Once they left the gym, Daniel took a quick shower. At least, it would’ve been quick if he didn’t spend minutes simply standing there, letting the warm water and the weight of what he was about to go do wash over him.

Ask her out.

Emotions whirled through his heart like the drops of water hitting the shower glass. Raph was right. He was only making it more complicated in his head; people met new people every day, so there was no way it could be that hard, right?

But, his friends were right, too, even if it was only an illusion from his subconscious. He couldn’t ask out Carmen back home. He could challenge anyone with no fear and even fight ten people at oce, but he still couldn’t ask her out. Had he even changed at all?

Was he ready for this?

Daniel left the shower and changed into a new set of clothes. Raph relaxed on the bed, and gave him a final thumbs up before he left for Carmen’s room. He couldn't even hear his own footsteps over the pounding of his heart. One chance. Only one chance to really ask her out, but he had a plan: she’d probably like going down to the cafe down the street from their hotel.

Daniel pushed the door open, and in that moment, he forgot his entire plan.

She wasn't playing a game like he thought. On her TV, her game was paused, and her laptop sat on her bed in front of a notebook full of scribbles.

“Oh, hey, dude! Did you need something? Sorry, I was a little busy.” She closed the door behind him and jumped right back onto her bed. “I was doing research on Stylus. I think I’m set on having him as my target. I know, he’s really high up for me to challenge, but he’s really interesting. Cedric wasn’t lying about the fact that he can’t be challenged. I’ve been watching online clips of his past galas to see if I could find some explanation, and he even makes a show of…”

As she continued going on and on about Stylus, Daniel watched in an awestruck daze. She was the only person in the world who he knew could get this excited about a singular topic, so focused that she forgot about anything else. Her sheer excitement and motivation energized the air around her like an electric disease.

Daniel gulped. “Uh…Carmen?”

“Yeah, crazy, right? So, the theory I came up with is that he’s using a body double. There must be a difference between the guy who’s Stylus on stage, and the guy who’s actually Stylus on the leaderboard, you know?”

“Carmen?”

“Maybe if he had a twin brother or something…oh, you’re right! Maybe I should check his family history!”

Only one chance.

“Carmen!”

She paused, and silence filled the room. “Sorry. I got a little too into it. Mr. Stone gave me the idea to do research while we were on the track together. What did you want?”

“Well, I was just thinking, you know…what if we did this elsewhere?”

“What do you mean?”

“Like…” Daniel chuckled. “Like all the research on Stylus. Wouldn’t it be easier if you were somewhere else, in a different setting to look up about him? There’s this really nice cafe down the street from here Cedric told me about earlier.”

Carmen snapped. “Oh yeah! I did hear before about how changing the scene can help you think better. You could help me figure this out while we’re down there, too. And we could do more research about…what was that guy’s name again? Your target?”

“Eternite?”

“Yep. Him. Just give me ten minutes and I’ll be ready. I’ll come knock on your door.”

Daniel left her room. He realized he never got a chance to say the thing he wanted to — that it wasn’t about the research, or their targets, that it was really about her. But his heart thudded in joy at the good news.

It wasn’t a no!

He wanted to shout from the top of a mountain, but Raph wasn’t in the room for him to share the good news. Instead, Daniel silently pumped his fist in the air, whisper-yelling to himself.

Ten minutes. Just ten more to kill, without dying from anticipation in the meantime. He was already dressed, so he laid on his bed to wait. But, when he checked his phone, the first news headline made his heart skip a beat.

“Breaking News: Shocking Breakthrough in Gigabyte and the Beast Case by SRB.”

Daniel immediately flipped the TV on, changing to the news channel broadcasting a live event. Though the text along the red banner was still in French, the man standing there spoke in English, with a French translator speaking afterwards.

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Cameras flickered and flashed as Senior Agent Decker stood on the stage of the SRB’s press conference hall, a massive room with a high ceiling that still wasn’t tall enough for all the questions coming at him.

Agent Maya Wolfe watched from beside the stage. Stuck behind the curtain, she wished she could be there — she should’ve been. Her findings from Jonathan Stone and his students was the reason this conference was happening.

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Instead of reporting to Decker or even her Senior Agent Hale, who stood beside her with his usual grim expression, she went to their boss, Director Grindstaff himself. He was on stage beside Senior Agent Decker, built like Santa, but with a thick gray beard.

Decker would’ve taken her information and promised to “handle it later”. But, Grindstaff was different. He had congratulated her on her “youthful gusto”, called Decker to his office, and arranged for a press conference within the hour. As she left, the two stayed in the room for a meeting during that time between. Maya didn’t get to know what happened there for Decker to be the one taking credit for the information, but that didn’t matter.

The truth did.

Decker cleared his throat. “Two days ago, it was Steelstorm. Last week, it was Tempest and Gold Sable. Before that? It was Viperrazor. Before that? It was Gigabyte himself. Your suspicions are not misplaced — the low ranks of our Fifty are in danger, folks. But, my name is Senior Agent Cameron Decker, of the Supernatural Investigation Unit. My team and I have been working around the clock to get to the bottom of this conspiracy, before more innocent lives are lost.”

