Feeling refreshed from his morning shower, Ralph stepped out of his apartment and turned to locked the door behind him. Granted, thief was something many villagers didn’t have to deal, but in the neighborhood he lived, it was almost everyday occurrence. He slipped his house keys into his pocket and walked along the hallway, heading to the front door. He noticed a group of civilian thugs standing near the stairway leading downward. His eyes ran over them.

One of them; a teen with dark hair, tan hat, arms crossed over his chest, blue-ish black vest; had a bat like baton hanging from his belt. Ralph felt the teen’s eyes on him as he walked down the ally. He hoped they wouldn’t try to get any smart ideas and break into his apartment before he was able to set up some nasty surprises for any would be thieves.

Ralph made it to the main street before he glanced over his shoulder to see if the thugs were still hanging around. They were. He sent them a warning glare before he headed to the training field to meet the rest of his team. He knew it was probably pointless he had bothered to get cleaned when there was a chance he would have to do it again before going to bed. Hopefully, Raizen would give provide the Team more training today.

Team 17 stood around the Training Field 15, waiting on him to arrive. Raizen read a book as he lend against a tree. Lilian sat in a cross legged position with her eyes closed and a peaceful expression on her face. Enzo had placed several kunai out in front of him and sat with his legs spread, a wet stone laying against his thigh as he sharpened a kunai.

“I’m sorry if I’m late,” Ralph called out as he approached. His chest heaved.

“No, you are not late, Ralph,” Raizen spoke up, “In fact, you are on time.” He snapped closed his book and straightened up. “Alright. Let’s talk about our first mission.” Ralph sat down, cross legged, next to Enzo, settling in for the ass chewing he knew was coming.

“What did you do wrong?” Raizen asked.

Ralph mentally went over their first mission. There were a number of things they could have done better. His thoughts were interrupted by Lilian’s hand shooting up.

“Yes?”

“We didn’t work as a team, at first, but we did learn how to do it within the mission time frame, ” She confessed. Ralph nodded in agreement. That was a straight up fact. “I think we could have better with me acting as team leader then Ralph.” She jerked her thumb in his direction. “We would have been able to get the mission done better and in a shorter time frame.”

Ralph paused. He thought about what she said. She was still going on about visiting the Supermarket in Holly Forest? He opened his mouth to reply as he turned to face her. He saw Raizen raised up a hand and spoke, “Ralph, let her finish.” He close his mouth with an audible snap.

“Enzo didn’t pull his weight on the mission,” she continued, “Claiming he never went shopping to help his mother, but we found out he knew a lot of people.”

Enzo snapped his attention to stare at Lilian with an outrageous expression. He didn’t speak up as the kunai lay on the ground between his legs and the wet stone slipped out of his hand.

“He could have gotten us a discount, due to his connections,” Lilian pointed at Enzo. She blinked as if she remembered something, “And let’s not me started on you, Raizen!”

“Oh?” Raizen raised an eyebrow, “Please, tell me your problems about me are.”

“You ditched us!” Lilian shouted, “It was our first mission. You are our teacher.” Apparently, this was something she was passionate about because she climbed to her feet and put her hands on her hips. “You are responsibility for us until we are able to required to go on missions by ourselves, after 6 months.” There was a crack in her voice. “Yet, you disappeared on us and forced us to finish the mission without your guidance.” Her arms straightened at her sides and she looked down at the ground.

Ralph glanced at Enzo and lend over, commenting, “I think there is something deeper going on here.”

“I get the same feeling,” Enzo agreed. “Maybe it could be related to the fact she already had her first kill.”

“Hmm, I had forgot about that,” Ralph whispered, “Maybe it could be something to do with that.”

“Feel better?” Raizen asked. Lilian sniffed, but she didn’t say a word. “Moving on. Ralph, what kind of things you think the three of you could have done better on your first mission?”

Ralph spoke, “First, Lilian could have been more open minded about our options when completing the mission. Since it was a simple shopping trip and our client handed us limited funds, we needed to save as much money as possible in order to be rehired for the mission. It was the reason why I argued to go with some of the smaller of the stores. Yes, I knew there was a chance of the bigger stores having a sale, but do they really have a better deal? I tried to explain this to Lilian several times, but like I said, she didn’t want to have an open minded over the options I provided.”

