Strings & Threads - Chapter 13 - RogueSunset (2024)

Chapter Text

Disclaimer: I do not condone anything bad and negative in this story (e.g violence, swearing/strong language, gore, etc) and this story and everything in it are entirely fictional and serve only as a form of entertainment!

~

Note 1: Just a quick reminder in case some of you forgot, Dawn is 10 years old while Faye is 9 years old. Both attend Eden as elementary students. Apologies for the sudden author’s note.

~

Date of Upload: 11:39 GMT, 18/6/2024

Chapter 11: Settling In With The Forgers

Word Count: 43,844

~

Wednesday, 19th of October 2005

06:35:02…

To say that the whole mood in the Forgers’ residence has changed is an understatement. It’s not much, but still significant enough for the pair of guests to notice. They couldn’t blame it. They fully understand the reasoning behind it.

After all, Loid decided to tell them the truth at dinner last night, with the exception of Dawn and Faye of course.

They listened with rapt attention, hanging to every word he spoke. They were curious, surprised, shocked, horrified. All crashing into one another to a mixture of incomprehensible feeling. When he finished talking, nearly everyone’s eyes were on the pair, their gaze judging and somewhat suspicious.

Again, they couldn’t blame them. Who wouldn’t be on edge and somewhat unnerved when they realize they’re pretty much just inches away from their potential murderer. Loid of course, tried to defuse the tense situation, citing that what he’d told to all of them was merely based on a nightmare, not from real world, first hand experience.

While it quelled some of their mistrust and suspicion, the awkwardness in the air still lingers even to this morning, where Rez and Zver have once again taken the breakfast duty to themselves.

“Whoa! This is amazing!” Dawn’s eyes glazing over the steaming hot delicacies plated before her on the long rectangular table. “Careful Dawn, it’s still hot. Let’s not get your hands burned because you’re too eager.” The gentle voice of Dawn’s older sister Anya warns her, placing her own hand on the young lady’s wrist.

The ten year old Eden student pouts adorably to Anya, realizing that she now has to wait a bit more before she could get her hands on them. “And that also includes you Faye.” Emerald eyes darting to the smaller girl, who also sports the same look as Dawn.

“Rude…” The young lady with purple eyes harrumphs adorably, folding her arms like a petulant child. Anya pinches her cheek, eliciting a sharp squeal from the girl. “Dawn! Big sis Anya is mean to me!” She points out.

“Honestly, I’d do the same Faye.” Dawn smirks, scooting closer to Faye. Faye in response scoots further away from the two mischievous siblings, a feeling of dread slowly pooling in her stomach. “Aww Faye, I thought you love me?” Dawn’s eyes tearing up, staining her mesmerizing mismatched orbs.

Faye snorts, throwing her gaze away. “I do. But right now, I feel a large amount of malice coming from you.” She narrows her eyes, prompting Dawn to whistle in a broken tune. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.” She chirps, eyes gleaming with devious intention.

“Now now, let’s not make a fuss on the dining table when there are a lot of food on it. It won’t look good to explain why there are food scattered across the floor because you two were too invested in your silly bickering right?” A semi admonishing voice that belongs none other to Rez reverberates through the room.

Immediately, Dawn and Faye become still, as the man puts down a steaming hot pot on a wooden coaster, revealing he’d cooked a lobster based bisque. The dark orange thick soup’s surface constantly broken by the ample bits of lobster, slowly floating and submerging over and over again. The herbs and spices used indicate that it’s hot and slightly on the spicy side.

However, Dawn and Faye absolutely salivating over it.

“Wow! You’re so cool Uncle Rez! How come you can cook amazing stuffs like this?” Faye asks. The man chuckles, placing down the large spoon beside the pot. “Well… me and Zver invested quite some time into it. You should too. Papa would be proud.” He answers.

“Speaking of Papa, where is he? It is unusual Papa and Mama sleep later than 6 on weekdays.” Dawn muses.

At those words, Rez lifts his gaze and meets Anya’s own, with the latter offering a wry smile, still feeling awkward from last night’s encounter. Neither wants to explain exactly why Loid and Yor are still in bed, and they definitely have a big red cross slapped over the topic of that conversation, not wanting either Dawn and Faye to find out.

Sure they have had their own fair share of hearing what their families and relatives do for a living. It’s definitely a far cry from what the average people would do for work. Unconventional, dark, grim even, but all in the name of peace and stability so that the average citizen would not need to live in fear.

Like Anya, they have been understanding and also understand they should never talk about this to anyone else, not even to their friends at Eden.

However, that doesn’t mean they’re eligible to know that there are two ‘murderers’ currently living with them in their house. Hell, one of them even mere inches away from them and if he was to commit the said crime, no one, not even Anya could stop him.

They’ve been living a not so ordinary life safely so far, and if the words from the conversation last night were to reach their ears, it’d more than like not end well.

“Papa and Mama…” Anya breathes, giving them the best smile she could produce. “They’re not feeling well. They’re still quite exhausted from their last mission.”

“Oh oh! I remember! I’m glad you all made it back safely, though I could still see the bruise from here.” Dawn points out to the dull bluish spot on her arm. “Yes, thank you Dawn…” She smiles.

“And that means they need more time to rest. They’ve had quite the busy days recently so I believe extra down time would be a good thing to have, no?” Rez adds, ruffling Dawn’s hair causing her to squeal in delight.

“Mmm… you’re right, Papa and Mama do deserve more time to sleep. They work so hard to save the world!” She exclaims, pride pooling in her chest. Rez quickly comes back with several plates and bowls, one for each of them along with the eating utensils.

“Easy, you can eat them now but don’t rush. You still have a lot of time before going to school right?” Rez looks at the clock nearby, showing the current time at fifteen minutes before seven. “You have slightly over an hour before school, so plenty of time to eat everything.” He chuckles.

“I want the lobster soup!”

“I want the stuffed crust pizza!”

Chaos ensues on the table once more, as the two young ladies scramble to get their first bite while Anya is more reserved, laughing at their antics. Rez walks back to the kitchen to help with Zver to cook the last batch before they could wash all the dirty equipment.

“So how’s school Dawn? Anything you’d like to talk to me?” Anya scoops up a generous amount of the bisque to her own bowl, using the spoon to slurp the soup slowly as it’s still hot. “Umm… nope! Dawn is doing fine in school. I hope I could ace all the tests in a few weeks so I can sweep all the Stella Stars for myself!” She flexes her biceps.

“You hear that Faye? Surely you won’t let that happen hmm?” Anya’s playful side eye darting at the younger of the two.

“Of course! I will be the one taking all the Stella Stars! You won’t beat me!” Faye counters, feeling confident she could do better than the already amazing Imperial Scholar Dawn. The ultraviolet haired girl is also one gifted student, with the prospect of becoming an Imperial Scholar herself wide open for the taking, already bagging six Stella Stars so far.

Only two more left before she could become eligible to earn the prestigious title, and she won’t delay such opportunity any longer.

“Hmph! We’ll see who’ll get the most stars this semester.” Dawn folds her arms. “Loser has to treat the winner with many snacks and candies, deal?” She extends her hand. Faye doesn’t even think for another second before practically slapping her hand into hers, sealing the deal.

“Oh you’re on sis!” She smirks, feeling flared and fired up from such challenge. As the daughter of the genius Franky and the talented Fiona, backing down is a big no no for her.

“All that big talk won’t help you much if you get sick during exams. Better get going with your breakfast.” A gruff voice startles them both. Whipping their heads around, they see the still half slumbering Damian Desmond swaying from left and right lightly.

“Big bro Damian!” They push themselves from their seat to greet him, hugging his waist since he’s much taller than them.

“Hey to you too.” He chuckles, ruffling their hair. He lifts his gaze to meet Anya, beaming at her husband.

“Would you like to join us?” She asks a stupid question. Never change Anya, never change.

“Of course idiot, I’d be a bigger idiot to pass up such opportunity.” Damian lightly cackles, earning him a raspberry from the pink haired spy/assassin. He helps himself sitting beside Anya, with her giving him a loving peck before handing him over his plate and utensils.

“Damn-“

SMACK!

“Ow!”

“Language.” Anya chides, knowing that there are two young girls with them.

“Sorry.” His tone however doesn’t indicate he’s sorry in the slightest. A string of smile tugs at her lips when she mentally hears him grumble. “We literally hurt and kill people on daily basis and those two know about it and yet I can’t say one swear word? Stubby Legs at its finest.”

She pinches him on the shoulder, causing the man to yelp and shoots him a knowing look. He turns red for a moment before mumbling yet another sorry, this time more genuine, even if only a tad.

“Mmm, this is good.” He savors the bisque. “Who made it?”

“Rez and Zver.”

Damian stills a bit, placing the spoon gently on the rim of the bowl. He throws Anya a slightly nervous look. “It’s okay, they’re fine.” Anya reassures him. Just like her, he’s still somewhat awkward around them. She can’t blame him.

As if on cue, Rez comes back, now with Zver tagging along, bringing in the final set of dishes for breakfast.

“Here you go, I hope you enjoy.” Zver places a long rectangular wooden plank on the table, surprising everyone save for Rez. “Whoa! This is amazing!” Dawn exclaims, eyes glistening with eagerness.

Those two not only smoked one, but two whole briskets that’re currently presented on the said plank. It’s burned with its entire surface charred black but that doesn’t mean it’s overcooked and gonna taste like eating cardboard.

Oh no, it’s far from it.

There are also other extra assortments to compliment the brisket, in the form of pickles, sliced red onions and slices of toasted bread. The smell… the smell is just… scrumptious…

“Hold on lemme cut it. Can’t cut it early or else the nasty delicious juices would be wasted on the plank. We definitely wouldn’t want that to happen right?” Zver winks, using a long butcher knife to cut one of the briskets, with the juice immediately come pouring out of the tenderized meat, the char on the outermost layer and perfectly medium rare in the middle.

More juice excreted from the meat when Zver applies a bit more pressure to it using the palm of his hand and Faye couldn’t stop herself and dip her index finger onto the small rivulet of beef essence, plucking her finger to her mouth and lets herself squeal in delight.

“It’s so tasty! Thank you for the amazing breakfast!” She hops out of the seat to hug both of them. The two stilled, not knowing what to do. Damian and Anya could only offer them a reassuring smile. “It’s… nothing. We’re glad you liked it.” Zver softly replies, guiding Faye back to her seat.

“Now, let’s continue shall we? We only have less than forty minutes before you two need to get to Eden Academy.” Zver notes. They still need to shower and get dressed after all, and the drive from here to there would take some time.

The pair of young ladies quickly devolve back to their previous chaos, hands flying everywhere across the table to have a taste on every delicacy available to relish. They’re after all, young and still growing. The best and adequate nutrients are required for them to have a healthy growth.

Meanwhile, oblivious to their surroundings, Anya and Damian have no clue on what to say to the pair that’s sitting across them. The mental imageries of last night still dancing in their vision and the air slowly suffocating them with pure awkwardness.

“Say…” Damian coughs, breaking the ice between the four a bit. “I’ve known this place like the back of my hand and I know that Pops doesn’t have a smoker in the kitchen despite its spacious size. How come you could cook this perfectly without one?” He points out to the briskets.

Zver slices himself a generous amount of beef before nearly devouring it in one go, chewing all the tenderness to pieces. Dabbing his beef juice coated lips, he clears his throat before answering.

“I could only say… it’s a secret.” He winks playfully, clearly finding his own amusem*nt in the short vague answer while Damian frowns. “What do you mean secret? Did you buy a smoker?” He prods. Suddenly the awkwardness has been reduced significantly.

“Mmm… something like that.” Zver tosses a slice of meat to his mouth, to which it earns him a smack on the head from Rez. “Manners.” He quips, and the ashen gray haired man receives a reply with a flash of Zver flipping the bird.

“We used the oven if that’s what you’re asking. It’s big and wide enough and definitely yielded the result we’re looking for.” Rez answers the question for the man.

Content with their answer, the four falls back to the quiet atmosphere, wordlessly eating their breakfast while the chaos caused by the two young girls drone on and on in the background.

“Alright that’s enough. Get showered and dressed. You only have half an hour left. Off you go.” Damian pushes them gently to Dawn’s bedroom. Franky and Fiona had anticipated this and brought her uniform so they don’t have to go back home.

Faye retrieved it from the hanger in Dawn’s bedroom, allowing Dawn to be the first to shower while she makes sure that all of her homework have been completed. Once Dawn comes out, she showers as efficiently as possible as they don’t want to be late.

Just shy over twenty minutes later, they spring into the dining room, their uniform nearly completed with only their big black hats in their hands.

“We’re done!” Dawn shouts, revealing Anya and Damian too have just finished showering. They’re dressed casually but befitting of Eden graduates. Leaf green turtleneck complimented with a pearly white undershirt along with a pair of chocolate khakis and a pair of black derbies.

Anya on the other hand wears a baby blue blouse that’s covered with a cream colored cardigan with the topmost button left unbuttoned, a bean colored maxi skirt and a pair of black tassel loafers.

This of course, confuses the pair. “Why are you already showered so early this morning? Aren’t you two granted vacation by Auntie Sylvia?” Dawn tilts her head. Damian nods. “Yup, we’re on vacation but that doesn’t mean we’re just gonna lay in bed or cuddle on the couch watching some movies.” He smirks, realizing that the two hasn’t caught up yet.

“So… what’re you up to? Where are you going?”

That question, is answered by Anya.

“Take a guess.” A mischievous grin forms on her lips.

Dawn looks at Faye, who does the same, trying to figure out exactly what Anya means by that. wracking their brains, they still couldn’t find any answer into it until Faye realizes something.

“W-Wait! Are you saying you-“

“We’re about to drive you to school? I think so. What about you Sy-on Boy?” Anya sneers playfully. “Mhm, it’s her idea by the way. I was forced.”

“You volunteered.”

“Forced.”

“YAY!” Dawn throws herself to Anya as Faye does the same, feeling very much excited and grateful they’re going to be driven to school by them instead of the usual bus ride. However, their excitement only increases once they realize there are two more people in the room with them.

“Wait, are you also coming along?” Dawn asks, looking at the showered and dressed casually Rez and Zver. The ashen gray haired man wearing a navy blue shirt with a silver gray blazer over it with a pair of coal black slacks and surprisingly a matching pair of combat boots.

For Zver, he wears an ivory V neck shirt with an unbuttoned wenge colored overcoat that reaches just above his knees, a dark blue jeans and a pair of chocolate Chelsea boots. And for some reason, he decides to add one more attribute to his appearance by flipping an aviator sunglasses out of his overcoat’s pocket and wears it, inside the apartment.”

“Please, don’t ask.” Rez sighs at the ridiculousness right beside him. He then looks at Dawn. “To answer your question, yes, we’re coming along with you to see Eden Academy since we’re asked to by Damian and Anya.”

“Really, that’s so cool!”

A lot of things left unsaid.

Half an hour ago Damian had asked them if they want to tag along to accompany them to school, much to the pair’s surprise. However, Rez saw the guilty look in Damian’s eyes, probably still feeling awful from last night and this invitation was his way to indirectly saying sorry, as a way to make it up to both of them.

Since the day was pretty much left open without any meaningful activities – Yuri told them yesterday they won’t be needed for the interrogation and could go lay back and relax and Sylvia pretty much told them the same thing -, they simply agreed and went to take a shower.

Now here they are, dressed nicely and smelling like the forest with the cologne they’re wearing.

“Well what’re we waiting for? Let’s go!” Faye tugs at Dawn, which prompts the older lady to run to the front door, to which Damian opens it so they along with Anya can go through. A small nod given to Damian by Rez and Zver before they make a small and quick walk downstairs, where to Anya’s surprise, found themselves with none other than Jeeves himself with a limousine owned by the Desmonds, thanks to their vast collection of expensive cars.

The limousine itself is none other than an early 1997’s[1] Ross-Ramsey[2] Silver Spur Limousine that was custom made for the Desmonds. The base color is onyx black with golden lines going across the body of the car, painstakingly painted by only the finest of Ross-Ramsey’s trusted coachliner.

A process that took countless hours to complete but the Desmonds were generous in rewarding such beautiful artwork, so in the end, it was well worth the difficult process.

A gold griffin, Desmond Family’s crest proudly painted to the hood, showing everyone to whom the luxurious vehicle belongs to.

“Damian, Anya. Good to see you two in this lovely morning.” Jeeves bows down lightly. Their relationship runs deep enough that any past formalities are now forgotten, becoming optional in the process.

After all, the butler is highly loyal to not only the Desmonds, but Demetrius and Damian as well, being practically raising them until they graduated from Eden.

“Good to see you too Jeeves.” Damian flashes him a warm, friendly smile. The man before him is not just a mere butler, but a good old friend of his.

“I thought you said you were gonna drive?” Anya raises a confused eyebrow. “Well, since you forced me to come along…” He drawls with a smirk, earning a scoff from the pinkette. “I thought I’d ask Jeeves to drive for us.”

“Jeeves, I am sorry for my stupid lazy husband. Forgive me for allowing him to drag you to this mess.” Anya sighs, eliciting an understanding laugh from the older gentleman.

“Please, don’t be Anya. I am more than happy to help.” He gives them a friendly smile.

“Come on, let’s get going! We’re gonna be late!” Dawn tugging at Anya’s wrist while Faye does the same to Damian. Jeeves diligently opens the door for them, revealing its interior.

There’s a wall along with a glass window separating from the front and the back, with the latter having two seats facing each other, bringing a total of maximum of housing six passengers in the back and two more at the front, in total eight people could fit in.

The interior is also equal in terms of elegance to the exterior. The roof was carefully done to mimic the starry night sky, its full effect can only be experienced if it’s nighttime and all the lights were off but it is still quite the sight in the morning.

Damian helps the two students enter the car and Anya as well before entering himself. Rez and Zver follows suit, opting to sit on the seat that’s adjacent to the door with Damian while the remaining three are sitting on the opposite side.

Jeeves closes the door and hurriedly skips to the driver seat and in less than twenty seconds, they’ve started their journey to Eden.

“Can you show us please? I wanna see it!” Dawn pleads, her eyes wide as saucers giving them her best impression of puppy eyes. She’s begging Rez and Zver to show their abilities to the two excited students.

Of course, they’re quite hesitant but upon seeing the approving nod of Damian and Anya, they relent.

“Alright, but stand back because it’s quite dangerous.” Rez warns them, a pair of excited squeal escapes from Dawn and Faye. Their eyes glued to them, not wanting to miss a single moment of what’s about to occur.

Glowing black and red tendrils are forming on their clothing as their chosen hands are slowly shapeshifting to their desired offensive ‘weapon’ so to speak, with Rez choosing the blade while Zver chooses the claws.

Their mouths are gaping wide open both in shock and amazement.

“That’s so cool!” Dawn moves forward, but quickly held back by Damian. “What was that for?!” She growls.

“Dawn, you nearly hit your head to the tip of Rez’s blade. That wouldn’t look good and hard to explain on why you have a gash on your forehead right?” Damian explains. Dawn groans but understands, removing his hands from her before moving forward once again, albeit in a much careful manner now.

“This is amazing… just like those superheroes and supervillains we watch on weekend morning.” Dawn runs her fingertips on the razor edge of Rez’s blade.

“Careful Faye, it’s very sharp and could pierce your skin easily.” Zver warns her, her delicate fingers touching the tip of his claws and true to his words, even though she applies only a miniscule amount of pressure to it, she could immediately feel the discomfort her skin feels.

“And this is only one of several powers you have?” Faye asks, to which Zver nods in confirmation. “Can you cut a cake with this?” Dawn playfully asks, earning a chuckle from Rez. “Of course, but only if the cake is as long as my blade and the table’s made out of steel.”

“Faye!” Anya shrieks, realizing what she’s doing. “Easy Anya, it’s fine. I won’t hurt her.” Zver comforts the disgruntled pinkette, seeing what Faye’s doing is toeing the line of dangerously close to wounding her.

She, for some reason, finds it comforting to nuzzle Zver’s clawed hands. Even Rez is confused but says nothing, still focused on Dawn. She nuzzles his index and thumb claws, with the man subconsciously starting to caress her cheek back, though as gently as he possibly can. One wrong move and too much pressure could easily make her earn a new scar that would definitely earn Loid’s anger and distrust.

“You kill bad guys with these things right?”

It’s a simple question, yet filled with hints of innocence.

“Yes, we do.” Rez’s answer comes through quickly.

“And how many have you killed?”

“More than what we can count.”

Faye then grabs the middle and ring claws with her little dainty hands, swinging it up and down lightly. “You might have powers that’re weirder than big sis Anya, no offense.” Damian pulls his fist to his mouth, barely concealing a cough that’s awfully similar to a laughter.

“But if you use it to bring justice and peace, then… you have my gratitude.” Such eloquence from a young lady is definitely something they’re not expecting but then again, she’s practically exposed to nobility and fine speech manner from one of the most famous and prestigious high class family in Ostania.

“It’s nothing, really.” Zver waves his hand coolly. “We’re just doing what your families have been doing for years, if not decades.”

What on earth just happened?!

They were just simply basking in the comfortable silence when suddenly they asked them to show their cool abilities. Kids are just weird. On top of that, their whole family and relative are also weird – in a way – so it becomes… weird squared?

But before anything else could happen, they realize that they’re currently at the gates of Eden Academy, security guards armed with not mere pistols but assault rifles with guard dogs by their side, state of the art screening technology to ensure nothing suspicious gets carried inside and high resolution CCTV.

Rez and Zver quickly shapeshift their arms back to normal, just in time for Jeeves to roll down his window and the passenger’s window on the left.

“Good morning.” The guard greets him. “Morning to you too sir.” Jeeves replies politely.

“May we check your vehicle?”

“Absolutely.”

However, once he lifts his gaze to look into the passenger area, he suddenly gasps and quickly offers a salute.

“M-Master Desmond! A-A surprise to see you!”

“Yes, thank you for your hard work.” He returns the gesture with a quick salute.

He then sees Anya as well. “Lady Anya! I am honored to m-meet you as well!”

Anya says nothing, only giggling in response.

“P-Please! Go ahead!” The man gestures everyone to pick up the pace with the screening. Moments later, the limousine is good to go and Jeeves drives into the academy ground.

“That famous that they stammer whenever you come around huh?” Zver ribs the man playfully. Damian groans. “Ugh well… you know how it is.” He runs a hand over his face. “How could anyone not be surprised whenever they see someone belonging to a family that’s as influential as the Blackbells, if not more?”

“I can relate to that a lot.” Anya shoots her signature smug look, Damian rolling his eyes as a response. “Yeah because you’re practically glued to me for years Stubby Legs. Of course you’ll get your own fair share of such experience, though mostly in the form of disdain…” He mumbles the last part, earning him a swift retaliation with her slapping his arm.

They arrive at the drop off area not long after, with Rez and Zver opening the car door for them, to which several students and parents could be heard murmuring in the distance, commenting on their appearance.

Bidding Jeeves goodbye, the group walks together side by side, Dawn and Faye walking in the middle.

“Who is that?”

“Am I seeing what I am seeing?”

“Damian Desmond? The famous and greatly revered Imperial Scholar?”

“And with his wife too? The Anya Desmond?”

“Who are those guys walking with them? They both look intimidating and scary.”

“Could be their bodyguards, just trying to blend in as good as possible.”

The chatters never truly stop as they continue walking, but mostly ignoring the pointed looks and hushed conversations.

None of them could blame them for their constant gossiping, considering that despite Rez and Zver dressed neatly but also casually to match Damina and Anya’s own dress code, they’re still sticking out considerably to draw the attention of others.

Damian is a tall man, taller even than the average men, standing proudly at 6’2 feet. The same could be said for Anya, as she stands as tall as her mother, which currently stands roughly an inch taller thanks to the shoes she’s wearing.

However, the two is practically dwarfed by the two men standing on the right side of the group, which from a passerby’s viewpoint, standing roughly at 6’4, if not slightly grazing right below the 6’5 feet tall mark.

Adding to the fact that they’re also physically fit, with wide shoulders and muscular physique, similar to the build Damian have. Their choice of clothing, though nothing out of the ordinary, also somehow adds an air of mysteriousness for the pair, which only amplified for Zver with his aviator sunglasses.

He pulls the sunglasses down by pushing the frame of the left glasses down a bit to throw a half stern gaze to a group of gossiping students, which quickly realize what’s going on and hurriedly leave the scene.

“You’re giving them the creeps Zver.”

“I know, they earned it.”

“Stop doing it, it’s not good.”

“I’ll only stop if they stop pointing and talking about us.”

“For this occasion, let them be.”

“Fine.”

The man groans, pulling his arms back to push them downwards, cracking his joints loose. “You sure seem to be even more famous than I initially though, Master Damian.” Zver chuckles. “I wish they’d stop talking about me, or Anya, or practically anyone else that’s involved with me one way or another.” He sighs, knowing how popular and well known he was during his time in Eden.

“Let’s not forget that you’re not the only one that became the talk of everyone in Eden. I too had my fair share of it.” Anya nods sympathetically.

“That’s literally what I just said Anya…”

“I know, I just want to tell my side of the story.” She smirks.

That piques the interest of Rez.

“Please do tell us. The journey’s still quite far from here, no?”

“It is, so let me tell you the infamous rivalry of one Damian and Anya Forger…”

“This one story never gets old! Dawn loves hearing it again and again!”

“Me too! Me too!”

~

And so, Anya regals the group with a grand story of how the rivalry – that once started bitterly changed to a supportive friendly one throughout the years – between Damian and Anya began. It all started because everyone had expected Damian to be the first one among their peers to receive a Stella Star, thanks to his prestigious name and his highly admired brother who’s considered to be a genius.

However, that expectation was completely derailed, all thanks to one Anya Forger, who became the first one to receive a Stella Star, an honor bestowed upon her thanks to her heroic act of saving a drowning boy.

Everyone was shocked, as they definitely did not expect the oddball to become the first student to be decorated with such esteemed award, especially after she made quite the impression to others (in a negative light unfortunately) by earning herself a Tonitrus on the very first day of school.

Damian was of course, displeased with that at first but what can he do? She did a selfless act and it was recognized to be elegant and valiant enough to warrant a Stella. He was supposed to be the one who received the first Stella in their year group, not her.

