Was this the right room?  He didn't recall computer data labs being so small.  Or so... computerless.

Paperwork?  Eh?  It was all over the floor in large piles.  Terrace couldn't believe that there were still some weirdoes out there who didn't modernize yet and like... actually use computers.  Oh wait, well, of course Terrace himself used a sword, but that was because Avelle thought it was a good weapon for him and it ended up that some guy had to handle the close combat when a Darkstalker got the jump on them.  Yea!  That's the ticket!  At any rate, the place looked messier than Terrace's room back home, and that was saying quite a lot.  The light was pretty crappy; it was only maintained by a single hanging lamp.  Yea, this room really needed to be upgraded.  Wondering why it was such low tech in such a high tech building, Terrace began to rummage through some of the paperwork piles.  He would have preferred a computer so he could just type some search words into a data base, but even without it, Juni wanted the info and Terrace was going to get it.  Couldn't refuse the ladies, after all.

"Hey!  What are you doing?"

Yipe!  Crap, a Baxtercorp employee.  Judging by the lab coat, he was probably one of the engineers.  He even had glasses, which just really gave off the scientist look really well.  Well, Terrace got into worse situations before.  He just had to explain the situation.

"Hiya!  Erm, I'm a little lost.  Is this a data storage room?"

"Well... yea, it is, but it's a restricted area!"

"I have a pass here, somewhere..." Fiddling within his pockets, Terrace quickly produced a piece of paper and handed it to the Asian scientist, who looked it over.

"Free pass to L'Aprile Four Score?  What would an expensive French restaurant have to do with..."

Ack!  Baxter Corp had way too strict a protocol.  Guy needed a pass for everything, these days.  "Oops, wrong paper.  Here."

As Terrace snatched back the old one, the scientist quickly glanced over the new.

"Erm... I think you're in the wrong area.  The research database accessible for hunters is..."

Feh, stupid protesters.  Terrace didn't have time to listen to wackos whine about whether or not he was in the 'right' or 'wrong' area.  Right and wrong were two arbitrary matters of opinion, anyway.  Rummaging through some of the paperwork, a particular piece caught his attention.  Didn't his boss mention something about this?

"Hey old man, what's this?  Something about a JJValentine?  Baxter Corp working on a new weapon?  Rob could use some upgrades."

"Don't touch that!  And I'm only eighteen!  Do I really look THAT old?  Look, it's because I've been under a lot of stress lately and..."

See, that was exactly what Terrace meant.  The guy that he was currently talking to really needed to learn to just lean back and take things easy.  Though the killer balloon thing or whatever that next paper seemed to be about did seem rather weird.

"Eh?  Inflatable soldiers?  What the heck..."

"Hey!  It might sound ridiculous but air is an incredibly expendable resource so if one could make an army..."

Whatever.  Crazy nut.   If Terrace thought the last one sounded bad, the latest piece of paper he was rummaging through seemed even worse.

"Doll project?  Making the super soldier?"  Terrace interrupted again.  A further look on the paper gave him the scientist's name.  "So... erm, Dr. Bremare Yamoto, is it?  Why are they called 'Dolls'?"

Bremare was becoming very aggravated.  "Because they're lovable huggable plushy freaks of death!  Now can you leave, finally?!"

"Eh?  Leave?  Yea... sure."  Shrugging, Terrace put the paper back where it was.  "I'll just leave you with... erm, your research about inflatable soldiers and dolls that are lovable and huggable and according to this paper are all female..."

The young man coughed as Bremare sighed.  Hmm.  Plushy?  Sounded like Juni's and Avelle's doll uniform.  The spandex that wasn't really spandex when you really thought about it.  Form-fitting cotton or whatever-it-was was cool.  Neat.  ...Wait a minute.

"Though... you know, I couldn't help but recall that lovable huggable plushy dolls of death were generally a Shadowlaw type of unit."  Terrace casually added.

"Huh?  You aren't supposed to..."  Before he could finish, Bremare found Terrace's big ass sword at his throat.

"Ah ha!"  Terrace grinned.  "I'm not really that much of an idiot, you know.  I heard about the reports that Baxter Corp apparently had a Shadowlaw infiltrater where he didn't belong.  Normally, Miss Baxter wouldn't care too much since it's not like there'd be any reason for Shadowlaw to target Baxter Corp specifically, but apparently that changed.  She doesn't appreciate how YOU apparently tried to assassinate one of Baxter Corp's researchers, you know.  And I never was one one to pass up helping a lady with a little rat extermination."

Terrace expected fear.  Cause his sword was big.  Big sword, big fear.  Why didn't he fear?  Avelle told him people would fear.  Though all Bremare was doing was frowning.  Then he called Terrace an idiot.

"You idiot!  *I'M* that scientist that was attacked by that Shadowlaw assassin!"

"Eh?  Why would you be..."

"Take a guess, moron!"

Terrace put away the sword, but slowly, just in case Bremare was lying.  Though he soon realized that the scientist wasn't.  Because it suddenly hit him... he heard talks about the JJValentine before but the whole doll process... the information which Baxter Corp really wouldn't have cared to research since they couldn't have their own official standing army anyway... it must have belonged to...

It suddenly hit him why Shadowlaw had this guy targeted.  They weren't opposing Baxter Corp.  They were trying to protect their own interests.  This guy, who apparently knew more than he should, was apparently giving out information which was definitely not in Shadowlaw's own interest.

Hmm... so the JJValentine was being made with initially Shadowlaw research.  Most likely highly illegal.  Well, Baxter Corp had done worse, before.

"Can you PLEASE leave, finally?"

It suddenly hit Terrace why the guy was probably always in a grumpy mood.

"Yea... Hey, listen, I'm really REALLY sorry about that.  Really..."

"It's okay.  I'm used to it by now."  Leaning down, Bremare started reorganizing his papers.  "By the way, if you're really wondering, it's not the size of the sword that's the scary part.  It's the wielder."

"Um... okay, I'll keep that in mind."

That was the conversation Terrace had before he managed to get to an encrypted vid phone later that day.  It was what he had on his mind when he reported back to her.  Normally, he wouldn't burden a lovely lady with this type of thing.  Especially since Juni... really didn't seem like the type that cared for dark conversation.  She was even often more cheerful than Avelle, even.  But they've been through a lot already so he felt he could talk to her about it, and he really had to get it off his mind.

"So you couldn't find any more info on the soul virus?  The blonde girl relented.  "Drat.  I had all the hunters searching everywhere and still nothing.  All I know now is that you basically sell out to it and you become a slave to your own power, instead of the other way around.  Too many sources of power are like that, these days.  Look at that Satsu no Hadou thing... definitely clouding that Dark Sakura's mind when she decided that we were the bad guys.  Jonas asked me if I was sure that the soul power Lady Rose supposedly uses and the soul virus were the same thing, but I'm pretty sure.  We have some sketchy details and... erm, Terrace, are you listening?"

"Erm, yea, soul power meets psycho power and it causes Bobo the clown to go berserk.  Um, Juni, can I ask you a question?"

"Huh?  Oh, sure.  Oh yea, call me Junivelle now.  I'm... not in the mood to be called my regular name at the moment."

Terrace blinked.  She was Junivelle, now?  That probably explained her serious mood at the moment.  Really weird how Juni did that... preferring to be called by that name whenever she got really serious.  But it was fine, since the topic Terrace was bringing up was rather serious, itself.

"I just met a guy who's apparently in the Baxter research department.  He apparently somehow got a lot of Shadowlaw data on him somehow.  Maybe he was a part of Shadowlaw before or maybe he just got into where he didn't belong.  But at any rate, he decided to give up most of what he knew to Baxter Corp, apparently.  Needless to say, I'm pretty sure... no, I'm positive that of course he's going to be hunted down, now.  I could see it in his eyes, really.  A guy who's doomed to die.  I know I'm right, too.  Because she didn't have it at first, but later on, it was the same thing I saw in Avelle shortly before her past came for her, too."

Looking at the screen, Terrace saw Juni staring back, surprised.  She didn't know what to make of what he was trying to say.  Which made sense, since the hunter himself wasn't sure what he was trying to say at first.  He did finally realize after a moment why he had to talk to Juni about it, though.

"Juni... um, I mean Junivelle..."  Terrace sighed.  "Why did Avelle have to die?  I mean, she like... she didn't do anything.  Hell, I never told the other guys this and Fokken was the only other one that knew, but often times she even used all of us to HELP Shadowlaw, even if it was for a price.  They thought it was just another Baxter Corp job, but Avelle let Fokken and I know better.  The others knew about her past, too, but she didn't want them to know that the past was still the present.  But it didn't matter.  WHY didn't it matter?  Avelle didn't leak any Shadowlaw info out at all.  She didn't sell out like that scientist guy I met.  And yet... her past came after her."

Junivelle closed her eyes, thought for a bit, then finally replied.  "I thought Bison cared about us.  Avelle didn't do anything, yet the order was given.  Avelle was one of Lord Bison's finest.  I'd think that he would have tried to talk to her... that he would have tried to get her back.  I thought that he would have tried to go after or at least find out the truth behind Ross's lies.  That he definitely would never have decided to have her killed.  But I was wrong.  That's why I'm looking for more information on that soul virus, really.  It must have infected him... it had to have done something.  It's only too bad that I couldn't find any easier way to cure Lord Bison, but I do have a final solution that will work."

