Tiko leaps into the air right before the blast hits her, landing infront of Butterfly, who opens all weapon systems. Tiko looks behind her and can see the crater where the blast hit. "Now that's no way to escort a lady." The General is about to fire again, but his gun is knocked out of his hands by a blast from Butterfly. *Butterfly, fire missiles at the troops, the big one is mine.* Tiko charges the General, who pulls out a smaller gun, he fires a shot, but Tiko dodges it. He growls in frustration and starts firing as fast as he can. Tiko rolls under the shots and brings her sword up, slicing the Generals stomach and chin. He stumbles back, and examines his stomach, it is only a flesh wound. "Tell me General, did Limburger hire you to kill me?" The General glares at Tiko and pulls out a grenade, he throws it at her, but Tiko dives out of the way. The General takes this opportunity to grab a gun from one of his fallen soldiers. He turns to Tiko and starts firing again, Tiko blocks the blasts with her sword and throws three poisonous short blades at the General's chest, stomach and head. The poison renders him unable to move. He falls to the ground and starts convulsing as the poison takes effect. Tiko runs for the tower doors but a blast hits her shoulder. She drops her sword and looks towards the source. One of the General's men is still standing and has his gun pointed at her. Tiko looks around for Butterfly, but can not see her. *Butterfly?* But the bike is nowhere in sight. Tiko grumbles and pulls out a dart, she cups it in her hand and raising her arms in surrender. The soldier approaches her, but makes no move to capture her. "My orders are to kill you human scum, so that's exactly what I am going to do." The soldier raises his gun to her head. "Did you know that the eyes are a window to a person soul?" The soldier blinks, "What?" Tiko flicks her wrist and the dart lands into the Plutarkians open mouth. He chokes and stumbles back, tripping over his comrades dead bodies. "I saw no soul in your eyes." Tiko walks back to her sword and puts it into the sheath, looking around for Butterfly. *Butterfly?* She hears a beeping and turns to the source, there she sees Butterfly parked by Charlie, Vinnie, Modo and Throttle. *Butterfly, where were you?* Tiko then remembered that she told Butterfly to protect Charlie when she was not riding her or giving orders. She must of heard them coming and went to protect Charlie. "Hi guys, decided to join me for a morning ride?" "Tiko, why did you come to Limburger tower, we were going to demolish it later today?" Tiko goes to Butterfly and opens up the back. She pulls out a first aid kit and starts to bandage her wound. "I came to talk to Limburger. My sensei ordered me to find out the connection between Limburger and Tamagawa, the Plutarkian I killed in Japan. So I came here to get answers, but I was attacked by these Plutarkians." Throttle looks the dead fish, "these are General Barracuda's men. You defeated him by yourself?" Tiko smiles, "I had Butterfly attack the men while I dealt with the General. Once I disarmed him, he was easy to fight, they aren't used to hand-to-hand I guess. But I made a mistake and did make sure Butterfly knocked all the soldiers unconscious, one was able to shoot my shoulder." Throttle looks to her now bandage shoulder and the blood trails that lead down to her hand. "Are you all right babe?" Tiko smiles, "Yeah, but I still need to talk to Limburger." Throttle exchanges glances with Vinnie and Modo. "Are you going to kill him?" Tiko turns around on Butterfly. "If he does not cooperate, then yes, but I have a feeling he will tell me what I want." Tiko starts her engine and rides up the side of the tower. Throttle looks to the dead and unconscious Plutarkians. "What are we going to do with them?" Modo gets off his bike and walks over to them, "Whew, they smell worse when their dead. Four out of the seven are still alive, let's take them with us and hold them for trail on Mars." Throttle nods and points to the truck across the street. "Charlie and Vinnie, take the live ones and put them in the truck, then drive them to the Garage, that's where Rimfire is picking us up. Modo and I will put the dead ones in the tower. Now let's move like we have a purpose." Vinnie and Charlie pull the truck next to the bodies and start loading them up. "Man, this job is stinky." Charlie laughs at Vinnie remark, but soon chokes on the foul stench. Modo and Throttle finish putting the bodies in the tower. "Modo, help Vinnie and Charlie, I'm going to get Tiko." Modo nods and heads for the truck, while Throttle heads for Limburgers office, what kind of woman did I fall in love with? I hope she's all right. While going up the stairs Throttle hears a blast, he yells at his bike to go faster. When he bursts threw Limburgers doors he sees Tiko sitting on her bike, which has a blaster pointed at Limburger's head. "Ah, how good to see you my miscreant mouse. Can you please call you guard dog off of me." Throttle looks at Tiko, but she doesn't even blink. "Limburger, I will ask you one more time. What is your connection to Ahiro Tamagawa?" Limburger sighs, "as I told you, we are simple the same species with the same objective. We are to strip our locations of their natural resources. I barely new him, I have no reason to care about a Plutarkian in Japan." Tiko looks to Throttle, "are we ready to