And then it grew, with her sacrificing her own handkerchief for him so he won’t get a Tonitrus (which ironically backfired on her), and then him earning his second Stella Stars in the aftermath of a harrowing encounter with Red Circus terrorist group hijacking their school bus along with Becky and Bill.

However, he knew, even if he earned his second Stella, that also meant Anya had earned her second.

He was still neck and neck with her.

The commoner had been on equal fighting ground against the esteemed noble.

And then, it became even weirder.

For probably the first time ever in the history of Eden Academy ever since its founding, a student not only earned a Stella Star in an exam, but somehow also earned a Tonitrus Bolt. Anya was truly an oddball, which baffled students and teachers alike.

While he also got yet another Stella Stars for his impressive achievement in History, being in the first place for having the highest score in the said subject, he also knew that once again, he was on the same place as Anya.

Three on three.

It seemed no matter what he did, no matter how many hours he invested into his study, Anya had always been able to match him.

Her writing was worse than the graffiti painting the walls of buildings in the less fortunate part of Berlint, always making funny faces which earned her the reprimands of teachers more than often for no reason, clumsy, quirky, and so much more.

So how come with such awful combinations that would’ve been more than enough to make her expulsed from school, allowed her to attain three Stella Stars?

That was when it bloomed to something more.

From disdain, to confusion, and then curiosity.

Their friendship wasn’t something that started smoothly. It was the furthest thing from it.

Bickering, arguing, yelling at each other, calling stupid names, all of it.

It was awkward, rocky at times, but somehow, someway, it went on and on, slowly improving.

It was going to be a slow yet steady progress on their relationship, growing closer and closer with each day passing.

Until tragedy struck the Desmonds, shaking Damian to his core.

Father was dead, mother was… inconsolable. The family… shattered.

Funeral wasn’t easy. His father in the casket, lowered to the ground as they bid their final farewell.

The man that he wanted to impress the most, the man that he wanted to gain the approval for so long, no longer among them.

Damian, while still was awful, had mellowed out throughout the years thanks to his friends, especially Ewen and Emile, Becky, and most importantly, Anya.

However, it all changed nearly overnight. The young man who was confident at all times, smiling and easily someone that you’d look up to, became a shell of himself.

He shut himself to the world, not even speaking one word to anyone, not even to his best friends, preferring to talk with grunts and handwritten notes. He only wanted to be left alone, still trying his best to come to terms with what had been ongoing with his life recently.

It was so bad that his grades were failing, at times even toeing the dangerous line of getting himself a Tonitrus. He was cold, not dead but barely living. His daily routine only consisted of waking up, eat breakfast, go to school, come back from school to eat dinner and work on any homework then sleep.

It was then it happened. Someone was fed up with his stupid antics and decided to take matters to her own hands.

That slap was powerful, felt personal. But he didn’t feel any anger nor hatred behind it. It held something even more heart wrenching.

Disappointment.

“Please get ahold of yourself Sy-on Boy!” Anya screamed at him, after dragging him to an empty classroom to give him a piece of her mind.

“I know you’re hurting but please, don’t do this to yourself! You have people around you to talk to! Friends that’ll help you!”

“Shut up Forger!”

“You’re someone to look up to! Someone that inspired people! This is not you and you know it!”

“You know nothing about me! You don’t know what it’s like to be left alone! You don’t know what it’s like to have a family that barely resembled one! You don’t know what it’s like to strive so hard to earn someone’s love only to be taken away from the very thing that you crave!”

Those hurtful words proved to be a fatal mistake.

Young Anya was a force of nature. She was, for some reason, similar to Bill, though even scarier. Bill was scary because of his tall and muscular stature, unbefitting of someone his age, but Anya…

It’s almost as if Anya could see through everyone so easily.

She was at first, someone that most would avoid. But over time, despite her quirky and random nature, people grew fond of her. She’s a commoner yes but for some reason, everyone felt home around her. Whenever they talk to her, they’re not the sons and daughters of powerful and wealthy families eager to boast about their lineage.

They’re just students. Friends that hang out with each other for fun.

She was the ball of sunshine of everyone’s life, literally. Whenever someone achieved something, Anya would be there to congratulate them. A genuine compliment, not one filled with hidden envy or malice. Whenever someone had a misfortune befell upon them, she’d also be the one to pick them up and hug them, telling them that it’s okay and that they shouldn’t dwell on the past too much, instead trying to hold their head high in optimism for the future.

She was always seen smiling, laughing, and unofficially the queen of their peers.

But now, that smile, that signature silly yet heartwarming smile of hers, was gone.

Evaporated into thin air.

She looked at him as if she just saw a ghost. No, a monster.

Those words she uttered, would forever haunt him for the rest of his life.

“H-How… how could you…”

Even in his distressed, angered state, Damian knew. He knew.

He f*cked up. Big time.

Sniffing sharply, barely able to contain her tears, Anya ran past him, slamming the door shut.

Anya, the girl that punched him on the first day of school.

Anya, the girl that earned her first Stella for a heroic act.

Anya, the girl that saved him on multiple occasion.

Anya, the girl that made him realize that life wasn’t all about academic achievements and should enjoy it to the best of his abilities.

Anya, the girl that became a ray of light in his dark and murky life.

Anya…

He ran after her, realizing the terrible mistake he had done. Unfortunately, the girl was gone.

That night, he couldn’t sleep. He felt restless, a sinking feeling in his heart that grew bigger and bigger. He… he had to somehow make it up to her. He needed to apologize.

Unfortunately for him, it was not as easy as he thought he’d be.

It was hard. Way harder.

Anya no longer talked to him, not even glancing at him. He wasn’t there. Damian Desmond no longer existed in her life.

When people started to notice that Damian began acting differently than he was for the past couple of weeks, they started wondering what did Anya do to make him wake up from his gloomy nature. They also began to notice that Anya refused to look at him, not even acknowledging him in the slightest.

While Ewen and Emile welcomed him back, the smile on their faces were strained, disappointed even to an extent. He knew they knew. Becky’s look of pure disgust confirmed it all. She had confided to them at one point.

People soon began to whisper and gossip, wondering on what did Damian exactly do to warrant such powerful yet cold reaction from Anya. Some were even beginning to get angry at him for hurting Anya, despite not knowing exactly how he did it.

She was the gem of everyone after all.

“Oh nothing out of the usual. Just Damian being an absolute dipsh*t.” Becky raised her voice loud enough for him to hear, with some students gasping at the crass language she used, enough to warrant her a harsh warning if not outright awarding her a Tonitrus if a teacher had heard it.

But she didn’t care. She deserved it. She knew he knew he deserved to be called out like that.

He kept trying to make amends to her. Getting up earlier than usual just to wait for her by the gates so he could greet and try to walk with her but found himself being blocked by Becky. Writing dozens of letters to be discreetly passed to her only to find it returned, crumpled with the words of ‘Don’t write to her ever again.’ that belonged to none other than Becky, again.

He even risked getting himself a Tonitrus by sneaking her a couple of peanut snacks, ranging from her favorite to ones that you can only get if you go abroad to get them or several limited Bondman memorabilia.

But none of them worked, with the snacks and gifts returned to him, fortunately undamaged.

He also began receiving pressure from his fellow friends, wanting him to make it up to her as quickly as possible. To atone to whatever he did to her to warrant such reaction from the pinkette.

“Please, don’t.” Anya’s words may be soft, barely above a whisper, but to everyone else, it was louder than the most vicious thunder.

“Don’t hate him. Understand him. He didn’t deserve all the tragedies that he experienced. Help him. He… He needs all of you.”

Damian simply got up and left, crying in one of the bathroom stalls.

How could she say that?

Her voice was strained, choking up even. It was hard for her to say those things. Even if he was getting beaten to a bloody pulp right before her, he wouldn’t ask for her for help. He deserved it. She deserved that kind of justice.

Anyone would’ve relished and delighted of such thing, especially if able to watch it with their very own eyes.

However, Anya wasn’t just anyone. She’s leagues better than that.

Even after hearing those hurtful words that he clearly should’ve not said, she still came to his defense. She didn’t want people to hate him. She wanted them to understand him. Help him back to his feet. Remind him of the old Damian. The real Damian Desmond.

A selfless act. Even when hurting she still prioritized everyone else. She still cared about him, even if it hurt her in doing so. The quality of one Anya Forger that worth more than a thousand Stellas. A mere commoner, a mere girl of lower social standings compared to her peers, just blew everyone out of the water by acting befitting of one with the highest social status and manner.

But even then, after such moving words from her, he knew she’s still hurting. The numerous encounter he had with her afterwards that only resulted in a one sided greetings that left unanswered was the proof of it.

While people had opened up to him again, though still somewhat reluctant, Damian wouldn’t let this opportunity slip past him. He practically apologized to everyone face to face, saying that they didn’t deserve to put up with his awful behavior for the past few weeks and would do everything in his power to make it up to them.

He also tried to talk to Becky but still, the girl that’s closest to Anya still adamant about it. Her words may had worked to others but it won’t work on her. She still viewed him as a nuisance, a general menace to Anya’s well being.

But Damian didn’t care.

He was persistent, and kept doing everything he could to win her back. To have Anya back in his life.

He kept greeting her, sending her letters, and more.

But in the end, she was still not acknowledging him. It began wearing him down considerably. He had asked Ewen and Emile to help him out and while they were thrilled to see their longtime friend was back in his elements, they couldn’t do much whenever they tried to talk Becky into it.

Damian understood and thanked them for their efforts.

Three weeks had passed since that fateful encounter, and still no progress.

But the students weren’t the only one noticing his plight.

One day, after classes were over, Damian was surprised that he was invited by none other than Master Henry Henderson to his place. The homework given that day weren’t that difficult and since he was staying in Eden provided dorm, he saw no harm in accepting it.

“How are you doing Master Desmond?” Henderson asked him, after serving him a cup of tea and several high quality biscuits he got as a gift from fellow teaching colleagues.

“I am doing fine Sir Henderson, thank you.” He lifted his head to give him a reassuring smile, despite definitely not feeling fine at all.

A bubble of silence grew between them, only broken by the soft sound of tea sips and biscuits being crunched.

“Master Desmond, I believe there was some kind of… disagreement you have with Miss Forger at the moment?”

Ouch. Bullseye.

His shoulder slumped, realizing that there was no point in denying it.

“Yes sir, I…” He sighed deeply. The painful memories of him being a total dipsh*t, as Becky put it, resurfaced, taunting and laughing at him for doing it.

“I… I f*cked up big time.” His choice of words shocked the elderly teacher, but he didn’t care. If he got a Tonitrus because of it, then so be it.

“Master Desmond, normally I would not hesitate to grant you a Tonitrus for such explicit language. However, I somewhat believe that all of this… circ*mstances you’re facing at the moment stemmed from your personal loss. So for this occasion, I will let it slide. But do not repeat such offense in the future.” Henderson was a strict teacher, but a fair one at that. If he wasn’t, he would’ve awarded Anya with three Tonitrus for punching him.

He knew what tragedy that had fallen over the Desmonds, so him swearing hard like that must’ve been one of the ways for him to let out some steam.

Better than bottling it after all.

“I’m sorry, I won’t” He breathed. Then he continued. “You’re right sir. It did have its roots to my grieving. Losing someone you desperately look up to so that you could earn his approval wasn’t an easy thing for me to deal with.”

“In my anger I… I have said some things that I knew I shouldn’t have said.” He sighed again, his throat constricting and he coughed because of it.

“I should’ve known better. I know her history with her family and yet, I lashed out at her, insulting the very thing that she holds dear.” Henderson merely nodded, as he had personal encounter with the Forgers that shook him to his core.

“And… I regretted it. I really am. I was an idiot.” He sniffed, rubbing his nose against his sleeves. An inelegant move but Henderson didn’t mention it.

“She was weird, yes, but she was without a doubt the most amazing and inspiring people I have ever met in my life. When everyone was fawning over me because of my Desmond heritage, she didn’t care, and she even punched me because I was insulting her. No one ever did that to me. Ever.” Damian chuckled.

Henderson surprisingly, laughed. He remembered it well. The most eccentric student Eden ever had in their five centuries of history.

“And even with her shortcomings, she didn’t let that get to her. She held her head high, always optimistic of the future, inspired everyone else around her.”

“She taught me that there were other things that’re more important than being the son of a noble family. She taught me that I should stop being Damian Desmond. She taught me how to become Damian. Ironic isn’t it? A commoner teaching nobility on how to live life to the fullest.”

He then looked at Henderson, eyes glistening with tears but he held it back.

“And then, me, being the idiot I was, decided to ruin it all. I hurt her sir. I hurt the first person that’re willing to catch me when I was falling freely. The first person to ask me if I was okay. The first person that tried her very best to cheer me up, even if she had to do silly things to get a rise out of me. The first person that hugged me and telling me that everything would be okay.”

By now, his tears couldn’t be contained any longer, staining his red cheeks.

“I want her back in my life, sir. I know it sounds weird but it’s true. She’s not just everyone’s ball of sunshine, the blinding ray of hope, she’s also mine. I want it back. I want her back sir. I’m such an idiot.”

Henderson didn’t say anything, allowing Damian to cry freely, staining his uniform with those tears of regret. The boy held back so much for so long it was only fair for him to take as much time as he needed to clear his mind and soul.

What seemed to be forever finally came to an end, with Damian reduced to a slumping mess, hiccupping and having a coughing fit.

“And I believe you’ve done a lot of things as a way to make amends with her?”

“Yes sir…”

“And how did you do it?”

“I umm… I tried to apologize to her, greet her in the morning by waking up earlier than usual then waiting for her by the gates so I could at the very least get a glimpse of her. I… I wrote letters as well.”

His cheeks heating up.

“And umm… I also smuggled snacks into class.”

He immediately slapped his mouth shut, realizing he just outed himself. Looking up, he was surprised to see Henderson didn’t react much to it, other than sporting a small smile.

“Again, I will not award you a Tonitrus for bringing a contraband item into school, not when you did it to do an elegant action.”

Damian breathed a sigh of relief. Not often you could escape punishment after basically confessing to a crime.

“So that’s pretty much it. I tried everything but so far, it yielded nothing. I really want things to go back the way they were sir, but it feels like I am hitting a sturdy brick wall over and over again. What should I do?”

Damian curled his hands into his hair, groaning softly in desperation. He really, really wanted her back.

“Master Desmond, have you ever considered the possibility of her already forgave you?”

That… was unexpected…

“W-What? No, I-“

“While she may not return the greetings and the apologetic gestures of yours, she never once did or say anything in a negative manner to you, right?”

He… did have a point.

She acted like he never existed in the first place, but it wasn’t her that crumpled those letters or writing those sharp words. Even those bags of peanuts and limited edition Bondman memorabilia were returned in pristine condition.

Henderson smiled. A genuine smile formed on his face.

“Master Desmond, it is quite possible that she already forgives you but maybe, a mere theory, she is afraid.”

Afraid? Why would Anya be afraid of him?

Not once in their years of constant back and forth fight she was afraid of him. In fact, it was quite obvious the opposite.

“I’m afraid I don’t quite understand the meaning of her being afraid.” Damian replied. Henderson placed down his cup of tea, dabbing gently on his lightly smeared lips. He readjusted his monocle before proceeding.

“Perhaps she does not want to have a repeat of what just occurred. While she is quick to forgive and not one to seek revenge, she is not at all, impervious to any kind of hurtful treatment.”

Damian grimaced, knowing exactly first hand of such thing.

“Perhaps she ignores you because she’s afraid, if she decides to confront you, the emotions would run high and she may end up saying things that she clearly does not mean and does not want to say, which in turn would sour things once again and allow the two of you fall back into the same destructive loop.”

Henderson was right. Becky had always been the one who talked on Anya behalf, repeating the same sentence over and over again.

“Anya does not want to talk to you.”

Damian slumped once more.

“So what should I do then sir?”

“Give it time. She is hurting at the moment but from what I can see, she has forgiven you. Let her breathe. Give her enough space to recover.”

Time? He didn’t want to wait for who knows how long. It could be until next week, or next month, or maybe next year! Or worse, never!

“But how could I know that she’s not still angry at me?”

“You can only hope. My observation is not absolute after all. It is up to her to decide. Moreover, I believe you have a good amount of proof of her already forgiving you, no?”

Damian hummed. The letters, while still crumpled, had lessened, and all replies were written by Becky which also had a decrease in the sharp venomous words written by her. He quickly deduced that everything he sent must’ve been given to Becky to be approved.

All those peanut bags could’ve been easily thrown back at him which won’t hurt much but when it came to the Bondman’s memorabilia, that definitely would hurt, especially that limited edition gold crusted badge he got a while back.

But the most obvious proof was the fact that Anya had stood up for him once more, shielding him from potential social ostracization for hurting her.

He didn’t even realize Henderson had moved to sit beside him, his large hand cupping Damian’s left shoulder in comfort.

“Master Desmond, what you did and say to her was most inelegant. Abhorrent even.” His voice thick with stern admonishment, the young man’s shoulders drooped significantly. He was right.

“However, what you’ve been doing so far, is nothing but simply a highly elegant and befitting of a true gentleman.” A smile graced his lips, showing that his stern words earlier weren’t meant to make him feel disheartened but merely as a valuable lesson to learn.

“You immediately realized your mistakes, tried to correct it, did everything you could in your power to reverse the damages you’ve inflicted and did so with wholehearted conviction. You did not give up, even in the face of numerous challenges you encountered. And most of all, you still have hope that one day, Anya would forgive you.”

He looked up to the elderly teacher.

“And that is all that matters. I am proud of you, Master Desmond.”

I am proud of you.

Those words reverberated into the core of his soul.

Such simple words uttered by someone not even blood related to him and yet had a more profound effect than the countless times he’d heard the words of ‘Do not besmirch the Desmonds’ name.’ uttered by his late father.

Without even realizing it, he threw himself to Henderson, hugging the man tightly.

“Thank you. Thank you sir.” He hiccupped to his suit, staining it with fresh tears. Henderson didn’t mind, only offering supporting pats on the back as he quietly allow the emotionally vulnerable student to rid his woes by crying.

A long while after, Damian extracted himself from his suit, cheeks red out of embarrassment for ruining Henderson’s dress shirt.

“Don’t worry about it, I’m glad I could help.”

He then looked at the clock. “I suppose that would be everything for today. It’s already late so you might want to return to your dorm to shower and get ready for dinner.” He stood up to bring the teacups and kettle to the kitchen.

Damian helped him by taking the tray as well, but one question still remained.

“Sir, what if I still want to do something more? I still want to try other things to make her acknowledge me again.”

Henderson looked at the young man on his side. His determination was nothing short of admirable. Persistent as always.

“I am not sure on what you could do to regain such privilege. But I am sure that you could think something yourself.”

Damian tilted his head in confusion.

“And what does that mean, sir?”

As they walked back to the door, Henderson gave a vague reply.

“You said it best, Master Desmond. Miss Forger is an unpredictable lady. Perhaps you could start by doing exactly that.”

And with that, Henderson bid him farewell before closing the door, leaving the exhausted young boy alone to his thoughts and those words said to him.

Unpredictable? Him becoming unpredictable to earn her forgiveness?

Not even a prolonged shower allowed him to find the meaning of those words. Dinner was a quiet affair, with Emile and Ewen preferred to stay silent while Damian barely registered the carbonara that was tonight’s menu.

He ate the rich flavored dish but to him, it felt bland. He was too absorbed on his own thoughts that he could barely finish his homework before going to sleep.

The words kept swirling inside his mind the day after. What exactly did Professor Henderson meant when he said those words?

It caused him so much distractions that he was called out by the teachers if he was feeling okay, to which he nodded. His friends were quite concerned, but said nothing. He kept racking his brain, trying to understand those words.

Until it finally clicked. An epiphany on a quiet afternoon by the bed, him laying on it to muse.

He jolted back up, his eyes brimming with excitement and hope.

This could be his last chance.

And he won’t waste any more time dwelling on it.

The drive to his destination was a quiet affair. His eyes were glued to the presents neatly tucked in an elaborate tall parcel as tall as him. The sun had gone down on Berlint, the moon replacing the fiery celestial object in its stead.

Jeeves couldn’t keep himself from smiling proudly at his young master’s resolve. He too had his fair share of hearing his current struggle as Damian had confided to him multiple times to ask for his advice.

Before long, they finally arrived at their destination: Forgers residence.

Damian moved to grab the door handle, but Jeeves stopped him.

“Master Damian…” He began. “Whatever happened, don’t dwell on it too much. You did everything you could to the very best of your abilities.” He smiled at the young man. Damian blinked, and nodded with a smile of his own.

“Good luck Damian.” He moved to grab the parcel as Damian’s not strong enough to carry it himself. “Thank you Jeeves.” The Desmonds second son replied, grateful to have someone like him in his life.

The walk to the front door felt long and heavy, with each step he took filled up his heart and mind with anxiety and anticipation. He steeled himself, bracing for the worst before knocking firmly at the door.

A muffled voice and a couple moments later, the door clicked open, revealing one other than Loid Forger himself.

“Damian? This is unexpected.”

“Good evening Mister and Miss Forger.” Jeeves greeted them, bowing lightly. “Damian here would like to visit Anya, if that’s okay with you sir?”

Loid chuckled lightly. “Of course that would be fine. Please, come in.”

Jeeves placed the parcel at the table nearby, with Yor expressing her surprise with a gasp, realizing just how much was packed in the wrapped parcel.

“Are all these… for us?”

“Yes, both for you Miss Forger, and Pops…” He trailed, feeling scarlet blush blooming on his face. “And umm… for Anya as well…”

The sudden downcast tone of his voice did not go unnoticed by the veteran spy. After all, Anya had been in a bad mood for weeks right now and judging from the young boy’s tone, he might have some part in her current predicament.

But he didn’t say anything, simply nodding and thanked Jeeves as the butler made his way back out. One last supporting glance and smile from the man and he was gone.

“Anya’s in her room. Let’s go.” Loid muttered lowly, prompting him to follow. The apartment was modest in size and cozy, but Damian knew, this humble place they call home was nothing compared to his place.

His own room was bigger than their apartment and yet, he felt nothing but loneliness. This place, smaller and somewhat cramped in a way, had made him feel comfortable and warm, welcomed even.

They arrived at Anya’s door, the signature scribbling of her name on the door’s plaque that he could barely read told him everything he needed to know as a small smile tugged at his lips.

“Now I don’t know exactly what happened since Anya refuse to tell us, but I hope you can fix it.” Loid’s voice was firm but made himself clear. Anya, while not his biological daughter, was extremely precious not only to him, but to Yor as well.

And him…

“I hope so too Pops. I’ll try my best.”

“I know, and I’m proud of you, Damian.”

I’m proud of you.

The same words spoken to him shook him greatly once more, again by someone not blood related to him.

Damian looked up and for some reason, gave the spy a quick hug.

“Thank you Pops.”

Loid nodded and turned the door handle, gently ushering him inside before closing it.

Damian gasped sharply, hazel clashing with emeralds.

Anya was awake, and heard pretty much everything.

“H-Hey… S-Anya…” He bit his tongue, nearly falling back to his old habit of mockery. The girl said nothing, breaking the eye contact, letting her feet dangle off the edge of the bed. “Mind if I sit with you?” He asked, but received no reply, verbally that was.

The only reason he moved to join her was the small nod she gave that barely caught by the boy. He kept himself at a comfortable distance, lest Anya became agitated. It was awkward, heavy air slowly pressuring them. His eyes darting everywhere, scanning the room and making sure he was able to take in even the finest details.

It was… laughably small. Even the ‘poorest’ wealthy student studying at Eden would own a room at the bare minimum four or five times the size of hers. But that didn’t matter now. What mattered was the girl beside him.

“So umm… I guess you probably already knew why I’m here…”

A small hum escaped her lips, wordlessly pushing him to talk more.

“And umm…” His tongue felt numb, lifting it require a herculean effort while his throat was constricted by an invisible phyton snake. “Uhh…” His mouth flapped around like fish out of water. He felt like the biggest idiot in the world right now.

“I’m… I’m sorry…” He finally managed to practically regurgitate those words out of his mouth after five minutes of stammering around. But when he glanced to Anya, the girl didn’t even move her head an inch.

Saddened, but Damian relented. He needed to get this off his chest and apologize properly to Anya. She deserved to know everything. How he felt and the regret that weighed on him for a long while.

“I’m sorry Anya, for lashing out on you like that…” He pushed himself further. “I… I knew… I knew I should’ve not done that, especially not to you, given our personal experiences together and… and the things… things I saw that gave me revelations of what you are… who you truly are…”

Their… ‘bonding journey’, so to speak, that lasted nearly half a year, definitely opened Damian’s eyes – and to a certain extent, the Desmonds, their friends, and several other people that got entangled with them unfortunately – of the true form of the Forgers.

Who they were, what they were doing, why Anya was enrolled at Eden, what Anya truly was, everything.

It was hard to believe at first. A big pill of truth that he could barely swallow without choking hard. But in the end… just like what an old saying stated.

Truth is sometimes weirder than fiction.

“And even though I knew who you are right now, along with your family and friends… I… I lost control and… I said…” He really didn’t want to relive that painful memory again. Those glistening green orbs, wide as saucers, looking at him as if he was a ghost. A monster.

“I said mean things to you…” He finally spat it out. It felt toxic, his mouth felt dry and his throat clogged by an invisible metal rod.

“I said things that I shouldn’t have said… and… I have no one else to blame but myself…”

“I knew that you’ve done nothing but to cheer me up for weeks. You, Becky, Ewen and Emile… all of you. But I… I was being old me…”

A dry chuckle, an exasperated one escaped his lips.

“Damian Desmond being the little sh*t he was, such a classic move by me…” He cursed. “By the time I realized what I said, it was too late. You ran away, I tried to catch up to you but by that time you’re already gone.”

He looked to his side and realized Anya now had tilted her head slightly to his direction. A small smile bloomed on his lips. A progress. Small but better than none. He continued.

“I immediately realized I messed up big time, and I quickly went into action. I tried apologizing to you but Becky was there to block me off. I sent letters and I got it returned all crumpled with her replying to them, telling me not to send them again.”