He took a breath, “As for Ezno, I don’t have anything to say about him or the fact he knew several of the mom-and-pop shops we went to.”

Ralph turned a critical eye on Raizen, continuing, “I do agree with Lilian one aspect of her rant, you should have stay with us and helped us figure out which plan was better used to get the mission done. It was irresponsibility to leave without informing us on your location. If you had informed us on what was going, assuming it was a family related situation, we could have been more understanding instead assume you were being irresponsible.”

Raizen nodded and turned to Enzo, asking, “Enzo, any concern, improvements, or complaints about the mission?”

Enzo sighed and straightened up, crossing his arms over his chest, looking at the ground with a thoughtful expression, “I agree with Lilian and Ralph on the irresponsibility part when it comes to you, Mr. Raizen, but we were also in a way responsible for the mission in case you weren’t be there to help us, in an event of an emergency. I just hope your excuse is good enough for us to understand your motives. However, from my point of view, we didn’t work as a team, so, we may need to learn how to work as a team before we could take on any more missions, but I do know that is up to you, Mr. Raizen. Besides the fact Lilian could have more open minded about our options, Ralph could be more willingly to listen to her as well.”

This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

Raizen nodded, “Anything else?” the three students shook their heads no and he took a breath before he started, “While I get there is a deeper reason behind your outburst, Lilian, we will address each of your concerns. First of all, the reason why I left, I wanted to see how you would react and if you would accomplish the mission without my guidance. Plus, there was a personal matter I needed to attend to. If I did this mission by myself, I would have it done in half the time with better results, but this was your first mission. The three of you did get through Ralph’s leadership, despite the fact you three did butt heads over how the mission was to proceed without me. For that, you three did an excellent job and deserve the tip Mrs. Emberglow gave you for completing the mission ahead of schedule, despite some of the trouble you faced, getting more then she usually gets, and keeping it below the budget she had set for you.”

Ralph felt pride soar through him. Team 17 did a good job on completing their first mission without Raizen guiding them. He glanced at Lilian who still looked troubled, but Enzo looked just as prideful as Ralph was.

“However, it would appear all four of us agree - Team 17 needs to work on Teamwork and gathering information.” Raizen announced, “We will be going over those aspect in our future training sessions.”

Ralph knew that was a possible since their teamwork was so crappy. He turned his attention back to his teacher.

“Another thing we will going over,” Raizen started before his tone turned exasperated, “Writing your mission reports. I thought it was something they taught in basic training!”

Ralph glanced at his teammates who looked just as confused as he did. Lilian spoke up, “They did. What was wrong with our mission reports?”

“They were filled with misspelled words,” Raizen held up a hand, “Incorrect grammar, and looked highly unprofessional with sloppy handwriting.” He looked annoyed as he went, “I was called up to the Leadership Room over your mission reports and was required to explain why your mission reports were like that.”

Ralph felt the heat raise in his cheeks. He knew his handwriting was terrible. He partly blame the orphanage handlers, but blame himself more. He wasn’t taught the basic everyday knowledge until he entered the school system let alone how to write his name or the letters. The handlers at the orphanage, once they found out which path he wanted to take, refused to help him with a single thing. He often had to teach himself and tried to pay extra attention during his classes to stay level with the rest of his class. He glanced at Enzo and Lilian.

Enzo looked at the ground. His cheeks were red. He flicked the kunai across the dirt surface of the ground. Ralph thought he would have better access to certain aspect of education since he was the son of a Blacksmith and a stayed at home mom. However, Ralph could have been wrong when Enzo, like himself, struggled in basic training, but he did manage to pull through to end up in the middle of the class.

Lilian blinked at Raizen, looking stoic. As if feeling Ralph’s gaze on her, she slowly turned her head to glare at him and Enzo. Ralph found a leaf more interesting. She obviously had more access to better education due to the fact she was an heiress and her clan invested in her schooling to better represent the Sakura Clan in the classes she was in.

