“I still don’t see why we have to call a meeting over just a bank robbery,” Serena griped. “Especially so late at night.” She added with a heavy yawn.

“The reason,” Luna answered. “Is because this was no ordinary bank robbery. These people knew exactly what they were doing.”

“Right, if you girls ever face a robbery like this again, you better be on your toes,” Artemis agreed.

“I think, considering everything, we can handle a bunch of thieves, no matter how clever they are,” Raye argued.

“Our point exactly, you are by far more than capable of dealing with any normal human,” Luna pointed out.

“You’ve got to remember that if these guys think they can out smart the law and your Sailor selves, they may end up thinking they can take you on, they could hurt a lot of people,” Artemis added.

Lita nodded at Artemis. “You’re right. We’ve got to be careful when dealing with someone like this. They’re a real threat to other people. They’ve already taken hostages and it was just their first heist.”

“It would help if we knew how many we’re dealing with here,” Amy analysed. “We could then tell how quickly we could incapacitate them and avoiding harm to innocent bystanders.”

“We already know their numbers,” Raye said. “There were five in the bank that took off in an escape vehicle. Mina followed another and lost him, that makes six.”

Mina’s lips tightened at the last sentence. “Nobody blames you Mina,” Serena said sympathetically. “You can get them all!” She chirped.

“He wasn’t one of them,” the blonde answered. “At least I’m pretty sure he’s not.”

Lita looked concerned, she placed a hand on her should “Who was he then?”

“Someone I never thought I’d see again,” she mused. “And I still didn’t see his face!” She suddenly erupted, scaring everyone else. She calmed again and composed herself, knowing she owed an explanation. The first person she looked to was the white guardian cat. “Oh Artemis. I’m sorry,” she sighed. “I should have told you straight away.”

The white feline immediately burrowed his brow. “Who was it?”

“It was JC,” she answered. The name meant nothing to the other girls. Nonetheless, it carried a sense of foreboding with it.

The silence was becoming dramatic as everyone waited for an explanation. “Are you sure?”

“I never saw his face, never have,” she explained. “But he had that same mask, it was unmistakeable.”

Artemis dropped his head in thought. “We have to be more careful, if he’s in league with them.”

“He’s not anything to do with them,” the blonde answered. “He never worked with anyone, you know that. He was going to sit it out and I would never have known it was him, but I saw the mask in his bag. He put it on before I could get a look at him. The only other thing I remember was his sports bag. It was filled with money.”

“Probably trying to get it changed up,” Artemis concluded. “You think we’ll see more of him?”

“Count on it,” Mina replied with an edge to her voice.

“Just who is this JC?” Raye interrupted. “An old friend.”

“Like Queen Beryl is an old acquaintance,” Artemis retorted.

“That bad?” Lita asked.

“No, but he’s the only person who managed to escape Mina as Sailor V every time, but trust me, he’s got a temper that could compete,” Artemis explained. “The last time we saw him,” he thought. “ Well, we thought he died.”

Mina let out a single solitary laugh, almost sarcastic in its sound. “You know, I never really believed he had died. I was sure that would be the last of him, though.”

“What happened?” Serena asked, leaning forward. Completely taken by the story, she had forgotten about her fatigue.

“JC, all things considered, was just small fry compared to the regular crooks in England,” Mina started. “Still, he was good, he never got caught, not even by me and his adventures, for lack of better term, usually ended in fires or some disaster. He had a short-lived crime spree but a famous one.

As best as Artemis and I could tell, he had a feud with a crime syndicate called The Circle. We never heard the name often, they operated very discretely. The last time I saw JC, he had just robbed a pawn shop.”

Amy raised an eyebrow “Why a pawn shop?”

Mina shrugged. “JC’s targets were always strange choices. I guess in retrospect they could have been fronts for The Circle. We can’t be sure.

Anyway, sure enough, he fled with bullets chasing him. It wasn’t soon before the police were on to him. I watched for the most of it. I knew he’d escape, like he always did. This time I decided to wait and follow him.”

“We followed him,” Artemis corrected. “To the docks on the Thames River, it was a place called Greenwich Wharf if I remember rightly.”

“Right. He had lost the police by now, so I picked my moment then.”

“Did you attack him?” Lita asked. Mina just shook her head.

“Either he was very good or very lucky, but an outright confrontation between us always led to him getting away. He never was up for a fight like the others. I decided to talk this one out. Look for a definite advantage before going for it. Or maybe even get something out of him.

