A/N: Welcome back to the next chapter of Crimson Burst Angel, however long of a break it's been between chapters. A big thanks to everyone who reviewed and read the last chapter! You guys complete me. ;p
I've been thinking of rewriting the first three chapters, because I cringe whenever I read over them. For one, chapter one needs moar cybots. Or at least a decent Jango R segment that doesn't read like a cop-out.
Chapter Ten: Distorted Connections
It wasn't a fancy place that Meg chose, but something near to the Ormicon offices that served reasonable food, fast. As she removed the keys from her bike's ignition, she gave Yoko a quick grin, feeling a small measure of relief as the other woman removed her arms from around Meg's waist. Her back felt slightly warm from Yoko's heat, and she watched Yoko remove the helmet. Her blue hair was slightly mussed by the wind, but Yoko's slender fingers combed it back into the clip as it was replaced.
Meg averted her eyes, looking at the small stall.
The burger joint was smaller than she remembered, Meg noted. Then again, it had been over five years since she'd eaten there. She supposed she might be remembering it wrong. The last time she'd been there, had been before things had gone to hell and back with RAPT.
"From what I remember, this place is pretty good," Meg told Yoko as she helped her off the bike. "Sure puts the food at that damn school to shame, anyhow."
"Anything would outshine the food served at the Academy," Yoko agreed, her dark eyes taking in the shop.
Any place that doesn't put hallucinogenic drugs in your food would outdo that school, Meg thought sourly as she led the way into the shop, pushing through the door and through the veil of plastic, tacky beads. There were a few people seated at the mismatched tables – Meg forced herself to relax. The place had hardly been touched by the RAPT insanity; something as inconsequential as time wouldn't change this place.
She guessed that had been why Jo had liked this place. There was a stability and permanency to it that was kind of reassuring. For Meg, the food reminded her of her old home in the states.
Turning her mind from the dark retrospection, Meg swaggered up to the counter, her charge following on her heels. The man behind the counter looked vaguely familiar, his grizzled hair slicked back from his face with grease, a silver-shot goatee and a shadow of stubble over his cheeks. He was polishing a few of the plates Meg could see behind the counter, while a few younger boys out the back kitchen worked the stoves.
He gave her a level look as she approached, seeing through her false bravado and her years of training. Meg grimaced at that; he probably remembered the loud-mouthed, ever-hungry and unfocused fool she'd been five years ago. Well, she'd changed since then, even if this place hadn't. She leaned on the counter, meeting his eyes defiantly, nearly daring him to associate her with her past self.
"Been a while, lass," the man said, and his voice was gravelly.
So he did remember, after all. Meg tried not to let that get to her.
"I guess it has," she agreed, taking a quick glance over the food on offer. It hadn't changed, either. She made a show of deciding, looking over the options, before she turned back to her silent companion. "You good with the cheeseburger, Yoko?"
"If that's what you feel is good food," Yoko said, a ghost of a smile on her face. Meg nodded to her, before fixing the old man with a blinding smile.
"Two cheeseburger deals, both with sodas."
The old man lazily took down the details on a dog-eared notepad, stopping several times as his ballpoint pen ran dry, the sounds of the other diners and the hokey-sounding music seeming to grow louder for a moment.
"It'll be about twenty, give or take. Take a seat, lass, your choice."
There wasn't really much of a choice at all, Meg noticed as she and Yoko made their way over to the sets of mismatched tables and chairs. There were, perhaps, two tables not already taken up by the other patrons, and one of those was still covered in plates and used cans of drinks. So, one choice and one choice only. Meg led Yoko to the back of the western-style diner, flopping down in the chair facing the door. No matter how safe she considered the environment, she wouldn't be making the fatal mistake of not watching the door.
Yoko pulled out the chair across from her, nodding to the mercenary as she sat down.
They sat there in uncomfortable silence for a minute or two, Meg trying to look everywhere except at the other woman.
This is… a lot harder than I thought it would be, Meg admitted silently. How the hell do I fish for information, when I don't even know what I'm looking for? I don't even know what to talk about, let alone use as ammo against her…
Yoko pulled out her planner, tapping the screen with her finger as she sorted through the contents.
Crap, I'm losing her. Say something, anything! Meg snarled in her mind, fishing about desperately for something to talk about. She struck gold.
"So, what happened, after Bai-Lan finished up at the Academy?" Meg questioned, leaning forwards on her elbows, her hands folded under her chin. She genuinely wouldn't mind knowing how Yoko got to the position of a secretary of the president of a prestigious company, in just a few short years. Hell, she was just two years out of school.
