watched in amusement.
"Can we switch?" Harper asked hopefully.
Steve gladly did since the salmon was pretty good too  served with a special sauce. Besides, it was more expensive than the chicken too and it was his turn to pay anyway.
Jacob smirked, shaking his head. "The two of you are the exact same."
"Like this guy," Nina pointed her thumb at her husband.
Adam cluelessly looked up from his salmon. "Hmm?"
"Same meal," Nina added, pointing at him and then at Steve.
"Wait, I thought Steve ordered chicken?" Adam frowned, confused.
Nina sighed. "And to even think that you were in focus."
Adam sighed. "What happened? I turn my attention to my meal for one minute and stuff happens."
"Your mum exchanged with him," Jacob said, pointing at Harper and then at Steve. "And you didn't even notice."
"I was more interested in my meal than anything else," Adam added. "Anyway, what do you guys want for lunch tomorrow? Wanna cook something, or wanna eat out?"
"We've been eating out for the whole week now," Nina groaned. "Let's make something. Maybe I can whip up an apple pie?"
"In that case, I'll work on making a mushroom casserole!" Adam added excitedly. "How's that sound?"
Steve smirked, his mouth watering slightly. "Sounds great. How can I help?"
"Well, maybe you can help me skin and slice the apples," Nina stated.
It was funny how they were discussing tomorrow's lunch over dinner instead of focusing on their current meal.

Heihachi bade them farewell and got into his car again. His driver was still on holiday so he had to do the driving by himself. Which he surprisingly didn't mind as much as he thought he would.
It felt good drinking with Kazuya and his family, they all had a good time together. They were a happy family, the five of them, and he wished that nothing would change the way they were.
He drove back to his beach house and sat in the living room in silence. The humidifier glowed light blue, emanating the beautiful scent of jasmine flowers as he sat. He already bought the large humidifier that Jin recommended him to get, but it was yet to arrive, so Heihachi was stuck with this for the time being.
'What now?' Heihachi thought to himself as he stared at the vast living room before him.
The holiday was over, him and Kazuya had made peace. So what was expected of him now? Just stay away from the family now that he was on good terms with them? Or show up every now and then to keep ties with them?
Heihachi didn't know which was the better of the two options. They both seemed strange in their own ways. In many ways too.
But then he remembered that he was planning that party. But then Jin and Lars were probably busy after getting home, Steve was still probably on his way home too. Heihachi decided to make out a rough plan to show them tomorrow.
Though he only started on that after a nice hot bath.

Shasha watched as Anna amiably talked and laughed over dinner. She and Lee declined the others' offer to have dinner together at La Poisson since they weren't in the mood for outside food after days of eating out.
"I miss this," Anna sighed as she ate the five-star meal prepared by Lee's chef. "Why eat out when we have glorious food at home?"
Lee chuckled. "We have the best at home."
Shasha almost felt like she wasn't supposed to be here, almost as if she was betraying them in some way because of what she knew. She sighed and poked at her sliced potatoes, unsure of who she should inform of it.
"You alright?" Anna asked, touching he hand.
Shasha quickly nodded. "Yeah, I'm just tired." She sighed. "Can't believe that Chigasaki went by so fast."
"Oh, tell me about it," Lee piped up. "And to think that all of us were unnecessarily worried about it too."
Anna snorted. "I like how we outright rejected the idea of letting Heihachi ride with us."
"And how you guys outright pushed me to ride with him," Shasha added.
Lee shrugged. "Because you're the only one who doesn't have a history with him."
Shasha groaned. "You know full well that I know most of the bad stuff the old version had done."
"Yeah, she's right," Anna nodded. "It's hard to not know about all of that when hanging with us."
"At least she didn't have to hang with him," Lee added. He turned to Shasha with a smirk. "At least this version is a lot easier to approach. You'd just feel like punching the crap out of the old one."
"Yeah, I get that feeling too," Shasha nodded in agreement.
As soon as dinner was over, Shasha turned into her room and quickly called Jun. She hoped that she was done with dinner and was just lounging about at home.
"Hello, Shasha," Jun greeted as soon as she answered.
Shasha felt a rush of relief as soon as she heard the older woman's voice. "Auntie, there's something I need to tell you."
"Oh, what is it?" Jun sounded light-hearted.
Shasha took a deep breath and told her everything about the older woman who called her just hours earlier. Jun listened in silence and when she was done, Shasha patiently waited for her reaction.
"Does... does Lee know about this?" Jun quietly asked after a moment of utter silence on both ends. "Did you tell him about this."
"No, I haven't," Shasha sighed. "I didn't know who to tell. I asked my mom about this as well and she advised me to tell you or Jin."
Jun took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "I need to get the rest. This is some big news, Shasha. You need tell Lee about this, okay? Pull him aside and tell him about it. Maybe it's best Anna doesn't know about this yet. Alright?"
Shasha nodded, releasing a ragged breath as she realised that she would have to approach Lee now. "Okay. I'll go talk to him now."
"Okay," Jun said. "Also, don't worry about it too much, okay? None of this is your fault, you did your part in this. It's time we get involved as well."
"Thanks, Auntie," Shasha sighed in relief. "It feels so good to finally tell someone about it."
Jun chuckled. "Poor girl, you must've been mulling over this all by yourself for weeks! It's okay, Shasha. I'm sure everything will turn out fine. Don't worry about this."
"Alright," Shasha smiled to herself. "I'll see you soon."
"Goodnight," Jun said. "I'll tell the rest about this."
Shasha hung up and stared at the vanity table for a moment, briefly admiring the carved mahogany, then went out of the room and rushed downstairs. She spotted Lee at the television, Anna nowhere about, and sat down on the armchair.
"Where's Anna?" Shasha asked.
"Taking a nice long bubble bath," Lee said, flipping through the list of movies and TV shows. "What about you? You seem like you wanna ask me something." He turned to look at her with a knowing smirk.
Shasha sighed. "Well, I do."
"Then, tell me," Lee chuckled. "What is it?"