-----Greenwich Wharf, London------

The car came to an abrupt stop, the tyres and brakes screaming as they did. The lights were already off. It made it easier to lose someone when it was this dark. Sailor V waited on a roof of corrugated steel, high above. The elusive JC had obviously come here for a reason, he had a trick up his sleeve for sure, and she would make sure she knew it first this time. She saw his shadow rush between the alleys of buildings. He darted though the grid in a random way that convinced her was deliberate.

He stopped in an abandoned storage house that still concealed steel girders with tarnished surfaces, they coloured a dirty red and littered the place. JC dropped a duffel bag he had been carrying and opened it. It was far too dark to see its contents. In fact it was barely light enough to see his silhouette but she could still hear him clearly. She had a pretty good guess what was in the bag.

She heard a hiss as he exclaimed a silent ‘yes.’ She jumped from her perch and with no sound at all, landed on the ground behind him. He tied up the bag again and spun on his heel, coming face to face with her. The sudden shock made him fall backwards and shout in surprise.

The heap of JC and the bag on the floor made an untidy business of getting up from the floor. “Bloody hell!” he whined. “You scared the shit out of me!”

For now, she said nothing. She waited for him to speak. He seemed confused by her silence. “What do you want?” He demanded. Almost as if she acted out of line.

“What do I want?” She returned in disbelief. “We’ll start with whatever you took from that Pawn Shop.”

“You saw that? Well, you see I can’t do that.”

“Its not a matter of whether you can or not,” Sailor V stated.

JC put a hand out in a submissive way. “Look any other time, I would, but I can’t. Not this time, this is my way out,” he reasoned.

“Out of what?”

“They’re close,” He said back. “I have to get out, this is my only chance. Or else they’ll.”

“Who’s they?” She interrupted.

“The Circle,” he snapped back. “Let me go, I swear, you’ll never see or hear of me again. Look, I’ll split the money with you.”

“Ha! How many times have I heard that one before?” She returned. Her ears pricked as she heard a car approach.

“Shit!” JC cursed. “They found me already. Please, you have to let me go, this is my only way out. They’ll kill my family if they find out who I am.”

“The Circle? Just who are they anyway?”

“Nobody knows, it’s why they’re so dangerous. Look, I’m in too deep with them now, I have to get out,” he pleaded with her. “I swear on the grave of my mother you’ll never see me again.”

Footsteps neared and Sailor V turned to focus on their source. Just then she heard foot scrapes behind here as JC fled. “JC! No!” She tried to stop him, but he got just outside of her reach. As he exited the shelter of the warehouse they were in, gun fire erupted.

JC retreated back. “Shit!” He kept shouting as the bullets clattered about him. Sailor V listened carefully. Judging by the gun fire and foots steps, there must have been at least eight of them. She crept up to the wall as she heard two stalking outside. There was a torn hole in the whole and she held back as they passed, noting one of them check it by peering a pistol through. They passed by and she rushed to attack.

She dived through the hole nimbly and without sound. The two men were just a few meters in front of her now. She rushed at them, catching their attention. Both spun to shoot but were too late. She grabbed one arm and twisted it, wrenching the gun free from grip as the man gasped in pain. She pivoted her weight and swung the guy straight into his companion. Both hit the wall with such force that they both slumped unconscious.

She heard heavy foot steps again and determined JC was trying to make a run for it again. She had to move quickly. A single shot sounded and any foot steps stopped. Did they get him? She took off in the direction of the sound.

There were more shots fired. JC must have still been alive. If he could hold out for little longer, she’d stand a chance of keeping him alive to get some answers. She cut towards the river, instinct telling her that’s where JC would head. She had no idea why, it just made sense for him.

She guessed right. Unfortunately, so had the armed men that came for him. Two of them had him pinned with nowhere to go. Just then JC noticed her arrival. “This is all your fault, you know?”

The two looked over their shoulder and turned to aim at her. She was two quick, aiming a snap kick at an abandoned tyre. The tyre lifted from the ground and caught them both in the chest. They tyre knocked them off their feet and onto the ground. She heard both grunt as the wind was knocked out of them. She slowed and took both of their guns, throwing them into the river.

JC pointed to her right. “Two more!”

She grabbed the tyre in both hands and spun on her heel. She threw it like a large discus towards the two approaching her and instinctively followed it up. As she had expected, they ducked the incoming projectile. That gave her just enough time to close the distance. A twist of one arm, a knee to the sternum and an elbow to the back of the head in just a few seconds was enough to incapacitate both of them and gave her time to focus on JC.

Typically, he had tried running further along the thick concrete wall, keeping the river from overflowing into the docklands. “JC!” She shouted in a commanding tone. He stopped and looked back at her for a moment, then carried on. “Damn it, JC!”

