Mother 3 Point 5: Resolution

by SL the Pyro

The world has become a chaotic place. Psychokinetics are hunted, and they hunt others in turn. With war consuming the entire world and evil lurking in the shadows, only a boy with the power of Formless PSI can save a world that doesn't want to be saved.

4. Prologue: The Boy from Nowhere, Verse 4

Prologue: The Boy from Nowhere

Verse 4

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Throbbing. No one enjoyed the misfortune of waking up with a throbbing headache; it just made the victim want to fall back to sleep to ignore it, but once awake the inconsistent pain would prevent it.

Lanette felt like this was one of those times, but it was so much worse than she ever remembered. "My head..." she groaned, her voiced slightly slurred as she reached for where the pain emanated from: right at the top. This was a bad idea, as the sting only intensified when her fingers made contact, but it didn't feel like hair when she touched it... more like paper. "Bandaged... what the hell happened to me?" she thought.

Her mind struggled to recall the events prior to this horrible pain in her skull. She had just left that MacroMart place with Lucas, trying to get away from those agents... and then that black car pulled out in front of her motorcycle, and she lost control... and then...

Her eyes snapped open and she jolted herself upright as she realized the potential scope of the problem, and... seeing her current location confirmed her fears. It was a lavish bedroom with exquisite furniture and antique dressers and drawers along its walls, each looking more expensive than the last. There was a distinct "brown and red" theme, the rocking chair, couch and various other things that could be called "constructs" crafted painstakingly out of fine wood. That was the brown; the red was pretty much everything else, from the rug on the floor and paint on the walls, to the cushions and the sheets of the queen-sized bed she was laying on. Not one object in the room didn't scream "rich."

And that was why she was scared. There was only one house remotely close to Eastville that had bedrooms like this.

So she knew where she herself was... then where was her friend? Looking around the bigger-than-necessary room, the only other human shape Lanette saw in the room was herself in the massive mirror hung on the wall. She saw that the extent of her injuries from the motorcycle crash were limited only to her head, where a carefully wrapped string of white bandages covered where the pain was worst. She considered herself lucky if the accident had been bad enough to knock her out, yet not do extensive damage to the rest of her body. But what of Lucas? He might not have been as fortunate... she had to find him, and quickly.

But as she was about to throw the covers off of her bed and get up, she heard the door handle click. Someone was coming in... there were a great many people who could want to see her right now, and out of them all there were only two that she could tolerate right now. One of them was Lucas, and the other was...

"O-oh, you're awake."

...thankfully the person who had arrived: Merelda Cain. Lanette breathed a mental sigh of relief, happy that Lady Luck seemed to still favour her despite the disaster that landed her here. Not that it meant she was especially happy to see the wife of Steven, Gods no, but she'd happily take her over him or any of his agents. But even then, she couldn't look her in the eye, instead directing her gaze out the window where the sun was beginning to rise. "...Why am I here...?" was her immediate question.

Her grumpy attitude was nothing short of what Merelda had anticipated. She had every reason not to be here, after all... it seemed she was the only one within a mile's radius of Steven who understood that. Still, she couldn't help but worry for her. "Oh Lanette, I'm so sorry..." she apologized, bowing her head in shame as she walked towards her, carefully touching the bandage on her head and being sure not to hurt her. "I can't believe they hurt you like this..."

She allowed the woman to "pat" her head for a few seconds before shaking it and telling her, "It was my fault. If I'd been better at driving-"

"Don't say that." Merelda promptly interrupted her, hugging the young teenager tightly. "This is hardly your fault. The men who cut you off like that were fired on the spot."

Well, that news made Lanette feel a little better, but it didn't solve her immediate problem. "I can't stay here." she reminded the older woman.

They both felt the pangs of remorse beating in their hearts, knowing that she was right. "I know..." she agreed. "But I don't know what I can do for you... security here has doubled since you were brought here. He won't just let you leave."

Lanette scoffed in annoyance. "Wonderful..." she murmured sarcastically, not surprised one bit. "But I'll be damned if I won't try... but first I need to find my friend." She looked to Merelda with expectation. "Do you... know where he is?"

Suddenly she was a lot less forthcoming, and hesitated before replying... but she told her anyway, because she felt that she at least deserved to know...

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Where was this place...?

It seemed like only half of Lucas' brain was working right, or at least that's what it felt like. His head was spinning terribly, and he was struggling to stay conscious. His whole body pulsed with some kind of numbing pain, a pain so bad that even opening his eyelids seemed like a chore. Not that he let that stop him.

And he immediately regretted it, for there was a very bright light directly above his head. He shut his eyes immediately and groaned, moving his hand to cover his face— wait... his hand wasn't moving. Neither was the arm it was attached to. And neither were any of his other limbs no matter how hard he tried. It felt like his entire body was being forced down. Panic swept through him; he did not like being completely unable to move. What was wrong with him? He sought to remedy the problem with a use of PK Healing, and maybe some PK Lifeup to get his strength back—

Attempting to use his PSI was also a bad idea it seemed, as the moment he tried the dizziness almost doubled in intensity. All he could do was let out a strained gasp; it felt like the wind had been sucked right out of his lungs. Something... something was preventing him from using his PSI...

Something else was above him now, blocking the light... a person? He could only see the vague, blurry silhouette of a human's upper body in contrast to the bright light behind it. He tried to focus, to see who it was, but again his body refused to obey. It was as if the simple act of concentration was being robbed of him... what was going on?

Something penetrated the numbness then, a sharp pain where his neck met his left shoulder. His vision was fading to black again...

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"Are you shitting me!" Lanette shrieked, having lost all concept of politeness towards Merelda when she was informed of Lucas' current location: the secret underground laboratory section underneath this lavish manor, where he was being experimented on.

"I wish I were Lanette, I really do..." Merelda affirmed with exasperation. "I tried to convince him not to, but he wouldn't be swayed. He's seems to be under the impression that Nowhere Boy brainwashed you..."

"Nowhere Boy...?" she enunciated to herself, needing a moment to realize that she was indeed referring to her friend. No doubt that was what the Government was calling him. It sickened her that he was given such a demeaning title. Nowhere Boy... it was like calling him a nobody! "His name is Lucas!" she growled through clenched teeth.

