Bob Harris was an ordinary-looking man who'd built his career entirely on talent. But talent only got you so far — and in a world crowded with young, photogenic actors, he had no real competitive edge. His fade from relevance was inevitable.
He hesitated for a long moment before finally speaking. "Acting is a brutal road. It takes years of serious training, and Hollywood has always been... with Eastern performers, it's always been..."
He didn't finish the sentence, but Bella understood perfectly.
She gave a small nod. "It's real. The discrimination is absolutely real. No matter how hard a female star works, she'll never match a male star's pay. Asian actors will always trail behind their European counterparts. I know how it works. Landing a lead role may be off the table, but my connections can push a second or third supporting role. If you take on Sadako as your client, commission won't be an issue."
Three years of work and all he had to show for it was a single commercial — a Japanese one, at that. Even so, Bob Harris couldn't bring himself to walk away from acting. The decision wouldn't come easy.
Half a lifetime spent in front of cameras. Giving that up overnight was genuinely painful.
Still, there was a wife, children, a mortgage, and car payments waiting for him at home. Staying the course as an actor wasn't perseverance — it was a slow death.
"Please... give me some time to think. I need to think this through..."
Three days later, after an exhausting internal battle, he accepted the offer.
Twenty years in Hollywood had given him more than enough experience to earn his talent agent license without breaking a sweat.
Bella's offer had cracked open a door he hadn't known existed. He wouldn't limit himself to just Sadako, either — he planned to register a full agency, scout promising male and female actors, and leverage his decades of industry goodwill to find them work and collect commissions. It was a bit like a retiring athlete stepping into a coaching role.
Bella made the introductions, and Sadako and Bob took an immediate liking to each other.
That said, Sadako still had studies to finish in Japan, and Bob had a commercial shoot to wrap up before either of them could turn their attention to setting up the agency in the States.
June 2002. The Yashida clan's internal war showed no signs of settling. Three factions, three competing claims, no clear heir — and the power vacuum was drawing hungry eyes from every direction. Former allies and rivals in both business and politics were circling, looking for a piece of the carcass. Even the Japanese and American governments had their hands in it, running backroom deals that made it plain: nobody wanted the Yashida empire to survive intact. Everyone was sharpening their knives.
Bella's six-month exchange program in Japan had come to an end, and she was ready to head back to Stanford.
Sakura-ryu was going with her, which meant a mountain of Japanese animation got packed into the luggage. Bella also picked up a generous pile of gifts for everyone back home.
After a farewell dinner with the classmates she'd actually gotten along with, she chose to walk back to her apartment alone rather than drive.
She was halfway there when a blond man burst out of a side alley and nearly collided with her. His expression was wild, his head swinging left and right — the look of someone convinced they were being hunted.
Not exactly a common sight on the streets of Tokyo, but not unheard of, either.
Every variety of score-settling went on in this city after dark. Bella could smell it on him from where she stood — strong chemical antiseptic layered over the sharp copper of blood.
Not my problem. She sidestepped like any sensible pedestrian would.
But the blond man's eyes found her anyway. One careless glance.
Those eyes were hawk-sharp. Proud, confident, predatory.
In that single moment, Bella felt utterly exposed — skin, face, eyes, the angle of her nose, the line of her mouth — all of it laid bare under that gaze. The sheer arrogance of it was infuriating.
Without a second thought, she stared right back. Who the hell do you think you are? You want to look at me like that? Go ahead. See how that works out for you.
Their eyes locked.
The blond man's eyes instantly flooded red. Blood welled from the corners of his eyes, from his nostrils, from the edge of his mouth — like a man who'd just taken a blow to the skull without anything touching him.
Bella blinked.
The sensation had been familiar. She used it herself constantly, just never on the receiving end before. Eagle Vision. And not low-grade, either — that had been a strong manifestation. The reason he'd lost wasn't technique — it was bloodline suppression. Her genetics had simply overwhelmed his, and the feedback had hit him like a hammer.
I randomly walk down a street in Tokyo and run into someone with Eagle Vision?
She hesitated for a few seconds. The blond man lurched toward another intersection, all but stumbling over himself in a panic to get away.
"Stop." Bella's voice was quiet. She didn't raise it.
No psionics. No display of power. Just a single word, backed by stronger genetic pressure. His legs locked in place. He trembled violently, his body fighting to run while his feet refused to obey.
"Who are you? Were you waiting here for me specifically?" She kept her tone conversational. "Tell me the truth."
The blond man's mental state was clearly in tatters. The proximity finished the job — his knees buckled and he hit the pavement hard, body rigid as a board. He didn't stop trying to escape, though. Moving in slow, inch-by-inch contractions, he attempted to drag himself out of her range.
Bella watched him crawl for a moment.
He doesn't look like someone who came here for me. If this were an enemy, walking straight into my path would be the most pointless move imaginable.
She activated her Eagle Vision and studied him carefully.
What she saw didn't add up. His emotional signature kept cycling — a spike of deep hostility, then back to neutral, then a wash of genuine goodwill. Back and forth. No pattern.
Is this man having some kind of episode? Psychological break?
Then she noticed it. At the center of his brain was an energy signature she recognized immediately. Gold threads. The residue left behind by an Apple of Eden's conditioning.
She let out a long, silent breath.
I don't even need to work this out. The shape of it is obvious.
On this planet, the only people in possession of an Apple of Eden, besides herself, were the Templars.
The Assassin Brotherhood had been effectively destroyed. By her timeline, that would have happened around 2000 — the year she'd transmigrated — when a traitor had handed the Templars everything they needed to gut the organization from the inside. The Brotherhood was down to scraps now.
Philosophically, neither side had it entirely right. Absolute order and absolute freedom were both fantasies — neither mapped onto how human societies actually functioned. At their core, the Templars and the Assassins were chasing the same destination through violently different roads. Calling the Templars good and the Assassins evil was a lazy read; both organizations had contributed something real to the world.
Personally, though? Bella had always had a soft spot for the Assassins. You could hardly be the hero of a game franchise and not earn at least a little loyalty.
That soft spot wasn't going to make her take sides or do anything reckless. She was far too busy for that.
But here, in the middle of a Tokyo street, was a man with direct ties to either the Brotherhood or the Templars — possibly both.
She turned the question over.
Pretend I didn't see anything and keep walking?