This was not the response his mugger had been expecting.

“Drop it.”

When Kit bent, the man shook his head. “Drop it,” he said.

The fake Rolex hit the dirt with a thud, then bounced against the railings of the graveyard to become lost in darkness.

“Now your wallet.”

Extracting a small leather billfold, Kit flipped it open, peered inside, and shrugged. Fifty thousand yen. About the price of a good meal in Akasaka, a week’s heroin, or a proper service for his bike. Hardly worth getting killed over.

“No,” said the man, when Kit got ready to drop it. “Hand the thing to me.”

Kit did as he was told.

His mugger was openly sneering now.

“And the rest.”

Kit began to search his own pockets. Nothing but keys to the bar and a handful of coins, mostly 500-yen coins or lower. It was only when he dipped his hand into the inside pocket of his wax jacket that Kit hesitated, although he imagined the expression on his face was surprise.

“Come on…”

“It’s just a postcard.”

“I don’t care,” said the man.

I always thought this is where we’d both end up. How wrong can one girl be? Signed with a heart, which was really just an M for Mary with the first and last downstroke squeezed together. If her card had sentimental value, how come he hadn’t answered the thing?

Dear Kit, it probably seems a long time ago now…

She’d got that right.

“Come on,” said the man.

“I’m late,” Kit said.

The man stared at him.

“You’ve already got my wallet. And my watch. What difference can a postcard make?” Quite why it mattered to Kit was hard to say. Although, from the mugger’s scowl it obviously mattered that Kit was refusing to do as he was told.

“Afraid?” the man demanded.

This was when Kit realised he was shivering. “Drugs,” said Kit, so matter of factly the man actually flushed.

“Fuck that,” said the mugger, raising his gun. “This should cure you.”

And just as Kit decided that perhaps it wasn’t worth dying for a black and white card of Amsterdam, his world exploded into a hurricane of white lace and scarlet silk, the mugger’s shot going wide as the cos-play spun between Kit and the firing gun, knocking it aside. Silver hair shook free and an ivory hair pin punched home, freezing a facial nerve as it ruptured the mugger’s eardrum and entered his brain.

As Kit watched, the homeless man sank to his knees and tipped forward, coming to rest with his head against the railings. The last thing he did was stare at the cos-play who’d dropped to a crouch beside him.

“Too slow,” she told him. “Way too slow.”

“What have you done?” said Kit.

“Spiked him,” she said. “Simple, neat, and looks to the untrained eye like a simple aneurysm.”

“What about that?” said Kit, nodding to the juggling knife now sticking from the man’s ribs.

“Oh shit,” she said. “Overkill…I’m Lady Neku,” she added, before executing a small bow and offering her hand. When Kit shook, he couldn’t help noticing that her fingers were sticky.

“You all right?” asked Neku.

“Drugs.” He said it without thinking. “I’ve got a…” Kit looked at the dead body, and then from the cos-play to the black cat who’d just appeared behind her. “Is this for real?” he said. “I mean, is any of this happening?”

Neku shrugged. “It’s as real as anything else on this planet.”

When Kit looked again the girl was gone and so was her cat. The body, however, was very definitely still there.

“Oh fuck,” said Kit, a fairly useless thing to say.

Picking up his watch, Kit threaded his wrist through its metal strap and managed to click the catch on his third attempt. It was ten minutes after midnight, which meant it was actually fifteen, because the watch could be guaranteed to lose five minutes in a day. Apart from a splatter pattern, his wallet looked fine, so Kit pocketed that too, having first wiped it on the dead man’s jacket.

If this was shock…

A hot night wind, a dead body, and the shakes.

I should call the police, thought Kit, only what would he say? I was about to be shot when a cos-play saved me. No, I don’t know why. Actually, he didn’t know why he had been getting mugged either. His clothes were cheap, his fake Rolex out of sight, and there had to be better targets out there.

He’d seen bodies before, of course. Watched the living die through the cross-hairs of a sniper rifle, each hit walled off in an area of his mind Kit no longer visited. Before that there was Josh, looking neater than he’d ever looked when alive, hair combed and shoes shined, wearing a tweed jacket he’d have hated.

Getting mugged, that was also shocking. And yet, it was the ease with which the cos-play turned the homeless man to meat…A spike through the ear and a blade to his side, before victim or Kit even knew it had happened.

That was the real shock.

He should leave before someone saw him standing next to a body and called the police anyway. In the time it took Kit to think this, he put a dozen paces between himself and the dead man, only to turn back. Had the girl been wearing gloves? Most cos-play-zoku did. Long black gloves that went up to their elbows, white-lace mittens, or some atrocity of chain mail and steel. What if her gloves had been fingerless? Some of the kids wore those. She’d have left fingerprints.

The drunken conversation Kit had with himself halted him on the edge of flight. In the end he went back, if only because if he decided to leave he’d waste more time frozen to the spot, worrying it was the wrong choice.

Kit knew himself well.

Trying to look as if he’d only just stumbled over the body, Kit touched a hand to the man’s throat and then reached for the knife, but it refused to move. Eventually he remembered to twist its handle and the blade slid free with a sucking sound.

“Nouveau-san…”

Kit turned at his name and found himself staring into the worried eyes of Mr. Ito, who still carried his rickety home-made brush. The man bowed and, after a second, Kit remembered his own manners and bowed back.

Sweeping the cemetery might actually be Mr. Ito’s job. Although it seemed more likely that the old man did it from respect or out of love for his dead wife. Whichever, he was there most hours of the day, dressed in a traditional jacket and wearing wooden clogs that were down at the heel.

“A thief,” said Kit.

The old man looked at the corpse.

“I didn’t kill him,” Kit added, wanting to make this clear. The old man glanced from the dead mugger to the thin blade in Kit’s hand.

“It was someone else,” said Kit.

“Ahh.” The man nodded, something clicking into place behind his eyes. “It was someone else. I understand.”

“It was someone else.”

“Hai.” A little bow. “Yes, I understand. Someone else.” Glancing anxiously at the blade in Kit’s hand, he asked, “Did I see this someone?”

Kit sighed. “I’m going now,” he said. “You might want to call the police.”

The man thought about that. “Might I?” he asked finally. “Only they were here again…” He paused. “Apparently, I didn’t see them either.”