"Hey there Natalie," The voice politely greets her when she mutters "No way…"
A young man around her age with blonde hair and obsidian pupils is the source of the greeting once she enters in her father's office.
"Natalie, you already know that this is Minato, he commands the #010 Battalion and is going to help us with the investigation." Rick informs her before she sees the man remove himself from the seat.
Natalie studies his appearance as he is clad in a navy blue tunic with black pants along with black boots. The golden hilt of his long sword captures her eyes when she makes out that sapphires were encrusted on the three ends of the hilt.
Minato reached out for her hand when she noticed that he wore black fingerless gloves. He brought his soft lips to the back of her hand.
"It is a pleasure to finally see you again, the first woman to gain the ranks as Captain of the #245 Battalion, your reputation proceeds you." The man in front of her name Minato states after she returned her hand back to her side.
"You wouldn't be the same Minato, that captains the battalion of renegades and mercenaries, would you?" Natalie inquistively grills about his creditability.
"That would be me but my men prefer to be call soldiers of Noursaia like your battalion is, at least can we call them that." He sounded slightly offended at what Natalie just asked him.
"I apologize if I stepped out of line there since all those who are drafted into our ranks are soldiers no matter of their past." Natalie sincerely apologized after she realized how offended he was to her statement.
"You know you are the first person she warmed up to as quickly as she did." Rick interjected which earned him a slap on the arm from Natalie.
"I guess I must consider myself lucky since she is known to have an iron fist when it comes down to the opposite sex." Minato quips, which causes her to blush from embarrassment.
'I can't believe that the Avatar had a point when it came to that.' She deemed after she developed a rebuttal in her head but was cut off by her father.
"You have developed the reputation to take the hardest solider and teach them the ways of being a knight. I am proud of you young man!" Rick interjects his opinion of the young man that stood at his height.
"A knight?" Natalie shockingly repeated since she could not mentally envision him as a knight.
He emits out a chuckle, "Yes, Ms. Andros, King Aikka dubbed me as a knight some years back as well as some of the Captains from the #001 and up to my battalion as knights."
'What! I can't believe that I am the lower ranking officer among them two. How come he never told me that?' "Your father is our leader."
Natalie faces her dad, who laughes the whole situation off, "If you don't mind Natalie can you catch Minato up on all the information that we know?"
"So now you are giving me babysitter's duty again?" She challenges her father in a dry tone after she processes his request.
"Trust me, I will be on my best behavior so you won't have to worry about me. It is an honor and a privilege to work under you again, Sir Rick." Minato comments while he slightly bows and at the waist.
"You won't have to use that title around here. Now go on, I am going to get me something to eat from the kitchen." Rick nearly pushed them out of his office when he proceed to head in the opposite direction of them.
"So can I see the king and the queen?" Minato flat out asked Natalie, who continued to walk in the direction of the dining hall. "They are eating in the dining hall so I am going to take you to them anyway."
'I can not believe that this blonde haired bimbo did not tell me that he was a knight.' Natalie angrily grubbles to herself.
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"So was dinner delicious you two?" Eva asked her children as they nodded their heads in agreement.
"Make sure you thank the cook for the delicious meal." Aikka told his children as they once again repeated their previous action.
"King Aikka, Queen Eva, Prince Kieran and Princess Kiera, I am sorry to interrupt you but you have a guest…his name is…"
"Minato!" Her green eyes witnessed the two twins swiftly removed themselves from the dining table and sprinted toward the blonde man.
"My, my, my, you two sure have grown since the last time I saw you " Minato comments as his guide's eyebrow only twitches in disbelief.
'Ah come on! Who is it he doesn't know?!' She inwardly screams in her head while Aikka and Eva draw near them.
"Ah, Minato it's so good to see you again! How have you been old friend?" The king poses after he extends a hand towards the young man.
"Well, I clearly see that the queen is pregnant, yet again. What are you expecting this time?" The tall male curiously probes while Natalie attempts to throw him a red flag for that question.
The queen would usually be highly upset whenever someone asked that question.
Instead Eva simply flashes him three fingers, two on one hand over Kieran and one where Kiera stood.
"Wow, five…" The solider softly whispered to the adults, which nearly made the raven haired woman almost lose her mind.
'He hasn't even been here for an hour! Yet, he already got the answer to the question that even the Avatar couldn't even get an answer to.'
'Who is this guy?! He isn't the same idiot from when I first met him?' The young woman ponders after she spectates an exchange of friendly conversation with the twins, who were already use to his prescene.
'They were staring at Princess Mai as if she was a foreign object even though she looks just like them.'
'Yet, when they see Minato they run for joy.' The captain considers when she feels a migraine on the rise.
"So how long will you be staying with us, Minato?" The king enquiringly wonders, which snaps her out of her thoughts.
"That just reminded me, I need to get Minato caught up on security measures! He has been away for so long." Natalie conjures up an excuse after she hears Aikka's voice.
"Here's a little fact for you, Minato along with your father created the security protocols so I am sure Rick kept him updated."
Eva senses that Natalie now had an aura of depression that her, 'Ah come on!'
"Ms. Andros is right. I do have to get caught up but I will see you tomorrow morning. I hope you all have a good night." He wished to them.
The twins agreed before they departed the hall with their father and mother in tow.
He noted that Natalie isolated herself away from the group after she heard what Aikka told her. 'He is just too perfect.'
"Ah cheer up, I really didn't do that much…hey are you all right?" Minato poses to her as he taps her and she eases up.
"I'm going to bed!" Natalie suddenly proclaims once she stood up from her crotched position that forced Minato to step backwards.
"Aren't you going to get me caught up with the case?" He requests of her which suddenly reminds her of her military duties.
