A/N: Again, it's been too long...again, again, again... so here's the next bit.

Chapter 17 - Catch, Release, Collapse

Siba

Teana and Subaru teleported down to the planet. They looked around at the kicked-up fog all around them. It was dark - darker than it had ever been before. They stood atop of dead leaves graves, every sound in the horizon sounded like a guillotine.

"What is this place?" Subaru asked.

"Siba." Said Teana. "Hayate told me that a lot has happened here… and that's why they need our help."

They went to their destination - the quarters on-camp of Hayate Yagami.

"Commander," Teana said. She stood at attention and Subaru did as well.

"Easy, Enforcer" said Hayate. "I'm glad you could finally make it."

"We are ready and at your service for however long it is needed. Per your orders, I am assigned to your campaign."

"I'd have half of Midchilda there with you if I got my way." Hayate sighed and walked to a table with a layout of Siba Capital on it. "Teana, Subaru, terrible things have happened here. This planet's Bureau has all but collapsed. The Midchildian Bureau has assumed temporary control of the planet for…the indeterminable future. I know that sounds contradicting. But that is the best way I can put it."

"How many of their officers are with us?" Subaru asked.

Hayate chuckled reactively. The answer to that sounded like a dark joke. "We don't know, Subaru, because so few of them chose to stay."

"Chose to stay?"

"Stay with us - with Midchilda. Siba's Bureau was fighting us with everything they had to stay out of their business - and when it got so bad that I forced a takeover, their mages left, rather than take any orders from us. Instead of being on our side to get this city back in order, so many of them now fight to oppose us."

Subaru gasped. Teana clenched her fists in anger.

"That's not right! Ugh - those brazen little…"

Hayate smiled weakly.

"Good - I'll need that kind of determination from everyone here. Given what I said, this rescue mission won't be as…kind…as I was hoping it would be. I am officially launching it as Operation class Heavy Rescue."

Teana and Subaru both nodded. 'Heavy' Rescue meant that combat was expected. High chance of targets who will need to be apprehended by force for recovery. As an Enforcer and a squadron Leader, the two girls were ready to do whatever was necessary.

"Understood, Commander!" Teana barked. She stood at attention again. "We won't let you down!"

At the base, Ferraz had made it back. She waited to find Daito and Hinode. And eventually, the boy at least came over when she called.

"Ferraz?" Daito asked.

"Oh Kaiser, am I not a Lieutenant anymore?" Ferraz joked snarkily.

"Ahm - uh - y-yeah, I'm sorry, I thought maybe someone else was my direct officer now," Daito muttered. "I can't really tell…"

Ferraz looked around the camp at all the Bureau mages that Midchilda had sent over. Aside from the boy in front of her, she didn't recognize a single face. It sickened her.

"Are you really okay with this?" she asked Daito. "Are you just going to allow this? We can fix this ourselves. Siba! Us! That opportunistic little bitch Hayate just wanted to pull the trigger on us. She was never looking for a real discussion. We never had a chance to convince Midchilda of anything we were saying. I'm not saying I was ready for everything, but I'm saying we didn't need Midchilda to pry their greedy fucking fingers in at every step!"

Ferraz was getting heated, but quickly took a breath and tried to lower her voice again. With what she was saying, she couldn't attract undue attention.

"Can you be a witness to that, Daito? Can I at least get an 'amen'? Can you also see clearly these Midchildian mages are just the few and the proud, crowding around the canals to pull you out and ration the savage out of you? Ironic when they were also the ones dropping you in and holding you under in the first place. They think you'll take any hand to get to safety, even their own. Well I'll be damned if they get another Siban on their side. I won't be another catch-and-release."

Daito glanced nervously around him. Ferraz was starting to scare him.

"F-Ferraz?" he asked, "what are you saying?"

"I'm saying that I am not helping them take over our planet. I'm leaving - and you need to come with me."

The older mage grabbed Daito's arm tightly and started to pull him with her as she turned to walk away. Daito, in shock, tried to pull free of her grasp.

"Wait - huh? Ferraz, let go of me!"

"Trust me, Daito. I know you don't get this yet but it's for your own good."

The younger boy dug his feet in as best he could, resisting against every step. His reaction was still a wash of sudden panic and disbelief. His attempts to respond left just stuttering and little else.

"W - wait! I - no, no, I can't-"

"This Bureau is not your home anymore, Daito. They're not our Bureau, and they are not our allies!"

As Daito finally processed what his superior was trying to do, and as he looked back and saw that no one would come to his aid unless he did something first, he gathered the courage to fight back. The boy reached in his pocket for the blue gem of his device.

"No!" he cried. He pulled the gem out and Boden activated immediately, the halberd-like weapon forming without hesitation. Ferraz looked back at Daito just in time to see the blue blade of energy swinging towards her, and she dodged out of the way. She released Daito in the process though, and now the boy was glaring at her with Boden at the ready.

