Red stamped down on the clutch and shifted gears, sending the Shelby surging harder through the storm as the engine roared beneath them and flames spat from the exhaust. The windshield wipers swept back and forth like a frantic metronome, scraping through the curtain of rain without ever quite clearing it, yet even through the miserable visibility he could still make out Raiko running ahead.
Blue lightning curled around her body in violent arcs, flashing against the blurred neon signs and amber streetlights until the whole city seemed to stretch into streaks of color around her. Red glanced down at the speedometer as the needle climbed through thirty, forty, then past fifty, and when he looked back toward Raiko only to see her still pulling away, his expression slowly went slack and his jaw dropped.
"Hey, partner," Red said, some of the color beginning to drain from his face as he shot Lightning a quick glance. "Tell me I ain't goin' crazy here, cause I really need ya to tell me this shit ain't actually happenin'."
Lightning gave him no answer, her sapphire eyes remaining fixed on the impossible sight ahead. Neither of them could quite bring themselves to accept what they were seeing, because Raiko was not merely keeping pace with the Shelby but actively outpacing it while they were already moving at speeds that defied everything either of them understood about an uma's physical limits.
Red shot Lightning another glance, one eyebrow lifting as he finally took in the bruising along her face and the swelling near her jaw. "By the way, what the hell happened to ya?" he asked. "Last time I saw ya this banged up was back when we were rookies."
"Nightingale," Lightning replied with a scowl, massaging the side of her jaw as if the name itself made it ache more.
Red barked out a laugh and shook his head. "No shit? Ya let Deschain's new trainee work yer tail over? God, that's hilarious. I would've paid good money to see the look on yer face when she landed the first one."
"I underestimated her, okay?" Lightning snapped, shooting him an irritated look before turning back toward the road. "Turns out running isn't the only thing Logan taught her. I hate admitting it, but she knows how to throw a damned punch, and she caught me off guard more than once." Her expression tightened as she rubbed her jaw again. "Won't happen twice."
Red's grin lingered for another moment before slowly fading, his amusement giving way to something far more serious. "Ya didn't do what I think ya did, did ya?"
Lightning's expression shifted almost imperceptibly as she looked toward him. "What? No, of course not." Her eyes hardened again, though the hesitation behind them remained just noticeable enough to make the answer feel less certain than she intended. "You know me, Red."
Red didn't reply. Instead, he stared at the shrinking distance for another moment before a nervous grin crept across his face, and without taking his eyes from the road for long, he reached toward the center console and tapped a recessed button beside the main display.
"Well, never thought I'd actually have to use this outside a test run," Red muttered, his grin turning decidedly uneasy. "But if there was ever a time to find out whether I flushed my whole ass retirement fund down the freakin' drain, guess this is it."
Lightning raised an eyebrow as she looked toward him. "Why do I already hate the way you said that?"
A mechanical whir answered her before Red could. The main screen lifted smoothly out of its compartment, revealing a hidden switchboard beneath it that looked more at home inside military hardware than a street car, complete with rows of steel toggles, indicator lights, and four larger controls, one of which sat beneath a red protective cover. Lightning's confusion shifted quickly into suspicion as Red began flipping the switches one after another, each indicator changing to green while a low electrical hum filled the cabin and steadily climbed in pitch.
Once the final light came alive, Red lifted the red cover and threw the switch beneath it, causing the Shelby to shudder beneath them as though something buried inside the car had suddenly awakened. The display immediately changed to a full diagnostic readout, showing live engine figures, wheel temperatures, boost pressure, fuel delivery, and several other measurements Lightning barely had time to register before another mechanical whir drew her attention toward the back seat. Her eyes widened as the rear cushions shifted apart and lifted, revealing two enormous metallic-red tanks mounted securely beneath them.
Lightning stared for a moment before turning sharply toward Red, disbelief written across her face. "Red, please tell me those aren't what I think they are."
"Oh, hell yeah," Red replied, his smirk sharpening as he kept both hands steady on the wheel. "Do me a solid and turn 'em on, will ya? Just twist those black knobs all the way open."
"Are you freaking insane?!" Lightning snapped, looking from the tanks to him as though she could not decide which offended her more. "You already have a thousand under the hood, and you hooked those damned things into the car too? This isn't Fast and The Furious, and you sure as Hell aren't Dominic Toretto." She waved her hands wildly. "Seriously, are you trying to blow our asses straight to Hell?"
"Come on, partner, ya know me better than that," Red said, rolling his eyes as he guided the Shelby through the rain. "Ya really think I'd go cruisin' around in some death machine rigged to turn me into a human brisket? I built these mods myself, reinforced the whole setup, ran more tests than I can count, and trust me, I know exactly what this baby can handle."
Lightning started to object again, but Red glanced toward her and met her eyes for just long enough to cut through the argument. "Ya wanna snag Raiko or not?"
The question stopped her cold, and after looking toward the streak of blue lightning still disappearing farther ahead, Lightning drew a sharp breath before twisting around toward the tanks. "You'd better hope you know what you're doing, because if this thing turns into a Goddamned bomb and we end up dead, I swear I'm finding you on the other side and kicking your damned ass for the rest of eternity."
"Touché," Red replied, clearly far too pleased with himself as Lightning reached for the black valves and twisted them open. The sharp hiss of pressurized gas filled the cabin while the readings across the dashboard began to climb, and Red reached behind the steering wheel to flip open two concealed red covers, revealing a pair of matching buttons beneath them.
"Don't worry yer pretty little tail, partner. We're ridin' the lightning with this one." He glanced toward her with an unbearably cheesy grin before adding, "Get it? Ridin' the lightning?"
Lightning rolled her eyes and let out a long groan as she tightened her grip on the overhead handle. "Just… drive."
Red's grin widened as he tapped through the display and opened his Spotify account, bringing up a playlist labelled Red Lightning. "And, if we're gonna go turbo, I'm gonna need some tunes."
"Red," Lightning said, her face twisting as she already knew exactly where this was going. "I swear to freaking God, if you fire up that—"
He tapped the song before she could finish, and the opening guitar riff immediately filled the cabin. "Oh, ho, ho, yeah," Red said, his grip tightening around the wheel as his grin sharpened. "Now this is my jam."
[BGM – Linkin Park – Given Up]
Lightning shot him a glare before reaching across to the display, swiping away his playlist and opening the one labeled Lightning's Shit. She scrolled for barely a second before tapping a track, and the guitar riff filling the Shelby was immediately replaced by something heavier as the next song thundered through the speakers.