Yoko looked up, her dark eyes slightly surprised.
"Ah… that's a fairly short story," the Ormicon secretary said in a low voice, adjusting her wire-rimmed glasses. Was it Meg's imagination, or did Yoko hesitate? Meg's eyes narrowed a fraction. Why would Yoko hesitate over something so mundane?
"Sure, but I'd like to know anyhow," Meg announced, fixing Yoko with a gimlet stare. "It's not like we don't have a ton of catching up to do."
A ghost of a smile, again. "I suppose we do."
There was silence, only the crooning voice of the western country singer over the decades old speakers. Raising an eyebrow at Yoko's reticence, Meg leaned forwards in her seat again, forcing the blue-haired woman to meet her eyes.
"Well? How'd you do it?"
Yoko met her eyes levelly. "After you left me at the hospital, I simply went on. When the Academy reopened after the Bai-Lan investigation, my parents sent me back, no matter how I protested. I wanted…" she paused, her eyes suddenly very distant, as if far away from the chattering of the diners, the bad country music, and Meg. "I have no idea what I wanted, but that place still held some bad memories there, for me."
Same here, Meg agreed. But at least I got to leave it behind.
"A lot of the other girls dropped out, after the incident. Bad memories, bad reactions to the drugs. In the end, there was only twenty students in my year level, and even fewer upperclassman. Nadesico certainly had fooled a lot of us, and the Ishtar Club had gotten to a lot of students."
"I'm surprised you let them send you back," Meg remarked, leaning back and crossing her arms over her chest. "I would have run away."
There was that maddening half-smile again. "No. I'm certain you wouldn't have."
I ran from you, because of the memories that place brought. God only knows how I would have cracked if Sei had made me stay there, to 'continue my education'.
"In any case, it was not hard to finish at the top of a severely reduced class. In spite of the bad publicity the Saint Luciana Academy had attracted in the previous years, we were still highly exclusive and still had a lot of the top businesses looking for… aspiring individuals."
"And Morholt from Ormicon was one of them?"
That got a laugh. "Mr. Morholt? No, he would never go and meet students, or anything so pedestrian. No, it was Mr. Zuru who I met following graduation. He offered me a spot on Ormicon's secretarial staff."
"…wait, weren't you making noises about going to a university to study art or science?" Meg tilted her head in confusion. It was so long ago, but her memory wasn't that dodgy. Was it?
"After the Ishtar Club… incident… I had to re-evaluate my goals in life. I took the job at Ormicon because it was really my only option after my high school graduation. No other employment offers were made, and I was one of the lucky ones. Secondly, Ormicon is a prestigious science facility. If I can work my way into the research and development departments, I'll be receiving world-class training."
"…but instead of working your way into the science facility, you somehow worked your way up the chain of secretaries?"
A light sigh. "Unfortunately, I became Mr. Morholt's secretary earlier this year. Since then, two research positions have come up, but he's turned my application down because he's become… attached to me."
"Sucks to be you," Meg drawled, grinning at Yoko. "But you haven't quit yet, have you?"
"I do find myself enjoying the work Mr. Morholt assigns me," the blue-haired woman admitted as one of the boys from the kitchen set down her plate and drinks, the boy ducking his head in a half-bow. Meg leaned back, as the boy placed her own burger on the table in front of her. Just the way she remembered them.
"Mr. Morholt is a very busy man, especially these days."
Meg cracked open her cherry-flavoured soda, trying to look casual as possible as the hair on the back of her neck prickled. 'These days' was very specific, she noted as Yoko took a drink from her can.
"That so?" she asked carefully, grabbing the bottle of ketchup from the table and emptying nearly half of it on her fries. "What is it that you guys do? I always hear about Ormicon in the news, but they're never all that clear on what you guys develop."
Was she imagining things again, or did Yoko hesitate once more?
"Mostly, we develop military-grade weaponry, for the new army of the Hokkaido region's that appeared," Yoko said, but her eyes were wary. "Sometimes medical research. I can't really say, much beyond that."
"I see." Meg forced herself to keep her tone to sound noncommittal. Couldn't Yoko say more, or wouldn't Yoko say more? She focused her eyes on her plate, stripping her gloves from her hands to scoop up a few ketchup-drenched fries. Yoko seemed happy to let the conversation wane for now, as she took a bite of her cheeseburger.
