M:   Belarus jumped up when Iremacht spoke, she was reaching into her purse for her pepper spray until the criminal entity spoke about Zalia. Normally a mother would be scared shitless if an international crimelord asked about her child, unfortunately for Belarus, this was something she expected of Zalia.

She first took a moment to calm the people in the cafe, then she sat down and groaned into her hands.

"I have no jurisdiction over her, Iremacht," she said, irritation in her voice, she's not my entity, she's not anyone's entity, if she's causing problems for you there is nothing I can do about it. Yes, you can argue that I'm her mother, but she doesn't listen to me or MA, considering your relationship with your own parents, I'm sure you understand that my hands are tied."

 -----

"Five more minutes," Prudoria said, waving his one good wing like he was sawing hang on.

He watched the sun for a little longer until the colors became less vibrant, only then did he go with TU. He was a bit nervous about asking Schwitzy anything, she scared him so much.

"Do we have to," he whined, his eyes starting to fade into black, "I don't want to get stabbed, Schwitzy is so scary."

L:   "She's not going to stab us, but she might be cranky," TU said. "Not a morning person, yet she wakes up so fricking early. She'll be fine when she gets her coffee and chocolates."

 Schwitzy's section of the mansion was split into three very organized floors. The uppermost level was her bedroom, the second level her gymnasium and recreational area, and the third level was her animal collection. Luckily for them, they didn't run into her as they went into the lowest level.

There were many, many, many aquariums. The rarest fish, sea turtles, land turtles, crabs, oysters and crabs, reptiles, hamsters, mice (brown ones for the snakes, gruesomely, and white ones to play with in the lab maze), guinea pigs, and even an axolotl. Schwitzy had her own staff designated to take care of the aquarium, but the new rotation hadn't arrived yet so the level was essentially empty. "Not a lot of lions here," TU said. "But some of these fish are the rarest in the world. I think we have a lot of puffer fish here too. Great for poisons."

M:   Prudoria was slightly disappointed that there were no lions, but he was still fascinated by all the creatures, he would stop at every single tank to get a good look at them, he didn't tap on the glass because he knew from experience that the tapping was really loud underwater.

"They're all so colorful and cute," he said, "I remember the mice, the humans tested on them sometimes, but all these other creatures I've never seen before."

He stopped at another tank and tilted his head at the occupant, it was a large tarantula that was sitting on top of a little log hideout, Prudoria had never seen something with so many legs, he thought that was pretty cool.

"I like this one, it's so fuzzy and has so many legs," he chuckled, "what is it, can I hold it?"

L:   "True she doesn't answer to anyone," said Iremacht. "But I'm letting you know that she wants to offer me so-called help with taking down the facilities that created Adira. She clearly wants something out of this. Perhaps it is just her connection with Adira, but I doubt criminals operate for the sake of love and care alone ... So, not to alarm you or anything, I'm going to stir trouble in your country."

He held up his hand in case there was any protest. "I'm just going to hunt down a couple of Smoke Wolves since Zalia has her roots here. There might be innocents in the crossfire." Iremacht smiled sweetly and stood up. "Just wanted to warn you. Oh and if Zalia asks you why, tell her to get out of my way."

-----------

"Um, no," TU grimaced. "You don't know half the things in here that are poisonous." That was an exaggeration, but TU hated small animals. They were fast and hard to hit and some of them could bite.

"That's a spider, by the way," he explained, jutting his chin at the tarantula. "Eight legs, a bazillion eyes, super creepy crawly, and fucking fast. Schwitzy wouldn't want us taking that guy out of his nice little home."

TU tapped the wire cage of the guinea pigs and watched them roll around inside. They were about the most cuddly things Schwitzy had here. They were also placed far across the room from the snake side. TU glanced over and swore he saw Schwitzy's new black snake flick its tongue at him.

M:   "Wha - seriously Iremacht, what do you take me for, a pushover," Belarus shouted, standing up angrily. She decided that this was not a conversation for open ears so she had Iremacht follow her to the next-door alleyway where they would have privacy.

"You must be insane to think that I would allow that," she growled, "and you must be beyond insane if you think that will discourage my daughter, all you're going to achieve in doing that is pissing her off. Russia tried that five years ago, going after her clan members to get her to stop messing with him, and you want to know what happened? Six military bases, thousands of soldiers, and millions of dollars in military equipment wiped off the face of the earth within two years!"