Merelda did her best to keep calm despite Lanette's sudden flare of anger. "Lanette... is he really your friend?" she asked. She knew she wouldn't like the implication, but she wanted to be sure. "You weren't hypnotized by him in any way?"

"Of course not!" she snarled, appalled that she would even think of asking the question. "Lucas is a good kid! He saved my life!" she defended him, with not two seconds of hesitation.

"Then why were you with him?" the older woman inquired.

"Huh?" That question had honestly caught Lanette by surprise, even though she felt like it shouldn't have. It was valid after all, she was traveling with a known fugitive out of her own free will in spite of what Steven might think. "Oh, well... when the Resistance picked us up... I heard from a friend that they were going to use him against the Government... as a soldier..."

Now that was shocking news. "What! They would use... a child in the war!" she exclaimed. This blatant lack of morality and decency was something that she expected from the Government, who cared not whether the Psychokinetics they hunted were adults or children; they would destroy an entire city just to eliminate one target if they had to. But never did she think the Resistance, which fought for the freedom and protection of Psychokinetics, would take a reportedly good-natured boy and throw him into the battlefield.

"Yeah... that was my reaction too. One of my friends didn't like it either." Lanette continued. "And Lucas definitely hated the idea of even being involved in the war... so I wanted to help him. I took him and dipped on the Resistance jerks."

Merelda couldn't hide her grin. That was just like Lanette; she was a hothead that wouldn't hesitate to go bare-handed against even a PSIber, yet she had a heart of gold and would happily throw her own life away if it meant helping someone in need. There was no doubt that she was aware of the danger that she had put herself in by simply being around the boy... clearly she held him in high regard. She wondered how deep those feelings went... but now wasn't the time to inquire or tease about something so personal. She helped him not because she was made to, but because she wanted to, and that was all she needed to know.

"And then I had to go and get caught by these jerks... of all the people, why them...?" she finished, her tone turning depressed.

Merelda also frowned. It wasn't fair, how the vigilant and good-natured were constantly stepped on and the cruel and power-hungry ran everything in this nightmarish world. The car that cut her off might as well have been fate giving her a cold slap of reality, and yet "Lucas" was the one being punished instead. "No... I won't let this stand." she decided in her mind. "Fate has a cruel way of putting us down, Lanette... but don't ever give in." she told her, reaching into the pocket of her bathrobe and pulling out... a card of some sort, similar in shape to a credit card, which she dropped into her hands. "The only reason we all fall down is to get back up."

She looked at the card with interest, wondering why she had gave her this. It was shimmering with a shade of silver, with a black stripe along the lower back of it. "What's this?" she asked.

"A keycard that will let you get into the underground lab." she explained to Lanette. Her eyes figuratively went as wide as dinner plates, looking at her with shock and confusion. "You can't stay here Lanette, and if he's really your friend, neither can he. There's no telling what might happen to him."

She couldn't believe it. She couldn't believe, in spite of all the circumstances and obvious reasons why she shouldn't be giving her this chance to save her friend, that she was giving her this chance to save her friend. "But... why...!" she had to ask, barely able to refrain from shouting.

"Because you have to." she replied sternly. "I'd much rather you stay here and be safe, but... I'd be lying to myself if I made you do that. You want to help him because you believe you have to, and no one has the right to deny you that. Not me, and definitely not him." She reached out and touched her shoulder, squeezing it to calm her down. "Just... promise me you'll be careful, okay?"

Now Lanette couldn't hide her grin. Surely she knew what the answer to that would be. "No promises." It still boggled her that there were people with this level of understand and compassion alive in this world, especially those so close to the greedy and corrupt. But she wouldn't complain, in fact she was happy. As long as people like that still drew a breath, the hope for a better tomorrow was never really gone.

She dared to smile at her one last time. "Now get going, before he decides to pay you a surprise visit."

The covers were thrown off of the bed in an instant. She didn't need to be told that twice.

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Steven was cursing himself in his mind, over and over again. He had been such a fool, and his men had been so inept to let her fall into the hands of one of those... demons! That was what he thought of Psychokinetics as, naught but demons bent on the destruction of mankind. There were many reasons to back up the bold claim after all, the war against the Government being the ultimate proof of that; they refused to simply fade into nonexistence. They threatened everything he is and was... thus he had no problem aiding the Government in turning their own power against them. And yet this girl, who he hadn't seen since years ago had been found with one of them...

But that wasn't the only reason he was cursing himself. No, his obligation to the Government and the PSIber project took priority over even that, at least according to Vice President Edel. He knew what that man was like, either ignorant of simply non-caring of the turmoil others were going through, and he would want information regarding PSIber-Silver's errors on the battlefield as soon as possible, a job that had already pushed back a day due to the incident in Eastville. As much as he wanted to just flip the lanky man off and see her, it wouldn't help his position at all. Eventually he settled for just doing the work he was assigned to get it out of the way.

Well, at least he was a scientist at heart. As vile as the concept was to him, anything he could learn about Nowhere Boy's mysterious brand of Formless PSI could aid in the Government war effort as well as assuring his safety from the Resistance.

The general desire was that he would be able to see things that the eggheads in those Government facilities missed, which was an apt theory since he was the inventor of the PSIber system. Frames of the video and system code from PSIber-Silver's memory was projected onto the flat-screen in his office. On the screen of his laptop was the programming code of every other PSIber currently active, being cross-checked with each other and PSIber-Silver's supposedly faulty operating system. Well... perhaps "supposedly" wasn't the right word. There had always been some problems specifically with PSIber-Silver, and he could only hope that this wasn't one of those. Not that he'd be surprised if the Government used a recurring issue with different circumstances as an excuse to make him do something...

Unfortunately though, the lack of differences in the code either big or small found by the computer and his scrutinizing eyes told him that this was a recurring issue. However, there was also definitely something different about it... which justified Edel's request. Damnit. Barely-restrained anger at the Vice President ignored for now, he did confirm that PSIber-Silver's system had suffered numerous errors after the indirect Formless PSI from Nowhere Boy to her blades. However, he was having trouble figuring out exactly how it affected her. This wasn't the first time she had been hit with Formless PSI – he wouldn't forget the Government-wide panic that resulted from Old Man beating her within an inch of her life – but this was the first time such errors occurred from being hit by Formless PSI in general, and based on his offhand knowledge of Psychokinetics, Formless PSI was simply a massive mental attack instead of something that caused illness and the like. But for whatever reason, it affected PSIber-Silver in a non-physical way. Her sudden and radical changes in priority were a bug he had yet to squash, but why would that one attack trigger that bug when it hadn't before?

