Chapter 3: Money Shot

5 Hours Later

Abandoned Mall, Musutafu, Japan

For the rest of the day, ZARA spent most of her time researching every bit of data she could find on the human race, alongside attempting to determine the whereabouts of their fallen space craft. 51 spent most of that time pacing around the mall with very little to do. He wasn't really gung-ho about returning outside and trying to roleplay as a human again unless it was absolutely necessary. He squeezed both of his long fingered hands together, trembling and gazing off into the walls. Flashes of what he foolishly hoped were past lives played out like a slow, agonizing film. Hundreds of silhouettes of innocent people burned into walls, cities aflame as Battleships passed overhead, unloading heavy plasma fire upon whatever survivors may have been left. 51 felt like vomiting, but possessed no mouth nor a digestive system to even produce bile in the first place. Perfect, expendable foot soldiers didn't need foodstuffs, though It contributed to his species' frail, malnourished appearance.

"Your heartrate has increased. Is there something troubling you?" 51 looked up, before turning back to see ZARA now standing behind him, he hadn't heard her approach. 51 stared down at the floor. What even could he ask? Where could he even begin? He tapped his fingers awkwardly. "Who...What am I exactly... ZARA...?" ZARA stared forward, processing his query before she produced a digital chirp. "You are Sectoid F051. 51st hatchling of batch letter 'F-'"

"That's... not..." 51 waved his hands about, attempting to stop ZARA from divulging such obvious information. "Y-Y-You misunderstand- ZARA, stop." 51 began to breathe in and out, trying to calm himself down. "What did I do before you... did whatever you did to awaken me...?" ZARA stared in silence, though 51 noted that she wasn't parsing an answer, It seemed as If ZARA was at a loss for words. Eventually, she cocked her head and blinked. "I am unsure. I merely chose you because you were the closest individual I could find. If I could have located something such as a Muton, I would have chosen them instead." Thanks, ZARA...

51 began to pace again, this time his hand against the side of his head as he tried to process everything thus far. "I keep getting these... flashes. Flashes of someone else, I think...or maybe it is me. But, I don't remember the faces. The locations. Nothing seems..." 51 waved his hands around in circles as he tried to guess an adequate word. "Correct... I feel like me, but... I don't Even know for sure what being 'me' means..." 51 trailed off as his analogy fell apart, he limply lowered his arms to his sides. ZARA just stared at 51, she glanced off to the side and gave off a curious "Hmm"

"Seismic impact incoming." What? What the hell was she-Before 51 could ask, a loud, earthshattering shockwave shook the mall on its very foundations, raining dust and grime down from the ceiling onto both aliens. 51 scrambled beneath a fallen table and covered his head, curling up into the fetal position and trembling in fear. "Why is this planet so dangerous?!" He thought to himself, now thoroughly finished with Earth's bullshit.

"Singular shockwave, the quake has dissipated for the time being." ZARA's words caused 51 to cautiously crawl back out from underneath his supposed safe-haven. "Then where did that come from then? Was It-" Another explosion once again almost rattled 51's oversized brain out, this time he was sent crashing to the floor. One shockwave, she said. Only one shockwave she said.

"It's not seismic activity. Thermal imaging has revealed that the source of the explosions came from something massive, due north of our current location." Massive? What was massive? Oh no... 51, without further questions, dashed back upstairs towards the roof, fearing for the absolute worst. He burst out onto the roof once more, and instead of seeing a Battleship unloading hails of green death onto the city below. He instead spotted something stranger across the way from the mall. It was a human. But he was so much larger than any of the ones he had encountered thus far.

Judging from this distance he had to be at least the height of a Large Scout Craft if one flipped it onto its side. He was a ghastly looking man too. His face was gnarled, and pointed as If it were more like an animal rather than a man. He possessed brown dreadlocks, a short stubby beard, a tattered jacket and a pair of blue pants. He was also noteworthy for being absolutely infuriated with something on the ground. He was shouting, but shouting at who? 51 wasn't sure, but he had to get a closer look. Bolting back downstairs, he once again donned his human disguise.

"I am leaving to investigate that giant nearby!" Though ZARA already knew that, she still gave a nod of affirmation. 51 ran out of the mall and onto the nearby street. He ran as fast as he could, running past Karkoon Park, still police barricaded from earlier, though the crowd had died down. Damn. He managed to get to a close enough distance from the giant. He, and a slowly growing crowd of people watched on in amazement at the giant's rampage. He stood atop a bridge running over the streets below, a train station it seemed like. The giant ripped off a set of overhead lines and threw them down carelessly to the streets below.

"Get away from me, toothpick!" The giant shouted, at what? A figure leapt forth into the giant's view, a human wearing what looked to be an outfit made almost entirely of wood. A rather inefficient set of armor, 51 thought at first, but figured there was more to it than just that. His suspicions were confirmed when the human outstretched a set of tendrils made of wood and wrapped themselves around the fallen lines just before they could fall and cause any serious damage. "What kind of a human is that...?" 51 muttered to himself. Before ZARA began to speak seemingly out of thin air.

