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Characters and situations in this fanfic were inspired or borrowed from
works copyright by
Artmic, Youmex, and AIC. No profit is intended or wanted from this work.
C&C is always appreciated.
homepage http://home.utah-inter.net/arthurh/art.html
-
MegaTokyo Nightfall Wars
Flashing lights stabbed through the smog ridden night's air, bringing dim
illumination to ramshackle
buildings and sleazy bars. Whores hawked themselves, calling out into the
night tiredly. A group of toughs
leered appreciatively, but kept their hands near hidden guns. Nervous eyes
watched for other gangs and the
far less likely cops.
Asian, African and European ethnicities rubbed shoulder to shoulder with
each other, stoically ignoring
each other. The occasional transient watched nervously, begging for a few
hundred yen. Frozen puddles of
unclean water showed the chillness of late January, in the cramped canyons
of the slums.
And striding from a nearby parked car, as if a rose in a patch of weeds, a
tall and elegant young women
walked towards a nearby bar. Short, but perfectly coiffed, dark hair
contrasted with a pale woman's suit,
black ruffled shirt and high heels finished off the ensemble, mostly hidden
beneath a long winter coat.
One of the toughs looked over, a wide grin of malice on his face. Her gaze
barely drifted over him, cold
and calculating. He blinked, suddenly feeling that strange emotion of prey,
being ignored because he was
too weak, too... insignificant. Her grace was unconscious and lithe, as that
of a predator.
She walked down the steps and into the bar, breaking her eye contact. The
ruffian's attention was brought
back to his fellows acts. In mere moments, he would convince himself that he
must have been imagining
things.
Sylia Stingray's eyes flitted across the bar's patrons. Less than normal and
probably mostly gang members
to boot. They fit in easily with the damaged furniture and peeling walls of
this dump.
Fargo was in one of the most rumpled and nondescript brown suits in
existence. He was talking to an
unfamiliar face behind the bar. Sylia glided up to the bar.
"A martini." Sylia waited a moment for the bartender to procure the drink.
Fargo nodded to her, signaling an almost empty corner where he usually did
his business. He walked over
and sat down, fidgeting with his own drink in its shot glass.
A minute later, Sylia sat next to him. "Did you find out anything about
Genom's involvement with
emergency landing of Shuttle Flight number 286-A?" she asked calmly. She
pulled a drag off of her
cigarette daintily.
Fargo nodded. "Yeah. Scuttlebutt is that Genom rigged the ship to crash near
a location of their choice.
Five hundred million Yen in experimental data and prototypes from the United
States Military, en route to
an undisclosed base here in Japan. The Minister of Defense can't put out a
hue and cry about the missing
equipment, as ninety percent of it was illegal here in Japan."
"You're positive that it was Genom? Not another multi-national?" Sylia
asked. She hadn't had much luck
finding out about what it had actually contained.
"According to my source. He claims to have seen which warehouse they stored
it in," Fargo replied. He
took a swallow from his drink, licking his lips.
"Where?" Sylia tapped her finger on the side of her glass. Why would Genom
bother to steal prototype
weapons. Most of their own designs were years ahead of the competition.
The rest were merely comparable.
"He wouldn't tell me. Says he doesn't like dealing with middleman." Fargo
shrugged for effect.
"How much is he asking for?" Figurative little warning bells started going
off in Sylia's brain. Her face
played straight and calm.
"Six hundred thousand yen by midnight tonight." Fargo's eyes blinked every
few seconds.
"And he'll only deal with me?" Sylia's leg muscles tensed, her eyes darted
to the opening of the booth. Her
mind catalogued each and every person in the bar.
"That's what he said," Fargo said woodenly. The tense atmosphere seemed to
thicken in anticipation.
"I'll have to think about it. Your payment will be in the normal place."
Fargo nodded, his hand tightening unconsciously around his glass. He could
not raise his eyes to look up at
her as she left.
Sylia stood up and started to walk towards the door, when three tough guys
stepped into her way. She
didn't even slow down while she snapped her small handgun out of her ready
purse, letting loose four shots
into two of them and snapping a kick at the final one.
Her gun arm was grabbed abruptly while she was balanced mid kick, her arm up
in the air. Shock showed
on her face as she looked over her shoulder at one of the thugs that had
been in the far corner only a
moment ago, easily forty feet away.
He pulled the gun out of her hand professionally as he started to talk.
"Now, now. That's enough of that,"
he said, charm oozing off of his voice. "You're a feisty one, aren't you?
Can't have you shooting up me
boys though. You're good, really good."
Sylia twisted as she punched him in the stomach twice and then planted her
palm under his jaw. She was
starting to become unnerved, as she noted that he seemed to not feel the
blows at all, standing unmoved.
Boomer! "Let me go." Perhaps words would work better, now that her escape
options were untenable.
The dark red haired man thought about it for a second. "No."
"If it's money you want, I don't carry more than a thousand Yen."
He smiled nastily, lips tight in a grinning rictus. "Yup. That's what I
want. And your boss's access to
military hardware."
Sylia blinked in surprise. She must be getting sloppy, if he knew that. "I
don't know what you're talking
about."
He backhanded her into a table, splitting her lip and loosening her teeth.
He walked over and picked her up
by her throat as casually as if she were a small child's doll. "Wrong
answer." His eyes seemed to become
pits of darkness, sucking in her gaze along with all of the existing light.
"Tell us where you store the stuff
and how to get all of your money."
Sylia felt the compulsion flitter across her mind, demanding adherence to
his command. She blinked in
surprise and stopped her voice from illogically blurting out the address to
the Silky Doll. "I'm just an
intermediary. I don't know where they keep the equipment they have me
procure."
Those eyes seemed to bore into her eyes. "Is that the truth?"
"Yes," Sylia said, shrugging off the compelling voice again. Was he a new
boomer, with some sort of
hypnotic power? That would not work on her.
"Who do you work for?" His smiling face had turned grim. He couldn't be so
wrong about this women
could he? He snorted. It didn't matter, in the long run.
"I am currently employed by EMS Engineering's Mateo Dupont. He is already
aware of what is happening
here," Sylia bluffed, her expression flat.
"Really?" the man said in a conversational voice. He jerked his thumb at one
of the people surrounding her,
who was holding up a device of some sort. "Jackie says that you aren't
wired. So I bet you're boss doesn't
know, yet." He grinned suddenly. "So you're going to join my team."
"I'm not available for hire." Beads of sweat started to drip down her back.
"Who said anything about hiring you?" he said, grinning. "My name is Devlin
of Clan McQueen. And... I
am a vampire." He suddenly bared his very real looking fangs. "And now, so
are you!"
Sylia had but a moment to be shocked as she saw all of the thugs and
ruffians bare their own teeth. Her
neck was suddenly twisted sideways as pain stabbed two points of
unbelievable ecstasy into her supple
neck.
She struck and punched frantically, her mind fighting against her own body's
lethargy and Devlin's
incredible strength. Slowly, her hands quit struggling as her gaze started
to fog over. The last thing she saw
was Fargo looking at her with sad, tortured eyes as her own eyes rolled up
into her head.
Slowly, oh so slowly, her heart beat. Longer and longer it paused.
She barely felt Devlin release her from his bite. One moment, then two
moments and her heart no longer
beat. Sylia could not even scream aloud as some liquid was poured down her
throat, burning as if the most
potent of acid, sickening salty.
Devlin smiled as he felt her take her first active sip of his blood. He
cradled her carefully as she suckled
unconsciously, her body betraying her to the darkness of night. After just a
few moments, he pulled his
wrist away, the blood stopping its flow.
He watched in anticipation for a few minutes. The first few moments of a
vampire's existence were usually
the most traumatic that a person ever experienced. It was important for them
to see their sire and
understand their helplessness.
Sylia twitched continuously, her body uncontrolled by any motive force.
Devlin started to frown. She
should have become conscious by now.
Slowly, the twitching subsided. Jackie started to lean down to whisper
something in Devlin's ear, when he
was suddenly knocked aside by Devlin. He lifted her into a limp sitting
position, opening her eyes with his
fingers.
"Her mind does not dwell in this vampires body. The flesh is quickened, but
I can not see her within it." He
stood suddenly and walked away. Just as he was about to the door. "Fargo.
Clean this mess up. Make sure
she isn't found."
Fargo nodded mutely. As the vampires left the empty bar, he carefully picked
up the flaccid body. "I'm
sorry, Sylia. But... he owns me, body and soul. I... I can't fight him. I
don't even want to try anymore,"
Fargo said finally, his voice choking.
He carefully lifted her, one of her arms over his shoulder. He was soon
driving down into an even worse
section of Tokyo, leaving the bright lights of life behind.
Broken rock walls and shattered buildings lined the precarious road he took
deeper into the canyons. His
unobtrusive dark blue sedan pulled in between two shattered buildings,
hiding from prying eyes. At the end
of the alley lay a black chasm, one of the many remnants of the Second Kanto
earthquake.
With no fanfare, he released the body, hearing it crash to the ground far
below. "Goodbye." Fargo turned
his back and drove off into the night. He just couldn't force himself to
destroy the body. Even under the
compulsion.
Sylia screamed in her mind again, desperately praying that someone could
hear her. Help me! Don't leave
me here, she entreated. I'm still alive! Her mind tried to reach out to
someone, anyone; striving vainly.
But the night only answered her with cold indifference, a mocking laugh at
her and her efforts.
-
Priss belted out one of her new songs as she gyrated her hips on stage. She
was wearing her trademark
leather skirt and halter, pale blond wig and pale face paint. Flashing
lights and her booming music filling
the nightclub that she was performing in. During one of the quick pauses in
between sets, a sudden chill
swept over her, causing her to look around, as if she expected an attack at
any moment. Reddish brown
eyes swept the room, taking in all of the patrons. "What?!" Priss muttered
to herself.
In a corner, Leon McNichol watched his favorite singer avidly. He slammed
down his drink, his eyes
meeting hers for just a second. As she watched, he raised his mug and
cheered with the rest of the audience,
jolting her back into action.
Nene slumped over desk, a pile of paper work threatening to take it over.
She yawned hugely and then
smiled in abrupt anticipation, as a huge ice cream Sunday appeared in front
of her. Her desk partner gave
her a thumbs up as she turned back to her desk after delivering Nene's
favorite treat.
"Thanks, Naoko!" Nene chimed. She was just about to dig in, when a sense of
dread filled her. Blue-green
eyes blinked nervously, looking around the office in confusion.
Linna laughed as she walked along with her dinner date, a handsome young man
who was dressed quite
snappily. He held open the door for her, when she too felt a strange,
dreadful feeling wash over her. Her
dark eyes looked around, trying to see what was out of the ordinary, totally
ignoring the questions being
directed at her for a second.
In a huff, her date closed her door and entered on his side of the car.
Linna belatedly realized that he was
leaving her as his engine revved up. He pulled out and away, ignoring her as
she waved for him to wait.
"Damn! What a jerk!" Linna yelled out. "Grrr. How am I going to find a taxi
at this time of night?"
Mackie turned and tossed in his bed, as nightmarish images of death and
suffering filled his sleep. Finally,
he drifted off to a deeper sleep, untroubled by strangeness once more.
-
Night was burned away by the day and day was swallowed whole by the night.
Sylia's body had lain
dormant the entire day, in a crumpled heap in the snow, only a small piece
of dark gray sky had been
visible from the hole that she lay in. But with the night, Sylia's body
awoke with a ravening hunger with no
conscious control, twitching silently again.
The first sign of consciousness was her eyes opening. Sylia could have
shouted in relief, if she'd been able
to. A moment later, her voice gurgled in triumph. Her hands and feet started
to tremble, as Sylia became
aware of an overwhelming hunger. As with any bodily functions, she pushed
them to the background, until
she could take charge of the situation.
Minute by minute, she relearned to use her body at an amazing speed. She
crammed in the experience of
growing from child to adult in less than a half an hour. Still stumbling,
she finally managed to crawl to her
feet, looking up into the air at her possible escape. Almost seventy feet of
sheer rock.
Not in her current shape, she decided. She scanned the crevice that she had
fallen into. To her left, it fell off
sharply. To her right, it curved out of sight. If she had landed just a
little differently, she would have kept
falling, dashing herself on rock the entire way.
Stepping carefully, keeping one hand on the wall, she worked her way
forward. Each step became more
confident, sure of itself. Soon she came to the ruins of what looked to be
some sort of underground garage.
It had mostly fallen in on itself, but she thought she could see a possible
pathway. She struggled until she
finally heard off in the distance the sound of loud, angry music and
shouting.
Creeping slowly forward, she saw lights down a passage. As quiet as a mouse,
she approached the lights
"Hey! Micha! What's taking so long? We can't start a party without
entertainment!" a voice called out
loudly.
"Shut your trap, Jamal. They'll be here in an hour. You can wait," another
voice called out.
Sylia's eyes narrowed as she came close to a doorway. Little light reached
her eyes as she looked into the
room. Trash and mattresses lay on the ground, blankets thrown haphazardly
here and there. Sylia saw one
of the only two figures leave the room. She had to get out now, while the
getting was good.
Sylia took stock of her situation and capabilities. No gun, but her knife on
her hip slid easily into grasp. She
had no illusions, that one punk would not stop her. Settling her suit coat
on her body a bit, she slid the knife
into her sleeve, ready to be retrieved in a moment.
As if she didn't have a care in the world, she stepped out into the room and
started to walk towards the
other exit.
Jamal blinked in surprise, spitting out some of his whiskey. "What the
fuck?" The clothing she was wearing
looked like it had been nice at one time. It also looked as if a gang had
attacked her. And then dropped her
onto a very large pile of dirt.
Sylia ignored him and continued walking.
"Hey! I'm talking to you. What the hell are you doing down here?" he
demanded, starting to catch up to her.
Sylia didn't stop walking, but did turn to look at him. "I am leaving. That
is all."
"Look, bitch. This is the Weasel's turf. You don't just walk in here and
expect to leave without talking to
me, Jamal the ruthless." For emphasis, he twirled open a butterfly knife
expertly.
"I don't want any problems," Sylia said, showing no concern, but turning
towards him, slowing as she
spoke.
"Hell, lady, you're already a problem. If you aren't careful, you're gonna
be dead," Jamal said
threateningly. "Why don't you sit you ass down and you're gonna tell me what
you're doing here." He
leered at her as he got a better look at her. Sweet!
Sylia noted the expression, realizing that further talk would be a waste as
he built up the courage to attack
her. With a negligent flip of her wrist she snapped her blade out and cut
his knife hand faster than Jamal
could blink.
Jamal blinked stupidly at his bleeding wrist as his knife clattered to the
ground. "ARGH! You bitch!"
Sylia blinked as her hunger almost seemed to roar in her ears, demanding
that it be sated. The smell of
blood seemed to be intoxicating. Her body took a step forward, almost of its
own violation. She clenched
her jaw, feeling a tightening of new muscles above her canines. With a
sickening surety, Sylia knew that
she had just unsheathed her own fangs.
Jamal roared as he charged her, swinging his good fist at her, trying to
knock her out quickly. Sylia stepped
past the punch, jamming the knife into his chest right next to his sternum.
The smell of blood assailed her. This was what her body was craving, she
realized. Not surprising, but still
unnerving, all the same.
The thug's expression changed to horrified surprise ever so slowly, as he
realized the mortal wound he had
just taken.
Sylia coldly and analytically went over what little information she knew of
vampires. The only thing that
she could safely say that she knew for sure of them, was that they needed
blood to feed, to survive, and that
they had fangs.
And survive she would. From a little girl that had plotted her revenge
against Genom when she was twelve,
to the young woman who had sworn to protect her father's technology from
abuse, to the mercenary who
led the Knight Sabers, one thing had been constant. Sylia was a survivor who
succeeded.
In that one moment of Jamal's realization of his death, these thoughts
flashed through her mind. With
shockingly little remorse, she pushed the knife deeper, while suddenly
biting into his throat, her other arm
curling around him as she sucked greedily at his lifeblood. The salty liquid
tasted like the nectar of life to
her, unlocking some nameless recess in her mind.
Jamal struggled for a moment, until he blacked out from shock and blood
loss. A minute later, Sylia let his
cooling body slump to the ground. For one long moment, she stared at him,
the second human to die by her
hands.
She stripped her suit jacket off, using it to clean her lips off. She
dropped the cloth off on top of the corpse.
She hurriedly dowsed him in the potent liquor that he had been drinking.
Slipping into his leather jacket,
she lit him on fire with a cigarette lighter.
She hid in the shadows near the entry for a moment. The other gang member
trotted in, a gun in his hand,
obviously expecting trouble, her patience rewarded by waiting for him to
appear.
As he tried to deal with the blazing body, she disappeared the way he had
entered, seeking an exit.
Minutes later, she was on the deserted streets of the Canyons. In seconds,
she was knew where she was and
was walking purposefully towards the nearest location where she could call a
taxi.
-
Sylia watched as the robotic taxi drove off, turning back to walk into the
back entrance of her store. Her
keys let her in to the business receiving area. She tapped in her key code
to unlock the penthouse elevator,
putting her hand up against the sensor plate.
"Error," a cheerful voice chirped.
Sylia stared in surprise at the small screen. Invalid biological reading?
She typed in a much longer pass
code. Her hands danced along merrily. In moments, she had the reason for the
error.
Her palm had been too cold, the hand of a dead corpse. Her security had been
set up in place to make it so
that even in death, none of the Knight Sabers could betray her.
Nodding to herself grimly, she opened the elevator. When she had stepped out
upstairs, she headed for her
room.
-
Mackie was startled by the sound of his sister's door closing down the hall.
He jumped to his feet, ignoring
the metal components of the small engine as they fell to the ground. He was
down to her door as quickly as
humanly possible. Without even knocking, he walked in, calling out, "Sylia!
Where have you been?"
Mackie stopped, as he realized that Sylia was in the process of disrobing.
She was down to bra and panties,
holding her shirt to her chest.
Sylia looked over her shoulder at Mackie. "Mackie, what have I said about
knocking before entering?" she
chided lightly. "I'll be out in a minute. I need to clean up."
Mackie nodded, stumbling back out to let her clean up. He slumped up against
the door after he closed it.
He'd been so worried, but everything was fine.
-
"So, what happened? You usually tell someone when you disappear." Mackie was
flopped on the couch,
vaguely listening to the news. He noted in the back of his mind that Sylia
was even paler than normal. She
really did need to get more sun.
Sylia sat herself down and turned towards Mackie. She had a bathrobe on and
a towel wrapped around her
head. "I was attacked, but I managed to escape."
Mackie looked shocked. "Attacked? Who? Was it Genom again?" He suddenly
realized that his fist was
clenched.
"No, it wasn't Genom. It was... something else. Something that I had not
been aware of." Sylia drummed
her fingers on the chair's arm.
