Chapter 32: Coming Home

"This way!"

Kent's squad, followed by Gumball, Lexy, and Christine, were heading for the lab Anais was in. On the way, they had some trouble running into some CR1M3 members, but at that point, they'd rather give in than to die.

"Please be alright! Please be alright!" Gumball said repeatedly.

"I'm sure wherever she is, she's okay." Lexy said trying to comfort Gumball.

"I'm so sorry, Anais. Please be okay!" Gumball continued saying, ignoring his twin sister.

"Freeze!" said Kent as he spotted someone going down the hallway.

The mysterious figure was green in color, could be Nova. However, in a split second, the figure ran off away from the hall.

"This one's mine!" Christine exclaimed as she bolted to chase down the figure.

"Hey, wait for us!" Lexy said. "Why do I have to be the babysitter right now?" Lexy and Gumball chased after the figure whilst the rest of the squad followed reluctantly.

The figure mad twists and turns throughout the building, but Christine's wolf attributes allowed her to gain ground on him and finally tackle the figure to the ground.

"Please don't hurt me!" said the figure, holding his hands over his face as he braced for a knockout punch.

As soon as Christine got up, both shock and awe (literally) with a hint of relief waved over her. "Eric?"

Eric laid down his arms and he too was surprised to see who. "Sis?"

"Freeze! For real this time!" Kent yelled as he and his squad (besides Gumball and Lexy) drew their guns on Eric.

"Wait! He's my brother!" Christine turned and said to them.

"I surrender! Just please, don't hurt me!" The voice from behind her said frantically.

"Juno, restrain him!" Kent ordered. One of the soldiers went up to him with a rope and tied him up. "Get him back to rendezvous with the others. The rest of you, let's keep going!"

Juno walked away with Eric. As the rest of the squad started rushing away to find Anais, Christine stood there, still comprehending over what she just saw was real or a dream. Eric turned his head to her for a few seconds before being shoved by Juno.

"I know it's hard to believe it, but now's not the time." A female voice said from behind her.

"You don't know how I felt. How it felt like to have your sibling being taken away from you for so long." Christine said with a shaky voice.

She turned to see Lexy standing there, still talking. "You're right. I don't know how it feels like. I got kidnapped as a baby and didn't know I had a mom, dad, and a twin brother for 12 years but yeah, let's assume that doesn't count." she said defensively.

Christine had no words to say after that.

"My little sister is somewhere in that lab right now and if we don't get there in time, I might just lose her forever, CJ. Do you really want me to know how you felt for the rest of my life?"

"No..." Christine said quietly.

"Then let's forget about this for now and get moving. We have much more time to think about it after and I'm pretty sure we'll get to see your brother soon." Lexy said.

"You go on ahead. I'm going back."

"CJ.."

"I need to see him, Lexy. We've been apart for a year, I'm not gonna wait another second."

Lexy had to think it over before nodding reluctantly and ran off to catch up with the others. Christine on the other hand, turned around and looked down for a moment. She sprinted her way back to the rendezvous point. "Thank goodness he's alright." was all she could think about.

Strike, Cato, Anna and Riki stormed in the lab, guns drawn. The lab looked empty, just a computer at the side, Anais on a table strapped in wires, but no one else in sight. As everyone slowly walked in, something started clanking at the ceiling. Everyone looked up except for Riki, who went straight to the computer. The wires Anais was strapped in were connected to the computer.

Anna and Cato walked towards Anna, wanting to take off the wires until Strike stopped them. "Wait no! We can't just disconnect her from the computer. She might die!"

"Disconnect?" Anna questioned.

Strike ignored her and walked to the computer, shoving Riki in the process. He turned on his wrist pad and started doing his work. It was so close until a deep voice was heard.

"Such a shame that you would be the one to turn your back on us, Strike." said the voice.

Everyone drew their guns besides Strike, who's trying so hard to focus and not get distracted. A man in green armor stepped out from the shadows on the other side of the table Cato and Anna were at. Strike stopped his work but everyone still kept their guns drawn on his head.