"Daito! You -"

She was about to escalate when she heard voices coming from where she and Daito had just been. The boy had done enough to bring attention to them, and obviously the Midchildian officers would not want Ferraz getting away with this either. Frustrated, the woman grunted through clenched teeth.

"Fine. You stay with them. But I'm not giving in."

Ferraz turned and ran as the voices got closer. They maybe got a glimpse of her before she ducked out of sight, but they didn't follow. Maybe if Daito had run after her, the Midchildians would have too, but the boy just looked on at the empty road in front of him and slowly deactivated his device. Something about how this had played out felt…definite. A clean cut between Ferraz and him needed to be made.

Now in the city, Teana and Subaru were gathering the masses. The pooren shifted around them like they were a light on the bleak-grey strand of the deserted ground. Both mages were now in their barrier jackets. Teana rested Cross Mirage at her side in one hand as she beckoned the scene in front of her.

"Come on, now," she called. "We'll get you to safety."

People stood as if to decorate the spine of the road they stood on. The mumbling pieties slowly shuffled into an order. That is, until the sound of pained voices echoed in the distance - but yet close by. The group froze, and then as the voice was heard just as fervent but closer now, the group began to scatter away from Teana and Subaru.

"Wait!" Subaru cried, "don't run!"

From the black, a figure stepped out of it like a zombie. The figure had two long energy swords - one in each hand - and both were active. The man stumbled forward towards the two girls.

"Identify yourself," said Teana.

"You should know…"

"Well, I don't, so do you mind saying?"

Her question was met with a painful rumbling roar from the figure that seemed to shake the earth below them. The two braced themselves to stay upright. Teana raised her device now, aiming the pistol forward.

"Cross Mirage, who is this?" she asked her device. Quickly, it answered her.

[TARGET IDENTIFIED - "SKIDROADER" - THE MOST DANGEROUS SERIAL KILLER IN THIS PLANET'S DATABASE]

"R - really?" Subaru shook.

"Yes!" Skidroader yelled. "I've been killing over and over!...and I can't stop."

That's when Teana and Subaru both noticed that his hands had actually been removed, and the swords were literally stiched into the severed stumps that were left over.

"I have to kill…I cannot bring myself to stop myself. They say, if I don't kill 100 times each day, they'll explode the bomb inside me…and that's why you're the next ones in my spree!"

He ran at them, flailing wildly. Teana aimed Cross Mirage so it would be quick.

"Take the shot." Subaru said.

Teana fired. The energy burst went perfectly right in between the guy's clavicles so it hit the center part of his throat, bursting through his neck and out the other side. He dropped to the ground, gasping and bleeding out from the holes. As his moves become dimmer, the two girls walked over. The man laid on his back, his eyesight fading, but he could still see the two silhouettes of the mages. He raised one hand into the air and began to whisper.

"Our Kaiser lies in the evening sky. The clouds are red about her.
I am here, Miss Olivie, I am running through the long grass.
O take me with you, dropping behind the woods,
Far away, to the heart of light, the silence.
For I am ready to give you my breath, my life,
The shining circle of the sun, the sun and your ember."

The light left from the rotting wood and his hand dropped. He was lifeless. Just then, Fate T. Harlaown dropped down and the other two spun to face her.

"Fate!" said Teana.

"Easy," Fate answered. "I'm glad to see you could join us."

"It is our duty," said Teana.

"Indeed. You can see it is not safe out here. I have been monitoring our efforts in the Capital alongside Signum and Vita. You have been doing well for yourself, but watch your back."

Fate looked out at the horizon. Bardiche glowed in her hand.

"We can account for the scars in our sides, yet we are not privy to the thoughts that we discard. This planet broke the font from which they sup; they bit hard upon the nape of their chaste and drew blood. I can only hope our efforts are enough to save them."

"Agreed."

Fate nodded.

"Good luck out there, Enforcer. I must continue on my task."

Fate flew into the air again.

"I'll make you proud, Fate!" Teana yelled after her. Then, she turned to her partner.

"We should keep moving as well, Subaru."

The blue-haired girl smiled as she skated next to her friend.

"I'll stick with Tia wherever we go."

These throws of rapture, kindly hands caress broken bones, hands that cut through parched soul like a sharpened stone. What is it that we leave in these fitting moments? Sentiment? These curtains fall and wrap us up in our rigor mortis, the nimble fingers of the black one, his majesty of cold, courting me into sweet abeyance. The malign steely touch of needle thorns massing and directing their gaze on my misfiring neurons. The vestiges of my sickening life, of my loves, my crowning glories, the pain and poetry of a spent existence. He coils up inside me now, kissing me and whispering sweet nothings. The words of release, the words I crave as I lose all, as the clotted mass of cumuli nimbus bows his head in salute. As i claw upwards, as i fall back into oblivion and his words speak out amongst the frightening turbulence, those final fleeting words i coax from his abhorrent throat. "Will you join my owsla?"

Fall of Efrafa - Simulacrum