Maya scoffed. “Working around the clock” was a way to describe it. They were doing whatever they could to do as little as possible.

Decker raised a small bag into the air. “This was a microchip we recovered from Gigabyte’s sparse remains, rest his soul. The information that Gigabyte — no, Connor — left for us confirms that these deaths have been the work of an underground terrorist organization, led by a figure only known as Apex.”

As the words left his mouth, Maya’s heart skipped a beat. Not Apex. No, Haruki Takahara. Jonathan had confirmed her real name, and she had relayed that to the Director.

What was going on?

“Apex is a terrorist that has been working with her loyalists to compromise international security,” he emphasized. “And infiltrate the Ultimate Versus tournament. At the moment, we do not yet know her exact motive.”

Maya clenched a fist in her pocket. Jonathan Stone summarized it perfectly. Cheating her way to the top to throw the world into chaos was her exact motive.

“And, at the moment, we do not have a list of her exact loyalists.”

Blood pounded in her ears. Yes they did. Everyone from Mindgame downwards had shown up at the School of Flow to try and kill Jonathan’s student. That alone was at least ten or eleven, and she relayed all the exact information to the director.

What the hell was going on?

Decker raised a finger into the air. “But! We do have suspects.” The screen behind him flashed to four head shots. “Mindgame, West Gale, Synapse, and Sir Guardian were spotted on the train that Gigabyte was last seen on, and we suspect that they are working with Apex to compromise international security. West Gale has unfortunately disappeared from the public eye, but we will track him down, and we will continue our investigation, because justice doesn’t rest!” he shouted. “And neither will we. Have a good day, everyone.”

Decker didn’t lose an inch of his towering height as he stepped down from the podium. He shook hands with Director Grindstaff as they all took a picture, and the Director took the mic afterwards to handle the following questions — answering some, deflecting the rest, as usual.

Beside the stage, Agent Hale shook Decker’s hand as he passed by. “Hell of a lot better than your last press conference.”

Decker scoffed. “Please. We can let it die! I told you, man, I had to buy a new suit that day ‘cause my favorite one was toast. It was pulling on my neck.”

When Decker tried to simply pace by, Maya stepped in front of him, blocking his path. “What was that?” she whispered harshly. “You didn’t say everything.”

Decker looked down at her with smug disdain. “I don’t know whatever you mean, Ms. Wolfe,” he chuckled. “I told everything you relayed to the boss instead of me. You know, even though it’s my case.”

“But what about Apex’s real identity? Or the exact list of everyone working with her?”

Agent Hale cleared his throat. “Maya, this isn’t—”

“No, Hale, it’s all good. Wolfe, if your little head is that worried about it, you can go check the record of your meeting with the Director yourself. Everything I just told them is all that you told the Director, going by the record. He asked me to file the paperwork for his meeting with you anyway, so I’m a pretty credible source.”

She drew in a sharp breath. “No. You cut that part out, didn’t you?”

“Maybe you should go spend more time with your husband instead of pulling your hair out over a case that isn’t yours. That’s what I’m gonna do, anyway. I got a date with a hottie in an hour. Might even ask her out. Oh, wait!” He pointed at the ring on his finger, and laughed before pacing away.

“It’s time for us to leave, too,” Agent Hale said. “We still have a mountain of paperwork to tackle since someone decided to skip it for another one of her crusades.”

Maya followed Hale’s steps, but it all passed in a blur of anger, tinged by a slight worry. Decker didn’t reveal all the facts. But, it’s likely that those were all of their official facts that they had on record. Did he purposely omit the evidence from the record?

Why would he help Haruki Takahara?

Decker’s daughter is being treated at an Arise Health hospital. The same company owned by Haruki Takahara’s family.

She almost stopped in her tracks as the realization dawned on her. Corruption. Bribery — the most serious allegation in all of the SRB. But, without proof, the most she could do was jot it down as a lead for later.

She could figure it out for sure over dinner with her husband.

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Matchmaking complete. Opponent found within desired range.

The menu bar at Rafiq’s wrist flashes yellow, expanding to a minimap showing two yellow blips: him, and his opponent. Rafiq chomped down a croissant as he jogged to follow. It led him through narrow brick roads and past a fountain before he found himself in a large skatepark with a roof, and graffiti-plastered walls and ramps.

With a sparse crowd watching, a young man coasted back and forth inside of a bowl that dipped into the ground. Tony Nine. Raph finished the last of his croissant before jumping into the bowl, right into Tony’s path. Tony swerved aside sharply, and grabbed the edge of the bowl as his feet and the skateboard faced the ceiling. With the other hand, he grabbed his skateboard, and landed smoothly at the top of the bowl.

Rafiq glared up at his opponent, a confident smile on his face. Tony Nine returned the smirk. “I should’ve known it was a mistake to leave my open matchmaking on,” he said, speaking in a plain American accent.

Raph chuckled. “But it’s too late to take that shit back. That rank’s mine.”

“Nah. From an A Class like you? I got this.”

“Prove it, then. I challenge you to a ranked fight, Tony Nine!”