"Huh, this isn't all that bad," Yoko said after she finished her first mouthful. "I admit, I was a little apprehensive about the quality of this place."
Meg smirked. "What'd I say? I told you I'd show you where all the good food is at in Tokyo. This place isn't renowned for its stellar furnishings, but they sure can make a nice burger. What else do you need? Good food, good company is what I always say."
She had to fight the chills running down the back of her neck, though. Military-grade weaponry, supposedly for the Sapporo army. Medical research, and an interest in cybernetic parts they could obtain from someone like Kruegar. And they were ruthless about all of these things.
Meg swallowed a bite of her burger, but she was no longer all that hungry anymore. The parallels to Ormicon and RAPT's development programs were probably just coincidence. Right? Bai-Lan did similar projects on the side. But there was something in Meg's gut that warned her. Maybe Ormicon wasn't nearly as toothless as their public image led Bai-Lan to believe…
The Councilman's home was more of an apartment complex, Sei noted as she made her way through the polished timber corridors. It was built in traditional Japanese style, the interior doors made of rice paper and wood polished to a shine – she had to wonder how much it had cost him to build. Such a large parcel of land, not too far from Tokyo, would certainly have been pricey.
What really made this situation odd, was that Councillor Daisuke Hiwatari had never been one of the richer men of the Bai-Lan council. Of course, he'd done well enough for himself, but the fact remained that he should have been able to afford something as… extravagant as this.
As Sei strode through the interior of Councillor Hiwatari's home, she heard the sound of slipper-covered feet running after her.
"Don Laoban!" A man Sei recognized as Hiwatari's secretary called out, and finally, Sei stopped. He ran up to her, panting slightly from his run as he offered her a shaky bow. Sei nodded to him, not in the mood for manners at that particular moment.
"I am looking for the Councillor," she told the man in a low voice. "I have made arrangements to meet him in the gardens at noon."
She didn't bother to add that she hadn't announced her arrival for the sole reason of surprising Hiwatari, nor that she'd arrived an hour earlier than the scheduled time. There were serious merits to an off-balance, worried opponent, and Sei frankly needed all the advantages she could get.
"Please, my lady. Allow me to escort you to the gardens. The Councillor has only just made his way there – he wasn't expecting you so soon," the man fussed, checking over his shoulder to see that Sei was following.
That was the point, my friend. Not all is lost, though. Perhaps this will still give me enough of an advantage to get the information I need from him.
She allowed the secretary to lead her through the traditional corridors of the Councillor's home, quietly observing the build of the place before they arrived at a set of closed double doors. The secretary clucked his tongue for a moment at this, quickly throwing them open.
The garden beyond was beautiful – there was simply no other word for it. Frankly, it made the gardens back in the Laoban ancestral house look plain and tacky. Water features, delicate plants, traditional shrines. She paused for a moment, her eyes searching the gardens quickly.
"I believe the Councillor is in the gazebo," the man's secretary said, when Sei remained silent. "Please, come this way."
The path to the shrine was laid out in a pale, granite-like stone and wound beneath a row of bare cherry-blossom trees, around the delicate wooden water features and, finally, stopped at wooden, open-air gazebo in the centre of the garden. Sei nodded to the man, thanking him silently for escorting her to the Councillor and allowing him to quickly vacate the area. Bai-Lan business was hardly the forte of idle gossip, and Sei didn't want to take chances with how far the secretary could be trusted.
Sei entered the small, wooden structure, surveying the simply-built seats. Councillor Daisuke Hiwatari was settled on one of the wooden benches, a large text open on his lap as his fingers brushed the page as he read. Sei cleared her throat, and suddenly Hiwatari looked up in alarm. The book slid off his lap in his haste to lunge to his feet, his dark eyes wide behind his glasses.
"Don Laoban! This is… an unexpected surprise." The man wiped at his forehead with a handkerchief he'd stashed up his sleeve. "I thought we had scheduled our meeting for noon."
"Councillor," Sei said, dipping into a low bow. The book Hiwatari had dropped had nearly impacted on her foot, and would have made a substantial bruise. "My apologies. The weapons inspection ran shorter than I expected, so I decided to come here directly." The lie was smooth, and he'd have no reason to doubt her. She was Bai-Lan's leader, after all.
"No, no, it's quite all right. You just caught me by surprise." Hiwatari's eyes rested on his fallen book, not far from Sei's feet. "Oh, if you'll excuse me-"
"Not at all," Sei replied, kneeling smoothly and taking the book into her hands. "Interesting reading materials. One would think the old myths and the Chinese constellations was a little out of left field."