[BGM – Metallica – Ride the Lightning]
"If you're gonna pick a song for the occasion, at least go with the classics," Lightning said, a satisfied smirk tugging at her lips as she snapped a look toward him.
Red rolled his eyes, though the corner of his mouth pulled upward despite himself. "All right, fine, I'll give ya this one. Kinda hard to argue with that."
****
Raiko thundered down the straight as bolts of lightning curled around her body and tore through the curtain of rain, every stride carrying her forward at a speed that reduced the city to streaks of neon and amber light. She glanced back over her shoulder and caught sight of the red Shelby steadily gaining on her, its engine roaring loudly enough to send ripples through the rain while thunder cracked across the sky in answer. A grin tugged at her lips as she let out a slow breath, because it had been far too long since she had been given a reason to truly cut loose, and she had no intention of wasting the opportunity now. The fact that Wild Lightning and her partner, Red Harlow, the very faces of C.H.A.S.E., were the ones chasing her only made the whole thing more interesting.
Raiko slowly closed her eyes and allowed the world around her to stretch into stillness. The rain seemed to hang suspended in the air, each droplet frozen like a bead of glass, while the damp autumn wind brushed against her face with a chill that felt almost like frost. Cars, pedestrians, headlights, and the blurred city beyond them all seemed to stop moving as her awareness sharpened, leaving only the road ahead and the steady pulse of power building through her body.
****
Inside the Shelby, the display suddenly began to scramble as the music distorted into garbled fragments before dissolving beneath waves of static. Red's eyes flicked toward the screen at the same moment Lightning straightened in her seat, both of them looking around the cabin as the speakers hissed and crackled before an unfamiliar voice cut through.
"Detective Harlow." Raiko's voice came through the speakers, calm and almost amused. "Think that little toy of yours has what it takes to outrun me?"
Red's grip tightened around the wheel while Lightning's expression hardened, and for a brief moment neither of them said anything as the realization settled over them that Raiko had somehow gotten into the car's system.
"Well," Raiko continued, "let's find out. Try to keep up."
****
The lightning surrounding Raiko began to intensify, growing brighter and more violent as the charge in the air thickened around her. The sharp voltaic whine climbed higher with every stride, almost like some unseen output being pushed past its limit, while bolts of blue-white electricity crawled over the road and burned black scars into the asphalt. Raiko dug one boot into the pavement, and the tar beneath it softened beneath the heat before beginning to glow along the edges. She drew a single breath, lowered herself, and then exploded forward with enough force to crater the road behind her, the city lights stretching into distorted streaks of neon as she tore down the straight.
Inside the Shelby, Red's smirk sharpened as he watched Raiko surge ahead. "Well, here goes nothin'!" he shouted before slamming his thumb down on the first red button.
The hiss of pressurized gas filled the cabin for barely a heartbeat before the Shelby answered with a savage roar. Flames burst from the exhaust as the engine surged, and the sudden acceleration threw both Red and Lightning hard against their seats while the car lunged after Raiko.
Lightning felt the force pulling against her face and pressing her deeper into the upholstery as the Shelby devoured the straight. Her sapphire eyes snapped toward the speedometer, watching the needle climb through eighty, ninety, then past one hundred while her grip tightened around the overhead handle and her teeth clenched against the strain.
"Woohoo!" Red yelled, his grin widening as the V8 screamed beneath them. "Now we're cookin'! Come on, baby, let's catch that sucker!"
****
Raiko tore through the city like a bolt fired from the heavens, the rush of wind screaming past her ears while the pressure dragged against her face and clothing. The grin on her lips only widened, because she had missed this more than she cared to admit. Running for the sake of running had its own freedom, but a chase was something else entirely, something no sanctioned turf race could ever reproduce. There was danger in it, unpredictability, the thrill of knowing someone was close enough behind to make every decision matter, and Raiko welcomed every second of it.
She drove herself harder, and a sonic boom cracked through the street behind her.
The pressure wave tore outward as she passed, knocking pedestrians off balance and forcing several to stumble into one another. Men were thrown face-first toward the pavement, while women instinctively grabbed at their skirts and coats as the blast of displaced air ripped through the sidewalks. Storefront glass shattered in rapid succession, followed by windows higher along the surrounding buildings and the windshields of parked cars. Alarms erupted throughout the street as metal frames shook beneath the pressure, tree branches snapped, and leaves were ripped into the air before being swallowed by the storm.
Raiko blasted through intersection after intersection at a speed that defied any reasonable explanation, yet the Shelby remained behind her.
When she finally glanced over her shoulder, she saw the red car barely two lengths back, its engine no longer sounding like a machine so much as a living beast roaring through the rain. Around them, the city had ceased to resemble Tokyo at all, reduced instead to streaks of yellow, red, blue, and white stretching endlessly through the darkness. In that moment, nothing else mattered to Raiko except the speed and the chase.
****
The Shelby's speakers crackled as Raiko's voice cut through the static once again. "I'll give you this, Detective, I'm impressed. You put a hell of a lot of work into that thing."
Red's grin faded slightly as his hands tightened around the wheel.
"But a car is still a car," Raiko continued. "That's the difference between you and me. Machines have limits, no matter how much power you cram into them." She allowed the silence to linger for just a moment before adding, "I don't."
Another thunderous boom rolled through the street as Raiko accelerated again, widening the gap almost instantly.
Red's expression twisted into a scowl, and Lightning caught the change the moment his thumb shifted toward the second red button. "Red, don't you freaking dare—"
He hit it anyway.
The Shelby answered with another violent surge as the engine roared louder than before, forcing them both deeper into their seats while warning lights began flashing red across the diagnostic screen. Lightning's eyes widened as the speedometer climbed through one twenty, then one forty, and finally toward one fifty.
"Come on, baby!" Red shouted over the scream of the engine, his knuckles whitening around the wheel as the car continued gaining speed. "Gimme everything ya got!"
****
Raiko and the Shelby tore onto the freeway cutting through the heart of the city, both of them ducking and weaving through traffic at breakneck speed while headlights and taillights blurred into ribbons across the rain. Red worked the clutch and gear lever in rapid succession, double-shifting whenever the road opened just enough to squeeze more speed from the engine, and with every car they passed, every last-second lane change, and every razor-thin dodge between vehicles, Lightning felt her heart lurch violently inside her chest.
