14 Not Again!

"No time to waste, come with me."

There was no reaction in between. Kia's average day had been upturned with those simple words. Kia entered work, as usual, and started her shift on time and was relatively satisfied. 

Tomorrow was going to be a Sunday, so she could get a mouse from that suspicious store and maybe find a gym to swing by and ask a few questions. 

I guess even G O D didn't want that. Kia was dumbfounded. "Wait, what?"

Instead of waiting, the hooded man goes around the counter and drags Kia by the wrist, taking out a sheet of paper and placing it down as he exits.

Kia forces them to stop asking, "Hey! I don't even know who you are… huh? Matsuura?"

The man nodded. "Can I now drag you somewhere now that you know it's me?"

"No—"

"I'm going to do so anyway."

For two work days, he was gone. Without warning, Matsuura arrived and acted much like how he first met Kia.

Kia got outside, her face shying away from the bright sun in the morning. "Ngh… what the hell's going on?"

Matsuura replied with one word. "Giran."

As Kia got inside Matsuura's ride, a sports car this time, she glanced at the interior. There wasn't anyone else but the entire front seat having various equipment for… something.

Guessing, Kia asks, "Dude, are we starting a war? Didn't I tell you I didn't want to do this anymore?"

"Handout is under the seat." Matsuura starts the car, the engine rumbling deeply.

Kia picked up a few dozen pages, almost the size of a magazine, explaining what had happened in the past few days. "Why do you always do this? It's also a block of text."

"Seatbelt on," Matsuura demanded.

"Seatbelts? You're a criminal, why should you care—"

"On!"

"Fine, fine. You could at least be nicer about it, asshole." Kia began to buckle her seatbelt and read through the info Matsuura gave.

The acceleration of the car pushed Kia into her seat, she braced herself and started detailing each of the entries on the sheet of paper.

"Hm… Giran." Kia muttered. She couldn't remember everything but something clicked as she put pieces of what she knew inside her head. Wasn't that someone affiliated with the League of Villains? "...We robbed him?!" Kia yelled.

"Read the table of contents and find my reaction to any potential inquiries."

Turning back to the start, Kia sees the list of categories. "There's even a dedicated page for my questions. Why specifically only my questions though? Are you calling me out?"

"Just read the damn thing," Matsuura said.

Kia did as told, getting an answer to her questions earlier. There was a page about Giran, his appearance, and what he does, but Kia moved past it, knowing she had already seen the show and remembered who Giran was.

[Prophet's Q&A]

'Did he seriously label it like this?'

[Q: Why did we steal from Giran?]

[A: Technically we stole from someone affiliated with Giran. Also, distribution centers are good places to steal from. They're better than individual trucks or well-guarded banks. Besides I have my quirk to tell if we're going to be somewhat safe, so payoffs are our only worry.]

[Q: Why did we steal from someone affiliated with Giran?]

[A: Because I can.]

Kia should've asked. She reasoned that the warehouse was just full of company-made material, not owned by a dangerous criminal!

In the two days that passed, Matsuura gathered information and knew that Giran was trying to find Prophet and the rest of the crew.

The problem was that aside from Kia and Prophet, the rest of the people involved had done a few jobs before in their criminal careers. Meaning, they were known in the Villain space.

Kia was new, so there wasn't any information. Matsuura had a known identity but little is there to denote his appearance, not even his true quirk.

Although, there was a reason why no one knows Matsuura's quirk for sure…

"There's a traitor…?" Kia read.

And if they were to be ratted out to Giran, not only was her life endangered but the other of their crew as well. In Kia's mind, there was no choice but to be involved in whatever Matsuura was doing to address the issue. Otherwise, she'd be killed or worse. 

Matsuura smiled. "Yes, there's a traitor. You know how long I was waiting for you to get to that part?"

"...What do you mean?"

"Because I can finally do this." With a loud thump from his shoe pressing on the brakes, the car shook, making Kia startled.

"Woah!" She said, the tight strap from her seatbelt stopping her face from hitting the front seat.

As Kia regained her balance at the sudden brakes, she stared at Matsuura, only to be greeted with a gun.

"Now then, I have a few reasons why I should kill you right now." An audible clasping noise from a holster emanates.

Kia raised her hands. "W-wait…" her confidence was gone. She wasn't dealing with inexperienced kids with a knife. It was Matsuura, aiming a gun and pointing it to her face. Judging by the sheen of metal inside the chambers, it was loaded.

"Kia, I have a question myself. How did you react?"

A revolver stared back at Kia but even so, she calmed herself down. "...I don't know? I asked why we robbed Giran?"

"Alright, so tell me… did you get scared when you read that? If I were to assume I was a new criminal, the name Giran wouldn't mean much to me. Yet here you are, frightened, despite supposedly not knowing about him."

"But look!" Kia slowly turned a page. "You have information about him!"

"That you skipped over."

Oh shit.

"H-how did you know about that?" Kia deflects, trying to find an excuse.

"I have a rearview mirror, you dumbass."

"Ah… er… I read it fast?"

"Doesn't change the fact you read it for 2 seconds and nonchalantly flipped the entire page over." Matsuura continued. "You also didn't even ask me about him. If you didn't know Giran, that'd be your first question. Not why we robbed him."

Double shit.

"Look man, I know about him but I don't work for him!"

After a moment of silence… he laughs.

