Kukai and I exchanged wide glances at each other. She just called the most wanted criminal in Japan and probably France who's kidnapped more than four dozen kids 'Uncle Kyou'. I released a nervous laugh and then attempted to get more information from her.

"You know Noelle."

It was more of a statement than a question. The young girl furrowed her brows together at this repeat of information. Obviously, she didn't like repeating herself.

"Yes!" she exclaimed stretching out the 'Sss' part in the one syllable word.

"Is she still here – in France?"

Kukai stared at me as though I was dumb and the question I'd just asked was even dumber. Bella's eyes softened as she spoke.

She shook her head. "No, she's not here anymore."

"How come?"

"Well…" it seemed as though she was debating whether or not she would tell us what happened or not. "Me and Noelle were playing one day – we were best friends. Daddy and Uncle Kyou were upstairs working on something…like a project they told me. The doorbell rang but Daddy and Uncle were too busy to hear it, and we had orders not to open the door unless they were here. So we stayed quiet. There were shouts from behind the door, shouts like 'You have till four to open the door'. We got scared and just as we were going to run upstairs the door burst open. I motioned for Noelle to follow me upstairs but it was too late, they made a grab for her and I decided to run upstairs to tell Daddy and Uncle Kyou."

"Oh."

"So, when are you going to bring her back?" she asked excitedly.

"Huh?"

"What are you talking about; she's staying with Amu and Ami," explained Kukai as nicely as possible.

"But she has to come back, Uncle Kyou's really angry."

"We saved her from Kyou."

I just sat there silently as Kukai tried to reason with the six year old that Noelle wasn't coming back to France to stay with them. Bella frowned, seeing how things weren't going her way.

"She didn't need to be saved from him!"

"She was scarred when we got her."

Bella turned to me expectantly.

"Sorry, but she's part of our family now."

"You'll be sorry," she hissed storming out.

"That was creepy."

"I swear it didn't feel like we were even reasoning with a six year old anymore. It felt as though she was our age."

"I …know."

"You sound distracted – what are you thinking about?"

"I'm thinking about Uncle Kyou. We've figured out that they're close together which is good in finding out information but bad because they can leak it to each other. I have no idea if they still keep in touch with each other, but I'm pretty sure they don't. So-

"So we can get information from her?"

"Exactly."

But just as Bella came back to the living room, Ikuto and Kain came out of the garden. There went our plans I thought sourly. Seeing Ikuto, she practically ran into his arms, embracing him in a large bear hug.

"I have to go Bella."

"Okay. I love you bye!"

"Look like you have competition. Jealous Amu?" snickered Kukai quietly.

"Not in the slightest. Shut up."

"Love you too. Bye," said Ikuto trying not to disappoint her.

"Pfft-

I punched Kukai in the shoulder shutting him up just slightly, but on the way out he was dying of laughter again.

"What's so funny?"

I shook my head to Ikuto who only stared at me with a confused look while Kain in a sympathetic gesture patted my shoulder. Seeing how the laughter wouldn't cease, I decided to give it one more shot. I punched his arm with so much power he slightly yelped in pain and stared at me in disbelief.

"You were getting annoying," I offered as my explanation.

"Whatever Amu, we all know you're just jealous."

"Hush it," I snapped causing Kukai to burst into a fit of laughter again.

Groaning, I stormed ahead of the guys; just enough so that the noise had become a bit softer. We got all the way to where the taxi had parked and was currently waiting for us. As usual Ikuto gave the directions; not officially but technically he was the leader of this mission. He didn't even once turn around to tell us anything while we were in the taxi; Kain kept quiet as well. The only noise that came from inside the vehicle came from Kukai and me.

"Why can't you just admit you were jealous?"

"She was six!"

"Whatever. You know that when he said 'I love you' to her your heart squeezed a little."

"It didn't, because I wouldn't ever be jealous of someone who is almost fifteen years younger than me."

"I'm dropping this," he mumbled sourly.

"It shouldn't have even been brought up in the first place."

