“Wait a minute, is that Kiki-Koko up there?”
The speaker was a young
woman with mostly short hair dyed blonde hair and bright pink
eyebrows, the only portions breaking the crewcut were the long bangs
that draped down over one of her eyes. She was still a girl really,
probably not even twenty years old. She was currently dressed in
artfully torn jeans with a rather jarringly bright top that may have
been made of latex, though she had a T-shirt over that.
“You’re the one
concerned with fads, not me. How would I know?”
The girl she was speaking
to looked quite a bit older on first glance. A second look made one
realize that the impression was largely due to her more conservative
style of dress. She looked rather more like a responsible office
worker or civil service employee. Some things stood out about her
however. Among other things was the fact that her pale skin had a
decidedly more grey tone than the usual pink, tan or brown most
humans had. Her ears were unusually shaped as well, but what stood
out the most was her green hair.
“Yeah, that’s her,”
the blonde woman noted. “What the heck is she doing here? I mean
this is a small local festival and she’s…well, she’s
Kiki-Koko.”
“I don’t see the
significance,” Minako suggested.
“She’s a thirty-year
old idol-singer,” Higa responded with a look. “And still popular.
Most of them, you know, get drummed out before they even get past
twenty.”
“In that case I think
you're using an extra word in your description with her.”
“What does that mean?”
“If she's stayed
successful into her thirties, why not just call her a singer,” the
green-haired girl noted. “I mean she's not still dancing around in
one of those costumes is she?”
“Well she's just up
there on stage right now, looks like they're getting set up to do a
show,” the blonde stepped to the side and pointed. “Just take a
look.”
“I'm not looking,”
the serious girl insisted.
“What's the harm in a
look, I mean she's a very beautiful woman,” Higa pointed out in a
sing-song tone.
Minako glanced around at
the other people in the festival and then back at the blonde woman.
“Higa-san, am I harassing you whenever I spot a handsome young man
I think you might be interested in?”
“Isn't that how normal
teenaged girls act?” the raver girl asked. “Get together and talk
about boys...or girls I guess in your case. Not sure how that works,
I think you're supposed to compare tastes and such but we're
completely diff -.”
“Under what criteria do
either of us qualify as normal teenaged girls?” The question was
laced with a trace of frustration.
“Why can't we be
normal?” the younger blonde woman asked with a sigh.
“Are we here for a
reason, or do you just want to 'hang out'?” Minako asked. “Because
I assumed this was something important.”
“No, no, but it would
help us fit in and go unnoticed, and sometimes I like to pretend,”
Higa responded. “And call me Kyou, Higa-san is my…no, well,
Higa-sama is my sister. It’s not like I go around calling you
Kita-san, Minako.”
“I would appreciate if
you did call me Kita-san, actually,” Minako responded. “As to
business, is there anybody of special significance on hand?” Kyou
started to open her mouth. “Not, Kiki-Koko.”
Kyou pouted briefly and
thought about it. “I had a text from a bonded I know, the bond was
a little bit strange. I think she might be a dormant carrier too and
that's messing with the read. But it was just a general come and hang
out invite.”
“If you already know
someone coming,” Minako asked through gritted teeth. “Why not
drag her into romance chats and everything else. Do you know what it
takes for me to get time off on short notice?”
“Umm, I don't know,
sneaking out.” Kyou continued as Minako tilted her head
incredulously. “Right, right. I know. I sympathize, I really do.
You're not the only one with family issues, remember? I had to run
this past the dragon lady myself.”
“How is your sister?”
Minako asked.
The blonde girl turned a
bit sober, “Still confined to premises, but she can get up and move
a little more now.”
“That's good to hear,”
the green-haired girl noted. “Anyway, why aren't you partnering
with this other girl?”
“I haven't actually
worked with her,” Kyou admitted. “I just know her. And last I
heard she hadn’t made the decision yet, so I’d like to see more
before calling her for backup.”
“Well at least that's
sensible of you.”
“Besides the last time
we hung out, I ended up drunk and Jun nearly bit my head off when she
caught me.”
“Kyou!”
“'You're lucky I don't
have a taste for pickled herring.'” Kyou's voice turned deeper and
harsher with a mockery of incensed anger. “There was lots of steam
and hot air. She lectured me all night and through the hangover about
the whole purity of the body thing.”
“I need to meet your
sister face to face sometime.”
“I'd rather not
envision that scenario, actually.”
“You asked for it.
You're seventeen years old,” the green-haired girl snapped. “You
can't drink. Family taboos aside.”
“I know, I know it was
a stupid idea,” Kyou admitted. “In any case, I think this is a
real thing so I wanted someone professional along.”
“There needs to be at
least one,” Minako mumbled before moving on to speaking a bit more
clearly. “In any case, I did some checking before coming. Hayashi
Umeko is helping with the festival's IT department.”
“Oh, is the bronzed
look your thing? Last one, I swear,” Kyou promised. “Anyway, so
that's another girl of significance.”
“Hayashi is
twenty-three,” Minako noted. “Unlike us she can actually drink
alcohol legally. I'd hardly call her a girl.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Kyou
noted. “Anyway, so that makes the bonded, the bronze, us and....”
Kyou paused staring out through the crowd.
“And?” Minako asked.
“And her,” the blonde
noted, pointing through the crowd. Minako turned about and followed
the direction of Kyou's finger to see a small gaggle of Caucasian
children around a girl...no young woman.
“She looks familiar,”
Minako said. “They're speaking Swedish. What can you tell me about
them.”
“They're a
bit...foreign,” the blonde explained.
“Foreign like you or
foreign like me?” Minako asked.
“I want to go with
Kajja!” The smallest of the five children, six if you included the
tiny young woman at their cnter, stomped her feet firmly. She was a
little girl of maybe six years of age with dirty blonde hair and
hazel eyes that were just a touch eerie.
“I have to work, Zuza.”
“Kajja” responded.
She wasn't all that much
taller than the two youngest children. Her brown hair hung to her
mid-back and her eyes were currently hidden by a pair of shades. She
didn't look very healthy. Her short, bony frame would have most
people assuming that her growth had been stunted somehow and hadn't
been eating much recently on top of that.
“You'll just be bored
hanging around me all day. You all can go and have fun without me,
don't worry about it.”
“But you're not boring,
you're cool,” Zuza insisted. “Why can't I help you?”
“I think there's a
goldfish catching two rows over,” a teenaged boy said. He stood
head and shoulders over “Kajja” He was obviously related to the
little girl, as were the other children. They all had the same sort
of vaguely creepy hazel eyes. He looked much better fed, however, and
a few moments of watching would have pegged the smaller sister in the
shades as being older.
