01/29/2017 AN: Well, it has been a long time since my last update! Thank you for your patience. And I'd like to extend a special thank you to those of you who were kind enough to check in on me and make sure I'm okay. Things are still in upheaval and will be for a little longer. Hopefully I can return to regular updates soon. In the meantime, here's a new chapter of Silence, courtesy of TheLazyBlackCat's bribery. Enjoy!
Tanya walked down the aisles of Lectric Land, snatching boxes from shelves and putting them in her cart. She'd been planning on building a Slate for a while and now was the prefect time to finish that project. The first prototypes had been complete and utter failures. The problem was power. Batteries here on Earth simply didn't have the capacity that the ones back home did, not without the trade off of massive size.
Tanya opened a cell phone box to investigate what the battery looked like. The employees at the store had been annoyed at her at first when they found her constantly opening boxes and tearing things apart, but she always put things back the exact way she found them if she didn't buy it. If she was going to buy it, the stuff ended up loose in the bottom of her cart.
Duke followed, pushing the cart for her and trying not to fall asleep from boredom. He needed to buy some groceries and they'd decided to share a ride instead of walking.
"You really sure they're okay with this?" He watched her pull yet another wireless phone out of the box and start dismantling it.
"Well, you know." She shrugged, eyes focused on the device. "I buy so much they sort of let me get away with anything."
Whatever part she'd been looking for appeared to work. She tossed the pieces into a plastic bin in the bottom of the cart and flattened the box, adding it to the already several inch thick pile.
"I need to make a new power source. But it's easier to just take pieces from other things instead of building it from scratch."
"What's the do-dad this time?"
"That," she looked up at him, "Is a surprise."
She collied with someone when taking a step back to continue her search for parts.
"Oof!" a small, dark man fell to the floor.
"Oh! Uh, sorry." Tanya offered a hand.
He nodded and took her hand. The man was small with close cut, black hair. Tanya was certain even Mallory stood taller than him.
"Origato," he half bowed to her. "I not to get in your way." His speech was stilted, as if unsure the words he used were correct. "Are you Kyōdaina Dukku?"
"Huh?"
"Hockey. Um…" His eyes unfocused in thought. "Alien?"
"Yeah," Duke answered, finally supporting his own weight instead of letting the cart do it for him. "We're Mighty Ducks."
"So good!" He bowed again. "Arata Toru," he said, one hand on his chest.
Tanya wasn't sure how to react to him. What was with the bowing? It reminded her of Mallory and Grin before they would spar, but she had never understood why they did that.
"Toru," he pointed to himself again, then to her. "Tanya?"
"Oh! Yeah," she nodded.
"And… Happy?" He pointed to Duke. "No, Robin Hood!"
"Uh… Sure." Duke waved, unsure how to deal with this guy. He was obviously a foreigner and they didn't know what his customs might be. "It's Duke. You want an autograph or something?"
"No, no. Uh," he again searched the air for words. "You smart. Right? Very smart."
Tanya nodded again.
"What…" he pointed to her cart. "Building?"
"I'm making something for a teammate. We have these devices back home called Slates. It's, you know, for notes and pictures and music and stuff."
"Oh, sure," Duke teased. "You'll tell him but not me."
"Toru?" A woman who stood a little taller than Toru came down the aisle. She started speaking in a language neither duck understood.
Toru responded, seemingly very excited about about something. After a moment, the woman glanced at Tanya and smiled.
"Hello," she said, extending a hand. "I am Natsuko, Toru's translator. Toru works for Tokyo Applied Sciences. He is here to share his new invention, the kaijō kurīnā."
"Oh!" Tanya's face lit up. "I've see the news reports. Fascinating concept." She launched into a conversation regarding the finer points of technology that would be exposed to the elements and corrosive nature of sea water.
"Great." Duke leaned an elbow on the cart again and rested his head in his hand. "I'll be right here whenever you decide to leave techno-world."
0000
Duke had finally managed to pull them out of the store. All he had to do was get to the grocery, buy a few items, and then he could relax back at the base and not deal with rabid fans who couldn't even communicate. Not that he had issues with people who spoke different languages; it was just too annoying having to speak through a translator.
"Whoa!" He grabbed Toru's shoulder and pulled the short man out of the way of an oncoming sword. He hit the button on his quick change and shifted into combat gear.
"You wanna play with swords," he growled, "Try someone who's armed!" He ripped the saber from his shoulder and activated it. Lunging forward, he thrust at the black-clad warrior.
One of the ninjas from the museum stood before him. This one was as silent as the others had been; but, he looked bigger and more muscular. Only his eyes showed from the black cloth wrapped around his face. No part of his clothing hung loose or would provide good grips.
Tanya dropped her bags and quick changed into her battle gear as well.
"Hey!" Tanya shouted, Omni-tool raised. "Back off!" She fired.
