The sun rises and the plan is starting to become a reality. Katya is on the broken crane, hidden and waiting like a patient bird of prey. Michelle, Trella and Mei-Ling are also hiding. Aya walks in like she owns the place and starts working like it′s just another day as usual. She notices Rico, the young forklift kid not being himself today.

  “Yo, Rico,” Aya calls. “Why so gloomy?”

  Rico forces a smile. “It′s nothing… Just had an argument with my girl again.” He hesitates, then the words spill out. “Trying to pick a name for our baby and… She picks such ridiculous names! And…”

  Aya sighs softly. “Don′t think I can help with that one… By the way, how far is she?”

  “Eight months,” Rico says. “She′s about to drop. I′m scared I won't be able to take care of them. Not many job opportunities around here…”

  Aya claps him lightly on the shoulder. “Let’s get to work.”

  Later that morning Aya makes some kind of distraction with the crates forcing the administrator to come out. She slips inside. Minutes after a car entered the compound. It was Marquez. The girls are ready.

  Michelle’s voice snaps over the radio. “Aya, come in. Our target has arrived.”

  “Perfect timing,” Aya replies. “Swapped part of the documents for blanks. I hid the real ones in a broken vent. Ready when you are.”

  Michelle gave the signal. Then everything snapped. The attack was not clean but it was decisive. A frontal surprise that cracked the compound into noise. The gate group stumbled. Katya’s shots felt like a distant thunder and then a bright flare; Aya's return from the rear was a new urgency that threw the defenders off balance. Shot and countershot blurred into a theater of panic. People ran. Men fell. Marquez and three of his guards dove for the building like wounded animals seeking a hole.

  The wharf was a riot of smoke, shouts, and flying crates. Gunfire echoed from the rooftops and between stacks, a living cacophony. Trella, Mei-Ling, and Michelle moved like wraiths through the chaos, their movements precise even as the world dissolved around them.

  Aya, reappearing from her rear position, spotted Rico crouched behind a toppled crate, wide-eyed and frozen. The young forklift operator looked like he’d just aged ten years in the span of a minute. Aya looked at him, lowered the Colt, her face had signs of concern.

  “Rico, if you don’t want your kid to grow up an orphan, jump into the water. And you never saw our faces. Understand?”

  Rico hesitated, staring at the water that reflected explosions and the sound of havoc. Then, finally, with a trembling nod, he leapt. Splash. Gone. Aya exhaled, almost imperceptibly, and melted back into the fight. For a brief second, her usual humor and force gave way to something human, something rare.

  Michelle found herself running on the stretch between chaos and purpose. She and Aya met in a breathless exchange — weapons traded with the practiced intimacy of partners and then they pushed inside together. The world outside was a smear. The ledger was the axis; everything else spun around it.

  Inside the building, Aya took care of the guards, Michelle pushed past upended crates and scattered papers. Marquez was there, hunched behind a filing shelf, the smallest man in the largest room, trying to project control.

  Michelle stopped two steps from him, her Colt held steady, her eyes cold. The air felt thinner, every sound amplified. “You stepped on Wong’s toes. Now you need to pay the price.”

  Marquez’s face twisted. A flicker of fear mixed with defiance. He reached for his pistol.

  Time slowed. Michelle’s finger hovered on the trigger. She could end it, and the ledger would be safe, and the mission complete. Michelle's response was not hesitation. She'd rehearsed the shape of this decision in her head until it had contours; her finger moved, a shot echoed, Marquez folded like a puppet with its strings cut. The sound finished; the world held its breath. Michelle′s finger was still on the trigger, but not pushed all the way. She wasn′t the one that fired. Aya — silent as a shadow you'd forgotten, fired the split-second sooner from behind her.

  Michelle turns, stunned. “You… did it…”

  Aya lowers her gun. “Yeah, I was just a bit faster. Let′s take what we came for.”

  Aya moved to the desk and opened the safe. The ledger, heavier than it looked, a soft spine of paper and secrets, came free into her hands. Michelle prepared the evidence. She took the small bandage from her kit, punctured the skin at the edge of Marquez’s temple, dabbed at the wound with clinical speed, and used the blood to mark the signature line on the invoice. Wong's stamp was already in her palm, pilfered from his office earlier in the day. The red on the paper was a symbol more than a stain: an accusation you couldn't ignore.

