The door to the observatory opened, and Kuroha and Ryouta entered.

"Kana, we're home!" Kuroha shouted running across the floor of the telescope chamber toward where the paralyzed girl lay on her couch. "The ocean was so wonderful!"

"I'm glad for you." Kana's synthesizer said. "But I have to go to the bathroom."

"Oh, of course." The purple-haired girl said, picking up the paralyzed oracle.

Ryouta sighed as the girls walked out of the room, then walked over to the observatory computer. He logged into a Syrian proxy server and then logged into an online news service and began scanning the headlines for anything that might indicate something to do with Witches. It was a boring task, but it was important that-

Huh he thought, as he looked at the headlines. Narita Airport Bio Attack. He clicked on the link and read more.

Apparently, an alert had been received that a bioweapon had been planted in the cargo handling area of the Narita International terminal, and the airport had to be evacuated while the police investigated. However, no details were given on the pathogens involved or the suspected groups.

It could be a hoax. He thought, or...

Break

The back door of the Toyota Highlander opened and Ishikawa shepherded Hikari into the vehicle, then jumped in behind her.

"Did anyone notice anything?" Nathan said, looking back from the driver's seat to look at the older Japanese-American Agent.

"No. I believe they assumed I was her father or grandfather." Ishikawa respond, buckling into his seat as Nathan pulled the SUV out of the curbside parking spot.

"Good. What about our faces?" Nathan asked, maneuvering onto the access road. "Are we compromised?"

Anna, who was sitting in the back seat, shook her head. "I don't think so. I took care of security, and everyone was paying attention to Hikari when Alex went backstage, and I chose a gate away from the crowd for you and Ishikawa."

"Excellent, excellent." Nathan turned toward Mark, who was sitting in the shotgun seat. "Now, I want to know everything about what happened back there, and why you chose to do what it did. First of all, why the hell did you go backstage?"

"I believed that Hikari's tampering with my luggage posed a threat to the operation, sir," Alexander said. "And that I had to prevent her from potentially revealing objects which could pose a threat our status as undercover agents."

"But the handgun was the only illegal object present, correct?" Nathan asked, not taking his eyes off the road to look at Alexander as he spoke. "And it was concealed sufficiently to pass a casual inspection. Why were you concerned?"

"I don't know, sir." Alex said, hanging his head. "I just seemed like the right thing to do at the time. But it worked out, didn't it?"

"Yes, it did work out, but that doesn't excuse what you did. You endangered the mission, and that is unacceptable."

"I'm sorry, sir."

"Um, if I may," Hikari piped up, "If Alexander hadn't come when he did, I would be dead now."

"That's true." Nathan said. "You saved a valuable piece of intelligence, Alex. And Success forgives many sins. However, remember your errors today, and learn from them. We may not be so fortunate a second time."

"I'm curious about this 'witch' business." Anna interjected. "I got a lot of it on camera, but I think that only gives me more questions. Hikari, who was that woman chasing you?

"She was another witch from the lab." Hikari said. "I don't know her name, but she had the power to control stone and concrete."

"What lab is this?" Nathan said. "I don't think dispatching assassins is standard Japanese Government practice. What's their affiliation?"

"A low-grade witch like wasn't allowed to know anything like that." Hikari said sadly. "I'm sorry. However, we had to avoid the military and the police when we were on the run, so I think they're working with the government."

"Great." Nathan muttered. "As if they're weren't already enough problems with this mission."

"It was pretty incredible what you did back there, though," Hikari said, looking at Alexander with stars in her eyes. "They told us at the lab that normal humans didn't stand a chance against witches."

Alexander looked down. "I got lucky." He said. "If she had fought smarter, I wouldn't have had a chance."

"No." Ishikawa said slowly, in his sharply accented English. "She fought as intelligently as she could. You were better. That's all there is to it."

"Thanks." Alex muttered. "So tell me more about this lab. What's going on with them?"

"I don't really know that much about the lab." Hikari said. "But they experimented on all of us at the lab. That's how we got our powers. Surgery and drugs. I-"

"That's not magic." Nathan murmured.

