December 7th

Rin was… Surprisingly well today. The fever had dropped back down to 38,5 °C, so he wasn't as disoriented or frail as the day before. He was even eating, and although his huge appetite hadn't returned it still came as a surprise to both Yukio and Shiemi. She had happily agreed to stay in the dorm again today while Yukio was gone to watch over him. Yukio had avoided telling him too much about what happened last night, not wanting to tell him until he had both pieces of the letter. Shiemi didn't know much either, and that was for the best. There was no need to worry her.

He had left early in the morning again today as he had agreed on meeting up with the girl in the basement at around eleven am, after doing a few chores for the order and a little paperwork. Once he got down there, he found her sitting on the stairs beside the scooters, wearing a pearl necklace while playing around with a coin, flicking it up in the air and catching it over and over. She made sure to show off the cheap jewelry as Yukio sat down beside her. If they wanted to get their hands on the second part of the letter they needed, then they had to make a plan. They would have to break into the exhibition room by nightfall, and somehow avoid being caught red-handed. First of all, they would need a keycard to get inside, and that keycard would have to be inside Lewin's office. Once they got the keycard, they would have to use it to get inside. Once in, they would have to figure out how to get to it without triggering an alarm.


Yukio was the one who sneaked into the office. He had gladly forgotten how messy the place was. Even though Bon was helping Lightning with, well, everything really, he hadn't been able to help with the mess. It was absolutely unfixable. This made things a bit more complicated, as the card could be almost anywhere. While he was looking around, Shōjo had been put on guard duty.

After looking around for a while, he finally found the card inside a seemingly random folder on his desk, but as he was about to leave, he heard someone by the door. Without thinking twice, he panicked and hurried over to a locker, then hid inside it. It smelled like used socks and sweat, and for a good reason as he stood on a pile of used clothes. He looked out, squinting through the small keyhole and watching with bated breath as Lewin and Kinzo entered the office.

"Things keep going missing! Someone has to be stealing, most likely someone from inside the organization." Kinzo complained, exasperated as Lewin walked casually over to his desk to look at some papers.

"I don't think so. Who would that be?"

Someone else suddenly entered. It was Arthur, and he was holding a folder in his hand, which he handed over to Lightning. Not an unusual thing to see, but it was still odd to see the professional looking paladin in such a messy place.

"Thank you. Oh hey, nice necklace." Yukio frowned upon hearing that and took a closer look. Sure enough, as far as he could see, Arthur was wearing the necklace Shōjo had been wearing earlier. That would explain why she hadn't knocked on the door to warn him; she had run off before she had the chance.

"You think so? I got it from some strange girl out in the hall. For some reason, I couldn't say no to her."

Arthur had headed off as quickly as he came, and Kinzo turned back to Lewin and continued. "To steal from your workplace is like stealing from your family. Don't you think?"

"Come on, no one here's stealing, no one would sink that low." He replied as he gathered the papers he needed and headed out again with Kinzo in tow. Yukio had avoided being caught, but no thanks to the girl.

It turned out that she had been distracted by a janitor and followed him around as he cleaned the floor. Once he found her, she just smiled, not aware that she almost caused a conflict by not standing guard as she promised. She did give Arthur the pearls to distract him though, so at least she did help a bit. Yukio was mad, but not mad enough to go off at her. He just hoped she could keep her promise once they broke into the exhibition room when he'd need her on guard the most. They agreed on being there by eight pm, and the girl had promised to be there.


She wasn't there. Yukio stood by the closed down entrance, and there he had been for fifteen minutes without a single sign of her anywhere. It wasn't until he noticed movement from the inside that he realized: she was already in there.

He decided to try and use the keycard on the digital lock screen. When a code was needed, he tried putting in a number, yet that didn't work. After three tries, he got blocked.

"Pssst! I can get you in from the inside!" The girl suddenly stood by the security gate which almost gave Yukio a heart attack.

"How did you get in there?!" He whispered back as she pressed a button, making the gate go halfway up. He quickly made his way inside, crouched, before she closed it again.

"I was hiding. That guy wasn't very tidy, he barely looked around before leaving. It was easy." She was proud of herself for being better at making a plan than him.

"Now look. There's a camera in both sides." She pointed at them "We're at a blind spot right now, so they can't see us. They booth record for about four seconds, then it's turned of for another four seconds before turning back on. You just got to get from one blind spot to another within four seconds. It's pretty easy. There should be another blind spot near the crosier because I went and fiddled with the camera" She then showed him how to get there without being spotted, and he carefully followed soon after. It ended up being way easier than he'd initially thought.

Once they reached the display, Yukio went into his pocket and pulled out a few lockpicks. He had only ever done this a few times, on missions when it had been absolutely necessary so he hoped it would work. Surprisingly it did, and he managed to remove the glass without triggering an alarm. He then took out a small pack of powder and used it to see whether there were invisible sensors. When red lasers appeared, the girl gasped. "That's so cool! What now? Should we try and take it out?"

Yukio nodded and carefully moved his hands under the red lasers, making sure not to touch them. Once he got to the artifact, he carefully moved it out of the display. His hand was too big to reach into the hole meant for the stick, as the part they just received was the top of the crosier. Shōjo's hand was just about small enough, and soon managed to receive the little piece of curled up, faded paper. Yukio carefully put the artifact back, and just in time as someone opened the gate. It was another guard, this time being a higher up that Yukio didn't know the name of. They quickly hid behind a taller display, hoping that the cameras hadn't seen them. The guard walked right past them, and to their luck, somehow left without noticing them.


They brought the letter to the two men that the girl lived with, and even though Daishi wasn't happy to see him there and wanted him to leave, he changed his mind when Yukio showed him the letter. The other part of the letter talked about the nun's father, and how he had locked the angel in a dungeon. She would write her lover another letter once she found out where this dungeon was. She would hide the letter by a pillar towards north-east in the Catholic Church that they both knew.

Yet none of them knew what or where that Church that could possibly be. Furthermore, Daishi didn't believe that this person had been an angel. It was more likely a man of science or a doctor. They couldn't know exactly how far back this all happened, so it could possibly be as far back as to the 1500 century, if not older. It was amazing the letter was intact at all, really.

Still, Yukio was determined to find out more. The letter might have talked about the Roman Catholic Church, in other words, the Vatican. The Vatican Main office would be located underneath the ground, but maybe they wouldn't have to go that far. If she mentioned the church, then the letter might be inside of St. Peter's Basilica, which was the Church above the Vatican.

Going there would be very risky, and the girl wasn't allowed to go with him at first, but when Yukio asked Daishi whether he wanted to know why the angel had been imprisoned or not, she somehow managed to get his permission to go to Rome with him.


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