Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“Does that punk Nova think he can just mess with us like that?!” If there had been a fly in front of him, Zeno would have surely swatted it by now due to how fast his hands were gesticulating.

“Simmer down, Zeno. I just got a fresh new intel report” Asimov opened up a data file he must have just intercepted, “Joule is being taken to ‘Firmament’, Sumeragi's orbital station” He then started a video simulation depicting Lumen’s song reaching the entire world. As well as a plethora of red dots popping up, representing all of the adepts that would now be visible to Sumeragi.

“From there they'll be able to broadcast Lumen's songs around the world. That has got to be their master plan. And so, we're gonna have to bust up their stupid scheme”

“I'll do it, Asimov. I'm gonna save her, no matter what!” Gunvolt had always been very serious, but now there was a thunder in his voice and a fire in his eyes. It had only been six months ago when he rescued Joule from Sumeragi… and it was also the only time I’ve ever heard him disagree with Asimov. He thought her septima was too dangerous to risk keeping her alive, GV didn’t, neither could sway the other, and so he officially left QUILL. I never told anyone this, but I’m glad Gunvolt didn’t follow Asimov’s orders. Joule never asked to be enslaved and exploited, if anyone deserved a shot at a normal life, it was her. Hopefully, he can save her again, and leave this all behind. Back to the matter at hand.

“The only way to reach Firmament is to use the orbital elevator. But first, you're going to have to seize control of it” I briefed.

“Leave that one to us, right, O' fearless leader?” Zeno finally calmed down, I guess you have to be pretty quick in controlling your emotions to survive in a field like this.

“Yeah. GV, you'll be first to attack, so create a good diversion. It'll be tough, but I think you'll be able to handle it.”

“Thanks guys...”

“We're counting on you, GV. Team Sheeps, mission start!”

The only way to reach Firmament’s orbital elevator Babel was through Sumeragi’s own man made island, A.K.A the Onogoro Float. I can’t even comprehend how much money went into construction costs alone. Regardless, QUILL intel had recognized the space station as a threat a long time ago, so it was always going to be one of our targets. Thanks to that, we had a boat ready in advance. If it weren’t for that, who knows what we could have done on such short notice.

Because of our prior preparations, I also had some experience actually piloting said boat. I would never doubt Asimov’s skill as a getaway driver (pilot?) but sniping’s not something you can multitask. Upon looking at the port window, Onogoro and Babel were closer than ever before. Asimov began the next round of briefing.

“Let's reconfirm the mission. GV, you'll lead the attack and create a diversion. We'll use that opening to hijack control of the orbital elevator. Once we do that, we'll use the elevator to send GV into space. Otherwise known as Mission ‘Bring Back the Muse’.”

“Hehehee, sounds great! Isn't it funny that we're going to rescue someone who was once our target?” Zeno had an odd definition for what counts as funny, but I can’t really fault him for trying to boost morale when the odds are so heavily stacked against us.

“...Let's put an end to this Muse situation once and for all, by our own hand. Good luck!” Asimov’s right, hopefully Joule, and soon maybe every adept, will never have to suffer by Sumeragi’s hand ever again.

The rain was ceaseless that night, in a way it was really lucky. If the seas were this rough with clear skies, even the most experienced diver would have been caught and killed before they even got close to the breakwater.

“Do you think they’ll make it?” I asked Asimov, still looking for an ideal sniping spot to set up with EATR, his custom-made electromagnetic anti-tank rifle. Could he even see through this downpour?

“Moniqa, when have you ever been so doubtful?”

“Ah, sorry. It’s just something about tonight.”

“Yes, I suppose so— Shit!”

The boat started rocking.

“What’s wrong?!”

“It’s fine, EATR was just thinking about taking a swim.” That was his hint to stop the chit-chat. I don’t get it, I’m not usually this unprofessional. Worried or not, I need to get it together! Suddenly, I was getting a call.

“Yo, this is Sheeps 2. Sheeps 3, do you copy?”

It’s Zeno, he’s alive!

“Sheeps 3 here, what’s your status?”

“GV and I must have been fish in our past lives, that swim was a piece of cake!”

“Excellent work you two, keep at it!”

“Roger Dodger!”

After fighting his way through strong winds, sheer drop ditches, three Mantis Legions, and what must have been an entire army, Gunvolt proved to be more than capable of his diversionary skills. All that was left in charge of the elevator control room was a skeleton crew, easily dispatched by Zeno. The next phase of the plan requires Asimov to join them in the control room to shoot down any leftover forces that attempt to come their way.

…I’m the only member of Team Sheeps that isn’t an adept, so I’m a lot squishier and don’t often see direct combat. Unless someone moves out of place, I’m not leaving the boat. Speaking of which—

“This is Sheeps Leader, I’ve joined Sheeps 2 and GV. Ascent up Babel starts in one minute.”

“The orbital elevator ‘Babel’... Looks like you made it in one piece.” What a relief, it looks like things are going smoothly so far.

Zeno hopped into the conversation, “We got full control now. Hope you're ready for some elevator action. All that's left is for you to go bring Joule back home. Hop to it, man!” The way he talked so casually, you would think Gunvolt was going to the train station to pick Joule up after school, not break into a heavily armed space fortress.

“This may be all under control, but you're still in a Sumeragi facility... Anything could happen... Keep your guard up, OK?”

“Got it. I'll be careful.”

“Aw come on guys, we all know this is super serious, but what’s the point in being so glum about it?”

“Z– Sheeps 2!”

“There’s no point in arguing either,” was all Asimov said before his line went silent again.

“Apologies. You’re right, cooperation is key.”

After that, the elevator booth began to move. Just earlier this week, we were all singing karaoke together, how could everything change so fast? One minute passed, then five, then ten, then thirty. The line has been quiet for too long. Did something happen? Stay calm.

“Sheeps 3 here, the weather’s still awful down on Earth”

“Sheeps 2 here, nothing’s happened except that Sheeps Leader must have gone out to take a leak or something.”

Ew.

“GV here, still moving up. And if I might add, I never thought I’d see Earth like this… it’s beautiful.”

It would be nice if he and Joule could enjoy the view on the way back down.

More time passed.

“You're gonna be out of the range of our communicators soon.” I had to inform him, although I’m sure he’s figured as much by now.

“You gotta save Joule, dude. And ya know, come home alive.”

“Yup... That's the plan.”

Still no word from Asimov? It doesn’t feel right if he’s not telling us “Good luck.” I can’t be the only one noticing this.

“......OK guys, seriously... Does anyone know where Asimov went?”

“Knowing our leader... He probably ninja'd his way into the elevator. I bet he's in the perfect spot, primed and ready to bail you out of a jam, GV. I'm sure that's what he's thinkin', ya know?” Zeno butted in with his own inane theory, of course he did.

“He's not like you, Zeno...” I didn’t even notice that we stopped using codenames.

“Hey hey Moniqa, is that why you have the hots for him?”

What the hell is that guy’s problem?!

“Whaa! It's not like I -like- him or anything.”

“He has way too low an affinity score to see through your little bashful, doki-doki routine. Playfulness will get you much further. Too bad you’re too straight-laced to do some real flirting!”

I will not respond. I will not respond. I will NOT respond.

One muffled scream later, I decided to change the subject.

“GV, are you still there?”

Silence. He must have gone beyond communications range.

The heavy rain became a light drizzle, it probably wouldn’t be too much longer until reinforcements arrived. I brought the boat in so that the others (and hopefully Joule) could get out easier. There was still no word from Asimov, and since that would mean that someone has moved out of place in regards to the plan, I need to leave the boat and help Zeno at the control room.

Getting to the control room was no issue, the others did an incredible job clearing out the defenses. I still exercised caution, it’s not like three people could have completely gotten rid of every line of defense in a facility this fortified.

When I open the door to the control room, I find myself greeted by the barrel of Zeno’s GaM71 TOPO pistol. He draws it back as soon as he realizes it’s just me.

“Whoop, sorry about that Moniqa.”

“Actually, it’s kind of a relief to see you take this seriously,” I shut the door behind me, “Have you heard anything back from Gunvolt or Asimov?”

“Not a word.”

“All communication from Gunvolt has ceased... The orbital station, Firmament... I really hope he was able to make it in without issue...”

“You don't need to worry about him. He'll be back here with Joule in no time flat.”

“Yeah, you're right…”

Asimov, if you're there somehow... Please, protect those two.

Chapter Text

The sun will rise soon and the clouds have all but cleared out, Zeno and I were still waiting at the base of Babel. I really hope Gunvolt, Joule, and Asimov will come back soon. But it’s no good to just sit here and worry, I have to bring my mind back to the mission. When I check the elevator status on the main control monitor, it appears that the booth has begun to descend.

“Zeno, someone’s using the elevator.” I tell him as he’s perched by a window, taking over Asimov’s defensive position.

“About time, let’s hope that it’s GV and the others and not a nasty surprise.”

It’s true, there’s a chance that whatever defenses, as well as Nova Tsukuyomi, the head of Sumeragi’s Defense Unit, could have killed them all and is heading down to kill us too. That’s the price of working in small numbers.

“Ya know Moniqa, Babel always looked so huge whenever I saw it from the city,” He turned his head over to me, “But in person, it’s even bigger! Crazy, right?”

“Hmm, I had never thought about it like that.”

We could die at any moment, and he’s talking about scenery? I suppose there’s nothing better to talk about.

I take another look at the main control monitor, and see that the weight limit isn’t even close to being reached, there couldn’t be more than two or three people on there, at the very least there probably isn’t a firing squad waiting for us. It also says that the elevator booth will arrive in about one minute.

“One minute until descent is complete, and the weight sensor indicates that there aren’t many people aboard”

“Well that sounds promising, I’ll head out to the entrance to see who’s there.”

“I’ll come with you.”

“Huh? what if it’s Nova in there?”

“If it’s someone that strong, I don’t think I’d last much longer whether I’m fighting, hiding, or running.”

“Fair enough, come along signorina, heh heh.”

Finally, the elevator doors open. Gunvolt was the first to be seen, the fire in his eyes from before had completely extinguished. There were also visible tear stains on his face, and two holes torn into his coat on the left breast.

“GV!! Hey man... You... What's...” Zeno’s bantering sputtered to a halt.

Joule was nowhere to be seen. Asimov was behind Gunvolt, collapsed, coat and sunglasses missing.

“Asimov?! Don't tell... He's... Dead?” Zeno had fear in his voice that I had never heard before, even back when he almost died in Sinner’s Row.

Gunvolt couldn't muster a reply. I could only stand there in silence. Asimov's body grew cold… The weight of our situation began to hit me all at once.

“Nooo!! It can't… It just can't be… Asimov……”

The grief was too heavy to bear, I couldn’t stand anymore and collapsed where I stood.

“Moniqa, hey c’mon, wake up already!”

Wake up? I must have passed out. We’ve been up all night, maybe I just fell asleep and had a bad dream.

“The mission’s a failure, we gotta get outta here now! Hurry up and help me with the body.”

“The body…” It wasn’t a dream, it’s all real. But it can’t be real, this can’t really be happening.

“W–Where did Gunvolt go?”

“We can talk about that later, now get over here!”

Right, I can’t get distracted now. Zeno and I have to exfiltrate Onogoro, I won’t let myself get in the way of the mission any longer!

Despite parking the boat right at the dock, it felt like it took much longer just to get back there than it did to take the control room. Glare from the morning sun almost made visibility worse than the storm from last night.

Even with Zeno’s help, I could barely stand up straight while carrying Asimov, he’s so lean that I don't really think about how much he weighs. and his cold arm kept limply hitting my leg whenever it swung back and forth. It didn’t help that Zeno kept pulling him in a different direction, even though we were both heading towards the same place.

After what felt like an eternity, we made it into the boat and took off. Although it looks like a rusting fishing vessel on the outside, Asimov had modified it to act as an FAC (Fast Attack Craft). As long as no one notices what an unassuming freezer trawler was doing so close to the Onogoro float, we shouldn’t have to actually use any of its onboard weaponry.

Even so, to really cover our tracks, the plan was to take the “scenic” route and meander around in the seas for a while before we head ashore so it looked like we really were just fishing. It also gave us more time to process what had just happened.

“Zeno, what happened to Gunvolt? Tell me.”

Zeno let out a heavy sigh.

“I’ll be honest, I have no idea. I asked him what the hell happened but he didn’t say anything. I tried to get a little closer but some invisible force pushed me away, then he walked off, muttered something to himself, and disappeared in a flash of lightning.”

“Wait, Gunvolt attacked you?”

Nothing about this sounded right.

“Nah, it didn’t feel like his septima.”

“So, who or what could it have been if it wasn’t him?”

“It sounds a little weird, but as I was flying back, I could have sworn I heard Joule’s voice shouting ‘Don't touch him!’”

“Joule? But I didn’t see her anywhere.”

“That’s the weird part, she wasn’t there at all!”

I leaned back on the wall and pulled out one of Asimov’s post mission beers from the cooler. I don’t like drinking when I'm in a bad mood, but I feel like I’m going to need it today. As I opened the can, an idea bubbled up.

“You know, after we all calm down, we can just go find Gunvolt and ask him what happened,” I suggested.

“That’s a good idea, he looked really messed up when I saw him. Definitely wasn’t in a state to talk.”

“Yeah.”

“By the way, can you pass me a beer?”

“What? No way, you’re too young!”

“So I’m old enough to kill people but too young to drink beer?”

Oh, that’s right. At least half of QUILL’s operatives were under eighteen, in other words, child soldiers. Even Gunvolt is only fourteen. It’s not fair that these children have to take up arms just to maybe have rights one day. After everything Zeno’s been through, I suppose he deserves a beer.

“You’re right, sorry.” I toss him a can.

“Sheesh Moniqa, you’re from Germany, right?”

“Düsseldorf.”

“Last time I checked, sixteen’s old enough for beer over there, so don’t try to stop me next time. When have we cared about laws anyway?”

“Alright, alright, you’ve made your point.” I didn’t bother to mention that we’re in Japan and not Germany.

The beer tasted like liquified cardboard. Asimov must have bought these a while ago if they’re oxidized like this. Though, the stale flavor didn’t seem to stop Zeno from wolfing down the whole can.

“So, how’d it taste?”

Zeno wiped the foam off of his lips.

“Terrible. How did Asimov drink this shit all the time?”

“I know, right?” I chuckled.

I miss German beer. But it’s not like I’ll be going back home anytime soon though thanks to the so-called Final National Defense Boundary "Kamishiro", the (I assume) EM barrier single-handedly responsible for Japan entering a second Sakoku. But there’s a much more immediate problem.

“We need to do something about Asimov’s body.”

“Yeah, I know,” Zeno stood up, “You remember the procedure, right?”

“Of course.”

Upon forming Team Sheeps, each of us made a contingency plan for if anyone died on the field. Asimov specifically requested that if his body could be recovered, he wanted us to dispose of it personally. He didn’t care if it was by cremation, burial, whatever, as long as no one could ever find it.

Zeno pulled out one of the body bags from the hold and pulled Asimov’s corpse into it. I searched for anything that could weigh his body down. Beer cans, even full ones, float, so those are no good. There are a couple of sandbags in the back, those should do nicely. I proceeded to place a sandbag under each arm.

“Ya know, those two bags might not be enough, anything else we could put in there?”

“Hmm…” I then remembered something important, “Hey, what were we going to do with EATR after this?”