It was becoming obvious to Steven that the answer to this mystery didn't lie within PSIber-Silver's operating system, but rather the Formless PSI that caused it to malfunction.

Pressing the button on his phone that enabled the exterior speaker and dialing a quartet of buttons, he slumped in his chair and rested his weary eyes while waiting for the Government scientists in his basement to answer. "Doctor Simon reporting." came the reply from a nasally voice that was barely intelligible over the phone line.

"It's Steven." he spoke. "I'd like a progress report."

"Unfortunately, I'm afraid there's no progress to report." the scientist told him with exasperation. Steven resisted the urge to growl, not in the mood for jokes. "For someone so young, Nowhere Boy's mind is incredibly strong and stubborn. We had to physically sedate him just now because he nearly caused the PSI-suppression system to overload."

"What!" he boomed over the phone, completely surprised and aggravated. "How is that possible!" he demanded.

"W-we honestly don't know." Simon replied, his voice quivering a bit. "There's definitely nothing wrong with the system's connections or the system itself, so the only explanation is that he simply won't give up. We're only able to gather bits and pieces of his mental processes before his mind starts to resist. "

Steven was in a state of utter disbelief. The PSI-suppression system was the heart and soul of the PSIber project, and the only reason that they could take Psychokinetics down with such ease and efficiency. It emits a special frequency that disturbs the higher brain functions of those not properly equipped, a means of disrupting the extrasensory PSI abilities. A single person causing it to fail - a child whose brain shouldn't be so well developed, no less! - was unheard of. Was this random child who had popped up out of nowhere really this powerful? Just who is he? "Sedate him as necessary if it happens again, but don't put his life at risk. Any information about his Formless PSI we can dig up might be invaluable, so we can't lose him." he ordered.

"Understood."

The scientist down below hung up. Steven exhaled loudly, the stress of the day starting to get to him. And for good reason, the most prominent being that the Government didn't yet know that Nowhere Boy was here. He didn't want them to take him away just yet. No... once the boy had been stripped of his secrets, then he would be made to pay for what he did to Lanette... the demise of such a powerful demon by his own hand... the Government would revere him as a hero for destroying their biggest threat.

Yes... he could be patient for a little while longer...

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Lanette still couldn't believe that she was receiving aid from Merelda of all people. She had a great many reasons not to, their respective safety the biggest of them all; there was no knowing how Steven would react to this turn of events when he found out about it. And he would find out eventually. She didn't know how much time she had, and she dare not waste any of it as she snuck through the halls of Cain Manor in search of the entrance to the underground laboratory.

Well, perhaps "search" wasn't the right term. She had lived in this manor, ever since she was young. Back then she was young and curious to a fault, wanting to learn about whoever and whatever she came into contact with. She explored the manor. Oftentimes she would sneak into and explore the underground laboratory. And most desperately, she wanted to see the outside world. As a result, she knew this whole place like the back of her hand. She knew exactly where she had to go, and even had a vague idea as to where Lucas might be.

But as she had to quickly duck behind the corner of a hallway, avoiding being in the line of sight of a butler nonchalantly making his way down an adjacent hall, it was clear that getting there would be the major challenge. It's not as if stealth wasn't her specialty, in fact she had to resort to a few... unsavoury means in order to survive in the Eastville Slums, but that was before the war began to involve Steven Cain. Being a valuable asset to the Government and a main target of the Resistance, security was sure to have been tightened a fair bit since she was a child. But she refused to let it daunt her. She kept silent, pressed flat against the wall and hoped to hell that the gray-haired butler wasn't headed in her direction...

Thankfully, he seemed not to notice her at all while he continued straight forward. Breathing a mental, soundless sigh of relief, Lanette snuck around back of him and tiptoed through the hallway he came from, and kept going until she reached the mid-way point of the hall: a spiraling staircase that branched between the first and third floors of the manor, and she was currently on the third while her destination was on the first. If memory served, the stairs had an unstable portion in the middle that would produce a loud "creak" whenever stepped on. She didn't want to make a whole lot of noise right now, so it looked like she'd have to continue her daredevil streak.

She only went down a few steps, enough to see that there was no one down there, before leaping over the oaken railing and letting gravity take care of her descent. She was well-trained in martial arts and very athletic, so a fall from a couple of floors of a building – provided it went unimpeded – wasn't a huge problem. Her shoes made barely any noise when they and her hand touched down on the carpet of the first floor, at which point she swiftly hid behind a wall again, just in case there was anyone in the hallway she wanted to go down. She peeked her head around the corner, and saw that the way was clear.

She continued on her predetermined path, noting with a bit of irritation that the door to her destination was closed. It wasn't usually closed from what she could remember... of course it would have to be closed now. If there was someone in there, she wouldn't be able to proceed. She pressed her ear against the door, careful not to move it in any way, so that she could listen in on anyone talking inside. She heard no one... hopefully that meant no one was there. Taking a necessary gamble, she opened the door and peeked through it... and not seeing a soul inside, she entered and quietly shut the door behind her.

The area in question was what any normal civilian would define as a living room, which richer people would refer to it as the "Common Room." It was no less lavish than the bedroom she'd woken up in, although where that room was red, there room was blue. It gave a more regal feel. The aesthetic differences were that the room was octagon-shaped, a massive chandelier stuck out of the high ceiling, a huge flat-screen television was sunk into the leftmost wall, and there was a wooden cabinet with glass doors that held all sorts of expensive-looking alcohol and wine.

That last one is what she was here for. It's a common practice for rich people to indulge on such expensive drinks in their spare time, but not Steven Cain. She knew him well enough that he never so much as touched the stuff at any point in his life, it was more for the enjoyment of guests. But there was one bottle containing an alcohol that no one seemed to enjoy, with a green label she didn't care to read and filled to the brim with a white liquid. And thus, if no one wanted it, it would never have to leave its spot. She opened the liquor cabinet and pulled on the bottle, and it moved like a lever of sorts, not actually leaving its spot.

