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I don't own the characters that I took from the original stories, I only claim ownership on the

Characters and storytelling that has been invented and added by myself.

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Autors Notes: Wow, a new chapter this soon? Yeah I'm a little surprised myself but during the last days I felt super motivated to continue the story for some reason. Also I want to apologize for the story progressing this slow at the moment. I was not entirely sure how I could get where I wanted to get. Pretty sure there is gonna be a lot more happening from now on, so stay tuned for it. If you enjoy please
make sure to Review :)

Mental Advantage

The Man in the white lab coat was furious; He had been running around his lab for days now, even more hectic than he usually was, always cursing and talking to himself. Two guards stood next to a big metal door, the entire remaining room was filled with machines of all kinds. Some of them were high-tech computers, others were rather old, but whatever machine you were looking for, there was no doubt it could be found in here. That is if you were able to find it. In the few spots where there were no machines standing, the ground was covered in cables and conduits. Every now and then one of the machines would start making sounds and the humming of electricity filled the room continuously. Some white colored lamps on the ceiling brought a bright, sterile light into the room.

And in between this chaos, the man in the lab coat cursed and roamed around. He was, indeed, someone important. His name was doctor Desty Nova, the smartest and probably craziest man in all of Zalem. The doctor was almost two meters tall, grey hair covering his head. His eyes reflected his genius, but every keen observer would notice the lunacy inside them as well. His tall shade was covered by a lab coat that might have been white once, but by now was stained in brownish colors. His face showed signs of his age as well as many marks due to experiments that didn't go quite as expected. He ran around between the machines, pushing a button here and pulling a lever there, his hands moving unbelievably fast over the different interfaces.

It was incredible that the little cyborg girl had ran away. He thought threatening her friends would make her stay. But apparently even that couldn't keep that stupid girl. Of course the girl he was thinking about was Alita. Years of time and preparing had just been thrown away when she left the city. At first he didn't realize it, until after a few days he had been informed about her absence. That was also the reason for his furiousness. The tech inside that cyborgs body was way too precious to just get lost in the desert. Oh, he cursed that girl. Somehow she still thought she was a real girl, but he knew exactly she was nothing but a weapon. Built to fight, built to destroy. That was not the reason he wanted her though. Weapons were useless to him. He could build them himself anyways, so why bother about using her as one? But this stupid little brat carried a highly efficient reactor core inside her, one of those kinds that he was not yet able to rebuild. Some of the few parts of old age tech that he really wanted to understand. Having a core like that would put him into a quite advantageous position towards everyone else.

The doctor left his lab, walked along the hallway, past all the other labs. Other scientists ran around hastily, talking to each other, taking notes or just heading into another room. Some of them greeted Dr. Nova as he passed by, but he didn't even notice them. They were all just pawns, only working because he couldn't afford to waste his time on their pathetic experiments. No one in here came even close to his genius therefore they didn't have anything to offer to him.. The hallway ended in a big metal door. On its left was a small keyboard, on which the doctor quickly typed in a few words, causing the door to open. Fluorescent lamps started up, slowly enlightening the room's interior. This one was almost empty, with deep grey walls and ceiling. In the middle of the room was a big metal plate and on that plate was a man, held in place by thick metal bonds. He was almost entirely robotic, only his left arm and his head were still human. The doctor clapped his hands and a small table emerged from the ground next to him. On it were scalpels, cables and many other chirurgic tools. Dr. Nova decided to go with one of the smaller knifes for now. There was more than enough time left to try every single tool at least once. He stepped closer to the plate. The man on the plate opened his right eye. The left one had already been cut out with perfect precision. His mouth opened as if he tried to say something. But that wasn't possible either since his tongue was missing as well. Dr. Nova remembered when he first came in here. The man, one of the less successful bounty hunters from the slums, had lied here, cursed him and told him he would never say a word. He let him talk for a few minutes until he cut off his tongue. He didn't need him to talk. There were way easier methods to get the information he wanted. With a satisfied grin, he nodded towards the door and both guards exited, closing the door behind them. Soon, his spies would return to him and then he would be able to get a hold of the stupid cyborg girl. Until then, there was no reason not to enjoy himself. As he drove the scalpel into the man's skin, he imagined the little girl screaming underneath his blade and smiled.

Alita took only a second to recover from the surprise. Anger floated through her veins as she began to see this man's true identity. With a smooth movement she unsheathed her blade and swung it around in a single strike aiming at his throat. The sword would have beheaded him if he wouldn't have thrown himself backwards, increasing the distance between them. "Ally! Let me explain!" There was no need for him to explain anything to her. The moment she realized where his name had its origin, she knew she would have to kill him. She leaped towards him, her thoughts filled by rage. Never before had she met him but still she had heard the stories. And she wanted to kill him. A lot.

