A young teenage boy was running for his life, a white laptop in his hand as he ran across the rooftops. He had pale green hair, a thin ponytail with darker green eyes, with bangs swept over his right eye. He wore a green zip-up jumper under a white coat, both of which had the sleeves rolled up, blue jeans, also rolled up, and black boots. He was Teseo, and right now he was currently on the run from Nova Tsukiyomi. Thankfully, the Sumeragi Adept's powers were on the fritz as well, or at the very least he didn't want to activate his Glaives. Either reason was probably why he was having his fancy limo chase Teseo down while Nova himself floated above the buildings with a transceiver on his ear to tt
"Holyshitholyshitholyshit!" Teseo was not like his rival Merak. He could actually fight worth a damn and was a red belt in Krav Maga. Tenjian and Gibril made sure all members of the G7 were physically fit and able to fight with their fists should their Adept powers fail for whatever reason. At least, that's what his Septima was telling him, because the only exercise he ever got with the G7 was running for his life from Gibril for putting a 'you must be this tall to ride' sign in front of her room. Teseo's Septima, Hack the Planet, was one of the strongest Septimas out there, giving him the ability to warp reality at near omnipotent levels, along with a powerful beam he had been working on dubbed the Cyberizer, able to turn a large area into a digital zone, killing anything that caught in the beam. It was for this reason Zonda-sama forbade him from using it unless he had explicit permission, as the beam could even kill her. At it's weakest, and right now it was very weak, it was a souped up fusion of Twitter and Facebook, allowing the G7 and Eden to have a mobile communication network with him as administrator. As such, he was aware of any changes to the network, and even as he ran like the devil was chasing him, he was constantly receiving update after update, each and every one of them filled with terminology and code he had never seen before; words like 'Reploid', 'Biometal', and the fact Sumeragi was partnered with a French government called Neo Arcadia.
"What the hell is going on?!" He yelled as he jumped to the next building, dodging psychic waves sent by Nova. He didn't even know how he got back to Japan! He was in Tashkent using Zonda-sama's report as a chance to hack Sumeragi's Datacenter when all of a sudden he was blinded by a green light and landed straight onto the car of Sumeragi's strongest adept! He couldn't risk contacting any of the Eden members in Japan; they were undercover, and barely any of them had a Septima that was as strong as him in his current state. Plus, he was the only member of Eden aside from Zonda who could teleport so that meant-
"Zonda-sama." He completely forgot about her! Her Septima, Phantasm Mirror, was even stronger than his Septime, and because of the way it worked, affected her personality greatly. With his Adept abilities on the fritz, he didn't even want to think how her powers would affect her. Any amount of time spent with her would tell you that the personality she took in her Septimal form was not an act, which made being around her during training sessions incredibly unbearable for everyone in the G7. While in her male and female adult forms, she would not stop making every single wordan innuendo, at times very loudly and obviously showing her love of being hit, or waking up in the beds of various Eden members in one of her forms. Who knows how this anomaly would affect her Septimal self? He shuddered in horror as his mind thought of the possible scenarios, none of them involving her adult girl form with a hottie.
"I suggest you don't try to use your Septima, Teseo-san." Nova said, floating above him. The second you made a run for it, I ordered my men to place a version of Firmament's upgraded firewall over the entire area. You're not going anywhere." Suddenly a pink rectangle that shined like a mirror appeared under Teseo, who dropped into it. "Then again, maybe you are." The rectangle disappeared. Nova put a hand to his ear. "This is Nova. It's just like you theorized. Zonda's been bugging our systems. It's the only way Teseo could get into our country and bypass our barrier." Why he was here was something he would leave up to the interrogators to find out. Nova chuckled as the man on the other end voiced his concerns. "Don't worry. If your theory on her during her psych eval was on the money, then we'll know exactly where she'll be."... "What.. who is Mino Magnus?"
-Z- -Z- -Z-
Teseo landed on the other side of Zonda's Phantom Mirror, falling on a mattress. "Oh thank god!" He said with relief. "Thank you Zonda-sama!"
"My sweet little Otaku!" Zonda yelled, thankfully in her female form. "It's so good to see you in good spirits!"
"..."