“That thing was always too unwieldy for me. Makes sense, it was custom made for Asimov, and he’s like, twenty centimeters taller than me.”

“Then, it should probably go with him, right?”

“…Yeah.”

Zeno wasn’t kidding when he said EATR was unwieldy. He had been able to carry it off of Onogoro, but that must have been the adrenaline helping him out, because now Zeno wanted my help to lift the other end. He lifted it by the barrel, I took the upper receiver and recoil pad.

“Moniqa, lift on three.”

“Got it.”

“One… two… three!”

As soon as we lifted the rifle, my leg tensed up and a chill ran down through my spine.

“You alright?” Zeno asked.

“Why do you ask?”

“You stumbled a bit.”

“Did I?” I hadn’t noticed.

We placed EATR over Asimov’s body. While putting the rifle down, I got a good look at Asimov. There were burn marks all over him. I shouldn’t think about why until we fulfill our leader’s last request. Before I zip up the bag, I whisper something into Asimov’s ear that I really hope Zeno didn’t overhear.

“Gute Nacht, mein Liebling."

We checked for any potential witnesses, and when the coast was clear, Zeno and I dumped Asimov’s body into the cold waters of the Northwest Pacific. The ocean swallowed the body bag and its contents almost instantly.

Leader of Team Sheeps, and one of the founding members of QUILL, tossed aside like garbage.

Chapter Text

The stealth FAC had served admirably, but it was time to leave it behind. Zeno and I disguised ourselves in clothing you would expect any commercial fisherman to wear. Heavy overalls, rubber boots, baseball cap. The plan now is to find Gunvolt, neither of us know where he went, but our best bet would be in his apartment.

A growling noise interrupted my train of thought. I soon realized that it came from my own stomach.

“Zeno, are you hungry?”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“Then we should do something about that.”

Stopping at a restaurant, even a fast food joint was too risky. Just being foreigners makes us suspicious, so minimizing any chances of our faces being seen is top priority. Thankfully, we passed by a small park flanked by vending machines. Most of them served drinks but one of the machines proudly advertised its vending of hot meals at all times of the day. I selected the hot dogs, they’re very portable and only take a minute to heat up, the shortest wait time of all the meals available. In that minute of waiting, Zeno purchased an energia tank from the next vending machine over. All paid with cash to avoid any possible tracing from a digital transaction.

“Ahh, these things really hit the spot after a long night!”

To be completely honest, I’m more of a coffee person. I could never get into saccharine sweet energy drinks like the ones Zeno enjoys so much.

I took my hot dogs out of the microwave bay, it was Zeno’s turn to choose breakfast. Of course, he immediately goes for the takoyaki, which takes the longest to heat up at a minute and forty seconds. While I bit into the well cooked flesh of the hot dog, I suddenly remembered the burn marks on Asimov’s body. Did Zeno notice those, too? I may as well ask while nothing else is going on.

“Hey, did you see all the burns on Asimov?”

“Yeah, I did. Wonder what could’a caused ‘em?” Zeno pondered while squatting by the microwave bay.

That’s right, I tried not to think about it until we disposed of his body. But now that Asimov is resting at the bottom of the sea, I have ample time to piece together how he could have died.

“Well, if he had really ninja’d his way up Babel. There’s probably a ton of live wiring that would easily kill anyone. Not to mention whatever deathtraps are on Firmament itself.” Zeno stated.

Could Asimov have really died from an accident like that? What an anticlimactic way for someone so influential to go… But that doesn’t really explain why he was on the booth platform with GV.

“What was he doing behind Gunvolt then?”

“If he made it up Babel, only to die on Firmament, GV might have found his body and dragged it into the elevator while he escaped.” Zeno replied while scratching his chin.

“Hmm, not a bad theory…”

Zeno’s takoyaki was ready. While continuing on our way to the apartment, I recalled the two bullet hole-shaped tears in Gunvolt’s armored coat. Whoever had aimed at him was going for the heart.

“Itadakimasu~ Ow! Hot!” he didn’t wait long enough for the takoyaki to cool.

I waited until I finished both hot dogs to posit my own theory.

“Zeno, you saw those holes in Gunvolt’s coat, right?”

“Bullet holes, what about ‘em?”

“Wouldn’t he have been able to avoid bullets because of his prevasion ability?”

“Oh yeah… But didn’t he tell us about some guy that made a septima-canceling bullet? What was his name…”

“Copen.”

“Right. Didn’t see any hint of him on Onogoro though.”

By now we had entered the seedy apartment complex Gunvolt and Joule had called ‘home’ for the past half-year.

“Oh well, we can just ask him.” Zeno assured.

Technically, the apartment was one of our safehouses, although it was struck off the list not long after Gunvolt went freelance. The door had been wrenched open. This whole mess started because Merak, head of cyber security at Sumeragi, had somehow come back from the dead and kidnapped Joule with the help of his armchair mech… thing.

The inside of the apartment looked completely untouched from last night. Gunvolt definitely wasn’t home, he probably didn’t return after the mission either. Which begs the question: Where did he go?

“GV? Come on man, it’s just us.” Zeno called out, hadn’t given up yet.

“There aren’t a lot of places he could hide in a little apartment like this, if we haven’t seen him by now, then I don’t think he’s here.”

“Dammit!” Zeno yelled and threw his arms up in resignation.

“Calm down, we’ll find him.”

“I know, I know. I just– I want him to be okay.”

“Same here.”

The next most likely spot to find Gunvolt would probably be one of the numerous safe houses he and Asimov set up years before either Zeno or I had set foot in Japan.

The first place we hit up was Team Sheeps’ primary base of operations, Gunvolt wasn’t there either. While we were there, Zeno and I slipped out of our fisherman disguises and into civilian clothes. Both of us also made sure to grab whatever we needed (that could fit into a backpack), it would probably be a long time before we set foot in here again. Now for the other six safe houses.

Zeno and I split up to cover more ground, I take three, he takes three.

The second safe house was in another apartment complex, although this one looked a lot nicer than the one Gunvolt lived in. I’m not entirely sure how Asimov and the man who lived there know each other, but I’m pretty sure it had something to do with how we get the money we have. Twenty floors up, I found the apartment and knocked on the hardwood door. A gruff voice rumbled out of an accompanying speaker.

“Whaddya’ want?”

“I’m an associate of—” Wait a second, Asimov used a different name when doing business with this guy. What was it again? Oh, right, “I’m an associate of ‘Captain Falcon’.”

I can’t help but wonder if he got that codename from one of Zeno’s video games. No, he was definitely using it before either of us arrived in Japan.

“Ah, gotcha.”

I could hear the clicking of several locks being undone. The door opened, revealing a brawny man that couldn’t have been much older than Asimov, dragon-pattern tattoos were peeking out from his partially unbuttoned shirt. I think he went by Kuore?

“Whew, Cap’s got good taste in ladies. I’d ask why he had to send you instead of coming here himself, but I wouldn’t say I’m mad at him for it.”

Kuore wasn’t subtle about the way he was eyeing me up and down.

“I was just going to ask if his ‘son’ had been around here recently.”

“Son?”

“Blond, long braid, always shorter than you think he’s going to be?”

“Oh yeah, that guy! Haven’t seen him in a year, at least.”

Damn.

“Ah, goodbye then.”

“You know, if you wanna’ stay a little while, I wouldn’t mind if you know what I’m saying.” He flirted.

“Maybe we can meet for dinner later~” I lied.

“Any luck on your end?” I asked Zeno, who visited the apartment of an old custodian who works at several different schools, including the one Gunvolt went to. Unbeknownst to everyone but us, she’s a QUILL sympathizer, and has been an invaluable source of intel when it comes to adept children that suddenly disappear off the face of the earth.

“Absolutely nothing, but I got some free homemade cookies now.”

Granny cookies sound way better than getting hit on by a yakuza, I’m more than a little jealous…

“Well, here’s hoping we find him soon.”

Zeno hung up after that.

Next up is a basement under a failing capsule machine store in the industrial district. The AC unit there stopped working last summer during that record-shattering heatwave. We all tried to carry out operations as usual despite it, but gave up after Gunvolt and Zeno got so sweaty that their spiky hair went completely limp. It really didn’t help that the only ventilation was the hidden floor panel used to get in and out… which was supposed to remain closed all the time.

Surprise, surprise, no sign of that blond braid anywhere. I called Zeno to give him the bad news.

“I don’t get it, why would he just disappear like that?!” His agitation was obvious, even without visuals.

He had already checked the other two safe houses he was assigned.

“I don’t know, there’s definitely something we’re missing.” I added.

“We’ll find him, we have to.”

The truth of the matter is that, the longer and farther we look, the chances of us finding Gunvolt get smaller. But I won’t tell Zeno that, not yet.

The last safehouse was a warehouse not too far from the same docks we left the FAC. It served as storage for extra vehicles, weapons, armor, and pretty much anything else we would need on a mission, all hidden in innocuous packaging. Zeno and I agree to meet up with each other first before we head in, using a nearby pier as a rendezvous point.

“Hey,” was all Zeno said when I found him.

No more fooling around, we were all business now. But that didn’t mean there wasn’t any time to talk while navigating the seemingly endless labyrinth of corrugated steel walls.

“I’m still not entirely convinced this isn’t just some kind of nightmare.” I tried my hand at lightening the mood.

Zeno said nothing, Gunvolt’s absence must really be getting to him.

“Zeno?”

“…Huh? Oh, sorry. I was just thinking about something stupid.”

“Stupid as in tokusatsu plot or stupid in real life?” I asked, curious.

“It’s looking more and more like GV died after he disappeared…but I’ve got this feeling that he’s still alive, and he’s avoiding us for some reason.”

“But why would he avoid us? Unless…”

“Unless…?”

I had an epiphany. What causes burn marks, besides fire? Electricity, and what is the Azure Striker septima if not electricity incarnate? As for the bullet holes, none of the Sumeragi adepts we’ve seen were known to bear arms, and any normal soldiers could have been easily evaded thanks to prevasion. Leaving either Copen somehow appearing on Firmament without either Zeno or I noticing, or Asimov having a sidearm I hadn’t seen him take along on the boat. If it’s the latter, then that would mean—

“Zeno,” I stopped in my tracks, “You don’t think… Gunvolt killed Asimov?”

Zeno stopped walking, his eyes widened, and his face warped with disgust.

“What the hell are you trying to say?!” Zeno barked.

“I’m sorry! It’s just, if he’s still alive, and assuming he wasn’t taken prisoner, then why would he avoid us like this?”

“Listen, I know GV, and so do you! What reason would he have to kill the guy who’s practically raised him?”

“Maybe they had some kind of disagreement?”

“You mean like when he found Joule? They didn’t exactly kill each other over her last time I checked.”

Zeno makes a good point.

“Alright, do you have any ideas then?” I asked.

“I’ll… Ask him in the warehouse…”

Zeno knew he wouldn’t be in there. I knew he wasn’t in there, but we had no choice but to check, even if it was entirely futile.

The double doors of the warehouse stood in front of us, whatever was behind them would be the closest we’ll get to the answer. I just couldn’t help but ask one more question.

“What are we going to do if he isn’t in there? I don’t think we’re in any shape to pull off a rescue operation if he really has been captured.”

“If GV isn’t in this warehouse… Then he died on that island with Asimov and Joule.”

“Only one way to find out.”

“Yeah.”

We each pushed one door open, and stepped inside.

Not only was Gunvolt nowhere to be seen, but a good portion of our surplus equipment had been heavily damaged.

“No way…” I muttered.

Zeno drew his pistol out of his jacket’s inner pocket. I followed suit with my own snub nosed pistol. Upon further inspection, Quite a bit of the damage done to the equipment looks like it came from a blade. It wasn’t too long ago when Asimov was trying to convince me that some sword-wielding Sumeragi soldiers Gunvolt faced were actually ninjas. I point my gun to the ceiling and take a shot at the first shadow I found.

The shadow revealed himself to be an assassin cleaving the bullet with an instantaneous swipe from his sword. Zeno shot at him several more times, but he blocked every single one, even as he dropped to the ground. The assassin slashed Zeno’s neck, splashing his black and white armor red.

I attempted to shoot at the assassin’s leg, only for him to knock the gun out of my hand with his blade, severing my right index finger in the process. The sheer pain bore down on my lungs as I involuntarily screamed.

Before the assassin could finish me off, a shot to the back of the head kills him. As he collapsed, Zeno could be seen blowing the smoke out of TOPO’s muzzle. He was still bloodied, but there wasn’t even a hint of a gash otherwise. Zeno’s septima, Ever-Living, wasn’t as flashy as energy flies or portals, but it certainly makes for a near indestructible opponent.

“Moniqa, can you find that finger? I can probably reattach it.”

“It’s… right… there…” I strained to get the words out.

Zeno picked up my severed finger from the floor, used the water from the bottle in his messenger bag to wash it out, and motioned for me to give him my right hand. He used one hand to hold my finger together, and the other to wipe some blood off of his neck and slathered it on the wound, causing my hand to twitch furiously. After what felt like the longest second of my life, the digit had been successfully reattached.

“Phew, thanks Zeno.”

“Nothin’ to it.”

As I bent down to pick up my gun, I noticed a faint beeping noise coming from in front of me.

“Zeno, do you hear that beeping?”

“Beeping?”

We soon understood the extent of the trap we walked into and ran as fast as we could out of the warehouse, barely making it out of the block when the structure was blown sky high.

The two of us found an empty dock to take a breather and watch the sunset. Even sitting down, my knees were shaking like a bowl of jelly. Zeno frowned at his t-shirt, the anime witch printed on it now completely drowned out by his own blood.

“This was one of my favorite shirts…”

We had to get out of this city, there was nothing left for us here.

Chapter Text

May

In truth, there was one more safe house Asimov set up in case of a heavily botched mission where there was nothing else to do but run away. It was far from the city, deep in the mountains, and a total pain in the ass to get to, but it was all we had. After a truly absurd amount of train and bus transfers, we had several kilometers of hiking through winding roads that may or may not have been paved at one point in time.

“Man, this fog is wild. I keep feeling like a guy with a pyramid for a head is gonna come outta’ the trees and jump us.” Zeno blathered.

“We could probably take him on…” I have no idea what he’s referencing and I really don’t care.

“That’s the spirit!”

What’s more, neither of us had ever actually been to this place before. Guess that goes to show Team Sheeps’ track record until recently.

If it wasn’t for the faded out bald eagle figurine tied to a tree branch, we would have totally missed the nearly invisible path beckoning us to go deeper into the foliage.

We encountered what looked like a dilapidated cabin jutting out of the lush mountain slope, I guess this is our home now. Zeno opened the sliding door and raised his eyebrows when the smell wafted out, a distinctive musk from years of abandonment in a humid area. I took off my muddy sneakers and stepped into the dark interior after Zeno.

“So, what should we do first?” I asked.

There was no response.

“Zeno?”

I look to the left and find Zeno sleeping in the corner, using his messenger bag as a pillow.

“Hm. That’s a good idea.”

I follow suit in the corner parallel to his.

After our first uninterrupted night of sleep in days, we immediately get to work. This “cabin” has a lot more to it than initially thought. Just in the room we crashed out in, there were two cots (which would have been nice to know yesterday…) and two bulky computer terminals that dared to call themselves “portable” as well as a large poster with the QUILL logo emblazoned on it covering most of a wall. Curiously, one of the terminals had a small, old-style flatscreen television set up as the monitor instead of a modern holographic display. But none of that would matter until we could get electricity to power it.

