- Pronouns
- She/Her
I should probably edit it to Manako's father being on the same floor.
The Troubled Schooldays of Nishifune Nozomi
Chapter 2-5: Assault
- Pronouns
- She/Her
I sit on the steps for a solid thirty seconds after the call ends. I know from experience that I'm wearing that ugly, angry face that I make whenever I get manipulated or beaten this way. I shouldn't, I tell myself (others have told me) get so upset he got me into this. The chances are if he had told me the whole truth I still would have got involved.
But he didn't. Because I will only allow myself to be his enemy. Because ultimately family is important and my family killed his.
No. Because whatever he maybe he is a hero, and I chose long ago to be the villain.
I can't just sit here. I need to start getting things organized. The first thing I need to do is get Alice around here to see to the two brain fried public safety officials upstairs. "You're having me do a lot of house calls lately." She sighs after I explain the situation "You know that I'm expensive hmm?"
"I don't want to try to ship a cop and a prosecutor all the way across town, so money isn't really an issue."
"Well, I guess you're the person I'm most likely to use new equipment on anyway! It's just such a waste of time to be out of the lab."
My phone buzzes, another call coming in. Junya. He's still okay. Tension I didn't quite realize I was holding flows out of me. "Ah. I have someone else calling. Come soonest okay?"
"Okay!"
I switch to Junya's call. "Junya-kun. I'm here, don't hang up."
"I was starting to think your new girlfriend had taken care of what you wanted."
I colour. "Where have you even been?"
"Unfortunately I had some delicate matters to attend to, The kind that don't take kindly to a buzzing phone. I assume you were calling me about these whispering horrors."
"That and some other things. I need information on exorcist politics, and you're in touch with that too."
"That's information I can supply but I need your help in turn." Junya may be a jerk but he's refreshingly straightforward about asking me favours. "I have a delicate problem in Ginza and I need some backup."
"Alright. I'll be there soon." I put the phone down and get up. "Manako. I'm going to need to head out."
Somehow we've dropped honourifics. When did it even happen? Was it when she french kissed me, or when her bullets tore through the tentacles reaching out for me?
"Where are you going?"
"Ginza. A friend of mine needs help. I assume it's related to all this."
"Should I stay here?" She looks kind of put out by the idea and I make a decision.
"No. Come with me. We'll go on the motorcycle."
"A motorcycle?" Manako perks up. "You can ride a motorcycle?"
"Yeah, though I'm not that good. Go get your gear together. Find yourself some armour that's comfortable, night vision and so on. Use one of the blue striped holdalls. They have extra-dimensional space in them which keeps the weight down."
Manako looks breathlessly excited at this and hurries off.I pull up the secure messaging ap and text the team I have on Akari. Better get an update there before I set off on yet another adventure.
<<SITREP>> I send it via the encrypted messager app that we're using. Texting the protection team requires a small mystical unlock on my phone designed to be difficult if your thoughts are hot molasses because some frog throated fuck is hitting you through a mind shield.
The watch team I hired are a smallish outfit, five main members plus a shifting array of muscle and hangers-on, including two mages, an ex-cop, and a JSDF airborne soldier turned mercenary commanded by a pretty, short-haired mercenary mage named Ii Aoi. Ii has two prosthetic arms and is, even more than most of the other pretty, deadly people I encounter, really just my type.
I wonder if Manako is going to have a problem with my wandering mind. In mage society, this is pretty standard, but normal people don't go for that.
Don't get distracted.
<<Was just going to message you. SITREP follows>>
<<Ready to copy>> The whole ready to copy thing is strictly unnecessary over text where you have a log, but it's another procedure we put in place to detect if the person on the other end is under external influence.
Pause, longer message.
<<No attempts at intrusion detected. All targets for protection appear to be following normal routine. No watchers accept the police. Half an hour ago they pulled out>>
I think for a moment then send.
<<Information and tasking follow.>>
<<Ready to copy.>>
<<INFORMATION: Public Safety compromised. Consider all Police, public safety and other state authorities unfriendly as of this time. Compliance may also be unfriendly. Lift attempt unlikely as hostile forces know that target is likely under observation>>
Pause, new message.
<<TASKING: maintain observation on the primary. If hostile forces attempt a lift, do not intervene unless you believe there is a danger to the life of the primary or her family. Maintain contact and inform me of where they take her. Avoid contact with all other agencies. Will pay 200% bonus due to adverse conditions and authorize the use of firearms for team protection.>>
Longer pause.
<<Copy on all. What kind of guns?>> I relax a little. I thought they might pull out if I told them the truth, but no.
<<Wait one.>> I head down to the room where Manako is finishing gearing up. As I expected she's sticking with the BR-18 and the pistol she grabbed earlier. I shut the gun cabinet and then key in a code sequence, linking it to the shared holdall I gave Ii. <<New items placed in your holdall. Should all be clean guns.>>
<<Nice. Will text if anything changes.>>
I put the phone down and begin to assemble my own gear. Manako is starting to look worried. "Sure you're okay coming with me?" I think of taking her hands as I ask her but decide it'll seem like I'm pressuring her one way or another.
"Will I get in the way?" she asks.
I put a pistol under my jacket in a shoulder rig, then consider whether a larger gun would be helpful. I usually don't bother because if I need to kill someone at range then I can just conjure fire or whatever but now I have guns available, I'm wondering if taking one might not be good. "Hey Manako, what's a good submachine gun to use?"
"How about a UMP?" Manako holds up another gun she's runed up. "I-I actually was going to carry this before I saw the BR-18. It's light and easy to handle and has good stopping power with the .45 caliber round."
The gun isn't very large, which is good. I hang it on my chest and see how my jacket will cover it. The answer is not very much. After a while I settle another bag of holding under my shoulder and push the gun into it. "If it comes to a fight I'll give you this okay?"
"Alright." I step over to check she has the armour on properly and that it's hanging in a way that won't look too weird and obvious, and do a little retrofitting to how she's wearing it. "So who are we meeting?"
"An old friend of mine. By day he's a tailor. By night he keeps the district safe from the supernatural. And the natural really."
"So he's like a superhero?"
"He's way too much of a sadist to be a superhero. He's more like a private investigator, just a private investigator who can kill ghosts."
"If he's a sadist, should I be careful around him?"
"He's not the kind of sadist who'd do stuff to you you don't want, except tease you." I'm colouring again. Damn my skin sometimes.
She considers that a moment then nods. "Then I'm ready."
We head up to the garage, a large, slightly echoing space the smells of oil and is mostly filled with the outdoor workbenches I use for anything that's too messy for inside the house. It's a big, chilly space, though a little magic and a space heater warms it up when I'm working here. Several drones, partly disassembled, lay on the bench, while I shovel two more and a charging station into the holdall.
Past the workbenches, the car and a few other vehicles are drawn up. I select one of the motorcycles, then fit the helmet on, Manako does the same and we get comfortable on the bike.
"Why are we taking the bike not the car?"
"A bike is just a lot more fun." I check Manako is on and then think of something. "Oh yeah, should I say that you're my apprentice or my girlfriend?"
Manako seems to give this very serious consideration, then hands go around my waist and squeeze lightly. "Say that I'm your girlfriend."
The helmet hides my blush and the big dumb smile that's forming on my face. "Okay. lets get this show on the road."
I trigger the doors and we accelerate out onto the highway.
We're still on approach to Ginza proper when my grid trips. A status symbol lights in my vision telling me it's drawing mana that will be dangerous to my health. The grid's cleanser seems to be taking care of it, but I hope there's nobody nearby with a more primitive grid or a busted limiter or they're in real trouble.
More signs of a problem as we approach. Men in mysteriously sober and fashionable suits, worn casually without ties but with an air of fashion you just don't see in most Yakuza clans. These are Ginto-kai, the Yakuza group that operates in this area. Junya isn't one of them them but is intimate with their chairman. I think they're probably on and off sleeping together. They fought together when the latter was betrayed and had to cut a bloody swathe back to the leadership of the group.
I can see paper birds perched in some places. Junya's eyes. I prefer drones but his origami has a certain flair to it.
We park somewhat short of the ring of pedestrianization around Ginza, and walk the last few blocks to where Junya's phone claims he is. We launch the drone on the way in, so it's not too difficult to find him, talking with another man on top of a building. His companion is a devastatingly handsome man in his mid-twenties wearing an exquisitely tailored suit. Kodai Ryu, the chairman of Ginto-kai. They're standing close together and I suddenly feel bad for interrupting. Junya looks up at the drone and sighs.
Manako and I climb up to join them. "Junya-san, Chairman." I give a short bow. "My apprentice and girlfriend, Murakawa Manako."
"So." Junya smirks. "We were wondering just who it could be that had managed to break through to this exquisitely carved lump of granite."
"I just kissed her. That seemed to work." Manako says, and bats her eyelashes at him. I am blushing again. Nobody told me that getting a girlfriend would mean getting ganged up on.
"So what exactly," I say testily, "is going on here?" We're looking down over a large building with all the lights on. It's clearly the nexus of all the Ginto-kai activity, and I can see several more of Junya's paper birds.
"The building down there is run by a nasty little cult called the Strength and Wellness Society."
"I think I saw a Compliance bulletin on them." I pull out a pair of binoculars and turn them on the building. "They're some new religion who have actual spiritual power."
Junya sniffs. "If you can call them that. They've got some magical remedies that are almost but not quite as effective as conventional medical treatment. Still, that's enough for them to have got themselves a lot of followers and a lot of money. They found out the building down there was a place of power and brought it up."
The lights are on and I can see what must be hundreds of people standing inside. Just standing, apparently motionless.
"Looks like something found them."
"It's similar to the shrine near Ueno by the look of it. It seems like it's feeding on the spiritual energy source in there." He turns and looks at me. "I hear you inserted yourself into that mess and kidnapped the exorcist agency's golden girl. There are several houses who are quite mad at you."
"I wasn't going to let my cute little underclassman get tied up in a moon moth cocoon or whatever other evil fate." I lower the binoculars, then cover an eye measure. "It's odd though."
"That it's gone after this geomantic well rather than another? Yes. I noticed that too." He frowns. "When I heard about Ueno park I rather expected it to pay me a visit. I do control the greatest nexus in this area."
"I don't think we're going to find out standing out here."
"Do we know how many of them are in there?"
"At least a several hundred. They called in a lot of their followers soon after the possession started. A lot of them are armed as well. Only knives and sticks but still enough to make things complicated." Kodai says. "We're wondering when it'll provoke a police response, but so far nothing."
"How did something like that make it this close to Ginza without you noticing?" I ask.
"It was born in there." Junya says. "At least that's what I think. It was born in there from one of them."
I stretch. "Well, we should resolve this quickly then. Do you have a plan?"
"Now you're here, I suppose your desire to pretend all that useless meat you put on your body isn't conspicuous means you want to sneak in?" Junya looks me over again.
"I put a lot of work into this, don't want to get it damaged."
"Let me show you the building plans." Kodai leads us down to an office at the top of the building where a couple of lieutenants are coordinating with the building plans. "We think the geomantic well is in the buildings atrium. We figured you'd want to go in through the roof and drop down while we stormed the front."
"We'll need to mute the whole building. Don't take anyone who can't coordinate by sign language." I look over at Manako. "Manako, I want you to come with me and cover me from the roof."
"Okay." Manako begins unloading her rifle.
Kodai frowns. "These are very rich people mostly, please don't kill them."
"Don't worry. It's runed to fire less than lethal rounds." Manako gives a thumbs up.
"The SMG is fitted for that too right?" I get it out and lay out ammunition.
"The UMP? Yep!"
Kodai looks pained. "Please no guns in the open."
"Don't worry. We'll pick up the brass and everything." I pat him on the arm and then begin to double-check my gear. Time to put together an assault plan.
In Sun Tzu, there is a concept of a pair of forces, the 'ordinary' and 'extraordinary' forces. In general the ordinary force has the job of directly engaging the enemy while the extraordinary force sneaks around the side and does the more exciting job of attacking the enemy from an unexpected quarter.
A mistake made by people applying Sun Tzu, especially Westerners is the idea that because a force is extraordinary, it must be stronger in combat power. This is not the case. It is the ordinary force, who fights the enemy directly who needs the majority of the army's combat power. The extraordinary force should have only as much combat power as it'll need to accomplish its mission.
In the case of our assault on the Strength and Wellness building, the ordinary force is Junya, Kodai, Junya's apprentice Luce, and a bunch of picked Ginto-Kai enforcers going straight in through the front entrance. The extraordinary force is Manako and I, going directly for the central source of spiritual power in the building. That should be where the horror is.
Before anyone goes in, Manako and I are going to draw a pair of large runes on the roof to mute the building. The normal procedure would be to put everyone to sleep, but with the way the local geomancy is acting, we don't have power for both, and we're less sure that sleep will work against the whispered cultists inside. We'll see if this actually works on people under the whisperer's control, but there's no point in not doing it.
According to the plans and drone and bird observations, the nexus point is a pool in the centre of the building's atrium, surrounded by greenery and decorative stone statues that the cult claims have great spiritual significance.
This is where I start to get a little worried about our quickly drawn assault plan, because I really don't think that placement makes sense from a geomantic perspective. It's possible that it's just a very deep well but I'm not sure that makes sense. The readings look good but just covering your eye is not the most sensitive instrument.
Still, the atrium entry is obvious. In order to avoid injury to anyone below, we've cut the glass atrium's roof open and removed it with telekinesis. Manako will cover me with her rifle, as I drop down into the atrium, find, engage and destroy the horror.
Junya's group are already engaged. I'm watching through a drone. Junya's is in first, a pollution mask across his face and Ginto-kai men spreading out around him with heavy sticks. A phalanx of beige and whtie uniformed cult security pour in on them as they breach the lobby. Junya moves like a snake, throwing a man over his shoulder, punching a pressure. The sleep rune doesn't seem to have done much, but then I didn't expect it to. We couldn't get that lucky. Even so, the cult guys can't stop the assault force. Kodai is beside him, knocking men down with heavy, fast blows.
The security pulls back and a man rears up from behind the counter with a double-barrelled shotgun. He swings it towards Junya and his mouth opens, spit flying as he shouts his hatred into the silence. Junya's eyes narrow, hand already extending as the gun comes online. The weapon jerks off target, then yanks against his body and discharges. The man's silent shout becoming a scream of pain as near-invisible wires whip around his body. He jerks like a puppet and his clothes shred, bloody lines appearing everywhere as the wire bites. Lifting the gun like a club, he charges towards the next security man, terrified eyes wide as the wire forces him into motion..
Junya has only got better with that demonic wire he carries. Apparently he hasn't figured out a way around the weapons ban. The demonic queen that powers it requires that anyone it hits who is not killed must suffer humiliation, the destruction of their clothing and outer seeming.
I should stop watching. The one-man I trust can be trusted to look after himself. I'm on the roof, the world silent around me. I tear my eyes away from the drone feed and look back at the atrium. The lid of glass and steel is cut through now, my spell having completed its work. Next to me, Manako checks a rune she's stenciled onto the bottom and gives me a thumbs up. That'll check any change in temperature or airflow giving us away to anyone below.
I grab the top and using telekinesis as much as the strength of my grid, shove to whole mass of glass and metal off to one side. I wouldn't want to drop it down there and hurt someone. That done all that remains is to smooth the lines of my outfit, and a final check on what's below. The outfit is almost all black with only the white fox mask with its red highlights for colour. I keep the mask up for now as I peer down into the dark.
Below the atrium is dark. There's only three spotlights falling on the pool. In their reflected light I can see scores of motionless figures, each standing stock-still by themselves. It would have been too much to assume that we could have taken them down like that, but hopefully, with the whispers cut off they won't be able to get new orders.
At the edge of the pool, and connected into it I can see a tentacle. A long wavy rootlet of strange and cryptic flesh dripped down into the water.
So, I was wrong. It's here.
Manako gives me the thumbs up and I pull her into a kiss, pull the mask down and step off. My safe fall enchantment is the same kind that armsmen use during an airdrop. The first part of the fall is actually accelerated, a terrifyingly fast plunge down, followed by a rapid deceleration.
It's at the start of that deceleration, just before it gets too severe, that I realize my instincts were right. Up close, seen from down here rather than up there, I see the tentacle for what it is. A fire hose that's been painted purple and redecorated with what look like growths.
The curious ambivalence I always feel at times like this comes. That feeling that maybe someone got me, but man, that was a good one.
The pool isn't the centre. This whole room is decoration.
Also an ambush.
I hit the ground, roll to kill my remaining momentum and come up into a wave of charging men. Not security, just ordinary cultists, but big and fit and left here to cover this entrance. Iron bars and mancatchers wielded by people who've obviously had at least some training to use them. I catch one of the sasumata before it can fully get me and slam it sideways into the first wielder, knocking him sideways. A man swings a metal bat, the blow hard enough to crack the floor tiles when I dodge to the side.
I'm in real trouble here. Eldritch power is pouring into the local geomancy and my limiters are working overtime to keep me alive and powered up at the same time.
Another man comes in with an iron bar, making short, powerful blows, too quick for me to dodge without overloading my geomantic limiter and it knocks me sprawling. A mancatcher comes down on me, then another, and I reach up and channel electricity down the handle past the insulation, knocking the wielder down.
Too late. Too slow. Men charge from all sides. I raise my hands to protect my head as a dozen blows come down on me.
It's fortunate that this isn't the first time I've done something like this and I made sure to give my girlfriend up above something a bit more dangerous than a rifle.
Having a partner just makes it all the easier.
Up above, Manako draws an activation rune on the case of a white and black object from my kit, then heaves it into space. It falls unnoticed, men contesting me in silence, busy as they swarm me from all directions, opponents flung backwards by one strike after another. The phantasm grenade airbursts and the room is filled with sputtering, silent light and shadow. The rune on my mask comes to life, shielding me from the effect and my vision blacks out for a moment, replaced a moment later by a strange, too bright false colour.
Men stagger around me, laughing, crying and twitching, all in ghastly silence as the illusions the grenade is spinning tear into their vision. One by one they collapse. One man falls into the pool and I pull him out so he doesn't drown. I check them perfunctory to make sure nobody is having a heart attack, then pull out my phone.
<<Thanks.>> I text to Manako.
<<Is it there?>>
<<No. I'm going to find it. Stay put and make sure nobody comes up behind me.>> That's less tactical advice than giving her a job she'll think is important so she doesn't try to come up behind me and get in trouble.
I move around to examine the pool. Even a decoy use of spiritual energy like this must come from somewhere. If I was the geomancer doing this, I'd do it by piping water up from underground and laying a bunch of geomantically reflective substances in the bottom of my fake pool. It looks like that's exactly what they've done here. I pull out my phone and check the building plans. Through one of the doors on the atrium's left there should be a way down into the basement. Once I'm down it's simple. Just follow the geomantic power through concrete tunnels and water damaged service ways. Down, down, down into the deep well of the city.
I meet resistance on the way. Small groups of men in overalls and hard hats, obviously given orders to repel before the silence hit. They come at me through the overlight passages, eyes glassy and fanatical. I take them down with speed and economy, moving onwards.
Junya texts. <<Situation?>> He'd consider it gauche to ever say a military style code like SITREP.