"Ah, yes, my lady. It's become a recent interest. The comparison between the Chinese and Japanese interpretations of the Four Symbols has fascinated me."
She brushed the page with the tips of her fingers – a picture of Kiyomizu Temple in eastern Kyoto, and the statue that represented the Azure Dragon of the East. Sei knew only a passing knowledge of Chinese mythology – for all the traditional aspects of her upbringing, constellations and their meanings had hardly been a major focus. Economics, finance, strategy, weapons; that was the appropriate education for a girl who would become the don of a major Chinese syndicate.
"This visit concerns the bizarre change of focus the council has had, since the last meeting." Sei passed the book to Hiwatari, her eyes scanning his face furiously for a hint – anything. His eyes looked down from hers suddenly.
Remorse?
"Please, my lady. It is not appropriate for me to divulge the inner workings of the council."
Sei leaned against one of the polished, wooden posts of the gazebo. "It never stopped you, in the times we've met before."
"Can you blame a man, for having a change of heart?" Hiwatari said, his voice low as he turned his back on her. He stared out, over the beautiful garden – a garden he hadn't had but two months ago.
I see. So that's what it is.
"So they bought you off," Sei remarked, placing a hand on his shoulder. She deliberately left out who 'they' were, hoping to prompt him into confirming her suspicions. "Hiwatari…"
He sighed, stroking the cover of the book. "Before the last meeting, a move was spear-headed by some of the other Councillors, to remove you from your office. They said that your obsession with RAPT had grown to dangerous levels, and that your ability to correctly assess profitable situations had become compromised. They had a medical testimony, my lady. I… I could not believe them, so I voted down the proposal."
"Then the majority of the Council still supports me?" That came as a surprise. She had been certain that there was a universal condemnation of her values, if the last meeting was anything to go by. So perhaps she had more support than she first thought.
In the space of a breath, though, Hiwatari dashed that futile hope.
"Barely. You survived that with a hair's breadth to spare, my lady."
It had been an even split, then, or near enough to it that it hardly mattered. A six-six split would have ensured that Sei retained her position, at least until her detractors convinced another Councillor that she was unfit for leadership. What would her grandfather have said…? Sei closed her eyes, removing her hand slowly from Hiwatari's shoulder.
"Who proposed the idea?" Maybe, if she could figure out who was poisoning the Council against her, she could do something to stop it. Buy him off, sack him, get Amy to plant child pornography on his computer – convince Meg that the Councillor was secretly part of RAPT. The last one made her smile, a little. That would have been a particularly vicious revenge.
Hiwatari sighed again, and he looked down at the leather-bound book. "I cannot be certain. In order to properly be certain of the integrity of the votes, we remain anonymous at meetings. You know this, Sei."
"I had hoped something would give them away," she said, her mouth quirking in a slight smile. She was getting cynical, in her old age, if the idea of feeding the traitor to Meg was entertaining. Sobering quickly, Sei turned the aging man towards her, meeting his dark eyes forcefully.
"Councillor, is there anything else you can tell me?"
Again, he looked away. Then was there more going on, that he hadn't told Sei? She had to remind herself forcefully that he'd all but admitted to being paid off. At least she knew, now. And what she knew, she could anticipate, or even buy him back, should it come to it. It was better than exposing a Councillor who'd otherwise been a good man, and have him replaced by another Councillor that could be even more corrupt and even harder to anticipate.
"Anything, Hiwatari. Anything at all?" she pressed, suddenly feeling cold.
His eyes were tired, as he looked back to her. When he spoke, his voice was very low. It was as if he feared discovery, even here in his own home.
"My lady, if you persist in your investigations into Ormicon, I cannot assure you that the Council will not vote against you, the next time it is brought to the table. Perhaps, in light of the bigger picture… it would be better for you to turn your back on locating RAPT."
Sei released his shoulder, forcing her breathing to steady. It was a warning, a very real one. She felt cold, the hair rising on the back of her neck.
Hiwatari, just how deep does this go?
Wordlessly, she nodded in thanks to him, striding out of the small gazebo and onto the garden path.
"Oh, and my lady?" Hiwatari called out to her suddenly, jogging after her. Sei turned, her eyebrow raised as he held out the leather-bound book he'd been reading when she'd arrived. "Please, take this as… as a sign of my regret."