“Our friends started to notice the standoffish air between us and realized something was wrong. Becky poured fuel to the embers and before I knew it, they were angry at me. Angry that I hurt their precious Anya. My precious Anya…”

A small squeak caught him off guard but Anya had thrown her head to the other direction. Damian thought nothing of it and resumed.

“They were eager to teach me a lesson, a painful one at that, until you came to intervene.”

“You… I knew, you didn’t have to do it. All I know, I could’ve been beaten to an inch of my life and you still have the right to not do anything about it because I know I deserve it. And yet… you didn’t. You came to my defense, told them that instead of trying to hurt me, they should try helping me. Understand me. And… and it broke me…”

Damian chuckled sadly, the memories of him crying alone in the bathroom rushed against him.

“I knew I messed up big time and hearing you say those words, makes me want to try even harder. I want them to know that I am sorry, genuinely. I started sending even more stuffs to you. Letters, snacks, even more Bondman memorabilia. Everyone knows you’re the biggest Bondman fan. Definitely giving me quite the scare of the thought of being caught smuggling contrabands into class. Worth the threat of getting Tonitrus though…”

Realizing that he’d been ranting to her for nearly half an hour, he decided to go straight to the point.

“So umm… with everything I just said… I just want to say that… I am sorry, Anya. I mean it. I truly am sorry, for hurting you. For saying those words. I didn’t mean it. I was… I was stressed out by everything that had happened. Those things shouldn’t be something a children have to experience and yet… it did. To me. To you. To us…”

“I am sorry Anya. I don’t know if you’d forgive me, but I hope you will. I am not saying you should at this very moment but… I hope. I can’t do anything else other than hoping, in time, be it tomorrow, next week, month, year, or even decade, you’d be able to forgive me.”

Anya still didn’t move, but Damian, at this point, didn’t mind at all. He needed to let this out, all of it.

“I am sorry for the things I’ve said. You… You’re amazing, Anya. You, the one that showed me that being a Desmond doesn’t mean I am invincible and immune to repercussions of my rude attitude. You, the one that showed me to be brave, to confront my fears. You, the one that taught me that life isn’t just all fancy tea parties and upscale fine dining with other nobility while trying to upstage everyone else by being an ignorant, heartless brat. You, the one that showed me that living life to the fullest by being myself is the best thing I could do. Living my life not as Damian Desmond, but as Damian, just a boy with his friends, making memorable memories that’ll last a lifetime. You, the one shining ray of light in my life. You, the one that caught me when I fell. You, the one who saved me. You, the one who I love and need. You… You’re Anya… my Anya…”

It felt nice, great even. Liberating. The crushing pressure against his chest suddenly lift off once he finished his long confession. He did it. He finally did it. He confronted her, apologized to her, did it sincerely.

Silence fell between the pair, not knowing what else to do nor say. It was… not awkward, but also felt… weird. But it definitely beat the previous atmosphere by a long shot.

He realized Anya hadn’t said anything, even after nearly an hour of them together. She just… stayed silent. The only reason he didn’t think she fell asleep was the slight twitching of her fingers and the gentle sway of her pink hair.

“Well… that’s… that’s a good talk. I’m glad I did it. It was nice.” Damian smiled to himself. A sad smile, but still, he did everything he could. Whatever happened after, it was all up to her.

“I umm… I guess I’ll be going. See you on Monday, Anya.” He gently pushed himself off from her bed, smiling at her before starting to walk to the door.

“Oh, before I forgot, here, I got this for you.” He gently placed an object to her lap. It was a Bondman badge. Behind it, written with gold ink, was a special message for her.

For Agent Starlight – Bondman.

“They were… they were filming an episode in Berlint a couple of days ago and I managed to ask him to write something special to a Bondman badge I bought not too long ago. I hope you like it.”

“And umm, there’re stuffs as well for you in the parcel I brought along. It’s outside if you want to grab them.”

And with that, Damian quietly trudged to the door.

Tap…

Not even three steps and suddenly, he was anchored to the spot. He looked back, nearly having his eyes popping out of his skull.

Anya… Anya was holding him. Her small hand, wrapped around his wrist, tightly. It was slightly uncomfortable, but Damian wouldn’t want to trade it with anything in the world right now.

Her head was hanging low, her pink bangs hiding her eyes. Damian froze, not knowing what to do or say in this sudden turn of event. He waited with a baited breath.

“Don’t… don’t go…”

Anya spoke. Anya just spoke.

Anya spoke to him.

“Please… come back…”

Invisible strings wrapped around Damian’s body, prompting him to return to sit beside Anya in autopilot mode. He didn’t want this to stop abruptly. No, he wanted a closure. And what better time than now?

He wanted Anya to take control of the situation. He dared not to move, nor say anything that could potentially scare her again. No, he cannot let that happen. Not this time. He patiently waited, smiling at Anya, who also stealing quick glances every so often.

“I… I umm…” She stuttered. “I heard… I heard you talked, with Professor Henderson…” She confessed.

Suddenly, a dark red blush bloomed on his face, embarrassed beyond belief. He suddenly felt nauseous and hoped nothing more but the ground to open and swallow him whole, erase his entire existence at once.

She heard him?! Did that mean she practically heard and listened to everything he and Master Henderson said?!

“W-What?! Y-You!”

“S-Sorry! I-I was walking around and I accidently picked up noises and I got curious so I walked closer then I realized it was you and Professor Henderson!”

Oh god! This was getting worse.

“S-So you heard-“

“Everything? Y-Yes…” Anya stammered the confirmation he dreaded the most. This was it. A group of SSS personnel will burst out of the door and take him away. Or WISE agents, whichever mattered not for the man. Absolute embarrassment ran through his entire body.

“I-I have to go. I-It’s been nice to-“

“N-NO!”

He was startled by the sudden high pitched voice of one eight year old Anya Forger. He found out a while back that Anya wasn’t at the same age as he or everyone else was. But now, it didn’t matter.

“Please, don’t go.” Her small voice pleaded adorably. He was rooted in place, waiting for Anya to recollect herself before she could continue. He dared not to utter a single letter.

“It’s okay Anya, I won’t go anywhere.”

Damian bit his own tongue, realizing exactly what he just said. Damn, since he had such a loose tongue?

To his surprise, Anya looked up to him, surprised by his words. A small smile cracked through her lips as she tried to stifle a giggle. “It’s not… funny, you know?” He mumbled, cheeks flaring out of pure embarrassment.

“It’s okay Damian. I liked it actually…” She confessed, to which Damian’s blush grew even deeper in shade.

“So umm… I guess I have to explain everything.” Anya cleared her throat. “But first, thank you. Thank you for… everything. I mean… the whole letters, snacks, and Bodman stuffs. I really appreciate it.” She thanked him.

“I-It’s no big deal.” Damian mumbled, again, embarrassed. “But I’m curious though, why did you let Becky deal with all of my gifts?”

“It’s the reason why I am about to explain everything.” She continued. A hum, the boy released. Anya began to recount her reasoning.

“I was… I was afraid I guess. You yelling and saying those mean things caught me off guard. Completely. It definitely hurt. Hurt more than I initially thought.” She shivered. Damian’s face fell, quickly sputtering another apology.

“I’m r-really sorry A-Anya. I d-didn’t mean to-“

“Please, Damian. I am not finished yet.” She held out a pleading look, telling him that she needed to let heavy stuffs off of her chest first before he could say something back. Damian relented, nodding cooperatively.

“It hurt, I really was hurt. Becky found out about this and decided to protect me. Shield me from you in any way possible. But then I heard that you were slowly being pressured and pretty much frowned upon by our friends. I… I didn’t want that to happen, because I came to realization.”

“You lashing out on me, it wasn’t because you were angry or hate me. No, because you couldn’t keep the bottled negative emotions inside of you any longer.”

Anya’s words were like a powerful thunder booming right beside him, loud ringing noise began to encapsulate him.

He kept to himself before that incident because he didn’t want them to know the true extent of his misery. He didn’t need them to know, especially Anya.

“H-How did you-“

“I can read minds you know?” She joked, giggling at him seemingly forgetting her special ability. Damian stammered and whipped his head away out of embarrassment.

“I-I know that!” He half shouted. “While I tried to block out your thoughts, it was not easy. Quite hard actually since whenever I came close to you, I felt like a heavy thunderstorm followed you everywhere. Your thoughts were like a hurricane.”

“And I… I was being stupid. I tried to cheer you up, all of us did. Maybe the method was wrong but I felt that if we decided to leave you alone, and maybe support you in a more discreet manner, it could’ve been a better option.”

They did went the extra mile just trying to get a small ghost of a smile for him. It definitely was grand and quite the effort, to the point they were risking getting Tonitruses if it wasn’t for the intervention done by Professor Henderson on their behalf.

“So… even though Becky told me that you had it coming…”

That damned Blackbell heiress.

“…Stop it! She was right in her own way you know!” Anya giggled, reading his mind. “I uhh, I decided to take matters into my own hands, even if it still hurt me a lot. I decided to help you. I told them to not take their anger on you because you hurt me. I told them to support you instead. Help you. Understand you. It was a much better option than having you being ostracized by the entire school. It definitely could’ve sent you to a much deeper dark hole than you were in already.”

Anya had a point, a solid one at that.

“So… yeah. At that point I already forgave you, Damian.”

“Then why you didn’t come to me? I-I practically greeted you all the time after that.”

“I… I was… afraid. Afraid that when I return those greetings it won’t take long before you’d return to being aggressive.”

Damian couldn’t blame her. He had an infamous bad temper after all, to the point he had made Anya cry multiple times before.

“Let me guess, Becky also told you not to say or do anything and let her handle everything for you?”

Anya nodded. “She did. I saw your effort and it definitely warmed my heart.”

Well, at that confession, Damian’s own was also warming at an alarming rate, another blush quickly creeping to his face.

“W-Well, I was genuinely sorry and horrified of my own action you know? I had to do extra to earn your forgiveness.” He mumbled, rubbing the back of his head.

“And I am grateful of it.” Anya returned the bashful gesture with a kind smile of her own. The same smile that dragged him out of his miserable hole years ago.

“So umm… I wanted to say how I feel but… I guess Becky’s words stuck to me, telling me that it’ll be better for both of us to stay away from one another, even though it was obvious that you’re desperate to have me forgiving you.”

“You know Anya, next time, I’ll make sure to annoy Blackbell even more than usual.” Damian gritting his teeth. Anya slapped him playfully.

“Don’t. But anyway, like I said before, I walked by and overheard your conversation with Professor Henderson. It was at that point I decided to make my own decision. I told Becky that I want to break the silence and give you my answer, but Becky told me to wait for a bit, since she wanted to make it perfect, with the gift and everything to return your kindness…”

“And look where that brought you.”

Anya giggled, nodding her head. “Yeah, we’re kinda behind schedule and you beat both of us to the punch.”

She then looked at Damian directly into his eyes.

“But I’m glad it came down to this. With you coming over unexpectedly. Didn’t know you’d be willing to go this far.”

“Hey, I told you. I am truly sorry. Deeply sorry, Anya. I couldn’t handle not having you in my life anymore. I missed you a lot you know?”

“You may be annoying…”

Anya rolled her eyes.

“Weird. Quirky…”

She slapped him again, with his own lips widening in that annoying grin that she grew fond of.

“But at the end of the day, those things made you who we all love and care. Anya. Anya Forger.”

Anya lunged at him, hugging the boy deeply.

“Does this mean… we’re back as usual?”

Anya nodded. “Yup! I accept your apology Sy-on Boy.”

Ah there it was, that nickname she gave to him. A small mischievous smile formed on his lips.

“Thank you, Stubby Legs.”

“AHA!”

A loud high pitched shout caused both Anya and Damian to yelp and heart racing over a hundred miles an hour.

“That was so amazing! It almost as if I was watching a Berlint in Love episode but live! As if I was there watching them directing and going through the scenes!”

“Blackbell! What the hell are you doing here?!”

“Well I should be the one asking you, Desmond! I was here the whole time having sleepover with Anya until you decided to ruin our night!”

“Me ruining your night?! You’re ruining my moment Blackbell!”

As Damian and Becky argued with one another after the latter jumped out of Anya’s wardrobe, Anya couldn’t help but to laugh at their silly banter.

It seemed that their friendships were mended faster than she initially thought.

“And you! Stop laughing Forger! Why you didn’t tell me about her?” Damian growled. Anya simply leaning her body left and right, swinging them lightly.

“I forgot.” She gave him her signature ‘heh’ smile, infuriating the boy even further.

“I can’t believe it! You two are accomplices! You made me come here and framed by you!”

“Made you come here? This whole thing was your own idea Damian so don’t try to shift the blame on us.” Becky rolled her eyes.

“Okay that’s it! I’ve had enough!”

Damian dove for Becky, who laughed and dodged his pounce, to which she blew a raspberry as they chased one another in the small room. Anya was thoroughly amused, which quickly found herself being used as a blockade for Becky, who kept juking Damian left and right as the Desmonds’ second son tried to catch the elusive Blackbell heiress.

Damian pounced, which unfortunately was the wrong move as Becky squealed and pushed Anya right to his wide arms, practically sacrificing her best friend to be Damian’s victim as he hugged Anya. But unfortunately for her, due to an oversight, Damian’s fingers still able to catch her, now making sure she won’t be able to get away and digging his fingers into her clothing to keep her from escaping.

In their brief struggle however, they forgot about gravity and their center mass, causing Damian to tilt backward and sent them tumbling on the floor hard, with Damian absorbing the harshest consequence of the fall.

It was loud, loud enough for Loid to come over and check on them to see if they were fine. “Damian! Are you alright?!” He made quick work to kneel beside them, with the boy in question groaning and wincing in pain.

A couple of minutes later, Damian was sitting on the couch, glaring at the two girls who were guilty for causing him such pain. He had an icepack resting behind his head to dull the throbbing ache while Loid was kind enough to provide him with a bowl of ice cream to help him with the pain.

“Anya, Becky. That was dangerous. It may not be a long fall but still enough to get someone hurt.” Loid admonished, while Yor was preparing them hot chocolate. “I’m sorry Papa. We were just too caught up in the moment. I guess it was long overdue since we’ve been not in the best of terms for a while.”

Loid’s eyes softened at those words. They were reckless, careless, but then again, they were just kids. They were happy and celebrating the end of the animosity between them. A little fun game of tag (somewhat) wouldn’t hurt much, if only Damian didn’t fall to the floor that is.

“I know, but still, that didn’t excuse you from such dangerous move. But for now, just relax and enjoy your hot chocolate okay?”

Yor arrived not long after, gently placing two mugs of steaming hot chocolate on the table, smiling at the trio who’re now simply indulging in the silence enveloping them. They’d been through so much in such short span of time at such young age.

Anya picked up her mug, to which Becky soon followed and took a quick sip to test if the chocolate was at the right temperature or not. Hot enough to be pleasant but not scalding hot, tongue burning temperature.

Deciding it was the former, they happily drank it in big gulps. The cookies, freshly made by Loid and served on a plate also helped enhancing the experience even further.

“Sorry for hurting you Damian.” Anya apologized first, and quickly nudged Becky to do the same. She was quite adamant about not apologizing, simply huffing and giving Damian a stink eye, a gesture that was returned in kind from the Desmonds’ second son.

“Alright fine.” Becky relented after Anya nudged her again. “Sorry for making you fall Damian, should’ve made sure it was harder than it was.” She sneakily insulted him, much to Damian’s annoyance. “I would’ve started round two if I wasn’t in pain right now. Consider yourself lucky Blackbell.” Damian huffed, scooping another spoonful of ice cream to his mouth while Becky grinned ear to ear.

Damian couldn’t suppress his own at the sight.

When Damian decided it was time to go home, he was surprised that Jeeves had returned and packed him with everything he needed for school tomorrow. He was informed by Loid that Melinda had given approval for him to stay with the Forgers for the night, much to his embarrassment.

He was allowed to sleep at the guest room – the room where Yor was staying prior – and they were happily playing some games before exhaustion finally overtook them as Anya and Becky retreated to the former’s room while Damian slept at his.

Tomorrow came, and with it, optimism followed. Almost everyone quickly noticed the sudden shift in the air at Eden Academy once more though this time, it was the feeling of hope and friendship being mended.

To further reinforce it, everyone was quite shocked to see Anya and Becky walking with Damian beside them, his hand holding Anya’s with a smile on his face.

Ewen and Emile couldn’t help themselves, quickly pouncing on their best friend and commended him for finally patching things up with Anya, though Becky still slipped in some snarky comments in a friendly way.

Everyone was happy, satisfied that the turbulence between them had been resolved and ended on a positive note.

Everything went back to normal, with them bickering and insulting each other, much to everyone’s amusem*nt as the infamous rivalry between Anya and Damian had resumed once more. However, at long last, it bloomed into something more.

Anya and Damian began studying together, the young man enamored with her ability to keep up with him, and that was excluding her mind reading powers. She was practically stumbling around, barely keeping herself from being expelled but now, she could keep up with the lessons and giving him quite the hard time to keep her away from snatching the number one spot.

While they were locked in a heated duel in other subjects, he was still unable to beat her in Classical Language. While it wasn’t a lingua franca that connected the entire world, it was still considered important due to its significant historical value.

Knowing that it would be futile to beat her in that subject, he turned himself to other subjects that he knew he could have a chance to beat her.

However, while it would be a much better option to study by himself to become the top student of Eden, it was quite lonely to be on the top.

No, no more. He did not want to be alone any longer. If he was going to be the best, he wanted to do it together. Being the best together was miles better than alone.

So they studied together, and depending on the day, Damian would visit Anya during the weekdays and Anya during the weekend.

It also proved beneficial to him and his family.

His mother was still coping with the loss of their father after all, and couldn’t speak much before excusing herself from him. His older brother was the same, having grown cold and distant thanks to the strict tutelage of their father.

With Anya around, she also helped Damian to open up to his family once more. Becky, Ewen, and Emile also helped, quickly finding out their little study sessions and practically barged themselves in to get included.

And that was fine for Damian. More than fine actually.

Seeing him laugh and enjoying himself with his dear friends helped Melinda to go through her grief, and also showing Demetrius that isolating yourself from others wouldn’t do you much good.

Slowly but surely, the Desmonds came back to life, one step at a time. Melinda, used to only greet them and exchange a couple of words before leaving, now often stepped up to deliver the snacks and drinks herself, immersing herself with their study by asking a couple of questions, much to Damian’s embarrassment.

Demetrius on the other hand, wanted to reconnect to his estranged brother, also made the effort to somewhat involved himself in their study, offering them guidance and assistance as he was quite the renowned Imperial Scholar himself and referred by many as a genius hailing from the Desmonds.

Loid and Yor also helped, along with others. Yor participating in Melinda’s little group called Lady Patriots Society, organizing in numerous charities that involved friendly games, mostly focusing on volleyball.

She also made sure to broaden Melinda’s once small circle of friends, making new friends outside of the elite group, showing that there were more exciting things outside of the high society circle that she grew accustomed to.

Loid on the other hand, helped her by being her personal psychiatrist. His deep knowledge proved invaluable for the widow, opening up to him so easily thanks to Loid’s warm and approachable nature. He tended to start things slow, allowing her to grow comfortable while offering her tea and biscuits before he started asking her questions.

She was comfortable with him, letting out things that not even her longtime friends know in her elite group. It felt… natural. Not because of their intertwined history with one another due to an impactful event in their life, but talking with Dr. Forger seemed natural, encouraging even.

He rarely stopped her mid talk, opting to listen until she finished. He then offered her advices, asking her with more questions so he’d understand deeper, but only if she was comfortable with it.

Usually, it was only twice a week, but as time went by, she grew more and more comfortable and before she even realized it, Melinda often times came to the Forgers’ Residence unannounced so she could have more sessions with Dr. Forger.

But even if Loid wasn’t around, Yor was also someone she could rely on. The matriarch of the Forgers was also more than happy to help her.

As for Demetrius, he was offered guidance by Yuri and Franky. While Loid also helped, he was more focused to help his mother to which Demetrius was thankful for. While Loid and Yor helped his mother, he felt that being tutored by Yuri and Franky was already more than enough.

Both were extremely gifted academically, as evident with Yuri’s stellar records while he was in school while Franky was backed up by his ingenuity to invent new things.

The eldest of the two sons often engaged in lengthy discussion. He didn’t just want to learn things by the book, he also wanted to see it with his own eyes through real life applications.

Which was why that whenever he had the time, he always asked either Yuri or Franky to tag along with them. Yuri often allowed Demetrius to accompany him on business trip as long as it didn’t interfere with his school life. Franky on the other hand, made him come along with him to test out his inventions.

While more than often it ended up in failure, it also allowed them to discuss on what should be fixed or improved.

Demetrius was already a force to be reckoned with prior to Yuri and Franky’s involvement in his academic life, but under their combined tutelage, one could confidently say that he was on track to receive a Neubel Prize[3] in his life.

And before long, their fellow friends at Eden began to notice their combined effort during their studies. It slowly became a common occurrence to see the five of them being at ‘war’ with each other, always trying to best the other to claim the top spot for themselves.

It became a hot topic for everyone. Anya, Damian, Becky, Emile, and Ewen. The five were extremely competitive but in a positive way. No sabotage, no badmouthing each other (with the exception of their usual banter/trash talk), just pure positive competition to lift each other up and having fun while at it.

Professor Henderson easily spewed the word elegant countless times, appointing them to become the role model of everyone. And soon, the trend spread like a wildfire. Others began to form their own study group, trying to see if they could beat them.

It was a positive change for everyone. No longer they tried to ridicule others whenever someone was in the bottom. They motivated them to try even harder and try not to ponder too much on their past failures.

They even collaborated with each other’s groups if they need extra help from others. Anya, along with her own group were more than happy to tutor them if they asked for it. Loid and Yor was shocked when one day a group of roughly thirty students were cramping themselves in the hallway leading to their apartment.

Loid told Anya their apartment wasn’t big enough to accommodate all of them and suggested to go somewhere else instead. Becky instantly volunteered and for that day, they spent hours studying at Becky’s home.

But even though they tried their best, and with the help of Anya and others, they still couldn’t get the top spot. It was snatched by either Anya, Damian, Becky, Ewen or Emile. But of course, the highlight of the group was the seemingly endless war between Anya and Damian whenever they were studying the same subject.

Sometimes it was Damian on the number one spot, other times it was Anya. They were locked in a never ending struggle to become the best, and it was amusing and fascinating to watch whenever it was revealed.

Anya would make some sly remarks to Damian and he’d do the same. Sometimes they’d treat someone with whatever they’d like, such as Anya asking for some limited edition peanut snacks or Damian asking her to do his homework for a week or asking Anya to make him something for lunch so they could eat together.

It wasn’t something that occurred for a year or two, it was constant. Even until they graduated from elementary and entering middle school it was so famous and well documented that everyone was eager to see the next phase of their rivalry.

It became even better than before. While they focused on academic fields during the entirety of their elementary year, it became physical starting from Year 7, their first year in middle school.

Anya and Damian joined Eden’s martial arts club, specifically the MMA one. It was unexpected but also hyped up their rivalry even further. While most of them simply thought it was the next stage of their rivalry, there was something more hidden in plain sight.

Anya and Damian were interested in joining CROWS.

Of course, it came as a shock to everyone that knew about it. Loid and Yor were unhappy with her sudden decision. There was a lengthy heated debate between Anya and her parents.

They did not want Anya to go through what they had for the longest time. It was their mission after all.

To create a world where children did not need to cry.

”Then let Anya preserve it!” Her strong reaction came as a surprise. Her eyes glistening wet with tears, voice cracking under the intense emotion she’s experiencing.

“Papa and Mama, along with Uncle Yuri had succeeded. But without someone protecting it, the world will fall into what it was before. Let Anya and Damian help you to maintain it!”

“Damian too?!” Came the shocked reaction of Melinda. Her youngest son was about to delve into the murky and dangerous world of espionage, assassination and more. A highly differing path compared to Demetrius who was dead set to cleanse the Desmonds’ image by taking over the Desmonds’ Group with his fellow trusted friends.

“Mother, please understand. This isn’t something decided in the heat of the moment. This isn’t something that we’d do for jokes. We’re dead serious on this.” Damian’s hard resolve confirmed it. They were not messing around.

“I know that the path we’re about to take isn’t going to be an easy one. It’s going to be painful, exhausting, both physically and mentally, but we’re ready for it. Compared to our friends, we’re probably would never be known to the public. But we’d be liars if we’re not proud of it.” Anya continued.

“Let me take care of things discreetly. Demetrius’s going to improve things publicly while we work in the dark to ensure he’ll be successful. Together for a better future from two different worlds.” Damian added in.

“I always enamored with Bondman aren’t I Papa?” Anya smiled warmly. “It wasn’t just mere childish amusem*nt for spy stuffs, it was real. I want to be like you. Papa, Mama, Anya wants to be like you two.”

“So please, allow us to start the intense training as soon as possible.”

Loid was rubbing his face with his hands roughly, still not believing himself hearing those words coming out of his daughter’s mouth. Melinda was silently crying, consoled by Yor while Demetrius was staring daggers at his younger brother.

It was a heavy conversation, to which Loid decided to postpone it at a later date. Anya was deflated, but understanding. It wasn’t an everyday occurrence to have someone’s daughter and son confessing they want to become a spy and assassin at the same time.

A couple of days later, they both were summoned again, this time to give them their answer.

It was a yes, though laced with intense emotions.

Anya hugged Loid and Yor tightly, thanking them over and over again for allowing her. They were crying, knowing the dangers awaiting her but she was a stubborn one, much like her parents. She promised she’ll be fine, as she had Damian as her partner.

Speaking of Damian, it was also something hard to accept for Melinda. She was sobbing, telling him to be safe and extra careful. Demetrius smacked him in the head harshly before hugging him tightly, whispering the word idiot to his ears over and over again much to his amusem*nt.

Their relationship had improved wonderfully after all.

Demetrius made Damian promise to always return in one piece or he’ll personally give him one hell of a beating if he didn’t. Damian rolled his eyes and taunted him back playfully, saying he’d like to see him try.

Becky was arguably the most hysteric one, openly bawling and crushing Anya with her hug, telling her to be safe and always send her letters whenever possible before moving to Damian and funnily enough, punched him before threatening him that she’ll join forces with Demetrius to beat him up if Anya was so much as getting a single bruise on her.

