IV

Chapter 19: Scavengers in the Labyrinth of Darkness

Maze_of_Lab_Rats

Part 1

*ZAP*

And all of a sudden, the lights went out. The only thing that illuminated the corridors were the weak emergency lights on the edges of the floor. "I really hope this is Asuka's doing… but I don't remember her mentioning this at all."

Yes, it was nothing but a baseless hopeful wish that would only get him killed. Someone probably noticed Hishiro's presence and was now taking action against him. He picked his revolver and set a grenade ready in his pocket just in case as he progressed through the facility, while following the blueprints provided by Asuka. But that didn't work as well as he expected.

A dead end? There shouldn't be a wall here… did they reformed this place? Or they never followed the blueprints in the first place? Thinking about it wouldn't help. The fact was that his only map was unreliable, meaning that he had to somehow search for the damn container in every inch of the building without being caught. Laughing at his own misfortune, he turned around and started drawing a map of his own on his phone while walking. That seemed like a good idea at first but...

"Huh? What the…?" Another wall that shouldn't be there. But not according with the blueprints. This path was supposed to be the one Hishiro had gone through just a minute ago. "Did I made a mistake somewhere?" His head was still a bit fuzzy, so it was possible he just went into a different direction. He marked the wall on his map and turned around one more time, intending to follow another path. But even that proved to be impossible.

"Okay, I definitely just passed by here. How come the path is blocked now?" The answer wasn't a difficult one, but was one he didn't wanted to accept. The only possible explanation for this was that these walls could open and close when given some kind of command. Which meant someone was aware he was there, and worse, they could control where he could or could not go, or just trap him inside altogether. But for that to work, they need to know exactly where I am at all times. How can they detect me if Asuka disabled the cameras and sensors? I doubt she failed, so they are probably using some other method. I need to find out what it is before they try to eliminate me!

Reaching this conclusion, Hishiro took off running, hoping to outspeed the path changes and ruin any traps the person behind it could have set for him. He turned in random directions and kept his eyes open for anything that could hint on what was being used to observe him. It took about a minute and half until he reached a dead end. Without wasting any time, he dashed out again, but this time following a planned route according to the blueprints, which involved going through some rooms with more than one entrance. This action resulted into all rooms having their doors locked after he went past the third, and he managed to go on for fair three minutes.

After giving a bit of thought to those results, he let out a small giggle. I don't really know how they are doing it, but it is a really inefficient method. It is as if they are predicting my route and closing the paths based on that instead of monitoring me directly, which probably left room for mistakes. If that's the case, then I can roam freely as long as I misguide their judgment.

Part 2

"Aaand... all done." Said the capped girl - Yakumaru - just as she finished pouring the bluish liquid inside the fuse box. Just as she wanted, all lights went out immediately after, with the exception of the emergency lights near the floor. "Hmmm… it seems like the cables for those are elsewhere else. Should we look for it?"

"No, that should be enough." Answered the Leader. "Cutting the main power supply will put them in disarray already. The security system is off too, there's no point in wasting our time on the emergency energy system." She then went to check the location of their goal and planned a route of action. "Alright, let's get going. And be ready to smash anything that moves on our way."

"Gotcha!" Naru replied with a smile while punching her own palm. Probably due to having to hold back before, she was eager to enter in action as soon as possible, keeping an eye open for a possible pray at every corner. That's why she was the first one to notice. "...eh?"

"What is it, Naru?"

"That wall over there." She pointed towards a corridor leading to a dead end and continued. "I think I saw it coming down from the ceiling."

Only Yakumaru was concerned at first, but hearing that, even the Leader stopped on her tracks and asked for a confirmation. "Are you sure of that?"

"Hmmm… could it be my imagination?" Answered the girl innocently as she tilted her head to the side.

The leader went into the corridor followed by the other two and checked the wall from one side to the other. "There doesn't seem to be anything different on it but… it is really weird to have a path leading to nowhere. Hmm… it's better to be safe than sorry. Naru, try to take this one down."

"Sure." And then, the paper maid uniform suddenly shape shifted into a huge bunny armor (which ironically exposed a lot of her skin) and tackled the wall with all her might, causing the whole place to shake from the impact. But the wall was still intact.