"So let's get the Knight Sabers over here and deal with the situation!"
Mackie exclaimed.
"No." Sylia speared him with a glance. "The Knight Sabers are not a tool of
retribution. That is not why I
created them."
Mackie gulped. Sylia sounded serious! "But what about Mason?"
"Mason was an obvious threat to our organization. He was in the process of
preparing to destroy us." Since
when had the fans become so loud? And what was that disturbing beating
sound?
"That isn't how I heard it!" Mackie exclaimed.
"Priss was lucky in that I was preparing to deal with Mason and that I felt
it important enough to keep the
Knight Sabers together to back her up." Sylia pursed her lips angrily. Well,
at least as angrily as she would
normally show.
"So you're just going to ignore them?" Mackie asked.
"No, I am not going to ignore them. But I'm not going to run in unprepared,
either. This new foe could
prove to be quite as deadly as Genom." Sylia stood up and walked over to the
window, staring out into the
dark night.
"Are you all right, Sylia?" Mackie asked, unnerved by her behavior. He stood
up and put his hand on her
shoulder.
"No, I am not all right." Sylia paused for just a moment. "Please, don't
touch me. Not right now."
Mackie pulled his hand back. "Ah, sorry."
Sylia stared into the night, without really seeing anything. "Mackie, I may
need to... have you put off you
going to college for a year." She glanced at him in the reflection of the
glass. "At least not off to Germany
like you planned."
"But Sylia!" Mackie exclaimed.
Sylia bowed her head, closing her eyes so that she wouldn't have to see his
agitation. "If... if I could do this
without you, Mackie, I would. But I really... need your help right now. I
need you to take over the day to
day operation of the Silky Doll, while I prepare to deal with this new
threat."
Mackie opened his mouth, but stopped himself before continuing to argue.
Sylia almost never admitted
needing help. Ever. She must really be serious.
Mackie shivered unconsciously. Genom controlled many aspects of multiple
governments, was wealthy
beyond imagination and could test military grade weapons in a major
metropolis with impunity. Sylia was
worried enough that she didn't even want him to know their identity.
"I guess I could look at going to a local university," Mackie replied. He
schooled his face to hide his
disappointment. Family was more important than college.
"Thank you, Mackie." Sylia looked out into the darkness, trying to fathom
just how little she really knew.
Far too little, she decided. She would have to arrange to have Mackie and
all of the Knight Sabers flown
somewhere if she were captured or discovered.
She didn't want them dragged down into this new hell of hers.
-
State of the art armored doors swished open, allowing Sylia access to her
laboratory and manufacturing
shop. A quick glance revealed that nothing had been moved since she had last
been down here. In moments
she had several sensors attached to herself after disrobing. Without any
fanfare, she lay down on a thin slab
of metal that stuck out of the wall.
Sylia quickly tapped some keys on the bench. A round opening irised open and
slowly slid the bench in.
Brilliant lights swirled and danced, going over every square inch of her
body.
Minutes later, she was released as the bench slid out into the room. She
slowly sat up, her mind in agony, as
always when she used the EMR scanner. In careful steps, she slid off and put
on her fluffy bathrobe. She
collapsed into her chair, waiting patiently for the computer to process the
readings as she recovered.
Ten minutes later, she had the unsurprising data. According to it, she was
dead. No heartbeat, no
appreciable living body temperature. She was also a bit lighter, which was
because she had almost no body
fat. No food in her stomach. Her intestines looked atrophied already.
Some things were surprising. Some sort of tissue had grown around her brain.
No respiration was occurring
at all. It made no sense. Where was the energy coming from to move around?
She continued to ponder the
information for the few hours left of the night, lost in thought as she went
over the specifics of the data.
Sylia felt a sudden lethargy seep into her bones. She looked around in a
panic, expecting to see Devlin or
one of his group. Nothing greeted her gaze. With fingers that felt as if
they were mired in setting epoxy, she
turned on several camera views around the building. Nothing unusual met her
eyes, until a camera on the
roof showed her the brightening orange of the Sun peeking above the
buildings to the east.
Fear arose in her breast. Sunrise! Of course. Vampires are creatures of the
night, they can not exist during
the day, so they... sleep? Hibernate? She had lost track of time. Would she
be safe here?
Sylia forced her flagging body to rise, staggering over to the door. Fingers
tapped at buttons unsteadily,
typing in a long and complex code, shutting herself off from the outside
world.
As her body collapsed, she determined to herself that she was going to bring
a pillow and blankets down
here in the future.
-
"What do you mean, she's fine? Why isn't she here to tell us herself?" Priss
demanded.
Nene nodded her agreement. She was sitting stiffly, still in her uniform as
she had to go to work in an hour
or so.
Mackie shrugged helplessly. "I don't know what's going on. She showed up
last night, out of the blue and
acting all weird."
Linna looked up from where she had been reading a magazine on the couch.
"What do you mean? Sylia's
always been a bit, well, different. Reserved, if you know what I mean."
"Ah, well she mentioned that she'd been attacked. She thinks it might be
something almost as bad as
Genom." He held up his hands to forestall any questions. "Don't ask. She
didn't tell me who or what. I
think she's trying to protect me or something."
Nene blinked and her expression changed to show a bit of fear. "A-anything
else?"
Mackie replied without thinking, "Not much, except for asking me to put of
going to college in Germany to
help her out here."
Linna and Priss exchanged a worried glance. Sylia asked someone to help her
out?
"Germany?" Nene burst out in surprise. "When were you going to go to
Germany?!" Her face couldn't help
to show how betrayed she felt over that bit of information.
Mackie looked like he'd been caught with his hand in the cookie jar. "Ah, I
was, uh, going to college there
in a couple of weeks."
Nene stared at him as she cogitated on that information. "A-and you weren't
going to tell me?"
"Er, no. Uh, maybe! Wait, of course I was! Well, I wasn't sure how to tell
you. I didn't think you'd
understand," Mackie replied hurriedly, looking uncomfortable and panicked.
Priss slammed her hand down on the table. "Look, that isn't important right
now! Sylia needs us! You can
have your lover's quarrel later!" She glared at each of them in turn. "The
important thing is to find her!"
"I'm right here," Sylia said, walking into her living room at that moment.
She was still clad in her fluffy
bathrobe from last night, looking slightly disheveled.
"Uh, Sylia! Er, how much did you hear?" Priss asked abashedly.
"Considering that you were shouting loud enough to wake the dead, quite a
bit," Sylia said wryly. At least
some of her sense of humor had survived, she noted. "Thank you for all
coming over. There are some
changes that we need to go over."
"What's going on, Sylia?" Linna asked pointedly.
"I'm not sure at this time. I need more information. One thing that all of
you need to be aware of is that
Fargo has been compromised. I am not sure how much he knows, but if you see
him, I want you to leave
immediately and tell me."
All of them nodded in response. Sylia continued, "I don't think he knows any
of you, so you should be fine.
However, he could be in the company of some very unfriendly people."
"So what other changes are going to be happening?" Priss asked.
"We are going to be making some changes in how the Knight Sabers are run."
Sylia turned to look at Priss.
"I am going to be giving you more access and control in the running of the
Knight Sabers. Mackie will be
helping out with the Silky Doll and some daily business dealings."
"What will you be doing, Sylia?" Nene asked worriedly.
"I am going to be busy reworking the hardsuits and some changes to internal
security," Sylia lied easily,
her face calm and passive. "So don't be surprised if you don't see me around
as much."
"Oh! Cool! Are you going to be able to add some better weapons to my suit?"
Nene asked excitedly.
Sylia smiled, slightly amused. If only Nene could get her self confidence
up, she would see that she does
just fine. "We'll see. I have some ideas. I don't think I'll have time for
some of the more esoteric devices,
unfortunately."
"Crud. I was wanting to be able to help more in combat." Nene pouted.
"If you'd quit being a wimp you'd do a lot better," Priss pointed out
snidely.
"And lose some weight," Linna pointed out helpfully.
"You guys!" Nene looked on the verge of crying.
"Hey, quit it! Nene does a lot for the team!" Mackie spoke up hotly.
Nene jumped to her feet, her blue eyes almost flashing angrily. "I don't
need you to defend me, Mackie! I
can do fine all by myself!" With that she turned and stalked off.
Mackie just stood there for a second, pushed back into action by the
slamming of the door as she left.
"Nene!" Mackie called out.
He was interrupted from following by Sylia's hand gripping his arm. "Mackie,
I think she needs to calm
down right now. Why don't you... try to make up to her tomorrow. Take her
out to dinner or for a treat."
"But..." Mackie looked torn. "I guess so." His shoulders slumped.
Sylia turned back to Priss and Linna. "Priss, I will see you tomorrow about
seven o'clock. Thank you both
for showing up tonight." Sylia turned and walked out of the room, heading
for her private rooms.
Priss frowned and looked a Linna and Mackie. Linna just shrugged. That had
been oddly curt, even for
Sylia.
Mackie just looked off in to infinity, his thoughts miles away, worried
about a certain red-head.
-
Leon whistled as he walked towards the dispatch office. He'd chat with Naoko
about this little problem
with prioritization during combat situations. Then he'd bounce it off Nene
when she showed up in about a
half an hour, late as usual. He didn't know how she kept her job, other than
she seemed to be an absolute
wiz on the phones and at directing the TAC squads to track down rogue
boomers.
Leon was suddenly twisted as a shorter person pushed by him in a rush, her
shoulder catching his tricep
painfully. "Hey, you! Watch where you're going!" he barked out immediately
without thinking.
The doors slid open as Nene stopped almost mid stride. Nene whirled on him,
"Shove it Leon! I am not in
the mood to deal with you right now!" She stomped over to her desk and
slammed into her chair. She was
only sitting for a bare second before she stood up and stomped off to the
bathroom.
During the entire time, everyone who wasn't on the phones (and a few who
were) watched her stalk off as if
she had grown two extra heads and was breathing fire.
Leon slid his sunglasses down his nose, looking at Nene blankly. "Uh, maybe
I'll come back later." What
had brought that on?
Naoko nodded wildly. As if Leon's voice were a cue, everyone in the office
suddenly jumped back into
their jobs.
-
Sylia weaved in and out of the crowd in the club. This was the third club
that she had visited this evening.
And this was only one night out of a long week of nights. A quick bit of
checking around had garnered
which clubs opened late and stayed open until nearly dawn. She figured if
there was anywhere vampires
could be found, it had to be something that was open all night. If clubs
didn't work, she was going to start
checking bars and all night movie theaters.
The only problem was, she wasn't sure what to look for other than pale
people with fangs. She sighed as
she put up with the itchy, long black wig and overly tight, black pants and
hot pink tank top. She hadn't had
the opportunity to go 'clubbing' in forever. It was a bit disturbing first.
But after several days, it was just
laborious.
A new man moved in front of her, looking to start dancing to the next song.
He was wearing a white ruffled
shirt and tight black pants. Knee boots finished off the outfit, which
accented his darker, Mediterranean
heritage. "Hey ya! Been in the city long?" he yelled to her.
Sylia put a smile on her face. Stick to the truth as much as possible. "I
was born here," she yelled back.
Sylia felt a tendril seep across her consciousness, inviting her to trust
him, like him. "Really? How long
have been a part of the night crowd?" he asked, still smiling, fangs just
barely peeking out through his lips.
Sylia let her smile drop. They had found her? "Not long." She had
contingency plans in place this time. She
was not going to be caught off guard.
"Hey! How about I introduce you around?" he asked, starting to dance under
the strobing lights.
"I don't know," Sylia answered truthfully. "I'm a little... nervous."
"Don't you fret you're head, chica! You'll be under my protection for
tonight." They danced for a minute
or so. He continued, "My names Anton!"
"Sylvie!" Sylia responded.
The song finally finished up. "Follow me, Sylvie. I promise that you won't
be attacked for at least this
night."
Sylia nodded slowly, walking behind him. Anton walked on unconcerned, a
casual grace evident in each
step. He walked to the back of the club, where a sign proclaimed that the
area they were entering was for
'The Parapet - Private Club, Members only'.
Anton waved aside two large men who were wearing security jackets. They
nodded to both of them as they
stepped through. Sylia blinked as her eyes adjusted to the dimness of the
club. Softer music, almost
classical drifted across the room.
Faded and peeling paint did not give the room a fun atmosphere. Two men in a
corner argued quietly, one
of them was wearing an expensive suit. About four people watched them as
they continued on with their
discussion.
Sylia was struck by how normal or drab all of them were, except for the man
in the suit. None of them
would ever stick out much in any crowd.
Anton gestured over to a drab pool table and some chairs that were lying
around. "We can wait over here."
Sylia kept her eyes half on the group in the corner. Anton looked on, his
face a mask of indifference.
The minutes passed slowly, until some sort of agreement was reached. The man
in the suit glanced around
as he walked off, barely giving Sylia a glance.
The rest of them walked over to her and Anton. "So, Anton, any luck?" The
leader of the new group asked
warily. His hair was so blond as to be almost white, cut fairly short and
neat. Two men and one woman
followed him, while the last went into a different room.
Anton shrugged. "She's not violent and she came along peacefully. I decided
to wait for the rest of the
posse before getting more information." He stood up, gesturing grandly.
"Posse, meet Sylvie. Sylvie, this is
James, Jito, Sayuri and Rumio."
Sylia nodded. "I'm not sure why you brought me back here."
"Oh, that's simple. We want to know who sent you and what you want," the
leader responded, he was the
one pointed out by James with the blond hair.
Sylia blinked. "No one sent me. And... I'm not sure what I want. I'm a
little lost."
"Not sure? Who and what are you, Sylvie?" James asked intently.
Sylia felt something crawling around for purchase on her mind, but it washed
over her soundlessly to no
effect. "My name is Sylvie Axari. And I'm not sure exactly about anything
else," Sylia said, shrugging her
shoulders to show that she didn't know.
James blinked once. "Oh? Who created you? How old are you?" Odd, she didn't
respond automatically and
woodenly. She reacted like he hadn't been able to control her. That could be
bad. That would mean she was
more powerful than him!
"I... I'd rather not say. I'm afraid he might try to take me or kill me."
Sylia looked puzzled. "Why do you
want to know how old I am?"
His eyes seemed to bore into her soul. "Answer my questions."
Sylia frowned at him as she had that crawling feeling across her mind again.
"Quit that. It won't work."
Anton blinked. "Really? Why not?" he asked conversationally. His eyes seemed
to be riveted to her.
Sylia turned her head slightly to look at the other man. "I don't know. I
feel something but it can't force me
to do anything."
Anton whistled, slightly stunned by that revelation. "You can feel his mind
trying to control yours?"
Sylia stared at him a second and then nodded. "It's like the one that...
made me. He couldn't control my
mind either. That was when he drained me dry and... made me a vampire, I
guess."
James nodded, as if to himself. "Who?"
"How do I know you won't turn me over to him?" Sylia countered calmly,
looking straight in his eyes.
"You don't." James eyes showed no emotion in return. They almost seemed to
glint in the darkness.
"Anton guaranteed my safety for tonight," Sylia informed him primly.
Moments passed and then James smiled, his face suddenly alive and sunny. He
looked over at Anton. "Bad
Anton!" He waggled his finger at him. Anton just shrugged back. "Now, as
Anton is a good friend of mine,
I'll agree that for tonight, here, you're safe. I won't promise anything
after you leave."
Sylia's eyes flickered to the other vampires. "And them?"
"They'll follow me or they get to go through me!" James said forcefully,
pinning each of his group with his
piercing stare.
They all nodded in response. Rumio nodded last, eyeing Sylia curiously.
Sylia stared directly at James. James met her gaze, a thoughtful expression
on his face.
"He said his name was Devlin McQueen," Sylia said finally.
James narrowed his eyes. "Hmm."
All of the other vampires shuffled their feet nervously.
They both watched each other for some hidden clue, some fragment of meaning
that would give them that
important tidbit. James finally replied, "He has a reputation for a
certain... ruthlessness. You could say that
he's even a bit infamous, here in Tokyo."
Sylia looked at him intently. "Really?" Sylia said dryly, a hard edge of
sarcasm evident in her voice.
James smiled thinly. "Rumor has it that he had a good line on some military
hardware, but his contact didn't
work out. You wouldn't know anything about that, would you?"
"Maybe." Could they know who she really was? Was Devlin that big of a
'noise' in this vampire
community?
Anton snickered appreciatively. At least she wasn't stupid. "So how long
have you been embraced, Sylvie?"
Sylia's eyes flickered toward the Mediterranean dandy. Embraced? That was
probably being made a
vampire, she guessed. "A week."
"And you managed to survive all by yourself?" James said to himself, almost
under his breath as he leaned
forward in his chair. "You're one tough lady. So, have you killed yet?" His
eyes seemed to be looking for
something.
"Yes. I was attacked and I... fed. He would have died anyways."
Anton narrowed his eyes. "So, you feel no remorse?"
Sylia shrugged. "He was going to do worse to me, I'm sure. I had to do it to
survive." Her voice betrayed
none of the anguish she felt.
Rumio looked up suddenly, her eyes riveted to the doorway that the suited
gentleman had left through. The
door opened, admitting three new people.
Sylia's eyes met Devlin's from across the room, challenging him by her mere
presence.
Devlin unzipped his leather jacket casually. "My, my! I'd thought you had
been destroyed. Fargo had said
he had taken care of that little mess, Sylia dear."
Even as Devlin entered and started to walk towards her, Sylia had jumped to
her feet and raced to the other
door. Her padded purse disgorged two parts of a large, broken down handgun.
With practiced movements,
she had it snapped together in a flash.
Devlin just shook his head. "You should know that that isn't going to
work..."
Sylia didn't even pause in her run, snapping off a thundering shot that
staggered her two steps sideways and
spun him around from the shot's force, almost disintegrating his left
shoulder in the process.
Two more shots followed as Devlin fell to the ground, hitting him in the
stomach and right thigh. His
cohorts looked on in surprise, finally overcoming their surprise to pull out
their own guns to pepper some
shots back at her.
Sylia dashed through the door and made a sharp right, heading for the exit.
She dropped a small cylinder
behind her as she ran for her life. Two security guards barred her exit from
the building. They seemed to
react slowly, barely reaching for their stun guns.
With a flash of brilliant light, the concussive grenade she dropped
exploded, catapulting the first vampire
out into the dance floor, while flinging the others back into The Parapet.
People started screaming in panic,
unsure of what was going on. Someone started screaming boomer.
The guards at the exit had finally recovered enough to pull out their guns
and had them leveled at Sylia as
she ran towards them. One of them yelled out, "Freeze! Or I'll fire!" as he
dropped to his knee in a classic
firing position.