" I was worried you would meet your demise at the hands of that ghastly Nova!" She let out a light sob. "Oh, to see someone who rejects love for duty. Some would say that's admirable, but I-"
"Zonda-sama!" Teseo yelled, to tired and confused to act normally. "Why did you blow your cover like that?! You were supposed to use your monthly report to the Glaive Control Center to open up a comm line so I could hack into their systems! Those Grimorire prototypes won't work if I don't have more data!"
"Alas, my early reveal was not my intent! My cover has been blown away, like petals in a lovely breeze! A flash of lovingly blinding green light flashed before my eyes, temporarily reverting me to my true, adorable form, right in front of the Glaive Control Center's manager! Who would feel such fear and revulsion at such a cute little girl like myself?"
Teseo looked away nervously. You do not recruit Adepts like Gibril and him to your cause by appealing to their strife and suffering. You appeal to their love of technology and love of killing and maiming respectively. The fact that he met Zonda-sama on a hentai forum (probably scouting him out) and the fact she talked so blatantly, inhumanly about the death of humanity and the rise of Adepts as rulers of the world would have horrified a normal man, especially the sexual way she put it. but Teseo was not a norman man; he was a super nerd with internet powers, and by god the way she worded it was convincing enough for him to join her cause...granted, she thought she was talking to Gibril, but still, the way Zonda could get into your head was frightening.
"But that shouldn't have been a problem. You could have just told the truth about your true form and said you preferred looking like an adult, and those suits wouldn't be hounding you! They're the only organization that hires middle schoolers to run military grade gear, they would've bought it!"
"If only that were true, my lovely lackey!" She said, clutching her chest and moaning. "But unfortunately, fate is a cruel mistress, and she has dealt me a familiar, unlucky hand! Do you remember my beautiful interdimensional adventure where I was pulled into a retro video game and fought the most adorable robot boy who could absorb his foes?"
"We both agreed to never talk about that ." That was one of the strangest things either of them had experienced. It did give them a good idea on who that Copen kid was though and what to expect from him. And it still baffled Teseo why Zonda-sama liked that Beck kid so much! The guy never closed his goddamn mouth! It didn't even move when he talked!
"Of course I did! My darling brother would die if he heard I had a crush on someone! He's quite overprotective of me, after all!"
'More like he's protecting them from you.' He shuddered as he recollected the last time Zonda-sama in her child form had a crush on someone. "...So how does this relate to Sumeragi chasing us?
"...Oh yes, I completely forgot about that!" Teseo groaned in frustration. "Anyway, as me and that cute little Gunvolt boy were fighting, we noticed that our Septima were not feeling the love! It felt as restrictive an stiff as the dimension we were trapped in ! The poor Gunvolt dear couldn't even use his painfully hot Prevasion of his, and I couldn't even use my mirrors to wow and dazzle him!" She sighed happily. "What's happening now feels just like that wondrous, lovely adventure! Cold, intrusive love, binding the Septima of Adepts like us once again!"
"Great, next you'll be telling me that stupid angel's gonna pop out of nowhere again." His crush on his once darling Ekoro-chan had disappeared quite fast after busting Zonda-sama out of that dimension, which was no easy featl requiring hacking into Sumeragi once again out of desperation to get the help of the wormhole user/fellow nerd; enemies or not, the prospect of seeing and touching real titties bought everyone together. That, and Merak had to get Zonda-sama and the other Swordsman trapped in the dimension, meaning Teseo had to make a very convincing lie as to why he wanted to help, and touching angel tits was a good excuse for something like him.
...And then Ekoro beat the ever living crap out of him, saying she was able to sense his 'creepiness' and no amount of pheromones would help him in his love life. That was the end of that crush. "So another dimensional anomaly is affecting the world again?"
"Why YES!" Zonda fell to the ground dramatically. "And the binding feeling is back and it feels sooooo much better now! It feels as though I've been split apart!"
'So that explains why you haven't changed genders.'
"Unfortunately however, our time is up. I would tell you more, but alas, we must wait for our comrades to rescue us!" Before Teseo could ask what she meant, what looked like a large, grey Minotaur in purple rounded armor, pink mohawk, and shades straight out of the disco era in America and a magnet symbol on it's chest busted through the ceiling, with floating green haired man in Sumeragi armor flying behind him.
