Sage hummed a soft melody as she prepped herself for her early-morning training.

It had been two years since she was accepted into Protocol, and those years had been the hardest of her life. A reason for that would be that she lost her best friend.

Jett.

Despite Sage's terrible efforts to rid Jett of her mind, she was eventually able to get a grip. She had told herself that if Jett let go of her, she had to as well.

That's the only way to move on..right?

Though, Sage still vividly remembers the day of her and Jett's departure. Jett had sent her off with so much hope that they would be able to keep in touch with each other..yet, the last time she ever received a call or message from her was years ago.

Sometimes Sage wishes to get rid of any memories of Jett, but even if she had the ability to, she would never be able to bring herself to do so. She had an attachment to Jett that she could not break. An attachment that even today, Sage still cares about.

Everything about that girl brought warmth to Sage and she knew Jett cared about her just as much.

Sage dragged herself out of her thoughts and pulled her hair into a high ponytail. After she finished brushing her teeth, she walked into her room and glanced over at a portrait. A prime example of Sage's failure to forget Jett. The portrait held the two's first day at the Academy.

Sage couldn't help her mouth curling into a small smile as she observed Jett. Her fingertips ran over the smooth glass as she brought the frame to her forehead.

"Where are you, Jett?.."

"Who's Jett?" Someone suddenly said.

Sage almost jumped out of her skin, not expecting any sort of interruption at that moment. She composed herself and rid herself of any look of annoyance before turning around.

"Hello, Killjoy"

Killjoy raised an eyebrow at the sentinel, "Were you kissing a photo?"

"What- No! Of course not.."

"Oh my gosh..Sage, I never knew you liked someone! That face you have on is so guilty! Tell me, who is it?"

"I wasn't even kissing- Whatever, believe what you'd like. What are you even doing in my room? "

Killjoy leaned against the doorframe, "Brimstone told me to get you. I don't know what he wants but he sounded pretty serious. What'd ya do this time?"

"You know very well I follow all the rules, I'm sure it has to do nothing with my behavior," Sage said with a confident smile.

"That's what they all say until you come out of his office from getting a spanking"

Sage's eye twitched, "He doesn't actually do that right?"

"No, he definitely does"

Sage's back instantly straightened, she instantly went to think back to any issues that she could have caused. She followed with the team with the last attack on Haven

"Chill, Sage! I was just joking, I can literally see the worry in your eyes. I'm sure it's nothing too. Just make sure to get there on time, or else he might actually give a spanking"

Sage went to scold Killjoy but she was already dashing out of the bedroom with a loud chuckle. Her shoulders dropped in defeat as she threw on her coat. She went to leave her room but she quickly took one last glance at the photo of her and Jett.

