Mimipe did not like the feeling of being hunted, and by a human no less.

The elder sister somehow discovered her schedule and for the past few days, waited for her after classes. For the suearis, who had been running all her life, evading the sister was child’s play, and she believed this would come to pass. Forti didn’t say a word when they first and last met at the police station, and now the human girl was chasing her all over the school? Ridiculous.

At the start of a new week, Mimipe prowled warily into her dormitory lobby, glancing behind her, tail swinging anxiously.

Sensing eyes, she looked straight at Forti, who was perched on a lounge chair, and hissed by instinct.

“Mimipe-“

“Leave me alone!”

“Let’s talk, and then I’ll never appear in front of you ever again.”

“There’s nothing for me to say to you!”

“Yes there is, and I will keep following you unless you talk to me.”

“I’m going to call campus security if you don’t get out of my face.”

“That’s fine with me. We can go through the entire hassle of explaining this situation, but I will have to share with them what I know about Jaekyul.”

The change in the suearis’ eyes was instant. Gone was the annoyed teenager and here was someone with both nothing and everything to lose.

Forti had her fair share of roughhousing and play-fighting in her adolescence with suearis children. To think gurgling snarls imitating adults and the accidental sink of baby teeth on soft flesh when over excited would grow into potent eyes that threatened bristling hostility, striking Forti like a deathly electric current. 

If a threatened animal’s aggression was motivated by fear and a human’s by anger, then, she wondered, what was Mimipe feeling now?

“Mimipe,” Forti tried again, realizing she hit a nerve. “Let’s just talk, and after our chat, I will never appear in front of you again, not intentionally at least. Ok?”

A slight bare of canines. Ears flattened. 

The suearis considered the promise with a growl.

“If you see me before I see you, I want you to walk in the opposite direction,” Mimipe negotiated. “You’re going to hide from me, make sure I never have to see your face again.” 

“I won’t approach you ever again,” Forti stated like she agreed with the added terms.

She followed Mimipe outside to a closed and infrequently used side entrance of Oak House. Seeing no one else around, the suearis stomped up to Forti.

“How do you know Jaekyul?” Not even the police records had his name.

“Why did he shoot my sister?” Forti retorted calmly. “What actually happened that day?”

“Answer me first.”

“You answer everything I ask and I leave you alone, that’s our deal.”

A hand shot out like a viper, latching onto Forti’s neck with claws pricking at the jugular. Forti grabbed its wrist by reaction.

“Don’t mess with me,” warned Mimipe. “Tell me how you know Jaekyul or I’ll kill you.”

“Like he killed my sister?”

“You said she’s alive!”

“By a miracle!”

Forti tore the spotted hand off her. The sides of her neck stung like deep paper cuts and something warm dripped slowly down to her collarbone. 

Mimipe stared at the sliding blood, at a person who didn’t care their artery was almost sliced open. In truth, Forti’s heart was about to leap out her throat, and the thin lacerations burned.

“Tell me who he is, why he shot Vasi, everything,” Forti said steadily, surprising herself.

The suearis hesitated for a moment, watching red seep into the human’s clothes, before grudgingly answering.

“...He’s a drug dealer. He wanted to sell me drugs, and I said no. But he didn’t like that. And your sister saw us and thought he was hurting me and tried to stop him. He freaked out and pulled a gun. It’s like I said to the Diapo, just read the report.”

“I did. So he’s your drug dealer?”

“What? No, I don’t do drugs! Weren’t you listening?”

“Then why’d you approach him?” It was supported by security cameras that Mimipe walked towards the criminal in a dead end alley.

“He called me, said ‘hey you!’ and I thought he was someone I knew from ValorA.”

Same information as in the documents. Same repertoire Mimipe said to the officers. It came out automatically like muscle memory, but if Riel didn’t inform Forti what she knew now, she would have believed that was the whole story.

“But he is someone you know.”

Should I kill her? Mimipe thought, but she couldn't. She’d get caught and be sent to jail, maybe for life. You can’t leave a body to rot here, and there’s no clean-up either… How much does she know? That question had Mimipe trapped. She hated that feeling, but she was more scared of her unsteady future to act on her hate.

“Who is he? Why did he shoot Vasi?” Forti asked again, gently. “If you don’t do drugs, why do you know a drug dealer from Deodunge?”

The suearis paled. How does she know he’s from Deodunge?

Forti considered testing if Mimipe would admit on her own her affiliations to Deodunge, but there was no benefit to knowing the suearis’ inclination to honesty. Rather, they probably would’ve gone in circles.

Mimipe’s antipathetic glare turned vigilant and unblinking, as if boring her eyes into Forti’s would illuminate the human’s thoughts. Should she walk away? But if this human started rumors, she would be powerless to the malicious onslaught, or worse, they would follow her like a shadow for the rest of her life under the sun. 

“You swear that what I tell you, you won’t tell anyone else?” Her voice was low and begrudging.

