"Could you please slow down? I'm having trouble understanding what it is you're trying to say," Chrom said, pinching the bridge of his nose, holding out his other hand in front of him.

Robin and Sumia kept their eyes glued to his hand, like a pair of hogs starved of slop. The moment his hand went down, words gushed out of their mouth, lapping over one another until their voices jumbled together into an incoherent blur.

"The Grimleal..."

"When the sun..."

"The outskirts..."

"Vaike's bar..."

"Just below the..."

Robin turned to shoot Sumia a glare. She glared back.

"Let me speak!" For once, their voices merged into one. Both of them leaned away, taken aback, only for their scowls to return seconds later.

"Stop speaking when I–"

"Quiet!"

Chrom's hand shot back up, and Robin and Sumia's mouths snapped shut with a click. Sweeping a frustrated look between the two of them, Chrom's shoulders slumped as he let out a long sigh.

"Robin," he said, his gaze landing on the tactician. "You first."

Robin gave Sumia a smug nod. She thought him untrustworthy? Chrom seemed to disagree.

Sumia huffed and looked away. Showed what a good sport she was.

Oh well. It's not like I care what she thinks, Robin thought bitterly.

Chrom cleared his throat, and Robin brought his attention back to the matter at hand. Stepping forward, he put a hand over his heart and made to bow.

"Your Grace, I–"

"Robin. Please, do away with the formalities. We're friends; you don't need to impress me."

Robin straightened himself and coughed. "Of course. I forgot."

"You. Forget."

"As I was saying," Robin said, raising his voice, "I've found where the Grimleal are hiding out."

"Oh? Have you?"

"Yes. They've set up a base at the end of the Prism mountain range just a little beyond the outskirts of the city. It's as far as pegasus knights are allowed to roam without straying over city limits."

"I see." Chrom leaned back into his chair, pressing his fingers together as he looked into the distance, deep in thought.

They didn't have time for them to think about it. They had to act.

"We must send troops to assault it before they have the chance to escape."

"We will, Robin. Don't worry," Chrom said, nodding. "But should we let your partner speak her part as well?"

"Sir, we don't have time–"

"Surely you could spare a few minutes to listen."

Robin huffed. "We know where to strike. I don't see what else we might need to know."

Chrom didn't answer. Instead, he motioned for Sumia to speak. She made to bow as well, but again, Chrom stopped her.

"Sumia, you don't need to. As I said, we're all friends here."

Strong words, coming from the Exalt. Robin expected Sumia to turn into a stuttering mess. Her reaction was a little less drastic.

"Oh. I suppose that must have slipped my mind."

Robin snorted. "It seems like a lot of things tend to slip your mind, don't–"

"They plan to execute the girls at sundown," Sumia said before he had a chance to finish.

"Huh?" Robin turned to look at Sumia, frowning. "I thought they needed five maidens to complete the ritual."

"I thought so too, but their ringleader decided to do it, even with the chance of failure such recklessness may bring."

Robin's eyes narrowed, and he leaned in close to her. "Where did you find this information? You can't just bump into runaway Grimleal on the streets."

"But that's exactly what happened."

"Really?" Robin rolled his eyes. "And all you managed to get out of him was when the sacrifice was happening?"

"He told me that there are only twenty-five of them left, and that out of all of them, the leader is the only mage. He also said that the prisoners will be kept at the highest cavern on the mountain, to shorten the travel distance to the summit."

"You got all that out of him? How? Did you bribe him?"

"Actually," Sumia growled, leaning in to meet him, "I hit him. A lot."

Their faces were close now, so close her breath tickled Robin's nose, sending a tingling feeling over his face.

"You? You couldn't hurt a bug."

"But I can hurt you. Does that make you less than a bug?"

"Robin. Sumia," Chrom said, pushing them away from each other. "Save the drama for the bedroom."

"Shut up!"

Chrom wilted a bit under their combined glares, and he raised his hands instinctively. Robin looked at Sumia. She looked back. A mutual feeling passed between them, and for once, it wasn't the feeling of grating on each other's nerves. It wasn't missed.

"Hey now," Chrom said, and he took a step back. "If you kill me, Lissa is next in line for the throne. Don't do this to–"

The click of a doorknob stopped them before they could get any further. Robin glanced at the back of the room just in time to see Frederick stroll in, his head held high. Upon seeing him, both he and Sumia stepped away to make room for him to step between them, while Chrom slumped back in his seat in relief.

"Frederick. How goes the patrols?" he asked.

"As well as can be, sir," Frederick said. "The new patrol patterns are so effective at catching criminals, there's no one left to cause any sort of fuss."

Robin cleared his throat, bringing Frederick's attention to him.

"Almost no one left." Turning to Robin, he added, "How goes the investigation, by the way?"

"Actually, we've found the ones behind it. How quickly do you think you can assemble your troops to storm their hideout and arrest them?"

