As they continued to the building, it turned out that the information Bella had been given wasn't exactly on the dot, "I thought you said these floors are supposed to be cleared out?" Risále asked, kicking the man in white robes to the ground before swiftly stabbing down into his chest.
Bella aimed the handgun carefully past Risále and shot the two people running towards them, "Give my people some credit, they did a lot of work. Alexander—Sorry, he prefers Xander, right? Xander said that they knew we were coming so I'm guessing these are reserve White Lotus members they've sent up here to safeguard. With all the explosions, I couldn't risk everyone's lives," She said matter-of-factly.
"Makes sense," Risále responded, jabbing her elbow into the robed figure's face, causing them to stumble back. She didn't hesitate to quickly jab the dagger up into the person's ribs and pull it back out, shoving them to the ground.
When she turned back, Bella was watching her almost carefully, "Not bad. I didn't think you'd be able to keep up."
Risále smiled, "Don't count me out so quickly, I was trained by Leon. That's gotta count for a lot."
At this, Bella raised an eyebrow, "In that case, I'm sure you can handle yourself," She said, and kicked the limp body out of the way, "Now, come on. It should be on the next floor if everything that I know is still accurate," She said the last sentence under her breath.
"Still accurate?" Risále asked, "Why would something have changed from what you know?"
Bella stopped for a moment, looking at Risále, "Ah, I forgot. You're not as far along as some of the others are you?"
Risále looked at her in confusion, "...In what? Like, pregnancy? Because as far as I'm aware, no one in the group is—"
"Quiet."
"Yes, Ma'am."
As they made their way through the halls, something made Risále stop in her tracks and frown. Bella seemed to notice immediately and turned to look at her, "Is something wrong?" She asked, her voice slightly more concerned than it was before. Risále bit her lip and decided to risk it.
"I can't explain it but…I think I know where we need to go. Or at least…Hm. Okay, I need to ask you something, but can we, you know, get to a quieter location?" She tilted her head at what sounded like people running up the stairs.
Bella nodded and grabbed her arm, pulling her up a corridor and into what seemed like a small closet. There was barely enough room for the two of them, they were both pressed close enough that Risále could feel the other woman's body heat. Bella turned on a small light that brightened the room enough so they could see each other's faces, "What is it?" Bella asked.
"The thing we're looking for. What exactly is it? Is it an object?" Risále asked carefully, trying to organize her thoughts in the presence of what must be one of the world's hottest women.
Bella peered over Risále, looking through the small window in the door to see if the coast was clear, "From what I've gathered, yes, the Wings should be a small artifact, why are you asking?"
Risále took a deep breath, "Because I don't think it's here. I don't think they have it. I can't explain it, but there's something else we need to get here. It's not the Wings but it's important. Plus, thinking about it, if the Wings were here, wouldn't the White Lotus have already used it by now? Especially since Julian is a member, he'd have easy access to it. I think…Either, they're missing some component of it or some way to unlock or…"
"Or they simply don't have it here. What a smart girl you are. Give me a minute, I'll let the others know. Where do you think this thing we need to find is?" Bella asked with a small smile on her face that looked absolutely stunning, so much so that Risále had to take a second to process the smile and Bella calling her "smart girl" in that voice.
"...Judging by my gut feeling and our luck? Probably where we had to go all along, honestly. I'm just telling you beforehand, I don't think we're going to find what we expect," Risále sighed, feeling a little stupid.
Bella seemed to notice this and patted her cheek, "It was helpful, Risále. Don't worry about it. Now, let's get going, and do try to keep up this time."
Risále grinned, "And do I get a prize if I do?"
The taller woman leaned forward, her long hair brushing against Risále's arm and she pushed the door behind them open as her other arm wrapped around Risále's waist to prevent her from losing balance.
"I'll think about it," She whispered into her ear before walking past her like nothing had happened.
Meanwhile, Risále internal monologue was simply a series of Oh my god, what the fuck, what the actual fuck, what the fuck have I gotten myself into—
It took her a moment to snap out of her daze and catch up to the woman.
They carefully made their way up the spiral corridor staircase, but as they passed a window, the glass shattered as the bullet flew right in front of Risále's face.
"Do we…"
"Start running," Bella commanded, and Risále sprinted past her while Bella pulled out a gun and fired out the window. Hitting her target, she turned back to follow Risále, only to barely dodge a man's body toppling down the stairs. Risále peeked out from the top of the stairwell.
"Sorry! I didn't expect him to be there so I sort of just panicked and threw him down! Are you alright?" She called down.
