Venom Coursing
Author's Notes: The Second arc of Venom Coursing continues, special thanks goes out to Tempest Dynasty for helping to provide me medical insight as well as insight into weapons. I also must thank him for editing this for me.
Chapter 8 – A Few meetings today
Michael sighed heavily. Today was a big waste of time; his mission was to find three missing FOXHOUND operatives: Nathan Cole, Angela Nelson and John Barton. All three had disappeared after reporting their successful mission and had not been heard from in two weeks.
Michael decided any further searching today was fruitless as he placed his hands in his trench coat. He then realised something and decided to take this opportunity to visit someone he had not seen in a while.
As he walked, Michael thought about the first time he met Yukimura
A young boy sat sobbing in a street. His father had again beaten him for reasons he couldn't understand; the man ranted about him going to Hell and about God.
"What's wrong?" asked a warm voice.
The boy looked up and saw a tall man; he had greyish black hair and greyish blue eyes, which contained warmth and concern in them. The man was dressed in a coat and jeans. When he saw how cold Michael was, he put his coat on the boy.
"Where are your parents?"
"Daddy he…he…"
"Come on. I'd better get you somewhere. What's your name?"
"Michael…Michael Hansen…" there was something about the man that made the boy want to trust him.
"I'm…Genjiro…Genjiro Sanada."
Michael headed towards an all too familiar place—he had lived here since he was six. He left at sixteen to join the U.S. Army and was later accepted for Special Forces training. It was an old dojo, with a few modern conveniences (the owner liked to keep it as close to the original as possible). Simple, modest, and rather traditional, it was a physical representation of certain martial beliefs.
He was about to head to the door when he suddenly he looked around and saw a tall man with long greyish-black hair and greyish blue eyes. The man looked to be in his twenties wearing a simple, well-worn kimono.
"Hello Yukimura-sensei," Michael greeted the man warmly.
"Michael!" Yukimura responded and they both embraced. "How have you been Michael?"
"I've been fine."
"Come on inside, please."
They were already catching up on times as they walked into the building.
No one would have guessed that Yukimura was actually over 440 years old and was even a legendary samurai warrior. It was the one battle he was particularly famous and made into a legend. He never liked to talk about it.
They talked as Yukimura served him some tea catching up on old times but then the subject came to Maria.
"I'm sorry Michael I've only heard about Maria's death recently."
"That's alright."
"So anyway…I hear you're working for FOXHOUND these days."
"How did you…?" Michael was taken aback. How could have he known already?
"Oh come on, Michael, you should know by now," laughed Yukimura and they simply spent the day catching up…
Yukimura sighed tiredly. It had been an hour since Michael left and he remembered how he had come into his care: he was on his way back to his hotel room having left the graveyard when he found Michael first…
Yukimura had not heard from Michael in days and was beginning to worry. When he approached the Hansen house, he heard a scream and shouting. Immediately he sprinted through the yard and through the yawning front door. Yukimura rushed into a hallway and saw Wilhelm Hansen banging his shoulder against a door wielding a knife in one hand.
"Get out of there you worthless good for nothing! You're nothing but a blight! Worthless! You would hang with devils! You fucking deserve to die! You deserve to be-"
The man did not get a chance to continue his rant as he harshly thrown away from the door and was subjected to a harsh glare from Yukimura.
"You! You would use your religion as an excuse for THIS?" Yukimura was outraged. He was old enough to remember a time where Christians committed atrocities during the time of Nobunaga Oda, when they used religion as an excuse to terrorise and persecute people and sow their hate of each other.
Wilhelm tried to attack Yukimura with a knife, stabbing sloppily at the Japanese man. Yukimura reacted quickly, kicking the weapon out of the fanatic's hand and sending it into the ceiling. He then landed a vicious blow to the man's jaw. Stumbling, Wilhelm ran out the door, but Yukimura decided to leave him as his main concern was for Michael. He knocked on the locked door worriedly.
"Michael!" he called to the boy between knocks. "Michael! It's me! Open up!"
After a minute, the door slowly creaked open and revealed a frightened young boy, tired and his face streaked with tears. Yukimura placed his hands on the boy's shoulders.
"Michael," Yukimura began soothingly. "Are you alright?"
