Ivy shrugged. "So what if I did?" she asked, getting out of the car. "It happens sometimes."

Joshua sputtered as he stumbled after her. "Sometimes?!" he exclaimed. He ignored the rock which he just tripped over. "I'm pretty sure that diverting a bunch of criminals by launching a Bey is, I don't know, kind of nonexistent?" he shouted. "You know that, right, Agent Jones? Am I panicking again? Why am I speaking like this? Did I lose my fabulousness again?" His flailing hands seemed to have a mind of their own.

"Oi. Slow down," Ivy snapped, holding her hand steady in front of his face and causing him to freeze to a stop. "Deep breaths, Burns. Deep breaths. You're gonna give yourself an aneurysm."

Deep breaths. Not too difficult. You got this. It'll be fine, right? The thugs are gone. For now, at least.

He inhaled, exhaled. Okay. Phew. Right, just breathe and try to relax.

Apparently life didn't want to give him a rest, because something in the engine exploded and the hood popped open with a thick cloud of black smoke, blacker than Havoc Tempo's heart.

Joshua screamed a rather colorful string of expletives and shot into the air like a firework rocket, clinging to the closest object he could find. "MAKE IT STOP ALREADY!" he bawled, flailing and wailing like a dying fish on a beach.

The object he grabbed sputtered something akin to "the hell you IDIOT get OFF me" and stumbled back very unsteadily, quite obviously not used to carrying his weight. Ah, Agent Jones, he thought in the back of his mind.

They watched as a final hiss of smoke drifted up from under the warped hood, miserably fading into the air.

And then all was silent, and the wind died down.

Joshua heaved a sigh of exhaustion and turned towards Ivy. "That happened," he remarked.

Of course, however, it was due time for him to finally notice exactly how she was carrying him at the moment. And it was also due time for him to finally see her rage-red face and wide purple eyes.

Joshua froze and blinked, staring at her doe-in-headlights expression. His throat felt dry. "Agent?"

She promptly dropped him.

"Don't. Ever. Do. That. Again," she hissed.

"Ow," Joshua moaned in reply.

"You know what, imma just go inside," she sighed, dusting her vest off.

"You could have at least put me down a bit more gently, maybe?" Joshua retorted.

"What, you want me to coddle you like a little princess? Pick yourself back up," Ivy said, walking toward the building. He didn't miss the way her nose wrinkled.

Joshua's jaw dropped. "Excuse me, how rude of you!" he said, pointing an accusing finger at her. "I just got chased by a bunch of clowns and you have the audacity to tell me that I should pick myself back up?"

"Are you coming in or are you just gonna yap?" Ivy said.

He looked up. "WBBA BACK ENTRANCE" was plastered on the wall.

Somehow, Joshua managed to calm his frazzled nerves just enough to arrive at the lounge, devoid of all life forms except the fish tank. The lone betta stared at him as if he'd taken all the food from the jar.

He ignored it by flopping facefirst onto the couch.

Ivy cleared her throat. "Oi. You need any water or something?" she asked.

He mumbled into the pillow.

"... Whatever you said," Ivy sighed. "I'll be back in an hour. Don't do anything stupid while I'm gone."

Joshua vaguely heard Ivy vanishing out the door.

For the next while, all he heard was the slow trickle of water as the filter spun in the tank. His shoulders were still absolutely tense.

Trickle went the water, and the fish stared at him. If it had sentient feelings, it would have wondered why a giant half-peeled banana was crying into the couch.

Too much had just happened. The culmination certainly couldn't have been worse than the migraine he was starting to feel. And he had a whole host of questions, as well as a mildly large number of missed phone calls (mostly from Karina, Mamá, Pop, and Director Sam), that were waiting to be answered. It was a miracle that his phone was silent now. The final cherry on top of the cake was the fact that "Cotton-Eye Joe" was looping incessantly in his thoughts.

The headache compressed onto his brain relentlessly. Make it stop, make it stop, make it stop, he chanted in his head, although it really didn't seem to help. He took a deep breath and tried to flop even more.

Then he heard approaching footsteps. He popped an eye open.

