AFA Part 2

Falling from Grace

Ch. 13 – "Awake"

"Linna? Linna, are you awake?"

The young Japanese woman stirred and opened her stiff eyelids a crack. She blinked hard, blinded by the light that flooded her raw eyes. "Owwww."

"Sorry. Here, let me turn the lights down for you," the masculine voice offered.

"Thank you," she replied. The dimming lights allowed for her eyes to open fully and focus on the blond-haired man sitting next to her bed, his silhouette framed by the sunlit glow filtering through long beige curtains waving across the wall behind him. "Masaki…?"

The man froze, blinking twice before a huge smile erupted on his face. "Wait! What… what did you say!"

"Masaki?" she repeated.

"Wow! That's great! You remember me!" He reached under the blanket and cupped her hand with both of his own.

"Huh?" she asked, confused.

"The others… they said you had amnesia. They said you couldn't even remember who you were, much less anyone else. But you remember me! This is terrific!" he exclaimed. His elation began to fade as a confused look spread across Linna's pale face. "What's the matter?"

She brought her free hand up to gingerly touch the fresh bandage at the back of her neck. "I… I'm not sure…"

"You know who I am, right? Do you remember your name?"

"I think… aren't you… my brother?"

"Brother…? Hahahahaha!" He laughed, before seeing the concern still present on Linna's face. Masaki gathered himself, bowing back towards the bed. "I'm sorry. You don't have any brothers or sisters, or at least none that I know of."

"Oh, that's right. Wait! I'm Linna… Linna Yamazaki!"

"That's right!"

"And… and… oh gosh…"

"What?"

"I'm missing school right now, right?"

"School!"

"I just knew it! I knew I'd miss the landing pad on the high bar one of these days!"

"Huh?"

"That's how I hurt my neck, right? I just knew that if I didn't stretch out my knee before practice, I'd screw up my form and throw myself off to the side! Now look at me! I'm a mess!" she cried, peeking under the blankets to find out what other surprise injuries waited for her there.

"Um, Linna?"

"Yes?" she answered innocently, lowering the blanket back into place.

"You didn't hurt yourself at track."

"I didn't? Was it… was it a car accident? Are Mom and Dad okay!"

"It wasn't a car accident, and your mom and dad are fine. I talked to them this morning. They are very worried about you, y'know."

"But how did I wind up in the hospital then? Why isn't Mom here with me?"

"Linna…" Masaki began, unsure of where to start, before deciding to get more information first. "…What year is it?"

"Why it's…" She paused for a second, taxing her mind for the answer. "… 2038… I think."

"2038!" The man's eyes widened then narrowed as he decided to play along for now to see the extent of the problem. "So that makes you a senior in high school, right?"

"Yeah, right."

"And you haven't graduated yet, right?"

"Yeah. I'm supposed to finish this summer, if I can keep my English grades up. I just hate foreign languages."

"So… have you ever been to Tokyo before?"

"Well…" she started, putting one hand on her chin, as she pieced together parts of her fractured memory. "… I did get to see the national track meet last year! But that was just on the outskirts of the city. We didn't even get to do any sightseeing!" she pouted, her voice reaching almost nauseating girlish tones. "Oh! I think I remember taking this trip through the inner city though! I think we even flew in a helicopter too! And it showed the space elevator construction just starting, and the new wings at Genom headquarters and everything!"

Masaki smacked his forehead in disbelief. "You didn't take that trip through Tokyo, Linna."

"I didn't?"

"That was a TV special that aired a few years ago."

"Oh. Wait! I remember that now! It… it aired… a few years ago? But…"

"It seems like it was just on yesterday, right?"

"Well, yeah."

"Linna?"

"Yes?"

"Have you ever seen a boomer before?"

"Um… do you mean, like, in person?"

"Yes."

"Well, I don't…" she started to answer, before doubts began to swell in the back of her mind.

"And you've never worked for a company called Hugh Geit, right?"

"Hugh Geit?" she repeated weakly, even more doubts clouding her confidence.

"Have you ever heard of a group called the 'Knight Sabers'?" Masaki continued quietly, touching on the one subject he hoped would spark the remainder of her memories.

"…Knight… Sabers…?"

