Friends for Now : Part 3

It was bright outside.

People were doing their own things, busy with their life. The sun was so bright that it would blind a person if you look at it too long.

It was so bright, yet, in a place that almost went unnoticed by people that passed through, a place that was ignored by them, was dark from the lack of sun shining through.

The alley between the tall buildings was where Valerian stood. The blond-haired lieutenant leaned on the wall with hands over his chest. There was nothing at all within a few feet of him, aside from the trash all over the ground and some puddles from the rain this morning.

He was waiting for someone. A certain person that he just contacted, a person that he would need a favor from.

His sworn enemy, the mercenary.

"What? You think I would actually fall for your trap, police boy?" The sudden appearance of the mercenary beside him almost made Valerian's heart jump out of his chest. He would die first to admit that, though.

"Calling me for a job, pretending to be someone who would hire me. You really think it would actually work, huh?" The mercenary mocked as he leaned on the wall, eyes looking at the lieutenant beside him.

His blue eyes wryly stared at the enemy who called for him with some curiosity undertone behind them. The police beside him were wearing non-uniform clothes while the mercenary was wearing his usual infamous black trench coat with a black mask adorning half of his face.

Valerian returned the stares. "No, I'm not stupid. That's why I did not tell anyone of our meetings." He answered nonchalantly.

The police took out a picture from his light brown trench coat. He handed over the picture to the other trenchcoat-wearing person, who happened to be a mercenary.

The mercenary left the lieutenant's hand hanging with a picture in his hand, waiting for the other person to take it. They stared intensely at each other for a moment. Each was trying to make what the other was thinking.

Then the black-haired enemy finally took the picture with his black-gloved hand. He was still staring at Valerian, calculating the situation, before he finally diverted his eyes and scanned the picture of two blond-haired boys. One was familiar, the other was not.

The picture contained the lieutenant and a boy around Axel's age. The older one was smiling formally while the younger was frowning as if he did not want to take a picture with Valerian.

Well, he would be frowning too if he was stuck with Valerian as a brother. Kiaran presumed the other boy in the picture was the lieutenant's brother with the same green eyes and the same blond hair, though the younger one was darker.

"What's this?" He raised an eyebrow at Valerian.

Valerian looked at the picture in the mercenary hand before diverting his gaze to the man. "It's-" He opened his mouth to speak but quickly got cut off by the enemy.

"Don't worry. You look incredibly ugly as always, by the way." Added the mercenary while pointing at his face in the picture.

He smirked behind his mask, and Valerian could feel the smirk without even seeing it. "Right, go on." The mercenary continued, biting the urge to tease the lieutenant even more.

Valerian gave all his best to not kill the man in front of him. He just glared at the mercenary as always.

Clenching his jaw, the lieutenant explained. "I want you to save my brother. He got kidnapped by the government last night."

Kiaran examined the boy in the picture once more. "And why should I help you save your brother?"

Valerian shuffled the inside of his coat and took out another picture. He handed the picture again to the mercenary, and Kiaran took it with a hidden fascinated glint in his blue eyes.

Those glints turned hard when he saw the content of the picture. It was a picture of Axel passed out inside some kind of jail with the lieutenant's brother, who was glaring at the camera.

Valerian pointed at the mute murderer's picture. "You would want to save him, don't you?"

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Valerian trusted the government. He was loyal and true to his words. He was the best lieutenant in this big and rich city.

The city of Livedam. This city was the capital of the country. Everyone loved being in here. The president was kind to his people. This was the safest place and the best place of all. In order to be the safest place, there had to be people who protected it.

And then came Valerian.

He was born to be the perfect child and protected the city. He would do what his parents did and live that way. It was his fate to protect Livedam.

But lately, the city did not seem like the safest place at all with what the lieutenant witnessed happening.

No, he was not talking about the mercenary or the mute murderer or the assassin or even the hitman that dangered the city. He was talking about the governments themselves.

It started with the event where he almost caught the mercenary yet again. The mercenary stole something from the government higher-ups, he was given the assignment to protect that something.