“Lilian,” Raizen spoke up, “Your mission report had three misspelled words. So, in other words, you did better then your teammates. I would suggest you learn the proper spelling of those words before your next mission.” He pulled out of his hip pouch and handed out a list. Lilian walked forward and grabbed the paper. She returned to her spot, looking down at the list with a small frown. She looked up at Raizen and nodded.

“Ralph,” their teacher turned to him, “Your mission report should have been a lot better then it was. Here’s a list of things you need to improve on before we take our next mission.” Ralph climbed to his feet, walked over, and grabbed the paper Raizen was holding out to him. He grabbed it and headed back to his place on the other side of Enzo. He read the piece of paper over as Raizen called Enzo up. Ralph winced. He was the reason why Raizen was called up to the Mission Control room. His list of things he needed to work was a long one - handwriting and misspelled words were just two he needed to work on. He glanced up at his team. Enzo looked upset as he looked over his list of required work. “Ralph, Enzo, Lilian,” Raizen spoke up, causing Ralph to look at him. “I know your list will required work, but right now, we will going over why information is important since you failed to do any on your first mission.”

Ralph resisted the urge to groan. It was going to be a long day. He just hoped they would get some physical training in before they called it quits for the day.

Ralph yawned as he parted with Lilian and Enzo. He couldn’t believe how much work Raizen put them through, today. They trained in the basics that they learned in the Academy before they preformed a mock mission against Raizen. Their goal was to gather information about Raizen, asking questions and tried to guess if he was trying to throw them off on their goal or was telling the truth. After that, they moved on to the writing aspect of their training. Lilian had to learn the correct spelling of the misspelled words while Enzo worked on his handwriting and Ralph had to work on writing in a straight line. That took an hour or two. Before they went home, Raizen informed them that they would taking another mission in the morning.

That news surprised Ralph. He really thought they wouldn’t get another mission for a week after how well the first mission went. When Lilian brought up that fact, Raizen simple said, “Life gives the best test and it is up to you if you remember the lesson or not.”

Ralph shook his head as he approached his apartment, bringing his attention back to the present and came to a stop. The lamplights lit the street as men and women moved in uniforms, indicting they were apart of the Police Force. He spotted a few of the nearby apartments with their front doors open and saw people moving inside, carrying furniture and boxes.

“What are you doing here?” the deep male voice rang out from Ralph’s left. He snapped his head around and blinked at the tall, dark haired man. “Leave.”

“I live in 8425, Apartment 505,” Ralph replied, pointing to the apartment building next to the one they stood beside.

The Police Officer frowned as he glanced toward the building. He held out a hand and demanded, “ID?”

Ralph reached into a back pocket and pulled out his wallet. He opened it and pulled out his Government ID before he handed it over to the Police Officer. The Officer grabbed a long cylinder device from his belt and flipped a switch. A bright light appeared at one end of the cylinder. Ralph’s eyes widened and his lips parted as he stared at the cylinder before he frowned.

The cylinder device must be a new piece of technology. He had been hearing rumors coming from the science department about new devices being developed. Of course, he knew these rumors were leaked with approval from the Government or else there would be a man hunt looking for the person leaking the developing technology. Ralph blinked as the cylinder light was raised from his government ID to his face.

“Alright, Barkson,” the officer grunted, handing Ralph’s ID back, “Hurry home. I wouldn’t be caught outside in a few minutes. There is a curfew put in place, starts at 10. We are moving the homeless into the empty apartments and we are expecting trouble.”

“Yes, Sir,” Ralph replied and hurried over to his apartment building. He climbed the stairs to the fifth floor and glanced at the apartment doors as he passed them. They were closed. He didn’t know if he would get new neighbors or not. He kinda hope he wouldn’t. He enjoyed his quiet evenings.

He reached his door and paused as he noticed the door wasn’t closed all the way. He frowned. He had shut the door all the way and locked it when he left this morning. He brought up a hand and used a single finger to push opened the door. It swung open with a creaking sound.