<<The atrium was a blind. I'm moving through the basement for the true source. You?>>
<<We've broken out of the lobby but they're swarming us. Ginto-kai has brought in more people to hold them off. I'm heading to your location.>>
If it was anyone else, I wouldn't wait, but Junya and I don't really have anything to prove to one another. I stop unsling the UMP and cover the corridor ahead. My phone vibrates, then vibrates again.
I put the gun up as Junya comes around the corner. His hands move in rapid sign language. "Anything?"
I sign back. "No, but I think it's just up ahead."
"Alright. You want to take lead?"
"Always."
"I doubt that."
Always! Always he makes me blush!
I move up on the door ahead. I've been looking at it while I'm waiting and I'm pretty sure this really is it. Not just because my grid is tingling to the waves of corrupted geomancy pouring out of it, but also because the structure of door. It's a hatchway like on a ship, implying there's water beyond.
We move up to the door, one on either side. It really is a watertight door like on a ship. No porthole. Junya shuts his eyes concentrates, then holds up 3 fingers, then makes the armsman hand sign for "monster".
I nod, take aim at the door. Junya grabs the handles, careful not to get in my line of fire and yanks it open. I throw a flash spell through then go myself.
I dive in through the door into a mostly bare natural cavern. There's pipes on the wall, taking water from the pool upward. On either side of the pool, a policeman is aiming his revolver at the door. There's muzzle flashes but I don't get to hear the bullets as they pass over me. There's just the vibration of the UMP's recoil as I cut it across them both. The rounds knock them down, jerking with the stun.
Junya leaps over me as tentacles lash out of the shadows. The thing is at the far end of the pool, tendrils writhing in the water. Wire and flesh meet, and purple fluid sprays as wire wins the battle. I put the creature in my gun's sights, override the runes that reduce lethality and kick all the power I can down the boosters. The gun vibrates against my shoulder and I hold the barrel down with all my strength and fire sustained burst.
The mass of the creature cores out and splatters as my bullets tear through it. I drop the mag, changing it with only a small difficulty then aim at the deflating thing.
Seems pretty dead. No sign of regeneration.
Junya touches my arm and points. Behind the ruined thing another man is lying. He's richly clad in white robes that suggest those of a Buddhist monk or a Christian priest, without being too similar to either. He's shaking with fear, trying to speak, though he can't in the silence.
I move forward towards him, gun ready, Junya at my side. Junya pokes the thing on the way past, concentrates, and is apparently satisfied, gives me the thumbs up. I cut the silence off and sound returns.
For a moment I think it didn't work. The man's mouth is moving but no sounds are coming out. Then I see his throat bulging. His eyes go wide and then his head snaps to the sound. There's a horrible sound of breaking bone and his jaw starts to hinge. Something wormlike and cancerous starts to crawl its way out.
I raise the gun, then think better of it. It's not moving fast and seems almost sluggish. If we're going to fight these things, then maybe one to study wouldn't be a bad idea. "Can you catch it?"
Junya's wire snaps out, grabbing the thing and yanking it up amid a forest of wires. He pulls out a paper box and dumps the worm inside, then shuts it and makes it vanish, the wire coiling back into his sleeve. "Well, that's done then. Let's get going before any of them wake up."
"Do you think they'll remember anything?"
"It would be so much simpler if they didn't."
But he didn't. Because I will only allow myself to be his enemy. Because ultimately family is important and my family killed his.
No. Because whatever he maybe he is a hero, and I chose long ago to be the villain.
I can't just sit here. I need to start getting things organized. The first thing I need to do is get Alice around here to see to the two brain fried public safety officials upstairs. "You're having me do a lot of house calls lately." She sighs after I explain the situation "You know that I'm expensive hmm?"
"I don't want to try to ship a cop and a prosecutor all the way across town, so money isn't really an issue."
"Well, I guess you're the person I'm most likely to use new equipment on anyway! It's just such a waste of time to be out of the lab."
My phone buzzes, another call coming in. Junya. He's still okay. Tension I didn't quite realize I was holding flows out of me. "Ah. I have someone else calling. Come soonest okay?"
"Okay!"
I switch to Junya's call. "Junya-kun. I'm here, don't hang up."
"I was starting to think your new girlfriend had taken care of what you wanted."
I colour. "Where have you even been?"
"Unfortunately I had some delicate matters to attend to, The kind that don't take kindly to a buzzing phone. I assume you were calling me about these whispering horrors."
"That and some other things. I need information on exorcist politics, and you're in touch with that too."
"That's information I can supply but I need your help in turn." Junya may be a jerk but he's refreshingly straightforward about asking me favours. "I have a delicate problem in Ginza and I need some backup."
"Alright. I'll be there soon." I put the phone down and get up. "Manako. I'm going to need to head out."
Somehow we've dropped honourifics. When did it even happen? Was it when she french kissed me, or when her bullets tore through the tentacles reaching out for me?
"Where are you going?"
"Ginza. A friend of mine needs help. I assume it's related to all this."
"Should I stay here?" She looks kind of put out by the idea and I make a decision.
"No. Come with me. We'll go on the motorcycle."
"A motorcycle?" Manako perks up. "You can ride a motorcycle?"
"Yeah, though I'm not that good. Go get your gear together. Find yourself some armour that's comfortable, night vision and so on. Use one of the blue striped holdalls. They have extra-dimensional space in them which keeps the weight down."
Manako looks breathlessly excited at this and hurries off.I pull up the secure messaging ap and text the team I have on Akari. Better get an update there before I set off on yet another adventure.
<<SITREP>> I send it via the encrypted messager app that we're using. Texting the protection team requires a small mystical unlock on my phone designed to be difficult if your thoughts are hot molasses because some frog throated fuck is hitting you through a mind shield.
The watch team I hired are a smallish outfit, five main members plus a shifting array of muscle and hangers-on, including two mages, an ex-cop, and a JSDF airborne soldier turned mercenary commanded by a pretty, short-haired mercenary mage named Ii Aoi. Ii has two prosthetic arms and is, even more than most of the other pretty, deadly people I encounter, really just my type.
I wonder if Manako is going to have a problem with my wandering mind. In mage society, this is pretty standard, but normal people don't go for that.
Don't get distracted.
<<Was just going to message you. SITREP follows>>
<<Ready to copy>> The whole ready to copy thing is strictly unnecessary over text where you have a log, but it's another procedure we put in place to detect if the person on the other end is under external influence.
Pause, longer message.
<<No attempts at intrusion detected. All targets for protection appear to be following normal routine. No watchers accept the police. Half an hour ago they pulled out>>
I think for a moment then send.
<<Information and tasking follow.>>
<<Ready to copy.>>
<<INFORMATION: Public Safety compromised. Consider all Police, public safety and other state authorities unfriendly as of this time. Compliance may also be unfriendly. Lift attempt unlikely as hostile forces know that target is likely under observation>>
Pause, new message.
<<TASKING: maintain observation on the primary. If hostile forces attempt a lift, do not intervene unless you believe there is a danger to the life of the primary or her family. Maintain contact and inform me of where they take her. Avoid contact with all other agencies. Will pay 200% bonus due to adverse conditions and authorize the use of firearms for team protection.>>
Longer pause.
<<Copy on all. What kind of guns?>> I relax a little. I thought they might pull out if I told them the truth, but no.
<<Wait one.>> I head down to the room where Manako is finishing gearing up. As I expected she's sticking with the BR-18 and the pistol she grabbed earlier. I shut the gun cabinet and then key in a code sequence, linking it to the shared holdall I gave Ii. <<New items placed in your holdall. Should all be clean guns.>>
<<Nice. Will text if anything changes.>>
I put the phone down and begin to assemble my own gear. Manako is starting to look worried. "Sure you're okay coming with me?" I think of taking her hands as I ask her but decide it'll seem like I'm pressuring her one way or another.
"Will I get in the way?" she asks.
I put a pistol under my jacket in a shoulder rig, then consider whether a larger gun would be helpful. I usually don't bother because if I need to kill someone at range then I can just conjure fire or whatever but now I have guns available, I'm wondering if taking one might not be good. "Hey Manako, what's a good submachine gun to use?"
"How about a UMP?" Manako holds up another gun she's runed up. "I-I actually was going to carry this before I saw the BR-18. It's light and easy to handle and has good stopping power with the .45 caliber round."
The gun isn't very large, which is good. I hang it on my chest and see how my jacket will cover it. The answer is not very much. After a while I settle another bag of holding under my shoulder and push the gun into it. "If it comes to a fight I'll give you this okay?"
"Alright." I step over to check she has the armour on properly and that it's hanging in a way that won't look too weird and obvious, and do a little retrofitting to how she's wearing it. "So who are we meeting?"
"An old friend of mine. By day he's a tailor. By night he keeps the district safe from the supernatural. And the natural really."
"So he's like a superhero?"
"He's way too much of a sadist to be a superhero. He's more like a private investigator, just a private investigator who can kill ghosts."
"If he's a sadist, should I be careful around him?"
"He's not the kind of sadist who'd do stuff to you you don't want, except tease you." I'm colouring again. Damn my skin sometimes.
She considers that a moment then nods. "Then I'm ready."
We head up to the garage, a large, slightly echoing space the smells of oil and is mostly filled with the outdoor workbenches I use for anything that's too messy for inside the house. It's a big, chilly space, though a little magic and a space heater warms it up when I'm working here. Several drones, partly disassembled, lay on the bench, while I shovel two more and a charging station into the holdall.
Past the workbenches, the car and a few other vehicles are drawn up. I select one of the motorcycles, then fit the helmet on, Manako does the same and we get comfortable on the bike.
"Why are we taking the bike not the car?"
"A bike is just a lot more fun." I check Manako is on and then think of something. "Oh yeah, should I say that you're my apprentice or my girlfriend?"
Manako seems to give this very serious consideration, then hands go around my waist and squeeze lightly. "Say that I'm your girlfriend."
The helmet hides my blush and the big dumb smile that's forming on my face. "Okay. lets get this show on the road."
I trigger the doors and we accelerate out onto the highway.
*****
We're still on approach to Ginza proper when my grid trips. A status symbol lights in my vision telling me it's drawing mana that will be dangerous to my health. The grid's cleanser seems to be taking care of it, but I hope there's nobody nearby with a more primitive grid or a busted limiter or they're in real trouble.
More signs of a problem as we approach. Men in mysteriously sober and fashionable suits, worn casually without ties but with an air of fashion you just don't see in most Yakuza clans. These are Ginto-kai, the Yakuza group that operates in this area. Junya isn't one of them them but is intimate with their chairman. I think they're probably on and off sleeping together. They fought together when the latter was betrayed and had to cut a bloody swathe back to the leadership of the group.
I can see paper birds perched in some places. Junya's eyes. I prefer drones but his origami has a certain flair to it.
We park somewhat short of the ring of pedestrianization around Ginza, and walk the last few blocks to where Junya's phone claims he is. We launch the drone on the way in, so it's not too difficult to find him, talking with another man on top of a building. His companion is a devastatingly handsome man in his mid-twenties wearing an exquisitely tailored suit. Kodai Ryu, the chairman of Ginto-kai. They're standing close together and I suddenly feel bad for interrupting. Junya looks up at the drone and sighs.
Manako and I climb up to join them. "Junya-san, Chairman." I give a short bow. "My apprentice and girlfriend, Murakawa Manako."
"So." Junya smirks. "We were wondering just who it could be that had managed to break through to this exquisitely carved lump of granite."
"I just kissed her. That seemed to work." Manako says, and bats her eyelashes at him. I am blushing again. Nobody told me that getting a girlfriend would mean getting ganged up on.
"So what exactly," I say testily, "is going on here?" We're looking down over a large building with all the lights on. It's clearly the nexus of all the Ginto-kai activity, and I can see several more of Junya's paper birds.
"The building down there is run by a nasty little cult called the Strength and Wellness Society."
"I think I saw a Compliance bulletin on them." I pull out a pair of binoculars and turn them on the building. "They're some new religion who have actual spiritual power."
Junya sniffs. "If you can call them that. They've got some magical remedies that are almost but not quite as effective as conventional medical treatment. Still, that's enough for them to have got themselves a lot of followers and a lot of money. They found out the building down there was a place of power and brought it up."
The lights are on and I can see what must be hundreds of people standing inside. Just standing, apparently motionless.
"Looks like something found them."
"It's similar to the shrine near Ueno by the look of it. It seems like it's feeding on the spiritual energy source in there." He turns and looks at me. "I hear you inserted yourself into that mess and kidnapped the exorcist agency's golden girl. There are several houses who are quite mad at you."
"I wasn't going to let my cute little underclassman get tied up in a moon moth cocoon or whatever other evil fate." I lower the binoculars, then cover an eye measure. "It's odd though."
"That it's gone after this geomantic well rather than another? Yes. I noticed that too." He frowns. "When I heard about Ueno park I rather expected it to pay me a visit. I do control the greatest nexus in this area."
"I don't think we're going to find out standing out here."
"Do we know how many of them are in there?"
"At least a several hundred. They called in a lot of their followers soon after the possession started. A lot of them are armed as well. Only knives and sticks but still enough to make things complicated." Kodai says. "We're wondering when it'll provoke a police response, but so far nothing."
"How did something like that make it this close to Ginza without you noticing?" I ask.
"It was born in there." Junya says. "At least that's what I think. It was born in there from one of them."
I stretch. "Well, we should resolve this quickly then. Do you have a plan?"
"Now you're here, I suppose your desire to pretend all that useless meat you put on your body isn't conspicuous means you want to sneak in?" Junya looks me over again.
"I put a lot of work into this, don't want to get it damaged."
"Let me show you the building plans." Kodai leads us down to an office at the top of the building where a couple of lieutenants are coordinating with the building plans. "We think the geomantic well is in the buildings atrium. We figured you'd want to go in through the roof and drop down while we stormed the front."
"We'll need to mute the whole building. Don't take anyone who can't coordinate by sign language." I look over at Manako. "Manako, I want you to come with me and cover me from the roof."
"Okay." Manako begins unloading her rifle.
Kodai frowns. "These are very rich people mostly, please don't kill them."
"Don't worry. It's runed to fire less than lethal rounds." Manako gives a thumbs up.
"The SMG is fitted for that too right?" I get it out and lay out ammunition.
"The UMP? Yep!"
Kodai looks pained. "Please no guns in the open."
"Don't worry. We'll pick up the brass and everything." I pat him on the arm and then begin to double-check my gear. Time to put together an assault plan.
#
In Sun Tzu, there is a concept of a pair of forces, the 'ordinary' and 'extraordinary' forces. In general the ordinary force has the job of directly engaging the enemy while the extraordinary force sneaks around the side and does the more exciting job of attacking the enemy from an unexpected quarter.
A mistake made by people applying Sun Tzu, especially Westerners is the idea that because a force is extraordinary, it must be stronger in combat power. This is not the case. It is the ordinary force, who fights the enemy directly who needs the majority of the army's combat power. The extraordinary force should have only as much combat power as it'll need to accomplish its mission.
In the case of our assault on the Strength and Wellness building, the ordinary force is Junya, Kodai, Junya's apprentice Luce, and a bunch of picked Ginto-Kai enforcers going straight in through the front entrance. The extraordinary force is Manako and I, going directly for the central source of spiritual power in the building. That should be where the horror is.
Before anyone goes in, Manako and I are going to draw a pair of large runes on the roof to mute the building. The normal procedure would be to put everyone to sleep, but with the way the local geomancy is acting, we don't have power for both, and we're less sure that sleep will work against the whispered cultists inside. We'll see if this actually works on people under the whisperer's control, but there's no point in not doing it.
According to the plans and drone and bird observations, the nexus point is a pool in the centre of the building's atrium, surrounded by greenery and decorative stone statues that the cult claims have great spiritual significance.
This is where I start to get a little worried about our quickly drawn assault plan, because I really don't think that placement makes sense from a geomantic perspective. It's possible that it's just a very deep well but I'm not sure that makes sense. The readings look good but just covering your eye is not the most sensitive instrument.
Still, the atrium entry is obvious. In order to avoid injury to anyone below, we've cut the glass atrium's roof open and removed it with telekinesis. Manako will cover me with her rifle, as I drop down into the atrium, find, engage and destroy the horror.
Junya's group are already engaged. I'm watching through a drone. Junya's is in first, a pollution mask across his face and Ginto-kai men spreading out around him with heavy sticks. A phalanx of beige and whtie uniformed cult security pour in on them as they breach the lobby. Junya moves like a snake, throwing a man over his shoulder, punching a pressure. The sleep rune doesn't seem to have done much, but then I didn't expect it to. We couldn't get that lucky. Even so, the cult guys can't stop the assault force. Kodai is beside him, knocking men down with heavy, fast blows.
The security pulls back and a man rears up from behind the counter with a double-barrelled shotgun. He swings it towards Junya and his mouth opens, spit flying as he shouts his hatred into the silence. Junya's eyes narrow, hand already extending as the gun comes online. The weapon jerks off target, then yanks against his body and discharges. The man's silent shout becoming a scream of pain as near-invisible wires whip around his body. He jerks like a puppet and his clothes shred, bloody lines appearing everywhere as the wire bites. Lifting the gun like a club, he charges towards the next security man, terrified eyes wide as the wire forces him into motion..
Junya has only got better with that demonic wire he carries. Apparently he hasn't figured out a way around the weapons ban. The demonic queen that powers it requires that anyone it hits who is not killed must suffer humiliation, the destruction of their clothing and outer seeming.
I should stop watching. The one-man I trust can be trusted to look after himself. I'm on the roof, the world silent around me. I tear my eyes away from the drone feed and look back at the atrium. The lid of glass and steel is cut through now, my spell having completed its work. Next to me, Manako checks a rune she's stenciled onto the bottom and gives me a thumbs up. That'll check any change in temperature or airflow giving us away to anyone below.
I grab the top and using telekinesis as much as the strength of my grid, shove to whole mass of glass and metal off to one side. I wouldn't want to drop it down there and hurt someone. That done all that remains is to smooth the lines of my outfit, and a final check on what's below. The outfit is almost all black with only the white fox mask with its red highlights for colour. I keep the mask up for now as I peer down into the dark.
Below the atrium is dark. There's only three spotlights falling on the pool. In their reflected light I can see scores of motionless figures, each standing stock-still by themselves. It would have been too much to assume that we could have taken them down like that, but hopefully, with the whispers cut off they won't be able to get new orders.
At the edge of the pool, and connected into it I can see a tentacle. A long wavy rootlet of strange and cryptic flesh dripped down into the water.
So, I was wrong. It's here.
Manako gives me the thumbs up and I pull her into a kiss, pull the mask down and step off. My safe fall enchantment is the same kind that armsmen use during an airdrop. The first part of the fall is actually accelerated, a terrifyingly fast plunge down, followed by a rapid deceleration.
It's at the start of that deceleration, just before it gets too severe, that I realize my instincts were right. Up close, seen from down here rather than up there, I see the tentacle for what it is. A fire hose that's been painted purple and redecorated with what look like growths.
The curious ambivalence I always feel at times like this comes. That feeling that maybe someone got me, but man, that was a good one.
The pool isn't the centre. This whole room is decoration.
Also an ambush.
