Chapter Thirteen - Counting Chess Pieces

Summary: I thought of Maron and decided, what would she be like if the story was more mature? Not in that way you pervs, but what if she was less magical girl-ish. She still has magical powers, but she's a little older, and she uses her God-given supernatural strength, speed, and agility to fight instead (you know, the one that lets her jump on rooftops and stuff). Oh, and Finn is not evil here. I just can't stand the thought of cute little Finn having to be bad (sob). So... on with the story and I hope you enjoy. Happy readings!

Ratings: T (just in case)

Pairings: MaronxChiaki, JeannexSinbad, FinnxAccess

Disclaimer: I own neither Kamikaze Kaitou Jeanne nor its characters. However, anyone who dares to take this story, word for word, as their own will have to answer to Finn and Access personally. And they have fangs. Just remember- you have been warned.

Last note: to change character perspective, I had to put their names, because this site's not letting me just put the dash on its own. Sorry for any inconvenience it may cause.

previously in chapter twelve...

After she finally calmed down, clearing her throat (she probably looked like an idiot to any passerby), Maron looked at the drawing again and smiled. Was this his way of saying he didn't want their relationship to change? That he was fine with competing against her if she wanted to do it herself? That he wouldn't leave her on her own? She smiled, although it was a bit sad from the memories it brought up.

Yeah, Maron thought, picking up her bag and heading to her floor.

Chiaki wasn't that bad after all.

and now... on with the story!

And so their friendly little competition began.

Jeanne set off another trap meant for her as she jogged past another room in the gigantic mansion. She was probably already ahead of Sinbad because she hadn't seen him yet, which meant that she wouldn't have to worry about him for a while. She also made sure to leave a few traps active to keep him off his game and slow him down so that she could focus on Miyako and finding the newest target. Finn had scouted the area earlier, per usual, but Jeanne had already been in the room that the angel had reported, with no luck. The target had been moved to another room.

As she rounded the corner, Jeanne spun on her heel, her instinct helping her dodged another trap as it swung to ensnare her and missed by mere inches.

Now that was exciting.

Jeanne took a happy breath, glad to see that Miyako was stepping it up again and back in the game. Once again, she was competing against her friend, as well as the full determination Miyako had to win.

Kami, how she loved this.

Coming upon another door, Jeanne peeked her head inside to see whether or not the piece was in there, just like she had twelve times earlier that night.

Bingo.

Closing the door behind her, the kaitou grinned broadly as the piece, sensing her presence, emitted a dark shadowy aura.

"Not fast enough." she said, her pin already sailing through the air and making contact before the demon could say boo.

"Noooooo!" it cried as it got sucked into the piece, but her enchanted pin was too powerful and he went in without any backlash.

The pin landed on the floor and rolled to her feet. The kaitou scooped it up with the toe of her boot, and with a flick of her ankle, it sailed the short distance to her and she caught it out of the air, just as it began its downward descent.

"Victory."

Turning, Jeanne began to backtrack her tracks out the room, humming a tune as she went. It was obvious that Sinbad was a no-show tonight. He always arrived, if not for the chase, then for the finale. Oh well.

One more point to her, one less for Sinbad.

.Chiaki POV.

I had been bugging him since he had included that drawing in his letter to Maron on a whim.

How many chess pieces had Jeanne collected so far?

As he sat at his desk in his apartment, tapping a pencil on the wood, he began counting. There were the pawns from last night when the six attacked, plus the one knight from Miyako, one pawn from when they met, and a couple of others.

So that made one knight, and…

Chiaki counted the pawns on his fingers.

…12 pawns, most of them white.

The boy stared at his fingers for a minute, before grabbing a nearby notebook and trying again. But the answer was still the same.

12 pawns? But a chess board only had 8 white ones, and 8 black.

He glanced over at his own meager collection of two since his appearance in town, as an idea occurred to him. Maybe... but, maybe...

Chiaki leaned back in his chair and let out a breath.

Maybe... the chess pieces weren't supposed to work out as they did on a board. After all, the number each of them had acquired was based on their skill. Of course, there was no saying that there were only a chessboard number of pieces, but still... right now, the numbers were working out well. If there were only a total of 16 pawns, then there were 4 left out there. Well, them, and the rest of the chess pieces. And that wasn't counting any that Jeanne may have acquired before he appeared. As it was, with her abilities being as amazing as they were, she was bleeding over onto his side of the board. It wasn't unlikely that she already had the other four.

The thief sighed, but even as he tried to curse his rival's abilities, he couldn't help but replay their last encounter. She had such a beautiful, graceful, and feminine way of moving. It stunned him him on more than one occasion, causing him to catch his breath and forget what he was doing.

