"I think I've got something."

As we all stood in the kitchen, nearing our second week of tense silence, these words made everyone freeze from their meals. Yuma stood at the counter, directly in front of the fridge, staring hesitantly at all of us.

"But I really feel like this is a bad idea."

"What is it?" Flower asked, her words sounding more like a demand than a question.

"It's just… I feel like I'm leading us all to die-"

"What. Is. It?" Flower repeated.

Yuma took a deep breath, his shoulders low. "I've gotten in touch with some of Meiko's other clients. Most of them were willing to talk to me about where they've met up with her."

Anon furrowed her brow. "What if they tell her? We don't want her to know-"

"They don't know it was us," Kanon answered. "Her clients just know we're somebody. Which isn't uncommon. For all they know, we could be potential clients, too."

Yuma shot her an appreciative glance and continued. "I've got a list of all the spots she's met with her clients as well as the dates that they've met. And I think I've found a pattern."

Rin raised her eyebrows. She was halfway through a bowl of cereal next to me. "A pattern?"

"Meiko goes to the same locations to meet with people. All these locations, though I'm missing a few, go in a very specific pattern."

"So you know where she's going next?" I asked.

"...I can take an educated guess."

"Well?! Spit it, Yuma!" Flower's voice rose in a combination of impatience and excitement.

He breathed in slowly. "I'm pretty sure her next meeting is in Monterrey. Mexico."

Flower picked up her bowl, half-finished as well, and dumped its contents down the sink. "What are we waiting for? Let's get you guys to the airport!"

"Flower, chill," Anon said, placing a hand on her shoulder. "We need some sort of plan before we just run in there."

"The longer we wait, the higher the chance that-"

"I know! I know," Yuma interrupting, holding up a hand to silence her. "I know. But we need to talk this through. We are, by no means, trying to ambush her here."

"Why not?" Flower asked.

"Because we're not just trying to kill her for payback," he answered quickly. "We need information from her. Information that she's not going to give up. Even if we threaten her life. She knows stuff about Luka and we need that."

"How are we supposed to get it?" She asked.

Rin nodded, clearly catching on to Yuma's plan. "We need to find where she's hiding. We need to find her base."

"Exactly." He seemed relieved Rin agreed with him. "The only way we're going to find this information is if we steal it from the source itself."

"But we are going to kill her, right?" Rin asked.

Yuma closed his mouth.

"Of course we are," Flower answered. "We can't have her running around-"

"Without her data, she'll be useless," Kanon pointed out. "She won't be able to bring in any income and she'll be gone before you know it. We don't…" she trailed off. "We don't have to kill her."

Rin looked like someone had punched her in the face. "Of course we do! We can't have someone who's trying to get back at us running rampant all over the world!"

Flower shared her vigor. "If we don't kill her, who knows what she'll do?"

Yuma and Kanon exchanged glances. "She won't have any power anymore. She won't be able to do anything. Would you rather kill her, or have her suffer in prison for the rest of her life?" Yuma asked.

Flower leaned forward onto the counter. "If she gets arrested, we're fucked. What's stopping her from telling them all about us? Then we will be suffering in prison for the rest of our lives."

"What do you guys think?" Kanon asked, looking between her sister and I. Throughout the conversation, we had remained silent.

My eyes widened. "I… uh…"

Anon lowered her gaze.

"You two are the tiebreakers," Kanon said calmly. Flower was basically fuming at this point and Rin wasn't far off. "So one of you, say something."

I stood tall, looking down at my bowl of cereal. "I…" Choosing sides was something I had hoped I would never have to do. But this was a team. We were in a difficult situation and I had an answer that I believed was right. "I think it's too risky to leave her alive."

All eyes turned to Anon. The girl recoiled under everyone's gazes.

She gulped. "We've killed enough people," she said.

Three to three. We stood in silence for a moment. Finally, Yuma shook his head. "Whatever. We'll have to come to a consensus later. For now, we know what we have to do. She'll be flying into Mexico to meet with one of her clients sometime this week. We need to scout the airport to look for her." He glanced at Flower. "I think you should come with us."

She furrowed her brow. "Why?"

"Because I'm pretty sure, at some point, Meiko has seen all five of us except for you. So I think it will be safest for you to stay in the airport and look for her."

She considered his words. "Okay. That makes sense."

Yuma turned to look at Rin and I. "You guys have to come with us. It's too dangerous for you to stay here by yourselves and we might need your help. But she'll be looking for you two. So, while we're there, you guys can't be anywhere near the airport."

"What do you expect me to do?" Rin asked with annoyance. "Sit in the hotel and twiddle my thumbs?"

"That's exactly what I expect you to do."

"We can't just sit around all day while you guys are out risking your lives-"

"He's right, Rin," Anon said. "If she sees you guys, all hell will break loose."

Rin shut her mouth, looking angrily down at her breakfast. She didn't seem interested in finishing it.

I laughed in an attempt to clear the air. "Finally. A real vacation."

Despite himself, Yuma grinned. It faded as soon as he started talking again. "Remember, I could be completely wrong here. We could be in Mexico for two days, two weeks, two months, I have no idea. All I know is that eventually, she will be meeting in the city. And I have a hunch her meeting is in a few days."