"So that's it?  Yea... I guess so."   The young hunter figured it would probably be cruel to tell Juni that maybe Bison did it because he was an EVIL psycho that was lord of an EVIL organization, but Juni herself never saw it as evil, herself, so what did he know?  Who was he to question the word of a lady, anyway?

"Terrace, I'm going after the guy that framed Avelle.  Ross was the guy that said that the information he got about Shadowlaw was from her.  He sold a lot of it on the black market so various other criminal gangs could avoid us.  He's finally been tracked down, though.  I'll avenge Avelle.  I already killed Bess, and I'll be curing Lord Bison for her, too.  I think she would have wanted it that way."

"Yea... thanks a lot, Juni.  I really appreciate it."

The blonde grinned and crossed her arms.  "It's still Junivelle... ah nevermind."

The constant need to eliminate they who threaten to continue leaking vital information in the future about the organization continues on.  As this mission hits closer to High Command than any other as fits the preference of a unit leader of the special forces, six dolls have been chosen for this special task.

Find and eliminate Aaron Ross, CEO of Deep Eyes Inc.
 

Wow, even after she was finally back with her partner, Juli was still getting the weirdest of mission assignments...

"Okay, I can understand that maybe I'm not supposed to know the reason why we have to go off to some random place in Germany to infiltrate some random business corporation to eliminate some random CEO.  Maybe I'm not supposed to question why this random business corporation in a random place in Germany who's random CEO we're going to kill is a company that simply produces glasses and eye wear.  But could I at least know why the hell the I&E department couldn't handle this and why it could possibly take six of us to do this?"

Marzche continued driving the truck along as Juli, riding shotgun, looked back at the girl with the two braids who had the back seat all to herself (for maximum comfort, apparently) for an answer.  The answer came really quickly though.

"Agent Juli, this mission hits especially home to me."  Janet remarked.  "I think it would for you, too.  You should know that the guy you're going after has been confirmed to be one of the main reasons why we had to send you after Avelle in the first place.  I don't know how the hell he could have conned Avelle into divulging everything she knew to him, but even I couldn't pull enough strings to save her after that."

"One of the reasons that I..." Juli glared at the screen, then clenched her fist.  She was too preoccupied in thought to hear her clearly, but at that moment, she thought she heard Juni from the back of the vehicle mention something about Lord Bison and betraying heartless jerks.  Her partner must have been in agreement.  "You should have said so, sooner, Janet.  Yea, Juni and I will handle this.  I appreciate the back up, though."

Shrugging, Janet continued.  "Like I said, I care about this mission too.  Marzche?"

Blowing a bubble gum bubble, Marzche took her eyes off the road for a few seconds to stare at the vid screen and let the bubble run out of air so she could speak.

"Hmph."

Erm, sorta speak, that is.

Janet sighed.  "Well, I thought Marzche would care about the mission too, but I guess not."

The brunette glanced over at the blue haired girl, but she had simply started on yet another bubble.  Juli blinked.  That was odd.  Why would Marzche care about anything?  And as far as she knew, Avelle pretty much ignored her just like everyone else did, besides Serina of course.  Heck, sometimes Avelle was even more condescending to her than Janet was.  Apparently, Janet must have talked with Avelle more than Juli thought when Avelle ranted to the brunette about how bossy Janet got, sometimes.

"Anyway, you saw the briefing.  I'm letting you and your partner get the kill.  Juni specifically requested it for some really weird reason.  But it fits in, perfectly, anyway.  Marzche will keep you updated on the situation so stay in contact.  Serina's going to provide the necessary diversion and you all have Noelle on standby if any of you need help, so I expect everything should go smoothly.  Oh, and if it's not too much trouble, see if you can get a videotape of his death."

"A video tape of his death?"

Wasn't that already mandatory, most of the time, anyway?  Why did Janet specifically remind the group about that?  Before Janet could answer Juli's question, Juni stuck her head out from the back.

"Don't worry, Dr. Janet!  We'll have lots of fun with this."

"Whatever works.  Just remember the rendezvous point."  Janet remarked as Marzche blew another bubble.

Work to exhaustion when you're young.  Because you won't get the opportunity to, when you're older.  He DID do that when he was young.  They never told him how it'd make him miss most OTHER opportunities, forever.  Bah.  Jero Kardinal wasn't really young, anymore.  Tomorrow would be his forty-second birthday.

Where did the time go?

Feh, he should be spending it at home with his family.  Maybe with his good friends.  But instead he was still managing Mr. Ross's security that day.  Security always had to be tighter when Deep Eyes was unveiling the latest in contact lenses.  Speeches would be the perfect opportunities for assassins to strike.  The more an assassin works, the more they find that it's actually easier to assassinate in populated crowded areas.  So he wouldn't be home for his birthday to spend time with his family or his friends.  Not that he cared.  Because he didn't have a family anymore and his best friend was pretty much gone, anyway.  Basically, his life was a piece of shit.  He admitted that.

Who would have thought that the business would take such a morbid turn.  Right away, he should have gotten out when he lost his partner and... no, it happened too soon.  He basically lost everyone but his wife, that day.  Though maybe he could have at least saved Evelin if he got out afterwards.

They were all gone, so he stayed in the business.  He was the only one left to run it, and really, it wasn't like he knew how to do anything else.  And it wasn't like there was anyone left who'd be hurt if he did end up getting killed in the line of duty, anyway.

This was Jeronimo Kardinal.  Widow at the age of forty.  Boy, did that sound stupid.  The two years since then hadn't been kind to him in terms of aging, but the tall razzled brown-haired man still retained a strict rigid stature.  Skin tone was a bit darker than than usual, due to his heritage that he really kept as a personal note and only his family and his partner's family knew about (which basically meant no one but him now, since life was a piece of shit seeing as to how everyone else was gone from it).  And his now defunct missionary work, too.  The hairstyle was... messy, yet professional enough.  For some reason, he could never get an extravagant and professional looking design at the same time, although Evelin had been able to.  Female hairstyles were probably more versatile than male ones.

Jero missed his family.  Life was a bitch.  But it was no excuse.  The professional world had no time for emotions.  Efficiency took precedent over everything.  There were lives at stake, and Jero knew too well that there was never any margin for error.

Eight in the morning.  Ross was exiting the corporate building of Deep Eyes Inc. to go give his speech at the press conference.  Jero and three of his best men were accompanying the white haired rather husky suited CEO.  There were three men in the walk way.  Three more at the door.  That's why Jero was extremely aggravated to discover that waiting at the door also was a young curly pink-haired girl in a light brown girl scout uniform who was holding a package.

"Hellooooshi!"  The girl beamed as she held the box in front of her.  Two of Jero's men immediately stepped in front of Mr. Ross.  They were trained and willing to take a bullet for their current client, although only because Ross was one of Jero's clients for a long time.  The girl was surprised, and quickly leaned to the right, then to the left, trying to get a look at the CEO of Deep Eyes.

"Excuse me, I believe you aren't allowed on these premises at the moment."  Turning to his men, Jero frowned.  "What the hell is in the package?  Who gave you authorization to let her on the premises?"

"Sir, she said that her mother was an employee, but she wandered off to buy some cookies from the bakery nearby.  The package was screened and no weapons were found."

"Teehee!"  The girl beamed as she took some of the circular bite-sized chocolate chips out of the package.  "Cookies are yummy and fun for everyone!  Want one, Mr. Nice Guy Grim Guy sir?"

This was... this was hardly proper protocol.

"Why, what a sweet young girl!"  The more rotund man, Ross, commented, and probably not just because he enjoyed eating.  "I'll try one of your cookies.  How much do they cost?"

Ross was always too naive for his own good.  Jero tried to raise his family to be more careful about everything, and it was fine, since he ended up being right.  Bloody lot of good that did them.

"We're giving out free samples today!"  The pink-haired girl eagerly replied.  "You can take a bite and really should enjoy it, because someday in the future things might not be as sweet as they are, today!  You can try to hold onto the cookie long after it's gone stale or complain to the chef for not making it more long lasting, but it still doesn't end up doing anything really nice.  They say it's best served cold, but I personally prefer you microwave them first, myself.  You'd think the best cookies would last forever, and it'd be really nice if they did, but it's often a game of chance.  Fun for everyone!  Unless you lose and whatnot."

Okay, this girl was a nut.  She did seem harmless, though, but not harmless enough for Jero to forcefully snatch the cookie that she was handing to Ross out of her hand and give it to one of his men nearby, who immediately ate it.

"It's safe, sir."  The man saluted.  "And very delicious, too!"

Jero nodded to the stunned Ross, indicating that they were safe for consumption.  Of course, the pink haired girl seemed even more stunned.

"Well?  Hand the man a cookie."  Jero snapped at her.

The girl blinked, then quickly handed Ross another cookie, though Jero did notice her look off to the side and almost glare at him for a split second with the a freak incarnation of a carebear stare... of DEATH.

"Look, Ross, we have to get going.  I scheduled our transportation to arrive on the dot to avoid any chance of trouble that could arise while we were en route.  We're already late, thanks to this crazy teenage girl scout."