Karina practically burst into the room, frantically looking around. She spotted him in a blink. "Joshua? Joshua!" she gasped breathlessly. "Oh, thank goodness you're okay." She collapsed on the floor next to the couch and put her arm around his back. "How are you feeling, hermanito?"

Joshua groaned muffledly. "Headache," he grumbled, slowing pulling himself into a sitting position. He flopped his head back onto the couch. "Too much just happened within the last gazillion minutes."

Karina hummed in agreement and sat up next to him. "Feels like hours have passed, right?" she asked.

Joshua shrugged as best he could, shutting his eyes. "I guess."

"Do you want me to get anything for you?" she asked.

He shook his head. "Nah, not now. I'm tired." He tried to sink his head into the fabric of the couch.

She shrugged. "Okay, if you say so."

And then Joshua remembered something. "Oh, yeah. Who brought you here, Rina?"

"You remember Norman Tarver? The dude who was part of that old Snake Pit conspiracy? One of your old teammates on the Bulls? He's part of the Surveillance Network, apparently. He helped me back."

Joshua frowned. "Norman's part of the Net?" he mumbled, only half-comprehending her words. "Ah, well. At least he's cool." 

Karina paused. "So then how did you get here?" she asked.

Joshua also paused, glancing upward at the ceiling lights.

He thought all the way back to the long (well, rather short) drive. Chased down by Ed and his minions. Broken window. Ed was a lunatic. One moment he was acting in a scene, the next moment he was acting like a psycho overlord. And Ivy Jones must have been a God-sent miracle with those double holsters and the absolute madness to divert a car with a Bey. And what was more, that Bey didn't simply have a spirit residing in it, but it'd somehow shapeshifted. Now that he thought about it, she was kinda terrifying.

He thought about her snippy attitude toward everything he said, and his blood simmered lightly. But she had protected him when they'd tried to kill him, no matter what suspicious weirdness the Surveillance Network was planning, so he had to give her that.

The headache sharply spiked, and he lurched up, clutching at his forehead with a wince, as all the weight of his horror came crashing down at once.

Someone had just tried to kill him.

Karina's eyes went round. "Hey, woah, Joshua, you okay?" she asked quickly, holding him up steady. "What's wrong? What happened?"

"Rina, someone just tried to kill me," Joshua breathed out shakily. He frantically shook his head, clutching at his hair. With each word, his breathing got more ragged. "They tried to kill me. I thought—I thought social media, that was bad enough. But now—someone just planned a whole—a whole public execution for me. They wanted me dead—"

"Hey, hey, shhh, calm down," Karina gently said, cutting through his high-pitched whimpers. "You'll be fine. Look at me."

She stared him down with that typical Karina stare. "Joshua, you're safe in here. Ed's not out there anymore. They'll get him." She gently put her arms around his shoulders and let him rest his head on her own shoulder, patting his crescent hair comfortingly. "I'm right here, hermanito."

And she began rocking him back and forth slowly, soothingly, repeating the last phrase over again. Slowly, Joshua's quaking shoulders laxed. Slowly, he sank onto his sister's shoulder, still clutching at his hair. She continued rocking him.

After a short time in silence, save for Karina's humming, Joshua opened his mouth. "They're not gonna try again, are they?" he muttered.

Karina shrugged lightly. "I'd kill them before they did," she said simply, tapping the floor with her foot.

Joshua heard the threat in her words, though. Karina never said "kill" very often. If she did, she always meant business.

He really didn't love his sister enough.

He thought back to the battered car again, and winced. "By the way," he said hesitantly. "The car kinda got destroyed. Sorry 'bout that, Rina."

Karina's eye twitched, then she patted Joshua's back once more. "Don't worry about it," she said. "For now, I'm just glad you're safe."

Joshua nodded numbly and relaxed as Karina quietly continued stroking his back. Quiet time with Karina was always a must. She could be annoying, but she was his sister. And right now he could really use her company.

She finally opened her mouth. "I'll bet that we're gonna be stuck in a really complicated case."

Joshua snorted. "Mhm," he mumbled under his breath, kicking his feet. "My brain's too messed up to think about that right now. I don't wanna get paperwork. Ever again. Oh wait, Rina, did I ever tell you what that Agent Jones did?"

"What?" Karina said.

Joshua stabbed each word with a jab of his finger. "She launched a Bey at a car."