Both the youngest
children turned around to look at the teenaged boy, wide-eyed. The
youngest boy, about eight years old, spoke out first. “Really? If
we get a goldfish can we keep it?”
“Ummmm...” “Kajja”
looked about a little hopelessly for a moment before answering.
“Sure, that'll be fine. Thanks Sebastian.”
It wasn't like they'd
actually manage to catch a gold fish, of course. Those kind of
contests were rigged from what she'd heard. Still, it made the young
woman a bit relieved that she wouldn't have to try to keep an eye on
her youngest sister while on the job.
“Davit and I'll be off
as well,” one of the remaining two children noted, fraternal twins
about twelve years of age. The speaker was the girl of the pair with
dark brown hair. “I think there was a haunted house somewhere.”
“Uhhh, I'm going to say
no to that,” the brown-haired girl noted.
“What's wrong with a
haunted...” the other twin, a similar looking boy paused as he
figured it out himself. “Oh, right, privacy.”
“We'll be careful,
Katja,” Sebastian promised. “Don't work too hard.”
“Okay, if anything
happens, come find me, or at least scream and make a fuss,” Katja
insisted.
“And then you’ll
punch everyone, right?” Zuza asked.
“Yeah, then I’ll
punch everyone,” the tiny girl in the sunglasses promised.
The brunette watched them
all fade into the crowd before sighing and working her own way
through the crowd calling out as she moved to avoid being jostled or
pushed aside. By the time she found the flow of people heading in the
direction that she wanted to go, her mood was more than little
tested. She pulled out alongside the festival’s IT tent and walked
inside scanning for the person she wanted. The other woman was easy
enough to find.
There wasn’t anybody
else in the world that hard nearly the same look. Unruly black steel
wires and cables twisted out of a skull made of pure bronze belong to
a figure sitting in a chair at a desk and seemingly staring out into
space. She was dressed in fashionable clothes topped incongruously
with a vintage leather flight jacket. Anybody who didn’t know
better would have simply assumed that the figure was a decorative
statue of some kind.
“Hey, Umeko, we’re
here,” she announced in Swedish to the metallic figure after
crossing the tent and drawing the eyes of the people inside. There
didn’t seem to be a response immediately and Katja waited
patiently. “Umm, can you hear me Umeko? I’m here, so where do I…”
“Stop,” the bronze
figure spoke in Japanese before turning shining white and red eyes to
focus on the short Swede. “In case you haven’t noticed, I’m a
little busy here, so be patient. And speak Japanese, I can’t
translate in real time on top of everything else.”
“Don’t you speak
Swedish?” Katja asked hesitantly in Japanese. “I mean sort of.”
“Depends on what
websites I have access to,” Umeko told her. “And currently, I’m
busy with handling the security for the festival’s wi fi. That
takes a lot of concentration.”
“Okay, well that
explains some of your grammar and word choices,” she mumbled that
in Swedish before continuing in Japanese. “Anyway I wanted to
say….”
“You’re here, I
know,” Umeko interrupted. “I caught sight of you on someone’s
attempt to upload a selfie. Why the hell are you here? You should be
reporting to the booth services for your assigned positions.”
“Uh, well, I thought
I’d say hi,” Katja commented hesitantly.
“Now you’ve said it,
so get on with what you’re here to do,” Umeko shifted about,
leaning back and seeming to return to staring off blankly into space.
“Right…well, I’ll…umm
get to that,” the Swede noted.
Umeko let her get half
way to the exit before speaking again in slow Swedish. “The
security staff have been informed that you and your siblings are a
kidnap risk, Katja. Try to relax. Eat something.”
“Oh, thanks,” Katja
returned. “I…wait, how do they know who we are.”
“You’re good at
avoiding public cameras,” Umeko noted. “But I’m better than
that. And don’t read too much into it. I don’t want you making me
look bad after I got you these passes and the job.”
“Right, of course,”
the woman noted with a smile and a nod before walking out.
Behind her, Umeko’s
metallic white eyes rolled for a moment. “And now she thinks we’re
friends. Lovely.”
Walking out of the tent,
Katja was stepping over to one of the other staff to get directions
to the booth services when someone stumbled out of the crowd in an
old, ratty t-shirt and frayed jacket. “Whoops, look out!”
The stumbling figure’s
feet were a bit tangled in each other sending her into a swift
forward charge which was stopped as Katja shifted her stance and
caught her into a standing position. Her hair twisted about in her
face and she started to try to shift it out of her face.
“Sorry about that,”
the stumbling girl said. “A got a little ahead of myself. There.”
“Yeah just watch where
you’re going,” the man next to Katja said. “You almost ran over
this kid.”
“Umm, actually, the kid
is the one who stopped me from falling, didn’t you notice?” the
girl asked.
“The kid is twenty,”
Katja noted. “And I’m fine, I just need to get to booth services
to figure out where I’m supposed to go.”
“It’s the tent over
there,” the faculty member noted. “Cut through there to avoid the
crowds.”
“Right, see you…”
Katja and the man both stopped and stared as the other girl took the
hair off and revealed a smooth, bald head. She readjusted the wig a
moment so that the hair was out of her face and then looked toward
the other two.
“Oh, yeah, they told me
the hair would come back now that chemo is over but it hasn’t,”
she explained drawing an uncomfortable look from everyone in earshot.
“My name’s Ayako, what’s yours?”
“Katja,” the Swede
noted.
“Oh, really?” Ayako
asked before speaking a stream of Russian.
“Err, I was born in
Sweden,” Katja noted.
“Huh,” Ayako noted
calmly. “Where in Sweden? We never lived there but my family spent
some vacations there. You know, before money was an issue.”
“I don’t know, most
of my life has been in Japan,” the Swedish girl explained. “Look,
I’ve got to get out of here, I’m supposed to be working.”
“Oh right, don’t let
me stop you,” Ayako said, “I’ve got someone to talk to myself.”
Katja nodded and walked
away as Ayako waved. Once the Swede’s back was turned, Ayako looked
toward the faculty and nodded. “Sorry about the disturbance. I’ll
be just a moment.”
“Hey, wait…” the
man started before the wig-wearing girl stepped into the tent. He
interrupted his head and shook it to clear some of his discomfort and
confusion.
Ayako walked into the IT
tent and saw Umeko sitting there and staring into space. “I'm
guessing you're busy. Roll your eyes if you'd rather I come back
later.”
The bronze woman's eyes
rolled momentarily towards her, narrowed briefly and then went back
to staring into space.
“Right, I'll see you
later,” she said with a nod and turned to walk away.
One of the staff was in
the corner of the tent watching an older model portable television
while he ate. It was obviously set up as a break area, but that's not
what caught Ayako's eye. Rather it was what was on the television
that did. There was footage of a group of brightly costumed people
walking into an official looking building. She walked over to look
over the man on break's shoulder.