Sei took the heavy book into her hands, her fingers brushing on a scrap of paper that had been used as a bookmark. She didn't open the book until she was back in the safety of her car – even then, she had count her breaths to keep her hands steady. Gently opening the book at the marked page, Sei scanned the back of the bookmark.
"Perhaps it would be worth your time, to question one Councillor Leon Cunnings."
It was late afternoon by the time Meg hauled herself back to the Elizabeth. Following the end of Yoko's lunch hour, Meg had elected to take the rest of the day off to stew and examine the various conspiracy theories involving Ormicon and RAPT tumbling around in her head. The cheap beer she'd kept ordering probably hadn't helped her clear thinking, though, she realized as she stumbled up the airship's boarding ramps.
What she couldn't work out was, how did a company under as much scrutiny as Ormicon have links to public enemy number one, RAPT?
She shook her head, leaning against the wall as she wandered in the general direction of her room. The world spun if she tried to focus her eyes, so it was better if she didn't. God, making shaking her head wasn't such a great idea, either.
Keying in the code to her room took a few tries, and when the doors finally slid open, Meg collapsed on her bed gratefully. She didn't even bother to kick her boots off as she reached for Jo's scarf, only clumsily peeling off her gloves to feel the worn softness of the wool. It was still bright outside, but right now, she just wanted sleep.
It had gone better than she'd expected, today, but she really hadn't learned much of value from Yoko. All she was left with, was a gut instinct that things weren't all they seemed at Ormicon and that, somehow, Sei wanted to get to the bottom of it.
Meg closed her eyes, her mind drifting. She thought she could vaguely hear someone outside her door, calling her name – maybe she was wrong. It took too much effort to listen, at that moment.
Even if her meeting with Yoko had gone well, there was something disturbing about what she was doing. On one hand, she was trying her damnedest to get Jo back, but on the other, Sei was forcing her to flirt with who might be the enemy, just to save her.
That's just a little bit wrong, Meg thought bitterly. What would Jo say, if she had been given this mission? Then again, I can't really imagine any scenario in which Sei would even give her this kind of mission. Ugh.
She must have dozed off for a while, because when she looked out her window again, it was dark. She swallowed thickly, her mouth tasting of cheap beer and grease from the burger. At least her head wasn't spinning anymore, she noted. That was a positive.
Rolling onto her side, she swung her feet down to the floor, leaving Jo's scarf sprawled out over the sheets. It was way past time that she reported to Sei, Meg realized groggily as she pushed herself up. A brief pause to check her message machine, and then she was off into the Elizabeth's metallic hallways, blinking as the fluorescent light stung at her tired eyes.
This time, Sei was seated in her private office, a mug of coffee on the table and papers littered all over the metal surface. An old-looking, leather-bound book was resting next to Sei's hand as she scanned the reports on her desk. The Bai-Lan leader looked up as Meg wandered in, raising an eyebrow at her subordinate's bedraggled appearance.
"How did your mission go, Meg?" Sei asked, a small smile tugging at the edge of her lips. Meg scowled at her.
"Well enough," she said sourly, as Sei motioned for her to take a seat at the opposite side of the paper-littered table. How the hell could she sit there, smiling, when Meg had to face down one of her oldest fears?
Damn Sei.
The smile seemed to grow a little wider, as Sei dropped the page she was examining back to the pile. "Is that why you reek of cheap beer?"
"Tch. No, I decided to do that afterwards, to waste Bai-Lan's time as much as you wasted mine." Meg crossed her arms over her chest, giving Sei a baleful stare. How could she be having so much fun with this? Sadistic cow. "And that 'cheap beer' comment is a little rich, coming from you. In light of last night."
"I see we're in a bad mood, then," Sei said, as she took a long sip of her coffee.
"We're on fire today, aren't we, Sei?" Her voice was scathing. She probably would not have reacted this badly, had Sei not been enjoying Meg's obvious discomfort so damn much. It had been a long time since Meg had been so far out of her depth, and to find out today that she still had such deep fears…
"Did you find anything useful, today? Or did you come here to snipe at me for a mission you didn't like?"
Meg sighed, resting her chin in the palm of her hand as she quickly sorted back through what she'd learned from Yoko. "Not really, only that Ormicon develops some things that RAPT used to. Military weaponry, biomedical research."
Sei leaned back, her dark eyes distant, calculating. "So it could be innocent, after all."
Meg frowned. When Sei acted like that, it got harder and harder to remember their days as a Bai-Lan cell. Instead of voicing those thoughts, she said, "I dunno, Sei. I just get this… feeling, that things with Ormicon aren't all they seem."