“Holy shit! This place has a basement?!” Zeno’s surprise was mutual, and we both forgot about finding a source of energy.

Within the basement was box after box of rations, the kind that could theoretically keep for decades, at least going hungry won’t be a concern. Upon taste-testing (devouring) the contents of a box, I found that the meal was as satiating as it was unremarkable. Now for the main task.

Apparently, there was not only a basement, but also a rope ladder that led to the top of the incline this hideout was built into. At the base of the rope were a couple of folded up solar panels and a small satellite dish, all connected with long wires to a box the size of a nightstand.

“Looks like we’ve found our power source and our connection to the rest of the world.” I point out.

“So we have. Wanna’ climb up there and set it up?”

“Not really, but we have to.”

“What, are you afraid of heights? Sucks to be you, I love a good climb.”

That certainly makes things easier for me, although that means I had to untangle the mess of wires before he started. 

Zeno gathered the panels and dish, using the wires to tie them to his back, gave the rope a firm pull to make sure it hadn’t rotted away, and when he confirmed it was good, proceeded to scurry up the narrow tunnel above like his life depended on it.

Soon enough, we had both power and an ethernet connection.

No one wants to be the bearer of bad news, but as the dedicated operator of Team Sheeps, it’s my duty to inform the rest of QUILL on what had happened.

“Team Sheeps to Haunted House, Sheeps 3 speaking.”

I got a response a few minutes later. A little boy with thick-rimmed glasses is seen on the other end.

“Haunted House to Team Sheeps, Parrot here,” he spoke with a slight lisp, “Um, sorry if I talk funny, a baby tooth just came out when you called. Anyway, state your business.”

Baby teeth? God, they’re all so young…

“I have urgent news regarding our most recent operation, please connect me to House Leader.”

“Okie, he might be busy right now but I’ll just tell’im that it’s really, really important.”

“Thanks, Parrot.”

“You’re welcome, Miss Sheep 3! Please stand by.”

Such a polite kid. I hope QUILL’s work pays off soon, for Parrot’s sake and other adepts alike. Speaking of young adepts…

“Oh man, Heinlein? Feels like it’s been forever since I’ve seen him. Sure am glad I’m not seeing him now though…” Zeno remarked.

Before Asimov picked Zeno out for Team Sheeps, he worked under House Leader AKA Heinlein, another one of the “Big Three” who founded QUILL. I guess it’s “Big Two” now.

“This is House Leader, what mission are you talking about and why are you the one reporting this to me instead of Sheeps Leader?” Heinlein grumbled.

It’s somewhat hard to tell due to the poor connection crunching the video quality, but it seems that Heinlein’s wearing a bathrobe. That and his sopping wet maroon hair indicates that he just stepped out of the shower, no wonder he’s so grouchy. Time to make a bad mood worse.

“Sheeps Leader can’t respond because he was killed in action.”

“He was what ?!” 

Heinlein deflated.

“Oh, oh no… What about GV?”

“Missing in action, presumed dead.”

Heinlein winced.

“Following the death of Sheeps Leader, the remainder of Team Sheeps now answers to you unless you state otherwise.”

“Very well, send a complete report on the incident as soon as you can. Dismissed.”

“Yes sir.”

And so the call ended.

After the complete report of Mission “Bring Back the Muse” was sent, there wasn’t much Zeno or I could do with practically no equipment, at least until we leave Japan. Which means that all we can do is continue to hide here until Kamishiro is compromised again, and who knows when that will be?

In the meantime, the cabin had plenty more mysteries to explore. In particular, the poster I noticed yesterday.

“I think there’s a secret message on the back.” Zeno teased.

“And I think it’s covering up a weird stain.”

“Then open it! I gotta’ know!”

We were both proven wrong.

“A secret tunnel?! That kinda’ stuff only happens in the movies! Asimov really was something else…”

What was beyond the tunnel was even more interesting. It appeared to be some kind of storage shed, everything was piled on top of each other. I could probably look through the contents of this room for a week straight and not find everything.

“What are these?” Something catches my eye.

Three extra Dart Leader pistols were lying on top of a composition notebook, which itself was placed on top of a box of bullets of an unspecified caliber. Although the guns all looked similar to GV’s, each one looked somewhat off under further scrutiny. One had a revolving chamber, another had a dramatically slanted handle and a reduced muzzle, and the last was twice the size of the other two, it was also the only gun that had visible signs of wear and tear.

“Prototypes?” I think aloud.

“Looks like ‘em,” Zeno picked up the revolver styled one, “Wanna see if they work?”

Why not? It’s not like we had anything better to do.

We played a game of rock-paper-scissors to determine who would shoot first. Childish, yes, but a surefire way to make a quick decision. Zeno won, so I set up the targets, 6 empty cans fished out from the pile of junk in the storage room.

“Range clear, fire at will!” I stated, after stepping behind the makeshift safety line.

“Heh, check this out.”

Zeno took up a strange stance.

“Special Operations QUILL.” He said in a bizarre imitation of an old man’s voice.

Zeno then spun the revolver around in a few different directions before pointing it skyward, all while displaying a terrifying lack of trigger discipline.

“Revolver Zeno.”

He spun the revolver around again before bringing it back to the same position as before.

“This is the greatest handgun ever made, the Fw-004 (TYPE-0) D:T/LEADER.”

He just kept spinning it around…

“Six bullets. More than enough to kill anything that moves.”

Zeno spun the loaded gun around again and flipped it around a few times for good measure before finally assuming a position to shoot.

“Now I’ll show you why they call me… Revolver.” He lowered the gun for five seconds, looking very proud of himself.

“Draw!” Zeno shouted as he shot… and hit a tree trunk, completely missing the cans.

In his defense, I couldn’t hit a single can during my turn either. It’s not hard to see why Gunvolt left these here.

June

Still no news on when we can go home, apart from a minor hacking job, there’s been nothing to do at all. So often I used work to distract myself from almost everything else that I’m finally seeing how Zeno lives for the first time.

“Can you please turn that down?!”

“If I turn it down anymore I won’t be able to hear it at all!!”

“Then use my headset!”

“Ew, mono sound? What is this, the 20th century?”

…Unsurprisingly, we have very little in common.

“Ugh, fine! See if I care!”

I leave the cabin before I can hear what he says.

Thankfully, the mountain forest is much more agreeable, even if it’s full of biting insects. I soon lose myself to the dancing of dappled sunlight on moss coated stones and the symphony of birdsong. By the time I return, Zeno’s already out somewhere else, probably using a sturdy tree branch to do pull ups.

Unfortunately, we can’t always just go outside to avoid each other. Rainy days are common, and will only grow more frequent as the summer draws on.

“Moniqa! Stop leaving your clothes everywhere!” Zeno alleged.

“Stop touching my sock!!” I denied the allegation.

“Then stop putting it near my cot!” he threw the off-white crew sock directly at my face.

What is there to gain from all this? We are our only allies in a country that wants us dead, and I don’t want to die here. I’m sure Zeno doesn’t either.

I came up with a solution.

“…Let’s watch something, anything. We can’t keep squabbling like this.”

“…Yeah, let’s do that.”

Zeno opens the virtual TV program set up in his computer. We nearly miss a PSA informing that a curfew from 22:00 to 06:00 is still in effect, and now for the weather.

A newswoman droned on, “…More rain expected throughout the weekend, and…”

We collectively groaned. Zeno noticed the time in the upper left corner of the screen.

“Hold on, a new anime’s starting today, lemme change the channel.”

“What’s it called?” I asked.

“That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Cybernetic Singing Fairy Hostess.”

“That sounds horrible, why would you watch that?”

“Hamburgers will clog up your arteries, why do you eat them?”

“…Touché.”

The constant breast jiggling sound effects on top of the simultaneously infantile and sexual moaning of the lead character were too much. I went back to the storage room to try my hand at navigating through the junk again, there always seemed to be something I hadn’t seen before. This time, it’s a tarp poking out from under various scrap, cardboard, and blue overcoats. Putting those to the side, I pull off the tarp.

“A motorcycle?!” I stage-whispered.

A motorcycle it was indeed, there was even a sidecar next to it.

“A what?” Zeno couldn’t fully hear what I said.

“Uhh, I’ll tell you later!”

“‘Kay.”

The next morning I found out that the motorcycle wasn’t completely broken down, but it definitely needed some repair before a ride could be attempted. Thankfully, there was a toolkit left nearby. I knew what I would be doing for the foreseeable future.

July

At first, I was so grateful that we wouldn’t starve. I still am, but every blessing has a curse attached to it. Everyday, it’s the same MRE, and I’ve never been so stopped up in my life… Couldn’t Asimov have kept anything else down in the basement?

I try not to let that keep me down, there’s a motorcycle to repair after all. With the help of internet tutorials, I’ve made a lot more progress than I would have otherwise. I was just charging up the bike’s battery when—

“Ahh! I can’t see!”

Everything went dark, the light must have gone out. It wouldn’t be long before a bright light assaulted my eyes.

“Sorry about that,” Zeno was holding a flashlight, “There’s a high chance of thunderstorms and I don’t wanna risk losing power for good. I’ll put the stuff back up tomorrow.”

“Okay. Can you get that light out of my face?”

“Oops.”

He moved the flashlight into the direction of the motorcycle.

“Is that a motorcycle?! How long has that been there?”

I forgot to tell him…

“Sorry, I meant to tell you when I found it. I don’t think I’m going to be repairing much while it’s dark though.”

“Guess you wouldn’t, huh.” Zeno held up the flashlight to the composition notebook that was near the prototype Dart Leaders. I hadn’t seen it before, but there was the word “CLASSIFIED” written on the notebook’s cover in pen.

“You wanna’ read it?” he asked.

“I don’t know… Wouldn’t that be disrespecting the dead? And besides, does the big ‘CLASSIFIED’ on the front mean nothing to you?”

 “Counterpoint: If Asimov trusted us enough to be in his super special squad, then he probably trusted us enough to take his secrets to the grave…”

He did trust us a lot, but it still feels wrong. Then again, it's no secret that lovers can tell each other anything, even what bodies they hide in the closet, all because they trust each other so deeply. Not that Asimov and I were ever lovers or anything, but… maybe one day we could have been?

“Well, if you don’t think he trusted you enough, then I’ll read it alone.”

Zeno started to walk away. That guy really knew how to push my buttons…

“Wait! I, um, I want to see it.”

Zeno and I found ourselves hunched over the notebook, lit with a flashlight, like some sick parody of a sleepover.

“Wow, I can’t believe Asimov actually wrote in this thing. He’s so old fashioned.”

“Just open it already.”

I still can’t believe I agreed to this.

The first entry was dated five years ago.

It has only been a year since I’ve come back to Japan, but I’ve already accomplished so much. I decided to pay a visit to S-FIT to put a stop to their little Project Gunvolt, and to give them my “thanks.” The mission was by no means a failure, but I found a boy there who insisted on joining my cause. His control over the Azure Striker was much greater than mine ever was, it’s very promising. These mountains are perfect for training. If all goes right, I could very well have my successor.

“Asimov was an Azure Striker?!”

Zeno was incredulous.

“I knew this was a mistake, you shouldn’t have opened this.”

Thunder roared from outside, Asimov’s ghost must be furious at us. Zeno flipped to the next page, as if we didn’t just violate our late leader’s right to privacy.

“I can’t believe you’re still reading!”

“Oh come on, we’re already in too deep, may as well keep going, right?”

“Ugh, right.”

I was complicit in this too, after all.

I would be surprised that he had been in Japan before that, but considering his fluency in Japanese and tenuous grasp on English, I kind of figured that he wasn’t really American.

The next few entries detailed the training regimen he imposed on Gunvolt, who had apparently only remembered his name as “Subject 78” before this. On stormy nights like this, instead of hunkering down, Gunvolt would have been climbing to the top of the tallest tree to learn how to “become one with lightning.” Honestly, I could have gone my whole life without learning how Asimov made his protégé such an efficient soldier by the time I met him. At least he had gotten him out of that awful Sumeragi lab.

“Whoa, GV got direct training from Asimov himself? No wonder he was so good at everything,” Zeno commented, “But man did Asimov sound like a hardass, Heinlein didn’t even make me spar with him until I was thirteen!”

The next entry was a strange one. There was a torn out page from a newspaper clipped into the notebook. I’d heard about some attempt to revitalize the print medium as a folksy novelty, but I can’t imagine it was profitable enough to last all that long.

YŌKAI IN THE MOUNTAINS?

Is fiction fact? Someone who wishes to remain anonymous submitted a fantastical story about how when he had gone foraging in the mountains, he spotted something beyond belief. Specifically, a Raijū. For those of you who don’t know what that is, Raijū are Yōkai with power over lightning that often take the form of wild dogs. However, our anonymous submission claims that the Raijū looked less like a dog and more like a young boy, and even gave us a sketch of what he saw (see next page). We at the Countryside First cannot prove or disprove the existence of Yōkai, but maybe you, the reader can! And if you do, be sure to tell us at………

There was another clipping behind the first, this one being a crude sketch of a long-haired child holding a knife in his mouth with lightning arcing all around him. The next page’s writing provided context for the clipping.

Last week, Gunvolt attempted to power on the other portable terminal with his septima. He overestimated the wattage needed for it and shorted it out. In a stroke of Good Luck, the actual computer was fine, but the monitor was destroyed. I was planning to start GV’s survival training soon, so I started him off by assigning him to fetch a replacement monitor. None of the smaller Dart Leaders are reliable to use and my old one is still too big for him, so all he has, aside from the Azure Striker, is a knife. He didn’t know it, but I was watching over him the entire time. His technique was getting better, but it still needs refinement. Let’s hope no anonymous submitters find him next time. If he’s not more careful, it might be Sumeragi finding him instead.

I can’t describe the specific emotion I felt about reading of Asimov acting as if that’s a normal thing to do to a child that couldn’t have been older than ten. I know that ten-year old was an extremely powerful adept being trained to fight for a worthy cause, but just the thought of it all gnawed at me. When I was ten, the biggest challenge I had to face was making friends at school. The entries after that were relatively uneventful, and I fell asleep while Zeno kept reading. Hopefully I didn’t snore too loudly, which is apparently something I do according to Zeno.

August

By now, the motorcycle was in a rideable state. The sidecar had also gotten a makeover, courtesy of Zeno. He was also a big help during the test rides, even if Ever-Living never needed to help him out of an accident. There’s no doubt that we’re using that motorcycle for transport when we leave the safe house behind, but the issue lies in that one of us will be in the sidecar, and both of us want to be in the rider's seat. But that won’t be a problem until we can actually leave. In the meantime…

“That anime again? I can’t believe it hasn’t gotten canceled yet, you know how Sumeragi gets about infringing on Lumen’s likeness.”

“Not gonna lie Moniqa, I think Sumeragi has bigger fish to fry right now.”

“Whatever, have fun watching that. I’m going to be productive and gather more intel.”

“I know you’re just browsing social media on there, at least I’m honest about when I’m messing around.”

He saw right through me…

Just then I received an urgent call from Haunted House.

“Team Sheeps, you need to mobilize at once!” Heinlein ordered.

“Wait, what’s going on?”

“Kamishiro is down! You can leave the country!”

Chapter Text

“What, how?!” I shouted, surely getting Zeno’s attention.

