(Y/n)'s POV

I couldn't believe what I was looking at...

I knew a guy with pink hair just like the one in the photo, but I'm not entirely sure this is the same person I am referring to. There's no way that my father is Cherry! I couldn't imagine him looking like that in his high school years. But as much as I wanted to deny the fact that he could be my father, something was telling me the opposite.

"Cherry?" I say out loud, breaking the silence that echoed in the night. "B-but it can't be him. There's no way!"

Langa takes in a deep breath before speaking as he looks down at the photo in my hand. "That's the only person I could think of who has the same hair color as the one in the photo," he said before pausing and continuing again. "Besides, didn't you say that your dad is a skateboarder who goes to 'S'? During my time there, Cherry seemed to be the only skater with pink hair. Even I had a hard time believing that."

My friend takes a closer look at the photo with intensity, too close to where his face almost touches it. He seems to want to confirm something before he makes his conclusion.

"And if you can imagine him without those piercings, then it does look like him," he says as his eyes narrowed a bit at his observation. Since he made that point, I saw how right he was and let out a sigh of defeat.

"But, I look nothing like him," I say while brushing my free hand through my (h/l) hair. I see Langa look at my face and my features before looking back at the picture to look at the young man's features.

"Yeah, you're right," Langa says, and then looks back at the photo with the same face he had before. "But you do look a lot like your mother. You share the same eyes as her as well as her hair." With my eyes never leaving the image of my mother, I could see how much I did look like her. But finding out about this truth that I never knew about seems to make things a bit difficult for me. Now it was like my whole world was flipped upside down. I place my hand on my head as I inhale deeply before exhaling.

"What am I gonna do now?" I ask mostly to myself but loudly so that Clanga can hear me.

"Well, you still have to decide if you want to race against Adam or not," Langa suggested, which caught my attention. I look back at him with a bit of curiosity as I wait for him to continue talking. "If you don't feel like racing, I could take your place and I'll race against him instead. It's your choice."

I looked away as my mind was dazing off a bit. After learning that Cherry is my father, I feel like I've gained a new perspective on things. I've already achieved my goal of discovering my father's identity, so now I can focus on my next objective: defeating Adam, the top skater in "S," so that I can prove to him an important point that he clearly doesn't see. I feel determined and unafraid to return to the abandoned mine to showcase my skills.

'I've made my decision.'

"I'm gonna be the one to skate against Adam."

Even though I was not looking at Langa, I could tell that he had a proud smile on his face, almost as if he was a proud older brother looking at his younger sister. "I'm proud of your bravery, (Y/n). I know you will do great. You can use that bravery to win the race. If not me, then you."

I heard how he praised me, and I wanted to use that against him as a little joke. "Oh, so are you saying that you're scared of racing Adam?" I ask in a teasing tone of voice with a smug look on my face. That seemed to have caused Langa to start laughing a little as he quickly replied back.

"No, that's not what I'm saying." He finished up with his laughing fit before taking a quick breather and spoke calmly. "I'm saying that I see the potential in you. The way you have a desire for skating is something you shouldn't lose."

Hearing those words coming from him gave me a sense of deja vu. It was almost as if I heard someone say that to me already. But despite how many times I've heard it already, it was a good reminder for me to always keep in mind when I'm in doubt. I smile softly as I look up at my tall friend.

"Okay. I'll take your word for it," I say with a shrug as I continue walking back to Langa's house with the photo still in hand. I was deep in my own thoughts when something came to mind. 'Heh, speaking of photo...'

"Oh, and Langa?"

I slowed down my pace so that I could let Langa catch up with me. "Yeah?"

As I looked back at the photo one last time, I handed it over to Langa and spoke in a serious tone, saying, "Can you do me a favor and show this photo to Cherry during the race?" Langa didn't say anything initially, but he still took the picture from me. It was only then that he asked the question I was expecting him to ask.

"Sure, I can do that. Why do you want me to show this to him?" he asks while putting the photo in his pocket to keep it safe.

I knew that some part of me might regret even having him do this while I was racing, but it had to be revealed at some point. I'd rather not be there when it is revealed. "I want him to know that the one who will be beating Adam is his long-lost daughter."

3rd POV

The night of the race against Adam was not far and the abandoned mine was filled with many individuals who were interested to know who would be skating the Matador of Love. Dark purple lights illuminated the main area as a projector showed everyone the track course. To their surprise, the track is going along the side of a cliff with no borders, which would make it difficult for the skaters to skate on during the race. Any little mistake could lead to one of them falling off and possibly getting something worse than just a broken arm.