She pulled on it until she heard a click. The wall adjacent to the liquor cabinet started to move, sections of it pushing out slightly and then moving to the side... to reveal a small, metal door that really clashed with the atmosphere of the common room. This was the entrance to the underground lab. Lanette smirked, remembering that Steven had a flair for the dramatic. Beside the door was a card reader, which she wasted no time using with the card Merelda gave her earlier. There was a faint "beep," and the metal doors hissed open to reveal and elevator. She stepped inside and closed the doors immediately, then felt gravity shift as it started to descend...

She leaned against the rumbling elevator wall and exhaled deeply, trying to psych herself up. Getting here was the easy part. It would get a lot more difficult from here on...

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He'd went over the programming code and error messages of PSIber-Silver many times, cross-checked them with the programming code and error messages of the other PSIber's many times and even rebuilt her code from the ground up many times. For the life of him, Steven just could not figure out the relationship between Nowhere Boy's Formless PSI and PSIber-Silver's malfunctions without in-depth knowledge of how the boy's PSI works. It was frustrating to him as a scientist not to be able to solve a problem that he felt should be so simple.

It helped not one bit when that frustration was compounded on by a surprise phone ring that startled him half to death. Exhaling with a gravelly tone, he looked the caller ID, and was not happy to see "Presidential Office" on the display. That could only mean either the President or Vice President – usually the latter – and he was not in a talkative mood right now. But refusing a call from someone so high up the bureaucratic chain of command was generally a bad idea, so he had no choice but to answer it...

Not to his surprise at all, Vice President Edel's face was the one to appear on the large screen. "Hello, Steven." he greeted, trying to sound as polite as possible... which wasn't easy for him, especially with the disapproving frown on his face.

He wasn't eager to return the mock politeness either, and got straight to the issue he was sure the lanky man was calling about. "If this is about PSIber-Silver, I'm still working on it. I thought we agreed that I'd contact you when it was done." he scolded.

Edel decided to return the rude attitude. If Steven wouldn't give any quarter, then he wouldn't either. "Not surprising, since you were obviously shirking your duties yesterday." he snapped, not giving him a second before holding a newspaper up in the image. The main headline on it was clear, but he read it out anyway. "Billionaire Steven Cain and his agents cause a car accident in Eastville." He then slammed the paper back down onto his desk, causing Steven to jump a little. "When I give you an assignment to you, you do it. You do not ignore it and go on a joyride!"

This lecture from the Vice President was not something Steven was in the mood for, and he promptly countered, "Well, excuse me if the PSIber Project isn't the only affair I have on my table! I have important family matters to attend to as well!"

Edel glared, but this time he did not raise his voice. Instead, he smiled grimly and said, "Whatever. It had better not continue though, I'd hate to penalize you..." He knew this was a flat-out lie, but he said nothing. "So personal problems aside, what have you found out about little lady Silver?"

Steven shook his head, groaning. "Its old news, I'm afraid. She's just having her sporadic command issues..."

The wide hand of the Vice President slapped the head of its owner. "Oh, not this crap again..."

"It gets worse, I'm afraid." Steven continued. "She was operating completely fine before suffering from Nowhere Boy's attack. Whatever bugs she had were brought out exclusively by his Formless PSI, right when it hit her blades."

"...You're kidding me."

"I wish I were, Edel." he told him. "I can't tell you anything else, I'm afraid... I can't find the connection between PSIber-Silver's malfunction and the Formless PSI though, especially since she was once hit with Old Man's without this happening." he explained. "I have no way of knowing if this will affect the other PSIbers or how I'll fix it without in-depth knowledge of how Nowhere Boy's specific strain of PSI works."

This wasn't good news to Edel, not at all. "So basically what you're saying is, this squirt of a Psychokinetic could potentially be the undoing of the PSIbers."

"Yep." He wasn't about to tell him that Nowhere Boy was with him though, not yet... "I'll keep trying to find out what I can, but the only advice I can give is to double your efforts in finding him."

Edel's eyebrow raised, now made completely invisible by the brown hat he always wears. "What? You mean you don't have him?"

The hair on Steven's neck practically stood on end. "Wh... what? Why the devil would I have him!" He had no idea what prompted Edel to ask that question, but it immediately gave him a bad feeling...

It wasn't helped that when he saw the shadow of that chilling smile and sadistic gleam in the Vice President's eye, and while they were gone as quickly as they came, the fear they instilled wasn't so quick to disappear. "Ehh, I just thought since the kid was last sighted in the Eastville Slums, and since you were in Eastville recently..."

He calmed himself down a bit, regaining his composure and scoffing. "Really, Edel. I'm a scientist, not a secret agent. Do you really think I'd want any enemy that powerful anywhere near me or my lab?"

The lanky man chuckled and teased, "So it's true what they say about rich people. They're just a bunch of cowards hiding behind people and their guns~"

"What was that!" Steven roared, standing up from his chair and his face turning red with rage.

"I'm joking, I'm joking!" Edel said quickly, trying to hold back his laughter. "Sheesh Steven, you get worked up so easily..."

He was starting to wish this miserable excuse for a Vice President was actually in the room with him so he could beat that immaturity out of him. "Are we done here?" he asked, wanting this to be over with.

"Yes, yes, go back to work now."

And then the video feed cut out, replacing the screen's display with his data analyzing programs again. Goddamn, that man aggravated him so much... he was starting to consider using his latest anti-PSI weapon on him for a test run. The thought of that calmed him down in an instant, as well as made him chuckle a little... the thought of the idiot wetting his pants at the sheer sight of his latest project was entertaining indeed.

But before that, he'd have to get their current problem resolved. He'd received no new notifications from the scientists studying Nowhere Boy... he needed that information as soon as possible to get the overdressed monkey off of his back. Maybe he should just go down there to help and try to make this go faster...

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The underground lab was such a drastic change from the manor that one might wonder how they existed so close to each other. The manor was a very classy and fancy place adorned with all sorts of valuable antiques set on pedestals, red carpets everywhere and finely-polished wood for walls. The lab was only half the size of the manor and had only one floor, encased in walls of shimmering metal with fluorescent tubes on the equally-metal ceiling that served for lighting. The floor was a polished ceramic, probably to maintain some semblance of style. Meant for more of a personal and private workspace than anything, it held all of the important data and experiments about anti-Psychokinetic weaponry and was so secret that only Steven's most trusted associates were supposed to know about it.

