To Lyger 0: That is most definitely her goal!
Tanja let out a breath, looking in either direction as she walked down the tree-lined path around the Trocadéro, glancing up beyond the tops of the trees at the Eiffel Tower off to her left, stretching high up above her. The scent of blooming flowers, the cool shade of the trees, the occasional bird call… if it weren't for the circumstances, she might actually be able to enjoy herself here; as it was, she couldn't allow herself to become distracted by the beautiful gardens. She had a job to do, and a hero to track down.
Dozens of people walked the path around her. A young couple passed her in the opposite direction, holding hands. The woman laughed at something the man said, patting him on the arm and smiling affectionately. A man jogged past Tanja, chasing after two young children on bicycles, one of whom ran off the pavement and nearly fell off her bicycle. None of the walkers were blonde women – or at least none were close to her own age. A group of teenage girls powerwalked past her, giggling excitedly. Tanja held her breath, rushing to keep up with them as they walked back toward the fountains, chatting animatedly. Three of the girls had bright blonde hair, almost turning white when the sunlight hit it through the trees. Could one of these be Aurore Beauréal?
"Did you see what Henriette wore for the party last night?" one of the girls asked, making a face.
Another girl scoffed derisively. "That top did not do her any favors, especially paired with that skirt."
"I can't believe Victor was giving her so much attention?" The first girl shook her head. "I thought he had better taste than that…"
Tanja frowned.
"Still," a third girl mused, "she did at least get us into the party. There's no way we could have gone to a university party otherwise."
"Hey," the first girl objected. "We're practically in university already. One more year, and we'll be there!"
Damn. Tanja grimaced. These girls were still too young to be Aurore Beauréal. As the group of girls turned off the main path down a side trail that let up toward the architecture museum, Tanja continued straight, sighing in frustration.
Maybe this had all been a wild goose chase. She had been so desperate for something, she hadn't even paused to consider the information she had received. The girl had said she didn't really known Aurore Beauréal, that they hadn't really been friends in school. But then she had also mentioned that Aurore Beauréal came to the Trocadéro regularly. But how could Tanja know that information was even correct? Aurore Beauréal might be here, but Tanja would never know it because the park was so enormous. And that assumed that she was here. But for all she knew, Aurore Beauréal never visited the Trocadéro, and this whole thing was for nothing.
Of course, in a city like Paris, could she really expect to find one person on the first try?
Finally, Tanja shook her head in resignation and stepped out from under the tree cover, looking up and down the rows of fountains lining the pool and sending sprays of water into the air that split apart to form rainbows in the sunlight. On the far side of the pool, a woman with blonde hair kissed a man deeply, clinging to his neck. Tanja furrowed her brows, studying them closely. The hair color was right, but… She sighed heavily. It still wasn't her. Near the top of the pool, opposite the Eiffel Tower, three women stood around a rose bush. Tanja started in their direction, but she stopped after only a couple steps. Still no sign of Aurore Beauréal.
She should have realized this would all be for nothing.
Tanja was just turning south to walk down by the river when movement caught her eye on the opposite side of the pool near the midpoint. Two girls a year or two younger than her who had been wrapped up in an embrace started walking up toward the museums, hand in hand. Tanja smiled and began to turn away… but as she did so, her eyes settled on the one girl's short blonde hair and pink shirt. She froze in place, her brows furrowing into a knot, and stares at the two girls intently for a long minute. Finally, she pulled out her phone and brought up the social media picture that she had found earlier. A mixed group of boys and girls, all standing in front of the Eiffel Tower, smiling brightly for the camera, beneath a banner that read, "Congratulations, Class of 2021!" Tanja glanced back and forth between the two girls in front of her and the photo.
"It definitely looks like one of Aurore Beauréal's friends…" Tanja murmured, studying the back of the blonde's shirt. Next to her, her dark-haired friend whose hair reached down to her waist turned her head slightly, and Tanja caught a plain look at half of her face. Her eyes widened in recognition. These two were definitely friends of Aurore Beauréal. Slowly, the two girls walked north, toward the steps leading up to the museums. Cautiously, Tanja shadowed them on her side of the poor.
Could these two know where Aurore Beauréal was? If they did, how could she convince them to share? Her mouth set in a thin line. Before anything else, she needed to find out where these two girls were going.
Tanja pursed her lips. They might know where Aurore Beauréal was; they might also be just as ignorant as she was. What if these two led her away from the Trocadéro, just before Aurore finally appeared? She sighed heavily. But what other leads did she have? She had been sent to the Trocadéro, and she hadn't found her here. Now she found two of Aurore Beauréal's friends, in the same location she had been told to search.
Finally, she steeled herself and rushed after the two girls, watching them carefully as she shadowed them on the opposite side of the pool. The spoke quietly together as they paused by the corner of the pool; even straining her hearing, Tanja couldn't make out any of the words. Suddenly, the blonde cocked her head in confusion, staring up at the esplanade overlooking the gardens, and broke into a headlong sprint, half-dragging the other girl after her. Gritting her teeth, Tanja raced after them, taking the stairs three at a time up the opposite flight, pausing to catch her breath just below the top step so her quarry wouldn't notice her running after them. That was when she heard it.