The car was now completely silent; I fiddled with my fingers just to pass time. Before long, Ikuto stopped the driver, but when I looked out the window we were in the middle of nowhere. Hesitant but more confused, I stepped out onto the dirt paved road with more trees than I could count. I snuck a glance at Ikuto, but his face was as emotionless as a rock. Kain…well Kain looked like he always did, not really giving away how he felt. They were the only people probably besides TaeYang who actually knew what was going on at the moment.

"Up ahead is an opera house…for the most part it's pretty abandoned," explained Kain pulling out his gun.

"All the information I've gathered from TaeYang comes down to this – this is Kyou's base."

"This feels so sudden; I mean just yesterday I was undercover looking for him."

"Yeah, after here I'm not sure what's going to happen…be careful, would you? All of you."

No one spoke as we headed into the army of trees. It all felt so surreal. In fact I was sure I was dreaming this. There was no way we'd already gotten to this phase of the mission so quickly. I held my gun in my hands firmly not taking my eyes away from Ikuto's head.

It's not like I had any feelings for him anymore. No it wasn't that, the reason was a dream I'd had a while ago. Ikuto had this baby in his hands and he was walking somewhere. Wherever it was, it was pretty abandoned; two men were there as well. They shoot him…and I was there to witness it all. What if this dream of mine actually came true? I mean Kyou has kidnapped all these children; could it be that when Ikuto is saving a kid, the baby from my dreams, he gets shot?

I shuddered at the thought of it, but the thought was consistent throughout our walk to the opera house. What about Kukai? It's pretty obvious that he and Utau have a thing for each other…what if something happened to him? A love that wasn't ever able to blossom. She'd be devastated, especially since they had such a sad goodbye. And Kain…did he have a girlfriend or a wife? If he was to get hurt how would they feel?

"It's going to be alright Amu," said Ikuto.

Snapping out of my trance of ill thoughts, I see my team staring at me with grins on their faces.

"We're all professionals after all," smiled Kukai.

"So you'd better not drag us down," smirked Kain.

There was a huge burst of emotion that exploded in my heart, but I refused to let tears show at this moment.

"Promise me," I whispered holding out my pinky. "Promise me you won't die!"

Kain and Kukai pinky promised me seriously, even though they were slightly chuckling. They turned to Ikuto, whispered something into his ears before walking ahead of us. I cleared my throat, expecting him to keep to his promise.

Ikuto walked towards me and slung his arm around me, bringing me face to face with his muscled chest.

"Silly girl, don't make things more emotional than they should be," he whispered into my hair while holding out his pinky.

I grabbed onto it and smiled.

"You'd better stick to it or else."

"I think you've forgotten another promise."

"What?"

"Promise me you won't do anything rash."

"I never do anything rash!"

"Really?" he questioned raising his eyebrow. "I'm sure there are tons of examples to give you."

"Shut up," I mumbled slightly punching him in the arm.

"Promise?"

I stared at his pinky for a bit before hooking mine onto his.

"Let's go."

I followed them, noticing how the building was starting to come into view. It was when I was standing in front of the building my heart began to pound and thrash violently against my chest. I was a negotiator not a cop. I wasn't like Ikuto. He was both a cop and a negotiator.

"We might have to split up."

The three of us stared at Ikuto.

"I think that would be best," reasoned Kukai. "One of you with Ikuto, the other with me."

"Yeah…"

Okay the method chosen to pick our partners was to hold the number one or two behind our back. I held my chosen number behind my back until Kukai said to show them. I had picked the number two, as had Kukai. Ikuto and Kain had the number one.

"That was easier than I thought," chuckled Kukai.

How the hell was he able to laugh in the middle of this situation? It seemed like I was going to have a heart attack any minute now.

"Ready?"

I inhaled deeply.

"Let's get this party started!" exclaimed Kukai rushing in.

I let out my breath and followed my excited partner in.

a.n.

Oh. My. Gosh. They've finally made it. Very short chapter, but prepare for quick or semi-quick updates.

e.n.j.o.y

n.e.k.o.m.