Karina choked on air. "She launched a WHAT at a car?" 

If only he could've taken a picture of Karina's face at that moment.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

She shut the door behind her and dusted off her pants.

"You're reckless, hon," said a tired voice at the desk, not bothering to look back. "We're supposed to guard people, not try to kill them."

"Norman told me to give him a taste of real action," Ivy retorted.

Skadi's head turned slightly. "And I told you that this was your mission, not Tarver's," she said pointedly. "You're responsible for keeping the operation smooth, got that?"

From the corner, a head of teal hair coughed slightly.

"That does not mean you get off the hook, Norman," Skadi said dryly, clicking her pen. Norman simply closed his eyes.

"Aight, whatever, you want the reports or you still busy?" Ivy said, wrinkling her nose.

Skadi held one finger up. "A few minutes, please." And back she went into her headpiece, communicating with a team at the scene of the crime.

Ivy puffed her cheeks and sank down on the wall, eventually collapsing onto the bench behind her and looking up at the ceiling. She mentally counted the rings around the ventilation pipes.

Her pocket was strangely quiet. Icarus? Ivy called out mentally.

The only reply was a dull lull in the back of her head. Icarus must've gone dormant for the rest of the day. He always did like to do his own thing.

Ivy closed her eyes. Sometimes she despised her job, no matter how fun it looked to jump across the rooftops catching criminals with a Bey like an actual superhero. They weren't heroes; just special operation scouts with ridiculously overpowered tops for weapons. And to get civilians or normal bladers entangled within the Dark Web version of Beyblade was practically inviting that exact same mess to then invade the public.

Why, out of all people, did the target have to be one of the most popular actors in the world? And why did the culprit have to be someone on which they had no profile? For sure Joshua's entire productions team would try to pry into the Network's investigation procedures and get everyone endangered. That concept infuriated her even more than his stupid, wilted-carrot hair and his incessant bumbling speech.

Normally, at the end of a mission, she'd be snarking at everyone who crossed her path. Now, with everything that had just happened, she was too tired to talk, so she simply sat and waited. If only she could've taken a nap, though; it would be a lot better than having to wait and send in a report.

She heard the rustling of a trench coat next to her and glanced over at the familiar head of teal hair. Norman leaned back against the wall next to the bench.

"Glad to see you made it back in one piece, Jones," he chuckled, looking off to the wall across from them.

Ivy rolled her eyes. "I could say the same to you, Tarver," she said, crossing her legs.

"Maybe we shouldn't have split the patrol," Norman said.

"Well, it wasn't like your motorcycle could carry four people," Ivy said. "Not to mention it was our fault for only going with one and not using both of them."

"Not the smartest," Norman admitted, shrugging.

He yawned and stared up at the ceiling with tired eyes. "What did you think of our movie star?"

"Our movie star? Tell that to Ty instead," Ivy sniffed.

"Don't tell me you already can't stand him?"

"I don't know how anyone can stand him," Ivy muttered. "I'm gonna have a headache for weeks."

His shrieking terrified face had been hilarious, she had to give him that.

The corner of Norman's lips quirked up. "You haven't heard him make his speeches yet, have you?" he asked, eyes glinting. "He can talk about anything for ages. There was this one time the Bulls went out to a high end restaurant m, but the entire time he went on about how bad the seasoning sauce was, and how some animal could cook the steak better than the chef. "

"Sounds like an awesome experience," Ivy said wryly. "I hope you had better luck with his sister."

Norman fixed his collar and exhaled a sort of laugh. "I mean, Karina's nicer to talk to, less impulsive," he said, shrugging. "She's usually embarrassed by him, from what I've known."

Ivy snorted, heels clicking against the floor as she stood up. "I'm not surprised," she said. She winced as she popped her ankle. "Man, my joints hurt."

"Jones, hon, come here," called a voice.

"Hold on a sec," Ivy said to Norman.

She approached the desk people, with their shining holographic computer screens and softly clicking keyboards, occasionally speaking something to each other or into a microphone, and stopped behind a mass of auburn hair tied into large, floofy sections.

Skadi clipped up the last of her paper pile and threw it over her shoulder. "Speedrun it," she ordered.

