When the stars align for us

Chapter 4

Having spent the night at an inn (after making sure there would be no records to alert the owner of the company she 'worked' at that she wasn't a civilian), Shinobu made her way to the large building where she supposedly worked as an assistant. That day, she headed inside a little early to speak to their ally.
Once she had reached his desk, he looked at her and nodded, as though to tell her that he was prepared. Having discussed the plan with Giyu, she knew that he couldn't skip 'work' the same day that one of the most important companies in Japan fell apart, as it would seem suspicious. So, they decided to execute the plan at the end of her work hours, because, luckily enough, Giyu was due to finish his shift two hours before she would.
After a long morning of serving coffee, transferring data and dusting desks, Shinobu made her way out of the building, waiting for her accomplice.
Sure enough, Giyu appeared in front of her, wearing the same blank expression that he had worn in all the time she had known him. Due to the large number of demons they were about to face, Shinobu was feeling more than a little nervous, which made her smile look strained.
'Are you OK?' Giyu asked slowly.
'What do you mean?' she replied, surprised.
'Well, you're usually much more talkative, so this behaviour is kind of unexpected, coming from you,' he explained.
'Oh,' she said, realization dawning on her face. Had she really let her emotions show enough for someone like Tomioka to notice? 'Um...I'm fine, thank you,' she murmured awkwardly.
Checking his watch, Giyu widened his eyes.
'It's time,' he spoke. Lightly patting her on the back, he headed towards the door. Bracing herself, Shinobu followed suit. She proceeded to lead them to the bottom floor, where the man was waiting for them.
'Ah, there you are,' he smiled politely at Shinobu, though once he had noticed Giyu, his expression changed to match the Water Pillar's.
Shinobu smiled back, while Giyu nodded.
'Are you two ready?' he asked them, his left hand on the door handle.
Having turned white, Shinobu could only make herself nod.
The man opened the door. They began to wait for the demons to arrive.
'How are we going to find the rest of them if only some of them bother coming here?' Giyu quietly asked.
'Suppose you knew your team was in danger, who would you send to protect it?'
'Myself, along with the strongest teammates,'
'Exactly. The strongest ones are most likely to walk through that door. We can deal with the weaker ones later. Our ally mentioned that most of them were pawns, so they probably have to rely on the strongest to feed,'
'Hmm...good point,'
Despite the tension gradually building inside her, she let herself smile.
The door slowly began to open, which brought her attention back to the situation at hand. Their ally locked the door and informed the five highest-ranking 'workers' who had entered that he was going to continue his work upstairs.
The demons stared at the slayers for a couple of seconds, until one of them finally took off his sunglasses, to reveal the slits he had for pupils and his red-tinged eyeballs.
'You have gotten yourselves in some pretty big mess, coming here,' one of them declared calmly, 'Are you going to follow our instructions and forget about all of this, or do you want to get violent?'
Without bothering to give an answer, Giyu unsheathed his sword and launched himself at the one who had just spoken. Meanwhile, Shinobu's hand found its way to the hilt of her own sword, before one of the demons looked her way and laser beams shot out of its eyes. Shinobu easily dodged out of the way, as the beams proceeded to cut through the wall. Having noticed the blood art, Giyu jumped back to his former position.
As the demons continued to aim laser beams at the duo, they dodged and swerved. Even though she wasn't taking any steps towards killing the demons, her self-esteem increased, as she smiled mischeviously at the demons. Running across the walls, she plunged towards a demon's head, stabbing it with her sword. The demon immediately tried to turn its head, but Shinobu was able to jump back in time to dodge the attack. Giyu, meanwhile, caught two of them off guard and incapacitated them as they were busy staring at Shinobu. He jumped backwards, as the tallest of the group turned to him.
Shinobu was about to distract the demon, before a sudden idea came to her mind. As the demon released a laser beam heading towards Giyu, Shinobu rushed in front of him, holding her blade in an angle that made it face the demon. The beam, instead of destroying the sword, projected itself back towards its owner, whose body was torn to pieces. Giyu incapacitated him before he could unleash another attack.
Giyu stepped back from the corpse, which quickly vanished.
'Nice work!' Shinobu smiled at him, holding up her hand, her palm facing Giyu, who reluctantly gave her a high-five.
Shinobu could swear that she had seen Giyu give her the smallest of smiles, though he proceeded to continue lacking a facial expression.