[content warning: hostage situation, no-name character death/injury]
A Navi shuffled along the pathways of the Ministry network, single-mindedly fixed on his destination. It was nothing unusual. Around him, Navis of all sizes and colors came and went, some chatting to friends or, like the green Navi, just focusing on the task at hand. Ahead was the panel that would take him to the heart of the network, where all requests and alerts were processed and sent out. Any Ministry worker could enter—in an emergency, anyone had to be able to let the complex know what was happening.
It was the middle of the week; a quiet day, with few Navis sending requests. Stinger looked around, rooted to the spot, as they finished their tasks and left.
He stared fearfully at the area's center as his feet moved on their own, pulling him closer. His hands lifted, bringing up information and control panels. Almost cheerfully, a young man sang along to a music stream in his head. Black abandoned the singing along to keep typing, sending his puppet a stream of commands that moved each joint of each finger fluidly to establish a more direct connection with his computer. "Very good, Stinger," the hacker congratulated like a teacher admiring a kindergartener's scribble, maneuvering him away to the side. "You can wait here."
As his controller worked away, deleting evidence of Stinger's appearance and adding layers to the Ministry security that Stinger couldn't even comprehend, the Navi's hand shifted into a short, sharp point. With a trembling arm, he lifted it toward his own head. "Now, now, don't be a bad sport!" Black said, retaking control. Stinger's hand lifelessly dropped to his side. "We only have one more thing to do after this. One more, and then you can rest." Stinger wouldn't tell his Operator what had happened. His memories of the past few minutes were already being erased as he accessed the warp he'd come from.
One block away, Black set his implanted transmitter to broadcast. "Begin."
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There were, as usual, a few people waiting in the lobby of the Ministry of Science. Some had come to take a tour of the building, some had come with resumes prepared and suits starched, and one redheaded woman was powdering her face. Standing a few feet from her was a man whose face was nearly hidden by his scraggly black hair. His hands were shoved in his deep pockets, and he tapped his foot impatiently.
The man had his arm around her neck and a gun pressed to her head in an instant. The woman went very still. "Nobody move!" he barked, firing two shots into the air. The couple of businessmen who hadn't noticed what was wrong joined in panicking with the others. "Shut up! Get on the ground!" His green eyes glimmered out from behind the curtain of hair. "Now, I got a few shots left," he said, looking up into the camera above him. "One for this girl here, and some for anyone who tries getting in my way." He bared his teeth in what looked more like a growl than a feral smile. The woman in his arm stared up at him in silent fright, some of the shock beginning to wear off. "I know you're there," he snapped. "I know you're watching me. Well, I want you to come down here!" Barely a second of silence passed before the man roared, "Get me Hikari Yuuichirou!"
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Hikari Yuuichirou had no intention of being gotten by anyone. The other scientists clustered around the monitor showing the dark-haired man's tirade didn't want him going anywhere, either. "Get Commissioner Kifune on the line," Meijin ordered.
"He just seems desperate," Montaile said. "Why not just see what he has to say, eh?"
"Yes, Montaile, he does seem desperate. He's also endangering everyone in the lobby," Meijin said evenly. "I don't think sending Hikari-hakase out there without protection is very wise, considering his position at the Ministry and the situation we're in." Reluctantly, Montaile put the call through.
"Hikari-hakase, Meijin," greeted the Commissioner, lacing his fingers together.
"Commissioner Kifune, we're under attack," Yuuichirou said, bringing up the security camera's footage. Kifune's eyes narrowed. "I'd rather we not cause him serious harm, but I don't want anything happening to the people outside."
"Of course not," Kifune said. "I'll send a team over with tranquilizer guns. They'll come in through the back and use the catwalks over the lobby."
"Thank you," Yuuichirou said. The call was ended, returning everyone's attention to the crisis just outside the doors.
"You think this is some joke, don't you?" asked the man indignantly. "You really think you can just keep me waiting, don't you?" He shoved the gun into the woman's red hair, producing a horrified scream. "Well, I'm running out of patience! If you wait any longer, you'll see this nice lady's head go splat!"
Yuuichirou looked at the mad gleam in the man's eyes. "I'm going," he said.
The scientists were horrified. Over the hubbub, Meijin said, "There's no way I'm letting you go out there alone—"
"That woman is going to die unless I do something," Yuuichirou said firmly. "I won't let that happen." He stepped toward the door.
"No. I'll see if I can talk him down," Meijin said, placing his hand on his employer's shoulder. "I'm almost as good as you, right?"
"Meijin, I can't ask this of you—"
"If you'd be fine, then so will I." Meijin stepped past.