Sweat ran down the side of her face despite the cold air filling the cabin, and her grip tightened around the overhead handle until her fingers began to ache. She had been through more chases with Red than she cared to count, pursuing rogue racers both on foot and behind the wheels of machines modified with every performance part imaginable, from battered street cars held together by stubbornness and cheap upgrades to high-end monsters built for nothing but speed, yet never once had they pushed a vehicle this far.
Deep down, Lightning knew that the smallest mistake would kill them. A pothole hidden beneath the rain, a driver changing lanes without warning, a fraction of a second of lost concentration, or one bad judgment call from Red would be enough to put both of their names in the morning obituaries.
Even so, some stubborn part of her still trusted him, because over the years she had watched Red pull off maneuvers that should have ended with his car wrapped around a concrete barrier, outrun some of the best drivers on the street, and even teach local police departments how to handle rogue drivers during high-speed pursuits. Like her, he had learned much of what he knew the hard way, without anyone holding his hand through it, and Lightning bit down on her lower lip as he pushed the Shelby closer and closer to its absolute limit.
The frame rattled violently around them while the chassis trembled beneath the strain, every panel seeming to vibrate as though the car itself was threatening to shake apart. The diagnostic display had long since turned red, the word WARNING flashing across the screen as alerts stacked over one another for engine temperature, suspension load, brake condition, transmission stress, and half a dozen other systems Lightning did not have time to read. With every passing second, Red's jaw clenched tighter, hard enough that she half expected him to crack a tooth, yet his eyes never left Raiko as the Sovereign continued tearing down the freeway ahead of them.
To Lightning, the entire chase still felt unreal, almost too ridiculous for her mind to accept even while she was living through it. Never in her wildest dreams had she imagined herself inside a car screaming down a freeway at well over a hundred miles an hour while chasing an uma who had somehow awakened an otherworldly power that allowed her to tear through every physical limit they had once believed absolute.
Then Lightning's eyes widened as a breath caught sharply in her throat. Farther ahead, a police cruiser was racing toward them from the opposite direction.
"Oh… shit…" Lightning murmured, her gaze snapping toward Red. "Red…"
****
Raiko noticed the police cruiser almost immediately, the vehicle having foolishly crossed onto the wrong side of the freeway and now racing straight toward her through the rain. Her gaze shifted toward a flatbed truck parked along the shoulder, its rear ramp raised while a crew of workers in hard hats repaired one of the concrete barriers. Their heads lifted at the growing roar of the Shelby and the crackling storm of electricity tearing toward them, confusion giving way to outright terror as they realized just how fast both were approaching.
Raiko looked back toward the oncoming cruiser, and the grin spreading across her face widened.
She veered sharply toward the flatbed as the workers scattered in every direction, some throwing themselves aside while others scrambled behind the concrete barrier. Raiko planted one boot against the metal ramp and sprinted upward, the steel buckling beneath the force of her stride before she launched herself into the air. Lightning streamed from her body in a brilliant trail as she flipped backward, twisted through the rain, and opened her arms while every eye on the freeway followed her ascent.
Her right arm rose toward the blackened sky, fingers curling as though reaching for something hidden beyond the clouds, and a heartbeat later a bolt of lightning tore downward and struck her palm. Power flooded through her body in a blinding surge, wrapping around her limbs and spilling from her in branching arcs as she began to fall.
Raiko twisted in midair and drove that gathered force toward the cruiser.
The lightning slammed into the hood with an explosive crack that swallowed the siren beneath it. Glass burst outward, the lights flickered and died, and the front end of the cruiser crumpled beneath the impact as electricity ripped through the frame and sent pieces of metal spinning across the freeway. The explosion hurled the vehicle upward, pitching it nose-first over Raiko while flames licked from the mangled engine bay.
For one brief second, Raiko stood beneath the falling wreckage and looked straight through the Shelby's windshield toward Lightning. Then she turned and drove her heel into the side of the cruiser.
The impact detonated with another burst of electrical force, sending the wreck spinning end over end through the rain. Blue lightning curled around the chassis as it hurtled toward the Shelby, and before it could reach the car, the cruiser erupted in midair and became a tumbling fireball of twisted steel, shattered glass, and burning debris.
****
"MILEY CYRUS!" Red shrieked as his eyes went wide and instinct took over.
"Playing 'Wrecking Ball' by Miley Cyrus," the car's voice assistant announced through the speakers as Spotify automatically switched tracks, and a moment later the opening of the song began filling the cabin.
[BGM – Miley Cyrus – Wrecking Ball]
He slammed on the brakes, ripped the emergency brake upward, and twisted the wheel hard enough to throw the Shelby sideways across the freeway. The tires screamed against the rain-slicked asphalt as smoke curled from burning rubber, and the entire car swung into a controlled drift just as the flaming wreckage of the police cruiser came crashing down ahead of them.
Red and Lightning ducked instinctively as the wreck struck the roadway once and bounced, twisting violently through the air while the Shelby continued sliding toward it. For several terrifying seconds, the cruiser passed directly over the roof, close enough that barely an inch seemed to separate the mangled undercarriage from the car beneath it. Red's widened eyes followed the wreck as it sailed overhead, and then the world seemed to lurch back into motion as the cruiser struck the pavement again, flipped several more times, and finally smashed into the concrete barrier with the violent shriek of crumpling steel before collapsing across the freeway.
Red fought the steering wheel as the Shelby spun beneath him, every sensor on the diagnostic display erupting into warning lights while the battered car struggled to regain traction.
"Come on, baby, don't give up on me now!" he cried, wrenching the wheel back as the Shelby slid toward the barrier.
The rear end slammed hard against the concrete, shattering one taillight and crushing the bodywork inward before the car finally lost the rest of its momentum. One side lifted precariously from the road as though the entire vehicle might roll, but after hanging there for one breathless moment, it dropped heavily back onto all four wheels.
Steam immediately began pouring from beneath the hood with a furious hiss, while the acrid stench of scorched rubber and overheated brakes seeped through the cabin. Red did not need the diagnostic screen to tell him how badly he had pushed the Shelby. He could already imagine the tires half-melted against the rims and the brakes worn down to almost nothing.
He and Lightning remained frozen in their seats for several seconds, their eyes wide and their bodies drenched in sweat as ragged breaths filled the cabin. Another explosion tore through the storm when the flatbed truck along the shoulder ignited, throwing a wave of orange fire across the freeway, and through the flames and flickering amber light, Raiko stood motionless with her gaze fixed upon the ruined Shelby.