It was mere seconds before her super natural speed allowed her to catch up with him. “JC, hold up!” She grabbed his shoulder and stopped him in his tracks.

“No!” He answered defiantly, trying to shake loose from V’s iron grip. He turned to face her. Behind the slick metallic mask he wore, she could tell he was looking at her with a thousand different types of anger and frustration. “Let go,” he growled.

“I can’t do that,” she told him firmly.

The eye pieces of his mask glinted, and she could see the pupils in his eyes, glistening in the moonlight. They glanced sideways and back again. Without warning, he tackled her to the floor. The air whipped twice just where they had both been as two more bullets were aimed for them. She landed roughly on her back, JC’s weight on top of her did enough to knock the wind from her lungs. She gasped for air and her stomach cramped at the attempt.

“You’ll get us both killed,” he screamed at her, putting emphasis in to the word ‘both.’ Before she knew it, he had got up from her and fled again. Unable to breathe, she was left defenceless against the two gunmen coming for her.

“You watch out, I’ll make sure she doesn’t get up again,” she heard a thick London accent instruct. This was it, she thought, fear began to further impair her ability to breathe. Unless JC came back for her.

“Look out for what?” The other asked.

“JC of course!”

“But he’s gone, he ain’t coming back.”

“Just look out for him, will you?

“Why? She’s as much trouble to him as she is to us. He’s not coming back for her.” The second gunman was right. JC wouldn’t come back for her. She was all alone. Her eyes burned as they tried to emit tears but it hurt too much. She hadn’t known fear like this before.

Her enhanced hearing magnified the sound of a gun barrel sliding as the gunman made sure a round was chambered. The barrel slid back with a screech and clicked into place. It sounded more like a war drum being struck. Then she saw the barrel aimed straight for her.

“Oh god,” she whimpered. She closed her eyes. There was a low growl as the trigger was pulled, pulling the firing pin back. A thunder crack went off as the pin began to throw itself forwards. The sound of the pin making contact with the bullet inside, the sonic boom of the bullet firing and then a loud ringing sound.

The sound in her ears began to filter out as she realised the bullet never hit her. The next sound she was aware of was JC shouting at her. “Get up!” She opened her eyes.

It was still night, she was still alive in the wharf and JC was standing over her, snapping at her. “Come on! Get up or I’ll kill you myself.”

She took a relieved sigh. Her breathing had come back. ‘When did that happen?’ she thought to herself, then remembered JC. She raised her leg and kicked him in the small of the back. He fell over and she quickly got up before he had a chance.

“You cheeky cow!” He shouted and jumped to his feet. “I saved your life twice, in as many minutes I might add, and you still have the nerve to fight me!”

“One good deed doesn’t undo all the bad ones you’ve pulled JC,” she defended.

“Bullshit!”

He grabbed the bag of money and stepped back towards the edge of the river. He looked over his shoulder nervously and back at her.

“What are you going to do?” She asked. He looked back at the water to answer her question. Her eyes shot wide. “JC, no! The under current! You’ll drown!”

His knuckles tightened as he gripped the bag tighter. “No fear,” he began.

“No!” She begged.

“No hesitation.”

“Don’t do it!”

“No problem.” With that final word, he took a step back and plunged into the murky depths of the River Thames.

“JC!” Sailor V stood on the water’s edge. All that was left was his metal mask. She stood there scanning the surface, trying to see a sign of him there. There was none but that mask. It was like a headstone to his watery grave. Police sirens could be heard in the distance. They were coming for the wharf. With no time left, she left the scene.

----- Cherry Hill Temple -----

“That was the last I ever saw of him,” Mina finished.

“Some story,” Amy concluded.

Mina looked at her friends. “The most dangerous thing about JC is the company he tends to attract more than himself. If he’s shown his mask in public, chances are he’s brought trouble with him. We should be ready.”

“We’ll be ready,” Lita answered. “We’ll catch him in no time.”

Mina gazed at the floor in front of and then raised her head with a reassuring smile. “Thanks.”

“Perhaps we should take a forward step in looking for this JC first, we could track down anybody who’s in the city from England.”

“It won’t be easy,” Mina reminded. “JC is extremely good when it comes to staying out of sight when he needs to. And chances are he’s used a different name to enter the country. But you’re right, we have to try.”

Amy nodded. “Mina, meet me after school tomorrow, we’ll start then.”

“You have something in mind?” The blonde asked.

“I’ll show you tomorrow and we’ll keep everyone informed of our progress, but for now only two of us will be necessary.”

“Can we go to bed now?” Serena interrupted.

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