He was stopped from following through with his threat as a large motorcycle
crashed through the door,
knocking him over as it roared on by. The big blue bike's tires squealed as
it spun to a halt, right in front of
Sylia. Without any fanfare, she hopped on the bike and spun it out, going
back out the destroyed door in
roar of its engine and the squeal of burning rubber.
Just a flicker of motion in her mirrors and Sylia ducked low at the very
last second, as a baseball bat
swished through the air where her head had been. The vampire had already
gotten to its feet and almost
caught up to her, while she was driving off on a motorcycle! She twisted the
accelerator as hard as possible.
By the time she had hit the street, she was doing eighty kph and
accelerating on one wheel. In her rear view
mirror, she saw Devlin's two vampires hop on their own street bikes and take
off after her. She opened up
the engine all the way. Turning suddenly, she curved around a corner and
onto a highway, where she could
open up the big engines of the motorcycle.
"Damn!" Sylia hissed, passing a Normal Police cruiser on the freeway traffic
while doing over three
hundred kph. She glanced back in frustration. She didn't need police
problems on top of everything else.
The officer in question just blinked in surprise as the bike rocketed by his
police cruiser with a roar. He set
his coffee cup on in the console and flicked on his lights, his engine
whining to life as it sped up. Two more
bullet bikes zipped on by him right as he accelerated.
"Punks! I'll show you!" He flicked his radio on. "Control, this is squad car
251 on Highway 6, driving west
past Tinsletown. I am in pursuit of three motorcycles in violation of
numerous traffic laws and driving
recklessly. Possible gang activity. Request backup and oversight, out!"
"Roger, Car 251. Affirmative on backup and oversight," the voice over the
radio responded.
-
Devlin groaned on the spattered floor. He grit his teeth as the blood in his
body flowed at his command.
Impossibly, miraculously, his wounds started to heal. The dark fluid
magically transmuting into muscle and
bones in soundless horror.
"God damn that witch! I'll see her burn in hell!" Devlin roared out,
staggering to his feet. His hunger
screamed its agony, its demands to him. Devlin hissed, looking around the
room, his eyes wild and
dangerous. Several of the vampires understood his frantic gaze and stepped
back unconsciously. A hungry
vampire is a very dangerous thing.
Rumio had slowly slipped to the back of the room where a small fridge was
kept stocked with blood in
different liquor bottles. She felt, rather than saw the crazed vampire
abruptly head towards her. Her fingers
scrabbled frantically at the bottle cap. At the very last moment, she turned
and threw the bottle lightly into
the air and watched in morbid fascination as Devlin snagged it and drank the
entire wine bottle in one
obscenely large gulp.
Sentience reasserted itself in Devlin's eyes, his angry glare encompassing
the entire room. "Where is she?"
he demanded quietly. His tone of voice promised death.
James stood lightly on his feet, poised to fight or flee at a moments
notice. Each of his people had guns out
and ready. He suddenly relaxed marginally. "Sylvie? She took one look at you
and ran off while shooting
you with the biggest damn handgun I've ever seen. Professional lady you
embraced there, old chap. She
covered her own exit and took off on some AI controlled motorbike from
hell."
McQueen snarled deep in his throat. "She's mine! I claim her life for her
attempt to kill me!"
James nodded. "I won't fight you over some unknown child." The rest of the
vampires nodded their
agreement in that. "I won't help you, either. I'm not going to get sucked
into some private vendetta." He
grinned suddenly. "You might want to warn your men who went after Sylvie.
She's a dangerous little
hotty."
Devlin smiled, his expression made ghastly by the smeared blood on his lips.
"Perfectly fine. And her name
isn't 'Sylvie,' it is Sylia, Sylia Stingray."
Behind Devlin, Anton frowned. She lied to him, even as he stared into the
depths of her soul. His frown
disappeared as suddenly as it appeared. Perhaps he should find out what was
so different about her before
turning her over to Devlin and his crowd.
James had seen that quick change go over Anton. Inwardly he felt sorry for
the young woman, thrust so
suddenly in the midst of centuries old predators.
She would be lucky to live out a week.
-
Sylia swerved in and out of traffic on the highway, headlights strobing the
night as the night's wind tore at
her with chill fingers. A quick glance showed the two bikes slowly closing
on her. For just a second, she
wished that she had Priss's skill with bike riding. They were only barely
gaining. If she had been just a bit
more skilled, she could probably lose them on her own.
He eyes narrowed, as she saw an exit to one of the abandoned upper level
roads coming up fast. The engine
screamed as she pushed the engine to the max, cutting off two cars and
almost causing an accident. She
needed to get away from the police and any innocents who might get hurt in a
crossfire. The barricade in
front of her didn't even slow down her heavily armored bike.
The two bikes behind her slid smoothly up the incline, not even missing a
beat. Hunched over they coaxed
every last bit of performance out of their monster bikes. They had to admire
their prey's choice of
motorcycle, as they were having to really push themselves to catch up.
High above them and straining to keep up, an ADP helicopter trained its
cameras on the three bikes.
"Control, this is flight 52-Hornet, in pursuit of suspects on motorcycles,
now turning off on too... elevated
Highway 24-D. Over." With practiced ease, he brought the speedy helicopter
up behind them. His military
helmet's pickup zoomed in on the one bike in the lead.
The ADP dispatcher hunched over her desk, her fingers flying across her
keyboard and screen. "All units,
the suspects have left Highway 8. The lead suspect has been tentatively
identified as being involved in an
armed confrontation, possible boomer incident number 16-2. Suspect is
considered to be armed and
dangerous. Over."
An officer leaned over her desk, studying the screens. He touched a button
on his headset. "All units, lead
suspect appear to be trying to escape or evade the other two motorcycles.
How long until those high speed
chasers can catch up?"
Leon grinned as his cruiser bounced off the ramp a bit, turning up the on
ramp. Squealing tires complained
about the stress loudly. Time for another tune up, Leon thought to himself.
As soon as he had a straight of
way, his fingers stabbed at four buttons in sequence. His engine's roar
turned into a scream as fins and air
intakes turned the car into the fastest turbine charged police chaser in
Japan. The two other ADP police
chaser's followed suit, falling in behind Leon, lights and sirens blaring.
Daley just sighed and picked up the microphone. "Control, this is Detective
Wong. We should be catching
up to the suspects in about a minute. Over."
"Roger. All units, Highway 24-D is partially demolished and ends twenty-five
clicks in front of the nearest
units. Be warned and watch for the end of the road. Over."
Sylia's motoslave's console started to flash a warning, showing a collision
warning, six kilometers ahead.
She gripped the brakes while sliding the bike to a stop. By the end of the
slide she had spun the back
around toward her pursuers. Her thumb toggled a safety screen off on her
grip and fired almost
immediately.
The two vampires were grinning as they saw her up ahead, until two plumes of
smoke exploded from the
undercarriage of Sylia's bike. The two missiles acquired their targets
instantly as they spiraled in, signaling
each other on which missile was targeting which bike.
One of the vampires reacted quicker than the other and leaped just before
the missiles hit. He was flung
into the air, his momentum throwing him over the curving edge of the
highway. His partner didn't even
have the chance to scream as he and his bike was engulfed in a blistering
explosion that melted asphalt.
Sylia nodded as she brought up the mini-computer console on the bike. There
was only one way out of here
on ground and that was going to be blocked by the cops any moment. The
whirring roar of a helicopter
interrupted her.
"Control! The lead suspect has fired what appear to be missiles at the other
suspects. Both pursuer bikes are
hit and down! Asking for permission to unlock weapons and take her down!
Over!"
The controller looked up at the commanding officer for his decision. He
nodded curtly back. "Roger, 52-
Hornet, take him down, hard!" she said, a hard edge on her own voice.
"Confirmed!" the pilot responded, flicking several toggles and freeing the
gun to follow his helmet finder.
Sylia saw the helicopter come back around, it's gun swing around to target
her. She spun out and angled
away towards the helicopter as it flew overhead, spitting a stream of bullet
that just missed her bike.
Leon swore as he saw the target heading towards the end of the highway. It
jogged back and forth, bullets
just barely missing the fleeing figure.
Sylia laid the bike on its side just a mere thirty feet from the edge,
sparks flying from the armored carapace
as she shed as much speed as possible while trying not to be hit. Her wheels
wavered back and forth, as she
struggled to control the bike.
Daley gripped the dashboard as he saw the bike go over the edge, the ADP
attack helicopter attempting to
turn and follow the strange maneuver. "What the hell?" he cried out.
Sylia felt the bike starting to slip out of her grasp. One last twist of the
controls and a frantic cybernetic
command shifted the bike into its motoroid form. Its arm caught her as the
shoulder mounted jet engines
turned it to fly back under the bridge, still losing attitude. In the few
seconds available, it rocketed behind a
building and turned down a side street. In a moment more, it was again a
motorcycle, cruising along the
road. Soon, not even the shadows could see her, as she disappeared.
"Control! I have lost the target! I have negative contact and no confirmed
hits!" the pilot called out, after
managing to turn around.
Leon skidded the car to a stop and popped open his door. He trotted to the
edge while pulling out his gun,
his slicked back hair being mussed by the high winds. Nothing but slums and
deserted buildings met his
view for thousands of feet.
"Control, I can confirm that. We've lost the bogie!" Leon glanced at his
partner in confusion. What had
they been chasing, a ghost? Something nagged at him, gnawing at the edge of
his conscious. Whatever it
was, maybe it would come to him later.
Daley just rubbed his chin in thought as he nodded absently back to Leon.
-
Sylia turned her motorcycle into an alley near the Silky Doll. At the end of
the alley, a concealed elevator
took Sylia down into the hidden recesses of the building.
For the next few hours, she maintained the motoslave, restocking its
munitions and patching up the armor
and paint while tuning it up. On the off chance that someone might recognize
it, she painted it a much
darker blue. When it was done, it gleamed like new.
Looking up from her work, she looked at the different support robots that
she had here. Nene's almost never
used original pink motoslave lay under a tarp, right next to a failed
prototype. Sylia pulled the tarp off and
slid her hand down its length. It had been a serviceable unit. Nene had just
never been very comfortable
with riding it. It had been almost a year since she or Nene had used their
motoslaves.
Sylia smiled as she realized the only one who really liked the devices was
Priss, who was already on her
third one. She glanced over at the monster motorcycle, easily half again the
size of any other bikes in the
garage. Its guns and missile loads were stashed in the crates next to it. A
true monster also when it came to
maintenance and cost. It should be useful again.
Sylia loosened the collar of her jumpsuit and headed up to clean up before
dawn. She stepped out of the
elevator into the living room. Her senses told her almost immediately that
someone else was here. Sylia grit
her teeth as she heard the drumming sound of a heartbeat, coming from her
kitchen. She felt a consuming
hunger at the sound of that heartbeat, that shook her minds foundations.
"Yo! Sylia! I've been trying to track you down!" Priss said, sticking her
head out of the kitchen.
"Hello, Priss. I'm going to take a quick shower. I'll be right out," Sylia
said as she walked down the hall.
"Sure!" Priss leaned up against counter, sipping at the coffee that she had
just finished making.
Sylia was back out in a surprising short amount of time, toweling her hair
dry. She might not sweat
anymore, but smoke and oil grease still made her stink. "What are you up to,
Priss?"
Priss glanced around. Mackie had gone to bed, complaining about being too
tired to stay up and work on
one of his projects. Her eyes finally met Sylia's. "What's going on, Sylia?"
Sylia arched her left eyebrow in feigned surprise. "What do you mean?"
"This new enemy has you spooked, bad. When are you going to tell us who they
are?" she asked.
"When I have enough information. It would be too dangerous to say anything
prematurely." Sylia wrapped
the towel around her neck loosely.
"Well, you've been having me do a lot more with helping on the Knight
Sabers. Meeting people, buying
equipment and going over schedules and security. You almost sound like
you're afraid you're going to
disappear or something."
"Not at all," Sylia lied. "I'm just too busy finding out information and
redesigning the hardsuits again.
When I feel I have enough useful information, I'll inform you and the rest
of the group."
"Sylia! That isn't going to cut it anymore! Nene looks like she might quit
the group, you've got Mackie
worried silly and you're putting yourself out of the loop!" Priss said
loudly.
"We'll discuss this later," Sylia replied calmly as she started to feel the
sun starting to rise. She stood up and
walked out the door.
Sylia was spun back around by Priss as she jumped to her own feet. "No,
we'll discuss it now, damn it! This
is too important for you to pull your damned 'I'm too mysterious' shit,
Sylia!" Priss stared up at the taller
woman, their faces inches away. She had forgotten that Sylia was so tall!
She noted an odd muscle tick in
Sylia's face.
Priss's sweat and leather smell filled Sylia's nose as her hunger seemed to
roar loudly in her ears.
Unconsciously, her eyes traced her face, down to the curve of her neck as
the sound of her beating heart
seemed to fill her ears, resounding within the vaults of her mind.
"Sylia! Sylia! Snap out of it!" Priss cried out. Sylia was unnerving her,
just staring at her like that. It was
like she was in a trance.
Priss pulled her hand back to slap her when Sylia's hand snaked out and held
it fast. Sylia's iron grip didn't
sway in the slightest as Priss tried to break free.
"We will discuss this later," Sylia said tightly, her lips pressed tightly
together, trembling slightly. Hunger,
urges, none of these things had threatened her control so horribly from
before she was made into this
monster. Did she need to feed again? She released Priss's hand with a jerk,
almost bowling her over from
the stress.
Without a backwards glance, she stalked down the hall towards the elevator.
Lethargy suddenly
encompassed her as stabbing light filled the living room in front of her. As
she realized what that light was,
fear and horror arose in her breast. She had waited too long! The sun had
risen and she was merely feet
away from something that stories said that could destroy her utterly!
It took all of her willpower to not flee screaming into the bathroom and
lock the door. "Room - blinds, full
closure," Sylia said, her voice strained to the limit. The room was suddenly
swallowed in near darkness,
only small beams of sunlight leaking through.
As if her fear had been the only thing keeping her standing, she staggered
drunkenly, almost falling to the
ground.
Priss stared in mute astonishment from behind her, rubbing her sore wrist.
"Sylia?"
Sylia squelched the impulse to turn and look at Priss. She focused on taking
one step after another, slowly
walking with stilted steps. Her body felt like lead, until a single beam of
sunlight burned her leg. She jerked
as if shot, sprinting into the elevator. The door slid shut behind her,
framing Priss's surprised expression
just before slamming shut.
The elevator ride seemed to take an eternity, during which she fought her
bodies overwhelming desire to
collapse had to be fought with an icy determination. She focused on her
burned leg. It looked as if acid had
been splashed on it, muscle and even a bit of bone visible. Finally, she
staggered out of the elevator and
into the sub basement. Sixty feet had never felt so far, such a hard hurdle
to leap before.
Finally, she entered her secure laboratory and shop. The door locked, with
her being the only person that
could open it. Not even Mackie would be able to enter it until night! With
the last of her strength, she laid
out on a table that she had set up with blankets and a head rest.
With comforting darkness around her, she let her body succumb to its daily
stasis. She was safe, at least
until night. She let her mind turn to other things.
-
Priss just stared in surprise. What the hell was going on? Sylia was acting
all weird and then almost
collapsing as she... fled! Why had Sylia had to leave? Maybe it had to do
whatever this crap that was
messing up everyone's life.
With renewed determination, she strode across the darkened living room to
the elevator. She watched as the
elevator supposedly went down to the basement. The basement light flickered
three times for a second.
"The lowest sub basement, huh? Well, Sylia, you and I aren't done talking
just yet!" Priss said to herself.
When the elevator returned, she boarded it and went all the way down.
It took her about an hour, but she found only one area that she was unable
to enter. It was supposedly where
Sylia designed their hardsuits, robots and other combat vehicles. The door
was thick and solid metal, no
ordinary intruder would be able to breach that forbidding armored entrance.
"Hmpf. If that's the way you want to play it." Priss stomped off.
-
Mackie yawned as he made himself breakfast. His tussled hair showed that he
had attempted to make
himself presentable. He glanced at his watch, noting that he only had a half
an hour to get to the ADP and
track Nene down. He'd been hoping that she would at least call or drop in to
talk to Sylia or himself. But
she'd been aggressively unavailable, her answering machine telling anyone
that she'll return their call
shortly. And it had been a week and still no sign of change.
He'd been surprised at how hurt he'd been by her cold shoulder tactics.
Belatedly, he'd realized that was
probably how she felt when he'd told her that he was planning on going to
Germany without telling her.
The toaster jarred him back to business as it spat out his single slice
bread.
After a lot of thinking the last couple of days, he'd come to realize that
he had to apologize to her. Sighing,
he started to munch on his toast as he walked to the elevator. In just a few
minutes, he was driving along on
a custom motorcycle that he'd been working on to replace his lost and very
lamented Highway Star. It had
never been the same after Priss had wrecked it. This one was just as
powerful, but was able to be toned
down enough for a normal person to ride, with some added control circuits.
He was a mere minute away when an alarm in the building started to go off,
indicating an intruder in the
basement.
-
Priss grunted in effort, sending the armored shod fist of her motoslave
slamming into the deformed door in
front of her again. Her next punch loosened the robot's foothold, sending
the armored behemoth sliding
back. Doggedly, she crawled it back up to the door and braced its legs
again. Even hunched over, the
Typhoon II motoslave nearly didn't fit in the hall.
Seeing a gap, she gripped the edge of the door and pulled. In just a few
moments, it finally gave out,
showing the interior of the dimly lit room. Sylia was laid out on a table,
covered with a blanket. The sides
of her head was in some sort of contraption, LED's blinking on and off.
"Son of a bitch!" Priss whispered. It was like some sort of high tech
Frankenstein movie set. Was Sylia
some sort of... ? Priss didn't even want to think about that.
Sylia turned slightly, her eyes opening. After she had seen that it was
Priss breaking in, she had laid back to
wait for her. She didn't have any way to stop her even if she had wanted to.
"Okay, Sylia! Get up! You've got some explaining to do!" Priss commanded as
she stepped out of the exo-
frame of the motoslave.
As if it were a struggle to even speak, "I... can't," Sylia whispered out.
Priss blinked in surprise. "Well, you can talk! Tell me what the hell is
going on! Or I trash this room!"
Sylia struggled against her body's inability to function. "No! Please...
don't!" She weakly raised her arm.
"Okay, then! Talk... Omifuckingod. The suit's sensors... they say you're
dead!" Priss exclaimed. According
to her thermal imaging sensors, Sylia was as cold as that table! Priss
lifted the visor of her hardsuit in mute
astonishment.
Sylia's eyes closed. Priss watched in mute terror as tears, terrible red
tears, slowly cascaded down her face,
disappearing into her dark hair.