I hit the ground, roll to kill my remaining momentum and come up into a wave of charging men. Not security, just ordinary cultists, but big and fit and left here to cover this entrance. Iron bars and mancatchers wielded by people who've obviously had at least some training to use them. I catch one of the sasumata before it can fully get me and slam it sideways into the first wielder, knocking him sideways. A man swings a metal bat, the blow hard enough to crack the floor tiles when I dodge to the side.
I'm in real trouble here. Eldritch power is pouring into the local geomancy and my limiters are working overtime to keep me alive and powered up at the same time.
Another man comes in with an iron bar, making short, powerful blows, too quick for me to dodge without overloading my geomantic limiter and it knocks me sprawling. A mancatcher comes down on me, then another, and I reach up and channel electricity down the handle past the insulation, knocking the wielder down.
Too late. Too slow. Men charge from all sides. I raise my hands to protect my head as a dozen blows come down on me.
It's fortunate that this isn't the first time I've done something like this and I made sure to give my girlfriend up above something a bit more dangerous than a rifle.
Having a partner just makes it all the easier.
Up above, Manako draws an activation rune on the case of a white and black object from my kit, then heaves it into space. It falls unnoticed, men contesting me in silence, busy as they swarm me from all directions, opponents flung backwards by one strike after another. The phantasm grenade airbursts and the room is filled with sputtering, silent light and shadow. The rune on my mask comes to life, shielding me from the effect and my vision blacks out for a moment, replaced a moment later by a strange, too bright false colour.
Men stagger around me, laughing, crying and twitching, all in ghastly silence as the illusions the grenade is spinning tear into their vision. One by one they collapse. One man falls into the pool and I pull him out so he doesn't drown. I check them perfunctory to make sure nobody is having a heart attack, then pull out my phone.
<<Thanks.>> I text to Manako.
<<Is it there?>>
<<No. I'm going to find it. Stay put and make sure nobody comes up behind me.>> That's less tactical advice than giving her a job she'll think is important so she doesn't try to come up behind me and get in trouble.
I move around to examine the pool. Even a decoy use of spiritual energy like this must come from somewhere. If I was the geomancer doing this, I'd do it by piping water up from underground and laying a bunch of geomantically reflective substances in the bottom of my fake pool. It looks like that's exactly what they've done here. I pull out my phone and check the building plans. Through one of the doors on the atrium's left there should be a way down into the basement. Once I'm down it's simple. Just follow the geomantic power through concrete tunnels and water damaged service ways. Down, down, down into the deep well of the city.
I meet resistance on the way. Small groups of men in overalls and hard hats, obviously given orders to repel before the silence hit. They come at me through the overlight passages, eyes glassy and fanatical. I take them down with speed and economy, moving onwards.
Junya texts. <<Situation?>> He'd consider it gauche to ever say a military style code like SITREP.
<<The atrium was a blind. I'm moving through the basement for the true source. You?>>
<<We've broken out of the lobby but they're swarming us. Ginto-kai has brought in more people to hold them off. I'm heading to your location.>>
If it was anyone else, I wouldn't wait, but Junya and I don't really have anything to prove to one another. I stop unsling the UMP and cover the corridor ahead. My phone vibrates, then vibrates again.
I put the gun up as Junya comes around the corner. His hands move in rapid sign language. "Anything?"
I sign back. "No, but I think it's just up ahead."
"Alright. You want to take lead?"
"Always."
"I doubt that."
Always! Always he makes me blush!
I move up on the door ahead. I've been looking at it while I'm waiting and I'm pretty sure this really is it. Not just because my grid is tingling to the waves of corrupted geomancy pouring out of it, but also because the structure of door. It's a hatchway like on a ship, implying there's water beyond.
We move up to the door, one on either side. It really is a watertight door like on a ship. No porthole. Junya shuts his eyes concentrates, then holds up 3 fingers, then makes the armsman hand sign for "monster".
I nod, take aim at the door. Junya grabs the handles, careful not to get in my line of fire and yanks it open. I throw a flash spell through then go myself.
I dive in through the door into a mostly bare natural cavern. There's pipes on the wall, taking water from the pool upward. On either side of the pool, a policeman is aiming his revolver at the door. There's muzzle flashes but I don't get to hear the bullets as they pass over me. There's just the vibration of the UMP's recoil as I cut it across them both. The rounds knock them down, jerking with the stun.
Junya leaps over me as tentacles lash out of the shadows. The thing is at the far end of the pool, tendrils writhing in the water. Wire and flesh meet, and purple fluid sprays as wire wins the battle. I put the creature in my gun's sights, override the runes that reduce lethality and kick all the power I can down the boosters. The gun vibrates against my shoulder and I hold the barrel down with all my strength and fire sustained burst.
The mass of the creature cores out and splatters as my bullets tear through it. I drop the mag, changing it with only a small difficulty then aim at the deflating thing.
Seems pretty dead. No sign of regeneration.
Junya touches my arm and points. Behind the ruined thing another man is lying. He's richly clad in white robes that suggest those of a Buddhist monk or a Christian priest, without being too similar to either. He's shaking with fear, trying to speak, though he can't in the silence.
I move forward towards him, gun ready, Junya at my side. Junya pokes the thing on the way past, concentrates, and is apparently satisfied, gives me the thumbs up. I cut the silence off and sound returns.
For a moment I think it didn't work. The man's mouth is moving but no sounds are coming out. Then I see his throat bulging. His eyes go wide and then his head snaps to the sound. There's a horrible sound of breaking bone and his jaw starts to hinge. Something wormlike and cancerous starts to crawl its way out.
I raise the gun, then think better of it. It's not moving fast and seems almost sluggish. If we're going to fight these things, then maybe one to study wouldn't be a bad idea. "Can you catch it?"
Junya's wire snaps out, grabbing the thing and yanking it up amid a forest of wires. He pulls out a paper box and dumps the worm inside, then shuts it and makes it vanish, the wire coiling back into his sleeve. "Well, that's done then. Let's get going before any of them wake up."
"Do you think they'll remember anything?"
"It would be so much simpler if they didn't."
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- Location
- a place
For someone so cool she can such a dork and i'm 100% here for it.
InterstellarHobo
Cosmic Vagrant
- Location
- No Fixed Planetary System
I was too busy to comment properly at the time, but I really enjoyed the previous update.
The frogman was a delightfully odious smuglord, and Nozomi's contingencies going off made for a very satisfying reversal of fates, Manako showed off her budding competance, and there was something deeply amusing about Nozomi picking out the perfect outfit for an interrogation.
Also, Manako and Nozomi's relationship is such a terrible idea on so many levels, and it feels like they both know it, but it's impossible not to root for them anyways.
This chapter I wasn't such a fan of. Maybe it was reading while tired, but I had trouble following what was happening, or why Nozomi was here in the first place.
I'm gonna give it a second read tomorrow.
Unrelatedly, Manako talking about guns sounds almost exactly the same as Nozomi talking about clothes. It's great.
The frogman was a delightfully odious smuglord, and Nozomi's contingencies going off made for a very satisfying reversal of fates, Manako showed off her budding competance, and there was something deeply amusing about Nozomi picking out the perfect outfit for an interrogation.
Also, Manako and Nozomi's relationship is such a terrible idea on so many levels, and it feels like they both know it, but it's impossible not to root for them anyways.
This chapter I wasn't such a fan of. Maybe it was reading while tired, but I had trouble following what was happening, or why Nozomi was here in the first place.
I'm gonna give it a second read tomorrow.
Unrelatedly, Manako talking about guns sounds almost exactly the same as Nozomi talking about clothes. It's great.
Spectrum
Tell me a secret~
- Location
- Behind you~
There are worse personality flashpoints than getting pissed off when someone consistently manipulates you to do things.
That's a very...Bronze Age point of view. I dunno, I don't believe in sins of the father.
Money -really- isn't an issue for her. :3
Of course she can, she's a disaster lesb--bisexual. ...hmm, doesn't have the same effect. Disaster (mostly) lesbian?
missing space
app
Ha...a descendant of the Female Landlord?
Just remarking that there's inconsistencies in the usage of trailing periods in the last sentence of each message through the app
Wao, a generous Johnson. Those guys should really second guess the job.
let's
D'aww. Who knows maybe Manako will be a positive influence on her instead of her being a huge negative influence on Manako. ;P
Wasn't it an 'or' question before? ;P
Should this be bought?
Just to snark a bit--leaving aside Nozomi's hilarious pretentiousness, why are they going with the brute approach anyway? Given everything else depicted about her kit and capabilities, I have to believe that Nozomi could easily instead do a gas/ventilation attack. Sure she has reason to believe a sleep spell won't work, but if physical sleep gas wouldn't work then other physical measures were also hosed.
extra is/unneeded 's
pressure point, presumably
...you have to be some kinda tryhard to seek out or use a queen like that as your weapon power source.
Er...how is she stenciling something on the bottom of the thing they haven't removed yet?
needs some commas
Sustained burst is a bit of an oxymoron, especially given she's just magdumping...
This was a little weird to parse. Head snapping to sounds is usually for when you hear something and your head/line of sight snaps to it, not what happened here.
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Gas is generally a hard way to breach a building because it'll kill a lot of people in the building. See the Moscow Theatre siege for instance.
Spectrum
Tell me a secret~
- Location
- Behind you~
The assumption is that it's future tech knockout gas, not like just tear gas or some shit ('cause that's pointless).
- Pronouns
- She/Her
IMHO even in future tech, you're going to have a lot of problems due to bodyweight etc.
Spectrum
Tell me a secret~
- Location
- Behind you~
What's the point of future tech (with a little magic assistance potentially) if you don't get to handweave reality lol : (
- Pronouns
- She/Her
I have a little writers block and a lot of election stuff going on so the update has got a bit delayed, sorry all.
Edit: It's possible I'm going to write a new idea a little just to stay sane over the next few days but I will have another update shortly.
Edit: It's possible I'm going to write a new idea a little just to stay sane over the next few days but I will have another update shortly.
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Tayta Malikai
200% Space Whale
- Location
- Australia
Okay I finally finished moving house, let's see what's going on in this thread.
We're assaulting some place now. I don't remember how or why we got here but dang this is pretty cool. This story was muddling for a bit but it's gotten more awesome over the past few updates!
We're assaulting some place now. I don't remember how or why we got here but dang this is pretty cool. This story was muddling for a bit but it's gotten more awesome over the past few updates!
I'm a big fan of how the romance developed in this story: somewhat unexpectedly and also somewhat casually. Sometimes it's a little embarrassing but it's also not that big of a deal.
I found this pretty funny. It's a good example of Nozomi's clipped and sardonic style.
A callback to the last time Manako came up behind Nozomi and got her in trouble, I see.
Chapter 2-6: Discussions
- Pronouns
- She/Her
It's spooky, walking out of the quiet building with an alien mind parasite in a paper bag. The silence effect is down, but the cultists are all down, slumped into what seems like sleep. I check one on the way past. He's in deep, eyes moving under his eyelids. "Should I call someone for this?"
"No." Junya says. "There's too many people here. Let your mage Compliance and the Association secret keepers blame this on a gas leak. We've done our job, let them do theirs."
I reload the UMP and stick it back into its holster under my arm. "I just don't want it to come back on me with Compliance. I suspect at least some of them are involved in a plot of this magnitude, and well, I'm not their favourite person on my best day. I have responsibilities now."
Junya's smile quirks up. "Your new girlfriend. The one who sneaked up on you."
"She's really very sneaky." I rub the back of my neck. "I still can't believe that she managed it really. This all feels kind of ridiculous. One moment I'm floating between a bunch of people who flirting with but not going out with, then I have a girlfriend. I don't even know whether she's even okay with all the other people who are interested in me."
Suddenly he's very close, not quite kabedoning me but definitely in front, in my personal space.
"And what about you Nozomi? What do you want?"
I don't blush or fluster because I've been expecting this for a while. "I like being flirted with by attractive older men, but I think I like having a girlfriend more."
He laughs, then steps back and falls back in beside me. "I always thought it'd be Aratani who'd steal you away."
"Funny. I always thought you'd get together and gang up on me."
"Interesting idea, but I don't think we ever could. He's far too respectable for me. Besides, I already have an important fiance."
We arrive at the ground floor of the building. Ginto-kai troops are cleaning up around the cultists. I do a quick sweep of the atrium for any casings that dropped down from above, find and pocket a couple then direct the clean up crew down into the basement. I scattered about twenty casings around down there, and frankly I don't want to have to be the one to pick them up when they have to retrieve the corpses from down their anyway.
We step outside, and then return to the command post, where Manako is just coming in from the roof. "Everyone alright?" I give her a hug.
"Yes. I picked up all my brass." She shows a handfull of bullet casings. "I need to go check the hall. Some of it fell down."
"Here." I hand her back the spent cartridges.
"Nozomi." Junya waves me over to where Kodai is standing with his lieutenants. I step into the circle. "Do you have any idea how many people infested with those creatures there are? And in what positions?"
"So far, no. I was hoping that studying the one we found might give us some clues." I push my hair back, which is actually a signal between Junya and I meaning "I need to talk to you privately." He nods, says something to Kodai, who goes back to directing things. Junya and I step into the corridor.
"I found reference to that thing in one of the books that I retrieved from the library raid."
Junya's mouth quirks. "The black one?"
"Yeah." I lean on the wall and then the exhaustion of the raid and the day and everything hits me and I slide down it. "I was thinking-- this is twisted, but I was thinking maybe Aratani has played me all the long the line, Maybe he knew that this was going on, maybe he's even the one who tipped me about that archive. He probably has some card he can play in reserve to get the black book from me, and in the mean time, I deal with his mess without him having to get dirty."
"You're right, that is twisted." Junya squads beside me. "You worry too much about Aratani."
"I hate him." I pull my mask off and look at it. "He's the one person who can ever play me."
Junya reaches out and pats me on the top of the head. "Everyone gets played sometimes Nozomi. The reason he always beats you is because he's managed to make you play yourself."
I pinch the bridge of my nose and then take a deep breath. "Can you bring Kodai-san to a meeting? I'm going to get in touch with Reijou and her group as well. I've got two public safety officials who might know something. I want to try to get one of these people alive. Before they hatch. Maybe we can question them about who the others are."
"Alright." He hands me the paper package. "Take this, go home. Deal with it, and then let's actually sort this out. We need to do that, even if it's Aratani's game." He gets up and offers me a hand. I take it and let him pull me to my feet. "Maybe you can come up with a way to get something you want out of it as well. More than just living through the misfortune."
I nod and heft the package. "I'll call you when I'm ready."
Alice is waiting when I get home, standing in my entry hall with her hands in the pockets of her white coat. "I've got them both sleeping. It looks like that's most of what the brain needs to throw this stuff off." Her eyes fall to the paper package and she raises her glasses. "What have you got there?"
"It's mine." I lift it out of her way quickly. "It's a parasite, but I want first crack at it."
"Oh you big baby. We can share!"
I need to improvise here. I don't want Alice to know what I have. "Okay fine! You go to my first floor lab. The readouts will come out there. I'm going to stow this in containment."
"Jealous of your containment lab are you? You plan to keep me in there one day hmm?"
"Maybe I do. Unfortunately, it'd be a little unethical, as I'm your patient~"
She sputters. I glance at Manako to see how she's taking it but she's busy adjusting her rifle. I touch her on the shoulder and she jumps, then comes with me. "How was your first fight?"
"Scary." She takes a deep breath. "I didn't expect it to be so difficult given I wasn't the one in danger. I-- well I was glad it was you fighting down their not me. Then I felt guilty about that. It was awful."
"Combat is a bit like that." I pull her into a hug. "It's very memorable. Adrenaline." I take her hand. "If you want to talk about it, then we can sit down later."
"Alright." She squeezes my hand. "I want to go clean my rifle. You should always look after your rifle after you fire."
"Can I give you my UMP as well." I take it out and hand it over.
"Oh. Sure. Though you really should clean your own guns!"
"I have to dissect this slug thing." I wave as we reach the arms room. "See you soon."
Manako waves, then almost drops the guns, and manages to right herself before stepping inside. Finally I manage to get downstairs, and place the package inside a containment hex. This lab is near the one I used to contain my previous prisoner, and quite different in aspect from the above ground house. No carefully painted walls here. My underground work spaces are clean and sterile, like a hospital or a morgue. A place where my experiments won't be disturbed. This containment lab has a workbench with a platinum containment hex on it laid out so it can be electrified or spun with laser light if desired. Cyclopian scientific equipment is placed around it at intervals, looking in at the hex, and then various physical and magical baffles can be lowered over it.
After I've made sure the wards are fully up and all the various instruments in the room are set up properly, I lower the baffles and speak a burn word which dissolves the creatures prison. It rises off of the desk in the hex, twitching as it tries to get free. "You seeing this Alice."
"Okay." Alice's voice says. "I have good telemetry."
I check the repeater screen which is showing various readouts on the creature within. It's almost hollow, like a set of lungs. Alice begins to talk to herself about its biology but I am busy at the vault. I open the secure shelves, pull out the black book and search through it for a while. Since I found the name I've been searching the rest of my collection for references to the The Bringer of Doors. There's frustratingly little. Then again apparently this is a being that does not exist.
"It seems like it's meant to link to other creatures." Alice says. "There's a softening of space around it, information is going back and forth, but apparently to nowhere." A pause. "It's growing fast too. The hex is keeping it in check but don't take it out. It'll grow into one of those things in short order if it has food. I don't understand how it stayed in someone's throat without killing them a long time ago if it's like this."
"Could we track it to where it's going?"
"If it was going somewhere. At this point it doesn't seem to be."
I think back to Reijou's words earlier. What did it say? "House, tell me what Reijou said the creature said to her."
Reijou's voice fills the air. Repeating the creature's warning warning about twisting the world plays. But that's not what I pay attention to. It's the word "Parent."
"Alice, could the spacial link have been keeping it from growing?"
"Possibly."
Annoyingly, given the arcane formula in the black book if I could get one that was connected, then it would be simple to find all the others. Time to try something else. I set a search spell going on the black book. Not looking anymore for the Bringer of Doors, but for the realm of a thousand voices.
There is a segment.
"In the realm of a thousand voices there is no different between a word and a thought, for each are equally compelling." That's simple enough. I translate the next part. "There is no difference between word and speaker. No difference between to describe and to be."
"Each voice is spoken by a different mouth, but each is unified by the doors. Woe to foes who attempt to close the doors. Woe to those who seek to separate the voices, for when seperated, a thousand voices may become a thousand thousand. For each word is a world, and each mouth may speak a thousand words!"
That's certainly first order cryptic bullshit, but let's compare it to what we have so far. We know it's spatially linked to other creatures. We know if those links drop, it seems to grow really fast.
Oh gods.
It's not a realm of a thousand voices. The realm is a thousand voices. This thing isn't just a creature, it's the building block of an alien realm.
Does that track? Could they be more easily thought of as just an alien hive mind? I haven't seen any of them do anything to the world yet, just to a human mind.
But it said it to Reijou. My parent will twist the world. Words are constituent. The word and the world as one.
I look away from the book and shake my head. I'm suddenly not sure if this rush of strange logic was my thought, or that of the books. I'm not sure if my own logic really makes sense but I'm set into the idea that something terrifying will happen if I don't do anything.