  They left the office quickly and without fanfare. Michelle carried the ledger like a promise, while Aya picked up the rest of the documents hidden in the broken vent. They all met outside. Katya descended from her perch on the main crane, landing silently among them. Her long gaze swept over the team, then the compound, finally resting on the small crane near the office — the one that had once seemed insignificant, now central to their plan. A silent understanding passed between the girls. No words were needed.

  They moved together. Marquez’s lifeless body was retrieved and hoisted carefully onto the small crane, the chains and hooks holding him aloft with mechanical precision. Michelle and Aya attached the stamped invoices and the blood-marked contracts to his chest, pinning the warning where it could not be ignored. A single note was placed atop it, stark and cruel in its clarity: “Who wants to be next?”

  The message was complete. The ledger was secure. And the girls, bound together by blood, strategy and now shared ruthlessness, walked away knowing that this day had changed them in ways no one else would see — yet everyone would feel.

  Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  ***

  The next day they went to see Wong. They entered the office. Wong was sitting in his chair. And he was not smiling like the last time. His face dead serious.

  “Well you really outdone yourselves.That really was a spectacle. But as you can see I am not smiling. You know why?”

  Michelle shakes her head. “Honestly, no.”

  “Do you know why I specifically wanted you for the job? Because I didn′t want it to be associated with me,” Wong snaps. “That is why I wanted a signature there! Now thanks to you I am all over the bloody news!”

  Michelle stays unphased. “Exactly. You wanted ′a′ signature. You never said ′our′ signature. Besides, what good would it do? The underground already knows we are back in business. If we would leave our signature there, everybody would say ′Yeah, the Fangs got hired to off a gang. Nothing new.' But since we put your signature there, everybody will now understand that operating in your territory is not exactly a good idea. So… as you asked, here is the ledger and a blood signed delivery note. Mission accomplished.”

  Wong pressed his hand to his face… He just realised he has been verbally outsmarted by a fifteen year old. “Well, deal is a deal. In how many pieces do you want Chan?”

  “I don′t care as long as any of those pieces can talk,” Michelle answers.

  Fine, come with me.”

  Wong took the Fangs into an old slaughter house. Rust and dried blood clung to the walls. Chan was there tied to a chair. Face swollen, one eye nearly closed, breathing shallow and uneven. Michelle stopped a few steps in front of him. “Aya,” she said calmly. “give me your Colt, please.”

  Aya was surprised, but did what she asked.

  Michelle stepped forward. “Louross Chan, I presume.”

  Chan swallowed hard. “W-Who are you? What do you want?”

  “We are the children of The Organisation,” she replied. “The original ones. You possess something that belongs to us. You will tell us everything we want to know and we will not kill you.”

  “W–Wait! Y-You exist? T-That can′t be!”

  “Oh, it can. We are very real. You dug up the old research of the Organisation, right? The one a guy named Tien hid.”

  “Y-Y-Yes…”

  “And you sold it. Multiple times.”

  “Yes.”

  “Who bought the data?” Her voice hardened. “I want names.”

  “F–First one was a B-Brazilian named Santos.”

  Michelle turned to the girls. “That was the guy we visited with Yael.”

  She then turned back to Chan. “Who else?”

  “T-Toshiro Yamada from Tojo pharmaceutics.”

  “That is a new name...” Michelle said. “Who else?”

  “A g-guy named Schmidt. H-H-He is the reason why I ended up here.”

  “Explain.”

  “He didn't like the idea that he is not the only one who would have the data,“ Chan stammered. “He wanted everything for himself. His associate sent soldiers after me. Real American soldiers!”

  Michelle’s eyes narrowed. “Soldiers? Do you know the name of that American guy?”

  “No I don′t…”

  “But you have seen him, right? If I show you a photo, would you be able to recognise him?”

  “P-Probably”

  Michelle shows him a photo of the deceased CIA deputy.

  Chan shook his head immediately. “No. And he had a military uniform.”

  Michelle turns to Trella. “I have a suspicion, but I'm gonna test him a bid.”

  Michelle shows him a photo of colonel Briggs.

  Chan shook his head again. “No, that is not him.”

  She showed him another photo. “And this one?”