"Miiiister!!!!"  The girl continued with that irritating whiny voice of hers, though this time she sounded like she was half pleading, and actually... half threatening.  In a really funny carebear sort of way.  "Why do you call people meanful names!?  Ooooooh, you shouldn't be so cruel to those you barely know because you don't like the initial impression!  You know that anger repression is a nasty icky yucky thing and it only leads to things that are bad bad BAD and whatnot and I can tell that, already!"

"What the hell would you know?  Crazy girl..."

"The more you know, because knowledge is power!"  The fluffy pink haired girl beamed, before narrowing her eyes directly at Jero.  "I'm still learning and education is endless, but you know that I know that you know that there's a scary skeleton in the closet!  The poor thing needs to be free!  Free as a bird!  Because soon the door will close forever and it will be too late for anyone to do anything about it!"

Skeleton in the closet?  Hmph, what Jero thought to be a stupid girl was smarter than she looked if she was able to deduce that that quickly from his mood.  How dare she... Jero decided to meet her challenge and return the stare.

"Yea, well, YOU can't do anything about it and I'm certainly not letting you know."

"Maybe I can do something about it..." The girl mischievously replied, leaning closer.

Jero crossed his arms.  "Ha.  What can you do about it?  I have a ton more experience than a foolish naive girl like you."

"Everyone can always learn something from everyone.  Come closer.  I have something for you."  The girl gloomily invited.

Jero looked down upon her, and they were glaring at each other eye to eye.

"Closer..."  She whispered.

He leaned closer.

"CLOSER!"  Demanded the girl.

The two were practically face to face in a staring contest.  What the hell was this girl trying to pull!?

Moments of silence caused the tension to mount.  Ross and the other men stared in awe, wondering what the young girl was going to try to do.  Both Jero and the girl were locked in a staredown of will power, seriousness and determination spread all over their faces.  The girl made the first move.

"Cookie?"  She beamed and quickly held out a cookie, which most likely resulted in a facefault in several of the onlookers, although even Jero himself was too stunned by the sheer absurdity of the girl to notice.  Pausing in shock for a long while, he finally angrily and forcefully grabbed the cookie from the girl, almost causing her to get yanked forward and slammed to the ground, though she quickly regained her balance.

"God dammit."  Jero cursed.  "I've had enough of this crap.  We're late enough as it is."

Saluting, the three men currently with Jero escorted him and Ross to the limousine waiting at the pick-up point.  This was not his day.  Of course, then again, no day after the incidents were ever his day, anyway.

Yes, life was a piece of shit.

"Ten men at sector five.  Two more at sector six.  All information has been shown to be accurate."  Marzche stated.

The sky was blue and clear, today.  It would hopefully remain that way.  No wait, of course it would remain that way.  There would be nothing less when the great Janet was leading the mission.  It probably wouldn't even turn red for anyone.  Aaron Ross really had no close family, unless you counted his sect of the black market.  If their info was wrong and someone did care about the random eye glass business CEO, it didn't matter.  This wasn't one of those missions that just had to be done for the sake of revenge.  It was hard enough tracking the guy down, but it was already confirmed that somehow he had connections and knew what he really shouldn't have known, and worse of all, was really just abusing said info too much.

Of course, SHE could not tolerate this.  Not that she'd be doing the deed herself, though.  It would be Juni and Juli's kill.  She would never get to know how he convinced Avelle to truly betray Shadowlaw, but she didn't really care.  Avelle didn't want her to know, anyway.

The sky was blue, indeed.  For the suited man slumped against the car under the effects of Janet's talisman, it was most likely a strange rainbow swirl.  A quick glance at Marzche to make sure she was ready.  She was simply nonchalantly blowing her bubble gum bubble, as always.

Bah.

There wasn't any time to think much further on the current situation when the beeping went off.  Janet tapped her ear a little to activate the ear phone.  She would soon wish that she hadn't.  Or at least that she had set the volume on the thing down before putting it on.

"JANEEEEET!!!!!"

God dammit, did Serina have to be so loud!?

"Hellooooshi!!?!!?!  Jaaanet?!  JANET?!?!?  THIS IS AGENT PSYCHO BUNNY TO AGENT WHIPHERWELL VAMPIRE!!!!!  HELLOOOSHI!?!?!?!?!!?"

"I'M HERE!"  Janet cursed as loudly as she could in an under the breath fashion.  "And it's Whippoorwill!  It's a bird!  And when did I give us code names in the first place!?"

"Teehee!  But code names are fun and whatnot and there's a method to the madness where one can detect when a code isn't a code and when one..."

SHE did not need this right now.  "Okay!  Look, what is it?  Did something come up?"

"Oooo, right!  Well, yea.  I found that the evil mean mean mediator man has a friend who is in charge of the protection and he was really mean to me and he knows what he's a doooooing and I don't like him and I think that he could mean lots of bad things on the mission but since Mr. Skeletor and Mr. Mediator Man seem to know something, I was just wondering if..."

"Wondering what?  Look, all we're here for is to kill Ross and that's it.  Is there anything there that is relevant to THAT and just that?"

"Um... Mr. Skeletor?"

"THANK YOU!"

"You're welcome!  ^^"

Janet quickly shut off the ear phone.  She quickly glanced over at Marzche just to get confirmation of what she just heard as the dark brown-haired girl's bubble gum popped.

"He's good."  Marzche shrugged.

Yea, that's what she thought.  Why was Marzche so uncaring about this?  Even someone who ended up accidentally getting the short end of the doll project stick should have cared about something like this.  Maybe she was just mad about how Janet forced her to undye her hair because that would have jeopardized the mission because in this case, it would have stuck out too much.

Hmph, hair dyes.  Janet had much better and higher priorities than something like those!  Like... getting her hair braids done perfectly.  Well, okay, Janet enjoyed looking good as much as the next person but she did it with a goal in mind, so there!  ...whatever, even Marzche had to know that it was just for this one mission, anyway.  Janet wasn't really amused, herself.  The reporter outfit she was wearing looked ridiculous, and Marzche probably didn't enjoy the limousine driver suit she had to wear, either.  But really, a reporter?  Really, a Chinese fighting girl who ended up being a reporter but really was supposed to be a secret agent was exactly like that sick bastardization of cannon in the Road Basher live action movie.

Hmm... here comes the target.  A quick command from the fearless all perfect leader and Marzche took a seat in the driver's position while Janet set to get things going.  She quickly yanked the unconscious guard up and made him stand at ready like the good mannequin he was, then took out Serina's microphone that the pink-haired powder puff girl lent to her.

And now for the truly devious part.  Sometimes even the greatest leaders had to make sacrifices in order to achieve their goals.

"Okay, Serina.  You're on, again."  Janet whispered into the mike.  The volume of the response quickly made her reel back as her ears were sent ringing again.

"YAY!"

Well, time to get this started.  The mike was set to a slightly deeper variation of Serina's voice and Janet was more than skilled enough to handle whatever crazy babble Serina had in store for her.

"HELLOOOOSHI!!!"

"THE HELL!?"

It wasn't the target that said that.  It was the darker skinned man who was also significantly taller and more fearsome looking.  Judging by the way that the other men was following him, he was probably the main bodyguard or security commissioner that Serina was talking about.  And if he didn't like Serina much, all the better...

"Miiister!"  Aided by the mike, Janet shouted in Serina's voice.  "Did you see my daughter?  A parent shouldn't be separated from their daughter when they love them much so because that would be really tragic but sometimes there just isn't much you can do about it!  But I guess I can find her later because sometimes there are higher priorities and that's why I want to get the scoop of the ice cream with our very own Deep Eyes Mister Master before other reporters can take the scalp!"

.....What the FUCK?  Okay, mental note to self.  Come up with her own lines when she's trying to annoy someone into submission and don't EVER let Serina do it again.  And what's worse was despite that incredibly fucked up display of CRAP, the guy didn't even look annoyed at all for some reason!

Oh shit... now he's glaring at her... Janet was supposed to make him want to get away from her as fast as possible, not really mad like he was ready to smack her.  But she couldn't even defend herself because then she'd give away that she was... well, only a killer agent of the most competent persuasion (since there'd be no less for SHE and all) and oh shit!

"What would you know!?"

Then Janet was quickly shoved aside as the group of men quickly entered the limousine.

.........wow, what an asshole.  No wonder why Serina didn't like him.  Well, at least things were getting back on track, now.  He even rolled up the non-see-through windows without any further provocation from Janet necessary, at all.  Hmm.

Time to get into the shotgun seat.  Janet quickly shoved the unconscious man into it.  There wouldn't be any room for her to sit anywhere else, but luckily Janet always comes prepared!  For SHE never would do anything like this without... a pillow!

Janet quickly slapped the pillow onto the man's lap then sat down on it and quickly shut the door, while stuffing her reporter hat into the glove department.  Another glance at Marzche to confirm the other girl was still with the program, and they were off.  Marzche quickly used her laptop to hack into the radio in the back just to see if they could pick up any extra information on the trip to Aaron Ross's maker.

It did disturb Janet a little how she managed to do that while keeping her eyes on the road at the same time.

Mr. Ross's voice was the first to come up as several shuffling noises were heard.

"What are your men doing?"

"Bomb scan." came the voice of Mr. Asshole Skeletor.  "Nope, all clear."