Bella raised an eyebrow as she made her way up the stairs, "You threw him, huh? Leon has definitely trained you well."
"Leon doesn't do anything halfway," She said, smiling fondly, "I bet you I could probably take you. In a fight. I could take you in a fight," She quickly added, but the look on Bella's face…
The woman tilted her head, sweeping her bangs out of her face, "We'll see about that. Though in all honesty, I could ruin you. In a fight," Bella said nonchalantly as she walked past Risále, "Come on, it's one more floor up."
Risále was still stuck on the sentence she had said before that. What does she mean she could ruin me?!
She noticed Bella was waiting for her and ran to catch up. As they made it across the giant hall, Bella stopped and motioned for Risále to keep quiet as well. She seemed to be listening for something and there was noise coming from a large door at the end of the hall. Risále turned to look at what was in the cases.
"We're in the treasury," Bella confirmed her thoughts, "Break one of the cases and grab a weapon. It sounds like there's quite a few people up there, and we're going to have to get through all of them."
Risále nodded and looked around. Her eyes landed on a jeweled dagger inside a case, and she was immediately interested in it.
"You like that?" Risále almost jumped as Bella peered over her shoulder, "You want that one?" She nodded and Bella spoke again, "Stand back."
Within a moment, Bella had raised what looked like a metal hammer and slammed it down on the case, shattering it immediately. She pulled out the dagger and handed it to Risále, "Thank you," The shorter woman said softly, looking at the dagger, "Now, we need to go."
Bella nodded and they made their way towards the final staircase, side by side. There was a huge wooden door blocking the way to what Risále would assume was the final room with the safe in it. As Risále went to open it, Bella grabbed her arm, "Hold on, give me a moment," She whispered, pulling out a phone and quickly making a call. Risále couldn't hear who was on the other side, but she could hear Bella quietly say, "We're at the safe room, west highest tower. Can you get into position for a quick exit?" A pause, and then, "Alright. I'll see you soon, we can talk more then. Stay safe," Her voice was soft as she spoke, gentle.
Then, she turned to Risále, her eyes not quite harsh, but filled with a fire. Risále could tell it was passion.
God, she was beautiful.
"Let's go," She said lowly, under her breath. Risále nodded, and with that, she kicked open the door.
The room had about eight figures in white cloaks, seven of them guarding the front while one was in the back, fiddling with something. Risále and Bella didn't hesitate, rushing at the White Lotus members.
Risále ran straight at one of them, tackling them to the ground and quickly pinning them down, stabbing them in the chest and the shoulder in rapid succession. Twisting away, she grabbed another by the ankle and dragged them down, grabbing the cloak tail and wrapping it around the person's neck. As they struggled, she stabbed them in the abdomen, turning to see Bella had taken down two and had just kicked a third one out the window.
She noticed Risále watching her and sent her a small, confident smile, "Three to two, blueberry."
Oh. Oh, that was adorable.
"Just keep watching me, bella," Risále took a calculated risk by calling her that. She certainly hoped the woman didn't know Spanish but from the way she was looking for her…Risále could never depend on her luck.
As one of the figures lurched at her, Risále grabbed their arm and swung them against the wall, hard enough to knock them off kilter and stabbed them twice in the abdomen and once on each shoulder, leaving them immobile. She turned to look at Bella, who raised her brow, "Not bad."
She didn't hesitate before grabbing the arm of the figure running toward her and twisting it in such a way that must have been broken from the way the person screamed. She slammed her hammer down on their head and they went down like a stone.
There was one more figure and behind them, there was a safe. They quickly dropped to their knees and began pleading, "Please, please spare me! I'm only doing what they told me to, I didn't mean to—Please, I have a family!"
Both Bella and Risále stopped and looked at each other. It was completely plausible that innocent people had been dragged into it or had been blackmailed. If that was the case, they really could be killing innocent people…
Bella pulled off the man's mask and grabbed him by the hair, looking him straight in the eye, "If I see your face against us again, I will not hesitate to put a blade straight through your mouth and through the back of your head. Got it?" She said roughly.
The man nodded and Bella let go of him. The man stumbled out of the door and his footsteps could be heard running down the stairs. She walked over to the door and closed it, "The lock is busted, so we should work fast, just in case."
Risále was looking at the lock on the safe, and she hummed, "Do you have any idea what the combination could be?"
Bella walked over, leaning over the shorter woman, "I have a couple of guesses, but I don't know how many attempts we have. I'm considering just smashing it open."