Alice, gives me the thumbs and I yank the sleep runes off both public safety official's foreheads. The two blink, eyes clouding for a moment, then come around, looking up at me.
"Where am I?" Tanigawa winces. Beside her, the Detective rubs her eyes.
"At my home in Den-en-chōfu." I sit down opposite. "These are some of my associates. Exorcists."
Reijou, the serious boy who is her bodyguard and a slightly cruel but very handsome creature I'm almost certain is not entirely mortal sit on one sofa, Junya and Kodai Ryu on the other. Reijou is looking intensely nervous. I know the feeling. No matter how many times you fight the supernatural, the pressure of social expectations, of authority, is harder. If you're fighting a monster you just have to kill it. That's not usually an option with public officials, or at least not a good one.
Manako sits in an armchair, also nervous but fascinated, while Alice seems unbothered. The Doctor moves over and peers into their eyes. "I'm a doctor. Is there any pain or discomfort?" She kneels next to Yoshitaka, who seems to be having a worse reaction.
"No. I just feel like I've slept really heavily." Yoshitaka winces.
"What's the last thing you remember?"
"My phone rang. It was a public safety number so I accepted it, and the voice on the other end sounded so good." Yoshitaka said.
Tanigawa doesn't say anything for a moment then. "I went into my office and found that fat man waiting for me. What happened to him?"
"He's dead. For now at least." I stretch out.
"That's good at least." Tanigawa leans back. "Are we okay doctor?"
"No permanent damage," Alice says. "You've been subjected to a fascinating process but it doesn't seem to be much different from normal mind control in its basic effects."
"Would you like some coffee? Or drinking chocolate?" I ask. I'm drawing this out a bit, letting the discomfort of a crowded but silent room make them want to answer more.
"Coffee," Tanigawa says. The detective nods. A shadow maid comes in with a coffee pot and two cups on a silver tray.
"When did you first realize that public safety had been infiltrated?" I ask after both have taken a sip.
Tanigawa sighs and looks at the table. "How do you know I even knew?"
"I worked it out a little while ago. You mostly work with Aratani and he recommended me, but I can't imagine you actually using a schoolgirl by choice. The Japanese state has its own mages. If you didn't know what was happening you'd have thanked me for my information and gone to find them instead."
"I didn't know until I found that man in my office." Tanigawa said.
"But you suspected enough that you wanted to call on me, not on Japanese state resources?"
"Yes."
"Do you know who in public safety is running point for the opposition?"
She looks at me, angry. Public safety's internal traumas are not what she wants to give up, until I think I'm going to need to prompt her. "I think it's my Boss's Boss, Director Tsutsui of the special section."
Tsutsui Haruto is not quite what I expected. Every other one of these people has been in some way or another debauched, in some way or another showing the evidence of fine living. The Director of Public Safety's special section, in charge of all of the bits of that vast organization that don't fit into the rest, seems not to enjoy his power very much. He lives in a fine but small house, out in the suburbs where the countryside starts to leak in, with a wife who is younger than him but not really glamourous seeming. He's thin, skeletal, and shows no outward sign of either heaving eating or drug use.
The bodyguards though, that marks him out as something special. Most guys of his rank will have some bodyguards with them. His close protection detail is four ministry men and one personal hire, all experts in a variety of martial arts. Not a particularly large force, though they're all extremely good.
No, the strange thing is the counter-assault teams, two whole vehicles full of armed men that move in seemingly random patterns around the director when he's moving that gives him away as abnormal. This is the kind of protection the prime minister might get, if there was a specific threat to him.
Truth is I'm growing increasingly sure this is a trap.
I'm watching his house right now, moving along the street, just a young girl, a college student or something. Well dressed, black coat, black skirt, black tights, a white scarf and bright headphones. Just another girl having fun in spring in Tokyo, walking along the suburban streets to some bus stop or other.
Encrypted voice message: "Two rats, left side of the street, grey Toyota."
"Seen."
Another vehicle, not the CAT, is hanging out across with the hood up, faking an engine fault, two men at the front pretending to check it out while they watch the house, the director and the pedestrians. Are they bodyguards or some kind of too obvious surveillance team.
"Hey Miss." One of them steps into my way. I can feel that someone else is out behind me.
I project calm, even though my heart thumps. I pretend not to hear, then pull my headphones off, music triggering as they're removed. "Yes?"
"Can you show me some ID? You look pretty young." He pulls out a police ID. Pretending like he's koban, even though he's obviously way to big, too muscular. I bet he does sumo.
Ah. They're not here for him. They're here for me.
I make no sudden moves. Just pretend to be a schoolgirl. They apparently aren't sure, or they would have grabbed me. I know there's a guy behind me, waiting for me to make a sudden move, so I make a show of surprise and pull my ID out of my pocket.
It's fake of course. A Tokyo University student ID, listing me as nineteen years old, and show it to him. He inspects the card, then nods to himself and pockets it. "Would you please accompany us?" Not saying the name on the card. It's a good forgery so it should have passed. Still. I am thinking I'm got. Who are these guys?
"Am I under arrest?" Fight? Run? Lie?
A hand reaches up from behind and grabs my wig, yanking hard. I take a deep breath as the cap below somehow unravels and my hair spills free. "Yes Nishifune-san. You are under arrest."
"Compliance, are you?" No point in starting a fight with them on a public street. "Show me your sigil." The man in front of me raises another ID, this one with a complex flickering symbol on it. Compliance. "What am I charged with?"
"Conspiracy to kidnap a protected person. Raise your hands."
I lift my hands, let him put the cuffs on comfortably. "You've been handcuffed before."
"I mostly prefer to be doing the handcuffing but I've been known to indulge." There's a hex bound into the cuffs, a powerful one, designed to disrupt any magic I might caste, especially by grounding local geomancy.
The man pushes me into the back of the car as his friend closes the hood. The one behind, another big beefy fellow gets in beside me, still holding my wig. The one who stopped me gets in to drive while the third one gets on in the other side, sandwiching me between them. They belt in, and secure my seatbelt.
The question now is, do they plan to kill me?
The car peels away from the curb. "It would go much easier for you if you'd just confess now." says the talkative one.
"I'm not saying a thing without a lawyer and my teacher's being informed."
The man with his hands free punches me in the stomach. It knocks the wind out of me. "I don't think you really understand the situation." says the one in the front. We're moving out of town, away from the freeway and away from town.
"I think I understand it pretty well."
The fist comes again. I cough. We drive in silence for a while, turn onto a secondary road.
"Take her jacket off." The driver orders. "She'll have armour in it. It was in the brief."
"But she has cuffs on." the guy hitting me protests.
"Just unbutton it."
Everything is so seat of the pants with this. I feel a sudden flash of pity for the men who are about to beat on me. They're also flying blind. Also doing extremely dangerous emergency stuff. The minion with my wig drops it on his lap then pulls up my arms and the other starts to unbutton my jacket.
"I don't want to tell you your jobs, but you're compliance agents right? If you're going to torture me why are you punching me, not putting a symbol of pain onto me or something."
"The secret is we want you to confess darling." The driver turns off. "If we use magic, it'll show up on later scans. How many fights have you been in lately? I bet you can't prove where you got another set of bruises. We're going to beat a confession out of you, and you'll go to jail. Maybe you can get out of it eventually, but not fast enough to prevent us stabilizing the situation."
"You're not really used to this are you?" The hitter has my jacket open and then punches me hard. I cough harder. It hurts much worse without the armour but I'm not exactly unused to pain. "What do you usually do for Compliance? Security I'll bet. Or catching normal criminals for the Japanese state."
"Shut the fuck up!" The hitter plants his fist in my stomach again, deep this time. I cough, and actually almost puke, and spit up a mass of blood onto the car interior.
"Fuck!" the driver says. "Fuck! Not until we're out of the--"
A large white van which has been coming up behind the car suddenly swings wide and pulls hard across its path. The driver screams something and hits the break but can't stop in time and the car stops, airbags slamming out in the front.
There's a sudden something a feeling of unknowable pour ripping the air and all three men convulse, screaming loudly for a moment then twitching to a stop, barely moving. The driver gropes for the glove compartment, managing to get it open on the third try and gets his hand on the big pistol within.
He's too late though. A figure has stepped out of the van and is levelling a rifle at him. Her face is masked, but her aim is steady.
The man sees her, hand still on the gun and his eyes go wide. Slowly he starts to take his hand off the automatic and raise it. She shoots him twice, walking around left to shoot the other man, then the third man as he bails out of the car and tries to run. The rifle makes no sound but each round glows red as it hits a its target.
The man in the front twitches, jerking in pain.
I lean forward and retrieve the keys to his cuffs. "I don't think that my girlfriend appreciated you beating on me meat boy."
I get out carefully. Reijou, who's power I assume mana crashed the three agents, both her guys, and a couple of Ginto-kai men. "How are we doing on time?" I ask.
"Road's blocked up behind us. A couple of cops we know and a spell that the Cleaner left." says one of the Ginto-Kai men. "We've got time to load these guys up."
"Alright, we'll take them with us. Get them loaded." I make no move to help.
"Are you alright?" Manako asks.
"Got a healing injector?" She hands me one and I apply it, the pain eases away. With any luck the kidnap team will have the location we need, but the truth is I doubt it. The next part of the extraction is up to Junya.
"No." Junya says. "There's too many people here. Let your mage Compliance and the Association secret keepers blame this on a gas leak. We've done our job, let them do theirs."
I reload the UMP and stick it back into its holster under my arm. "I just don't want it to come back on me with Compliance. I suspect at least some of them are involved in a plot of this magnitude, and well, I'm not their favourite person on my best day. I have responsibilities now."
Junya's smile quirks up. "Your new girlfriend. The one who sneaked up on you."
"She's really very sneaky." I rub the back of my neck. "I still can't believe that she managed it really. This all feels kind of ridiculous. One moment I'm floating between a bunch of people who flirting with but not going out with, then I have a girlfriend. I don't even know whether she's even okay with all the other people who are interested in me."
Suddenly he's very close, not quite kabedoning me but definitely in front, in my personal space.
"And what about you Nozomi? What do you want?"
I don't blush or fluster because I've been expecting this for a while. "I like being flirted with by attractive older men, but I think I like having a girlfriend more."
He laughs, then steps back and falls back in beside me. "I always thought it'd be Aratani who'd steal you away."
"Funny. I always thought you'd get together and gang up on me."
"Interesting idea, but I don't think we ever could. He's far too respectable for me. Besides, I already have an important fiance."
We arrive at the ground floor of the building. Ginto-kai troops are cleaning up around the cultists. I do a quick sweep of the atrium for any casings that dropped down from above, find and pocket a couple then direct the clean up crew down into the basement. I scattered about twenty casings around down there, and frankly I don't want to have to be the one to pick them up when they have to retrieve the corpses from down their anyway.
We step outside, and then return to the command post, where Manako is just coming in from the roof. "Everyone alright?" I give her a hug.
"Yes. I picked up all my brass." She shows a handfull of bullet casings. "I need to go check the hall. Some of it fell down."
"Here." I hand her back the spent cartridges.
"Nozomi." Junya waves me over to where Kodai is standing with his lieutenants. I step into the circle. "Do you have any idea how many people infested with those creatures there are? And in what positions?"
"So far, no. I was hoping that studying the one we found might give us some clues." I push my hair back, which is actually a signal between Junya and I meaning "I need to talk to you privately." He nods, says something to Kodai, who goes back to directing things. Junya and I step into the corridor.
"I found reference to that thing in one of the books that I retrieved from the library raid."
Junya's mouth quirks. "The black one?"
"Yeah." I lean on the wall and then the exhaustion of the raid and the day and everything hits me and I slide down it. "I was thinking-- this is twisted, but I was thinking maybe Aratani has played me all the long the line, Maybe he knew that this was going on, maybe he's even the one who tipped me about that archive. He probably has some card he can play in reserve to get the black book from me, and in the mean time, I deal with his mess without him having to get dirty."
"You're right, that is twisted." Junya squads beside me. "You worry too much about Aratani."
"I hate him." I pull my mask off and look at it. "He's the one person who can ever play me."
Junya reaches out and pats me on the top of the head. "Everyone gets played sometimes Nozomi. The reason he always beats you is because he's managed to make you play yourself."
I pinch the bridge of my nose and then take a deep breath. "Can you bring Kodai-san to a meeting? I'm going to get in touch with Reijou and her group as well. I've got two public safety officials who might know something. I want to try to get one of these people alive. Before they hatch. Maybe we can question them about who the others are."
"Alright." He hands me the paper package. "Take this, go home. Deal with it, and then let's actually sort this out. We need to do that, even if it's Aratani's game." He gets up and offers me a hand. I take it and let him pull me to my feet. "Maybe you can come up with a way to get something you want out of it as well. More than just living through the misfortune."
I nod and heft the package. "I'll call you when I'm ready."
#
Alice is waiting when I get home, standing in my entry hall with her hands in the pockets of her white coat. "I've got them both sleeping. It looks like that's most of what the brain needs to throw this stuff off." Her eyes fall to the paper package and she raises her glasses. "What have you got there?"
"It's mine." I lift it out of her way quickly. "It's a parasite, but I want first crack at it."
"Oh you big baby. We can share!"
I need to improvise here. I don't want Alice to know what I have. "Okay fine! You go to my first floor lab. The readouts will come out there. I'm going to stow this in containment."
"Jealous of your containment lab are you? You plan to keep me in there one day hmm?"
"Maybe I do. Unfortunately, it'd be a little unethical, as I'm your patient~"
She sputters. I glance at Manako to see how she's taking it but she's busy adjusting her rifle. I touch her on the shoulder and she jumps, then comes with me. "How was your first fight?"
"Scary." She takes a deep breath. "I didn't expect it to be so difficult given I wasn't the one in danger. I-- well I was glad it was you fighting down their not me. Then I felt guilty about that. It was awful."
"Combat is a bit like that." I pull her into a hug. "It's very memorable. Adrenaline." I take her hand. "If you want to talk about it, then we can sit down later."
"Alright." She squeezes my hand. "I want to go clean my rifle. You should always look after your rifle after you fire."
"Can I give you my UMP as well." I take it out and hand it over.
"Oh. Sure. Though you really should clean your own guns!"
"I have to dissect this slug thing." I wave as we reach the arms room. "See you soon."
Manako waves, then almost drops the guns, and manages to right herself before stepping inside. Finally I manage to get downstairs, and place the package inside a containment hex. This lab is near the one I used to contain my previous prisoner, and quite different in aspect from the above ground house. No carefully painted walls here. My underground work spaces are clean and sterile, like a hospital or a morgue. A place where my experiments won't be disturbed. This containment lab has a workbench with a platinum containment hex on it laid out so it can be electrified or spun with laser light if desired. Cyclopian scientific equipment is placed around it at intervals, looking in at the hex, and then various physical and magical baffles can be lowered over it.
After I've made sure the wards are fully up and all the various instruments in the room are set up properly, I lower the baffles and speak a burn word which dissolves the creatures prison. It rises off of the desk in the hex, twitching as it tries to get free. "You seeing this Alice."
"Okay." Alice's voice says. "I have good telemetry."
I check the repeater screen which is showing various readouts on the creature within. It's almost hollow, like a set of lungs. Alice begins to talk to herself about its biology but I am busy at the vault. I open the secure shelves, pull out the black book and search through it for a while. Since I found the name I've been searching the rest of my collection for references to the The Bringer of Doors. There's frustratingly little. Then again apparently this is a being that does not exist.
"It seems like it's meant to link to other creatures." Alice says. "There's a softening of space around it, information is going back and forth, but apparently to nowhere." A pause. "It's growing fast too. The hex is keeping it in check but don't take it out. It'll grow into one of those things in short order if it has food. I don't understand how it stayed in someone's throat without killing them a long time ago if it's like this."
"Could we track it to where it's going?"
"If it was going somewhere. At this point it doesn't seem to be."
I think back to Reijou's words earlier. What did it say? "House, tell me what Reijou said the creature said to her."
Reijou's voice fills the air. Repeating the creature's warning warning about twisting the world plays. But that's not what I pay attention to. It's the word "Parent."
"Alice, could the spacial link have been keeping it from growing?"
"Possibly."
Annoyingly, given the arcane formula in the black book if I could get one that was connected, then it would be simple to find all the others. Time to try something else. I set a search spell going on the black book. Not looking anymore for the Bringer of Doors, but for the realm of a thousand voices.
There is a segment.
"In the realm of a thousand voices there is no different between a word and a thought, for each are equally compelling." That's simple enough. I translate the next part. "There is no difference between word and speaker. No difference between to describe and to be."
"Each voice is spoken by a different mouth, but each is unified by the doors. Woe to foes who attempt to close the doors. Woe to those who seek to separate the voices, for when seperated, a thousand voices may become a thousand thousand. For each word is a world, and each mouth may speak a thousand words!"
That's certainly first order cryptic bullshit, but let's compare it to what we have so far. We know it's spatially linked to other creatures. We know if those links drop, it seems to grow really fast.
Oh gods.
It's not a realm of a thousand voices. The realm is a thousand voices. This thing isn't just a creature, it's the building block of an alien realm.
Does that track? Could they be more easily thought of as just an alien hive mind? I haven't seen any of them do anything to the world yet, just to a human mind.
But it said it to Reijou. My parent will twist the world. Words are constituent. The word and the world as one.
I look away from the book and shake my head. I'm suddenly not sure if this rush of strange logic was my thought, or that of the books. I'm not sure if my own logic really makes sense but I'm set into the idea that something terrifying will happen if I don't do anything.
#
Alice, gives me the thumbs and I yank the sleep runes off both public safety official's foreheads. The two blink, eyes clouding for a moment, then come around, looking up at me.
"Where am I?" Tanigawa winces. Beside her, the Detective rubs her eyes.
"At my home in Den-en-chōfu." I sit down opposite. "These are some of my associates. Exorcists."
Reijou, the serious boy who is her bodyguard and a slightly cruel but very handsome creature I'm almost certain is not entirely mortal sit on one sofa, Junya and Kodai Ryu on the other. Reijou is looking intensely nervous. I know the feeling. No matter how many times you fight the supernatural, the pressure of social expectations, of authority, is harder. If you're fighting a monster you just have to kill it. That's not usually an option with public officials, or at least not a good one.
Manako sits in an armchair, also nervous but fascinated, while Alice seems unbothered. The Doctor moves over and peers into their eyes. "I'm a doctor. Is there any pain or discomfort?" She kneels next to Yoshitaka, who seems to be having a worse reaction.
"No. I just feel like I've slept really heavily." Yoshitaka winces.
"What's the last thing you remember?"
"My phone rang. It was a public safety number so I accepted it, and the voice on the other end sounded so good." Yoshitaka said.
Tanigawa doesn't say anything for a moment then. "I went into my office and found that fat man waiting for me. What happened to him?"
"He's dead. For now at least." I stretch out.
"That's good at least." Tanigawa leans back. "Are we okay doctor?"
"No permanent damage," Alice says. "You've been subjected to a fascinating process but it doesn't seem to be much different from normal mind control in its basic effects."
"Would you like some coffee? Or drinking chocolate?" I ask. I'm drawing this out a bit, letting the discomfort of a crowded but silent room make them want to answer more.