Priss suddenly felt as if she'd been punched in her stomach. Boomers didn't
cry blood. "Aw, shit.
Vampires."
-
Nene walked out the door and outside to the parking lot, her head bowed
down. She had a set of folders in
her hands. She was almost to her motor scooter when someone attempted to get
to her attention by clearing
their throat. Nene glanced up apathetically. What she saw set her heart
racing, whether from surprise, anger
or something else, she could not say.
Mackie stood by his bike which was parked next to hers, a curiously pensive
expression etched on him.
"Uh.... hi, Nene!"
"What do you want, Mr. Stingray?" Nene replied frostily.
Mackie winced. "Just to talk, um, apologize actually." His left hand fiddled
on top of the fire-engine red
bike.
"Oh? What, you aren't going to bribe me with ice cream?" Nene said tartly.
"What?" Mackie stuttered out. He stared at her in surprise. He blushed as he
realized that she was aware of
one of his favorite tricks to get her to help him.
Nene just glared at him, which Mackie found to be quite disturbing. The
opening in the conversation
stretched uncomfortably wider. Mackie blinked nervously. He had thought this
was going to be easier than
it was turning out to be.
Opting to say something, he replied, "Um, Nene, do you want to go out
somewhere to eat? Or something?"
Nene's face softened slightly. "It's nice to see that you're actually asking
me, instead of just making all of
our decisions, Mackie!" She took a deep breath and then expelled it. "Yes,
you can. That doesn't mean that
you've apologized yet, mister!"
Mackie nodded vigorously.
"Hey! Nene! Glad I caught you before you managed to leave!" a jaunty male
voice called out.
Nene wilted even below her normal five feet. Oh, no! Leon! "Hello, Leon.
What can I help you with
today?"
"I was trying to get some old footage we have of the Knight Sabers, to check
something, and the video
records in the mainframe are all messed up. I've got hardcopy backups from
the vault on their way, but I
thought I might ask you to try and wiggle your magic fingers to clear them
up enough so that I can take a
look at them." Leon smiled as he slid on his glasses. It was way too bright
out here. Nippy too. He zipped
up his jacket.
"Uh, Leon? Can it wait till tomorrow?" Nene looked over Mackie.
"Now, Nene, this is pertaining to an investigation concerning a possible
homicide! Surely you're dutiful
enough to stay behind at work for a mere half an hour?" Leon poked her
shoulder for emphasis. "It could
make a very favorable impression in your next review!"
Nene winced and then glared at Mackie. This was all his fault! Leon had been
holding that one incident last
week above her to get her to do extra computer work. "I guess."
Leon noticed the glare and finally took stock of the young man standing
there. "Oh, ho! So is this the young
man that's been causing you all sorts of grief?"
Mackie blinked. "What?"
Nene just wished the floor would swallow her whole. "Le-on! That's none of
your business!" Nene whined.
Leon smiled predatorily suddenly. "Well, don't you fret your little head,
Nene!" Leon put his arm over
Mackie's shoulder. "I'm sure he'd be more than happy to wait for you. Say,
kid, what's your name?" Leon
said conversationally as he directed Mackie back inside.
"Uh, Mackie. Mackie Stingray!" Mackie looked down at Leon's hand and then
pleadingly back at Nene.
"Detective Leon McNichol. Pleased to meet you."
Nene managed to squelch the urge to snicker at Mackie's problem. "Why, thank
you, Mackie. You're so
kind."
Mackie managed to not grumble at all on the way to a secured terminal room.
Leon waved them on through
any security checkpoints as if he hadn't a care in the world.
Making a show of cracking his knuckles, Leon proceeded to bring up some
records. "See these are the ones
I need you to fix, if you can," he said. On the screen where two motorcycles
driving up the spiral road to
the top of Genom Tower. "I remember them being a lot clearer, so I think
someone's tampered with them."
Nene nodded quite stoically. Yeah, she said silently, someone did! Me! "I'll
see what I can do!"
"Perfect! Hey, Mackie, wasn't it? You drink coffee? Come on, let's leave
Nene to finish this as quickly as
possible!" Leon was suddenly dragging Mackie outside, letting the door to
close behind them.
Nene sighed and looked at the image that Leon wanted fixing. Well, she
couldn't lose her 'magic' touch,
could she? Perhaps she could fix only part of the image, maybe the
motorcycle and some of the building
behind it. Sylia said that the old motoslave design was kind of obsolete. So
that shouldn't hurt. Whistling,
she went back to work.
Back outside, Mackie found himself scrutinized by the very large and
intimidating detective. "So, you're
Nene's boyfriend, huh?" Leon said quietly.
"Uh, yeah. I guess so. Well, maybe." Mackie was a bit confused. Leon had his
arm back around him as he
guided him back down the hall.
"Now, I don't know if you realize it, but Nene's almost considered our
little sister, here at the ADP. We
really don't like it when she's upset," Leon spoke as if he was talking
about the weather. His grip on his
shoulder tightened, almost painfully.
Mackie looked down at the hand, the meaning becoming blatantly obvious.
"So we want you to treat Nene as if you were a perfect gentleman, okay?"
Leon continued on as if he was
discussing some boring news with a friend.
"Uh, huh!" Mackie managed to get, his eyes a little wild.
"Good, good! It's nice to see that you understand!" Leon stopped suddenly.
"Oh, wait! The nearest coffee
machine is all the way in the cafeteria. Maybe later, huh?"
Mackie nodded his agreement.
Leon seemed to think something was funny as he escorted him back to the room
Nene was in, laughing
joyfully. Nene looked up as the two entered. Nene just stared at them oddly.
Mackie seemed to be very
nervous for some reason. And Leon laughing was just plain odd.
"I'm just about done, Leon. See?" she said, pointing at the screen.
Leon nodded appreciatively. "Yeah, that's it!"
On a screen right next to it, he pulled up another picture, more recent and
one that neither Nene nor Mackie
had seen before. It was a snap shot of a woman on a motorcycle, a good side
view. The motorcycle was
quite distinctive. It was a bright blue motoslave. The woman riding it had
long black hair that was partially
hiding her face. Bullets sparked on the ground around her.
Nene suppressed her instinct to gasp. That was Sylia's motoslave!
Sylia's Hurricane motoslave? "What!" Mackie exclaimed softly, his eyes wide.
He couldn't quite stop
himself.
"Eh? Is there something wrong?" Leon asked inquisitively.
"Ah! No! Wow! That's a neat bike! And, uh, who's that on it?" Mackie tried
to reply glibly. "I, uh, build
motorcycles, you know!"
"Now that is a million yen question. That picture is of a young lady who
evaded the police in the wee hours
this morning. Well, after shooting some missiles that blew up two bikes and
we think one driver of said
bike. And with this little bit of info, I'm now positive that she is riding
the same vehicle that the Knight
Sabers use!" Leon proclaimed grandly.
Nene and Mackie looked at each other in puzzlement.
"So she might be another Knight Saber!" Leon said, as if explaining a very
simple thing to small children.
Nene's watch started to beep. She quickly turned off the signal.
"Oh! Wow! We're kind of late. Uh, say, Leon? If you don't mind, we're going
to get stuck in traffic if we
don't leave soon!" Nene blabbed out quickly.
Mackie nodded agreement. "It was, uh, nice to meet you Officer McNichol!"
They both beat a hasty retreat out the door.
Leon shook his head. Jeez, kids some days. He walked out of the room after
saving his screens and down to
the front windows where he watched Nene and Mackie get on their respective
vehicles. Leon nodded
approvingly. The kid was right, he noted. He did build a really hot bike.
Leon frowned suddenly, squinting down into the morning light. He didn't
recognize the brand, but it really
looked really familiar. He tapped the window. Damn. Now he had another thing
that would nag him until
he remembered it. Leon turned away and started to walk back to his desk.
He was halfway there, when he idly mused, it's not like it could be another
Knight Saber motorcycle.
Leon stopped so suddenly that an officer behind him almost ran him over.
"Son of a Bitch!" Leon exclaimed. Without an explanation, he took off
running and slid into his desk,
leaving a befuddled mass of officers behind him. Leon in a hurry and heading
to his office?
Daley looked up in surprise. "What's up? Did you just get a breakthrough?"
Leon looked up. "Maybe! Let me dig up some information and I'll let you
know!"
Leon started to pull up records from the Griffin case and that last climatic
chase. Just as he'd thought, the
motorcycle that caught the monster car did look oddly familiar. It wasn't
the same bike of course. Leon
could go downstairs and check out the remains they had found.
Leon tapped his screen for a second. Maybe he'd better check on that first.
He had the evidence file pulled
up, looking for the remains of that bike. He blinked in surprise when he saw
that it had been sold in a police
auction... three days after the Griffin incident? "What the hell?" Leon
exclaimed softly. No way, that
shouldn't have happened.
A bit of poking around and he discovered that a Dr. Raven had purchased the
remains. Just one of his many
purchases. Just an old junk collector, Leon mused. Maybe.
A computer glitch? Not likely, Leon decided.
"All right, Mr. Stingray, let's see who you are," Leon said to the screen.
He had the name tapped in a short
time (all of the names variations) and his computer searching. These
searches could take quite a while.
Leon was about to stand up to go get coffee, when the machine beeped at him,
asking him if it wanted it to
continue searching using the Normal Police's and other external databases.
Leon blinked and looked at the
screen in surprise. Huh, only three matches, all actually older than the
ADP. He almost hit the key to
continue, skipping them by, when he opted to look at those records on a
hunch.
Leon's eyes widened as the obituary showed on the screen. Katsuhito
Stingray? The supposed father of
boomer technology, whose body had never been found when his lab burned to
the ground? His eyes
scanned down until he found the highlighted text. Hmm. Survived by two
children. Mackie Stingray and
Sylia Stingray. Mackie had been seven, when his father had died eleven years
ago. So that could have been
him, downstairs. He did sort of look like the kid in the picture.
Leon blinked as he stared through the screen. He tapped a pen on his desk.
It was an odd link, a hundred to
one said that it wouldn't pan out. He started to tap on his keyboard,
inputting two searches. These would
take longer, even with the specific information he now had.
Leon stretched and stood up. He finally went after that coffee. By the time
he had returned, the information
was on the screen. Mostly school records, he noted. Leon whistled as he
skimmed them both.
Sylia Stingray had graduated top honors from the new MegaTokyo University at
the age of nineteen, with a
double masters in engineering and robotics/AI. Mackie hadn't been quite
academically inclined, but he'd
gotten good enough marks to win a full scholarship to a prestigious German
university, after completing
most of his beginning college courses. Before his eighteenth birthday.
Leon scrolled through more data, discovering that Sylia had evidently
decided to enter into business for
herself, as she owned and operated a lingerie shop not that far away. Leon
pursed his lips. A double
Masters degree and she sells clothes? Something smells fishy, Leon thought
to himself.
Leon couldn't help gasping at the latest bit of information as it flashed
across the screen. Those two kids
owned five percent of Genom Corporate's actual stock? That made them beyond
rich! It was in a trust fund
for the younger sibling, until he was twenty-one, but Sylia was supposedly
worth in excess of a hundred
billion yen. And she only had a two percent share! All tied in with their
father's giving Genom the right to
build whatever sort of boomers they wanted with his intellectual rights.
Leon's mind churned through the information. He now had several possible
links of the two Stingrays
connection to Genom, boomers and the Knight Sabers. They even had the
resources and the ability to create
those hardsuits now. So, along with Priss as a Knight Saber, he could
possibly identify the brains and
money behind the outfit, also possibly the leader, the White Saber. That
left the Green Saber and the Red
Saber.
Leon leaned back in his chair and propped up his feet on his desk. The Green
Saber was some sort of
agility and weapons specialist, probably a trained soldier. The Red Saber
wasn't much of stand up fighter,
but he'd heard some rumors linking her to the destruction of the boomer that
had taken over the ADP
building, melting it with an electrical surge when it had been ordered to
destroy the ADP building.
An ugly realization suddenly occurred to him. That indicated technical
know-how and intimate familiarity
with the ADP's systems. Something that Nene Romanov had in spades, a young
lady that just happened to
know one Mackie Stingray on good terms. A certain Mackie Stingray that was
driving the same style
motorcycle that Priss had been riding during the Griffin incident.
"Nah, couldn't be, could it?" Leon muttered to himself. Inescapably, he
found that Nene couldn't be the
Red Saber, after all, she worked here quite late most of the time, during
quite a few boomer incidents.
Leon had the computers pull up the times that the Knight Sabers had been
active and when Nene had been
on shift. The computers response indicated that Nene had been on shift at
least eight percent of the time.
Leon sighed and then bit off the breath sharply. A quick change to the query
listed Nene as having been on
shift zero percent of the time that the Red Knight Saber had been seen and
active.
In fact, the Red Saber was most likely of the Knight Sabers to not be there,
Leon noted. Just as if she
wasn't able to make these impromptu fights like the others.
Leon scowled deeply. Now, what was he supposed to do with his newfound
knowledge? With a chill, Leon
realized that he could easily destroy the Knight Sabers. It had been pure
happenstance that he'd tumbled on
Priss's identity during that 'vampire boomer' incident.
He was an officer of the law. True, the ADP mostly turned a blind eye
towards the Knight Sabers, as they
did deal with boomers the ADP just wasn't properly equipped to deal with.
Mason was a slime and his death had been something akin to a duel.
Manslaughter charges could have been
brought up against them, but had been deemed, unofficially, by the ADP's
lawyers as unreasonable for the
lives that would be lost trying to apprehend them. If the Knight Sabers were
ever brought in for other
crimes, those older charges could always be tacked on top.
But Leon drew the line at murder. And shooting a kid on a motorcycle with a
rocket wasn't just 'defending
yourself,' it was excessive use of force. The ADP helicopter had good video
of her shooting the victim.
Clothing and the bike had been found, but only ash residue had been
recovered from the scene. The coroner
was labeling the incident as anomalous. No body had been found, so no death
had been recorded. Ergo, no
death, no murder charges. As of yet.
Something stank, Leon surmised. But what was it exactly? Leon cleared his
computers searches,
committing the information to memory as best as possible. Leon suddenly
didn't trust his computer quite as
much as he used to.
His paperwork piles had grown over the last hour as he'd sleuthed. Leon
looked over the pile morosely.
Damn.
Grinning fiendishly, Leon had an idea occur to him. He already knew Priss
was a Knight Saber and he
know knew that Nene probably was, too. He could put her in a position where
he could watch her. And if
he could get her to help with his and Daley's paperwork, that was just all
the better.
"Hey, Daley? Are you drowning in paperwork as bad as I am?" Leon asked
suddenly.
Daley massaged his forehead. "Yes, mostly because I have to clean up yours."
Leon looked back over his shoulder. "Yo, Chief! How the hell are Daley and I
supposed to do our job when
we spend more time filling out forms rather than doing our job?"
Chief Toto glared at Leon. "That requires a hotshot like you to actually
know your job!" He rubbed his bald
head aggrievedly. Why did he have to put up with hotheads like Leon?
Leon slammed his land down on his desk as he stood up. "Just because I don't
do the job the way you like it,
doesn't mean I don't carry my load!"
"Oooooh! If you did your job like I wanted, my blood pressure wouldn't be
nearly so high!"
"So, if I asked you for someone like say Nene Romanov to help out with me
and Daley's paperwork so I
was out of the office 'working,' you'd say yes?" Leon said with a sudden
grin.
Toto looked at Leon long and hard, trying to see if he was trying to pull a
fast one. "This isn't an excuse to
get out of doing your paperwork, is it?"
"Nope!" Leon said truthfully. I'm putting her right under my sights so I can
keep track of her!
"Hmph. I'll think about it."
Which was Toto-ese for I'll do it in my own good time, Leon thought to
himself.
-
Nene and Mackie rode the elevator up to the penthouse. When they headed to
the living room, they found
Sylia, Priss and Linna waiting for them. Mackie blinked in bafflement,
horror crossing his face as he saw
Sylia slumped over in her chair, looking deathly pale and not moving. She
was wrapped up in a blanket.
Priss was standing near her in her hardsuit's inner suit.
Mackie looked at Priss as he trotted over to Sylia. He gasped as he felt the
clammy coldness of her skin as
he held her hand. "Sylia!"
Sylia's eyes opened and her head slowly turned to Mackie. "You're here.
Don't... don't let me go." Her eyes
seemed to be reddish, as if something had gotten in them.
Priss almost snorted, but held herself back. "All right. We're all here. So,
do you want to tell them, or do
you want me to?" Priss said angrily.
Sylia just couldn't muster the courage to tell it herself. "No, you go
ahead," she muttered softly. Her eyes
closed tiredly.
Mackie, Nene and Linna looked back and forth in consternation. Mackie had a
slightly terrified look on his
face.
Priss just looked down on Sylia for a second. "Sylia's dead."
The other three people looked at her strangely.
Nene finally giggled and then laughed, cutting off abruptly. "Oh, you guys!
You're trying to pull my leg
again, aren't you?"
Priss just massaged her forehead. "No, I'm not. Sylia's dead and has been
for a week. She's one of the living
dead, a vampire. Just like Dracula."
Mackie just looked confused. "Vampires don't exist." It wasn't what he
feared.
Linna nodded her head in agreement.
"No, she's right. I am a vampire now." Sylia's eyes had opened and she was
looking at the group.
Mackie suddenly realized what was so odd about her eyes. She had gotten
blood into them. And her hand
was so cold. With a gulp, he turned her hand over, putting his fingers to
her wrist. He checked for a pulse
for almost a minute. "Sylia? How... is it father's..."
Sylia interrupted him curtly. "No. A vampire did this. He killed me and made
me into one of his kind."
Linna concentrated for a second. "What does your father have to do with
vampires, guys? I thought he
invented boomers."
Mackie gulped audibly. He looked over to Sylia, but she could only return
his stare. As if at an unspoken
agreement, Mackie turned to the group. "You might want to sit down for
this."
Priss narrowed her eyes, almost closing them. "What, you're going to tell us
you're actually boomers?"
"We are not boomers!" Mackie shouted, surprising almost everyone. "We were
not made!" He clenched his
fist unconsciously.
"Our father is hardly a saint, but he was a visionary. He dreamed of
transforming humans into a higher life
form. Much of his research was based on not just recreating the human, but
in remaking us. Advancing the
human race, so that we had no weakness, no frailties," Sylia said from the
couch.
"But what does this have to do with you two?" Nene asked, looking around at
both of them. Mackie
couldn't meet her gaze. He suddenly found the carpet to be extremely
interesting.
"Son of a bitch... he used his own kids as guinea pigs?" Priss exclaimed in
surprise.
Mackie shook his head. "No, not guinea pigs. He'd already fully developed
the process. He just inflicted it
on us. We didn't even have any idea that he'd done it, really, until he was
killed. I don't even really
remember from before, because I was so young."
