Through a Trance of Despondency

He heard the door open, noted the white ceramic mug of coffee placed down upon the desk before him, that familiar logo, the two magpies, their legs entwined, flanking a shield that detailed the four minor arcana suits of the tarot deck.

"What's the latest?" a voice asked.

He did not look up for a moment, his attention caught by the black screen and its rows of green text, the words flickering before him, drawing him in: 'classroom,' 'conditioning,' 're-education.'

"A crop of these same schoolroom indoctrinations," he said, at last looking up at the other man standing over his chair. "Battle Fever dealt with one of the incidents, but they failed to notice the others taking place across the country. They were most left to prefectural police or the army."

He looked away, his eyebrows drawn together in a frown.

"By the time anyone called us, the damage was already done."

They had been doing this for three years now, a collaborative effort between the FBI, Interpol, and the Japanese government. Three years of honing their technique, of recruitment and training, of dealing with impossible threats, obscene monsters, and still they were last on the list to be called whenever something like this happened.

Iida Kenji scowled at the screen again, reading those same words; 'classroom,' 'conditioning,' 're-education.' Three years, and still no one thought they could make a difference.

He turned, catching the look on Taki Kazuya's face, sensing that the other felt much the same way.

"Do we know what caused it?"

"Battle Fever reported some kind of Venus flytrap creature. Reports from local police and the army don't describe exactly the same thing, but what they do say it was similar enough for us to guess that they were all the same creatures, different seeds sown in separate locations perhaps."

Taki nodded.

"That's as good a guess as any. I take it Battle Fever aren't willing to play ball with us?'

Iida shook his head unhappily, reaching for the mug of coffee, gratefully lifting it to his lips, savouring the warmth for a moment.

"They've played coy whenever we tried to reach out to them."

The other man scowled.

"I guess that's to be expected."

"They doubt our loyalty, I suppose," Iida remarked.

"Battle Cossack doubts our loyalty, you mean."

The war in Vietnam was still a tender wound, and whilst the man who had inherited the Battle Cossack uniform had no overt ties to the Soviet Union, there was no doubt that the tensions of maintaining the Battle Fever international coalition had made the group less partial to working with others—even those also co-funded by the Japanese government.

The first Cossack had been raised in Kazakhstan or Uzbekistan, he seemed to recall, somewhere in Central Asia, one of those countries that had been absorbed into the Soviet Union. Iida had no idea how the man had dressed in Soviet livery and still called himself a Cossack, not after the way they had been treated by the regime before and after the war, but as Battle Fever wouldn't talk to them and Shiraishi Kensaku was now dead, he guessed he would never know the answer.

In the escalating stand-off between the Soviet Union and the United States, Iida had seen a lot of propaganda from Russian sources using Battle Cossack's image, extolling his triumphs, presumably mostly fictional, whilst America was starkly reluctant to discuss the efforts of Miss America.

Perhaps it was her career, he thought, or perhaps it wasn't a good look to have an FBI agent so noticeable in the public eye, after all, wasn't that how the team had lost their first female member? Iida had no idea who it was wearing the armour now.

"I tried talking to Agent Martin," Taki said, guessing his train of thought, "but she was playing her cards close to her chest too."

Iida sighed, a mix of frustration and tiredness.

"Anyone would think we're the enemy."

Since EAGLE had been disbanded, and with Interpol's own International Science Special Investigation Squad likewise disinterested in cooperation, it felt as if the window of opportunity they had was closing swiftly.

Angrily, he found himself staring at the screen. He didn't want to believe that the past three years had been a waste.

Again, as if sensing his thoughts, Taki spoke.

"Don't worry, we'll pull through. We might receive funding from the FBI and Interpol, but they're wary of us, we've got too much freedom."

"You mean they can't tell us what to do," Iida remarked.

The other man laughed slightly.

"That's right. Sooner or later though, they're going to start looking at their budgets and asking themselves why they're sending untrained police officers and soldiers to deal with threats infinitely more hazardous than anything they've been trained for whilst still paying for us to sit in this nice building all day and do nothing."

Iida scoffed.

"And then what, they'll close us down?"

Taki sighed.

"Well, it's not impossible, but let's hope for the alternative."

He lifted the mug to his lips again.

"Which is?"

Taki Kazuya calmly placed a cigarette between his lips, striking a match against the side of a box, the burning sulphurous flare momentarily bright, and then lost with the shake of his wrist.

"That they come to their senses and let us do our job."

Iida nodded, turning back to the screen, looking at the words once more. 'Classroom,' 'conditioning,' 're-education.' How many more kids would need to suffer before they were allowed to take a stand?

"That would be good," he said, his voice distant, almost as if he was recalling his own childhood, the rolling hills, running wild in the woods.

"It will be good," Taki Kazuya assured him, "we just need to play the long game."

The coffee was warm upon his lips. Behind his hands, on the ceramic of the white mug, that logo remained, two magpies, their legs entwined, flanking a shield that detailed the four minor arcana suits of the tarot deck.