{Rune}
Needing to train outside sucked but my thoughts were somewhere else the whole time. Since Raven and I heard about the mysterious Falcon group member that had been spotted in London I could not think of anything else. In the whole world the group had been extinguished, at least the ones that were found. Like Raven said, it wasn't unlikely for some of them to be alive but I was certain it'd be almost impossible to find them because they were hiding. And now someone openly revealed their identity at a place where all eyes were on. The Falcon family had the most visible trait that showed others their origin... the purple eyes. It was something special that only the Falcon family inherited.
At the moment I was climbing up a tree being supposed to attack from above.
What if I could contact that man? He'd know a lot more for sure and maybe he was able to tell me about it. What did he want at the old headquarters? There had to be something there in London that got him to show himself there. If granny wasn't gonna help me I needed to somehow find that man... us family shoul protect each other, right?
I saw Kate coming my way with a gun in her hand and scanning her surroundings. The gun was a fake of course but it still hurt getting hit. Me and Ed where hiding but since I had to attack first I waited for the right moment.
I jumped down and made her fall before kicking her gun away and taking it instead to aim at her.
At the same time she jumped up while tripping me with her immense force in her legs. Now I was falling. She aimed her fist at me and I saw the perfect opportunity to take her down before that but that required super speed so I had to let her hit me.
The impact was light because it wasn't a real fight and Kate jumped up excidetly, her braids falling loosely on her shoulders.
However, the next second a blue colored bullet hit her chest when she realized that Ed was still in the trees with his beloved sniper gun.
"Oh come on, it's two vs one." She put her hand out to help me get up and I gladly took it.
"In game or a real fight you can always be surrounded by more enemies so defeating one requires you to keep focused." Jane suddenly landed on the forest ground next to us. I never knew that she was so close... I didn't see her at all. We nooded and waited for Ed to join us when the training was finally almost over.
"Where's Raven?" I asked wondering if he planned on randomly attacking us the next few seconds as another test.
"I'm right here." A shiver went down my neck when his voice came from right next to my ear. Since when was he behind me?!
"You weren't paying attention and the moment you chose to jump was too early. Your posture was off and you were to slow." He scolded and held his forehead.
"Hah, this is really embarrassing for me as your coach. I really thought I'd be able to scare you right now though. Guess you're not the jump scare type either." He actually seemed totally invested in the subject but I didn't like how he claimed to feel embarrassed because of me. I knew very well that I was too slow but the other things he said weren't even that bad... I just wanted to get this stupid game over with tomorrow and then find a way to go to London as soon as possible. Could I just drop out of Inoue? Maybe if I wasn't good enough on purpose... but I had to think about it a little more after the game.
{Raven}
I felt a little offended because Rune didn't show any reaction when I scared him like that but seeing his annoyed expression when being scolded was even better.
"Rave seriously... you're always so hard on him." Jane mumbled and rolled her eyes at Rune who grinned at her a little before she started talking to the other two about today's training and tomorrow's game.
"Blondie, am I mean to you?" I teased and put my hands on my hips while Rune tied up his hair again so his light wavy strands fell down softly at the back of his head.
"The harder the training the more I'll learn." He stated unimpressed and proceeded to dust some dirt off his pants.
"By the way, your hair is too long. It'll get tangled up and because it's people will notice you in the forest immediately because of its color." I remembered that I wanted to say that but Rune quickly took a step back.
"I'm fine with my hair like this. But if you to dare cut it off, I might kill you." He threatened in all honesty and I finally saw an opportunity to greatly get on his nerves with this. Every person had a limit of patience and Rune's seemed to be his hair...
"Hm, you should be glad I don't carry a scissors." I sighed and stretched my back when seeing how the sun stood very low already. There was a little silence between the two of us and again I noticed how he lost focus. The whole day that had been the case but after lunch it got worse. Was Rune really scared of the Falcon family? It was odd to say the least.
"Rave, don't forget the check list.
Mr. Gray insisted on it." Jane then handed me a piece of paper and a pen to put crosses there. I almost forgot about the check up to the participation of the game because it was so useless. Jane was right though, if Mr. Gray wanted it then we better did it...
"I'll ask you some questions so you can participate. Just answer with yes or no."
"Training time is already over..." he remarked but I didn't pay attention to it. What did I care if he wanted to go home?
"Any chronic deceases?" I breathed out not wanting to go through all this.
Rune let himself slide down a tree so he could sit.
"No."
"Consumption of medication or drugs that affect your physique or mind?"
"No." He continuously answered without any interest. What even were these questions? If someone here was taking drugs they'd never admit it.
"Pregnant?"
"The hell?" He grunted a little and I smirked at him.
"What? How am I supposed to know what your genitals look like? For all I know you could be a trans boy." I argumented and actually considered the possiblity for a second. Right... how did I know Rune was not a trans boy?
"I am not. And even if, I would not get pregnant randomly." He defended himself and crossed his arms. So not a transboy... more like a fem boy.
"Whatever, I told you to just say yes or no. So... disabled?"
"No."
"Wearing contact lenses, glasses, ear pieces or any other device?" I was already about to skip to the next question when he unexpectadly reacted differently.
"Why?" He asked and I thought for a few seconds before I remebered the reason.
"Glasses, Lenses, earpieces, etc. could secretly have GPS or any other sensors to cheat in the game... that's why they have to be controlled." I rattled down not knowing why this was important all of a sudden before Rune asked yet another question. How was technology even so advanced that they put sensors in a tiny contact lense?