"Bunch of pitiful children. You're not worth my time. You're too late anyway. The transfusion of the serum is almost complete. Your little friend here will join our cause in no more than 5 minutes."

Anna was starting to shed tears, thinking of what would happen. Cato on the other hand was questioning something else. "How did you know she's our friend?"

"I've done my research on all of you, Cato, Riki, Anna. Quite respect given for you to risk your lives to save these little brats. The other three are evacuating as we speak, in which if I recall correctly, two of them was this little girl's siblings. Such a heartbreaker to hear that you three have failed to bring her back."

"Shut up!" Riki shouted. "Strike, get back to working on that shit!"

Strike hesitated to turn his back, and turned slowly to the computer. A cock of a gun was heard. "I don't think you want to do that Strike."

Strike turned around and sees the barrel of the gun being aimed towards him. "You dare defy the mighty Nova?!"

"So you're the mighty Nova huh? This should be fun." the white and black cat said.

Cato looked at Riki and Riki rushed to Nova, kicking the gun up in time for Nova to miss Strike. They rumbled for the gun while Cato and Anna tried to get a clear shot on Nova. Nova manages to shove Riki to the ground and aimed his gun at Riki.

Cato got a clear shot finally, but he was too late when he pulled the trigger. Riki was shot in the chest before Cato barraged him with bullets.

"NOOO!" Anna screamed, catching Cato off guard but Strike still focused on stopping the transfusion.

Anna ran to Riki, laying on the ground next to Nova standing weak on his knees by the wall.

"Hahaha, his death and all of yours will be in vain." Nova said confidently. However, one thing caught Nova's eye. Riki's supposedly dead body pulled a sly grin on his face.

"Heh, sike." Riki said before he exploded into a puff of cloud. Anna looked confusingly on her hands which was once carrying Riki's weak body and looked at Nova.

Nova too looked as surprised. In a blink of an eye, a white blur fell from the ceiling right on top of Nova. Nova, crushed by what dropped from the ceiling, passed out.

"Surprise." Riki said.

Riki stood up and saw the faces of his friend and sister, while Strike still focused on getting his work done.

"What the hell was that?!" Anna screamed.

"What? I didn't scare you, did I?" Riki said jokingly.

Anna walked up to him and slapped him, still continue to scream. "You idiot! You DID get me scared!"

Riki scratched the back of his neck and then Anna wrapped her arms around him, crying on his uniform.

"How did you do that? You never did it before when we were fighting that ninja dude." Cato inquired.

"I didn't know how to do it before we fought the ninja dude." Riki said.

(Flashback)

"While all three of you were fighting off Asashin, my Sharingan caught his hand movements to make clones of himself. I tried it out and it somehow worked." Riki narrated over the flashback.

Riki tried to remember how Asashin did the hand signs from his Sharingan and did it on his own. Then, a copy of himself manifested beside him.

"Cool." Riki said.

"That gave me an idea." Riki said, narrating again. "I gave him my gun and made him pretend like I was the real thing as you guys got Asashin pinned down. Then, I jumped up onto the pipes conveniently placed on the ceiling. Lighting isn't that great so I was basically concealed."

"And then basically I've been watching from up there the entire time." Riki said as he tied Nova to a nearby pole with some rope.

"So that explains the clanking noise." Cato said.

"I was hoping nobody heard that."

"Guys, we got a problem." Strike said. Everyone immediately ran to him.

"What is it?" Anna asked.

"Problem number one, Anais is gonna be fine 'cause I stopped the transfusion process, but part of the serum is already in her blood flow. We need to get her the antidote quick."

"There's an antidote?" Riki asked.

"Yeah, and I know how to make it. I can whip it up if I have enough time."

"Then do it now." Cato said.

"That brings me to problem number two, which is.." Strike said, before being cut off by a computer voice.

"Building will self-destruct in T-minus 5 minutes."

"Freeze! Down on the ground!" said a familiar voice.

Everyone faced towards the lab door and saw Kent's team with guns drawn on Strike.

"Hey, guys! Easy! He's with us!" Riki said.