“Is that Sword Knight?”
she asked.
“Yeah, he's been
talking with the Eiyu-Tai and the police, apparently,” the man on
break said.
“But he’s British,”
Ayako protested. “You’d think if the Stellar Section was going to
send someone to talk to a Japanese team about something that it would
be Yurei.”
“Didn’t she used to
be a villain?” he asked.
“Okay, maybe not her,”
the bald girl admitted. “But what’s Sword Knight doing here?”
“Maybe they're
arranging some sort of publicity thing?” the man said hopefully.
Minako felt her phone
vibrate as the brunette Swede came out of the booth services tent
with a shoulder bag and a staff vest. So far, special or not, she
seemed focused on just getting to her work and getting it done. The
green-haired girl looked over toward Kyou and gestured with her
buzzing phone.
“Have you got this?”
“I see someone I know
actually,” Kyou said. “That girl, think I might head down for a
talk while you’re on the phone.”
Minako glanced toward the
brunette, but she was already going around a corner out of sight.
“Fine, we’ll catch up to the other one later if we need to.”
Stepping aside she
answered the phone. “Kita.” Around her, the air turned sluggish,
dampening the sounds of her speech barely a foot away from her
position.
“Minako, good to hear
you sounding so healthy,” a familiar voice said in French.
Minako blinked in
surprise and straightened herself a bit more than usual as she looked
around. “Acquin-sensei? I am…surprised to hear from you at this
time. Isn’t it late in Quebec?”
“I’m in Seoul at the
moment,” came the woman’s response.
“I see, is there
something you need me for?” Minako asked.
“This call rather
relates more to you,” Acquin-sensei noted. “Where are you right
now?”
“I’m at a festival in
Fukushima with Higa-san,” she reported.
“Do you have your gear
with you?” the woman asked.
“It’s in the car at
the moment, will I be needing it?” Minako looked up to see Kyou
still across the way talking to another girl near one of the food
booths.
“I see that they didn’t
bother to inform you,” Acquin-noted. Minako could almost see the
frown on her face. “There’s a manhunt for Azure Shrike. Fukushima
is one of several possible cities where he has a target.”
“That does not surprise
me,” Minako said. “Shrike is a bit outside my abilities.”
“Perhaps, perhaps,”
Acquin agreed. “That doesn’t mean you should be a sitting goose
either. If he shows up, try to keep civilians safe but don’t engage
directly if you can avoid it. Sword Knight is assigned to liaise with
the locals there.”
“Contain the situation
and hold out for the adults,” she responded. “I understand,
ma’am. I might have some trouble blending in with my gear…”
“You’re at a
festival,” the woman reminded her. “Just tell people you’re in
cosplay.”
“All right,” the
green-haired girl noted. “I should tell you, sensei. There’s at
least three other specials at site besides myself and Higa-san. One
bonded, one apotheosis carrier and one unknown.”
“Are they on the job?”
“I don’t think so,”
Minako noted. “It mostly looks to be a coincidence.”
“What brings you to the
festival, might I ask?”
“Higa-san had a vision
of some sort.” The admission was made reluctantly.
“Don’t assume
coincidence when a sibyl tells you something’s coming,” her old
teacher instructed. “Hang up now. Get your gear on and get ready.
I’ll relay this to Sword Knight and your handlers.”
“Yes, sensei,” Minako
agreed. “Good luck.”
“Good to speak to you
again, girl,” the woman said. “Be careful.”
The call disconnected and
the sluggish band of air around Minako simply dispersed as she turned
to look toward Kyou.
“Hey, Ayako,” a voice
called out, drawing the girl’s attention to the side as a blonde
girl with a crewcut and long bangs strode across the scene towards
her.
Ayako smiled and waved
casually back at the other girl. “Kyou. I was wondering if I would
see you here.”
“I wasn’t certain I’d
get the chance,” Kyou commented. “Anyway, are you part of the
staff here? What were you doing in the IT tent?”
“Oh, Umeko Hayashi’s
working here,” Ayako explained casually. “You know, the bronze
woman? She and I were in the same hospital when she had the first
nanite treatment.”
“Wow,” the sibly
responded with wide eyes. “That’s coincidence. Maybe you could
introduce me sometime.”
“Ehh, don’t know how
well that would work,” the other girl responded with a helpless
shrug. “Umeko doesn’t generally seem to like people. Anyway, it’s
exciting isn’t it?”
“How do you mean?”
“Well, she’s a third
type of super, isn’t she?” Ayako asked. “I mean, until for like
thousands of years its just been magicals and gifteds. Now there’s
cyborgs.”
“That is a thought,
actually,” Kyou agreed. “Makes you wonder why there hasn’t been
more talk about her, actually.”
“Anyway, did you know
Kiki-Koko is here?” Ayako asked.
“Yeah, I just saw her
people setting up a few minutes ago.” A strong breeze passed
between and around the two with a whispering sound that quickly died
off. Kyou looked in the direction of the wind and then nodded. “Hey,
I left my priestess stuff in the car. Care to walk back with me to
pick it up? Maybe I can earn a bit of money for doing some blessings
or readings.”
“Are you supposed to
take money for that sort of thing?” Ayako asked. “You’re just
an apprentice, aren’t you?”
“I am perfectly within
my right to offer minor blessings in exchange for a little bit of
cash,” Kyou assured her.
“Is this like you
assured me that you were twenty years old when we went to the rave
last time?”
“No, no, I’m being
perfectly serious. Besides, you didn’t believe and still let me
drink anyway, so…” Kyou stretched the word meaningfully.
“This is true,” Ayako
noted with a smile. “By the way, my hair hasn’t grown back yet.
Is that a magic thing.”
“It probably is,”
Kyou noted. “I had my hair dyed when I cast my first charm and,
well, no longer have black hair anywhere.”
“You mean you’re
naturally blonde?”
“No, the blonde is
dyed,” Kyou noted hesitantly as she pointed to her eyebrows.
“Wait, you’re a
natural pinkette and you dye it?” Ayako said in protest. “Why
would you do that? It would be awesome to have pink hair.”
“Yeah, it was fine when
I was ten years old, but I’m older now and it’s a little
embarrassing,” Kyou commented.
“You’re five years
younger than me and I think pink is great,” Ayako told her.
“And…hmmm. Give me a moment.”
Ayako walked over to a
booth selling masks and a came back with one of the handful of
quality, sturdy masks they were selling. It was an oni mask but it
hadn’t been painted yet, apparently being arranged for the
purchaser to put the colors they want on it. Ayako slipped the mask
on her head and posed.