Sei smiled, though it looked tired. "As much as I trust your gut instinct, Meg, I can't go in front of the Council and tell them to believe me because my top agent has a 'feeling', which is a pity. I'd like for the Council to be so easy to control."
Something in Sei's voice prickled the edges of Meg's tired mind. What had it been, that Amy had said last night? Oh, right. That was it.
"I hear you're having issues with the Council. What's up with that?"
Sei raised an eyebrow, looking suitably surprised. It wasn't usually Meg's style, to worry herself with the inner workings of Bai-Lan, nor the troubles the Council sometimes gave Sei. She felt a brief moment of guilt – she really left Sei alone to deal with all of that stuff, didn't she?
Sei turned her eyes back to the reports on the desk in front of her, her voice forced and level. "They believe I'm too eccentric to effectively lead Bai-Lan, and that my 'conspiracy theories' are going to bring the organization down."
Oh Sei… How hard must this be on you? She'd been so wrapped up in her own problems, that she forgot Sei was still very much human.
Instead, Meg snorted in derision. "Of course, those pompous old fools forget, how you and your grandfather salvaged the organization after they locked us into contract with RAPT. If it were up to them, we'd have been dragged down along with RAPT."
"Councils do have short memories. But the fact is I need proof, to support the claim that RAPT exists and that Bai-Lan is right to keep chasing them."
"I believe you," Meg offered, knowing how useless that sounded. The backing of Bai-Lan's loosest cannon; Sei must feel so supported.
Sei smiled ruefully, taking another long sip from her coffee. "Thankyou, Meg. But regardless of my problems with the Council, I still need you to work on Yoko Ketsu. She's our only link to Ormicon, and potentially the link to RAPT."
"…right," Meg sighed. She'd known that it would come to this – the lack of information she'd obtained had pretty much guaranteed that she'd be spending a few lunches with Yoko in the future. She'd just hoped that it wouldn't be the case.
"Just relax. We need you to do this," Sei reminded her, gently. "You're doing an important mission for Bai-Lan."
"Whatever, Sei. I'll try to learn more next time. I just have to get her to trust me."
Beth kept her eyes fixed on the blurry computer monitor, sipping the extra strong coffee Kirk had brought her when he'd visited the security department, not quarter of an hour ago. Stationed on yet another double shift, even she needed a boost to keep her going when she faced another ten hours at the same terminal.
She rolled her stiffening shoulders, cracking her neck and generally trying to get more comfortable. It was looking to be a long night, with the scientists working overtime on the project once again. Things were certainly speeding up – was some kind of deadline nearing, that they had to adhere to? Her eyes narrowed thoughtfully.
The subjects were getting more human, in recent days. More, those that were human were getting less identical to their genetic donor, something Beth was not sure of. Good or bad, it was hard to determine, but from the look of things, that was what the scientists were angling for. Especially given how hard the scientists were arguing with Maria, over how that particular specimen should not be sacrificed to the Gauntlet and Maria's endless hatred, that that one was the closest they'd come in five years-
Of course, they never actually said what it was they were trying to create, something which had annoyed Beth greatly.
Beth averted her eyes as the latest batch of specimens were loaded into the Gauntlet, listening absently to the sound of machineguns firing, screams tearing out from throats and roars from the more inhuman of the beasts.
Surprisingly though, the current lot lasted close to an hour in the Gauntlet, far outstripping those that had come before it. She rested her chin in her palm, checking the other feeds quickly. She had to give the barest impression that she was doing her job, after all.
The guards began to collect the bullet-shredded remains from the Gauntlet, and Beth quickly gave them the go-ahead to dump the bodies in the usual spot. The bodies were torn beyond recognition now, and she was not longer able to tell which had been humanoids, and which had been monsters.
Still, the length of time they'd survived was troubling. The project, whatever sick reason it was for, was definitely coming to a head.
Worse, Meg still hadn't figured it out, yet. What more did she have to do to get the girl to come here and put a spanner in RAPT's plans? Her eyes flickered over to the screens, watching the RAPT guards dispose of the mutants and the humans. The gore didn't bother her – she'd seen worse. But there was something flitting on the edge of her awareness…
Mutants mean they use those slightly radioactive cybernetic brains, she realized, a smirk coming to her lips. And that means they leave a trace. If I put the right word in the right ear, they can connect the dots themselves…
Beth leaned back, staring at Maria's visage on the screen. It was a way to lead them to the answer, without seeming directly responsible. She couldn't get caught just yet, though. There were still a lot of things she had to do.
