"It's under here. Every base has a laptop like this."

"Yeah. Yuma told me. I just don't know how to… work it."

In the main room, from under the table, Rin retrieved a thick laptop. She unfolded it and set it on the table. The home screen wasn't a normal desktop. The computer had been completely reprogrammed to suit the group's best interests. Rin clicked through a few tabs, the dark background making it hard to make out the contents of the screen from her side. She typed in some numbers, the coordinates of the Montana base, and sat in one of the chairs. I sat next to her. After a second of loading, the screen went black.

And then Yuma's concerned face appeared on the screen.

"Where the fuck are you guys?" He asked, his voice ripe with worry. Before Rin had the chance to respond, Flower, Anon, and Kanon each appeared from offscreen, staring at us.

Rin took one look at them and sighed. She turned to me. "You talk to them," she said, standing from the table and heading back towards the living quarters.

I watched her go with a frown.

"Len? What happened?" Yuma asked again.

"I was about to call it," Flower told me. "I was almost positive you guys were dead."

"It's… it's a long story," I said, pulling the laptop closer to me. "But we missed our flight. And I don't know if it's a good idea to take her anywhere in public right now."

"Tell us, Len," Kanon goaded. "We have time."

I didn't feel like recounting the story again, but I knew it was necessary. So, for the next half hour, I explained everything that had happened the day before. I made sure to leave out the fact that we had slept in the same bed.

Once they heard about the enemy assassin, their expressions grew troubled.

"...and here we are," I concluded, glancing towards the hallway once again. "I don't think she feels good. It's a nasty cut."

Yuma leaned back, running a hand through his hair. Anon's eyes were trained on the floor. Kanon's expression was stiff and strained. Flower stood behind them, her arms crossed, deep in thought.

There was a moment of silence as all of them absorbed the information.

"Good job, Len," Anon finally said. "You… did everything right."

I let out an unamused laugh. "Took me hours to remember what this place was called."

"Did you stitch her up? Clean the cut first? Did you-"

"Anon," her sister interrupted. "You can look at it when they get back."

"We need to get you guys home," Yuma finally said. "We're gonna come get you. Do not leave the base until we get there."

I nodded. "Okay."

"Keep the laptop on. If we need to contact you, it'll be on here."

"When are you guys leaving?" I asked.

"Now."

Yuma's concern was almost troubling. Like we were still in danger. "Okay," I answered.

He didn't respond. He reached forward to close the screen. The call ended.

Now, to wait.

Rin was probably lying down and I didn't want to bother her. So I went to the armory. Entering the room, I was pleasantly surprised to find it stocked with the same amount of guns as home. I decided to shoot down the range to pass the time.

The two bases were so similar that I could almost convince myself that I was already home. It was easier to take my mind off the situation if I pretended, as I shot at the target down the hall, that the others were all down here with me. Somewhere.

But that wasn't the case.


That night, I was sitting in the main room, rummaging through my bag when my radio activated.

"We're outside. Hurry." It was Yuma.

"On our way," I answered, throwing everything back into the bag and pulling it over my shoulder.

Rin hadn't left her bed all day.

"Rin," I said, entering the bedroom. "They're here. It's time to go."

Her back was to me. For a moment I thought she was sleeping. She shuffled a bit, then turned to face me.

"How you feeling?" I asked. We hadn't changed her bandages all day. She refused to let me near them.

"Alive," she said softly. With a deep breath, she pushed herself up. "Let's just go home."

"Agreed."

We could hear the steady beat of the blades before we reached the top of the stairs. Opening the door revealed the amazing sight of Anon and Kanon standing in the helicopter, holding their hands out to us. Their hair blew wildly in the wind. The smell of rain was still in the air, the fields around us a harsh green in the moonlight. Tonight was completely clear.

"Let's get out of here!" Yuma yelled from the driver's seat.


It was morning by the time we finally arrived home.

Rin said nothing to the others as she walked slowly out of the main room, no doubt heading to her bed.

Flower watched her go from the table. Once the injured girl left, a sigh escaped her lips. "We have a lot to talk about."

I had slept on the plane ride home. Plus, I didn't want to disturb Rin's sleep. So I joined the others at the table for our tense, inevitable conversation.

Flower rested her elbows on the table. "We just… this is bad, okay? This is really bad."

No one said anything.

"Losing Meiko as an ally, and, even worse, learning that she's plotting against us, is… catastrophic. I don't even have the words," Flower continued.

"We can still get contracts other ways, though, right?" I asked.

"Yeah, but no high-value ones. Plus, if you were right about the other assassin, she's most-likely found another crew to work with."