When he asked what it was, they did not tell him at all. Valerian brushed it off and went to catch the mercenary after he murdered the government who had the 'something'.

Everything was going normally in Livedam.

And then a person came running to him like he was dying. The man was part of the politicians, his face was pale and full of sweat. He grabbed Valerian's shoulders and spoke.

"They blackmailed me, they made me the bad guy. Save me. Save me!" Uttered the man.

Valerian wished he had listened to the politician that day because later that night, he would see the man's lifeless body with a hole in his forehead.

Valerian ran to the floor where the gunshot was taken. The sound of a blazing alarm rang in the building. His breath was ragged as he arrived at the door.

He tried to kick the door open, but he peeked to see the door was being held by a table. He pushed it again. He took a step back and ran with all his might to the door, making the table push over.

He got in the room to see the window was crushed. The killer had already taken off. He ran over to the window and looked around. He caught a glimpse of a red porcelain mask on the other building before it disappeared quickly as it came into his vision.

It was the assassin. She must have killed the politician because he did something wrong. She always killed the governments that corrupted people or simply had done something wrong to society.

But the politician had said that he was- he was blackmailed. His breath caught in his throat as he looked at the body that lay on the floor. The blood was oozing from his forehead and all Valerian could do was stare.

Valerian felt guilty since that day. He came to the politician's house, and oh, how he felt like someone stabbed him in the chest when he saw his wife and children.

He came to the politician's room to find how messy it was. Papers were everywhere, boxes were thrown around like he was running out of time.

He picked it one by one and scanned all of them. Whatever it was, he must have saved some truth behind what was happening. He could avenge the politician, it helped him through his guilt.

He did not find anything until something caught his green eyes. There was a bunch of papers that were poorly hidden under the bed. Valerian walked over and crouched on the floor. He took the papers in his hand and sat down on the bed.

There was a big classified word written on the paper. Valerian furrowed his eyebrows. He read the paper one by one, and each paper made his world spin. His heartbeat was faster than ever, something was hidden in Livedam.

The city that was supposed to be the safest place was the most dangerous one.

He read project DM-3. It was written that project DM-1 was finished, where they killed all the scientists that were involved in this project and kept hidden the dark arrow.

It was a success, and they blamed the politician who held this info for all the scientists' death. That's why he's gone and now- and now Valerian found the truth.

The lieutenant gripped the paper and clenched his fists as he read more. The project DM-2 was even worse. They made humans inhuman. It did sound ridiculous. But, when Valerian saw the pictures, it did not seem ridiculous anymore.

They were not really successful, though. All the people who were turned into- into a messed up human that was called 'demon' died within a few days after turning. Their eyes would turn red and become a mindless killing machine that hurt anyone in sight.

When he thought that this could not get even worse, he was proven wrong as he read project DM-3. Apparently, they tried to make a portal to another world through a mirror with the arrow that was being hidden.

The mirror was being hidden in some building, and Valerian promised he would find it. He would destroy the mirror before anything happened. He would save this city somehow. He would save Livedam.

He was so close to finding the mirror when his subordinate suddenly came to the room with panic in her eyes. "Lieutenant, the mercenary-"

She did not even finish the sentence, and Valerian had already stood up with the papers in his hand. He ran past the politician's family in a hurry to his car. He got in the car with her subordinate and put the papers on the car's chair behind him.

He drove at full speed with a siren blazing on top of his car. The building where the scene happened started to appear in his sight as he arrived at the scene. He parked the car outside the building and quickly got out with a gun in his hand.

He saw an annoyingly familiar figure jump from the building with the help of a rope gun and land right in front of him. "Today, you're quite later than you usually were, police boy."

The mercenary did his usual teasing, and Valerian found himself frozen in his spot. He could not focus on any words the mercenary poured, he just put on his irritated face as always. His green eyes kept eyeing the box in the criminal's hand.

Was that the black arrow? If it was, then did the mercenary know about the DM projects?