"I'm wearing lenses. Do I need to take them off for inspection?" His eyes glowed in a serious manner and I had to admit that I never realized him wearing contacts. I squatted down and raised his chin with my hand to take a closer look at his eyes. Now that I payed attention to it I saw them but these were colored lenses and not those for seeing better. Rune blankly stared back and didn't move. His face felt cold from the cool air in the forest park and his cheeks had a rosy pink color.
"Nah, these don't look suspicious. I don't see a reason to wear colored lenses though. You are pretty weird, blondie." I wondered why he'd wear those in the first place. Blue or green ones could be understandable if he wanted to stick out but wearing dark brown colored lenses was odd.
"That's good, now please let go of my face. I don't like people touching it." He brought out between pressed lips so it looked somehow adorable. Thinking about it, I had never touched his face before apart from accidentally during training.
Lost in thoughts for a second I let go and cleared my voice to regain focus. What was I even thinking?!
I proceeded to ask the questions until Rune was finally allowed to go home. When I looked after him leaving with the bus from the forest park it felt a little like staring after a stranger. Every day I learned something new about him and every day I wondered again who Rune Smith even was. At the beginning I was suspicious of him but why wasn't I anymore? A young man who just recently found out about his gifted abilities with no relatives that just decided to move to LA. A secret singer that was unexpectedly good at close combat despite looking so fragile from the outside. Where did he learn that because it surely wasn't only one or two techniques that he used. Also... how did he know about the Falcon masacre when he just recently got into all of this? He was simply an unsolvable mystery. One time he acted fearless and arrogant but then he'd keep apologizing and being strangely soft for no reason.
I realized that I should not let my guard down around him now that two weeks of training had passed. All his papers were clean and nothing in his record hinted anything suspicious but my gut told me that there had to be something. It was since the day I woke up in his apartment in Berlin, so fearless... people with no fear had to be confident in their skills or fools but I almost killed him two times yet he did not change his behaviour.
The bus was just leaving when I decided to do a little research there.
"See you later!" I yelled back at Jane and the others before I also got into the bus, somewhere Rune wasn't able to see me.
Following him was simply an action of security because I wanted to know where exactly he lived. In his records there had been named some apartment in a building in the east but this bus was dropping Rune off in a rich block in the west.
Interesting... it felt like a surprise that I actually found something odd about him.
I kept following the younger until he entered a rather large modern house with a pool and garden behind it.
Yeah, this was definitely not the address that was recorded.
Quickly, I got out my phone and searched for information of this houses owner.
"Vera McConnell? That Vera??" I didn't believe my eyes when I realized how this had to be the home of that famous celebrity we met at the jewelery shop.
Why in gods name would Rune go in there? They did not seem to know each other back then... was she his girlfriend? No, they did not fit together at all. But this was unexplainable. Or maybe Rune really was faking everything he showed us until now.
I couldn't stop feeling fooled when seeing this. It made me furious how that guy proudly marched though all of his training, playing the nice guy but then having something to hide. Why did I even treat him differently than the few other trainees I had last year...
I needed to find answers about this... who knew? Maybe Rune was actually a spy of some sort. No one could be trusted these days.
I typed a number in my phone and waited for the person to pick up while still being right around the corner of where Rune went.
There was only one person or maybe two that I could trust with this right now...
"Since when do you ever call me..."
Vince's usual tired but slightly sarcastic voice sounded from the phone. He was mainly working in the IT sector and he was also my best friend together with Jane so Vince was the only person I thought about telling this.
"You know how I told you that Rune is somehow weird? I saw him going into a villa that belongs to that celebrity Vera but I am sure there were no relatives or partners mentioned in his papers."
"Raven..." Vince sighed on the other end.
"Are you really telling me that you still suspect him after being his coach for two weeks?" He questioned and I wanted to explain my thoughts to him when I was interrupted again.
"Listen, he-"
"I know you have heavy trust issues but all the other people you thought were weird always ended up in a shitty unreasonable situation because of you. Following Rune after training? Really? He still has a personal life, you know. What if he is friends with her and just pretended to not know her to protect himself?" Vince tried talking sense into me as usual and I was well aware that everything he said could be true... however, I refused to believe it.
"No, you don't understand. I tried ignoring this for some time now but how comes we coincidently meet a random gifted dude that just recently found out about his powers and he ends up in our group as my trainee showing advanced combat skills and knowledge about the gifted society. He has no respect for power and does not fear getting beaten up like any normal human would... that guy has been through something, I'm sure of it."
The other end was silent for a moment. I knew Vince did understand what I meant and yet he held against it.
"I met him in the library a lot when he tried learning more about all the groups so that could be why he already knows so much... and for the rest. Surely, there is a chance he went through something or still does but it's not our right to question it as long as it doesn't threaten the Inoue group. Get a hold of yourself Raven... Rune is not a bad guy, even your cousin knows that."
I had to keep it together to not kick something around me. This bad feeling in my gut wouldn't leave now that I brought it up again. All those times I saw Rune laughing, smiling, being annoyed or even flirting... they could all have been fake. We couldn't know anything...
"There is something else... we coincidently overheard a conversation of Mr. Gray talking about a member of the Falcon family that was seen in London. Rune reacted rather strangely to it..." I added the last bit of memory that might prove something to Vince.
"Raven... I put my trust in you that you will not hurt anyone without reason, do you hear me?" His voice now sounded deeper and more serious than before. It happened very few times that he used that way of speaking so I knew he really meant it.
"Why?"
"I thought about it and Rune... nevermind, this is not something I can tell you over the phone. We'll talk tomorrow after the match."
Before I replied to him the call already ended and I was left with even more questions. What did he want to tell me? Did he also suspect something? Knowing Vince, he always searched for the deeper meaning and the truth behind things and also people. Trusting Rune blindly was not like him at all.