“What do you think?”
she asked. “Does it just scream mysterious and powerful?”
“Doesn’t your armor
come with a helmet?” Kyou asked. “I seem to remember it does.”
“Yeah, but it’s a
boring normal samurai helmet. This will add a bit of flavor to it.”
“Yeah, you know what,
that will look good,” Kyou agreed. “Just slip it on next time you
bring out the armor and the spear will consider it part of the set.”
“I know, I’ve been
experimenting a bit with the armor,” Ayako admitted. “Changing
the cover, taking some pieces off. You know, modernizing it.”
“Taking pieces off?”
Kyou asked. “What are you taking off?”
“Oh, the shoulder
pieces,” the other girl said calmly. “The tunic. You know, making
it look sexier.”
Kyou stared at her for a
long moment before shaking her head in disbelief.
“Doesn’t most of the
protection come from the spear anyway?” Ayako asked.
“I don’t know,”
Kyou commented. “Have you been hit yet?”
“Not really, I move
pretty fast when the spear’s out,” she explained. She paused for
a moment at the sound of music reverberating through the festival.
“Hey, sounds like the concert has started. I’m going to head
over, meet you there?”
“Uh, yeah, I suppose,”
the medium said. “Shouldn’t take me too long to get dressed and
such.”
Katja came out of the
staff tent and looked back over her shoulder to see a green-haired
girl dressed rather blandly walking off to the side on a cell phone.
She'd seen the same girl and the blonde with her earlier. The blonde
girl didn't stand out all that much but the other, apart from the
green hair, didn't look like she was there for the festival. None of
the booths seemed to interest her at all and the sunlight seemed to
bother her.
And now she'd seen the
two girls twice in a short span. It was the sort of thing that made
her paranoid. It would probably come to nothing, like everything
else. There hadn't been any problems since they'd come north, so she
didn't expect there to be anything now, but there was no harm in
caution.
Besides, it didn't look
like they were making an effort to follow her. The blonde was getting
some drinks from one of the booths. Neither appeared to have eyes in
her direction as she went around a corner and breaking line of sight
with them. She checked the shoulder bag the staff had given her to
check the supply of trash bags then adjusted the vest marking her as
one of the staff before moving to the first booth.
“Hey, checking the bins
for you,” she said. “Need any emptied?”
The man stared at her for
a long moment before answering. “How old are you girl?”
“Not that's your
business, but twenty,” she responded. “Do you need the bags
changed or not?”
“Wait, your the one
that's friends with the statue girl, right?” the man asked.
“Umeko? I wouldn't say
friends so much,” Katja responded some of her harsh tone fading a
bit away. “She's just helping me through some things.”
The man looked her up and
down a little bit more. “You are a scrawny little thing.”
“Do you need me to
change any bins out, or should I go on to the next booth,” the
Swedish girl asked.
“I don't have any full
bins right now,” the man noted before handing her a skewer with a
bunch of roasted meat and vegetables.
Katja took the skewer by
reflex and pointed to it. “What's this? I didn't ask for this.”
“So you don't pass out
along the way girl,” the old man explained. “There's not enough
meat on your bones for a girl your age. Or any age really.”
“I'm healthier than you
think, old man,” she responded.
“I'm sure you are, but
don't waste my food, it's impolite,” the booth operator noted.
Grimacing, Katja looked
over toward the menu, reached into her pocket and withdrew some yen
to put on the counter. “Fine, I'll take an early lunch.”
Before he could say
anything, she stomped along the path heading to the next booth.
“There's no harm taking
some help, girl,” he called out to her.
The Swedish girl didn't
respond and merely walked up to the next booth. “Do you need any
bins changed?”
“Oh, we can change them
out ourselves, but you can take full bags to the refuse collection.”
The woman brushed at her forehead as she pointed around behind the
booth and Katja nodded around to the back to collect the three or
four bags there and started carrying them off toward the nearest
collection point walking behind the booths to avoid getting in the
way of the attendees.
She'd passed five or six
booths before finding the shed and depositing the bags. She passed
between two booths to head back into the main lane and barely had a
moment to respond when a man in mechanic's overalls stepped forward
in an attempt to grab her by the arms.
“What do you think
you're...” the man's questioning was ended as the tiny girl, just
shy of five feet tall, slipped out of his grip and slammed him down
into the ground.
“Get off of me!” she
snapped. Looking down at her hand where she was holding the man down,
she noticed the subtle shift of color under her skin and let go
quickly stepping back.
The man quickly got back
to his feet and regarded her a little more cautiously as he tried to
work out his shoulder. “What are you doing snooping around in the
back of the booth?”
“Of all the bloody...”
she held out her vest. “I'm collecting the full trash bags so they
don't clutter up where everybody's walking around. And what are you
talking about snooping? Am I going to steal your secret barbeque...”
she turned to look toward her left and stopped as she saw something
that looked like it was out of either a manga or the special
enforcement divisions. It had a place for someone to sit and three
limbs ending in wheels. “...is that a...rideback or a kuratas or
something?”
“It's a prototype
recreational vehicle,” the man, she assumed an engineer, insisted.
“Not some flight of fancy. I'd better not catch you poking around
here again.”
Katja scoffed and pointed
behind him. “You're right in front of the damn refuse collection
point, you idiot. You're going to have over a dozen people like me
coming in and out for the whole damn day.”
“We'll see about that,”
the engineer snapped still clearly trying to keep his distance. “Now
get out of here.”
“Fine, fine,” she
snapped, “I'm going.” As she started to walk past him she half
lunged, glaring as the man flinched away from her.
She stepped up to the
next booth still glaring over her shoulder before forcing a smile on
her face and looking back to the people behind the booth. Before she
could say anything the woman spoke to her. “Don't worry about it.
That man's been snapping like a dog at anybody that gets too close.
He only let's up when his barker is around for one of their
demonstrations.”
“Right, by the way,”
Katja said. “You wouldn't happen to have any full refuse bins that
need to be taken to the collection point. You know, right past that
booth over there?”
“I think I just might,”
the booth worker said with a smile.
A minute or two later she
was glaring into the engineer's equally hostile eyes as she carried
some trash through the space between booths toward the refuse
collection.
The man first came to her
attention not long after he came into the festival grounds. He’d
pushed through a small family with his face concealed by a
combination of a hoodie and a scarf. The family’s complaint after
him is what attracted her attention to the man and once she’d
noticed him, she was quite willing to give him all of her attention.
Umeko directed the camera
to follow his position until he started going past its range of
motion and then she looked for another device to slip into. She
spotted a pair of high schoolers taking a selfie at the edge of the
camera and pushed herself into their device, getting a fraction of a
glimpse to find another camera with an angle on this man.
