Note:
I know many character will seem OOC in the beginning, but they are supposed to grow into the manga personalities as the story progresses. Some will be slightly modified, though, because they left not much space for growth.

This is also my first fanfiction ever, my first piece of fiction writing ever outside school, so don't kill me ;_;

It's very likely this starts out as T and moves on to M like 90% of AgK stories because of the nature of the manga.

It contains 3 OCs that will be part of the story (sorry for the random names, they were generated randomly with some Internet generator), though we usually won't see the story from their point of view because they are mostly side characters/things to drive the story.

Chapter 1

One year before Tatsumi

"Ready?" a lean, short teen asked, whispering.

The teenager was crouching on a low, heavy branch of a lush tree. His green hair reached his coat's fur trimmed green hood, and a tuft of it fell over his left eye. His green eyes were fixed on a small group of soldiers. A blond, long haired girl, slightly older and about the same height, was kneeling on the branch of a nearby tree. She had a recurve bow tensed in the direction of the soldiers, and was observing them with big brown eyes. The group was in formation on a forest clear, seemingly awaiting instructions.

"Let's make this quick and clean, Lubbock," she answered.

Lubbock knew she could take about half of them before they noticed, but after that it'd be more difficult. So he had weaved a web from Cross Tail's cords, his Teigu, beforehand. A quick succession of arrows flew from their location in surprising silence. Three soldiers didn't see them until it was too late, and ended up with an arrow stuck to their back. The remaining three tried to escape in different directions, but they all got caught in the web. Swiftly, the cords tensed and they all stopped moving.

"Let's go."

With military precision, they started moving in the direction they knew their comrades were waiting. Both of them were quick on their feet, and agile enough to move from tree to tree without much difficulty. Lubbock had his mind clear, he knew they had made a clean job without chances the other soldiers heard. A girl with golden colored hair and matching eyes was waiting impatiently for them right in the border of the forest. She was a shapely woman, with great curves, which distracted Lubbock sometimes. Though, a mission was a mission, and he knew he couldn't afford to be distracted. A tall, bulky man in an white and gray armor stood next to her. He wielded a red spear with a gray handle.

"What is the situation, Leone?" Lubbock asked.

"They are about to strike. Bulat saw a man in the nearer house, and a family of three in the other one," she answered. The two houses could be seen from where they stood. They were both tiny wooden houses, and they were surrounded by cultivated fields. Small, green hills could be seen behind them, and the forest extended until just before them.

"Okay. From what we heard, the Imperial Army is under orders to kill them all. Let's get ready to move."

"Lubbock, with Leone," Bulat said looking at Lubbock, and taking command of the situation. He had been once a high-ranking Imperial Officer, and Lubbock respected him a lot for that. He was extremely skilled, and made good battle decisions. "Megumi, with me. We go to the farthest house. They are already approaching. Go!"

Lubbock and Leone dashed past the fields and reached the house. Unfortunately, by then, the group of soldiers was storming in. Lubbock took a millisecond to react and sent his cords to prevent their entry.

"Nu-uh, come back here!" Lubbock said, facing them.

"Transform! Lionelle!" Leone said excitedly as she gained lion-like features.

Tiny feline ears appeared from her head, blending in with her hair. The hair got longer, wilder, but kept its original color. A small lioness tail appeared from her rear, and her hands turned furry with claws instead of human nails. They looked like she had lion-themed gloves on. Smiling with new, improved teeth, she jumped at the soldiers that were being stopped by Lubbock's cords at the doorstep, punching the face of the first one, rendering him unconscious. Lubbock had weaved a pair of knives and was now throwing them at one of the soldiers, killing him. She punched the life out of the third one and ran inside the house. Lubbock followed after her, and was greeted with an amazing scene as soon as he got there. The inhabitant, a lean, narrow man, with short gray hair and bluish-gray eyes behind a pair of square glasses, was standing next to the slashed bodies of two imperial soldiers. He held a cooking knife covered in blood with both hands, pointing it at Leone, and was looking at her with a mix of determination and fear, slightly crouching, ready to jump. He had a bit of blood spray over his clothes, going from his chest to his left cheek. Lubbock wondered how on Earth he had managed to do that. He seemed like small man, not particularly strong, and the reports said he was just a farmer. No additional information was given to them. It was slightly suspicious, at best.

"Who the hell are you?" he asked them without shouting, maintaining his stance. Leone put a foot forward, with both hands on the air. She lowered her head a bit to show him that she meant no threat.

"Tsch, calm down. We came here to save you or something, but it seems you did a pretty good job on your own with just a cooking instrument. We're from the Revolutionary Army, we heard that you and the family next door were going to get killed under the presumption you were traitors to the Empire."