"I learned in ten minutes more about boomers, hardsuits and his theories
than he'd told all of his colleagues
combined. My father's dead hand, pushing me from beyond the grave." Sylia
was looking at the ceiling.
"His process enhanced our minds, replacing them with molecular computers."
Nene looked from Sylia to Mackie, not sure what to think. "So you've been
following his plan?"
"I... am not my father. No. He wanted to spread the change across the whole
world. But Genom would
pervert those ideas, using it to foster their own power. So we've hidden,
trying to check Genom's excesses.
Mason must have uncovered that information to use it to become Largo."
Silence stretched uncomfortably. Mackie looked down at Sylia. "So, what are
you doing about this...
vampire business, Sis?"
"I don't know. I was hoping to find out more before he found out that I had
survived. He will probably be
on his way here tonight, to either kill me or to make me his slave." Sylia
had never felt so helpless, her
death seemed to be impending and nothing she could do would stop these
events.
"I think we might have to argue with him a little bit about that. The Knight
Sabers stick together, no matter
what." Priss nodded her head once.
Linna concurred, "Me too! I bet this bloodsucker's never met the likes of us
before!"
Nene finally nodded. One of the foundations of her life had just shifted
under her.
-
Rumio whistled tunelessly as she walked along. She turned down an alley and
opened a door hidden behind
a dumpster without knocking. "Hey, Star? You there?"
A man relaxed, dropping his money back to the table. He pulled out a gun and
laid it on the table. He
shoved his thick glasses back up his pug nose. "What do you want, Rumio?
Trying to give me a heart
attack?" he yelled out.
Rumio rolled her eyes and headed into the small room that Star was using.
The greasy little man might be
contemptible, but he knew things that most other people only dreamed of.
"What happened to your
guards?"
"Stupid idiot got hungry and ran to the corner to get some fast food." He
grumbled something under his
breath.
"You're going to get yourself killed someday, you know that?" She waved of
any response he had. "Never
mind, I need to know where someone is and I want you to stall anybody else
from finding this person for a
day."
"That's dangerous. My clients expect truthful and timely information." He
squinted at her, beady little eyes
watching the classically pretty Japanese woman with long hair.
"Anything else costs extra, I know, I know!" Rumio lit a cigarette and
dragged in a deep breath through it.
She blew a small ring of smoke. "Her name is Sylia Stingray. She's into some
corporate espionage and gun
running. Military grade weapons."
"Sounds like a dangerous woman." Star clutched his hands in front of him.
"Yeah, you could say that. But we live in a dangerous world, you know?"
Star nodded. A dangerous and profitable world. A smile grew on his face.
-
Rumio stared into the lingerie shop from across the street. This has to be
some sort of joke. Her attention
was jerked to a young man behind the counter. In the distance, it had looked
like the Sylia Stingray that
Devlin had described. Rumio curled her lips in a smile. Perhaps it wasn't
such a long shot, after all.
Kid brother? Rumio mused. Could be. Her attention was dragged to a red
haired young woman who was
dressed in some sort of police uniform. The two talked for a little while,
until the girl waved goodbye to the
boy and walked off towards the parking.
Nene stretched and yawned again as she walked to her scooter in the public
garage. Suddenly a presence of
a friend struck her, demanding her attention.
Nene turned around to see Rumio walking up to her. Rumio waved and said,
"Hello! How're you doing,
girlfriend?"
Nene found herself waving back. "I'm fine. I was just going to go grab a
bite to eat. Want to join me?"
"Sure. How about that little noodle joint right around the corner?" Rumio
inquired.
"I... guess. I'm just about a regular there, it seems." Nene blinked, trying
to remember that she had been
growing tired of the little eatery. But it felt so remote from herself,
unimportant. Bemusedly, she let herself
be led off, even though she had wanted to... go home? Change before... work?
Nene blinked her eyes tiredly. It had been a great dinner with her old
friend Rumio. Imagine that she and
Sylia had actually had an old friend in common. Rumio had met her at school,
years ago and had lost
contact.
Nene looked down at her empty plate morosely. "Wow, I don't even remember
eating."
Rumio's eyes twinkled. "You wouldn't remember your head if it wasn't
attached, Nene."
Nene pouted. "You're just as bad as Linna and Priss! Everyone is always
picking on me!" A couple of the
patrons in the small restaurant looked up, smiling at Nene's outburst.
Realizing that she was being watched,
she blushed in embarrassment.
"Say! Nene-babe, do you think you help me with a prank?" Rumio asked as she
leaned over
conspiratorially.
"Oh?"
"Like I said, I haven't seen Sylia in forever and I want to surprise her.
How about you sneak me into her
apartment so I can really freak her out?" Rumio's eyes twinkled in merriment
as she smiled broadly.
Nene almost blurted out yes, but some of her caution reasserted itself.
"I... I don't know. Sylia would... be
upset at me. I'm not supposed to bring... friends to her place." Bullets of
sweat glistened her forehead.
Her smile hardened slightly. Nene acted like an airhead, but she was proving
remarkably hard to bend to
her will. It had been a grueling half an hour to get her to this point.
Rumio wished she were better at this.
"Don't worry! I'll take the blame for it. I'll say that I talked you into
it."
Nene blinked as Rumio's full mental force pushed her mentality. "I... I...
guess so," Nene said woodenly. A
smile lit her face suddenly. "Come one, Sylia will be so happy to meet you
after so long!"
Rumio followed Nene outside after paying the bill. Mentally she rehearsed
several courses of actions as
they walked back to the Silky Doll. The business had closed, but that didn't
stop Nene from accessing the
building from the garage. Nene tapped in a code and let her palm print be
identified.
Nene was standing at the front of elevator doors as they swished it open.
She blinked in surprise at Sylia
and Priss as they pointed handguns towards her from twenty feet away.
"Nene, get down!" Priss shouted.
"W-what?" Nene stuttered. She was in the totally wrong mode of thinking and
unprepared to fight.
Rumio, on the other hand, was completely prepared to fight. The moment the
door opened and she'd seen
Sylia and the stranger with guns out and ready, she'd reacted.
Priss saw the stranger literally blur behind Nene, using her as a human
shield. She blinked as she realized
that the woman had pulled a gun and pointed it at Nene's temple while
holding her off the ground with one
arm, all in one blindingly fast move.
"Stop! Or I splatter her brains all over this elevator!" Rumio shouted. Not
bad, they'd have only lost one
friend to Devlin's group. She bared her fangs to let them know that she was
serious.
"What do you want?" Sylia demanded. She was dressed in a snazzy blue dress
and white blouse
combination, hair perfectly done up as normal. She was bent on one knee
awkwardly, both hands holding
up the same gun she used to shoot Devlin with last night. It would punch
right through both of them, if it
came down to it.
"I came to talk! I am not here as an enemy!"
Nene whimpered and tried to struggle as her mind suddenly cleared. How could
she have been so stupid?
Vampires really were real!
Priss almost growled. What was she supposed to do? She felt so helpless.
"Release Nene and then we'll
talk!" Priss shouted back. Maybe they'd be lucky and she'd be reasonable
enough to deal with.
Rumio whispered into Nene's ears, "No sudden moves." She slowly let her down
and slowly pulled her arm
away while holding the gun up to show that she wasn't going to shoot.
Nene plastered herself on the hallway wall, getting as much out of the
crossfire as possible. Her eyes
looked left and right as she expected a firefight to start any moment.
Rumio just stood there in her jeans and t-shirt, winter coat open in the
front. "Well, are you going to shoot
me already?"
Sylia debated for just a second with herself. "No. Why did you come here?"
She cradled the big gun.
"You made yourself an enemy last night. Devlin McQueen has claimed your life
for attempting to kill him.
No other vampire will stand in his way. He's seen to that." Rumio holstered
her gun under her coat.
Priss started to take her gun apart and slip it into various places in her
leather jacket. Nene released the
breath she'd been holding, sagging up against the wall. Maybe if she stayed
quiet Sylia wouldn't yell at her
for bringing a vampire here. Nene's throat started to itch at the thought of
those fangs only a few inches
away from her.
"And you are just telling me as an act of kindness?" Sylia arched her
eyebrow to show her disbelief at that
thought.
"Not even! No, I'm here because if I give you a little information, maybe
you can kill him!" Rumio snarled
as she clenched fists, her shoulders tight with bent up anger.
Priss was taken back by the shear hatred encapsulated in that statement.
"Kill him?"
"Yes, kill him before he kills you! But you won't survive if you don't know
how to fight," Rumio replied,
visibly gaining control of herself. "How much of being a vampire do you
know?"
"Almost nothing. I know that sunlight burns and that I need to drink blood.
I have fangs and I seem to be a
bit stronger and faster. But that is all," Sylia responded slowly.
"So you don't even know of the secrets within your blood, your vitae?" Rumio
couldn't believe this, she
was lucky to even be alive. She noted Sylia incredibly pale skin. "When was
the last time you fed?"
"What? Six, no seven nights ago. When I first awoke, I was attacked by a
street thug. He was going to kill
or worse. I was forced to kill him and I fed. I drained him of all of his
blood and then burned his body."
Sylia's face went flat as she tried to control those roiling feelings of
disgust with herself.
"And you haven't fed since? You're lucky that you aren't a raving monster
that's killed all of your friends!
You must feed!" Rumio burst out in shock.
"Who am I to say who lives and dies? I couldn't stop myself!" Sylia turned
suddenly and walked around the
corner and into the living room.
Rumio, Nene and Priss all followed quickly. They sat down immediately, Nene
and Priss unconsciously
sitting nearer to Sylia.
"Fool! Feeding does not have to kill the victim, unless you have no
control!" Rumio declared as she sat
down across from Sylia.
"I just couldn't stop myself! I drank every last drop within him." Sylia
paused to take a breath. "Vile! It
should not been so good! Tasted so sweet!" Sylia spat out vehemently.
Suddenly she curled herself up,
hands covering her face. But tears would not come anymore.
"Yes. It is. The blood calls to us, because without it, we are nothing but
ash in the wind." Rumio looked at
Sylia with a sad smile. "You must feed or you will fall into a sleep that
might last centuries. Or become a
ravening monster." In her mind, she was thinking of where to go to feed her.
Priss spoke up suddenly. "She can take just a little, right?" This was
insane, she didn't want to go back
down that road.
Liar, she said to herself. A part of her, deeply repressed, remembered the
ecstasy of being fed upon. It had
been terrifyingly scary and intensely euphoric at the same time. It had been
one of the few good feelings
that she could remember from that horrific time after the second Kanto
Earthquake, after her family had
been killed and she'd been so alone.
Nene blinked in confusion. What was Priss driving at?
Sylia looked up at Priss in horror. "No. I won't do that to you!" she said,
jumping to the correct conclusion.
Priss snorted. "What's the big deal? It's like donating blood. You take just
a little and I get to eat steaks for
a week." Priss smiled rakishly. "You are going to buy me a steak dinner or
two, aren't you?"
Indecision warred on Sylia's face as she tried to find some reason not too
take Priss up on her offer. Rumio
nodded and spoke up, "You will try harder to stop and she won't struggle.
It's better all around as a solution
for the moment."
Nene had grown quite pale. "If she doesn't feed, you said she'd become a
monster. How can you be worse
than a vampire?" she asked timidly.
Rumio stared down her nose at Nene. "She'll become little better than a
rabid animal, attacking and feeding
on anything that comes near her."
Nene shuddered under that gaze.
Priss stood up and shed her jacket. "So it's settled. And with Rumio here,
she can pull you off if you don't
stop." Priss sat on the small couch next to Sylia, offering her wrist, oddly
enough.
Sylia stared at the arm in front of her as if it were a viper. Priss watched
in fascination as fangs unsheathe in
Sylia's half opened mouth. Moving slowly, as if afraid to act, Sylia brought
the wrist up mouth. With bared
teeth, she bit down suddenly. Her lips gathered around the flowing blood,
greedily suckling it.
Rumio watched dispassionately. "Once your done, lick the bite and it will
heal instantly."
Sylia nodded as she felt vigor and energy flow back into her. It was easier
this time to fight the urge to keep
feeding and feeding, draining Priss until she was dry.
Nene's stomach roiled and she felt faint. A chill ran up her back as she
finally took note of Priss's face.
She'd seen that look on druggies, when she'd ran away from her parents home
and lived on the street for a
few scary weeks. Rapture, bliss, all rolled in one.
Sylia released her bite from Priss, holding the hand and examining the skin.
It appeared unblemished, only
a smudge of red blood coating the surface. "How odd."
"It makes it easier to feed. Luckily for us, the feeding is not unpleasant
for the victim. In fact, many find it
enjoyable," Rumio watched Priss recovering her wits and glanced slyly at the
red head. An odd smile
flashed briefly on her. "And you, Nene-babe? Will you feed your friend so
she doesn't have to hunt in the
dangerous night?"
Nene's eyes widened at the question. "Ah. I guess, uh, if Sylia needs to."
Sylia opened her mouth to nay say that, when Rumio talked right over her.
"Most vampires feed nightly
merely to survive. Sylia has been starving herself for over a week and needs
to make up for that."
"O-okay." Nene let Sylia feed on her with little fanfare. Nene's wits were
shaken by the pleasure racking
her.
As Sylia fed, Rumio spoke up. "Now for the reason that I came. Devlin is
going to come for you. You
should be prepared to try and kill him tomorrow night."
As Sylia finished, she gave Rumio a hard look. "I understand. Why do you
want him dead? Explain that
before I'll agree to anything else." Her skin had taken a slight blush,
looking almost alive.
Nene just sat kind of sat there woozily, an odd smile fading off of her
face.
Rumio countenance changed from fear to irritation to anger almost instantly.
"He killed the only person I
cared about and did it without a thought or care. We're related, in an odd
way, Sylia Stingray. My sire was
created by Devlin, you see. And when he dared to stand up against him,
Devlin killed him. Luckily, Devlin
doesn't know that I am his grandchild, so to speak."
Sylia blinked in surprise. "Ah. You said you would tell me of his strengths,
weaknesses."
Rumio smirked. "I did, didn't I? Devlin's almost seven hundred years old.
He's got a slew of mind powers
that just won't quit and he's fast enough to take down a normal street car.
He's also strong enough to
probably lift that car and toss it easily."
Priss whistled appreciatively. Rumio nodded acknowledgement to the implied
respect. "He's no ancient
vampire though, no matter his wish. Sunlight and fire still burns. And if
you take his head he will die! A
stake through the heart will paralyze him, just as it will with any vampire.
Inflicting massive damage will
drop him into torpor, a coma-like state."
"Hmm. He seems to be a very hands on person." Sylia drummed her fingers
absently.
Rumio nodded. "Yeah, he'll kill you with his own hands. You're right about
that."
Sylia smiled grimly. "He'll try. Will he accept a challenge? For one on one
combat?"
"Yeah, he will, but it's your funeral. He'll rip you apart like a piece of
paper in a shredder. You haven't
even mastered the ability to speed your actions beyond that of a mortal."
Priss suddenly grinned. Then she turned somber as something occurred to her.
"Are you sure you want to
do that, Sylia?"
Sylia's eyes narrowed dangerously. "They can obviously find me. I want to
put the fight on my terms. And I
don't want to put all of my friends in unreasonable danger." Sylia stood up
gracefully. "Rumio, I want you
to let Devlin know that I wish to fight him one on one in what is known as
No-man's Land in the Canyons."
Rumio just sneered. "It that's the way you want to go, be my guest. I'll be
sure to let your brother know, so
he can bury your remains."
"Mackie will know what I'm doing." Sylia looked as unconcerned as a cat
sunning on a summer day.
Unnerved by the unswerving decision and the looks of understanding from her
friends, Rumio just nodded.
She stood up and bowed slightly and then walked to the elevator.
After she was gone, Sylia spoke up. "Nene, I'm going to need your help in
setting up some things. You'll
have to call in sick. Priss," she said, turning to the singer, "I'm going to
need your help too. There are some
things that I'm going to need before the end of the day."
Both girls nodded and replied in unison, "Yes!"
-
Priss adjusted the engine on her big red bike. Stopping for a moment, she
adjusted the lamp to shine in
better. She wiped her greasy fingers on the towel on her shoulder. She
reached in her jump suit's pocket for
another tool.
"Um, Priss?" Nene asked as she walked up.
Priss grunted an acknowledgement. Stupid engine wasn't giving its best
output. She'd have to drive it out
Doc's later. After she napped out. Damn, I'm turning into just as bad a
night owl as Sylia, Priss thought to
herself.
"Did you... No, you knew what it would feel like! How? Why?" Nene's hand
drifted to her throat.
"Go away, Nene." Priss stoically ignored the girl.
"No! I think I deserve to know! I saw you're face, before Sylia bit you. You
knew that it was going to feel...
good. How?" Nene set her shoulder, an almost cute expression of
determination on her face.
Priss's jaw muscle worked. "Yeah, I knew."
Nene stood watching expectantly. "You wanted it, didn't you?" Nene accused.
Priss slammed the wrench into the tool box while jumping to her feet. Two
quick steps had her towering
over Nene. "Yes, I knew it would feel good. And yes, I wanted it. What do
you want to make of it?"
Nene had never quite had the feeling of impending violence come from Priss
be directed at her. She
flinched and the stood up straight. "It's wrong! You're acting like its some
sort of addiction!"
Priss glared at Nene. She grabbed the front of Nene's blouse, dragging her
up to glare at her, eye to eye.
"Don't you dare pull that holier than thou, attitude shit, Miss Snitch. We
aren't the white hats in some kids
fairytale. You aren't some pure as snow princess. You know how good it felt.
It's better than sex. You want
it right now, don't you? Now imagine that you'd been fed off of for months
and it was the only thing that
made you feel good?" Priss released Nene, letting her step back in fear.
"Yeah, it was addictive. So what?"
"And you knew it was addictive and let her... had me... Months? You've known
about vampires for that
long?" Nene squeaked out.
Priss snorted in disgust. "I was fourteen, Nene. Remember a little thing
called the Second Kanto
Earthquake? It left a lot of kids homeless and orphans. Easy prey for things
in the dark, when you're just
trying to live. And keep away from the cops and teachers." An expression of
pain crossed her face. "There
was a woman, a vampire, that protected a lot of us. Kept the gangs away from
us. And kept other things
away too. All she asked for was a little blood, maybe once a week at the
most. And the Kiss, its like a hit of
a drug like you've never felt before. It wasn't a bad life."
"Oh." Nene looked shocked.
"She warned me about the other vampires, how they'd just make people
disappear. A lot of my friends
thought she was joking, until that last night, when one of them showed up to
kill all of us." Priss balled up
her fist and slammed it into the bike's armor. "Nancy must have learned
about it, because she showed up
and they fought. Nancy beat him in the end, but she lost it."
