Hacker of Solomon
Chapter 2: A Not So Ordinary Day
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the Witch Hunter Robin characters, blah blah blah. But I wish I did. ^_~ The plotline, however, is all mine!
Rating: safely PG-13, for language and violence.
Summary: Something happens to Michael, landing him in a coma at the hospital. But when Solomon immediately sends a replacement hacker, suspicions arise in the STN-J. Is this some plan cooked up by those down at HQ, or are things not what they seem?
Author's Note: I HAVE THE HTML FIGURED OUT! *bounces* Sorry for all of those who had to put up with those lousy html tags. It's all better now!
And I hate to say this, in reply to some reviews, this isn't exactly going to be a RobinxMichael story. In fact, it probably isn't going to revolve around any couples. Just little hints of it, nothing really big. But you can tell that I'm allowing Robin to have some attraction for Michael, but the story unfortunately is not going to dwell on it. Gomen nasai for anyone who was hoping for that! ^_^
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Hahahahaa...
Michael moaned softly, that horrid noise still echoing inside his head. The world was dark... perhaps it was all just a dream? He opened his eyes, expecting to see the blinking light of his computer screen on standby, or perhaps the illuminated window. But he didn't. All was darkness. He blinked, and realized he wasn't laying down. He wasn't even sitting, nor could he be considered standing. There was no floor, no wall, nothing. He was just suspended in darkness.
"What's going on here?!" he gasped, and his voice echoed around him eerily, causing terror to ripple through him. He twisted around, trying to figure out where he was. Trying to piece together what had happened.
Memories came to him slowly. The hacker... that's right! Someone had hacked through his impenetrable firewall... the messages... the Ring of Ogham... the laughter... the pain...
What had happened to him?
"Hello there, sir hacker," said a quiet, yet cold voice Michael spun around in midair, having trouble making his floating body stop. But he saw nothing but black.
"Wh-who are you!" he shouted, his voice failing to stay steady. "What the hell have you done to me?!"
"Heh heh heh..." the voice chuckled, and something appeared in the corner of Michael's vision. He spun around and his mouth fell open.
It was a kid, maybe ten-years-old, standing before him. He was a sickly-looking child, with dark hair that greatly contrasted his white skin. The boy opened his eyes, and a spasm of fear filled Michael.
The child had no pupils... no irises... just a blinding whiteness.
It's. . . a witch. . . Michael realized.
"What have you done to me?!" Michael shouted again, his voice wavering in fear.
The child didn't answer, just continued staring at Michael with his blazing eyes.
"You..." the child said softly, with a wry smile that made Michael's stomach flip-flop. "You should not yell at me..."
The child lifted his hand, and somehow, Michael knew what was coming.
"No! No STOP!"
But it happened anyway. The same pain that had wracked through his body before filled him again. A scream ripped from his mouth, and he heard it echoing in the darkness around him..
Oh, God! his mind cried out. Please! Make it stop! Please!!
But for what seemed like hours, it wouldn't. By the time it did, Michael was sure that he would open his eyes and see the Grim Reaper bearing down on him, but he found that he couldn't open them. His whole body seemed to have shut down.
"Now," said the child's voice in his ear. "You are going to tell me what I need to know... about the STN-J. . ."
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Sakaki turned sharply around a corner, expertly maneuvering his motorcycle through the midmorning traffic. He took a sideways glance at his watch, then swerved to the right to pass a slow-moving car. Or, well, perhaps it was going the speed limit, but Sakaki could care less. It was moving slower than he was.
He was late. Over two hours late. He had slept right through his alarm clock. Still cursing himself inside his head, he picked up his speed even more, darting illegally between two lanes of unmoving traffic.
Suddenly he screeched himself to a halt as he unsuspectingly reached an intersection. He glared up at the red light. Turn, he urged it. Turn green, damnit!
As though hearing him, it did. He shot forward, quickly changing lanes in front of a black car, and then turned sharply down a side street toward the STN-J.
He slowed down a little as he reached the end of the street, then hit the brakes to avoid running out in front of traffic. The STN-J building was right around the corner. He peered around the corner and blinked.
There was a factory truck stationed outside it, along with several other cars.
"What the hell?" he asked himself out loud. His tires squealed as he turned the corner, and almost immediately turned again, down into the parking garage. He brought himself to a halt in one of the smaller parking spaces, right next to Robin's Vespa. He wrenched the helmet off his head and glanced quickly around as he darted for the stairs. Everyone else was there. He wondered if even Dojima had beaten him.
"Oof!" he grunted loudly as he slammed right into something big and squishy. He stepped a few paces back and saw an overgrown Factory worker standing before him, in one of the creepy suits they often wore, but his headgear was taken off and he was carrying a clip board.
"Watch where you are going!" he bellowed, walking past angrily. Sakaki glared after him.