He was still pushing his
way through the crowd, drawing an increasing amount of attention from
people, though most simply put him out of their minds after an
accusation of rudeness and moving on with their day at the festival.
The suspicious fellow never seemed to take any notice of the calls.
His attention was rather focused as he scanned his head about,
looking for something.
Umeko’s perspective
jumped to a new camera angle as she connected to a phone and waited
for it to be answered.
“This is Masao,” the
voice on the other end said.
“Yes, that’s why I
called your number,” she responded.
There was a long pause
before Masao answered. “You’re only twenty feet away from me. I
am literally looking at you right now.”
“Yeah, but I’m in a
camera following some guy who apparently thinks it’s still winter,”
Umeko returned. “It’s easier to talk this way while I’m doing
that.”
“You’re not supposed
to be monitoring cameras, Hayashi,” Masao said. “You’re
supposed to be monitoring the wi-fi and making sure no one is hacking
our attendees.”
“That’s what I was
doing, but then I noticed this,” the disembodied voice of the
bronze woman explained. “If security hasn’t already told you
about it then they’re not doing a very good job. He’s not making
much of an effort to stay hidden.”
“Do you have something
you can show me?” Masao asked.
“Let me send you some
images,” she responded before diverting some of her mental feed
toward his phone.
It didn’t take long for
Masao to respond. “Some of these are from cell phones, aren’t
they? You’re bouncing through attendee devices. That’s the
opposite of what you’re supposed to be doing.”
“I’m not hacking
anything,” she said testily. “I’m just using whichever
unsecured phones have a camera angle on him. Just look at the photos
and tell me he isn’t suspicious.”
“No, no, I agree,” he
responded. “Get off the phone and I’ll contact security. Can you
tell me where he’s going?”
“Yeah, it looks like
he’s heading for the Kiki-Koko concer…Shit.”
Her eyes shifted from the
electronic realm to the physical as she sat bolt upright and started
running out of the tent. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Masao
staring at her a bit confused as to what had just spurred her to
action.
Kiki-Koko somehow managed
to look just about perfectly radiant in a dress that would have
probably been embarrassingly youthful for a woman of twenty-five,
much less thirty-seven. Her hair was no longer dyed and in pig tails,
as it was in the older images of her career way back before Ayako was
born. Instead she showed her natural black hair and its touch of grey
as she sang along with teenagers, parents and children. There was
this wonderful blend of liveliness, confidence and dignity that Ayako
really hoped she’d be able to manage herself someday.
Standing on the edges of
the crowd, with the oni mask atop her head, she was clapping along
with everyone else when the man shoved her to the side and stepped
forward into a small empty space between her and the majority of the
audience. Ayako thought about calling out the man’s rudeness but
decided to let it pass. The man himself started to enter something of
a martial stance as he took a deep breath. At first Ayako rolled her
eyes, thinking he was just about to give some mundane shout at the
top of his lungs, trying to disrupt the performance.
Then his shout rang out
as a true kiai that sent a cascade of air rolling forward, sending
several civilians spilling around like bowling pins. They cried out
in shock and surprise as they fell, mostly unharmed. People turned
around to look what was happening, the music stopped cold, and the
man was removing his outer clothing to reveal the blue skin and
armored costume that had been underneath the concealing clothes. Then
several people started screaming in an attempt to get away from him.
In the midst of the new
stampede, a trio of young Caucasian kids huddled together trying to
avoid being trampled. The blue man’s attention, seemed to be
directed at the stage however as Kiki-Koko watched on and shouted at
her band to get off the stage to safety. He started to take a deep
breath, clearly looking to do something like had just a moment ago.
Ayako tossed the oni mask
up into the air and reached for her upper left arm. More
specifically, she was reaching for the rather realistic tattoo that
was blazoned along her arm there. The feeling of the spear pushing
off her skin and into real space made her flinch slightly but then
the weapon was in her hand, the armor already in place of her
clothes. She caught the oni mask in her left hand as it fell from the
apex of the toss and threw the spear in an arc with her right hand.
The sudden appearance of
the spear brought a moment’s pause to the blue skinned man, but not
much more than that. At least not until the owner of the spear seemed
to flash out of nowhere leaving a pink and white trail of visual
echoes that swiftly caught up with her. Giving the newly appeared
masked samurai, the blue man still unleashed an aggressive shout in
the general direction of the woman on stage.
Ayako tossed the spear
again, her body flashing after it, time slowing down enough for her
to perceive the on rushing mystical sound creep its way toward
Kiki-Koko. The spear was still in mid-flight when it intercepted the
kiai’s path and Ayako grabbed hold of it, stopping it’s travel
and causing time to speed up again. She held the naginata out ahead
of her horizontally and gritted her teeth as the energy of the shout
was funneled into the spear.
The armored girl with the
spear recognized the sensation of adrenaline releasing into her veins
with a thrill of anticipation as she tossed the spear out again. Time
slowed down for her as she watched the blue man sneer and almost
casually deflecting the spear aside into the ground. The rush of
Ayako’s motion changed slightly as she angled for the weapon,
watching as it released the absorbed energy into the area. The blue
man braced against the cascade and then her hand was around the
spear’s shaft and time sped back up to its normal passing and the
visual echoes of her passage caught up to her.
Shifting forward she
attempted to club the man over the head with the butt of her spear,
expecting him to still be recovering from suffering his own attack.
Instead he’d easily blocked the attack, catching the spear in his
hand and twisting it out of her grip sending her sprawling forward as
time slowed and the spear was tossed away, dragging her with it.
Ayako’s body slammed
into the ground twice before she recovered her balance and caught up
to the spear, time and her speed returning to normal as she stood
there trying to ignore the pain of her fall and keep where she was.
Out of the corner of her eye she could see Kiki-Koko leaving the
stage already.
“Get the hell out of
my way,” the man shouted in English. “Or I’m going to tear you
apart.”
As he spoke he started
rushing at an angle to pass her and head into the crowd. Ayako tossed
the spear out. Time slowed down as the spear cut impossibly fast
across the scene and then she was moving herself. This time moving
not much slower than spear as she wanted to follow it to the end of
its throw. She dashed past the blue man and gripped tightly on the
spear as it stabbed into the wooden frame of the stage.
“Who the hell hires the
Azure Shrike to kill an idol singer?” she asked before trying to
pull the spear out of the stage. It budged slightly, but in the
accelerated time of its flight, the spear had wedged itself tightly
into the framework.
The Shrike chuckled as he
strode forward and set himself up to take a breath. “You wannabes
have no idea how many of you die each year before anybody ever knew
you existed.”