Of course, having been a little girl when she accidentally discovered it, Lanette obviously wasn't one of the trusted. And for good reason, because this place didn't have a single good memory in her mind. She hated this place with a burning passion, almost as much as she hated him for creating it to begin with. Creating weapons, some of them molded out of living beings, to fight in a war that had consumed the world... that someone would willingly partake in the slaughter of hundreds, perhaps thousands or even millions – God only knew how many Psychokinetics there were in the world – baffled and horrified her to no end. It truly was amazing how just a little anger and greed could drive someone to do such terrible things...

She snapped herself out of her reverie, remembering that one of those terrible things was taking place right now as she crept through the lab. She had to be extra careful since not only were scientists and the like constantly moving from room to room, but there was no soft ground to mask her footsteps. Again though, it was fortunate that she had a good idea of where to go. There were only so many suitable places to operate on a "specimen" after all. Specimen... that's probably all that Steven and the rest of these people thought of Lucas as. It enraged her to the core. She had half a mind to hope that whoever was experimenting on him was still in the room when she got there, so she could give him a piece of her mind.

Fortunately for her it seemed that everyone was focused on the new sets of goals that came with having a known criminal on their operating table, so sneaking around them was very tedious and nerve-wracking, but not horribly difficult. Especially since her destination was at the end of the lab opposite that of the entrance elevator. She was as quiet and quick as a human could be, and in no time she was at the dead-end hallway lined with various doors, each one a designated operating room. The rooms where the PSIbers were created... they scared her back then, and they scared her now. How Lucas had stood up to one with no fear of the consequences was nothing short of admirable.

And speaking of "Nowhere Boy," there he was, spied through the window of the third door she peeked through. Much to her pleasure, there were scientists in there; something to take out her frustration on. She took one last look down the hallway to make sure no one saw her, before slipping the key card into the door's card reader. Of its own volition, the door swung open.

The scientists only had a split second to see who had entered, before that person rushed in and delivered a solid kick to the closest one's face. It was forceful enough to send him sprawling onto his back, along with whatever terminals and machinery happened to be behind him with a loud crash. "What the- you!" the other scientist shouted through his face mask, stunned at what had just happened and unsure of what to do. So he did the first thing that came to mind: attempt to restrain the young woman that had intruded on the lab. A bad idea, as when he tried to grab her, she simply tripped him with a hard kick to his shin, and he tumbled onto the ground with a hard thud.

Satisfied that she'd at least gotten a good hit on them both, she turned her attention to Lucas, who seemed to be out cold on the operating table, yet still had each of his limbs, his neck and his waist bound to it by thick metal clamps. There was also a metal bowl of some kind attached to his head that had many prongs sticking out of it, and a cable that disappeared into the machinery that the first scientist toppled over when he fell. She noted with disgust that his left arm was bent at a rather unnatural angle from the elbow downward, and also had a decently-sized scrape upwards of that elbow. He had been in a motorcycle accident prior to this, so there was no doubt in her mind that it was broken. She wasn't sure who to be angrier at, herself for allowing this to happen to him, or the scientists here for not even bothering to tend to his wounds.

She moved along the table, pressing the appropriate buttons on each side to release the clamps, and quickly moved to his head and shook him by the shoulder while pulling the unbecoming metal "hat" off. "C'mon kid, now's not the time to be dozing off!" she scolded him, before she noticed a redness on his shoulder... a redness that had formed into a bruise. She knew what it was: a needle mark. They drugged him with something. Now completely furious, she turned to the second scientist who was trying to crawl out of the room. She would have none of it, pulling him up by his collar, spinning him around to face her front and slammed him against the wall. "What did you do to him!" she screeched.

"I-I... I just gave him a s-s-small sedative! I swear!" the scientist stammered from fear.

"A sedative... so they couldn't keep him out with the PSI-suppressor?" she realized with a bit of curiousity and a lot of amazement. That boy was one hell of a fighter. "How do I wake him!" she demanded.

His visible skin paled, afraid of what she would do when he answered her. "Y-you can't... he'll only wake up when the sedative burns through his system!"

Indeed, he was right to be afraid. "Wrong answer." she told him coldly, throwing him into the nearest rack of medical supplies and watching him go down with it. There was no choice then, she'd have to carry Lucas out of here. She scooped the boy up onto her back, cursing inwardly as his broken arm dangled limply in front of her, and dashed out of the operating room.

She wasn't happy when she encountered three more scientists in her path, wondering what on earth the noise was. "What the! What is she doing with Nowhere Boy!" one of them exclaimed.

"Not leaving with him if I can help it!" another said, both he and the other speaker rushing at her with no hesitation. Hoping Lucas couldn't feel any pain while unconscious, she had to set him down a bit harshly in time to intercept her attackers, delivering a hard punch to one of the stomachs, then a roundhouse kick to the other's head.

"Oh my god!" exclaimed the third, apparently a female, before running down the right-side corridor. This was followed shortly by the sound of security alarms blaring throughout the complex.

"Shit." Lanette cursed. She took Lucas back up onto her back and made a mad dash for the entrance elevator.

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The thing about security klaxons is that they're intentionally loud, so loud that even people above ground can hear them. Namely, people like Steven Cain. "What the devil!" he said, just about to shut down his computer and head down to the underground lab. "Now what!"

Not too long after, his phone started to ring. He picked it up immediately, receiving the frantic voice of a female on the other end. "Mister Cain, it's an emergency! Someone just broke into the lab and took Nowhere Boy!"

"What!" he roared, his fingers reaching for his computer mouse and minimizing windows. Behind all of the windows that contained his research material, he had his own program for watching through his security cameras. He had Nowhere Boy's room pulled up, and was horrified at what he saw: both scientists sprawled out on the floor under a pile of either machines or medical supplies, and their test subject absent from the operating table. "Who did this!"

"A woman, sir! Teenage, with a white cast on her head!"

"White cast on her-" he stopped. He knew exactly who the scientist was talking about. "But that's impossible... can he control her even while unconscious! Was this why he'd been trying so hard to fight the PSI-suppressor?"

"Sir, what do we do!" the caller pleaded.

If Lanette was really still under Nowhere Boy's influence, then he was even stronger than he feared. This would take more drastic measures to rectify. "Security teams will already be scrambling, but in case they aren't enough, I want you to get the Destructor ready!"

