Tango: Interlude 3
The memory of a man known as Oni Lee watched the building carefully, noting yet another exit in progress. Two hundred and thirty-seven in the last hour, and the one-hundred-eighth female. He had been watching the building for nine hours now, and this marked the thousandth woman to leave the building. He had an impression that this was something Takeuchi Lee would have found satisfying, and so felt a memory of satisfaction, so faint from the million layers of memories between that it barely registered.
A pager buzzed on his hip, and a quick check showed that the mission could finally begin. If there were any capes still in the building, they were in their quarters on the higher floors, which made this an acceptable time to strike. He made a fresh memory in an empty room on the second floor of the building it had been watching, and then stood back from the window. As he faced the million-times-removed memory of the original Takeuchi Lee as he realized he was going to die, he wondered if other memories felt this wa-
This memory knew there was not much time to accomplish his goal. He sprinted out of the room with knife drawn. Down the hallway, an agent of the PRT dropped their coffee. He made a new recollection of Takeuchi Lee behind the person, then sprinted towards them to provide a distraction as he felt the million-times removed memory of dying. As he swung his knife at the PRT agent and it bit into flesh, he wondered if other memories felt this wa-
He continued to the stairwell, trusting his old recollection to take care of things. The stairs were taken two at a time, careful enough to avoid injuries he'd remember later, fast enough to reach the basement level before the lobby lockdown could be rescinded to trap him. The basement level had a strong steel door, this he remembered from the briefing, but he was prepared for it. He applied the thermite patch quickly and efficiently, drawing from dozens of similar experiences that melded together in detail until only the skills remained. He backed up the stairs as it burned, ignoring the sounds of PRT pouring in from above. As soon as he had an opening, he made a fresh memory on the other side. The PRT shot him in the shoulder as soon as they had a visual, but he knew he was already dead. He wondered if the other memories felt this wa-
He made another memory outside Lung's cell, behind the guard, and pulled a pin on one of Bakuda's bombs. It was a simple affair, by necessity; too complex and it would fail to activate even once, and even now, once one of her works was used in one memory, future detonations would be unlikely or unpredictable. As the cryogenic effect froze his body, turning the melted lock of the door to immobile slag, he wondered if the other memories felt this wa-
He made another recollection in front of the officer, using it as a distraction to end the man's life. As he felt the end coming, he almost asked the other if they felt the same wa-
He applied another thermite patch, ignoring the containment foam that began to fill the hallway, now mixed with fine white ash. Soon another recollection was formed inside the cell, and another after that. The memory he'd created activated another of Bakuda's creations to deal with the countermeasures, making the electronics fizzle and emit acrid smoke, the foam stopping short. The two doomed recollections made brief eye contact through the hole, and they both silently wondered-
and then the old memory turned to ash, and he knew-
"Lung," the memory of Takeuchi Lee said, ignoring the choking ashes of his past as they drifted into the containment foam below, "Bakuda has sent me to recruit you."
The dragon was still mostly asleep; this was quickly remedied by application of an epipen to the heart. Kenta grunted a moment later, his heart beating faster than any normal human could have survived.
"Lung," he said again, "Bakuda has sent me to recruit you. She told me to kill you if you did not accept to her terms."
"I. Do. Not. Submit," he ground out in Japanese, still fighting the heart attack as his body began to grow and put off heat.
"I know this," the memory replied. "Oni Lee remains loyal to you." This was something he had a deep impression of, and so it was truth. He did not have any such impression of Bakuda.
"Good, Lee. I would regret killing you."
He made a recollection, then used the last of Bakuda's toys, the most powerful he had with him and by far the most risky. As his fresh memory told Lung to stay back and the bomb erupted, he wondered if the other memories felt this wa-
The old memory was engulfed in a vertical column of white fire, not letting out any scream as he turned to ash. The fire disappeared, and the light of a streetlamp showed down the shaft it left behind. He grabbed Lung and sent a memory of them both to the street level, forgetting the restraints along the way. As the PRT breached the cell door and took in the ruined cell and the two doomed occupants, he wondered if the other memories felt this wa-
He sent another memory to the top of a building as the memory of Lung grunted in discomfort. "I always hate traveling this way, Lee," he commented.
"I wonder if the others feel the same wa-" the memory replied as they exploded into ash.
He made another memory of them both atop a rooftop far in the distance as Lung grunted again in discomfort. "I hate traveling this way, Lee," he commented.
"I wonder if the others feel the same wa-" he replied.
He almost made another recollection when Lung put a hand to his chest. "Enough, Lee. I will not continue to travel this way. Find us a vehicle, and take me to Bakuda. I must teach her respect, and then I must learn what she knows of the girl who humiliated me."
