"Mia is going to kill me for letting you guys in here, isn't she?" a cheerleader girl timidly asked.
"She'll thank you for it," Wes replied. "Some day."
"Thanks for the assist," I added. "We'll take it from here." I smirked.
"What is this?! You think you can sneak into our cheerleading practice?" Mia roared.
"Not exactly air-tight security around here..." Wes snickered.
"Look, I told you earlier that I don't want to be part of your plan to take down my dad and brother. And you know what's changed? Nothing." Mia crossed her arms and glared at him.
"Just hear me out." I interrupted them before things would escalate into a fight. "We're your family now. The people who care about you… the ones who always have your back… that's who your family is. And that's us. You know we're always here for you."
"That's… that's really sweet. I do appreciate you guys. In most ways, you're way more of a family to me than they ever were," Mia divulged. "But my dad and brother are a big part of my life."
"I'm not saying I agree with what my dad's doing," she continued. "I'm just saying that it's complicated. I'm not exactly ready to wage an all-out war against my family."
"I get it. Morality isn't black and white. And we're not going to set out to hurt them. And I'm not going to ask you to do anything you're not comfortable with. But we do need to stop them." Wes declared.
"We just want to make things fair for everyone," I lied. I simply wanted to get my revenge on Wannabe Stud, Cake-Up, and their shitty school… but telling Mia I wanted to ruin her brother's life obviously wasn't the way to get her on my team.
"I know. I... I guess I've always known it would come to this. And you're right. I'm with you. Thanks for sneaking into cheerleading practice to talk to me. I know I've been avoiding you two, but I actually feel a lot better after that talk..." Mia admitted.
"Heh. Glad we could help." I smirked, my job here done.
"Okay, okay. Now get out of my gym!" Mia barked at Wes. "I have a practice to finish!"
"That's another one ready to rejoin the team!" I smiled, nudging Wes.
Wes nodded. "Yeah... but don't get cocky. None of this is going to matter if we can't figure out a way to get Nishan onboard. No one else can hack into the computer system at Hearst High."
"But there's no way he'll come with us if he can't run fast enough to keep up with the group. He's too worried about getting caught. Maybe we could have him train with a jock?" I mused.
"Here's the thing. I've run the numbers. I know Nishan can run fast enough to get in and out of Hearst High's campus in a minute and a half..." Wes informed me. "He just doesn't think he can."
"Then it's a question of getting Nishan to believe in himself?" I rolled my eyes.
"Yeah... I've got an idea." Wes responded. "If we can give Nishan some motivation to run, we can time him and show him how fast he really moves."
"And when you say 'motivation'..." I snickered.
"I mean we're going to make him fear for his life." Wes grinned.