Hmm.  Bomb in the back of the limousine?  Why didn't she think of that?  Dammit.  This guy WAS good...

"That's... really unnecessary, Jero."

"Unnecessary?  That other girl had some maturity in her eyes, but she definitely wasn't old enough to be a parent of that pink-haired girl."

Damn, Janet apparently wasn't tall enough either.  How did he figure that one out?  Lots of people keep telling her that she acted significantly older than she really was.  Janet didn't know whether to take that as a complement of maturity or as a sign that people were seeing her as some old hag, though.

"You think those two are... oh please, Jero.  That pink haired one... She's just a girl.  I'm pretty sure things are safe, here."

"Yea, that's what my partner said about that other pinkish haired girl before 'that girl' blew his brains out, Ross.  If you think you're so safe, why did you hire me?"

"There are many people out there after my head, Jero.  But even Shadowlaw hasn't been able to figure out who I am by now.  It's been at least a year since the time I decided to deal with them and absolutely nothing has happened.  My money and power gets me some of the best security and secrecy out there.  I'm confident no one will be trying anything."

"Then let me just do my job, and you do yours.  Everything's provided with no extra charge, anyway.  I don't mean to make you paranoid or anything, but you'd be surprised at how long it can take to gather information.  But once people have that information, you can expect them to cash in."

Ah, so Jero was learning his lessons, finally.  Intelligence reported that Shadowlaw was able to circumvent him in the past easily enough, but it was now shown that that information was out of date.  Well then, it probably was a good thing that Janet was handling this and not just Vega.  While Janet preferred to stay out of Fenrir's little game with him, she did have to admit that she trusted herself more than the serpent.  Of course, she trusted herself more than nearly ANYONE, though.

"Look, is this about your partner?  Really, Jero, no one liked the guy.  He certainly lived up to his namesake.  Maybe he wasn't high class enough to deal with wine, but we all know how much he sure enjoyed his booze!"  Ross laughed, before looking a little more serious.  "Really, though... there were some rather nasty rumors, even up to his death.  I don't think he was exactly the most loving father to his own family, even.  His wife had to have divorced him for a reason."

Janet really wished she could have seen the glare that resulted from Jero in response to that, because from his tone of voice, he was PISSED.

"Don't you EVER say that about my partner again.  I don't care about any god damn rumors and I already saw the truth for myself."

"Okay, okay.  I'm sorry.  The whole 'died trying to defend your family and his' thing, right?  Forget I... what are you doing now?"

That was when the window behind her opened up.  Dammit!  Janet quickly ducked down so that Jero could only see the back of the head of the man who's lap she was sitting in.  Well, to be more precise, who's lap had the PILLOW that she was sitting on top of.  Even in situations like this, she had to maintain at least some of her dignity, after all.

"Where the hell are you going?"

Janet actually heard Marzche forcefully swallow her gum before she slowly looked back.  "The conven..."

"You aren't supposed to take this route."

"Jero, it's only a couple minutes' difference."  Ross remarked.  "Maybe our driver just wanted to take the scenic route.  Not that that'll do us any good since you closed the windows blockers down."

Jero simply frowned in reply as the window to the passenger's area closed again.  The two dolls quickly glanced over at Marzche's computer to see if the situation would update.  This was followed by Janet looking at Marzche for confirmation of the info that she just saw, which was quickly given in the form of a nod.

Well then, this was going to be rather difficult.  But this was also why SHE always had a back-up plan.

Today, Juli was going to kill someone.

It was nothing personal.  Or then again... maybe to Janet, it was, but Janet wasn't going to be the one who was going to kill someone today.  At least, assuming optimal conditions.  Someone was such a danger to Shadowlaw that he had to be singled out.  Someone had to die.  Although Janet overestimated how much Juli could want 'revenge.'  This wasn't revenge.  Or even really much a matter of principle for Juli.  It was mostly just a job, like any other.  Actually, guilty enough, perhaps Juli was looking forward to it, because it'd be her first with her partner in a long time, but other than that?

Revenge?  Obviously, Avelle had a reason to listen to this Ross.  And now she was gone because of it.  But wasn't it obvious?  She was gone the minute she decided to be gone in the first place, anyway.  So Juli didn't really care for revenge.  It wasn't like she hated Avelle.  No, really, actually, she wished Avelle were still alive.  Heck, really, she wished Avelle never made the choice to leave in the first place.  But that was over, and thus even if this revenge were actual real revenge, getting revenge wouldn't change anything.

Besides, until now, Juli never even heard of this Ross person, anyway.  She didn't hear about how she had to go after Avelle specifically because Avelle began directly betraying Shadowlaw.  She simply received the order, and had to carry it through.  Or maybe... maybe she was just too scared of the thought of Avelle actually killing her back then to think much more on the subject.  At any rate, now she suddenly hears out of nowhere about this man who apparently was the cause for all of that, and now today, she was going to kill him.  Or maybe her partner was going to.  Although any kills her partner got would be recorded as Juli's, too.  Which was fine, because that was the way Juli saw things as whenever they worked together on missions, anyway.

Juli remembered what was probably her first kill.  She had simply walked up behind the target, gun in hand, and shot him.  He heard her and turned to look at her, and she recalled a stumped look on his face.  He didn't have any time to realize what was going on.  He didn't have any time to have any fear in his eyes as the hand gun rang out.  All the build up, all the preparations, all the information Shadowlaw intelligence had researched on the person to find the best time to kill him, and all the training Juli had gone through had culminated into that one shot.

Assuming optimal conditions, this mission would be the same.

This particular entrance to the brick building of the news convention center was empty.  It was completely devoid of people, save for the two girls in dark dark blue standing in front of the large row of glass doors.  Soon the limousine would arrive.  Janet would probably do something insane like crash the thing into the nearby pillar, before getting out and immediately lighting the thing on fire.  All the security Ross set up would not do anything, because it was all the way on the other side of the building, anyway.  All the precautions taken would be forgotten in an instant as he frantically got out of the car.

Hmm.  Maybe the mission wasn't the same, after all.  But at least Juli's role would be.

"Juni, do you have the weapon?"

For her, today would be like that day.

"Yep, I have your weapon right here!"

Well, then again, considering that her partner decided that the weapon to use in this situation today would be a ROCKET LAUNCHER, apparently not.

Juli crossed her arms and glared at her partner.  "You got a rocket launcher."

"Yep!"

"And that's the weapon we're going to kill the target with."

"Yep!"

Juni's rather clueless partner continued beaming as Juli sighed.  "Juni, don't you think that weapon is just a little cumbersome to use in a simple assassination mission?"

"But rocket launchers are cool!  And I saw someone else try to use one for killing a single opponent, so why can't I?"

Guess it was time for Juli to point out the obvious, again.  "Juni, DID that someone succeed in killing that single opponent with that rocket launcher?"

"Um..."  Juni paused.  "Well, considering that I'm still alive, I guess not..."

Wha...?  When did someone try to kill Juni with a rocket launcher!?  Hmm... apparently Juni wasn't the only one to come up with harebrained things like that, after all.  Juli figured she'd ask about that particular fiasco, later.  Right now, her curiosity was sparked by something else.

"How did you sneak that thing over here, anyway?"

"Oh, I stole it from one of the security cars around the bend.  They were all away at the front of the building so I figured no one would notice it."  Juni beamed again.  The girl never ceased to amaze the brunette.

"Yea, well, just hurry up and put it back.  I don't want to set off an explosion that would accidentally like, kill Janet and Marzche or anything."

"Yea, okay.  I'll be right back.  Ack!"

With a quick mach slide, the blonde was gone.  Juli couldn't help but smile a little and shake her head at that.  Juni tended to overdo things, but it must have been nice to enjoy the goal of shooting for the top flashiest kill.  Of course, Juli herself didn't really care for that.  Which was why she was glad when her partner had arrived back and given Juli something a lot more compact.

"Here you go!  We'll just use this then.  It's Avelle's gun!"

Although maybe she was counting her blessings too soon.  Juli carefully observed the object in her hand.  Avelle's gun was a special custom object.  It looked sort of like a pistol, but the barrel was more narrow and widend out at the end in order to allow for psychic amplification whenever Avelle decided to have it.  That was something Juli didn't really know how to do.

"Huh?  Juli?  What's wrong?"

"I... don't know how to use this."

"Sure you do!"  Juni beamed for the third time that hour.  Well, it was always good to have some optimism around, Juli supposed.  "Okay, so maybe it's been a while, but you used it a long time ago.  Are you talking about the psycho power amplifier?  You can just use it on normal pistol mode.  That's what you did, before."

Glancing at the gun again, Juli shrugged and clicked off the safety.  Hmm, well, her partner was right about the normal mode bit.  This would be just fine.  It looked like things were going to be like that first day, after all.  Odds were pretty good though that the brainwashed version of the first day was supposed to have involved her partner Juni, too, but since Bremare screwed up on that front, Juli at least knew she had the real version remembered.  Not that her partner had to know that, though.  The brunette was more than happy to stay with the friends forever illusion.

Assuming optimal conditions (which Juli was going to make sure would stay assumable), it wouldn't be an illusion anymore, anyway.