Belarus took a moment to calm herself down, though she was still notably irritated, "you're picking on the wrong country too. Zal's main headquarters is somewhere in Mandara, and most of her clan members are Japanese. A word of advice Iremacht, stop thinking that you control every crime lord in this god-forsaken world, because one of these days you're going to find that those very lords are not people you want to make enemies with, even EU and NATO are afraid of Zalia."

The country shoulder-checked Iremacht and started to leave, but she stopped to say, "you know, Zalia idolized you, you're the very reason she became a criminal, I would have thought you would be proud to have inspired someone. Then again, with how you tossed your friendship with Poldara to the curb, clearly, I should have lowered my expectations."

With that, Belarus marched back to her car and drove off, her guards following a ways behind.

L:   Iremacht watched Belarus leave with a tight smile and clenched fists. That was unexpected. No, not Belarus's reaction to him targeting her; he predicted she'd be resistant and lecture him about it but in the end, she wouldn't be a threat. What was surprising to him was that Zalia's relationship with her parents was as estranged as he was with his. Neither of them gave a damn about what their parent countries thought or said.

Nonetheless, though things didn't go exactly as he'd planned in this meeting, Belarus had given him vital information. If most of her soldiers were in Mandara, picking off the ones in Belarus would be easy. So that was the order that he gave out as he left the cafe. He'd stir up enough ruckus in Belarus to annoy the country as well as warn Zalia.

In the meantime, Iremacht departed to carry out his real plan.

"One of these days?" Iremacht repeated Belarus's words as he sat in the car. He snorted. "Don't worry, dear Belarus. I've already crossed the wrong crime lord once and barely lived through the consequences."

-------------

While Prudoria and TU explored Schwitzy's animal collection, Schwitzy herself was making herself coffee from her personal coffee maker in her room. She had just returned from her morning run outside; she neglected to check her animal room when she was going upstairs so she didn't see either of the boys.

Soon, however, she went downstairs to do her daily check-in on her pets, scrolling through financial news on her phone and sipping coffee as she went. She heard TU and Prudoria's voices before she saw them.

M:   Despite TU's warning and his own fear of Schwitzy, Prudoria took the tarantula out of its tank and sat on the floor to get a better look at it.

"I bet you wouldn't hurt a fly little guy, you're just a misunderstood cutie, I know how that feels," he said, softly stroking its back and giggling as its furry feet tickled his arm, "I don't get why TU doesn't like you, you're very friendly, what kind of spider are you?"

He looked at the label on the tank and it said Mexican Redknee, Prudoria hummed at that, "redknee huh, I would say you were more orange than anything."

He put his face really close to the spider and it started to crawl on his face, making the country laugh at the feeling of being tickled, "hey TU, I think he likes me, does he have a name, if not I want to call him Freund, I think it fits him."

L:   TU had his back turned to Prudoria so he thought he was just talking to the spider within its tank. He was in for a heart attack when he turned to find a giant insect essentially covering Prudoria's face. Schwitzy entered the room at that moment and glared at Prudoria

"HER name is Sunny," she said. "Short for Sunray." At the same time, TU found his voice and shrieked at the top of his lungs, "AAAAAAGHHHHHHHHHHHOLY FUCK PRUDORIA'S GONNA DIE!!!"

Startled by the sound, the tarantula jumped off Prudoria's face and scuttled frantically around on the ground. TU jolted, screamed even louder, and ran out of the room yelling "FUCK!" over and over.

Schwitzy rolled her eyes at his reaction and knelt down to tap the ground with her finger. "Sunny. Come." She opened her palm as the spider scuttled towards her and rested in her hand. She dropped it back in its aquarium.

Then she pointed at Prudoria. "You're banned from this room. Out. We're going to train so you can be more of an asset and less of a wandering child."

M:   "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to hurt anyone," Prudoria said, not so much in fear of Schwitzy but sadness that he scared the spider and now couldn't see her again, "please don't ban me, I'll be better next time, I won't take any more animals out of their tanks."