"Yup, looks pretty solid." Commented the Leader after checking the wall one more time.

Yakumaru scratched her cheek and smiled wryly after recovering from the shockwave. "It is actually kind of amazing that it stood still after that, even if the wall wasn't fake."

The Leader agreed with a nod, knocking on the wall a few times before turning around. "Good thing it was just a fake alarm. It would be really troublesome if-"

Before she had time to finish, part of the ceiling started to move down a few meters behind them. At this rate, they would be completely trapped in that corridor. The leader was the first one to react, dashing towards it and pulling Yakumaru with her. "Naru!"

The third girl (still with the bunny armor on) understood the command right away, jumping forward and holding the lowering ceiling in place so the other two could get through in time. Once they did, she left the armor behind and jumped to the other side of the moving wall, calling it back later on as it reconstructed her clothes sheet by sheet again.

Wiping the sweat of her forehead, the Leader finally allowed her body to relax. "That was close..."

"No kidding…" Agreed the capped girl, sitting down and rubbing her ankle.

"Ya-kun, are you alright?"

"Yes, don't worry. I just took a bad step- wait, Naru! If you get this close I can get quite a view from down here, you know! By the way, aren't your clothes shorter than usual?"

"You think so? I couldn't get all of the paper back before the path got closed, but I thought it didn't made that much of a difference."

"Okay, okay, stop messing around you two." Clapping her hands once, the Leader got the attention of the other two. "We are going to get in trouble if we don't get moving fast."

"True." Agreed Yakumaru as she stood up. "We escaped this time, be these walls could trap us at any time"

"But wasn't the security system off? And Ya-kun did cut off the power..."

"Naru is right, Leader. This is weird. I doubt there could be any automatic security system working on the emergency energy supply."

"Hmm..." The short flu masked girl placed a hand on her chin and thought for a moment as she started walking again, followed by her teammates. "Then these are manual and totally mechanic security measures, but even if that's the case, they must have a general idea of our position in order to prepare a trap like that one just now. And with no power for the security cameras, the only possibility I can think of is.."

"An esper."

"Exactly. You two better be ready. We might get company very soon."

Part 3

After wandering around in the facility for several minutes, Hishiro discovered three important things.

First, there seemed to be a limit on how many walls could be lowered at a time. He noticed that, after taking detours, some paths that were blocked before became open for no apparent reason. This worked on his favor, as he would be totally out of options if all walls were lowered at once.

Second, despite of the first rule, all routes leading to the basement were blocked, which made the mission basically impossible to complete without first dealing with whoever was messing with the interior layout of the building.

And third, his persistence obviously pissed someone off badly, as now he was being chased down by people wearing red suits with states and jets on several parts of their bodies. They didn't had any weapons and weren't that protected against bullets, but their mobility was troublesome. Getting enough speed from the jets, they could freely dash along the walls, and with their skates, they could bend their bodies to avoid incoming attacks and obstacles while keeping their speed. The ideal way to deal with such type of enemy in a closed environment would be facing it head on at close range, where all its tools would be rendered useless. But if Hishiro were to do that against so many of them, he would get overpowered by their numbers in no time. That's why he was forced to place himself into disadvantage by running away while being pursued.

And of course, he couldn't possibly outspeed them on foot. He did manage to keep them from reaching him easily by taking turns at every chance he got, forcing them to slow down, but that was hardly enough.

As the boy ran with all his might, two pursuers caught up with him eventually and tried to tackle him down. Noticing it, he suddenly stopped on his tracks, making them crash on each other and drift on the floor all the way to the wall at the end of the corridor. But his actions didn't stop there. He turned around in a flash and shot several times before starting his dash again. The pursuers managed to avoid the projectiles with ease, making the resistance seem pointless. However, they overlooked the small explosives Hishiro had set up on the floor, which caused a brutal blast once they got near enough. With nowhere to go in such a closed space, the shockwave traveled at a tremendous speed on the corridors and took down most of the pursuers. Even Hishiro himself, who had managed to get quite some distance from it, felt the heat and the violent wind push his body from behind, almost making him trip and roll on the floor. This was effective, but it won't work a second time. I can't keep tricking them forever.