"Shinji Nishiya.

Hero name: Kamui Woods

Age: 27

Quirk: Arbor. Nishiya is capable of manipulating and producing wood from any part of his body that he desires which can be used as weapons. Weaknesses are unknown, though likely to be fire due to his easily flammable frame."

51 felt like he was about to have an aneurysm, he patted every inch of his body trying to find just where the hell ZARA was... perhaps he was just going crazy? "Remain calm. I have formed a direct link to your main implant, I am currently in your brain." Why did she have to go and say it like that? "I was unable to pass this information onto you earlier, but within the past 200 years, mankind has undergone a sort of rapid evolution that allows most humans to be born with what would be categorized by most metrics as supernatural powers, powers they have come to call 'Quirks.' Some humans use these Quirks for law enforcement and they are known as 'Heroes,' while others use them for illegal activities and they are known as 'Villains.'" 51 looked between the fight between Kamui Woods and the Giant Villain.

"I assume then that the giant human is a...Villain then...?" ZARA was silent for a moment. "Correct." 51 furrowed his eyebrow. "Why the hesitation to tell me...? what was that about?" ZARA was once again silent. "I informed you that subject Nishiya was a Hero and your first assumption was to believe he was fighting another Hero?" 51 scoffed. Before noticing someone staring at him with a disturbed expression, which was compounded by the fact that the man had only a singular eye. "Who are you talking to dude?" the man asked, leaning his giant eyeball closer to 51, causing him to recoil in disgust. "Um... no one..." 51 responded with a shrug of his shoulders. The man leaned back and began to sweat.

"Uh, alright man. You do that then..." The man winced and moved a bit farther away from 51. With his attention drawn away from the fight. He barely missed a figure leaping into frame. A new contender. Around the same size as the Giant Villain. It was a woman wearing a skin colored suit with purple gloves and boots with orange accents running along the tops of each of them, alongside a mask of the same color scheme laying over her purple eyes that topped out on the sides of her head into a pair of purple horns.

"Canyon Cannon!"

She declared in a booming, triumphant tone as she launched a flying kick right into the Giant Villain's giant jaw. Sending him careening off of the train tracks and onto the city streets below, now out of sight to 51 and the rest of the onlookers. They all watched, now in pure shock at the newcomer absolutely devastating the Giant Villain in one hit. "ZARA...?" 51 asked, wanting to know just who the hell this titan of a woman was. "No information found. Running a scan for a related ID..." No information, huh...? She must not have an extensive record then. Or any record for that matter. 51 watched as the woman leapt down onto the street to confront the Giant directly. She bent down and grabbed the Giant's leg before turning her head towards the onlookers around her.

"Piece of cake for the world's next hottest hero. Hi there everyone, my name's Mt. Lady, and you wont have to worry about this bum anymore~!" The woman punctuated her statement by cocking her hips back in a provocative manner. 51 could see some onlookers frantically trying to pull out cameras from their bags or were taking dozens of photos from their smartphones. Mt. Lady... just then, ZARA pinged.

"ID matches to a Yu Takeyama. Age 22, Quirk registry reads her's as 'Gigantification'..." Didn't really take a genius to figure that part out. So it did seem that this Mt. Lady was a new Hero in town. Huh, and 51 was around to see it. Though as Mt Lady was soaking up all of the attention from the admittedly thirsty onlookers, the Giant Villain, in one last act of defiance, grabbed a nearby, parked truck.

"Bite me you purple-" The Giant Villain gave the truck a toss as hard as he could. Mt. Lady reacted by dodging the truck, though attempting to catch it as It passed by her, It slipped out of her grasp. Kamui Woods, seeing the large truck sailing through the air in a random direction too tried to stop it with his Arbor, but It too was just moving too fast and sailed off straight towards 51's position. He was too caught up with listening to ZARA to even notice the truck careening right at him.

"Danger! Projectile to your front!" ZARA shouted to 51, he finally looked up and froze, absolutely petrified in fear, though ZARA was yelling at him to move. Other onlookers weren't too keen on the imminent danger either until the truck was mere seconds from impact. 51, wracked with fear, did what any self respecting Sectoid would do in a position where his death was imminent... flee and hide and cower for his life... He shielded his face with his hands and hoped for the best... though, when he didn't feel the embrace of death, or perhaps him lying, bleeding to death in agony underneath a truck, he opened his eyes and saw that the truck was now suspended in the air, surrounded by a purple aura...