"I…I…" Michael began but the boy collapsed into Yukimura's shirt, wrapping his arms around him and sobbing loudly.
"It's alright Michael." Yukimura said gently embracing the child "You're going to be alright…"
Since then Yukimura took Michael into his custody and taught the boy Sanada martial arts. The 444-year-old samurai honed and learned the art for over centuries, first learning Jiujutsu and Kenjutsu. He adopted other styles over the centuries, including Kenpo, Karate, and Aikido. It was a year later he told the boy of his real name.
Michael was a great student the boy learned well, adjusting to new styles and training very quickly. Yukimura had the privilige of meeting General Heidern; the soldier became Michael's second martial arts teacher. This was how Michael learned to combined both Sanada style martial arts and Heidern assassination techniques into a formidable style. Yukimura was always proud of Michael's progress.
Mana Kirishima staggered along a blurry path, still clutching a MO Disk. Her mission had gone wrong; her back up got careless and failed to finish off a spy. The spy had shot the backup in the back and her in the stomach. She did not think the bullet hit any vital organs, and fortunately the spy died before he could fire another shot.
Mana resisted pain as she was trained to do, but soon she fell to her knees, blood still pouring out of that wound.
Michael was close to his hotel room when he heard a noise he saw a trial of blood cautiously he kept his hand on his Colt Delta Elite, ready to draw as he followed the trail. He then noticed a young maroon-haired girl of about ten or eleven years old, clutching at a gunshot wound.
The soldier immediately rushed to the girl and assessed her condition: she was losing a lot of blood from the gunshot wound. His mind wondered if the bullet hit any organs, but he couldn't take the risk of extracting it himself. He went for a nearby payphone and called the Emergency Services.
"There's a little girl—she's been shot with a semi-automatic pistol! It looks like she's lost a fair amount of blood and I don't know if the bullet hit any vital organs," Michael then gave the operator the location, heard the confirmation, and quickly returned to the girl.
The girl groaned and looked up at Michael with teary eyes. He knew she needed medical treatment as soon as possible and she looked incoherent. Michael rushed back to his car to grab his first aid kit, making record time returning. He found a box and very gently propped her legs, then took a bandage out and pulling the girl's shirt up slowly. Then he carefully applied the bandage, keeping it tight but not constricting. Touching the girl's face, Michael found that she was terribly cold. Shock was quickly setting in and she needed to be kept warm. Pulling a mylar blanket from the kit, he gently wrapped the girl in it.
Next to the girl he found an MO disk. Suspicious, he quickly picked it up and stuffed it into his jacket. Just then he heard an ambulance approach. He ran to the edge of the alley, pressing himself against a wall covered in shadows. But he had to make sure the paramedics found the girl.
"Over here!" yelled Michael as he temporarily broke his position then returned, peeking over the edge as paramedics rushed in andfound Mana. Michael knew this was his cue to leave as he was still on a mission and must maintain a low profile. That thought in mind, he left the scene as quickly as possible.
Tomoyuki Kirishima was in his office when his phone rang he promptly picked up the phone,
"Yes?"
"Mr Kirishima, your niece has just been brought in. She's been shot in the abdomen. She is in critical but stable as the bullet missed vital organs. You should come immediately to see her."
"Indeed…" Kirishima replied as he noted down the name of the hospital "Thank you."
Kirishima then hung up and thought hard on his next course of action. He knew that Tagawa was found dead. That fool got so careless that he got shot in the back of the head! And what about the disk? Did Mana have it?
"Agents Kuromoto, Hitachi, and Yamagawa, report to my office immediately."
Five minutes later the three agents arrived, Kirishima acknowledged them with a mere nod
"There was an bungled operation due to Agent Tagawa's carelessness. He is dead, and Agent Kirishima has been wounded. Their mission was to kill a spy and retrieve tan MO Disk containing dangerous information. In the wrong hands, it could ruin us. Agent Kirishima is still alive; I found about this a few minutes ago and I know the location of the hospital. Your orders are to question her about the disk and once you are done questioning…terminate her."
Michael was now back in his hotel room. Fortunately the police had not noticed him as he left. He would have stayed with the girl, but he was on a mission and needed to keep a low profile. The last thing he needed were questions from either hospital staff or from the police.