Work to exhaustion when you're old.  Because when you're old, getting exhausted is easy so you don't need to work much in order to do it.  Yay!  Not that Juni had to worry about being old anytime soon, unless someone magically invented the aging ray of fast forward agingness or something.  So she was going to enjoy this.  Okay, maybe it was Junivelle that told Terrace she was doing this for revenge, and Juni herself actually maybe didn't care thaaaat much, but it was like... revenge!  Getting payback and all!  Cool!  Because just regular killing by itself was pretty boring.  It was much neater when there was a reason added behind it.

Juni remembered what was probably their first kill.  Marzche was also there for the mission but only sorta since she mostly just handled the transportation.  Avelle was still with them during that time, too.  After Juni and Avelle provided the necessary distraction (and promptly got beat up.  Um... oops), Juli had simply walked up behind the target, gun in hand, and shot him.  He heard her and turned to look at her, and Juni recalled a stumped look on his face before BANG!  That was HILARIOUS!  That was the BEST!  He was just like, "What the hell are you doing, here!?" then BANG!  No time for him to even register what was going on and cower in terror before the blast sent his brains flying all over the place.

Of course, now, if Juni herself was as good as her partner, she would have killed the target before all of that then Juli wouldn't have needed to bail either her or Avelle out, later.  Doh.  Hmm... ah well, Juni was getting better at everything.  Even Juli told her that, and Juli was usually right about those sorts of things.  She really wished they could have used a rocket launcher.  Jenni got to use a rocket launcher.  Rocket launchers were cool.  But nope, Juli was also right about how that really wouldn't have worked.

Ah well, now they were going to kill Ross with Avelle's gun.  The gun of the girl that he ended up getting killed and all.  So that had to be pretty cool in and of itself, right?

Where was that limo?  Juni wanted to see the shiny fire of the car bursting into flames (Janet and Marzche not in it, preferred).  Maybe they'd get a really stumped look on Ross's face too before Juli fires.  Hopefully Juli would go for the head shot... oh wait, she probably would to avoid the what-if scenario of Ross having a bullet proof vest to protect his heart.  Hooray.

...

...

...

Eh, what the heck was taking so long?  This didn't seem that good.  The blonde glanced at her partner, who was looking back at her, equally surprised, until their radio ear phones rang a little.  The two both clicked the things on to get the info feed from Marzche.  This was probably not a very good thing.  Sigh.

"Three enemy units moving to the rear and your position.  Noelle has confirmed that the passage way through Hallway B is still open.  We're moving onto Janet's third back-up plan since they already set up prevention against the second, too.  Whatever.  *click*"

Juni blinked as her partner frowned.  Um... darn?  Well, maybe this would give them the chance to do something flashier than simply giving Ross a shoot to the head.  Juli clicked the safety back on to the gun and handed it to the blonde, then the two quickly entered the building to move into position for the next phase.

"Juni, where are you going?"  Huh?  Juni blinked again as her partner clarified.  "Marzche said that it was hallway B we were supposed to take, remember?"

"Oh, right.  Eep."

Sigh, Juni... really needed to keep focused more.  How could she have missed something like that?  Great... there was probably some big screw up mistake in her current plans that she was missing, too, even though Junivelle kept on telling her there wasn't... maybe she should have told Juli but...

"Juni!  Hurry up!"

Ack, that probably had to wait.

One trip to a random rest room to use as a dress stop later and Juni and Juli were in more casual clothes.  Well, actually, the doll uniform WAS their casual clothes, but they gave off the whole "we're here to do some cool agent stuff!" vibes too much so the two had to quickly get changed into something which... well, didn't.  Juli had an agents uniform that Juni stole from the security car and Juni had a simple dark blue shirt and some tan corduroy pants.

Juli glared at her partner.  "Juni, what are you doing with my civilian outfit on?"

All Juni could do was blink in confusion as she glanced downwards at what she was wearing.  She finally slowly gave her reply.

"I... don't... know." she finished with a look of O_o on her face.  "Erm... how did you get the uniform that *I* stole from the security car?"

This caused Juli herself to observe her own outfit.  "Hmm...  Juni, next time, keep track of your own costume bag, okay?  These switch ups are... well... that shirt is really too big for you.  No wait... you're only shorter than me by an inch... ACK!  Whatever!  Come on."

Mach slide towards the future!  Three minutes later and they were there.  Serina, Marzche, Janet, and Noelle were already waiting for them.  Although Marzche didn't look really happy in that weird red limousine driver suit even if she managed to find the time to redye her hair to a blue color, and really, Janet as a Chinese Reporter was one of the stupider things Juni's ever seen.  That Road Basher live action movie really really sucked.  Noelle was wearing a news reporter outfit too.

Janet immediately went over discussion of the new plan with the others.  Blah blah blah, position here, move over there... when would they get to kill the target finally?

"And Juli and Juni secure the positions here."  Janet finished while pointing to the map on Marzche's computer.  Oh wait... plan three was the plan where Juni and Juli didn't get the kill.  ...DOH!

"Jaaaaneeeet!!!  I was thinking there should be a change of the plaaaan because I wanted to see something for myself and I realize maybe I'm not supposed to handle it like Juni and Juli but if one never tries one can never get anywhere and trying is something I really really really want to be doing!!!"  Serina piped really loudly.  Hooray!  Serina to the rescue!

Though... Janet didn't seem very happy for it.

"Serina, we're supposed to stick to the current plan.  We can't have any deviations.  I do NOT want this to have any chance of being screwed up, here."

"But... but... what if there's more?  Marzche and I can handle the security, Jaaaneeet!  Really really really!  Please please pleeeeaaase?  Juni and Juli have a better chance of securing the death penalty without trial anyway and then you can provide back up securities and things should work out really that way and whatnot!  Right, Marzche?"

"Natch."  Marzche nodded in agreement, though it seemed like she was doing so just for the sake of agreeing with Serina, probably.  Since Marzche seemed to like... never care about anything or something.

"FINE!  Do whatever!"  Exasperated, Janet threw her hands up in the air.  It must have been annoying to deal with people like Juni or Serina when you were trying to be a leader, judging by how much Juni herself aggravated her own partner sometimes.  "I'm only the one who's supposed to be in charge and has a lot more experience in how to arrange these things and actually did all the research but nooooo.  Look, if it'll make you that happy, fine, but only because it doesn't jeopardize the mission an overly significant amount!"

"Thank you muchly so!"  Serina beamed.  "Now we can succeed in bringing out the cold hard TRUTH which is fun for everyone and also really..."

"Yea yea!"  Janet quickly interrupted.  "Anyway... um... what the hell is this on Marzche's computer right now?"

All six of the dolls quickly glanced over at Marzche's nifty laptop to see the video feed Juni had planted on the security car.  Juni beamed.  This was going to be cool!

"That's the mini-cam I set to the car where I got my rocket launcher from!  And the driver's still inside!  Neat!"

Juli turned to look at her.  "Um... Juni, why did you do that?  Oh wait... I'm not sure I want to know.  Even though I probably already do."

The enemy was... well, the enemy.  Sometimes you had to take them out.  You get bonus points for finding really really neat ways of doing so, though!  This was going to be one of them.  The man was still in the car.  According to her timer, that little bomb she set on the rocket launcher would be going off soon.  Just a little longer... stay in the car a little longer...

KABOOM!

"AAAAAH!!!  OH MY GOOOOOD!!!!"

Marzche stared at the screen with the screaming flaming man, intrigued.  "The... The lights are... nice."

"ACK!"  Serina covered her mouth in shock as the man ran around crying for help and several others ran over to try to give him said assistance.  "Juuuuni!  That was really really MEAN of you!!!!  I mean... I guess it does create a good diversion and all but the poor man's probably going through a lot of pain right now and oh nevermind, he just became unconscious now and unconscious people don't feel pain so that's good but that's still REALLY mean and I feel sorry for him and he might die but I guess there really isn't anything we can do about that anyway."

"There's no hesitation..."  Juli remarked, although even she was a little surprised.  "Come on, we can use this diversion to move into position."

"Yea."  Janet quickly glanced down at the various numbers on Marzche's laptop screen.  "Everyone, move out and make it fast.  They'll be on to us soon now."

"Come on, Maaaaarzche!  We have the red bird's call to answer!"  Serina quickly piped.  "The casualties of everyone is really sad but sometimes the sad stuff just happens and if we don't hurry, things will get even worse!"

"Natch."  Marzche remarked as she stood up, closed her lap top, and ran off.

As Juli and Juni themselves dashed off to to eliminate their target, Juli threw her partner a question.

"Juni, do you think that was necessary?"

"Can't really tell."  Juni shrugged.  Necessary?  Who cared about that?  It wasn't like Juni was targeting civilians.  Martyrs were bad but security guards were open game.  Especially ones that managed the cars and equipment.  "I think that it would help in the future though.  It's not like Shadowlaw will never encounter this security firm again."

"Point."

Hmm... the flaming man was fun but the car explosion was probably the best part.  Juni figured she'd give it an 8.0.

Okay, he should have noticed something was wrong when he saw that cookie girl on the premises.  Even if there was no proof that was caused by the cookie girl.  He should have noticed that something was wrong when he saw that just barely adult  reporter trying to pass herself off as a middle-aged woman trying to give Ross an authentic interview.  Even if there was no proof that was caused by the false reporter.  He should have noticed that something was wrong when the limousine driver 'took the scenic route' which was heading for the back entrance of the convention instead of the front.  Even if there was no proof that was caused by the limousine driver.  But now he knew when he saw the security car burst into flames like that on the security camera that something was wrong.  Shit, what the hell was that?  Jero had seen bombings before but they never targeted a specific security car!

