The peace was in jeopardy once again.
Ever since a dangerous terrorist named Majima had shown up in Westalis, tensions had escalated with Ostania to the point that assassinations and convoluted terrorist plots were becoming more common than usual. Loid had been investigating his sudden appearance and motives for weeks in an effort to stop him, and there was concern for Anya's safety because of a spike in attacks on Eden Academy students. While he did not fear them, Loid took care not to recklessly engage him as the risk of attracting unwanted attention to himself was high.
"An outside force trying to escalate tensions between the east and west? What could be his motive?" Loid thought to himself. "Intel has told me that he fled here after his plans were thwarted overseas. He has a large body count to his name, so he's obviously a threat to the general public at large. His numerous conflicts with a young girl named Chisato Nishikigi are also well-documented. They say that she's a weird one, but she's actually highly skilled. It'd make sense if she were here in Westalis too..."
"Papa! Play ball with me!" Anya called out, dribbling a red ball and donning an impatient look.
"Not now, I'm trying to think. Also, stop bouncing that ball, you're disturbing the neighbors." Loid responded.
"Yor on the other hand kept claiming that she saw some scraggly man with bushy green hair and a Hawaiian shirt. Maybe she knows something I don't?"
That night, there was a large commotion at a large, but regal-looking tower near the heart of the city. The tower's lobby was littered with numerous bodies of building staff and criminal henchmen alike, as rumbling was heard on the floor above. Turns out, Yor and Majima were in the midst of a tense battle; Majima was there to spur the quiet Westalis into a conflict with the aggressive Ostania while Yor was tasked with taking out Majima himself for disturbing the peace between the nations. While the fight had only lasted for about five minutes, Majima was already on the back foot.
"Hmph. You're actually stronger than those Lycoris girls. I'm impressed." Majima said, clutching a stab wound on the right side of his torso that didn't hit any major organs.
"Well? Have you had enough?" Yor said, slowly strolling towards the injured Majima with a piercing glare.
"...Like hell!" Majima blurted out before he pulled out a gun and fired.
However, Yor quickly dodged, causing Majima's eyes to widen in shock before she suddenly appeared in front of him and drove her dagger right into Majima's chin, hoisting him up into the air from the impact of her attack before abruptly pulling her arm back and dropping him.
"W-well that's it." Majima sputtered out with a bloody smile. "Just k-know that people like y-you threaten the equilibrium between those two n-nations. Peace? That's all a farce, and you k-know it."
"I think the real problem is people like you." Yor said coldly before she stomped his head in. Not long afterwards, Yor started fretting about the small bruise she sustained on her shin.
"Ugh...it hurts…" Yor complained before she suddenly felt someone's presence and went back into her more serious persona.
"Is there still one left?" Yor thought to herself.
Meanwhile, Chisato was closing in on the scene, though her weapons were concealed to avoid raising suspicion. Turns out that she was also after Majima, and had aimed to stop him since the Cafe LycoReco crew had relocated to Westalis for a separate mission.
"Why does he keep coming back? He's like an annoying little cockroach." Chisato complained as she charged towards the building where the disturbances were heard. When she arrived, she was taken aback by the numerous bodies that were strewn all over the lobby and froze in place.
"W-what happened?" Chisato said in shock as she walked cautiously through the mess, keeping an eye on all directions to negate a potential ambush. While she nearly trips on the corpse of one of Majima's men, she quickly regains her footing and continues onward. As she got close to the stairs, she pauses and listens quietly to the commotion upstairs.
"Nothing? Are they higher up?" Chisato thought before she steeled herself, pulled out her gun, and slowly ascended the stairs.
"That bastard! I'm going to make sure I get him into custody before he takes any more lives!" Chisato said to herself before her phone started ringing. She quickly pulled it out and answered as she continued her ascent.
"Chisato, where are you? You've been gone for hours and we can't find you!" Takina said in an angry yet concerned manner.
"Sorry Takina, gotta go. I'll call you back." Chisato responded before hanging up, spurring Takina to go follow her. She slung her backpack over her shoulders and charged out the door, and everyone else from the makeshift cafe looked on.
"Be safe and bring her back, alright? Don't let her do anything foolish." Mika called out.
"Understood!" Takina responded back.
