Author's Note on Chapter 4:

The first part was mainly written a long time ago, but I revised it just now, and I am much more satisfied with it now. The rest is pretty fresh out of my mind. Finishing Dangerously in Love has given me new inspiration.

In a previous chapter I had mentioned the reward in "Dollar", which doesn't make any sense, now that I think about it. Nina's from Ireland so I thought that maybe British pound would be something she could relate to. The problem with the Euro is, that she has probably left Ireland before they got the Euro, so she isn't really familiar with it. I will ignore that for now and whenever Nina is speaking of huge sums of money, it will be either in Yen or in Euro. At the moment 1 Euro is approximately 1.2 US Dollar or 0,7 Pounds.

I will mention a few background details, they might not fit in with the Tekken story you know, that's because I am ignoring the T4 ending. I started the story before it became public and I cannot fit the results in. ( - so we are in an alternate universe, one could say - ) I also have a clear idea of what happened in the past, at the 2nd tournament, which I will describe in a T2 story I am currently writing in German. I might translate it someday, if people are interested, or I will give you some details, if you ask me personally.

---

Chapter 4

It was 11 o'clock when Nina was sitting in front of her bosses' office waiting to be let in. She had informed him already that she had failed to kill Kazuya Mishima, but that she was willing to try again.

The door opened and his secretary came out, throwing Nina arrogant glances that seemed to say 'You bitch.'

"Miss Williams? He will see you now."

Nina was led inside. When she entered the office, her boss looked up from the desk.

"Nina. Please sit down." He gestured towards a chair in front of his desk and then added, pointing at an opened envelope lying on top, "This guy has some nerves."

Nina recognized the Mishima Zaibatsu Logo.

"Came in an hour ago, straight from the Mishima Office."

"What is it?" Nina asked confused. "Is he offering us money to kill whoever wanted to kill him?"

"Worse. He has sent us a bill."

"A bill?"

"New waterbed, new wooden floor, new carpet, new wallpaper and god knows what, all adding up to the extremely exaggerated amount of 5 Million yen."

"What?"

"That was my reaction. Get him out of the way!" he cursed. "Our client has raised the reward to 600 Million Yen and I add another 10 Million to that. This has gotten personal."

Nina nodded. She started to like Kazuya. With his tendency to make enemies everywhere, he was giving Nina the possibility to earn more money than she could ever have imagined. She went over the amount mentioned, in her head. 610 Million Yen… Even after living in Japan for some time, she still had the tendency to convert it to something she was familiar with. That was… over five and a half Million Euro…Thank you Kazuya.

"But you won't be working alone," her boss interrupted her thoughts.

"I never work with a partner…" Nina quickly threw in.

"That's not quite what I meant. This job is now open to everybody within the agency. It is your choice to work alone or in teams. Whoever gets the job done will get the reward."

"I don't like this at all. They will get in each other's way and get killed. Mishima is not an easy target."

"One can tell from the amount offered on his head."

---

Despite all safety measures, getting in to the building had been quite easy. He had hidden in a catering delivery van, which had gotten him into the underground car park of the Mishima Zaibatsu. When the car had stopped and the driver had come to the back he had knocked him out and pulled him inside, where he had changed into the other man's clothes. Now dressed like a caterer and equipped with his security card it was possible to use the maintenance lift and get up to the 83rd Floor where a small cafeteria for executives was located. Having arrived there safely and unnoticed, he made his way to the men's bathroom. He made sure that no one was around before he walked in and checked out the area for any ways to get into the ventilation shafts. But there was nothing here. However easy it had been to get up here, the upper floor was shielded very well. No one without the proper authorisation could use one of the main lifts to get up to the 84th and the maintenance lift ended on the 83rd floor.

'The maintenance lift… maybe there I'll find a way to get into the lift shaft.'

Ryoichi had done this kind of job plenty of times before, but never had it been this easy to get so close so fast. He felt that the last bit would keep him busy for a while, even before he encountered all the problems.

When he returned to the maintenance lift, it had gone back down. He swiped his access card through the card reader, but nothing happened. The lights of the lift-buttons stayed out. He pressed the button again, but nothing happened. He peaked at the display overhead. It indicated that the lift was on the 6th floor. Minutes later still nothing had happened and Ryoichi decided to try to get to another maintenance lift.

On his way through the halls, he almost ran into people twice; one time he had just passed the bathroom and was able to hide there; the second time he quickly turned a corner and was glad when the person walked into the other direction. He feared that someone might recognize, that he didn't belong here. Not everybody was allowed on the 83rd floor and he had been glad to steal an access card that would get him here.

The other lift arrived almost at once, but his hopes that he could get into the lift shaft through it were shattered at once. There was no hatch or ceiling panel that could be removed.

---

Nina sat in her BMW Z3, which was parked in front of the massive office building of the Mishima Zaibatsu. She was surveying the area. A bandanna covered her hair and a pair of sunglasses shielded her eyes from the midday sun. She didn't have to bother about being recognized. Contrary to the other assassins she was known by her target, but she didn't see it as a disadvantage. She knew him personally, she knew his weaknesses and he had few. Every bit of insight was useful.

Irritated she glanced at her watch. 'Wasn't it time for him to go out for lunch?' Nothing was happening at the main entrance. Nina thought about her options. She wasn't too enthusiastic about the idea of infiltrating the skyscraper. 84 floors and she'd have to reach the top one. Admittedly, Kazuya had kind of challenged her with his arrogant comments concerning the safety the evening before, but still, she wanted only him and she'd get him without setting a foot into this ridiculously oversized building.

---

Kazuya put down the phone and looked at his watch. His empty stomach told him it was lunchtime, but his busy schedule told him otherwise. He looked at his computer screen to see what had to be done and then decided that he couldn't continue without eating something first.

"I'll be going out for lunch," he said to his secretary, when he left his front office towards the hall.

He strode along the carpeted corridor, heading straight towards the main lift, when his phone bleeped. He grabbed into the pocket of his coat to pull it out. It was a memo.

'8 pm, Italian Restaurant, Jin'

"Damn. I had almost forgotten about it."

Recently Kazuya was trying to for a relationship with his son.

At first he hadn't realised, what he had lost, when the family broke apart. Yes, Heihachi was a mean bastard and Lee could be a pest, but he had come to realise, that he missed his step-brother. Their relationship, however, was effectively damaged, since Lee had betrayed him and helped Heihachi at the second tournament.

Jun had been killed by Ogre, before Kazuya had been brought back to life…

Jin was the only one left, and it was the same for the boy. They only had each other.

At least they were on speaking terms now. At the fourth Tournament Jin had wanted to kill his father, end the cursed bloodline. But when he had been captured by Heihachi, it was Kazuya who saved him. It had taken him enormous will power to overcome devil, who wanted to kill the boy, but he had done it… for Jun.

Jin had left the tournament without speaking to him, but Kazuya had called him numerous times, and finally Jin had agreed to a meeting on neutral ground.

Kazuya hurried on towards the lift. He didn't have much time to waste, standing in the hall. He swiped his card through the card reader and one of the currently unoccupied lifts immediately made his way up to the executive floor. Kazuya stepped inside and pressed the button for the underground car park. A red light in the display indicated that the lift was in 'high priority mode', which meant, that it wouldn't stop on the way down.

When Kazuya got out, he pressed a button, setting the lift back to normal mode. He hurried towards his car.

---

Nina was about to doze off in the sun, when the barrier of the car park opened and a red sports car raced up the ramp and onto the street. She sat up. Only one person working in the building was able to afford such a car. She started the engine of her car and set out to follow. The other driver wasn't paying much attention to any speed limits, so she had trouble keeping up.