"- was ranked as a B-rank witch, but they determined that I was defective and decided to dispose of me. We escaped while in transit."

"So you don't know where the lab is." Anna said.

"Yes."

"So you said this witch I was fighting 'hung up'. What does that mean?"

"We have a device on the back of our necks." Hikari said, raising her hand to the nape of her neck. "When we use too much magic, or when a certain button on it is pressed, it pops out and we can't use any magic for the rest of the day."

"Seems like an important weakness." Alex said. "Why include something like that on something as important as a witch?"

"So they could control us." Hikari said gravely. "We were guinea pigs, not soldiers. There's a button on it that ejects it. Then we die."

Alexander looked at Nathan. He had explained what had happened at the Cargo Area of the airport, and he had expressed significant concern about the possibility of fighting additional witches. If they could be kill with the press of a button, that would make things slightly less hellishly difficult.

The car turned onto the Expressway and everyone was silent for a moment.

"Did you see what Alex did back there?" Anna said abruptly. "When the witch was all like boom boom and then he was all like pew pew!"

"He was pretty amazing," Hikari said. "The way he used the smoke and everything."

"It was pretty cool." Anna said. "Not that I enjoyed that or anything."

Break

The car had arrived at the safe house, and dropped off the CIA team. Nathan and Ishikawa were greeting the landlady while Alex and Anna moved the luggage inside.

While Alex was moving his questionables bag up to his room, he spotted Hikari outside the freshly designated girl's room.

"Hey, Hikari." Alex said, putting down his bag.

"Oh, yes?" Hikari turned around and spotted Mark, then blushed. "I never got to properly thank you for saving me back there."

Alex shook his head. "Its fine."

"Still, thank you."

"I've been wondering, Hikari," Alex said slowly. "Why you've been so quick to trust us. Why is that?"

"You saved my life." She said. "If you wanted to hurt me, all you had to do was do nothing. Besides, it doesn't really matter who I trust."

"And why not?"

"Because I'll be dead in a week."

"What do you mean?" Alexander demanded, slamming his hand into the wall. "How can you possibly know that? Are you sick?"

"No. We witches need to take a certain pill called a death suppressant every day, or we die." Hikari said sadly.

"Wait, what?"

"If we don't take the pill, for thirty hours, our skin splits and we start to bleed. After a few hours more than that, then we..." She choked up. "Melt."

"Are you running out?" Alexander asked, trying to force the image of a person melting out of his head.

"Yes." Hikari muttered. "I have seven pills left."

"That's... that's terrible." Alex said. "Is there anything we can-" An idea crossed his mind. "Could you show me one of the pills?"

Hikari reached into her pocket and pulled out a single pill in a blister pack. The letters DR623G were stamped on the packaging in bold black ink.

Could that be a drug identification code? Alex thought, looking at the characters. "Show me another."

She did. The letters were identical.

"That's probably a drug identification code." Alex said, showing Hikari the lettering.

He started walking toward the door to the girl's room. "If we-"

He walked into a fist.

"You can stay out there, pervert." Anna said. "What is so important that it requires you violate all boundaries of decent behavior to-"

"Hikari is going to die if we don't get a certain pill in the next week." Alex said. "We need you to find the drug code. Can you look up something without it being traceable back here?"

"Who the hell do you think I am?" Anna said. "Of course I can. What's the code?"

"DR623G."

"I'll see what I can find."

Break

"To conclude," Anna said, "The Death Suppressant drug is manufactured at the Dresden Pharmaceuticals Takayama facility."

"And what do you want to do about it?" Nathan said, raising an eyebrow. "There was just a break-in at the factory, so they'll be on guard. There will be guards, security systems, cameras, and so forth."

The group of spies, plus Hikari, sat in a private room in the basement of their house. They were seated after the local fashion, on cushions around a table. Anna stood in front of the assembled group next to a projector screen displaying the findings on her search.

"We're talking about her life here." Alex said. "Isn't there something we could do?"

"I think there's something we could do." Nathan said. "We could shout that the sky is falling and try to get the U.S. to declare war on Japan and invade, and hope that the factory falls into our hands before your friend melts."