For Masaki, Linna didn't have to say the answer out loud… the blank glaze over her pale violet eyes told the rest of the story. He paused for a moment, waiting to see if there would be any change. When it didn't come, he leaned over and gave her a reassuring hug, even as her mind continued to toil on the question. "Just relax and get some rest for now. I'm going to get the doctor along with a couple of friends of yours, okay?"

She blinked a couple of times, then shook her head to refocus, replying with a fragile "… okay…" before settling down into the soft pillow. Unfortunately, the settling process caused a sharp pain in the back of her neck, forcing her to abandon her otherwise comfortable position and roll onto her side. As she watched Masaki leave the small hospital room and close the door behind him, her mind drifted back to his questions, and in particular the last one he had asked. "Knight Sabers… Knight Sabers… where have I heard that name before? A group? He said they were a group… is it… a band?" Something about that thought tugged at something in the recesses of her mind for just a moment, but the truth remained hidden in the distance beyond for the dazed and confused country girl.

Light crept across the bedroom floor, bathing the pristine Oriental rug with its bright hues. Sylia pulled the covers over her head, blocking out the light. The pulling action agitated the blisters on her right hand, where the match had burned down at the tip of her fingers. She hadn't found the willpower to drop the match then, much as she didn't have the willpower to even eat or get out of bed now. Sylia was now part of the living dead. Even Henderson's pleas with her hadn't moved the woman to any sort of action during the past few days, not since Jill and Katsumi had found her again, not since Linna was carted off to the hospital by a boomer that her artificial doppelganger had presumably modified.

But Galatea was merely a symptom of the problem, a virus still spreading out of control. At first, the Knight Sabers seemed to be the cure Sylia was searching for. But in her haste to stamp out the disease of her father's creation, she had inadvertently infected those around her. Now the best way to avoid hurting anyone else was to remain isolated from the world. In some respects, Sylia could see the logic in committing suicide. However, despite all the murder and butchery she was privy to in the past, regardless of all the violence her own hardsuits were capable of, and the violence she herself had wrought countless times before, she couldn't bring herself to the final solution… even if it seemed that death was the only way out of this endless nightmare she lay trapped in.

Sylia gripped the blankets tightly in both hands and curled up under the covers, hoping that eternal sleep would finally find her on this day.

"Switzerland! How did I get to Switzerland!" Linna gasped.

"Well, we didn't know who you were. The only people we thought that could answer that question were here," Katsumi explained sincerely.

"But I don't even know anyone from Switzerland!"

"The people who we knew weren't in Japan anymore, at least not since the boomer plague."

"The boomer plague?"

Katsumi let out an uneasy sigh, turning towards Jill and shrugging her shoulders. "We know more than she does at this point."

"And is that such a bad thing?" her friend remarked callously, sitting in a chair beside the window. In her lap rested an English language magazine that she held gingerly with her bandaged right arm, leafing through it with her left hand. "Maybe we shouldn't be tampering with her then."

"We have to! She's the only one who might help us find Priss!" Nene shouted.

"Priss?" Linna asked, bewildered.

"Do you remember her? Please tell me you remember her!" Nene pleaded from the other side of the bed.

"Priss… Priss… it sounds familiar…"

"C'mon, Linna, think! Please!"

That name drifted within the haze filling the country girl's mind, teasing her with its possible meanings. "I think…"

"Yes?"

"I… I think… I think I can't picture anything about her." She sighed in frustration.

Nene let out her own tired sigh in turn.

"Give her a break, Nene. She can't even remember you yet, and she's looking right at you," Jill chided.

"Well… Well… I thought that Linna might remember more about Priss because she means…" Nene suddenly stopped her speech, blushing as she pondered the consequences of revealing what she had almost blurted out.

"Means what?" Katsumi questioned curiously.

"Yeah, means what?" Linna asked too.

"Oh no." Nene hid her face behind her hands.

"What?" Jill chimed in as well, now very curious as to the meaning.

Just then, the door opened, allowing Masaki to slither through, carefully holding a tray full of four cups of coffee in his hands.

"Ah! My savior!" Nene beamed, leaping up from her chair to relieve Masaki of her cup of coffee.