To tell Forti would mean having her life in this human’s hands. She despised Forti as revenge hates mercy, but she despised herself more for being in this pitiful position, and for feeling like she was betraying herself. Forti could hear Mimipe’s desperation.

“I swear.” Two words laden with sincerity, dense as neutron stars. 

Mimipe eyed Forti a little longer. 

“If you tell anyone, I’ll kill you.” The human didn’t reply and only observed, waiting, like an expectant child at an enclosure. 

Mimipe suddenly found the ground fascinating.

“Jaekyul… He’s… my brother…” She growled momentarily as if the fact disgusted her. “He wanted me to slip drugs to students in ValorA.

“I told him no, but he kept bugging me. ‘Get some addicted and make a vein in,’ and I got angry and yelled at him.” She desperately wished she could kill Forti, kill anyone in her way. Life would be so much easier, but then she should go back to Deodunge. “But then your sister—I don’t know where she came from—she misunderstood everything! She thought Jaekyul was threatening me or something and called the police.” Why was her life like this? She sniffled, sinuses clogging as her sight blurred. “And the drones came, and Jaekyul freaked out so he shot her.” Mimipe roughly wiped her eyes as if it would stop her crying, only aching them more. She hated crying. For someone from Deodunge, she cried too easily. 

“So,” Forti spoke slowly. “He shot her because he got caught.”

“No! He was trying to protect me!” Mimipe yelled defensively. “He- He was making sure that… No one suspected I had any relation to him or Deodunge.”

Forti considered what had been revealed. 

Sibling love. 

That was the reason, the answer to why. She wanted to laugh until she cried.

“I want to meet him,” she finally said. “Arrange a meeting for us.”

“So you can kill him?!”

“No,” she said sternly. “If I wanted revenge, I would go after what he loves instead of killing him. An eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth, a sister for a sister, but I won’t.” 

Mimipe looked at the human suspiciously.

Forti clarified. “Lucky for him, my sister is alive. I want to meet him for his help. Vasi is in a coma, and only the mind reader from world two can wake her up. I want his help getting one, it’s the least he can do.”

“You want him to smuggle in a mind reader?” Mimipe asked incredulously, tears cleared by surprise. Forti nodded. 

They fell silent. The suearis was thinking, and Forti considered she should’ve emphasized that getting Jaekyul’s help was not the least he could do, but what was owed to her. 

Is she thinking how to arrange a meeting, or how to never let me see him?

“I can’t get in touch with him anymore…” It’s the latter. “With the heat on him, he won’t be back out here for a long while. Don’t bother with him, just… stay away from him, or else you’ll end up like your sister. I mean it. He’s crazy.”

Forti stepped closer to the girl who’s tail swung low, building a physical press to her next words.

“My sister was dead. She’s alive, but she was dead. If it wasn’t for that miracle, I would have devoted my life to exacting the same pain and grief he caused me and my family on him and his. Do you understand? I wouldn’t care if I died as long as I crippled him. But instead, I’m asking for his help. He should be on his knees, thanking Vasi for being alive. So tell me how I can meet him.”

The suearis furrowed her brows. If this human thought she could make her cower, she was gravely mistaken. In the dark city, debt always dangled like temptation, whether monetary or honor-bound, and for swinging it in her face, Mimipe would have swiped Forti’s off if they weren’t where they were. 

“I answer your questions, and you leave me alone. That’s our deal,” Mimipe reminded.

“Then how can I meet him?”

“You can’t.” Forti heard the inflection of a taunt.

“Why not?”

“Because you won’t find him.”

“...No, I will, just like I found out about him in the first place.”

The suearis snarled loudly, fangs flashing, and Forti flinched.

Mimipe took that victoriously as a sign of the human backing off while Forti mentally kicked herself.

She wasn’t here to make an enemy, but ever since her sister had died, the thought of revenge came too easily. It slithered in and coated the walls of her mind in venom, and in her poisoned daze, she was overwhelmed with the need for justice, for retribution. She had the thought to damn a sister for trying to protect her criminal brother, but it wasn’t right.

“Mimipe, please.” Act desperate, Forti. You are desperate. It’s not vengeance you need, it’s help. “Just, tell me how I can get him to help me then. Do I tell him I know you? That I’m the sister of the girl he shot? I don’t know him, but you do. I don’t know Deodunge, but you and he do. I only want the mind reader and I need his help getting one.”

“Can’t you get it some other way? Why do you need Jaekyul?”

“There is no other way to get it.”

“Says who?”

“Says… someone.”

It has to be an info broker who told her all this, Mimipe thought. But how did someone like her even find one? And what info broker just blabs about the- Ugh, never mind. If Jaekyul just listened to me in the first place, then I wouldn’t be in this mess. I told him to never come here, but did he listen? No! And now I’m still cleaning up after him all the way out here! 

A sense of camaraderie with Forti against Jaekyul blossomed, and Mimipe entertained an idea as if planning a harsh prank.

It’s not like she’ll actually find him. The info broker should know better. They’ll probably lead her to a dead end and only did this to get more money.

“A Wurgeld.”