"Where's Ross!?"

"He's in the bathroom.  You know he always goes to the bathroom at this time of day, sir."

God dammit!  Arrrgh, Jero tried to warn that fool about how stupid scheduled bathroom times were.  Whatever organization which was staging this attack was good if they were able to dig up THAT particular piece of information on Ross's habits.  Still, they must have gotten their intelligence wrong because they were off by a couple minutes.

And because of that, Ross should have been out of the bathroom by then.  But he wasn't.

"Aaaaaagh!  I really got to go, myself!"  One of the men screamed before dashing off.

Okay, what the hell was that about?

"Even Ross doesn't take this long.  Do we have any men over there?"

"That area's closest to the car explosion, sir.  Most of the other guards are checking that out."

Well, fuck.  Dammit, they caught Jero at one of  the worse possible moments.  He was all the way over in the supply room getting the various large and small crates inspected and checked out, and it made movement too cumbersome.  Seconds spent trying to get over the mess could possibly cost him dearly.  It has, before, after all.

Hmph.  There wasn't any need for panic yet.  Jero's men were competent enough and there were some assigned to make sure they didn't leave Ross's side no matter what.  The exception being that they'd wait outside of the bathroom stall at this time of day.  They weren't THAT loyal.  What he had to do, however, was figure out who the hell was pulling this and it wasn't very hard, because the outfit the girl sitting on one of the crates in the distance was wearing sorta gave it away.

With a smile, the pink-haired girl in the full-body leotard waved.  So she was one of the enforcer demons sent from the shadows of hell, after all.  Guess they did finally find out about Ross, then.  Better do something about it, fast.

"Men, get that girl NOW!"

"Eh?  But sir, she's just..."

Normally they were supposed to act without question, though Jero could understand why they were hesitant in this particular case.  A quick glare fixed that though, and they were off after her.  The girl quickly flipped off her seat and dashed off through the door as the men ran after her and Ross prepared to radio the closest unit to Ross to up the security in that area.

However, the only reply he got from the receiving end was a female voice replying with a very nonchalant "Nani?"

"Didn't you hear my orders!?"  Jero angrily screamed into the transceiver."

"Not really..."

When the hell did he have a female unit leader?  Not that Jero was sexist or anything (Evelin was a damn good officer, herself) but currently, he didn't have any.

"I want you to immediately recall all units back from that fire incident!  We don't have time for a full scale investigation on that right now!"

"Whatever.  *click*"

!?!?

The door where the pink-haired girl ran off to suddenly shut close.  Jero heard a similar shutting noise from the door behind him.

...dammit.

He slowly reached for his pistol, trying to make sure his movement couldn't be detected, because he knew at that moment that he was being watched.  Only... the pistol wasn't there.

"HELLOOOOOSHI!!!"

AAAAAH!!!

Normally Jero was a really calm man who had been trained and experienced enough to remain so during the most tense of situations, but that girl's voice was just too damn loud as well as really inappropriate for tension and made even him jump a bit at the sudden sound of it.

Quickly turning around, he noticed the girl was examining his gun inquisitively for a bit before turning to look at him with that same questioning look.

"Oooooo, a gun, huh?  Guns are really nifty and fun for everyone in many cases!  You point it at bad people and it makes the bad people go away."  She beamed, before her face adopted a more saddened look.  "But... but I don't think I'm a very bad person, myself, though I guess I'm not one to be a judge, either.  Not a mediator, not a judge, not even really supposed to be an executioner, but follow your heart because some of us have no other guideline.  Well, besides mean psychic vampires, of course.  ^_^"

Okay, Jero didn't know how the hell someone managed to say "^_^" but he really didn't have any time to figure that out right now.

"Vampires?  I wasn't aware that vampires were the ones in charge of leading evil demons around."  Clenching his fist, Jero readied himself.  He wasn't going to underestimate this girl, especially since he already knew what they were capable of.

"Evil demons?"  The girl looked shocked as she dropped the gun in between two of the crates where no one could get it.  "Miiiister!!!  I already tooold you!  Calling people such meanful things is really just mean mean mean and whatnot!"

"You're here to kill Ross, aren't you?  What else?"

"Well, you know, not everyone who dresses like a puppet had to be of the deadly persuasion."  The girl shrugged.  "Maybe I just really enjoy wearing the lobster suit!"

"Lobster suit?  Oh please!  It's not like I haven't met your kind, before, demon girl."  Jero retorted, deciding to play his own game of metaphors.  "I know what you do.  You kill.  Get out of my way!"

The girl was a bit surprised.  She apparently wasn't expecting him to identify her by her uniform alone.  Assassins didn't just go around telling everyone what they wore when they were on missions of assassination after all, though at least she was apparently smart enough not to inquire about it because she already reached that logical conclusion, herself.  Instead, she sighed and apparently was going to put up a pathetic attempt to defend herself.

"Some of us have to do mean things simply because that's the definition of having to do something.  Janet won't allow me to trade eye for an eye in the nice way with something less yucky then giving eyeballs to each other and sometimes I wish I could but then again, sometimes it's not good to play the mediator man when you don't know what you're supposed to be doing."  The girl replied as she shook her head.  She then stared at Jero accusingly for a moment.  "But that's actually something you're supposed to know, what with Mr. Ross playing mediator man and whatnot!  I really think it'd be nifty if you told me about it because then things would be great!"

She smiled again at that last one.  What the hell was this girl talking about!?  The mind of these... lobsters were insane!  Of course, Jero felt that way ever since the time his partner learned the hard way that lobsters had claws.

"I'm supposed to know about the mediator man?  And how would you know that?"

"I just suspected and Marzche told me mucho information in that regard, so I figured it was thusly thus so!"  The girl beamed, before a rushing punch from Jero sent her slamming through the crates behind her.  She quickly jumped out of the rubble, shocked, though it was obvious that she was hurt pretty badly by the impact, too.  "HEY!!!!  That wasn't very nice!!! >_<"

As if Jero had time to talk to that stupid bitch.  He quickly made a run for a door to try to get to Ross himself as fast as possible, until something slammed into his back and exploded, sending him crashing to the floor.  Apparently this girl was good enough that he couldn't turn his back on her, though he didn't know what the heck hit him.  Turning around, he saw the girl standing back a little with her arms out and one holding a microphone for some stupid reason.  It was apparently her fighting stance, though it didn't look as trained as the one he saw the other 'lobsters' in the past use.

"Off the spring they go, when the vampire came calling..."  The girl frowned and glared at him.  "You can call us demons but I would never be able to know either way without the TRUTH!  TELL ME ABOUT THE LOBSTER, SKELETOR!"

"Well, maybe I could tell you if you would SPEAK ENGLISH!"  Jero shouted before he dashed at the girl again.  The girl quickly dropped something to the ground then leapt out of the way, and as Jero stepped over it, another explosion knocked him down.

How did they manage to get those explosive devices past the detectors!?  Jero was able to sort of find his answer as the girl ran from him, apparently trying to stall him.  She was dropping more of the explosives behind her, though a closer look revealed that they weren't regular explosives.

They were cookies.

Reaching into his pocket, Jero found the cookie the girl had given him, earlier.  He recalled that the man who had to dash off to the bathroom was the same one that had sampled the cookie before Ross ate one.  Hmm, delayed lactose cookies.  Jero never saw THOSE used before in an assassination.  These girls were more devious than he thought.

The particular cookies that the girl was dropping behind her as land mines glowed a purplish blue color and exploded after about two seconds, though, indicating the girl was somehow explosively charging them.  Bah, he didn't care.  He had to find out who the hell was toying with the computer and radio systems in the room and didn't really have time to deal with the stupid pink-haired...

Another cookie slammed into his back and exploded.  Of course, there was always the chance that the girl herself was causing all of this.  At least, the radio interception would explain the microphone, even though the voice on the other end of the transceiver had a completely different tone to it than this girl's.

"I think I found the skeleton in the closet and Marzche identified it when she saw you, too!  The key to your secret garden shouldn't be off limits to everyone else or else no one could ever enjoy it!"

Someone else was there?  A quick glance upwards revealed that high atop a large pyramid of crates, another girl was watching.  This time it was the limousine driver, except her hair was blue and she too was wearing the uniform.  They were everywhere.  How many of those girls were there!?

Oh fuck it!  He had to get going!  They were both on the other side of the room so he could access the door behind him now.  He'd have to do manual override.

"DON'T GO INTO MR. MCGREGOR'S GARDEN, PETER RABBIT!!!!!!"  The pink-haired girl screamed as he quickly entered the passcode by the door.  Nothing.  He had to try voice.

"Passcode five four ten eight!  Open this door!"

The apathetic girl's voice rang from the intercom.  "Um... no."

Behind him, the blue-haired girl shrugged, before typing in a couple keys which promptly caused the passcode input device to send a small surge of electricity ripping through the man.

"Calling Mr. Red Bird!"  The pink-haired girl taunted.  "Tell us about the mediator man!!!"