"Ah." Frederick's eyebrows creased as he frowned. "Well, since you've had all the soldiers patrolling around the city, there's none left on standby."

Robin cursed. Damn him and his overly efficient planning.

"How much time do you need to get troops to the mountain on the outskirts of town?"

"An hour at least."

The sun was already hanging over the horizon by a thread. A glance outside told him that they didn't have that kind of time.

"We'll need someone to go in first, then. Someone who can keep them from killing the girls before the rest of the troops arrives." Looking at Chrom, Robin asked, "Is Cordelia back from the Border Pass yet?"

"I'll go."

All eyes turned to Sumia. Under the eyes of all three of them, Sumia's eyes fell to her feet. At first, Robin thought she was making a poorly timed joke, but did someone making a joke look as nervous as she did right now?

"You can't do that!" Robin said, throwing his arms into the air. "You're not strong enough to handle twenty-five men at once. You'll be killed."

"And Cordelia can?"

"She's Cordelia. She won't be slaughtered the moment she enters the enemy's line of sight."

"But I will?" Sumia said, stepping close to Robin.

"Let's be honest, Sumia. Have you ever realized why I kept you in the back lines? It's to keep you safe."

Sumia threw back her hands, groaning in frustration. "Well if I stay in the back lines, I'll never get any better! You blame me for being a deadweight, but you're the reason why I'm so useless!"

Robin scoffed, crossing his arms as he stared deep into her eyes. "Then tell me who was it who spent all her time picking daisies or feeding the horses to skip out on training? It wasn't Cordelia or Sully, I'll tell you that."

"Well, I'm not going to be useless! Not anymore!"

Before Robin could get another word in, she spun around and ran out the door, slamming it as she slipped outside.

As he listened to her footsteps fade, he clenched his teeth.

The stupid girl was going to get herself killed.

As Sumia bolted through the halls, the red carpet a blur beneath her feet, anger coursed through her, blooming out from her chest and into her fingertips as she curled her fingers into a fist.

Stupid Robin. Even after all they'd been through, he still thought she was useless. Well, she'd show him. She was going to rescue the kidnapped girls all by herself.

It's not like I care about what he thinks, anyway, she thought. He doesn't matter to me, not like Chrom does.

When she burst into the stables, her pegasus reared back with a loud neigh, startled. She recognized her mistake, and she approached it slowly, arms raised.

"Calm down," she said, speaking carefully. "It's just me."

It took a moment for it to realize it really was her, and when it finally did, it let its hooves fall to the ground. The pegasus shook its head, its silver mane flowing in the wind. Her pegasus was a proud and majestic creature, and yet it showed no struggle as she put straps over its muzzle and led it outside.

"The Prism mountain range?" she murmured, combing her slim fingers through the silver strands in her pegasus's mane. "We were there just this afternoon, weren't we girl?"

Her pegasus snorted, as if to agree with her.

"That's right. Do you think you can take us back there?"

Another snort, and a flick of an ear. A yes, then.

Pulling the reins over the pegasus's head, Sumia dragged herself up on its back, taking a moment to settle herself in. She flicked the reins, and with the flap of its wings, the pegasus lifted off the ground.

Just as her pegasus took to the sky, she felt something grab onto her. The pegasus neighed at the sudden shift in weight, but otherwise remained unfazed. Sumia, on the other hand, screamed and lashed out.

Her armored hand struck the cover of a tome. Sumia craned her neck as far back as she could to find Robin clinging onto her waist.

"Robin? What are you doing here?" she squeaked.

"Making sure you don't kill yourself," he said through gritted teeth.

"I told you, I'm going to show you I'm not useless. You can't come with me."

"Well, it's a little too late to get off."

Sumia opened her mouth to protest, but when she looked down she saw that the ground was quite a good distance away, getting smaller by the second.

"I guess you're right," she said.

"Y–yeah," Robin said, closing his eyes.

His grip tightened around her stomach, and that's when something clicked inside her head.

"Robin. Have you ever flown before?"

"I'm starting to think I should have."

"Oh."

A second passed in silence. Then she said, "Well, don't let go. I don't want Chrom to hate me for killing his best friend."

What's this? A story I haven't put off for next week? Preposterous!

I've been feeling majorly burnt out this week, and I've been taking a few days off to sort of reorganize where I've been going with most of my other stories, so if you've been following them now you know why I haven't done much this week.

I don't think I need to tell you that this story is drawing to a close, as it should be pretty obvious from the way I've set things up. There's probably only two chapters left in the story. Looking back, I really put more thought into the "buddy-cop" part of the story than the "rom-com" part, and there really isn't much in the way to build up a romance, something that I've found kind of disappointing. The next time I try writing one of these–and trust me, there will be a next time–I'm going to keep that in mind, but until then, this is all I've got.

Next chapter will be released on Feb 1st.