While turning on another corner, he operated his cellphone trying to find what could possibly be the control room within the blueprints. If I can get there, I can both open the path to the basement and use whoever is there as a hostage to get rid of those speed maniacs. Yup, that sounds satisfying.

However, he made the mistake of not paying enough attention to the path he was walking, thus he took way too long to notice he had trapped himself in a dead end. Clicking his tongue, the boy turned around and prepared to fight his way through the horde coming at him. With his back literally against the wall, he held both of his guns pointing forward and activated his ability, creating a distorted field on the floor. When the pursuers' feet came in contact with it, they were unable to handle the sudden slow down of their lower bodies and fell forward like dominoes. But because of the skates, they just kept coming at him as if nothing had happened.

"Rgh! To hell with that!" Shouting that, Hishiro squeezed the triggers of his guns one after the other nonstop. With so many of them moving forward on a belly dive position, there wasn't enough space for them to avoid the bullets, resulting in lots of pained groans and blood splatters - specially when they were hit by the AMCP. He would probably get most (if not all) of them like that if he had not ran out of bullets midway. There was no time to reload, the eight enemies remaining were approaching too fast. He took a stance and braced himself. I need to somehow take these down, or at least find a chance to escape… It's not gonna work, is it?

It was then that the situation suddenly changed.

An explosion happened behind the pursuers, sending them all flying towards Hishiro who threw himself on the floor to avoid getting hit. All of them struck the wall at full force and fell down unconscious besides the brown haired boy. "What… the hell just happened?" Looking at the source of the blast, he saw three girls running in his direction while being followed by a dozen of those red suits. "Oh no..."

...

Yakumaru dropped a couple of test tubes, which broke once they hit the floor and caused another blast in an attempt of slowing the pursuers down. "Leader! I can't keep doing this forever, and there's a dead end ahead!"

"We can't win against so many of them, turning back is not an option! And our goal is ahead of us! Prepare the strongest explosion you can make! You too Naru! We're breaking through!"

"Roger!"

"Okay~*!"

On their leader's command, the capped girl picked up two sphere like objects from her belt while the giant bunny girl concentrated the highest amount of paper mass on her right fist and both charged towards the wall without caring about whatever (or whoever) was in the way. Both the fist and spheres caused a massive explosion upon contact with the obstacle that shook the whole facility, causing the emergency lights fickle and parts of the ceiling to collapse. Still, the wall was not completely destroyed. All they managed to do was to tear an opening in the middle of it. Naru could barely believe her eyes when she saw that. "No way… we went all out and that's it?"

"That will have to do. We will have to go through that hole one by one!" Shouted the Leader as she started to climb into the hole. Being the smaller of the three helped this time and she went through without problem.

Meanwhile, Naru took the front line and used her paper to block the path of the incoming enemies. "I'll hold them here! You go next, Ya-kun!"

Reluctantly, Yakumaru ran for the gap in the metal wall and tried to squeeze herself into it while th Leader on the other side had to pull her in to help her make it. Once she was done, the bunny girl distracted the pursuers with another paper bomb and went for the passage as well (needless to say, she changed back to her maid outfit to get through the wall).

Unfortunately for her, she couldn't make it in time and one of the red suits grabbed her by the ankle and pulled her while she was halfway in. "Wha-?! Let me gooo!"

"Naru!" Yakumaru reacted fast and held both of her friends arms before she could be pulled off the hole. The result was a human tug-o-war with half her body on each side of the wall, but probably due to the suit, the pursuer was slowly managing to drag her out of it.

Until…

*BANG!*

Following the deafening noise, blood splattered on Naru's legs as the person in suit fell limp on the floor, letting go of her feet. Without understanding what had happened, the girls heard an unknown male voice from the other side of the wall. "No matter how despaired you are, this is no way to pick up a girl. Do you have a wall stuck fetish or something? Despicable..."

"W-who's there?!" Asked Naru, unable to see the source of the voice from that position.

"Never mind that, just move quick! They are still coming! I can't escape if you block the way like that!" Answered the male. Besides his voice, several gunshots could be heard from the other side of the wall. Yakumaru and the Leader wasted no time and pulled their friend with all their might with no success. The maid girl got into a bad position due to having her legs suddenly pulled and now she couldn't move an inch.

"NNNNGhhh-! S-stop! You're going to tear my arms away! It's no use, I'm totally stuck!"