"Well, excuuuuuse me!" he muttered under his breath, continuing his walk to the elevator, his mind full of curiosity, as well as a sense of foreboding. What the hell had happened to make the Factory come to the STN-J? He pushed a button and the elevator ascended upwards. Sakaki saw, as each floor passed quickly before him, that there were several Factory personnel on every floor. By the time he reached the top floor, he was beside himself with wonder.
"Sakaki!" Kosaka's angry voice greeted him angrily as the elevator's door creaked open. Sakaki stepped out and saw the chief leaning against the wall beside the door to the office. He turned to face the young hunter, his arms crossed and his face screwed up tightly in anger. "Where the hell have you been?!"
"Slept through my alarm clock," Sakaki said with a yawn, sauntering over with his hands in his pockets. He supposed his disposition was a little too cheery, because Kosaka's face went purple in fury.
"Apparently you can't hear the communicator either, even after ten times! Can't you see, we have a situation here?"
"Well, what is it?"Sakaki asked, passing the chief and looking into the office.
He had never seen it in such disarray. Several Factory employees were rummaging through the desks, and several more could be seen working on the computers. Only one hunter could be seen amongst them, and that was Amon. He sat at Michael's computer, his face emotionless, but one could tell by the way he slumped over the keyboard, and the pace in which he typed that he was frustrated.
"What's going on?" Sakaki asked the chief again. The balding man opened his mouth to reply when another voice interrupted.
"Sakaki! How could you just stroll in late like this?!"
Sakaki turned around, a sense of shock filling him. Doujima had appeared, and was stomping over to him with a look that suggested he had done the most heinous crime one could commit.
"What are you talking about? You always-."
"Something happened to Michael! But no! You decide to just sleep in, not bother with the communicator after ten-."
"Wait, what?!" Sakaki gasped, the situation finally registering in his head. He glanced over at Amon, who glanced up, as though sensing his gaze, and then back down at his screen. He looked back at Dojima, who seemed to have forgotten her anger and looked down at the floor solemnly.
"Robin found him this morning . . . We don't know what happened to him, or when. We just figure that it must have been a witch . . . "
"A witch . . . got Michael??" Sakaki said softly, unable to believe it. He took another look around. It just didn't seem possible. The office had such a tight security, how could a witch have attacked him? "Where is Michael now?"
Dojima didn't reply, merely shook her head a little, eyes cast down toward the floor. Then, she turned and walked off. Slightly confused, Sakaki followed her. She reached the small lounge beside the coffee maker, and Sakaki peered over her shoulder and felt his stomach turn over a little.
There he was, stretched out on the couch. All of the other STN-J members were there, surrounding their fallen hacker. Even Zaizen was there, whose unreadable face stood out amongst the grave expressions everyone else had adopted. Karasuma was kneeling beside Michael, a hand lightly touching his unnaturally pale forehead, with a look of deep concentration on her face. On the chair beside her sat Robin, who stared quietly in front of her, in a sort of daze. Sakaki noticed that she was clutching Michael's CD player tightly in her hands. Also there was a man Sakaki had never seen before. Perhaps he was another Factory worker, except he wasn't wearing the uniforms they were known for, but instead a white lab coat. Sakaki then noticed a bag lying at the man's feet, which said "Dr. Sukiyama."
"Have you felt anything?" Dojima asked Karasuma in a hushed voice. Karasuma lifted her eyes up to the blonde hunter, and then dropped it again, sighing.
"Nothing."
Nobody said anything. In fact, the mood of the room was so melancholy that Sakaki couldn't take it. An exasperated sigh accidently escaped his lips as he turned his back on them.
"Hey!" Doujima growled at him in warning.
"Well, if someone would just tell me what's going on . . . !" Sakaki replied, a twinge of annoyance in his voice.
"Hey," said a deep voice from the computers. Sakaki looked up to see Amon looking their way. "Come here. Take a look at this."
Sakaki walked on over, accompanied by Karasuma, Dojima, and Zaizen. He looked over Amon's shoulder, and saw that he had a file opened on the computer. It was a message in a funny sort of language Sakaki had never seen before.
"What is that?" asked Doujima. "Russian or something?"
"Gaelic," Amon said. "It's a part of a message that was sent through the computers when we got hacked last night."
"Hacked?!" Sakaki gasped in shock. He glanced at the others, who glared back. Clearly, they already knew that part of the story. "But you would think, after that last time . . . I thought Michael fixed it!"
"I'm still trying to figure out how they did it"
"If we decode this message," began Zaizen, "perhaps we could get some clue as to who-."
But a sudden loud, heart-wrenching scream interrupted him, and caused all of them to jump a good food in the air. It only took a split second to figure out who it was.
"Michael!" Robin's voice could be heard over the outcries. Everyone in the room hurried immediately over to the lounge. Sakaki forced himself through two Factory workers and felt his breath catch in his throat.
