Chapter 7: Favour
"Elian, your powers for gathering information are amazing," Ryuhou shook his head, one hand resting on the keypad. "Good work." He listened to the voice in his ear, his expression blank. "You're sure it's him?" He asked, looking up slightly as he heard some familiar clacking footsteps running down the corridor. Scheris.
"Thanks, we'll be there soon," he said curtly, hanging up.
"What's going on?" Scheris asked, her hands clasped behind her back as she entered.
Ryuhou turned towards her, spinning in his seat, his voice showing his excitement. "We know where they are, and he's with them," the Alter User said, a slight smile on his face. Scheris gasped in surprise. "They make their move tomorrow," he turned back to the girl. "I don't want anyone else to touch him. This time…he's all mine." His smile widened as he looked at the prisoner file on his screen, showing the infamous NP3228. Ryuhou closed down the document and stood, brushing off his coat.
"Before we get to them though…we have a meeting back at headquarters; the commander wants to see us for a debriefing." Ryuhou stepped out of the bunker shuttle and onto the ground of district F-150-250. "We're to report immediately, so Elian is sending someone."
Almost on cue, the immediately recognisable sound of a certain Alter's revving engine revved in their ears and a pink and orange Alter car came screeching around the corner. Scheris stepped back, looking rather sick as she saw Straight Cougar pull up before them. "What?" She whined, "Are you serious? He's the one who has to take us? I'm gonna puke, and it won't be my fault!"
The front window rolled down and Cougar pushed his glasses down his nose, looking up at the two HOLY members. "Elian said quick, di'n he? And who could be quicker than I? That's right, no one can, so get in the car or stay here. I really don't mind, Miss. Scheris." He stuck his tongue out childishly at her. Scheris did the same, placing her hands on her hips. Ryuhou rolled his eyes and walked around the front to open the passenger side door. He slid in.
"Just get us there, Cougar, that's all you have to do. Let's not start something you might regret." The HOLD member crossed his arms, staring straight ahead out the windshield. Scheris slipped into the back seat, quickly putting her seatbelt on.
The Straight Cougar grinned a grin that some would call evil and revved the engine. Scheris paled. "Alright-y then, hold on you lot! This is gonna be my new record!"
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Sure enough, by the time the two arrived, Scheris had puked her lunch twice into the backseat, and Cougar had broken his record time from that particular distance. "Ah ha!" Cougar pushed his glasses up on top of his head as they got out of the car in the middle of the HOLD car park. The car crashed to the ground immediately, the tires burning. "Once again I have broken my all-time record! This is just absolutely incr-"
"That's enough gloating for one trip," Ryuhou said bitterly as he brushed past the Alter User to climb the stairs. "We have a meeting to get to; hurry up."
When Scheris gathered herself together again and Cougar had apologised once again to the mechanic staff, the three of them started through the main building towards the commander's office. Before they entered, one of the guards at the door stopped Scheris. "I'm sorry ma'am, but the commander has told us that only higher operatives are to know the specifics of this mission, I'm sorry but you will have to report tomorrow and you will be informed with the rest of the other operatives."
Scheris blinked in surprise and her shoulders fell. She sighed deeply, placing her hands on her hips. "Well~, alright then, I guess I'll see you tomorrow Ryuhou! Good night!" With a little wave and a wink she started off back down the corridor, jogging lightly towards the elevator. As soon as the doors closed Cougar started chuckling.
"I really don't know how you can deal with that, I mean really," Cougar shook his head as the two of them passed through into the commander's office. Ryuhou snorted gently, staying a little ahead. To tell the truth…Ryuhou didn't know how he managed either.
Ryuhou stopped as he saw just how many of them were in the office. Elian, Urizane and all of the higher operatives were there. Sitting in his comfortable looking office-chair, Commander Jigmarl seemed almost smug at the turnout, and sat back with his fingers laced together, resting on the polished mahogany of his desk. Ryuhou stepped further into the office and moved to salute to the Commander, who inclined his head in response. Cougar simply gave a quick flash of two fingers in a wave, at which Martin scowled but otherwise did not say anything.
After a few more minutes, the Commander cleared his throat, and the occupants of the room went silent. Martin gave a smile and hummed slightly, looking around at each person, his cool eyes passing over each member of HOLY. "Now that nearly everyone is here, I believe it's about time we start our meeting."