"What a pain in the ass..." Mizuki complained before she slammed down a glass of liquor and looked on.
"This isn't going to be good." Kurumi remarked before she went back into her area.
Reaching the door to the next floor, Chisato flung it open and raised her weapon.
"Stop! Hands u-!" Chisato shouted before shock overcame her once again; she noticed that Majima's body was laying on the ground, and a black-haired woman with a stylized black dress was standing nearby. Blood was dripping from her daggers, and there were blood stains dotted around on both her outfit and her legs and arms.
"W-who are you?" Chisato stuttered.
"She actually killed Majima? She's probably really strong...I need to be on my guard."
Yor slowly turned around, directing her fierce gaze towards Chisato and slowly approached her.
"I was ordered to dispose of this disgusting man, and it looks like I succeeded." Yor said coldly. "It looks like my job here is done."
"Oh, well in that case it looks like my job is done too." Chisato said, accompanied by a nervous laugh. However, Yor's gaze remained fixed on Chisato, clearly seeing her as a threat.
"However, I can't have any outside witnesses to my work." Yor said ominously. "I'm afraid you might tell others about what I do, including my own family."
"W-what? No, that's nonsense! I don't even know who your family actually is!" Chisato said, stammering.
"The fact remains...you're a witness, and you must disappear."
Chisato started shaking, terrified at the woman slowly approaching her. At the same time however, she was trying to ready herself for a potential surprise attack.
"She has two daggers, so she must fight up close...I need to keep my distance if I want to subdue her."
Without warning, Yor threw one of her daggers at Chisato's head with blistering speed, but she subtly moves out of the way as the thrown dagger embeds itself into the wall.
"How? She shouldn't have had any time to react to that!" Yor thought.
"Go ahead, throw the other one!" Chisato taunted, but Yor ignored her goading and charged towards her opponent in order to close the gap.
"Crap!" Chisato exclaimed before she fired two shots, both of seemingly bounce off of Yor's chest harmlessly.
"Huh?" Chisato said in shock. However, Yor slightly winced in pain as the bullets still left small bruises.
Soon enough, Yor quickly caught up to Chisato and delivered a swinging kick which was blocked by Chisato's right arm. However, the force of the kick soon sent Chisato flying into a nearby table.
As Chisato was stunned, Yor had noticed the rubber bullets on the floor and picked one up to examine it.
"Rubber bullets? So you have no intention of killing me, then." Yor concluded before she flicked the rubber bullet in Chisato's direction at high speed, hoping to dispatch her quickly. However, Chisato once again dodges the shot with ease and leaps up to confront Yor again.
"Her reaction speeds are must faster than I thought. Long-ranged attacks are out of the question." Yor thought before Chisato manages to land a shot on her shin, which stunned her long enough for the Lycoris agent to use her restraint device to bind Yor at the torso. Relieved at finding an opening, Chisato approaches as Yor simply maintains her glare up at her.
"I want answers. Who are you? Who killed all of those people downstairs? Why is Majima here?" Chisato demanded, though her hands were trembling and tears were running from her eyes. Yor's glare turned into more of a serious gaze before answering.
"I'm afraid I can't disclose that information." Yor said calmly. "My mission is already finished, but I cannot have witnesses to my work!" Yor said before standing up, though at the same time she was starting to internally wonder if she was getting too ahead of herself. Regardless, she stood up and readied herself to resume the fight.
"Stand back!" Chisato warned.
However, the warning fell on deaf ears as she was immediately assaulted with a barrage of kicks that was finished by an axe kick that slammed Chisato into the ground. Wiping the blood from her mouth as she slowly got up, she managed to grab the next kick aimed at her with her left hand as she shot at Yor's chest with her right, stunning Yor long enough for her to throw her off.
"Why didn't it bind her legs more? Those kicks hurt…" Chisato remarked as Yor remained on the ground, trying to cut herself loose with her dagger.
"Come on...come on...there!" Yor said, using her dagger to slice off the ropes one-by-one before she got up to confront Chisato once again.
"H-how?" Chisato remarked in confusion.