"Anais!" said Gumball and Lexy as they ran towards the table.

"We need to get her out of here. She's been injected with the serum and we need to make an antidote. We need this guy to help us. Maybe he can alter the brainwash from the guys that are left scrambled around here." Cato told Kent.

"That'll be a violation of protocol, son. We can't bring him to HQ, he's still a threat."

"I don't need to be sent to your HQ. All I need is a good place to work and a few ingredients. And we got no time to argue now, we need to move!" Strike suggested.

"Building will self destruct in T-minus 4 minutes."

Kent pulled out his radio. "Radio Command, this is Support Alpha, we need to pull in for evac. This whole place is gonna come down. I repeat, pull in for evac."

"You can take off the straps now." Strike turned to Gumball.

"Should we trust this guy?" he asked the first trio.

"Do you want her to die?!" Cato asked and hurriedly took off the straps. Gumball started to take them off too and carried Anais on his back.

"Alright, let's move, team!"

(Outside the building)

"Aaahh, what's taking them so long?" Blu yelled in anger.

"Stay calm, they should be out by now." Sykes said.

Chatter in the radio started to come on, attracting the brothers' attention. "This is Support Alpha, we need to pull in for evac. This whole place is gonna come down. I repeat, pull in for evac."

The two brothers in arms looked at each other for a brief moment. "Alright everyone, get ready to move out!"

Every single soldier remaining started up their trucks and got seated. The kids were already sent away safely from the other trucks and helicopters earlier.

"Evac is ready! Where the hell are you guys?!" Blu said on the radio.

As if on cue, the squad rushed out the entrance in a hassle, as fire was seen behind them. Everyone got on board on respective vehicles.

"Everyone fall back! Fall back to base!" Kent yelled to the drivers. All the remaining trucks started off away from the building.

"What the hell happened?" asked Sykes, who was in the same truck as Kent, Cato, Riki, and Strike.

"The building was set to self destruct. We had no idea.." Kent said, cut off by a loud noise.

The building behind them exploded and collapsed to the ground. Everyone looked back at the wreckage, even the drivers who looked at the rear-view mirrors to see it.

"As I was saying, we had no idea who initiated it, but everyone was accounted for."

After Kent's explanation, Sykes started eyeballing Strike. Not being at the scene, they wondered why he was there.

"And why is this kid with us?" Sykes asked.

"We need him, he knows how to alter the brainwash. He can make the antidote." Kent answered.

"So he betrayed his own people, how do we know he won't do it again?" Sykes asked with a skeptical face.

"I can assure you, sir, my intentions are pure. I'm your only hope at getting these captured people back, if there were any." Strike said.

"We captured some after Kent's troops went to get the isolated one. Others, weren't so lucky." Sykes said.

"And green wolf? I heard his sister was with you guys."

"He was captured by his own sister. Probably for the best." Kent said.

"I can whip up an antidote and bring them back. I got some stuff that can help me. All I need is a workbench, which is why I'm following you guys."

Sykes looked at Kent, then me and Riki. I get that he doesn't feel well about the situation, all the more now that we got one of them on our side, but this is probably the best we got.

(3rd person POV)

The building is now reduced to rubble. Everything and everyone's remains had been buried inside the ruins of what used to be CR1M3 headquarters. At least, most of them.

A hand spurted out of the rubble, and the figure slowly dug himself out of the ruins. He stood up, full of anger. "Strike, I will get you."

Thanks to his mask, which is now cracked and has a hole on one eye yet still working, he can track down the trail of tyre marks on the road. Groaning over his injuries, he slowly walked towards the direction of the tracks.

And that wraps this chapter for now. How long has it been, a couple of months? Damn, I need to get my schedule back on track. Anyway, sorry for that huge delay. I can't really say that school was the reason this time cuz I finally graduated (Woohoo..) so Immajust sayI'm a procrastinator. But hopefully you guys enjoyed this chapter. I'm a bit rusty so you might think this isn't much of what you expect from about 2 months of work. Imma try my best to get back up. Comment down below on what you think and I'll see you guys in the next chapter. Peace out!