“Kamishiro is down!” Heinlein repeated, “Get the wool out of your ears and move to these coordinates as fast as you can, the operative you’ll meet is someone Sheeps 2 will recognize. Do whatever it takes, but don’t be stupid about it! House Leader out.”

I couldn’t believe it, all those months of waiting and just like that, it was finally time to go.

“Zeno, turn off the TV, we’re leaving!”

“For real?!” Zeno jumped out of his chair and immediately started pulling his effects together…without turning off the monitor, guess he’s determined to finish that episode one way or another. I don’t have time to complain, the motorcycle needs to get out of the storage room.

In what felt like less than five minutes we were both fully packed. Now comes the hard part.

“Okay, I know you want to drive the motorcycle and I want to drive the motorcycle, so we’re going to have to—”

"You drive." Zeno interrupted.

“R—Really?”

“C’mon Moniqa, we don’t have time for that.”

“Alright then, let’s go.”

“But there is one last thing I wanna do before we leave this place for good…”

For some inexplicable reason, Zeno went back into the cabin and grabbed the three prototype Dart Leaders, and buried them as fast as he could.

“What are you doing?”

“Well, I think we can spare them a minute, don’t you?”

I see. Three buried guns for three lives lost. I can’t really say no to that, I just wish he had thought of this earlier.

After the impromptu funeral service ended, we drove off and never looked back. To say driving a motorcycle with a sidecar at top speeds through narrow mountain roads at four in the morning was perilous would be an understatement.

“Good thing we did those test rides, eh?” Zeno could barely be made out from the howling of the wind.

“What?!”

“I said, Good thing we did those— Whoa!!!”

I had reached a sharp turn, and while I managed to avoid driving off the cliff into oblivion, the sidecar still left the ground. This would happen several more times before we left the mountains.

With great relief, we made it out of the mountains and onto flat roads flanked by farmland. I can only hope that I didn’t give Zeno any premature gray hairs.

“Woo-hoo-hoo! Roller coasters don’t have anything on your driving!”

…Perhaps I wouldn’t have to worry after all.

Since the coordinates led to a city known for its seaside resorts, there were two possible routes we could take. We could take the back roads through the various nearby towns, which would lower our chances of standing out, but would take much longer. Alternatively, we could take the expressway, which would be unquestionably faster, but we would have to deal with the automated toll booths recording us when we enter and leave. I know motorcycle helmets completely obscure the face, I also know that those cameras are equipped with more than just a camera. But no matter where we go, there’s a bigger problem.

“Man, couldn’t Kamishiro have just waited a couple more hours to glitch out?” Zeno complained.

There was a curfew in effect. While we’re still in rural areas with little to no lighting, passing by is easy with an electric motor and headlight turned off. But as we get closer to more populated areas…

“I’m just not sure what we should do, we’re stuck between a rock and a hard place!”

“Easy, take the faster way.”

“And what if we get barricaded in and they drop a Mantis on us?”

“We’ll think of something.”

He sounded so sure of himself.

“I guess we don’t have a choice…”

The expressway ramp was fast approaching.

Apparently, Zeno had brought handheld chaff cartridges with him this whole time, and used those to scramble the tollbooth cameras. After that, the expressway seemed to be a breeze, with absolutely no traffic, and only a straight path ahead. But just as the sky started changing from night to dawn, a siren blared and a voice boomed out from a loudspeaker.

“Pull over! You are in violation of curfew and several traffic laws!”

“Tch! I got this.” Zeno somehow pulled ORSO out of the sidecar cavity.

I don’t even know how he fit that in his messenger bag, disassembling and reassembling maybe? However he did it, the pursuit stopped as soon as it started.

“Phew, good thing I brought the armor-piercing bullets! I was kinda’ iffy on ‘em ‘cause they tend to jam—”

“Good work, that could have turned ugly.” I interrupted.

And as if fate was mocking me, the moment I said that, a much larger threat rushed towards us.

“A Spyder ?!!”

The unmanned tank didn’t hesitate to open fire. It was close, but I somehow swerved around each laser volley. But there’s no way I can keep that up, something had to be done!

“Uhh…”

Zeno pulled out two grenades, but he looked unsure.

He chucked them towards the Spyder, but the explosion had no effect.

“We could really use an Azure Striker right about now!” Zeno yelled, perhaps hoping that Gunvolt would appear out of thin air and save us.

Another round of lasers, another bout of evading the lasers. The beam cut through the connector fastening the sidecar to the rest of the motorcycle. Zeno was just quick enough to leap out of the drifting sidecar. As he held onto my back, the real possibility we could die here began to weigh down.

“It’s… been nice knowing you.” I admitted.

“Don’t give up! I’ll come up with something, I swear!”

Suddenly, a pink light flashed behind us accompanied by a sparkling sound. The spyder completely disappeared, maybe we won’t die here.

“What?! I didn’t know you could do that!”

I was overjoyed.

“I can’t, step on it, go as fast as you can…" Zeno was uncharacteristically fearful, "Hurry!”

I accelerated as much as I could, although our exit was coming up.

“I thought Zonda was killed! What the hell is this?!” He ranted.

“Zonda?!”

I couldn’t believe what he was saying.

“I can’t forget those septima mirrors even if I want to! We might already be in their illusion!”

“Whether or not we’re trapped… all we can do right now is keep going. And look, the exit!”

There was no time to waste worrying about surveillance systems or septima mirrors. I drove straight through the exit tollbooth. All there was left to do was get to the sea. Red lights, one way lanes, none of it mattered, we had to get there no matter what.

I drove onto the boardwalk, and came to a complete stop at the very end of the pier. I looked all around for any signs of the operative we’re supposed to find. Soon enough, Zeno pulled me by the arm, leading me to a speedboat.

“Wow, you two don’t waste any time.” The girl in the speedboat remarked, she was wearing a frilly blue sundress and had a bird-themed purse at her side. She nonchalantly went back to sipping her pouch of starfruit juice.

“Well, what are you waiting for? Come on!” Zeno jeered.

“Oh, right!”

I hadn’t realized I was still standing on the boardwalk.

The way the girl was piloting the speedboat made my driving look delicate. 

“Zee-Zee, it’s been so long~ You know, that hair-dye looks very fashionable on you!”

“You think so?”

It seems that they really did know each other. As I looked back, the land had almost completely vanished. So much had happened in that country, and now it was all behind us.

“By the way, this is Moniqa. She’s a bit of a softie, even if she’ll never admit it.”

“Who are you calling a ‘softie’?”

“Pleasure to meet you, Moniqa. Call me Vera~” she giggled.

The sun finally broke through the horizon, and Vera stopped the boat.

“So… are we taking this all the way back to China?” Zeno asked.

“Definitely not!” Vera huffed, “In fact, our ride should be coming up any minute now~”

Not long after, a massive submarine emerged from the water. Vera brought the speedboat directly into its open maw, and we were soon swallowed whole. The diving alarm sounded, and it sank back into the deep.

The hatch leading this hangar back to the rest of the craft opened, and a young man with silver hair came out to greet us. I’d never seen him before, and Zeno hadn’t either.

“Hey there, you… uh… whatever your name was again.” Zeno attempted.

“It’s okay, I’m new here. Welcome aboard the Exodus, I’m Tenjian.”

Chapter Text

The Exodus, QUILL’s very own submarine. It has been little over a year since I have traveled in it, trusting my life to a handful of teenagers trying their best to do the work of multiple people at once. Even with the Exodus’ systems and navigation being almost fully automated, it still needs constant manual oversight. Ideally, a vessel of the Exodus’ size should have a crew of at least 90. The problem is that QUILL has about 100 operatives spread out around the world, many of them too occupied with their current missions to pack up and go somewhere else. But what’s even stranger, is that crew shortages don’t seem to be an issue this time around.

“What kinda’ recruitment campaigns has Heinlein been running recently?!” Zeno remarked.

“And so quickly too…” I added.

“Yeah, it’s a bit weird, but I think it’s a sign of success!”

Zeno must have heard the apprehension in my voice.

“Besides, it probably means that neither of us will have to take a station or two, woo-hoo!” He added on.

Zeno went off to look for anyone he recognized, I headed towards the galley.

If there’s one thing that hasn’t changed, the galley still leans more towards walk-in pantry rather than cafeteria. I finish preparing my instant coffee and look up from my mug to notice someone sitting at a nearby table, a woman that looks… a lot like me, actually. I suppose that saying about everyone having a lookalike somewhere in the world is true.

“Excuse me, would you like a tarot reading?” She asks.

“Sure, why not?”

I don’t often indulge in astrology, but it can be fun once in a while.

The woman shuffled her deck of cards, then cut it into three, and picked the first card on the top of each pile.

“The Tower, you have just endured a great ordeal.”

It’s true, although I think anyone here could have figured that out.

“The Hanged Man, your fate surrounds you.”

Not entirely sure where she’s getting at with that, but fortune tellers thrive on vagueness.

“Death,” she looked up at me with cold eyes, “Well, I’m sure that could mean anything.”

“Um… Thanks for that…”

I tried to be polite, although I can’t help but feel like that woman was threatening me. She said nothing in response and I took that as my cue to leave the galley.

As I make my way to the bridge, I overhear Zeno telling a story.

“And he said, ‘What’s updog?’”

He regaled those around him of the time he pulled the “Updog” prank on Asimov. The surrounding youths erupted out in giggles and guffaws. It would probably be better not to interrupt them.

It’s still hard to believe that there were no vacant stations on the bridge. Quiet sobbing from below distracts me from that before I can think too much more on it. I recognize Tenjian at the captain’s seat, he must be pretty good at leading if he’s there. Since there’s nothing for me to do, I may as well see if I can comfort whoever’s crying.

I find a strong looking man sniffling by one of the few windows, he stares at the deep sea in reverential awe.

“Are you okay? Do you need someone to talk to?”

“It’s just…” He catches his breath, “The ocean is so beautiful… And yet, the very movement of this horrid vessel pollutes it!”

It must be rough to care about the environment so much while the climate continues to worsen, it’s not hard to sympathize.

“Yeah, it’s unfortunate that no one’s found a way to make a zero-emission submarine of this kind yet.”

“Yes, perhaps one day, in our glorious future we will have moved past the need for such barbaric methods of transportation.”

“Maybe one day…”

The man composed himself, and gazed longingly out the window.

“Say, if this over-glorified can were to suddenly be torn apart right now, what would you do?” He asked.

I really hope that wasn’t another cryptic threat…

“Well, I would probably die.”

“Yes, but how would you feel?”

“I’d probably be pretty unhappy, to say the least.”

“Ah, that’s where your kind and mine differ,” he stood up, “You see, I would gladly welcome Neptune’s strong, firm embrace.”

Oh, I guess he just… really likes the ocean…

He continued to wax poetic about the ocean, causing audible groans from other crew trying to work.

“Bloody hell, look at what you’ve done!” A small girl shouted, “He’s gonna be like this for hours!”

The sound of a boot kicking metal echoed out from above, undoubtedly from that same girl.

“Now, now, Gibril. It’s better to just let Milas get it out of his system.” Tenjian tried to diffuse the tension.

“FUCK NO!!! You’re already pushing your luck asking me not to turn that weakling bitch into a bloody pulp but—”

Gibril’s mouth froze shut, she flipped off Tenjian and went back to work.

“LMAOOO, looks like you need to chill out, lololol” a boy with green highlights taunted her, and quickly ran from her punches, laughing the whole time.

Tenjian sighed with the exhaustion of an overworked babysitter. It was probably a bad idea for me to come here…

“I’ll, um, see if I can make myself useful anywhere else.”

“That would be best.” Tenjian murmured.

It’s not like everyone in QUILL were the best of friends, but I don’t remember any of us ever being quite this hostile to our own allies.

“Oi, Moniqa!” Zeno called out.

Thank goodness, at least he’s still the same.

“Hey, you seem to be having fun. Catching up with your old friends?”

“You mean those guys I was chatting with earlier?”

“Yeah.”

“I have no idea who they are. In fact, the only face I’ve recognized this whole time is Vera’s.”

“That reminds me, were you and Vera a couple before this?” I asked.

“Haha, nah, Vera’s not into guys.”

Zeno put his arm around my shoulder and started to whisper.

“And to be honest, she freaks me out. She’s too sweet, like she’s gonna poison my drink the second I let my guard down.”

“Aw, she doesn’t seem that bad.” I whisper back, although I don’t really know why we’re whispering.

“You’ve never seen her in action! There was this time I saw her make a guy break his own neck with a smile on his face—” Zeno left my side and started talking in a loud, overly enthusiastic voice, “And it was sooooo cool!!”

Vera stepped out of the shadows, her pale eyes burned like will-o'-the-wisps.

“I know right~?” she chimed, “Don’t feel too bad about him, he was a human trafficker. Made a whole lotta money off of Sumeragi’s need for test subjects~”

Well, that certainly killed whatever sympathy I might have had for this person… If Vera’s telling the truth.

The dive alarm goes off again, it’s time to surface.

Chapter Text

After disembarking on an empty coastline, Zeno, Vera, Tenjian, and I all traveled to our next rendezvous point by foot. Although, something still bothers me…

“Um, is it safe to leave those two unsupervised?” I asked Tenjian.

“Who?”

Tenjian didn’t seem to understand what I was talking about.

“The girl’s name was Gerbil I think?”

“Gibril.” He corrected me.

“Apologies.”

“Ah yes, Gibril and Teseo were rather troublesome earlier…” Tenjian thought for a moment, and then said, “It would be unfortunate if they killed each other, but it would also save me the burden of dealing with their incessant antagonizing.”

“That’s a little cold,” Zeno inserted himself into the conversation, “Aren’t we all on the same team?”

“Hm, indeed.” Tenjian acknowledged.

It wasn’t much longer until we reached the rendezvous point, a long unused bus stop.

“Lookie, our ride is already here~!” Vera pointed out the fake tour bus waiting for us.

It was another four or so hours on the bus. I hope it wasn’t too tiring for the boy using his septima to drive it, he already seemed frustrated about something… Perhaps it had something to do with the “vernacular” of the other boy next to him. He just… kept rhyming about everything he saw as if he were a real tour guide, that also rhymed.

“Whoa, this guy’s really committed to the bit.” Zeno whispered to me.

Upon passing through a city, there was a highly visible banner hung up on a mid rise building. I couldn’t read the Mandarin on it, but my guess was that it’s either hate speech or an advertisement for some kind of sale.

“Disgusting.” Tenjian muttered.

“What is?” Zeno asked.

“This city claims to be ‘adept-free’.”

Looks like it was hate-speech after all, what a shame.

Soon enough, the bus finally arrived at Haunted House, QUILL’s largest headquarters and primary site of research and development. Its name is a bit tongue and cheek, decades ago, developers rapidly constructed enormous residential complexes within various cities in this country. Because they were built so quickly, these complexes stood vacant for several years, creating the striking image of a fully developed city district with no residents. News outlets dubbed them “Ghost Cities”, and while most of these eventually did get populated, an economic depression caused a few to stay relatively unpopulated, eventually leading to abandonment and decay. And where better to hide your factory, but in plain sight?

“Oh, Zee-Zee~ I’m so excited to show you how much everything’s changed~!”

Vera quickly dragged Zeno off somewhere else. He was mostly working from here before going to Japan, so I guess he’s got a lot of catching up to do. I on the other hand…

“This is Sheeps 3, Team Sheeps has successfully made it back to Haunted House. Awaiting further orders.” I state to Heinlein upon greeting him in his office.