"Coffee," Tanigawa says. The detective nods. A shadow maid comes in with a coffee pot and two cups on a silver tray.
"When did you first realize that public safety had been infiltrated?" I ask after both have taken a sip.
Tanigawa sighs and looks at the table. "How do you know I even knew?"
"I worked it out a little while ago. You mostly work with Aratani and he recommended me, but I can't imagine you actually using a schoolgirl by choice. The Japanese state has its own mages. If you didn't know what was happening you'd have thanked me for my information and gone to find them instead."
"I didn't know until I found that man in my office." Tanigawa said.
"But you suspected enough that you wanted to call on me, not on Japanese state resources?"
"Yes."
"Do you know who in public safety is running point for the opposition?"
She looks at me, angry. Public safety's internal traumas are not what she wants to give up, until I think I'm going to need to prompt her. "I think it's my Boss's Boss, Director Tsutsui of the special section."
#
Tsutsui Haruto is not quite what I expected. Every other one of these people has been in some way or another debauched, in some way or another showing the evidence of fine living. The Director of Public Safety's special section, in charge of all of the bits of that vast organization that don't fit into the rest, seems not to enjoy his power very much. He lives in a fine but small house, out in the suburbs where the countryside starts to leak in, with a wife who is younger than him but not really glamourous seeming. He's thin, skeletal, and shows no outward sign of either heaving eating or drug use.
The bodyguards though, that marks him out as something special. Most guys of his rank will have some bodyguards with them. His close protection detail is four ministry men and one personal hire, all experts in a variety of martial arts. Not a particularly large force, though they're all extremely good.
No, the strange thing is the counter-assault teams, two whole vehicles full of armed men that move in seemingly random patterns around the director when he's moving that gives him away as abnormal. This is the kind of protection the prime minister might get, if there was a specific threat to him.
Truth is I'm growing increasingly sure this is a trap.
I'm watching his house right now, moving along the street, just a young girl, a college student or something. Well dressed, black coat, black skirt, black tights, a white scarf and bright headphones. Just another girl having fun in spring in Tokyo, walking along the suburban streets to some bus stop or other.
Encrypted voice message: "Two rats, left side of the street, grey Toyota."
"Seen."
Another vehicle, not the CAT, is hanging out across with the hood up, faking an engine fault, two men at the front pretending to check it out while they watch the house, the director and the pedestrians. Are they bodyguards or some kind of too obvious surveillance team.
"Hey Miss." One of them steps into my way. I can feel that someone else is out behind me.
I project calm, even though my heart thumps. I pretend not to hear, then pull my headphones off, music triggering as they're removed. "Yes?"
"Can you show me some ID? You look pretty young." He pulls out a police ID. Pretending like he's koban, even though he's obviously way to big, too muscular. I bet he does sumo.
Ah. They're not here for him. They're here for me.
I make no sudden moves. Just pretend to be a schoolgirl. They apparently aren't sure, or they would have grabbed me. I know there's a guy behind me, waiting for me to make a sudden move, so I make a show of surprise and pull my ID out of my pocket.
It's fake of course. A Tokyo University student ID, listing me as nineteen years old, and show it to him. He inspects the card, then nods to himself and pockets it. "Would you please accompany us?" Not saying the name on the card. It's a good forgery so it should have passed. Still. I am thinking I'm got. Who are these guys?
"Am I under arrest?" Fight? Run? Lie?
A hand reaches up from behind and grabs my wig, yanking hard. I take a deep breath as the cap below somehow unravels and my hair spills free. "Yes Nishifune-san. You are under arrest."
"Compliance, are you?" No point in starting a fight with them on a public street. "Show me your sigil." The man in front of me raises another ID, this one with a complex flickering symbol on it. Compliance. "What am I charged with?"
"Conspiracy to kidnap a protected person. Raise your hands."
I lift my hands, let him put the cuffs on comfortably. "You've been handcuffed before."
"I mostly prefer to be doing the handcuffing but I've been known to indulge." There's a hex bound into the cuffs, a powerful one, designed to disrupt any magic I might caste, especially by grounding local geomancy.
The man pushes me into the back of the car as his friend closes the hood. The one behind, another big beefy fellow gets in beside me, still holding my wig. The one who stopped me gets in to drive while the third one gets on in the other side, sandwiching me between them. They belt in, and secure my seatbelt.
The question now is, do they plan to kill me?
The car peels away from the curb. "It would go much easier for you if you'd just confess now." says the talkative one.
"I'm not saying a thing without a lawyer and my teacher's being informed."
The man with his hands free punches me in the stomach. It knocks the wind out of me. "I don't think you really understand the situation." says the one in the front. We're moving out of town, away from the freeway and away from town.
"I think I understand it pretty well."
The fist comes again. I cough. We drive in silence for a while, turn onto a secondary road.
"Take her jacket off." The driver orders. "She'll have armour in it. It was in the brief."
"But she has cuffs on." the guy hitting me protests.
"Just unbutton it."
Everything is so seat of the pants with this. I feel a sudden flash of pity for the men who are about to beat on me. They're also flying blind. Also doing extremely dangerous emergency stuff. The minion with my wig drops it on his lap then pulls up my arms and the other starts to unbutton my jacket.
"I don't want to tell you your jobs, but you're compliance agents right? If you're going to torture me why are you punching me, not putting a symbol of pain onto me or something."
"The secret is we want you to confess darling." The driver turns off. "If we use magic, it'll show up on later scans. How many fights have you been in lately? I bet you can't prove where you got another set of bruises. We're going to beat a confession out of you, and you'll go to jail. Maybe you can get out of it eventually, but not fast enough to prevent us stabilizing the situation."
"You're not really used to this are you?" The hitter has my jacket open and then punches me hard. I cough harder. It hurts much worse without the armour but I'm not exactly unused to pain. "What do you usually do for Compliance? Security I'll bet. Or catching normal criminals for the Japanese state."
"Shut the fuck up!" The hitter plants his fist in my stomach again, deep this time. I cough, and actually almost puke, and spit up a mass of blood onto the car interior.
"Fuck!" the driver says. "Fuck! Not until we're out of the--"
A large white van which has been coming up behind the car suddenly swings wide and pulls hard across its path. The driver screams something and hits the break but can't stop in time and the car stops, airbags slamming out in the front.
There's a sudden something a feeling of unknowable pour ripping the air and all three men convulse, screaming loudly for a moment then twitching to a stop, barely moving. The driver gropes for the glove compartment, managing to get it open on the third try and gets his hand on the big pistol within.
He's too late though. A figure has stepped out of the van and is levelling a rifle at him. Her face is masked, but her aim is steady.
The man sees her, hand still on the gun and his eyes go wide. Slowly he starts to take his hand off the automatic and raise it. She shoots him twice, walking around left to shoot the other man, then the third man as he bails out of the car and tries to run. The rifle makes no sound but each round glows red as it hits a its target.
The man in the front twitches, jerking in pain.
I lean forward and retrieve the keys to his cuffs. "I don't think that my girlfriend appreciated you beating on me meat boy."
I get out carefully. Reijou, who's power I assume mana crashed the three agents, both her guys, and a couple of Ginto-kai men. "How are we doing on time?" I ask.
"Road's blocked up behind us. A couple of cops we know and a spell that the Cleaner left." says one of the Ginto-Kai men. "We've got time to load these guys up."
"Alright, we'll take them with us. Get them loaded." I make no move to help.
"Are you alright?" Manako asks.
"Got a healing injector?" She hands me one and I apply it, the pain eases away. With any luck the kidnap team will have the location we need, but the truth is I doubt it. The next part of the extraction is up to Junya.
This is an interesting use of adjective but I think I like it
- Location
- Dollhouse
- Pronouns
- She/Her
heavy eating?
I don't know if to be amused or concerned with how willing Nozomi is to enter danger. Even knowing that she had a team running security and intercept when they nabbed her.
Not much to say other than I'm very interested in how the story is progressing and once more thank you for writing, FBH.
InterstellarHobo
Cosmic Vagrant
- Location
- No Fixed Planetary System
I think this sentence got mangled.
The start of the final section reads like casing the joint, but by the end it reads almost like counter-kidnappng Compliance agents was the goal.
Why Nozomi do like she does is once more a little unclear.
TheLastOne
Person of impeccable tastes (for destruction)
Just starting this, but the first two chapters have me adding this to my watched.
keios
very normal
- Location
- US
Wow! I didn't read for a bit and then there were like tons of updates.
I *knew* she had never kissed anyone before! Glad she and Manako have finally worked it out. Manako showing up this chapter.. pretty badasss!
The plot is extremely exciting. Can't work out what to think about Aratani.
I *knew* she had never kissed anyone before! Glad she and Manako have finally worked it out. Manako showing up this chapter.. pretty badasss!
The plot is extremely exciting. Can't work out what to think about Aratani.
Spectrum
Tell me a secret~
- Location
- Behind you~
missing a word, probably 'who I'm flirting'
Snrk, the banter...
That seems a bit flippant for the history between the two. Nozomi's sense of inherited guilt isn't exactly 'playing herself'.
redundant
Also the whole thing is a bit fragmentary
As I snarked earlier, it doesn't matter how impressive Nozomi's supposed rep is, official actors really shouldn't be using her as a hatchetman.
might be a typo?
whose
Any proper shadowrunning mage has contingencies in place and can pivot to a secondary playbook.
TheLastOne
Person of impeccable tastes (for destruction)
Less connected to the current plot, but I'm supprised no one commented on this. She steals a book guarded by Worms kitted out with modern gear, and those kinds of beings aren't suppose to use modern gear. Then she gets hunted by the Knight of Worms - only while it does appear to be one of her curse's hunters, it doesn't follow all the rules (it doesn't set off her fit) and it evidently is scarier/more significant then her normal hunters. It also was using technology to follow her - American, it looks like.
Then another horror out of the same book starts acting out, and evidently with Japanese government support.
Something is foul in the state of Denmark.
Chapter 2-7: Arson and Grand Theft
- Pronouns
- She/Her
The Monochrome Girl frets as she walks through the streets of Tokyo. She's not sure of these clothes, and the package on her back is heavy. They're stylish, sure, but how does the woman she's pretending to be ever do missions in them without messing them up? She doesn't know. With a wig as well it's a double nightmare.
It doesn't help her senses are dulled right now, pulled down with only a thin layer of plastic between them and the full fury of the world outside. Kasumigaseki, the centre of Japan's civil service rising around her in boxy concrete, architectural styles of a better era, before the lost decade became thirty years.
The back door of the target building is locked of course. She pulls out the pick gun and screwdriver from her kit, inserts them and pumps the trigger. The door opens smoothly first try.
Someone less experienced than her, a veteran for all that it'll still be a year before she can legally drink, might look both ways or make other furtive motion that'd give away she shouldn't be here, but she doesn't. She walks in and locks the door, stepping into the busy office space at the back of an office block. Some workers look at her as she passes but she pays them no heed, walking straight to the elevator and hitting the up button. Two suited men come in on the second floor, having a loud conversation about emerging markets, then grow quieter and more curious as they see the girl.
"Hey." One says, turning towards her. "Who are you exactly?"
The Monochrome Girl pulls the gun out of her bag and shows it to them. It's a boxy black automatic pistol, the same polymer framed Belgium designed, US made gun that won the US army's pistol replacement program before war aborted the desire to spend resources on something as marginal as a replacement automatic pistol. She sees the two men's eyes widen, and readies herself for the dim possibility space in which one of them makes a move. "Next time the doors open, you should get out."
"Y-yes." The older of the two says. "Alright."
The door opens again and a gaggle of office ladies, laughing about something, make to step in. Their laughter dies at the expression on the men's faces, then they see the girl, and the gun and back up fast.
The doors close and the girl rides up to the top floor.
She's done enough play acting, and there won't be any more people stepping into the left for a while. It's been made clear to her that she doesn't need to worry too much about what she's doing standing up to close scrutiny. Investigators will want to believe in the fiction that she is spinning.
She pulls the googles out of her bag, closes her eyes and removes her glasses, then slots the familiar high-technology over her head. It only takes a moment to boot up and then she opens her eyes and lets her power fully flower.
Security will be waiting for her on the executive floor. She can trace the line of it. She know she's armed but will meet her anyway, with mancatchers and bravery, for the honour of the company. Their boss is an ex-cop, ex-riot police unit, frustrated, willing to spend his men's lives. The girl tucks the gun back into her bag and pulls out another weapon, a long, weighted cord.
The door pings and the security men waiting beyond tense. They're standing in a group behind two mancatchers in the open plan executive office at the top of the building, where the company chairman and his many secretaries and minions stay. Outriders stand at either side of the door. They think they have the advantage here. They'll grab this terrorist girl as soon as the door opens. There's nothing for her to dodge behind when they rush. They're not prepared for a long metallic weight on the end of the rope to whip out of the lift before the door is even open and break the mouth of their commander as he starts to yell an order. He's knocked down as if he ran into a door. For a fatal instant, his troops hesitate, mancatchers raised but uncertain, waiting for the signal that won't come, glancing back. What? Is that? Did she?
She steps out of the elevator and her rope weapon whips around, impossibly gracefully. The kind of grace that comes from considered knowledge of where each movement will put it. She controls it from the middle, both weighted ends slamming into the softer parts of security men. She spins, pushes forward, and the left side of the rope snaps around the legs of two dazed security troops, pulling them together. They trip, trussed. The other end plays out, slamming into one face after another after another, until they're all on the floor in a shocked, bloody tangle.
The leader staggers to his feet, clutching his mouth. The Monochrome Girl drops the rope and pulls out her FN, levels it at his face. A few seconds ago, before his defeat, he might have charged her, trying for the gun, or to let one of his fellows get it. Now the pain and shock have made the weapon real, and he freezes, eyes wide.
She keeps it on him for a long moment then snaps it up to the ceiling and fires once. The security men and the watching executives and secretaries wince from the detonation. "Everyone out." She says. "Use both elevators."
They run, scramble into the lifts, the security men dragging their downed colleges. The girl ignores them and unwraps the package on her back. She wanted to carry the weapon in fully assembled but at one point four meters, the big american made sniper rifle is too conspicuous. She's practiced the rapid motions needed to put the gun in firing order a lot since he got this mission. First the barrel, then the bipod, and finally the high tech binocular sight fits on the top.
A USB cable links the sight with her goggles. A good picture. She unplugs the cord again, aims her pistol and blows out one of the big plate glass windows on the side of the office overlooking the Central Common Government Office. There's a wash of pressure and papers jerk and twitch in the high altitude wind. She plugs back in, braces the gun on its bipod and takes careful aim.
The longest range sniper kill in history was made by a Canadian special forces soldier during the first Iraqi civil war using just this kind of rifle. That was around three thousand meters. It's a record that will probably be broken soon, given the chaos and war that now engulfs so much of the world, but for now it's a good guide.
She doesn't want to attempt something so ridiculous. The shot she's making is ridiculous enough. She lies down on her stomach with the rifle braced on her shoulder and takes aim at the building, then accesses the camera feeds inside.
The target has just got in, already through security and up to an office in the building's middle floors. She keeps the gun safed and waits patiently as the target moves into the office. Everything is unfolding as she has foreseen.
Her target steps into an office marked as belonging to the head of public safety's special section. He walks over to the desk, checks the in tray, then jerks in surprise as another man steps out of the shadows. The Monochrome Girl wishes she could find out what they were saying. Ah well. It probably doesn't matter.
The Monochrome Girl calculates briefly with the help of the sights and her goggles, local weather information scrolling down one side as the ballistic computer works, then centres the target and fires.
The 12.7mm round penetrates through the window of the government office cleanly. It continues easily through several internal walls, through a cubical, through the coffee cup of an office worker raising it to his lips, and then strikes the public safety director in the neck. The round decapitates him cleanly, blowing out his neck parasite as well and splatters him over the wall.
The other man snaps around in a combat stance, something hissing around him, then fades out of view. Another mage. She isn't quite sure why they chose to remove their own piece from the board rather than his kidnapper but it's not a big deal to her. She knows exactly what they had on the public safety special section head, and is glad enough to be able to push hot metal through him.
Below there is the sound of sirens. Dozen of police vehicles are drawing up, hundreds of police rushing into the building. Time to go. She stows the gun on her back, then walks to the window, aims her grapple and fires, then ziplines down towards the next building. Professional that she is, she already has her exfiltration route set out.
I hear Junya's abort code, the anger in his voice and my stomach drops out. We've got all three compliance agents, ziptied, blindfolded and bagged in the back of the van. We're out, way to far out to do anything. To even know what happened yet. All there is Junya's tightly controlled anger on the tactical net.
"Magenta. Magenta. Magenta." That means he's aborted both the primary and secondary extraction points. He's headed for a rally area streets away. What happened.
"Nozomi," Manako has a laptop open, "look at this."
Breaking news. Shots fired in Kasumigaseki. Public Safety Official killed.
It's that last line that makes me realize we were set up. There's no way the press would have that unless the police wanted them to have it. Someone killed the target and is going to blame us for it.
Sorry Aratani. I guess you were wrong.
I need to think of a new plan. I need to think. I need to get there and actually be able to affect the situation.
I open my mouth to say "Take us to Kasumigaseki." Then I feel something. A feeling across my eyes as if I really need to blink. For an instant I try to deny it, try to tough it out, and then my body begins to jerk around. I feel something incredibly awful happening in the deepest parts of myself. Manako is holding me and calling my name. I'm falling back into darkness.
And then in the darkness I see Reijou, glowing with light as her hand touches my forehead.
I blink, then sit upright, ready to grab something coming at me and wrestle it. No monsters present. A familiar ceiling.
I'm at home, in bed. Wearing a silk nightgown. Manako is sitting in an armchair, still in tactical gear over her sweeter, a rifle sitting at her side. I'm not connected to any monitors which must be good. However my teacher is sitting on the balcony, which is bad.
I get up, cautious not to meet Manako, pull on a robe and go to sit next to Kondo-san.
"If you're here I must be in trouble."
"Perhaps not as bad as you think. According to your doctor, that young exorcist girl managed to prevent most of the soul drain you experience." He pours me out a cup of tea, then offers me the pot and I return the favour. "But you're being framed for the murder of a public safety official."
"What did you do with those three compliance guys who tried to jump me?"
"They're alive, but no longer a concern." He takes a swallow of tea. "I've already told Compliance and my Japanese state contacts that you were with me at the time of the murder, and provided proof. False of course, but nothing that they can disprove. They'll still be a hearing however."
"Thanks." I look down at the central garden below. It's peaceful. I wonder if their's a hunter now. Probably. "What do I owe for these services?"
He thinks for a long time. "For now, nothing, save your continued retrieval of dangerous knowledge."
I look over at him, a little surprised. This is a major favour he's done me, something that would usually require reciprocity. Then I understand. "You're not saving me. You're saving her."
He looks back at Manako, her head cocked against the chair, mouth open in the innocence of sleep, and smiles a little sadly. "I need a student Nozomi. Someone to assist me in my work not just today but over decades to come. I'm truly sorry that it might not be you."
I shake my head, a kind of pleasant sadness settling over me. That particular melancholy savor, the kind of defeat that makes you smile. "It's alright. She's a rare talent. I didn't really expect it either. She deserves a long life and a good tutor."
