Darkest Days

13, Full Force

"Yeah, yeah sure we do..." NextGen had blurted out with a blatantly angry tone.

He then turned to him. Silently.

"If you wanna give up on your life, just say it normally..." he murmured angrily under his breath. His head was fixated to NextGen's position. All of a sudden we saw Ari dissappear and she reappeared behind the man and stabbed him in the back of the head from the top of his head to his neck. "We don't need ya nonsense dude, just tell us where this 'Crow' guy is alright?" She says loudly, almost in a commanding tone.

When Ari took her katana out of his head, both sides of his head flopped in either directions and his brain was exposed for a second. Then all of a sudden both sides of his head and neck joined back together as if this was a normal commodity for him. "Shut up" he mumbled angrily as he put his head back together. Yeah, he put his fucking head back together.

"You know what, what if I told you... I am Crow?" He asked rather calmly with a tint of anger in his voice... we all suddenly froze and looked at him.

No one even. Dared. To move.

And then...

He disappeared...

"What the fuck was that?" NextGen shouted all of a sudden, breaking the silence. "Shut up, he could still be here" Ari replied, her face rather serious and so was her voice. Then all of a sudden an explosion from beneath us appeared and it blew everything below us to a crumbs. It took a huge chunck out of the building... and then I fell all the way down.

"W-wait what happened?!" I shouted, my face was painted with the expression of fear, I didn't bother hiding it anymore. What's the point? "The whole place is gonna collapse!!" Maki shouted while she also fell, but soon after she managed to catch me mid air and hold onto me from behind. As if she was using me as a sheild. Before I could splat into blood on the floor I managed to land with my aura emerging from my feet to my knees and causing a small crater to form beneath my legs. "We gotta get outta here! And we gotta catch his ass!" I shouted loudly as I let Maki go. I unseathed my katana and ran down the hole in the wall in front of me...

(NextGens pov)

I had no idea what happened or what was going on so I just jumped in place and then after the explosion I ran and stood behind Ari, she was the only one there who I knew was experienced other than Specter. Since Specter had fallen down the ditch I was just left with this tall lady, I had no slight idea who she was... all I knew was her name...

"U-uhmm... w-what now?" I mumbled quietly, looking down at the ditch in slight fear.

If I don't pull my bitch ass together I might end up like that

"Oh well, now we gotta call the rest of my team!" She exclaimed happily whilst jumping up once and then her eyes looked into mine for a moment.

"I just realised, you're shorter than me, heh" She says this with a happy face whilst looking at me. I just looked back at her with a face of fear...

Is she not taking this shit seriously or what?

"Okay, follow me! Oh and also just incase you're slow-- actually..." Her face had a bright look and her smile widened even more for a moment.

"Why don't you just get on my back? I'll do the running..." She says all of a sudden. I just looked at her now... not from fear but because I was completely caught off guard... I could feel my face heating up.

Isn't that something couples do or am I just thinking too much?

"U-umm...I-In...w-what...actually...n-nevermind... I'll j-just..." I couldn't find anything to say, I just stood there... kinda embarrassed. Then all of a sudden she turned around and crouched whilst putting her katana away. "Here, get on..." She said calmly, now it was as if she saw me as a friend.

"O-ok...then..." I replied quietly, almost muttering my words. I climbed onto her back and all of a sudden I could feel the heat on my face getting worse. Why am I blushing, stop it, it's not like I even know her so well...

For some reason I felt so calm when I was on her back though. I couldn't describe it. It was so strange to me because all my life I would be thrown around by others around me and I would be used by others, as if I were a tool...

I felt so calm and safe, it was like she was an older sibling to me. I could've just slept on her back I felt so calm.

Why? Why am I like this? What is this feeling?

I was about to close my eyes until...

"Alright then! We're here!" I heard her exclaim. I poked my head and placed my chin above her shoulder amd saw what seemed to be a strange metal door under what seemed to be a massive bridge with a river flowing right behind us. There was a scanner next to the door and Ari placed her hand and then the door suddenly opened up and she walked in...

(Specters pov)

I was running through a litteral hell hole, all I could see was destruction of the city ahead of me and beside me, Maki was also running. Her face though didn't have an expression...

"Hey Maki..." I called out to her.

"Yeah?" She replied quietly whilst still having the same expression and then she finally turned her head to me. "Sorry, I zoned out" She laughed slightly.

"That's fine but just tell me, how did you learn to control your aura so well?" I asked in a rather stern voice.

"Oh! I trained everyday, on my own. That's the way anime protagonists do it, right?" She said, rather mockingly and teasingly to me. Right after she chuckled and then all of a sudden her facial expression went serious.

Then she literally disappeared, before my very eyes and I stood still. She reappeared in front of me and had her katana covered in blood. Which only meant one thing.

What the hell... how is she doing all this, I'm such a bad teacher, I should've taught her all of this, but she ended up learning it on her own.

"Impressive, you learnt sensory so you can feel enemy presence from far away.." I say calmly, my face having a slight smile since I'm proud of her.

"Yeah, and now there's a big disturbance at south block, so let's go!" She replied, rather seriously as well, although this was her first S rank mission, she was doing great.

At some point though, we saw something very disturbing...