He could only assume that none (or very little) of it was due to Kami's transformation gift, because he certainly wasn't that graceful. He could even chalk part of it up to her experience on the job, but even that didn't explain all of her talents. It was probably the gymnastics, and Maron herself. He had honestly not met a girl more fascinating than her, although some, like Miyako, could be entertaining. But it was like Maron was on a different level from them all. Not only was she smart, graceful, and kind to her friends to a fault, but she had been chosen by Kami to capture the demons in this world, and somehow managed to juggle school, club activities, and being a kaitou - a task that he was still struggling with, without breaking a sweat.

Inadvertently, the memory of their kiss came to mind, and Chiaki felt himself heat up slightly, both from embarrassment and shame. He shouldn't have done something like that to her. Maron wasn't the kind of person to fall for someone and give up being a kaitou just because they kissed her, he knew that now. But back then, the idea had seemed plausible enough. Plus, he had been hearing about this "great thief" from Access for so long that he might have gotten a bit carried away.

Still, what he had done was wrong, and he should apologize for it the next chance he got. Even if he had enjoyed it.

.Jeanne POV.

She returned from her heist just in time to catch Chiki's gaze on her as he stood on his balcony.

"Hey."

"Hi." she responded, balancing on the apartment railing, and despite the fact that he just caught her coming back from a capture that he hadn't been a part of, she didn't feel any urge to go inside her place and avoid any comments he might say.

His eyes were strangely serious, and Jeanne somehow doubted that he cared about her nightly activities tonight. Something else was on his mind. She bent at her knees to bring herself closer to his level and minimize the chances of their conversation being overheard. No need to speak loud enough for the people with their balcony doors open in the apartments above, beside, or below to easily overhear.

"Well?" she asked him. "Is there something that you want to tell me?"

He chuckled a bit. "Observant as always."

However, the smile on his lips didn't last long.

"Can I come over?", he asked.

"Knock yourself out."

As Chiaki disappeared inside of his place, presumably to use the hallway as his point of entry, she lept off the railing and treaded lightly into her own. As she passed the chessboard, Jeanne added her newest addition to her collection, and by the time she reached the door, she had pulled her hair ribbon out and was once again Maron Kusakabe.

Even though she was ready, she waited for the knock at the door before she opened it and let her neighbor inside. And even though no one was in the hallway this time of the night, she made sure not to say anything until the door was closed and re-locked.

"So what did you want?"

The other sometimes-thief looked over his shoulder back at her and gave a smile, although it wasn't his normal charming and confident grin, but more of an embarrassed one.

"I actually remembered something only a bit ago that I have to apologize for."

"Is this about the chess pieces of mine that you still have?"

"No." his smile remained, but was a bit more embarrassed, and one of hands came up to scratch the back of his neck.

"Actually, I, uh, wanted to apologize for back around the time that we first met."

"Why? What did you do then? Aside from compete with me, that is."

As she asked, her brain was already running through the possibilities. He had challenged her, vied for the cursed piece, and...

Before she could stop it, Maron felt her face heat up - an unusual occurrence for her, and she immediately spun around before he could see her moment of weakness.

"Would you like some tea? I'm thirsty. I guess it was all the running around I did. Oh, I guess you may not want anything then, right?"

She was rambling. Even more embarrassed, she began walking quickly towards her kitchen, only to pause at the sound of Chiaki's voice.

"You're nervous."

His voice, filled with awe, pulled at her, and Maron, for all she was worth, couldn't stop her head as it turned to glance back at him, red face and all. As their eyes met, she found that she couldn't speak, her embarrassment made worse by the fact that he noticed her slip-up. But she couldn't deny it - the lie stuck in her throat like peanut butter.

"I-"

He began walking towards her, as if he was drawn and couldn't resist.

"I didn't think that you could get red.", he commented.

He stopped in front of her. Maron felt frozen, as if she couldn't move. And Chiaki slowly extended a hand to her cheek at her lack of protest, her eyes following his palm up, but her lips suspiciously unable to voice a thing.

She flinched in anticipation of the contact.

"I never thought you'd be anything but... calm."

She could feel the heat of his hand through the blush on her cheeks, contact imminent and their very cells vibrating as they go closer until they would touch -

"Maron!"

"Chiaki!"

"We have a situation at-!"

At the sounds of the two angels-in-training, the two kaitos immediately separated, both of their faces now completely red. But Maron, out of nothing more than pure stubbornness, recovered first.

"Who is that?"

She was looking at the unfamiliar purple-haired figure hovering in front of her neighbor and fellow thief. Chiaki coughed as his eyes met Access', and the purple angel-in-training turning pale as he realized that he had just blown their cover.

"Shit."