Belle
After the fighting stopped, the two factions gathered together into their two separate cliques, eyeing each other suspiciously while Belle scowled between them. Meanwhile, the sound of running footsteps alarmed everyone briefly until Wise rounded the corner and met Belle's gaze. The siblings immediately hugged, and everyone relaxed. Then Belle stepped back and the look on her brother's face clearly meant that he already knew she was mad as hell.
"Wise, get Fairy to delete the security footage of the station," Belle snapped.
"Uh, yeah, all right," said Wise, nodding as his sister casually directed him to have their illegal A.I. hack and edit the municipal security camera database. But he knew from a lifetime of experience that when Belle was like this, it was best to just do as she said and get out of the way.
"Everyone!" said Belle. "Let's all walk back to Random Play together. Let the locales see that something is up and we are already aware of it, so they won't talk to PubSec about this little mix up. All right?"
Lycaon and his maids looked at her somewhat placidly, but the Cunning Hares knew the drill and nodded. Belle led the way out of the subway station with a determined stride, and everyone fell in to follow her. She was in the lead until near the subway exit when Lycaon walked quickly in front of her, meeting some bodyguard requirements of his own, Belle was sure- but she was a bit too irritated to pay him any mind, at the moment.
As Belle strode out ahead of the group, Lycaon quickly strode out in front of her again to check the length of Sixth Street before Belle could round the corner into the sight lines there. She did not know it, but he was giving the street a quick scan with both his naked eye and the various view-modes of his eyepatch. He found no threats and then he turned as Belle rounded the street corner behind him.
Belle wanted Lycaon to know how she felt right now, so she gave him one of the darkest scowls that she knew how to muster. His crimson eye widened at her as she passed him. Good. Seems like he's getting the idea.
As she passed Lycaon by, he stood in place, somewhat frozen by the sheer ferocity of her glare at him. He'd never had a client look at him like that. Meanwhile, the Cunning Hares walked past and he overheard them talking:
"Oh man," mumbled Billy. "The she-wolf is gonna' growl at us all now, isn't she?"
"You shot at her, Billy!" hissed Nicole. "This is all your fault!"
"What! No! I shot at the wolf guy!"
"Who was in the same physical space as Belle," said Anby.
"Anby! Not you too!" whimpered Billy.
"Shhh!" said Nekomata. "She will hear you!"
Wise was the next one to run ahead of Belle slightly, using his key to unlock the locked video store in anticipation of Belle's imminent arrival. The door opened with a jingle and they all filled in. Belle and Wise, then Lycaon close behind, followed by the Cunning Hares and finally the maids of Victoria Housekeeping.
Belle took a deep breath of the familiar scent of Random Play. Her home. Her place of power. She went up three steps of the stairwell, turned around to look at everyone staring at her (she was now taller than everyone except Lycaon) and she crossed her arms.
"All right, debrief time. Who wants to start?"
Lycaon and his maids looked at her impassively, none of them really knowing that she expected- but that was fine. Belle already knew their side of this fiasco. Her gaze fell on the Cunning Hares and her brother.
Wise rubbed the back of his head nervously. "Well, I guess it starts with me…"
Belle listened as Wise told about how Fairy had informed him that Belle had shut off communications. A few hours later, Wise and Fairy both become concerned with Belle's continued silence, and their frantic search for Belle began and continued for most of the day. It seems they finally located her through security camera facial recognition in the Lumine Plaza subway station.
Wise then dispatched the Cunning Hares, as he was unsure of Belle's situation with Lycaon, who Fairy had identified by cross-referencing with government files (that she hacked without permission) and identified him as a mercenary with an alarmingly high combat danger rating. Wise had interpreted that discovery as potentially dangerous for Belle, and that assumption had biased his instructions to the dispatched Cunning Hares.
She then heard about the movements of the Cunning Hares and everything up to the point of their conflict with Lycaon. Belle took a deep breath, satisfied that she now had the full picture of everything that had happened this afternoon.
And she was even more angry than before! Her voice belted out sharply, and everyone in the video store winced.
"Fairy, did you advise Wise as to whether I seemed to be in distress or not?"
"That information is subjective opinion and did not seem relevant," said a computerized voice, distantly from the backroom.
"Interesting! 'That information did not seem relevant!'" said Belle with a pointed inflection, her arms widening in an expression of annoyed exasperation as she glared at Wise. He winced and rubbed the back of his head. She'd warned him multiple times to parse Fairy's information for possible missed context. The A.I. didn't always know what might be pertinent and what might not be when it came to social interactions.
"Billy!" said Belle, rounding now on the cyborg and the gathered Cunning Hares. "You saw us in the train. Just sitting there. Why didn't you just come up and speak to me?"
"Uh, because I was supposed to be secretly tailing your kidnapper, or whatever," said Billy, his robot face not looking at her directly.