An ear-splitting scream echoed off the buildings around her, reverberating on the stone walls of the museum complex. Aurore Beauréal's two friends had already run across the plaza and down the street radiating out from it on the right, angling roughly north. Cursing her hesitation, Tanja rushed after them, dodging traffic in the circle around the plaza. Horns honked. Tanja burst forward, out of the way of a delivery truck, and only barely avoided running straight into a motorcycle. Another unnatural shriek, almost drowning out the blaring horns around her, pierced the air. Tanja put on a burst of speed, all her focus past the two girls in front of her, searching the street beyond for some sign of the disturbance. Ahead of her, the two girls also accelerated, scanning the streets and sky. Suddenly, at least three blocks down the street, something silvery-grey flew up above the heads of the pedestrians, spinning something long and thin in its arms.
"The Lancer!" Tanja gasped, her eyes wide. Finally! This might be her only chance! Quickly, she dove to the side, ducking down beneath a park bench and muttering her transformation phrase. She grimaced as the magic wreathed her, looking out from below her bench at the press of pedestrians around her. Would any of them have seen? Would any of them know what they were watching? If they tried to stop her, she would easily handle a group of powerless civilians, but it would still cost her time that she couldn't spare. While if she had waited, when who knew what might have happened? If the Lancer got away, then she might never find her again! This could be her only chance to capture the Lancer and help Marta get her freedom.
Cerna rolled out from beneath the bench, surged to her feet, and raced down the sidewalk, her attention completely focused on the Lancer. Hurtling through the air, the Lancer tumbled backward under her feet came back under her and seemed to push off of some invisible force below her, arresting her backward momentum and bringing her lance to bear against something on the ground. Another scream reverberated up and down the street, and the Lancer dropped out of sight, moments before a plume of dust wafted up into the air. What the hell was going on up there!? Cerna drew her battleaxe from her back and gave it a testing swing, even as she charged down the street and leapt over the heads of the pedestrians who had stopped and started slowly backing away. Quickly she took in the scene confronting her – the Lancer flat on her back in the middle of the street, her lance clutched tightly in both hands. Cerna's battleaxe came up above her head, and she brought it down in a powerful strike, only to turn away at the last moment.
"Get the hell out of here!" snapped Screamer, glaring at Cerna furiously. Phones snapped all around them. Cerna's eyes widened in surprise. Screamer swallowed nervously, her focus split between Cerna and the Lancer, who was picking herself up off the ground, shaking her head groggily, pushing herself up with the shaft of her lance. Screamer drew in a breath and started to open her mouth, but Cerna held out her battleaxe in front of her.
"No – I need her alive!"
Screamer batted the battleaxe away and gave Cerna an annoyed look. "I don't care what you want; she attacked us!" Drawing in a deep breath and turning away from Cerna, Screamer unleashed a crippling sonic blast straight at the Lancer.
The Lancer's hands came up to cover her helmet where her ears would be, and she reeled back, stumbling to her feet and turning away from the noise, nearly losing her balance and falling over backward, only barely maintaining her footing. However, as Screamer paused for breath, the Lancer suddenly spun around and leapt forward, swinging her lance around overhead and aiming the tip downward. "Armis!" The lance shimmered with a black pulse that ran down the shaft to the tip, and she pushed higher into the air, building momentum and driving the lance down at Screamer with both hands. Screamer let out another shriek when the lance was less than a meter from her face, but the Lancer dropped to the ground, avoided the blast, and spun out of its way. Three cars on the opposite side of the road rocked back and forth, their alarms going off in protest and adding to the din. The Lancer rolled to the side and stabbed at Screamer's gut with her lance, faster than Screamer could react.
The lance clattered off of Cerna's battleaxe as she jumped between them, swinging her battleaxe sideways and batting the lance down to embed into the ground. The Lancer pulled her lance out of the road surface, sending a spray of pavement in all directions, and dropped into a crouch for another attack, but Cerna felt Screamer's hand on her shoulder and rolled to one side, just as Screamer let out a shriek. The sound waves struck the Lancer in the chest, throwing her backward through the air.
"Atavis!" The Lancer tumbled end over end twice in midair, only for her movement to arrest, leaving her hovering, suspended a meter off the ground. Kicking forward, she brought her lance in close, charging straight at Screamer with a roar.
Cerna jumped in front of the Lancer, batting her lance aside with the handle of her battleaxe as she did so, and the Lancer dropped to the ground in a crouch, spinning her lance around to lie along her back and shifting it into her other hand, spinning it once to block a strike from Cerna. "Come in with me and nothing will happen to you, Aurore," Cerna shouted at her, swinging her battleaxe in a downward chop. "This doesn't have to get any messier than it already is!"
The Lancer dropped back a pace and flipped her lance around in front of her, meeting Cerna's blow and catching the battleaxe on its beard. With a sudden jerk, she yanked the handle right out of Cerna's hands, sending the battleaxe flying across the street to embed in a car. "Not a chance!" she hissed back at Cerna, bringing the butt of her lance around at Cerna's face. "I don't trust a word you people say!"
Cerna jumped into a backward cartwheel as the lance butt flew through the space where her chest had been moments before. With another sonic blast, Screamer sent the Lancer flying backward. Cerna dove toward her battleaxe, jerking it out of the car's body and bringing it up in a defensive posture. The Lancer sprang forward, between Cerna and Screamer, and drove the butt of her lance into Screamer's gut. Screamer sprang backward with moments to spare, as Cerna kicked the Lancer in the back of the leg, dropping her to one knee, and swung her the blunt back of her battleaxe around at the Lancer's neck. "Sorry about this."