Not convinced Schwitzy would listen to him, he stood up and said goodbye to Sunny, then left more deflated than before. He went back to his room and sat at the edge of the balcony, resting his head on the railing and dangling his leg over the side.

"Why do I have to mess up with everything," he muttered to himself, he really was upset, he was happy with that spider and felt like he bonded with it, but now he couldn't see her anymore, it hurt him in a strange way that he never felt before.

L:   Schwitzy decided to leave Prudoria alone for a bit in his room. She wanted to begin his training as soon as possible but perhaps letting him stew in his thoughts for a while would be good for him to learn from his mistakes. TU, on the other hand, felt very guilty for getting them both in trouble in the first place.

"It was my fault," he reasoned with his cousin. "Why'd you ban him? He was just curious about the spider - still one of the worst creatures in the world."

"He's like a baby who constantly reaches for the frying pan," Schwitzy growled. "He has to learn, the quicker the better. I have zero forgiveness for foolish behavior. That's how the world operates. It isn't all cute sunshine and cuddly animals. It's a never-ending storm and cruel wilderness."

"Well, now he's feeling shitty about himself," TU protested.

Schwitzy narrowed her eyes at TU. "Tell me, do you feel shitty about yourself?"

"Er, yeah. All the time, honestly."

"Then this is perfectly normal. I think he's had enough time to cry. I'll be waiting for him underground."

TU sighed and left to fetch Prudoria. His cousin was extreme but at the end of the day, he had to agree with her. Life was a dangerous game for criminals like them. If that tarantula had been a little more poisonous, Prudoria could've gotten a bad injury from a single bite. Underestimating things for their appearances just like that was what got people killed.

He knocked on Prudoria's door. "Oi! How're you doing in there?"

M:   Prudoria heard the knock but didn't answer it just yet, he didn't blame TU for what happened so he wasn't mad at him, he just didn't want to talk to anyone at the moment. Since he locked his door, the insurgent couldn't come in to check on him, which meant that Prudoria had to endure consistent knocking and apologizing until it got annoying.

After about three or four minutes, Prudoria had enough and threw the door open in annoyance, "will you shut up already," he growled, "what part of, 'I don't want to talk to anyone so I'm ignoring the door' do you not understand?!  What do you want?"

L:   "Whoa, calm down," TU said, raising his hands in surrender. "I'm doing something called 'checking up on you.' It's something a friend would do when their other friend is upset." He stepped into the room in case Prudoria left him stranded outside again."Hiding from your troubles won't help anyone," TU said in a lighter tone. "Schwitzy's approval is something you have to earn. In fact, anyone's approval is something you always have to earn. I'm telling you, before it becomes a habit, don't come huddling in here whenever you're sad."

He patted Prudoria's shoulder. "We're supposed to teach you to control some of your powers today. Fair warning, Schwitzy's in charge of the training, but I want you to treat this as an opportunity to get over your fears and earn her respect. What do you say?"

-----------

In Berlin, Germany received a phone call to his desk from Poland. He lit up because he enjoyed talking to his long-time friend and answered it with a happy voice. His smile quickly dropped when he heard Poland's panic and frustration over what the hell the Iremacht was doing in his country and why one of his government research facilities had just blown up."I don't know," Germany admitted.

"I don't know anything about his motives. We rarely talk. I'm not even allowed in his house. I can ask Bundeswehr, but I doubt he knows much about Iremacht's international goals."

M:   Prudoria just crossed his arms at TU's words, he seemed more stand-offish than before, "I'm not hiding from anything, this is my room is it not, I can come here when I please. I'm not afraid of Schwitzy anymore either, I know what she's doing, she's picking on me because she thinks I'm a weak pushover that will cower at confrontation. After everything I've been through, NO ONE will see me as weak, you understand that."

Prudoria flicked his wing and his eyes flickered between black and white a few times before settling on white, "let's just get this over with, lead the way TU."

-----

"Why does no one seem to know what his deal is," Poland sighed, "I called Ireland and he said the same thing. Mandy called me an hour ago and said that Iremacht was targeting Bel because Zalia was messing around with him. You're his cousin Germany, and his base of operations is in your country, you got to help me out here, if government buildings are being attacked then I can only fear the worst, and I don't want to have to declare war on anyone, especially not you. I don't want history to repeat itself a third time."