Senshi Sabers
Chapter 49
Beryl brought the woman to the underground chambers, then excused herself.
"Can you make me like you?" the old woman suddenly demanded.
"What?" Mistress Nine answered.
"I'm trapped in this... decaying shell." Risa Meru gestured to her aged form. "Put me in a bioboomer body, and I will do anything you want," she answered flatly, the old woman sitting in a somewhat battered wheelchair.
"We can torture you until you give us what we want," Viluy noted, frowning at the strangely defiant human woman.
"I'm delicate," Risa shrugged as she pointed out, "you'll probably just kill me before you get what you want."
Mistress Nine was... rather impressed by the woman, actually.
"Let me remove the brain," Viluy said to Mistress Nine grimly, "we just can extract all the data we need directly."
"My willing assistance would be more efficient," Risa responded.
"You...," Viluy started.
Mistress Nine raised a hand, silencing her. "The transfer technology isn't perfect. It may change you," she noted.
"ANYTHING would be better than this," Risa sighed.
Viluy added, "You would be expected to assist us against humanity."
"I haven't cared about a human being since Dr Mizuno died," Risa answered bluntly.
Mistress Nine studied her for a moment longer, then nodded. She looked at Viluy and ordered, "Get the medical units, prepare her. We'll move her into an advanced command type."
"Understood," Viluy bowed slightly.
"Will it hurt?" Risa asked after a moment.
"Hopefully," Viluy answered dryly.
0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0
Yaten Kou shook hands with Chief Haruna, "Nice doing business with you."
"Well, nice that one of us enjoyed it," Haruna said dryly.
Yaten looked amused, "Hey, we heavily discounted the costs, Chief."
Haruna grunted quietly.
Yaten continued, "We'll have the first batch of suits available in a week, and should have more in a month or so."
"That's only twenty or so suits?" Haruna noted. "Manufacturing issues?"
"Hmm," Yaten nodded, "We really can't fully assembly-line building them. A lot of the fine work needs to be done by hand."
"I see. And not enough people to do the work?" Haruna guessed.
"Not enough well trained ones," Yaten agreed. They stood as they added, "Speaking of training, we'll have a trainer coming in to assist getting your officers up to grade."
"My men are qualified in using K-Suits," Haruna noted, a bit miffed.
"Trust me, there is a much steeper learning curve with the new armors," Yaten replied, "you'll need some training."
"Very well," Haruna accepted it.
Yaten was walked out by Minako Aino, who peppered them with questions on the armor and such. Yaten found the woman amusing, actually.
"Sir," Yaten's driver nodded, the tall redhead waiting.
"Sorry for the delay, Vesta," Yaten noted as they got in.
"Where to next?" Vesta asked, clicking the door locks on the armored car.
"Back to Starlight," Yaten sighed, "I need to check in with Kou."
"Will do," Vesta started the car and they slid into traffic. "You got a message from Taiki, as well," she noted.
"Oh, what do they want NOW?" Yaten muttered.
Vesta hid a smile as she listened to her boss complain.
0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0
"All right, who was kidnapped?" Usagi Tsukino asked, the detective called in because it was apparently a bioboomer related crime.
The beat cop who initially responded replied, "Risa Meru, age 78, a programmer for the predecessor to Infinity. She helped develop the core system architecture for bioboomer consciousness."
"Seriously?" Usagi blinked.
"So why was she in a care home?" Naru asked.
The cop checked his notes, "She had a form of early onset dementia. She was institutionalized, don't have any other details."
"And for some reason a bioboomer kidnapped her," Usagi mused. "Wouldn't any info she have be outdated?"
The young man shrugged helplessly.
Usagi and Naru walked the site, checking everything out. The bioboomer had broken in, killed a attendant, grabbed the woman and escaped dressed in a stolen uniform. They had also, apparently, fried the facility computers.
"No video records?" Naru asked the local manager.
"Whatever they did fried our system completely," the woman sighed, "we're going to have to reboot everything."
"And your files?" Usagi asked.
"Also shot," the woman sighed. "I can email head office off my phone and ask them to forward whatever we have from there?"
"We'd appreciate it," Naru thanked her.
After checking in with the forensics team, the two headed nack to the station, where they continued their research.
"Well, that's interesting. Risa Meru has a rap sheet," Usagi noted.
"Huh. Serious offence or...?" Naru wondered.
"Attempted murder actually," Usagi blinked.
"Wha..?" Naru opened the file and read. "Huh. She attempted to murder Dr Mizuno's common-law husband?"
"Yup. Looks like she got an insanity, diminished responsibility defense going, and she was commited," Usagi noted.
"Which is why we've never heard of her," Naru noted. She frtowned, "Wanna bet Prof. Tomoe stole her work after she was locked up?"
"No bets," Usagi said dryly.
0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0
"Congrats on moving in with Miss Mizuno," Setsuna noted, amused.
Rei blushed faintly. "Thank you, I guess," she said to the imposing, somewhat cool woman.
Ami entered, carrying a tea tray. "You said one of my Mother's coworkers was taken?" she asked Setsuna.
"Correct," Setsuna nodded, "Risa Meru. She was a programmer, as well as assisted in neural charting the early bioboomers."
"So why does Mistress Nine want her?" Rei asked.
"Despite her psychological issues, she was brilliant," Setsuna noted, "and that was with tech forty years ago."
Ami made a face, "It is worrying, yes."
Rei frowned, "Any way we can... I don't know? Rescue her?"
Setsuna shook her head, "We still don't even know where Mistress Nine is, much less where they might be holding Ms Meru."
Rei grunted.
"Though she may not be as useful, due to her medical issues," Ami added, sighing.
"Oh?" Rei blinked.
"She was suffering from a degree of mental decline," Setsuna noted, "though it's hard to say how much she's been effected."
"So Nine messed up?" Rei guessed.
"If her issues are biological, they could try to move her mind into a bioboomer body," Ami mused. "Which would be... worrying."
"Especially if he's still homicidal," Setsuna added, and filled them in on the woman's attempt to kill Ami's father.
"Well shit," Rei blinked.
"Yes, it's possibly a problem," Ami agreed.
To be continued...
Notes: I'm kind of thinking of making Risa into a version of Largo, from canon Bubblegum Crisis. We'll see.