Back in Scrap Iron City everyone that was older than five years knew the stories about Nova's right hand. The assassin and maverick that carried out almost all his battles until he disappeared a few years before Alita was gifted her new body by Doc Ido. Even Ido told her the stories about him: He had been one of the most deadly assassins ever to live within the city's hydro walls, but not just that, simply the fact that he had been working for Nova for such a long time was the best indicator for his madness. It was even said that it had been him who cut the huge cyborg Grewishka into pieces, before Nova saved Grewishka's life and turned him into the monster that he had been when Alita finally finished him off. After that, he vanished from sight, the last thing being heard about him was that Grewishka and a bunch of other people that had their own scores to settle with him went to kill him once and for all. Ido had told her that no one knew exactly what had happened that day. There was only one thing for sure. The only one to return was Grewishka himself. And by now? Well, most people thought of it as a fairytale, a story to tell the kids whenever they wouldn't behave. "Shenyen is going to come get you, if you don't behave." Even Ido said that to her once, but she had only laughed and sworn to kill this man in case she was ever to meet him.

Her feet hit the ground in front of him and without hesitation the blade inside her hand cut the air, this time aimed to slice him in half. But once again, he moved out of its range way quicker than she expected. "You really are not going to listen are you? Well then. Let's fight." That was unexpected. Not that it mattered but she respected his choice to die trying instead of running away. Still, he would never be able to challenge her. No human could accomplish that. It amused her how he still seemed this overconfident. The cyborg girl sheathed her blade and moved into an aggressive stance. She didn't need her blade to kill him anyway, so she would grant him the mercy of a fair fight. If you could even call it that. Now he was barely 2 feet away from her, his arms raised in front of his upper body. Her fist shot forward, with probably enough speed to obliterate massive steel. He moved fast, way faster than he was supposed to. With his left he caught her wrist in the air, led her force around his body. As her feet left the ground he immediately ducked down and Alita flew, her own strength and speed used against her. As she hit the ground a few feet behind him, her thoughts were racing. Not only had he just dodged her, no, he would have even hurt her if it weren't for her metal body. It had only been a simple throw that anyone could have accomplished and still his flawless execution and the fact that she had not been prepared for him to actually react this fast had cost her this easy hit. She flipped back onto her feet and turned around. "I really don't want to hurt you Alita. Let me explain everything to you and I promise if you still want to kill me afterwards, I won't resist." There was almost something similar to regret in his eyes for a second, until he went back to a cold stare. It still surprised her that he had been able to strike against her but this time she was going to be prepared. The young man watched her attentively as she prepared herself to take him down once and for all. He had taken a slightly defensive stance, but this time he left no doubt that he actually had a lot of experience in one-on-one combat. A solid stand, both arms raised, covering up every weaker point. Still, his left arm was wounded. Alita was sure he wouldn't be able to block a strike she led against him either, so there were only two options left for him. To dodge her or to attack first. For a few seconds no one moved, both scanning their opponent for possible weaknesses. She wondered what he might be thinking when he moved his right hand. It only took an instant but Alita noticed a small silver flash traveling through the air. The girl stepped to the left, evading the small knife by just a millimeter. Still she couldn't avoid it carving a small scratch into her arm, barely enough to even be noticeable. She smiled as her body healed itself within seconds. As she raised her head again he had already gone back to a rather relaxed posture. He even smiled lightly, just as if he thought he had won this fight already. But Alita wasn't done yet. She took two steps towards him to pounce into one last devastating kick. But before she even left the ground her legs gave in underneath her.

