authors note;

Hey guys! Thank you once again so much for all the Fallows and Favorites! They make my day. But I am hoping for more reviews cuz, believe me, knowing what you like and what you don't like about the story and charactershey help me A LOT! So PLEASE review! I'd love to know what you guys think of Akira and Olive. Please don't hesitate to share your opinion with me. Stay excellent and don't forget to be awesome!

Raleigh and Olive walked towards the training room in a comfortable silence, work out bags in hand.

Raleigh appreciated this, normally he would either feel the need to say something or it would just feel awkward. As they walked people said hi to Raleigh and just gave strange looks to Olive. When he first came here he was the one who got strange looks so he could understand how this could bother somebody but Olive didn't seem to mind.

"So, are you excited to get back in to a Jaeger?" Olive asked looking at him curiously.

"I am." Raleigh paused, "first I need to find my co-pilot though."

Olive nodded her head.

"You can call me Raleigh by the way."

She looked at him and said "I can. But that would mean I'll have to tell you that its ok to call me Olive."

"You don't have to." Raleigh said amused.

She shook her head. "It's fine. You can call me Olive."

"Why Olive?" Raleigh asked as they entered the empty training area.

"Akira. When I was little I loved olives so she though it was ironically suiting."

Raleigh smirked "You don't sound like an 'Olive'."

She raised a brow "What is an Olive supposed to sound like?"

He shrugged "Not sure. But probably not like an 'Olivia'."

She smiled as they walked in to the training area.

Olive had come wearing sweatpants and a shirt that was too big on her, she went to a corner and without hesitating she took of the sweatpants. To Raleigh's relief she was wearing training shorts that was tight underneath. While Raleigh didn't want to seem like he was watching her, he couldn't help but wonder; is she really as good as they say? Before he had left his room to get here he had quickly checked her and Akira's fight with the Kaiju on YouTube (of course it had millions of views) and Chuck couldn't have been more wrong. These girls were good even with the Jaeger they had. Even then, the Jaeger was impressive thinking about the circumstances they put it together in.

She started bandaging her hands, he could see it was second nature to her. He watched the way she stretched from the corner of his eye, trying to look as busy as she did. She had a way of moving that made you want to keep watching, her built frame was trained for fighting but it looked like it was made for dancing. Elegant yet lethal. She looked quite beautiful.

She glanced his way and quickly he tuned his head, took his jump rope out of his bag and started counting.

1,2,3…

When he returned his gaze to her she was shadow boxing her eyes closed, looking quite concentrated.

20,21,22…

She moved fast and with perfect technique. Her red hair was in a messy bun and it flashed left and right as she moved. She was as good as they said. As far as he could tell anyway.

58,59,60…

She has a great posture and great foot work. His only critique would have been that she let her guard down because her hands were too lose, but she probably made up for that in technique and speed. It said something about her personality. She was confident in her ability enough that she didn't feel the need to guard herself. Cocky.

The rope caught on his feet and he realized he had lost count. He looked down at his feet untangling himself.

"You were at 73." Olive said.

He looked up to see her big brown eyes looking at him. He asked "You were counting?"

She gestured her head to the rope in his hands "The clicking sound, I cant help but count it. It's an obsessive behavior thing."

"Does it bother you?"

"No, its kinda soothing actually."

"Ok then" he said. Interesting.

He thought about asking her if she wanted to practice together and hesitated for a second and as he was about to ask, she said "Do you mind helping me out?"

He looked at her, caught off guard by the irony.

"If you don't mind of course, I'll understand if you'd rather work out alone but I need to work on my 'dialog' and doing that alone is kind hard."

He smiled. "Its ok, I was about to ask the same thing."

She had a relieved expression for a split second then it disappeared. She didn't want to get rejected and she didn't want to show weakness also.

"Marshal wants me and Akira to show him our dialog, you know, for the physical compatibility."

He raised an eyebrow "I thought you guys were already a team."

She took a deep breath "We are, but we aren't your usual academy Rangers so, he just wants to see." She looked in to his eyes "He wants to see if our compatibility was just a fluke or not. He wants to make sure that we can handle this." Everybody did.

He looked back in to her eyes without saying anything but nodded. She liked his eyes. They were a nice shade of blue.

"Remember its not-"

"-its not about beating somebody, it's about a dialog. I know." She said with a sigh.

"-and patience." added Raleigh with a smirk. She was inpatient. She pushed her lips together and nodded. They both took their stance and started.

