Icarus 6
In the cafeteria of the academy the three freshmen boys were being interrogated by Ran and Alice.
Ran shouts "Look we know that you guys know where they went so tell us."
Harrison says "For the last time we don't know where those two went."
Caleb adds "Yeah they just told us they were going on a journey."
Alice took Ran away from the group and whispered to her "They have to be hiding more information."
Ran agreed " I'm not sure they're not even listing fake locations. They're just protecting those two with the little knowledge they know."
Alice says "True but if we don't get a leg up on the girls , Ichika might choose someone other than us."
Ran says "I know, but my brother didn't know anything , these guys don't have a clue and those second years probably know Wyatt enough to look in the right places."
Meanwhile in Maryland as Cody was relaxing in his bedroom , his door was sent flying off the handle as Cecilia, Rin Kanazashi and Houki rushed in.
Unfazed by their appearance Cody says "Right on time, Wyatt told me to expect a visit from you Cecilia."
Rin says "If that's the case you probably know why we came here."
Cody says "Yeah you want me to reveal the location where Wyatt took Ichika but I kinda can't help you."
Cecilia walks up to Cody to grab him by the collar and asks "Why's that?"
Cody smirks and says "It's because even if I did know I would never betray my teammate in his hour of need."
The girl were unconvinced by his performance as Cody states "Fine he bribed me with something I couldn't refuse."
He picks up a flash drive from his desk as Kanazashi asks, "So what is this info?"
Cody sighed as he said "I'm not sure it's password protected, he'll say the password would be sent once everything blows over."
At that moment Kanazashi took the drive and a laptop sitting on Cody's desk and within minutes, she handed the computer back to him.
The teen boy looked in awe as he said "Good job, now for where Wyatt is staying."
Curious, the girl's leaned closer to clearly hear where Ichika was. Cody adds "He never told me."
This shocked the girls as Houki asked "But Wyatt gave you that drive to keep his location a secret."
Cody chuckles as he says "Oh no the drive is from someone else and Wyatt told me if a blue haired girl with glasses came by, she could get me these files."
Rin says "So all this time you never had the intention of helping us."
As Cody's smirk stretched as far as it could go he said "Nope, not only did he help me get these files but to humiliate a couple of IS pilots. I think I might actually owe him a favor."
The girls left defeated as they knew that their trip had ended up a complete failure.
In a New York suburb within Westchester County, Charlotte and Laura got out of a taxi.
Charlotte says "This should be the right address."
Laura says "Nice plan war buddy, we'll intercept them at Wyatt's home."
As the girls made it in front of Wyatt's door, Laura rang the doorbell to see a tall, thin middle aged African American man with short dark hair and brown eyes. He wears a light blue work shirt with a white collar, a purple tie, dark blue pants with black suspenders, and dark shoes.
The man says "Charlotte it's nice to see you've finally come to visit." He looks towards Laura and adds "Wyatt also told me a little about you as well Laura."
Charlotte says "It's good to see you in person Mr. Joseph , is Wyatt home?"
The man says "No but he did tell me to call if one of his classmates swung by."
As Mr. Joseph called his son and put him on speaker phone, they heard Wyatt say "Hey pops how's it going."
Mr. Joseph says "It's going good son, Charlotte and Laura are with me on speaker."
Wyatt chuckles and says "Guess Mom won the bet, I thought at-least three would come to the house."
Confused, Laura asked "Wait so Wyatt knew we were coming?"
Wyatt responds "Yeah so I took Ichika to the last place you guys would ever look. Laters."
The call was cancelled as the girls wondered where on earth Wyatt could've gone.
The next morning in Italy as Kaitlynn was drinking a cup of coffee, she saw Madoka come downstairs in a pair of her old pajamas.
Kaitlynn asked, "So how did you sleep Madoka?"
Madoka yawns as she says "Honestly that bed was way too soft, I'm not sure how you can sleep like that."
As a 5'11" tall male with curly medium length black hair and vivid green eyes enters the room he says "Trust me the mattress is pretty good."
Confused the ex-terrorist asked "Wait who exactly is this?"
Kaitlynn says "This is Dante , my older brother who drove us here from the airport."