"Obviously that isn't practical." Ishikawa said. "And there would be moral problems with that. But what could we do?"

"What about a Special Forces raid." Alex said. "That's a discreet solution, and it's hardly as big a commitment as an invasion."

"The CIA has worked with SOCOM in the past." Anna said. "And that would solve a lot of the problems of an invasion, as if that was ever a reasonable option."

"There are all kinds of ways a small, elite team could get the drugs, once they were on the ground." Alex said. "And they wouldn't draw the sort of attention that any other option would."

"But what could motivate President Viktor to launch a commando raid on an allied country?" Nathan said. "It would be a very risky proposition."

"It's not as if it's entirely without precedent." Ishikawa said. "The U.S. and Pakistan were technically allies during the Bin Laden raid."

"That was one thing and this is another." Nathan declared. "Bin Laden was a high-value target, and everyone knew that the Pakistanis were going behind our backs. This is one of our strongest allies, and we'd be going in on a whim to save the life of one young woman."

"Not one young woman." Ishikawa rebutted. "One witch. Presently the only one in the possession of the United States Government."

"Fine." Nathan said. "We needed to get our shipment of heavy weapons in somehow, anyway. I'll make the call."

"Thank you." Hikari said softly.

Break

Dominic Winters had been assigned general oversight of operation Blazing Summer. At present, he had received confirmation that his team had landed successfully in Japan and, despite some altercations, was still prepared to go ahead with the mission. He was now about to review the first data dump they sent him on the status of their mission.

Winters logged into the secure server and opened the satellite transmission file from the field team. He had people to look at things like this, of course, but on the few field missions he had been involved with, he had liked to review as much of the core raw data as he practically could in order to get a feel for what was really happening.

The first item in the transmission packet was a written report, with attached video files. He opened it and began to read.

...Everything in the Far East Report is true... Encountered a magic user at the airport... Engaged hostile terrakinetic magic user... Taken possibly friendly magic user into custody... Currently residing with the Advanced Command team... Interrogation revealed existence of 'Lab' responsible for creation of magic users... Evidence of significant ties to Japanese Government...

Then he got to the bottom of the report.

To conclude, the captured magic user is chronically dependent on a specific medication, of which she currently possess a week's supply. Further medication may be found at the Dresden Pharmaceuticals Takayama facility. However, due to suspected connections between Dresden and the unknown 'Lab' group, diplomatic approaches are judged as unlikely to procure additional medication, and likely to reveal our possession of critical information of possibly hostile groups.

Winters knew what was coming next.

It is thus the recommendation of this officer that an elite team be assembled on short notice to raid the facility and acquire the drug. The captive magic user is a valuable asset, and having her melt down in a week's time would severely limit the intelligence that could be gathered from her. In addition, she serves as evidence that something is occurring here. Additional evidence is enclosed.

Nathan Hunter.

Winter's picked up the phone.

Break

President Viktor Justinian picked up the phone. The call was from the emergency hotline from Langley, so he knew it was almost certainly something serious. And just when things were starting to quiet down he thought.

"Hello?" He said. There were only a few people with permission to use this line, limiting who could be on the other end.

"Mr. President?" An urgent voice said. "This is Dominic Winters."

"Ah, Dominic. How have you been?" The president asked. "Doing well, I hope."

"No isn't the time to chat, sir. We have a situation."

Viktor sat up straight in his chair. "What is it? Terrorists? I knew they'd been too quiet lately. We've got to-"

"Not terrorists, sir." Winters said. "Remember operation Blazing Summer?"

"Yes."

"Well, it found what it was looking for."

"No. Seriously?"

"The advance team found two magic users at the airport. The details are still a bit sketchy, but they neutralized one and took another into custody, apparently willingly. They're interrogating her now, and they discovered that all of these 'witches' are chronically dependent on a certain medication, and the witch they captured is almost out."

The president raised an eyebrow. "I assume getting more isn't as simple as a visit to the local pharmacy?"