With a sad sigh, she turned her back to it and closed the door.

~~~

"I'm sure you are worried as to why I called you in here" Was the first thing Brimstone had said when he welcomed Sage into his office.

Sage felt nervous around Brimstone. He was the leader of their division after all, and she always felt the need to prepare the words she planned to say to him.

"I am.." Sage replied honestly.

Brimstone scooted up in his chair and rested his chin on his hands, "Are you familiar with Kingdom?"

"Kingdom..you mean the organization that has been after us for centuries?"

"You've done your homework. The kingdom is an organization that came long before us, and its main plan was to steal Radianite from the first light and use it for evil purposes. Luckily we were able to withhold some of that Radianite and use it to form Valorant. Unfortunately, to this day, Kingdom still opposes a threat to us and we were recently informed of unlucky news"

Sage held her breath before muttering, "And that news would be?"

"Kingdom has sent one of their strongest divisions after us and we need you to fight alongside us to counter their attack"

~~

Sage attempted to process the information but her heart was racing. Kingdom? Sending their strongest division..for what?

"May I ask why they are suddenly springing this attack on us?"

"That is something that I even ask myself. It is quite a possibility that they found a team strong enough that can wipe us all out"

Sage sat up, "It's not fair. They almost wiped us out last time on Ascent, and now they want to send death our way"

"It's not death if I'm there"

"It's still..not fair"

"Sage, the world isn't fair. But, I can assure you that if we prepare ourselves for the attack then we will have the upper hand. If I'm correct, they are planning to attack HQ. HQ is one of the most heavily guarded places, so I have the utmost confidence that we can handle Kingdom's division. That's only..if we have all hands on deck. You are vital to be in this fight"

Sage still seemed unsure but she didn't join Valorant just to back down when things get hard. She hardened her stare and stiffly nodded, "Yes. I will fight for you"

"Great, the attack is tonight"

~~

"What do you mean..You've never had me go against Valorant's members. You've sent me to find Radianite pieces..but never this type of thing"

"Jett, you are one of our strongest members. You have that ability to fly. Not a lot of people possess that ability when fused with Radianite" Hench spoke.

Jett stared at him with narrowed eyes, "Yes..but, up till now, you have never granted me the freedom to fight because you claimed I was too 'reckless'. so how do you know that I'm one of you're strongest members?"

"You act as if I've never seen your records in that old Academy you were in. You were ranked in the top 5 of your class when it came to self-defense classes, martial arts, and not to mention, you were number 1 in battle strategy. It truly is a shame that you were rejected by Valorant. They lost an amazing fighter"

Jett couldn't help the blush that appeared on her face. She always valued compliments but in this situation, she felt uneasy. Especially because..her best- ex-best friend was in the organization of Valorant.

"What if I don't want to?"

Hench raised his eyebrow, "Repeat that?"

"What If I don't feel comfortable participating in this..fight?"

"What if I told you that you don't have a choice"

Jett's heart began to pick up speed as she looked at the door. She wanted to leave, she didn't want to fight Valorant. She isn't fond of the organization, but that doesn't mean she wants to attack it.

"Don't even think about it. You know even with your speed, I can stop you in an instant. Do you forget that I was the one who saved you from living the rest of your life on the streets. I believe it is time you owe me a favor"

Jett's jaw clenched at her leader's words, "I- I'm sorry for my choice of words. I will go through with your plan. But..on one condition"

"And that is..?"

"I'm going by myself"

~~

Jett tapped her foot against the gravel of her old hometown. She decided to take one last revisit to her favorite spot before she had to commence with Kingdom's plan. The tip of her foot dug into the gravel of the park as she swung slowly on the swings.

The time of the attack was approaching and Jett was sweating pinballs as it came closer and closer. Jett found it easy to forget all her past ever since she joined Kingdom, but only one particular thing stuck with her.

Sage.

Jett knew she messed things up with her two years ago, and she still regrets it to this day. There were many moments where she considered calling or even messaging Sage but she could never face her. Sage would look at her with so much disappointment and Jett just couldn't handle something like that.

Jett eventually settled for keeping Sage as nothing but a memory.

"Why the long face?"

Jett looked surprised when she heard the familiar Japanese accent, "Yoru! Why are you here?"

"I hear that you decided to go on a hard mission and you request to go without your team. So, I decided to follow you"

"Dude, if Hench finds out that you came here..he will have my head!"

Yoru frowned, "I already told him I was going with you, he seemed fine with it. He doesn't want his precious toy to go alone anyways"