Priss flexed her hand, unconsciously making sure she hadn't hurt it too bad.
"Rumio wasn't lying, Nene.
Nancy became a monster, feeding off him and then the last girl, other than
me, because of her hunger."
"I, I'm sorry Priss. I didn't know." Nene felt like a heel, smaller than an
inchworm.
Priss didn't even seem to notice Nene. "She came out of it and saw what
she'd done. Vampires cry blood
tears, you know. She cried as she held me. And when dawn came, she let it
burn her to ash."
Nene put her hand over Priss's. "I'm sorry, Priss. I didn't know."
Priss stared down at the small hand as if it were a viper. "My friends all
die, you know? Eventually.
Remember Sylvie?"
"Bull! We've been your friends for years!" Nene said with feeling. "And
we'll pull through this too!"
"Nene, Sylia's dead. She's one of them. It's happening all over again."
Priss's voice sounded so hollow, so
devoid of any feeling.
"We're the Knight Sabers! You don't see Sylia just waiting for this guy to
kill her. She's going to fight."
Nene turned and started to walk away. "I'm going to fight too."
Priss stared at her as she walked off. She chuckled after a moment. "Thanks,
Nene. I guess I needed that."
Nene smiled brightly. "That's what friends are for."
Priss got a grin on her suddenly. "Hey! Nene! Remember what I said about you
not being some pure
princess?"
Nene stopped at the door to the garage, turning back. "Yeah?"
"Isn't Mackie up right now?"
"Um, yes. I think so."
"So what are you doing down here?" Priss asked innocently.
"What? You want me to... with him?" Nene blurted out in shock. "I don't know
if I'm ready for that!"
"You might not get another chance. And besides, he might try running away
again." Priss turned away to
hide her smile.
"Oh!" Nene fled, a blush covering her entire face.
-
Leon quietly cleaned his revolver, polishing it until it shown. Something
was up with the Knight Sabers.
Priss hadn't shown up to do her show last night. Nene had skipped work last
night and then called in sick at
the last moment, again. And Sylia's place was locked down tighter than the
Imperial Palace.
And the last time that there had been problems that the Knight Sabers had
been involved in, someone
nearly blew up the ADP. The time before that, they managed to blow up an
artificial island. The time
before that they stopped a maniac after he killed almost a million people.
Leon's nose was almost twitching. "Hey, Chief! I'm going to go patrolling in
one of the choppers. When
Daley gets here, tell him I'll be back in the morning bright and early to
work on that Jiang case." Leon
hopped to his feet and grabbed his jacket.
Chief Toto looked up in surprise from his coffee. "What?" He almost called
out after him, but Leon was far
gone.
Leon zipped up his jacket as he stepped onto the roof. He nodded in thought
as he saw them loading up the
large patrol helicopter with a K-suit. The Chief would yell and scream at
him later, but it wouldn't make it
into his record unless he screwed up really bad.
Though he had had to talk to accounting after the he trashed his second
K-suit. Leon slid his glasses on and
boarded the helicopter.
The pilot looked over at Leon. "I'm not going to get in trouble with this,
am I?"
Leon had the decency to look offended. "What?"
"You're going to trash another suit aren't you?" he accused the detective.
"I have no idea what you are talking about," Leon said, leaning back in his
seat in preparation for a nap. He
opened one eye. "Aren't we supposed to be going on patrol?"
The pilot rolled his eyes. "Yes, sir."
-
Devlin McQueen walked confidently into the blasted ruins of the canyons. His
light sensitive eyes took in
the entire area. On the top of a two buildings, two of his shadows drifted
into place. Devlin couldn't see
anything incongruous, or out of place. Would Sylia actually fight him? Or
was she taking this opportunity
to try and flee to some safe haven? Behind him, another shadow moved, hiding
itself from view.
Devlin snorted. He hadn't seen a real warrior born in almost a centaury.
Mankind had become coddled,
weak. Depending on boomers to fight their wars. Although, even he could find
uses for these interesting
toys.
Several thousand feet away, his ears picked up the roar of a very large
engine. Turning, he saw a
motorcycle rolling slowly into view. The red paint almost glowed with the
moonlight on it. The figure on it
seemed to be almost a shadow, rippling blackness shrouded it.
"My, my, Sylia. You do seem to like your toys. I thought you might do
something like this, so I brought my
own along this time." Devlin toggled a switch on his watch. His massive form
was covered in a large black
trench coat, suspicious bulges evident. The wind blew through his hair.
Sylia frowned in thought in her hardsuit. What was he talking about? Her HUD
suddenly flashed a warning,
directing her to look to her left. Thundering around the corner on its jets,
a blue gray boomer opened its
mouth wide, firing its mouth cannon.
Reacting instantly, Sylia leaped off the back of the bike, landing lightly
thirty feet away. The bike fell over,
deeply scored by the laser blast to its side. "Damn!" Sylia muttered as she
looked over her shoulder.
The boomers sensor played out, trying to get a decent lock on the black
figure in front of it. Needle
actuators around its eyes moved back and forth. It landed on the ground,
approaching the figure carefully.
Devlin frowned as he started to walk towards the fight. Something about this
just didn't seem right. She was
taller than he remembered.
Sylia upped the stakes, bringing her palm particle beam blaster into play,
peppering the unsuspecting
boomer, gouging into its chest and shoulder.
The boomer launched itself at her, going for a quick kill. Threat analysis
changed upwards for the figure in
front of it, change to at least as dangerous as itself. It seemed to just
stand still, until at the last moment it
leaped up and over him. The boomer's shoulder disintegrated from a punch,
making it roar in anger.
Devlin's eyes narrowed as he saw metal wing-like protruding out of her back.
As she landed behind the
boomer, they folded out of sight. "A hardsuit? Or her own boomer?"
The BU-55c decided to up the ante as it spun around. Chest plates and
shoulder pads moved to the side as a
wash of heat, brilliant red, strove to strike the dodging figure. The black
cloth-like substance on the outside
of her armor ignited from the near strike, burning merrily.
The boomer stepped back in almost awe. Devlin's eyes widened from the
shadows. "A Knight Saber!
Hiring them was a cunning move, Sylia!" Devlin muttered to himself.
Sylia ignored the burning remains of her stealth sheathe, dashing forward as
her blades snapped into place.
White light glimmered brightly from them. The boomer lashed out in a
powerful one-two combo, trying to
keep her as far away as possible.
The white Knight Saber dodged both blows while leaping over it again. She
gouged its back, the boomers
armor managing to somewhat protect it. She ducked under its lethal backhand
that smashed a light pole.
Her left blade retracted abruptly as she stepped within its reach and hit
the boomer's head with an uppercut,
triggering her knuckle bombers. Their armor piercing capabilities sundered
the boomers head from its
shoulder, gore flying for feet.
Before it could react to the loss, Sylia shoved her right blade deep into
its chest, where she knew its backup
AI was hidden. With a groan of metal and the breaking of concrete, the
boomer collapsed on it front.
"Bravo, bravo." Devlin clapped his hands. Poised to flee at the first sign
of her attack, he quipped, "But I
thought this was supposed to be a fight between Sylia Stingray and myself?"
Sylia wanted nothing more than to wipe that smug smile off his face, but she
had to respond, lest other
vampires seek her friends out in revenge. She raised the visor of her
helmet. "Yes, it is, isn't it, Devlin
McQueen?"
Devlin's eyes widened in surprise. "You know, in retrospect, that makes
perfect sense. So, you are the
leader of the Knight Sabers."
Her face held her steely determination. "I'm here to kill you for what you
did to me."
"I'm wounded. Here I have given you the ultimate gift, eternal life, for the
mere pittance of your human
scruples," Devlin said, grinning. His trench coat was loosened now, guns and
other ordinance visible. "Or
are you upset at not being 'human' anymore?"
Both of Sylia's blades snapped into place with a metallic 'jing' sound. "I
have not been fully human since I
was seven. No, I will kill you because you made me a monster and took my
life." Sylia suddenly dashed at
her full speed, her backpack rocketing her towards the vampire.
Devlin sidestepped the attack as if she was a clumsy rookie. As the armored
figure skidded to a halt, Devlin
had pulled out two guns and had peppered her back with shots. He didn't seem
surprised at the lack of
damage, as he dropped his guns immediately after emptying the clips.
Sylia snapped off some of her own shots with her palm blasters. She blinked
in awe as she saw him lean
out of the way of each shot, left and then right, completely at ease. As the
last shot faded into darkness, he
dashed forward and planted a strong punch to her face, rocking her
backwards.
Devlin stared at his fist in frustration. He'd barely dimpled that armor.
Sylia shook her head to clear it. Only ten feet away, Devlin had pulled out
a sawed off shotgun and started
pumping rounds into her. Instinctively acting with her training, she raised
her arms to block the relatively
week neck of her armor. Small chips appeared, showing the damage the armor
was taking from the solid
slugs.
When his gun finally gave out, he pulled out an old pistol, large and mean
looking. He snapped off two
shots, cursing as he saw them bounce off. He really missed his old three
shot revolver that he'd had last
century. That thing had stopping power.
Sylia unleashed a barrage of lower power burst, spraying after the suddenly
weaving and dodging figure. It
was a dangerous tactic, being an intense drain on her batteries. First one
shot and then more started to find
their target, burning him and finally knocking him to the ground. Two full
power burst caught him as he
was jumping to his feet, knocking him squarely up against a chain link
fence. He groaned as he collapsed to
the ground on his knees.
Devlin stared daggers at her as he struggled to heal the grievous wounds
that he'd inflicted. He just needed
time!
Salvation was had by an unexpected interruption, as a large hardsuited
figure landed heavily, jet blaring
and kicking up dust. Power claws gripped an oversized rifle expertly. The
new hardsuit, angular and blue,
had white decals announcing to anyone who could see, that this was an ADP
K-suit.
"Back away, slowly!" Leon barked out. He had the white hardsuit bracketed.
"Don't try anything funny,
Knight Saber. This gun fires depleted uranium slugs and it will penetrate
your armor like it wasn't even
there!"
Sylia had turned in case it was another attacker. The ADP K-12 was no slouch
on the combat field and if
that was the gun she thought it was, he wasn't joking. How had he gotten
permission to carry that? Those
could punch through buildings! "You don't understand! He's a monster!"
"He may be a monster, but he doesn't deserve to be murdered! Back away,
now!" Leon yelled out. "Control,
I need backup ASAP to help apprehend the Knight Sabers! Home in on my
location." Leon nodded at the
acknowledgement that he received as he clicked off the radio.
Sylia took one step back, trying to figure out how to deal with the
situation. "You idiot! He's really a
monster!"
Priss slammed her fist onto the console of the Knight Sabers portable base.
"What the hell does he think
he's doing?" She and the rest of the Knight Sabers were within the truck, in
their inner suits, ready to jump
in to the fight at a moments notice.
"Stingray! Don't do it!" Leon yelled out.
"I dunno, Priss. It's not like him to go off like that," Nene said,
shrugging. She blinked when she heard
Leon's last comment come across the radio.
Linna looked over at Priss with an unreadable expression. They were all
surprised at the sudden sounds of
armored plates slamming into place. They all spun to see Mackie closing the
head plate, sealing himself in
his bulky hardsuit.
"Mackie, what do you think you're doing?" Priss called out.
"What does it look like?" Mackie said, toggling the door open.
"Mackie!" Nene called out, running to the door as the hardsuit landed on the
ground.
"Suit up! The shits about to hit the fan!" Priss followed her own advice and
stepped into her own suit. Easy,
practiced motions slid the suit around her body. She slammed her helmet on
as she bounced out the door.
Linna and Nene weren't quite as quick, but they weren't far behind.
Devlin smiled, noting the distracted Knight Saber standing next to him. All
at once, Leon finally looked
over at the prone figure. Eyes met and locked.
"Save me," Devlin said. His dark eyes demanded obedience, submission.
The words echoed in Leon's mind, seeming to gain strength. Woodenly,
responding as if he were an
automaton, "Save me."
Sylia blinked in surprise. Mind control? What could Devlin be...
"Kill her! Destroy her!" Devlin shouted, his will encompassing Leon's mind.
Sylia rocketed out of the way as Leon opened fire, gouging out the earth
behind her.
"Kill her. Destroy her." Somewhere with himself, Leon railed against the
commands that forced him to do
the very thing he came here to stop. But the part that was in control acted
with precision and speed,
stomping after the smaller armored figure. He let loose burst when he
thought he might have a chance to hit
her.
Sylia relaxed slightly, as she saw that Leon had exaggerated. Slightly,
anyways. The gun seemed to be
mostly regular tracer rounds, with only one in ten actually being the heavy
armor piercing rounds.
Sylia had never really considered the ADP truly dangerous. Their weapons
were not as advanced, the
tactics sometimes laughable. But as she dodged and tried to counter him, she
had to grudgingly admit that
Leon was no slouch, even if he was outmatched. But she didn't have time to
deal with him!
Devlin was trying to escape! Sylia suddenly changed direction, angling along
a wall, near where she had
entered the area. As Leon followed, she turned suddenly, to dash away.
Leon skidded to a halt as his thrusters died. He turned to follow the
Knight Saber when the wall behind
him exploded as Sylia's forgotten motoslave came through it.
Leon yelled out, "Oh, shit!"
The Typhoon II entered the battle as an ace up her sleeve, changing the
whole field of battle. The big
mecha slammed into the slightly smaller K-suit, body-checking it to the
ground. Sylia nodded in
satisfaction. The Typhoon II should more than handle the ADP hardsuit. She
turned back to Devlin, just in
time to react to a sword being swung at her neck!
-
Priss skidded to a halt in front of Mackie's bulkier and (thankfully) slower
hardsuit. "Mackie! Think damn
it! If you go charging in their like a bull, you might get Sylia killed!"
"Priss, get out of my way!" Mackie said in a determined tone of voice.
"Mackie, I'm not going to stop you, but I want you to think about what you
do." Priss stepped to the side.
"We don't want her hurt either. But it's her fight."
"Guys! We've got other problems!" Nene called out from behind both of them.
They swiveled around to look at the red hardsuit, for some odd reason giving
the impression of irritation.
Linna just looked on in her own green hardsuit.
"The ADP is sending several TAC squads, the first group's ETA is only a
minute away!" Nene gulped as
she listened to the data feed. "They are to assist Detective Leon in
capturing us. They've already got K-suits
on their way! Chief Toto sounds really serious."
"Oh... shit," Priss said eloquently. She thought frantically for just a
second. "Mackie, go make sure Sylia's
all right, but don't interfere if it looks like she's holding her own. Nene,
Linna, you're with me. We have to
buy some time. Nene, be ready to blow the truck if it comes down to it!"
"Okay!" came the acknowledgements.
The red hardsuit watched the bulky orange suit trundle off, bazooka cannon
at the ready. She was torn for a
second. She didn't want to fight the ADP and she really wanted to go with
Mackie, but Priss and Linna
were going to need her.
In moments the three Knight Sabers had intercepted the first caravan of the
ADP. "Okay, let's do it!" Priss
said, her dark blue hardsuit gleaming as she crouched down to leap.
"Priss, I, I can't do this!" Nene said plaintively.
Linna looked over in consternation and then understanding. "Oh, crud."
Priss's visor hid her expression as she turned and looked at Nene. "Nene, I
won't force you to fight. This
isn't a fairy tale. These guys are going to be using lethal force." She
launched herself into the air, Linna a
mere moment behind.
For a heart wracking moment, Nene didn't know what to do. Then, as if she
had just had an epiphany.
Friends. That was what was important. She took a breath and then launched
herself after them, mini
thrusters blaring to land softly behind the blue and green hardsuits,
forming a triangle. Acting in unison,
they dashed towards the oncoming vehicles.
The drivers had just a moment to be shocked as the hardsuits in front of
them sprang into action. The two
lead armored troop carrier's engines had a catastrophic failure as shaped
explosive punches destroyed them.
Communication suddenly ceased as a deathly static over took the radios.
"Don't kill them if you don't have too!" Nene called out.
Priss snorted. "Like these jerks are threats!" She leaped up and over the
large, square vehicle and landed in
the back of the just opened doors, unloading ADP troops. Each trooper
carried his snub nosed rifle and
wore their standard soft armor. Helmets, gas masks and goggles gave them the
appearance of some sort of
storm trooper.
Without even asking, they unleashed a barrage of bullets at the blue
hardsuited figure as it charged them.
They were forced to stop as the figure plowed into them like a bowling ball
into ten pins. The worst injury
among them was only a few broken bones, but their dignity would take some
time to recover.
Linna dealt with the other group of trooper in a similar manner as Priss,
going hand to hand to knock them
out. At the third and final troop carrier, Nene leaned into the double doors
in the back, pushing them closed
against the combined weight of the troops. As soon as she had the doors
closed, her laser worked quickly to
wield the doors closed.
Priss looked up, seeing a swarm of lights headed this direction. "Company!
Take out their guns and they
can't shoot at us!"
Nene and Linna responded, "Right!"
"Go!"
The three hardsuits moved out again taking a moment to deal with some police
cruisers smashing their
hoods and engines casually. The small fire-bee fighter copters had just a
moment to realize that they were
under attack as the Knight Sabers all leaped a hundred feet straight up into
the air.
-
Sylia blocked and dodged frantically, trying to keep her head attached to
her body. She had never
considered him using a melee weapon as a serious threat. Whatever the sword
was, it was holding up to his
inhuman strength and battering up against her armor. Her own double blades,
protruding from her gauntlets
was barely keeping the sword from her neck.
Devlin snarled gleefully. He had her on the ropes now! He was driving her
back. When her wings snapped
out, he swung his sword in a vicious overhand blow, smashing it and
disrupting her attempt to gain some
distance.
Out of control, she cork-screwed in the air, abruptly terminating as she
impacted into a wall. Sylia's vision
cleared to see Devlin, sword in hand up against her throat. With a dread
certainty that she wasn't going to
live, she released her last plan. She had to stall!
"It was a good fight. The best I've had in ages. But you lose! Just like
everyone else!" Devlin crowed,
gloating over his victory.
He barely had a moments warning when a shell exploded the ground behind him,
shredding his jacket and
flinging him at the prone figure in front of him.
Seizing the opportunity, Sylia ignited her thrusters to get to her feat in
one burst and grabbing Devlin in a
bear hug. Staggering drunkenly, Sylia walked back out into the open.
Mackie looked on in confusion. What was Sylia doing? Uncertainly, he lifted
his bazooka cannon up. In the
back of his mind, he noted that the larger robot was slowly disassembling
Leon's K-suit quite viciously.
Sylia watched on her HUD as numbers counted down. "And the Lord spoke and
said, 'Let there be light',"
Sylia said to herself.