Ewen and Emile were fortunately didn’t go as far as Becky, though the sadness and worry painted on their faces were more than enough to tell Damian that they too were caught up in the emotional whirlwind.

Damian hugged them both, telling them to stop worrying about him. Ewen and Emile nodded, and with great difficulties and not so subtle sobbing, wished him all the very best of luck.

After everyone was done giving them their approval and support, Sylvia greenlit their training after they had dinner.

Their first training began a month before they started their first day at school, and it was definitely exhausting and exciting at the same time.

When the first exhibition match of the MMA club was announced, everyone was brimming with excitement, because of one particular match.

Anya versus Damian.

And put simply, it was amazing.

Both were trading blows, but neither could gain significant advantage for a prolonged period of time before the other nullified it. Grunts and shouts filled the large room as they battled one another in the ring.

While the fight was usually divided by genders, Anya and Damian were allowed to fight each other due to their own request.

And it was stunning.

They were unrelenting, stubborn, and eager to beat the other. Everyone was in awe as they attacked and countered one another. Fifteen minutes later, the referee declared the fight a draw, with both of them nearly collapsing to the floor after such high octane fight.

They received standing ovations from the attendees, realizing that everything they’d seen so far from the two had just turned up a notch.

And not long after that, they were heavily involved in multitude of competitions that they easily won, all thanks to the strict and brutal regiment from their personal training with Loid, Yor, Yuri, and others. They showed promise to surpass everyone.

And it showed brilliantly from the dozens of medals and trophies they won. They even were appointed to represent Ostania in the Olympos Games[4] once they were allowed to, with Anya in Judo while Damian in Karate. Anya’s path to gold medal was a breeze, as she was put simply, a monster.

Thanks to the years of tutelage received from her mother, she simply grabbed the opponent and slammed them hard to the ground. Even if she was caught by her opponent, she easily removed herself from her opponent’s grasp before slamming them to the ground.

They’ve trained really hard for years to be in the world stage, vying for the prestigious gold medal and fame. But sadly, they were no match against one Anya Forger, taught by the legendary and pretty much superhuman Thorn Princess and Twilight.

Damian was also the same, his path to gold medal was a breeze, all thanks to his determination and hard work, and of course, with the training received by Anya’s parents and others.

They excelled both in academic and non academic field. They were famous and highly respected by many but they remained humble. Humility worth more than medals and trophies after all.

They were also not the only one with numerous accolades and awards to their name.

While Becky didn’t qualify to accompany the two to their first Olympos Games, she had won a generous amount of medals and trophies in Taekwondo. Ewen was more into Boxing and he definitely had a natural talent for it judging from the achievements showcased in his room.

Last but not least, while Emile wasn’t into martial arts too much, he excelled in the world of pastries. He was eager to participate in any competitions that involved sweet things such as cake and candies. Emile was a natural at it, winning numerous competitions in baking, pastry making, decorating, and more.

The five of them, colloquially known as The Waku Waku Group (don’t ask how and why they earned that name, you can blame a certain pinkette for that.), were greatly revered by everyone. They aspired to become like them, hoping that one day, they could be as good as them, if not better.

They were so famous and influential that some of their funny insults became slangs in Eden. For example, if someone said they were about to ‘pull a Stubby Legs’, it meant that they were about to do something drastic or out of the ordinary to achieve what they want, with the word Stubby Legs obviously referring to the once insulting word for Anya, which now became an affectionate nickname for her given by the boys.

Another example would be ‘try not to be a Dummyan’ which meant that became frustrated or overconfident enough that they failed spectacularly, which of course referring to the numerous unfortunate occasions of where Damian could’ve snatched the number one spot from Anya but failed for the funniest and most ridiculous reason because of his own stupidity.

One documented example of it was when he was so sure he was going to ace the exam that he forgot that there was one more question left unanswered, all because he didn’t turn the paper around. What could’ve been a 100 score mark for him became 95, with Anya snatching the top spot by just one point.

However, as time went by, Anya and Damian won something else. Something that was far more precious and important than a thousand medals and trophies.

They won each other’s love.

It was silly, and stupid at the same time. They were extremely bright student and yet at the same time, the densest pair known to mankind.

Everyone in school knew that there were something going on between the two, but they just wanted to see if one of them was going to cave in or not.

It wasn’t subtle either, with Anya and Damian both blushing whenever they accidentally brushed their hands with each other, or they’d deny they have feelings for each other whenever they were confronted about it.

“We’re just friends! Really good friends!” Was what they’d always say, much to everyone’s annoyance.

Best friends they said, and yet, always spotted going together, just the two of them, be it having breakfast or lunch or just hanging out.

Becky was practically screaming at them the whole time to just confess, barely held back by Emile and Ewen, who also in disbelief that someone as charming and smart like Damian could be an absolute oblivious idiot.

As Becky would always say, watching the two denying it was like watching a live episode of Berlint in Love. Viewers would say something as ridiculous as that would only happen in a love drama movie or TV series so they could reel in more viewers and get them invested to the progression of their relationship.

Well, they were dead wrong.

They weren’t so subtle either.

The constant stealing glances that were done not so secretly between each other, the blush blooming on their faces whenever one of them said or did something, the constant fight that seemingly spawned out of thin air that could even be classified as out of the ordinary for the two that regularly fought, and so much more that easily indicated that there was something else blooming between them.

But watching the two vehemently denying it was a whole entertainment of its own, and another plus point was that they could tease the pair endlessly every day.

It went on for so long that they thought it was going to be like that until they graduated, but that won’t happen under Becky’s watch.

Last day of middle school, year 9, Becky made sure they won’t beating around the bush any longer.

It was simple, lock them in Anya’s room and didn’t let them out until they confess. Even Ewen and Emile were in it with Becky, having grown weary and annoyed of Damian’s indecisiveness.

It was definitely awkward, but then again, it was their own denseness and constant denial that brought them into this moment.

They knew.

Anya knew Damian knew, and vice versa.

There was no point in denying it any further.

“I love you!”

They’ve known each other for nearly close to a decade, went through so many things together, and it finally culminated with them saying those three words at the same time.

Can it become even more awkward than it already was?

Their faces turned redder than a healthy ripe tomato. This felt like a peak romcom revelation scene where both the male and female protagonists finally admit their love for each other.

They stammered incoherently for a minute before Damian cleared his throat, admitting that it was stupid of him to deny the obvious for so long. Anya told him the same, and was glad they could get it off their chests.

When the door opened, Becky was squealing upon realizing that they’ve become something more than just best friends.

They’ve taken the next step in their chaotic relationship.

When they returned to Eden, everyone was shocked to see Anya and Damian with their hand intertwined with each other.

It became a sensation in a few hours.

Everyone was constantly hounding the pair for any piece of information they could get their hands on. How did it happen? When did it happen? What made them finally confess? Was it as romantic as the ones depicted in romance movies?

Thankfully, Becky was there to intervene, happily answering their questions with answers that satisfied their curiosity.

Everyone was happy, delighted, and most importantly thankful that they weren’t that stubborn to realize the obvious.

The last three years in Eden was filled with joyful memories. They couldn’t believe they’d been attending the same school for twelve years. It seemed like it felt like yesterday they were inducted as students of Eden while in reality it was over a decade ago.

The last day of school was over, and to everyone’s mild surprise, the valedictorians were Anya and Damian. They gave a tear jerker, heartfelt parting speech. Everyone felt the emotions behind it, and couldn’t hold back the tears.

They truly changed Eden dramatically in their own chaotic fashion.

They’d gone through so many pains and joy, delight and suffering together. They still couldn’t believe it was all coming to an end. But unfortunately, as the old saying, all good things must come to an end.

And that speech, that day in the hall, was their last day together in Eden. Whatever happened after that, was their responsibility. To carve their own path, to shape their future in the vast world.

It was definitely not an easy thing to accept. They’d grown accustomed to go to school five days a week, constantly entertained by the shenanigans of everyone, especially the famous five. Now, they’re about to be separated.

Sure, some of them were still happy they’re about to attend the same university, be it in Ostania or abroad, but there was no denying a significant part of their friends wouldn’t be there with them.

“My friends, please, do not be saddened by this bittersweet farewell.” Anya eased their sadness.
We may be apart from now on, away from many that we’ve grown fond and care of. But remember, we forged this friendship for more than a decade. We wouldn’t forget everything that we’ve went through together. This friendship, this… bond, will last a lifetime. What we have is priceless, invaluable, cannot be bought by money nor a mountain of gold. Cherish it, be proud of it. We may not be together anymore but rest assured, we will always be there for you, right here.” Anya placed her right hand over her heart.

It was enough to intensify the ongoing crying happening in the hall, with everyone giving her and Damian a powerful standing ovation. It lasted over five minutes, an incredible feat of its own. Anya definitely gave a memorable speech.

However, it wasn’t going to be the only thing that’ll become memorable for everyone that day.

“I would like to address one more thing before we end this speech.” Damian gathered everyone’s attention. He cleared his throat, as the crowd was curious what he was about to say.

“Well… first of all, I am not sure how I should begin this one out.” He chuckled nervously, which was echoed by everyone. As confident and collected Damian could be, he still had his moments of awkwardness and anxiousness.

“I… I am sure all of you have known the extensive history of me and Anya throughout the years, especially since the start of middle school.” Everyone chuckled in unison once more. Who in Eden didn’t know about it?

“I was, put simply, an idiot.” He sighed, laughter erupting in the hall. He continued once it died down. “I, well… both of us were in full denial, even though we knew it was true. What once started by a punch to my face, which mind you, still painful after all these years…”

Everyone laughed once more. It was probably one of the most well known incident throughout Eden history. A ‘commoner’ put a noble son in his place with a powerful punch that sent him crying and pride shattered.

“It definitely grew into something more slowly. Reluctant friends, frenemies, friends, close friends and finally, as boyfriend and girlfriend. Even though it took way too long than what it should’ve, I am glad it happened.”

“And umm, put simply, I did not want to have a repeat of it. No, I won’t let it happen a second time. This time, I want to be the one to set things right. I know I won’t regret what I’m about to do next.”

Becky gasped sharply, realizing what was about to happen.

Anya was startled upon seeing Damian went down on one knee.

This… this can’t be happening right?!

“Anya Forger, would you be honored to become my fiancé and wife?”

Instantly, everyone was gasping loudly in utter shock and disbelief. They did not expect this to happen in any way! Sure they were deeply in love with one another but to get married right after graduating?! Wasn’t it a bit too fast even by today’s standards?!

Silence befell the entire hall, students and teachers alike were waiting with baited breath. What was it going to be? What would be Anya’s answer to the sudden proposal?

Damian however, knew clearly what the answer’s going to be. The smile on his face grew bigger.

Anya may still be speechless, her hands cupping her mouth, but the tears flowing down freely on her face was more than enough as an answer to him.

“Y-Yes… a thousand times yes!” Her answer, choked and filled with intense lovely emotions finally came pouring out from the deepest part of her heart.

Damian already expected such answer from her, but what he didn’t expect was what she’d do next. A loud yelp was picked up by the microphone as Anya tackled him to the floor, hugging him tightly while crying freely out of pure joy.

Once again, everyone stood up to give them another lengthy standing ovation, this time however, Becky didn’t join them, the Blackbell heiress chose to sprint to the stage to hug Anya so hard Anya could’ve sworn she heard some of her ribs cracking in protest.

“Oh my god! Anya! Anya! I can’t believe it! You’re getting married! Please tell me this is real! I am not dreaming aren’t I?!” Becky was ecstatic, tears flowing freely as Anya laughed at her best friend’s overreaction.

“It’s real Becky. It’s real…”

“This feels… unreal. Almost as if I am an actress in a scene in Berlint in Love!”

Anya rolled her eyes in amusem*nt. Of course, being a hardcore fan of the famous TV series, Becky would always find a way to connect something to the show.

“Oi Blackbell, move your ass out of the way.” Damian sneered, to which Becky poked him hard on the chest multiple times.

“I can’t believe you pulled that move Damian! You’ve taken my best friend away forever! She’s going to get married to you!” She snarled. “You better take good care of her or I will personally make your life a living hell! Got that?!”

Damian shook his head in amusem*nt before suddenly, Becky hugged him hard.

“I love you Damian, please take care of Anya okay. She means a lot to me.”

Damian’s gaze softened. They may bicker and insult each other countless times every day, but in the end, if trouble came, he’d be the first one to defend her and vice versa. He was grateful to have someone like her as Anya’s friend, and his friend as well.

“Don’t worry Becky, I promise. I love you too silly.” He chuckled when Becky jabbed him roughly on the side, the smile on her face betrayed it all.

Damian helped Anya up before helping Becky as well. Thankfully, Becky was attentive enough to realize that Anya’s act of tackling Damian had made the box containing the ring thrown somewhere on the stage before picking it up.

She gave it to Damian who picked up Anya’s right hand, sliding ever so gently the ring to her ring finger, securing it properly. It was a perfect fit. A shiny silver ring with the color of Damian’s eyes as the gem.

It was romantic, thoughtful, and symbolic.

He then produced another box, this time the ring had Anya’s emerald eyes as the gem. Anya knew what this meant. She carefully retrieved the ring from the box and slid it to Damian’s own ring finger.

And with that, Anya and Damian proudly showed everyone their engagement, which was reciprocated by thunderous applause and cheering.

Ewen and Emile surged forward to hug their longtime friend, jokingly giving Anya their condolences for having to put up with his antics for the rest of her life. Damian gave them a painful punch to their shoulders but they were laughing, and Damian couldn’t stop himself from doing so as well.

As they went down the stage, everyone congratulated them and wished them all the very best of luck with the marriage.

Graduation speech just took a whole one eighty with that stunt, and it wasn’t until long that media picked up what happened.

Demetrius was furious, with Loid and Yuri were eager to team up to give Damian a piece of their mind due to his sudden unexpected move of getting engaged with Anya. Thankfully, Yor and Melinda were faring better in response.

“You just graduated and already planning to get married?! Do you even realize how much of a commitment it’ll be?! Marriage isn’t something that one could simply mess around and make fun of!” Demetrius glared at his younger brother.

“Tell me Damian, how would you like to be tortured? We SSS offer a lot of options.” Yuri already cracking his knuckles, eager to have a go thanks to the young man being engaged to his beloved niece.

“Or if you don’t want to, WISE could also become a good choice, though don’t think it’ll be less painful than SSS methods.” Loid murderous gaze caused Damian to gulp nervously.

It seemed his action had led him to an unfortunate situation.

Fortunately, Yor and Melinda were there to intervene, smacking them out of their murderous stupor while Franky in the background was shaking his head in disbelief.

“Damian dear…” Melinda was already overcome with emotion. To have her son, still so young and had a long road ahead already wanting to get married, it didn’t feel real.

“I understand that you love Anya deeply, but isn’t this a bit too fast for you? You both have just graduated from Eden and while neither of you are going to attend university due to your devotion to being a spy and assassin, wouldn’t it be better for you to wait a year or two before settling down?”

“Demetrius is right Damian.” Melinda choked. “Marriage is something sacred, a special moment in your life to be bound by a deep oath with someone that you’d want to spend the rest of your life with.”

Damian nodded his head. He knew everything about it. He studied everything he could about marriage.

He gave his answer.

“I know this might seem ridiculous, but me and Anya, along with you all, have been together for so long. Our lives, crossed and intertwined with each other due to a significant event in our lives. I know this is highly unexpected but… if something happened to me, or Anya, I do not want to leave this world with the regret of knowing that I did not take that chance of being something more than just Anya’s boyfriend. I do not want a repeat of what happened in Eden. Not anymore. If I die, at least I’d die as a content and happy man.”

He grasped Anya’s hand in his, smiling at the young woman.

“I love her, and I would be honored to be the one she’ll spend the rest of her life with.”

Melinda swallowed the large lump in her throat. Her youngest son had grown up so much…

“And what about you Anya? Do you feel the same?” The voice of Yor came out, asking her beloved daughter.

Anya, without missing a beat, confidently nodded her head.

“I do. I am elated that Damian proposed to me and now being his fiancé. I know we’re still young but I believe we’re ready for it. He’s the one for me. I cannot imagine spending the rest of my life with anyone else but him.”

Yor’s lips were trembling hard, trying to keep herself from crying. However, Anya went over to her and hugged her mother tightly.

“Mama, it’s okay. I’ll still be around. I won’t just disappear like that after I got married. You and Papa will always have a special place in my heart.” Anya kissed Yor’s cheek, hugging her tighter.

Yor may not be her biological parent, nor was Loid, but her love for Anya was equal to that of her own blood.

“That also includes you Papa. You and Uncle Yuri better not plotting anything involving hurting Damian. You’ll have to go through me first.” Anya narrowed her eyes, making sure her message was sent clearly to everyone.

“Yor, please fetch me some painkillers because my head feels like about to explode…” Loid mumbled, a sentiment that was echoed by Yuri. Yor let out several choked giggle before going to the kitchen to retrieve the medicine.

Demetrius on the other hand, couldn’t do much but grumpily allowing his younger brother to marry. After all, his involvement in Demetrius’s marriage was significant enough, allowing him to be married to his beloved wife that’d been going strong for three years so far.

It was definitely a surprise for sure, and was something that a fresh graduate from high school shouldn’t do, but knowing the path awaiting them from now on, which was highly differing from their peers, Demetrius knew that it would be one of their biggest regrets if they didn’t act while it was still possible.

“Alright, little brother.” He gritted his teeth upon seeing Damian’s widening smirk. “Now that you’re engaged to Miss Anya, my condolences, again.” He said to Anya who giggled loudly. “When will you get married?”

“I don’t know. Next week maybe?”

Damian barely dodged the crumpled tissue thrown at him by his older brother.

“You idiot! Stop playing around! Be serious!”

“How am I suppose to know?! I want to get married as soon as possible!”

“At the very least be realistic!”

“It is very much realistic big brother! Marriage doesn’t have to involve a lot of people and a grand ceremony and party afterwards!”

“Don’t you dare suggesting that! have some pride as a Desmond! Make sure it’ll be memorable for everyone!”

“Now it feels like you’re the one getting married.”

“I am already married thank you very much.”

“Alright whatever, just don’t make it too complicated.”

“Damian, knowing our mother and Anya’s parents, I don’t think it’ll be possible.” Demetrius sighed, massaging his temple already. Yor and Melinda shared a bashful look, knowing that they’d been caught.

“Fine, we can go to a wedding organizer tomorrow.” Damian suggested. “And you better not invite Becky on this Anya! That girl’s going to be an even bigger headache to deal with.”

Anya laughed at the fact that Damian was absolutely correct. Becky would definitely more than eager to get herself deeply involved in the wedding plans. She would be the perfect addition to the chaos her mother and Melinda already brewed.

“Sorry dear, but I don’t think I could keep it from her.” Anya giggled, to which Damian groaned in defeat.

“Someone please help me…”

And as promised, the day after, everyone started helping them planning their wedding. It was a long and strenuous effort, with dozens of changes and additions thrown into the mix to ensure the wedding would go as smooth as possible while also giving them the experience they’ll never forget.

The media was also hounding them, no doubt about that part upon learning one of the most sought after young man in Ostania already planning to tie the knot with none other the Olympos Judo gold medalist Anya Forger.

Rumors and speculations circulated around like hungry vultures but everyone made sure to only give them the necessary responses and tried to give them as little information as possible.

They need not the extra attention they already had. Paparazzi seeking them as best as they could, taking photographs whenever they’re spotted in public. It got to a point where Demetrius had to step in, threatening them to have the SSS involved if they kept taking unauthorized photographs of Any and Damian, along with pretty much everyone else.

It definitely helped, as in less than a week no one dared to do it unless they’ve received formal permission.

Finally, after months of planning, half a year later, they were married at the Desmonds’ Estate. True to Anya’s graduation speech, she made sure to invite everyone from Eden, especially her friends from the same academic year.

It was grand, lavish, befitting of someone of Desmonds’ caliber. However, Anya made sure it wasn’t only exclusive to high society members. No, she also invited everyone from the orphanages she frequented during her time at Eden as a form of volunteer work.

She showed her appreciation and at the same time, using her wedding as an opportunity as a charity raising event at the party.

The media captured the event thoroughly, applauding Anya’s effort to raise more awareness to the orphans in Ostania.

Everyone had a great time there, with Loid tried his best to deny the fact that he cried so badly his eyes were puffy. The party lasted until past midnight. The morning after, marked a new dawn in Damian and Anya’s life.

From reluctant friends to best friends, then boyfriend and girlfriend and finally, husband and wife.

And so, it finally marked the end of arguably the most documented and well known rivalry in Eden history. Funny how after more than a decade of fierce competition between them, neither of them became the loser, nor it ended in a draw.

Both became joint winners, and they claimed the ultimate prize for themselves.

Their complex story will serve as source of motivations and inspirations for generations to come.

~

“And… voila! The end!” Anya claps her hands together, bringing the long oral history to an end. They’ve dropped Dawn and Faye earlier and currently walking around the academy ground to reminisce lightly of the past.

“Well, I have to say Anya, that was one hell of a life story.” Rez chuckles. It went on and on and at one point they’re worried it might never end. “You recount everything clearly and in great details. Must be another advantage of being an esper hmm?” He chuckles.

“Mhm, and I am proud of it. But probably because Papa also kept reminding me to be as good as him in memorizing things since Papa has a photographic memory.” Anya giggles.

“Nah, you’re just good at it so you can keep teasing me of embarrassing things I did at Eden.” Damian sneers, earning himself a quick slap on the arm from Anya. “Shut up, you’re making things up.” Anya hisses, pink color blooming lightly on her cheeks.

“Oh my, Master Desmond! Miss Forger! It’s an honor to meet you again!” A feminine voice rings behind them. Turning around, they see a neatly dressed woman in her early thirties, her glasses framing her face nicely. Her long chocolate hair flows freely behind her, reaching to the small of her back.

“Miss Tanya! It’s you!” Anya quickly rushes forward to hug her tightly. The woman is pushed back considerably, nearly losing her footing until Anya shifts their weight to her, saving her from falling.

“Anya…” Miss Tanya sighs, running her hand on the pinkette’s back. They part after a minute, with Miss Tanya’s brown eyes looking at the dashing man that is Anya’s husband.

“Damian.”

“Miss Olivera.”

“I hope you’ve been treating Miss Desmond well.”

“I have.”

Miss Tanya’s smile grows larger. Damian takes her hand and kisses it gently.

“It’s good to see you again Miss Tanya.”

“It is Damian, it is.” She sighs happily. Her eyes then move to the side, looking at Rez and Zver.

“Would you be kind enough to introduce me to your friends, Anya?” She teases. Anya realizes and stammers, quickly introducing them.

“Miss Tanya, this is Rez and Zver, they’re my friends we met in university.” Anya has to lie after all. No one, apart from those who they can trust, knows exactly what they’re doing at the moment.

“And this is Miss Tanya Olivera. She’s our Biology teacher from 10th grade to 12th grade. She is, put simply, amazing.” Anya compliments her, to which Miss Tanya waves her hand to dismiss it.

“Nonsense, you were the amazing one. I was simply giving you guidance.” She places her hand over her mouth to cover her small laughter. “And without you, we won’t become what we are today.” Damian folds his arms with a knowing grin.

“So what brings you here today?” Miss Tanya asks. “We just dropped Dawn and Faye for school, and we’ll be going soon somewhere to enjoy our little vacation.” Anya answers. “In the middle of a week? Are you two skipping classes? That’s not a dignified manner from famous Imperial Scholars like you two, you know.” Miss Tanya teases.

“Rest assured Miss Tanya, we made sure our schedule is cleared for this week.” Damian chuckles. “Are you going to teach a class now?”

“Oh yes, I am going to teach the eleventh grader now. Maybe you should pay them a visit to motivate them to study harder. After all, you both are the highly regarded Imperial Scholars that’re the very reason why students are in awe whenever the Anya and Damian rivalry stories are brought on.” Miss Tanya reminds them of their highly influential achievement during their days in Eden.

“We would love to, but we don’t want to impose you. Would be unfortunate for them to lag behind others because one of their sessions is used by us to recount our stories.” Damian says.

“Nonsense! They are smart and studious. A little break from the dizzying subject of Biology wouldn’t hurt them much.” Miss Tanya giggles. “But wouldn’t other teachers frown upon our little unexpected visit? Eden values their study highly after all.”

“We should be the one thanking you for allowing you to provide some time to make a visit.” Miss Tanya smiles.

Looking at his wristwatch, Damian sees that it’s only eight thirty two in the morning. “Well, if you insist, I suppose we would be honored to be allowed to have your class session dedicated to motivate them.” Damian agrees, to which Miss Tanya’s eyes glimmer with delight.

They’re led to her classroom, which everyone was confused for a second before realizing just exactly who entered with their Biology teacher.

“Mister and Miss Desmond!” They all cheered, brimming with excitement and glee. They thought today was about to become any other day. It’s not that they dislike Miss Tanya and the subject, they do love both, especially with Miss Tanya’s caring and passionate teaching method, which made her a favorite among students, but because of hard and complex the subject is.

But today, they’re surprised with the unexpected visit from arguably two of Eden’s most well known Imperial Scholars.

“Good morning everyone.”

“Good morning Miss Desmond!” Everyone replied with the same enthusiasm. Anya giggles, waving her hand lightly. “Please, don’t call me that. I may be married to Damian, but Miss Anya should do just fine.” She corrects them.

“And the same goes to me, Sir Damian or Mister Damian would be okay.” Damian adds. They all nod in unison, before a student decides to ask their teacher.

“Miss Olivera, is this something that you’re planning to do?” A boy asks. “Yes and no, Master Bradley.” Miss Tanya answers. “Today was supposed to be like any other day but then I crossed path with Miss Anya and Mister Damian. We had a quick talk and then I asked them if they would like to take over my class for today instead to give you some reprieve from my subject by giving you motivations and more.”

Everyone brightens considerably after that.

“Umm, Miss Anya?” Another one raises her hand. She seems timid.

“Yes, Miss?”

“My name is Alya.”

Anya places a hand over her mouth. An adorable lady with a similar name like her own. “Yes Miss Alya, you can ask any questions you’d like.” She gently encourages her.