Takane Katsu yawned widely, stretching her arms out as she submitted her final report on the Mirage raid. From the looks of the charges the Initiative had laid on him, Shates was going away for a substantial amount of time. With the boy's confession to the trafficking of the dangerous substance, the trial was a mere formality. Her new boys had done well, if Takane could be bothered to admit such a thing. Wilder had done some good work with them, since her last visit to his district.
Waving to a few Initiative officers that she passed on her way to her temporary office, Takane collapsed into the worn, leather-covered armchair and propped her booted feet up on the desk, her arms crossed behind her head as she toyed with the toothpick between her teeth with her tongue.
She let a few moments go by, staring at her usual spot on the wall. Satisfied with the idea that she was now alone in her office, she let her guard down, taking up a sheet of paper that had been on her desk, her eyes glancing over her incomprehensible, scribbled notes.
Following the submission of a couple of… patchy reports over the past few weeks, Chief Katsu had sent her to Station 49 to assess the internal integrity of the officers there. She chewed on her toothpick thoughtfully, studying her notes on each of the officers in 49 and their commanding sergeant. So far, there had been little to substantiate her father's concerns over Station 49, nor had she encountered deliberate circumventing of the law during her stay. Sure, there had been a little sloppy work, but that wasn't exactly a capital offence. And their performance during the raid on the Red Dragons hideout had been certainly up to scratch.
She sighed, cracking her neck restlessly. This 'subtle' bullshit route, that her father had forced her to take, was giving her a headache. Couldn't she just line them up in an interrogation room, and find out where the stories did not intersect? Oh, but Takane, they'd see you coming and be driven underground at the smallest hint of a threat. She scowled to herself. Things had been a whole lot easier, back before Iriki Azuma had betrayed them.
In the quiet station beyond her door, Takane could hear the phone ringing. She waited for a moment, hoping that someone else would pick up the call so that she wouldn't have to, but alas, it seemed not to be.
Growling under her breath about headaches and lazy newbies, Takane grabbed the phone and recited, "You've reached Station 49 of the Tokyo-Osaka Hanshin Police Initiative, what can I help you with this time?"
The first thing Takane noticed was that the phone had been set to audio only. The second thing she noticed was that there was a heavy amount of distortion, coming from the other end of the line.
Her eyes narrowed, the hair on the back of her neck rising.
"I do not have much time, so I must be brief. Go to Shinagawa, and in the basement of the old armoury there, you will find them." The voice was feminine, but highly distorted.
"Find what?! Be a little clearer, ma'am, or I'm gonna trace this phonecall and come down on you like a firestorm for wasting my time with a prank call," Takane spat, rising to her feet. This brought back too many bad memories – how he'd fooled them all so well, how he'd sold them out to RAPT and destroyed all they'd worked for. She clenched her teeth.
"Calm down. Take as many men as you like, but please. Be quick, before they get nervous and move the bodies again."
With that, there was a click, and Takane knew that the caller had severed the connection. Takane let the phone fall, her mind working furiously. By the time the phone hit the floor, she was out of the office and shouting for officers to help attend the tipoff.
If this tipoff was genuine, Takane thought furiously as she grabbed her bokken and charged out of Station 49, then she didn't have time to waste. As she lunged onto her chopper and sped off into the heavy Tokyo traffic, she just prayed that the woman had made a mistake in saying 'bodies'…
The old armoury in Shinagawa had been a supplier for RAPT, and later TOHPI, until its owner up and died not a year back. Ever since then, it had been on the market. Honestly, Takane had wondered why – until now. She heard the sound of police cars pulling up behind her, sirens blaring as she jumped off her chopper.
Wilder strode over to her as the other Initiative officers began to divert traffic away from the old store, his dark eyes questioning.
"Takane, what the hell is this?" he asked harshly as he followed her to the armoury's boarded-up door.
"What's it look like? A country picnic?" She cursed loudly then, grabbing at boards and giving it a tug. Hell, whoever had boarded up this place did one heck of a job. She pushed her brown hair out of her eyes, glaring at Wilder. "Don't just stand there like some slaw-jawed yokel, give me a hand!"
Wilder hesitated for a moment, before grabbing one of the old planks and yanking it clean off the doorframe. The man was built like a bear, after all. She'd seen him fracture wrists with the power behind his grip, so she wasn't sure why she was surprised as she was.