He sat down in front of a laptop he kept then inserted the MO disk. After an hour of effort and hacking he managed to figure out the password, thanks to a hacking program designed by Mei Ling. What he saw disturbed him greatly.
It was a list of names with various designations. They included subject, controller or hunter. He also saw a host of methods of brainwashing someone. He went through the rest but was in for a shock. Michael saw the names of the operatives he was looking for but these were termination orders for all three of them. Even worse, they had used Angela to carry them out! Brainwashed, she killed her partners then promptly terminated by agents of some organisation called Muchitsujo. From the information available, it looked like some kind of special agency, one of many that were created during the Cold War.
Michael wondered why the girl would have this, but then a thought struck him. What if the girl was in danger? Thinking carefully, he knew the paramedics would take her to the nearest hospital with a trauma centre. He had to research carefully but quickly.
Michael arrived at the hospital that best matched the criteria. He went to the lobby and walked up to the receptionist.
"Excuse me, is there a 11 year old girl here?" Michael asked then gave a description of the girl.
"Ah yes, Mana Kirishima? She's in critical but stable condition, and she's resting now."
"That's good news. May I see her?"
"What's your name and relation to the patient?"
"Michael Hansen. I'm her godfather," Michael replied, hoping that the excuse would pass.
"Very well Mr. Hansen." The receptionist handed Michael a visitor's pass "She's in the intensive care ward room 14. There are three police detectives interviewing her. They may ask you questions, just to warn you."
"Detectives?"
"Yes they came in a couple of minutes before you."
"Thank you."
Michael headed into the corridor then made his way to the room the receptionist directed him to. Michael felt suspicious of these 'detectives.' They could be real, but they could also be impostors. Either way, he needed to tread carefully and get the girl to a safer place.
He quickly found the room and suddenly found himself flanked by two men in black business suits. One was pointing a Beretta at him and the other had his gun off to the side. Both the weapons had suppressors and this right away told him that these men were certainly not police officers.
"Who are you?" demanded one of the men.
Michael did not answer and quickly sized up the situation as the men came closer. He struck quickly, grabbing the arm of the closest man and threw him to the ground. Before his partner could fire, Michael kicked him in the stomach and knocked the gun out of his hand with a second kick. The other man's gun was kicked away as well, and as the first man tried to stand, Michael rushed in to catch him in the jaw with a rising kick. An axe kick then crashed down on the man's back, dropping in him once again. Reacting instinctive, Michael ducked, avoiding a wild punch aimed for his head. The FOXHOUNDer's retaliation came in the form of a low sweep kick, knocking his opponent down. Moving with the momentum, a second aerial spinning kick lashed out to strike the falling man. Michael then took this time to move into the room and silently congratulates himself for successfully emulating one of his friend's techniques.
As the two men were stunned, Michael readied a ceramic knife he had tucked away in his pants. Alarm filled his being as he noticed the third of the suited men aimed a pistol it at the girl. Michael wasted no time and threw his knife, hitting the man in the throat, slicing through the carotid artery. The result was a panicky would-be hitman screaming and struggling with a blade lodged in his throat. His final act was to shoot a round into the ceiling, most certainly alerting the entire building of trouble.
Michael retreived his knife then looked at the girl who regarded with obvious and frightened suspicion. He would have to act quickly, as the men were quickly coming around and the hospital had most likely reacted to the scream and gunshot.
"If you want to live come with me." Michael said to her, his eyes bearing straight into her own.
The girl Mana slowly nodded at Michael. The soldier looked around; carrying her would be risky even if he were careful. Fortunately, he saw a wheelchair in the corner of the room. Helping the girl into the wheelchair, he wheeled her out into the hall, keeping to the less-travelled paths and avoiding large crowds. The panic caused by the gunshot might keep attention off him…
Tomoyuki Kirishima received a call on the phone,
"Yes?"
"Sir. It's Kuromoto something went wrong," the man's voice sounded pained.
"What do you mean? This was a simple operation."
"It was complicated, Yamagawa's dead."
"What happened?"
"Someone came in. He looked suspicious so Hitachi and I approached him. He took us by surprise—knocked us both out. Then he entered Agent Kirishima's room and killed Yamagawa."
"And?"