Those blue eyes darting to the side, directly to where Rez and Zver are standing. “I’m sorry for being brazen but, who are those two with you?” Alya questions. Anya blinks, realizing that neither Rez and Zver have done anything other than standing silently near the door.

“Oh! My apologies! These two are my friends!” Anya answers. “Me and Damian met them at our university. The man on the right is Rez and the left one is Zver.”

Murmurs blooming from the students. Such unique names for such mysterious people. They look imposing, and definitely scary. Their gaze, while soft and unassuming, still gives off slight air of discomfort if one was to look too long into their eyes.

“I-I see, and what’re they studying?” Alya asks once more.

“I am currently studying as a medical student, with the goal of becoming a surgeon in the future.” Rez answers quickly upon realizing that neither Anya nor Damian had prepared something like this. A complete lie of course, but a necessary one to maintain their identity.

“And as for me, I too am a medical student, but I want to become a researcher to cure diseases.” Zver doesn’t want to overthink too much for an answer, instead following Rez’s own and modifying it slightly. He has a slight tick upon hearing a quiet yet still audible enough snort from the man standing beside him.

Immediately upon hearing his answer, Alya’s expression grows brighter considerably.

“I want to become a researcher too! I would like to cure cancer!” She exclaims. Zver chuckles, nodding his head affirmatively. “Then I hope you have been working very hard to your study. It’s not a sprint, it’s a marathon. You have to dedicate your life to it.” He reminds her.

“I have! I will not stop until I achieve my dreams!” She exclaims, fist pumped into the air.

“Good! We expect great things from you from now on!” Zver gives her a thumbs up, causing the lady to giggle and nod her head furiously. She’s delighted to have found someone that has the same vision as she is.

“Alright! Now with that out of the way, as I said before, for today, as a special occasion, my class would be cancelled!” Miss Tanya announces, causing everyone to erupt in loud cheering. “Which means, you can use this precious time to ask anything you’d like to both Miss Anya and Mister Desmond, be it something involving about Biology or even something completely irrelevant such as life in university. Have fun!”

The class does not waste any time, immediately throwing several questions in blazing speed, overwhelming the two Imperial Scholars. They calm them down before picking random students that raise their hands.

Rez and Zver on the other hand, decide to stay silent and watch them from the side, leaning against the wall.

Everyone’s enthusiasm is bubbling through the room. Anya and Damian are more than happy to answer their questions, with Miss Tanya also asking several questions of her own. Before long, the bell rings, signaling the end of their first period of the day and which also means the end of Miss Tanya’s Biology class.

“Alright class, unfortunately for us, my class has just ended, which of course, means Miss Anya and Mister Damian will have to go.” Miss Tanya announces as a collective groan of sadness and disappointment reverberate through the room.

Rez and Zver move themselves out of the class, holding the door open for Miss Tanya to walk out, followed by Damian and Anya.

“Don’t worry! You’ll do just fine. We wish you all the very best of luck!” Anya waves at them as they exit the class.

“Thank you for spending some time with my students Miss Anya and Sir Damian, they surely greatly appreciated your time with them.” Miss Tanya bows lightly in respect.

“No Miss Tanya, we are the ones that thank you for your generosity.” Anya replies. She walks forward to give her another lengthy loving hug. “I wish you the best of luck Miss Tanya, I hope we can see each other again soon.”

“And to you as well Anya, I wish you good luck for your future endeavors.” She pulls away slowly, before setting her eyes onto Damian. She is surprised when Damian walks forward to give her not a handshake, but yet another hug that equals in affection that Anya gave her.

“Thank you, thank you for everything during our time in Eden.” Damian will always remember her as the teacher whose teaching never made him bored. Always passionate and caring to her students.

“Y-You welcome, D-Damian…” She wheezes. Realizing his mistake, he lets her go, slightly embarrassed that he was hugging her a bit too hard. “Sorry…” He mumbles. “None taken Damian.” Miss Tanya giggles.

“We also would like to thank you to allow us share some of our experiences as well.” Zver bows in respect, a gesture that’s followed by Rez as well. They were not completely silent through the entire class, with several of the students were also quite interested in their fair share of stories.

Stories that obviously needed to be made up, but still contained several positive reinforcements to it for them to follow.

“It is no problem. I am glad you two could give them some help and guidance.” Miss Tanya replies.

Damian’s cellphone suddenly rings, prompting him to move away but not before excusing himself from the group.

“My apologies, it seems that my mother requests our presence at the Desmonds’ Estate for a brunch it seems.” Damian announces to the group ass Anya and Miss Tanya are talking. “Melinda wants us to join her for brunch?” Anya asks.

“Yeah, she invited us all.”

“She already received the news from our previous mission. She is highly worried and would like to know if we’re okay.”

Damian’s right index tapping against his left arm tells Anya discreetly the reason why. She snorts, but then realizes that it’s for Rez and Zver, who quickly picks up the hint and exhales lightly. She may be an exceptional student and spy with great track records who’s also capable of reading people’s minds, but she’s still quite dumb sometimes.

Damian must’ve picked up the subtle signs and snorts, earning himself another glare from his wife.

“Well Miss Tanya, it seems that our time has been cut short, but again, I am honored for your gracious hospitality.” Zver picks up her hand and kisses the back of it gently.

“P-Please, think nothing of it Master Zver.” Miss Tanya blushes, taken aback from his sudden move. Rez gives him the stink eye but Zver merely winks at him. What a charmer as always…

“Then, I shall get going to get ready for my next class. I bid you all farewell.” Miss Tanya bows once more before walking away from them. “Bye Miss Tanya.” Anya and Damian wave at her, bidding their beloved teacher goodbye.

“You did not just flirt with the Biology teacher Zver.” Rez smacks him hard in the head. “She could be married for all we know.”

Damian chuckles upon hearing it. “Don’t worry, she isn’t. She’s currently single, despite already around 31 years old now. I guess she’s still waiting for Prince Charming since we first met her.”

“If the Prince Charming is him, I’d gladly give him the poisoned apple.” Rez grins smugly, receiving a middle finger by the man.

“Alright, let’s get going then. I already called Jeeves to pick us up. He should be at the main gate in ten minutes.” Damian says. “Your mom must’ve been really worried.” Rez offers him a sympathizing look. “Yeah, who wouldn’t?” He grunts. “Must be scary for her when she received the news that we got ambushed and me and Anya got hurt.”

“I know that feeling. Good thing we’re all okay.” Rez cheers him up. “Yeah, so anyway, let’s go.”

~

Damian was right, slightly over ten minutes later, Jeeves arrived to pick them up again using the same car. The drive to the estate is quite the journey, being located on the outskirts of Berlint where most of the wealthy class resides.

The hustle bustle of the capital city of Ostania gradually begins to decrease as they move further and further away from it, with now Jeeves driving to the outskirts of the city.

Half an hour later, they found themselves at the front gate that lead to the Desmonds’ Estate. The front gate is elaborate and majestic in size, towering over them at five meters and sturdy enough to stop a truck going over fifty kilometers per hour if someone decides to drive in unauthorized.

A guard post on the left side of the gate, with four guards armed with submachine guns and two guard dogs on alert.

Jeeves rolls his window down and gives one of the guards his ID. A quick look and using metal detectors to ensure nothing suspicious is carried over, they allow him to enter the estate’s ground.

Rez and Zver are impressed, as the land the Desmonds own are vast, possibly enough to fit a small town inside as well. Green fields around the gravel road that’re maintained meticulously by a group of gardeners without a doubt, shiny and healthy as the sunrays bathing them with its warm light.

There is also a huge greenhouse visible from afar, probably a place where Melinda Desmond spends some of her time taking care of the floras she owned in her spare time. The gardens surrounding it are also a sight to behold.

But of course, the crown jewel of the estate is none other than the mansion itself.

The mansion, put simply, breathtaking. It’s massive in size, easily bigger than Berlint City Hall. The old 18th century style accentuates the building, giving it a distinct personality. There’s a fountain in the middle of the roundabout, a big one as well. Elaborate carvings on the fountain as it spews coordinated lines of water to their designated basins.

The mansion features several large and tall pillars, with the stairs made out of white marble leading to the main entrance. To Damian’s surprise, there’s someone already waiting for them by the stairs.

Exiting the car, Damian couldn’t hold his excitement any longer.

“Hello mother.”

Melinda, dressed casually in a grass green tunic that reaches above her kneecaps with a chocolate cardigan over it and a slightly oversized black sweat pants. “What is this outfit you’re wearing?” He tilts his head slightly in confusion.

“Oh, it’s getting colder in October but at the same time the fireplace’s too hot for me, so I decided to wear something comfortable and capable of keeping myself warm but also cool enough to wear near the fireplace.”

Damian sighs before enveloping his mother in a big hug. The huge difference in their height causes Melinda to slightly stand on her toes to get comfortable in the hug. “My baby, my Damian.” She coos to his ear. No matter how old he is, or how much he’s grown as a man, he will always be Melinda’s dearest baby.

Damian couldn’t help the grin growing on his face. His mother means a lot to him. They’ve gone through so much for a long time. He loves her with all of his heart.

“And of course, I cannot forget my beloved daughter in law…” She trails, smiling from ear to ear. Melinda and Anya have grown really close to each other, thanks to her significant contribution in mending Melinda’s relationships with her two sons.

“Hello Melinda, it’s good to see you t- ahh!” Anya quickly regains her footing upon being pounced by Melinda, literally, enveloping her in a big hug. Anya tries to break free but somehow, Melinda is stronger than her in this occasion.

“D-Damian, a little h-help?” Anya croaks, but Damian pretends not to hear her plea of help, whistling a broken tune to distract himself. Anya tries her best to glare but she gets distracted each time Melinda crushes her with her hugs.

“Oh Anya, my dearest sweet Anya. My beloved daughter in law…” She mutters lovingly, still not letting her go. Anya groans as Melinda refuses to let her go. Damian has a big satisfied grin on his face. Anya is so going to get back at him for it.

After another minute of hugging her, Melinda finally lets her go, allowing the poor wheezing girl to get some much needed oxygen. “Oh my god Melinda, you’re gonna get me killed.” Anya gasps dramatically, to which the matriarch of the Desmonds only offer a gentle titter as a response.

“Anya dear, I know you’re much stronger than that.” Melinda’s mirth written all over her face. But only then she realizes that they have two more unexpected guests.

“Oh? I did not know you’re bringing a couple of your friends.” Melinda runs her gaze up and down between Rez and Zver. “My apologies for intruding Ma’am, we’ll be taking our leave then.” Rez and Zver bow in unison before starting making their way to roam around the estate.

“Who said I was going to deny your invitations?” Melinda smiles, halting them on their tracks. “Again, we don’t want to intrude, as we believe the invitation to the brunch is strictly reserved to familial relationships only.” Rez explains.

Melinda laughs at their courteous reply.

“Nonsense. Don’t think too much of it. Any friend of Damian or Anya I will immediately consider them as family. There’s a reason why I still invite Becky, Ewen and Emile often to any meal time if they’re available.” Melinda explains.

“But first, where are my manners? My name is Melinda Desmond, mother of Demetrius and Damian Desmond, and also mother in law to Anya Desmond.” She winks at Anya’s direction. Anya bashfully turns her head away, heat rising to her cheeks.

“Pleasure to meet you Miss Desmond.”

“Please, call me Melinda.”

“Well then, thank you for allowing us to join your brunch, Melinda.” Zver bows in respect.

“Think nothing of it. Speaking of which, I would like to know more about you.” Melinda requests kindly. “Of course, we’re…” Suddenly, Rez feels something’s not right. Looking at Anya and Damian, it is more than obvious that Melinda has known what they’ve been doing for years but then again, she doesn’t know exactly who he and Zver are.

He suddenly becomes conflicted, whether to tell her the truth or not. They don’t know how well she’ll take the news if they come clean to her.

“Don’t worry, I’ll handle it.”

Rez’s eyes quickly found Anya’s emerald orbs. She just talked in his mind. A sense of relief washes over him.

“Melinda, why don’t we get inside first? I’ll tell you everything you need to know. These two… they’re quite complicated so to speak.” Anya starts. “That’s true. If they introduce themselves here, we won’t be entering the front door until noon I’m afraid.” Damian chuckles.

“It is of no concern then. Please, come in.” She invites them.

As promised, upon entering and making their way to the spacious and large family room with the aforementioned fireplace, Anya begins regaling her with the story of Rez and Zver from the very beginning.

Melinda listens intently, but quickly becomes horrified once Anya recounts the story of their near demise from the devastating explosion from a bomb.

“Dear god, is that true? All of it?” Melinda asks. She’s not skeptical per se, but she still needs to know if it’s true and want it to be confirmed by the pair themselves.

“Yes Melinda, here’s a solid proof to it.” Zver transforms his arms into a pair of deadly claws, capable of ripping someone to shreds with ease. Melinda has had her fair share of weird and seemingly supernatural encounters, having become the mother in law to an esper is the proof of it.

But to see something like this, coupled with the fact that Rez just changed into a completely different person, almost as if seeing Loid in action as Twilight though without the realistic face mask gives her the creeps.

A loud thud startles them, with Melinda realizing that a maid has become an accidental victim to the otherworldly presentation. The poor young lady fainted and currently laying on the ground by her side.

“Oh dear, she wasn’t supposed to see that.” Melinda quickly moves to pick her up. Damian intervenes, and with the help of several passing maids, instructs them to place the poor lady in the infirmary specifically for the maids and butlers of the estate.

“What will happen to her?” Rez asks, knowing that their cover has just been blown. “No need to worry about it. We made sure that everyone working for us will not report anything out of the ordinary, as long as it’s deemed acceptable and reasonable by me of course. They know about Anya’s mind reading ability if that’s what you’re asking.”

Melinda’s answer brings them a relief, knowing that they did not need to worry about the girl blabbering her mouth.

“That’s good to hear, for a second I thought I had to resort to extra measures.” Zver grins, which quickly swatted by Melinda using a rolled up magazine. “Ow! What was that for?” He pouts.

“That’s not necessary Mr. Zver. Rest assured yours and Rez’s secret is safe.” She chides him. Zver pouts even harder, causing Melinda to laugh.

Anya continues to give her an oral history of Rez and Zver, as maids are going back and forth to the rectangular table they’re sitting around to deliver the brunch Melinda requested.

“So yeah, they’re the ones who saved us mother. Although, it was definitely one nasty fight. You… well, I guess you did not need to see what happened to that Alex guy.” Damian says, grimacing slightly at the mental image of the man being ripped apart in half brutally.

Melinda agrees. “Indeed. I need not to picture it in my head, lest I lose my appetite.” Melinda replies. “But on the other hand, I would like to thank you two, for saving my son, my daughter in law, and my family. It was brave and selfless of you to take matters to your own hands.” Melinda gives them her gratitude.

“We just did what we had to do Melinda. It was the right thing to do.” Zver shrugs.

Clapping her hands, she begins to glance over the delicacies presented table side. “Well then, I believe everyone’s quite famished, so feel free to eat anything you want. More will come soon after all.” Melinda picks up her teacup and starts by sipping gently on her tea.

“Mom, you do know we-“

BUMP!

“Thank you Melinda, that sounds nice.” Anya ribs him sharply to stop him from sprouting nonsense. “Are you crazy woman?! You could’ve killed me!” Damian sharply hisses. “Stop being a wuss Sy-on Boy.” Anya blows a raspberry. “I know we’ve eaten quite a lot for breakfast but don’t try to say no to brunch with your mom. I know Loid and Yor would have your head if they hear about this.” Anya giggles.

Damian groans, slightly dismayed but then again, she’s right. Begrudgingly, he picks up his cup of coffee, the cappuccino lighting up his eyes and soon, he begins eating through his first pick of the brunch.

The food and beverages being served are definitely top of the line cuisine, worthy to be served at a famous and renowned restaurant. The Desmonds made sure everyone working under them are the best of the best, and the personal chefs cooking in the kitchen are no exception to the rules.

“Already starting without me, mother?” A gruff voice startles everyone in the room. Turning their heads around to the source of the voice, which happens to originate from the door that leads to the family room, they found themselves staring to a young adult male that has his slicked back hair having several strands aimlessly jutting out along with bleary eyes, indicating that he just woke up.

He’s wearing a bisque color robe with a matching pair of slippers. In his left hand, he’s holding a folded today’s newspaper. While his eyes are still showing that he’s still quite sleepy, it’s still giving the appearance of a sharp gaze to everyone in the room.

“Demetrius!” Damian exclaims, not expecting his brother to be staying at the mansion during weekdays. He’s usually staying at his own apartment in Berlint, managing businesses in the Desmonds Group.

~

Note 2: Apologies for interruption but I decided to make Demetrius slightly older than his previously established age (27) to 28 as to follow the current (presumed) age in the wiki, which is around 13-15 and since this current story takes place 15 years in the future from the headcanon I established, this means he’s currently at the age of 28 as stated above.

Other than that, the story resumes now and apologies for breaking the immersion.

~

“Damian.” He hums, silently walking to his preferred seat and allows himself to have a cup of coffee to kick the bleariness away. “How are you doing brother?” He asks. “I’m fine, as you can see.” He waves his arms around, trying to light up the mood.

A small smile breaks on Demetrius’s face, inhaling the smell of rich black coffee in the morning. A touch of creamer should suffice for now.

“I heard about what happened in your latest mission.” He speaks. “Are you sure you’re alright?”

“I’m fine Demmy, just some minor scratches and bruises. Nothing an ice pack can’t handle.” Damian reassures him. “You were intercepted I heard.” He continues. “We were. But we neutralized the threat.” Damian affirms.

“And what about you Anya, were you hurt?”

“Nope, like Damian said, we’re okay.”

“Good good.” Demetrius hums.

“Stop being so stiff this early in the morning Demetrius. You’re here to relax and wind down from yet another hectic week.” Melinda implores. Demetrius snorts. “Hard to relax and wind down when they’re still bugging me off with phone calls to midnight.” Demetrius grumbles.

“Didn’t you tell your secretary to take over? I thought she’s the one who suggested it?”

“She did. But I guess they just ignored her and kept trying to contact me instead.”

“Poor Katie. She is trying her best.”

“She is mother. She’s still trying to adjust to my hectic work life.”

“Why don’t you add SSS to the mix? Should fix it immediately.”

“Haha. Very funny Damian.”

Damian snickers, while Demetrius gives a half glare.

“So, are these two your new friends?” He motions his free hand to Rez and Zver. “Oh yes, they are. Meet Rez and Zver. They’ve been helping us with the new case we’re having.”

“Nice to meet you Rez, Zver.” Demetrius gives a weak wave. “Likewise Demetrius.” Zver nods.

“Come on big bro, what was that? Are you really that tired from all the work?” Damian jests. “I thought your work only consists of going from one boring meeting to another and stamping a mountain of paperwork for approval.”

“I could stamp you and ship you somewhere else instead. Way more fun than those you’ve mentioned.”

“Mother did you hear that? Demetrius being mean to me.”

“You two never grow old, did you? Despite being adults you’re still kids at heart.” Melinda laughs heartfully. The two siblings continue to throw insult at one another, but nothing contains profanity fortunately otherwise Melinda might have to twist their ears as a punishment.

“Sorry to say Damian, but unlike you, my work doesn’t involve travelling all across the world while being paid thoroughly at the same time.” Demetrius counters.

“Isn’t that what you also do oftentimes?”

“I have work to do. There’s a difference.”

“I have too!”

“No you don’t. You just go everywhere in an endless honeymoon with Anya under the pretense of working as a spy and assassin.”

“That’s not true.”

“Then care to explain why you have a vast collection of pictures hung on the wall of your room?”

“Those are pictures we took while in Eden.”

“You have pistols and Anya’s stilettos on them.”

“It was a prop!”

Rez and Zver are enjoying the banter immensely while silently continuing to eat while Anya and Melinda are constantly laughing at their antics. The constant silly banter back and forth between the two siblings is an entertainment and a half.

“Don’t try to deny the fact that you have a whole sofa dedicated to you in your office so that you can snooze in the middle of the day.”

“You’re right, but I only use it if I feel like I have to.”

“In other words, every day.”

“Even when I’m laying down on that couch I am still productive, unlike a certain someone.”

“I too am productive when I’m laying on a couch.”

“Stuffing your face with cookies is not a definition of being productive little brother.”

“Why you-“

“Demmy dear, what is this ruckus I am hearing early in the morning?”

The two siblings suddenly freeze upon hearing yet another feminine voice coming from the doorway. Slowly turning their head, they’re greeted with the unexpected sight of none other than Demetrius’s wife.

Melissa Desmond.

Similar to Demetrius’s current attire, she’s wearing what seems to be a thin white shirt underneath the burgundy robe and a matching pair of slippers as well. It contrasts significantly against her alabaster skin and auburn hair, along with those piercing lime green eyes.

She gracefully enters the room, with her target dead set onto none other than her husband. Demetrius gulps, bracing for the inevitable before finally, Melissa arrives right behind him.

“What did I tell you about leaving everything behind and just relax?”

“I… I am relaxing.”

“What about those phone calls hmm? I could’ve sworn one more unanswered call I’d throw your phone against the wall.”

“They keep pestering me even though I told everyone to go to Katie.”

“Then simply turn your phone off. It’ll get the message across and Katie can start handling things.”

“I-“

SMACK!

“No. when I say relax, you better relax Mister Desmond. Everyone knows you need a break badly. That’s why Katie along with others volunteered to take over your work.” Melissa sweetly leans down to hug him from behind, her arms around his neck though Demetrius could feel the killing intent behind it.

“Okay, okay. You’re right.” He pulls her close to plant a chaste kiss on the lips.

Satisfied, Melissa pulls away and greets Damian.

“How’s my favorite brother in law doing? It’s always nice to have you around.” Melissa greets him, hugging him and ruffling his hair. “I-I’m fine Melissa, thank you for asking.”

“Hey, back off Melissa. You have Demetrius.”

Melissa laughs, covering her mouth. “Oh dearest Anya. No need to worry. I am not going to steal Damian away from you. I already have my pick after all.” She sends a quick wink to Demetrius, who chuckles and sips his coffee.

“Come here you.” Melissa spreads her arms to welcome Anya into her warm embrace. Anya and Melissa had hit it off almost instantly. They’re both in tune with one another and sometimes both Damian and Demetrius wonder if it’s a good or bad thing for them to meet and got to know each other.

They’re like criminal accomplices, always scheming together to make their life even more chaotic than it already is.

Melissa Desmond, formerly known as Melissa Lombardi prior to her marriage to Demetrius Desmond. Born in the city of Milani[5] in Italo, her family moved to Berlint when she was at 4 as her father was expanding his shipping company.

She met Demetrius upon entering Eden elementary school, being placed in the same hall as he did. However, they did not interact with each other much though she did know him well. His intelligence and determination were highly regarded among his peers, though unfortunately, it made him quite rather cold and unapproachable, only allowing himself to interact with people he deemed worthy enough.

However, it all changed a few years later, and he became much warmer and friendlier. She got to know him more during a project that he and her got themselves into one group. He was remarkable and definitely way better in terms of approachability.

He’d smile and constantly reminding everyone that they’re chosen by him to be in his group because he believed they have the quality and strength needed, and he expected great things from them. But at the same time, he maintained the importance of teamwork and helping each other, as their combined effort would yield amazing results.

From then, fascination bloomed to something more. Before Melissa even realized it, she was already falling in love with the brilliant man.

However, nothing came out of it until they graduated, yet Melissa hoped that one day, he’ll notice her infatuation with him.

It seemed that luck favored her. Two years after graduating, her father, Diego Lombardi, owner of the Lombardi Shipping Company, found himself in a financial trouble. Realizing the growing issue, he began searching people to invest in his company to save it.

Demetrius heard the news and was willing to invest in it, in exchange for thirty five percent ownership in the company. Diego was thrilled and his company was saved. However, Melissa was also frequently present in the meetings involving Demetrius, having find herself working for her father, slowly making her way up from the bottom to the top so she’ll know everything she needed to know by the time her father will pass the company to her.

Demetrius of course, noticed his old classmate from Eden and struck a small talk with her often. It grew ever so slowly and before she realized it, they were dating and two years later, they were married.

“I heard about what happened to you recently with Damian, I am glad you’re alright.”

“Nothing Agent Starlight can’t handle. I am strong!” Anya puffs her chest out, flexing her arms as well. Melissa laughs, her shoulders shaking.

“Of course of course, our powerful and mighty spy Agent Starlight.” Melissa bobs her head up and down. It is only by then she realizes another two presences in the room with them.

“Oh my, apologies. I believe we haven’t met before.” Her eyes widen a bit in surprise. “We haven’t met indeed. The name’s Rez and this one’s Zver. We’re their friends.” Rez introduces them and motions his right hand to Anya and Damian.

“I see. Any friends of Anya and Damian are friends of mine automatically.” Melissa grins brightly. She then makes herself comfortable, slightly pushing Demetrius out of his seat, much to his annoyance to grab herself a plate.

“So what brings you here?”

“Mother wanted us to have a brunch with her, since she’s worried upon hearing the news.”

“Mmm… can’t blame her. I saw the news on television. Covered up by CROWS right?”

“Yeah, they did a good job in covering it.”

Everyone falls into a comfortable noise, with Anya and Melissa talking with each other and Damian with Melinda and Demetrius. Rez and Zver excuse themselves from them after fifteen minutes, wanting to explore the estate further.

“Please, be my guest! Have fun out there.” Melinda approves.

And with that, the pair make their way roaming around the vast estate. They encounter dozens of maids and butlers maintaining the mansion, no doubt ensuring everything is kept in pristine and prime condition.

“Remember when we visited a place like this not too long ago?”

“Well… the previous one that we did was… boom boom.”

“We did good on that mission, right?”

“If good means stealing over three tons of gold before blowing the whole thing to smithereens, I’d say it was a damn good mission.”

They are currently going through a long hallway on the first floor. A lot of unused rooms in this mansion it seems. The maids and butlers might have their own personal quarters and so far, the ones they met hurriedly say their greetings before scampering away.

“Am I really that scary?” Zver muses. “Have you seen yourself, I’m constantly terrified.” Rez chuckles. “f*ck off. I look like Ben Affleck’s twin if he had one.” Zver proudly states, receiving a bewildered look from Rez who’s coughing harshly at the bold statement.