One that was coming out of him. His psionics, he was using his psionics to hold the truck aloft, he stopped it dead in its tracks... but... how?! The only thing he knew how to do with his Psi abilities was 'Mind Merge,' at least that's what he thought. Yet, there he was, now holding a truck, a multi-ton vehicle, in the air as if it were nothing. Though, when the adrenaline wore off, he did start to feel a massive headache taking form. He dropped the truck carelessly with a loud, metallic crash onto the asphalt and began to stumble, now feeling the world spinning around him. Slowly, the murky voice of ZARA began to register to him again.

"51... 51! Are you injured? Can you hear me?" 51 blinked as he came back to. Looking around at the people now staring at him in shock and concern. Just then, Kamui Woods landed on the street nearby and rushed towards the fallen truck. "Is everyone alright? Is anyone hurt?" He asked, looking around at the shaken up, but ultimately unharmed civilians. One of them, the same man who spoke to 51 earlier shook his head. "N-No, everyone's fine. This guy stopped the truck before it hit us..." The man gestured to 51, Kamui Woods looked to him and approached, though still looking around to ensure no one was hurt.

"That was a good catch then. That could have been a terrible accident had It been not for you." 51 stared at Kamui Woods as if he had two heads. He did what? What was he talking about? 51 looked around and noticed several other people standing around him that would have probably been crushed had he not caught the truck in time, though the significance of what he had done still wasn't setting in very well. Kamui Woods felt a bit uncomfortable at the boy's sudden silence. But figured he was a bit shaken up from doing whatever he had done to stop the truck.

When he noticed yellow fluid leaking from his nose though, he became concerned. "Do you require medical attention, you're bleeding." Bleeding? 51 tapped his lip with two of his fingers and looked down, sure enough, it was coated in his own blood. He trembled and began to pant. He could still hear ZARA saying something but It sounded like she was underwater with how muffled it was. Before Kamui Woods could say anything else. 51 ran away as fast as he could. "Hey! Wait a second! You might be hurt!" Kamui reached a hand out to stop him, but 51 just ignored him and continued to flee. Really, the entire run back to the mall was such a blur due to adrenaline and possible blood loss.

Minutes later..

Having made sure he wasn't followed. 51 now stood in the middle of the food court, panting with his hands on his knees, still in his human disguise. "You're bleeding" ZARA said, no shit. 51 began to retch... somehow. He wasn't really sure how advanced this damn disguise was, was this what it felt like to have a stomach? He hated it. "What... what happened... How did I do that?" 51 finally spoke up, though his voice was alarmingly slurring a bit. ZARA approached and wrapped a arm around his shoulder, leading him to a nearby table. "I am unsure. Right before you halted that vehicle, I detected powerful fluctuations within your implant, a power surge. Though what caused It, I cannot be certain. It almost destroyed your brain, however." That seemed to explain the crippling headache and the world spinning...

Though still, 51 was rather impressed at his outburst, even If it did almost render him brain dead. He dropped his disguise and leaned back in his seat, clutching his giant head in his hands. "Rest. You need to rest. I will defend you if necessary." There wasn't really any point to arguing with ZARA, although sleep did sound pretty good right about now even though 51 was afraid of returning to those awful dreams. He sluggishly made his way over to his makeshift bed appropriated from one of the fast food joints nearby, just a booth with a leather seat.

He laid down longways and closed his eyes, hoping that at least his headache would be gone by the time he awoke once more. His sleep only being interrupted later on the day by some commotion nearby the mall, ZARA seemed to explain It as some kind of hostage situation, though It seemed to be resolved on account of the loud explosion he heard outside... with it subsequently beginning to rain. What was it with this city and explosions? Well, he supposed he had to take the blame for one of them. He felt like the mall was going to cave in with how much shit was blowing up around here. Nevertheless, the pitter patter of the rain lulled him back into a deep sleep...

To be continued.

Authors Note:

Glad to see the favorites and follows, I appreciate the lot of you for wanting to see more of this odd crossover idea. I want to clarify some things at the top of the hour. Regarding 51's disguise, It alters his body shape due to it utilizing the same shapeshifting powers as the Faceless from XCOM-2, which I figured was just another alien race the Elders conquered, though the game doesn't make it clear whether or not they're naturally like that or If the Elders gene edited them like the rest of their conquered species. Though yes, this does begin somewhere around 10 months before the Entrance Exam Arc. On the subject of 51's psionic capabilities, I always pictured that the Sectoids are stunted by design by the Elders to just be nothing more than basic foot soldiers, with Mind Merge being the only thing they're capable of pulling off, whereas the Sectoid Commanders are allowed to retain their psionic abilities to the fullest extent. I figured though that perhaps a Sectoid could begin to break through this limit, painfully but with enough work, can become just as much of a Psionic menace as their commanders are. Though 51 is a long ways off from being a Mind Controlling, Mind Fraying, Rookie critting badass He still has a massive amount of potential. If anyone has any other questions just drop them in DMs and Ill be happy to answer them. Until next time!

Vigilo Confido, Plus Ultra!