****
Lightning tore off her seat belt and kicked the passenger door open before stepping into the rain, her legs unsteady beneath the rush of adrenaline still coursing through her body. She moved toward the masked racer as their eyes met across the devastated freeway, surrounded by the steady patter of rain, the hiss of steam escaping from the Shelby, and the frightened cries of the workers staring helplessly at the destruction around them. The sharp hum of electrical current remained everywhere, while blue-white bolts continued crawling across Raiko's body and snapping into the pavement beneath her boots.
Raiko let out an amused chuckle as she paced through the rain, one finger lifting toward Lightning.
"There it is," she said, her smirk widening with quiet satisfaction despite the devastation surrounding them. "I've been waiting a long time to see that look on your face, Captain. That moment when the great Wild Lightning, who's spent her whole life being praised, adored, and treated like one of the finest umas to ever touch the turf, finally starts to wonder if maybe she isn't quite as untouchable as everyone made her believe."
"That no matter how hard she pushes yourself, there's still a gulf between us that she hasn't crossed," Raiko continued. "You've spent so long believing you stand at the top of what an uma can become. Umas have measured themselves against you, the Emperor, the rest of the Godly Fifteen, every great champion the Twinkle Series ever produced, but all of you have barely scratched the surface."
Lightning's expression twisted as she ripped the pistol from her holster and brought it up in both hands, leveling the carbon-black P30L directly at Raiko. Her sapphire eyes burned as she glared down the sights. "Raiko Tempest, you're under arrest."
"Under arrest?" Raiko repeated, raising both hands as she tilted her head with faint amusement. She glanced down at herself, then slowly looked back at Lightning. "Funny, because I don't really feel like I'm under arrest. Do you?"
"I'm not asking again," Lightning warned as she thumbed back the hammer. "Turn around, get on your knees, and put your hands behind your back."
Raiko studied her for a moment before giving a small shrug. "Yeah, I don't think so."
"Your mistake is thinking you have a goddamned choice!" Lightning snarled, tightening her grip around the pistol as her patience finally snapped. "Now get on your damned knees before I put you there myself!"
"And your mistake is pulling a gun on an unarmed suspect," Raiko shot back, the amusement disappearing from her face. "Maybe that kind of cowboy shit flies back where you're from, with too many cops growing up on late-night action movies and thinking they're the next big hero, but take a look around, officer." Her expression hardened into a scowl. "This isn't America. This is Tokyo, and not only are you a long-damned way from home, you're a long-damned way from the turf."
"You've spent your whole life running dirt and grass that somewhere along the way, you forgot to take the blinders off and look at the turf for what it really is," Raiko continued, her gaze hardening as she looked Lightning over. "It's a cage. It teaches us exactly how fast we're allowed to run, where we're allowed to run, who we're allowed to race, and what we're supposed to become once the cheering stops. The moment one of us refuses to stay inside that little box, suddenly we're a problem that needs to be controlled, corrected, or thrown away."
"And you…" Raiko lifted her chin slightly, contempt settling into her expression. "You're worse than most, officer, because you didn't just accept the cage they built for you. You bent the knee, bowed your head, and started dragging everyone else back inside whenever they tried to break free." Her eyes narrowed. "Just another damned slave doing whatever her masters tell her. Guess you really can't take the South out of a girl after all."
"I'm no one's damned slave!" Lightning snarled. "I'm an officer of the law, and you're a criminal. You and every other racer hiding behind the MRA can dress it up however you want, but that doesn't change what you are!"
Raiko gave another quiet chuckle, her gaze drifting toward the badge secured at Lightning's belt. "Are you sure about that? Because from where I'm standing, that looks a hell of a lot like a collar. Maybe yours is shinier than most, but it still tells you where to stand and who you're supposed to bite."
Raiko went quiet for a moment, the amusement fading from her face as she looked at Lightning through the rain. "We all lost something the day Logan Deschain went away," she said. "Strider lost him, the URA lost him, the Twinkle Series lost him, and whether anyone wants to admit it or not, the whole damned world lost something too. Some of us took it harder than others, but you?" Her tone sharpened as she stopped pacing. "You made it personal in a way none of the rest of us did."
Lightning's gaze hardened, but Raiko continued before she could answer.
"Maybe you had every right to," Raiko said. "You respected him, admired him." She paused. "Loved him… and then one day he was just gone. But instead of dealing with that pain, you took it, shaped it, sharpened it, and turned it into a weapon against anyone you decided was the enemy. A lot of them deserved it, sure, but plenty of them didn't."
Lightning's jaw tightened, but the faint twitch of her eyebrow betrayed the questions beginning to churn beneath her anger, stirred by a nagging sense of familiarity she could feel but could not quite place.
"Back at the Convention, you called out Sensuke Fujii. That he put that girl on a pedestal and turned himself into some avenger on her behalf, whether she wanted him to or not." Raiko's expression darkened as she tilted her head. "And hell, I don't blame you, the man's a prick, but you know what's funny? You did the exact same thing with Deschain."
Something in Lightning's face faltered.
"He never asked you to turn yourself into some weapon for justice," Raiko continued. "He never asked you to spend your life going after the MRA, and he sure as hell never asked you to carry his pain around like it was yours to avenge. But you did it anyway. You took what happened to him and used it to keep that fire burning inside you, and every time it started to die down, you found somebody else to throw into it."
Raiko gestured toward the mask covering her face, her fingers lingering near its edge for a moment. "This mask? I wear it because it's what I choose to show the world, but I've never forgotten who I am underneath it." Her gaze leveled on Lightning. "You, on the other hand, built yours out of lies, guilt, and so much damned self-delusion. Hell, you've worn it for so long you probably don't even remember what your own face looks like anymore."
A bitter smile tugged at Raiko's lips as she studied her. "You can keep fooling yourself if that's what gets you through the day, and you can fool everyone else too, even that Brooklyn loudmouth you keep riding around with, but you can't fool me, Lightning." Her eyes narrowed. "I know exactly who you are."
"You don't know a damned thing about me!" Lightning snarled.
"I know everything about you!" Raiko shot back. "I know you put on that vest because you needed to believe you were doing something good with all that anger. I know you tell yourself this is a career, that this is your calling, but deep down you treat it like a sentence because you never stopped blaming yourself for what happened to him, for what you think you should've seen, what you should've stopped, and what you let happen."
Lightning's jaw tightened further, the gun trembling in her grip.
"I know that's why you fight so damned hard," Raiko continued. "Why you threw yourself into this crusade and never looked back, because somewhere deep inside you, you still think you failed him."