And to add to the scary effect, the finish line had what looked to be a gravestone standing for everyone to see. It made it look like someone was going to die that night.

Reki couldn't believe his eyes. He and the rest of the group, excluding Langa, had to walk to the entrance of "S" because of a fallen tree due to the storm the other night blocking the way, and now had to see what his friend would be going through. Langa had texted Reki earlier saying that (Y/n) was going to be the one skating, so it made him anxious for sure knowing that there might be a possibility that the child could get hurt if she was not careful.

"What is up with that course?" Reki asks as he and the rest of the gang have their eyes glued to the projector.

"If they slip off the track, they're dead for sure," Miya says in a low whisper as a sweat drop goes down along the side of his face.

Shadow, already in his clown makeup and outfit, had a stern and serious look on his face as he looked at the race track while sitting in his wheelchair. He sneaked out of the hospital so that he could watch the race in person since there was no way he wanted to miss seeing who won. "Why'd we trade the normal course for a death trap?" he asks out loud, hoping that he will get his answer.

And luckily, he did get his answer... but it wasn't from anyone in the group. "The entrance to the abandoned factory got sealed off due to the storm."

Upon hearing the voice, Reki, Miya, Shadow, Joe, and Cherry turn around and see Snake walking towards the group with his red cap covering most of the features on his face. "Adam asked for this as a replacement," he continues to say.

With this new info being shared in the conversation, Joe and Cherry looked back up at the course and couldn't help but recognize it so well. "We used this back in the day. When 'S' first started." Cherry says out of the blue with Joe agreeing with every word his childhood friend said.

"It was deemed too dangerous and got banned," Joe adds.

Snake looked in the same direction the famous skaters were looking and spoke up once again. "He said it was appropriate for tonight."

A chill runs down Reki's spine after hearing those words. Only a man as crazy as Adam would proclaim this given that this is an important night for him. He gulps as the redhead's mind goes to the girl who will take part in this race. "(Y/n)," he mumbled to himself, hoping that the girl could hear him, but obviously she couldn't.

Suddenly, he snapped out of his thoughts when he heard another pair of footsteps walking towards the group. He turns his head and sees a familiar sky-blue-haired teen walking in his direction. His eyes seem to brighten up at the sight of his friend.

"Langa," he says while breathing out a sigh. "How did it go? Is she at the starting line yet?"

"I walked with her half of the way towards the starting line and let her walk the rest of the way there by herself," he tells the redhead as he stands beside him while everyone else listens to the boy talk. "She should be there any minute now."

~~~~~~~~~~

Going up the hill, (Y/n) has her eyes gazing towards the ground with her (2/f/c) hood covering her head as her mind races inside her head. The wind was a bit stronger because of how high she was walking, but it didn't bother her that her (h/l) (h/c) was blowing off to the side. She didn't think that there would be a night where she would race against Adam. Well, the first time she and Langa raced with Adam doesn't entirely count since no one crossed the finish line because the cops showed up.

Her grip on her skateboard tightens a bit as she talks to herself in her head just so that the outside world doesn't hear her.

'I can do this. I'll do this for Mom.'

But brushing that thought off to the side, she looked up towards the top of the rocky hill and could see a dark and tall figure standing underneath a dead-looking tree, almost as if whoever was there was waiting for her. She takes a deep breath before picking up the pace of her walk.

Upon further inspection of the mysterious figure, the girl sees that the person is wearing a black cloak that flows along with the wind. She knew it was Adam. The board he had with him wasn't like the board he previously raced with as it no longer looked like the shape of a coffin.

(Y/n) stops walking as soon as she is standing a few feet away from the skater just so that there is a good distance between the two. She was feeling nervous, but she tried to ignore it as her presence was now noticed by Adam, who spoke in a deep and intimidating voice.

"Welcome, Phoenix," he spoke in English as his head turned in the child's direction. The hood of his cloak falls off his head, which reveals his spiked-up blue hair and his face wearing a mask that is seemingly made of bones from what (Y/n) can see. She can't see his eyes as the gaps in his mask create a shadow that hides the details of his blood-red irises. "I've been waiting for you."

Adam then takes off his cloak and (Y/n)'s eyes widen at the sight of his new outfit. He had on a skin-tight suit that was black and reached up to his neck. It is patterned with blue and white decorative lines while the back of his suit is left open in a heart-shaped hole to expose his back. Stripes of black material are attached to the gap where a spiked bone-like shape runs along his spine, resembling the bone of an actual human spine. He is also wearing looser black gloves with blue guards worn on his hands and white gemstone-like protrusions are fixed onto his knees and elbows.

"Do you like the look?" Adam asks, which snaps (Y/n) out of her thoughts as she looks back up at his bone-like mask, trying to find his eyes within them. "I felt it was the most suitable of outfits for tonight. For our little danse macabre."

(Y/n) inhales deeply at the thought of skating against Adam like this. Something was telling her that his outfit resembled something like a funeral. Gulping her worries away, she stands beside Adam with her gaze shifting towards the track in front of them.

"We're only here to skate, nothing more," she mumbles to herself but loud enough for Adam to hear, sounding a bit more mature for her age. But that is something to expect from her after everything that happened to her lately.

Adam takes out a coin and flips it into the air as they both stand ready in front of the startling line. As the coin is flipping in the air, the Matador of Love continues to speak, saying his thoughts out loud before the race truly starts. "Tonight. We tango where no one can interfere." Both skaters bend forward with their skateboards in hand as they wait for the moment the coin hits the floor. (Y/n) doesn't seem to be focusing on Adam's words as her main focus was on the race. "A world that was created just for us."

And that moment finally came when the silver coin touched the ground, bouncing up from the impact of it making contact with the rocky floor. Now the race had begun and the skaters were off...

As usual, Adam was in the lead with (Y/n) behind him. The girl was not used to this sort of track, so it was a bit difficult for her to travel down the hill and make perfect sharp turns without worrying about possibly falling over the edge. Every rocky pillar that hung above the two skaters gave (Y/n) the chills as there were times when she thought that she might run into one. She could barely focus on the track she was on as she tried to see where Adam was the whole time.

He seemed to be going faster than the other times he skated, which meant that he was serious. (Y/n) heart started to pound in her chest as some of the exhilarating feeling was present, but half of it was beating due to fear.

'Adam is skating blindly. He's pushing himself to go far beyond,' (Y/n) thinks to herself as her suspicions seem to be correct. In the distance, she can hear Adam speak to her.

"Follow me!" he encouragingly tells her. But when he looked back and saw her not going as fast as him, he knew something was up and he needed to change that. "Something tells me you can keep up," he says as he speeds up, increasing the gap between him and the (h/c)-haired child.

(Y/n) takes note of his speed and looks around her to see if she can get ahead of him in some way. To the side up ahead, she notices a large rock that looks to be in the shape of a ramp. She gasps at the realization that she could use that as a way to skip the turn of the track and jump right to the other side of the cliff to get back on track and to also be ahead of Adam. "That could work," she mumbles to herself as she now puts all of her focus on the ramp-like rock. With enough acceleration, she skates to the side of the cliff and launches herself in the air after going over the rock ramp.

She could see many sharp rock pillars in the abyss below her but was glad that she would land safely once on the other side of the cliff. As she was soaring through the air, she looked around to see if she could spot Adam, but he was nowhere in sight, which confused her greatly. "Huh? Where'd he go?" she asks herself.

But before she could think or say anything else, a familiar voice rang in her ears. "Peek-a-boo, birdie~"

Startled, (Y/n) turns around and sees Adam soaring above her on his skateboard with a blank yet scary look on his face. "I jumped right after you. Kindred minds think alike," Adam says as the two of them get closer to the race track. Because Adam was above (Y/n), he landed in front with the girl landing behind him. She was still flabbergasted that he managed to jump to follow her, but she quickly brushed that to the side and focused on the race.

'Come on! I almost had it!' (Y/n) yells to herself in her head as she tries to gain more speed.

"You're gonna have to try a lot harder than that! Tragic," Adam then says as he gets ready into position.

At that exact moment, Adam lifts the nose of his board up and pulls a one-eighty, now skating directly towards (Y/n). Slamming the front wheels of his board down on the rocky track, his speed increases. It looks like he was about to pull a Love Hug!

(Y/n) bent her knees as she got ready for what was going to come next. She'd avoided the Love Hug before, maybe she could do it again. But what happened next surprised her. Adam flips his board up into the air and catches it as he is now running towards the girl with the amount of speed he was given.

Her eyes widen and loses focus for a quick second. 'What?! Is this a combination attack or something?' The girl quickly snaps out of her thoughts when she sees Adam is about to swing his board right at her. On instincts, (Y/n) ducks down by leaning back with her gloved hand scraping against the floor to give her balance and support.

But right as Adam missed the hit, he was now behind her and took that as an advantage. He zooms forward on his skateboard and pulls the same attack again with his board. He chuckles as he brings his board coming straight down towards the young skater. She gasps after seeing what Adam is about to do and reacts fast by slowing down her speed so that she dodges the attack, which leads to him being in front now.

(Y/n) inhales a sharp breath as she hears Adam speak to her from ahead. "Very good! Keep pushing! You can have anything you want if you push your own limits," he says as it looks like a rainbow glow starts to shine through the small gaps in his mask. He was laser-focused on this race, which didn't go unnoticed by (Y/n).

She grunts as she tries to keep up with this insane skater. Her heart rate became faster when the two suddenly entered a tunnel in the abandoned mine, where the child had to avoid the sharp rock pillars that were hanging from above. Some came tumbling down towards her after Adam skated up and over the track to knock them down, which caught her off guard.

'Come on. I have to go faster than this. Faster!'

The nine-year-old leans forward more to create less drag against the wind. Her hood flies off her head, but she doesn't pay too much attention to that a she focuses on going faster.

"That's it," Adam says in encouragement as he notices the increase in the girl's speed. "Right here. Right now!" After saying that, he stomps his foot against his board and it causes the side piece of it to fall off. Now his board was in the shape of a cross.

Something about the surroundings and the way Adam skated in front of (Y/n) made it very hypnotizing. She never lost sight of the male in front of her. He was the only thing she could see as the course around her seemed to have disappeared into darkness. Something about this new feeling made it feel familiar like she'd experienced something like this before.

She couldn't see it herself, but her (e/c) eyes turned into a glowing rainbow color...

"We made it, (Y/n)," Adam's voice echoes into the dark void they both were now in. (Y/n) straightens up her posture a bit when the blue-haired male continues to speak as he turns his whole body around on his skateboard to look at her with his arms extended out. "A world that belongs only to us!"

A red aura engulfs Adam as the same happens to (Y/n), but it is an orange-yellow color that represents flames like those of a phoenix for her.

"Isn't it wonderful? Destiny sent you to me. Forget your boring life. We're meant to live like this," Adam says, which confuses the girl as she becomes less tense.

"'Boring life'?" she questioned out loud now that her mind was open. It felt like any thought she could think of could be heard by Adam himself.

"No more cruel expectations. No one telling you how you should live your life. No one can hurt you here. In this life, the only commitment you'll have is to the thrill of skating. You can forget everything and everyone else who did you wrong. You can finally feel like you belong."

At those words, a few images flashed before (Y/n)'s eyes as if they were replaying the horrible memories she ever experienced in Okinawa. The death of her mother... Reki's hurtful words... betrayal from Cherry... feeling alone.

"Isn't that what you want?"

~~~~~~~~~~

Reki and Langa stare intensely at the projector that is showing the entire race. The only problem that is happening is that the camera is having a hard time trying to keep up with the two skaters. They are going way faster than they have ever gone before.

"A new interval record has been set," the voice of Carla can be heard within the group of skaters.

Miya's eyes widen after hearing that. "You gotta be kidding!" he says in shock as his eyes never leave the race.

"That's crazy!" Shadow then says to himself. "They're on totally different levels!"

"Impossible," Cherry then says to himself. He always knew (Y/n) was special, but he never thought she would skate like this. Especially given that she was always seen as an innocent child. But then a thought came to mind. "Unless they're both in the zone right now."

Upon hearing that, every member of the group, except for Joe, turns toward Cherry with a questionable look. "The zone?" Reki questions.

"It's a state of being that can happen for the best athletes," Cherry starts to explain. "Like when batters can't see anything but the ball heading toward them. They're concentrating so intensely that everything else goes dark."

"Oh wow," Reki and Langa mumble to themselves as they both look back up at the race.

Langa gets worried for (Y/n) knowing that there could be a possibility that she is in fact in the zone. He puts his hands in his pockets to relax his nerves, but then feels something in one of them. Looking down, he slightly pulls out what was in his left pocket and sees that it was the photo that (Y/n) wanted him to show Cherry.

He remembers (Y/n)'s words specifically when she told him her instructions, but he was thinking that now was maybe not a good time to do it. He looks up to see the girl racing her heart out and he is contemplating if he should show it to the AI skater. There was so much pressure put on everyone that he wasn't sure if he could.

'Should I...?'

~~~~~~~~~~

In the dark void of the zone, (Y/n) was standing up straighter on her skateboard as Adam continued to speak to her.

"You don't want anything. You don't need anything," he tells her.

(Y/n) had a neutral look on her face, feeling as if she was being hypnotized by Adam's words and the darkness around her. "'Anything'?" she questions out loud.

"That's right," Adam whispers, all of a sudden sounding like he was saying that directing into her ear. A pair of arms that look similar to Adam's extend out towards the child from behind her, looking as if he was standing that close to her. "Forget all of it. Every last thing in your past. Let it go."

The flashback continues to replay in the girl's mind. She couldn't stop looking at every image of every terrible thing that made her feel like she wasn't important. At that moment, she felt like she had already given in to Adam's control. She couldn't move and hardly had anything to say except repeating some of the words the pro skater had said.

A single tear rolled down her cheek just as Adam's extended hands reached up to her face and covered her eyes, almost as if he was trying to block out her vision from seeing those memories that made her feel sad. It felt comforting to the point where she just let it happen. Like she wanted to stay in the void.

"Forget everything... Let go..."

~~~~~~~~~~

Langa couldn't stand watching his friend go through this. He needed to distract himself for a few moments so he decided to make his move to the favor he made with (Y/n). He takes the photo out of his pocket completely and goes over to Cherry.

"Cherry, I need to show you something," he tells the AI skater in an urgent way, which catches the attention of the others around. However, Cherry never broke his gaze on the race as he was feeling worried for the girl who was currently skating blindly.

"Not now, Langa," he responds in a low tone.

"Cherry, please, just--"

"I said not now--"

"It's about (Y/n)!"

That seemed to have caught the male's attention because now his eyes were directed towards the snowboarder. Knowing that any info that has to do with (Y/n) after everything that's happened to her made him interested in what he had to say. Even everyone else was interested now that they heard the girl's name.

"What about (Y/n)?" he asks with a hint of a worried look on his face.

Without saying anything, Langa holds the photo out towards Cherry, waiting for him to take it. Not knowing what to expect out of this, the pink-haired male takes the photo and looks down at it, having to take a few seconds to process what he is looking at. His golden eyes scan the image of the younger adult version of himself, but then they shift to the image of a familiar young female he knew so well in the past.

"(M/n)?"

Upon hearing that name, Joe looks over Cherry's shoulder to look at the photo and his reaction is the same as the AI skater's. "Wait, (M/n)? Wasn't that taken on the day she left for America?" the green-haired male asks in curiosity. Cherry was still in shock and wondering what this had to do with (Y/n).

Langa was a bit taken aback to figure out that both Joe and Cherry seemed to have known the woman in the photo as he looked at the two pro skaters for a second before questioning them. "So you guys know who that young woman is?" he asks, to which Joe and Cherry nod their heads.

"Yeah. She was our closest friend in high school," Joe answers.

Cherry took his eyes off the photo to look back at the snowboarder, still with a look of confusion on his face. "Where did you get this?" he asks, almost sounding desperate to know the answer.

The sky-blue-haired teen looks back at the photo as he spoke. "(Y/n) had it kept in her backpack." He then points a finger at the (h/c)-haired woman portrayed in the picture. "That's (Y/n)'s mother."

Hearing this shocks everyone in the group, especially Cherry. He didn't have the words to say how surprised he was since he practically got his breath taken from him. The only reaction he could express was his eyes widening from pure shock as his heart skipped a beat. He looks back at the photo before looking up at the projector that is projecting the race, and then back at the photo, and then back up at the race.

He didn't know how this was possible. Unless...

~

The day before (M/n) left for America, he recalls feeling devastated after hearing the news. He didn't want her to leave Okinawa because he knew he would miss her. After skating together so many times and sharing the same interest in art and writing, their bond had grown stronger than ever before throughout the years. Deep down... he loved her, and she felt the same way about him. So, he wanted to spend the whole day with her before she left, not realizing that night...

And to top things off, he became depressed after finding out that (M/n) had died the day she was going to move back to Okinawa. He just had no idea that she would be bringing a little girl with her... His daughter.

~

Cherry was having a lot of mixed feelings at the moment. He was devastated that he never knew about this, to begin with. He blamed himself for not noticing how (Y/n) looked so much like her mother. But most importantly, he was ashamed for almost sending his own daughter away by accident.

He looks back up at the race and watches as (Y/n) is skating on a dangerous track. His perspective changed dramatically now that he sees her as more than just a little girl who loves to skate. His breath hitched as he tried to hold back the tears that were threatening to spill from his eyes.

And at last, he finally found his voice to say one thing...

"That's my child."