“Yeah, there’s a reason why he has none.” He snickers, quickly shoved away roughly by Zver.

“You’re such an ass.” Zver laughs, making their way to the foyer where the main grand staircase’s located. “Wanna go out and have a look?”

“Mhm. Weather’s pleasant and cool. I like it.” Rez shrugs his shoulders in agreement. They quickly find themselves entranced by the greenhouse they saw earlier. A quick stroll later and they find the building bigger than they initially thought.

“Pardon me sir, do I know you?” A gardener, a middle aged man asks. “We’re Miss Desmond’s guests. We’re just looking around.”

“Ahh I see. Please, do feel free to look around.”

“Thank you, mister?”

“Peter. I have been working as their gardener for over twenty years.” He informs. “Wow, that’s quite an achievement sir. You must be proud of your work.” Zver commends him. “Of course. I am the one mostly taking care of these beautiful, rare, and exotic specimens the Desmonds have collected from all around the world, though sometimes Miss Desmond comes along to do her own work here.”

“Melinda does some gardening in her spare time as well?”

“That is correct. Though, it only started after the death of her husband. Before that, she barely even glanced to the greenhouse’s direction. Sometimes it made me wonder if they truly cared about this place.” He sighs.

Allowing a greenhouse like this to flourish for the sake of letting it flourish and because you’ve grown fond and love it, a fine line is laid between the two.

“Well, I suppose it fortunately ended up well. She loves it here, yes?”

“Yes, she does. There’s a small area in the greenhouse dedicated for her whenever she would like to just lounge in the greenhouse while basking in the sun and the sweet smell of flowers. She sometimes brings over a guest or two to have a small tea party here.”

“Can’t blame her. The smell is very pleasant here. I believe I’m currently smelling the flower aster?”

“Ah! You have quite the keen sense of smell sir! That is very much true!” Peter lights up upon hearing those words from Rez, no doubt ecstatic to find someone well versed in the world of flora.

Peter guides the pair around the greenhouse, a massive one if they have to say, but also expected from the grandiose image the Desmonds display to the world.

“So here, is where Melinda would spend some of her time in. Small yet cozy.” Peter leads them through several flat stone steps before appearing at an area where there are several love seats and a circular table in front of them.

The trees towering above them are providing adequate shade so they’ll be protected from the heat of the sun while not too much to block the entirety of it.

They walk around the greenhouse with the highly experienced gardener, often asking questions and engaging in deep conversations. The man is thrilled to have the honor to talk to them. It’s not often that someone would go the distance to know more than just the flowers’ names.

To have them capable of understanding what he’s talking about to a good degree soars the man’s heart to new heights.

After slightly over forty minutes, Rez and Zver decide to bid the man farewell, but not before Peter gifting them with a bouquet of yellow spider lily for each of them.

“We thank you for your hospitality, Mister Peter.” Zver thanks the man. “No no young man, the honor is mine. Thank you for the conversations we had. It was fulfilling and delightful.” He boisterously laughs. And with one final wave, they make their way back to the mansion.

“Ah there you are! I was wondering where you’ve gone to.” Melinda could be seen waiting for them by the stairs. “Looks like you impressed Peter quite well if he gifted you a nice bouquet of flowers.” Her eyes locked onto the bouquets.

“We had some talks with him. It was nice.” Rez replies.

“I’m glad to hear it. However, it appears that Damian and Anya are requesting your presence back in the family room at the moment.”

Huh, interesting.

“Is there any particular reason?” Zver questions. “Anya received a call from her friend Becky, telling us that she also demands to hang out with them. I believe Anya had told you her history with Becky before?” She asks. “She did, right when we accompanied Dawn and Faye to Eden. It was fascinating so to speak.”

“Fascinating is an understatement of course. They’ve become friends since the very first day of school and it was solidified by Anya’s brave move of punching my son.” The mother of Damian and Demetrius giggles, reminiscing the day she received the news.

“Friendship can blossom in the weirdest and most unexpected ways after all.” Zver comments, as they go through the door, which immediately reveals a rather interesting scene before them.

Anya and Melissa are laughing uncontrollably while Demetrius is throwing daggers with his gaze directly at Damian, who’s holding his ground with his own version of Anya’s ‘heh’ look. On the table, lies paper monopoly money along with the board.

From the looks of it, one could assume that Damian has won the game while at the same time Demetrus suffering utter defeat.

Ironic, a skilled and experienced businessman defeated in his playground by someone whose expertise completely different than him.

“How on earth did that happen, Damian?” Demetrius growls. “Eh, I’m just better than you.” He shrugs, the smug grin never leaves his lips. “You cheated.” Demetrius argues. “Alright now that’s just being a sore loser brother. I don’t cheat and you know it.” Damian gives an offended look.

“You cheated! You must’ve done something to the dices when you held it!”

“Well sorry to inform you but I must’ve rolled those favorable numbers because you can’t stop sweating. Must’ve helped the dices to roll better.” Damian laughs. “Knowing you, you probably asked Franky to lend you some high tech dices that can roll using a remote control and you switched it somehow.” Demetrius grits his teeth.

“All fair in war and monopoly, dearest Demmy.” Damian sticks his tongue out. Demetrius’s about to show him how fair a businessman can be in ‘war’ when Melissa grabs him roughly and shoves him to her embrace, his face buried to the crook of her neck.

“Now now, it’s just a game, honey. No need to get so riled up. Winning and losing are normal after all.” She plants a kiss onto his head. Demetrius mumbles something incoherent but Melissa is able to pick it up.

“I know, I know. You just had a bad game. It’s okay. You win some, you lose some. Maybe next time we play, you’ll be the one giving Damian a heavy beatdown.” She smirks at Damian. Damian gulps, knowing that Demetrius would definitely take his sweet time to gloat over him when it happens.

“Fine, sorry for beating you.” He half apologizes. Demetrius produces what sounds like a muffled cackle. Demetrius being Demetrius…

“Oh, you’re back!” Anya finally realizes Melinda has come back with Rez and Zver in tow. “Damian, I think it’s time for us to go.”

Damian nods and walks to Demetrius. “Oi, stop cuddling with your wife. We’re going somewhere else.” Damian poking at Demetrius side. “Fine fine, off you go little brother. Go annoy someone else for today.” Demetrius huffs, hugging his younger sibling tightly.

“Take care okay? Don’t get into more trouble now.”

“Tch, you should worry about yourself oldman.”

“I am only seven years older than you, you know.”

“My point still stands.”

Demetrius playfully shoves him back, with Damian laughing lightly at his response to his jabs.

“Where’s my hug dear Damian?” Melissa tilts her head amusedly. Damian gives her an equal amount of hug but it only lasts briefly before he’s pulled back by Melinda, who crushes him with her own hug.

“M-Mother! Too much!” Damian wheezes sharply, his ribs croaking in protest. Melinda pretends not to hear it, giving more pressure to him as a response. “Oh my dear son. Damian please be careful and take care of yourself okay? My little gem…” She twists her body around, causing Damian to forcibly follow her momentum.

Everyone’s thoroughly amused by the affectionate display, as Damian finally allowed to break free after a minute of being lovingly crushed by his mother.

“My god mother, Yor’s training definitely made your hugs tighter.” He coughs. Receiving private training from the legendary Thorn Princess definitely bore a fruit after all for the matriarch.

“Or you’re slowly growing softer.” Melinda slyly grins. “Anyway, tell Becky we said hi okay?”

“Will do mom. Bye everyone!” Damian waves at them. Anya does the same and followed by the rest.

It was a good brunch and bonding time, and they can’t wait until the next one arrive.

~

“So why Becky wants to hang out with us? Isn’t she supposed to be back in Munisch with Ewen for her study?” Damian questions. “Well, knowing her, she probably could still ace the tests. Won’t look good on her attendance score but still, she’s not a regular in skipping classes.” Anya replies.

“Fair enough, but why do we have to meet her at Emile’s shop?”

“Because he’s your best friend and he’s revealing a new item on his pastry list.” Anya answers.

“Oh, I didn’t know that. Why he didn’t tell me?” Damian asks.

“Because it’s supposed to be a secret, Damian. The only reason why I know because well… Becky.” Anya titters. Damian rolls his eyes in mirth. Becky plus excitement plus giddy equals secrets being leaked easily.

“Of course, Becky. That girl hardly can keep her mouth shut when she’s extra thrilled of something.” Damian mumbles.

“What is this place you’re talking about? Sounds interesting.” Zver questions. “Oh that, yeah. One of my best friends named Emile decided to pursue a career in culinary expertise and he opened his shop a few years later. It’s well known across Berlint.” Damian explains.

Rez waggles his eyebrows at Zver, who mumbles the word ‘fat f*ck’ under his breath, eliciting a throaty laugh from the man sitting beside him.

“What? Something’s funny?” Damian questions. “Nothing! Nothing…” Zver grumbles, still scowling at Rez. Anya decides to take a peek at Rez and Zver, curious on the latter’s reaction. She finds… well, nothing.

To be fair, nothing seems too much, as she could pick up some words regarding about cakes and sweet things from Zver. Switching to Rez, he’s mostly already forming up several sly comments inside his head.

Anya twists her head side to side, content with the silly thoughts they hold.

“It’s alright if you have a sweet tooth Zver. No one’s gonna judge you. You’re an adult after all and you can have a cake for breakfast if that’s what you want.” Anya consoles him, which returned by an even bigger grumbling from Zver.

“What? It’s true. You’re not bound to the usual and expected menu for breakfast or any other meal time. It’s not gonna be in the movies where you’ll have a cup of tea or coffee in the morning followed by some toasts or omelette which would then be followed by lunch that consists of some nicely cooked meal.” Anya tries to reason with him.

“Anya, please… just… shut up…” Zver groans, burying his face deeper into the soft surface of his seat while Rez is having a lot of fun relishing in the man’s plight.

“We all know you’ve been cooking quite a lot of delicious and varied dishes recently, and we’re grateful for that.”

“Damian, seriously, shut. Up.” Zver growls. Damian chuckles and allows him to sulk by himself.

“Leave him be. He gets antsy and moody when he hasn’t got any cakes sometimes. It’s normal.” Rez waves them off. It earns him a quick slap on the side of his head from Zver. “Hahaha! You know damn well it’s true!”

Fortunately, the constant teasing finally comes to an end as Jeeves pull the car to a stop, right in front of the shop.

“Thank you Jeeves. I’ll call you later, okay?”

“No problem at all Damian. Have fun.” Jeeves waves them goodbye, the car driving further and further until it disappears upon turning to another street.

“Welcome to Elman’s Confectionaries & Co. Even the building’s exterior looks appetizing right?” Damian says. The pair couldn’t deny the statement. It’s definitely standing out, more than likely made to attract people to entice them to enter the shop.

They do say that the first thing you want to get them interested is through visual contact. He definitely nails the subject, and coupled with the fact that they could already smell the faint yet discernible scent of freshly made pastries, makes them confident that this Emile guy definitely knows what he’s doing.

“Come on, let’s go in. Becky’s already waiting.” Damian invites them, holding the door open for the trio. Upon entering, the sight of packed and busy shop invades their gazes. People from all range of age bustling back and forth to pick up their desired items.

Children laughing and having fun around the shop while being reprimanded by their parents, teenagers busy talking and laughing with their friends, probably buying cakes and candies with their weekly allowances for themselves or as a surprise for their friend as a gift or birthday surprise.

“Anya! Damian! Over here!” A distinct voice calls their names out. Anya whips her head around, instantly finding Becky among the crowds.

She stands out compared to everyone else, as it’s a common occurrence for Anya and Damian. The Blackbell heiress is a huge fan of the fashion world after all, always trying to be the first to know if there’s a new design or collections launched by any clothing company.

She’s currently wearing a long sleeved carrot orange maxi dress that reaches below her shin with a hips length cerulean cotton jacket and a pair of black Chelsea boots. Slung over her right shoulder across her torso and resting nicely on her left side, is a copper colored baguette bag.

And to top it all off, in Becky’s distinct style of flair, she wears a wide brimmed, champagne colored knitted sun hat, indoor.

While Anya is brightened up by her best friend’s appearance, Damian already developed a tick on his forehead. Becky realizes this and the smile on her face just grow bigger comically.

“My my Blackbell, to what do I owe you the displea- sorry, I mean pleasure of meeting you here today?” Damian faux pas is obvious enough for the heiress. “Had I known you’re tagging along with Anya, I would’ve sent you somewhere faraway from Berlint.” She counters.

Becky falters first, followed by Damian as they hug each other lovingly.

“Treating Anya well, Damian?”

“Only when she’s behaving.”

“You’re an awful husband.”

“With the amount of daily pranks and teasing I receive from Anya, I believe what I do in return is justified.”

Damian flicks her sunhat, causing Becky to yelp and hurriedly grab it from falling off her head, glaring at the dashing tall man before her.

“What an ass.”

“Love you too Becky.” The man winks.

Huffing playfully, Becky turns her attention to her best friend of more than ten years.

“Hey there Miss Starlight, how’s my favorite spy doing?” She greets, in a hushed tone so people around them won’t notice. Anya rolls at the silly nickname she bestowed upon herself when she received her first ever Stella Star, but welcomes Becky’s embrace all the same.

“I’m doing fine Becky, don’t worry.”

“How am I supposed not to be worried? I was informed by a CROWS agent that you and Damian were hurt from your latest mission!” She half shouts, referring to the incident happened a few days ago. Anya nods her head in understanding.

“It’s fine really. It’s all thanks to these two.” She moves away a bit to motion her hand to where Rez and Zver are standing.

“Good day Miss Blackbell, an honor to meet you. We’ve heard many great things about you.” Rez grins. “Oh really? That’s a pleasant surprise. I believe you both heard a lot of my time in Eden?”

“Yes, Anya explained everything to us thoroughly. Amazing track record I must say.”

“Amazing because the only thing she did back then was bullying everyone, especially me.” Damian snickers. “Trying to tarnish my reputation aren’t you, Damian? You never changed.” Becky giggles, waving her right index finger side to side.

“It can’t be called slander if it’s the truth dear Becky.” He returns, arms crossed against his chest with a knowing grin. “Speaking of which, if you’re here, doesn’t that mean Ewen is still with you too?” Damian asks.

Becky hums positively. “Mhm, he’s back there. He’s giving Emile some much needed pep talk. He’s nervous.” Becky answers. “Emile’s nervous? That’s something.” Anya comments. “It’s his latest creation Anya, of course he’s nervous. He’s proud of it and hopefully, everyone else loves it as well.” Becky explains. “Come on, with you two and… our new friends in attendance, I’m sure it’ll give him a lot of confidence boost.”

Becky leads them to the back where only employees (and Emile’s close friends and relatives) are allowed. It’s jam packed with Emile’s employees and most importantly, the new creations. Everyone’s busy trying to make sure it’s as perfect as possible and available and adequate quantity for the eagerly waiting customers out there.

“Deep breaths Emile, deep breath. It’s gonna be okay. Everything’s gonna be okay.”

“I’m trying, I’m trying. It’s tough you know, heh…”

“Emile! I brought extra supports!” Becky loudly announces her arrival, with Damian, Anya, Rez, and Zver in tow.

“Oh my, Boss man!” Emile shakily stands up from his seat and hugs him in a tight, brotherly manner. “Whoa easy there, your legs are buckling like crazy.” Damian jokes in an attempt to loosen up the intense mood. “Hard not to when I’m dreading the reviews. A lot of well known food critics are also present out there you know? You saw Gregory Strauss?” He replies.

Anya scoffs. “Gregory Strauss? The new, popular guy in the culinary world? Rising star and currently starring his own cooking show in Berlint Horizon TV channel? What’s to worry about him?”

“He likes cakes.”

“So? It’s not his opinion that you should worry about. It’s Jacques Bernard’s opinion you should focus on.” Anya counters, reminding Emile of the elderly gentleman who’s been heavily involved in the pastry world for over thirty years. A man in his fifties, well known and highly regarded in the scene.

“Good job Anya, now you just made him even more stressed.” Ewen shoots him an annoyed look. “What? I’m telling the obvious. Better break the news to him now rather than later. He’d probably faint from seeing the esteemed man among the critics.”

With the man visibly sweating with the thoughts of many influential food critics giving bad reviews, Rez turns to Zver, who understands and nods.

“Emile, right?” Zver asks. Emile looks up to see a tall man leaning his body forward, hands resting on his kneecaps. His red eyes seemingly piercing right through his soul and even though it should’ve made him unsettled, he finds nothing but peace when staring into them.

“Y-Yes, that’s me. And you are?”

“Zver. The name’s Zver. That one over there is my friend Rez.”

“Nice to meet you.”

“Likewise. Now, let’s get to the main point, shall we?”

Emile nods, with the charcoal haired man know kneeling on one leg in front of him.

“Relax. Everything’s gonna be fine. Just calm down, take a deep breath. In… and out. That’s it. Keep doing it.” Zver helps him. “Don’t let their face and name intimidates you. Focus on what you love and what you believe in. You love making pastries and you believe you’re good at it, right?”

Emile nods his head. “But what if I am not as good as I thought I do? What if my creations are a total failure?” The anxiety creeps back in.

“Then don’t think much of it. If you succeed, congratulations, you made it! If you don’t, then don’t be disheartened. You can’t improve yourself without making mistakes. You can’t become a better version of yourself if you don’t learn from your past failures.”

Emile looks at him deeply.

“What I’m trying to say is that, don’t let their reviews take ahold on your heart and mind. Think of it as a vital lesson for you to study. Will you be saddened? More than likely yes. It’s normal and okay to be sad if you fail. What’s not okay if you keep wallowing in it. Tell me, you know this Jacques Bernard guy well, right?”

Emile nods. “I read about him a lot. I bought his book as well.”

“Then you should know he probably has given countless talks on how he failed so many times in the past before he could become the man he is today, right?”

Emile nods again.

“Then be like him. Use his life lessons as your motivation. Success is not final, failure is not fatal. It is the courage to continue that counts.”

He breaks a small smile on his lips.

“Whatever happens today, know that each and every one of us are proud of you.” Zver taps him by the shoulder. Emile laughs lightly, feeling a tad better than before.

“You sure know how to give motivational speech. Are you a pâtissier or baker as well by any chance?”

“Mmm, something like that. But anyway, let’s get prepared, shall we? Show them how you mean business.” He slaps his shoulder a bit rougher for one more boost of confidence.

A few minutes later, Emile is out with the excited crowd, delivering a plate for each food critics that’re attending his grand reveal.

They all have a bite of his cream filled croissant infused with lemon meringue and topped off with whipped cream dusted with cinnamon. His other creation is a chocolate cake that’s layered with caramel, a total of five layers of caramel is present, dividing the cake into six sections. On top of the cake, carefully placed, are strawberries and blueberries neatly adorning the cake’s perimeter and, on the middle, a towering creamy frosting with a single cherry resting on it.

To his great delight, all five food critics give him a positive remark about it, and of course, with the main target, Jacques Bernard, gives his own review, the one that Emile wants to hear the most.

“It’s simple, yet sophisticated. You make them stand out and allow them to speak for themselves. The croissant, soft like the clouds and yet it gives you a distinct snap with the lemon meringue that’s soothed by the sweet flavor of the whipped cream that’s complimented by the faint scent of cinnamon.”

“The chocolate cake is a fine piece of art of its own. Layered with caramel could’ve spelled disaster as both the chocolate and caramel are sweet on their own. It could’ve been like eating clump of melted sugar, which in my opinion, horrible. But you chose well to use dark chocolate as the majority of the cake that’s countered by the sweetness of the caramel.”

“The strawberries and blueberries also help out balancing the sweet and sour taste intertwining with one another, and the frosting is thankfully, easy to melt in the mouth. Often times you find it stuck in your mouth and throat, requiring you to wash it down with a gulp of water. You evaded that error well, and the cherry on top, pardon the pun, is a nice final to the cake.”

He offers him a warm smile, happy with the young man’s achievement.

“So all in all, I believe you’ve done a great job today, young man. You have a bright future ahead if you keep this up. I am eager to see your next creation, which hopefully, soon.”

Emile couldn’t keep his giddiness any longer and he shakes Jacques’s hand with high enthusiasm, thanking him for his kind and inspiring review. The other food critics echo the same sentiment, with them also wanting to see where he’ll take his path from now on.

A bright future lays ahead of him, one that he himself will have to define.

After the initial reviews, it comes to no one’s surprise that Emile’s new items are sold out at record time. Everyone is eager to have a taste on the critically acclaimed croissant and cake, but unfortunately, even with thorough preparations and stocking up a good amount of it beforehand, they still couldn’t meet up with the demands and with heavy hearts, announce that those who aren’t able to get one today would be able to get one tomorrow.

There are some disappointed groans and complaints but then again, it’s expected. Most stay around to mingle with the food critics, either asking questions or lining up for a picture or asking for their signatures.

Emile couldn’t be happier.

“Oh my god Emile! You’ve done it! I knew you could do it!” Becky gushes over and over again, hugging her best friend tightly. “Everyone loves it! And the reception is extremely positive! Even Jacques was thoroughly impressed!”

They look around, the shop still filled with people bustling back and forth. It’s been over an hour since the grand reveal, and Emile is still riding that high. He’s done it. His new items are a massive success.

“Good job Emile! I’m so proud of you!” Anya follows suit, hugging the man, and Becky, tightly as well. “Anya! Please! You’re killing me!” Emile wheezes. The spy with superhuman strength tends to forget that she’s trained by the legendary Thorn Princess, her mother.

“Sorry, sorry. I am just so glad that you nailed it.” Anya giggles, patting his back to ease up the pain from being crushed.

Emile suddenly enveloped by another group hug, this time initiated by Ewen and Damian.

“Good job man, we’re so proud of you.” Damian whispers. “Keep it up yeah? We have high hope and deeply believe in you.” Ewen adds. Emile blushes, not used to this kind of thing with the boys. He could tell that Damian and Ewen also feeling super awkward but trying their best not to show it.

Unfortunately, Anya already snickering and whispering something to Becky, much to their slight dismay. Damn her and her mind reading ability…

“Thank you. All of you, I really appreciate it.” The blush on Emile’s face grows brighter and brighter. He definitely needed that confidence booster and all those peptalk given to him. Speaking of peptalk.

“I umm, thank you to you too as well, Zver. We barely know each other but you helped me with zero hesitance. I don’t know why you did it but I am grateful for your help.” He shakes the man’s hand in gratitude.

Zver chuckles lightly in response. “Ahh don’t think much of it. I helped you because I felt that you needed it. We all need a helping hand in our life once in a while. I’m glad I could provide one to you today.” Zver replies, downplaying his own aid.

“But still, I am thankful for your help.” Emile insists. “As a thank you, why don’t we retreat to our spot? I may or may not have saved some of my latest creations for you as a gift.” Emile smirks slyly. “You do?! I didn’t know that!” Becky shrieks. Her mouth had been salivating over those scrumptious sweet stuffs when he presented it to the critics.

She is so eager and ready to have a go herself.

“Yes yes, now get your tail to stop wagging Becky or you’ll swipe over the displays with it.” He playfully chides the Blackbell heiress. “Follow me.”

True to his words, Emile did save some for the group, enough for everyone to have one per item. They all very much agree with the critics. It is absolutely mouthwatering to gaze at and delicious to eat.

“If I go back here tomorrow, wait no, actually, I would like to order two boxes of them to be picked up by tomorrow, VIP priority.” Becky demands. “Sure thing. That’ll be nine hundred dalc thank you very much.” Emile replies back without missing a beat.

Becky’s eyes looking at him as if he just grew another head.

“Nine hundred dalcs?! Are you gonna stuff the croissants and layer the cakes with molten gold?!” She shrieks. She may be filthy rich but she still understands there are prices that’re just ridiculous.”

“I thought you have no qualms about expensive food Becky? Change of heart recently?” Emile mocks. “I-I don’t! But that’s just outright extortion idiot!” Becky smacks him with her sun hat.

“Well, a piece of the cream infused lemon meringue croissant cost 5 dalcs each. Each box has eight of them which means it’s 80 dalcs for two boxes. For the chocolate cake, each one is 20 dalcs. Two boxes mean 40 dalcs. Combine both, the total is 120 dalcs.” Emile explains.

“But that still doesn’t explain the extra 780 dalcs!”

“I am not finished. VIP means it’s a high priority one, which increases the cost by twofold, in this case, 240 dalcs. 300 dalcs is because you’re Becky and the rest because I feel like it. Voila! 240 plus 300 plus 360 equals 900 dalcs! There’s your answer!”

THWACK! THWACK! THWACK!

Everyone at the table couldn’t hold their laughter any longer as Becky unleashes a barrage of slaps using her sun hat to Emile’s shoulder, laughing in the process.

“You greedy, egotistical bastard! How dare you charge exorbitant prices for your own dearest friend?!” Becky giggles, still smacking him regardless. Emile feebly defends himself from the assault, enjoying the company of his friends with silly interactions. It’s a good way to unwind after such a long period of anxiety and stress.

Time flies by when you’re enjoying the company of those who’re cherished, as they quickly find that it’s already half past one at noon.

“Damn, we’ve been here for a while, haven’t we? Anyone wants to grab a quick lunch?’ Becky asks. “I am down for that. We just ate but no offense Emile, it wasn’t that fulfilling. I’m still hungry.” Damian agrees.

“Can’t blame you Damian, feels weird to only eat cake and pastry. My mouth feels sugary now. I need something more solid, you know?”

“Nah Em, that’s just you being you.”

“Shut up.” Emile flips Ewen off.

“Alright, it’s settled, we all need an actual lunch. Any ideas?” Anya asks.

“Paulie’s anyone?”

“I just had Italoan yesterday. I’ll pass.” Becky denies.

“We can always go to Jardin de Nuit.” Anya suggests.

“Anya, as much as we love that place, I think it would be nice for us to have lunch where no CROWS personnel are around us wouldn’t it?” Damian offers her a kind smile. Anya sighs, knowing that he’s right.

“Well, what else then?” She pipes.

Ewen snaps his fingers. “Oh I know, let’s go to the Berlint Greenfield Driving Range.”