A quick glance at the floor showed that it was not only being littered with explosions from the cookies that the pink-haired devil was dropping around, but the blue-haired one was creating her own ground mines and explosions out of nowhere using her laptop, somehow.  It would be impossible for him to approach them under these conditions, unless...

Suddenly, the meaning of what the girl was really asking of him was finally realized.

"Fine, I'll tell you."  Jero began.  "I'm the one that was there when the vampire came calling, once.  I'll tell you, though, that Ross never gave me any information about lobsters, whatsoever."

"Really?"  The girl looked at him questioningly as the duo stopped with the mine-laying.  "But the mediator man isn't supposed to keep the secrets of the bargain from the mediatee!  Unless..."

She didn't have any time to finish though because Jero had already used the temporary lull to close the distance.  When he got near the girls, the pink-haired one attacked with a flying upwards kick while the blue-haired one backed away, though Jero was able to block the attack in time and quickly did a rushing kempo ground uppercut to knock the girl out of the air.  She was hit hard by the punch but able to balance herself in time to land on her feet, although she didn't look rather happy anymore.

"Aaaaah!  Maaaarzche!!  We're late!  We're late!!  The Mad Hatter isn't playing very nicely!!!"

The girl who must have been Marzche shrugged and typed a few keys into her computer, causing the doors to open.  "Tea party."

Perhaps against his better judgment, Jero found himself running after the two.  Unfortunately, he didn't notice the third one step in, though he did notice when she tripped him with a quarterstaff then slammed him on the back with it hard, knocking him forward a good distance.

Getting up, he saw a fourth one too, which was apparently concentrating on something as sparkles were surrounding her and causing the pink-haired one to glow a blue color.

"Hooray!!!!  Noelle provides the instant recharge!"  The girl beamed.  "Your number one stop for full recovery!  Have faith, will travel!  Even if the true laying of hands really couldn't be surpassed and whatnot."

....four of them?  This was too much.  It would be fitting that Jero would die this way, though.  Even though quarterstaffs especially were painful weapons that would probably cause him to die a slow painful death, at least he could go down fighting, unlike his partner.  Except for the fact that apparently the girls were too busy arguing to start the fight in the first place.

"Dammit, Serina!"  The one with the braids snapped.  "You were supposed to be providing security!  Noelle just scouted out a unit heading for Agent Juli and Juni's location!  What were you doing!?"

"But... but Jaaaneeet!!!  I wanted to find out the secret!!!  I think that maybe the mediator is just the messenger and I was wondering if I could... um..."

"Serina, Avelle didn't want us to know the reason why she did that, okay!?  I keep telling you not to do things like this or you'll jeopardize the mission and WHY doesn't anyone ever listen to me!?  Look!  You're lucky that Juli and Juni are competent enough to be able to succeed despite this but..."

Marzche pointed to her computer.  "Incoming."

"Oh dammit."  The quarterstaff holding girl sighed, then in a quick dash, all four of the girls were gone just as a group of Jero's men arrived.

"Sir, we..."

"Not now!  We have to reach Ross!"

Knock on wood.  Some say it brings you good luck.  In this case, Juli's partner doing it would bring her a small group of soldiers.

"Maaaaaaarco..."

The blonde's voice rang throughout the corridors.

Footsteps were heard as some of the security guards ran to check it out.  Those would be a few more that would not be in Ross's escort anymore.  Juli looked around a corner and saw them run by, but they wouldn't be able to keep up with her partner.  As stated before, one of the specialty skills of being an elite agent was the ability to run really damn fast.  And unlike the soldiers, their boots were suited to not making too much noise.

Knock on steel.  It makes a much louder echo than wood does.

"Polo!"

The brunette chimed from another far end of the twisted maze.  She couldn't see Ross.  She couldn't see the officer that was with him, or the group of men, but she could tell by now that their nerves were probably shooting up a bit.  Intelligence had this place completely mapped.  There was only one exit Ross could take.  The minute Juli and Juni got him alone, he was gone.  Once again, more of the escort was dispatched to investigate the noise.  Once again, the group around Ross had gotten smaller.

Knock on glass.  Because glass breaks easily.  The shattering noise quickly caused some of the men to fire their weapons at the doll that wasn't there.  Juni's mach slide came in incredibly handy for things like this.

"Maaaaaaaaaaaaarcooooooo..."

The blonde hauntingly chimed again.  Like a ghost, or a shadow.  A shadow that made noise, that is.  One which isn't there anymore when yet another duo of men go off to hunt it down.

Often times a fight is largely based on emotion.  Your fighting spirit, will power, whatever.  If you get too emotional, you can screw up, too.  Unless you know how to channel that emotion correctly.  Probably by a stroke of luck, Juli managed to do so that fateful day she killed Avelle.  But she wasn't prepared for the trauma when she confronted Bremare, and if Folken wasn't there, she probably would have paid dearly for that.

Today, Ross would be paying dearly.

Knock on... well, knock on that guy who just happened to get too close.  Because unconscious men can't do anything.  Bam!  Yeesh, stupid annoying idiot.  There was always at least one that wanted to try something unorthodox.

And with that, they finally saw him.  There were two more officers left.  The count Juli took when she last saw the group rushing from the bathroom area to attempt to shuttle Ross to safety had proven accurate.

"Shit shit shit..."  One of the men muttered.  Ross looked terrified.  "You!  Go take Sir Ross and get out of here!  They're close!  I'll hold them off!"

The other man saluted and Ross and he quickly dashed through the door and closed it behind them.  The layout floor plans of the building showed that it was just a normal door with a normal lock.  Nothing Juni couldn't handle.  The man took out his rifle and pointed it through one of the corridors.

Sometimes one doesn't need to knock.  They only need to shuffle their foot on the ground to produce a little noise.  And that's what Juli did.  The man in suit turned to point his gun in the direction of the noise, only to pause as he realized his mistake.  This man's emotion and fear had made him act irrationally.  He was concentrating too much on the source when he should have been keeping his wits about him, and now it was going to be his downfall.

"Hmm... clever girl..."  The man remarked as he looked back to see Juni right next to him.

The blonde's eyes narrowed as she kneeled against him until her head was right next to his, then slowly whispered into his ear.  "Baka..."

And with a quick earth direct slam, the man was out.

"Heh, wow, Juli!  Wasn't that really COOL how I..."

"Juni," interrupted the brunette, "Quick, get to work on the door.  I'll cover you.  The men we tricked into running off into a hundred and one directions will figure out what's going on and will be back, soon."

"Oh, you don't need to worry about that."  The blonde beamed.  "I made sure to lead them all to the same area where I had a load of C4 waiting.  Oh!  Finished with the door lock.  But um... the door itself seems to be stuck."

Hmm... her partner had a very videogame mentality.  Shooting for top score, playing for the fun of the graphics... Of course, that might have been because Bremare based a lot of her pre-programmed agent training on a videogame in the first place, but even that couldn't have led to something like this.  Juni was going for a group kill, though in this case it would turn out to be rather helpful.

As Juli tried in vain to turn the doorknob and push the door open (after she had looked underneath it to make sure no one was at the other side waiting to shoot her), she heard a large explosion in the distance, followed by some remarks from her partner who must have been watching.

"One... two... three four five... five people sent flying into the air!  Wow!"  The girl cheered.  "Oh wait... make that five and a half.  Ouch!  Ooooo, no wait!  Five point six!  Erm... I think.  Juli, how much of a percentage of the human body do you think a head would count for?"

"Not now."  Juli remarked.  "I finally got the door open."

"Aaaaah, okay.  Still, it was a nice group explosion, even if rather generic."  The two girls resumed their pursuit.  "Got about seven hits right there in one blow.  Still... I'm not really satisfied with that, but the execution and the special effects were pretty nifty.  I think I'll give it a 7.5."

Ross was on the run.  He was almost near the exit.  But it wasn't too hard for the two dolls to double around and cut him off.  He wasn't exactly the fastest runner in the world.

One flaming psycho powered kitty cat later, and that last man escorting Ross was out of the picture.

....okay, since when the hell did Juni train her kitty cat to do a psycho crusher?  HOW did she train her kitty cat to do a psycho crusher?!  Wasn't that type of thing supposed to be special or something and not just any normal cat (or normal human being for that matter) could do something like that?  How did it teleport in there out of no where?  Then again, Juli figured that maybe she didn't want to know.  As long as Cuddles didn't attack her again...

He was a large rotund man.  This one had the look of fear in his eyes.  He had the time to realize that Juli was going to kill him.  Not that it mattered.  Except... Juni was the one who had the gun at the time.  And for some reason, she didn't have it out at the moment.  Juli was about to ask her whether she would prefer to do the kill shot, but before she could, a click from her ear phone occurred again and it was quickly followed by Marzche's voice.

"Update status of yellow emergency from Noelle.  The escape route has been secured.  The pursuit route has not.  *click*"

....dammit, they had to speed things up then, or they'd be caught.  Well, no problem.  They were near the exit.

"Juni, we need to hurry up and..."

It didn't matter what Juli said, next, because her partner wasn't hearing it.  Juni didn't even get to hear Marzche's radio message because of another one that coincidentally interrupted it for her.