"Well, it is and it isn't." Winters said. "Dresden Pharmaceuticals produces the drug off the record for the organization that created the magic users, and we've sourced the drug to one specific factory."

"And you want to go in and grab some?" The president asked.

"Essentially."

"Wait a sec. I'll bring General Ochoa into the call."

There was a brief pause as the commander of SOCOM was connected.

"What is it?" The General said, the moment the call went through. The commander of SOCOM was a gruff Hispanic man, who towered over most others and dearly loved crushing the enemies of his county.

"We have a situation." Winters began, and he proceeded to detail the events that had led up to the call.

"So you want me to send my boys in, on a week's notice, to an allied country, and raid a private facility to steal a drug so a witch doesn't melt." Ochoa said. "Do I have that right?"\

"Essentially." Winters said.

"It could be done. Ochoa muttered. "I have a squad of SEALs on standby in Yokosuka. We have a fast attack boat in the area with a SEAL delivery vehicle, and I suppose we could-"

"Ochoa, I haven't approved the mission yet." Viktor said. "I just wanted to get your opinion on the feasibility of it."

"It could be done sir. As I said, I have teams on standby that could do it. And I'd bet on SEALs against private security any day of the week. However, it could be risky. We are attacking an ally, after all."

"I understand that." The president responded. "And that is a risk I'm willing to take. However, we need to decide if we go ahead with this mission."

"I don't want to sound like I'm planning a coup, but the fewer people know, the better." Winters added. "With something like this, complete secrecy is critical."

"Agreed." The president shook his head. "We can't afford to take this before congress. That would let the cat out of the bag in a hurry."

"So, are we going to move forward with this?" Winters asked.

"I don't know. The president said. "I'm just not sure that we stand to gain enough from this operation to justify the potential risks. Couldn't we just put this witch on a flight back to the states and test her until she runs out of medicine? I don't mean to sound heartless, but this is just one life. We could lose a dozen is this mission goes wrong, not to mention the potential risk of alienating the Japanese."

"Sir, there is very little we know about these witches. Frankly, our scientists wouldn't know where to start. I don't think they could uncover much in a week." Winters closed his eyes. "Plus, she may be useful to the advance team. Those setups are always fragile, but she possesses the power to create what Agent Knight described as 'energy barriers'. If this goes south, they may need her."

"Out of the question." Ochoa said. "She's a civilian, and a foreign national. We can't make her fight in one of our battles. Plus, she's untrained. She may well do more harm than good in a gun battle. On top of that, we don't even know if she'll cooperate."

"Be that as it may, other witches escaped with her. If we secure the supply of Death Suppressants, we could use them to buy the loyalty of the witch we already have, as well as others."

"Death Suppressants?" Ochoa asked.

"The term for the medicine the witches use. If they don't take it, they slowly melt over the course of about ten hours." Winters said clinically. "First, the witch develops skin lesions, which begin bleeding, and then she goes into massive organ failure. After that, she undergoes massive cellular decomposition and eventually melts."

Viktor fought off a sudden surge of nausea. "Why do you need to describe the effects of the lack of the pill? We know that-"

"And the witches also have a device on the backs of their necks, with three buttons on it. When you press one, they lose the ability to use magic. When-"

"That could be useful." Ochoa interjected.

"When you press the second button, it ejects the device, and the witch dies."

"This seems rather irrelevant." The president said. "We are discussing the topic of the-"

"But she doesn't just die." Winters said. "She melts. Just like what happens when she runs out of medicine, but much faster. I'd imagine that it has to do with massive cellular collapse, but either way, it's pretty graphic. Bones in a puddle of-"

"Please excuse me for a moment." The president said. A few moments passed. Winters was about to say something to Ochoa when Viktor continued, "I'm back."

"So, will you approve the mission?" Winters asked. "Don't make me give my speech about expanding the frontiers of human knowledge. Just make this easier for both of us."

"Fine." The president said. "In any case, I think it might be worth it, for the intelligence benefit."

"Then I will begin planning the operation." Ochoa said. "We are already on a short schedule, and I need to make some calls. Good bye."

Ochoa left the call.