"You might not give her the first, but it seems that you are the second." He gives me a look. "You'd better keep her safe."
"I'll guard her with my life." I rub my eyes. "I might take her out of the country. This has gone completely wrong. I don't think I can pull it back."
"That I leave to you." He raises, then looks at me seriously. "Just be careful Nozomi. The Aratani boy has dropped you into a particularly dangerous situation."
"I know."
There's a pop of air and he's gone. Manako's eyes open and she makes a jerky grab for the rifle, then relaxes. "Nozomi, you're awake."
"Come out and sit with--" I get that much out before she's in my arms, the magazines on the outside of the tactical vest cold against me through the silk robe and the nightdress beneath. She kisses me hard, tilting my chin as she pushes forward, her lips pressing against mine like she was afraid I'll vanish away. After a few precious moments I tilt my head back, pressing my forehead against hers and into her eyes. They're brown, and very big, joyful and afraid. At my back, her arms are warm through sweater and gloves, hooked around me. She smells of cordite and sweat, and I don't mind at all.
"I dreamed you were awake." She says. I know that feeling. The awfulness of dreams of hope. "I needed to know this was real."
"What's got into you? You've seen me have a seizure before." I keep my gaze level, resting my hands on her shoulders
"You've never fainted before! That second year reached into you and did something. Maybe struck down the Hunter. I thought she'd hurt you." Her arms press tighter into my back, hooked just beneath my ribs, hearth's embers on a cold morning. She ducks her head closer into me, almost muffling her next words as my arms rest limp where they are. I don't know what to do. "She hurt herself to. The doctor says she's still fragile from what she did a few nights ago."
"Is she okay?"
"She's awake. The Doctor and that hot tailor told her not to do anything risky."
"So you do like guys as well. I did wonder."
Manako pouts a little. "I like you more."
I'm the one that leans in this time, a swift brush against her pout, before pressing forward, deeper until she suddenly pulls back until the back of her neck presses against my interlocked palms. She swallows, opens her mouth, before shutting it and swallowing again. When she speaks, it's a whisper. "Are we-- Have we -- Have we lost?"
I don't answer right away and she continues to speak, urgent. "Everyone thinks we have. The prosecutor phoned someone and shouted at them. The Cop is just silent. The tailor and that gangster with him have been together trying to figure out what to do. Is it that bad?"
"A high ranking public safety official was assassinated and they're blaming us for it. They can't prove it but they'll be gunning for us now. Maybe not Reijou, the exorcists will protect her. Junya, I suppose has his own protection, but you and me…" I move forward, shifting so she's sitting further on my lap, and make to kiss her again, but she looks at me and I stop, searching for anything else to speak about. "Have you ever wanted to just travel, just the two of us?"
"But what about my Uncle? What about the girls getting kidnapped?"
I'm silent for a long while, gently embracing Manako.
"I don't know. I don't know how to do anything." My voice shudders as I speak, and my tongue tastes saline. Am I crying? How weak. I take a long breath, try to get myself under control.
Manako's arms squeeze tight again as she shuffles closer, pressing my head into the crook of her neck. "Shhh." she says.
I enjoy the faint smell of her hair for a moment, but the words bubble up, pulling me away from her. "Aratani set me up for this. He knew things like this would happen and he staked me out to save his reputation. Just set me out to do his dirty work. Now I've put you in--"
I don't realise she's kissing me until I try to speak more and can't. Her lips are wet, and taste salty. Is she crying too? "Just stop." She's trembling as my hands move down her sides, slow tremors like ripples in a pool. She kisses me again, softer, pulling away after a second. . "Stop talking."
She leans in again, but this time we only hug, each of us desperate, her hands tight around my shoulders as I grip onto her waist fiercely. I couldn't say how long we hold each other, but eventually I shift, one of my legs going numb from her weight. The motion drives the top of one of the magazines into my ribs, and I yelp at the cold and sharpness. Manako flinches backwards, almost standing up. Her face is tear-stained and her hair a tangled mess, but. I've never seen anyone so beautiful. We speak at almost the same moment.. "Are you--"
"Can I --"
I lick my lips, compose myself a bit "Can I take your vest off?"
She blushes, suddenly shy, then I see her eyes widen and she laughs, a tremulous thing. "I thought you were, I thought you were asking for something else."
I stand up and begin to undo the vest. She begins to help and I kiss her again. We fumble blindly with the vest, spinning in place as we breathlessly kiss, a furious urge that burns away my melancholy. It finally comes free, and I toss it blindly away, ignoring the muted thump as it lands.
I reach up, my hand slipping into the curve of her throat, and step into her, my thigh slipping between hers. Manako's breathing deepens as she pulls me back down into the armchair. I press forward, feeling the fabric of her jeans up against my bar leg. My mouth slips from her own and I start tracing her jawline with my mouth, nibbling lightly at the flesh at the junction of her neck, the action producing a breathy sound that liquifies something inside me. I nip at her earlobe, pressing harder into her as my hands trace meaningless patterns in the small of her back, then move back to her lips and--
The armchair overbalances, tipping the two of us out of it, sprawling in a heap of limbs across it's back and the floor. I try to stabilize with my hand and feel my hand slide on Manako's vest, which goes forward, under the balcony rail. There's a metallic sound as plate carrier, plate, tools, most of a battle load of ammunition and hundred thousand yen encrypted personal radio drop three stories.
We both stop, stunned, as the echoes die away.
"House." I mutter belatedly. "Catch that." Manako starts to laugh. A moment later I join her. Laughing so hard I almost start to cry again. I roll to the side so we're side by side on the back of the armchair.
There's a lot of things I should say to Manako. About us, about mage society. The expectations that mages have about the world and how those aren't the same as the ones of normal people. It feels somehow more desperate than half the fights I get into. "That's the second time we've had an almost."
"Mm."
"I keep thinking I should try to talk to you about things." I look up at the ceiling. "Like, Mages don't date the way humans do. What's normal just isn't the same."
"Like how?" She looks over at me, rolling so we're side by side on the soft upholstery of the armchair.
"Like, it's pretty weird for a mage to only have one romantic partner. You have a husband or a wife, but you have, well, others."
"Do you have someone else?"
"No!" I look over at her quickly. "I'd never have done that without asking you first."
She rolls over so we're face to face. "Then, why don't we just leave that question until you find someone else you like?"
There's a kind of commitment that, a commitment that, if I find someone else, I have to let Manako be able to hurt me in the aftermath. But then, haven't I made that commitment already, in a thousand different ways?
"Do you want to take a shower?" I mutter into her hair.
"Yes."
It's at that point I think that it hits me.
What happens to middle class girls who look like they might not make their highschool exam?
They get tutored.
I get dressed before I go down, thinking out the angles of it. I don't know that what I figured out is true yet. I make most of my outfit black today, black top, fancy black skirt, white shirt poking out of the top. White thigh highs with mystic symbols stitched into them in black and red thread.
Yoshitaka is sitting at the kitchen counter table and drinking my booze. There's a mostly empty bottle of Arran Robert Burns Single Malt Scotch next to her. Something I brought back from a trip to England. Her cheeks are flush and she's kind of leaning over the table. "You got no right to complain!" She says when she sees me. "A girl your age shouldn't even have booze." She knocks back another shot.
I'm not really worried. I actually have another three bottles in the cellar. I'm more annoyed.
"How drunk are you?" I sit on the hight chair opposite her, and reclaim the bottle. She watches it go with a sigh.
"Not drunk enough." She rubs her eyes. "Tanigawa is talking about taking her niece and fleeing the country. I don't know where we could possibly go they won't find us. I never thought, I never thought they'd just kill one of their own like that."
"Did you ever get the information about the kidnapped girls we were talking about?"
"No." She rubs her eyes. "Or not enough to be useful. I was looking through the transcripts when my memory cuts out. I remember that a bunch of them were like you said, low achievers in middle school, but got into a good highschool."
"I've got an idea maybe, about how they're selected. I'm just not sure how to check it out."
She looks at me then at the bottle."Okay I'm definitely too drunk for this. Can you do something about that?"
I go to the fridge, pull out a set of injectors and tap my wrist. "How your arm out." She does and I apply the injector. There's a hiss of gas and she shivers, eyes clearing.
"That's awful."
"Just make sure to drink some water as well. The alcohol will still dehydrate you. You can still get a hangover."
"Great." She goes to the tap, pours herself a tumbler and then returns. "So what have you got?"
"Tutoring company." I say. "It's got to be. Making some kind of assessment of them in the process of tutoring. Either they were trying to create a reserve for their supply of foreign girls, or they were field testing assessment."
"So we just ask your friend who tutored her, and we're back in business." Yoshitaka shakes her head.
"We don't even need to phone my friend. I remember who they were. They had a weird name. It was Porphyrion." I had thought it was funny in middle school. It having an Greek name. An obscure mythological reference.
"I suppose it'd be too much to expect them to have a facility on their records where they could care for dozens of kidnap victims."
"We're probably going to have to wait for them to kidnap someone else than then follow them." I rub my eyes. "The first thing we're going to need to do though is figure out who met the criteria for their assessment."
Porphyrion's offices are kind of out of the way, a nondescript pair of office block in Nerima overlooked by a bunch of high apartment buildings. There are actually two of them, the assessment centre and the administrative offices.
The big problem is going to come if they've purged their own records to an offsite location. Which, if they're as slick as they've been so far, they will have.
However, while I'm not actually a hacker, I'm relatively confident that I can at least figure out where they sent the data, assuming they didn't get really clever, pack it onto a hard drive and send it off via courier. Even if they did do that though, that requires somebody at the building they're leaving to know where the stuff went. That assumes of course there's no paper records, which will be even harder to move.
Junya and Reijou are out. Both insist they'll be back if we have a clear target, but for now Reijou's organization wants her as far away from me as possible. Junya in the meantime has a rush job in Ginza. "It's probably a diversion to get me away from you, but it's not something I can ignore."
"Do you need any help?"
"Nah." He waved. "Just get your own problems sorted."
"You too."
So it's just Manako, Tanigawa, Yoshitaka, and me, with a few hired Yakuza for seasoning. We spent the rest of the day assessing the complex. Both Manako and I called in sick from school, which is going to raise questions with her parents if they find out, but seems like the only safe option. Besides but we needed all four of us working flat out to to do the proper assessment. things get any worse. I put Manako on drone observation of the complex, while Yoshitaka, Tanigawa and I set about compromising an employee and gathering other human intelligence.
Most of the day is spent with us furtively hitting up our contacts to see about getting more than the city hall floor plans. We get a good hit about six, when one of Yoshitaka's street level informers comes through with a janitor with a serious hostess club habit who ended up borrowing a bunch of money from the Yakuza.
A few calls and a suitcase of money later and we've got a good read on precisely where the paper record room and the server room are.
We're in luck in that they're all stored in the administrative block. Apparently there's some level of tight security about bringing them over from the less secure test centre every night, which the janitor has to do. We briefly discuss a plan to have him abscond with the packet on the way across but scotch it as we don't know if he has the records we want. In turn, the janitor leads us to a security man recently transferred to a post he didn't want for drunkenness. He proves easy to crack and we get an idea of the night security. There's a code pad check in system, but the guard tells us that it's mostly kept in the security room, due to daily changes.
"Do you think this is a trap?" Tanigawa asks as we sit around with the annotated plans spread out over my dining table, its edges weighed down with coffee cups and plates of mostly eaten cakes. Manako is sitting with her but Yoshitaka is still out, checking with her contacts in the police in the state of play within public safety. "Security is nominally tight, but this isn't something that would stop you on your own is it?
"No. I could get into a building like this without anyone noticing at all." I slump back in my chair. It's a bleak thing to think after a day of planning and investigation but the security just feels too light. Too normal. That means there's a surprise in there, almost certainly.
"And if they realize we took the records, they'll shift their focus and target in a different way. People from down whatever list they're using." Manako says. "This feels hopeless."
I tap my fingers on the map and think. "Wait a moment. I have an idea."
Detective Yoshitaka doesn't like the guy she's driving with. She doesn't like the suit I gave her either. "I look like a hostess" she complained when I gave it to her.
"The point is that you don't look like a cop."
Her driver is a Yakuza, though not a particularly obvious one, Eiji-san, Ryuta's trusted lieutenant. Is to old and fat to really look the part when he puts on a normal suit that hides his tattoos. The approach to Ryuta was honestly the most agonizing thing today. I was sure he was going to be compromised and get us into a fight, but he wasn't and it was embarrassing. Hopefully this means they don't have that many more frog throats, so can't compromise people other than through a normal chain of command.
I doubt it though. I suspect they'll have a few more in reserve. However they probably suspect, accurately, that I've laid some traps in case they try to come after any of my other friends. Ryuta though, they could have got. He likes his privacy too much, and knows my capacities to well to have let me know his life well enough to lay anything good.
I watch the car passing along below from a number of screens. I've got a pair of drones up, and a compromised traffic camera, plus a few web cams laid during earlier ground reconnaissance. One of those is watching Manako specifically, sat on the ground sheet at the window of an empty apartment, covering the car with a huge .50 cal rifle. The rifle is the same one used by Canadian special forces, and Manako proudly told me that it holds the record for one of the longest ranged sniper kills in history. The advanced scope on the top is made by an American civilian company and automatically adjusts for target movement and even wind.
I won't find out for a while how much of an irony the choice of weapon is.
The longest part of operational prep was spending an hour making sure of all the various runes we'd sprayed onto it before either Manako or Tanigawa were willing to fire it in the busy streets of a Nerima evening.
"We're coming up on the initial point now. Can you see us?"
"I see you." I report.
"Eyes on." Manako says. She's switched over to a pair of binoculars, then drifts to look at the building. "There's not much going on at the target. A guy just took the trash out."
"Alright. Eji-san, start your run now."
The car, a silver toyota pulls along the street slowly. On the drone feed I see the man putting the trash turn to watch it, then his eyes widen as the window lowers and Yoshitaka raises the grenade launcher she's been keeping between her legs. The first round is smoke, to let her measure her aim, the second is an incendiary round the smacks through a ground floor window.
"Got it!"
Eiji punches the car forward, accelerating away in a scream of tires. The man outside is speaking into a radio. Indeed, the whole building has lit up with radio and phone transmissions.
I hit the second part of the plan and there's a distant boom. Part of the street jumps as the fiberoptic serving the office's internet connection.
The singular insight I had for this is that we don't actually need to take the records. If we render them unusable then the entity breaks out anyway. It's not optimal, because it ends up with a bunch of prominent people hatching cosmic horrors, but that's something for Aratani and my enemies to care about more than I do.
Or at least. I can make my enemies think that I don't care. Think that I'm willing to take the win that is hurting them, rather than the win that comes from actually doing something about the horror's they've summoned to remake the world. They probably have backups, but logically this should cause them to displace their records, and hopefully make it easier for me to get at them without walking into whatever trap they've laid.
Eiji and Yoshitaka's car zooms away, visible on the drone, making its pre-planned escape route. There are Tokyo police area cars looking for them, and several police drones up, but so far the route looks like it's been successful, especially with our own drone overflight.. I hand that job over to Tanigawa as Manako speaks up.
"Fire trucks are arriving now. There's a pair of armoured van as well. I see two fat guys, they might be frog throats."
There's a lot of milling around going on on the street, but they seem to have a procedure. A ladder is already up against the building and as water is sprayed into the lower floor, men in fire fighting suits who jumped from the van are already swarming up it. A few moments later they throw the first strong box down the ladder to the men waiting below. The boxes go into the armoured vans one after another, then the fire suited men go with them.
The two vans pulls away into the traffic as the fire fighters start to address the blaze in earnest. At the end of the street they split, and a pair of police vehicles fall in with them for escort.
"They're not stupid." Tanigawa sighs. "How do we know which one is carrying the real records?"
I don't have a good idea. "Let's just keep watching for now."
They're not, I think, quite used to the idea of drone observation being a thing. At least, there's no precautions taken to do in the quad copters. Still, for now they're just in transit, "M, stay in position to make sure they don't start pulling more boxes out and taking them elsewhere. Y, what's your status?"
"We've proceed as planned and we're outbound, no sign of pursuit." The launcher dumped down a storm drain, clothes changed, fresh car. They'll be police checkpoints soon after that kind of grenade attack. We'll wait them out.
"Looks like the escort dumped one of the trucks."
I look over at the image of the second truck. The police vehicle is diverging away. "Huh."
"I guess it's the other one."
"No." I consider. "No, I think it's that one." After all, if you're running a kidnapping ring, what would you want less than the police knowing where your records are? Corruption only goes so far.
I hope I'm right, because the first van stops at a place much harder to raid. A busy night office in Shinjuku, with a lot of visible security, including police. Meantime the other van doesn't go so far, another quiet Nerima office complex. It looks dead quiet as the men start to unload the truck. Dead quiet except for a fat man in a cheap suit watching as they unload. A woman who looks like a college girl waiting with him.
"That can't be--" Manako blurts. She's been watching the feed. "He died! He turned into a monster and I shot him!"
"I guess death isn't the end for creatures like him." Explains why they're willing to attach eldritch throat cancers to themselves. "I'm heading that way."
I get up from the booth in a station cafe I've been sitting at and head for Nerima.
There are tons of police around. Police and onlookers. The firebombing has made a splash, both on social media and in the normal news. Groups of police are everywhere, looking for people and checking IDs. The news is already worrying we're turning into America. A commentator is talking about the esper program.
In a way it makes it easier.There's a lot less going on in the back streets around the office.
I'm wearing a black hoodie, a rain cloak, shorts and black leggings under it's actually still quite cold. Runes are woven into the hoodie in white that make the eyes slide off it, and I have a dark blue scarf to cover my face. It's not quite truth invisibility, but it's a lot less visible to mages. If it was just fashion I'd use red, but don't want to look too much like one of the American rebellion's super soldiers.
I check it from across the street, then begin to climb up to building top level, staying low and careful not to skyline myself. "I'm at the target. Going radio silent. I'll double click when I'm about to make entry."
They're being fairly quiet about it, the blinds drawn but the lights are on. Some covert scrying shows me the capture team from earlier are set up in a lounge in the second floor, chatting with several dozen Yakuza, whose office this may actually be. The voice shit they're doing is an absolutely terrifying power. A room over, several tech types are setting up laptops, communications and so on. Looks like I hit the jackpot. Or just a secondary command centre that's a trap. I won't know until I make entry.
I circle the building slowly. The drone is pulled back now. I don't want to tip anyone inside. There's are two look outs on the roof. They're probably supposed to be covering both angles but they keep congregating together and smoking. Gangsters can be pretty lazy. I use my thermal monocular to check that there's not someone without a cigarette trying to fake me out by covering the far side. Nope.
Initial check done, I find place to wait, roof of a building a little way along the street. sitting back in the shadows and wrapping them around me with a simple enchantment. Invisibility is hard but using shadows is easy. I put my headphones on and put on the podcast I cued up.
With any luck it'll rain.
By three AM the building seems to be mostly still. There's still two lookouts on the roof. New guys after a shift change a few hours ago. Most of the other Yakuza, techs and guards are asleep or have left in a gaggle. The fat man left a while later, while the female mage took the Yakuza boss, who's actually quite handsome, up to the third floor. She seems likely to be distracted for a while.