That suggestion earns him a collective confused look from everyone. “I’m sorry what? Greenfield Driving Range? Sorry, but we’re trying to eat, not swinging golf clubs until our arms pop out of their sockets.” Becky deadpans.

“Wait wait, hear me out. None of us have anything to do for the rest of the day right?”

“Yeah…”

“Well, I guess why don’t we go out to get lunch and at the same time, just unwind by playing a nice session of golf by the driving range? Gets us tired but loosen up the muscles.” Ewen explains.

“Don’t you mean you want a rematch with Damian since last time he-“

“No, and no. Shut your- no actually, don’t read my mind please.” Ewen sighs, with Anya giggling mischievously, confirming it all.

“If you really want a rematch, you could’ve said so.” Damian slyly quips. “But in all seriousness, he does offer a solid suggestion though. Their grilled sandwich and meatball pasta are killers.”

“I said I had an Italoan yesterday for dinner. I don’t-“

“They have a wide variety of menu Blackbell. You want me to scribble the pasta section for you in case you get nauseous, Miss Pompous?” Damian sneers. “I’d rather scribble your ugly face with it thank you very much.” Becky huffs. “Alright, the driving range it is then. Any objections?”

Her question is met by a collective silence. “Good, then let’s get going.”

“Wait, what about Emile’s shop?” Rez questions. “Oh don’t worry about it. I put trust in my employees to run the shop without my supervision. They’ll do just fine.” Emile waves it off. “But I really do need to change my clothes first. I smell of wood oven and flour.” He sniffs himself.

~

Forty minutes later, they have finally arrived at the driving range. After paying the entrance fee, they quickly secure themselves three tables and Becky shamelessly combines all of them together, much to the bewilderment of other visitors.

But upon realizing who she is along with her entourage, they quickly pretend they see nothing. Anya orders Damian and herself the driving range’s signature grilled sandwich glazed with hot honey, a bowl of Caesar salad and a plate of chicken strips with their signature spicy sauce.

Becky on the other hand, ironically, orders herself an Italoan dish, specifically fettuccine with extra cheese, to the amusem*nt of everyone as the teasing and mocking start to flood in.

“All of you shut up before I shove those golf sticks in your asses sideways. Moment of weakness okay? Moment. Of. Weakness.” She glares at the boys. “My name is Becky, I had Italoan yesterday and I threw a tantrum. Oh what’s that? Extra cheese on fettuccine? Don’t mind if I do!” Damian gives an awful voice imitation of Becky.

After everyone finishes ordering what they want, the boys quickly make their way to their respective spots.

“Ready to get your ass beaten again, Ewen?” Damian grins smugly. “In your dreams, Sy-on boy.” Ewen mocks back. “Keep bickering and I’ll easily overtake you from behind.” Emile cackles.

By now, a good amount of people have noticed several influential individuals in Ostania have converged in one place to hangout and a crowd is slowly building up. It’s not often you’ll see the second son of the Desmonds with his wife, the heiress of the Blackbell company, the well known pastry chef of the Emile family and last but not least, the genius Imperial Scholar hailing from the Egeburg Family as its heir, with rumors already circulating around that he’s aiming to become an astronaut for Ostania.

However, it is worth noting that they have two more people with them, but they quickly deduce that it might be security personnel following them around, though it’s interesting to note that they’re also playing with them.

“Wait, Rez, Zver, you two do know how to play this right?” Damian asks. “Yeah, we do, just uhh… kinda need to warm up first. It’s been a while.” Rez says, stretching himself. They’ve already discarded their blazer and overcoat respectively, showing their muscular physique that doesn’t go unnoticed by the female population in the area.

Every one of them is eye catching, a fact that no one can deny.

The driving range offers quite the view, with lake at the far end and the maintained carefully green field serving as the playing area. There are multiple markers to mark the distance travelled by the golf balls, from the closest one being twenty five yards and the furthest one being four hundred yards away.

Hundreds of golf balls littering the playing field, as if someone decided to pull a prank by throwing snowballs everywhere that doesn’t melt under the sun.

“Alright, the furthest one with the most awful and shortest swing gets to pay for everyone?” Damian asks. Ewen and Emile nearly object for a moment but then, almost as if they gained Anya’s telepathic ability at the same time, deviously chuckles and nods their head eagerly.

Trap has been planted.

“Alright! Let the game begin!” Damian announces as he takes the first swing. It hits the ball hard, sending it flying high to the sky at high speed. It’s a good start for him, with the ball landing just over two hundred and fifty three yards into the field, earning him several applauses from the crowd.

“That’s good, but not good enough.” Ewen yawns, swinging his driver hard into the ball, sending it flying a good distance away, landing just a few yards in front of Damian, much to the Desmonds’ second son ire.

“It’s just the first ball, we still have many to go.” He grits his teeth. Emile also takes his first shot, landing a dozen yard behind them, though he’s still very much happy with it. It’s an intense competition, with Anya and Becky serving as their personal cheerleaders as they eat.

“Well, I guess it’s time for you two to make your entrance, right?” Damian says to Rez and Zver, who just finished warming up. “Sure thing.” Zver chimes, grabbing the driver to get himself acclimated to it.

It’s lightweight and sturdy. Perfect.

Rez takes his position, readying himself with the correct posture. He swings the driver back and just as he’s about to swing it forward with great power, Zver stops him.

“Uh uh. Behave.” Zver reminds him. Rez throws him an annoyed glare but nodding regardless. He restarts his swing and hits the ball hard, allowing it to soar far to the field before rolling a couple of times before coming to a halt, stopping at two hundred and sixty five mark.

“Huh, interesting. Must be beginner’s luck.” Damian chuckles, though deep down he knows they’re holding back hard. They’re under the watchful eyes of the public after all.

“I prefer the term getting back into it.” Rez corrects him, his eyes telling Damian everything he needs to know.

Rez knows he knows.

Zver takes his first swing and it lands roughly the same place as Rez did, with the latter quickly throws a jab that he’s remote controlling it. The competition resumes once more, as they try to beat each other. The crowd becomes dynamic in number, with some leaving and some joining as time goes by.

After fifteen minutes or so, Damian decides to take a break, taking a seat right next to Anya as she slides him his drink.

“You did good so far honey.” Anya praises him. “Thank you. Why don’t you have a go too?” Damian suggests. “After I finish feeding you your meal.” Anya giggles. “Ugh, lovebirds.” Becky mocks them by pretending to puke.

Ewen and Emile soon follow them, taking a rest while Rez and Zver are still busy swinging, though they’re changing the clubs every so often.

“What’s your high score?” Damian asks.

“Two seventy one. You?” Emile asks.

“Two ninety seven.” Damian replies.

“There was a brief hurricane passing by, lucky.” Emile scoffs. “Yeah, I said thank you and he said no problem before he went away.” Damian deadpans. “How about you Ewen?”

“Two eighty five.”

The boys talk with one another, as Anya continues to feed her husband with chicken strips and sugar dusted chocolate beignets.

“They really are holding themselves back, aren’t they?” Anya sighs, looking at Rez and Zver still sending golf balls far out into the field but in a normal manner, knowing that it would create a huge suspicion if they go all out. “I know we all have been golfing for years as one of our hangout things to do, but if they go all out, they’d easily beat any professional golfers out there.” Damian chuckles.

“Them? Beating the professional golfers? Please, just you and Anya are more than enough to do the job. Just bring your mom here and she’ll send it to a random small Westalis town in one swing.” Becky jeers.

“Breaking news, numerous golf balls of unknown origin are found across Ostania and Westalis. Authorities are still yet to find the culprit and their goal.” Damian gives a fake headline, to everyone’s enjoyment.

“Enjoying that Italoan dish you weren’t looking forward to BeckyBoo?” Emile mocks the heiress. “Shut up before I shove this straw down your throat Elman.” Becky growls. “Damn, I forgot. Never disturb a lady’s meal time when she’s angry.”

Becky responds by flicking a small bit of ice cube to the man.

Ten more minutes of talking, Becky and Anya finally join in the game, with Becky confident she’ll be better than the last time.

“You barely hit one hundred yards last time we played…” Ewen mumbles, earning him a painful yelp when Becky kicks him in his calf. “Shut up and watch. I can go for two hundred now.” Becky exclaims, adjusting her grip on the driver.

Making sure she has the correct posture and grip, she inhales deeply, swinging the driver back to the maximum arch before sending it back forward with the most power she could muster. The driver’s head hits the ball in a loud whizzing noise, the ball shoots up in a vertical angle for a solid ten seconds before it starts losing momentum and gravity overtakes it.

The ball rolls around forward for a moment or two, before finally coming to a complete stop. Everyone stares at the ball in disbelief.

“Wow…” Damian puffs.

“Damn…”

“Becky…” Anya covers her mouth, eyes wide as saucers.

Becky is also in disbelief, her grip on the handle is tightening as her whole body is shaking.

“Two, seven, yards. Twenty seven yards.” Ewen snorts, unable to hold it back any longer. Becky yowls in frustration, already half sprinting to chase Ewen with the goal of smacking him with the driver’s head.

“Calm down Blackbell calm down, we don’t need you stomping around and flip the whole driving range upside down because of one snort.” Damian holds her back, grabbing her by the shoulders. “Though, it’s kinda anti climactic isn’t it? From two hundred to twenty seven? Where did the zero roll away?” Damian snickers.

“You guys are a bunch of assholes.” Becky swears, twisting her body around to swing her driver to Damian’s calf, causing the man to yelp and releases her. “Becky what the hell?! You crazy!”

“You three are driving me crazy!” She hisses, still wanting to chase Ewen to see how far his scream would go if she swings it to his shin. Becky’s definitely crazy.

“Not my fault you boasted and failed epically. What happened hmm?” Emile snickers. “I could’ve had it if it wasn’t for Ewen’s stupid last second decision to make a funny face that caused me to miss my swing!” Becky stomps, while Ewen’s currently hiding behind Anya who’s twirling her driver around in mirth.

“Save me Anya from this rampaging beast.” Ewen whispers, the word mischief written all over his face. Anya places a hand over her mouth, tittering in delight. “Anya! You’re supposed to be backing me up from these scoundrels!” Becky complains, trying to juke Ewen from Anya.

“Alright, alright. Just calm down Becky. We still have a lot of golf balls left. You can have another one instead of throwing a temper tantrum.” Damian pulls her away, with the girl still grumbling and spewing sharp harrumphs.

“Fine, but Anya, you better make sure none of these idiots do something that distracts me.” Becky warns. “Aye aye, Miss.” Anya mocks salutes her. “Boys, you better behave before I make sure it’s only the golf balls gonna get launched far into the sky with this.” Anya twirls the driver around, the threat is clear.

The trio gulps and nods their head. Anya could be scary without even trying.

Becky moves back to her position, and takes another swing, this time the ball goes out far into the field, and lands just shy below two hundred and forty yards.

“See?! See?! I knew Ewen was the problem!” Becky points out. “Really Becky? Not owning your own mistake and instead throwing shade to someone else? Real mature Becky.” Ewen rolls his eyes. “That one just proved it! You did make a funny face to throw me off!” Becky counters.

Rez and Zver on the other hand, are simply watching from the side. They’re shifting their weight slightly onto their sticks, content with just being spectators.

“Alright Becky, whatever you say. Let’s just keep playing shall we? Why don’t you have a go Anya? Show us the amazing Starlight Anya’s prowess.” Emile suggests. The pinkette nods her head ecstatically, already getting herself into a comfortable position.

“Come on babe! You can do it!” Damian cheers from the side. Anya winks, and with one powerful swing, sends a powerful cracking sound through the driving range as she sends the ball far into the sky. Everyone that’s watching elicit a collective ooh as they try to track the ball’s trajectory through the air. It lands somewhere far, far beyond the group’s record so far.

“Three hundred and… twenty four…” Damian sighs. He should’ve known better. His wife is nothing short of amazing and powerful. She just bested everyone by just one attempt.

“Look! Look! It landed far, right?!” Anya exclaims, pointing and her gaze is like asking for his approval. She’s so adorable and precious it’s intoxicating.

“Yes dear, you did. You’re amazing.” Damian chuckles, strolling slowly to Anya before giving her a quick peck, as a reward. “Aww, you’re so sweet. But unfortunately, not good enough.” Anya teases, referring to his own personal record so far.

Damian scoffs. “Please, it’s just a lucky swing. Nothing more.” Damian plays it off.

“Well Anya, I have to say, that’s quite the swing you got there.” Zver moves closer, the golf club laying against his left shoulder. “Thank you. I practiced a lot for years.” She replies. “No doubt about it. The hard work definitely shows.”

“Though I am quite intrigued dear Anya.” Rez steps in. “I thought it was kind of an unspoken agreement that we’re supposed to have fun, and not arouse suspicion. Surely there are some semi professional golfers currently around us at the bare minimum playing as well and judging by that nasty swing, surely it’ll raise some suspicion on why you have the same prowess as professional golfers in terms of swing power?”

Anya blushes deeply at her accident.

“S-Sorry! I just got carried away…” She apologizes. Looking around, there are some look of amazement and curiosity pointed at them, no doubt because of her shot.

“Well nothing wrong with that, but I hope nobody gets curious enough that we’ll get asked questions for tips and tricks.” Rez shrugs with a knowing grin. “We can always say that we’re once trained by professional golfers. Nothing suspicious about it.”

“Definitely would if you’re still literally in your early twenties. But… as long as you think it’s fine, it’s fine I suppose.”

“Well, why don’t you two do it as well? I know you have been holding back for the sake of not arousing attention.” Anya challenges. Damian smacks a hand to his face. “Anya you idiot…” He mumbles.

Looking at each other, the pair shrugs. “Well, maybe not now. Perhaps when we’re nearing the end of our session, we’ll do one for you.” Zver replies. “That’s a deal!” She accepts, shaking his hand.

The game between the group resumes, with the boys having a fierce competition with Anya. Becky still tries to lend Anya a hand but she’s still lagging behind. As for the boys however, their only hope lies on Damian, who also manages to score an over 300 yard shot, specifically 346 yards.

By now, they’re so engrossed in their own world that they didn’t realize there’s an ever growing larger crowd around them.

Anya and Damian have created their own little competition, a callback to their Eden days. No matter how old they’ve become, it seems that competing against one another is just their nature. It will always find a way to sprout between them.

“Come on Anya!”

“Come on Damian!”

By now, Becky, Ewen, and Emile have stopped playing, focusing completely on the highly competitive pair as they exhaust their golf balls.

Thanks to their intense training, and to the amazement of everyone watching, they are able to keep swinging at full power for minutes.

However, after they’ve sent their last golf ball, they’re still ironically, end up in a tie. And it’s also their best record as well. Three hundred and fifty one yards. Not even in golf they can beat each other. It ends up with a draw.

“Wow… that was something…” Damian gasps, trying to catch his breath. He hasn’t done much working out ever since the accident two days ago and this definitely feels good and it gets him pumped up.

“Sy-on boy, here I thought you could beat me in golf today.” Anya huffs, wiping the sweat off her brows. “I am just being generous dear. I don’t want to beat you in a friendly game.” He winks at her. “Of course of course, whatever you say dear.” She giggles.

Bowing to the spectators, they receive a heartwarming round of applauses in return.

“Now, I believe there are only two more that haven’t showed us their true potential hmm?” Damian glances at Rez and Zver, who so far have been taking it casually, trying different golf clubs, just to have fun.

Upon hearing those words, Rez shrugs his shoulders, an act that’s repeated by Zver.

“Oh? Is it time? Alright then.” Rez stretches his arms once more. Grabbing the driver, he moves to position and makes sure that the final ball is as perfect as possible.

“Alright, you’ve been warned.” Rez says. Both him and Zver are now in sync, swinging their clubs back to its maximum angle before swinging it forward. Unbeknownst to all, glowing tendrils forming and jumping in and out of their skin underneath the clothing they’re wearing, increasing the power substantially.

The unified sound of the drivers hitting the balls is so loud everyone is covering their ears, and some of them even ducking out of instinct that there’s an accidental discharge of firearm in the driving range. The pair of golf balls soar through the sky at extreme speed, flying past the driving range at a near straight line.

The balls fly further and further, passing the three hundred and fifty yards mark and then… four hundred yards mark.

To everyone’s astonishment, it is still going. The golf balls hit the barrier net and to everyone’s second shock, they tear through it with ease, as they could see the golf balls finally meet their final resting place, submerged into the depths of the lake.

The driving range becomes silent, everyone is still trying to comprehend on what on earth have just happened before their very own eyes.

“You… you broke your golfclub…” Ewen points out. Rez looks down and true to his words, his golfclub isn’t just broken, but shattered. The head is nowhere to be found, replaced by shrapnel scattered around them. The same fate is also shared by Zver’s club.

Everyone is in disbelief.

Realizing that they’ve accidentally gone too far, Rez offers a not so convincing nervous chuckle.

“S-Sorry, just umm… a huge gust of wind helped us both.” He explains, though internally, he could tell Zver’s gritting his teeth in annoyance.

“You really couldn’t say something more convincing, can you?” Are the words left unspoken by the man.

Regardless, Rez offers to pay for the damage they’ve caused, a sentiment shared by Zver of course.

As they pack up, they’re quickly swarmed by everyone, with them asking mostly about their prowess and tips and tricks, just like what they’ve warned about earlier.

“Sorry, sorry, but we really have to go.” Anya apologizes. “But I guess one of the secrets is to just keep practicing a good posture and maximize your strength when the head is already halfway through the swing. And of course, maintain physical health.” She gives a quick answer but as usual, the public isn’t satisfied with just a simple answer like that.

As they return the golf clubs (along with paying the broken drivers), they make a quick call to Jeeves and within ten minutes, they’re off to go back home.

“Speaking of which, would you guys mind to have dinner with us tonight?”

~

20:41:38…

“Whoa! That’s so cool!” Dawn’s young mind is blown with amazement. The Forgers Residence is way more packed than usual, all thanks to Anya’s earlier suggestion of her best friends to have dinner with them. Of course, they wouldn’t refuse such generous offer.

However, what Anya did not anticipate, is that the addition of Melinda, Demetrius, Melissa, and last but not least, Jeeves himself.

“Anya, we’re seriously jam packed here.” Loid grumbles. “Why can’t we go somewhere else much roomier than our home? I’m sure Melinda has an apartment bigger than ours in Berlint.”

“That’s because your apartment feels like home dear.” Melinda replies, giggling at his frustration for the sudden unexpected visitations. “My apartment in Berlint may be bigger and roomier than yours, but I don’t visit it often and due to that, I feel loved here.” She smiles.

“Well, they say home is where the heart is. Since the heart of your home is your family and friends, I suppose that bringing all of us over there would make it a temporary home, no?”

“Are you suggesting us to haul all those food and drinks over there so we could eat dinner at my apartment?”

“Nevermind. Forget what I just said.”

Anya shares another laughter with Melinda, who enjoys the sudden realization Loid just received. It does sound silly.

“Silly Papa. Why don’t you help Uncle Franky and Yuri? They look like they’re about to have another shouting match on how to do those ribs.” Anya points out. “Alright, alright. Off you go dear.” Loid kisses the top of her head before sending her away.

One thing her Papa’s right about, is how packed it is. With so much people crammed into her home, it does make traversing around the apartment slightly more difficult than usual.

Melinda is sitting beside Melissa, both are quite entertained by Damian, Demetrius, and Jeeves playing poker.

Yor is giving Bond his dinner before joining Sylvia and Fiona to have a small lazy chat with them.

Loid, Franky, and Yuri are busy in the kitchen trying their best to coordinate the chaos ensuing.

Becky, Ewen, and Emile are still busy talking about their recent golf game, with Becky staring daggers at them whenever they bring up Becky’s little blunder earlier.

A brief flash of memory displayed right before her. Fifteen years ago, the Forger family, a father and mother, a daughter, and a dog as a pet.

How far her once small family grew into something as big as this. A small emotional smile blooms on her lips. Never in a million years it would evolve into something like this.

Truly a once in a lifetime experience.

“Big sis Anya! Come here! This is so cool!” Dawn waves at her, the mish mashed eyes of her younger sister sparkling with wonder.

“Alright, alright. I’m coming.” Anya exhales lightly, trudging slowly to their spot, which is laying on the floor in front of the TV. Her favorite show Bondman is playing, a long running TV series that got her even more hooked into the world of espionage more than a decade ago.

“Oh? What is this Rez?” Anya points out at a glowing rectangular device held by Rez and Zver. It looks odd, and one side is completely covered with a screen, just like the TV playing beside them.

“Oh this?’ Rez flips the device in his palm. “This Anya, is a phone. A smartphone to be exact.”

“Wait, what? Hold on now I’m curious.” Becky scrambles to have a seat near Anya, eyes glued curiously at the unknown technology.

“Wait, say that again? Smartphone? You mean cellphone right? Like this?” Becky pulls up her phone, a black Motorello[6] MicroTAC 9800X.

“Yes and no. Yes, it’s like that, and no, it’s not a cellphone. Well technically it is, but smartphone is a more advanced mobile phone.” Rez explains. Becky tilts her head in confusion. “I don’t understand? Why is it called a smartphone when it’s a cellphone?”

“Well Becky, that’s because it’s more than just a simple device to make and receive a call, which is what your phone is currently capable of, right?”

“Yeah…”

“You see, while with your current technological advancements only allow you to make and receive calls, this smartphone that I have, are no longer bound to such function. It has become diverse. As in, there are more features in it than just simple call function.”

Rez shows her what he’s talking about by turning on his phone again, the screen flashes briefly before retaining its glow.

“Look sis look! You can touch it!” Dawn squeals. She presses random numbers on the screen and presses the arrow button which of course, doesn’t unlock the phone.

Amazement written on Anya and Becky’s faces. “W-Wait what? you… no physical buttons?” Becky asks. “Well, mostly no. But we still retain some, like these ones.” Rez shows a singular button on the left side of the phone and two buttons on the right.

“The single button is for turning on and off your phone, and the two buttons on the right are for volume control. Oh and if you press the single button and the lower button at the same time, it can take a screenshot.”

“What’s a screenshot?” Anya asks. By now, everyone begins to catch on what’s going on.

“It’s a function to capture whatever’s being displayed on the screen at that moment. Think of it as you taking a picture of what’s on your TV right now with a camera but instead of using another source of device, you basically use that TV to do it.”

Becky and Anya are looking at each other, still confused while Dawn and Faye are pretty much entranced by the scientific-ish explanations.

“Can I try?” Becky asks. “Sure thing, here you go.” Rez unlocks his phone and hands it over to Becky. Immediately, Anya huddles up closer to Becky while Dawn and Faye are taking their seats in their lap respectively.

The background is a simple one, dark main theme with the Milky Way galaxy taking most of the screen. There’s a digital clock nearing the top of the screen and several unrecognizable symbols on the very top of it, though it’s extremely small in comparison to the size of the numbers of the clock.

There are also several icons taking the majority of the lower section of the screen.

All in all, it’s extremely alien to them.

“You can swipe to the sides and up and down. Swiping to the sides will bring you to the next and previous page while up and down will show and hide the entire list of applications installed in the phone.

Heeding his words, Becky does exactly that, and to her surprise, it does bring her to new pages and when she scrolls down, a comprehensive list of applications pops up alphabetically.

“That’s an interesting device you have there, mind telling us more?” Melissa asks, with Melinda nodding eagerly as the boys who’re playing poker now stealing glances to the growing conversation.

“Of course, we’re more than happy to.” Zver acquiesces, handing Melissa his own phone. “Back to basics. Yes we can make and receive calls like your phone does but we can also do something more. The technology this phone has allows it to make a video call.”

“Video call? So like a call but you can see people?”

“Exactly. We can have a live video feed, just like how CCTV works. We’re able to see and hear them at the same time.”

“That’s amazing! Can you show us now?”

Zver lets out a laugh, which confuses everyone.

“Something funny?” Melissa asks, slightly offended. Zver waves his hand dismissively. “No, no. Sorry, I didn’t mean to laugh at you or your question. It’s just… unfortunately, with your current technological capabilities, I fear it would be downright impossible to do.”

“What’s wrong with our technology?”

“Well, first of all, this phone that me and Rez have, usually use 6G on daily basis, though we do still allow less advanced ones such as 5G, 4G and 3G. And I believe, from what I’ve seen so far, you’re very near in reaching 2G right?”

“That’s correct. I’ve heard talks about it from researchers I encountered not too long ago.” Demetrius adds in, now invested in the conversation. An ambitious man with ever present hunger for new information and knowledge and by the looks of it, he just found another gold mine.

“And currently, you’re still relying heavily on 1G network. Give a couple of years then you’ll switch to the newly introduced 2G network. However, it is still not enough to maintain adequate stability to a video call, especially if you want the resolution to be as good as possible, almost as if you’re with them face to face.”

Demetrius mulls, but then a bright idea comes into his mind.

“What if we borrow your phone and reverse engineer things from it?”

“Still won’t be an easy task.”

“But better than nothing.”

“I understand that this could have a massive positive impact to human society, and should you become the first one to acquire such high tech feature, I have no doubt you could become the richest man in the world that owns the most valuable company in the world as well. However, it is not that simple unfortunately.” Zver says.

Demetrius hums. “Explain further please.”

“It is not as simple as knowing. You also need to be able to implement it and make it widespread. What good is this phone when there’s nothing that can support it? Anya, Becky, do you see any number or letter beside the icon that looks like a staircase?”

Anya quickly finds it.

“Staircase… no. We don’t see anything.” Anya answers. “There it is. Our phone is highly advanced and yet, when there’s no complimenting technology to support it, it becomes near useless.”

“It would take hundreds of billions, if not trillions of dalc to make the technology not only a reality, but also feasible, sustainable, and of course, affordable to the average people. You’ll have to build new towers, figure out the transmission, finding the pieces to assemble a phone like this, mass produce it at a low cost so everyone can afford it, so on and so forth.”

Demetrius sighs, knowing how much investment needed to be spent to make it available. No sane investors, be it individuals or companies would be willing to lend such extraordinary amount of money.

Hell, from Zver’s words, he probably need more than the annual GDP of Ostania and Westalis combined to get the project going.

“Well… that’s a shame…” He grumbles.

“Easy Demetrius. Slowly but surely, you’ll get there. It’s fine. Don’t overthink it. Live in the present to the fullest is way better.” Rez tries to humor him.