Michael was thrashing around, his face screwed up, mouth wide as he cried out, as though in great, agonizing pain. Amon had hurried forward, and he and the other man, Dr. Sukiyama, grabbed the boy and held him down. Sakaki threw a look toward Robin, who was standing, her hands thrown over her mouth, face frozen in a look of terror.
"Sakaki!" Amon shouted at him. Without clarification, Sakaki ran over and threw himself on the young man's flailing legs. Amon pressed himself against Michael's chest, pinning his arms down, allowing the doctor to pull back. He knelt beside a small bag next to the couch, reached inside and pulled out a large syringe, and stuck it into a tube of clear liquid. Sakaki swallowed hard and looked away, a burning sensation shooting through his lungs as Michael managed to knee him in the ribs several times.
Then, the thrashing began to calm down, then stopped all together. Sakaki released his grip and looked up to see the man putting the now empty syringe back in the bag, and closing it.
"Wh-what happened?" Dojima said in a high, shaking voice, staring wide-eyed down at Michael in shock.
"It was like, he was having a nightmare . . . " Karasuma said softly, almost to herself, her eyes surveying the hacker intently.
"A nightmare . . . " Robin repeated, so softly that nobody heard her.
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By closing time, it was still unclear what happened to Michael, or what happened to the computers. Michael was taken down to the hospital so his condition could be monitored. But because of his imprisonment, someone had to keep guard of him full-time. The hunters didn't understand it, although they didn't question it. Deep down, they all felt that Zaizen was being paranoid about it all. It wasn't like Michael was just going to wake up suddenly and then tell the nearest nurse every secret he knew about the STN-J. Young Robin had volunteered to watch over the boy that night.
Amon was the only one left in the office. Everyone else had decided to call it a night. He sat at Michael's computer, his eyes itching from staring at the bright screen for so long. He paused only to take several sips of coffee, and then returned again to typing.
Around eight o'clock, the telephone rang.
"Amon," Zaizen's voice came unexpectedly through the receiver. "I need to speak with you in my office."
Amon returned the phone to it's place and got to his feet, his back cracking at the sudden movement. He looked at his screen with a short surge of hatred going through his body, not at Zaizen, but at the computers. At the hacker. After hours of working, practically non-stop, he was no closer to figuring out who was behind it. And now he was about to tell Zaizen of his failure.
"Working late, I see," said Zaizen, his chair turned away from Amon as he stepped into the office.
"Yes. And it seems you are too," Amon said, his voice calm, even bored sounding.
"I just received a message from HQ. It appears they are going to send us a new hacker."
Amon blinked in disbeleif.
"What?!" he asked, his voice unable to hide his shock. "But how did they know we even needed one?"
Zaizen turned his chair around and fixated his stern eyes on the dark hacker. "I was wondering the same thing..." He then reached out and grabbed his flat-screen monitor then swivelled it around so Amon could read it.
The email was short, only several sentences long, and all it said was that a new hacker was arriving in the next week to aid them in the weeks following. It didn't even say who it was, exactly where he was from, or even if it was a him. But it was pretty clear from the message that they knew about Michael's condition.
"So, what do you think?" Zaizen asked sharply
"They act as though we asked for a new one," Amon said quietly, "And everything else is so vague..."
"Yes, and as you are well aware, I haven't, nor had any intention of asking Headquarters for a new hacker. I feel you are quite suited for our needs right now."
"So why do you think they are sending us another one?"
Zaizen didn't say anything for a moment. He stared at his cigar for a moment, then glanced out the window.
"There are people working for Solomon with amazing skill, Amon. I'm beginning to wonder if they have anything to do with what happened last night..."
This comment took Amon by surprise. Of course, some part of him had thought that, just as he had thought it suspicious when Robin was sent. He wouldn't put it past Solomon to do something like it, but his question still remained unanswered.
"So, what are you planning on doing?"
"I want you to look into this," Zaizen said. "I would like you to find out anything you can about this hacker. This will be our top priority for the moment."
"Yes, sir," Amon said. "Is that all?"
"For the moment."
Amon bowed slightly, then left the office. Zaizen stared after him, then reached over and pressed a button on his phone.
"Yes?" said a man's voice through the speakerphone.
"It's me. I don't think we have much time. I want you to begin as soon as possible."
"Everything is prepared. Would you like us to wait for Amon to leave?"
"No. Don't bother. You can continue with him in there. He will understand."
"Alright." There was a click, and the office was silent once more. Zaizen inhaled deeply on his cigar before putting it out in it's ashtray.
The hacker was going to be there tomorrow. He could tell. And this hacker was going to have to be under complete surveillance. He would not allow Solomon to do what he had a feeling they were trying to do.
They were not going to catch him off-guard again.
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Well, that's it for now! The next chapter is partially completed, but it'll take me awhile yet. ^_^ As always, I enjoy your critiques, criticisms, complaints, rants, raves, etc. Oh, I suppose compliments are good too. Thanks to all who have been reviewing!
Until next chapter…
~Lighty~