go?" Throttle nods and Tiko pulls out a short blade. She throws it at Limburgers head, Throttle yells in response, "Nooooo." Tiko looks to Throttle in surprise, so does Limburger. "Did you think I would kill him?" Throttle looks at Limburger and can see the blade in the wall behind him. Throttle sighs in relief, "I don't know what I thought." Tiko glares at Throttle and then at Limburger, "this is a warning Limburger, if you ever try to hurt Charlie again, then the next time I will not miss." Tiko then rides Butterfly out the window and into the street, Throttle close behind. When they reach the street, they notice that Modo, Vinnie and Charlie have already left. Tiko is about to take off, but Throttle stops her, "Tiko, I... I'm sorry I over reacted up there. I'm just saw that you killed some of the Plutarkians here and I was afraid you were going to kill Limburger." Tiko looks at Throttle, a serious expression on her face. "Throttle, for years I trained on how to be an honorable fighter and to obey my master. My master ordered me to kill Limburger if he did not cooperate, but he did, so I had no reason to kill him. It would also have been dishonorable to kill him unarmed, and I never dishonor myself, my master or the art I love. I killed these Plutarkians because it was necessary, it's either kill or be killed. I am sorry if you disagree with my beliefs, but you are going to have to live with them if you want to become apart of my life." With that said, Tiko rides off to the Last Chance, Throttle, riding a little ways behind her. When they reach the garage, Tiko parks Butterfly and goes upstairs to Charlie's room, not saying a word. "Man, what did Throttle do to T-chan?" Vinnie grabs Charlie waist and hugs her, "don't worry, I'm sure it's just a little misunderstanding, Throttle will fix it." Charlie sighs as she sees Throttle's guilty expression. Charlie breaks out of Vinnie's embrace and goes upstairs to find Tiko. "So Throttle, did she kill him?" Throttle looks at Modo, "no, she only threatened she would if he tried to hurt Charlie again. But I really blew it, I yell out 'no' when I thought she was going to kill him. Now she's pissed at me for not trusting her." Modo puts his hand on Throttle shoulder. "You have to remember that we come from two different worlds. Her way of doing things may seem strange to you, and the same goes for her. If you grew up learning how to kill those who threatened you and those you loved, wouldn't you have killed those Plutarkians?" Throttle sighs and goes to Charlie's door. He knocks, "Charlie, can I speak to Tiko alone, please." Charlie opens the door and glares at Throttle. "Listen Throttle, it has been along time since she has ever cared for any man. If you hurt her because of your different ways of doing things, then I will never forgive you." Throttle nods to Charlie, who walks back into the living room. Throttle steps into the room and closes the door, he walks up to the bathroom door and can hear the shower running. "Tiko, are you in there?" Tiko opens the shower curtain and yells at Throttle, "I don't want to talk to you right now." Throttle reaches for the handle and tries the knob, it's locked. "Tiko, please, I need to talk to you about this." Tiko turns off the shower and wraps a towel around her hair and body. She then opens the door and looks at Throttle. "What do you want?" Throttle looks into her eyes and he can see she has been crying. "Do you want to get dressed first?" Tiko looks to the bed, she has laid out her clothes that she was planning on traveling in. "You can talk to me while I get dressed." Throttle looks a little surprised, "your sure you don't mind dressing infront of me?" Tiko takes the towel off her head. "If it bothers you, then turn around and talk to me." Throttle sits on the side of the bed, his back to Tiko as she dries herself. There is silence until Throttle sighs, "When I was in love with Carbine, I found that I loved not only her more gentle side, but her fighting spirit as well. With you, I find that my feelings are the same. When I was on Mars fighting the Plutarkians, I was forced to kill them, but since I have come to earth, I have found that I do not need to kill. My mistake is that I didn't see it from your point of view. You might have different feelings and beliefs, and I know now that I need to respect that. Can you forgive me?" Throttle turns to Tiko and he can see she is now fully dressed and tears are streaming down her face. Throttle goes to her and holds her close, she cries into his chest. "Please don't cry Tiko, I am so sorry." Tiko sits on the bed, pulling herself from Throttle's embrace, "there is something I need to explain to you. But first I need Charlie to make a call for me." Tiko stands up and goes to the door, she opens it and yells at Charlie, *Charlie, can you call the airport at 555-1212 and tell them to have a shipment for Tammaron Frank to be delivered to this address. Tell them to send it C.O.D., and if they can not, use my Visa CC, it's in my snowboarding coat.* Tiko hears Charlie's "O.K." so she goes back into the room and sits next to Throttle on the bed. "Besides Charlie and my sensei, you are the only other person who is going to know the truth about how I got this scar and why I call Charlie Little Butterfly." Throttle puts her hand in his and squeezes it. "The first time I ever killed someone, it was in cold blood."