⚜️

"For fuck's sake stop inhaling the food, you'll choke!" Monique scolds Rey who has been eating macarons three at a time.

I look around at the pretty floral wallpaper of Suzy's shop as well as the rose gold cutlery next to my chocolate truffle pastry. The aesthetic in here is to die for.

So are the prices!

Kai scoffs next to me, "How has Yuri not died yet?"

Yuri looks up from her mouthful of puff pastry, "The secret," she says and holds up her glass of her caramel latte, "Is to continuous hydrate."

Rey nods at Yuri, "Thank you."

Ah great now I'm gonna have to pay for more macarons.

Ariadne perks up suddenly, "So you told us we're headed to Ireland next."

I wipe some chocolate off my lower lip, "About that... I found a very high paying job in Dubai, though it might be a bit more risky than the rest."

Minnie nods along while scraping her plate clean which once had a very delicious looking cheesecake, "The security over there is over the top. The Ireland job is after two months and this job can happen in half a month. We will have to hustle."

Suzy slides up to our table, "Can you guys discuss thes details in a more private setting?"

Minji starts to bow in apology but then remembers she is sitting on a chair and hits her head on the plate, making all the dishes shake.

Elara rolls her eyes and then smiles at Suzy, "We're sorry about that Stella, we'll stop."

Suzy's eyes widen, "My name's Suzy-"

Blaise laughs, "Do you really think you fooled us?"

I nudge Blaise then point to the table next to us where a group of women just sat.

I clear my throat, "Sorry about that... Suzy. The food is so great," I say a little loudly, enough for the table next to us to hear, "Especially this pastry, it's so rich."

Stella... Er... Suzy smiles wide, "Thank you Alicia! I hope the drinks are up to the mark?"

"Amazing!" Rey replies with her full mouth.

*****

(Consider this a bonus scene idk)

BANG!

My ears are ringing. And it's not stopping. At all. 

Please make it stop.

"I LOVE THIS!" Pandora shows excitement for the first time in her life. She is bobbing her head happily, her eyes glowing brightly. It is more terrifying than usual and I am afraid of what she might do to me if I ever piss her off. 

Oh please help me why did I recruit her-

"Dora's behaviour really concerns me at times," Dharuna mutters next to me, holding a tray of bullets for the psychopath. I watch as Pandora picks one up, while her gaze is trained on the poor cardboard cut out of a man, with three bullet holes in it, all very concerningly close to the centre, considering that Pandora claims to be a beginner.

I wouldn't be surprised if she committed war crimes in her past life.

Dharuna's eyes are not even trained on me as she speaks to me. She's looking at Rey, who's helping Mon to aim the gun, even though that little prude has a terrible aim herself. Again, I wouldn't tell Rey that, because she might just improve her aim and lodge a bullet in my pretty skull. 

I will haunt her if she ever does that. Not that she would be affected in any way if I did. Life is so meaningless.

I wonder if I would go to the pretty Land of the dead in Coco and have swirly designs painted on my skull and have people sing to my grave. That would be so cool.

Rey moves to stand right behind Mon, and she places her hands on the taller girl's shoulders, "Relax the shoulders, stretch the arms out, and resist the recoil or your biceps will try to break up with you at night."

Monique laughs, "Oh yeah? You seem to know a lot."

Rey then places a hand below Mon's arms and raises them to her shoulder level, "This much height is good. Try to not tilt your hands too much, but maintain the hands at the eye level for a good aim."

I look at the poor cardboard cut-out of the innocent man on the far wall of the shooting range, and then at the hideous headphones that Mon is being forced to wear. This morning is not turning out how I wanted it to.

Oh and Alby is sitting in the corner of the room with her hands covering her ears. She thought it would be cool, but I guess all the noise and Pandora's traumatic commentary changed her vision.

Mon shifts a little on her feet, straightens her arms, and then shoots, the bullet hitting nowhere near the board. But Mon still reeled back because of the tremendous recoil.

Pandora blows a raspberry, "Yeah, I don't want Dharuna, can we switch?"

Dharuna looks both relieved yet very offended. Pandora has that effect on people sometimes.

Rey looks radiant, "Do you think I'm better than Dhara?"

Pandora scrunches her nose, "Sorry, I should have worded myself better, I want Alicia to help me out. Why don't you go pick a fight with the little meth dealers outside?"

Rey looks offended as all hell as she stalks over to where Alby is sitting, who is now looking at us with amusement, and plops herself down on the bench, sulking.

"Don't be sad little buddy, I might be able to get us free meth," Alby tries to soothe Rey's ego. Rey looks at her with interest.

"No way in hell am I letting you two become meth addicts," I shut down their plan-in-progress.

"Okay okay, how about we get some ice-cream?" Allie then offers.

"I'd like that," Rey says in a low voice and the two of them head out.

I stand by Pandora, correcting her posture from time to time, handing her some ammo as she shot the figure repeatedly.

It really is terrifying, just watching her. Like she has a personal vendetta of the white outline of a man on the black cardboard. Her shots are downright vicious.

Meanwhile, Dharuna helped Mon correct her posture, to face the recoil of the gun. Dhara's hands rest on Monique's shoulder as she helps the taller girl aim. 

Monique seemed to not understand at all, and Dhara had to keep explaining stuff to her as she aimed, which is ironic considering she can memorize entire textbooks in a matter of few hours and understood how to put together Ikea furniture whose instructions were in pure Swedish which none of us know.

Pandora finally exhales loudly and removes her headphone and glasses, "I am tired of watching Monique play dumb, can we leave?"

"What? No-" Monique begins to say, but Pandora cut her off immediately.

"You are giving me top tier second hand embarrassment, so much so that I am willing to eat a bunch of lactose and sugar that will probably bloat my face up and botch some of my foundation."

All of us are just staring at Pandora as she finished her monologue. Does she mean to say ice-cream?

Her hand grabs my arm roughly.

Mom, help. Please.

She looks me dead in the eye, "Come on now, I am buying. And stop look like a deer in front of a hunter. If I wanted to kill you, you would be in your grave already."

That doesn't help my fear of her, not even a bit.

"Wait! What about-" Dharuna starts to say but Pandora holds up her hand.

"If I feel even the slightest bit of sexual tension when I'm around the two of you again, I will not hesitate to jam my pistol up your asses."

And with that final sentence, I am dragged out of the shooting range by Pandora.

⚜️

Hi hi! It's just me stress-writing again, don't mind me.