  “Yes. That's him.”

  Trella frowned. “Who is it?”

  “Former Brigadier General Kingston,” Michelle said.

  Trella inhaled sharply. “You mean—”

  “Yes,” Michelle finished. “And now the real problem starts.”

  She turned back to Chan. “I suppose there is no evidence of him being involved?”

  “None. And anything that existed, Schmidt took.”

  “We have what we came for. We′re done here. Thank you for the assistance, Mr. Wong.”

  Wong smiled faintly. “My pleasure. But what do you want to do with him now? You said you wanted to kill him, but now you promised not to kill him.”

  Michelle met his eyes without flinching. “I said we will not kill him. Haven′t said anything about anybody else…”

  Wong’s eyebrows rose. “So you wouldn′t mind, if…”

  “Not at all,” she replied calmly.

  Wong gave a hand signal to his guards. Shoots were heard in the background. Chan is dead.

  “That was a very thin line,” Wong remarked.

  “Yes,” Michelle said. “But that thin line gave us the pieces of the puzzle we needed.”

  “Young Miss Williams, you have accomplished something rare. You made an impression. In the future if you want to do any business in Tratpur, just call.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Wong,” Michelle replied. “It's been a pleasure.”

  The meeting ended up in a handshake and a silent promise. The girls went back to the hotel and packed. Time to go home.

  ***

  The next morning, the room was filled with half-closed bags and folded clothes.

  “I assume you want me to drive again.” Trella said.

  “Well,” Michelle smiled faintly, “you are the only driver here… And you′ve got better. Don′t worry, you′ve got this.

  “When we’re back,” Trella said, “I’m making Maya and Talia teach you how to drive.”

  Michelle laughed softly. “Not a bad idea.”

  Mei-Ling studied her. “What you pulled off was really something. To be honest you′ve scared me a few times. Never seen you like this.”

  “When I saw Wong,” Michelle admitted, “I knew I had to adapt. Otherwise he would’ve eaten me alive. I’m just glad I can drop that mask now.”

  “Well that was a good mask,” Katya said. “You even fooled me. You′ve got us all worried there.”

  “Don’t worry,” Michelle said quietly. “I’m still me.”

  “But seriously, Wong was right about one thing,” Mei-Ling added. “You really have guts. And to outsmart him like this - for him that was a hard pill to swallow.”

  Michelle got really flustered and shy for a moment…

  “Yeah, that′s our Michelle we love!” Aya laughed loudly.

  Aya was loud and joking as always, but it was visible something was bothering her…

  ***

  Later… The girls have boarded the plane back to Mexico. Still worn out from the mission they fell asleep quickly. But not all of them. Aya couldn′t rest.

  “Michelle?” she murmured. “Are you awake? Can we talk for a second?

  “Sure.”

  “Back then in that warehouse,” Aya said slowly. “You were about to kill Marquez…”

  Michelle hesitated. “Yes… I think so…”

  “You definitely were. You had your finger on the trigger and…”

  “And you fired first.”

  “Yes,” Aya replied. “And I′m glad I did.”

  “Why?” Michelle asked quietly. “You needed me back then and I needed to prove that I can-”

  “You didn′t have to prove anything to us,” Aya interrupted. “Just between you and me… You may be a Fang, but you are the only one who didn't murder anyone. That is very unique for you. And honestly, we wish you would keep it that way.”

  “I′ve already killed before.”

  “That time you shot because you were protecting your old man. You may have lost your ′virginity′ back then, but that was justified and you′ve never lost your innocence. If you would shoot Marquez, it would have been a murder.”

  “He was about to shoot me.”

  “Yes, but only because you pointed your gun at him first,” Aya said gently. “Basically he was the one defending himself against you. I know this will sound odd, but we don′t want that kind of blood on your hands. You are uncorrupted. Unlike us… I look like I thrive on brutality, but the truth is - I hate myself for that. I don′t want you to become like me.”

  “Aya, you…”

  “You are the connection between our dark world and your world. You give us the little bit of normality we never had. We don′t want to lose that. Please.”

  Michelle lowered her head in sadness. The weight of those words hit her hard. Especially when those words came from Aya. Michelle even shed some tears. She understood. She looked at Aya and gave her a big silent hug.