“Forget the code names for a second,” Heinlein kept looking around me, “Where is Zeno?”

“Vera wanted to show him something.”

“I see, I’ll just tell him later then.”

“Tell him what?”

“That I’m officially disbanding Team Sheeps. I’m not Asimov, and I don’t have the vision he did.”

“I understand, sir.”

“Anyway, meet Tenjian by the stairwell in five minutes for your next task. Dismissed.”

Unfortunately for me, Heinlein didn't say which stairwell was the stairwell. I went to the closest one by his office, but Tenjian was nowhere to be found. There's definitely more than two stairwells here, but if I look for all of them it would definitely take longer than five minutes… Wandering around through the hallways, I come across a workshop full of busy youngsters. Surely at least one of them would have seen Tenjian walk by, right?

I knock on the open door to have some semblance of manners.

"Yes, yes, come in!" Called out a voice, clearly preoccupied with something else.

Within the workshop, it appears to have undergone recent (and rather slapdash) changes. Old posters poking out from crooked whiteboards, an out-of-place kitchen, writing on a wall that I can only make out the first letter "T" before being stenciled over by an unfamiliar insignia, and a large spherical robot currently being built in the center of it all.

"Um, has anyone seen Tenjian around?" I ask, "I was supposed to meet him by the stairs but I can't find him."

I was ignored for the most part, until the boy who had been in the guts of the robot (the same one who had driven the bus earlier) noticed me.

"You again…" he grumbled, "Tenjian walked through here just a minute ago to check on our progress, I didn't see which way he went but it sounded like he went to the left."

"Oh, thanks." I told him before walking away.

As I was leaving the workshop, the chiming of a timer rang throughout the room. All of a sudden, anyone who had been previously hard at work was clamoring around an orange oven. The harried boy shooed them away as he pulled out a tray of fancy looking cookies.

I better leave before I get hungry…

So it ended up taking a bit longer than five minutes to get to Tenjian… You would think it would be simple to find some stairs, even in a building as large as this, but nothing about Haunted House is simple.

Oddly enough, Vera was here as well, but no sign of Zeno. I guess I don’t need to think about him as much anymore, I doubt we’ll be working side-by-side again anytime soon.

“Hello again, Moniqa. Did you get lost on the way here?” Tenjian asked.

“Yes…”

“It’s okay! You won’t get lost again if you just follow me~” Vera reassured me while making direct eye-contact.

Something about Vera’s gaze was incredibly mesmerizing, like there were galaxies in her eyes.

“We’re almost there.” Tenjian said.

I didn’t even realize we were moving, all I could focus on were Vera’s eyes, my legs were walking on their own. Suddenly I remembered what Zeno told me:

“There was this time I saw her make a guy break his own neck with a smile on his face—”

Before I could think further about what he had said. Vera blinked and I found myself near a row of basement rooms. Tenjian just finished unlocking a door.

“After you.” He told me.

A chill went down my spine when I entered the room, after the lights were turned on, I could see what was really happening.

“Wh—What is this?!”

Several frozen bodies were piled up in the corner, most of which were non-adept members of QUILL.

Chapter Text

“Unghh…”

Did I pass out again? No, I think I was knocked out this time…

With a clear view of the murdered QUILL operatives, I can see that this isn’t a bad dream. It’s so cold in here, but I can’t get up, my hands are stuck to the wall. Or at least I think they are, I can’t feel them at all. For some reason, the smell of freshly boiled instant noodles cuts through the air.

“Good morning, does it smell good?” Tenjian asked, holding a styrofoam cup with steam floating out from the top.

“Tenjian, Is that you? What’s going on?”

“You know, it took an awful lot of restraint to not kill you back on the Exodus.”

“What—” I couldn’t believe what I was hearing, “Who are you?”

Tenjian glared at me.

“I’m the one asking the questions here,” he walked up very close to me, “You should be grateful that you’re not lying there with the rest of those inferior beings.”

He pointed to the corpse pile.

“But… Aren’t some of those people adepts…?”

“I told you, I’m asking the questions,” his voice had grown even icier, “But if you must know, they foolishly clung to the idea of ‘peace’ between all kinds of humans, so I let them join the weaklings they care so much about.”

“This is insane.” I said under my breath.

“I thought the same thing when I was left to die by people like you. My whole life, I’ve seen nothing but cruelty upon adepts, so I’ve made it my life mission to unite adeptkind to exterminate our common enemy.”

“Wait, genocide isn’t the answer! That will only lead to more pointless bloodshed!”

I’m aware he’s well past the point where words can sway him, but I had to say it anyway.

“…We’re wasting time. Let me begin, are you familiar with the symptoms of frostbite?”

Now that he wanted me to answer, I didn’t. He’s going to kill me anyway, why should I humor him?

“Very well, you’ll find out soon enough if you continue to be so uncooperative.”

Tenjian stood up, and summoned a sword made of ice.

“I’m going to ask you a question,” he held the cup of instant noodles towards me, “If I like your answer, you can have some of this nice, hot, soup,” he pulled back the cup and pointed the ice sword directly to the tip of my nose, “But if I don’t like your answer, then this room will continue to get colder and colder.”

The ice sword dematerialized.

“Play your cards right, and you might even walk out of here alive.”

“If I wanted to take the safe path, or ‘play my cards right’, I never would have dropped out of university to join QUILL in the first place, so let’s just get this over with already.”

“Putting on a brave face all of a sudden? Alright, where is Asimov’s body?”

“Why do you want it?”

The temperature dropped sharply, the parts of my body I could still feel could only sense stinging pain.

“Let me ask again, where is Asimov’s body?”

“It’s-s-s-s-s somew-w-w-w-where where n-n-nn-no one can ev-vvv-ver f-f-f-find it.”

“…I hope you know that no one is coming to save you, just tell me where you put the body, and you can still save yourself.”

“Nnnnnn-never!”

“How disgraceful…”

My body had gone completely numb, at least the pain’s stopped. I hear two sets of footsteps just outside the room, did Tenjian call for backup? Or maybe Death’s coming for me.

“D-d-d-do you h-h-hh-hear that-t-t-t?”

“Changing the subject won’t save you.”

The footsteps grew louder, and then someone kicked the door down.

“No Zee-zee, don’t go in there!”

Zeno? But why was he here?

“What the hell is this?” he ran inside, and looked horrified, “What are you doing?!”

Tenjian sighed.

“What a shame, I was hoping someone as useful as you wouldn’t be so attached.”

“Yeah, well I’m ‘bout to attach my fist to your face!”

Zeno went in for a punch, but was intercepted by Vera, who forced him to stand in place with the same septima that made me walk down those stairs without realizing it.

“Thank you Vera, at least someone here has some common sense.”

“This is because you didn’t listen to me,” Vera seemed to ignore Tenjian, “Now look what’s happened.”

Zeno was twitching and grunting, trying his hardest to break free. But no matter how hard he struggled, he was still forced onto the ground, and his hands were frozen behind him.

“Do you need me to stand guard outside?” Vera asked Tenjian.

“No, I doubt they’ll last much longer at these temperatures.”

Vera left the room and Tenjian followed, but not before holding the broken door in place and freezing it shut.

The cold… feels so comfortable… maybe if I rest for a bit, I’ll figure out what to do later……

“Ow!”

I was slapped awake.

“Dammit, don’t fall asleep! Are you trying to die?!”

“Z-z-z-zeno…? H-h-h-how… ff-f-free?”

“That’s the right idea, keep talking to me!” He pointed to the chunk of ice that formerly restrained him, “I think you can figure it out for yourself, though.”

The ice was covered in blood, and two disembodied hands were still stuck inside.

“Heh, did those idiots really think I wouldn’t try something like that?” Zeno flaunted his newly regenerated hands, “A little slower than usual to grow ‘em back though, probably ‘cause of the cold.”

Zeno attempted to free me, but didn’t have any way to melt or break the ice off my hands, and I can’t grow them back either, so amputation isn’t an option.

“C-c-c-corpses…”

“Shit… did Tenjian do all this? Do you think Heinlein knows?”

“D-d-dunno…”

“Uh, guess I’ll ask important questions when we’re not freezing…”

“Uh…huh…”

Zeno was really struggling, it hurt to watch…

“I know! I’ll melt the ice!” Zeno ran over to the cup of instant noodles Tenjian left by the door, presumably to taunt us. He picked up the cup, and his expression immediately soured, “Dammit!”

The cup made an audible “clunk” when Zeno threw it onto the floor, its contents frozen solid.

Zeno grew desperate, with nothing else in the room except for bodies, he started kicking the ice in the hopes that it would break. Why does he care so much?

“L-l-leave… me…”

“What?!”

“G-go…”

“No way!!”

“…Why…?”

“D-d-do you even have to ask that?!”

The cold was starting to get to him.

I asked again, or at least tried to.

Zeno wasn’t getting anywhere, and slammed the wall in frustration.

“I…c-couldn’t save J-joule, or GV, or anyone!” His voice started to crack, “If I at least s-s-save you, then I’m not a total f-fuckup!”

Oh, so that’s what this is about.

“It's-sss ok-k-k-k-kay.”

“No, it’s n-n-not!!!” He had completely broken down, “We’re gonna d-d-d-die in here!! We can’t just-t-t let those b-bastards get away with this! Not after e-e-everything we’ve b-been through!”

“That’s right! You won’t die here!” an unknown voice cried out.

Chapter Text

“You won’t die here!”

A blue-haired child wearing three wristwatches appeared out of thin air.

“…What?” was all Zeno could say, it looks like he’s as lost as I am.

“We’ll talk outside, follow me!”

The child motioned toward the now open door.

“Can you get up, Moniqa?” Zeno asked.

“Huh?”

My hands were free, did that child do this too?

Out of that room, I didn’t think it would actually happen… not alive, at least.

“Wow, you’re really lucky,” The child was examining my (disturbingly pale) hands, “Neither of you show any signs of necrosis.”

“So, who are you supposed to be again?” Zeno asked, totally baffled.

“Oh, right! You two are from Team Sheeps, correct?” The child deflected.

“Formerly… it was just disbanded.” it was getting easier to talk again.

“It was?!”

Looks like Heinlein didn’t get around to telling Zeno after all…

“Nevertheless,” the child interjected, “Can you tell me where the one you call ‘Gunvolt’ is?”

Oh great, looks like this is another trick after all.

“Nice try Tenjian, but I won’t crack.” I jumped to conclusions.

“Huh? I’m not with Eden!”

“No, it’s pronounced Tenjian .” I corrected, still somewhat delirious.

“Wait a sec’, I’ve heard of that name before,” Zeno added, “Aren’t they an adept supremacist group? I think I passed by their headquarters last time I was in Uzbekistan, not a very subtle building.”

“Yes, Tenjian is one of their leaders! Please, Gunvolt might be the only one that can stop them!”

“Whatever side you’re on, you won’t find Gunvolt. We certainly didn’t…” I conceded.

“Your best bet would be back in Japan. But don’t bother, he’s gotta’ be dead, I’m sure of it.” Zeno said.

“Dead?” The child mumbled, “That can’t be, I could have sworn this is the Azure timeline…”

I have no idea what this kid is talking about…

“Hmmm, it looks like I have my work cut out for me… Well, I’ve brought some items to help you out of here. The rest is up to you!”

“Wait! You didn’t answer me!” Zeno blurted out.

“Oh, uh, just call me Xiao,” He waved goodbye, “ Zàijiàn!”

And just like that, he disappeared into thin air again.

Xiao left us with Zeno’s TOPO and ORSO, my snub nosed pistol, fake passports, airline tickets, and a couple of instant hot packs.

“Any plans?” I ask.

“Use the underground tunnels to retreat, get you to a hospital, then kick Tenjian’s ass.”

“Alone?”

“No, I’ll get Heinlein’s help.” He sounded doubtful.

There’s no way he’d stand a chance against Tenjian, or however much of Eden’s forces are around us.

“…I’ll argue with you later.”

It’s a good thing Zeno knows his way through these tunnels so well, apparently they’re supposed to function as easy escape routes in case of a raid.

Zeno motions to stay back, he shoots at something, and then gives me a thumbs up. I see that his fingers are discolored too. I really hope Xiao was right about not having necrosis… As we pass through the corridor, I see a person likely around Gunvolt’s age lying face down, bleeding out from a headshot.

“Do you really think everyone down here is from Eden?”

“I’m assuming that anyone I don’t know is an Eden goon and anyone I do know is a traitor. If I’m wrong… I’ll deal with it later.”

When we almost froze to death, Zeno was scared of being a “fuckup”, but I think that I should be feeling that about myself. I’m the adult here, and yet all I’m doing is standing back while the children keep murdering each other.

“What are you waiting for?” Zeno derailed my train of thought.

I can wallow in self-pity when I’m safe, I should just try not to be dead weight in the meantime.

Walking through the corridor, it almost looks like there’s a light on the other side. I don’t realize what it really is until I try to stop to take a look, only for my feet to keep moving.

“You were doomed the second you made eye-contact with me, no one can escape my Charmer~” Vera’s voice echoed throughout the walls.

Vera stopped our walking when we were close enough for her liking, I could barely make out a weary expression beneath the glowing eyes.

“Did you know that if your chest is hit in a specific way at a specific time, something medically fascinating happens~?” Vera quizzed, knowing full well neither of us are currently capable of speech.

I could feel my body twist around against my will, my arm winding back, numb fingers curled into a fist.

“It triggers a condition called commotio cordis, and it means that…” she faltered, “…It means that… It means…”

Vera’s voice had a strained sound, was she tired?

“I can’t do it!” Vera turned away, breaking Charmer’s effect.

Suddenly having control of my body again, I immediately fell over from the awkward position Vera left me in. It looks like the same thing happened to Zeno.

“Vera?” he sounded more surprised by her sudden change of heart than her ambush.

“Just go… It sickens me to see someone like you help someone so worthless…”

However she said it, Vera’s spared us and we shouldn’t take that for granted. We quickly left her behind.

By now, we had made it to the bottom floor of a subterranean parking garage. The visibility was good enough that it was easy to see that we were the only ones on this floor.

“That’s the third time today we’ve been saved by random bullshit or dumb luck,” Zeno let out a rueful laugh, “at this rate, I need to be saved so often you may as well stick me in a pink dress and throw me in a turtle’s castle!”

“Zeno, I didn’t get to tell you this earlier… but, you’re not a fuckup.”

“Huh? What are you talking about? It was just joking around…”

Did he really think I wouldn’t forget about his breakdown earlier?

“You said you couldn’t save anyone, that’s not true. Do you remember right after we got out of Onogoro, how we spent the whole day looking for Gunvolt?”

“What about it?”

“If you hadn’t been there when that assassin ambushed us in the warehouse, I’d only have nine fingers… and would be dead.”

“Yeah? Well, if you didn’t hear that bomb’s timer beeping, I would’ve been blown up, so there!” He retorted, as if that negates his earlier actions.

“Alright, we’ll both take the credit.”

“Sounds good to me,” Zeno seemed genuinely happier, “So… I’ve had just about enough of this place, ready to get outta’ here?”

I wanted nothing more.

Chapter Text

There was just one more floor until the exit was in sight. But something felt off, was there really no one else here but us? I think Zeno was looking more cautious too, I guess it was pretty stupid to let our guard down. Then again, he sure looks a lot less on edge than he did a second ago…

“Hey, is that who I think it is?” he whispered to me.