Between the two of them, they quickly cleared what remained of the boards away from the door. Takane nodded to the sergeant, waving him to the side as she let out a feral cry and planted her boot against the worn wood, busting the door from its hinges and tearing it from the lock. She spat off to the side in contempt, grabbing Wilder's flashlight as she stepped into the darkness of the abandoned store.
The old armoury was dusty from the year of disuse it had suffered, pale sections of streetlight filtering in through the grime-streaked windows. Takane quickly scanned the room, her grip tightening around the bandage-wrapped grip of her bokken and the flashlight. There was the sound of rats gnawing on wires in the wall, the scuttle of tiny clawed feet against plaster. Cursing, she rested her bokken on her shoulder.
"There's nothing here, Katsu," Wilder said, moving beside her. She could hear the other Initiative officers moving into the store, the crunch of grit and splinters underfoot as they glanced about the room warily.
"Tch. I ain't leaving, not until I've checked out the basement here," Takane drawled, as she moved forwards. There was a door behind the dusty counter, and she vaulted over the bench easily. "Wilder, you're with me. You two, stay out here and make sure nobody comes here. If we don't make it back in ten minutes, radio for backup."
"Takane, you're being ridiculous. Who was that caller? This must be a prank. The Katazukis were a respected family, surely you can't be serious-"
"Wilder, I am serious. When it comes to the law, I don't get much more serious. Now get your butt over here. I need someone watching my back down there."
He sighed, sliding over the counter as Takane pushed the door to the basement open. He was oddly reluctant, Takane noted grimly. Normally, Wilder was one of the first ones to back her more outlandish hunches up. But this time…
The stench hit her, almost a solid wave of sickly air. She nearly gagged, leaning against the doorframe as she clamped a hand over her mouth and nose, her stomach rebelling.
Hold it together, Katsu. What would you dad say, if he saw you squirming like a teenage bimbo who'd never taken her first life? This ain't the first dead body you've seen, nor is it gonna be the last. She straightened, pulling herself together as she began to descend the steps to the basement. Wilder followed, a few steps behind her, his flashlight darting over the white-washed bricks of the walls. The smell only got worse with each step – just how many bodies were there?
She let her flashlight rest on the first of the bodies, as her booted foot hit solid concrete.
There were, perhaps, fifty bodies stored down here, just in haphazard, mutilated piles of limbs and blood.
Oh god, what is this? What the hell have we just found? She felt cold sweat trickle between her shoulderblades as her eyes darted over the mounds, over the blood and the mouths caught in grimaces of agony when they died.
"Holy shit," she whispered, then the realization hit her with the force of a bullet train. The number of bodies was not the question – it was whether or not those bodies were entirely human. Green blood mixed with red in large stains over the concrete, scales, horns and mandibles -
Takane closed her eyes for a second, bending to turn over one of the more human corpses in the pile. A tattoo was scrawled across the body's left arm and shoulder, long silver hair matted with blood, entire divots of flesh torn from her body by machinegun fire.
She looked up at Wilder, releasing the decomposing body with a shove as she stood. The smell was almost unbearable, but she forced a grin she didn't feel.
"Looks like we found ourselves a little RAPT hidey-hole," she said. "We're gonna need that back-up after all."
A/N: In terms of clarification for this fic, I'm operating on the assumption that Meg is now 20, Amy is 16, Sei is 24 and Jo would be 22.
Also, something I've been meaning to work into the narrative is Meg's dubious nationality, but at the current pace of things, I won't get a chance to do so. Given her full name is Megumi, I've theorized that one of her parents was Japanese, while the other was American. She was born in the states, and until she joined Bai-Lan as Jo's partner, had little to do with Japan.
Finally, how did you guys feel about the characterization of Takane, Sei and Meg in this chapter? I admit, I'm having a little too much fun with Sei's intrigue plot, so I'd like to hear how you guys are receiving it.
I'm treading a fine line with Meg's characterization – trying to show her more serious side while still allowing her to be the Meg we know can be quite difficult. She has her periods of angst and her moments of fun and near-normalcy, and the times when she's not obsessing over Jo or RAPT seem very far between. So guys, how am I going with her?
The Takane PoV is something new that I wanted to try. Capturing her way of talking was kind of difficult, this chapter, while also portraying her seriousness about the law and the Initiative's work in Tokyo. I've enjoyed writing her parts and dialogue so much, that I think she's been promoted from cameo. :x
I'd love to hear your feedback!
'til next time! Stay tuned for the next chapter, White Is Black!