"Shut up!" Lightning snapped, the words tearing out of her before she could stop them.
Raiko barely reacted. "I know that you put on this big, uncompromising hardass act for yourself and for the girls under you, because Captain Lightning is supposed to be fearless. She's supposed to know what to do, make the right call, and never crack when everyone else is looking to her."
Her gaze sharpened. "But underneath all of that, you're still that scared, little crybaby who used to hold onto her stuffed bunny and curl up under her bed when the storm rolls in. I know that even after all these years, you're still terrified that one bad call will get your girls killed, terrified that you'll screw up when they need you most."
"How did you—" Lightning's eyes widened as the question escaped her, but the shock lasted only a heartbeat before fury rushed back in to cover it. Her hands were still trembling around the pistol as she tightened her grip and forced the sights back onto Raiko. "I said shut up!"
Raiko stared down the barrel without so much as blinking. "I know you wake up every morning telling yourself that this?" she said, gesturing toward Lightning before sweeping one finger toward the ruined highway around them. "All of this, is about the MRA, about protecting people, about saving every girl you think needs to be saved, but if justice was really the only thing driving you, you would've stopped a long time ago and asked yourself whether any of this was actually helping anyone."
She shook her head slowly. "This was never just about justice, Lightning. It was never just about doing what's right. This is about you, what you lost, what you regret, and what you still can't forgive yourself for. You just decided to make it everyone else's problem."
Tears began to gather in Lightning's eyes as her expression twisted, though the pistol remained fixed on Raiko. "I'm warning you…"
"And most of all, I know the one thing that scares you more than anything else is the thought that Deschain might look at you one day and finally see what all of this has turned you into," Raiko said.
Lightning's expression went slack, the anger in her face giving way to something far more vulnerable.
Raiko watched the reaction settle across Lightning's face before continuing. "And with the way things are now, even if you somehow brought the MRA down for good and finally got everything you've been fighting for, what makes you think that would fix any of this?"
"And most of all." Her gaze hardened as she held Lightning's eyes. "What makes you think he's still want anything to do with you?"
Lightning's sapphire irises narrowed to pinpricks as a furious cry tore from her throat and she pulled the trigger. The slide snapped backward, the muzzle flashed, and the recoil sent a sharp tremor through her arm as the round tore free of the barrel and raced toward Raiko.
Blue lightning erupted across Raiko's body before Lightning could even process the shot, brilliant arcs of electricity crawling through the rain as the air around them seemed to seize. Every falling droplet slowed until the storm itself appeared suspended in midair, thousands of beads of water hanging motionless beneath the fractured glow of the city lights, and then, almost as suddenly as it had begun, the electricity vanished.
The rain resumed its descent as thunder rolled across the sky, leaving Lightning staring ahead in stunned confusion until she realized something felt wrong. Her arms were still extended exactly where they had been when she fired, her hands still curled around a grip that was no longer there.
Lightning's eyes snapped wide.
"Lose something, officer?" Raiko asked.
Lightning's gaze jerked toward her, and the breath seemed to leave her lungs as Raiko casually held the P30L between two fingers, dangling it in front of herself as though she had simply plucked it from Lightning's hands. Before Lightning could form a word, Raiko raised her other hand and slowly opened her palm, revealing the fired bullet resting harmlessly against her glove.
She let the bullet fall, and it struck the rain-soaked asphalt with a faint metallic clink before disappearing beneath the downpour. Raiko then turned her attention to the pistol, wrenched the slide free with a brutal twist, released the magazine, and tossed the disassembled pieces across the road in different directions. Lightning could only stare at her, arms still half-raised, as the pieces of her weapon skittered across the wet asphalt and vanished into the rain.
"See, I know all about you, Lightning," Raiko said, her expression softening into something almost amused. "I know you've been hunting me across every continent you could reach, chasing rumors, hearsay, half-baked sightings, and blurry pictures that barely proved I existed. For a long time, you thought me and the rest of the Sovereigns might be nothing more than a ghost stories the MRA cooked up just to send you running in circles, and when half of C.H.A.S.E. started thinking you were crazy for refusing to let it go, you kept looking anyway."
Her gaze lingered on Lightning as that faint smile remained. "That's the thing about you, though. Once you decide something matters, you don't know how to stop. You chase it until there's nothing left to chase, and if you hadn't walked away from the track when you did, you might've gone on to surpass every last one of the Fifteen." Raiko tilted her head slightly. "So maybe we're more alike than you want to believe."
The fury returned to Lightning's face almost instantly.
"I'm nothing like you, Raiko!" she snapped, taking another step forward. "Everything you said, everything that came out of your mouth was just straight up bullshit, so don't you dare lump me in with you or any of the other psychos running in the MRA!"
She gestured sharply with her free hand. "I made a promise that I'd burn that whole damned organization to the ground if that's what it takes, and I'm not stopping until every last one of you is behind bars. You hear me?!"
Raiko lowered her gaze for a moment as a faint scoff slipped from her, then looked back at Lightning with the smallest trace of a smile. "Well, I guess we'll find out whether you can keep that promise, won't we?" she said, her eyes narrowing slightly. "But take it from me, you may think you've got us figured out. You may think you know what's coming and that you're ready for whatever the MRA throws at you, but you don't." She slowly shook her head. "Hell, you weren't even ready for me."
Her gaze shifted toward the battered Shelby, where Red was still hunched over the console and frantically tapping at the screen, his expression growing more panicked with every passing second.
When Raiko looked back at Lightning, the amusement had faded from her face. "What you saw tonight was barely a taste of what I can do, and it was only a taste of what the Sovereigns are capable of. We shattered the cage, broke the shackles that kept us tethered to the turf, and pushed beyond every law and limitation the world spent years telling us could never be broken." Her eyes hardened beneath the storm. "This is what we've become, Lightning, and if you keep coming after us, this is what's waiting for you."
Raiko's expression darkened further. "And that's before we even start talking about the MRA itself. You, C.H.A.S.E., Tokyo P.D., all of you crossed a line tonight, and you didn't just step over it. You went charging past it like it was never there." She gave a slight shake of her head. "You know as well as I do that the MRA can be a lot of things, but forgiving has never been one of them."
"You think that's supposed to scare me?" Lightning spat, refusing to give an inch despite everything she had just witnessed. "I've spent years going to war with the MRA, and they can bring every damned thing they've got!"