I look at the boots slowly moving down the concrete ramp, the wearer is humming, and appears to be doing some kind of stretch. That voice does sound familiar…

“Is that Heinlein?” I thought aloud.

“I think so, we’re saved!”

“Wait, we don’t even know what he’s doing here!”

It’s too late, Zeno was already running up to greet him.

“Eh, Zeno? What are you doing out here? …And what happened to your face?”

“Sir, Tenjian’s a mole from Eden! He tried to kill us!”

“…Us?”

“Moniqa and I were just barely able to get out!”

“That’s… unfortunate…”

“We need a plan, there’s no way they’re just gonna get away with—”

Heinlein shushed Zeno.

“Listen, it seems like you’ve had a bit of a misunderstanding.”

“I can literally show you the room where we almost froze to death! My old hands are still stuck in the ice!”

“That’s not what I meant. Eden isn’t trying to destroy us from the inside out or anything like that, we’re simply trying to accomplish the same goal.”

The same goal? But that would mean… Oh no.

Zeno stood there in quiet terror, before bursting out into a fit of laughter.

“Hah! good one, and here I thought I was the jokester,” Zeno lightly poked Heinlein, “Now let’s go show ‘em what we’re made of.”

“That wasn’t a joke, you idiot.” Heinlein confirmed my worst fear.

“Wha—but—What?!”

While Zeno continued to take up Heinlein’s attention, I attempted to sneak around them. I felt bad about leaving Zeno behind, but I’d probably only get in the way at this point. I had almost made it to the exit before Heinlein shot me in the leg. Farther than I thought, all things considered. He was now standing directly over me, I should choose my words wisely, they might be my last.

“Why did… you miss… my vitals?”

“Because, I want you to know all about the kind of inner hell you’ve made my life, and I can’t do that if you die instantly.”

What could I have possibly done to him? Did he really hate non-adepts that much?

“Hold on a moment.” Heinlein said, as if I had much of a choice.

He inhaled, and blew the bullets being shot at him back into the direction they were shot from. The sounds of Zeno’s pain were very audible, but he recovered quickly enough thanks to his septima.

“You bastard!! What would Asimov have to say about this?!” Zeno strained, presumably still trying to fish the bullets out of his body.

“Quiet! You didn’t know him like I knew him.”

Zeno attempted to shoot Heinlein again, only to be blown back into the concrete wall by an exhaled gust of septimal wind.

“He’ll be fine… unless if I smashed his brain.” Heinlein crouched down, “Now, let me tell you a little story. You probably won’t bleed out by the time I’m done, and if you do… Well, wouldn’t that be a tragedy.”

He was really laying the sarcasm on thick.

I was on the cusp on manhood, what should have been the start of my life. Thing is, it felt more like the end. Nobody wanted a freak like me around, not my mom and pop, not even my so-called friends. But I didn’t mind, because I was set on becoming a marine, only for that to fall through too. Adepts really aren’t allowed to do jack shit in the States.

So I threw myself away like the piece of trash I was, and just wandered wherever the wind took me. (heh, get it?) Until one day, I found myself somewhere in the pacific northwest. The rain that day was the kind that beat the tar out of you. There was lightning too, but no thunder, and it kept striking from the ground up. Awfully strange, right?

May as well check it out, not like anybody would’ve cared if it killed me. Turns out it was all coming out from some guy, another piece of shit adept like me. When I got a little closer, I could really see just how beautiful that blue lightning really was. That was the first time I ever realized that us adepts are forces of nature. I never cared much for church or God, but that? I could worship that for the rest of my life. It was then that I understood why the average joe fears us, mankind’s always been afraid of nature, especially the kind they can’t control.

As I approached him, he spoke to me.

“Go away, I’m dangerful.”

Reverence aside, I just couldn’t stand bad grammar back in the day, ground my gears like nothing else.

“It’s dangerous, dumbass,” I hadn’t been paying attention to the way my hair was rising, “Either speak English properly, or don’t speak it at all!”

“I said… GO AWAY!!!”

By complete accident, he unleashed that beautiful blue dragon directly into me.

I still have scars all over my body from that, but they’re not for your eyes to see. Frankly, part of me still thinks that everything after that is just some kind of pre-death hallucination.

When I came too, I could see his face up close, and he was just as gorgeous as his lightning.

“You are… not dead?” he made more of an observation rather than asking a question.

“Why, I’ve never been more alive.”

I had to feel that power again, I needed to. So I blew him away, he struck back of course, exactly as I intended. It was an entirely pointless fight, and it felt so good. No longer was the storm beating me down, but he and I had become Raijin and Fujin, supreme gods of the storm. Our battle ended up outlasting the tempest, and somehow we ended in a draw under the light of the full moon. From then on, we were inseparable.

“Or I thought we were!” Heinlein slammed on the wall in frustration, “Logically, I understood why I couldn’t come to Japan with him. Someone had to run QUILL on the outside and there’s no way that old fart Clarke could be trusted with anything outside of the confines of a spreadsheet.”

I think I’m starting to see what this has to do with me…

“Four long years I had waited, doing everything I could to support him in destroying the corporation that treated him like something to be locked away in the dark.” Heinlein took a handgun out from inside his coat and emptied all the bullets inside, only to replace them with a different set of bullets, “And then it finally happened, he wanted to form a team to join him over there! But I was needed elsewhere of course. It was fine, I just needed to be patient after all. But then came his requests: Zeno, for his immense resilience in the battlefield and ‘familiarity with Japanese culture’, and you, for your proficiency in the Japanese language.”

Heinlein pointed the muzzle of his gun directly to my face. To be honest, I kind of wished I had already lost consciousness from blood loss.

“But I know why he really wanted you, don’t think I didn’t notice your cup size or your cute face!” He brought the gun in close enough for me to see the word ‘TALON’ engraved onto it, “And then you let him die!!!”

Heinlein front kicked me hard enough to launch me into the air.

“Feel the true force of The Hawk!”

Violent gales burst through every opening in the base floor of the parking garage, I could barely make out the sounds of Heinlein firing his gun, and his incantation.

“The eye of the hurricane…Dutifully marches ahead… Trampling o’er the world whole… WINDY CITY”

I couldn’t tell if it was the bullets firing holes into me or the wind, it hardly mattered in comparison to the wall I smashed into. But instead of blacking out, I find that my wounds are all healed, and I don’t have even a hint of a concussion. I soon realized that the blood all over me wasn’t mine.

“Lucky break, am I right?” Zeno groaned from behind, he must have cushioned my impact. Poor kid...

“Zeno…”

The wind stopped, and we fell onto the ground.

“We have to get out of here,” I urged Zeno, “Forget fighting for now!”

“And go where? Heinlein’s at the exit and if we go back into the tunnels, he’ll just turn it into a vacuum,” Zeno stood up with a stagger, “I dunno about you, but I don’t wanna die running.”

“So willing to throw your life away…” I grumbled.

“Huh, whaddya’ say? I think the wind messed my hearing up a bit” Zeno said with complete sincerity.

“Nothing…”

I took my pistol out, only to find it completely broken. Damn thing was useless to the very end.

“Here,” Zeno handed me TOPO, “Probably better than that peashooter you were issued anyway.”

“Thanks.”

But how effective could a gun really be? Heinlein can divert bullets away with nothing more than an exhale, most of his septima seems to come from his breath. Although, it seems like he had to expend a lot more effort just to use the wind outside rather than inside of him. Could that mean…?

“You know him better than I do, is Heinlein’s septima tied to his windpipe at all?” I asked Zeno.

“Sorry, but your guess is as good as mine. Septimas are like assholes, you don’t just show them around to everyone.”

Don't go snooping on others' septimas. How could I forget.

“There you are! I really sent you flying, huh?” Heinlein sneered.

No time, I have to see if it’s possible to suffocate The Hawk out of him.

“You’re really something else for living through that, even after using my custom aerodynamic bullets and everything!”

How am I going to get close enough to choke him?

“Oh well, what goes out must come in, right?”

Heinlein inhaled like I’ve never seen before. The popping in my ears could hardly be felt compared to the agony in my lungs. Could he still make a vacuum even in an open space?! But if he’s inhaling… that means he can’t divert!

There was no time to aim, I fired the entirety of TOPO’s magazine in Heinlein’s general direction.

The inhalation ceased, the nearby air returned to normal.

But Heinlein was still standing, not even a trace of a bullet in sight. He had such a smug look on his face.

“It can’t be…” I gasped.

That was my only plan, there was nothing else I could do.

“Don’t forget about the ‘bear’!” Zeno growled.

But as he was readying ORSO, blood started to dribble from Heinlein’s lips, then his grin wavered, and his gray coat slowly turned red. He must have inhaled the bullets, and those must have torn his lungs to shreds.

Heinlein let out a series of coughs as violent as they were bloody. He did his best to aim his dying bursts of pressurized air at us, but his accuracy was worse than Zeno with that Dart Leader revolver.

Before I knew it, another founder of QUILL had died right in front of Zeno and I.

Zeno silently spat in Heinlein’s lifeless face before walking to the exit.

I really wanted to feel something, anything, at Heinlein’s death. But I couldn’t feel anything, not sorrow, not anger, not guilt, not the satisfaction of survival, nor my fingertips. Although that last one might have just been residual frostbite. I wonder now if I even should have been as sad as I was when dumping Asimov’s body into the sea. How much more did Heinlein know about him? Who was Asimov really? I guess that doesn’t matter now, I’ve got a flight to catch.

Chapter Text

TOPO and ORSO had to be left behind in China, there was no way we were going to sneak those onto a commercial airliner. But it seems that Zeno came to that conclusion earlier than I did, I still have no clue where he ditched those guns.

The most attention we attracted in the airport were some odd stares from passers-by, even security didn’t pay any mind to the two frostbitten Europeans wearing torn, bloodstained clothing. That probably says something bad about modern society, but at least it’s convenient for us. Even on the actual plane, the flight attendants continued their business as usual. Since these kinds of planes always bundle their seats by three, there was some businessman stuck with us.

“Um… Shanghai must be pretty rough these days, huh?” The poor guy, he was really trying to make small talk.

“Uh-huh.” I didn’t know what else I could have said.

“It wasn’t always like that, not when I was a kid at least.”

“Is that so.”

“Yeah, that’s why I don’t live there anymore…”

The businessman gave up after that and went back to his in-flight entertainment.

I was able to distract myself for a while listening to an album or two from some rockstar Joule recommended to me a while ago. It definitely feels like music she would have liked… Unfortunately that means it’s a bit too teeny-bopper for my tastes.

Meanwhile, Zeno seemed to really be struggling looking for something from the media library, they probably don’t have a good selection of anime here. Which reminds me…

“Hey, Zeno?”

“What’s up?”

“Are you… alright?”

“Well, for some reason the only anime here is the first six episodes of the Mighty Beck spinoff, talk about shit taste,” he’s so predictable, “Other than that, I think I’m okay.”

“Well, just in case you aren’t actually okay… I’m really sorry about ‘Robert’.”

“‘Robert’?” it took him a second to realize I was talking about Heinlein, “Oh, don’t worry about it. If you weren’t gonna do it, I would’ve.”

“I guess, it’s just… that kind of thing leaves an impact on you.”

“It’s really no big deal. I mean, sheesh, if he and ‘Isaac’ were really on the same page, then maybe you weren’t all that full of it when you suggested that ‘Geeves’… ya’ know…”

“Maybe, we’ll never really know, will we?”

Zeno shrugged. He turned towards the window, there was too much cloud cover to see anything.

“I’m glad you’re alive.” He mumbled.

“…The feeling’s mutual.”

I started up an episode from some British sitcom, but I don’t remember anything after the cold open because I fell asleep for almost the entire rest of the flight after that. I hope Zeno got some sleep too, for his sake.

A relatively calm end to the worst day of my life.

We arrived in Geneva at around six in the morning, although we didn’t fully leave the airport for another three hours. Soon enough, Zeno and I were in front of the entrance of the Rama Building, QUILL’s European headquarters, and where I worked for a little over a year.

“So, you’re certain that this place didn’t get taken over too?” Zeno asked.

“Well, I was certain until you brought it up… Why didn’t you ask sooner?”

“Hadn’t thought about it.”

“What do you think we should do then?”

“Guess I’ll just take my chances, I don’t really have anywhere else to go.”

“Then I’m coming with you.”

“Your funeral, heh.”

The last of The Big Three, Clarke, isn’t an adept. If the Rama Building really was taken over like Haunted House, then he would definitely be dead by now.

Inside, the lobby looked exactly the same as it did the last time I was here. The same faded wallpaper, the same dusty chandelier, and the same person at the front desk.

“Moniqa, long time no see,” they said in that same calm tone, “You and your friend must have had an interesting time in Japan.”

Typical Bolero, just as enigmatic as ever, all I know about them is that they’re an adept in their thirties. Sadly, that’s considered old for adepts.

“You have no idea.” I couldn’t think of anything else to say.

“So, any changes since Moniqa left?” Zeno wasn’t being all that discreet about his suspicion, “I’m Zeno, by the way.”

“I know who you are,” Bolero almost sounded frustrated, “Anyway, nothing new around here. The place is still falling apart and the old man still won’t consider renovations.”

That pretty much confirms that Clarke is still alive. Bolero continued to vent on how the Rama Building has hardly been changed for decades, they must have been holding this in for a while…

“Um, speaking of which, is Clarke still in his office?” I tried to get things back on track.

“I believe so” Bolero switched immediately back into receptionist mode, “I think he forgot to take his lunch break again, so do remind him, or don’t, it’s not my problem.”

“WHAT?! ” Clarke screeched.

I started off the report with the deaths of Asimov and Heinlein.

“Dear God, how did this happen? Why didn’t I hear anything about Asimov for four months??”

“Heinlein never relayed the message?”

“You should probably calm down, ‘cause that’s not all.” Zeno added.

“Oh, I should have never quit smoking…” Clarke sounded even older and shakier than before.

“If you need a minute, we can come back.” I muttered.

“No, no, let’s just get it over with.”

“Haunted House got taken over by an adept supremacist group called Eden. We don’t really know how much of QUILL’s been compromised…” Zeno sounded unusually uncertain, he must not be used to giving bad news to someone as high-strung and frail as Clarke.

“Oh dear, oh dear… Poor Heinlein, he must have died fighting off those horrible people.”

“Well…” Zeno hesitated.

“Ah– Anyway, we need to stop them” I diverted.

“With what? Haunted House had most of our resources and personnel, not to mention we’ve been operating in the red for a while now…”

“Money shmoney, we hafta’ stop them before they destroy us whole!”

“I know, I know, but those boys were the real leaders! I’m just the old fool who runs the books…”

“Isn’t there something we can do?”I asked.

I didn’t want to just give up.

“Maybe get a doctor to look at those first…” Clarke gestured toward the blisters that formed on the frostbitten areas of our bodies.

“Oh, right.” I had almost forgotten about that.

Ironically, Heinlein leaving us both with a lot of open wounds made healing quicker thanks to Zeno’s septima being able to get into my bloodstream. But even that couldn’t fix my nose, cheeks, and fingers.

“Actually, there is one thing I can do for you two.” Clarke rummaged around his desk drawers and pulled out a pair of car keys, “It’s parked in the alley nearby, you’ll probably need it more than I do.”

“I’ll meetcha downstairs, I’ve got a date with destiny.” Zeno said before he ran off.