The male clicked his tongue loudly. He had joked about that just a moment ago and now it came back to bite him. "You gotta be kidding me..."

"Hey, you! Stop complaining and help out by pushing her from your side!" Suggested the leader.

"What? How do you expect me to do that!?"

"Quick, just do it! I don't want to be stuck here forever!"

…

Thank god Asuka can't see me now… At least I hope she can't. Hishiro prayed that repeatedly on his mind as he shot down another enemy and wiped the blood on his forehead. The girl's attacks summed with his own put the pursuer in disarray (as well as hurting him and burying him in a pile of corpses), giving him an opening, but it wouldn't take long before they all came at him again. Taking this opportunity, he turned around, facing the girl that had everything from her hips downwards sticking from the wall and… No, seriously, how the heck am I supposed to do that?!

"Hurry up!"

"G-gimme a second." He was at a complete loss before the scene in front of him, but if he just waited and did nothing, he could end up getting killed. Okay, calm down… All I have to do is to push her. Just put all your strength in a single push and get it over with as fast as possible.

For the sake of keeping Naru's pride and image, there won't be a detailed description as to how Hishiro decided to do it. With his help, she moved a bit but not enough to free her. "It's working! Do it again, but harder this time!"

With one last push, Naru was released and fell forward on the other side. With the gap finally unoccupied, Hishiro crawled his way through it as fast as he could just before the pursuers reached the wall again. Once he left the hole, he aimed his guns at it and unloaded them without mercy until they finally stopped trying to get through as well.

Part 4

After running away from the the area, the four intruders were finally overcome by fatigue and laid down on the floor lit by the weak led lights. For a while, no one dared to say a word. After all, one of these four were not from the group. They only helped each other due to how the situation had developed during the battle. So they agreed on this truce until they recovered their stamina without even needing to talk.

However, this was nothing but a facade. Hishiro knew that his situation was dire and kept his mind running while he rested his body. These girls aren't here just for a walk. Given the circumstances, I bet that they have are after the cargo being stored here. If their goal clash to mine and they turn out to be enemies, I'll be in a huge disadvantage here. Damn... it's just like the USB drive incident all over again. At least my headache is gone.

In this situation, it was crucial for Hishiro to identify the other party as an enemy or not before they did, so he took the initiative and broke the silence. "We escaped by a hair just now..."

"That was the second time for us, actually..." Answered the flu masked girl. There was no hostility in their voices, but they were both on their guard.

"I see… I wonder what were those things anyway? They looked like powered suits, but they weren't that strong or resistant."

The capped girl sat up and explained. "For me, they looked like modified Queen Divers… though if that's the case, the staff must be really desperate to get rid of us. These are old models developed one or two years ago that had several issues and was only useful against some type of esper... but I don't remember exactly which one. I had seen them only once before, so I don't know the details. In summary, it's just a pile of trash tech."

"Ugh… they way you said it made me a bit angry that I had to go through all that because of them, Ya-kun."

The careless conversation between them confirmed that the mood was lighter now. Hishiro took the opportunity to try and talk his way out of this. "Well, what happens now? I'm sure we all know that none of us is here just for a walk, and I would rather avoid having to fight again so soon."

"Well, we were going to dispose of anyone inside, but you did save Naru while holding your own against that many of them. This is an unusual situation..." Said the Leader, resting her chin on her hand. "Who are you and what are you doing here in the first place?"

"I'm afraid I can't answer any of those..."

"Don't get me wrong, I'm not interested in your secrets or anything. I just want to make sure our jobs aren't going to get in the way of each other."

"In that case, can't you say what your goal is first?"

"Nice try, but that won't do."

"Figured as much..." It wasn't amusing that she was talking as if she held the game on her hands, but he couldn't exactly complain given their numerical advantage. "There's the word that this place is guarding something that wasn't supposed to be here. I just need to make sure that whoever is behind this won't get to use it no matter what."

"Oh, isn't that the same as us?" Naru spilled the beans before the Leader could answer, which earned her a few cold glances.

"We were contracted by the true owner of the cargo to recover it."

"Guess that's our lucky day then. We both could use a bit more of manpower, right?"

Following Hishiro, The leader stood up and walked towards him, extending her hand. "Sure. Then shall we cooperate for the time being?"