Nearly everyone? Ryuhou asked, blinking very slowly in confusion as he looked around. He didn't think that there would be anyone else to add to the group that was here; all of their…strongest Alter Users were present, if you could call them the strongest. More, the highest ranked. Yes, Ryuhou thought that was more appropriate.
"As you all know, tomorrow we will be commencing the Native Alter Hunt, beginning with an assault on the group of renegades forming on the Western Coast, near the outskirts of area G-130-150. We will be splitting into three groups, those attacking from the water, those attacking from the land and those-"
A single knock sounded at the door, and the HOLY members looked up as one of the double oak wood doors cracked open, and a rather petite woman stepped into the room. The Commander's eyes brightened as he saw her, his smile widening. He leant forwards in his chair, lacing his fingers before his mouth. "Ah, it's good to see you're back in time. I trust everything went well with the subject?"
The girl turned around after closing the door behind her, stepping across the room with a small sigh. "It went better than we hoped," She replied, moving towards Martin's desk, before placing the file under her arm on the desk in front of him. "I hope I didn't miss too much. Once again, I'm sorry I was late, Commander." She moved to sit on the side of his desk, brushing back a lock of long white hair.
To the surprise of many occupants in the room, Commander Jigmarl simply nodded, inclining his head to her and taking up the file, absently flicking through it before sliding out his chair, and unlocking the filing cabinet in his desk, placing the file inside. "It's alright, I had expected your tardiness; I knew where you were. You did not miss much, nothing you didn't already know." Turning back to the members of HOLY, who were torn between confusion and stunned silence, Martin smiled. "Now, shall we continue?"
While the commander spoke about their doings for tomorrow, Ryuhou took in the woman leaning against the desk of Martin Jigmarl. She was rather young, indeed she looked no older than he was. Her hair was a strange white, falling to her shoulder blades in gentle waves. She wore the coat of the male's HOLY uniform, however the skirt of the female one with…were they leggings? The woman (No, she was more like a girl, Ryuhou noted) was dressed to fight, unlike any of the other female HOLY members they had, of which there were not many. Ryuhou had never seen her before, and he had been through all of the recruits personally at the beginning of the year. Since then, no new members had been added, to his knowledge. From the looks of the other members, they didn't know her either. And the way she had simply waltzed into the Commander's office without a care, and spoken to him like that…
…Just who was this girl?
The debriefing ended half an hour later, the groups assigned under Urizane and Cougar, and himself and Scheris. The girl, who had not been mentioned yet, simply stayed where she was as the rest of them began to move, her head leant back slightly to look out the large, full-length wall windows of Commander Jigmarl's office.
Just when they began to move, having been dismissed, Martin spoke up again. "Oh, and just before you leave, I have one more thing I would like to speak to you all about," He told them, his resonating voice sounding rather serious as it echoed throughout the room. The HOLY members paused at the tone, and the Commander gestured to the white haired girl, who pushed away from the desk and shoved her hands into the pockets of her coat. As she turned towards them, Ryuhou saw her eyes, a shade of blue that seemed to shine in the dusk light; both a dark and a light tint of azure at the same time.
"This is Akira Aizawa, she will be conducting her first mission assignment with you all tomorrow as a member of HOLY. I have given her free reign to do what she must in order to achieve our goals for the...hunt tomorrow," Martin paused slightly, looking up at Akira with a small smile. "However, she is still a HOLY member and must abide by the orders of her superiors. Which…out of you include Elian, Urizane, Straight Cougar and Ryuhou." The commander turned his gaze on each one of them as he spoke their names, and Akira followed him.
When those eyes landed on him, Ryuhou felt like the breath was kicked out of them. The blue had turned a bright, sharp and electric under what little afternoon light was left in the room. Both it and the intensity of the colour disappeared however when the automatic lights lit up the room, and the girl, Akira, took that as a cue to bow low to them all. She spoke, her voice sounded rather friendly. "It will be an honour to work with all of you, I hope you will take good care of me."
When she stood, she gave them a kind, lively smile that made Ryuhou stop and think twice about that glare from before. Had it even been a glare? And just…who was this girl to have the Commander's favour?
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AN: I'm really sorry about how late this chapter was! The next chapter will be absolutely MASSIVE compared to all of my other ones, so there's no need to worry! I'll keep you guys updated on how long that'll be, but at the moment I don't know!
Thank you all for all of your reads and reviews, I know this chapter has a lot of what you have been waiting for, but I wasn't too generous, now was I? ;)
Thank you all!
Holly :)