Raiko chuckled softly, though there was something almost familiar in the way she looked at her now. "Always the child, so damned quick to get angry and even quicker to pick a fight, even when you know there's a good chance you're gonna get your tail handed to you."
"Guess that's one of the things I've always loved about you." Her expression softened as the teasing edge slowly disappeared. "You've always worn your heart right there on your sleeve, Lightning, no matter how hard you try to pretend otherwise." A quieter smile touched her lips. "Just like Logan… just like Bee."
Lightning's expression faltered so abruptly that the anger seemed to drain out of her all at once. "W-what did you just say?"
Raiko tilted her head, watching her with an expression Lightning could no longer read. "Well, I suppose this is goodbye for now. Still, it's good to see you—"
Thunder cracked across the freeway and swallowed the final word.
Lightning's eyes widened as confusion twisted across her face, because for one fleeting second, she thought she had heard something familiar beneath the thunder, something in Raiko's words that made no sense at all. Before she could ask, a soft grin tugged at Raiko's lips and a brilliant flash of lightning erupted around her. Lightning turned away and raised both arms against the blinding light, and when the brilliance finally faded, Raiko was gone. Only a scorched patch of asphalt remained where she had stood, glowing veins of red running through the melted tar as thin trails of smoke curled into the rain.
The sound of the Shelby's driver-side door opening drew Lightning's attention behind her as Red climbed out and stared at the battered remains of his car. His hands immediately went into his hair, his eyes widening as he took in the crushed rear quarter, shattered taillight, steaming hood, and abused tires.
"Shit, shit, shit… oh God, my baby," he muttered, looking as though someone had personally kicked him in the chest. "What the hell?" His gaze finally shifted toward Lightning, though the adrenaline was fading fast enough that the words stumbled out of him. "Light, what the… what the hell was all that? All this? I mean, what the hell did we just—"
Lightning barely heard him.
Her hands slowly curled into fists at her sides as she stared toward the empty stretch of freeway where Raiko had disappeared, and for the first time in years, Captain Lightning found herself forced to consider something she had never seriously allowed herself to believe. Maybe she was not prepared for what the MRA was becoming, and maybe neither was C.H.A.S.E.
More than anything, Raiko's words had stirred something inside her that Lightning could no longer ignore, leaving her mind and heart pulling in opposite directions as she tried to make sense of everything she had heard. Somewhere beneath the anger and denial, part of her already knew there was only one explanation that made any sense, yet even now she could not bring herself to admit it aloud.
The irony almost made her want to laugh, especially after what Nightingale had said about her refusing to face anything that threatened the version of the world she had spent years convincing herself was true. Perhaps that was exactly what she was doing now, because saying it out loud would make it real, and once it became real, she would finally have to confront how much everything had changed while she was still desperately clinging to the way things used to be.
Her gaze lifted toward the blackened sky as lightning spread through the clouds and thunder rolled across the freeway, sending another tremor through the ground beneath her boots while the heat from the burning wreckage fought against the chill of the autumn wind.
****
Thunder cracked hard against the concrete walls as lightning flashed across the blackened sky beyond the open sides of the two-story parking structure, while rain hammered the pillars and barriers before spilling across the gray floor in broad sheets. Katsuragi Ace tightened the zip tie around the wrists of one of the masked umas kneeling in front of her, then wiped the sweat from her forehead with the back of her glove. Her damp ears twitched beneath the storm, while the red ornament in her hair had grown heavy with rainwater, making her groan as she silently regretted wearing it into the field with the rest of her uniform.
"Ow, hey, that's too tight!" the girl snapped, twisting against the restraint as she glared over her shoulder. "You Goddamned sellout! Had your tail handed to you at the Twinkle Series, so you decided to throw in with the pigs instead? Screw you, Ace. I hope the MRA puts you in the ground!"
"Yeah, yeah, keep talking," Ace replied, rolling her eyes before giving the girl an almost patronizing pat on the head. "Save some of that for the judge, will you?"
She rose to her feet while the girl continued cursing behind her, only for the sound of approaching boots to draw Ace's attention toward the entrance. Fenomeno emerged from the rain a moment later, her long black hair slicked down against her shoulders, the outward-pointing ends that usually gave it the shape of a fir tree now weighed heavy with water. She dragged two more masked umas along by the backs of their collars into the covered space, both already restrained with zip ties, then dropped them onto the concrete with little ceremony as they cried out in protest.
"That makes three up here," Fenomeno said as she adjusted the brim of her police cap and rubbed her hands together with quiet satisfaction. "Yaeno just grabbed another one hiding upstairs, and C.B.-senpai and Bamboo Memory-senpai both reported successful captures with their teams."
"Heh, not too bad for a first mission, if I do say so myself," Ace said, a smirk pulling at her lips as she glanced toward the prisoners before shifting her weight onto one boot. "Still, all that training doesn't really prepare you for what it feels like once people are actually fighting back. My drift's still a little sloppy too, and I nearly ate pavement once or twice."
"Don't be too hard on yourself, Ace-senpai," Fenomeno replied, her ears twitching as she looked over at her. "You spent years learning how to run one way, and now they're asking you to tear all of that apart and build it back differently. That's rough on anyone, and even Lightning-senpai said it took her a while before everything stopped feeling wrong."
"Yeah, well," Ace said, glancing toward the rain beyond the edge of the structure as her ears flicked once. "Guess that just means we keep at it until we get better."
"Katsuragi Ace?" one of the two restrained umas asked from the floor, her eyes suddenly lighting up despite the zip ties around her wrists. "Oh my God, I'm seriously one of your biggest fans." Her gaze shifted toward Fenomeno, and somehow her excitement only grew. "And I got taken down by the one and only Fenomeno too? If my hands weren't tied right now, I'd be asking both of you for autographs."
The uma beside her slowly turned with a deadpan stare. "Seriously? They're taking us to jail and you're fangirling?" She sighed before looking up at Ace. "Look, we were just in the wrong place at the wrong time, okay? So how about you cut us a little slack and—"
"Be quiet!" Fenomeno's voice boomed through the enclosed parking structure with enough force to make every restrained uma flinch. Even Ace jolted, her ears shooting upright and her tail stiffening as both hands instinctively lifted in surprise.
Fenomeno planted her feet, pulling down on the hem of her police cap and fixed the prisoners with a hard stare. "You and your friends were in violation of Article 68 of the Road Traffic Act, which specifically prohibits joint dangerous acts. That alone can mean up to two years in prison, a five-hundred-thousand-yen fine, or both, and that's before anyone starts adding the rest of tonight's violations!"