At this point, I think Zeno doesn’t just say “I’m going to the bathroom” like a normal person just to mess with me.

The elevator gave a concerning tremble before going down. Written on the back wall was “Freedom for all humanity!” in English, French, German, Italian, and Rumantsch Grischun. Upon further inspection, the same phrase appeared to be written in even more languages under the first five. QUILL did have members from every part of the world after all.

In the lobby, Bolero seemed to be chatting with someone online.

“You know, if you get over your squeamishness, the rats might actually teach you a thing or two…” they soon noticed me, “Hey there, where’s your buddy?”

“Bathroom, what are you doing?”

“The New York team is investigating a secret laboratory under a prison. They must be pretty desperate if they need help from little old me. Apparently it’s way bigger than Intel let on.”

I’m not sure if I want to know what QUILL needs to check out a shady American prison lab for, but I should find out in case my help might be needed.

“Apparently, the Americans are trying to make their own glaive knockoffs and are using adept prisoners as their guinea pigs,” Bolero continued, “I’m sure the CIA’s taking all the credit for getting the info out of Japan, but we all know it was World Hack King.”

“Who?”

“Come on Moniqa, do you live under a rock?”

“I kind of was until yesterday, Zeno and I needed to hide from Sumeragi after all…”

“Eh, fair enough. Since you don’t know, World Hack King is the hacker that leaked petabytes of classified dirt from under Sumeragi’s nose.”

“Seriously? That could change the whole world!”

“It already has… By the way, you should really watch his streams of illegal September Historia mods, they’re a riot.”

Just then, the elevator opened. Zeno came out, notably with no symptoms of frostbite.

“Ah, I should have known you would do that.” I said in a disapproving tone.

“What can I say? No way you’re getting me in a hospital full of needles.”

“I just hope you didn’t make a mess in the bathroom…”

“Relax, I cleaned everything up… mostly.”

My condolences for whoever's cleaning up tonight, it must look like a murder happened in there…

“Are you going to need help with the New Yorkers?” I asked Bolero.

“Let me see… Huh. It looks like they’re already done. Guess those rats were more helpful than I thought. It sounds like they saw some pretty messed up stuff in there, though…”

“You can tell me about it later…” I took that as my cue to go to the hospital already.

Chapter Text

Thanks to the miracle of modern medical treatments, nothing needed to be amputated. All I had to do was take some medication, keep the afflicted areas bandaged up, and rest for a week or so.

The bad news is that I have to wait at least a week just sitting around doing nothing instead of preparing to get revenge on Eden. They slaughtered so many of our own, and just shoved them in that freezer room like they were slabs of meat… I don’t even have work to distract myself from the fact that I almost joined them.

“It’s over here, right?” Zeno’s voice brought me back to the present, he was pointing to a small car covered by a cloth parked at the end of the alley near the Rama Building.

“Let me check.”

My bandaged fingers struggled with the key fob, but I was able to press the unlock button eventually. The flash of headlights blinked out from under the car cover.

“Looks like that’s our ride!” Zeno enthusiastically yanked the canvas cloth off of the car, revealing it to be a small yellow buggy with clear signs of a slapdash conversion to an EV (electronic vehicle).

“Wonder what we’re gonna do ‘til you get better? I could exercise, but all my favorite training spots were either around Haunted House or at that one spot back in Japan GV and I used to do workouts in…”

“Hmm… Since we’re in Europe for the time being… I think I want to go back to Germany and tell my parents I love them.”

It’s the least I could do after putting their only child through all of this.

“Ah, that sounds nice,” Zeno had a wistful look on his face, “I’d totally do the same if my folks were still around…”

Shit, I really need to stop taking what I have for granted.

“I’m sorry. I—”

“Nah, don’t apologize for having parents,” Zeno took the keys out of my hands, “Want me to drive you there?”

“Are you sure? It’s a long drive from here…”

“Not like I have anything better to do.”

And so, that’s how Zeno and I traveled by land, sea, and sky all in the same week.

I wasn’t kidding about the drive being long, poor Zeno must have been driving for over eight hours. It didn’t seem to get him down much, or at least he didn’t show any signs that driving so long bothered him.

The old castles and farmlands we saw were certainly different from the ones we saw in China. Despite the initial novelty, we mostly just passed through city after city, highway through highway.

Still, there were a couple of conversations that continue to linger in my mind, even long after they were spoken.

The first one happened just after we had passed Lake Geneva.

“So, Moniqa…”

“What is it?”

“Why did you learn Japanese, anyway?”

It would make sense for Zeno to be curious, I doubt he would have been able to think of any non-otaku reasons to learn the language on his own.

“Well, when I was growing up, I wanted to become a diplomat, bring the world closer to peace through words.”

“So you learned a bunch of languages to be able to talk to people around the world better, right?”

“Yes, and Japanese just happened to be one I was good at.”

The conversation could have stopped there, but he noticed the whole “peace through words” thing earlier.

“It, uh, sounds like that whole peace through talking thing didn’t work out.”

“Haha, not one bit,” I gazed out towards the puffy clouds, “I’d like to think I’m a pacifist at heart, but to believe that every conflict can be solved through talk alone… is naïve.”

“And that’s why you joined QUILL? For peace? Bit of a weird choice on your end.”

“It’s not like anyone else is standing up for adepts!” I was starting to get a bit heated here, “We can’t even get close to world peace until human rights are recognized for everyone, and you’re all human beings too dammit!”

“Whoa there, Moniqa! The way you’re getting riled up, someone might think you’re an adept.”

“Sorry, am I speaking out of line?”

“Not at all, it’s just… people like you aren’t very common, ya' know?”

The next remarkable moment happened after we crossed the German border. We had just gotten back on the road after stopping at some döner kebab place for dinner. I don’t know how long it’s been since he was last in the Italian Peninsula, but Zeno certainly remembered a lot of the profanities, he really made sure to show them off when we got stuck in the middle of post-9 to 5 commute traffic. Eventually, he turned the radio onto some talk show to distract himself.

“You know, these days nobody has respect for the nuclear family anymore, it’s degeneracy all over the place!”

“I don’t think I like where this is going…” I commented.

“What’re they talking about?”

“You don’t understand German?”

“Not very well, didn’t have much use for it where I operated.”

“Well, you’re in luck, my parents are both fluent in English in case you need to talk to them.”

“Dumb luck strikes again, hehee.” Zeno grinned.

I listened back to the radio show, the hosts just finished laughing a bunch at their own jokes.

“Haha, yeah, because of 7G radiation everyone’s gotta pop pills for every little thing. No wonder the world’s ending.”

I probably should have changed the frequency by now, but morbid curiosity got the best of me.

“Why else would adepts exist, they’re clearly God’s punishment for straying from tradition!”

“I feel like I don’t wanna know what they’re saying about adepts…” Zeno could understand that much of what they were saying.

“You don’t.” I turned the radio off using the back of my hand so I wouldn’t damage my fingers any further.

“Haha, it’s almost kind of nostalgic. Those radio hosts sounded kind of like the neighbors’ chatter I used to overhear back home.”

“You know, I don’t think I’ve ever heard you talk about home before.”

“That’s because I don’t for the most part. May as well start now though, just so you don’t have to feel bad about having parents in the future.” Zeno teased. He switched the radio back on, this time onto some easy listening station, “Let’s start with what you do know about me.”

“Alright, I know you’re from Italy… But I also know that there hasn’t technically been a unified Italian government for almost twenty years, although most of the international community doesn’t recognize any of the breakaway states except for the historical ones like San Marino or what’s left of Vatican City.”

“Phew, you definitely sound like someone who wanted to get into international politics. But is that really all you know about me?”

“Other than the anime stuff and Ever-Living, that’s pretty much it.”

“Jeez, guess I’m gonna hafta start from the beginning…”

He really didn’t have to, but I guess it beat listening to any more jackass talk show hosts.

So back in Reggio there was my mom, my dad, my big bro Trevis, my big sis Mila, and me. Maybe it’s just the rose-tinted glasses, but those days still feel like some nice dream, like they aren’t real. It’s hard to believe I used to watch dubbed episodes of Boreal Fist with Mila while Trevis always got pissy about the subbed version being better, or that I’d go to school and when I got home, mom or dad (maybe both) would be waiting for me.

I used to get myself into a lot of trouble too. ‘Specially when it came to picking fights or climbing places I shouldn’t have been climbing. I’d usually get an earful about it, but really everyone was just glad that I was such a healthy kid. I remember that sometimes Trevis used to joke about how fast I healed from bumps and scrapes.

“Keh heh, if you got better any faster I might think you had a septima or somethin’.” He would say.

“Cavolo! Don’t joke about that!” is what dad would say if he overheard, then he’d usually guilt Trevis with the “What would your mother say if you thought she gave birth to one of those freaks?!”

Pretty messed up in retrospect, but I didn’t even know what an adept was at the time except that my parents didn’t like ‘em.

That all changed on my tenth birthday. We got some gelato and went down to the beach to celebrate, it was a great day for the most part. But then I snuck off to climb some really scary looking rocks by the water. Mila was gonna snitch, but I begged her not to, it was my birthday after all. So she and Trevis just watched as I climbed all the way to the top. Heh, I bet I looked so cool. I didn’t look so cool when I lost my footing and slipped.

…I don’t really know how badly I got injured from the fall, just that by the time the paramedics got there, I was all better. Dad was furious that no one believed what he or the others saw, but at least no one got hurt, right?

Everyone tried to live life as usual, but everything felt off. Trevis didn’t make jokes anymore, Mila was always nervous, dad didn’t know how to talk to me, and mom always looked like she was about to cry. The neighbors never greeted me anymore either. No matter what I did, no one ever seemed to lighten up. I knew it had to do with the accident, but I couldn’t understand why. I wasn’t injured, why is everyone still so whacked out?

One night, after I snuck out to feed a stray cat, I could have sworn I saw some strange people lurking around home. They were gone by the time I got close enough to get a good look at anyone, but there was definitely something fishy going on.

I rushed in to warn mom and dad, but I heard mom crying, I just hid and listened before I knew what to make of it.

Then I heard her say, “What are we going to do? I’ve birthed an…” she sobbed, “an adept…”

“Nonsense! Ambrogino isn’t one of those things!”

Zeno’s a nickname by the way.

“Then what would you call what happened on the beach? A miracle from God?!”

I couldn’t bear to hear them talk about me like that, I just apologized over and over, for whatever I did wrong to be called an adept.

“Oh Zeno, what am I gonna do with you…” was all my dad could say.

“Just don’t be so reckless anymore, topolino mio.” Mom told me.

…

The house exploded after that. At least, I’m pretty sure that’s what happened. All I really remember is that all of a sudden everything was on fire, and mom and dad were… Let’s just say I didn’t realize what they were mom and dad for a long time.

Next thing I knew, someone was grabbing me and everything went dark.

…

It was pretty hazy for a while after that, more like a nightmare than a dream. But I remember the needles, and all the blood. I don’t know if it was from sedatives or restraints, but I couldn’t move a muscle, I couldn’t even cry for help. Not that any of the faces gawking down at me would help.

I had no idea what was going on. Just that I wanted out.

 And before I knew it, my wish was granted.

Took a while to recover from all the drugging and the blood loss, but eventually I realized that I wasn’t in the same place as before. In fact, I had been rescued by QUILL! I guess that was the start of my dumb luck.

I’ll never forget Sibilo, he’s the guy that saved me… he also made a pretty funny face when I ripped the IV drip out of my arm and tried to run away, only to fall on my ass.

After Sibilo calmed me down, he brought me up to speed on what had happened. Apparently, the local crime family heard about some miracle kid that was in what should have been a fatal fall, only to have completely recovered before any medical treatment needed to be done. They figured out pretty quick that said kid was an adept and that his septimosome could probably be used to make… something that could make them more powerful? I wasn’t paying attention all that well…

I still barely knew what an adept was, much less a septimosome.

Thankfully, Sibilo caught onto that and gave me the rundown on adepts and septima and all that stuff. The important part was that I’m not a bad person for being one.

After I finished recovering, we tried to find my family. All that was left was our bombed out home, the bastards that took me knew that I’d be able to survive the explosion. No indications of any family in the hospital either.

With nowhere left to go, I thought helping Sibilo save more people like me was a pretty good idea. Sibilo thought otherwise, or at least he didn’t want me around whatever dangerous stuff he was messing with. Sooner or later I was handed off to Heinlein. The rest, as they say, is history.

“Ha ha, wow, I think that’s the first time I’ve ever talked about that with anyone,” tears were streaming down Zeno’s face, “I’m not sure what I’m feelin’ right now, it’s bad but… also good?”

“Maybe you’ll be able to get a better idea if you pull over and let me drive.”

“Are you sure? What about your fingers?”

“It’ll be fine, that Swiss doctor isn’t here to yell at me about it. Besides, I know the rest of the way home from here.”

“…Okay.”

I’m still not sure whether I did the right thing letting Zeno spill his guts out to me like that, but I like to think that it helped in some way, even if only somewhat.

Chapter Text

Pulling into that familiar suburb was… surreal to say the least. It’s only been a couple of years, and yet it feels like an eternity since I’ve been home. Considering how late we arrived, I wasn’t sure if my parents had gone to sleep or not, but it seems that at least one of them was still awake. That, or one of them left a light on.

Zeno gave a knock on the door… and then he gave another knock on the door… but before he knocked a third time the door opened.

“[Excuse me, but it’s awfully late to try to sell your products.]” My mother thought Zeno was a salesman.

“Uhhh… Ich nein Alemannisch?” Zeno wasn’t kidding about not knowing German.

“[Huh?]”

“Hallo, Mutti!” I made sure that she noticed me,

“[Oh, Moniqa!]” She beamed, “[What a lovely surprise!]”

“[Sorry I couldn’t tell you or Vati in advance, it was all very sudden…]” I switched to English, “By the way, my coworker Zeno’s home life is really complicated right now, so he really needs a place to stay until work picks back up.”

“Of course, It’s not like anybody else is using the guest room!”

As mother ushered us in, Zeno giggled to me,

“A guest room? And here I thought a couch would have been the best I could get!”

“Well, life has been very lucky for my husband and I over the years.” mother answered.

While she was busy making sure Zeno knew where the bathroom was, I went to my childhood bedroom. After all this time, it still waited for me.

Lying in bed, dusty plush toys look down on me. Everything about this bedroom is undeniably mine, but something about it just isn’t right. I turn the lamp on and see a couple of faded photos I had carelessly left on the nightstand sometime in the past. The picture was from some fan convention that happened in Berlin about a decade ago. There's a girl smiling as wide as she could, despite her painful looking dental braces. She hadn’t taken another life yet, nor did she understand the kind of suffering children even younger than her have silently endured. This is her room, I’m only a guest now.

After several months of old rations, fluffy omelets with fresh greens tasted like a piece of heaven. I’m definitely going to have a stomach ache from the sudden change in diet, but I don’t care, it’s absolutely worth it.

“So, how’s your work with UNICEF been?” Father asked me as he dumped what must have been half a liter of cream into his coffee.

Zeno almost choked on his orange juice.

“Oh! Um, well I was deep in the Himalayas,” I had all day yesterday to fabricate a story, “It’s really hard to get access to educational materials over there, you see.”

Zeno was busy drawing a cat face into his omelet with ketchup, but it wasn’t hard to see his lips pursed in a desperate attempt to not laugh at my blatant lying.