"I...found...you..." The minotaur said, very, very slowly, breathing heavily in-between every word. "Teseo...lord of the code... you..."
"You are under arrest for crimes against the glorious Sumeragi and the City-State of Neo Arcadia!" The Green man interrupted. "I, Jota, the Shining Sentinel, and he, Mino Magnus of the Eight Warriors of Neo Arcadia, place both you and Zonda of the Swordsman under arrest for crimes of treason against both the Japanese and Europoean Democratic Republic of Neo Arcadia! Magnus-san!" The minotaur robot raised his arm, summoning an axe bigger than his head in a flash of electricity. Suddenly, Teseo and Zonda floated in the air and slammed straight into the flat end of the axe. "Good job, fellow soldier! Now follow me back to Nova-sama to arrest these traitors!"
"Ok..." Magnus watched as Jota flew away. "Who..was...that?" Miss Alouette told him to listen to the nice flying man, but he just kept talking and talking wouldn't shut up about Sumeragi! Because of the magnets in his systems, Magnus had trouble speaking, or thinking in general, leaving his actions in control of an onboard NetNavi most of the time. Because of this, he couldn't simply slapped the talking man to shut him up, and had to endure him talking about Japan and Sumeragi like he was some hick tourist!
"GET ME OFF OF HERE!" Teseo screamed.
"Oh yes, you're such a beautiful beast! Swing my limber, nubile body!"
Magnus slammed them into a wall. "Shut...up..." He jumped down into the streets below with the intent following the annoying talking man, Teseo screaming in fear and Zonda...well you wouldn't exactly call that screaming. However, the streets were not made with the intent of supporting a machine as heavy as him, and he fell straight through the pavement and into the sewers. "Oh..no.." Miss Alouette was going to kill him again! That'd be the fifth time this week !
"This suuccks." Teseo said dazedly. If he was paying attention or if Magnus had some level of intelligence, they would have picked up on Zonda's form flickering in and out, turning a bright, almost mirror like pink before returning back to normal.
-Z- -Z- -Z-
Out of all of Sumeragi's strongholds and facilities, Seat Base was the most technologically impressive and the most imposing in terms of scale. Named by Sumeragi officer Merak at the time of it's opening, Seat Base was a large undersea colony/military base that started out from a hollowed out volcano under Japan's oceans and extended over 200 miles with the help of the European Democratic Republic of Neo Arcadia. Over 30 undersea buildings were built to support whatever either nation needed, and since this was a joint venture, there were Neo Arcadian personell at the facility, lead by a Reploid co-commander that shared power with Merak.
She was of the Einherjar, one of the eight warriors that answered directly to the Neo Arcadian ruling council, second only to the Two Guardians in military power. As per the offical charter on Reploid frames which dictated what bodies Reploids could have, the Einherjar were allowed to choose what body type or gender they wanted and could change them at any time. This Einherjar, Sol Titanion, chose that of a 6 foot tall European woman that looked to be a youthful 28 years old, with waist length honey blonde hair that had two fist sized hair buns on both sides of her head wrapped in red metal casing and two brown insect antenna sticking out of the front, Her armor was an old, Adept Wars design, which meant large orange leg armor and toeless feet. She had an orange jumpsuit under the armor, a butterfly themed chest armor with a fire pattern on the front and a cleavage window on top, large, orange gauntlets with transparent, orange glowing hands, with jets projecting large, flaming wings on the sides of the gauntlets.
Titanion was known for two things: flaunting her body (given how much she paid for it she sure as hell was gonna do it) and being anal retentive when it came to the work ethic of those who served under her, and that included the humans and Adepts Sumeragi gave her. Quite the frigid bitch for a fire elemental. Her office was the best looking room in Seat Base's military sector; large and circular, metal painted a calming ocean blue with five windows in each corner of the room showing the ocean outside. A large, shark shaped projector was on the ceiling, and the floor was a soft plush blue carpet that felt so good, you could sleep on it. Between working for her or Merak, many of those working in Seat Base chose her, mostly because she was hot, but mostly because she wouldn't warp you into a pool of lava if you pissed the lazy bastard off. That, and you didn't have to call Sumeragi home office to get your damn check with her.