She was the one to make the first move and she was hasty about it, if it weren't for her good technique that would have been a point for Raleigh. The Second time around she let him come to her and she pulled him down immediately, what she didn't expect was the way he came back; She had thrown him over his shoulder with a Judo throw (looking at it from the outside a 5' 3" girl was throwing a 6' 1" guy over her shoulder) and hadn't expected him to recover from it but he had as he tripped her from the ground and got her in a heel hook. She tapped yielding.

He got up and reached for her hand. As he pulled her up he said "you are fighting me, not listening to me. You have to move with me not at me." She nodded. Wrinkling her nose.

And this time they danced. It was like every move she made he knew what came next and she knew what came after that. It was like it was practiced, he moved and she filled in the blanks.

They set on the floor breathing heavily. They had worked out for hours and it only got better. Raleigh was pretty sure this was what compatible felt like but he decided not to say anything about it. They set there waiting for their breathing to calm down, Olive handed Raleigh her water bottle. "Thanks." He muttered and took it. After taking a couple of big sips he handed it back to her and wiped the sweat of her face with the edge of his shirt.

Olive took a peek and regretted it right as she did. His abs looked like they were carved out of marble for gods sake... She mentally slapped herself; of course he was built. He was a Ranger. She was glad she was already red from the work out, if not her blushing would show.

"Shouldn't Akira be here? I mean she is your Co-Pilot afterall and I'm pretty sure she needs the work out more than you do." Raleigh asked.

Olive shrugged "She'll be fine..."

Raleigh didn't see how but didn't push the subject.

"What do you think?" She asked suddenly.

"About?"

"Us being rangers." She said simply.

He stared at his feet, thinking "I do agree it was reckless," he looked up at her "but I can understand why you did what you did."

She looked at him.

"And I think in the end you guys saved a city full of people and that was very brave and extraordinary."

"Why do you think we did it then?" She asked

"What do you mean?"

"You said you could understand why we did what we did. Why do you think we did it?" She asked again not breaking her eye contact. He felt like it was a dare to her. Who ever looks away first looses, so he didn't.

"I think when you lose your loved ones, you feel like your life is taken away from you. You feel like you were destined to feel half empty, broken and lost." He said. She raised an eyebrow. "And I think this was your way of taking your destiny back in to your own hands. The Kaiju had taken it from you when you were little, so now you took it back"

For half a minute she didn't say anything just looked in to his eyes, then she smirked and said "So I gather you know our sobbing story."

He smiled and "Yeah word gets around. Don't worry, we all have em."

"Sounds like you know the feeling." She said pulling her knees to her stomach and hugging her legs.

He hesitated "Yeah…"

"You don't have to tell me."

He blinked, not breaking eye contact was getting harder. He smiled "Its only fair"

She put her head on her knees and watched at him with tired yet interested eyes.

"I was 15 when the first Kaiju, Trespasser attacked San Francisco, me and my brother Yancy had watched the attack as it was broadcasted with our mother and father. Some time after that, our mother got diagnosed with cancer. Even then she didn't stop smoking. After we buried her, our father left. I think he just didn't know what to do, he was lost without her. So from that point on we only had each other." He said finally looking at his hands. Olive was still watching his face, the way he tried hiding his anger and sadness with calm words. With anybody else he would be able to hide them well but she didn't buy it. She did the same thing after all.

"So me and Yancy decided to join the Jaeger Program."

"to take back your destiny in your own hands." She said.

He looked at her big brown eyes. "Yes." He agreed. Her eyes held interest which made Raleigh remember Yancy. He didn't know that many people who really looked in to ones eyes and sincerely listened like they cared. It's easy to ask one how they are, but actually listening the answer and caring about it is a rare ability not many has and Yancy had it. And so did she.

"And we did. For a while anyway…" he trailed off. He didn't know how to continue.

After a minute of silence "I'm sorry for your loss." she said almost in a whisper. Many people knew about what happened to Yancy of course, it was all over the news.

He smiled and nodded "Yeah, me too."

Olive stood next to Akira in the crowd that was watching Raleigh Becket go through his co-pilot candidates like they were nothing. The candidates weren't bad but as Olive came to understand, they just weren a match with Raleigh. It wasn't about skill but being compatibility with each other, knowing one another's steps. What was curious was the face Mako made after every patch ended.

As if he heard this, Raleigh said "Ok whats wrong with them?"

"Excuse me?" Mako asked

"Every time a match ends you make this gesture," he made the face Mako was making "Like you are critical of that performance."

"It's not their performance I'm critical about, its yours. You could have finish every single match two moves earlier that you did." She was right.

People from the crowd made "ooohhh" sounds.

This made Raleigh raise an eyebrow. Smirking he said "Why don't we change this up, lets give her a change." Pentecost's face said that wasn't happening. Whispers rose from the crowd.