Ayako grimaced as she
tugged at the spear, feeling it shift again but still not free
itself. “Crap, crap, crap.”
Across the now mostly
empty patch of ground a small brunette Caucasian girl was shuffling
some others behind her and out of the scene. Zuza looked up at her
eldest sister’s serious face as she watched the scene unfolding and
the blue man taking another deep breath. Katja turned to her fifteen
year old brother briefly. “Get them out of here.”
Nobody had time to
respond before she was running across the field shouting loudly. With
each step, yellow flaring marks appearing on her skin. The scrawny
brunette grew several inches in the course of her run, gaining a full
foot in height and a perfectly toned and proportioned body. Her brown
hair flared out into a cascade of black and silver as two darkened
horns grew out of her forehead and a long, flesh colored reptilian
tail stretched out behind her.
The Shrike interrupted
his focus on Ayako to turn about and release a kiai at Katja instead.
The reverberating scream twisted through Katja, sending pain twisting
through her body as bruises erupted over where her skin was exposed.
It didn’t slow her down at all, however, and she twisted her body
about to swing a fist into the Shrike’s face.
He barely twisted out of
the way only to be struck by her tail as Katja followed through her
punch’s momentum. The Shrike went sailing back through the air,
twisting about to control himself and slamming into the side of a
nearby tree, the bark splintered under his feet and he propelled
himself forward.
Katja prepared to take
his charge as Ayako finally freed her spear, then the man vanished
from view. The black and silver haired monster-woman blinked and
looked around uncertain just before the Shrike reappeared to her
left, slamming his hand downward into the back of her skull. She
staggered and stumbled forward as he arced an eyebrow and dodged her
tail. Then the first newbie’s spear seemed to simply materialize
beside him and he rotated back around on his foot, spinning a kick
out that passed just over a dodging Ayako as she grabbed the weapon.
Spinning about, his second kick would have caught her in the small of
the back if the monster woman hadn’t stepped forward and forced him
to sidestep out of the way of one of her fists.
He reached out as she
passed him and sent her stumbling into the girl with the spear. They
both recovered quickly, showing exceptional fighting instincts. It
was all instinct and no training, however, given time he’d take
care of them easily. However, his target was getting further away by
the minute. The Shrike could see the signs of her passage in the
ground so she wasn’t out of his reach yet.
Leaving behind the two
girls, he started running forward only to be cut off by a mass of
metal and gears. The machine surged forward, trying to slam down into
him with one of three limbs as a bronze-skinned young woman walked
into view with a calm look on her face.
“You know, I thought
I’d have to try to work at this,” she noted loudly. “But
surprisingly, this ‘recreational vehicle’ already has combat
protocols.”
The Shrike dodged aside
of the controlled robot’s next strike, readied himself as the spear
appeared beside him again, but this time catching the spear-woman’s
foot across his chin. A fist with glowing yellow marks slipped past
his face and then one of the oversized metal limbs punted him like an
American football back further into the festival.
Katja cursed as she
simply took off running but Ayako paused a moment to look over toward
where Umeko was. “Umeko, you just kicked him into a bunch of
bystanders!”
“Next time why don’t
I just let him tear you apart then?” the bronze woman asked as she
stepped forward to put herself into the cockpit of the prototype and
start driving it forward.
Rolling her eyes, Ayako
shook her head and launched the spear up into the air. Time returned
to normal as she grabbed the spear and found herself hurtling along
through the air above the festival. Tossing the spear again, she saw
it land in the ground behind the Shrike.
Watching in the slow time
between when the spear was thrown and when she next grasped it, Ayako
saw the Shrike look toward the spear and then turn preparing to
unleash a kiai on to the crowd. Then her hands were around the spear
and she was tossing it again, this time catching it as it crossed
between the Shrike and the crowd. She held it out horizontal and
shuddered as the power of his shout was siphoned down into her spear.
Ayako slammed the spear
into the ground sending a wave of absorbed force heading back towards
the Shrike as she leaned on the shaft to catch her breath. In the
sudden cloud of dirt and dust she couldn’t be sure if she’d
caught him or not. The mecha thing rolled into view just ahead of the
monster-woman and Umeko pulled herself out to look around.
“Did he get aw…”
Umeko didn’t have much more time to answer as she was pulled bodily
out of the mecha and slammed into the ground face first and then
doubled over as something invisible slammed into her stomach.
The Shrike faded into
view as his invisibility faded, fist reared back to send it flying
down into Umeko’s throat. His attack was interrupted as he was body
tackled by Katja, the two of them spilling into a chaotic jumble of
kicking and punching bodies until the Shrike rolled to his feet and
hurled her against a tree. He snarled as he wiped the blood away from
his mouth and then turned about to dodge aside of the mecha’s blow
before releasing another kiai shout that scattered the pieces of the
machine away.
“You three fucking
amateurs are going to regret you ever got in my way,” he snarled.
He turned to look at Katja as she was stepping up and getting ready
to charge forward again.
As the kiai released
Katja cringed, expecting to feel the tearing of muscles and other
tissue that came the last time his shout passed over her. Instead,
the shout came out with a strangely distorted muffled sound that
didn’t hit her with near the impact that it should have.
“Wendigo,” he
whispered grimly. “I’d heard you retired.”
He turned to look behind
him and blinked as he found himself looking at a girl with green hair
tied back into two pig-tails and decked out in a suit of green armor.
“Sensei never liked
that code name,” Minako said simply. “I’d think a cannibal
spirit is more appropriate a name to give someone like you.” Then
she lashed out with her arms and sending a pair of twisting vortexes
of wind surging toward the Shrike.
With a snort of laughter,
the man leaped over the funnels and landed on the other side of them.
He watched the grim expression on the other girl’s face with a hint
of satisfaction until his eyes happened to catch sight of the paper
charm on the ground in front of her. He leaped upward into the air,
avoiding the reach of the spell trap as the space in front of Minako
visibly warped.
Cursing, Minako twisted
around to her back and sent a wave of air upward, sending the man off
target. The green-haired air controller blinked as a spear darted
impossibly fast across her vision, followed quickly by the image of
the young woman in the pink samurai armor. As the spear passed
through her wind, she could feel it dying off. Then the pink-armored
woman slowed down above the shrike holding the spear and swinging its
butt downward into him, releasing what Minako presumed to be the
absorbed force of her gusts of wind.
The Shrike turned about,
controlling his accelerated descent and started to focus his will.
The girls watched as he once again began to fade from view. Then it
stopped as paper charm slapped into his forehead and he landed in
full visibility beside Katja.