Rain is coming down steadily now and the two cigarettes on the roof are standing together under an umbrella. They seem to prefer the front of the building, maybe it's a more interesting view.
I work my way down from my perch and then turn off the podcast and hang my headphones around my neck, and insert the earpiece for my radio in one ear. Then I move in along the alley at the back of the building, mount the fence silently and begin to climb up the back.
The rain is coming down hard, but a small amount of Crawley effect applies to my hands makes getting up easily. I get to the second floor and hang their for a moment, listening at the window. Snoring inside, the sound of active computers.
I hang their for a moment more in the rain, thinking how much I love this. As fun as it's been working with others there's something uniquely satisfying about this lonely sneak. I sketch a rune on the window lock and it pops open silently, then slide it over.
The tech is of course, sleeping on a sofa right under the window. Water and cold air hits him and he starts to wake up, then I whisper a word of sleep in his ear and he turns over and begins to snore again.
The water is a problem. I fetch a towel from my kit and dry my boots off, then shrug off my rain coat and ball it up with the towel, letting both drop away into the dark. I'll get wet on the way out but it's better than revealing my presence. Only then do I tug the window shut, double click my radio and climb over the sleeping tech to check the room.
It seems like the plan to occupy the building with a pile of guys all night has been mostly undone by lack of sofas. The office itself is a pretty typical open plan with half height cubical desks affair, that wouldn't look out of place for anything from a law office to an anime studio, but there's only one sofa in here. A second man is sleeping under one of the desks in a sleeping bag. I go over and whisper a word of sleep to him as well, keeping him out, then go check the door. There's a couple of Yakuza outside sat in office chairs and talking about some girl at a local club. No problem.
I walk over to one of the laptops, which is plugged into a rack of hard drives and jack into it. There's some basic anti-esper countermeasures, but while I'm not exactly the world's best hacker, I know enough to rapidly cut through with magic.
Access files. Bingo. Dozens of educational files. Myers-Briggs type profile. Probably not that. IQ tests, a few other normal educational tests. Huh. What's this? Perihelion? I insert a thumb drive and take everything. No point in second guessing.
My radio buzzes. "N, the fat guy is on his way back. Sorry, we didn't spot him till he was almost at the building."
Damn. No point in crying over spilt milk If I didn't have them I'd have no observation at all I double click in response, and pull the drive out, sticking it into a pocket. The outer door opens and the two Yakuza on the stairs stir, and I hear them get up.
I could teleport out but that would make a noise. Instead I duck in under one of the desks.
"That you friend?" One asks.
"Yes." The voice hits hard. "Where's Ichika?"
"Still with the boss."
"Lucky bitch." He laughs. "I should have found some action earlier. I was hoping for someone in particular."
"This girl you think will break in here?"
"Yes." The door opens. The fat man steps inside the office, the lighter footsteps of the yakuza behind him. "She did something horrible to me and a friend of mine earlier, and I'm longing to do something even worse to her."
I reach into my hoodie and grip the pistol inside. If I have to silence the place it's my most reliable option.
"Sorry you didn't find her then."
The fat man walks in, he's checking around the room. I ease back further into the shadows. The main light comes on, and both techs mutter and come awake. "You lazy fucks. You're not supposed to be sleeping. You're supposed to be on watch in here."
"Sorry sir."
"Maybe you will be." He laughs. "Then again, if she's come and gone that'll mean I might get to meet both her and that short haired girl who shot me again. I'd like that."
I almost step out and shoot him right then an there, then I realize that's exactly what he's trying to induce. Even in casual conversation, the magic bleeds through. How did they build his power? The door opens again, female voice, sounding annoyed. "You're making a noise Van."
"I'm sorry Ichika-chan." He laughs. "I was wondering if we'd had visitors while I was out."
"Well, wonder quietly."
Once again I wait, listening to the two techs messing around. The fat man, Van, goes out, once again talking to the Yakuza who he seems to be more interested in than the techs. I wait, not moving and hoping my body doesn't go stiff as they putter around.
"You want some coffee?" One of them asks. "There's a machine down the hall."
A flicker of music as headphones are removed. Some tinkly video game sound. One of the tales games? "What?"
"Coffee? Do you want some."
"Sure. Get a couple of cans." The headphones go back on and the door bangs. I'm never going to get a better chance than this. I crawl out from under the desk, staying low and walk around the back of the guy on the laptop. Yeah, Tales of Symphonia. I prefer the sequel. I walk to the window, pull it open with a smooth motion and whisper a word that'll warm and dry the air coming in, then push myself out through it, sticking to the wall with a hand as I pull it closed.
Just in time, the other tech comes back with the coffee. I slump back against the wall, then embarrassingly almost lose concentration and fall, saving myself at the last moment. Time to get out of here.
The rain has mostly subsided to a fine mist and I retrieve my coat and towel from the bottom, stuff them into my kit and then make my way out of the compound. "I'm out. Pick me up at--" I take a moment to check my map and give an address.
"Did you get it?"
"Yeah." I take out the thumb drive and look at it. "Yeah, I got it."
It doesn't help her senses are dulled right now, pulled down with only a thin layer of plastic between them and the full fury of the world outside. Kasumigaseki, the centre of Japan's civil service rising around her in boxy concrete, architectural styles of a better era, before the lost decade became thirty years.
The back door of the target building is locked of course. She pulls out the pick gun and screwdriver from her kit, inserts them and pumps the trigger. The door opens smoothly first try.
Someone less experienced than her, a veteran for all that it'll still be a year before she can legally drink, might look both ways or make other furtive motion that'd give away she shouldn't be here, but she doesn't. She walks in and locks the door, stepping into the busy office space at the back of an office block. Some workers look at her as she passes but she pays them no heed, walking straight to the elevator and hitting the up button. Two suited men come in on the second floor, having a loud conversation about emerging markets, then grow quieter and more curious as they see the girl.
"Hey." One says, turning towards her. "Who are you exactly?"
The Monochrome Girl pulls the gun out of her bag and shows it to them. It's a boxy black automatic pistol, the same polymer framed Belgium designed, US made gun that won the US army's pistol replacement program before war aborted the desire to spend resources on something as marginal as a replacement automatic pistol. She sees the two men's eyes widen, and readies herself for the dim possibility space in which one of them makes a move. "Next time the doors open, you should get out."
"Y-yes." The older of the two says. "Alright."
The door opens again and a gaggle of office ladies, laughing about something, make to step in. Their laughter dies at the expression on the men's faces, then they see the girl, and the gun and back up fast.
The doors close and the girl rides up to the top floor.
She's done enough play acting, and there won't be any more people stepping into the left for a while. It's been made clear to her that she doesn't need to worry too much about what she's doing standing up to close scrutiny. Investigators will want to believe in the fiction that she is spinning.
She pulls the googles out of her bag, closes her eyes and removes her glasses, then slots the familiar high-technology over her head. It only takes a moment to boot up and then she opens her eyes and lets her power fully flower.
Security will be waiting for her on the executive floor. She can trace the line of it. She know she's armed but will meet her anyway, with mancatchers and bravery, for the honour of the company. Their boss is an ex-cop, ex-riot police unit, frustrated, willing to spend his men's lives. The girl tucks the gun back into her bag and pulls out another weapon, a long, weighted cord.
The door pings and the security men waiting beyond tense. They're standing in a group behind two mancatchers in the open plan executive office at the top of the building, where the company chairman and his many secretaries and minions stay. Outriders stand at either side of the door. They think they have the advantage here. They'll grab this terrorist girl as soon as the door opens. There's nothing for her to dodge behind when they rush. They're not prepared for a long metallic weight on the end of the rope to whip out of the lift before the door is even open and break the mouth of their commander as he starts to yell an order. He's knocked down as if he ran into a door. For a fatal instant, his troops hesitate, mancatchers raised but uncertain, waiting for the signal that won't come, glancing back. What? Is that? Did she?
She steps out of the elevator and her rope weapon whips around, impossibly gracefully. The kind of grace that comes from considered knowledge of where each movement will put it. She controls it from the middle, both weighted ends slamming into the softer parts of security men. She spins, pushes forward, and the left side of the rope snaps around the legs of two dazed security troops, pulling them together. They trip, trussed. The other end plays out, slamming into one face after another after another, until they're all on the floor in a shocked, bloody tangle.
The leader staggers to his feet, clutching his mouth. The Monochrome Girl drops the rope and pulls out her FN, levels it at his face. A few seconds ago, before his defeat, he might have charged her, trying for the gun, or to let one of his fellows get it. Now the pain and shock have made the weapon real, and he freezes, eyes wide.
She keeps it on him for a long moment then snaps it up to the ceiling and fires once. The security men and the watching executives and secretaries wince from the detonation. "Everyone out." She says. "Use both elevators."
They run, scramble into the lifts, the security men dragging their downed colleges. The girl ignores them and unwraps the package on her back. She wanted to carry the weapon in fully assembled but at one point four meters, the big american made sniper rifle is too conspicuous. She's practiced the rapid motions needed to put the gun in firing order a lot since he got this mission. First the barrel, then the bipod, and finally the high tech binocular sight fits on the top.
A USB cable links the sight with her goggles. A good picture. She unplugs the cord again, aims her pistol and blows out one of the big plate glass windows on the side of the office overlooking the Central Common Government Office. There's a wash of pressure and papers jerk and twitch in the high altitude wind. She plugs back in, braces the gun on its bipod and takes careful aim.
The longest range sniper kill in history was made by a Canadian special forces soldier during the first Iraqi civil war using just this kind of rifle. That was around three thousand meters. It's a record that will probably be broken soon, given the chaos and war that now engulfs so much of the world, but for now it's a good guide.
She doesn't want to attempt something so ridiculous. The shot she's making is ridiculous enough. She lies down on her stomach with the rifle braced on her shoulder and takes aim at the building, then accesses the camera feeds inside.
The target has just got in, already through security and up to an office in the building's middle floors. She keeps the gun safed and waits patiently as the target moves into the office. Everything is unfolding as she has foreseen.
Her target steps into an office marked as belonging to the head of public safety's special section. He walks over to the desk, checks the in tray, then jerks in surprise as another man steps out of the shadows. The Monochrome Girl wishes she could find out what they were saying. Ah well. It probably doesn't matter.
The Monochrome Girl calculates briefly with the help of the sights and her goggles, local weather information scrolling down one side as the ballistic computer works, then centres the target and fires.
The 12.7mm round penetrates through the window of the government office cleanly. It continues easily through several internal walls, through a cubical, through the coffee cup of an office worker raising it to his lips, and then strikes the public safety director in the neck. The round decapitates him cleanly, blowing out his neck parasite as well and splatters him over the wall.
The other man snaps around in a combat stance, something hissing around him, then fades out of view. Another mage. She isn't quite sure why they chose to remove their own piece from the board rather than his kidnapper but it's not a big deal to her. She knows exactly what they had on the public safety special section head, and is glad enough to be able to push hot metal through him.
Below there is the sound of sirens. Dozen of police vehicles are drawing up, hundreds of police rushing into the building. Time to go. She stows the gun on her back, then walks to the window, aims her grapple and fires, then ziplines down towards the next building. Professional that she is, she already has her exfiltration route set out.
*****
I hear Junya's abort code, the anger in his voice and my stomach drops out. We've got all three compliance agents, ziptied, blindfolded and bagged in the back of the van. We're out, way to far out to do anything. To even know what happened yet. All there is Junya's tightly controlled anger on the tactical net.
"Magenta. Magenta. Magenta." That means he's aborted both the primary and secondary extraction points. He's headed for a rally area streets away. What happened.
"Nozomi," Manako has a laptop open, "look at this."
Breaking news. Shots fired in Kasumigaseki. Public Safety Official killed.
It's that last line that makes me realize we were set up. There's no way the press would have that unless the police wanted them to have it. Someone killed the target and is going to blame us for it.
Sorry Aratani. I guess you were wrong.
I need to think of a new plan. I need to think. I need to get there and actually be able to affect the situation.
I open my mouth to say "Take us to Kasumigaseki." Then I feel something. A feeling across my eyes as if I really need to blink. For an instant I try to deny it, try to tough it out, and then my body begins to jerk around. I feel something incredibly awful happening in the deepest parts of myself. Manako is holding me and calling my name. I'm falling back into darkness.
And then in the darkness I see Reijou, glowing with light as her hand touches my forehead.
*****
I blink, then sit upright, ready to grab something coming at me and wrestle it. No monsters present. A familiar ceiling.
I'm at home, in bed. Wearing a silk nightgown. Manako is sitting in an armchair, still in tactical gear over her sweeter, a rifle sitting at her side. I'm not connected to any monitors which must be good. However my teacher is sitting on the balcony, which is bad.
I get up, cautious not to meet Manako, pull on a robe and go to sit next to Kondo-san.
"If you're here I must be in trouble."
"Perhaps not as bad as you think. According to your doctor, that young exorcist girl managed to prevent most of the soul drain you experience." He pours me out a cup of tea, then offers me the pot and I return the favour. "But you're being framed for the murder of a public safety official."
"What did you do with those three compliance guys who tried to jump me?"
"They're alive, but no longer a concern." He takes a swallow of tea. "I've already told Compliance and my Japanese state contacts that you were with me at the time of the murder, and provided proof. False of course, but nothing that they can disprove. They'll still be a hearing however."
"Thanks." I look down at the central garden below. It's peaceful. I wonder if their's a hunter now. Probably. "What do I owe for these services?"
He thinks for a long time. "For now, nothing, save your continued retrieval of dangerous knowledge."
I look over at him, a little surprised. This is a major favour he's done me, something that would usually require reciprocity. Then I understand. "You're not saving me. You're saving her."
He looks back at Manako, her head cocked against the chair, mouth open in the innocence of sleep, and smiles a little sadly. "I need a student Nozomi. Someone to assist me in my work not just today but over decades to come. I'm truly sorry that it might not be you."
I shake my head, a kind of pleasant sadness settling over me. That particular melancholy savor, the kind of defeat that makes you smile. "It's alright. She's a rare talent. I didn't really expect it either. She deserves a long life and a good tutor."
"You might not give her the first, but it seems that you are the second." He gives me a look. "You'd better keep her safe."
"I'll guard her with my life." I rub my eyes. "I might take her out of the country. This has gone completely wrong. I don't think I can pull it back."
"That I leave to you." He raises, then looks at me seriously. "Just be careful Nozomi. The Aratani boy has dropped you into a particularly dangerous situation."
"I know."
There's a pop of air and he's gone. Manako's eyes open and she makes a jerky grab for the rifle, then relaxes. "Nozomi, you're awake."
"Come out and sit with--" I get that much out before she's in my arms, the magazines on the outside of the tactical vest cold against me through the silk robe and the nightdress beneath. She kisses me hard, tilting my chin as she pushes forward, her lips pressing against mine like she was afraid I'll vanish away. After a few precious moments I tilt my head back, pressing my forehead against hers and into her eyes. They're brown, and very big, joyful and afraid. At my back, her arms are warm through sweater and gloves, hooked around me. She smells of cordite and sweat, and I don't mind at all.
"I dreamed you were awake." She says. I know that feeling. The awfulness of dreams of hope. "I needed to know this was real."
"What's got into you? You've seen me have a seizure before." I keep my gaze level, resting my hands on her shoulders
"You've never fainted before! That second year reached into you and did something. Maybe struck down the Hunter. I thought she'd hurt you." Her arms press tighter into my back, hooked just beneath my ribs, hearth's embers on a cold morning. She ducks her head closer into me, almost muffling her next words as my arms rest limp where they are. I don't know what to do. "She hurt herself to. The doctor says she's still fragile from what she did a few nights ago."
"Is she okay?"
"She's awake. The Doctor and that hot tailor told her not to do anything risky."
"So you do like guys as well. I did wonder."
Manako pouts a little. "I like you more."
I'm the one that leans in this time, a swift brush against her pout, before pressing forward, deeper until she suddenly pulls back until the back of her neck presses against my interlocked palms. She swallows, opens her mouth, before shutting it and swallowing again. When she speaks, it's a whisper. "Are we-- Have we -- Have we lost?"
I don't answer right away and she continues to speak, urgent. "Everyone thinks we have. The prosecutor phoned someone and shouted at them. The Cop is just silent. The tailor and that gangster with him have been together trying to figure out what to do. Is it that bad?"
"A high ranking public safety official was assassinated and they're blaming us for it. They can't prove it but they'll be gunning for us now. Maybe not Reijou, the exorcists will protect her. Junya, I suppose has his own protection, but you and me…" I move forward, shifting so she's sitting further on my lap, and make to kiss her again, but she looks at me and I stop, searching for anything else to speak about. "Have you ever wanted to just travel, just the two of us?"
"But what about my Uncle? What about the girls getting kidnapped?"
I'm silent for a long while, gently embracing Manako.
"I don't know. I don't know how to do anything." My voice shudders as I speak, and my tongue tastes saline. Am I crying? How weak. I take a long breath, try to get myself under control.
Manako's arms squeeze tight again as she shuffles closer, pressing my head into the crook of her neck. "Shhh." she says.
I enjoy the faint smell of her hair for a moment, but the words bubble up, pulling me away from her. "Aratani set me up for this. He knew things like this would happen and he staked me out to save his reputation. Just set me out to do his dirty work. Now I've put you in--"
I don't realise she's kissing me until I try to speak more and can't. Her lips are wet, and taste salty. Is she crying too? "Just stop." She's trembling as my hands move down her sides, slow tremors like ripples in a pool. She kisses me again, softer, pulling away after a second. . "Stop talking."
She leans in again, but this time we only hug, each of us desperate, her hands tight around my shoulders as I grip onto her waist fiercely. I couldn't say how long we hold each other, but eventually I shift, one of my legs going numb from her weight. The motion drives the top of one of the magazines into my ribs, and I yelp at the cold and sharpness. Manako flinches backwards, almost standing up. Her face is tear-stained and her hair a tangled mess, but. I've never seen anyone so beautiful. We speak at almost the same moment.. "Are you--"
"Can I --"
I lick my lips, compose myself a bit "Can I take your vest off?"
She blushes, suddenly shy, then I see her eyes widen and she laughs, a tremulous thing. "I thought you were, I thought you were asking for something else."
I stand up and begin to undo the vest. She begins to help and I kiss her again. We fumble blindly with the vest, spinning in place as we breathlessly kiss, a furious urge that burns away my melancholy. It finally comes free, and I toss it blindly away, ignoring the muted thump as it lands.
I reach up, my hand slipping into the curve of her throat, and step into her, my thigh slipping between hers. Manako's breathing deepens as she pulls me back down into the armchair. I press forward, feeling the fabric of her jeans up against my bar leg. My mouth slips from her own and I start tracing her jawline with my mouth, nibbling lightly at the flesh at the junction of her neck, the action producing a breathy sound that liquifies something inside me. I nip at her earlobe, pressing harder into her as my hands trace meaningless patterns in the small of her back, then move back to her lips and--
The armchair overbalances, tipping the two of us out of it, sprawling in a heap of limbs across it's back and the floor. I try to stabilize with my hand and feel my hand slide on Manako's vest, which goes forward, under the balcony rail. There's a metallic sound as plate carrier, plate, tools, most of a battle load of ammunition and hundred thousand yen encrypted personal radio drop three stories.