"Don't call me that. It feels..weird"

"Why, you into that stuff?" Yoru teased, yelping when he felt Jett wack his head.

"You know I requested to do this mission alone..for a reason!"

Yoru scoffed and sat down in the swing next to Jett, "Oh please, I can't believe you would even think about going on a dangerous without me! Your best friend! Your buddy!"

"I only use you for your really good rice triangles"

"Tsk, yeah right. I know you love me"

Jett smiled to herself and formed her hand into a fist so she could lightly pound it into his shoulder, "You're right. I love you just so you can give me your rice triangles"

"That sounds a little better"

Sighing, Jett got up and brushed off some of the dust that got on her pants, "Are you sure you want to go on this mission with me? I mean, I'm kinda fighting against like 5 members of Valorant"

"Please, any chance to see Phoenix and beat his ass is always worth it"

"You and him know each other?"

"Of course! We were childhood friends. I was a foreign exchange student since I came from Japan. Phoenix and I were friends when we were teenagers and stayed friends until Phoenix got accepted into the Academy you got into. That eventually brought much distance between us. So basically, any chance to see my old best friend would be nice"

Jett chewed on her lower lip, "Yeah..you're not the only one seeing your best friend"

"Oh? Is this the Sage girl that you wouldn't shut up about for a good year"

"Mhm"

"Oh man that sucks, you have to face the terrible wrath of your best friend that you decided to ghost"

Jett flushed, "Please don't remind me. I feel enough guilt as it is".

"You're no fun. Sometimes making humorous jokes out of your pain is therapeutic"

"Yeah for you" Jett scoffed before walking towards the sidewalk with a streetlight.

Yoru watched Jett for a second then got up to follow her, "Are you feeling okay?"

Jett wanted to lie but she knew lying to Yoru was pointless, "Not the best. But I'll be okay. I just have to..fight my old friends"

"I'll be with you every step of the way, Jett"

Jett looked over at Yoru with an appreciative yet sad smile, "Thank you"

~~

Sage stood at her post with Viper who was observing a projectile canister that was filled with poison. Unlike Viper who was being productive, Sage kept nervously chewing on her fingernail. The battle was to begin soon and she continuously checked her orbs to see if they were in place accordingly.

"Sage I can sense your nervousness from here. You are usually so composed, why the sudden change?" Viper asked, setting the canister of poison onto the table.

Sage sighed and leaned against the wall, "I'm just nervous"

"I am too, but you usually never let it show this bad. Is it someone in particular that you are worried about?"

"No..that's just it. I don't know who plans to attack us. The fact alone that Brimstone claims that these people are the 'strongest' makes me scared. What if we die, Sabine?"

Viper was surprised when Sage used her name, "You never call me by my first name. You really are scared aren't you?"

Sage sighed and nodded.

"I'm not good with words..but. I think you should follow what you tell all of us. To not fear death but embrace it. Everything happens for a reason so if you die, it happened for a reason. But aside from that, we won't truly know how strong they are until we actually see them. If we work together, we can surely defeat whoever comes our way"

"And you claim that you're 'bad with words. Those were excellent words, Viper. Thank you" Sage smiled.

The conversation with Viper was able to calm some of her nerves, but the itching feeling of fear kept looming.

~~

"Alright, we're here" Jett whispered, flipping up her hood over her head.

Yoru stared ahead, "Wow, you weren't lying when you said that the HQ was heavily guarded. There are guards everywhere!"

"Yeah, but I'm sure they have nothing but guns. No radianite whatsoever" Jett replied, staring at the several guards surrounding the place.

Yoru nodded, "So all we have to do is take those guys out. And then what else? We don't infiltrate right?"

"I don't..think so. I think all we need to do is get the members' attention and draw them out into an open area"

"Alright, your gun is loaded right?"

Jett made sure to double-check as she cocked back the hammer of her revolver, "Ready?"

"Wait wait, you're only going in with a Sheriff?!"

"Yeah? I know how to use it best and besides, Vandal or Phantom's spray recoil is too much for me. One tap with a Sheriff, and they're dead!"

Yoru sighed, "And you're confident that you will be able to hit their heads?"

"Are you questioning my ability to hit heads?"

"No.."

"Good! Now, continue with the plan"

~~

Getting past the guards seemed way too easy to Jett. The guards were hardly fighting back and most of them ran away before Jett could even get a hit on them.

"That was too easy" Yoru mumbled.

Jett nodded, "I was just about to say that. Why did they all run away?"

Yoru rubbed his chin and considered throwing down his teleport portal to get a better view on the outer perimeter but before he could make any move, he felt his feet get swiped off the floor and thrown into something.

"Yoru!" Jett yelled, dashing away before anything could get to her. She watched his friend get caught into a ball of rope. She threw down two smoke bombs and dashed around one of them to get some type of information on where the net came from.