The man innocently handed Katsumi her cup, oblivious to the line of questioning. "Here you are, ladies," he added, walking around the bed to hand Jill hers.

She took the cup with her good hand, then glanced up at Masaki with a flash of inspiration. "Hmm, I wonder if he might know."

"Know what?"

"What Priss means to Linna here?" Katsumi joined in.

"Yeah," Linna added, although now a little concerned about what the answer might reveal.

"Priss? And Linna?" he gulped, his eyes shifting around the room, until he found Nene hiding her face behind her coffee cup. "Am I to guess that she started this topic?" he accused, trying to avoid divulging the answer himself.

Jill saw right through his tactics. "Ahh, so you do know something, don't you?"

"Well, you see…" he started, nervously pacing into the far corner of the room. He glanced over his shoulder back at Linna, who was intently staring at him. "… all I can really say is that they are very good friends, and they mean a lot to each other."

"So what can't you say?" Katsumi baited.

"Well…" Masaki stalled, turning to face her when he noticed Jill leaning forward in her seat, preparing to cut down his denial. Finally, he noticed Linna cringing into her pillow between them, and recognized the answer right then. "… The rest is really something that is better left private for now, at least until Linna gets more of her memory back," he added diplomatically.

An audible sigh from Nene drew everyone's attention. "What!" she cried, surprised. "That's what I meant to say too!"

Jill leaned back in her seat, letting her magazine fall to the floor as she concentrated on her coffee. "I don't know. It sounds like you guys are trying to hide the obvious from us." She winked over to Katsumi. "I mean, we both remember what Sylia's like. You may not exactly be her type, Nene, but I'd be willing to bet that Linna was hand picked by Sylia for more than just her athletic ability, if you catch my drift."

Katsumi had to blush herself at some of the memories of their first times changing into the softsuits and Sylia's "reactions" to them.

Linna blinked at Jill, deeply confused. "Huh?"

Masaki sipped on his coffee, pretending not to notice.

"Actually, Priss personally picked Linna," Nene corrected, bringing the hot brew to her lips and taking a sip. The quiet hush that filled the room forced the cup down from her mouth as she glanced around to find the other four occupants of the room staring at her. "What?"

"Priss picked me? Personally?" Linna repeated.

"Well, yeah."

Masaki spat out his coffee all over the floor as Katsumi let out a telling "… oh my God…"

"Oh… sorry, so sorry," he apologized profusely. "I'll clean that up right away," he stammered, setting his coffee cup on the window ledge and beating a hasty retreat from the room.

"I guess that about explains it," Jill smirked.

"Explains what?" Linna asked nervously. "What did she pick me for!"

Nene stared at her in disbelief, then broke out laughing. The other two women joined in the contagious display.

"What! What's so funny!"

"It's… it's nothing, Linna…" Nene started to apologize, before a knock on the door silenced the laughter.

The door opened allowing a pair of doctors to enter. "Sorry to disturb you, Miss Yamazaki," the first one announced. He surveyed the occupants of the room while slowly walking towards Linna. "I'm Dr. Boynton. I performed your operation. I heard you were awake now and I wanted to personally see how you were doing."

Nene moved away from Linna's bedside to give the doctor access for his checkup. He stood beside the bed, reaching over and grabbing an electronic clearscreen hanging above the headboard. He spoke while reviewing the contents of the medical records contained there. "According to these notes, you're suffering from mild amnesia right now. Is that correct?"

"Yeah, I guess," Linna answered weakly.

The doctor glanced around the room, seeing a few nods from the other people present. "How is the pain right now?"

"Not too bad. The nurse gave me some medication a little while ago."

"I see," he confirmed from the notes on the clearscreen. "Did the nurse also talk to you about your injuries?"

"No, she said a doctor would talk to me later."

"Well, I guess that makes me that doctor then," he joked lightly. "You were brought in with a mass at the base of your neck."

"A mass?" she asked.

"Y… yes," the doctor answered a little slowly, reassessing the patient's own knowledge on the fly. "It was causing multiple neural problems, interfering with motor functions, heart reliability and breathing. We felt it was necessary to remove the mass immediately in order to increase the chance of survival. Luckily, we were able to remove it in its entirety the first time, and as you can probably see, your vitals are now stabilized now and very promising."