The boy did the same, accepting the hand shake with an innocent looking face. "Of course!"

The two of them smiled at each other and held each other's hand for a while. But in truth…

He is lying. Well, whatever. I'll just use his skills until we reach the cargo and then take care of him before he has the chance doing anything.

She is not buying it. It would be okay if she really took it to the original owner, but I have no guarantee that is their real intention. Killing her right now is dangerous because the other two are way too strong. I need to plan carefully when I'm going to strike.

The other two could just stare blankly as invisible sparks raged between them until they finally let go.

Between the Lines

Unknown time - LIZARD Headquarters

Led by Yuna, Hideaki was taken to a large office on the penultimate floor of a business business building on the edge of District 7. Among all the fancy furniture there, what undoubtedly caught his eyes the most was the table with 3 expansive monitors and several paper sheets scattered on it on the opposite corner of the room. Behind it was a boy with spiky red hair wearing messy clothes sitting on a luxurious chair with his legs crossed over the table while eating an apple as he paid attention on what was being displayed on the left screen.

"Please sit down." Said the boy pointing to a small chair without even batching an eye on Hideaki. The older male did as he was told, since he was in no position to refuse even if he wanted to. "I was really looking forward to meet you, professor… Hideaki, right?"

"Unfortunately, I can not say the same for you, mister Overseer." Hideaki spoke in a menacing tone, probably trying to scare the younger male, but all it did was amuse the boy who set the apple aside, put his feet down and leaned on the table.

"Hehe, and you're right to not to. Well, at least you shouldn't if the circumstances were different. Relax, you're my honor guest today. No need to be so nervous. Want a drink?" And the kid actually pulled a bottle of wine from beneath the table and opened it with his bare hands, serving two glasses that Hideaki couldn't quite tell if they were there before or not.

"N-no, I'm fine. More importantly, aren't you too young to be drinking that?"

"Yes. And I'm also too young to be on the position I am right now. And too young to ask of you what I am about to." Answered him while shrugging with a expression that screamed "it can't be helped" before continuing. "No need to be so polite, drink it. It's good stuff, trust me."

Hideaki was going to refuse once again, but after thinking again about his own position, it would be for the best to not go against what this person said. Still, he regretted his decision the moment he took a sip of it. The liquid seemed to be just like regular wine at first glance, but the flavor was actually way stronger than anything he had ever tasted in his life, making him almost spit it out. He tried to hide his reaction by swallowing fast and slowly place the glass on the table again, just to find out that the kid had emptied his glass all at once.

"Anyway, I would love to kill some time, but I'm a busy person, so I'll go straight to the point." Said the Overseer, making a serious face for once. "I heard everything about you from Yuna. I know about the little rebellious group you led not long ago. To be frank, we aren't much different from each other, you and I."

"Where are you getting at?"

"This city is corrupt, professor. You know that very well, don't you? A lot of conspiracies happening beneath the carpet and atrocities being made in the name of science… when not even that is true, as there are political interests involved in them, forcing them to happen the way they do, no matter how many have to suffer because of it. That's why you decided to rebel. Right, Kihara Hideaki?"

The emphasis given to the last part made Hideaki brows twitch slightly, but the Overseer continued without giving him time to say anything. "I respect your decision. However, your methods were too inefficient, and you didn't have enough resources. You may be a genius in many areas, but strategic thinking is not one of them. Which is why I'm going to offer you a second chance." The boy stood up, walked towards the window and spread his arms open. "I have everything you lacked. Money, manpower, influence, the perfect plan to take control of this city and the means to fix it once I do that. There's only one small piece of this whole puzzle left to make it all possible - and that's where you come in."

"And why I should believe in your words? I am not willing to offer any help without-"

"Calm down, let's do this one step at a time, okay? I'll prove my intentions to you in the given time, just like I did to Yuna. But our conversation today is about why YOU are important in all of this."

Sighing in resignation, the older male dropped the subject and asked what he was more curious about. "In that case, what do you need me to do?"

A satisfied smirk appeared on the boy's face, seeing that Hideaki intended to cooperate for now. "Come with me. It'll be easier to just show you first hand instead."

…

"What… is the meaning of this?!"