"And just between us," Viktor said. "I don't think I could let a girl melt like that. But Dominic?"

"Yes, sir?"

"Never do that again."

Break

Philip Lee stepped off the plane and onto the airstrip at Fleet Activities Yokosuka. He was a Navy SEAL, fresh out of Task Group Level Training. In Individual Specialty Training he had specialized in Advanced Close Quarters Battle and Advanced Demolitions, and been assigned to SEAL Team Twelve, which was forward deployed in Yokosuka.

He was a tall man with short brown hair, and bright blue eyes. He was, of course, well-muscled, but most of it was lean muscle, and he moved with a lithe grace. Philip carried a heavy back loaded with his various personal effects as he stepped onto the tarmac and looked around.

As the plane began to taxi away, he spotted a man in fatigues walking toward him.

"Hey, new guy!" The man shouted, waving an arm, "You're Philip Lee, aren't you?"

"Yeah." Philip responded. "Who are you?"

"I'm Gabriel Nichols." The man said, as he stopped next to Philip and extended a hand. "Pleased to meet you. You're the new SEAL, right?"

"Yeah." Philip said, shaking Gabriel's hand.

"Sargent Michael ordered me to, and I quote, 'go meet the new guy'. So here I am."

"Interesting. So where am I supposed to go?"

"To the SEAL Cave."

Break

"You know, putting us underground was a nice touch." Philip said, walking into the partially buried concrete bunker that housed the Forward-deployed SEAL team. "Gives it a certain ambiance."

"I know what you mean." Gabriel replied, "But the name is kind of lame. I'm not sure who came up with it."

"Gabriel! You're back!"

Philip turned toward the speaker. He was even taller than Philip, and his body was covered in rippling muscles under the thin t-shirt he wore. He had brown hair and a jovial expression on his face.

"I'm back." Gabriel agreed. "I bought the new guy."

The man looked at Philip. "So you're our new breacher, eh? I'm John Stafford." He paused for a moment. "I," he said, in a deeper voice, "am heavy weapons guy."

Gabriel rolled his eyes. "I don't think that's funny to anyone else."

"Sure it is." John shot back.

"He's incorrigible." Gabriel said, turning toward Philip. "Also, a tip about John. For him, the Cold War never ended, and neither did Vietnam or Korea. Or WWII. Or the Revolutionary War. So be careful around him."

"I'm perfectly stable." John protested. "Sargent Michael made me undergo extra psych testing."

Gabriel sighed. "Unfortunately, he passed."

Philip looked around. The teammates he had met so far seemed to have a rather interesting dynamic. He wondered what Gabriel's comment meant.

"Anyway," John said. "Let's take the new guy down to the kill house. Put his through his paces."

Break

"Breaching!" Philip shouted, and smashed his shoulder through the door. The hinges holding up the heavy slab of wood gave way, and he charged into the room behind the falling door, assault carbine held ready.

The moment his line of sight was clear, he spotted a black silhouette behind a desk. He fired, placing two rounds in the chest and one in the head of the dummy. He stepped to the side to allow his imaginary squadmates to enter, then swept the room for further threats.

Another dummy popped up in corner, and Philip shot it in the head, dropping it instantly.

As he advanced into the room, heart pounding and mind running on overdrive, three more silhouettes popped up in the doorway. He hosed fire toward them, hitting one twice and one once, and absolutely shredding the third. As his assault carbine clicked empty, he dropped the long gun into his combat harness and drew his sidearm, a .45 caliber pistol. He fired at the target he had only hit once and tapped it twice more, then put an extra round into the other target.

Philip took cover behind the now empty desk and began to reload his carbine. He slid a fresh magazine into the weapon and advanced toward the door out of the room. He took cover behind the doorframe, then burst out through the door, carbine at the ready.

No new targets presented themselves, so he moved down the hallway toward the next door in line and examined it.

The door was of much sturdier construction that the previous one, and would not open as easily. Philip reached into his pouch and removed a (simulated) shaped charge device and placed it on the door, over the deadbolt. He took a step back, holding the wires leading to the explosive in his hand.