Her eyes narrowed as she continued, clearly warming to the subject. "You were speeding, ignoring traffic signals, running recklessly through public roads, and putting everyone around you in danger. Drivers, pedestrians, other umas, yourselves, all of them could've been hurt because you wanted to play street racer for the night!"
Her ears twitched sharply. "It's reckless, it's irresponsible, and whether you care or not, younger umas see this and think it's something worth copying. You should be ashamed of yourselves, and if I were you, I'd be praying nobody decides to start looking at the Organized Crime Punishment Act too, especially Article Three."
Ace slowly turned her head toward Fenomeno, giving her a strange look that seemed caught somewhere between admiration and disbelief. "Leave it to Meno to know the laws by heart."
The two umas on the floor had gone completely silent, though the girl Ace had arrested earlier merely groaned and rolled her eyes. "Oh, put a damned sock in it," she snarled. "You're no better than the rest of the pigs, Fenomeno." She cleared her throat and spat onto the concrete before looking back at them with a bitter smirk. "You're all the same, ready to jump us the second you get the chance, but none of you give a rat's ass what brought us here in the first place."
Her smirk sharpened as she leaned forward against the restraints. "Enjoy wearing those uniforms while you can, because everybody's gonna know what you did after tonight. You threw in with the cops, slipped that collar around your own necks, and turned yourselves into their dogs. The MRA won't forget it, and neither will the rest of us, so you'd better start watching your backs."
"Like I said, save it for the—" Ace began, only for the words to die in her throat when something large slammed into Fenomeno with terrifying force.
A hulking uma in a red-and-white motorcycle racing suit drove straight through her, tackling Fenomeno off her feet and carrying her bodily into the front of one of the parked vans. The impact caved the vehicle's nose inward with a deafening crash, crushing the steel, shattering the windshield, and smashing the headlights apart as fragments of glass, plastic, and carbon fiber sprayed across the concrete. Fenomeno choked as the air was driven from her lungs, and when her attacker pulled back, Yamino Breaker stood over her with her teeth bared behind the mask.
"Meno!" Ace cried, but before she could move, instinct made her snap her head toward the rush of air beside her. She crossed both forearms just as a boot slammed into them, the force driving her backward several steps while another uma twisted through the air with a delighted grin stretched across her face.
"Oh, wow, it's Katsuragi Ace!" Rekka Blaze exclaimed as she landed lightly on the concrete, watching Ace stumble before finding her footing again. Her grin softened for barely a second before sharpening into something far more predatory. "Aw, now I'm actually gonna feel bad about putting you in the hospital. I mean, I'm kind of a fan."
"Thought I smelled a pig!" Yamino growled as she swung a fist toward Fenomeno, who ducked aside just before it connected. Yamino's knuckles slammed into the mangled front of the van instead, punching a deep fist-shaped dent into the steel. "Never figured it'd be some washed-up turf star playing copper, though. Then again, it's you. Guess I should've seen that one coming."
Fenomeno rolled across the concrete and came up on one knee, breathing hard as she looked toward the towering uma looming over her. "Yamino Breaker, I presume."
Ace straightened and turned toward the shorter girl with twin tails, her pale blue eyes narrowing. "And you must be Rekka Blaze."
"Aw, a Twinkle Series champion actually knows my name?" Rekka asked, pressing one hand lightly against her chest as her grin widened. "Careful, Ace-senpai, you're gonna make me blush."
"Yeah, that's her," Yamino said, rolling one shoulder as she stepped toward Fenomeno again. "And you'd better remember mine too, because I'm the uma who's about to cave your skull in."
Rekka glanced toward Yamino, her grin fading just enough for real concern to show through. "You good?" she asked, giving the larger uma a once-over. "I saw that little bird put you through a damned building. For a second there, I honestly thought you were dead."
"Yeah, well, it takes a hell of a lot more than that to put me down," Yamino replied, rolling one shoulder before cracking her neck. "I'm sore as hell, but I've still got plenty left in me. I thought that pole grind was the craziest shit she was gonna pull, but turns out she's not just a psycho, she's the whole damned psych ward." Her gaze shifted toward Rekka. "What about you? Didn't Captain Loudmouth hand you your tail?"
Rekka scoffed and brushed the comment aside with a crooked smile. "Yeah, turns out Jack Sparrow knows a thing or two about Capoeira. Whodathunkit?" She rolled her shoulders and lowered herself slightly, the grin returning to her face. "But don't worry about me. She didn't kick my ass hard enough to stop me from wiping the floor with these losers."
Her smile shifted into something far more suggestive as she rested one hand against her hip and touched a finger lightly to her lips, her eyes traveling over Ace from head to toe with shameless interest. "You know, now that I'm getting a proper look at you, you really don't look half bad," she said, watching with obvious amusement as Ace immediately stiffened and folded her arms across her chest and waist.
"Guys might not always say it out loud, but plenty of them go crazy for the tomboy types. Tough attitude, rough edges, all that fire underneath." Her grin widened as she leaned forward slightly. "You ever get tired of pretending you don't notice, I know a few guys who'd be more than happy to take you out to the pasture and give you a good ride. Know what I'm sayin'?"
Ace's face twisted in disgust, while Fenomeno merely raised an eyebrow as though she could not quite believe what she was hearing.
"A-are you off your rockers? I'm seventeen!" Ace cried, her composure collapsing almost immediately as heat rushed into her face. "And I…" She hesitated, tapping her fingertips together despite herself. "I-I mean, I haven't even had a boyfriend yet."
"Oh?" Rekka's eyes lit up as she clapped her hands together and immediately turned toward the restrained umas. "You hear that, girls? The World-Conquering Great Ace's still a virgin!"
Ace's face turned such a violent shade of red that Fenomeno could have sworn steam was about to start pouring from the top of her head. Among the restrained umas, the first stared at Ace with stars practically shining in her eyes, the second looked genuinely appalled by Rekka's complete lack of restraint, while the third merely rolled her eyes as though she had already decided everyone involved was hopeless.
Yamino let out a long, irritated groan and dragged a hand down her face. "Seriously, can you park the street-hooker act for five damned minutes?" she snapped, glaring sideways at her. "We're supposed to be beating the hell out of them, not making them throw up first."
"Oh, believe me," Rekka replied, her smirk returning as she lowered herself into a fighting stance. "By the time we're done, throwing up is probably going to be the least of their problems."