Devlin didn't understand what she was saying. His eyes widened in surprise,
for in the night, a ring of light
appeared in southern quadrant of the sky. For some reason, this ring seemed
to strike deep at his fears. As
he watched the ring seemed to expand inward. Single brighter stars appeared
within that shimmering,
shining bright and white.
The ADP chopper pilots flying into the area looked around in confusion. Odd
lights were illuminating the
city, dancing across it as if alive.
Far above, in the cold of space, satellites turned and rotated. Mirror-like
solar collectors angled according
to a preset signal that overrode their computers. The virus continued it
methodical overtake of all of the
solar collectors and reflectors that it could in orbit.
Devlin jerked as the first touch of light struck him. It didn't hurt, but it
was incredibly bright. No matter
what he could do, he couldn't break Sylia's titanium clad grip. His head was
above her own, with his arms
pinned to his side. In horror, he saw more and more lights converging on
their spot, illuminating the area.
"Gheagk! AAAAAAH!" Devlin screamed, as daylight was focused on this small
section of MegaTokyo.
His skin started to smolder and smoke, burning away. Muscle and bone started
to show as his flesh turned
to ash.
Leon could only stare in mute horror as the vampire burned in the bright
light only thirty feet away. The red
mecha had finally destroyed his power train, leaving him at its mercy. His
poor K-suit's helmet and
shoulders were broken, leaving him almost defenseless. He squinted as the
bright light struck his bare face.
It was warm, but only about as much as a sunny day in spring.
As Devlin crumbled to dust in her grip, Leon felt the strange compulsion
break and fragment leaving him
confused and stunned. "W-what? What's going on?"
Sylia looked away from the clothing and dust at the exclamation. She walked
over and stared into Leon's
eyes, calculating, planning. "Leon McNichol. What do you plan to do?"
"Eh?" Leon squinted at her. His whole body tensed. He was at her mercy.
"What do you mean?"
"You know who I am. What do you plan to do?" Sylia stared at Leon through
her cameras, trying to judge
what he would do, what actions she must take.
"I came here to stop you from stepping out of line. I saw you as you were
about kill a man. So I had to act
to stop you." Leon squinted as he saw the light illuminating the area
starting to fade. "That guy on the bike,
he was one of them, wasn't he?"
"Yes. He was a vampire." Darkness encompassed the area, leaving Leon to
stare at the dark shape.
"A vampire. A real live vampire, eh?" Leon just couldn't fit such a creature
into his world view that quickly.
"And they are after the Knight Sabers? So you are just defending yourself?"
"Not the Knight Sabers, Leon McNichol. He was after me. The Knight Sabers
have chosen to stand behind
me."
Leon heard the sound of a heavier mecha tromping toward him, obviously not
one of the Knight Sabers.
Leon pursed his lips in thought. "I was here to stop you from killing
someone. But I'm never going to
convince anyone higher up the chain about vampires. And it sounds like he
was the real life monster that
you were trying to tell me about."
Sylia flipped her visor up. "And my secret? The other Knight Sabers
identities?"
"The ADP has always cut you guys a lot of slack, because of all the things
you've done to help the city. I've
kept the secret for a while. As long as you don't cross the line, I'll keep
my mouth shut. Besides, I haven't
figured out who green is yet." Leon smiled roguishly. He was rewarded with a
small start of surprise out of
her.
"You know who Red is?" Sylia said coolly. She had hoped that he hadn't
guessed that one.
"Yeah. Surprised the hell out of me when I did figure it out. Nene doesn't
really seem like Knight Saber
material."
Sylia seriously considered killing Leon, right then and there, but no, that
would be cold blooded murder.
Not only that, but the Normal Police and ADP would spare no expenses to hunt
them down for that. She
did not relish living as a wanted fugitive. Or to do that to her brother and
her friends.
There was no choice, it left only one avenue open. Trust, in a person
unknown to her. A person that just
tried to arrest her and kill her.
Sylia agonized for a second. "I have no choice then. I guess the Knight
Sabers exist at your sufferance."
Sylia ended the conversation by closing her visor and turning while walking
away.
The big red mecha set the K-suit down as gently as possible. Leon started to
scramble out of the ruins of his
armor. He blinked in surprise at the three figures taking off. He didn't
remember seeing that big bulky
yellow suit before.
-
"Knight Sabers! Status?" Sylia called over the radio.
Priss watched the sky up ahead. "Oh, about two dozen K-suits are about to be
air dropped in on us."
"Well, why don't we leave? Regroup at Raven's. Make sure not to be
followed," their leader said.
Priss turned to Linna and Nene. "Nene, blow the truck. We'll hoof it back to
Raven's."
"Roger!" A specially encoded instruction was transmitted through the static
she was generating.
The Knight Saber's faithful mobile base ignited spectacularly , as special
charges set the very metal of the
vehicle afire. By the time the special combustibles would finish burning in
an hour, a forensic scientist
would have a tough time telling more than that it had been a vehicle of some
sort.
The large helicopters in the air had their pilots blinking as they saw the
incandescent flames off in the
distance. "K-suits? Are you ready?" After a chorus of affirmatives, the
pilot pulled the eject toggle,
launching the ADP's K-suit arsenal into the air behind it.
The leader of the ten K-suits started to cheer as he saw the Knight Sabers
rocket towards the cliffs that
surrounded the area, heading away from them at high speeds. "We've got them
boxed in, there's no way
they can escape... DAMN! How the hell can they do that?"
That was in reference to the three hardsuits rocketing up the side of the
cliff, hundreds of feet straight up. A
small crowd of onlookers was watching the scene from the top of the cliff.
"Look out!" cried one of the men, taking his own advice and diving to the
ground, just as the three sleek
hardsuits came over the edge.
The blue and green one landed easily, while the red one stumbled a bit,
almost stepping on a fallen
pedestrian. "Oops! Sorry!"
"The subways! Follow me!" Priss said, pointing towards the nearest subway
entrance.
Nene waved as she called out "Bye, bye!" A jet assisted leap landed her
right behind the other two
hardsuits.
A moment later, a thundering roar broke the stunned silence as the ADP's
large carrier helicopters crested
the cliffs edge. "Where did the Knight Sabers go?" its PA system yelled out.
Many of the crowd pointed
towards the subway entrance. "Damn it! They've gone into the subway system,"
the PA blurted out, as the
pilot didn't realize that he was still on the loud speaker.
"We've lost them, control! They led us around like we were amateurs!" the
pilot relayed privately back to
headquarters.
-
"What the hell do you mean, you made a bad call while out there? Do you have
any idea how much that
cost us in equipment and morale?" Chief Toto yelled at Leon. Daley and Nene
were the only other two
people present.
Daley winced. Leon was in deep trouble. Nene just tried to keep her cool.
"At first appearance, it looked like the Knight Saber was about to murder a
human. At that point, I called
for backup that could deal with the Knight Sabers! The unidentified
assailant then did something to me,
forcing me to attack and try to kill the Knight Saber. I was incapacitated
while the Knight Saber dealt with
the threat." Leon took a deep breath. "It wasn't human, whatever it was! It
was back on its feet in less than
a minute, after having taken enough damage to actually down one of our
K-suits."
"So where's the evidence? Where's the boomers body?" Chief Toto snarled
right back.
"I don't think it was boomer. I don't know what the hell it was, but it
burned to ashes!"
"And you said it was using this sword to damage a hard suit?"
"Well, yeah?"
"Chief, I've had the forensics boys take a look at it. The sword isn't
normal. It's tempered titanium steel,
sharpened to a razors edge. The thing has nicks in it, just like it had been
used to chop into heavy armor,"
Daley said helpfully.
Toto spun towards Daley. "Are you collaborating his story?"
"Hey! I'm just bringing you the facts. If you had the strength, you could
possibly damage a combat hardsuit
or boomer with that thing."
Nene let out an 'eep' from where she was taking notes.
"Do you have something to add, Romanova?" the Chief blurted out angrily.
"Uh, no Sir! But it is possible that it could be some sort of bio-weapon,
isn't it?" Nene squeaked out. She
and Sylia had worked that out as a possibly 'theory' as to what happened.
"Possible? Not likely! And when is someone going to tell me why the hell did
someone feel like pointing
every single damn satellite in orbit at the battle? I've had calls from the
UN and the DIET for the last
several hours! They've been riding my butt to get this investigation done
ASAP. Telecommunications was
interrupted across the entire eastern hemisphere, costing millions!"
"I don't know, chief!"
"Well, until we finish this investigation, you're suspended!"
Leon winced. This was starting to look ugly.
-
That next night, just after sunset, Mackie was sitting on the couch, using a
portable terminal to work out a
repair schedule for the hardsuits and their other equipment. The loss of the
truck was going to take weeks to
replace and they'd have to be very careful when they did.
"Hey, Nene? When you're done with checking out your hardsuit, do you want to
come up and grab a bite to
eat?" The little window in the corner of the screen showed the bouncy
red-head. Mackie failed to notice a
red dot moving across the floor towards him. He blinked in surprise as it
darted across the table in front of
him and then disappeared. What had that been?
"Sure, Mackie! What are you cooking?" Nene asked.
The red dot steadied itself on the young boys back, as crosshairs lined up.
Three muted coughing sounds
barked out, shattering the window and traveling through his body and the
screen on his lap.
Nene blinked in surprise as the screen blanked out even as it transmitted
the sound of breaking glass.
"Mackie?" Her screen started to flash an intruder alert in the penthouse. A
little status bar indicated armed
intrusion, weapons fired.
Sylia jerked at the sound of shattering glass and metal, echoing from the
living room. She glided out of the
shower and slipped on her bathrobe. A small panel slid open in the sink
cabinet, letting her grab a small
pistol. She had a bad feeling that it wasn't going to be enough.
She flung open the door and dashed into the living room, where a nightmare
awaited her. Blood was
splattered everywhere, Mackie's prone form was crumpled on the ground. She
barely heard the sound of
breaking glass, as a black commando garbed figure stepped in through the
ruined window.
Goggles and a face mask hid his expression, but didn't muffle his voice.
"Damn! Shot the wrong target."
His hands snatched two hand guns from shoulder holsters as Sylia's gun shot
him three times, dead center.
She had but a moment to realize he must be armored, when his shots rang out,
striking her in the stomach
and legs. She collapsed in pain, scrabbling to try and shoot him back. She
was flipped back over and her
gun was slapped out of her hand with brutal efficiency.
"I can't believe that you were the one that killed Devlin. You're weak and
slow." He slid the mask and
goggles off with one hand. Sylia realized it was one of the dead vampire's
henchmen. "But your blood will
still taste sweet. And with it, I'll have your strength to challenge anyone
who stands in my path!"
"What are you... glergk!?" Sylia tried to struggle, but his fangs were in
her throat as he sucked the blood
out of her. "Stop," she managed to get out. Her hands struck futile blows
against him.
Slow seconds passed as she felt herself weaken. So this is how it would end?
"Mackie!? Sylia! Get away from her, monster!" Nene's muffled voice yelled
out from the elevator. Her red
hardsuit's laser discharged, sending the smell of burning flesh into the
air.
Jackie rolled to side, managing to dodge the second laser burst. Damn! Where
the hell had she come from?
"Stay out of this mortal!" He tried to force her leave, to submit. But he
couldn't see her eyes.
"You bastard! You killed Mackie!" Nene charged at him, landing a weak punch
into his stomach.
Jackie grabbed and threw her outside, where she skidded past the swimming
pool in a trail of sparks. He
dashed after her to try shooting her in weak points in the armor. He was
about half way there, when her jets
flared, flinging her into the air, while spinning her around. Her laser
stabbed out from her right arm,
clipping him again, burning away most of his shoulder.
He couldn't help himself as he screamed in agony. The damn thing burned like
fire! He was surprised when
she landed right in front of him, grabbing him and smashing them both
through the wall, back into the
living room.
Nene was possessed by an insane, righteous fury. Normally the most timid and
weak of the Knight Sabers,
she fought in a berserk rage. Again and again, she smashed him into the
reinforced concrete of the floor.
She had almost succeeded in smashing him through the floor when her
concentration was broken. "Nene!
Stop! He's down!"
"M-Mackie? B-but how? You were dead. At least hurt really bad?" Nene stopped
striking the battered and
broken flesh on the ground before her in confusion.
Mackie leaned down to her. His clothes were splattered with his blood, but
she could see sickly bruised
flesh beneath it, oddly discolored with veins of gray-silver. "Something
else my father left behind. I'm
going to be fine," he managed to say, between grit teeth.
"Mackie!" Nene cried out, grabbing him in a tight embrace. "I thought... I
thought you were dead."
They were startled back to the current situation as Sylia jammed a katana
through the chest of the vampire,
pinning it into the gravel so that it couldn't move.
"Argh, you bitch!" Jackie cried out. He'd needed just a minute or two more
to heal his wounds.
"Talk! Or I'll kill you right now!" Sylia declared in a voice that alluded
to an arctic wind.
"What? What do you want to know?"
"Why did you attack me? Why did you shoot Mackie?" Sylia asked, twisting the
sword slightly.
"Thought he was you! I attacked you for revenge and to take your blood for
my own." Jackie sucked in air
as if he needed to breath, the reflexes of his life coming back to him.
"What do you mean, take my blood?"
Nene moved over and put her laser up against his forehead. She wasn't taking
any chances.
"Devlin's blood was strong, powerful enough to create potent childer. If I
take your blood, I become at
least as strong as you!" He gasped as she turned the sword a bit. "You're a
hunted woman, Stingray. Your
nights are numbered! And just because of your blood."
"I won't be easy to kill."
"You won't be able to hide or run, Sylia Stingray! They'll come after your
friends, your family!" His hands
suddenly shot out in a blur and grabbed Nene's right arm and tossed her on
top of Sylia. Not even pausing
to remove the sword he dashed to the edge of the roof and flung himself off,
into the night.
"Nene! Don't let him escape!" Sylia cried out.
She needn't have even ordered as the Knight Saber flung herself after the
vampire. He was about to strike
the ground, when she unleashed her a full spray of lasers into his back,
riddling his body full of holes. His
body bounced with a sickening thud off the mostly empty sidewalk as the
sword imbedded in him shattered.
The onlookers were treated to the unusual sight of a Knight Saber landing
lightly next to the body. Even as
she dashed towards the body, it jerked itself to its feet. Barely
recognizable as a man, he bared his fangs
and leaped at her, his insane beast awakened and demanding death and blood.
She ducked his hands and smashed a punch into his gut, triggering a powerful
burst, almost like a knuckle
bomber that Priss and Linna favored. Her helmet was covered in blood as he
sprayed blood from his mouth.
The bystanders gasped at the savagery of the exchange and then again as the
man seemed to crumble into
himself. By the time his bones would have hit the ground, there was a cloud
of dust that drifted away.
Nene felt numb and tired. Moving woodenly, she looked around at the
gathering crowd. Shaking off her
lethargy, she took off, bouncing and gliding down the street and turning
corners until she felt she had lost
any pursuers. A back entrance to the Silky Doll took her back upstairs.
"Is... is everyone all right?" Nene asked finally. That had been a fairly
traumatic event for her.
Sylia looked up from where she was checking on Mackie. "We're fine. Did you
stop him?"
"Y-yeah."
"Nene, go get out of the hardsuit and come back up here. I'll need your help
as 'Nene Romanova: ADP
police officer," Sylia looked up from where she was bandaging Mackie. "Take
his shirt and trash it in the
secure area."
Nene nodded and followed the orders. She had a sinking feeling that this
night was going to be another
long night.
-
Linna looked around the trashed living room, seeing small piles of debris.
"Oh, that's why she wanted to
meet downstairs. Brrr. I should have brought my sweater." Sighing
theatrically, she turned back into the
elevator and hit the button for the sub-basements. It was always so cold
down there.
A minute later, she stepped out of the elevator and into the cold and
sterile base that the Knight Sabers
operated out of. A bit of walking finally found the other Knight Sabers
sitting at the break table, sipping
coffee. Well, except for Sylia, of course. "Hello!"
"'lo Linna. 'bout time!" Priss said as she slouched in her chair. She had
her hands in her leather jacket's
pockets.
"Some of us hold a full time job during the day! I need my beauty sleep,"
Linna replied, sticking her nose
up in the air.
"You got that right!" Nene said, brightening up considerably.
It took a moment for the put down to dawn on Linna. "Hey! That's not nice!"
"Ha! You're just upset that I got you with that one!" Nene crowed.
Priss ginned, trying to fight down a laugh that just wanted to be released.
"Y'know, she might be right."
"Not you too?" Linna started to scowl.
"Poor picked on Linna. I mean, she gets half the crap that Nene gets but
whines twice as much." Priss's
smile was so wide it threatened to break at any moment.
Nene, Mackie and Sylia all started to giggle until they couldn't hold back
and started to laugh themselves
breathless. Priss joined in just a moment later.
Linna put on a dignified and wounded expression. "I swear. I thought you
were my friends."
Her comment just set them to laughing even harder. Finally, Sylia coughed,
bringing everyone back down
to the earth.
"Thank you for showing up, Linna." Sylia saw Linna perk up in expectation.
"As you might be wondering
what happened upstairs, a vampire made an attempt on my life. As he put it,
he wanted to take 'my blood'
for his own and for 'revenge.' He seemed to think that drinking my blood
would make him more
powerful."
"Eww. Cannibal vampires." Linna's comment seemed to sum up Priss's thoughts.
"Nene dispatched the vampire, but they are likely to be more that will
attempt to kill me in the next few
nights. We have to come up with some plan of attack, or some idea of how and
where to flee." Sylia paused
a second, lost in deep thought.
"Nene?! What have they been feeding you? Klingon Wheaties?" Priss asked
incredulously.
"Hey!"
"Later! This is a matter of grave importance to all of the Knight Sabers. Do
we fight or flee?" Sylia asked
the group pointedly.
"I'm not going to let any blood sucker push me around. I say we fight!"
Priss exclaimed.
"Uh, exactly how many vampires are we talking about?" Linna asked. "I'm all
for fighting battles that we
stand a chance at winning, but I'm not going to walk into certain death.
This is starting to sound like a
really bad episode of that old American vampire hunter show from about
thirty years ago."
"We don't abandon our friends! If that means fighting, then we fight!" Nene
exclaimed, her grip on
Mackie's hand tightening convulsively.
"I'm not convinced that we can fight them. I need more data," Sylia said
tiredly.
"What if we took away their reason for attacking you?" Mackie asked
seriously. He had a very hard look
on his too young face.
"Huh? What are you thinking about, Mackie?" Nene asked.
"That guy from tonight, he wasn't really here for revenge. He was here to
'eat' you." Mackie noted Sylia's
shudder of horror. "He was sloppy and got himself killed because he was in a
rush. They must think that
because you're new, that if they hit you when you aren't in your armor, they
can kill you. They're probably
right too."