"I am not a spy," he said, looking at them with mistrust. He stood a bit more upright. Lubbock guessed that at least he wasn't ready to jump at their throats anymore.

"I know. We'd know if you were one of ours," she said, with a factual tone. The man lowered the knife a bit. He was still looking at them like they were about to jump and knock him out, best case scenario.

"Also, if she really wanted to kill you, she would already have done it," Lubbock added, shrugging. It was true, and they needed to get over this quickly. They had just a few minutes until they were to meet the soldiers who would be transporting the victims. "Come with us, we're supposed to get you and the guys next door to safety. Reinforcements will come if we don't hurry. And the other team is probably done by now."

The man kept the knife in his left hand, but extended his right one towards Leone. It was surprising, to say the least, since a couple of minutes ago he was about to skin them with his knife. But he looked calmer, somehow. Or at least that look of extreme determination had vanished. Lubbock was confused, and his first instinct was not to trust him.

"Ken. Nice to meet you."

"Leone." She shook his hand. "And this here is Lubbock."

They both nodded to each other and exited the house, trotting in the direction of the rendezvous spot, which was in the opposite direction of the hills, and well deep in the forest. Leone led the way, being followed by Lubbock and then by Ken. Lubbock trotted a bit to catch up, and leaned close to her.

"Uhm, Leone," Lubbock whispered, "we are not supposed to reveal our names."

"I know," she answered with a sweet tone. "But I have a good feeling about this guy."

They entered the forest again, and walked for a few minutes. The forest was lush at that the border, but near to the rendezvous spot it became sparse again and they reached a clearing. The other group was already there. Besides Megumi and Bulat, there were three more people. Ken's neighbours, Lubbock guessed. The mother was tall and slender, with big blue eyes and long chestnut hair. Her husband was a bulky, hardened type, with short black hair and small brown eyes. Holding his hand was a kid, around ten years old, who looked like a small version of her mother. The father and the mother were close together, and Megumi and Bulat flanked them rigidly. But when they saw the other team approach, he walked a few steps towards them.

"We'll be meeting the ones who will take you to a safe house here in five minutes. And, mister, if you could hand me the knife you'd really make us all feel safer. I think you're scaring the kid," Bulat said, holding his hand out for Ken to hand over the knife.

"I feel better with this, thank you very much," he answered, defiantly. Leone stepped towards Bulat slowly and in a curvy fashion, like a playful kitty.

"You know, he did beat a couple of Imperial soldiers single-handedly with that knife," Leone said suggestively. Megumi raised one of her very blond eyebrows and crossed her arms over her chest.

"What are you implying?"

"We should really consider his potential."

"We'll take it up to the boss, in any case. But if he wants to come along we'd have to blindfold him." Bulat said. Lubbock couldn't believe he had let the knife issue slide, much less that he wanted to take him along. Ms. Najenda was going to get mad at them, probably. They were endangering the security of the base, blindfold or not.

"Ohhh, I can work with that," she said seductively. Ken kept looking them with a straight face, and crossed his arms over his chest.

"Who said I wanted to join you?"

"Who said we wanted you to join?" Megumi asked, in the same tone, raising her eyebrow again.

"Touché." He said, smiling and uncrossing his arms. He was really a weird guy, Lubbock thought. He could do weird, he guessed, but he wasn't fully trusting this man at the moment. He was supposed to be a calm farmer, but he had beat two Imperial soldiers with a cooking knife. He had gone from seemingly mistrusting to wanting to join them. He was either a very bad actor or had a screw slightly loose.

Right then, a white carriage being pulled by two bay horses showed up. The were traveling along a small path. Four soldiers got off the carriage, and saluted Bulat. He returned the salute and gestured the family to go to the carriage. The soldier near the carriage helped the little girl get on it. Next in went the mother, and then the father. The soldier most near Ken looked at him indecisively, going from his face, to his knife, to his face again.

"We have orders to take you too," he said, nervously.

"He'll be coming with us if you don't mind. We'll be in charge of him. He looks pretty promising," Bulat said, politely.

"Sure. We'll go along then." He got into the carriage with the rest of the soldiers, and off they disappeared into the forest.

"Well. We'll blindfold you if you don't mind," Leone said, winking at him. Ken blushed a bit.

"Ah, sure."

Footnote:
I'm sorry about the writing. I'm not really a good writer and I haven't really enjoyed writing for years. Hopefully this eases me a bit into writing again.
Also, the wording might be awkward at some points because my native language is not English. So I'm completely open to suggestions about different wording/phrases that I might use.