Isabelle laid flat on the ground in an open field, her bright eyes were hidden behind opaque goggles while she clutched a rifle.

Half of her face was illuminated by the beams of sunlight that pierced through the clouds.

Up ahead were ten human-shaped targets, wooden planks that were dozens of meters apart. The first of which, the one closest to her, was shattered and riddled with bullet holes, as if it was the target of a machine gun.

In her mind, she constructed a path way from the first one to the last. As soon as she felt confident in her mental calculations — she fired.

The first one was a bullseye, a perfect hit in the center.

It then continued, radiating with a crimson haze. As it flew across the open field, then took a sharp turn, breaking a hole through the second target, very near its center, before heading straight towards the third. But as it traveled through the shafts of sunlight and the cloudy shade, it struck the very edge of the third target’s head.

“Well, it almost worked…” She lamented to herself, letting out a frustrated sigh.

Isabelle got up and dusted herself off, and went over to David, who asked her, “Are you finally going to eat lunch?” He yawned.

She removed her goggles and said, “I have a few questions…”

“Does it concern pie?”

“What? No.” Her eyebrows curled, sighing, “I just wanna know, how did you figure all of this aura stuff?”

“We didn’t learn it overnight, Isabelle.” He scratched his head and answered, “Me and Anastasia, as well as our old comrades, had to figure this out on our own through trial and error. We copied from nature, mostly — watching fire burn and waves crash. It took us almost two years to understand how it works. That and also tv gave us an idea.”

“I see…”

“The problem is that bullets… Bullets aren’t part of nature. That’s why it’s so hard to imbue aura into. We don’t really recognize something moving faster than the eye can see. I was surprised when you said you wanted to try this out on the shooting range. It becomes difficult to control your psychic energy once it’s separated from your body.”

“Yeah… I’ve come to realize that.” She turned around, looking at her progress on the field.

The first dummy was riddled with holes, and so was the second one. The third one had four holes in it, along with the freshly shattered edge, and the fourth one had a single hole in it. The fifth one onwards were in pristine condition.

“Don’t worry, it won’t take you that long. You have us to teach you, and you’ve already come a long way experimenting with your abilities like this.” He said confidently, “If you no longer have any questions, it’s time for lunch.”

“I have one more question. Did you um… did you also dye your hair?”

With an eyebrow raised, he responded, “Huh? Yeah, I did.”

“Did you dye your hair to match with your eyes? Orange hair, orange eyes? Is it like a pun, matching the curtains with the window?”

“White hair didn’t look good on me. And… someone important to me said it looked better this way.” David answered in a roundabout way, his metal arm then started to ring.

“Hmmmm…” She muttered with doubt.

“I need to take this. You should take a break already and meet up with the other two.” He said as he quickly left, answering his hand with, “Sir, yes sir… okay sir.”

With an eyebrow raised, she watched, “Mhm… okay then.”

*

“Everyone’s changing their hair color left and right.” Isabelle sighed, headed to the kitchen with her chin in her hand, “He definitely meant Luna, didn’t he? I guess I shouldn’t pry…”

As she opened the door, she found three individuals already there with drinks beside them.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

“If it isn’t little miss vampire wannabe.” She was greeted with a taunt from Maria, who was sitting at the counter, eating cookies. On the table were her two red-eyed colleagues, eating potato chips while they stared at the screen watching a film.

“Where have you been?” Isabelle asked.

“Missions.” The dark-haired woman shrugged, “Where’s Felix?”

“I’m surprised he’s not with you.”

“I thought he was still training. Haven’t seen him all day.”

“Could you go look for him, Isabelle?” Grant requested without even bothering to look at her.

“Sigh, fine. Whatever.” The red-eyed woman sighed again and walked out the door.

“And what are you two doing.” Maria asked as she glanced over to the other two.

“Watching a movie.” The two replied in tandem.

Maria perched her head over her hand. “… morons.”

**

The hatch to Felix’s room creaked open as a silver-haired girl peaked inside.

“Huh? Who’s there?” Felix asked, his face still covered by the shirt.

She looked quickly looked away, but her crimson red eyes gravitated towards the shirtless Felix, unable to help herself, “It’s— it’s me.”

“Oh hi, Isabelle.”

As he put on his gray shirt, he looked to Isabelle, who was desperately trying to look away. “What’s wrong?”

“It’s … nothing.” She faced away and twirled her hair.

“So…” He said as he put on his four-leaf clover necklace.