Before the door could open, Yuuichirou said, "We'll head further back, into the Research Room. An outsider won't find it easily." As Montaile and the other scientists began to leave, Yuuichirou turned back toward the double doors out. "Meijin... be careful."
It was no time for jokes, and they both knew it. "Of course, Hikari-hakase." Yuuichirou left Meijin to square his shoulders and step through the doors.
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"You know, one would think they'd invest in better security with their checkered past," Black said, traipsing through the back door and leaving Arrow behind in the security network. "I guess mine'll have to do." He reached behind his ear, adjusting his implanted transmitter so Arrow could get through as well. "Let the sniper team through," he said. "We don't want you being caught so early over something so trivial."
"What about Atsuki?" Arrow asked.
"He won't have any trouble, especially once I'm where I need to be," Black said, stepping into the elevator and hitting the button to take him to the first basement level. "You don't mind, do you?" he asked. He got a short laugh as an answer. "Good. Now, let's see if I can remember the shortcut..." He stepped off the elevator. To his right was what he'd expected—a tunnel that would eventually take him to the rightmost of the outside four buildings. "Reminds me of home," he muttered to himself, looking around at the drab walls and listening to the way the soft taps of his boots echoed down the halls. More loudly, he said, "We'll be there in less than a minute. Burnerman, on the ready."
"You sure I can't help out here?" he asked. "Just for a little?"
"You know where you're needed," Black said in a tone that left no room for argument.
"Understood," Burnerman said, disappointed. At the end of the tunnel was a flight of stairs, and above it was a sunlit stairwell. Black's bionic lens adjusted quickly, while he had to squeeze his natural one shut.
"There's no way I'm taking all these stairs," he said, opening the door. To his left was a copier—just what he needed. To his right was the elevator. Straight ahead were a few unfortunate scientists, and Black wasted no time reaching into his jacket and pulling out a gun. "Burnerman, transmission," he said, holding his PET off to the side. To the onlookers, Black commanded, "Don't move. Not an inch—" One of the scientists was darting glances from Black to the copier. Shakily, he lifted his PET arm. Black clicked the safety off and fired. "I don't suffer heroes lightly," he told the remaining scientists, quickly looking away from the man he'd hit. "Stay out of my way."
Keeping his gun trained on the ashen crowd, he crossed to the elevator. He reached into his jacket again as the display above his head pinged. The other gun had too much kick for his tastes, and it wasn't like controlling a gun in each hand was easy to do for anyone. But real guns were rarities in Japan, and this crowd had probably seen plenty of movies. They'd be scared enough. "Everybody out!" Sure enough, the people in the elevator ran for it. Black stepped in and pocketed the second gun, hitting the button for the top floor. The door closed, leaving him free to put the safety back on and let his arms drop so the gun pointed at the floor.
"Ya want th' one to your right," Punk said.
"I was just about to ask," Black said as the elevator opened. "Thanks." There weren't any more people to intimidate up here, leaving him free to stow his gun away while he strolled across the walkway. "Nice day, isn't it?" he asked, looking out at the wooded area that surrounded the Ministry complex. Far beyond it, the city carried on, tiny cars zipping from place to place on narrow bands of road. The door to the next building was at arm's reach before he knew it. "Oh, well. Back to reality."
The elevator opened on silence, but Black wasn't fooled. He kept his gun at the ready, optics and ears constantly scanning for the slightest disturbance. It seemed that Burnerman had already arrived; the coffeepot was boiling over.
He heard running, and his instincts acted faster than his mind; he turned and shot, disposing of a would-be attacker. The baseball bat the scientist had been carrying clattered to the ground as Black walked away. "If anyone else is watching, consider that a warning," he said to a nearby security camera. When he turned the corner, he found more scientists. But they were less foolish than their ally, and let themselves be led into one of the side rooms. Black took their PETs, sent Punk in to lock the door, and then continued toward his destination.
Before long, he arrived at a room walled in by glass. "Punk, if you would…" Even as one of the scientists tried to lock him out, Punk let him in. "Arms up. Back against the wall." They were unarmed, and he wasn't; they did as they were told. "I'd hate it if you tried anything," he said as he started making the rounds, confiscating each man's PET and turning it off. "I really would prefer you stayed alive for now." A nearby drawer ended up being the receptacle for the powerless PETs, while the scientists themselves were marched out of the room. Once Black was alone, Punk locked the door.
"How are things, Arrow?" he asked, bringing up the building's security cameras.
"You're just in time." Black took a look for himself. The police team was heading in through the same door he'd taken.
"I always am." He studied the team for a moment longer, then said, "Atsuki, I'm in. You're about to have company. If you could call off the variety hour?"