"But… the mass? Was it… cancer, or something?"

The man coughed nervously. "Well, our tests have shown it wasn't malignant, but I'm a little hesitant to label it as cancerous right now. We've ensured that it is properly handled," he spoke cryptically, glancing over at the cautious Jill. He recalled the pointed conversation she had had with him regarding 'the mass', and the confirmation from his old friend Meisho Henderson back at the Stingray family home. "But you're well on the road to recovery. With any luck, your memory should return over time. Of course, we'll need to do more scans of the affected area to ensure proper healing is taking place, and you will need to see a specialist for the next few months until everything checks out okay."

"Okay," Linna agreed.

"But in the meantime, can you turn over so I can check your stitch work?"

"Sure." Linna rolled over to her side while the doctor carefully peeled back the bandage.

"Hmm, the nurse needs to change this. As soon as we're done, I'll have one come in and take care of you, okay?"

"Mmhmm," she mumbled, a little unnerved.

"In the meantime, there's someone here who's been anxious to see you."

"Really?"

"I'm not sure if you remember much about how you were brought here. I was as shocked as anyone to hear of a medical rescue boomer actually enveloping a patient and carrying them to a hospital," he spoke as the other doctor motioned into the hallway.

A series of metallic clinks drew everyone's attention to the doorway as the doctor calmly glanced over his shoulder. Jill, Katsumi, Nene were stunned by the reappearance of the green hardsuit that strolled into the room.

The doctor continued to talk. "After the boomer brought you here and alerted medical staff, it found a maintenance shop and… recharged its batteries there, I guess. It patched into the hospital network to check your condition, and started sending e-mails and messages to the hospital staff when the data wasn't adequate. Finally one of the techs came and asked us to bring it up here to you…" The doctor finally turned around and noticed Linna staring at the 'medical rescue boomer', her face completely drained of color, her mouth hanging open. "… Um, Ms. Yamazaki?"

Linna wasn't paying attention to the doctor any longer. As soon she saw the boomer walk through the doorway, nightmares began flickering through the recesses of her mind. She couldn't remember anything specific, but she was sure she knew this boomer from somewhere, and that 'somewhere' wasn't good. The problem was that the more she struggled to remember, the less she was certain of. In fact, she wasn't even sure how she knew what a boomer was at all. But the more she looked at the orange visor, the sleek edges leading along the shoulders, the cold metal armor, the faster the pulsing images flashed in her mind. Images of humans… were they friends?... boomers, workers, monsters… her enemies?… then more pictures: danger, combat, struggles, injuries, rescues, space, blood, death… and then, one clear memory… The green boomer approaching her, lit by the glowing figure behind it. She was unable to escape, unable to get away. The boomer stretching one glowing hand at her head while she was struggling to get free, bound by something, someone, the glowing figure. "G-Galatea?"

"Galatea?" The doctor repeated Linna's question, momentarily confused with the forgotten word. However, repressed memories of that name came back to the doctor as he uttered a name himself. "Dr. Stingray…"

The others in the room turned towards the doctor who, like his patient, was now lost in the past. Doctor and patient stared blankly at each other, seeing, but apparently not seeing the other. Linna's past, however, began to haunt her much more realistic sense.

Through her eyes, the doctor's shape and form morphed from the elderly lab-coated man into something far more terrible. Out of his bald head flowed long black hair, his thin eyes widened into burning crimson orbs of vengeance, his white coat slimmed and curved to fit into a female body… the body of the being she knew only as an angel of death. "N-no… get away… GET AWAY!" she screamed, struggling backwards, trying to claw her way through the bottom of the mattress.

Nene ran to her friend's side, grabbing hold of one arm to try and calm her down. "Linna, what's wrong?"

Masaki burst through the door, mop in hand. He rushed over to the bed to see what he could do to help. Linna didn't even acknowledge their presence; she continued to scream and flail in apparent fear for her life. In her mind, Galatea stretched out one corrupting hand to her heart, preparing to rip her very soul out of her chest. Behind her, the hardsuit approached with its outstretched hand leveled towards her forehead, ready to shred the rest of her sanity… which was rapidly dissolving under the weight of her own fragmented memories.

