Emiya Clan - Nerima 02b
Nabiki Tendou prided herself on her information gathering skills. Very little happened in the Nerima ward of Shin-Tokyo without her knowing about it and she often used that knowledge to make a little money on the side.
To support her family, of course.
Ranma getting himself into trouble was not really a news-breaking incident. That the trouble involved large scale property damage might rate a footnote in the neighborhood newsletter. That a new fiancée was involved was newsworthy, but only to a small circle of individuals that made up nearly eighty percent of her personal income.
When a small envelope arrived in the mail informing the family that a 'Shirou Emiya' would be stopping by to discuss their daughter's engagement to the heir, naturally the first thing she did was turn to her phone's speed-dial and inform the rest of fiancées and other involved individuals that collectively made up the so-called Nerima Wrecking Crew.
A short but profitable afternoon was spent dropping just enough hints to extract bribes and other payments for this 'exclusive information', and she laid out plans and contingencies to best take advantage of the incoming chaos she knew would arrive later that day.
The remaining time was spent shaking down her contacts while looking up any public references to this 'Shirou Emiya'. Public information was surprisingly scarce on the net, and the only mention her contacts could give her was a decades-old internet message board that the pharmaceutical/technology conglomerate known as Mid-Bio Informatics had run for some alternate-reality game. The website was defunct now, and she couldn't find any details on the event MBI had been promoting with their ARG.
The only mention she could find of the name was a small adoption filing in the city records for the town of Fuyuki several decades back by a Kiritsugu Emiya, but she couldn't find any more detailed records for anyone by that name either.
It was a mystery, and she didn't like mysteries.
A noise from downstairs told her guests had arrived. Ordinarily she would try to sit in on the meeting and gather information that way, but usually she would have some information on their guests to compare her observations against. She didn't like going into a meeting cold like this, and bent over her laptop to try a deeper search.
The sounds of small talk continued to float up from below as she tried various terminals and websites with no success. A shout from below made her pause for a moment, but she quickly identified the voice as her baby sister and put it down to the usual Ranma-caused chaos.
Her hard drive suddenly ticked and sputtered with the noise of data being read and she frowned as she checked her open applications. None of them should require accessing this much data...
Her eyes went wide open as she checked her 'net connections. A large upload was taking place and she paled as the only possible scenario ran through her head.
I must have hit a security trip wire somewhere, she thought. Everything on this computer is being copied to an offsite server!
She quickly unplugged her networking cable from its port, but a flash in the corner of her screen showed the wireless was still active. Reaching across her desk she powered the whole modem off, but even without any live connections, the screen still showed the data-upload taking place.
Shouts, crashes and explosions heralded the arrival of the NWC but she paid it no mind as her mind furiously thought of ways to cancel the hack. Just as she was about to consider forcefully powering down her computer, a small window popped up in the middle of her screen and she stared at it with wide eyes.
IF YOU WANTED TO KNOW, YOU ONLY HAD TO ASK ~M. EMIYA
Nabiki shoved herself away from her desk and rose on shaking legs. She made her way to the corridor outside and all but threw herself down the stairs, only to pause at the landing.
Before her was chaos. She had expected that. What she didn't expect was for the entirety of the NWC frozen in place - literally. Shampoo was hanging from the ceiling, twin blocks of ice holding her arms and weapons in place as she kicked at it furiously. Kuno was unconscious in a wall, Ranma's usual handiwork. Akane and Ukyo were both pinned to the floor in the middle of a catfight. Ryouga was held down by all of his limbs by more ice which reinforced themselves periodically as he struggled and cracked his restraints. Mousse was covered completely in a single large ice cube with his face frozen in surprise. Numerous holes and craters outside the shattered walls indicated the locations of the remaining members.
Sitting in calmly at the family table were a trio of strangers. A well built man who's spiky red hair was going gray at the tips. Flanking him were two women, the elder brown-haired with light blue highlights, the younger with longer hair tinted the same shade as those highlights. The two elders wore identical hard expressions on their faces. The youngest was simply staring at the Boy of Chaos with flushed cheeks on an otherwise impassive face.
Nabiki took all this in at a glance, but refocused her gaze on the man sitting at the table. Though his head was still turned towards Ranma and Genma, the latter now retaking his chair, she could have sworn he was looking straight at her.
Her mind flashed back to the mysterious hacker that had breached her computer's defenses.
"Who are you people?" she demanded.
She was not reassured to see the man smile.