Bubblegum Crisis: Stage Three

Chapter 25

"SHIT!" Leon McNichol yelped, taking in the battered corpse.

"It's a mess," Jeena Malso agreed, the head of the ADP standing beside the regular cop as they looked over the scene.

The body of Quincy Rosencroitz was still sitting behind his desk. What was left of him, anyway. His boomer secretary had quite brutally beat him to death. The old man had also had a surprising amount of cybernetics, so that was an issue too. Whomever had beat him to death had ALSO attacked the tech, with something like a very amped up taser.

CSI teams were taking full recordings of the site, as well as evidence collecting. There was a lot of blood splatter to log, along with collecting both organic and mechanical bits. The boomer itself had, apparently, just collapsed outside the office...

"How the heck did an off the shelf boomer taser his electronics with no assisting tech?" Leon wondered aloud.

"It's theoretically possible for a boomer to hot-wire their own power core," Doctor Yuri noted, the older man brought in to take care of the boomer. "It will be interesting to see if this one managed it...," he muttered.

"I want it autopsied," Jeena reminded him as the staff hauled away the boomer. "thoroughly. No saving time using computer scans."

Yuri sighed, "I try not to make the same mistake twice, ma'am."

As he left with the boomer Leon looked questioningly at Jeena. She explained, "When a boomer attempted to kill Miss Stingray, he just ran a computer diagnostic on the unit, that came up clean. Then he put it through recycling."

Leon considered that for a moment then he had to ask her, "You didn't consider him a suspect at that point?"

"We did, but found nothing. He's just brilliant but lacks common sense," Jeena sighed.

Considering that story, it strongly implied Genom's computer network was compromised. That's make looking into anything here complicated, Leon silently thought.

"You do realize the regular police are going to be digging into Genom a lot more now?" Leon observed quietly.

"With Quincy, James Yamako, and Mason all dying? You'd almost have to think it's all connected," Jeena agreed.

"And the attacks on Sylia," Leon added.

"That too," Jeena nodded.

Not long after Sylia Stingray herself arrived, followed by Nene Romanova, both notified by Jeena. Police stopped her at the door, and Leon walked over to her. "Sorry, we're still working the crime scene," Leon said.

Sylia looked faintly annoyed, but nodded. "Can you confirm it's Quincy?" she asked.

Leon decided that was reasonably safe to answer and said, "It appears so. We still need a full examination of course."

"Understood," Sylia nodded.

"We'll need to ask you some questions," Leon added politely.

"I didn't know Quincy well," Sylia noted, "he was more a friend of my father."

"Then this won't take long," Leon shrugged.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0

Priss Asagiri was standing in the hall not too far away, looking grumpy as she talked on her phone. Someone had to shadow Sylia when she went out, and while Nene was ADP trained, she wasn't that good a fighter. So it had to be either Linna or Priss, and guess who drew the short straw?

"Sorry, love. SOMEONE had to go...," Priss sighed.

"Hey, they woke me up too," Aoi pouted.

"Yeah," Priss sighed. She brightened as she continued, "Well, unless they arrest Sylia tonight, she and Nene are doing the moving in thing tomorrow. I just need to do an appearance, then we're free for the day."

"Oh?" Aoi asked.

"I was thinking we could take Sho out to a movie, then drop him off with a babysitter," Priss suggested. "Then we could go out for a show...," she offered.

"Or we could just stay at home and do... stuff," Aoi teased.

"Well, yes...," Priss chuckled softly. Just then Sylia and Nene finally got away from the cops, and headed up the hall towards Priss. "Sorry, got to go," Priss said, putting her phone away.

"Setting up a date on work time?" Nene had overheard enough of the conversation to tease. "Naughty girl."

"Setting up a date so my pissed off lover doesn't demand I just quit this crazy job," Priss retorted mildly.

Sylia made a face. "I'm sorry we had to call you out this late," she said.

Priss swept the elevator before they went in, making sure her high powered railgun pistol was ready to draw. "Was that Quincy in there?" she asked.

"Yes. It appears whomever is after me removed him too," Sylia sighed.

"We don't necessarily know it was related to you," Nene observed, "we know from raiding Mason's computers that Quincy did a LOT of dirty stuff."

"Though he and Sylia were both attacked by supposedly rogue boomers," Priss noted.

"There is the outside chance it's a hit by our rivals Gulf & Bradley," Sylia noted, playing devil's advocate. "They could have snuck in a assassin bot."

"Those are just a urban legend," Nene waved that off.

"And if they were a real thing, wouldn't Genom itself be building them for someone?" Priss noted dryly.

"Ha. Point," Sylia conceded.

They reached the parking garage, where Priss carefully checked out the area. She used the specialty glasses to scan for unusual heat sources and such, even as they headed to the car.

"Looks clear," Priss noted.

"Do you want us to drop you off?" Nene asked as she got in the driver's seat.

"Please," Priss admitted tiredly. She watched with amusement as Sylia got in the passenger's side. They apparently shared driving duties... "Do you need any help with the move, tomorrow?" Priss asked more out of duty than willingness to help.

"It's mostly just unloading store bought stuff," Sylia noted, "we should be fine."

"I'll stop in after noon or so, just in case," Priss said, then yawned tiredly.

"Heh. We'll see," Nene teased.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0

"Hmm," Linna sighed as she cuddled up to her lover Reika.

"Linna. We have to get up," Reika sighed, laying n her back. The alarm had gone off once already, and would again soon.

"Ughblh," Linna made a incoherent protest. She sat up, her hair messy as she stretched and yawned. "Do we HAVE to get up?" she asked. "It's the weekend."

"We promised to help Sylia and Nene move," Reika reminded her.

"Ugh. Who's bright idea was THAT?" Linna pouted.

"Yours," Reika pointed out.

"Oh, right...," Linna sighed. Reluctantly, she slid out of bed, "I'll put coffee on."

Reika got up, belting on a robe as she followed. "Do we want to do breakfast here, or eat out?" she asked curiously.

"Why not pick up something when we go see Sylia's new place?" Linna suggested. "We could bring them something too."

"Sometimes, dear, I think you're a little too nice," Reika noted as she kissed her on the cheek.

The two had coffee and bagels, then dressed casual before heading out.

"Silky Doll Lingerie?" Linna noted the store that appeared to occupy the whole first floor of the building.

"Well, it would be convenient if she and Nene get frisky," Reika noted.

"I can't quite imagine Sylia doing that," Linna admitted. She added, "Nene, maybe..."

"Yo!" Priss waved as they all headed to the elevator on one side of the building. "Wonder how Sylia reacted to the porn palace?" she laughed.

"Assuming she doesn't own it," Reika observed.

Both Linna and Priss looked at each other, "Nope," they chorused.

The 'apartment' that Nene and Sylia had talked about turned out to be the upper floor of the building, interestingly. It was also filled with shipping boxes, and the two women were vigorously unpacking. "Welcome," Nene waved them in.

"My father owned the building," Sylia quickly explained, "I found it going through some of his documents. And no, I didn't know about the shop..."

Everyone laughed at that...

"All right," Reika said briskly, "I think most of what we're doing is putting stuff together?"

"That's the plan. We were going to share a office here but...," Sylia mused.

"No way we could share a computer," Nene noted firmly.

To be continued...

Notes: YES, I've always liked the Silky Doll in Bubblegum Crisis stuff. Heh. Might have non-boomer versions of Sylvie and Anri staffing it. We'll see.