"What! But it not finish-"

"Just do it!" he ordered, before slamming the phone down. He couldn't believe this was happening. "How was he still controlling Lanette while unconscious, and hindered by the PSI-suppressor no less!" he asked himself. "Did I make a mistake by taking him into my own custody?"

But there was no time to second guess himself now. He'd been the one to start this gamble, and he would see it through no matter what. He ran out of his office to where the "Destructor" was supposed to be...

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Lanette seriously wished the elevator would go faster than it did; she was in a hurry, damn it! Once she was back in the common room, she immediately ruled out running to the garage to steal a vehicle since the inside of the manor was no doubt crawling with security agents now. Then where could she go? The glanced around the room, noticing the broad window that took up the majority of the back wall. There, she'd exit that way. Setting Lucas down for a moment, she grabbed the lightest and smallest piece of furniture she could find – a rocking chair as it turned out - and hurled it at the glass, wasting no time and picking up her friend as it shattered to pieces. It was a bit chancy, but she might find a useable vehicle out in the driveway.

She jumped out of the window and, upon landing on the lush grass of the lawn, ran around the manor and sprinted in that direction. There, at the very end of the driveway... a motorcycle! Her motorcycle! She couldn't possibly mistake the shape for anything else. She ran for it like her life depended on it, purposely weaving between the other vehicles in the driveway to trip up any pursuers – she hadn't bothered to check if there were any, but it didn't hurt to be careful – and saw that, amazingly, the motorcycle's keys were still in the ignition. Surely Steven's men weren't that stupid... she chalked it up to be Merelda's doing.

Not wasting time looking a gift horse in the mouth, she mounted the bike and set Lucas down on her lap in front of her. He couldn't hold onto her while unconscious, after all. She turned the engine over, and plowed forth towards... a closed metal gate. Of course, they weren't so silly as to leave the gate of a billionaire's house open... but they wouldn't be going anywhere if the obstruction wasn't removed. Making another daredevil move, she put her foot down and charged with all the momentum the bike could muster, also popping a wheelie for added effect. With a resounding clang, the massive forward momentum broke through the gate's center, sending metal grating flying in both directions while she continued on. "Hope that buffs out..." she thought, looking with disdain at a hefty dent the motorcycle sustained to its front chassis plating.

The security agents piled up to the gate, watching helplessly as Lanette drove off into the distance. "Don't just stand there! Get to your cars!" one of them shouted suddenly. The rest of them turned around and followed suit...

...But then they stopped again, enthralled with a new spectacle.

Something was behind the large manor... something big, taller than the building by a foot or two, rising up into the sky. Its figure was easily big enough to block out the sun, leaving only its silhouette visible from their viewing angle, and its unnatural shaping made it impossible to identify. Then, with fire coming out of the bottom of the massive object, it surged forth with the sound and volume of a jet engine in the direction of the escaping duo.

Most of the agents just stood there, wondering what on earth they'd just seen... but then they remembered they had a job to do. They continued running for their vehicles and prepared to give chase as well.

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They had to get away from Fourside. While Lanette did remember that it was one of their future destinations, now just wasn't the time to go looking for the "Sanctuary" alluded to in the Black Diary, not while Steven and his goons were after them. Seeing nothing in front of them, she took her eyes off of the road for a brief second to look at Lucas. He still seemed to be unconscious... "Fucking idiots... if I'd handled myself better, they wouldn't have gotten to you..." she told him, ashamed of both them and herself...

Then the distinct, thunderous sound of that jet engine broke her out of her depression.

She looked at the rear-view mirror of her motorcycle to see... something tearing through the blue sky in her direction. "What the hell...!" she muttered. This thing was clearly faster than her motorcycle, and overtook it in mere seconds. Then it slowly started to descend to the road... and it produced a loud thunk as it touched down, right in her path. The thing was large enough to block both lanes. Rather than have a repeat of what happened last time, Lanette reluctantly skidded her motorcycle to a stop a few feet short of the obstruction, enough to get a good look at it.

"Mmh..." It was perhaps fortunate that Lucas had decided to regain consciousness, his body starting to stir in her lap. "Where..." He lazily turned his head in the direction of the thing.

Suddenly he was very wide awake.

"What in the world is that!" The newest obstacle barring their path was an absolutely huge machine, its size on par with another battle machine that Lucas had once encountered in his own journeys. The sight of another one was more than enough to fully bring him back into the waking world, even if he was still a little disoriented.

"Glad you're back with us, Lucas." Lanette said, her voice devoid of the joy and relief she should be experiencing at seeing him conscious again. "We have a... problem..."

The machine was large and loosely shaped like a human in the way its arms and legs were positioned, although the left one arm missing. It had no actual head per-se, but there was a large section of glass in the body arranged in a hexagon-shape, held in place by thick metal plates. Most of it was also covered in the same polished metal, but not all of it, leaving a number of various circuits and gears and such visible. Whatever this thing was, it was obviously incomplete, yet still looked very capable of crushing them under its heel.

"Stop where you are, Nowhere Boy."

The voice echoed from the machine, male, gruff and commanding. Lanette recognized it immediately. "Shit... it would have to be him...!"

Lucas was busy tending to both his exhaustion and his wounds, alternating both PK Healing and PK Lifeup as he grabbed his broken arm and popped it back into place. His resulting scream of agony got Lanette's attention. "I'm fine! Just... working the kinks out..." he informed her through gritted teeth, seething as he quickly used his PSI to evict the pain in his arm as well as restore its functionality. "Do you... know that pilot...?" he asked.

Seeing that Lucas seemed to have his injuries under control, but nonetheless sympathetic about the pain he must be going through because of his arm, she answered his inquiry. "Yeah... he's the reason I didn't want to come back to Neo Fourside." she informed him grimly. "Lucas... meet my Dad."

His eyes went wide. "Your... Dad!" he repeated. The large, incomplete machine started to lumber towards them as they spoke.

"Yeah." she confirmed for him. "One of the most rotten people working for the Government. He's the one who started the PSIber Project and made most of their anti-Psychokinetic weaponry." Lucas could say nothing in response. He didn't need to in order to know her feelings, because he could see them clear as day: anger, intense anger unlike any he'd ever felt before, not even from his previous hot-headed friend. And all of it directed towards the man in the machine. "All those Psychokinetics... all their blood is on his hands...!" Her fists were clenched shut, shaking from suppressed rage.