"Did it look like I was being kidnapped?," said Belle, staring bullets into the side of his thick skull. "While I was on the train, unrestrained, riding back to Sixth Street? Where I live? I even think I fell asleep on Lycaon's arm. Is that what you think someone being kidnapped does?! Have a nice little snooze against their assailant's shoulder?"
"... no," said Billy, softly, his index fingers pressing together nervously, his immobile golden eye slits somehow appearing to be contrite.
Belle put her hands on her hips and scowled at the full gathering of the Cunning Hares. "Did anyone think to just.. I don't know? Call out my name?! 'Hey, Belle!? You okay?!' Huh?! As I arrived at my home subway stop! Did anyone think it strange that a kidnapper would bring me closer to my home?! Huh?!"
The Cunning Hares and Wise all looked downcast and admonished. Nicole and Billy had drooping shoulders. Anby averted her gaze and frowned slightly, which was about as expressive as she got. While mostly blameless Nekomata, who had been on the flanking maneuver designed by Wise's navigation, seemed to be happily enjoying the drama, her dual tails waving about in mild excitement.
But none of them offered a response to Belle's question.
"And you!" said Belle, next rounding on Lycaon who stood rigidly nearby, towering over the harem of battle maids who were gathered around him. The smallest maid, Corrin, flinched as Belle turned her attention in their general direction.
Belle stalked down the stairs and across the room to glare up at Lycaon's face. "Why didn't you think to point out the person you thought was a threat to me? I know Billy. I could have told you in a half second that he was an ally and not an assassin."
Lycaon's ears wilted slightly. "I do apologize, but standard procedure is to not overly stress the Principal during-"
"Overstress!" cried Belle with a mocking guffaw. "Not overstress your Principal?! You mean like manhandle me around without telling me why?!"
Belle jabbed a finger into Lycaon's belly with the intent of illustrating the unpleasantness of forceful touching, but Lycaon's abdominal was like a brick wall. Belle winced as her index finger mildly jammed as it rammed impotently against the hardened muscles under Lycaon's vest. She shook her hand out and continued her rant at Lycaon anyway, like that hadn't just happened.
"You didn't tell me anything! You left me entirely in the dark! And then you literally shoved me into the dark in that stupid cabinet! And then called in your squad here to damage public property in my neighborhood during an entirely unnecessary and avoidable brawl! If you're going to protect me in the future, you are going to damn well keep me in the loop, do you understand? Lycaon?"
Lycaon blinked down at this fiery little woman who was scowling angrily up at him, her blue-green eyes gleaming with passion. He'd never had a client or a principal ever talk to him like this. And he'd also never deserved it before. It was a new experience for him. It completely changed his perception of Belle as a client.
"Y- yes," said Lycaon, clearing his throat. "It will be as you wish, Lady Belle, of course. Please forgive my foolish behavior and allow me-"
"Save it!" interrupted Belle, "I'm not in the mood for all that fluff that comes out of your mouth."
Behind Lycaon: Corrin looked terrified; Ellen Joe was grinning, enjoying the moment, her unnervingly sharp teeth gleaming between her lips; and the head maid, Rina, had a hand over her own mouth and was clearly trying to hold back laughter. It was likely the first time Lycaon had been publicly dressed down right in front of them, but Belle had little care for Lycaon's pride at the end of this long and disastrous day.
"Now then," said Belle, returning to her step and glaring at the room. "You all have some things to think about. I expect to never witness these stupid mistakes again. And now, I'm going upstairs to bathe and sleep and I don't want to see any of you." She looked pointedly at Lycaon. "Any of you! Until tomorrow morning."
Belle turned and stomped up the stairs. She rounded the corner and suddenly remembered she needed to talk to Wise about this live-in situation with Lycaon. He didn't know about that yet. She paused long enough to yell out one more command.
"Wise! Come see me in two hours!"
Lycaon
Lycaon stood uneasily in the video store, feeling somewhat professionally embarrassed but trying his best to not look it. Meanwhile, everyone else seemed to be recovering themselves like shell-shocked villagers after the passing of a tempest. No one immediately said anything, and then:
"So uhh-" said Nicole into the awkward silence of Belle's furious departure. "We're gonna' take off. Catch you later, Wise?"
"Yeah, sorry," said Wise, giving them an apologetic smile and wave. "Bye, everyone."
"And this little mission brought our interest back to zero, right?" said Nicole on her way out the door.
"Just the principal debt between us, right? Wise?"
"Yeah, yeah, Nicole, just the principal debt again. Like I said."
"Cool! See ya' later!"
The Cunning Hares filtered out of the video store, Anby voicing a craving for hamburgers. Despite their dressing down, that group of young mercenaries seemed to be rapidly bouncing back into good spirits. Lycaon suspected that they had been through something like this situation before.
Wise approached Lycaon with an apologetic look, offering a handshake. "Sorry about that. I'm Wise, Belle's brother, but I suppose you know that already. My sister is usually very sweet, but sometimes she gets angry and turns into the big bad Wolf of Sixth Street. Don't take it personally."
*End of Prologue*