We both stop, stunned, as the echoes die away.
"House." I mutter belatedly. "Catch that." Manako starts to laugh. A moment later I join her. Laughing so hard I almost start to cry again. I roll to the side so we're side by side on the back of the armchair.
There's a lot of things I should say to Manako. About us, about mage society. The expectations that mages have about the world and how those aren't the same as the ones of normal people. It feels somehow more desperate than half the fights I get into. "That's the second time we've had an almost."
"Mm."
"I keep thinking I should try to talk to you about things." I look up at the ceiling. "Like, Mages don't date the way humans do. What's normal just isn't the same."
"Like how?" She looks over at me, rolling so we're side by side on the soft upholstery of the armchair.
"Like, it's pretty weird for a mage to only have one romantic partner. You have a husband or a wife, but you have, well, others."
"Do you have someone else?"
"No!" I look over at her quickly. "I'd never have done that without asking you first."
She rolls over so we're face to face. "Then, why don't we just leave that question until you find someone else you like?"
There's a kind of commitment that, a commitment that, if I find someone else, I have to let Manako be able to hurt me in the aftermath. But then, haven't I made that commitment already, in a thousand different ways?
"Do you want to take a shower?" I mutter into her hair.
"Yes."
It's at that point I think that it hits me.
What happens to middle class girls who look like they might not make their highschool exam?
They get tutored.
*****
I get dressed before I go down, thinking out the angles of it. I don't know that what I figured out is true yet. I make most of my outfit black today, black top, fancy black skirt, white shirt poking out of the top. White thigh highs with mystic symbols stitched into them in black and red thread.
Yoshitaka is sitting at the kitchen counter table and drinking my booze. There's a mostly empty bottle of Arran Robert Burns Single Malt Scotch next to her. Something I brought back from a trip to England. Her cheeks are flush and she's kind of leaning over the table. "You got no right to complain!" She says when she sees me. "A girl your age shouldn't even have booze." She knocks back another shot.
I'm not really worried. I actually have another three bottles in the cellar. I'm more annoyed.
"How drunk are you?" I sit on the hight chair opposite her, and reclaim the bottle. She watches it go with a sigh.
"Not drunk enough." She rubs her eyes. "Tanigawa is talking about taking her niece and fleeing the country. I don't know where we could possibly go they won't find us. I never thought, I never thought they'd just kill one of their own like that."
"Did you ever get the information about the kidnapped girls we were talking about?"
"No." She rubs her eyes. "Or not enough to be useful. I was looking through the transcripts when my memory cuts out. I remember that a bunch of them were like you said, low achievers in middle school, but got into a good highschool."
"I've got an idea maybe, about how they're selected. I'm just not sure how to check it out."
She looks at me then at the bottle."Okay I'm definitely too drunk for this. Can you do something about that?"
I go to the fridge, pull out a set of injectors and tap my wrist. "How your arm out." She does and I apply the injector. There's a hiss of gas and she shivers, eyes clearing.
"That's awful."
"Just make sure to drink some water as well. The alcohol will still dehydrate you. You can still get a hangover."
"Great." She goes to the tap, pours herself a tumbler and then returns. "So what have you got?"
"Tutoring company." I say. "It's got to be. Making some kind of assessment of them in the process of tutoring. Either they were trying to create a reserve for their supply of foreign girls, or they were field testing assessment."
"So we just ask your friend who tutored her, and we're back in business." Yoshitaka shakes her head.
"We don't even need to phone my friend. I remember who they were. They had a weird name. It was Porphyrion." I had thought it was funny in middle school. It having an Greek name. An obscure mythological reference.
"I suppose it'd be too much to expect them to have a facility on their records where they could care for dozens of kidnap victims."
"We're probably going to have to wait for them to kidnap someone else than then follow them." I rub my eyes. "The first thing we're going to need to do though is figure out who met the criteria for their assessment."
*****
Porphyrion's offices are kind of out of the way, a nondescript pair of office block in Nerima overlooked by a bunch of high apartment buildings. There are actually two of them, the assessment centre and the administrative offices.
The big problem is going to come if they've purged their own records to an offsite location. Which, if they're as slick as they've been so far, they will have.
However, while I'm not actually a hacker, I'm relatively confident that I can at least figure out where they sent the data, assuming they didn't get really clever, pack it onto a hard drive and send it off via courier. Even if they did do that though, that requires somebody at the building they're leaving to know where the stuff went. That assumes of course there's no paper records, which will be even harder to move.
Junya and Reijou are out. Both insist they'll be back if we have a clear target, but for now Reijou's organization wants her as far away from me as possible. Junya in the meantime has a rush job in Ginza. "It's probably a diversion to get me away from you, but it's not something I can ignore."
"Do you need any help?"
"Nah." He waved. "Just get your own problems sorted."
"You too."
So it's just Manako, Tanigawa, Yoshitaka, and me, with a few hired Yakuza for seasoning. We spent the rest of the day assessing the complex. Both Manako and I called in sick from school, which is going to raise questions with her parents if they find out, but seems like the only safe option. Besides but we needed all four of us working flat out to to do the proper assessment. things get any worse. I put Manako on drone observation of the complex, while Yoshitaka, Tanigawa and I set about compromising an employee and gathering other human intelligence.
Most of the day is spent with us furtively hitting up our contacts to see about getting more than the city hall floor plans. We get a good hit about six, when one of Yoshitaka's street level informers comes through with a janitor with a serious hostess club habit who ended up borrowing a bunch of money from the Yakuza.
A few calls and a suitcase of money later and we've got a good read on precisely where the paper record room and the server room are.
We're in luck in that they're all stored in the administrative block. Apparently there's some level of tight security about bringing them over from the less secure test centre every night, which the janitor has to do. We briefly discuss a plan to have him abscond with the packet on the way across but scotch it as we don't know if he has the records we want. In turn, the janitor leads us to a security man recently transferred to a post he didn't want for drunkenness. He proves easy to crack and we get an idea of the night security. There's a code pad check in system, but the guard tells us that it's mostly kept in the security room, due to daily changes.
"Do you think this is a trap?" Tanigawa asks as we sit around with the annotated plans spread out over my dining table, its edges weighed down with coffee cups and plates of mostly eaten cakes. Manako is sitting with her but Yoshitaka is still out, checking with her contacts in the police in the state of play within public safety. "Security is nominally tight, but this isn't something that would stop you on your own is it?
"No. I could get into a building like this without anyone noticing at all." I slump back in my chair. It's a bleak thing to think after a day of planning and investigation but the security just feels too light. Too normal. That means there's a surprise in there, almost certainly.
"And if they realize we took the records, they'll shift their focus and target in a different way. People from down whatever list they're using." Manako says. "This feels hopeless."
I tap my fingers on the map and think. "Wait a moment. I have an idea."
*****
Detective Yoshitaka doesn't like the guy she's driving with. She doesn't like the suit I gave her either. "I look like a hostess" she complained when I gave it to her.
"The point is that you don't look like a cop."
Her driver is a Yakuza, though not a particularly obvious one, Eiji-san, Ryuta's trusted lieutenant. Is to old and fat to really look the part when he puts on a normal suit that hides his tattoos. The approach to Ryuta was honestly the most agonizing thing today. I was sure he was going to be compromised and get us into a fight, but he wasn't and it was embarrassing. Hopefully this means they don't have that many more frog throats, so can't compromise people other than through a normal chain of command.
I doubt it though. I suspect they'll have a few more in reserve. However they probably suspect, accurately, that I've laid some traps in case they try to come after any of my other friends. Ryuta though, they could have got. He likes his privacy too much, and knows my capacities to well to have let me know his life well enough to lay anything good.
I watch the car passing along below from a number of screens. I've got a pair of drones up, and a compromised traffic camera, plus a few web cams laid during earlier ground reconnaissance. One of those is watching Manako specifically, sat on the ground sheet at the window of an empty apartment, covering the car with a huge .50 cal rifle. The rifle is the same one used by Canadian special forces, and Manako proudly told me that it holds the record for one of the longest ranged sniper kills in history. The advanced scope on the top is made by an American civilian company and automatically adjusts for target movement and even wind.
I won't find out for a while how much of an irony the choice of weapon is.
The longest part of operational prep was spending an hour making sure of all the various runes we'd sprayed onto it before either Manako or Tanigawa were willing to fire it in the busy streets of a Nerima evening.
"We're coming up on the initial point now. Can you see us?"
"I see you." I report.
"Eyes on." Manako says. She's switched over to a pair of binoculars, then drifts to look at the building. "There's not much going on at the target. A guy just took the trash out."
"Alright. Eji-san, start your run now."
The car, a silver toyota pulls along the street slowly. On the drone feed I see the man putting the trash turn to watch it, then his eyes widen as the window lowers and Yoshitaka raises the grenade launcher she's been keeping between her legs. The first round is smoke, to let her measure her aim, the second is an incendiary round the smacks through a ground floor window.
"Got it!"
Eiji punches the car forward, accelerating away in a scream of tires. The man outside is speaking into a radio. Indeed, the whole building has lit up with radio and phone transmissions.
I hit the second part of the plan and there's a distant boom. Part of the street jumps as the fiberoptic serving the office's internet connection.
The singular insight I had for this is that we don't actually need to take the records. If we render them unusable then the entity breaks out anyway. It's not optimal, because it ends up with a bunch of prominent people hatching cosmic horrors, but that's something for Aratani and my enemies to care about more than I do.
Or at least. I can make my enemies think that I don't care. Think that I'm willing to take the win that is hurting them, rather than the win that comes from actually doing something about the horror's they've summoned to remake the world. They probably have backups, but logically this should cause them to displace their records, and hopefully make it easier for me to get at them without walking into whatever trap they've laid.
Eiji and Yoshitaka's car zooms away, visible on the drone, making its pre-planned escape route. There are Tokyo police area cars looking for them, and several police drones up, but so far the route looks like it's been successful, especially with our own drone overflight.. I hand that job over to Tanigawa as Manako speaks up.
"Fire trucks are arriving now. There's a pair of armoured van as well. I see two fat guys, they might be frog throats."
There's a lot of milling around going on on the street, but they seem to have a procedure. A ladder is already up against the building and as water is sprayed into the lower floor, men in fire fighting suits who jumped from the van are already swarming up it. A few moments later they throw the first strong box down the ladder to the men waiting below. The boxes go into the armoured vans one after another, then the fire suited men go with them.
The two vans pulls away into the traffic as the fire fighters start to address the blaze in earnest. At the end of the street they split, and a pair of police vehicles fall in with them for escort.
"They're not stupid." Tanigawa sighs. "How do we know which one is carrying the real records?"
I don't have a good idea. "Let's just keep watching for now."
They're not, I think, quite used to the idea of drone observation being a thing. At least, there's no precautions taken to do in the quad copters. Still, for now they're just in transit, "M, stay in position to make sure they don't start pulling more boxes out and taking them elsewhere. Y, what's your status?"
"We've proceed as planned and we're outbound, no sign of pursuit." The launcher dumped down a storm drain, clothes changed, fresh car. They'll be police checkpoints soon after that kind of grenade attack. We'll wait them out.
"Looks like the escort dumped one of the trucks."
I look over at the image of the second truck. The police vehicle is diverging away. "Huh."
"I guess it's the other one."
"No." I consider. "No, I think it's that one." After all, if you're running a kidnapping ring, what would you want less than the police knowing where your records are? Corruption only goes so far.
I hope I'm right, because the first van stops at a place much harder to raid. A busy night office in Shinjuku, with a lot of visible security, including police. Meantime the other van doesn't go so far, another quiet Nerima office complex. It looks dead quiet as the men start to unload the truck. Dead quiet except for a fat man in a cheap suit watching as they unload. A woman who looks like a college girl waiting with him.
"That can't be--" Manako blurts. She's been watching the feed. "He died! He turned into a monster and I shot him!"
"I guess death isn't the end for creatures like him." Explains why they're willing to attach eldritch throat cancers to themselves. "I'm heading that way."
I get up from the booth in a station cafe I've been sitting at and head for Nerima.
*****
There are tons of police around. Police and onlookers. The firebombing has made a splash, both on social media and in the normal news. Groups of police are everywhere, looking for people and checking IDs. The news is already worrying we're turning into America. A commentator is talking about the esper program.
In a way it makes it easier.There's a lot less going on in the back streets around the office.
I'm wearing a black hoodie, a rain cloak, shorts and black leggings under it's actually still quite cold. Runes are woven into the hoodie in white that make the eyes slide off it, and I have a dark blue scarf to cover my face. It's not quite truth invisibility, but it's a lot less visible to mages. If it was just fashion I'd use red, but don't want to look too much like one of the American rebellion's super soldiers.
I check it from across the street, then begin to climb up to building top level, staying low and careful not to skyline myself. "I'm at the target. Going radio silent. I'll double click when I'm about to make entry."
They're being fairly quiet about it, the blinds drawn but the lights are on. Some covert scrying shows me the capture team from earlier are set up in a lounge in the second floor, chatting with several dozen Yakuza, whose office this may actually be. The voice shit they're doing is an absolutely terrifying power. A room over, several tech types are setting up laptops, communications and so on. Looks like I hit the jackpot. Or just a secondary command centre that's a trap. I won't know until I make entry.
I circle the building slowly. The drone is pulled back now. I don't want to tip anyone inside. There's are two look outs on the roof. They're probably supposed to be covering both angles but they keep congregating together and smoking. Gangsters can be pretty lazy. I use my thermal monocular to check that there's not someone without a cigarette trying to fake me out by covering the far side. Nope.
Initial check done, I find place to wait, roof of a building a little way along the street. sitting back in the shadows and wrapping them around me with a simple enchantment. Invisibility is hard but using shadows is easy. I put my headphones on and put on the podcast I cued up.
With any luck it'll rain.
By three AM the building seems to be mostly still. There's still two lookouts on the roof. New guys after a shift change a few hours ago. Most of the other Yakuza, techs and guards are asleep or have left in a gaggle. The fat man left a while later, while the female mage took the Yakuza boss, who's actually quite handsome, up to the third floor. She seems likely to be distracted for a while.
Rain is coming down steadily now and the two cigarettes on the roof are standing together under an umbrella. They seem to prefer the front of the building, maybe it's a more interesting view.
I work my way down from my perch and then turn off the podcast and hang my headphones around my neck, and insert the earpiece for my radio in one ear. Then I move in along the alley at the back of the building, mount the fence silently and begin to climb up the back.
The rain is coming down hard, but a small amount of Crawley effect applies to my hands makes getting up easily. I get to the second floor and hang their for a moment, listening at the window. Snoring inside, the sound of active computers.
I hang their for a moment more in the rain, thinking how much I love this. As fun as it's been working with others there's something uniquely satisfying about this lonely sneak. I sketch a rune on the window lock and it pops open silently, then slide it over.
The tech is of course, sleeping on a sofa right under the window. Water and cold air hits him and he starts to wake up, then I whisper a word of sleep in his ear and he turns over and begins to snore again.
The water is a problem. I fetch a towel from my kit and dry my boots off, then shrug off my rain coat and ball it up with the towel, letting both drop away into the dark. I'll get wet on the way out but it's better than revealing my presence. Only then do I tug the window shut, double click my radio and climb over the sleeping tech to check the room.
It seems like the plan to occupy the building with a pile of guys all night has been mostly undone by lack of sofas. The office itself is a pretty typical open plan with half height cubical desks affair, that wouldn't look out of place for anything from a law office to an anime studio, but there's only one sofa in here. A second man is sleeping under one of the desks in a sleeping bag. I go over and whisper a word of sleep to him as well, keeping him out, then go check the door. There's a couple of Yakuza outside sat in office chairs and talking about some girl at a local club. No problem.
I walk over to one of the laptops, which is plugged into a rack of hard drives and jack into it. There's some basic anti-esper countermeasures, but while I'm not exactly the world's best hacker, I know enough to rapidly cut through with magic.
Access files. Bingo. Dozens of educational files. Myers-Briggs type profile. Probably not that. IQ tests, a few other normal educational tests. Huh. What's this? Perihelion? I insert a thumb drive and take everything. No point in second guessing.
My radio buzzes. "N, the fat guy is on his way back. Sorry, we didn't spot him till he was almost at the building."
Damn. No point in crying over spilt milk If I didn't have them I'd have no observation at all I double click in response, and pull the drive out, sticking it into a pocket. The outer door opens and the two Yakuza on the stairs stir, and I hear them get up.
I could teleport out but that would make a noise. Instead I duck in under one of the desks.
"That you friend?" One asks.
"Yes." The voice hits hard. "Where's Ichika?"
"Still with the boss."
"Lucky bitch." He laughs. "I should have found some action earlier. I was hoping for someone in particular."
"This girl you think will break in here?"
"Yes." The door opens. The fat man steps inside the office, the lighter footsteps of the yakuza behind him. "She did something horrible to me and a friend of mine earlier, and I'm longing to do something even worse to her."
I reach into my hoodie and grip the pistol inside. If I have to silence the place it's my most reliable option.
"Sorry you didn't find her then."
The fat man walks in, he's checking around the room. I ease back further into the shadows. The main light comes on, and both techs mutter and come awake. "You lazy fucks. You're not supposed to be sleeping. You're supposed to be on watch in here."
"Sorry sir."
"Maybe you will be." He laughs. "Then again, if she's come and gone that'll mean I might get to meet both her and that short haired girl who shot me again. I'd like that."
I almost step out and shoot him right then an there, then I realize that's exactly what he's trying to induce. Even in casual conversation, the magic bleeds through. How did they build his power? The door opens again, female voice, sounding annoyed. "You're making a noise Van."
"I'm sorry Ichika-chan." He laughs. "I was wondering if we'd had visitors while I was out."
"Well, wonder quietly."
Once again I wait, listening to the two techs messing around. The fat man, Van, goes out, once again talking to the Yakuza who he seems to be more interested in than the techs. I wait, not moving and hoping my body doesn't go stiff as they putter around.
"You want some coffee?" One of them asks. "There's a machine down the hall."
A flicker of music as headphones are removed. Some tinkly video game sound. One of the tales games? "What?"
"Coffee? Do you want some."
"Sure. Get a couple of cans." The headphones go back on and the door bangs. I'm never going to get a better chance than this. I crawl out from under the desk, staying low and walk around the back of the guy on the laptop. Yeah, Tales of Symphonia. I prefer the sequel. I walk to the window, pull it open with a smooth motion and whisper a word that'll warm and dry the air coming in, then push myself out through it, sticking to the wall with a hand as I pull it closed.
Just in time, the other tech comes back with the coffee. I slump back against the wall, then embarrassingly almost lose concentration and fall, saving myself at the last moment. Time to get out of here.
The rain has mostly subsided to a fine mist and I retrieve my coat and towel from the bottom, stuff them into my kit and then make my way out of the compound. "I'm out. Pick me up at--" I take a moment to check my map and give an address.
"Did you get it?"
"Yeah." I take out the thumb drive and look at it. "Yeah, I got it."
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- Pronouns
- She/Her
also Merry Christmas and happy holidays.