Every last bit of power seemed to have been drawn out of her body. She wasn't even able to lift her arms as the ground came closer rapidly. An inch before she hit the ground her fall stopped all of a sudden. To her left she heard an exhausted groan. He must have caught her before she hit the ground. "Good lord Alita, you are heavy. What on earth did you eat?" Shenyen laughed a little bit, amused over his own joke. "What did you do? Why can't I move? TELL ME!" Panic manifested inside her heart as she realized there was nothing she could do. The only thing that seemed to be still working were her eyes and mouth. Her entire body was numb. "It is quite simple. A little bit of Neutroniumdicintrin can disable almost any electronic circuit within seconds. You see, sometimes it's not strength that is required to win a fight. Every now and then more advanced equipment will even beat your mere strength." He moved her towards the house and leaned her against the wall. There was nothing she could do, her body wouldn't move no matter how hard she tried. So she watched him as he turned around to look for his knife. He quickly found it and returned to her. Without any hustle he sat down in front of her, crossed his legs and smiled. It was not an angry or mad smile though, instead he smiled that someone would look at a cheeky child. "Well, I know you are probably really mad at me now. But again, I never wanted to harm you. People keep reacting this way once they hear my name, and I guess you now know why I didn't want to tell you at first." "What do you want from me? Bring me back to Nova? Is that why you are here?" He laughed. This fool dared to laugh about her. "Oh Alita. Why on earth would I do that?" "Because you are his right hand. You serve him don't you?" "Well I did, that much is true. And honestly I can't decline that I have quite a bad reputation for a good reason. But… let me start from the beginning. Maybe you will be able to understand me afterwards." He pulled out a rag and started to clean the knife in his hand. Then he stopped again, looked her in the eyes and resumed to talk: "A few years before you first appeared, Nova was looking for someone to do his dirty work. So he hired me. I worked almost three years for him. Assassinations, Scout missions, he named it, I took care of it. In return I had access to a lot of money and even more tech that he had recovered. This way I learned things about the old ages as well as our current time tech. That's also where the poison came from that ended our little disagreement." He stopped there as if he was waiting for a reaction. When Alita didn't say anything he continued: "This went on for quite a while. Until the fateful day that I met Grewishka. He was my target to kill that day, so far quite easy. But once Nova had gotten a hold of this psychopaths head, it took him only days to turn him into that … that monstrosity. And then, all of a sudden, I had become expendable. That was when he decided to get rid of me. Grewishka must have agreed quickly, eager to get his revenge on me, so one evening he and a bunch of other scum made their way to kill me. But at that point, I had already been warned by an old friend, who you might have known as Vector. Don't worry, he deserved just what you brought over him. Anyway, when Grewishka and his little squad arrived at where I was supposed to be, I had been long gone. So Grewishka slaughtered everyone in the most impressive paroxysm I have ever seen. And there I was. An outcast. The residents hated me for what I had done and Nova himself wanted my head. So I stayed out of the city for quite a while, and when I returned, Grewishka was dead and Nova was busy hunting someone else. You. The rest of the time consisted of hiding in plain sight and smaller jobs to keep my head above water. Of course I made sure to observe people that might cause problems later. Again, you were one of them. Until the day that you looked for people to join you on your journey. Well, I guess you know the rest of the story."

During the entire story, he didn't break eye contact with her a single time. Alita wasn't sure what to do next. On one hand she still wanted to kill him badly, on the other hand she could use someone like him on her side. At least in case he could actually be trusted. "Why did you really join me out here then?" "Isn't that obvious? For once I would like a place that I can get a restart in and at the same moment, once you left the city, Nova would have a lot more time to do other things. How long do you think would it take him to realize I was in the city all along? As much as I enjoy the thrill of the hunt, I prefer not to be the prey myself." So what? Would she be able to just move on knowing he had been Nova's associate? Alita believed him. He was the enemy of her enemy but was he really a friend then? A decision had to be made here. In her situation she wanted him to at least believe she was on his side. If anything would happen, she could still backstab him. "Alright. I won't kill you for now." "Not like you could?" He still had that superior grin, this time it was in a nice way though. Apparently he didn't blame her at all for trying to kill him. "Please. Can you just restore my strength now?" "Of course, but first would you mind telling me why Nova is hunting you? I mean I heard the stories but I just can't figure out what makes him want you." "My heart." "Your heart? I thought you didn't have one." He pulled out a black hard shell case from his pocket, about the size of a pencil. It snatched open, giving sight on a small needle inside. Shenyen grabbed it cautiously, removed its safety cap and pricked it into Alitas arm. She didn't even feel the needle but her power started to return almost immediately. At first her arm, then her upper body and finally her legs as well. The girl sprung to her feet, grabbing the young man by his throat lifting him straight up from the ground. Shenyen struggled inside her grip, but he was not a match for her at all. Alita saw red, every fiber of her body told her to kill him right here and now. Without any effort she kept him off the ground, watching him struggle for air. "I do have a heart." She pulled him closer until her face was right next to his. "It's just not human. And if you ever use that stuff on me again, you better make sure I never recover from it." That said, she dropped him back to the ground. He fell onto his knees, coughing and gasping for air. She felt like kicking him a few times, just for the fun of it. "I guess that should be a lesson then." He raised up, looked at her then turned around. "Don't get too unwary though." With these words he disappeared into the dark, leaving her wondering if she had made the right decision.