The doctor at least recognized this fact and called for assistance. Katsumi and Jill could only stand back and watch in horror as Masaki and Nene fought to hold Linna down. A team of nurses and doctors came and finally managed to administer tranquilizers to the tortured woman. After a tense few moments, her eyes fluttered towards the back of her head and her body finally relaxed, collapsing into the tangled mass of sheets, wires, and tubes.

For its part, the hardsuit closely monitored the situation from the doorway. Once Linna fell unconscious, it silently turned back out the door and down the hall again, towards the maintenance bay. From there it could keep a watchful eye over its charge while remaining 'unseen', as it had been ordered before.

A few minutes later, the swarm of doctors and nurses had exited, leaving the other women and Masaki alone in the room.

"Maybe we shouldn't have brought her back here," Katsumi said, breaking the uneasy silence while glancing over at the oblivious Linna. Even in deep sleep, her troubled mind still fought whatever she had seen before as she turned her head from side to side and mumbled under each slow, labored breath.

Standing next to the seated Katsumi, Jill nodded her head. "I can only imagine what she's been through."

"I can't, and I was there for a lot of it," Nene added. Sitting in the chair closest to Linna, Nene reached over and brushed a strand of brown hair from her friend's sweat-beaded face. She turned back to Jill and Katsumi with a questioning look on her own face. "So why did you bring Linna back here anyway? Why did you want to find out who she was?"

The two women looked at each other, Katsumi shrugging her shoulders while Jill let out a deep sigh, bowing her head even as she replied to Nene's questions. "We didn't have much of a choice really. We wanted to confirm some suspicions we had about what Sylia was really up to."

"But when Sylia mentioned 'the old Sabers', she never even said you were still alive. I just assumed that the boomer had killed both of you." Nene looked up and noticed Katsumi wincing at her tale, but she wasn't sure if it was because of the boomer attack or from Sylia's impersonal treatment of their memories.

For her part, Jill just sneered. "In Sylia's mind, we were probably as good as dead. Kat and I weren't any help to her anymore, so she chose to ignore us. Then again, that e-mail I sent back to her a couple of months ago probably just cemented that fact in her thick head anyway."

"E-mail?" Nene asked, confused.

"Yeah. I guess that, since she just barely mentioned us, she wouldn't have told you that she tried to get us to come back when she found out about the Wizlab being on Genom's 'most wanted' list," Jill explained.

"But I still don't understand something," Katsumi spoke up. "If Sylia still had you three, then why did she need us too?"

"I guess she figured with that sotai thing, she needed all the help she could get," Jill surmised.

"Not exactly," Nene corrected, bowing her head as she back-peddled to the time in question. "If Sylia sent that e-mail when I think she did, I was the only one still on the team."

"Still on the team?" Katsumi asked as both former Sabers paid close attention.

Nene glanced over at the unconscious Linna and felt a sick sense of déjà-vu as she began to recount the painful events.

"I guess it all started with an office boomer. All three of us were attacking it, with Linna taking it on first. She… well… it turned out that she worked for the boomer that went rogue."

"So what?" Jill said indifferently. "It's a rogue boomer. Just kill it, right?"

"I wish she could have, or that Priss or I had," Nene said, her voice full of regrets. "But that wasn't Linna. She… she had this respect for boomers. She treated them more humanely than most people treat other people. And when she saw a boomer that she knew, I guess she just couldn't bring herself to kill it."

"Let me guess. It creamed her, right?" Jill replied unsympathetically, getting an evil glare from both Katsumi and Nene in turn. "What?"What! I'm right, aren't I?"

"Yeah, but you could be a little nicer about it, y'know," Nene countered, obviously hurt.

"It's okay, Nene," Katsumi said, trying to calm her down. "Please, what happened next?"

The former ADP officer huffed at Jill, but smiled at Katsumi as she continued. "The boomer hurt her, but I don't think it was that bad. At least, it wasn't why she wound up in the hospital afterwards."

"Hospital?" Katsumi asked, concerned.

"When we tried to rescue her, the boomer used Linna's hardsuit as a shield. Priss…" Nene paused as she recalled the stark images from the hardsuit data recorders. "… Priss tried to take out the boomer, but hit Linna with a knucklebomb instead."