"So I'm scouting the airport," Flower clarified. "Until we find Meiko. Then I'm tailing her to see which flight she takes, and where it goes?"

"Exactly. We are not killing her, we are not attacking her, we're not even gonna try to track her with our tech. If she finds one of our trackers on her, she'll go into lockdown. We can't afford to fuck this up. We have to do it the hard way."

Flower shrugged. "Sounds easy enough."

Rin crossed her arms. "I can't believe you guys are going to make me sit in a hotel room for two weeks."

Yuma shrugged. "Maybe less. Maybe more. I have no idea."

"Sweet," Kanon clapped her hands together. "When are we leaving?"

"As soon as everyone's packed."

"One more thing," Yuma said, his expression darkening once again. "We… we could be gone for a long time. I'm gonna take some extra time to pack all of my gear. I don't know when or if we'll need it, but we won't come back here to get it for a while. Who knows," he added in a low voice. "Maybe… maybe we'll never come back here."

His troubling words hung in the air.

He sighed. "Go pack. We'll leave when we're done."

The six of us descended to our rooms in silence.

I had very little to pack. In fact, all of my belongings easily fit into my duffle bag. Surprisingly, Rin was the same way.

"Wait," Yuma called as we began to leave the room. "Gimmie your bags. I've got more shit I need to bring."

So we left our bags with them and returned to the main room.

I chuckled as I sat in one of the chairs. "It feels like I just got here. And I'm already leaving."

Rin sat next to me. "Yeah," she sighed, looking around the bare room. "There's no place like home."

"How long do you think we'll be gone?" I asked her.

She frowned. I had noticed that, since we returned from London, she had been even quieter than usual. "I don't know."

Something was eating at her. As much as I wanted to know, I didn't want to pry. But I also didn't like seeing her so down. "You know," I said, casting a glance towards the gym. "We probably won't get the chance to spar again for a while."

Beneath her low gaze, I saw a small smile appear. "Probably not," she agreed.

"And it would be a shame-"

She pushed herself from the table. "You're on," she taunted, running towards the gym.

That's better, I thought with a smile. I raced after her.

She already had the staffs off the wall when I stepped onto the mat. I caught mine easily when she threw it at me.

Her eyes sparkled with determination. If there was one thing I had learned about Rin in the past few months, it was her love for competition. "This is it," she said.

"Winner takes all?" I raised my eyebrow.

She took a deep breath. "Winner takes all."

We stood at opposite ends, staring each other down, waiting for the other to make the first move. With a flash of movement, Rin jumped forward.

It was hard to imagine that I had once been unable to fight her for more than a few seconds. Many of her moves seemed horribly predictable, with only a few extra swipes taking me by surprise. Clack after clack rang out through the room around us as I deflected strike after strike from her. There were a few times when I attempted to counter her with a strike to her side, but she jumped neatly out of the way every time.

Minutes passed. The further into the match we got, the heavier my breathing become and the sorer my muscles felt. Rin was feeling my same fatigue. Despite this, we wore matching grins.

I played back the first time I had beaten her. She was too quick to strike directly with the staff so I would have to catch her first.

She aimed for a low strike to my hip, which I dodged with a jump back. With the other end of her staff, she brought it down towards my head. Here's my chance. I held up my weapon to block it. There was a slight pause as Rin recovered her strength from the blow. Taking advantage of the time, I pushed the staff up, throwing her off balance, and knocked it out of her grip easily with a strike to her right hand. Realizing she was about to lose, she jumped for it in an attempt to recover herself. To stop her, I jumped behind her, swinging the staff in front of her stomach and pulling her in.

Her weapon clattered against the ground. I had her pulled against me, completely helpless as it fell.

We paused. It was over. I had won.

Despite this, I didn't release her from my grip. For a moment, we stood there, both surprised at the position we had found ourselves in. Her breath coming out in gasps, she slowly looked over her shoulder towards me. The adrenaline still pouring through her made her every movement shaky. She gazed over her shoulder at me with those low-lidded, icy blue eyes. We were close enough to share the same air, both of us trying to catch our breath. I resisted the urge to lean in closer.

Lost in the moment, I was completely taken off guard as she swiped at my left hand, jumping through the gap in my arms. I basically handed my staff to her as she jumped away, turning back to me and aiming the end straight at my neck.

"Dead," she said.

"No way!" I yelled. "I had you! I totally won!"

"You got distracted."

I definitely did. "Only after I had won."

"You didn't call 'Dead'," she pointed out with a sly grin.

"I didn't need to!" I rose my voice, still a little dizzy from the moment I had just shared with her. "I won and we both knew it!"

"Mhmm," she said, lowering the staff to the floor, still grinning. "Sure you did."

"The fuck are you two doing?" Yuma's voice called from the main room. "We need to go now!"

I let out a deep breath, watching Rin as she picked up her discarded staff and set it next to mine against the wall.

As she passed me, she sent me another sly smile.

It took me a moment to remember how to move my legs. I followed her out.


Feed me that badass Rin and Len fluff. I live for it.

Thanks for reading guys :)