He ran backwards, nimbly avoiding the laser blast aimed at his feet.
Duke advanced, saber ready.
The ninja met his eyes and nodded once. He and Duke began circling, neither making a move to attack, swords at the ready.
Tanya stood in front of Natsuko and Toru. She had no doubt that they were the targets and not her or Duke. That sword would have been aimed at them if that were the case. She let Duke handle him while scanning the surrounding area.
"Keep your eyes open," she warned. "There were three the last time."
"Who are they?" Natsuko's voice trembled.
"We don't know yet; but, we're working on it." She hit the emergency button on her comm to alert the rest of the team to the situation.
Toru turned his back to Tanya, watching where she couldn't.
Despite herself, Tanya kept getting distracted by Duke and the ninja. Neither one seemed willing to be the first to attack, each patiently waiting for the other.
Duke never took his eyes off his opponent, trusting his teammate to have his back if other foes appeared. He'd had more than enough experience to know to wait, to make his opponent attack first. But this guy wasn't budging. He took another step left as the foe moved right, maintaining the same distance between them.
The ninja leapt forward, sliding under Duke's blade and kicking back to knock his feet out from under him.
Duke leapt up and spun, prepared for an attack from behind.
The ninja ran towards Tanya, sword held low and ready for attack.
"Nuh-uh!" Duke lifted his wrist and shot a bola at the ninja, tripping him before he could reach is target.
Tanya leveled her Omnitool at his head, prepared to stun him if needbe.
He sliced through the ropes and lunged at Toru.
Duke's sword deflected the attack as he stepped in.
Tanya moved the scientist and translator back, using herself as a shield. She kept glancing upwards, aware of possible attack from the building above.
Ringing metal sang as their swords met and met again. Duke leaped up and spun around, landing a solid hit to the ninja's back with the flat of his blade.
The ninja knelt, one hand fisted and resting on the ground. He glanced over his shoulder at Duke and nodded once more before a puff of smoke surrounded him and spread out.
"Oh, no you don't," Duke growled, charging right into the smoke screen.
The ninja was gone.
"Coward," he muttered. "You three alright?"
"Yes, yes," Toru repeated breathlessly.
"Why were they after you?" Tanya asked. "I mean, he obviously wasn't after us. Which is, like, pretty, pretty unusual."
"Yeah," Duke sheathed his sword. "Nice change, though."
"I do not know," Natsuko's brow furrowed in worry. She began speaking to Toru in Japanese.
They conversed back and forth, seemingly growing more agitated and unsure. At the end, all they were left was a shrug and apologetic face.
The Migrator pulled up and Wildwing, Grin, and Mallory ran out, weapons at the ready.
"Looks like you two have the situation under control?" Wildwing looked over the area, the eyes of the Mask glowing red.
"Yeah. It was one of the guys from last night," Duke crossed his arms. "Question is, why would he be after a sword last night and attack these two today?"
"Hm." Wilding ran a silent scan of the humans and didn't see anything unusual about them. They were human, they had no alien tech on them or anything more advanced than the bags of new purchases that had been dropped as they exited the store.
"Great," Tanya finally noticed her purchases. "I hope nothing broke."
"How would you even know?" Duke knelt to help her.
Tanya gave him an unamused stare.
"So, this was a human attacking humans." Mallory's words would have been a question. "Doesn't sound like something for us to get involved in."
"They injured my brother." Wildwing clenched a fist. "That's all the reason I need."
"It is possible he wanted information on the kaijō kurīnā," Natsuko offered. "We are revealing it to the public tomorrow. All through testing and development, we have faced sabotage."
"Hm. What is this kaijō kurīnā?" Wildwing asked.
"It's a series of robots to clean the oceans of oil," Tanya spoke up. "I've been reading about it for the past week. It's cutting edge technology for, you know, hu-humans."
"WHAT are you bird brains up to now!" Klegghorn shouted, walking up to them. "I'm getting calls about some sort of sword fight and attempted robbery out here?"
"I'll let you two explain it," Wildwing motioned towards Duke and Tanya.
"We came outta the store; some guy tried to shish kabob these two; we stopped them."
"Yeah," Tanya nodded. "That's pretty accurate."
"I can already feel the headache starting," Klegghorn grumbled. "Alright. Who's going to file the report?"
"Not it!" Duke said quickly and headed towards his car.
"Guess it's you." Klegghorn looked at Tanya, giving her no other option.
"Fine." She handed her bags to Mallory. "Put these in my lab?"
"Sure." Mallory took them. "See you later!"
"Yeah, yeah," Tanya muttered. "This is not how I wanted to spend my afternoon."
"Hey, you guys want to run around and play hero, you do it on my terms," the short, angry human reminded. "That's our deal."
Tanya introduced him to Toru and Natsuko and started on the least fun part of her day.