Madoka says "Oh yeah I kind of remember him now."
Dante changed the subject and said "So I heard Wyatt is coming by in a few days."
Kaitlynn says "Yeah I'm pretty excited for him to get to visit."
Dante taps the left side of his forehead and says "But are you sure he'll be okay seeing dad after the, you know accident."
Confused, Madoka asked "Exactly what accident happened between him and your dad."
The two nervously giggle as Dante says "Trust me Madoka, once you see him it will be obvious."
Almost as if on cue, a 6 foot tall middle aged man with black hair, a short beard, mustache and sideburns that point upwards and dark blue eyes enters the room. He was dressed formal but the one thing that drew the most attention was a vertical scar on his left eyebrow.
The man says "Sorry I couldn't see you last night, there was a last minute emergency at the hospital."
Kaitlynn says "No worry's dad , me and Madoka practically went straight to sleep when we got here.
As Mr. Belladonna smirks and says "So you must be Madoka Orimura, Kaitlynn told me about you."
Nervous, the girl blurts out "How did you get that scar over your eye?"
At first the room was silent until the three Italians burst out in laughter at the girl's question."
Mr. Belladonna says "You seriously never told anyone the story, Kait."
Kaitlynn says "I mean it's pretty awkward and Wyatt would never let me live it down."
Dante says "So Madoka you know that our dad was the one who operated on Wyatt years back right."
The girl shook her head yes as Mr. Belladonna explained "Well during the operation one of my assistants messed up the dosage for anesthetic. So in mid-surgery Wyatt woke up and stabbed me with a nearby surgical knife."
Madoka says "And this is the same guy who you want to marry your daughter."
Mr. Belladonna says "I thought the same but the two clicked while Wyatt was in recovery. Plus I would've reacted the same if I woke up with someone covered in my blood. Speaking of the lad, where is he?"
Kaitlynn says "I'm not sure, he just said he's taking Ichika for a sightseeing trip."
Meanwhile in Houston,Texas , Ichika found himself walking through a military base with Wyatt and Natasha Fairs.
Ichika says "I can't believe I let you drag me to Texas."
Wyatt says "Well whose fault is that you need to hide from the girls ."
Ichika responds "It's yours, you told them in the nurse's office last week
Wyatt says "True but it's your fault for not making a decision , Dummymura."
Natasha chuckles at the two's squabbling, and says "Alright calm down you two, don't forget why you two are here."
Wyatt says "Yeah you told me there was some sort of unknown attack at one of the dummy prisons."
Confused, Ichika asked "Wait dummy prisons, what exactly do you need those for."
Wyatt explains "After you saved me from Phantom Task, Squall was moved to a secure facility while having her names show up on several different prison's inmates list."
As Natasha stopped in front of a large glass window, she said "This was the cause of the attack."
The two looked through a glass screen to see a large bulky mechanical armor with each of its fingers being a gun barrel and a gas mask like helmet.
Intrigued, Wyatt says "Okay, it's not the usual design but we've dealt with golems before."
Natasha says "These aren't your normal golems though, they're not fueled by cores but by men."
This shocked the teens as Ichika asked "But how is that possible, there's no way men could be used as cores or even active as an IS."
Natasha says "Normal yes but after doing testing on the corpse, the same energy within cores were found with blood samples."
Hearing this Wyatt says "I think I might know how this is possible. Ichika remember the Excalibur incident."
Ichika says "But there's no way there's enough cores to implant them into an army."
Wyatt says "True but if they could get a blood sample of Exia, mix it with a little of mine. Potentially they could create a serum that would allow for men to not just become pilots but living cores."
Ichika says "Well they did create a clone from Squall, it's not impossible this theory could be true."
Natasha hands Wyatt a flash-drive and says "We've gotten data of these units and Dr. Maxwell says it could help with a project of yours."
Wyatt says "Oh yeah speaking of data, Nat can you have a mock duel with Ichika."
Confused, the woman says "Really, I would've expected you would want to challenge me yourself."
Wyatt says "I do but due to Ichika hiding from the girls all week, I got the chance to modify his unit into a part of the predator series."
The woman smirks as she says "Honestly you had me at a rematch against Ichika. Me and the Silver Gospel have been itching for one since last summer."