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"All I wanted was a job, okay? Just a nice job to feed my family." The man's green eyes glimmered out from under the curtain of shaggy, black hair that hid his face. The woman's initial shock had given way to silent panic. Tears rolled down her cheeks as the man shoved his gun harder against her temple. "We're going to lose our house! Do you hear me? We're going to live in the street-"
"Please calm down," Meijin said for what seemed like the fifteenth time. He felt like a broken record. He knew what to do in theory, but this was very different. Nothing seemed to be working, and the strange man was becoming more and more of a wreck, harder and harder to reason with. "If you just leave this young woman alone, we'll see about getting you the paperwork. All you have to do—"
"Paperwork?" the man asked hysterically. "Paperwork? All I ever see is paperwork!" Mad desperation filled his face. "Do you even know what it's like? Have you ever had to look at a paycheck and wonder if you'd ever see another? Have you looked around and known there isn't a soul in the world who'd take you?"
"I can tell you that Hikari Yuuichirou is a very generous man," Meijin said. The green-eyed man was watching him, an odd expression on his face. "I'm sure once he hears your story, he'll be able to work something out. But that's only if you put the gun down."
"Okay. Fine." The man didn't look very convinced, even as he said, "I'll believe you."
Meijin was surprised that he'd gotten the gunman to change face. Still, he wasn't going to look a gift horse in the mouth. "Good!" He raised his arms to his sides. "But first, I'd like to make sure that woman's safe. We—"
"All right, all right. Here. Take her." The man shoved his hostage into Meijin. She leaned against him, panting. It was only when he felt something cold and hard push into his chest that he knew something had gone very wrong.
The gunman suddenly whirled, rapidly firing seven shots into the air. Choked gasps and yells came from above—there had been policemen up there, and the man had hit them all. For a moment, Meijin thought the dark-haired man had eyes in the back of his head to take them out when nobody else had known they were there, but then common sense caught up with him. "The security room—!"
"Don't move," the redheaded woman said. She ripped off a thin layer of spirit gum, taking her 'hair' and a wig cap with it to reveal brown, slightly spiky hair. "Nova just needs to take a couple things, and then we'll be on our way."
The dark-haired man's confident smirk turned into an annoyed frown. Meijin turned his head to see the receptionist whispering into a phone. "You're going to wish you hadn't done that," the big man said, striding to the desk. "Yumi, we don't need all these people lying around. Can't you take them elsewhere?"
"Of course," Yumi said. Pushing Meijin ahead of her, she yelled, "You heard him!"
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"I thought that test was never gonna end!" complained Kaita as he and Mary joined the other students piling out the doors of Akihara Elementary. "Mary-chan, wanna go get ice cream? I need a break after all..."
"Chaos at the Ministry of Science!" shouted Kero's voice.
"...that?" Kaita turned to see a crowd of people gathered around an electronics store display.
"What's happening?" wondered Mary, taking Kaita's hand and following as he shoved through people to get to the front.
"We haven't received word from inside the five-building complex other than the call placed by the Ministry of Science's receptionist on duty. As far as we know, Nova's hostage situation continues within. No word on what's happened to the scientists who hid deeper in the building. Police cars attempting to enter have had communications cut. We're about to get a live helicopter feed from—my word!" Mary's hands flew to her mouth. The more he looked at the sight before them, the worse Kaita felt.
The Net Police had tried to get inside. Their police cars were stuck just past the Ministry gates. The first row's tires were melted onto the pavement. The rest were a mixed bag; some had gotten the same treatment, others had crashed into the cars in front of them. The four prominent satellite dishes on the rooftop were moving to point at the camera. Its feed went blurry as someone inside yelled, "Get away, get away—"
"Nova," whispered Mary.
"If it's Nova, then we can stop them," Kaita said determinedly.
"But they've got hostages, Kaita-kun... and if they have hostages, they have something keeping them there. Maybe this one really is better left to the adults..."
"We'll be careful," Kaita said. "And we'll figure out where Beat's gotten to, so he can help us out!"
Even as Beat popped out of Kaita's PET, Mary looked down at her hands. "I have a really bad feeling about this, Kaita-kun."
"If it gets to be too much, we'll get out of there. But we have to at least try..." Kaita knew it was bad to try swaying her when she was so against it, but he also knew it was the only way he'd have her help—and it was true, after all. He added, "There're a lot of people in there who need our help. If it seems bad out here, think of what it must be like for them. We have to help them!"
"I... Yeah, you're right," Mary agreed. "But if it seems like it's too dangerous, promise we'll get out of there?"
"Promise!"
But even as they started heading for the subway, Black's words came back to Kaita: "Stay away from the Ministry of Science, kiddo. It's not your fight."