Rogue

Chapter 11

It was Wednesday afternoon and Tamakoma was completely empty except for three residents. Everyone was in school and those that weren't made themselves busy with work away from the branch. Rindo kept the door to his office locked, probably taking a nap at his desk without anyone knowing. On the other hand, Akira meandered throughout the branch in search of food. Jin had stopped supplying the girl with rice crackers because, according to him, "she would no longer be needing them", whatever that meant.

So, here she was with her hands shoved deep in the hoodie pockets of an obnoxiously bright pink hoodie that she had stolen from Izumi. She laughed about his love for it, considering it was atrocious with the magenta and blue plaid pattern, and stole it to spite him. But now the color meant she couldn't really walk around without being noticed.

Akira sauntered to the fridge, opening it for the hundredth time in the last hour as she begged for new snacks to appear out of thin air. She was honestly just bored and trying to make time go by faster. She sighed as she was again disappointed by her lack of options, not finding last night's curry appetizing at the moment.

Suddenly, she froze and her green eyes steeled as she felt a presence sneak up behind her. Is this a sneak attack? If so, why aren't they attacking? After waiting and realizing that this person was simply standing there, she stood up straight and closed the refrigerator door.

"What do you want," she narrowed her eyes, barely glancing over her shoulder to look at them, "chibi?"

Yuma stood in a similar stance, matching her brightly colored hoodie with his own purple one. He had a small grin on his face, for what, she couldn't tell. "Come to kill me?"

"We know the consequences of starting a fight with you, Enomoto-san." A black blob emerged from Kuga's back and morphed into an egg-shaped trion soldier. "I'm Replica, Yuma's chaperone. It's nice to meet you." The blonde fully turned around, leering at the autonomous trion soldier.

"Right," she arrogantly confirmed. "Because you know you'll lose."

"Correct." She crossed her arms, still not letting down her guard even though they claimed no harm.

"So?"

"We know a lot about you from our travels." Kuga and Akira locked eyes. "We also know just how smart you are." The woman cocked a brow at the small boy. "I want to make a deal."

"I'd like to hear my side first. What do I get out of it?"

"You can decide after agreeing to what we request." Her eyes narrowed a bit more at the trion soldier.

"I need your help restoring my real body," the white-haired boy revealed. "And I want you to bring my father back." He lifted his pale hand, showcasing the Black Trigger that his father had given his life for. "If anyone can do it, it's you." Akira sighed. She knew exactly how people became Black Triggers. She had watched her mother crumble right in front of her eyes.

"Sorry, kid." A frown settled on her pink lips. "Your dad's dust." Akira almost winced at the gruffness of her response. "If I do research and tests on you, I can probably figure out how to keep you from dying, but I doubt there's much I can do about your father. Even if I can draw his soul from your Black Trigger, at most, I can transfer it to an autonomous being." She tapped on Replica with her nail, the sound of metal reverberating through the room. "He'll be no more than another Replica.

"But, if that's what you want, then I can try."

Yuma tested her, trying to figure out if she was just saying what he wanted to hear. But, he found no lies in her statement and chose to put his faith in her. The boy nodded, willing to do anything to change things back to the way they were. He wanted to live again.