Closer the mechanical beast trudged along the road. Lucas looked at it, knowing full-well that a machine this big in this world had only one purpose: to destroy things. And the man piloting it had created similar machines, also with the purpose of destroying things. This man... he knew this kind of man only too well. It was thanks to the actions of such a man that his life was ruined.

That's all it took for Lucas to find his own inner rage, his right hand closing into a fist and starting to spark with the basic green energy of his PSI. It took him a moment to repeat the gesture with his left hand, but eventually he worked his way around the injury. "That's why I'm not an orphan like the others were... my parents aren't really dead. I just... ran away..." Lanette finished, looking at the man with ferocity in her eyes.

He said nothing, but he fully understood. He wouldn't want to be affiliated with a monster like that either, even if it were his own father. The hulking machine had reached them now... and so had the pursuing security agents. They came to a stop in a haphazard fashion, effectively forming a barricade of steel. There was no ideal terrain to drive the motorcycle on now; four-wheeled vehicles had the advantage in an off-road race, and her father's machine had already proven capable of outrunning them. "There is no escape for you now, Nowhere Boy." Lanette's father boomed from the cockpit. They could see him, strapped tightly into a black, leather chair and gripping a pair of red joysticks. He hadn't bothered to change out of his casual clothing and as such didn't look all that assuming as a pilot, but the threat he represented was still very real. Lucas could tell that this man had nothing but contempt for him.

Suddenly, his view was blocked by Lanette who stood in front of him, arms spread wide in a motion for her father to stop. "Stop, Dad!" she pleaded with him. "He's not evil! He's-"

"How dare you!" Steven roared, not even hesitating in cutting Lanette off. "Insolent demon! You would use my daughter as a shield!"

Her heart sank.

"I tried to convince him not to, but he wouldn't be swayed. He's seems to be under the impression that Nowhere Boy brainwashed you..."

"A shield!" Lucas exclaimed, outright horrified at what he was implying. "Why would I use her as a shield!"

"To get to me!" he replied promptly. "Admit it, dog! You only saved her so that you could use her to reach me!"

"What!" he shrieked. "I would never-"

"Don't bother trying to talk to him, Lucas." Lanette interrupted him, her voice low. "He thinks you brainwashed me..."

"Brainwashed you! But I can't even use PK Hypnosis!"

"Try telling him that." she challenged him. "Dad's stubborn as a mule. Once he gets an idea in his head, he'll never admit he's wrong. He thinks all Psychokinetics are like demons bent on the destruction of all mankind or something. And since he's the one who made most of the anti-Psychokinetic weaponry... well, he's paranoid."

That last part was the only thing that made Lucas stop to think. He could only imagine that in a war scenario, there were a great many people that would want him either in custody or dead. Yes, he had every right to be paranoid, but to be stubborn to the point where he thought the golden-hearted boy would use a good friend of his as a human shield? Lucas had to draw the line somewhere. "Then... you must know how this has to play out." he told her. Lanette lowered her arms, looking back to him. In spite of the tension in the air, he could see the softness in her eyes. "He's still your father... if you don't want me to hurt him, I won't."

It was true. Steven was her father. As much as she hated him, that's what made it so hard for her to tell him, "Do what you have to do."

Hesitant but still adhering to her choice, Lucas gave her a slow nod and walked out in front of her. She stepped back as he faced the metallic titan her father piloted. "You, Lanette's father!" he addressed him. Steven narrowed his eyes. "I don't know what kind of a monster you think I am, but I would never sacrifice another person for my own sake!" he shouted at him. "You might be my friend's father, but if you don't get out of our way right now, I will make you regret it! You have once chance to calm down so we can settle this civilly!"

This seemed to be all of the provocation that Steven's security force needed, as they started rushing forward. "Stop!" Steven himself commanded, and they did as they were told. "Don't interfere! He's mine!" he ordered them. They looked at him with surprise, but they obeyed. His gaze turned back to Lucas. "To be perfectly honest..." he began. "Even if you hadn't been using my daughter like you were, I wouldn't care. You are still a Psychokinetic that can use Formless PSI, a brand of it that severely damaged one of my PSIbers. You're too dangerous to let go, for both me and the Government." The arm of the robot opened its three-pronged fist, then closed it with force. "You can either surrender the secrets of your PSI so we can better eliminate your kind and purify this world of you demons, or I'll grind you into dust here and now with this Destructor. The choice is yours, Nowhere Boy."

For Lucas, the choice was very obvious, and it was none of the above. "In other words, I either die or allow thousands of other people to die because I chickened out." he reiterated. "Forget it!"

Unnoticed by everyone, someone had come up from behind the barrier of black security cars. It was Merelda Cain, having seen the onflict in its beginning and having heard the argument as she rushed to witness it up close. She held her hands to her chest and said to herself, "Steven... may God have mercy on you for what you're about to do..."

His choice made the inventor of the PSIber Project grin with sadism. "So be it!" he growled with finality, bringing the Destructor's massive arm back in an arc that clearly indicated a punch was incoming.

Lucas' instincts screamed at him to jump out of the way, but then he remembered that Lanette and a handful of other innocent people were right behind him. "And he's accusing me of using meatshields!" he thought to himself; if he moved, then the claw would decimate all of those people. Then he had no choice but to repel it like he did with PSIber-Silver's blades before and pray that it would send it back far enough. If he was going to fight this behemoth, he needed more space away from the others.

In perfect timing with the huge punch as it swung at him, he thrust his own arms forward, generating the sphere of shimmering, octagon-shaped plates around him. Sparks flew in every possible direction as they collided, and he could immediately feel the immense force behind the machine. Lanette shut her eyes, thinking that he would be flattened like a pancake. "Lucas!" she shrieked in horror... but that horror turned into utter awe when she saw him standing strong. There was a world of difference between a small, sleek sword and a giant block of steel, and both Lucas' shield and Lucas himself were feeling it. It began to crack under the pressure, and he could feel sweat and eventually blood starting to streak down his face. PK Counter's inability to stop all of the damage it absorbed was clearly showing now.