The Shrike grimaced as he
barely avoided Katja’s barrage of blows only for the assault to be
taken up by Ayako appearing beside her spear and twisting around it
like she was pole dancing to slam a kick into his skull. He recovered
quickly and hurled her behind him into Katja. His legs were whipped
out from under him by a burst of air and before he could get back
into contact with the ground he was whipped across the scene and
slamming into a concrete wall.
As he stood up, a paper
charm darted through the air and stopped before him, causing the air
to warp and distort as it slipped over him. Inside the region of
distorted space, he seemed to become extremely small or distant and
his motions turned odd and slow. The Shrike brought his hands
together as he started striding forward, growing swiftly larger as
the distorted region of space began to fall apart.
“You two,” Minako
shouted looking toward Ayako and Katja as they disentangled from each
other. “Rein yourself in, we need to pace this figh...”
“Kid, I don't need to
pace anything!” Katja insisted growling as she leaped out to land
in front of the Shrike as he tore out of the magical trap and the
paper chart burned up, the ash drifting to the ground.
The supervillain smirked
as he redirected the woman's first blow, dodged aside from the butt
of Ayako's spear as she appeared behind him and then caught Katja's
second fist and swept Ayako's feet out from under her. He smirked for
a moment before Katja slammed her head forward into his nose
approximately the same time as the spearmaiden slammed the ball of
her foot up between his legs.
Growling, the released
Katja and slammed his fist into her face, this time he wasn't
impressed when she simply seemed to look away. He followed up with a
thrust to her throat causing her to cough and clutch at her neck. The
Shrike twisted about to kick Ayako in the stomach as she getting back
to her feet. He turned back to Katja and slammed into the back of her
skull, dodging aside as her tail lashed out at him in the course of
her stumbling aside from the blow. The blade of the spear lashed out
cutting through his costume and drawing a narrow line of blood across
his chest.
“Going to play for
keeps then?” he asked, taking in breath as he started to shout a
kiai into her face.
Instead he found himself
thrown back by a gust of wind. He twisted about in the air and
landed, digging in against the rush of wind before shouting outward,
pushing his kiai against Minako's wind. He ducked and dodged around
the secondary twists of wind and rolled aside as his first kiai
closed out, ducking forward, closing on her position.
Behind the Shrike, Katja
was pursuing and he noted the girl in the armor getting ready to hurl
her spear again. Smirking, he rolled to the side as the spear flashed
past him straight for Minako. The green-haired twisted about to face
the Shrike as another magical charm trap wrapped up around Ayako and
her spear, both seeming to grow tiny and distant within the area of
distorted space.
“Damn it!” someone
shouted from an unseen position as the paper charm fueling the
distortion started to burn.
“So that sanctimonious
Eskimo found someone to pass her secrets on to,” the Shrike said as
he closed on Minako.
The green-haired girl
gestured creating a short burst of wind to catch one of the man's
blows. She thought she caught a feinted kick and set about to block
the other direction only to find that the Shrike followed through
instead. Grunting, Minako rolled with the impact and used a blast of
air to push herself away from the combat. In the same moment, a blast
of dust and dirt erupted from underneath the man.
Katja slammed into the
Shrike from the side as he tried to clear his vision. She managed to
make one contact before he rammed a knee up into her stomach and
moved into a stream of maneuvers with his eyes closed battering
around the monster-girl relentlessly until she finally stumbled back
and fell to the ground, struggling to get up.
“Hey, bastard!”
another voice shouted as Umeko walked out from where she'd been
standing on the edge. Her eyes flicked to the speakers scattered
about the area they were fighting. “You want sound? I'll give you
sound!”
Suddenly a cacophonous
shriek of feedbacky noise bombarded the entire area. Minako screamed
out clutching her ears and then focusing her powers to cocoon herself
in a dense cascade of wind. The Shrike covered his ears and walked
toward her, face irritated as he felt the sound waves actually
focusing on him and saw the speakers changing shape to do so. He saw
the bronze girl muttering to herself desperately as he approached
closer, and smirked at her.
“It's a bad idea to
incapacitate all your teammates with an action, idiot,” he sneered
at her as he reached forward to grab her shoulder. Almost instantly
he seized up and started screaming through gritted teeth as the
speakers died off.
“It's a fucking bad
idea to grab hold of a metal girl with a live power main wrapped
around her leg, asshole!” she shouted in his face.
The Shrike snarled and
forced himself free from Umeko, looking down to the power cable he'd
missed stretching from behind her. Then his covered foot lashed
upward into Umeko's chin, connecting with a clang. Then another foot
came around slamming into her side and sending spinning clear of the
power cable. A kiai slammed into her back and Umeko shuddered before
collapsing to her knees trying to focus on clearing the grinding
feeling within her own body in the wake of that kiai striking her.
“That was actually
pretty clever,” the Shrike said as he started to walk forward. “I
have to give you cred....”
His speech stopped when
Ayako's spear erupted out of the warped space and streamed past him
into a tree, drawing a line along his face. The villain instantly
turned about swinging his arm in a play to clothesline the woman that
would be inevitably following, but passed through nothing but the
spear's afterimage. A look of confusion covered his face in the brief
moment before Ayako's hyperspeeding form slipped out of the magical
trap and lashed past him clipping him as she passed by.
Angrily, the Shrike
shuffled a few steps and kicked out at the power cable sending
striking into Ayako's back. The girl in the pink samurai armor
screamed out in pain until she managed to stiffly toss her spear away
and was soon darting across to grip it, struggling to remain standing
as she returned to normal time.
“And where's the mystic
hiding?” the Shrike called out.
“Where she's supposed
to be!” Minako snapped out loud as she gestured and a small tornado
erupted underneath the Shrike, sending him flying into the sky.
Once in the air, she
tried to keep him off balance, twisting him about with one funnel of
wind or another. When the kiai burst out of her cascade of air, she
rushed to a defense to canceling it out, releasing the villain. The
Shrike dropped out of the air and shouted again along the way down,
forcing Minako to make another defense before he landed and shouted
again, sending Minako flying backward into a wall and land on her
face.
“You know what, kid,”
he said. “You've impressed me, I think I'll kill you first.”
“Stop!” another voice
shouted out.
The Shrike turned toward
the voice and saw an impossibly beautiful young girl staring at him.
She had blonde hair that yet seemed to nearly grow from within with a
pinkish light. Her eyes were large and her skin shimmered with the
light touch of scales across her cheek and neck where a set of lines
had started to appear along her throat. Her hands were held out, the
first signs of webbing appearing between her fingers appearing
underneath the first joints of her fingers.
He took her in and
laughed uproariously. “This is your trump card? Do you know who I
am?”
“Yeah,” Kyou
responded as she stared at him. “You're so someone who's so much
less than he should be.”