Sylia nodded slowly in agreement. "I'm not sure what you mean."
"We get rid of your old body. We know it's feasible. Look at what Mason did.
Trick everyone into thinking
that you 'died.'"
Priss's chair slipped out from beneath her, letting her fall to the ground
in a crash. She looked up from the
ground, shocked horror on her face. "What the hell are you talking about?
You can do that? Why didn't you
tell us?"
Sylia blinked in surprise. "By the time we had figured it out, Largo was
dead."
"Sylia, what does Largo have to do with Mason?" Linna asked, looking between
the two siblings.
"There is a very great likelihood that Largo was, in most ways, Mason. The
technology is a subtle
application of boomer AI technology." Sylia tapped on the table, slowly and
steadily. "I think the risk is
unacceptable."
"Eh? Why?" Linna asked.
Priss had a very hard look of concentration as she sat back down on the
chair that she had overturned.
"Mason became the monster Largo. I... won't let that happen again."
"I don't see what the difference is between what your father did and being
in a boomer body." Linna tried
her best to keep calm. "Besides, Mason was pretty monstrous to begin with."
"The Fanword Syndrome is well documented. A human mind needs a certain level
of physical stimulus. If
it doesn't get it, the mind begins to fragment into different psychosis's."
Sylia shrugged.
"A 33-S boomer is pretty humanlike and can 'feel,' can't it? " Priss had a
very hard frown on her face.
Sylia nodded slowly. "That is true. There sense of touch and smell are about
sixty percent as good as a
humans. Later models were even better."
"Does anyone have a better idea?" Nene asked.
"We could try to disappear, but my attacker made a comment that 'I couldn't
hide or run.' He could have
been bluffing, but they found me rather easily. First Rumio and then the
attacker from tonight." For people
who knew her, you could easily see her agitation as she tapped the table.
"So they're probably watching right now." Linna frowned. She wasn't usually
the most paranoid of people.
But then again, what was that phrase? You're only paranoid if they aren't
out to get you.
Sylia seemed to sink into herself. "I've dragged you into this. I just don't
see another way out, some way to
fight them effectively."
"So we 'fort up' and lock down. How hard is it going to be to get you into a
different body?" Priss couldn't
believe they were going to do this. It sounded like something out of a
sci-fi show. Or an old Frankenstein
movie.
Sylia looked strained but finally nodded. "I guess it is the only option.
It's going to take a few days to
prepare everything. We'll have to steal a body. I don't have the facilities
to make an S type android body. It
will take that long to grow a 'brain' for it, anyways."
"Great, Genom." Priss looked very unhappy at her voiced thought.
-
The next two days were spent in frantic preparations. Finally, on second
night, Sylia brought them together
to tell them that she was ready. Sylia stood over what would hopefully be
her new body. It lay on the bed
quietly, but more alive than herself. She had just finished installing the
new 'brain' and hooking it up to the
battery of computers with a four inch wide band of optical cables. It was
going to be shorter than her old
body, but of more classical proportions. The blond hair seemed wrong, as did
the violet eyes.
Priss, Nene and Linna were standing in their hard suits, helmets off but
prepared to act instantly. "So, how
long is this going to take?" Priss asked.
"Downloading will take approximately a half an hour. Uploading to the new AI
will take about half that."
Sylia took a deep, unneeded breath . She laid down on the table, resting her
head in between a complicated
apparatus. Bands of steel wrapped around her, binding her to the table.
Mackie sat on a stool over by the computer. "Ready when you are, Sis."
She still almost called it off, right then. But, in the hallmark of true
bravery, pushed past her fears. There
will be no Largo. Nor Reika either. In a very real manner, she was just
following her fathers dream to its
ultimate conclusion. Man, controlling his evolution via technology.
"Go."
Priss nodded to the other two Knight Sabers. "That's our cue. Time to take
out their eyes and ears."
Linna and Nene nodded in understanding. It hadn't been too difficult to spot
the spies that were watching
the building. Luckily, they had no idea that Sylia also owned the buildings
behind the Silky Doll.
-
They surrounded the last spy in fairly short order. He looked quite upset as
he kept asking for status
updates through a walkie talkie. A large semi-auto rifle was leaned up
against his leg. His dark eyes danced
around the roof top as if he expected to be attacked at any moment. So he
wasn't too terribly surprised when
three figures came bouncing over the edge of the room.
"This one's alive!" Nene called out. That didn't stop her from pointing her
laser at him.
"So we give him the option of leaving." Priss also had her right arm pointed
at him. Whether she planned
on using her plasma cannon or rail spikes, only she knew.
Linna didn't say anything, but almost danced on her toes in readiness.
"I'm going to give you five seconds to drop your weapons and leave.
Quickly."
The guy smiled cockily and put the rifle to his shoulder. "Can't do that,
I'm afraid." With a startling
quickness, he fired as full spray of bullets at the blue hardsuit in front
of him.
"That wasn't too bright, buddy." Priss took carefully measured steps toward
him.
The gun clattered to the ground. "Nah, I was just told that I'd better at
least put up a fight. If you don't mind,
I'm going now."
"Orders, huh? Life sucks for you."
"Please don't say that."
-
"Sis, your pattern is in a highly agitated state. I'm going to have to abort
for now," Mackie said suddenly.
His hands typed and reversed the process in just a minute. He looked over at
the figure lying on the table.
"Do you want to talk about it?"
"No."
The silence stretched out longer and longer, widening uncomfortably between
them. "Come on, Sylia. You
know that this can't work unless you're calm."
Sylia stared at the metal ceiling. "I know." The silence stretched out even
further. "I'm scared." That had
hurt to admit. She was supposed to be the one in charge, the one who didn't
need help.
Mackie looked at her with worry written all over him. "I think I
understand."
"No, you don't."
"How can I help you if you don't tell me!" Mackie threw up his hands in
disgust.
Sylia didn't respond. Her eyes were closed as her mind raced for some
solution to the problem. She almost
jumped in shock when she felt a warm hand take her own in its grasp. She
turned and looked in surprise.
"Please, tell me. I'm your brother. I want to help."
"I... I've always been scared of what father did to us. Making us part
machine." It felt like she was opening
an old wound, the pain tearing at her. The pain was almost debilitating.
"And this is worse, because you're choosing to become one of your own free
will."
Sylia nodded slowly. "Ever since Largo, the dreams came back. Nightmares,
really. They're always the
same." She gulped loudly, swallowing a breath she really didn't need. "I
wake up and go to have breakfast.
You or one of the girls is there and we are chatting, when I realize
something is... wrong. Sometimes, it is
red or gold eyes. Or maybe I can see silver veins under their skin."
"My god..." Mackie hadn't thought that Sylia had any fears like this. She
was always so calm, so collected,
even during combat.
"But that isn't the worst. I realize that they... they've become monsters,
soulless creations. Sometimes, it
seems like I fight and even win, k-killing the... other times I can't get to
the hardsuits and... and they chase
me, catch me. And I can feel them stripping me of flesh. When they're done,
I hear... him. Laughing and
mocking me."
She stops for a second, as if trying to gain her courage back. "S-sometimes
it's Mason. Most of the time, it...
it's Largo. He's laughing and talking about 'the look of the victor.' And in
his eyes, I see myself. I... I've
become some sort of monstrous boomer, that looks barely human. But it has my
face, with glowing red
eyes!" Sylia took in a sobbing breath of air.
"Sylia, you would never do that!"
"I didn't think Mason would kill thousands of people just to try and get the
OMS either."
"Mason was a monster. He murdered and killed dozens of innocent people.
Becoming a boomer just let him
do the things that he'd only dreamed that he could do. I have faith in you
Sis. You're stronger than Mason."
He squeezed her hand again. "If you like, I'll stay here, holding your
hand."
For the longest moment, she didn't say anything. Almost sobbing, she nodded.
"Please. Don't let me go."
"Just a moment. Let me get set up." He moved the keyboard and monitor so
that he wouldn't have to leave
her side. He then gripped her hand tightly and started the process. He
breathed a sigh of relief as he saw
that Sylia was finally calming down. The process would work.
Almost an hour later, Mackie yawned. Hopefully, they were finally seeing the
light at the end of the tunnel.
Three more minutes and they were done. And it looked like they had cleared
out all of the watchers. A
small rustle of clothing was his only warning of an attack, as his head was
struck savagely, smashing his
face against the screen. For just a moment, the screen hung on the edge of
the table before it crashed to the
ground.
Rumio looked around at the different advanced looking electronics. The young
man groaned on the ground
and then collapsed fully into unconsciousness. "Timing is everything," she
said to herself with a wry grin.
She looked behind herself to see the portal in the air fading out.
It would cost her a pretty penny to replace the item she had just used. But,
if it advanced her in the Jihad, it
would be more than worth it. Rumio looked at the two figures laying on the
ground. One was obviously a
boomer. The other was Sylia, laying still, as if one of the truly dead.
Her eyes plumbed the comatose figure with senses far different than merely
mortal eyes. Sylia's aura
looked oddly muted, almost nonexistent. Shrugging, she turned the chair
around, sat down and bit deeply
into her neck. Within a minute, she felt the blood was fully drained from
the body.
Focusing deeply, she continued to drain the body. Even though she had
drained her dry of all blood, to gain
her essence, her power, she would have to take Sylia's soul into herself.
After just a few moments, there
was nothing left except for a corpse. A decaying corpse without a spark of
life left within in it.
Rumio frowned. She had thought that she would feel something after
diablorizing Sylia. It could be
possible that she had not done the act correctly or that it had just failed.
It was supposed to be quite hard to
accomplish at times. She shook her head in frustration. To take such risks
with no reward was disheartening.
Suddenly, the metal bands holding the boomer snapped from behind her as she
broke free. Cables snapped
free as Sylia jumped to her feet clumsily. "What did you do to Mackie?"
Anger welled up in her. How dare
she attack her brother.
Rumio looked on the boomer with disdain. "He's merely unconscious. He will
have to live with her death
on his conscious. That is far more punishment than he deserves for being
dragged into this hellish
nightmare that I live in."
Sylia's eyes narrowed and then relaxed. "Fine. You killed her, so why don't
you leave."
Rumio eyed this strange boomer warily. This one was not acting normally. She
blinked in surprise as she
noted the vibrant aura, rich with the texture of feelings and life around
it. "What are you? No... who are
you? You couldn't be..."
Sylia tightened her muscles in preparation for to fight.
"How? How can you be free of this cursed existence!" Rumio screamed, eyes
flashing with an eerie scarlet
hue. She struggled with the monster within her, almost attacking Sylia in a
frenzy as she was so infuriated
about her escaping the torture of being a vampire.
Long seconds passed. "I do not know if it would work for a normal vampire.
As I told Devin, I haven't been
fully human since I was a girl. My father created the original boomer, you
know. Most of the actual designs
for their minds are based on his technology. The same technology that
replaced my flesh and blood brain
with a neural computer."
"A cyborg? But most cybernetics are useless after being embraced. The
vampire body does not know how
to use them." Rumio looked confused. The cybernetics boom from a few years
ago had taught the vampires
a few things about technology that they had been unprepared for.
"That term will have to suffice. And for over a day, my mind did not know
how to control that body. I
finally adapted. But, because of that unique situation, I could transfer my
'programming' to a different body.
The risks were less than staying a vampire."
"You... how dare... I'll crush your heart in my hands, you abomination!"
Rumio face distorted, her fangs
extended. Her hand we curled into claws as she hunched over.
"BACK OFF." The high pitched whine of capacitors charging broke the
stillness, as the dark blue hardsuit
bracketed the vampire in her sights.
Rumio cursed to herself. The three hardsuited figures standing at the
doorway put her at a severe
disadvantage. The olive green one stepped into the room carefully, her own
arm cannon raised and primed.
Behind them stood the much smaller red suit.
Her decision was taken from her by this damned circumstance of fate. "Fine.
I'm out of here."
Sylia stepped carefully, making sure to stay out of the line of the heavy
weapons. "Stop. I want your word
of honor, that you will never come back here, that you will never attack us.
Also, that you will tell them
that I died at your hands."
"No."
"You won't leave this room alive unless you do."
The two women glared at each other, determined figures carved by harsh
events into strong willed
antagonists.
"You have my word of honor that I will abide by all of your demands. Damn
you." Rumiko grit her teeth in
anger, her fangs showing.
"Hopefully not. MegaTokyo does not need another Largo."
Rumiko narrowed her eyes at that odd pronouncement. Her back stiff, she
pushed her way beyond the
armored warriors.
-
Leon slipped his shades on as he latched his helmet to his bike. The sun
glared off of a light layer of snow,
making the midwinter day seem brighter than even summer. He'd stopped by
headquarters to see how Nene
and Dailey were dealing with the mess that he'd dropped on their lap.
But Nene hadn't been there, having called in sick... again. This was
unsettling him. He'd stopped by her
apartment, but there had been no answer.
Priss's trailer had been empty too. He'd avoided going there since that
night, fearing (possibly correctly)
that he'd burnt that bridge behind him trying to stop what he'd thought was
a murderer.
He stuffed his hands in his jacket and walked the half block toward the very
banal and bland exterior of the
Silky Doll. The wind tugged at his hair as the door opened. Leon looked
around the interior, spotting a
young lady behind the counter.
She smiled warmly. A ringing phone, calling her attention away, interrupted
her from greeting him. "One
moment, sir!"
Leon tuned her out for just a moment. He was brought back to the present as
the sales clerk spoke up,
"Excuse me? Miss Stingray wishes to speak to you and cordially invites you
upstairs."
"Umm? Sure. Lead the way."
"Just take the elevator up to the penthouse. She's expecting you
momentarily!" She gestured to the elevator
behind the counter.
Leon ticked off the seconds as the elevator took him up. A small burst of
colder air greeted him.
The sight that greeted him struck him as... ordinary. Four young women and
one teenage boy, sitting
around a living room. Papers were laying across the tables, graphs and
diagrams being easily evident.
"Stingray." Leon nodded his head and he loosened his jacket.
"Please, take a seat, Mr. McNichol." The dark haired woman in front of him
matched the photos and
description of Sylia Stingray.
The only unknown was the woman with slightly longer dark hair, held back out
of her face with a head
band. Leon felt a wave of uneasiness as he realized that the woman (even
Nene) seemed to all being
wearing some sort of exercise suit under their bathrobes. If you discounted
the odd sensor net connections
that were visible.
"Thanks. I figured it was about time that we got some sort of an agreement
hammered out."
Off to the side, Nene let out a breath of air explosively. Relief was
stamped all over her face.
Sylia smiled, like the cat who had just eaten a mouse. "And what do you
suggest? We are mercenaries, after
all. We get paid to do illegal jobs most of the time."
"Yeah, well, I figured that the ADP can cut you some more slack. There
weren't too many casualties from
the little tussle a week ago. Your organization has done this city a great
service." Leon took a small breath.
"If it weren't for you, Largo would still be running around, leveling cities
until he got whatever he wanted."
"So we get some slack... if we don't cross a certain... line?" Sylia asked
pointedly.
"I don't hold to murder. And you seem to try to keep your messes small."
"You don't have a problem with what happened to Mason?" Sylia said, over
stressing the words
sarcastically.
Leon dragged his hand through his hair in nervousness. "Sounds to me like it
was some kind of duel. There
were a lot of high explosive craters that matched what his suit would do.
You don't just hop into one of
those suits unprepared. He knew what he was getting into." Leon smiled
disarmingly. "'sides, at the worst,
all they'd be able to pin on you is involuntary manslaughter. At least,
according to the ADP legal hounds."
"If Genom lets us live to go to trial, of course."
Priss snorted in disgust. "Yeah, right."
"Priss! I want to make some things clear, Mr. McNichol. You aren't part of
our organization. This is as far
as our agreement goes."
Leon stared at her for a long moment. "I can live with that." Something was
odd. That little bit of intuition
was pinging in the background, screaming for him to notice something right
in front of him.
"Good." Sylia stood up and held out her hand.
Leon stood and gripped her hand, staring into her eyes. He blinked in
surprise, shock evident. "You... you...
Boomer!" That's what was wrong. Her eyes, they weren't her normal brown, but
just a slightly off gold-
flecked brown.
Sylia held his hand tightly as she squinted at him. She released him just as
suddenly. "You have some very
keen eyes, detective."
Leon looked around carefully. His probing eyes looked for any hint of what
he suspected. "I, uh..."
"Relax, cowboy. Sylia's human. She's just not in a human body." Priss glared
at him with her dark red eyes.
"I happen to know of a few boomers that are lots better people than some I
could mention." Priss finished
her words softly, as if she had pulled at old wounds.
"I'm not the first person to make the leap to a boomers body, McNichol. If
you think back, you might
even..."
"Mason! That bastard! That's what Largo meant!"
Nene emitted an "Eep!"
"Very astute. Yes. Obviously, this isn't anything I want to let become
common knowledge."
"Hey, you can trust me!" Leon used his thumb to point at himself. "I'm
pretty good at keeping secrets. I've
known that Priss is a Knight Saber for months."
"Months? How the hell did you know that, you creep?" Priss yelled as she
grabbed him by the front of his
shirt.
"It helps to keep your helmet on top of your cute head. It doesn't protect
your identity if you aren't wearing
it." He held up his hands to forestall hurricane Priss. "It was during that
DD mess. I wasn't totally out of it
at the end."
Sylia rolled her eyes. "Priss, let him go. Leon, don't you have somewhere to
be?"
"Eh, not until tomorrow. I've got a hearing to see if I get my badge back."
"Ooh." Nene suddenly stood up and stomped on his toes. "Get a clue and grow
up."
Everyone stared at Nene. Under their gaze, she started to sweat.
"What?"
Linna grinned widely. "Nothing much, Nene poo. Just the kettle calling the
pot black."
"You guys are mean!"
Leon couldn't help it. He tried to hold it back as long as possible, but
finally he just burst out laughing.
Everyone except Nene soon followed him.
Nene shared her angry glare around. Her gaze finally came to rest on Mackie.
"Do you have a problem, Mr.
Stingray?"
Mackie just smiled. "Nope."
Nene's left eyebrow twitched. "Are you sure about that? Or do you like the
couch?"
Mackie gulped suddenly.
"Nene? You didn't, did you? You sly dog! You did! And here I didn't think
you'd ever get the guts to go
after him!" Priss started to chuckle.
"I didn't just say that out loud did I?" Nene asked very quietly. Her face
was rapidly turning the same color
as her hair.
Laughter was her only answer.
-
Characters and situations in this fanfic were inspired or borrowed from
works copyright by White Wolf, Artmic,
Youmex, and AIC. No profit is intended or wanted from this work.