Yor didn't respond, instead opting to immediately thrust her dagger in Chisato's direction. However, Chisato blocked the strikes with her bag as she purposefully backed herself near the table where she was thrown earlier. Acting fast, Chisato grabs one of the broken table legs and quickly blocks one of Yor's dagger strikes with it. In that instance, she fires a shot into Yor's torso, causing her to briefly lose her grip on the dagger as Chisato throws the table leg across the room with Yor's weapon still embedded in it.
"Let's see how you fare without those fancy weapons of yours!" Chisato exclaimed.
Yor uses a deadly hand chop aimed at Chisato's neck, but she dodges in time and fires off two more direct shots into Yor's stomach that dazes her enough for Chisato to finish by elbowing her hard enough to send her a few feet away. Wanting to end the fight fast, she utilizes her restraint device again, but Yor dashes out of range before she can aim and fire.
"Damn!" Chisato exclaimed.
Yor goes straight towards the dagger she lost earlier and quickly retrieves it, dodging multiple gunshots from Chisato in the process. Aiming to retrieve her other dagger, she quickly moves to the other side of the room as Chisato continues firing at her and maintaining a close distance. Two shots manage to strike Yor, one on her left thigh and the other on her right shoulder. While she maintains her sprint, the pain from where she was shot was starting to get to her.
"Those things really hurt...I definitely can't afford to get hit with too many more of them." Yor thought, getting close enough to her other dagger to retrieve it.
"I don't think it's affecting her...I need to conserve ammo." Chisato thought to herself.
In the heat of the moment, she proceeded to chuck half of a broken table in Yor's direction. Yor responds by slicing the table piece clean in half with a hand chop, shocking Chisato immensely.
"I'm not going to lose here. I won't let my secrets be known...not by Yuri, and not by Loid or Miss Anya. I'll do anything to protect them, even if that means killing a hostile witness!"
Now fired up, Yor runs towards Chisato with speed difficult to track with the human eye. Chisato pulls out her restraint device again and attempts to fire at her, but the shot misses and within seconds the device is knocked out of Chisato's hands with a hand chop.
"Huh?" Chisato said in shock.
"Thanks for giving me this honor." Yor said simply before she jabbed her dagger in Chisato's direction.
However, right as Yor's weapon partially pierced Chisato's lower torso, she was blown backwards by three shots from Chisato's gun. Chisato had reacted quick enough to press her gun into her chest right as Yor had attempted a close-range killing blow, and by the end of the exchange both were on the ground in immense pain.
"Crap...I hope that didn't hit a vital organ…" Chisato said, gripping the stab wound in pain.
While Yor was more secretive about how much pain she actually felt, she suddenly dropped to her knees when she attempted to stand up.
"Ack, these bruises sting…how am I going to hide these from Loid and Miss Anya?" Yor thought.
No longer wanting to fight, Chisato slowly got up and walked towards Yor. While Yor notices her approaching, she also loses interest in continuing the fight; She had already completed her mission, and sustaining any more unnecessary injuries against someone who wasn't a target to begin with was going to make concealing her distress harder.
"L-listen to me, please." Chisato asked calmly, holding a cloth against her wound at the same time. "I also came here to deal with Majima, but it seems you got to him first. So, there's no reason for us to be fighting in the first place."
"B-but, I'm afraid others will find out what I do if I don't dispose of you right here. It'd be a mess if my family ever find out what I do for their sake…" Yor said solemnly, while grabbing her thigh where she was hit earlier.
"I won't tell anyone about what happened here, I promise. We both wanted Majima dealt with, and that's already done. I really wish that there could have been another way to deal with him though…" Chisato responded, giving a wary glance to Majima's messy corpse.
Embarrassed, Yor apologized profusely.
"I'm so, so, sorry! Are you okay? My dagger didn't hit a vital organ did it? I'm going to get scolded for this, I'm certain of it!" Yor said, moping in an exaggerated manner.
"I don't know myself. What I do know is that you're secret's safe with me." Chisato said with a weak smile.
"Oh, thank goodness!" Yor exclaimed, while casually plucking a splinter out of her hand from the table piece she broke earlier.
Suddenly, the sound of footsteps was heard on the lower floor by the two of them. Instinctively, Yor overcame her pain and rapidly fled through a door on the other side of the room to avoid detection.