“So umm… what else can you do with this thing?” Anya asks. “Ah! I know something that’ll be fun. Here, let me have it.” Rez asks his phone back. Becky gives it immediately, as Rez fiddles around with it briefly before telling them something.

“I want you all to smile, and hold it for ten seconds. Start now.”

Anya, Becky, Dawn, and Faye quickly give him the biggest and brightest smile they could produce. Rez flips the phone around and to their surprise, they could see themselves clearly on the screen, with a countdown going from ten to zero.

“Better make sure to have the best pose you can do.” Rez reminds them. Becky and Anya decide to do a simple V sign with their right hand while Dawn and Faye are hugging each other.

The phone releases an audible click sound and the group could see the screen becomes dark briefly before returning to normal. Rez looks at it for a bit and nods his head. “Perfect, this should do well.”

He then gives the phone back to Anya. “What just happened was I took a photo of you. You see the four round glasses on the back of the phone? That’s the camera. There’s also one more on the front that also functions as a camera. I used the latter to take that picture.”

The four gazes to the phone screen, enraptured by how detailed the picture is. “Pinch the screen with two fingers outward to zoom in and inward to zoom out. See how detailed it is?”

Anya does so and she could see that the phone not only captured them and Rez in a picture, but also made sure that it captured everything in great details. She zooms in and could see some of the strands of hair and she could even see the mugs on the table behind them and still able to discern the flowery pattern on it clearly.

“Wow, even with the best camera in the market we have at the moment won’t be able to do this.” Anya confesses. While CROWS does have access to cameras with incredible resolution that rivals or even better than this one (probably), it’s ridiculously massive compared to this portable, lightweight device called smartphone.

It’s like placing an elephant and an ant side by side.

The wonders of technology…

“And if you look at the bottom, you can swipe to the word that says ‘Video’ to take a recording. There’s also a function called Panoramic which could take a picture in 360 degrees.”

Wait what?

“Wait, say that again?” Demetrius asks him to repeat. “Yup, like I said, three hundred and sixty degrees photo. Here, let me show you how. I want all of you to stay still for a couple of seconds okay?”

Rez stands up and starts rotating around slowly, eyes glued and focused to his phone screen. After a couple more seconds, he stops and sits back down.

“Here, I got it. Note that due to Loid, Franky and Yuri are still busy in the kitchen, they’ll look either blurry, stretched, or deformed.” Rez says. He passes it to Anya’s group, before Anya passes it to Damian and then everyone else in the room before returning it back to Rez.

“That’s amazing… you could take a picture of your surrounding in one shot instead of stitching them back together later from multiple pictures.” Sylvia comments.

“How powerful is your phone? Surely to be able to do something like those require incredible amount of power.”

“It does, and put simply, definitely more powerful than the most powerful computer you have right now. Put into perspective, your most powerful supercomputer right now, if you have a thousand of them, you lined them up neatly, and make them work together into a cluster of supercomputers, and you pit it against one of our phones, it is still incapable of reaching one tenth of this phone’s processing power.”

To say that everyone’s shocked would be a massive understatement. A device that small and that lightweight, easily defeats the best tech they currently have.

“If we could convert that phone into something CROWS could use, I doubt anyone would be willing to mess with us.” Sylvia notes.

“That is very much true, but, again, as we mentioned before. Technology continues to improve and evolve. Right now, yes, our phone is the best piece of technology one could have, in this era. However, in a couple of decades from now, if you say this phone can beat any supercomputer of that era, everyone would laugh at you.” Zver says.

“Right now, it may be a slow progress. But there will be a time where suddenly everything accelerates and you can barely keep up at that point. New things being discovered left and right. Inventions popping off everywhere. Just like how Industrial Revolution changed the world.”

Everyone nods in agreement. Industrial Revolution definitely revolutionized the world they’re living significantly, setting a new course for the history of mankind.

“But still, even with all of these fancy things we have in this phone, there’s still one thing we all love to do with it.”

Rez clicks something on the phone and an audible sound of upbeat music comes blaring from the phone’s speaker.

To everyone’s surprise, Zver starts laughing and smacks him hard in the back.

“You’ve got to be kidding right? I thought you already uninstalled it?” His right hand holding his stomach, still laughing hard from the sudden revelation. “Well, I mean, I got bored okay? Just shut up.” Rez grumbles.

“You really are the embodiment of the word ‘casual gamer mom’ with that game. You’re playing Candy Crush, I can’t believe it.” Zver howls.

“Funny you say that, considering that I saw not too long ago that you’re already at level ten thousand and three hundred and ninety four in Candy Crush. Whatever happened to the ‘I Uninstalled Candy Crush So I Can Fous On Asphalt 14’ sentence you uttered? Because previously, prior to me finding out about that, you were only at level nine thousand and five and that was only eight months before I found out about your new high level.” Rez smirks.

“I modded the game. I wanted to see what happened after level ten thousand.”

“Mhm, sure you do.”

Zver grumbles, but regardless, he pulls his own game, which is Asphalt 14.

“Here you go. This is called a mobile game. It’s a video game that’s available to play on your phone.” Rez hands over the phone to Dawn, who’s more than eager to have a try of the Candy Crush game Rez talks about.

“It’s a simple match three game Dawn. Which means you have to match at least three exact same color and shape to make it disappear. There are also powerups to enhance the gameplay. I’m sure you can pick it up very soon.” He grins.

Dawn and Faye are working like a well oiled machine, their small fingers touching the screen as loud noises of the game envelopes the room.

“Wait what the hell? Are these actually games or just an extremely interactive movie?” Damian asks, holding Zver’s phone as he hovers over the main menu of the racing game. He could see that he’s rich, more than rich actually. There are two counters, which he deduces are the currencies for the game.

“You… You have all of them? You owned all of them?! Over one thousand cars?!” Damian exclaims.

“Yup, I grinded a lot of them but some, especially the exclusive ones, I just bought it instantly with premium currency.”

“Premium currency?”

“You see that counter on the right, with all the big numbers?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s called premium currency. You mostly get them via purchasing them from in game store with real money. With premium currency, you can practically buy everything the game has to offer and boosts up your progress incredibly the more you spend. So if you’ve just downloaded and played the game right now, but because you’re a Desmond, no offense, you can spend a generous amount of money and immediately get all the best stuffs the game has to offer.”

Damian and Demetrius are glued to the screen, eyes focused on scrolling on the vehicle selection screen. They could recognize some of the vehicles name though interestingly they are mostly slightly altered from the ones they know. But of course, the main focus for the two siblings are the names of vehicles that don’t exist. Yet.

“Video games? I am too old for that. Poor old me wouldn’t be able to play complex video games. It’s too much. I’d rather do some gardening or reading a book.” Melinda sighs.

Zver nods in understanding. “Don’t you worry Melinda. I’m sure Candy Crush would be the perfect game for you. It’s simple, easy to understand, though if you don’t keep yourself restrained, it could turn into addiction. Trust me, I know.”

Melinda scoffs. “Then I don’t want to get addicted to this thing called video game.”

“Ah, that’s true, but I bet you won’t say the same if I tell you that you can also get addicted reading E-books.”

Melinda’s eyes quickly find Zver’s own, wide in curiosity.

“Excuse me, care to repeat that again.”

“E-book Melinda.”

“What’s an E-book?”

“Like the name suggests, it’s a book, but electronic. Digital is the better term for it. It means that any book that you love to read, is available to be read on your phone as a digital literature. So for example, instead of bringing several books that you love everywhere, which of course could become a hassle, all of those could be easily stored digitally in your phone. Even if you have ten, one hundred, a thousand, or even more that you’d like to read and carry around, you can store all of it inside it.”

Melinda’s eyes are twinkling with something that Zver finds amusing. The prospect of having thousands of reading material in the palm of your hands is too good to be true.

“So you’re saying that, it can also store more than just books as well?” Sylvia questions.

“Yup. Those stacks of papers I’ve always seen you get surrounded with, could easily be converted into digital papers so you can allocate the space on the table for something else.”

“But your phones, aren’t they a bit too small compared to A4 papers like these ones? Wouldn’t that give you a headache if you were to stare to a bright screen for too long?” Sylvia asks.

Zver nods his head. “Of course, however, we have a solution for it. Well… two solutions.” The man turns his head onto Rez.

“Hey Rez, do you still have your tablet around?”

“Of course, why?”

“Let’s borrow mine and yours for the ladies.”

“Sure thing.”

The pair produces what looks like an upscaled, bigger version of the so called smartphones. It’s definitely bigger, and from Fiona’s guesstimation, it’s definitely bigger than their face if compared side by side.

“Here you go. This is called a tablet.” Rez hands Melinda his tablet while Zver hands it over to Sylvia. Yor gets the best of both as she’s located between them. To say that everyone’s highly curious would be understandable. Their eyes twinkling with wonder and curiosity, trying to figure out what exactly this ‘tablet’ is.

“Put simply, tablet is like an oversized smartphone, which offers more powerful specifications. But of course, this also means it’ll be bigger and heavier than smartphones but thanks to technological advances, the ones you’re holding now, is less than half a kilogram.”

“It’s really big too…” Yor chimes.

“That’s true. What you have at the moment is a 16 inch wide screen. It’s definitely big. Which means you can view anything on it easier.”

Sylvia sees the ‘Swipe up to unlock’ message and does exactly that, with the lockscreen quickly removed and now showing her the home screen.

“Swipe to the right. You see an app with the icon of an opened book? Tap it.”

Rez is instructing Sylvia’s group while Zver’s handling Melinda’s. Upon tapping the icon, it brings them to a new place, which offers several reading material. They’re highly impressed with how sleek and user friendly the design is.

“You may now see that the app is mostly dark right?” They all nod in unison. “Tap the gear icon, it’s called Settings and you can customize the app however you like, as long as it allows it.”

Fiona taps the gear icon and it brings another menu, no doubt the customization menu of the app.

“You see the Appearance option, tap it and you can see that the theme of the app is currently has Dark mode selected. There are also several more modes, such as Light, Gray, Afternoon, Dawn, and more. Light is the app’s default theme and if you enable it, fair warning, if not wary, could literally flashbang you.”

Curious, Fiona selects the Light mode, and true to Rez’s words, the screen, once dark and nice to look at, suddenly becomes way brighter by several magnitudes.

“Ow my eyes!” Yor shrieks, shielding her eyes from the sudden visual attack. Rez is laughing at their mistake while Sylvia is sighing in slight annoyance at Fiona.

“Sorry… I just wanted to know.” Fiona mumbles. Sylvia selects the Dark mode and all is well once again in the world.

“So now you know why we put it in Dark mode. That mode is quite nice isn’t it? Because it’s designed so that it won’t hurt your eyes if you’re staring at a screen for a prolonged time and a significant help if you want to read at night. Makes your eyes less weary in the morning. But of course, that doesn’t mean you can spend the rest of the night just staring at it. Irritation would always be a possibility, which would only grow the longer you spend on the gadget.”

“Oh my! I know this novel! It is one of my favorite! But why’s the writer’s name slightly altered?” Melinda slightly jumping in her seat. “Do you read this too?” The mother of Damian and Demetrius asks.

“Well, no. I think a friend of mine put it in there as a prank. Trying to frame me as someone who’s highly lovey dovey and romantic.” Zver answers.

“Well… I don’t know about-“

“You shut your mouth.”

Yor on the other hand, is still wondering about something else.

“You mentioned before that you can convert these physical papers to digital ones, can you show us how to do it?” Yor asks. “Good question, here, let me do it for you.”

Rez is handed over his tablet, while instructing Sylvia to take a paper from one of the stacks.

“Okay, now lift it up. Slightly higher, there you go. Ah! A bit to the left please? That’s it, perfect! Hold it for a moment, okay?”

A loud beep sound comes out from the tablet a few seconds later, with Rez hurriedly turning himself around so they could see what’s going on.

“I took a picture, or rather, I scanned what’s on the paper using the scan function built in into the application. And right now, it’s processing it. The progress bar in the middle of the screen shows how much the tablet has processed. It should be done in a few moments.”

The content of the chosen paper soon appears as a digital document, completely identical to the physical one down to the punctuations. It’s a perfect copy.

“Incredible, this is stunning…” Sylvia sighs. This could’ve been something that would help her tremendously. No longer she’s required to have literal mountains made out of paper invading her desk. All she needs to do is to have them stored in one of these phones or tablets and she’s good to go.

It’ll save a lot of paper and of course, space in her desk and office. Portability and accessibility also play an important role. She doesn’t have to carry those wobbly stacks around with the danger of falling down and making a huge mess, and at the same time she doesn’t have to reprint everything she needs if she forgets to bring it along with her.

All of it, safe and secure inside this wonderful piece of technology.

“Oh come on! What was that Demmy?! You’re such an awful driver! No wonder Melissa’s the one drives the most.” Damian groans, a loud crashing noise that’s awfully similar to a car impacting something hard blares from the phone speaker.

“The control’s highly sensitive, not my fault the car’s extremely responsive.” Demetrius deadpans.

“Didn’t you hear what Rez and Zver says?! Go to Settings and change the controls to your liking! You’re not used to his settings that’s why you’re crashing nearly at every turn.”

“I just need more practice, that’s all.”

“Jeeves, please give this idiot a wake up call.”

Ewen and Emile are watching from behind, again laughing as Demetrius crashes against several barrels filled with water. The car respawns, completely looks brand new even though it was nearly sliced in half moments ago.

“Alright that’s it, you’ve had your fun, lemme try.” Damian grumbles, snatching the phone away from Demetrius, earning his ire. “So much for common courtesy little brother.” He glares. “Common courtesy is thrown out of the window when it encounters exceptional stupidity in the likes of yours.” Damian snickers.

He goes to the settings and this making sure that he’s as comfortable as possible with his desired settings.

Once he feels it’s good enough, he restarts the race.

“Now watch and learn big dumb brother.” He cackles, pressing the gas pedal icon as the car goes zooming across the streets of a city called Venice.

Damian keeps his words, capable of driving the car way better than Demetrius did. Unfortunately, he doesn’t win, barely winning first place as one of the bot opponents – whom Rez explains is an artificial intelligence that’s made for the game and controlled by it to mimic the appearance of other human players in the game – snatches the win by several milliseconds.

“You didn’t win.” Demetrius points out.

“And I crashed ten times less than you did.”

“YES! We won Faye!” Dawn squeals, both gifted children finished yet another level of a game they found after they got bored of Candy Crush. The game’s called Angry Birds Evolution and they really like the aesthetics of the game. It’s cartoonish but it makes itself charming in its own ways from it.

They’ve split the team in two, with Anya teaming up with Becky and Dawn with Faye. Together, they try to beat a level, and once they’ve beaten a level, they give the phone to the other team. The one with the most wins will get a treat from the losing team.

And so far, Faye and Dawn have been in the lead, by approximately eight to five.

Melinda and Melissa are giggling to themselves, engrossed with the novel they’re currently watching. Yor has her head planted on Melinda’s shoulder, she too, interested in the choice of literature of Melinda.

Jeeves, much to the surprise of everyone, is capable to get himself acquainted with the racing game. He also nearly beats Damian, but unfortunately, he’s struck by a bot and spins lightly, allowing the bot to take the advantage and wins the race. But still, Damian isn’t off the hook as Demetrius is making sure he knows that Jeeves nearly beats him and is better than him in the game.

“Alright, it was fun and all but let’s get the dinner going yeah? This is the last batch! Careful, hot stuff!” Franky loudly announces everyone that dinner’s about to start while carrying the last plate from the kitchen.

Everyone eagerly grabs their own plate, while at the same time, Franky not so subtly grabs both Rez and Zver by the shoulders and pull them away from the crowd.

“I have a business proposal for you two.”

“And that is?”

“Can you explain to me everything about those things they’re playing with? I would like to make a breakthrough, a massive one using inventions reverse engineered from those smartphones. If it becomes successful, you two can have a quarter of my company’s share for each of you.”

“How about no?”

Franky’s eyes, once shining with dalc symbols, dies a sudden death.

“Oh come on! Pretty please? How about thirty percent for each of you? That’s sixty and I no longer have the majority of the company’s share!”

“You still have forty by the way.”

“That’s not the case! You guys are two against me alone. Sixty against forty!”

“Relax Franky. We’ll tell you a lot but let’s discuss it over dinner. Loid’s grumbling while Yuri’s about to skewer you with that fork in his hand.” Rez chuckles, patting roughly Franky’s back.

Dinner is a pleasant event. Everyone’s enjoying the food served on the table but also, at the same time, using the knowledge imparted by Rez and Zver, they’re taking multiple pictures with different poses and record several videos.

Loid, Franky, and Yuri are asking numerous questions, as they were unable to get themselves quite involved in the conversation beforehand due to the tasks they had in the kitchen.

They are amazed, bewildered, and fascinated.

Once dinner’s over, everyone retreats once more, with Anya and Becky watching Dawn and Faye playing several more games while Sylvia and Fiona are busy figuring out the ability to translate the documents that’re scanned to other languages.

The boys are still having a little competition among themselves, still eager to prove that they’re decent at the racing game.

Melinda, Melissa, and Yor are having the time of their lives, realizing that there’s an app that could alter and modify pictures to their own liking.

“So how long until we can finally get these available to buy?” Dawn looks up to Rez, eyes full of hope. “Well…” Rez trails, trying to find the best way to break the news to her. “Assuming you’re undergoing the same pace as me and Zver did… I’d say at the very least, fifteen to twenty years from now, or maybe twenty five years.”

Dawn’s hopeful gaze crashes down in a disappointed flame.

“But that’s so long! Me and Faye are going to be in our twenties! Big bro and big sis gonna be in their thirties and Papa and Mama… every one else…” She grows sad. A soft gentle look graces Rez’s eyes.

He pats her head supportively. “I’m sorry, but it’s the truth. But believe me Dawn, once you’ve reached that stage, you’ll find yourself become highly nostalgic of the world you’re living in right now. A world where technology is still growing and causing great excitement to everyone. A world where technology hasn’t completely grasped everyone in its control.”

Dawn tilts her head, not understanding what that truly means.

“Don’t think too much of it, you’ll understand when the time comes. But for now, how about we play some more games? I believe you’d like the game Minecraft.”

“That sounds interesting! Let’s go play it!”

However, slowly but surely, everyone grows tired and soon, the Forgers Residence falls to a quiet sleep.

~

Deciding that tossing and turning around for the past five minutes isn’t going to make him able to sleep, Loid goes up from his spot and stretches his joints.

A few satisfying pops later, he begins making his way out of the room, carefully not making too much sound lest he wakes up his slumbering wife.

Becky, Ewen, and Emile went home with Jeeves driving them back, while Melinda, still wanting to spend more time with her eldest son, came with Demetrius and Melissa to one of their apartments in Berlint that’s only fifteen minutes away.

Everyone’s asleep, only necessary lights kept turned on. Zver could be seen sprawled on one of the couches, snoring lightly, completely immersed in his dream world.

However, Rez’s nowhere to be seen.

And his answer comes soon after.

“It’s 11 at night. Can’t sleep?” Rez’s voice cuts through the air audibly. Loid steps outside to the balcony, seeing Rez leaning against the railing, gazing to the night landscape of Berlint. In his right hand, there’s a leather bound notebook, a surprise considering the advanced tech they showcased earlier.

Loid thought it has become old fashioned and phased out in favor of one of those devices.

“Didn’t know you still have one of those. What’s the story behind it?” Loid strikes a conversation, which answered with a chuckle at first.

“I know you might be thinking that with all those fancy technologies we have, it’s not wrong to assume that we no longer have use of the quote on quote, old and outdated stuffs like paper based notebooks. Truth to be told, they’re still popular and in demand, as we have a generous amounts of companies producing papers and books like these.”

“Any particular reason as to why they’re still in favor with society?”

“Well, I guess because it’s just… different. Yes, it is easier and more convenient to write and keep all the important notes and memos in your phone, but there’s just something alluring and relaxing when you pick up a pencil or a pen and write it on a book. The smell of a freshly produced paper also a nice touch.”

Loid smiles, knowing that he’s still enjoying some of the old ways despite the rapidly changing and digitalized world.

“You haven’t answered my question though.”

“Oh sorry. I don’t know. I’ve tossed and turned so many times but my body and mind refuse to let me sleep.” He confesses.

Rez hums, the air around them falling to silence once more. Not truly awkward but something’s definitely amiss. The sparkling lights from Berlint is a sight to behold, joined by the stars at the night sky.

“I understand if you’re still suspicious of me and Zver. That’s probably why you’re unable to sleep. Your mind is keeping you alert still, not wanting something bad happening to your family and friends.”

Loid snaps his head, not expecting such assumption.

“That’s not-“

“Easy, I’m not accusing, just trying to give you an explanation. That’s all.”

Loid concedes, nodding his head.

“Did you have fun?”

“Today? Oh yes, we did. We escorted Dawn and Faye, talked to one of Damian and Anya’s teachers, met their friends and families and became their acquaintances as well, visited a lot of places. It was nice.”

“That’s good to hear.” Loid sighs contently.

He leans over, a few feet away from Rez.

“I’m sorry.”

“Whatever for?”

“For breaking the news to everyone, about what I dreamed the other night.”

“Don’t be. It’s the right thing to do. You can’t trust someone that falls into your life and quickly becoming your friend that easily. Not saying you should be suspicious of everyone doing the same but considering mine and Zver’s circ*mstances, I think it’s the right choice.”

Loid is thankful they’re highly understanding. A big weight lifted from his chest simply like that. He could breathe freely again.

Yasuharu Takanashi - Friends

“Don’t think too much of it. Let it go. We hold no grudge against you.”

“That’s kind of you to say.”

“Kindness will get you far, especially in a world where peace must be maintained.”

Loid glances over to the man, smiling as he lets his eyes roam into the night sky. The red eyes glowing dimly against it.

“It’s beautiful.”

“What is?”

“The galaxy above us. Hundreds of millions of stars in our galaxy, which itself is already a cosmic marvel, but still nothing compared to the trillions of galaxies out in the observable universe. Whenever you ponder into the night sky, it makes you wonder, that despite everything that’s happening in the world, on this planet, it’s incredibly tiny and irrelevant to the grand scheme of things. It’s a humbling view.”

Loid looks up. while light pollution is slowly growing, they’re still lucky enough to be able to enjoy it every night.

“Do you… ever get tired? Of fighting?”

“Why’s that?”

“You said it yourself, no? Even if we triumph over evil a million times, we only win here, on earth. We’re not out there, fighting on a cosmic scale, waging war against evil through the universe, one galaxy at a time. We’re not even fighting for our nearest planet in the solar system. What difference does it make if we do or don’t fight.”

“You’re right. It doesn’t matter.”

Loid looks at him perplexed. How come he could agree so easily?!

“Heh, I knew it would get a rise out of you.” Rez chuckles. He leans against the railing once again, this time however, uses his left hand to support his chin, leaning his weight into it slightly.

“What you said is true, Loid. A million, billion, trillion wins against the forces of evil on earth, consecutively if we could, is nothing compared if we look at it through the lens of the universe. We’re like a grain of sand upon a vast beach that stretches for kilometers.”

“However, it is our duty to do what’s right, as insignificant as it may be. Most of us won’t even make a massive change that’re noticeable by anyone in our lifetime. But that doesn’t mean we’re supposed to just lay down and do nothing right? I am not going to change anything so why should I do something?”

He sighs.

“However, that’s only me. But imagine if ten more people follow the thing I do? Or a hundred? A thousand? A million? It sure does make a significant change, a noticeable one.”

“That’s the reason why we fight, Loid. You, Yor, Fiona, even your daughter Anya, and more. You alone may not be able to save the world, but together, we can do it.”

He leans his head up, gazing into the cosmos once again.

“I do get tired sometimes, wondering when we can lay down our arms and put an end in this fight. But… evil will always find a place to bloom and flourish. Again, like I said previously, if it’s only me that don’t fight it, then it won’t make a difference. But all of us, and with countless others out there, collectively agree to stand down and let evil consume everything, then yes, put simply, we’re f*cked.”

Loid chuckles, not expecting him to throw an explicit language out of the blue just like that.

“But personally, I am proud of it. Yes, I do get tired sometimes. Yes, sometimes I’d like to wind down, but at the end of the day, it’s what I’d do. For the people I love, for the causes that’re just. My contribution alone may not be noticeable, but with me, Zver, and everyone else, we are capable to make a change. A change for a chance to have a better tomorrow.”

Loid shakes his head in levity. Such heavy words coming out from his mouth at this time of the day. He sounds an old wise man you’d meet at the park by the bench, casually spewing out some of the best life lessons one can have for free.

“You’re something else you know that?”

Rez laughs at the compliment. “Me and Zver get that a lot.”

“Thank you.” Loid thanks him. “For those words of encouragement. We’re still unable to get any info of them and I’m beginning to grow restless.”

Rez’s demeanor changes instantly.

“Don’t you worry. Sooner or later, they’ll make their moves. Make sure CROWS have informed Interpoli to be on heightened alert and to relay any possible intel as quickly as possible.”

“I already did. They’re working on it.”

“Good, that’s good.”

Rez grabs Loid by the shoulder, nearly causing his instinct to kick in but he stops himself at the last second.

“Since you can’t sleep, how about I make you a hot chocolate with torched marshmallow. I heard it’s quite effective to make you drowsy.”

“I am not a six years old kid you know.”

“Six years old, sixty years old, doesn’t matter. A hot chocolate in a chilly night like this is always welcomed. Besides, they do say that your body may grow old, but never let your soul grow old.”

“Stop spewing nonsense.”

“I’m being serious!” Rez laughs, making his way to the kitchen.

A mug of hot chocolate filled with dozens of torched marshmallows later, Loid is finally able to fall asleep soundly, stomach filled and warm with the sweet beverage.

A small smile graces his lips.

~

[1]. 1997 = 1982 Silver Spur Limousine. Please refer to the headcanon lore posted on Chapter 4.

[2]. Ross-Ramsey = Rolls-Royce.

[3]. Neubel Prize = Nobel Prize.

[4]. Olympos Games = Olympic Games.

[5]. Milani = Milan.

[6]. Motorello MicroTAC 9800X = Motorola MicroTAC 9800X.