“Y-yeah… I was gonna— why are you soaking wet?”

“Training.”

“Why… would you ever need to train with water?”

“It was Anastasia’s idea. It’s the closest thing we could come up with… against…” His eyes narrowed, the memory of the white beam of destruction that tore through his hand in his previous mission.

Isabelle looked around the dim room and noticed a pen on the table, as she looked back at Felix’s dripping wet body with a red flush on her cheeks, she smirked slightly and picked it up the pen, “You know… I have a pen that can write underwater.”

“Ah, is that so?”

“Yeah, it can write other words too.”

“Huh? Oh. Oh…” Felix dryly responded as he caught on to her joke.

Suddenly, there was a buzz noise on the table, and a ring from Isabelle’s back pocket. As Felix picked up his phone, Isabelle spoke first, “It’s a message from David. Said that he’ll be working on paper work today, also says not to disturb him otherwise we have to buy him—”

“—Apple pie.” Felix cut her off, knowing full well what David would say.

“Ah, mhm. That’s right. And yours?”

“Anastasia says she went to headquarters. Guess that means I don’t have anything to do.”

“So, what do you plan to do?”

“Normally I would just train for a little while, have some coffee after… but…” Felix picked up a bottle, the one meant to stabilize his psychic powers, and swallowed one of the pills. “…I’ve been training nonstop. Now I just wanna have some coffee and rest.”

Her curious expression turned into a smile.

“Really.” She giggled, “You’re nothing like I thought you were.”

“What did you think of me, then?” He asked with dry sarcasm.

“From the stories I’ve heard, I thought that you’d be… a cold and hardened killer, who would be difficult to talk to... Sometimes I idealized that you’d be this shining beacon, raised to save lives and to protect the peace at all costs.”

“Thanks. I’m glad you hold me in such high regard.”

“I mean, you’re still difficult to talk to, just in another way. But I like this you much better than the ideal I held you in.”

“To be fair, neither of those are wrong.” He smiled.

“You really surpassed my expectations, you and Nero both.” She softly giggled.

“What do you mean?”

“I thought Nero was just an idiot, and yet I realize he’s incredibly strong. And I thought you were incredibly strong, but…”

“Are you saying I’m an idiot?” Felix squinted.

“Well…” She looked away.

“Here I thought I was the cold-hearted killer…Besides, how is Nero strong?” Felix asked condescendingly.

“I mean, he beat David the first time they sparred.”

“Nero… beat David?” He mumbled out with a startled expression, his eyes wide.

“Yeah.”

“Interesting…” He bit his thumb with a grin, a burning motivation ran through his veins.

Isabelle’s eyebrows curled in response, but the faint blue glow faded as he glanced over to her, “But we’re not the only one who are strong. You are too.”

“Eh?” Her cheeks reddened slightly.

“You have full access to your powers, right?” He asked as he held her hair.

“O-oh, that’s what you meant…” She giggled, “It’s funny you say that… I have all this pressure on me…”

“I’m a little glad. When you saw you leave after the Director, I realized we were in the same boat. It sounds selfish, but I’m glad someone understands how it feels…”

“Is, is that so?” She stuttered over her words.

“Still… Nero beat David. I’m feeling motivated.” A stream of blue began to seep out of his skin.

“Well, maybe you could um, put that motivation away while we have some coffee?” Isabelle replied as she twiddled her fingers.

“Ow… oh, right.”

The two of them returned to the sight of three people watching a movie on a small, maroon laptop. Felix’s sharp eyes were set on the blonde-haired man with a sandwich in hand. Maria looked up at Felix and Isabelle with a cold glare.

When Grant noticed, he looked up and waved, all while Nero was still focused on the film.

As they sat down with the other three, Grant asked a question. “I already asked these two, but do you have any tips for me to work on for my power.”

“I… really don’t… know.” Felix answered as he looked at his own reflection in his coffee, his blue eyes being a stark contrast to the dark brown, but as he looked up the Grant’s focused gaze, he gave his answer, “But Anastasia told me to find out what’s keeping me from using my power… and overcome it.”

Maria subtly smirked as she listened silently to Felix’s answer.

Grant’s serious expression broke into an awkward smile and replied, “I see. Practice makes perfect, then.”

“That’s all we really can do.” Isabelle shrugged in response.

“I don’t wanna hear it from you, you’re the one improving the fastest.” Nero replied as he dug into his snack.

Isabelle whimpered while Grant chuckled. While the other two partners simply smiled at each other and continued eating.

~