"ZERO'S IN MY BASE?!"
that didn't mean being around her was any better. She sat at her blue, seashell themed desk, staring at the soldiers on the holo screens above her with fury. "HOW?! HOW DID HE GET HERE?! THERE'S ONLY ONE TRANSERVER IN THIS ENTIRE GODFORSAKEN FACILITY, AND I SURE AS HELL'D KNOW IF ANYONE USED THAT!" Now that she thought about it, that cloaked figure that used the Transerver to break in still hadn't made her goals known. She really should find out who that was before anything important was stolen or broken.
"W-well, he took the elevator and-"
"BULLSHIT! WE HAVE FIVE MANTIS UNITS STATIONED OUT AT THE SURFACE ENTRANCE, NOT TO MENTION THE REPLOID-PROOF DOOR THAT MEMORY WIPES ANY UNAUTHORIZED VISITORS! I CAN'T EVEN GET INTO THE BASE THAT WAY!"
"I don't know how he did it either! He must've cloaked-"
"Finish that sentence and you're demoted." Titanion warned. "I don't tolerate stupidity in those under my employ. We all know Zero's systems are incompatible with modern cloaking technology. If he did try to use cloaking tech, you would've found him in the elevator on the floor with his brainfried like a CD-ROM under a magnet, or at the very least glitched out." Zero was the only top agent of QUILL that could always be detected, the blonde's body far too old for most modern cloaking technologies. The only way to do so was to use one of those cloaking fields but that would require an Adept with an extradordinary Septima to power one small enough to fit over a-
"One more thing." One of the other soldiers said. "When we were recovering the soldiers he beat up, they said he took one of their guns to attack them with. Stranger still, he didn't have any holsters on his legs. Commander John of the Shield Battalion said he must have used his own core to power the gun blast that he used to distract them while he made his escape."
"Interesting.." Titanion said with a smile. There was only one recorded instance in Sumeragi's database of Zero doing such a thing; it was when he couldn't use his own energy to power his own onboard weapons. And if her hunch was right about the Adept, she can use him to lead her first intruder right into a trap. "So if he can't use his weapons and had to use one of yours, he's running on empty! Have you found Merak yet?"
One of the officers shook his head. "Merak-sama is still MIA. We haven't been able to track him due to interference topside. We can't get any transmissions in our outside the entire colony."
"God damn it.." Titanion muttered, getting out of her seat. "Guess this means I'll have to deal with Zero myself. You idiots know where he is?"
"Thirtieth floor of the main building. He's in the civilian secti-" The soldier stopped talking from the glare Titanion was giving him.
"So...you let him get into the civilian SECTOR?!" The soldiers visibly winced from her volume. "YOU IDIOTS!"
"B-but the Crimson Striker isn't a threat to civilians-"
"Yeah, but do you think the civilians know that?! He's like goddamn spiderman and everyone's J Jonah Jameson!"
"W-wha-"
"Nevermind, screw it. The fuck is wrong with you guys? There's an enemy on the damn base and you didn't lock down the area where you kept the civilians, which I remind you, are human?!"
"We apologize for our lack of competence, Titanion-sama!" One of the soldiers proclaimed. "Merak-sama left us to our own devices and cancelled our training program because he said-"
"Too much work for him, I bet. Gonna roast that fucking brat when I find him. You idiots don't do a thing, you're on break. I'll find him myself and do your jobs myself!" She snapped her fingers, causing the screen to disappear. "How is it that the pedophilic hothead has more competent troops than the goddamn supergenius?!" She took one look at the door and smirked. 'Really? Listening outside my door and not even planting a listening device? Pitiful.' She then disappeared in a burst of flame, missing the serpentine figure outside her window that crackled with electricity.
'So that's what's going on.' The intruder muttered to herself, a horde of E-crystals in her hand as she stood at the door, invisible to the naked eye. 'I don't know why you're here Zero-sama, but that's a question you'll have to answer when Asimov-sama finds out.' For now, she had to get back to her room with these crystals. Thanks to that little bug she put into the system when she first got here, she could track Titanion's usage of the Transerver network. If she found Zero, the figure would know, and when Titanion put Zero in a cell for later, she'll be there to bust him out. She ran to her room, resisting the urge to snicker. 'Idiot doesn't even know I'm tracking her!'