"We don't have a lot of information so I can just tell you on the way to where you will be staying." She supplies an answer to his question.
The couple made their way out of the dining room when she accidentally bumped in to someone.
The solid ground was never felt because someone held her up by her waist, "Are you alright Ms. Andros?"
Golden specks caught her eyes when it immediately registered in her head exactly who she bumped. "Are you alright?" Yet it was Princess Mai, whose voice chimed in.
"Hey, you should be watching where you are going!" The captain angrily fires off unaware that Minato presently holds her in his grasp.
"Could you stop being so rough? I still do have you in my arms." He quietly advises, which instantly quells her actions as well as her anger.
Jordan registered that the young woman no longer argued with him, which was something out of the norm for her. "Who are you?"
The blonde was settling his companion down in fear of her possibly causing him physical harm and/or serious injuries.
"I didn't know that the Avatar roamed these halls. It's a pleasure to meet you, my name is Minato." The young man politely introduces himself after he kneels to one of his knees.
"You don't have to bend to a knee for this jerk! He's insensitive to the people's feelings around him."
"Hey Mai, he's manipulating you to try and make me jealous. What he doesn't know is that I never did like him!" The raven haired woman yells out her tirade before she storms off down the hallway.
"I'll handle this for you. She might really rip your head off if she talks to you." The solider says before he follows after her who continues to still fume.
"Is that true?" Mai challenged him about what Natalie said was true or not.
"No it isn't." The golden figure easily lied but knew he personally did not care since he learned to be a habitual liar even though he did not wanted to.
'That's another lie right there.'
'I just don't like the fact that this Minato character is going to be an obstacle towards getting Natalie.' His thoughts turned to Minato.
"It is getting late, I am going to walk you to your room okay?" The young man told her as they made their way toward the guest wing of the castle.
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"I need something to punch." She irately grumbled once she was outside before a small boulder in the distance caught her attention.
"Natalie wait up!" Minato was shouting after catching up to where she was, which was her standing in front of a small boulder.
Natalie adjusts her feet so that they were shoulder width apart, inhales a deep breath to channel her anger to her right fist and connects with the boulder.
"Are you alright?" He was asking before the sound of something cracking was heard until the boulder was splitting in half.
'Iron fist indeed…' The blonde inwardly concludes before he realizes that she now faces him.
"What do you want Minato?! I am so not in the mood to talk to you right now?" She hisses at him as the rage evaporates from her body after she punches the rock.
"A captain always keeps their composure."
"If they don't then it means that they are going to risk losing lives in their battalion. If you aren't careful then you will end up doing something reckless." The young man recited the creed they took in order to be awarded the rank of Captain.
"Don't feed me that crap right now! This is not a freaking battlefield so I can express my emotions if I want!" The captain retorted because she did not feel like being belittled.
"It's obvious that you have a problem with a intergalactic individual, who sits at a much higher rank than any of us ever will. Whatever he did that made you so upset doesn't justify his position as the Avatar whatsoever."
"At the present moment, we cannot afford to have personal vendettas or we will lose sight of the mission." The taller of the two asserts to her in a stern tone.
His obsidian eyes was watching his words sinking in sincd she was running her fingers through her head of hair and exhaling a sigh of relief.
"Plus, I don't think any more of these poor defenseless rocks deserve to be punch like that. How is your fist?" Minato asked when he pointed at the rock and then her hand.
"I didn't feel anything at all…see." The solider claims as she lifts her hand up to show she there were no bruise or marks on her knuckles.
'She couldn't be part of one those experiments…could she?' He was considering while carefully observing her hand.
"Hey Minato," Natalie brought the blonde of his thoughts, "Yes?" he asked.
"Thanks, I needed to be reminded of my position."
"It just that when someone calls you a cold-hearted bitch that never thinks about her thoughts or feelings and fails to see the small picture then I don't see why I can't hold my anger against that person." Her green eyes cut away from him when she responds to his question.
'Someone called her that…could it have been the Avatar?' The young man's thoughts were beginning to make sense as to the reason why she was so angry.
"Listen to me, you shouldn't allow anyone that barely knows you pass judgment on you. You simply prove them wrong."
"Besides, whoever called you that isn't a man at all." The taller male firmly states his opinion when the solider feels her cheeks burn.
'What am I doing?' The raven haired woman thought as she was left slightly speechless from her conversation with Minato.
"Since we are heading in the same direction, we can walk together."
"You can just fill me in on the information tomorrow. Does that sound like a deal?"
"...but wait a minute, Rick asked me to inform you tonight and it would not be right if I don't tell you." The young woman abruptly feels a yawn that she stops with her hand.
"See...you aren't even in the mood for a brief. Nonetheless, I traveled quite a distance and I wouldn't mind a comfortable bed to sleep in."
"Come on…" Minato offers his hand toward her.
'What am I doing?' The solider ruminated again as she accepted his hand when a smile grew on her face.
'He hasn't even been here for a full hour yet and he got a smile on her face!'
'All I got was another argument to take my head off.' Jordan was realizing after observing the pair's conversation from Mai's window.
'How dare he comes in to this castle and play peacemaker and greets me as if I knows him on a personally level.' He remembered how this Minato character addressed him.
"Thanks for walking me to my room. I deeply appreciate it." Mai's voice brought him out of his thoughts when she still stood with her door open.
As he was about to depart from her room, he pauses to look at Mai, "How bad do you want Aikka?"
"What?! Where is this coming from?" The princess quips as her eyes side cast to show her embarrassment.
"I already know why you came to this kingdom in the first place. From what I'm seeing, your plan isn't going to work. If you do what I tell you then you just might have your wish."
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Author's Notes:
06.24.17 Major editing revision