She heard a footstep and she instantly turned around to see a shadow staring straight at her. Quickly she raised her Sheriff to the person's head, but she felt a kick to her back. What was happening? Why was her reaction so slow? The kick caused her to fly forward onto the ground, but before anything could happen, she stumbled to her feet and dashed backward. She knew her power was draining.

"Let go of my friend" Jett yelled!

Yoru continued to struggle his way out of the net, "Jett, calm yoursel-"

Was the last thing Jett heard when she heard Yoru's scream of agony. Someone had put a bullet to his knee.

Jett's eyes now held anger and furey at the sight of her friend bleeding out. She felt power surge through her as she raised her arms. As her arms raised, five symmetrical knives surrounded her. Her eyes darted at the two people that held guns to her head.

"You've lost," Someone said with accompanied loud footsteps.

Jett huffed a breath through her clenched teeth. She closed her eyes and thought out her plan. Once she formed a probable plan, she instantly dashed forward and upward so that she was sky-high. She sent down two of her knives into anyone that she could see at that moment. But for some reason, they were able to dodge it. Jett's eyes widened at the reaction time of these people.

"Agh!" Jett yelled as she felt a bullet skim her arm, cutting into the seams of her jacket. She felt herself losing momentum in the air, so she used the last bit of energy she had to throw her last smoke down and float away.

Once she landed on her feet, she clenched her jaw tightly. She looked at her arm that was bleeding out. She shuffled to a nearby tree and leaned her back against it, "Fuck..this hurts"

She felt her eyes close tightly, but the most audible thing she heard was footsteps coming towards her. Eventually, she had to open her eyes and what she saw was not something she expected.

She was surrounded by three people who were glaring at her. One was wearing green, another one was that shadowy figure she almost hit earlier, and the other one was wearing a thick yellow jacket.

"Go ahead, just kill me already" Jett muttered in defeat.

Her eyes closed once again and waited for some type of bullet to take all the pain away. But nothing came for some reason.

"We will wait for Brimstone's decision," Someone said.

Jett couldn't tell if they were talking to her, but she could honestly care less. She let one eye peek open to see Yoru. Her eyes widened at his figure beginning to stand up. She drew her eyes up to the three people talking.

She had to distract them.

"Why haven't you killed me yet?"

"We already told you. We are waiting for someone to make that decision"

Jett shrugged and continued to keep a close watch on Yoru who continued to sneakily limp his way behind the three. Jett was genuinely surprised that Yoru was able to stand after being shot in his leg.

"You should just kill me. I have nothing yet to live for"

"That's a lie. There is much to live for, you just haven't found your place in life yet" The venomous voice spoke.

Jett found the girl who just spoke extremely scary. She wore a mask and wore nothing but green and black. She reminded Jett of a snake

Yoru eventually made it up to them and was able to yank one of them into a tight headlock as he held his gun to the shadow's head.

"One move and you're creepy dude is dead" Yoru hissed.

The two looked extremely taken back when they saw their comrade's head shoved right up against a gun.

"Woah..wait, hold on a second," The girl with the yellow jacket said.

Jett was able to use this opportunity to get up and hold her gun up to the two, "I think you have lost now"

"Not just yet"

Before Yoru and Jett could even process the voice, she heard the sound of a beacon being placed and shots being fired.

Jett couldn't get them out in time and she felt a painful sting in her back. The pain in her back continued to grow and she couldn't help but let out a scream of pain.

She couldn't tell where she was at that moment in time. Her vision felt dizzy and she knew that her body was numb and in shock.

"Now, we can see who you really are," A deep gruff voice said.

Jett couldn't do anything to stop the hood of her jacket to be pulled down.

~~

Sage could tell something was happening down at the frontlines of HQ. She knew it was bad when she saw Brimstone hurry down the stairs. Sage knew she had to stay at her post but if all of her comrades were down there, she had to go too.

She adjusted her belt and hurried down to the front of HQ. It seemed their plan of using the guards as decoys worked. She remembered hearing that all of the guards were able to leave safely without any serious injuries.

Sage finally made it, and the first thing she spotted was her team members that were huddled around something.

Curiously, she slowly made her way over to her fellow teammates.

"Did we manage to catch them-" Sage began to say but as she approached closer, the two figures that her team was huddled around were something she had not expected.

Jett's eyes widened at the sound of that voice. She couldn't help but stare up and lock eyes with someone she'd never thought she'd see again.

"Jett?".

.