Ivy didn't miss a beat as she caught the papers deftly. "Cops managed to catch most of the ninjas at the film site today, with the exception of so-called Havoc Tempo, also known as the actor Ed Vergo. I have reasonable evidence from battling to believe that Mr. Vergo just so happens to be our chief suspect, codename Deadly Nightshade."

"Gimme," Skadi interrupted, holding one hand out, other still typing.

Ivy tossed Icarus out of her pocket to Skadi and continued talking. "Events today also indicate that Joshua Burns is one of Mr. Vergo's targets specifically because of his Bey's background."

"Oh, ain't that fantastic," Skadi said. She put Icarus into a large glass cylinder connected to the computer and pressed a few buttons. "I need to organize a stronger watchguard for the Burns boy. It's hardly a coincidence that they decided to spotlight again when he landed two months ago. He's probably an even bigger catch than we think."

The scanner beeped as the words SCANNING DATA flashed an electric blue across the computer screen, the same color as the glass cylinder.

"Please just tell me you didn't severely destroy his internal mechanisms," Skadi said, glancing at the Bey being scanned. "You know how much of a pain that is to fix."

Ivy shrugged. "Hey, he's bound to get a few dents when we're constantly out in the field like this," she said. "At least he won't spontaneously burst."

Skadi tapped her fingers on the desk absentmindedly. "You reckon you'd ever try entering a tournament again someday?" she asked quietly.

Ivy didn't respond, simply watched as the loading screen finished scanning.

She hadn't done competitive blading in ages. And even now it was so different than back then. Beginning with the Bakuten Revolution, the WBBA had swapped out the older Bey generations with smaller stadiums and safer Beys which split apart to indicate a win or a loss—similar in spirit to the Astral-Steel Era, but with none of the deadly, hazardous conditions, star fragments, and stadiums hewn into the ground. The old Legendary Bladers had long since retired their active careers for other work. No one knew the whereabouts of many of them, who preferred to keep hidden from the public eye, and few ever talked publicly of the older battle eras.

Perhaps it was indeed better this way—less collateral damage, easier for everyone to participate, whether in an adult league or in the junior leagues. But maybe it really wasn't better this way. The Burst system was unstable, fragile—standing on stilts in the middle of a thin glass bridge, right over a large canyon rife with monsters. They'd already seen so many corruptions and abuses of power within the few years that Burst had come into existence, and she'd been unlucky enough to witness much of it firsthand.

Ivy was abruptly snapped out of her thoughts as Skadi pushed the chair back and stood up, leaning toward the computer screen. "Hey, take a look," she said. "Looks like Icarus absorbed some more abnormal particle charges from the chase. Same signature as the ones we found in the alley on 23rd Street."

And then there was beeping, and a red warning flashed in the corner of the screen. The computer scan highlighted some small fragments of debris in a hideous green color, identifying whatever compounds that were mixed into the mess. Miraculously, Icarus was still dormant.

Ivy sucked in air through her teeth. "Well, actually, I forgot to mention something," she said, brow furrowed.

Her hand reached into the neckline of her vest. She drew out a folded piece of paper and threw it onto the table. "Found this when I got into a fight with one of the ninja minions, who's also apparently a terrible spy. Kinda forgot it was in my pocket."

The paper had only a few words, written with terrible kindergarten handwriting: last task underway and then we storm

It looked ridiculous. And it would be ridiculous, to most people. Unfortunately, as everyone in the room realized, it was not ridiculous, but a serious plan to take over the world.

How did they know that? By the serpentine signature, and what looked like a circle of black scales on the ripped edge of the paper, reminiscent of a certain serpentine organization.

Skadi flipped the walkie-talkie off her desk and deftly dialed in code 3. "So we're late," she hissed, desperately flying through her desk files. "Breaker 1-9, Agent Zaraevna reporting an emergency, over. Send message to the Director, the cobra has officially reared its head. I repeat, the cobra has officially reared its head. Take action immediately. Over."

The office space was a cacophony of whispered panic and interns slipping over dropped papers.

Ivy looked over her shoulder at Norman, who seemed paler than usual, and whose hands fidgeted with the collar of his turtleneck ever more nervously.

"Dad would be pissed if he were here," she muttered.

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Additional drawing which didn't make the final cut: