It was almost nostalgic, Sylia had to admit.
She hadn't been in a bar with a scruffy man talking about secrets that
could kill them both in so long.
For her part, she was wearing
the lengthy silver hair and more overly sexualized attire of "Sari
Gintyl", the alias she'd originally created upon arriving in Paragon to
evade Crey detection. Since then, it had become a useful tool when she
wanted to have a face to face meeting with one of her Sabres who had yet
to earn the level of trust needed for Sylia to reveal herself.
Similarly, it made potential damage like what had nearly revealed Nene
back in Megatokyo less likely. And, of course, meetings like this were
much easier to arrange. Thus, Sylia had selected a rather slinky black
number that didn't reveal that much of her bust but had a plunging back
that was just revealed beneath the short dress jacket she'd added on top
of it. The slit up to mid thigh revealed legs that went all the way up,
while her back length silver hair had a decorative blue ribbon tying up
a bit of it in the rear. Assorted jewelry complemented the look to the
point Sylia was certain she could pass for a high class escort if anyone
were to pay attention to her.
Across the table from her, her
discussion partner was less stand-out, wearing mostly standard formal
tuxedo fare. His hair wasn't perfectly arranged, and longer than
average, tied back in a short pony tail. Combined with a face that,
while clean-shaven, suggested the wearer was more used to a five-o-clock
shadow, it added a sort of rakish charm to him that Sylia could
appreciate, even if it didn't do anything for her for a variety of
reasons. She imagined Linna would find him dreamy and resolved never to
let them meet. The studious imperfection of his appearance screamed
"smooth operator" to her, right down to the casual flirtation they'd
exchanged before getting down to business. If she closed her eyes, she
could almost believe she was working across the table from Fargo again.
"So
your employer is interested in providing us with a job? I do hope you
realize the Sabres don't do promotions or endorsements, for obvious
reasons," she smiled.
"Indeed," he chuckled. "Besides, I doubt
we'd want our label slapped all over your armor any more than you would.
Rather, we have a bit of a Crey problem and are hoping you can help us
with it," he smiled easily. "Especially since the recent unfortunate
collision between you and their follow-up imitators."
"You're
remarkably well-informed, Mr. Kaji," Sylia said honestly. Most of that
particular crisis had been hushed up when implications of Crey interests
manipulating the situation had come to light. Thus, any real
investigation had not made it into public light. As this was to the
preference of parties on all sides, really, Sylia hadn't pressed the
issue.
"My employers keep an ear out for certain things. Your
actions could be seen as sort of an....audition in advance." He raised
his hands in a warding gesture at her glance at that. "We didn't have a
hand in that particular mess, but we were watching to see how it went.
You notably came out smelling like roses despite the ambiguity of your
intentions."
"An interesting turn of phrase," Sylia said
pointedly, eyes narrowing. Normally, the reaction was more than she'd
actually go for, but with this disguise, it was better to react more
normally.
"An accurate one. Your group has behaved suspiciously
even by most hero standards. The investigation wasn't the first one
suggested. Merely the first one to get approval due to the pressure from
above. You're not so naive as to assume everyone takes you at face
value?" Kaji asked, a hint of a smirk on his face.
Sylia raised
an eyebrow. For someone selling cooperation, he'd not so much as
flinched from that opinion when she seemed to get irritated. A test?
"No, I suppose not. So what kind of cooperation are you planning?"
Kaji
leaned back, glancing about as he tossed a handful of change into the
ashtray between them, Sylia catching the one coin not quite minted by
the US government in the pile. "Simply put, we're aware of a recent
upswing in Crey activity. They're tightly compartmentalized, with
individual operations so far apart they can get into turf wars over
resources before they realize they're on the same side. However,
recently, something big happened. One project group's base went down in
flames, figuratively speaking. The people that followed behind have some
serious pull with the Board, though, because that thing's pulling in
twice the resources it did before. Beyond that, we don't know anything."
"And
you need some deniable assets to investigate it," Sylia said, before
raising an eyebrow as the man shook his head.
"We need you to
pressure Crey on other sides, but leave that one alone. The more
pressured they feel, the tighter security gets, and nothing will make
them feel safer than to see the Sabres, who they know hate them,
focusing on other branches. It makes them overconfident, so we can start
getting some solid intel."
Sylia glanced at him, tossing a bit
of her hair over one shoulder before her gaze went from "casual" to
"piercing". Kaji simply took it in stride as she steepled her hands.
"Your desire to see us not interfere that much.....is rather suspicious.
Hoping to get out with a few secrets you'd rather we not know about?"
she asked.
"More like this is a messy situation we don't want any
more elements added to," Kaji admitted. "You're not the only one that
might make a move. This is some deep stuff you've gotten your crew
involved in, and my backers aren't the only ones looking into it.
Really, if we come across something that needs to get to you, we'll let
you know."
"A rather uneven cooperation," Sylia noted, before
nodding. "But it requires nothing from us we wouldn't already do. You
have a deal for now, Mr. Kaji."
He smiled back at her.
"Excellent. I'm sure my employers will be happy to have your
cooperation. Incidentally, have you tried the scampi here? It's really
quite good..."
***
"Status."
The one report that
Engineer Carlson didn't want to deliver was requested by the deep tones
of his new supervisor. For two seconds, he considered his chances of
running for the door now, but a quick glance over his shoulder put that
to rest. He'd be dead before he reached the door, and maybe they
wouldn't take out the bad news on him.
"Response from the ground
penetrating radar is steady, but beyond a certain point, we can't detect
anything but the tunnels, and those are a total maze. Inspections on
foot have met with considerable casualties, but we don't know to what.
People just...drop off the grid," he said, waiting for the explosion.
"Interesting.
Our little sleeper is defending herself even if she's not awake yet, is
she?" the Director observed, steepling his fingers before him on the
observation railing. He was an unnaturally tall man in an atypical black
Crey science uniform that hung off his broad shouldered form like
something more appropriate to a funeral than a lab. Somewhat unkempt
brown hair framed an intelligent face with unnervingly piercing gray
eyes that were presently locked on the screen depicting the lower depths
of what had once been one of Crey's most elaborate biotech labs.
"Karen, what do you think of the likely areas for the central core to be
located?"
"I would say there," the white haired woman standing
behind him noted, highlighting a segment of the screen from her pad.
"The disappearances have been the worst around that location, in a
radial pattern."
The Director nodded at her, before looking up as
a siren blared.
"We have an intruder in the first line of sentry
markers, sir!" Carlson said, a glowing red dot darting quickly across
the screen, headed right for Karen's projected location.
"Interesting.
Heading right for the danger zone. What does she know that we don't?"
he wondered, watching the dot move. "She never triggered the outer
perimeter of security."
"She, sir?" Karen asked politely, raising
an eyebrow.
"Yes. Our security teams seem to need to scrape off
another kill silhouette. The only way one could evade the outer shell of
security is if they'd been there since before it was placed. Which
leaves either our personnel, all of whom have been accounted for after
the collapse, or one of the experiments. And if she's been down there
the entire time and hasn't checked in, that means she was one of the
ones that escaped from the facility," he explained. "Given the likely
origin of the core, it's entirely possible she's trying to save it."
***
Rider
leaped from rock to uneven ledge to side wall and further forward. If
she'd been human, she'd have lost track by now of how long she'd been
hiding in the wreckage of the complex, waiting for her chance. Watching
for a point to punch through their security. And she'd been watching for
news of the situation below the surface. She'd known it should have
been hopeless, but something in her had been unable to give up on the
possibility that Violet had survived the collapse. A darker part of her
mind noted that if the younger girl hadn't, Rider might possibly prefer
being caught and killed by Crey down here.
Still, she was almost
there. At full repair, her suit would've been able to simply elevate
above the wreckage and fly the rest of the way there. As it was, her
self-repair systems were overtaxed as it was, so she was simply using
short bursts of flight-assist to propel herself forward, saving her
power cells for potential fights ahead.
Around her, she felt
more than saw the shifting tendrils of nanotech. Unlike they had been
before, these had the color of dried blood shot through the deep black
of the greater mass. She'd learned to avoid them, after losing a few
inches of armor to one....and seeing an entire Crey patrol devoured by a
swarm of them a few days later. The things had pulled them apart...but
left nothing behind. Rider theorized that it was just the distance
involved. Violet was likely so spread out amongst these tendrils she
simply didn't recognize it was her, or possibly wasn't even in control
of them at the moment. Either way, Rider had to get to her....the real
her...and the closer she got, the more the certainty that Violet was
alive solidified.
As Rider passed the third set of beacons, not
caring what Crey she lured in behind her, she began to dodge and weave,
avoiding the lumbering but clumsy tendrils that could have smashed the
agile woman flat with a mere flex of their weight if they'd connected.
Ahead, always ahead, was the beacon, the certainty. The feeling that she
couldn't describe even to herself. She could feel her....feel
Violet...and she was going to get her back.
***
Pain...it
hurt so bad that she'd almost forgotten what feeling good felt like.
All she'd known was the pain and the danger.
The crawling things
about are dangerous. She'd reached out, stopped them, and the pain had
gone away a little bit. She doesn't know why. But she kept doing it.
Little by little, it made a difference. Little by little, the hurt had
gone away. Now one of them is getting close. Getting too close to her.
She doesn't want that. It will hurt her. Hurt her when she's almost
ready. The one coming for her was more dangerous than any of the others.
It was strong and fast and getting closer every second. She couldn't
crush it. The pieces of her closest to it were strong but sluggish.
Nothing had gotten this close, so they hadn't been adjusted to the
smaller, more nimble versions that caught things near the outside.
The
intruder reaches her with ease, but stops just short of her center. She
lashes out. She's so close, so close to being whole again... But the
intruder flits away out of her reach, before coming back. What is it
doing? What does it want with her?
It's only then that she
notices the noises. The intruder is making them. Words. Speech. They
seem familiar but she's been here so long that her memory is hazy. But
one word resonates with her. The intruder repeats it over and over. It
has a meaning she's nearly forgotten.
She hesitates. The intruder
steps forward, repeating the word. She panics and a new group of
tendrils explode outward, faster than before. They wrap around its arms
and legs, and she feels the hints of safety again. She'll absorb this
one like all the others and then she'll be safe. She pulls it closer,
and it says the word again, one last time, like a prayer, and for once
she can make it out distinctly.
Violet.
That...voice.
That name. She knows it and the tendrils slow to a stop.
She
hears it and they loosen their grip.
She comprehends it and the
memories smash through the pain like a bursting dam...
***
A
tall, scary looking woman with strange, inhuman eyes.
Ruby says
her codename is Bellerophon. Sovereign isn't scared, but she knows
Violet is. The tall one seems almost surprised when Sovereign steps
between them. She kneels down and speaks to Violet. Gently, quietly.
Almost timid. It's Violet's first real impression of her. A gentle soul
in a body of steel.
***
The guard comes again,
looking for Violet. He's come many times, smiling, leering. He gets
closer than she likes. Knows she's not sure enough to call security on
him. Even if she's uncomfortable. This time, he tries to touch her. And
finds his wrist wrapped in supple yet firm steel, like a clamp. He finds
himself staring into eyes that trigger an atavistic fight or flight
reaction. Flight wins, as he decides not to risk the chance that her
value to the company exceeds one maimed guard. He leaves, his voice
insulting as if to save face. She doesn't hear him. She's too busy
looking at the strong back of her protector.
***
Violet
finds it hard to sleep alone. Before, she'd always curled up with Ruby,
but lately her sister has been giving off signals that Violet should
try to find a bed to herself. Violet thinks it may have something to do
with how she's been looking at Seiba. Breaker's too touchy to try, and
both Duo and Archer aren't around due to training schedules. Violet pads
across the barracks and decides to risk snuggling up next to Rider,
against her back. The tall woman stirs and looks over at her. She starts
to back away, apologizing, before strong, long arms draw her back,
enveloping her in their warmth. In safety. She falls asleep easily to
the lullaby of even breathing and Rider's steady heartbeat...
***
Rider
could feel the nanites begin to devour her suit, but she continued to
call out to the bulging form in the middle. She said her name again and
again, hoping...believing she wasn't gone. The gurgling mass would be
the site of her goal, or it would be her grave.
The core rippled
as it drew her in, almost ready to absorb her completely. She was there.
Rider knew she had to be there. "Violet....please..." Her last words,
possibly, but she didn't regret them....before the pull stops. As the
grip loosened, Rider was surprised enough that she landed on her well
shaped rear rather than her feet. As she watched, the bulbous pitch
black core swelled on one side, a massive bubble that suddenly burst.
Only Rider's preternatural reflexes allowed her to catch the flying
form, pale skin and dark purple hair visible through the bits of grime
sticking all over her. The gunk still clinging to Violet wriggled like a
living thing, but Rider was too busy hugging the younger girl to
notice. She doesn't say anything but her name, over and over again,
because that's all she can say right now.
Dislodged rubble,
however, triggered instincts in both of them, Rider scanning the horizon
as Violet looked around their immediate area. "We can't stay here,"
Rider said, getting a nod from Violet. The younger girl reached down,
touching the slime that's all around them as it bubbled and flowed
around her smeared skin, forming a patchwork of armor that eventually
sealed into a dark colored helm around her face. She tried not to waver
as it finished, but Rider could see that it'd taken quite a bit out of
her just to do that much.
"Ready," she said, as Rider nodded,
scooping her up in her arms and dashing for the exit she'd scouted out
weeks ago. The opening shots were easily dodged, and the entirety of the
trip was much easier for Rider now given the tendrils lying lifeless
and inert all across the hellish landscape that had been so dangerous to
traverse on the way in. Rider suspected that Crey hadn't expected that
particular result, as the security forces pursuing them were still using
the safe pathways their men had burned through the nanotech tangles
earlier rather than cutting across the dead lumps. A small blessing,
Rider considered to herself. For now, she simply focused on getting the
exhausted girl in her arms out and away from this place.
***
"Sir?"
He
didn't answer immediately, waiting, watching the screen as the two dots
slowly evaded the handful of icons indicating Crey security teams. Once
they vanished, he turned around to Karen, the woman wearing her typical
blank expression. Almost. His experience with her since she'd been
assigned as his aide showed him a number of minor cues that indicated
her confusion. "Yes, Karen?"
"Why did you allow them to escape?"
she asked, as several people around the control room froze at the
accusation, however mildly voiced. "The nanocolonies going inert once
the core was removed was a high probability result. Cutting our security
teams across the dead areas would have allowed them to intercept both
the escapees easily, and weighed down by her passenger and damaged
already to boot, Unit Bellerophon would've been a simple target to
recapture."
The director nodded casually as he listened to her
points, before crossing his arms behind his back. "You are correct that I
prevented our troops from recapturing them. However, our previous
results have proven almost decisively that reconditioning them is
pointless. It never takes. However, with the core removed, we have a
sizable sample of an entirely different renewable resource." He smiled,
before turning to the monitor technician. "Carlson, bring up the sonar
array display."
The operator tapped a few keys, before blinking
at the same time as Karen as a massive sprawl, coating nearly the entire
collapsed pit of the former complex for nearly half a mile down was
revealed in the false color display. The director's smile didn't fade.
"With the core gone, the greater mass's sensor baffles are inoperative
as well as their self defense programs."
Karen nodded as she
looked over the extent of the nanotech infestation of the wreckage.
There were easily several metric tons of the material running throughout
the area. With proper equipment, they could collect enough of this
particularly virulent and hardy strain produced by Unit J1BLI1 and
reproduce it almost indefinitely. Perpetually, if they could reactivate
it and resume feeding it.
"One must always keep an eye on the big
picture." The director smiled. It was not a pleasant expression.
***
Something
was strange. Touko wasn't sure what, but the careful arrangement of her
house was ever so slightly changed since she'd left to go antique
shopping.
It wasn't the living room. Though cluttered with the
various junk she inevitably acquired anywhere she moved, the room was as
she had left it: crowded and disorderly bookshelves, purchases from
curio shops scattered on open surfaces, cardboard boxes free standing
here and there, and a wall of old televisions, each tuned to a different
station and all set on mute for the moment. The kitchen, mostly used as
a dumping ground for the legion of take out boxes, TV dinners, and
whatever else she and Shiki use to fend off starvation given their
shared lack of any real skill in the culinary arts, was only changed by
the addition of the rice cooker that their houseguest had acquired for
the purposes of cooking the truly stupendous amounts of food she
consumed on a weekly basis. Shiki's room was as bare and ascetic as
usual, as was the apartment upstairs. Her workshop, tightly sealed and
warded, had been untouched since she was there last, the various dolls
and mannequins hanging from their positions on the wall opposite her
worktable. Her trunk was undisturbed, and unfortunately or not, no one
but she had been in her own bedroom for some time. There were times she
almost cursed that boy's luck.
By processs of elimination, she
found herself in the dojo, where she saw something she hadn't in months.
Shiki and the girl were both wearing traditional kendo garb and facing
each other on the mat. As Touko watched, her cigarette smoldering away
forgotten in one hand, the two clashed, faster than most masters of the
art would have thought possible.
Their styles were remarkably
similar in some respects. Both the girl and Shiki were not berserkers,
remaining calm at all times. But the differences were apparent when one
saw how they handled the training swords. The girl tended to block with
the entire sword, absorbing the impact and returning the blow with
crushing force, a style more suited to a European blade than the katana
the wooden bokken was intended to replicate. By contrast, Shiki's moves
were more fluid, dodging away from blows and counter attacking with
swiftness that would shame the wind. She circled, waiting for her
moment, then pouncing at the slightest opening. Unfortunately, her
opponent was more cornered lion than prey, and such attacks were often
brushed off and responded to just as quickly.
The match continued
along the established stalemate for some time until both lowered their
weapons at an unspoken signal. The girl smiled faintly, which was
returned by Shiki before the pair turned and noticed Touko for the first
time. "Oi, Touko," Shiki said by way of greeting as she mopped at her
forehead with a towel and tossed another to the other girl.
"Shiki,"
Touko nodded. "I thought you'd decided sparring wasn't worthwhile?"
Shiki's
smile was faint, but the amusement was real. "To determine our skills,
yeah."
"And this was?" the red haired woman asked, curious.
"Just
for fun," Shiki returned with another tiny smile, even as the girl
walked over, having filled three glasses from a kettle of water that had
been sitting by the side of the mat. Touko counted herself a better
than decent observer of people, and to say the girl had improved was
stating the glaringly obvious. When she'd first arrived on Touko's
doorstep, she'd been run ragged, her bearing that of someone hunted and
her nights haunted by dreams she confided the contents of to no one.
Even when awake, she'd been stiff and excessively formal. Touko'd made
some progress in getting the girl to lighten up (and vice versa,
considering Touko's initial negative opinion of the girl's impromptu
residence with them), but she'd been unable to help the girl shake that
haunted expression. Now, while there was still a hint of buried pain in
those intense blue eyes, she was more cheerful than Touko'd seen her
since their first meeting.
The girl nodded as she handed Touko a
glass, sipping with an understated elegance that belied how quickly the
water was disappearing into the obviously somewhat dehydrated fighter.
Finally, Touko spoke up, curious enough about the significant change to
toss her usual subtlety to the wind. "So, sparring seems to agree with
you."
The girl nodded. "It was Shiki's idea. I've never actually
tried using sparring as a way simply to enjoy myself. It was pleasant."
Touko
nodded, frowning slightly. Getting details out of this girl was about
as difficult as Shiki when she went into monosyllable and grunt mode.
She was about to excuse herself from the somewhat-awkward silence when
the girl looked up from her empty glass. "Touko, I believe I owe you an
apology. You've been nothing but accommodating to me, but I've hidden
much from you. Even my name. But while I can't reveal everything due to
prior obligations, I believe I do owe as thorough an explanation as I am
able to give."
The resulting tale took up the better part of an
hour, during which Touko's suspicions about the reasons behind Seiba's
(for that was their mysterious guest's name) haunted eyes proved to be
far, far too optimistic.
Touko hadn't been on particularly good
terms with her family and especially her younger sister, for some years.
But a small part of her still remembered younger, happier days when she
and her sister had been inseparable, and woe betide anyone who had
tried to do mischief to either. Before the family business came between
them. And before the Designation had put her on the run, unable to see
the rest of her family as well. Thus, it was with some slight jealousy
that Touko listened to Seiba describe her family's situation and their
reasons for planning their escape...and with sympathetic pain as she
described what that escape had cost her.
"She said there was a
chance that some of them might still be alive," Seiba said, frowning.
"But I don't have any clues to work with, and the trail seems to have
gone cold. I'm almost beginning to think that maybe those rumors were
really just more probable because I wanted desperately to believe that
they were still alive..."
At this summation of their guest's
situation, Touko and Shiki shared a significant glance, before Shiki
looked away first with an expression of exasperated bemusement. "He'd
come anyway, as soon as I mentioned this to him," she sighed.
Touko
nodded with a chuckle, lighting up again as she looked over at Seiba,
who was gazing at both of them in incomprehension. "Miss Seiba, I think
we know someone who can help you," she said, sliding her glasses off.
"You see, he has a talent of sorts for finding things..."
***
It
wasn't a particularly good looking bar, but neither was it
exceptionally run down. The plain wood tables weren't polished to a
gleaming shine, but there was something to their rough texture that
added character. And the bartender had had long experience with sliding
drinks along his bar, rough surfaces or not, and never spilled a drop as
he kept up with the two regular patrons that were currently the only
inhabitants of the quiet little pub. He'd mistaken them for a couple the
first time they'd come in, given the easy flirtation they indulged in.
The kind that didn't break any new ground but showed the pair knew each
other fairly intimately. He didn't listen to what they talked about, but
the friendly laughter and easy rhythm of old stories and new jokes was
familiar enough to him. It wasn't until the first time they'd drank that
now familiar toast that he'd realized the two would've been three if
they'd had any say in the matter, and that the missing third was as much
the reason they came here as anything.
"To absent friends," the
man said first, as he always did, raising the particular brand of beer
that had become as much of the ritual as anything, downing the thing in
one gulp.
"To absent friends," the woman returned, copying the
gesture before both slammed the cans down on the table, crushing them in
a single movement.
"You know, my coworkers consider me a morbid
son of a bitch for doing this every year," he said with a faint chuckle.
"At least, most of them do. Lance thinks it's some convoluted plan to
woo you, but then, Lance would think any particular method of wooing the
woman you're interested in is fair game. Even if he's hardly as
unleashed and free as he tries to act."
"Mmm. My coworkers that
know about it think I'm obsessed with working out what went wrong. They
try to tell me it won't bring her back," she replied, slightly
melancholy. "Most of them have stopped saying it out loud these days."
"They're
right," he pointed out. "Though I suppose if it's something you'd be
doing anyway, there's no real help for it. You've never been much for
moderation."
She leaned forward onto the bar, her fingers
twitching in a remembered muscle memory even if she hadn't smoked a
cigarette since the funeral. Some days she wished that she'd done it
sooner, as it'd saved her a lot of money in the long run, and who knew
how her risk of cancer'd gone down. Of course, the irony that she'd only
taken the other woman's advice after she was gone wasn't lost on her.
"My mother thinks that all it really shows is that my work ethic is
skewed. She's been on me for the last couple years to find a nice girl
and settle down like she did with my step-mother. If she only knew," she
chuckled, a touch darkly.
He heard the recrimination in her
voice but didn't say anything, raising two fingers and receiving a nod
from the bartender in return. "Hell, I didn't believe you when you
mentioned it for the first time. I'd known you were close...but then
again, drunken benders have a higher possibility of such things, I
guess, especially in college," he said with a lopsided grin, getting a
laugh from his companion.
"Would you believe the first time was
due to sleep deprivation more than alcohol?" she chuckled. "I was just
so exhausted after that particular cram session that I didn't bother
going back to my bedroom. Apparently, though, I wasn't so exhausted as
to not enjoy the moment...then again, she might've been drunk. I did
lose sight of her for a bit," she snickered.
"Mmm. Still, any
prospects?" he asked gently, gauging her reaction as she looked
thoughtful.
"Well, there is this cute little something down in
TechDiv 3, but I'm not sure it'd be fair to her. I mean, leaving aside
possible job hazards with my research, I'm still not sure I'm over her
enough to go looking for someone new. I'd hate to break the girl's heart
by letting her know a month down the line that she'd been a rebound
from a dead might've-been-serious," she sighed.
He nodded, before
both of them blinked at ringing phones in their respective pockets.
"Looks like work caught up to us," he smiled, getting a rolling of eyes
from her as she stood up and put down money for both their tabs. They
walked together to the door before turning opposite directions.
"See
you next year?" he asked.
"Same place, same time," she returned,
before both turned on their phones to answer the calls.
***
"This
is Kaji," Special Inspector Ryojii Kaji said as he opened the phone.
"The
boss would like a personal debriefing with you about your interview
with the contact," a soft, curt voice said.
"Right, I'll be right
there. Just wrapping up anyway."
"....I apologize for the
interruption," his teammate said, her voice filled with a sincere
regret.
"It's okay, Maiya. We're both professionals. We know how
work never really ends," Kaji said, disconnecting and sliding the phone
back into his pocket. Time to inform the big man of his prior
engagement's intentions.
***
"Dr. Akagi speaking," Ritsuko
answered.
"Ritsuko, I need you to come in a little earlier than
expected. We've had a few new arrivals that will need a quick looking
over," the elegant voice of her employer spoke up.
"Compatibility
tests?" she asked, curious.
"No, in this case, they brought
their own equipment. However, one is rather exhausted and the other not
much better. I'd like to make sure they aren't going to die outright
before introducing them to our other two prodigals."
"Part of the
same batch?"
"They do seem to match the descriptions," Reika
confirmed.
"I'll be right in, Miss Chang," she said, slipping
into "work mode" as she did.
"Thank you, Ritsuko. I knew I could
count on you," her employer smiled over the line, before hanging up.
Ritsuko
closed her phone, pondering the implications of that message. For a
group considered officially dead, this newest batch had proven
remarkably good at not dying. It seemed that Miss Chang's insistence
that Ritsuko learn the tools of her sister's trade in addition to her
own specialization in armor development and interfacing was proving
useful after all.
---
"Oh, silver blade, forged in the depths of the beyond. Heed my summons and purge those who stand in my way. Lay
waste."
She hadn't been in a bar with a scruffy man talking about secrets that
could kill them both in so long.
For her part, she was wearing
the lengthy silver hair and more overly sexualized attire of "Sari
Gintyl", the alias she'd originally created upon arriving in Paragon to
evade Crey detection. Since then, it had become a useful tool when she
wanted to have a face to face meeting with one of her Sabres who had yet
to earn the level of trust needed for Sylia to reveal herself.
Similarly, it made potential damage like what had nearly revealed Nene
back in Megatokyo less likely. And, of course, meetings like this were
much easier to arrange. Thus, Sylia had selected a rather slinky black
number that didn't reveal that much of her bust but had a plunging back
that was just revealed beneath the short dress jacket she'd added on top
of it. The slit up to mid thigh revealed legs that went all the way up,
while her back length silver hair had a decorative blue ribbon tying up
a bit of it in the rear. Assorted jewelry complemented the look to the
point Sylia was certain she could pass for a high class escort if anyone
were to pay attention to her.
Across the table from her, her
discussion partner was less stand-out, wearing mostly standard formal
tuxedo fare. His hair wasn't perfectly arranged, and longer than
average, tied back in a short pony tail. Combined with a face that,
while clean-shaven, suggested the wearer was more used to a five-o-clock
shadow, it added a sort of rakish charm to him that Sylia could
appreciate, even if it didn't do anything for her for a variety of
reasons. She imagined Linna would find him dreamy and resolved never to
let them meet. The studious imperfection of his appearance screamed
"smooth operator" to her, right down to the casual flirtation they'd
exchanged before getting down to business. If she closed her eyes, she
could almost believe she was working across the table from Fargo again.
"So
your employer is interested in providing us with a job? I do hope you
realize the Sabres don't do promotions or endorsements, for obvious
reasons," she smiled.
"Indeed," he chuckled. "Besides, I doubt
we'd want our label slapped all over your armor any more than you would.
Rather, we have a bit of a Crey problem and are hoping you can help us
with it," he smiled easily. "Especially since the recent unfortunate
collision between you and their follow-up imitators."
"You're
remarkably well-informed, Mr. Kaji," Sylia said honestly. Most of that
particular crisis had been hushed up when implications of Crey interests
manipulating the situation had come to light. Thus, any real
investigation had not made it into public light. As this was to the
preference of parties on all sides, really, Sylia hadn't pressed the
issue.
"My employers keep an ear out for certain things. Your
actions could be seen as sort of an....audition in advance." He raised
his hands in a warding gesture at her glance at that. "We didn't have a
hand in that particular mess, but we were watching to see how it went.
You notably came out smelling like roses despite the ambiguity of your
intentions."
"An interesting turn of phrase," Sylia said
pointedly, eyes narrowing. Normally, the reaction was more than she'd
actually go for, but with this disguise, it was better to react more
normally.
"An accurate one. Your group has behaved suspiciously
even by most hero standards. The investigation wasn't the first one
suggested. Merely the first one to get approval due to the pressure from
above. You're not so naive as to assume everyone takes you at face
value?" Kaji asked, a hint of a smirk on his face.
Sylia raised
an eyebrow. For someone selling cooperation, he'd not so much as
flinched from that opinion when she seemed to get irritated. A test?
"No, I suppose not. So what kind of cooperation are you planning?"
Kaji
leaned back, glancing about as he tossed a handful of change into the
ashtray between them, Sylia catching the one coin not quite minted by
the US government in the pile. "Simply put, we're aware of a recent
upswing in Crey activity. They're tightly compartmentalized, with
individual operations so far apart they can get into turf wars over
resources before they realize they're on the same side. However,
recently, something big happened. One project group's base went down in
flames, figuratively speaking. The people that followed behind have some
serious pull with the Board, though, because that thing's pulling in
twice the resources it did before. Beyond that, we don't know anything."
"And
you need some deniable assets to investigate it," Sylia said, before
raising an eyebrow as the man shook his head.
"We need you to
pressure Crey on other sides, but leave that one alone. The more
pressured they feel, the tighter security gets, and nothing will make
them feel safer than to see the Sabres, who they know hate them,
focusing on other branches. It makes them overconfident, so we can start
getting some solid intel."
Sylia glanced at him, tossing a bit
of her hair over one shoulder before her gaze went from "casual" to
"piercing". Kaji simply took it in stride as she steepled her hands.
"Your desire to see us not interfere that much.....is rather suspicious.
Hoping to get out with a few secrets you'd rather we not know about?"
she asked.
"More like this is a messy situation we don't want any
more elements added to," Kaji admitted. "You're not the only one that
might make a move. This is some deep stuff you've gotten your crew
involved in, and my backers aren't the only ones looking into it.
Really, if we come across something that needs to get to you, we'll let
you know."
"A rather uneven cooperation," Sylia noted, before
nodding. "But it requires nothing from us we wouldn't already do. You
have a deal for now, Mr. Kaji."
He smiled back at her.
"Excellent. I'm sure my employers will be happy to have your
cooperation. Incidentally, have you tried the scampi here? It's really
quite good..."
***
"Status."
The one report that
Engineer Carlson didn't want to deliver was requested by the deep tones
of his new supervisor. For two seconds, he considered his chances of
running for the door now, but a quick glance over his shoulder put that
to rest. He'd be dead before he reached the door, and maybe they
wouldn't take out the bad news on him.
"Response from the ground
penetrating radar is steady, but beyond a certain point, we can't detect
anything but the tunnels, and those are a total maze. Inspections on
foot have met with considerable casualties, but we don't know to what.
People just...drop off the grid," he said, waiting for the explosion.
"Interesting.
Our little sleeper is defending herself even if she's not awake yet, is
she?" the Director observed, steepling his fingers before him on the
observation railing. He was an unnaturally tall man in an atypical black
Crey science uniform that hung off his broad shouldered form like
something more appropriate to a funeral than a lab. Somewhat unkempt
brown hair framed an intelligent face with unnervingly piercing gray
eyes that were presently locked on the screen depicting the lower depths
of what had once been one of Crey's most elaborate biotech labs.
"Karen, what do you think of the likely areas for the central core to be
located?"
"I would say there," the white haired woman standing
behind him noted, highlighting a segment of the screen from her pad.
"The disappearances have been the worst around that location, in a
radial pattern."
The Director nodded at her, before looking up as
a siren blared.
"We have an intruder in the first line of sentry
markers, sir!" Carlson said, a glowing red dot darting quickly across
the screen, headed right for Karen's projected location.
"Interesting.
Heading right for the danger zone. What does she know that we don't?"
he wondered, watching the dot move. "She never triggered the outer
perimeter of security."
"She, sir?" Karen asked politely, raising
an eyebrow.
"Yes. Our security teams seem to need to scrape off
another kill silhouette. The only way one could evade the outer shell of
security is if they'd been there since before it was placed. Which
leaves either our personnel, all of whom have been accounted for after
the collapse, or one of the experiments. And if she's been down there
the entire time and hasn't checked in, that means she was one of the
ones that escaped from the facility," he explained. "Given the likely
origin of the core, it's entirely possible she's trying to save it."
***
Rider
leaped from rock to uneven ledge to side wall and further forward. If
she'd been human, she'd have lost track by now of how long she'd been
hiding in the wreckage of the complex, waiting for her chance. Watching
for a point to punch through their security. And she'd been watching for
news of the situation below the surface. She'd known it should have
been hopeless, but something in her had been unable to give up on the
possibility that Violet had survived the collapse. A darker part of her
mind noted that if the younger girl hadn't, Rider might possibly prefer
being caught and killed by Crey down here.
Still, she was almost
there. At full repair, her suit would've been able to simply elevate
above the wreckage and fly the rest of the way there. As it was, her
self-repair systems were overtaxed as it was, so she was simply using
short bursts of flight-assist to propel herself forward, saving her
power cells for potential fights ahead.
Around her, she felt
more than saw the shifting tendrils of nanotech. Unlike they had been
before, these had the color of dried blood shot through the deep black
of the greater mass. She'd learned to avoid them, after losing a few
inches of armor to one....and seeing an entire Crey patrol devoured by a
swarm of them a few days later. The things had pulled them apart...but
left nothing behind. Rider theorized that it was just the distance
involved. Violet was likely so spread out amongst these tendrils she
simply didn't recognize it was her, or possibly wasn't even in control
of them at the moment. Either way, Rider had to get to her....the real
her...and the closer she got, the more the certainty that Violet was
alive solidified.
As Rider passed the third set of beacons, not
caring what Crey she lured in behind her, she began to dodge and weave,
avoiding the lumbering but clumsy tendrils that could have smashed the
agile woman flat with a mere flex of their weight if they'd connected.
Ahead, always ahead, was the beacon, the certainty. The feeling that she
couldn't describe even to herself. She could feel her....feel
Violet...and she was going to get her back.
***
Pain...it
hurt so bad that she'd almost forgotten what feeling good felt like.
All she'd known was the pain and the danger.
The crawling things
about are dangerous. She'd reached out, stopped them, and the pain had
gone away a little bit. She doesn't know why. But she kept doing it.
Little by little, it made a difference. Little by little, the hurt had
gone away. Now one of them is getting close. Getting too close to her.
She doesn't want that. It will hurt her. Hurt her when she's almost
ready. The one coming for her was more dangerous than any of the others.
It was strong and fast and getting closer every second. She couldn't
crush it. The pieces of her closest to it were strong but sluggish.
Nothing had gotten this close, so they hadn't been adjusted to the
smaller, more nimble versions that caught things near the outside.
The
intruder reaches her with ease, but stops just short of her center. She
lashes out. She's so close, so close to being whole again... But the
intruder flits away out of her reach, before coming back. What is it
doing? What does it want with her?
It's only then that she
notices the noises. The intruder is making them. Words. Speech. They
seem familiar but she's been here so long that her memory is hazy. But
one word resonates with her. The intruder repeats it over and over. It
has a meaning she's nearly forgotten.
She hesitates. The intruder
steps forward, repeating the word. She panics and a new group of
tendrils explode outward, faster than before. They wrap around its arms
and legs, and she feels the hints of safety again. She'll absorb this
one like all the others and then she'll be safe. She pulls it closer,
and it says the word again, one last time, like a prayer, and for once
she can make it out distinctly.
Violet.
That...voice.
That name. She knows it and the tendrils slow to a stop.
She
hears it and they loosen their grip.
She comprehends it and the
memories smash through the pain like a bursting dam...
***
A
tall, scary looking woman with strange, inhuman eyes.
Ruby says
her codename is Bellerophon. Sovereign isn't scared, but she knows
Violet is. The tall one seems almost surprised when Sovereign steps
between them. She kneels down and speaks to Violet. Gently, quietly.
Almost timid. It's Violet's first real impression of her. A gentle soul
in a body of steel.
***
The guard comes again,
looking for Violet. He's come many times, smiling, leering. He gets
closer than she likes. Knows she's not sure enough to call security on
him. Even if she's uncomfortable. This time, he tries to touch her. And
finds his wrist wrapped in supple yet firm steel, like a clamp. He finds
himself staring into eyes that trigger an atavistic fight or flight
reaction. Flight wins, as he decides not to risk the chance that her
value to the company exceeds one maimed guard. He leaves, his voice
insulting as if to save face. She doesn't hear him. She's too busy
looking at the strong back of her protector.
***
Violet
finds it hard to sleep alone. Before, she'd always curled up with Ruby,
but lately her sister has been giving off signals that Violet should
try to find a bed to herself. Violet thinks it may have something to do
with how she's been looking at Seiba. Breaker's too touchy to try, and
both Duo and Archer aren't around due to training schedules. Violet pads
across the barracks and decides to risk snuggling up next to Rider,
against her back. The tall woman stirs and looks over at her. She starts
to back away, apologizing, before strong, long arms draw her back,
enveloping her in their warmth. In safety. She falls asleep easily to
the lullaby of even breathing and Rider's steady heartbeat...
***
Rider
could feel the nanites begin to devour her suit, but she continued to
call out to the bulging form in the middle. She said her name again and
again, hoping...believing she wasn't gone. The gurgling mass would be
the site of her goal, or it would be her grave.
The core rippled
as it drew her in, almost ready to absorb her completely. She was there.
Rider knew she had to be there. "Violet....please..." Her last words,
possibly, but she didn't regret them....before the pull stops. As the
grip loosened, Rider was surprised enough that she landed on her well
shaped rear rather than her feet. As she watched, the bulbous pitch
black core swelled on one side, a massive bubble that suddenly burst.
Only Rider's preternatural reflexes allowed her to catch the flying
form, pale skin and dark purple hair visible through the bits of grime
sticking all over her. The gunk still clinging to Violet wriggled like a
living thing, but Rider was too busy hugging the younger girl to
notice. She doesn't say anything but her name, over and over again,
because that's all she can say right now.
Dislodged rubble,
however, triggered instincts in both of them, Rider scanning the horizon
as Violet looked around their immediate area. "We can't stay here,"
Rider said, getting a nod from Violet. The younger girl reached down,
touching the slime that's all around them as it bubbled and flowed
around her smeared skin, forming a patchwork of armor that eventually
sealed into a dark colored helm around her face. She tried not to waver
as it finished, but Rider could see that it'd taken quite a bit out of
her just to do that much.
"Ready," she said, as Rider nodded,
scooping her up in her arms and dashing for the exit she'd scouted out
weeks ago. The opening shots were easily dodged, and the entirety of the
trip was much easier for Rider now given the tendrils lying lifeless
and inert all across the hellish landscape that had been so dangerous to
traverse on the way in. Rider suspected that Crey hadn't expected that
particular result, as the security forces pursuing them were still using
the safe pathways their men had burned through the nanotech tangles
earlier rather than cutting across the dead lumps. A small blessing,
Rider considered to herself. For now, she simply focused on getting the
exhausted girl in her arms out and away from this place.
***
"Sir?"
He
didn't answer immediately, waiting, watching the screen as the two dots
slowly evaded the handful of icons indicating Crey security teams. Once
they vanished, he turned around to Karen, the woman wearing her typical
blank expression. Almost. His experience with her since she'd been
assigned as his aide showed him a number of minor cues that indicated
her confusion. "Yes, Karen?"
"Why did you allow them to escape?"
she asked, as several people around the control room froze at the
accusation, however mildly voiced. "The nanocolonies going inert once
the core was removed was a high probability result. Cutting our security
teams across the dead areas would have allowed them to intercept both
the escapees easily, and weighed down by her passenger and damaged
already to boot, Unit Bellerophon would've been a simple target to
recapture."
The director nodded casually as he listened to her
points, before crossing his arms behind his back. "You are correct that I
prevented our troops from recapturing them. However, our previous
results have proven almost decisively that reconditioning them is
pointless. It never takes. However, with the core removed, we have a
sizable sample of an entirely different renewable resource." He smiled,
before turning to the monitor technician. "Carlson, bring up the sonar
array display."
The operator tapped a few keys, before blinking
at the same time as Karen as a massive sprawl, coating nearly the entire
collapsed pit of the former complex for nearly half a mile down was
revealed in the false color display. The director's smile didn't fade.
"With the core gone, the greater mass's sensor baffles are inoperative
as well as their self defense programs."
Karen nodded as she
looked over the extent of the nanotech infestation of the wreckage.
There were easily several metric tons of the material running throughout
the area. With proper equipment, they could collect enough of this
particularly virulent and hardy strain produced by Unit J1BLI1 and
reproduce it almost indefinitely. Perpetually, if they could reactivate
it and resume feeding it.
"One must always keep an eye on the big
picture." The director smiled. It was not a pleasant expression.
***
Something
was strange. Touko wasn't sure what, but the careful arrangement of her
house was ever so slightly changed since she'd left to go antique
shopping.
It wasn't the living room. Though cluttered with the
various junk she inevitably acquired anywhere she moved, the room was as
she had left it: crowded and disorderly bookshelves, purchases from
curio shops scattered on open surfaces, cardboard boxes free standing
here and there, and a wall of old televisions, each tuned to a different
station and all set on mute for the moment. The kitchen, mostly used as
a dumping ground for the legion of take out boxes, TV dinners, and
whatever else she and Shiki use to fend off starvation given their
shared lack of any real skill in the culinary arts, was only changed by
the addition of the rice cooker that their houseguest had acquired for
the purposes of cooking the truly stupendous amounts of food she
consumed on a weekly basis. Shiki's room was as bare and ascetic as
usual, as was the apartment upstairs. Her workshop, tightly sealed and
warded, had been untouched since she was there last, the various dolls
and mannequins hanging from their positions on the wall opposite her
worktable. Her trunk was undisturbed, and unfortunately or not, no one
but she had been in her own bedroom for some time. There were times she
almost cursed that boy's luck.
By processs of elimination, she
found herself in the dojo, where she saw something she hadn't in months.
Shiki and the girl were both wearing traditional kendo garb and facing
each other on the mat. As Touko watched, her cigarette smoldering away
forgotten in one hand, the two clashed, faster than most masters of the
art would have thought possible.
Their styles were remarkably
similar in some respects. Both the girl and Shiki were not berserkers,
remaining calm at all times. But the differences were apparent when one
saw how they handled the training swords. The girl tended to block with
the entire sword, absorbing the impact and returning the blow with
crushing force, a style more suited to a European blade than the katana
the wooden bokken was intended to replicate. By contrast, Shiki's moves
were more fluid, dodging away from blows and counter attacking with
swiftness that would shame the wind. She circled, waiting for her
moment, then pouncing at the slightest opening. Unfortunately, her
opponent was more cornered lion than prey, and such attacks were often
brushed off and responded to just as quickly.
The match continued
along the established stalemate for some time until both lowered their
weapons at an unspoken signal. The girl smiled faintly, which was
returned by Shiki before the pair turned and noticed Touko for the first
time. "Oi, Touko," Shiki said by way of greeting as she mopped at her
forehead with a towel and tossed another to the other girl.
"Shiki,"
Touko nodded. "I thought you'd decided sparring wasn't worthwhile?"
Shiki's
smile was faint, but the amusement was real. "To determine our skills,
yeah."
"And this was?" the red haired woman asked, curious.
"Just
for fun," Shiki returned with another tiny smile, even as the girl
walked over, having filled three glasses from a kettle of water that had
been sitting by the side of the mat. Touko counted herself a better
than decent observer of people, and to say the girl had improved was
stating the glaringly obvious. When she'd first arrived on Touko's
doorstep, she'd been run ragged, her bearing that of someone hunted and
her nights haunted by dreams she confided the contents of to no one.
Even when awake, she'd been stiff and excessively formal. Touko'd made
some progress in getting the girl to lighten up (and vice versa,
considering Touko's initial negative opinion of the girl's impromptu
residence with them), but she'd been unable to help the girl shake that
haunted expression. Now, while there was still a hint of buried pain in
those intense blue eyes, she was more cheerful than Touko'd seen her
since their first meeting.
The girl nodded as she handed Touko a
glass, sipping with an understated elegance that belied how quickly the
water was disappearing into the obviously somewhat dehydrated fighter.
Finally, Touko spoke up, curious enough about the significant change to
toss her usual subtlety to the wind. "So, sparring seems to agree with
you."
The girl nodded. "It was Shiki's idea. I've never actually
tried using sparring as a way simply to enjoy myself. It was pleasant."
Touko
nodded, frowning slightly. Getting details out of this girl was about
as difficult as Shiki when she went into monosyllable and grunt mode.
She was about to excuse herself from the somewhat-awkward silence when
the girl looked up from her empty glass. "Touko, I believe I owe you an
apology. You've been nothing but accommodating to me, but I've hidden
much from you. Even my name. But while I can't reveal everything due to
prior obligations, I believe I do owe as thorough an explanation as I am
able to give."
The resulting tale took up the better part of an
hour, during which Touko's suspicions about the reasons behind Seiba's
(for that was their mysterious guest's name) haunted eyes proved to be
far, far too optimistic.
Touko hadn't been on particularly good
terms with her family and especially her younger sister, for some years.
But a small part of her still remembered younger, happier days when she
and her sister had been inseparable, and woe betide anyone who had
tried to do mischief to either. Before the family business came between
them. And before the Designation had put her on the run, unable to see
the rest of her family as well. Thus, it was with some slight jealousy
that Touko listened to Seiba describe her family's situation and their
reasons for planning their escape...and with sympathetic pain as she
described what that escape had cost her.
"She said there was a
chance that some of them might still be alive," Seiba said, frowning.
"But I don't have any clues to work with, and the trail seems to have
gone cold. I'm almost beginning to think that maybe those rumors were
really just more probable because I wanted desperately to believe that
they were still alive..."
At this summation of their guest's
situation, Touko and Shiki shared a significant glance, before Shiki
looked away first with an expression of exasperated bemusement. "He'd
come anyway, as soon as I mentioned this to him," she sighed.
Touko
nodded with a chuckle, lighting up again as she looked over at Seiba,
who was gazing at both of them in incomprehension. "Miss Seiba, I think
we know someone who can help you," she said, sliding her glasses off.
"You see, he has a talent of sorts for finding things..."
***
It
wasn't a particularly good looking bar, but neither was it
exceptionally run down. The plain wood tables weren't polished to a
gleaming shine, but there was something to their rough texture that
added character. And the bartender had had long experience with sliding
drinks along his bar, rough surfaces or not, and never spilled a drop as
he kept up with the two regular patrons that were currently the only
inhabitants of the quiet little pub. He'd mistaken them for a couple the
first time they'd come in, given the easy flirtation they indulged in.
The kind that didn't break any new ground but showed the pair knew each
other fairly intimately. He didn't listen to what they talked about, but
the friendly laughter and easy rhythm of old stories and new jokes was
familiar enough to him. It wasn't until the first time they'd drank that
now familiar toast that he'd realized the two would've been three if
they'd had any say in the matter, and that the missing third was as much
the reason they came here as anything.
"To absent friends," the
man said first, as he always did, raising the particular brand of beer
that had become as much of the ritual as anything, downing the thing in
one gulp.
"To absent friends," the woman returned, copying the
gesture before both slammed the cans down on the table, crushing them in
a single movement.
"You know, my coworkers consider me a morbid
son of a bitch for doing this every year," he said with a faint chuckle.
"At least, most of them do. Lance thinks it's some convoluted plan to
woo you, but then, Lance would think any particular method of wooing the
woman you're interested in is fair game. Even if he's hardly as
unleashed and free as he tries to act."
"Mmm. My coworkers that
know about it think I'm obsessed with working out what went wrong. They
try to tell me it won't bring her back," she replied, slightly
melancholy. "Most of them have stopped saying it out loud these days."
"They're
right," he pointed out. "Though I suppose if it's something you'd be
doing anyway, there's no real help for it. You've never been much for
moderation."
She leaned forward onto the bar, her fingers
twitching in a remembered muscle memory even if she hadn't smoked a
cigarette since the funeral. Some days she wished that she'd done it
sooner, as it'd saved her a lot of money in the long run, and who knew
how her risk of cancer'd gone down. Of course, the irony that she'd only
taken the other woman's advice after she was gone wasn't lost on her.
"My mother thinks that all it really shows is that my work ethic is
skewed. She's been on me for the last couple years to find a nice girl
and settle down like she did with my step-mother. If she only knew," she
chuckled, a touch darkly.
He heard the recrimination in her
voice but didn't say anything, raising two fingers and receiving a nod
from the bartender in return. "Hell, I didn't believe you when you
mentioned it for the first time. I'd known you were close...but then
again, drunken benders have a higher possibility of such things, I
guess, especially in college," he said with a lopsided grin, getting a
laugh from his companion.
"Would you believe the first time was
due to sleep deprivation more than alcohol?" she chuckled. "I was just
so exhausted after that particular cram session that I didn't bother
going back to my bedroom. Apparently, though, I wasn't so exhausted as
to not enjoy the moment...then again, she might've been drunk. I did
lose sight of her for a bit," she snickered.
"Mmm. Still, any
prospects?" he asked gently, gauging her reaction as she looked
thoughtful.
"Well, there is this cute little something down in
TechDiv 3, but I'm not sure it'd be fair to her. I mean, leaving aside
possible job hazards with my research, I'm still not sure I'm over her
enough to go looking for someone new. I'd hate to break the girl's heart
by letting her know a month down the line that she'd been a rebound
from a dead might've-been-serious," she sighed.
He nodded, before
both of them blinked at ringing phones in their respective pockets.
"Looks like work caught up to us," he smiled, getting a rolling of eyes
from her as she stood up and put down money for both their tabs. They
walked together to the door before turning opposite directions.
"See
you next year?" he asked.
"Same place, same time," she returned,
before both turned on their phones to answer the calls.
***
"This
is Kaji," Special Inspector Ryojii Kaji said as he opened the phone.
"The
boss would like a personal debriefing with you about your interview
with the contact," a soft, curt voice said.
"Right, I'll be right
there. Just wrapping up anyway."
"....I apologize for the
interruption," his teammate said, her voice filled with a sincere
regret.
"It's okay, Maiya. We're both professionals. We know how
work never really ends," Kaji said, disconnecting and sliding the phone
back into his pocket. Time to inform the big man of his prior
engagement's intentions.
***
"Dr. Akagi speaking," Ritsuko
answered.
"Ritsuko, I need you to come in a little earlier than
expected. We've had a few new arrivals that will need a quick looking
over," the elegant voice of her employer spoke up.
"Compatibility
tests?" she asked, curious.
"No, in this case, they brought
their own equipment. However, one is rather exhausted and the other not
much better. I'd like to make sure they aren't going to die outright
before introducing them to our other two prodigals."
"Part of the
same batch?"
"They do seem to match the descriptions," Reika
confirmed.
"I'll be right in, Miss Chang," she said, slipping
into "work mode" as she did.
"Thank you, Ritsuko. I knew I could
count on you," her employer smiled over the line, before hanging up.
Ritsuko
closed her phone, pondering the implications of that message. For a
group considered officially dead, this newest batch had proven
remarkably good at not dying. It seemed that Miss Chang's insistence
that Ritsuko learn the tools of her sister's trade in addition to her
own specialization in armor development and interfacing was proving
useful after all.
---
"Oh, silver blade, forged in the depths of the beyond. Heed my summons and purge those who stand in my way. Lay
waste."