Shinju watched as Kay approached Kisame. She had hacked into the police department's CCTV and was monitoring it all.

Her program was rerouting emergency calls to a call center in Kirigakure which was creating havoc for the City and Kirigakure as they tried to sort out where exactly the crimes and pleas for help were coming from.

Shinju cringed slightly as Kisame's brains spattered all over his computer and she watched as Kay emotionlessly used his thumb to access his mainframe. She was in.

A few key strokes and all the information was being transferred to her. And through her, to Mother. The organization was wiped from the City's archives, including everything Itachi had managed to coax out of other Nations. The CCTV footage around the City was wiped clean. There would be no video surveillance evidence against them. They were like ghosts; rumoured to exist but no evidence of them doing so.

A bitter laugh escaped her lips. How amusing that they were now being hunted by the Uchiha's as well as the City. It seemed everyone wanted them dead. But that was one of the thrilling parts of the job: outsmarting and outmaneuvering her opponents. A sick game of chess.

She watched and silently hurried the transfers to finish. When they did, she communicated to Kay and began shutting down the City.

A sleek black sedan barrelled its way through the streets. Kakuzu was behind the wheel and he was determined to find her. That demon woman who he couldn't escape. She was his poison and he wanted more. She brought him close to death and he had never felt more alive.

"Chief! All power gone! All comm-" the broadcast shut off suddenly.

"What the fuck?!" Kakuzu growled, slamming his now useless radio against the car's dash. He tossed the broken pieces to the floor and gripped the steering wheel. Following the smoke from his destroyed headquarters he soon arrived at the scene.

Police, fire crews, rescue workers all milled around the site trying to find survivors and rescue them from the wreckage. The hiss of steam as the water hit the superheated flames mixed with the cacophony of sirens.

Kakuzu grabbed the shoulder of a rescue worker. "Any survivors?" He asked. The man's somber head shake told him all he needed to know. Turning slightly he watched as two rescue workers carried out a body under a white sheet. Where his head was the cloth was soaked in blood. Initially Kakuzu dismissed the body, thinking it was just another dead cop, until the workers nearly dropped the transfer board, the jolt causing a blue arm to limply hang off the edge.

Kakuzu's eyes narrowed. He strode over to the body. Reaching it he beckoned for the workers to stop and they waited to see what he would do.

Reaching out, he gently laid Kisame's arm beside his body and lifted the sheet to see his former colleague. Kakuzu's eyes narrowed and he grit his teeth before dropping the sheet back onto Kisame's face and turning away.

First Hidan and now Kisame. Kami knew where Itachi was. Rubbing his face in impotent rage, Kakuzu accepted that the rest of his colleagues were now dead. Or missing in action which is worse than being dead.

A rookie jogged up to him. "What?" The tanned man snarled. Swallowing his fear, the rookie reported that a suspicious figure had been seen on the roof of the Council building.

Without a word Kakuzu headed to his car, slid in and with a screech of the tires and a thick wall of smoke, headed to the Council building, a disused former government building.

Shinju was engrossed in wiping her laptop of any pertinent information should it be found or taken from her. To the layperson, when opened, would look like a regular laptop bought at an electronics store. All her programs were gone and all back doors were closed.

She grabbed the small antennae that she was using to boost her signal and began breaking it into small and useless pieces. Should someone try to repair it it would never work.

She was so engrossed in this task that she failed to sense Kakuzu walking across the rooftop towards her.

"How did I know you'd be here?" A familiar deep voice asked.

Her breath caught in her throat and she froze for a second before continuing her task. She didn't reply to him.

"ANSWER ME!" Kakuzu yelled, drawing his service weapon and pointing it at her.

Shinju raised her arms and slowly stood to her feet. Her computer and the broken pieces of the antennae were left at her feet.

"Think about what you are doing" she calmly told the angered man.

"Think?! I KNOW what you've been doing! I KNOW you and your friends are behind this! We have the proof and you will face society to answer for your crimes!"

Shinju laughed. She couldn't help it. Perhaps it was the tension of the moment. Perhaps she found his statement genuinely amusing.

"You had proof and now it's gone," she smiled, catching some ash flakes on her hand and smearing it on her fingers to prove her point.

Kakuzu growled deep in his throat and hardened his stance, his weapon still pointed at her. "Why did you do this?! You owe me that at least!"

Shinju backed up, taking small steps backwards, until the back of her feet found the edge of the concrete abutment. Kakuzu advanced with her, not letting her out of his sight.

"I did it because Mother ordered it" came the casual, almost flippant, reply.

Gripping his gun tightly in his hand Kakuzu demanded to know who Mother was. Shrugging, Shinju answered the only way she knew how: "Mother is everyone and no one."

She looked into Kakuzu's dual coloured eyes which were narrowed in a mixture of hatred and longing; he hated her for the game she had played on him and he longed for her because she was the first person in a long time to see him for him. She had looked past his scars and tragic story and somehow burrowed into his heart, an organ he thought long dead.

He knew his duty, he knew that he had to kill her but he was struggling to do so. Tears began pricking at his eyes and he tried to blink them away. The losses and the stress of the last few weeks were getting to him. He was becoming vulnerable because he was so tired of the slaughter, the scrutiny and the turbulence of his own emotions. He was just so tired.

Kakuzu dropped his arm and the gun swayed listlessly at his side, still gripped in his hand. "Shinju..." he began.

The purple haired woman stepped up onto the abutment and stood there with her arms lowered to her sides but still stretched out to show she was unarmed.

"What are you doing?!" Kakuzu demanded, recognizing that her position was becoming precarious. She took another small step back. "Don't!" Kakuzu begged, "please... don't..."

Shinju smiled at him and whispered a term of endearment that they had shared between them before leaning back. She gave into gravity and felt herself become weightless.

"NOOOOOOOO!" Kakuzu shouted and lunged for the abutment, desperately trying to reach her in time to pull her off the edge. He would reach her and embrace her tightly and admonish her for scaring him. He would love her, bury his face on her hair and inhale the sweet scent of roses. He would leave it all behind, career, city, money, all of it... for her.

He heard her body hit the pavement below, a sickening crunch as her bones broke, a squelch as her blood and brain exploded out of her body from the force of the impact.

He slowly sank down until he was sitting against the abutment. His forgotten gun was still in his hand. How would he do it? Through the temple? The mouth? Both ways were not guaranteed to be effective. Could he shoot his own heart? Would that stop it from tearing itself apart?