"We can survive without the big ones," Kanon pointed out. I noted to myself that she hadn't gloated about her correct suspicions yet. At this point, she probably never would. Her dedication to helping her friends instead of saying I told you so was an admirable one.

Flower shook her head. "Yeah. We can. But that's not what I'm worried about." Her eyes passed over each of us, stopping on me. "Meiko's going to know, when none of her guys return to her, that you escaped. And that means she's going to be after you. She knows more about us than anyone else on the planet. And if she's working with Luka, that means Luka knows more about us than anyone else on the planet."

I joined my hands on the table nervously. "So… what're we gonna do?"

"I don't know. But we need the money from our contracts to function."

"We did a huge one," Anon shrugged. "We'll be okay for a while."

"But what happens when it runs out?"

"That could take years, Flower," Yuma pointed out.

"Years of them plotting against us. Now, not only does Luka want us gone, but Meiko does, too. If we don't do something, we're not gonna live long enough to see those years."

A heavy silence filled the table. Now I understood why they waited to start this conversation until Rin had gone. The stress on her head was enough already.

"We need to do something," Flower concluded.

"...Do what?" I asked.

"I think we should go after them."

Kanon's shoulders slumped. Anon's eyes bulged.

Yuma shook his head and laughed. "You really think we can track them down?"

"I think you can, yes."

"You're fucking crazy," he responded. "I track civilians. Not the world's most-wanted."

Flower scowled, raising her voice. "We have two options! We either go out and do contracts like normal, letting them track us and hunt us like animals, or we go after them first."

"Either we die running from them, or we die fighting them," I said, my eyes glued to the table.

The two silenced their bickering to look at me. It was a harsh way of putting it, but it was true. The unspoken knowledge of this situation.

Flower was standing now. "We might have a chance if we fight back. Maybe."

"We're going after them."

We all turned towards the hallway. Rin stood, head still wrapped, arm in a sling, leaning against the wall with tired eyes.

Yuma let out a huff of frustration. "This is a deathwish."

"We don't have a choice," Kanon pointed out, her voice gentle and patient with him.

"Let's…" Rin trailed off. "Let's not take any contracts for a while," she suggested. "We need to focus on tracking down Meiko."

Flower nodded. She seemed pleased with how the conversation had turned out. "Okay."

A moment passed. As everyone concluded that the conversation was over, they slowly dispersed from the table. Anon and Kanon disappeared into the living area with Rin, Flower stomped off to the gym, and Yuma pulled his laptop out of his bag to begin his search.

No one had told me what to do. So I followed Flower towards the gym.

She was already in the range, the rest of the world dead to her as she focused in on her target. Not wanting to bother her, I decided to make use of the high-class gym equipment.


For the next few days, a horrible tense mood fell over all of us. There were no smiles, no jokes, and very little conversation. Everyone did their own thing while Yuma, assisted a bit by Kanon, searched for any sign of the woman who had just tried to kill us. I wasn't sure if my training was completed or put on hold, but no one instructed me specifically towards anything during those days. I was able to spend my days how I wanted for the first time in months. I didn't know what to do with myself. The somber mood was killing me, so I spent most of my time trying to escape from it.

If, a couple months ago, I had imagined what an assassin hideout would be like, I would have never guessed it would be full of laughter, jokes, and a general familial mood. Now, this place felt just as unwelcoming and unfriendly as I would have pictured.

One day, I was alone in the armory overlooking one of my favorite guns when Rin appeared in the doorway. She could now go without the sling, with Anon's permission, and the cut on her head had almost completely healed. She looked good as new. Like with everyone else, I had seen her every day and yet barely spoken to her since London.

"You busy?" She asked.

I glanced down at the disassembled gun. "Not really. Just trying to kill time."

She nodded. "This sucks."

"I thought I was the only one who thought that," I told her.

A soft laugh escaped her. The first one I had heard in a long time. "No. Not just you. Everyone hates it."

Though it wasn't specifically clear what it was, I knew what she was talking about, and I hated it too.

"Come on," she said, nodding her head towards the gym.

"Where we going?"

"Sparring."

I furrowed my brow. "Are you sure-?" Adding back one of my favorite training practices would do wonders to improve my mood, but Rin was still healing.

"Anon gave me the okay. Let's go."

Ditching my worries, I let a wide grin stretch across my face. "Finally," I said. "Something fun."

The staff was almost unfamiliar in my hands. But the second we began, it felt as if I had never stopped.

The morale in the bunker was at an all-time low, but Rin and I were able to find some way to smile through it.


A short chapter. But finally, we get to our plot. Yay!

Thanks for reading! :)