The memory nodded, and looked down to street level to make a new recollection as Lung made his way to the fire escape. In his final moments, he was tempted to ask aloud whether his friend and master could remember if his other selves felt the same wa-
He found a suitably nice car for his master's return, and made a memory in the driver's seat. Then he stood patiently as the million-times-removed horror crept over him like a gentle brush of air, content to wonder if the other memories felt the same wa-
Kenta reached the ground, crossing the street as the recollection of Takeuchi Lee turned into a three-meter radius cloud of thick white ash nearby, more still drifting down from the half-remembered self before that, carried on the light evening wind. The current memory perfunctorily hotwired the car, set the air conditioning to Lung's preferred temperature, and set the radio to the correct station, just as a thousand memories had done before.
Kenta entered the vehicle on the passenger side, adjusting the seat back as far as it would go to accommodate his still-enlarged frame. The memory noted that this likely meant he was anticipating a fight with Bakuda, and made a note to forget the bombs she had given them when they arrived. He drove the vehicle into the street and began navigating north.
"Lee, tell me what you know of the dancing girl," Lung commanded.
"We do not have much information. She has joined the children that you sought to punish that night, and they carried out a bank robbery yesterday evening. Bakuda is ambushing them as we speak, using a captured teammate as leverage."
"Ah, that is good. I can eliminate both problems at once, if we hurry."
The memory sped up the car, using a million memories of lightning-fast reflexes to weave through traffic at almost triple the legal limit. He continued informing Lung of everything he knew.
"We are unsure if the girl is actually the one to blame for the dance. The PRT believes that she controls vermin, and suspect the muscle-twitcher of the power behind closed doors. Bakuda plans to recruit them."
"Recruit them?"
"As she recruited the people under your protection, and their families or friends. A bomb in every head, and more hidden away to enforce loyalty. She said it was a lesson you taught her."
Lung laughed then, and Kenta laughed after. "Fear, indeed," he said, speaking as much to himself as to the memory. "Yes, I taught her to use fear, but it seems I forgot the next step. She does not command respect; she demands attention." Kenta chuckled once more, and then Lung continued. "I suppose you and I will have to correct this, my friend."
"I suppose so," the memory of Takeuchi Lee replied, smoothly swerving around another car.
Suddenly, a trio of beeps came from his chest, and several things happened at once.
The fire bomb fizzled and sparked, its delicate inner workings accidentally forgotten.
The cryogenic bomb was less sophisticated, but it too was impaired. The memory, already in motion to touch Lung's chest and send a new memory out, felt its torso go numb as most of its less mobile organs froze solid.
The final bomb was merely a miniaturized EMP device, and its mundanity proved to be its most fatal aspect. The car, traveling at well over a hundred and twenty miles an hour, now had a dead engine and a frozen steering column, stuck in a turn. It rammed into a telephone pole a moment later, flipping end over end, the memory barely hanging onto consciousness as the impact crushed his legs and broke his frozen spine, shattering organs like glass inside of him. He managed to lay a hand on Lung and create a memory of them both on the sidewalk, one question in his mind as the ground rushed up to meet the roof of the car-
The memory distantly recalled Takeuchi Lee's creeping realization of incoming death as he watched the car tumble and skid away. His friend and master, a deep groove of certainty in the haze of half-remembered memory, looked down at him with anger and sorrow as he collapsed to the ground. It was clear that Lung knew what the memory knew, that there would be no recovery from this.
He suspected the answer, but still, he asked it. "Do you know if they felt this way, when they came to an end?"
Lung knelt by him, revenge and pain written on his face. "You ask that a lot, my friend, and my answer is the same. I hope they do not, but I know that I would in their place."
The last living memory of Takeuchi Lee processed this, and agreed. Lee would have wanted to li-
Lung looked down at the broken body of his longtime friend, and the wreckage where they had died a moment before. He had expected this day to come, in one way or another. He'd expected to feel rage, to want to tear the one responsible to shreds, to break down their castles and destroy everything they loved. He'd expected it to be a loss, like losing a hand and having it take months of peace to regrow.
It felt like both of those things, but somehow, he hadn't been ready for it to hurt.
Lee didn't deserve this kind of death. He hadn't died in combat, or under orders, or even at his or Kenta's own hand. This death was a sneak attack, little better than poison or a sniper shot. It had been the kind of dishonor he would have made a joke of, in his springtime days. It didn't seem so funny anymore.
He decided something, as he picked up the delicate body of his lieutenant with his increasingly large hands. He wanted Bakuda to feel this pain, before he killed her. He wanted to destroy everything she loved, not out of anger, but out of cold, sharp pain, pain that demanded to be spread so that the burden could be felt by those more deserving of it. As the sirens began to ring out in response to his escape, he started walking north, knowing that he would find Bakuda there, one way or another.