Akirameta Nakimoto remembers Japan fondly. The cherry blossoms in the summer air, the high rise buildings of glass and steel, the ever present glow of neon light. She loved Tokyo with all it's wondrous technology. And noodles everywhere!

Her father was a very important businessman, so she got to spend a lot of time in the city. She didn't like the men he often met with. Scary men who seemed to look at Akirameta like she was a product. She heard rumors
that her father had ties to Yakuza, but nothing was ever proved. Maybe that was why he suddenly left Japan for America, leaving her behind with her mother for four years before sending for them.

She thinks about her mother. Beautiful, calm, and nurturing, mother always had time for Akirameta and her twin Gennagisa. Genna was older than Akirameta by about an hour, and lived the big sister role with relish; always protecting her little sister and getting her out of trouble. Genna was the one to hold her for the week she spent crying when her heart was broken.

She sighs thinking back to her first boyfriend, Devon. He was so king and cared for her, always doing sweet things for her. But her father disapproved. Father seemed to always disapprove of her, and Devon was Caucasian and not the boy her father had chosen for her. She didn't care though and continued to see him; Until his family suddenly moved far away. Her father apparently put pressure on them and payed them off to get them out of the picture.

That was when Akirameta first ran away. She was found a week later in the city, living on the street and sporting her first tattoo on her right arm. Her mother was very upset with her and almost kicked her out again until Genna calmed mother down. Akirameta would run away two more times by the time she finished high school.

She shakes her head at the thought of that year after school. Her father was furious that she didn't go to college with her sister. She went back to the city again, and quickly found herself living with the man who was supplying her with drugs. He was a big black man with huge muscles. Violent, and short tempered, he beat her up several times during that year, but the drugs kept her with him. He knocked her up at one point and lost it when she told him about it. She spent the next few days in the hospital where she lost the baby before the police sent her to rehab.

She thinks about the letter she received just before she was released from rehab. Her sister wrote about a friend from college who disappeared after she had moved to a different city than the one Akirameta was in. Genna had gone to search for her, but had run out of leads. She asked Akirameta to come and help her look, thinking that she might be able to find a new lead with her experiences on the streets. Her last week in the rehab center was stressful. She wanted to get out so she could help her sister and get away from the man who out her in here.

When she arrived in Dead End, she searched for Genna for three days before she realized that her sister was nowhere to be found. No one seemed to remember having talked with Genna. Akirameta was tired, cold, and scared. Someone seemed to be following her. One night she was attacked by a man, but not the one that had been following her. She fought back and ran but he chased her for some time before she ran into a building she had been told about earlier, the sanctuary. The nice woman there, Shadow, helped her to calm down and gave her food and a place to stay. Later on Shadow helped her to find a job at the local pizza place. She never saw the man that had attacked her again, but her mysterious stalker was still around, watching. She catches sight of him briefly in shadows before he melts back into them.

Is her stalker someone sent by her lover in the other city? Is he Yakuza, here at her father's request? Where was Genna and her sister's friend Nikol. How could they just vanish with no clue? She was going to stay here till she found her sister and some answers.