He was too zoned out to notice that the mercenary disappeared from his sight right before his subordinate captured the criminal. He snapped out of his thoughts and quickly went back to his car, ignoring the mess around him.

He went home with a lot to take in that day, oblivious to how his subordinate eyed him sharply.

Tomorrow came fast, and he was suddenly got called by the higher-ups. He knew this would happen sooner or later. He was about to pick Aster up from his extra class when the call happened.

Valerian rushed to the meeting room and opened the door to see a bunch of people in fancy suits and dresses. All eyes were on him as he stood in front of the table where everyone sat. He bowed a little to show some respect before looking at the people in front of him.

"Lieutenant Valerian Edelweiss, I heard you read something you should not have." One of the men in the room spoke up, he tilted his head at him.

"There was a missing paper in the room where the break-in happened, did you steal it?" The woman in formal dress spoke sternly as she angrily stared at him.

The break-in? He did not steal anything from the room. He did not even get in the building at all! It was the mercenary or the mute murderer that took it, one of the two. Well, he did steal from the politician's room, but that's different.

"As far as I'm aware, I did not get in the room at all, ma'am. I didn't steal anything. It must have been the merce-"

The woman slammed her hands to the table. "Cut the crap. We know you have the papers either way."

Another man with glasses sighed. He looked over Valerian coldly. "Just give us the papers before we make a move towards you."

"You also need to sign an NDA." Another man with bald hair jumped in.

Valerian gritted his teeth. Did they threaten him? Why would they do something like this? This was wrong. Livedam was a safe place, they were making it dangerous.

"No." Valerian ventured. His blonde hair that almost covered his right eye bounced as he looked around the room. "This is wrong, I am not going to stay silent about this."

The glasses man raised an eyebrow. "You're going to regret it, lieutenant."

Valerian bared his teeth. "Then I'd like to see you try, sir." He quickly left the room after he said that.

He also quickly regretted what he said after he received a picture of Aster who got locked up with the mute murderer in prison.

✵✵✵✵✵✵

The sworn enemies were busy gearing up inside an abandoned warehouse. They met up again after their meeting in that alley. They promised to meet in this warehouse right when the sun hid away from the world.

"What's that?" Valerian commented while reloading his gun. He watched the mercenary holding some kind of necklace before putting it inside his black trench coat.

"A voice changer. My murderer would have to wear that to actually talk." He answered as he took out his knife.

Valerian looked over the mercenary's neck. "So that choker you wear is actually a voice changer?"

Kiaran looked into Valerian's green eyes as he sharpened his knife. "Duh."

The light flickered a little as the both of them diverted their gaze from each other. "He's not mute, then? Your murderer." The lieutenant asked again while putting his gun away.

"Nah, I just taught him to never talk if it's not important." The mercenary shrugged and adjusted his black mask. Valerian tried his best to ignore the implication of the mercenary's words about the mute murderer.

Kiaran finished gearing up and walked over to Valerian. "Here's the plan, we got in, you shoot them all, you got your boy, I got mine." He spoke as he made encouraging gestures with his hands.

Valerian furrowed his eyebrows at the mercenary's plan. "I am not going to protect you."

The mercenary snorted. "Oh please, I can protect myself, police boy, I am saying that because-" He took out a light brown mask and offered it to Valerian.

"-I am not going to protect you." He shoved the mask into the lieutenant's hand and made his way out of the warehouse. "Make sure to wear that to cover your ugly face!" Yelled Kiaran as he vanished from Valerian's sight.

Valerian rolled his eyes and wore the mask to cover half of his face. He adjusted his light brown coat and went outside.

He saw the car and found the mercenary already sitting beside the driver's seat. The night was haunting him as he made his way to it and got inside. He looked around the warehouse once more as he closed the car's door. Valerian turned on the car's engine in silence.

"So," The criminal darted as he stared at the police who was wearing his seatbelt. "Friends for now?"

Valerian did not even try to look at Kiaran. "Acquaintance." He answered as his foot pressed on the gas pedal.

Kiaran wore his seatbelt and leaned on his seat. "Friends, it is."