Hideaki could only shout in astonishment in front of this scene. The Overseer had taken him to the underground floors of the building. After walking through the white corridors of the facility, they had reached the researchment room, which contained several machine and chemicals, but none of them mattered to him. None except the one at the very end.

It was a capsule-like machine filled with a fluorescent transparent orange liquid. And dived in the fluid there was a body of a girl attached to several cables and tubes, floating in fetal position.

"This, my friend, is the key of our success." Answered the spiky haired boy with a wide smile on his face. "She is a prototype of STUDY's little project, but they discarded her once they managed to create a more stable subject without knowing the true value she holds."

"This does not matter! How do you expect me to help your cause-"

"BEFORE you make precipitated conclusions, you should take a look on this." Interrupting Hideaki, the boy handed him a couple of paper sheets. "It's just a summary, but it'll give you a better idea of what she is."

If he could, he would had thrown those papers on the floor and stepped over them while leaving everything here behind. But he couldn't. Not because he feared for his life, but because Yuna was working under this boy now. Her fate was basically on his hands. That was mostly the reason behind why she was chosen to break him out of the reformatory - to put this pressure on him. Even though his reason was telling him to not look at it, he had no choice but take the documents and read its contents.

And by then, it was too late to regret doing so.

This… this is…! C-certainly, using something like this, it would be possible to… but to go this far would be…

"So, what do you think?" Asked the Overseer, already knowing the answer by just looking at the other man's expression.

Still shocked, he took a while to answer. "A-are you really willing to go through with this?"

"Of course. It would be stupid to simply ignore an opportunity like this one."

"But..."

"Listen, Hideaki-kun. Our enemy is more powerful than us, and is willing to use the lowest tricks they can to keep things going on their favor. We can't expect to defeat them without playing dirty. You can understand that, right? It is a necessary evil for a greater good."

He didn't answered this time. The conflict was clear on his eyes. If we did that, how much better would we be than the ones we are antagonizing? But… is there even another way? If I reject this, would there ever be another chance? And even if there would, there is the risk of it being even worse than this one.

Seeing that the professor wouldn't make his mind, the younger male sighed and turned around, walking towards the machine and placing his hand on the glass as if petting it. "We need her to be complete in about a month. But right now, we have no one capable of doing this. The only ones that probably have the knowledge and skills to stabilize her are Kihara Gensei and his apprentices. Well, Gensei is missing, and Kiyama Harumi is beyond our reach. That leaves you as our last hope. What do you say, Kihara Hideaki?"

"How… do you know about that?" The boy didn't even looked back at him and just kept his hands on the machine. "All I ever did was observe. Unlike Kiyama-san, I never participated in his researches and experiments. I may not be able to accomplish what you expect of me."

"You'll never know unless you try."

Hideaki lowered his head and clenched his fists, kneading the paper on his hands. He knew what was the right thing to do, but something was just born within him that conflicted with his ideals and he couldn't ignore it. This, summed to his curiosity, was what would trail the path he would take from there on, regardless of the consequences.

And this is yet another short-to-be chapter that blew out of proportion and forced me to split it in two. I just can't help it but keep adding the ideas I come up with on the go because it's just too fun to mess with different characters!

And for anyone wondering as for why there was no Between the Lines in the last chapter, here's a fun fact: half of this one was supposed to be on the last chapter but… I somehow messed up when I uploaded the file. Sorry for that XP. Good thing I keep backups, I'm not sure if I could keep the atmosphere as it should be if I had to rewrite it. I'll leave the meaning of the contents for your speculation and move on to the replies

Guest: Whoops, I misread what you asked… lol. But no, the Deep Blood arc will be left out. I guess you can already guess which arc this is going to be about, right? Then again… thinking about it, I might be able to salvage something from the Deep Blood arc after all. You just gave me a great idea! It may take a while until I can use it tho…

Sargent Crash: Welcome aboard! Glad to know you're enjoying the story… and I was honestly expecting you to take a little longer to catch up, as I tried to release this before you did. Well, I failed miserably lol. I hope you stick with us from now on until the end!

One last thing, I've been trying to fix the grammar on the early chapters because I read it again and… it's really bad. So that's what these updates were about (and partly why it took me a while to get this done). Well, thanks for your support and see you all next time!