Dolls of the Red Zone(Girls Frontline)

Chapter 32 - An Honorable Fight

Ayako: So you said your interest was with M4, what do you want from her?

AK-12: We have been requested to retrieve her in the words of my commander.

Ayako: And that entails? Kidnapping her like you did Kimiko?

AK-12: You jest, we will upgrade her neural cloud per Persica's request, then regroup with Angelia and continue on with the rest of our original intent.

Ayako: You here for Elisa as well?

AK-12: We're here to prevent the KCCO from becoming a nuisance, if that involves Elisa's capture, so be it.

Ayako: Has she lied yet Kimiko?

Kimiko shakes her head, she certainly was a good judge to ask, albeit a bit skewed since AK-12 was her bondmate, but Ayako put faith into her as an ally nonetheless. 

AK-12: Why assume I lied to you? We are allies for now yes?

Ayako: For now blind woman, don't let it go to your head that you're playing with a real team now.

AK-12: 'Real team'? All I can see is a group of misfits that can't protect their own.

Ayako: I'll choose to ignore that, otherwise Persica might not like me as much anymore.

That could have been the end of the argument, everything could have been done and dusted, everything could have moved on. But that wasn't the type of person AK-12 was, she saw a jab and she went for it.

AK-12: Are you insinuating that you could beat me?

Ayako: I'm damn sure of it, want to test?

AK-12 smirked and those eyes opened again. If Kimiko was getting stared down she'd been frozen in place, no fight would be had, but Ayako certainly isn't Kimiko. She stared right back, eye to eye of DEFY's alpha, this certainly didn't look particularly safe to onlookers. 

Kimiko though knows when to step in, putting her hand on AK-12's shoulder a moment after their staring contest begins, and AK-12 backs down. Her eyes close again and her finger migrates back off the trigger of her rifle.

AK-12: You are oh so lucky your teammate is mine, otherwise we would have had pick parts up off the floor. Did you know that she isn't strong enough to prevent me from choking her out? We had quite the introduction.

Ayako: With all due respect to my teammate, Kimiko certainly isn't meant to be strong in a physical sense.

AK-12: I'm an EW doll too you know, if you want to see fear you should see how Kimiko looks at AK-15, she would've been far less inclined to stop this.

Ayako: Business.

AK-12: Very well then.

Ayako: You're upgrading M4 here and then we're all going together, I'm not leaving dolls behind.

AK-12: Admirable, then I can start the upgrade now if you want. 

Ayako: Get to it, I have words to share with Kimiko.

And so AK-12 moved over to M4's side and began whatever she was supposed to be doing, it didn't really matter to Ayako. What did matter though was Kimiko, what had happened to her to make her so different?

Ayako: Private?

Kimiko just nods, keeping her silence as long as she can. She isn't certain if she's going to get scolded or hugged, frankly she's more worried of the sheer amount of questions she is going to get.

So the two walk into a trench and sit down, there is a silence for a brief moment, just long enough for Kimiko to get even more anxious. But Ayako eventually speaks.