As always, her view of
the world was like watching a mosaic of shattered pieces of glass
rotating and spinning with or against each other. With each rotation,
she saw another reflection of the past, future or hidden things about
the person or thing she was looking at. Actions were always that of
what was occurring in the present, but the images still gave her
hints of stuff to come.
When she'd first came
into her heritage seven years ago, the pieces were huge and the
spinning was terribly disorienting. As she'd gotten older, the shards
of reality she saw had splintered more and more allowing an
increasingly more stable and complex view of the world around her.
She still hadn't come close to returning to a simulation of the same
sort of vision she'd had as a child before her unearthly heritage
awakened.
Right now she was staring
at a man's image as bits and pieces of him rotated between all the
versions of him past, present or potential. It was a disappointing
and disturbing image, watching the never-realized potential for
heroism rotating into view and she had to remind herself that it was
a thing that had never developed, never really happened. Her visions
always tried to roll over to seeing the best in what she was looking
at rather than the reality.
“Less?” the Shrike
said in a friendly tone of voice that Kyou was certain wasn't the
reality. He started walking toward her in a voice that was much more
creepy to her for sounding so calm and rational even while she tried
to force her perceptions to rotate back towards reality or perhaps
showing his worst self. “Less? You have no idea what you're
talking about, do you little witch? You watch me tear your friends
apart and your last ditch effort is to drop an illusion and try to
bowl me over with pure, inhuman beauty.”
He looked down and walked
around a paper charm hidden in the dirt and continued to casually
look towards the path along the way to Kyou.
Kyou could see his sneer
now and the rest of his image was slowly rotating away from that
idealized, kind and never happened version of himself as he strode
toward her with a hunger in his look that she knew had been put there
by her own appearance.
“Hey, don't knock it,”
the blonde said nervously. “Most people that see me like this are
incapacitated for at least a few minutes, depending.”
“I'm not most people,
girl. Too much willpower to get taken out that way.”
The Shrike reached her
past the assorted traps she'd laid between the two of them. He
grabbed her chin as she winced in pain and he lifted her up off the
ground.
“I should have just
gone straight through the traps. I've heard about you Higa witches.
You're supposed to be bad-asses. I should show you what the
apotheosis virus did for me magically speaking.”
Kyou reached up to hold
around his arms and gasped out. “It sure didn't make you any
smarter.”
With a hand gesture, the
dozen or so paper charms he'd walked past came streaming towards
their creator, stopping as the ran into the Shrike's back. As space
and time warped around him, the villain released Kyou who stumbled
away, clutching at her throat. The blue-skinned man snarled as he
focused his will to start burning through all the distortions in
space and time, one after another, scoffing at how much of a
one-trick pony this girl was. Always the same sort of trap.
As the last charm was
burned away by the force of his gift-enhanced will and endurance, he
stepped forward speaking. “I change my mind. Let's kill you first.
See if those gills of yours work or not. I don't see how you five
thought you could beat....me? Oh, crap.”
His confident attitude
failed as he took another step out of a field of illusion and found
himself faced with a subtly glowing sword blade held in the hands of
a tall and broad shouldered man flanked by five other superheroes he
recognized as the local team.
“I get the feeling that
their plan was just to delay you,” the swordsman said with an
unmistakable British accent. “How is everyone then? All right with
you lot?”
Behind him, there were
paramedics attending to all five of the girls showing various levels
of physical injury. One of the paramedics called forward, “I think
they'll be all right, sir.”
“No I won't,” Kyou
croaked. “My sister's going to kill me.”
“Oh, don't say that,
Miss Higa,” the Sword Knight said in a charming tone. “You five
just fought a first rate blackguard, and nobody died.”
“That's a wonderful
accomplishment,” Umeko noted sarcastically.
“Don't look under the
mask,” Ayako pleaded weakly.
Minako simply sat quietly
letting the paramedics do their job and Katja had regressed back to a
tiny brunette and was trying to ineffectually push off the paramedics
trying to treat her.
Three days later, the
five girls found themselves sitting in a room facing a woman sitting
behind an elegant and well made desk. She was dressed in unassuming
manner, looking rather plain. Most of the girls had come dressed in
their civilian attire, or forms, but Ayako had appeared with her
spear and dressed in armor and oni mask.
“I'm glad to see you
all chose to come,” the woman noted. “And thank you for referring
the message to those of you we could not find. You may call me
Himura, I represent a party that was impressed by your actions at the
recent festival.”
“You went through
channels to deliver my message,” Minako noted before turning to the
other girls. “I'd suggest it is safe to say she knows all of our
identities.”
“Really?” the
pink-armored samurai asked nervously.
“Perhaps,” Himura
responded. “We prefer to be polite.”
“And what do you want?”
Umeko asked.
“My employer would like
to sponsor you,” Himura explained matter of factly. “As a team.”
Katja stood up and
started walking for the door. “Sorry, I've got to go. I won't stand
by and do nothing, but I can't do this sort of thing all the time.”
“Miss Holgersson, we
would be offering a salary,” the mousy woman commented casually
causing Katja to stop. “We are also aware that you have issues
regarding family safety and we can at least help with that. Though I
must admit, details of your situation are spotty.”
Katja walked back in and
sat down.
“My answer is yes,”
Kyou said. Everyone looked at her. “My sister insists.”
“Do you do everything
your sister tells you to?” Umeko asked.
“No, she doesn't,”
Minako said about simultaneously to the pink samurai saying. “Nope.”
“Kita-san and Higa-san
have been training for this sort of position for most of their
lives,” Himura noted. “The rest of you are older but have only
recently come into your abilities. Having facilities to train your
skills will help you develop them to their highest use. Whether you
intend to continue with a career as a hero, say for instance you plan
to be an IT tech, you will still come out ahead.”
“So, what would the
name of this team be then?” Ayako asked.
“We had thought to call
you the Chimera Sirens,” Himura suggested.
******************************************
Team Formation Questions:
The Bull's Question: We defeated a dangerous enemy, who was it?
The Azure Shrike, former super-agent turned mercenary assassin. Triggering his apotheosis virus gave him enhanced willpower and endurance which gives him a lot of brute force ability when he learned some mystical martial arts.
The Legacy's Question: We impressed an established hero, who was it?
Sword Knight, one of the UN-sponsored team known as the Stellar Section. A mystical martial artist from a knightly tradition.
The Janus's Question: We saved the life of someone important, who was it?
The singer known as Kiki-Koko.
The Transformed's Question: We angered someone important, who was it?
The Protege's Question: How did we keep in touch?
After the first battle, a woman representing a mysterious party contacted us all and suggested forming a team.
Chimera Sirens Index
Chimera Sirens Session One: Consequences and Discoveries
Chimer Sirens Session One: Rolls and Notes
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