"Ouch," Jill whispered, as both she and Katsumi traded glances over at the bedridden woman.

"We… we got her to a hospital. Priss… she took it real hard. She blamed herself completely."

"Since she was responsible for Linna being on the team in the first place, right?" Jill guessed.

"Yeah, I think that was a big part of it. But, even worse, somehow Linna's injuries… well, because of the accident, she found out she could never have her own kids."

Katsumi gasped at the revelation. "Oh God, that's horrible."

"And when Priss found out, that was the last straw for her. She quit right then, and Linna was taken home by her parents, thanks to Genom's help. That left just me and Sylia."

"So that explains the e-mail then," Jill spoke up. "I can only imagine what her real response was when she found out about the Wizlab, and when she realized how stretched she would be. But I still don't understand something."

"What?" Katsumi asked.

"Why didn't Sylia just come out and tell us why she really needed the help if she was so desperate? Why not tell us about Galatea?"

"I think she was afraid that if you knew the truth, you wouldn't want to help," Nene spoke up. "At least, that's why she hid the truth from me."

Jill nodded towards Nene. "Yeah, that's true. I suppose Sylia has never really been able to trust anyone in a long time."

"Especially after all the things her father did to her," Nene added. "So," the young woman continued, her voice perking up, "what did you two do after the Knight Sabers? I guess I'm hoping for some advice, since it seems like neither the ADP nor the Knight Sabers are going to be needed any time soon."

Katsumi smiled at the welcome change in topic, but then frowned as she realized where it would lead. "Well, we started a security consultation business back in the US. Jill had a lot of contacts from her military pals over there, and I'm pretty good with the cyber stuff."

"Really?" Nene perked up even further.

"Yeah! Things were really starting to build up for us. At least, until last week…"

"Once we rescued Linna from the hospital, we had to burn some bridges to make it out of the country in one piece. I don't think we'd be welcomed back with open arms right about now," Jill added grimly.

"So what about your business? What are you going to do now?" Nene looked expectantly at both of them, waiting for their plan.

Katsumi just stared back at Nene silently. She glanced over at Jill, who had her head bowed in thought.

"I suppose we've started from scratch once. We can do it again, right?" She looked up, strangely looking for support from Katsumi.

Katsumi blinked twice, then broke into a smile as she reached down and took her business partner's hand. "Yes, we can do it again."

Jill smiled in return, then glanced over in Nene's direction. "And maybe we could use a little more help in getting started. What do you think, Kat?"

Katsumi turned to face the astonished Nene. "Well, I could certainly use a hand keeping up with the cyber protection software."

Nene wasn't sure what to say. With so many things on her mind, she hadn't seriously considered life after the Knight Sabers yet. She was just happy to still be alive. And yet, it was those who weren't as lucky as she that occupied her thoughts at that moment. Foremost was the one being she was most concerned about. But as she glanced up into the expectant eyes of the two former Sabers, two people she could almost call friends now, Nene wondered if somehow, someway, things might work out for her and Mackey here in Switzerland after all…

"So, do you have it?"

"Of course. It's not like I could pass up an opportunity like this," the doctor replied flatly.

Standing close together in the unused hospital room, the two men kept their voices very low.

"Here," Dr. Boynton's assistant presented a sealed cryo-storage unit. "I'm certain that this will preserve the specimen to your specifications."

"If not, we'll be in touch again," the agent answered with a thinly veiled threat. Taking the small box by the handle, the dark-suited American reached into his jacket and pulled out a thin envelope. "Here's your material. I'm certain that it will provide the required boost to your research."

The anxious doctor grabbed the envelope from the man's hands and held it close to his chest, almost caressing it with his obsession. "Thank you for your country's business."

The agent nodded, adjusted his sunglasses, then turned and left the doctor to his vices. The man took some small measure of satisfaction from recovering the 'alien' object that had eluded some of the US government's best in Chicago not less than a week ago. On his way to the Swiss airport, he smiled, thinking of the boost his performance rankings would see. He had in his possession something that every government in the world wanted to control… a small key to the phenomenon that had nearly wiped out Japan, which in turn would be a boon to the power projection of whomever could harness its destructive power once again.

To be continued…