"Breaching!" He shouted, and pressed the fire button.

There was a loud crack as a blasting cap in the device detonated and a sudden surge of smoke. Philip kicked the door open and charged in, laying down suppressive fire as he did so.

There were three silhouettes in the room. One went down the moment he opened fire, and a hole appeared in another. Philip double tapped the unwounded target, then dropped the last one standing and advanced into the room.

Break

"So what did you set the parameters to?" John said, looking at Gabriel with an incredulous look on his face.

The two men were standing in the control and observation room of the kill house in the Yokosuka SEAL cave. At present, they were watching Philip make his way through a series of rooms designed to test the skills of even an elite operator to the limit.

"I set them to full combat realistic." Gabriel said. "He's fighting the kill house the way it's meant to be played."

"Wow. That kid's gonna go places." John said, as Philip breached another door and swiftly dispatched the simulated enemy combatants.

Gabriel looked down at his watch. "We've got that meeting soon."

"What do you think that it's about?"

"I doubt it's a mission briefing." Gabriel said. "Everything has seemed quiet lately."

"I know. It's probably just some routine thing."

"Even so," Gabriel muttered. "I wonder why they asked us not to talk about it."

"Maybe it is a mission. Some kind of pre-emptive thing."

Gabriel stepped up to the microphone for speaking into the kill house. "That's enough, newbie. We've got a meeting, and you're invited."

Break

The trio of SEALs stood outside the door to the briefing room, the two older operators discussing past missions with Philip.

"So then the damn terrorist realizes that I'm holding a Light machine gun." John said, gesturing animatedly. "And he says something, and I absolutely light him up. The look on his face was priceless."

"Hilarious." Gabriel said, stepping toward the door. "Anyway, it's time for the meeting."

"Fine." John said. "Be that way."

The trio walked into the lecture room. It was a small chamber designed to seat most of a platoon, with seats arranged in concentric semicircles facing a podium on an elevated platform. The trio took their seats near the front of the room and waited.

Over the course of the next few minutes, four more men filtered into the room and sat down. At precisely the time the meeting was scheduled to start, one of them stood up and walked up to the podium. He cleared his throat, then began to speak.

"Gentlemen. You have been called here today for a very special mission. Now, I know you've all heard that before."

There was a smattering of laughter from the assembled operators.

"In any case, for today's operation, we need to raid a certain factory and steal drugs to prevent an allied witch from melting."

Silence reigned over the room for a moment, and then the speaker continued.

"Now, I know most of you will be responding with something in the neighborhood of 'are you shitting me?' This is expected. However, this is not a joke. A CIA team, part of an operation called Blazing Summer, has discovered that an organization operating within Japan, with the possible cooperation of the Government, has produced a significant number of individuals with superhuman powers."

Everyone was quiet for a moment. Then John raised his hand. "Does this mean that the target of this operation is within the borders of Japan?"

"Correct." The speaker said. "We are raiding the Dresden Pharmaceuticals Takayama facility." An image of a pill in a blister pack appeared on the screen behind him. "Our objective is to secure as many of these pills as possible. They are essential to the survival of magic users, and thus to our attempts to figuring out what the fuck is going on here."

He looked around the room before continuing. "Now, it is possible that we may encounter enemy magicians during the course of this operation. In the event that this occurs, there are a few things you need to know. First of all, all magic users have a device on the back of their necks essential to their survival. If this device is removed, they die. There is a button on the bottom left of this device that ejects it from their body, terminating them."

There was a brief pause, then Gabriel spoke up. "What sort of things can these magicians do?"

"We aren't entirely sure." The speaker said. "So it is critical that you stay on your toes at all times. However, the magic user currently in our custody is a young Japanese woman, with the ability to create force fields. From her testimony, the other magic users will be girls in her age range, with a wide variety of powers." He smiled. "But they all die to bullets."

Philip felt some of the tension leave his body. For a moment, he was concerned that these magicians would be invisible juggernauts, able to absorb everything the SEAL squad could throw at them while they ripped the operators apart with mystic powers."

"Now," The speaker said. "This is what we're going to do."