"I believe he's some kind of operative or former operative. He obviously has extensive training and is likely a seasoned field man. I'm not too sure."
"Describe him."
"He was a foreign man in his thirties, he looked European but had a slight Asian look to him."
"Did the hospital staff find Yamagawa's body?"
"No, sir. We were able to remove him without being seen."
"Good. Return immediately." Kirishima ordered as he replaced the phone into the cradle. He had to find the man and Mana as soon as possible.
Michael drove back to the hotel room, Mana resting in the passenger seat. He brought Mana in through a back entrance, to his hotel room, finally to the bedroom. He noticed her wincing and gasping in pain and remembered that she had been off the drip for a bit now, and she was now feeling the pain. A quick rife through his soldier's medkit revealed several emergency syringes of morphine.
"Your name is Mana right?" Michael asked but the girl did not answer. The veteran soldier sighed; he knew the girl wouldn't trust him right away despite the fact he saved her life.
Michael got the morphine ready for injection then looking into the young girl's suspicious eyes he spoke seriously,
"I'm not going to hurt you, I wish to help you."
Mana nodded though she still looked suspicious. She didn't put up any resistance as Michael helped her into the bed and injected the morphine. He went out to the living room and reclined into a chair. This was obviously big and Michael knew he couldn't handle it alone. Tapping his Codec on, he made the call and hoped it wasn't Reese.
Fortunately, Campbell answered the call.
"Colonel. I've found some information on the missing FOXHOUND operatives…" Michael then laid it all out, him finding Mana, the MO Disk and its contents. "So that's it, Colonel. This looks pretty nasty and it doesn't look we're dealing with terrorists. They've brainwashed them into working for them. I believe I will need some backup for this one."
"I see." Campbell replied "I can spare Berserker Demon and Dark Eden. They are both in Japan, I also will need that disk transported to us ASAP. I will send Black Cougar as a courier to get it back to us, understood?"
"I understand Colonel," Michael replied.
"Good. Cougar should be with you soon."
Michael sighed and he spent the next hour watching over the girl. It was another half an hour later that he felt someone nearby. Picking up his Colt, he went back into the living room and saw a familiar face, thus lowering his weapon.
"You're here earlier then I expected."
"I was in the area, the Colonel contacted me about the disk so I came here as quickly as possible," the person replied, brushing some dirt off his black uniform.
Michael knew the man as Trang Nguyen Han, a ninja master of the Iga Clan and a member of FOXHOUND, code named 'Black Cougar.' The man was Vietnamese but was adopted into the Iga Clan when he was six.
"I have it right here." Michael replied producing the MO Disk and handing it to Trang.
"Demon and Eden will join you soon, good luck Venom."
"You too."
With that Trang left and Michael was left alone with Mana.
It was two hours later that Michael heard a knock at the door. Picking up his Colt, he leaned himself against the door with his pistol ready. He peered through the peep hole and saw two familiar faces, killing off all the tension. Putting his gun away, he opened the door and welcomed two of his friends and coworkers, Garland Durev and Maggie Thompson.
"Why hello Garland, Maggie," Michael greeted them, inviting them inside.
"Campbell contacted us and he told us you needed back up," Garland was first to speak.
"That's right. How much did he tell you?"
"Not much he said you would brief us," Garland replied.
"Alright…" Michael began then he went through what has transpired so far.
"Unbelievable! Those bastards, they use anyone just to finish off their enemies!" Maggie seethed while Garland's normally calm and neutral face betrayed a small hint of disgust.
"That's right. They've been using people to perform assassinations and even use them to recruit in their organisation. The disk reveals that much."
"What about the girl?" asked Maggie.
"Mana's asleep right now, I'm unsure of how much the kid trusts me or for that matter, us, but by now I think she realises that being with us is a matter of self preservation," Michael said.
"But if she's been brainwashed…" Maggie began but Michael shook his head cutting her off.
"For some reason I don't think she's been brainwashed at all. She was probably recruited from an early age, like a child soldier," Michael theorised.
Maggie gasped but nodded knowingly; all three of them had engagements against child soldiers before.
"There are clues on the disk I noted a few of them down, we need to investigate. Maggie can you…?"
"Of course." Maggie replied.
"Thanks."
TBC