Yamino's irritation gave way to a matching grin as she cracked her knuckles and fixed her attention on Fenomeno. "Now that sounds more like it," she said, rolling her shoulders before stepping forward. "Come on, then. Let's find out whether all that shiny C.H.A.S.E. training actually taught you two anything useful."
****
Yaeno Muteki's ear twitched as her gaze snapped toward the ramp leading down to the lower level, where the sound of crashing steel and shattering glass suddenly echoed through the parking structure. Her tail flicked once behind her as she tightened the industrial zip tie around the wrists of the uma kneeling at her feet and rose, one eyebrow lifting as distant voices cried out beneath the rain.
A second later came the unmistakable rhythm of fists striking flesh, muted beneath the thunder but familiar enough that Yaeno's expression sharpened immediately. She had spent most of her life exchanging blows, hammering heavy bags, and sparring in her grandfather's karate dojo since she was old enough to stand properly, and there was no mistaking the sound of a fight.
"Hey, what gives?" the restrained uma complained as she twisted against the thick plastic binding her wrists, only for it to hold firm. "What the hell is this thing made of?"
"Stop struggling," Yaeno said, her gaze remaining fixed on the ramp. "It's industrial-grade and reinforced for umas, so you're not breaking it. All you're doing is tightening it around your wrists, so stay where you are and—"
Her eyes widened. A sudden shift in the air beside her made one ear snap upright, and instinct moved before thought ever could. Yaeno turned sharply and brought one arm up just as a leg came crashing down toward her head. The kick slammed into her forearm hard enough to send a jolt through her entire shoulder, and she gritted her teeth as her eyes locked onto the crimson-and-gold coat and the sharp grin of the uma behind it.
Yaeno shoved upward with a cry, forcing her attacker away. The stranger twisted effortlessly through the air, landed on both feet, and spun once before settling into a loose fighting stance, her coat tails swaying behind her. Yaeno immediately shifted into her kata, spreading her feet and lowering her center of gravity as her hands came up.
"Coward!" she snarled, her eyes narrowing. "Attacking someone from behind is dishonorable. Have you no shame at all? Name yourself!"
The other uma rolled her eyes and hooked a thumb toward her own chest. "Does the whole pirate thing somehow escape ye, lass?" she asked, looking genuinely amused. "Honor's a fine thing when it suits the occasion, but sneakin' up on someone is half the bloody profession." She straightened, removed her tricorn with a flourish, and swept into an exaggerated bow. "Captain Barbarossa of the Crimson Tides, at yer service. Pleasure makin' yer acquaintance."
With another flourish, she settled the hat back onto her head and gave Yaeno a slow once-over, her grin sharpening as she studied the stance in front of her. "And ye must be Yaeno Muteki. Judgin' by the way yer planted and how quick ye caught that kick, I'd say there's more than a little karate in ya." Barbarossa's eyes gleamed with interest as she rolled one shoulder. "Not a bad block either, lass. Not bad at all."
"Captain Barbarossa?" Yaeno's eyes widened for the briefest moment before narrowing again. "I see, so you're the one Captain Lightning called Tokyo's number two rookie." Her body tensed as her tail flicked once behind her, and when she lowered her center of gravity, her expression hardening with the authority of someone who had already made up her mind. "As an agent of C.H.A.S.E., I'm placing you under arrest. Surrender quietly, or I'll be forced to subdue you."
A flicker of surprise crossed Barbarossa's face before she snorted and burst out laughing, doubling over as one hand slapped against her thigh. "By me first mate's peg leg, that's a good one!" she exclaimed, still chuckling as she straightened and noticed that Yaeno's expression had not changed in the slightest. Her laughter tapered off as she tilted her head. "Oh, ye were serious, lass?"
Barbarossa exhaled sharply and planted one hand on her hip, amusement still lingering in her eyes. "Well then, ye oughta know they say a captain always goes down with her ship," she said, the grin on her face sharpening as her gaze hardened. "Me? I say a proper captain drags every scurvy dog she can down with her and makes 'em shake hands with Davy Jones himself."
She rushed forward before the last word had fully left her lips, and Yaeno immediately noticed the slight limp breaking the rhythm of Barbarossa's stride. The first kick came low, sweeping toward Yaeno's legs, but she lifted one foot clear and stepped back just as Barbarossa planted a hand against the floor and whipped her other leg upward in a roundhouse. Yaeno blocked with her forearm, only for Barbarossa to spring from the ground into a backflip and bring another kick down from above. Yaeno caught that one as well, bracing through the impact before Barbarossa landed and spun directly into a third strike.
Yaeno blocked again, stepped inside the opening, and drove a fist into Barbarossa's chest. The blow connected hard enough to force the pirate queen backward, but Barbarossa answered before the distance could open, snapping a kick into Yaeno's abdomen and sending them both stumbling apart across the concrete.
Barbarossa drew several heavy breaths as she straightened, and the smile on her face had sharpened into something almost manic. "Finally!" she exclaimed, rolling one shoulder before cracking her neck. "A landlubber who actually knows how to fight instead of pickin' it up from whatever riffraff crawled outta the nearest tavern." Her eyes narrowed with renewed interest. "Let me guess, black belt?"
Yaeno gritted her teeth and pushed through the ache spreading across her stomach. "Very much so," she replied, resetting her stance. "My grandfather once told me about a martial art from Brazil that moves almost like a dance." Her gaze narrowed as she studied Barbarossa's footwork more carefully. "He had a friend in Okinawa who was a master of it before he passed away. You wouldn't happen to have been one of his students, would you?"
For the first time, Barbarossa's expression faltered as something darker passed behind her eyes. "Aye," she said after a moment. "Suppose ye could say that." Her gaze lifted again as the smirk slowly returned. "Feels like another lifetime now."
Yaeno exhaled once and lowered herself back into position. "No matter. On the honor of my grandfather's dojo, and on mine as an agent of C.H.A.S.E., I will defeat you."
Barbarossa's grin widened as she settled into her swaying stance, shifting lightly from side to side despite the weakness in one leg. "Ye can keep yer honor, lass. A pirate's code is all I need," she said, amusement and challenge mixing freely in her words. "Ye'd best make sure yer cannons are loaded, yer powder's dry, and every last gun on yer deck is ready to fire, 'cause if ye mean to sink me ship, ye'll need the whole damned broadside."
Yaeno stared at her for several seconds, her expression remaining perfectly flat. "I… genuinely have no idea what you just said."