The Killing Fields
Prelude: Breathing
Tokyo: 08 April 2045
The young woman's step was light upon the pavement. There was a mist of rain about the city, and the overcast sky made her skin seem even paler than it already was, a condition worsened by the dark clothing she wore. She was undoubtedly a foreigner and probably a stupid one at that; no one her age and size would be in such a neighborhood at this time of night unless she was soiled...or terminally stupid. Yet this was the second one Priss had seen drifting past in as many hours. The other was dark-skinned, bigger, more wary, but it still didn't sit well with her.
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The girl - who was actually older then Priss herself, though she could have been taken for younger than any of the Knight Sabers - pushed her sunglasses up on her nose as she turned a corner. The alley was half lit by a harsh streetlamp, half in shadow. The sunglasses and the smell of garbage dulled her senses, but her hearing was still almost optimal. There were the odd street noises - loud music a block away, police sirens, raccoons in the garbage cans - but she could still make out the footsteps of her quarry. She reached into her duster for the little gun she kept there, then thought better of it. Last one was too clean. Why not enjoy this one... Sliding her hand out of the inside pocket, she hiked up one side of the duster and took out another weapon.
The other woman had to know she was coming. She was just as good as the girl - at least, the girl assumed so; it would not do to underestimate her - and could hear at least as well. If not see without the glasses to hide her identity. The girl swallowed, her throat strangely dry, and suddenly thought that this other one could be even better than she was.
She stopped suddenly. She couldn't hear the other footsteps anymore. So the other was digging herself in for a confrontation? Fine by her. She got a good grip on her knife and continued forward slowly.
The dark-skinned woman was facing away from her. Melissa dove forward suddenly, twisting in midair as the woman spun around and reached for her knife arm. The laser knife glowed bright blue in the half-shadow. She stepped back into the light of a streetlamp as she dodged a kick, then rushed toward the woman again, coming in low.
A swipe at the leg elicited a howl of pain, but there was no blood. The laser sword cauterized as it cut through skin and muscle. The woman's other leg hit Melissa in the side. She staggered backward but managed to keep her balance. Still sitting on her haunches, she sliced at the woman's shoe at the ankle and was rewarded with another cry of pain. The woman fell.
Melissa deactivated the laser knife. She was running low on power...had to finish it quickly. Shoving one hand into the center of the woman's chest right at the breastbone, she brought the knife to the woman's throat and cut it in one swift motion. Blood and a milky, pale grey fluid spurted out onto her. She closed her eyes.
The woman struggled for much longer than a mundane human would have imagined, her backup oxygen supply allowing her to remain conscious even as the blood and other liquids drained from her body. Finally she stopped moving and Melissa kept her hold for a few moments more to make certain that she wasn't simply playing dead.
She stood up and felt the scratch marks where the woman's fingernails had dug into the skin of her face and chest as she tried to keep the girl from pinning her as she bled to death. Nothing that couldn't be fixed again, but it was still a bitch. At the same time, though...she did have to keep in practice. Not all of them went down with the first EMP blast.
Her fingers slid down to the pin on her duster, and she turned it ninety degrees. Her clothing shimmered and the blood seemed to disappear. Thank Cthulhu for cloaking...maybe one of these days she could figure out how it worked, though, so she wouldn't have to keep lugging around the same clunky thing with almost no battery time. One of these days. For the moment, she concentrated on getting back to her apartment.
Once she was there, she removed the pin from the duster and took it off. It felt like removing a suit of combat armor, almost, although Melissa herself wouldn't have known that. She took off her t-shirt and jeans, throwing them over a chair, and had just grabbed a washcloth for her face and hands when the phone rang.
She crossed the room and picked it up on the third ring. "Hello, Sylia."