But like against PSIber-Silver's assault, he fought it off. Steven yelped in surprise as with a backlash that everyone could feel through the air, the massive claw bounced off of the octagonal plates and reeled back, the arm's bulk taking the rest of the Destructor with it and making it stumble backward. The legs struggled to correct for the abrupt shift in weight, but Lucas didn't let them finish. Taking as little time as necessary to regain his composure from stopping the attack, he launched one of his own, thrusting his arms forward again and creating the green hexagon he loved so much. The barrage began, aimed right for the legs. His idea was to immobilize the enemy so that it couldn't pursue them; even if it was easier to simply kill the pilot, he wanted to avoid any bloodshed that wasn't from his own body if at all possible.

Steven could do nothing but hold on tight inside the cockpit as the impacts shook the machine like a tornado trying to rip the shingles from a rooftop. Under normal circumstances the Destructor should be able to take the barrage, but with gravity also working against him in this case it was doomed to fall down, collapsing onto its knee-joints and using its single arm to prevent a "faceplant." If anyone outside could see his face, it would be one of raw disbelief. "If that had hit the cockpit, that might've killed me!" he screamed in his head. "What power! This boy is definitely too dangerous to be left alive!"

Steeling what resolve he had left, he controlled the Destructor and made it get back up on its own two feet. The leg joints had suffered considerable damage from the relentless assault, bits and pieces of metal missing and scorched where it was still intact. But it was still standing, and Lucas wasn't pleased about this. There was no time for him to prepare another attack however, he had to move this conflict away from the others. So he closed the distance, deciding to prepare a less time-consuming move. His finger sparked with green energy as he ran, and held it up to the sky when the cockpit was in plain view of it. Lanette was fortunate to remember what he was doing and covered her eyes as the green light of PK Flash blinded everyone present for a few seconds.

Everyone that is, except the intended target.

He had no time to react before the Destructor's massive fist swung in a horizontal arc and hit his body with considerable force. He screamed in pain as was sent flying a few feet through the air, rolling to a stop right back where he'd started the battle from. "Lucas!" Lanette cried out, at his side in an instant. The slam had been a painful one, appearing to have broken his left shoulder and tore off the whole sleeve that was on that arm. Several scrapes now marred the flesh, and a few had managed to get onto his left cheek.

"You're tactics are futile, Nowhere Boy! PK Flash won't make it through this tinted glass!" Steven informed him, certain he'd stay down after the brutal whack.

But yet, despite the obvious pain he must be in, he got back up as quickly as he could. "I'm okay... don't worry about me, Lanette!" he assured her, popping his shoulder back into place with another anguished cry and healing it. His confidence was fading as the Destructor stomped in his direction, the enraged pilot making it run faster than he figured it should be able to move. "You idiot! I'm trying to take this fight away from the other people! Don't you care if they get hurt!"

The only reply he earned from Steven was a war cry as he opened the claw and thrust it forward like a battering ram. He had no choice but to play the role of the shield again, creating another PK Counter. There was a twist this time though; the claw caught the barrier rather than punching it, giving it grip and thus much more force than before. With the weight of the machine's momentum behind it, he felt himself rapidly being forced back. "Oh no! Everyone, get out of the way!" he shouted to the unfortunate people in the way of the catastrophe.

They didn't need to be told twice, or even once; Lanette and the security agents moved as fast as their bodies physically could, jumping off of the road as the PK Counter tore up the asphalt it was push along. The vehicles in the way, both Lanette's motorcycle and the agent's cars, were tossed aside like baseballs.

And the one behind them who seemed to think they were a suitable barrier, Merelda, could only stand there in utter disbelief of the spectacle. Worse yet, the Destructor was still going.

Time seemed to slow down in this moment of utter terror.

"Mom!" Lanette shouted, she and the security agents only able to look on helplessly as what would surely be a fatal impact was headed for her. Lucas' and Steven's respective eyes widened as they realized that something terrible was about to take place. Merelda could only stand there, scared out of her right mind, the thought of her dying a painful death running through her mind repeatedly.

"No!"

Throwing his own safety to the wind, Lucas redirected the priority of the shield with one of his hands to the ground behind him in an effort to better stop this tragedy in the making. Both his body and his shield ached and threatened to break in clear protest, quite literally between a rock and a hard place. But it was working, they were getting slower...

Slower...

Slower...

...

Stopped.

The only noise came from the rumbling of the Destructor's engine and the whistling wind blowing through the barely inch-wide gap between Merelda Cain and her crazed husband.

"G... get back... Miss...!"

The PK Counter was starting to spark sporadically.

"I-it's... gonna explode...!"

But she was still in a state of shock at what had just happened. It was too much for her frazzled mind to process immediately. Fortunately for her, Lanette had heard his words and tackled her mother away from him.

Not a moment too soon.

The PK Counter cracked fully and exploded in a shower of sparks, its last bit of redirected energy tearing through the metal claw of the Destructor like a knife through butter. Shrapnel was blown in every direction.

And when the light faded... a bloodied, battered Lucas was laying on the ground, most decidedly unconscious.

"L... Lucas...?" Lanette said lightly, unsure of what had just become of her friend as she helped her mother up off of the pavement. With that done, she ran to him immediately. "Lucas!" Then she saw the extent of the damage. His clothes were half gone, ripped apart by the explosion, and there was a wound of some degree to accompany every tear. There was no doubt about it: he was going to die if he didn't get help soon. "N... no! Damnit Lucas, wake up! You have to heal yourself!" But her shouting was in vain. He did not stir. "Lucas! Lucas!"

Her plight was not helped by the security agents. Seeing that their boss was unable to continue the fight, the surrounded them both, their guns drawn and pointed at him regardless of his condition.

Lanette crawled over him, blocking their line of fire with her body. "Don't you dare!" she roared, furious despite the tears lining her eyes. "You fire those guns and I swear I will rip you limb from limb!" The agents looked at each other with indecision. It wasn't so much her threat as in this position, they would shoot Steven's daughter too.

"Stop, all of you! Secure your weapons!"

The voice belonged to Steven Cain, still in the cockpit of his Destructor, slumped into the pilot's chair from exhaustion and horror at what he had nearly done. All eyes were on him. What he was about to say would contradict his entire purpose for living right now, but... he couldn't just turn his back on this.

"Get him a doctor, now!"

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A/N: I think I'm getting better at writing battle scenes. Why? Because I was very hungry and very tired while I was writing that last part simply due to how much I enjoyed it. Time for food and sleep. x_x