Ichika says "I feel the same, you're definitely a pretty tough opponent."
As they made their way to the testing fields and activated their units. While Natasha's Silver Gospel was the same as last summer, Ichika's unit was a completely different beast.
It was a mix between its 2nd and third shift as it regained the multi-purpose unit Setsura and only had 4 of its energy wings instead of 6.
Wyatt shouts from the viewing area "From the minds of Maxwell and Joseph, Tabane's pride has been destroyed and reconfigured into the new hope of man. Byakushiki : Shine Wolf."
Ichika sighed and thought, "He really likes to brag about this."
Natasha starts off the battle by getting high into the air and firing energy feathers with a spray attack.
To her surprise, Ichika charged at her and the attack seemingly got absorbed into his unit.
As Yukihiria Nigata opened up to reveal an energy blade , Ichika went to strike his opponent but Natasha dodged it.
Ichika attempted to land a hit on his opponent but couldn't get close to striking Natasha.
He thought "Damn it, it's the same unit and I've been training like crazy since last time, so how can't I land a hit."
From Ichika's intercom he heard Wyatt say "That's because that was an AI, you're dealing with the Missile Lady of Houston. Besides, every pilot is constantly becoming better."
Ichika says "That makes sense. Wait, did you just read my mind?"
Wyatt says "No but I can tell you're getting frustrated that you can't get an attack in. Also watch out!"
As Ichika tried to figure out what Wyatt meant, Natasha landed a roundhouse kick onto Ichika's neck.
He was sent reeling from the attack and sent hurtling into the ground. He thought "That's what he meant."
Wyatt says "Remember you've got that new mid-distance attack."
Ichika groans as he says "True but we still haven't tested it in combat yet."
He heard Wyatt giggle as he said "What do you think this match is about."
As Ichika stood back up, he saw that Natasha was charged at him with her clawed gauntlets.
Ichika swung his blade as a blue crescent moon shaped slash flew towards Natasha.
Natasha narrowly avoids the slash but part of her wing was cut off. Once she regained her balance she thought "That's a new trick."
While she was off guard , Ichika got in close and managed to land a sword slash against his opponent.
A smirk formed on Natasha's face as she said "Not bad , what do you call that last attack."
Ichika groans and reluctantly says "Wyatt trademarked it as the Getsuga slash."
From the intercom, Wyatt says "Come on it's his best and only move. Plus you told me you like Bleach."
While he was parrying attacks from Natasha's claws , he responds "Yeah but whoever says Ichigo's they're favorite. I'm more of a Hitsugaya fan."
Before Wyatt could comment , Natasha swung with her unit's claws as Ichika's blocked it with his blade.
The two continued to trade attacks but neither could get a decisive blow on the other.
From the loudspeaker, Wyatt says "Alright you two that's enough. I've seen everything that's needed."
Natasha sighed as she said "Seriously kid, things were just getting interesting."
Ichika says "I know but Wyatt just wanted to see how the new modifications worked in combat."
As they deactivated their units and left the training arena , Natasha asked "So how did you manage to absorb those energy feathers."
Ichika responded "Well after the Byakushiki went through its second shift, Wyatt tried to find a way to conquer its high energy cost. During the summer his attempt with solar energy failed due to my unit overloading the generator due to the energy output."
From the hallway , Wyatt says "Then after some further research I decided the best way to solve his unit's gluttony was just to have it be able to absorb energy rather than create."
Natasha smirks and says "And you figured that out all by yourself, that's pretty smart."
Ichika says "Well he came up with the idea but Dr. Maxwell actually did most of the heavy building."
Wyatt says "That's why it's a collaborative effort. So Nat, where are our sleeping quarters."
She smirks and says "Don't worry you're staying at my place for your stay here. Also make sure you get some sleep because there's a festival in the afternoon."
Wyatt says "Wow seriously that's awesome."
Natasha says "Yeah I also signed the two of you up for the rodeo."
Confused, the Japanese teen asked "What is a rodeo?"
Wyatt explains "It's when people ride a wild bull until they get thrown off."
The woman pats the two on the back and says "Don't worry people do it all the time. Besides, it's definitely less dangerous than flying an IS."