"No," Risále said suddenly, "I…I've seen this kind of safe before…Somewhere. It's only got three attempts, and trying to break it will make the safe self-destruct, destroying anything that's inside. We'll try two codes you think it might be and if we can't open it, might as well take the entire thing."
Bella nodded, and moved in front, typing in a code quickly, "I would have thought that they would have gone by Julian Rowlock's birthday but maybe…Minakshi's?" She tried a second code and it seemed obvious that it wasn't the code.
Suddenly, Risále turned to look at the door, "People are coming. A lot of them. We need to get out of here, I don't know how many of them we can get rid of."
"Alright, help me get the safe out of…Are you alright?" Bella asked, noticing that Risále seemed to be far away at that moment, as if she was considering something far, far away. Then, Risále looked at her with a determined look.
"Stay close to the door, make sure they don't get in. If this doesn't work, get out of here, but I think it will. Just…Trust me on this one," Risále said as leaned down to look closely at the lock.
Bella grabbed her shoulder, "If this doesn't work…"
"I know, it could destroy whatever is inside."
"No, I don't care about that. It could kill you. Are you absolutely sure about this, Risále?" She responded.
Risále nodded, "I'm sure."
Bella took a deep breath and stood by the door, standing in front of the door and nodding to her, holding the door closed behind her back. Risále took a deep breath as well.
Are you sure? (R)
Yes. It's your birthday, June 15th. The password is 0615. (A)
If this is wrong, then you're going to get me and her killed. (R)
It's not wrong. I'm sure. Do it. (A)
And with that, Risále inputted the code. To both of their surprise and relief, the noise was different, and the safe door opened. As they both looked into it, they were surprised and a bit confused to see that there was a small flash drive in the safe, "Let's not ask questions. Grab it and—"
The door slammed open and white cloaked figures flooded into the room, more than both Bella and Risále could handle. The shorter woman put the flash drive into her jacket pocket and Bella held her hand out, "What—"
"The dagger. Give me the dagger," Bella said. Risále didn't question her, and she felt herself being dragged towards the window, "Hold on tight. Your life depends on it," Bella said. Risále processed her words just in time to wrap her arms around Bella's neck, clasping them tightly before Bella launched them off of the window sill.
Risále was too scared to scream and had her eyes squeezed shut but she suddenly noticed that the falling feeling had disappeared. She slowly opened one eye to see that Bella had jammed the dagger into the wall of the castle.
That they were dangling hundreds of feet off the ground. Out of instinct, Risále wrapped her legs around Bella's waist and hid her face in her shoulder. Bella used one hand to slowly stroke her back, "You're fine, we're alright."
"Risále! Bella!" It was a familiar voice yelling, and she realized it was Hyunwoo's voice, "Hold on, we'll get you both down soon!"
Bella nodded and looked at Risále, "Can you reach up and grab onto the dagger?" She asked Risále nodded, and she reached up, hanging face to face with the woman, "Good, you're doing great. Alright, now turn around, I want you to swing yourself forward. Hyunwoo will catch you, he won't let you fall, I promise. Can you do that for me?" She asked.
Risále nodded hesitantly and began to swing herself. The gap between them and the wall Hyunwoo was standing on wasn't too big but if she misjudged…No, she wouldn't. She could do this. She swung herself and squeezing her eyes shut, she let go at what she approximated was the right time.
She knew she was safe the moment she felt strong, warm arms around her. She opened her eyes to be met with Hyunwoo's gentle smile, "Brave girl, see? You did it. I know it must have been scary, you don't like heights, right? You're alright, now, I promise. I have to put you down for a moment because I need to catch Bella, is that alright?" Risále nodded and Hyunwoo gently put her down. He handed her a water bottle, "Drink slowly. You're alright."
A few seconds later, she saw Hyunwoo lean back slightly from the force of catching the ginger-haired woman in his arms, "What, did I get too heavy for you while you were gone, Hyun?" She asked, the fondness in her voice contrasting from the words.
"Not at all, Mira, just wasn't prepared to see you in all your beauty," Hyunwoo laughed brightly. Bella seemed to roll her eyes.
"Flatterer."
"I missed you, too, sweetheart," He drawled, a playful look in his eyes.
Risále felt like she was intruding on something, but when Hyunwoo let Bella down and walked over to her, easily picking her up, "I'm proud of you, darlin'," He said softly and she couldn't help but turn a bit red at how his accent seemed to jump out specifically with that word. Was it a pet name thing? Whatever it was, it was hot.
As her eyes met Bella's she saw the amusement in her eyes and the small nod she gave her, she couldn't help but blush.
Oh well, this was something to deal with later.