"Hahahaha! You should have seen your face. Damsel in distress much?"

That bastard.

Kia fumed. "Jesus Christ! What the fuck were you thinking? I was convinced you'd shoot me at that point!"

"Nope." Matsuura shrugged. "That's the only inconsistent part of my knowledge of you, to be honest. You know about Giran but are new to this whole Villain business. You might have some kind of unknown background but so far your personality and motivations suggest not being the type to hand me over to Giran."

"So then why'd you pull out a gun for?!"

"Check the Q&A."

There was no way he had an answer ready for that situation, and as she turned the page back to the Q&A section, there was something in the handout.

[Q: Why did I almost get shot for being a traitor?]

[A: I just gauged your reaction. I can tell clues just based on that.]

"It's at the end!" Kia complained. "How would I even see this from the beginning?"

"When given a set of instructions, do you follow each step from beginning to end?"

"Yeah? What's this got to do with anything?"

Matsuura started the car back up while Kia answered. "So you don't skim the instructions before doing them step by step. You're a bit impatient as a person, so I knew you wouldn't even check the individual questions."

"...That makes absolutely no sense."

"Of course it wouldn't, you're Kia."

"Did you just use my name as an insult?"

"Keep reading again, you're Kia-ing." Kia tried to retort but Matsuura rushed to raise a hand. "No questions or statements for now. We're onto business, not pleasure anymore. There's still a traitor I want to take care of before striking at where Giran values most."

"You already know who will betray us?"

Matsuura frowned, Kia was still asking questions but he relented anyway. "Mhm. Hot Hands most likely. He's the newest member with the most interaction with Giran. He buys support gear from affiliates of his and gets jobs through Giran. Likely suspect."

"So are we going to… kill him?"

"Not yet." Matsuura picks up a phone from the front passenger seat and tosses it to Kia. "Here, call Buster and Gouger. Listen carefully, just tell them… 'It's me, Queen. Hot Hands is going to betray us.' Do you understand?"

"Uh… sure." Kia taps the display, and the phone given to her glows bright as she sees the contacts with both Buster and Gouger's phone numbers on the list.

Dialing Gouger first, Kia puts the phone to her ears and listens. It was on speaker mode by default, odd but manageable for Kia. Besides, she'd rather not bother to change the settings for now.

"Who is this?" Gouger's voice responds.

"It's me—"

"My Queen! I should have known!" A sudden flushing noise from the other end resounded. "What are you calling for?"

"Were you just taking a shit? Okay, never mind. It's me, Queen. Hot Hands is going to betray us—"

"That smug-eyed bastard! I knew it! He insulted my love for you once before, killing him should've been the first thing I did! My lady, where are you? I will keep you safe!"

"Uhmm…" Kia looked to Matsuura, her eyes hinting at what she should do next.

With a nod, Prophet took the phone. "It's Prophet speaking."

"Urgh! Ew!" Gouger reacted with a blech. "Can't you tell me where to meet through the Queen? I was enjoying her voice!"

"...Just wait at Tatooin Station."

"Okay," Gouger answered, the phone beeping at the end of the call. There wasn't even a goodbye since it wasn't Kia responding.

Matsuura handed back the phone to Kia. "Here, do Buster next."

"Sure." Dialling the number, once again Kia greeted the call with the predetermined phrase.

"Hello?" An innocent voice answered back. "Daddy is away right now!"

A childish girl responded, making Kia not know what to do. "Uhmm… where is he?"

Seconds of silence came, a shuffling of people, and background voices echoed before someone else answered the phone. "Sorry about that, my daughter likes to answer my phone like that ever since me and my wife taught her to say it. Anyway, who is this?"

"It's me, Queen. Hot Hands is going to betray us."

"Really? I mean, I didn't know he had it in him… but are you sure? Prophet might have made a mistake."

Kia tried to hand over the phone to Matsuura but was stopped by him. Instead of responding, Matsuura gestured to Kia to repeat the location he said to Gouger.

"Yeah, I think I'm sure," Kia answered. "Just meet us at Tatooin station." Ending the call, Kia tries to give it back, only for Matsuura to reject it again. "Here…"

"Keep the phone, it's yours. Don't think it's free; I'm dragging you to the other side of the city after all."

"So what are we going to do about Giran?"

"Page 8, Roman numeral 6."

"For fuck's sake…" Kia bitterly uttered. She read the following passage, widening her eyes in terror as she discovered what they had to do. "You're not actually doing this right?"

Matsuura pointed a thumb at the weapons and equipment on the front passenger side seat. "WE are. There's more on the trunk of the car."

"We're going to fight an entire crew of hardened criminals on their home turf! All for hurting Giran more?! Why?!"

"Q&A—"

"Goddamnit." Kia cut Matsuura off, furiously flipping pages.

[Q: Why are we pissing off Giran more?]

[A: Leverage. For a crew our size and with a quirk like mine. A little show of what we can do will convince him to stop pursuing us. Revenge isn't much on his mind, money is. Losing money is what he hates most, second to reputation. He's going to lose both when we deal with him this way.]

Kia unsatisfied, asks again. "I don't know if pissing him off will help. Why can't we do anything else?"

Matsuura sighed. "Easy, I want something more important that warrants this. Information."

"Information on who?"

"Giran's employer."

"Why...?"

"That USJ attack I learned about. I want to know who hired Giran for it."