"Juuuuni!  I couldn't find the key to the secret gaaarden!  You'll have to get it from the mediator man if you really really want it.  I'm really sorry but I did try my bestest so I guess that's what really counts but I hope you get a victory.  *click*"

So he wouldn't die so fast.  The new plan allowed for a lot more flexibility than just a shoot to the head.  This was Juni's chance.  Accomplishing bonus objectives were always a nifty thing.  This would be a rare opportunity to do so!

"It must have been something big, that Avelle wouldn't even be able to properly describe it in her journal tapes."  Juni remarked as she held Ross by his collar and her kitty cat climbed onto her shoulder, purring contemptedly.  "Serina told me that your security commissions officer person apparently doesn't have the complete picture.  So I ask of you right now.  Give me the complete picture, or die.  You should make the correct choice, because for this mission, I'm not allowed to forgive someone for making the wrong one."

"Wh... what!?"  The fat man stuttered.  "So you really are..."

"JUNI!"  Juli shouted even louder, quickly distracting the girl.  ACK!  "We have to get going!  NOW!  Hurry up and finish this!"

Finish this?  But... but she couldn't finish it now!  She wanted to know how Ross was able to get Avelle to do that, because even Avelle's journal tapes didn't seem to give the details, and... not now!

"TELL ME THE COMPLETE PICTURE!"  Juni snapped as footsteps echoed from the distance.

"The complete picture?  Do you really want it?  What if I don't want to tell you!?"  Ross returned the snappage.  He was stalling!  WHY WAS HE STALLING!?  The footsteps were coming closer!  CRAP!

"Juni, we have to finish this NOW!"

No no NO!!!!  Well, they had to get the job done.  There wouldn't be another chance, but she wouldn't be able to get anywhere in time.

Ross glared at her in defiance.  "I'm never going to tell you, you stupid bi..."

KAPOW!!!!

Juli stared in shock as Juni quickly slapped a recorder to the wall and Ross fell to the floor.  She wanted something cool.  She wanted to set off a chain reaction.  Or maybe have Rosh cry out the final key to the secret before he died.  Or maybe even she could have at least killed him with Avelle's gun, but that was all she could do on such short notice.  Because as indicated by the men who turned around the corner, guns in hand, she was out of time.

"FREEZE!"  One of the guards yelled.

That was when things seemed to enter slow motion.  When time seemed to almost stand still.  Juni didn't freeze.  Reflexively, she reached for her gun and whipped it out to point at the man.  There would be a grey streak that would create an orgy of destruction.  These soldier's lives would be over.

"JUNI!!!!!!"

She would cause gargantuan balls of chi to descend upon them like the wrath of God, himself.  The enemy would be literally vaporized.

"LOOK OUT!!!!"

They would die to her power.  A force more powerful than the two walking holocausts that devastated Shadowlaw on that day of Jokuzetsu.  The last thing they would hear would be the crescendo of the angelic choir, and the final solution would be carried out.

The soldiers opened fire.  Juni didn't have time to pull the trigger.  A sheering amount of pain shot through her and then all was black.  One second later, she opened her eyes.

Huh?  Juli had used a sniping arrow kick to knock her around the corner and out of the way of gunfire.  What was...

Suddenly Juni had snapped back to reality.  She quickly glanced at the bullet holes in the wall behind where she used to be standing.  ACK!  She almost got KILLED back there.  Except that Juli was there to knock her out of the way and... CRAP!

"JULI!!!"

Juli had her hand over her mouth, and tears in her half shut eyes.  She was tightly clinging onto that bleeding arm with her other, and was obviously just...

"J... Juni, we have to get out!"

There wasn't any time to break out the healing.  Helping Juli up, the two quickly ran down the hall and were outside of the building.  Immediately, a transport with Marzche at the wheel drove up to them.

"GO!"  Janet quickly motioned to them.

Leaping into the back of the transport, the vehicle dashed off.  There were no enemies to come around the bend and pursue it, however, because they were probably too busy watching Juni's particular work of art that she left behind.

Jero arrived and immediately ran up to Ross, who had been on the ground.  Due to that, the men had a clear shot at the assassins, but they still managed to get away.  However, that was the least of Jero's worries.  Ross... what the hell did they do to him!?  His face around the mouth looked ripped apart and completely mutilated, and he was cut and bleeding all the way down the neck!

"Ross!!!"

Ross coughed, hacking up more blood which landed on Jero's suit.

"Don't try to talk!  We'll..."

He angrily coughed some more, before grabbing Jero and forcing him closer, where Jero could finally just barely make out what he was trying to say.

"R.... Ruuuuun.... yo...u IDIOT...!!!!!"

Standing up and stepping back, Jero stared at the man, aghast.  They... THEY WOULDN'T!  Who the FUCK was THAT sadistic!?  But... but then he remembered... the car explosion, the explosion which took out nearly all of Ross's escort...

"GET OUT!!!!"  He shouted to the rest of the men.  With that, they quickly ran away and were soon out of the room.  Which was good.  Because the time they got out of the room was the time that Ross exploded.

The explosion covered the entire corridor, but the camera had been able to send the feed of it right before it was blown up by said explosion at the same time.  Looking at the monitors of Marzche's laptop as Marzche continued driving, Janet crossed her arms.

"You jammed a bomb down his throat."  The leader remarked, more as a statement than anything.  "Hmm... sick but effective."

She slowly turned to look at the back area of the transport, where Noelle was attending to Juli's wound.

Under less shocking circumstances, Juni would have been watching the video, too.  It was recorded, at least.  Perhaps later, when she saw it, it would be neat.  Perhaps later when she saw it, she would think about just how cool it was.  Ross's explosion?  Great!  It would be a perfect 10.0, if Juni would say so, herself.  But right now, that wasn't what Juni was thinking about.

"Aaaaaaaaah, JULI!!!  I'm so sorry!!!"  Hugging her partner, the blonde continued crying as Noelle wrapped up Juli's wounded arm.

"It's okay."  The brunette tried to console her.  "I mean... really, it's okay..."

Maybe she was just saying that.  But it wasn't okay!  Thanks to Juni's failure, and thanks for Juni not even being able to work around her failure, Juli could have been...  how could it be okay!?  You only get one life and no continues.  It really really sucked!!!  Not cool!

The mission was accomplished.  Juli later on told her partner not to worry about it.  That she wouldn't be leaving Juni anytime soon as far as she could tell.  That she wasn't even seriously wounded, and she didn't expect them to fail in a mission THAT badly at all.  That fear would only make you unable to concentrate when you needed it the most.  And Juni did realize that it wasn't that bad.  That she was only shocked during that time.  Because it wasn't like things like this didn't happen before, anyway.  But still... there was still always that want.  The want for the thing which guarantee for sure that a mission would NEVER be failed 'THAT badly'...

The transport drove off into the distance.  They would be back at Headquarters by the next day.

I want power, sk8tbrdmstr.  I'm sorry, you probably don't understand what I just said, huh?

Juli was in the medical ward, just to make sure there weren't any long lasting wounds.  It had only been a couple minutes since Juni had come back into their room at Mrigranka, still a little shaken up.

"I'm wondering why I couldn't take those soldiers on.  I'm wondering why I have to be so weak."  The blonde had closed her eyes.  "Every mission, every fight... I have to be in the shadows.  You'd think that's what an assassin is supposed to do.  But I wish I could be the great one.  The one that strikes fear into the masses' hearts.  ...yea, Dark Sakura was really neat, that way."

It wasn't too hard for Junivelle to come up with an explanation.  "Do I have to tell you?  Even the great Avelle didn't do things directly.  She had to use her wits to win."

And Junivelle decided that was what she was going to do to defeat the evil that had taken over Bison, now.

sk8tbrdmstr, I am sending you this e-mail because it was urgent and I couldn't catch you on chat, today.  I'm sorry, but I'm not sure if I'd be able to see you again.  I might not be able to go online anymore, after this.

Junivelle smiled as Juni continued typing at her computer, her kitty cat resting on her shoulder.  She had already made the private message.  She had already contacted and left the message to the one who would be the key to achieving her goals.

But don't be so sad.  It's because I don't think I'll have any online time anymore.  Because I'm getting a promotion in my job!  :)  I didn't tell my sister, yet, though.  Because I'm not sure what she'd think, and my friend told me that it would probably be best to wait.

So Juni still saw Junivelle as just a friend?  Well, she supposed it was probably always good to think of yourself as a friend.  Self-confidence would be important, especially where they would be going.

I might even make it all the way to the top.  There might even be a new shift in the management.  And... I think I'll be back.  So don't see this as a good bye.  Just see it as a notice that I might be offline for a while.  I'm going to get some power, this time around, and then things will be great!

Lord Bison could supposedly read minds.  He read Juni's mind very well one Christmas morning.  But he misinterpreted what Junivelle really was.  He made a mistake.  A mistake which Junivelle was going to capitalize on.  The thorns would dig deep, and the gardener would take out both the weeds and the roses at the same time, and only the plants of springtime would remain to occupy the garden.  The final solution was coming, and she would be proud of being the one who would be there to take Shadowlaw out of the chaos.  Juni finally finished typing her e-mail, then clicked the send button.

So thanks to my friend, I'm moving up in the world!  If things go great, you can call me by my new moniker, or you can stick to the old one if you really want.  But wish me luck, for I'll be off.  Thanks for everything, sk8tbrdmstr.  I'll see you later^^

High Lady June