"Hey, wa-" Chisato shouted before covering her mouth, remembering to keep Yor's trail hidden.
In a flash, Takina had opened the door and pointed her gun in all directions before rushing towards Chisato.
"Chisato, are you hurt? What happened?" Takina asked.
"Uh, well…" Chisato responded with a sheepish smile.
While Takina wasn't satisfied with this answer, she suddenly noticed Majima's body in the background and became overwhelmed with shock.
"You...killed him? What happened to you refusing to kill others?" Takina asked in shock.
"No, one of his henchman killed him in a mutiny and he stabbed me before getting away." Chisato said.
Takina inspects the stab wound and wipes up some of the excess blood before covering it up with gauze and medical tape that she had on hand.
"It doesn't look as bad as I thought, but you'll still need to visit the hospital to be sure. Though...why do I get the feeling that you're lying?"
"I'm not lying, you have to believe me!" Chisato said with a childish pout.
"Whatever, let's get out of here."
Takina picked up Chisato by her thighs, allowing Chisato to drape her arms over Takina's shoulders. The chattering between the two continued as they went down the stairs and exited the building.
"So Takina, want to head to the aquarium again tomorrow?" Chisato asked.
"I have a mission tomorrow, and I believe that you might be busy as well." Takina replied firmly.
"Ugh...never a dull moment in this place, I suppose. I just wish it was a bit more fun..."
"You're awful cheery for having a stab wound right now."
"Aw, this is nothing!"
"I sincerely hope it's nothing. I can never tell how serious it is with you until it's too late."
The next morning, Loid was sipping a coffee and watching the news intently.
"Yor was really late last night. I wonder where she might have been." Loid thought.
"A grizzly incident occurred at the Memorial Tower last night, where eight of the building's personnel and ten masked men were found dead at the scene. Also among the deceased was a man only known by the name Majima, whom was wanted by the police and Secret Service for instigating conflict between Westalis and Ostania. He was found with multiple stab wounds, the likes of which are too graphic to be shown here. More at 12, back to you Pryor." The news said.
"Papa, I want pizza for breakfast!" Anya exclaimed.
"You can't have pizza for breakfast. Now, go get changed, the bus will be here soon." Loid responded.
"You're no fun…" Anya sulked before going into her room.
Concerned, Loid went over to the door to Yor's room and knocked.
"Yor, breakfast is almost ready." Loid said.
"Uh, coming!" Yor replied.
In an attempt to hide the bruises that she sustained from the fight with Chisato, she wore long jeans and a baggy blue sweater. It was a late day in May, so she felt like her choice of outfit wouldn't stick out too much.
"That should suffice…" Yor said to herself before she got up and left her room. Standing at the doorway, she greeted Loid as he was waiting for her.
"Are you alright? You didn't get back until really late last night." Loid asked.
"Ah, yes. I just had to meet with distant relatives is all. A lot of drama to be had."
"Is that so? You'll have to tell me more about it some time."
"Y-Yeah, I guess so!"
Meanwhile, the Cafe LycoReco group were at the hospital waiting for Chisato to be discharged.
"Chisato, you really need to be more careful next time. There's no knowing what would've happened had you let your guard down." Mika said as he cleaned a glass.
"Sorry about worrying you guys." Chisato said sincerely. "I heard that Majima was at the Memorial Building, so I tried to stop him but one of his own henchmen had killed him before I had the chance to apprehend him."
"Oh, so that's what that news story on the tv was about. What a damn mess." Mizuki said, her arms crossed in a lax manner.
"Still, I admire your initiative." Mika admitted.
"I did have a drone out, but it got shot down." Kurumi said.
"I'm just lucky I got to you in time. How's the wound?" Takina asked Chisato.
"Oh, just fine! Doctor said that It wasn't as severe as they thought, which I'm thankful for." Chisato responded. "So...who wants ice cream later?"
The room responded warmly to Chisato's suggestion, even the normally cold Takina.
"Sure, that sounds nice." Takina said with a subdued smile.
"Then it's settled!" Chisato exclaimed, pumping her fists in the air.
While both Chisato and Yor survived their battle without much lasting injury, there's no knowing what might happen if they cross paths again. For now though, they'll resume their normal lives...or at least, what's considered normal by their standards.
- THE END -