"All the suitable candidates to be you co-pilot are here . No changes will be made." Pentecost said in a voice that said that final.

Any other man would shut up but of course, not Raleigh.

"Why you don't think your brightest can keep up with me?" dared Raleigh.

Mako looked at The Marshal with big hopeful eyes. He took a deep breath, he knew he would regret this later.

"Go." he said with a sigh.

The crowd clapped as loud as they could at the sight of the great match they just saw.

"I've seen enough." Said Pentecost stopping Mako and Raleigh's match. They were obviously compatible.

"Yeah me too, Mako is my Co-Pilot." Said Raleigh getting up off of the matt and putting a hand on her shoulder. Makos face lit up.

"No, she will not." Said Pentecost "I've already made my decision. You will be test piloting Gipsy Danger tomorrow and you'll meet your Co-Pilot then."

Without a word Mako picked up her stuff off the floor and walked next to the Pentecost to take back her place as point keeper. You could read her disappointment from her face. At this point Olive wanted to step in and say something, even a blind man could see that they would be drift compatible and as she was about to Akira put a hand on her shoulder. She looked at her ready to protest but Akira shook her head and whispered. "You don't have to fight their battles for them. Let it go." Olive took a breath and bit her lips hard, she was right.

Raleigh opened his moth to protest but Pentecost cut him off "Ok, next up it's Miss Olive and Akira Snow, step up please." forcing him to let it go.

Raleigh raised an eyebrow and took his place among the crowd next to Herc to watch the girls. Herc gave him a sympathetic smile and gave him a pat on the shoulder.

With Mako and Raleigh's match Akira and Olive had completely forgotten about the fact that they would be under the same spotlight.

They stepped up on to the met together, Olive's determined step made Akira look clumsier than usual. She looked completely lost.

Olive took her place across from Akira and picked up the wooden sword motioning to Akira to do the same and she did, but only it was upside down. Olive motion to her to fix it and Akira did with a "Ohh! Right." This made people laugh. Akira blushed a little but Olive paid no attention to them. She gave Akira a determined nod as if to say "don't worry, this will work" and as Mako gave the start signal Olive tripped Akira with an easy swing of her sword and Akira was on her back, hard. Several "Ohhh.." sounds rose from the crowd.

"1-0" announced Mako but without waiting for a second signal Akira took a counter attack which knocked Olive back a couple of steps but Raleigh could tell she had been waiting for it. She had that face she made when she knew she was going get hit. Akira struck Olive with a perfect combo with a perfect posture, the clumsy girl was all gone. This surprised everybody, suddenly she was a fighting machine like her adopted sister, her body reacted to Olives attacks at the perfect timing at the perfect rhythm. They were going back and forth with the same dedication and same technique. It was like they both knew exactly what would come next.

People gave each other looks of amazement but this wasn't what amazed Raleigh, he knew how Olives body moved when she fought. He knew cuz he had watched her and trained with her. He knew her rhythm, her posture, how she looked almost like she was dancing and that was unique to her, he had never seen it with anybody else. He even knew her fault which was letting her guard down out of cockiness and Akira was doing the exact same thing now, as if she was mirroring Olive.

Raleigh whispered to Herc "I thought Akira was the brains between the two, did you know she could fight like this?"

"No, as far as I know she has the reflexes of a box of matches." He said sounding surprised.

The match went on without and point being given. They moved in union, their attacks and defences fitting in with each other like puzzle pieces. No one was superior, it was like they were copies and how could one beat oneself anyway?

"That's quite enough." Said the Pentecost waking up everybody from the dream they were in. Everybody but Akira.

While Olive dropped the sword off her hands Akira ren at her as if she didn't hear the Marshal, but Olive was waiting for this so with a swift movement she took Akira in a choke hold and whispered something into her ear nobody else could hear.

Akira dropped the sword off her hands and blinked as though she just woke up.

People started whispering to each other.

Olive slowly released her.

"Ok people the show is over-"

The loud alarm made everybody jump. A Kaiju was about to attack.

"I want every body back on their posts NOW!" yelled Pentecost. Everybody ren to their working post and all the Rangers lined up in teams around the Marshal. He took a good look at all of them and rested his eyes on the Snow sisters "Whats the situation?" He asked in to his radio.

"Its a Category 3 sir, code name Belobog." Tendo's voice said over the radio.

"Cherno Alpha I want you ready for back up," Ordered the Marshal.

The Russians nodded, "Yes sir."

"And Tacit Ronin, get ready, I want you on the front line."

"Yes sir." Said Olive and Akira in union.