“But then just as we were wrapping things up, I got lost in a snow patch and that’s why I’m all frostbitten hahaha.”

“We’re just glad you’re alright, Schnucki.”

Poor father, he looked so distraught just from the fake version… I can’t even begin to imagine how he would react if he ever found out the truth.

Mother chuckled, “You’ve certainly chosen a more dangerous profession than either of us would have at your age.”

“I mean… there was that one time there was that terrorist attack at the lab just before we retired.” Father added.

“Terrorist attack?” Zeno inquired while his mouth was full of omelet, “Just where did you guys work?!”

“Nowhere scary,” mother reassured, “Just Bibio Technik,” she turned to father, “[You always make that incident sound so scary, we weren’t even in the building when it happened…]”

“[I know that , but I didn’t want to bore the guest.]”

“Anyway,” Zeno chimed in a sing-songy voice, “I think I’m gonna go walk these calories off.”

His eyes were saying, “Let’s continue this outside.”

“I know a good park to do calisthenics in, follow me.”

“See you later, kids!” Father cheered.

We walked straight past the park into a quiet alleyway where less people would be hanging around. After double-checking that no one was eavesdropping, I nodded to Zeno, signaling that we could speak freely. He immediately burst into a fit of laughter.

“You’ve been lying to your parents this whole time?!”

“Wh– What’s so funny about that!”

“It’s just—” he wheezed, “You lied to their faces so casually. Yeesh, I really shouldn’t play poker against you, huh?”

“Ugh, what am I supposed to tell them? ‘Hi Mutti~ Hi Vati~ I’m dropping out of university to become a terrorist~’ I couldn’t do that to them!”

“Well, when you put it like that I totally get it,” Zeno composed himself somewhat, “My folks probably wouldn’t be too happy if they knew what I’ve been up to.”

That statement made me wonder if ten year-old Zeno would have still joined QUILL even if his family didn’t die in that explosion… But I didn’t feel comfortable asking him that question, not right now at least.

Later that day, my parents convinced me to go with them on a “window shopping trip” in Königsallee. It had been a while since I’ve been back so it’s not like I was going to say no. They’re always delighted to have an excuse to do touristy stuff in their hometown anyway. I didn’t think Zeno would be so enthusiastic to tag along, but apparently a few more high-end electronics stores had been added since I was last there, and he was itching for a pair of good headphones.

We were looking out at the old moat when Zeno quietly remarked,

“Bibio Technik… I swear I’ve heard that name before…”

“You probably have, they were bought out by Sumeragi a few years ago.”

“Why?”

I see mother walking towards us with her phone at the ready, she definitely wants a family picture to show off to her friends.

“I’ll tell you some other time.” I had to end the conversation about my parents' former workplace for now.

“Zeno, could you be our ‘photographer’ today?” Mother asked, just as I predicted.

Zeno obliged, and there was soon another quaint photo for the slideshow photo frame at home.

As we went into one of the electronics stores Zeno was so eager to hit up, he noticed a section of the store entirely dedicated to (overpriced) Japanese imports. There was no way he was going to pass that up.

“Oh look, a special event on Kiri-chan: The Giraffe Princess themed merchandise,” father pointed out, “Schnucki, isn’t that the anime you liked so much?”

What terrible timing…

“Well, I mean—”

“Wha— YOU LIKE ANIME?!!” Zeno exclaimed a little too loudly.

“Uh— I— Uh…”

“Oh yes,” mother confirmed, “Moniqa loved that Giraffe Princess so much that she even learned Japanese to watch it ‘authentically’, I love how my daughter’s such a go-getter!”

Zeno couldn't help it, his laughter was so intense it brought him to tears… much to my parents’ confusion. I had to drag him out of the store until he calmed down.

“Hoo… This is great~”

“I’m glad you’re having such a good time…” I grumbled.

“I can’t believe you were an otaku too this whole time…” he had a very satisfied look on his face, “I‘m never gonna let you live this down by the way.”

Mother… Father… How could you betray me like this?

“So you were lying to me about that whole ‘peace through words thing’, huh?” Zeno asked.

“No, I still wanted to be a diplomat when I grew up… But now you know why Japanese ‘just happened’ to be a language I was good at…”

Zeno’s laughing fit came back with a vengeance. I know he’s the type of guy to see the humor in anything, and it’s probably how he’s survived for so long, but isn’t this a bit much?!

Eventually we were able to return to the store, thankfully I didn’t have to twist the truth too much about what Zeno found so funny. In the end, the only thing purchased during that entire outing was a pair of Kiri-chan themed headphones.

The light rain that night reminded me of the weather right after everything went wrong back in Japan. All those secrets Asimov kept, now confined to a decaying corpse under the sea. When Zeno and I were drinking those old stale beers in that boat all I could think of was the beers back home, and now I’m here… But do I really want a beer that badly?

“Hey Moniqa, what’s German beer like anyway?” Zeno just happened to ask.

“It’s different from the canned stuff, let me show you.”

Sure, why not? I haven’t really had some since my sixteenth birthday anyway. Back then I felt so grown up, I didn’t even realize how much of a child I still was.

The same Kneipe (pub) I went to back then was still around so I took Zeno there. Guess I can add “tour guide” to the résumé now, too.

“Oooohhh…” He was mesmerized by the color chart displaying the spectrum of beers from pale ales to stout lagers.

We ended up tasting a wide variety of beer that night, although it was less “tasting” and more “inhaling” on Zeno’s end.

“Zeno! Stop rushing before you can even taste it!” I nagged.

“Aw, eat your fahckin' heart out Asimov you mullet-havin’, piss-water drinkin’ sunnovabitch!”

He completely ignored me…

Rowdy when sober, it’s not much of a surprise that Zeno is rowdy when drunk as well.

I continued to nurse my stein of Kölsch when Zeno somehow became (mostly) coherent again and asked me a question.

“By the by, what’s the deal with that place yer parents worked at?”

I said I’d tell him some other time, and now is technically some other time, so I may as well honor that. Probably not a great idea to do so in a public setting but I was somewhat inebriated by now too. At the very least, I got us to switch the conversation to Japanese, the less eavesdroppers the better.

“So, you know how pretty much every country these days has at least some attempt at a biometric ID database?”

“Uh, I do now…”

“It’s really only been successfully integrated into a few countries: Japan, but only for Sumeragi employees, and here in Germany for every citizen.”

“But I didn’t have to give any spit samples or fingerprints or anything when I bought those headphones…”

“It only really comes up if you're, say, trying to buy a house or get a job.”

“What’s this hafta’ do with Bibi Techie again?”

“Bibio Technik, and it’s the largest of the companies the government contracts to process biometric data.”

“Soooo if Sumeragi bought ‘em up that would mean they’d have access to all sorts of biological data from whatever adepts live here.”

“Exactly. All the red tape they have to get through is enough of a struggle as it is…”

“Was anything done about it?” Zeno leaned in and spoke softly, “If you know what I mean.”

“Well,” I chose my words carefully, “Not long after I took a break from university to work at ‘UNICEF’, I heard that Bibio’s main building in Duisburg was hit by two successive terrorist attacks.”

“Would these terrorists happen to have some kinda legal protection in Switzerland by any chance?”

Alcohol clearly didn’t make Zeno less sharp, even if it slurred his words a little more.

“Perhaps.” I was halfway through my second beer by now, “The point is, one of the terrorists took part in a cyberattack, destroying all of the digitized data with a computer worm.”

“And I assume that the same hacker worked as an operator for the terrorists breaking into the building to destroy the physical data…”

“She already knew a good portion of the building’s layout by heart from all those years of ‘Bring Your Child to Work Day’.”

“Sounds handy…”

Zeno was getting sleepy, time to go home.

When we came home, mother and father had both gone to sleep. Makes sense, it was well past 2 in the morning.

I laid Zeno down on his side onto the guest room bed and was about to leave the room when he spoke,

“Hey… Your parents… Had they retired from Bibbity Tech yet? When the attacks happened?”

“…No.”

“So all that data…”

“At least some of it was my parent’s work, yes.”

“I see why you lie to them so much… They’re too sweet to know their complacency…”

I think he meant complicity, but both work in this context.

“Zeno, I thought we already had this conversation?”

“Yeah but,” he further entangled himself in the bedsheets, “Today’s the first time I’ve felt like a kid but, in a good way? I dunno…”

Zeno is still a kid, even if he doesn’t feel like one.

“I think that’s called ‘feeling safe’.”

“…It’s nice.”

He sounded satisfied, but in a very different way than he did after breakfast.

Zeno’s deep, not-quite-snoring breaths indicated that he had fallen asleep. I headed out of the room, but just as I opened the door…

“Moniqa?”

“Yes?” I felt there was an obligation to answer.

“Do you think there’ll ever be a time when QUILL won’t be needed anymore?”

“…Isn’t that our goal?”

“Well, yeah but… What would you even do?”

“Hm, I guess I’d probably try to finish my political science major… What about you?”

“Maybe I’ll just become a squatter, or sell my kidney, or maybe I’ll shave my head and become a freelance hitman… I don’t wanna get a barcode tattoo though…”

I think that last one was supposed to be a reference to some video game…

“You… don’t have any other ideas?”

“I didn’t say that!” He pouted, “Have you seen my juggling? I could totally be a clown! Or maybe I’d start a podcast! Oh but only assholes host podcasts tho…”

“What would the podcast be about?” My curiosity was piqued.

“Uhh… I dunno… I don’t even have a co-host…”

“Oh yeah? Well what if I was your co-host? We could be assholes together.”

“But we don’t even have anything in common… At least nothing we can tell the public.”

“You already know my ‘dirty little secret’… Unless you think Kiri-chan’s too normie for your tastes.”

Zeno let out soft laughter, he was too tired for anything more raucous.

“I don’t think I ever wanna hear you say ‘normie’ ever again.” He groaned.

“Gonna have to get used to it if we’re doing that Kiri-chan podcast.” I teased him in a reversal of roles.

“…”

“Zeno?”

He had already fallen asleep, for real this time. I fully left the guest room, straight into the “other” guest room.

Chapter Text

As much as I love my parents, having to constantly lie and use doublespeak around them was more than a little stifling. That and the “peace” back home only made me think of Japan, where I had to be on edge 24/7. I thought it would be comforting to stay in Germany, but after I recovered as much as I needed to, returning to work felt like unloading a heavy weight.

Not that there has been much to do, QUILL’s kind of a mess right now… No real leadership, no factory, and no money. Even with everything Zeno and I have been able to gather on Eden, we don’t have the funds nor the raw strength to retaliate against them. If Gunvolt was still around it would be a different story, but as is…

“We’re getting close,” I told Zeno, “Get the equipment ready.”

“Aye, aye, cap’n” he quipped.

As Zeno clamored to the back of the car to grab my tablet laptop, I observed a large billboard on the side of the road. There was a banner hastily pulled over whatever was originally being advertised.

In Italian it said, “DANGER: EXCLUSION ZONE AHEAD, TURN BACK WHILE YOU CAN.”

“The ZER (Roman Exclusion Zone)… I’ve heard a lot of rumors about this place.”

“Same here,” Zeno added, “There’s definitely a reason QUILL hasn’t stuck its nose here until now.”

It just goes to show how desperate we’ve become…

I park the car behind one of the supporting pillars of the billboard and take my tablet laptop from Zeno. It was time to give a status report to Bolero, who has been multitasking more than ever. Whether it’s checking in on Clarke in the hospital, procuring equipment, organizing paperwork, or planning out missions, they’ve been doing it all.

“This is Lupa,” I stated, “Ilia and I have made it down the river, but have yet to find the twins.”

Bolero decided to be cheeky and use Roman mythology themed code names and signals this time around. What I was really saying was that Zeno and I were at the border of the ZER but haven’t reached the Vatican Ruins, our target destination.

“Mars speaking, Palatine should be nearby,” Bolero responded, “You should also ditch the car soon, it’ll only make you a larger target.”

“Aw man, we’re gonna hafta hoof it?” Zeno whined.

“You knew this would be happening Ilia.” Bolero said.

“Yeah, yeah…”

“Now then, before we really get this going, let’s recap the mission objective. Lupa?”

“Operation Black Tie: collect treasure from the ruins and bring it to our contact, who will in turn auction the treasures off, raising money for future operations.”

“That’s the jist of it, good hunting you two.”

With that, Bolero ended the transmission.

“Guh, what a pain in the ass,” Zeno pulled out two internal frame backpacks, “I was hoping we could get a bit farther into the city first…”

“Tell me about it…”

As an operator, my activity in a mission is typically limited to wherever my computer setup is. For a while, I thought piloting the boat at Onogoro would have been the most action I would actually take part in, excluding getting in and out of Japan of course.

And now here I am, backpacking deep into the remains of an ancient city that may or may not be full of war cultists.

“Ya know, I think I might be growing soft.” Zeno had to speak a little louder due to the intense November winds rushing around us.

“What makes you think that?”

“Just that, I used to laugh at this kinda weather, but now… Now I see it and think ‘I wanna go back to sleep’,” he sighed, “How am I supposed to get back at those Eden scumbags if I can’t handle some wind?”

“I wish I had a good answer…”

“Eh whatever, I think I’m starting to see why no one else wanted to take this mission.”

“That’s not true, whoever Palatine is, they’re here to help us.”

“If they haven’t been killed yet…”

The further we walked, the more jagged the roads became, after a certain point it almost looked as if a volcano had erupted here. Considering Monte Albano hasn’t been active for tens of thousands of years, the cooled lava flow must have been the work of a powerful septima.

Eventually we reached a field of barricades jutting out amongst ruined buildings. There was someone standing atop the tallest structure, they were concealed by a dark blue raincoat.

“We’ve got company.” I told Zeno.

“I see ‘em.”

He pulled out his handgun, something similar to TOPO, but cheaper and flimsier.

“Really?” the stranger asked, “You’re going into here with that?”

“Hey, that voice…” Zeno thought aloud, while lowering his gun.

The stranger leapt off of the structure, hopping onto various ledges to ease their descent before reaching the ground.

“It looks like you’ll need my help after all. It would be outright irresponsible if I left you two alone here.”

Zeno’s eyes glimmered, he tossed the gun aside and ran towards the stranger.

“Hey! What are you doing?!” I pick up Zeno’s gun and watch what happened next with apprehension.

Zeno gave the stranger a fierce hug, jostling the hood of their coat, revealing their face.

“You’ve grown quite a bit since we last met…” the stranger strained to speak.

“Sibilo! It’s really you!” Zeno was overjoyed.

Indeed, the stranger was actually the very same Sibilo that rescued Zeno from the Calabrian mafia. I recognized his cream-colored hair and upturned eyes from QUILL’s personnel roster, although the picture didn’t carry the same regal air he did in person.

“That would explain who Palatine is,” I pulled out a map derived from a satellite image, “But then who’s the contact we’re supposed to leave the goods with?”

“Also me.” Sibilo answered.

“Huh, how’s that supposed to work?” Zeno asked.

“It’s a bit of a long story, ” he smiled, “Come, let’s walk and talk.”

A few ladybugs made of energy flew out from under Sibilo’s coat as he walked deeper into the ruined city.

Sibilo told us that his mission six years ago wasn’t to rescue Zeno from the mob, but rather to steal the resources from them… Which he did technically accomplish by taking Zeno. Afterwards, Sibilo was so disgusted by what he had seen that he went AWOL to destroy the entire syndicate himself. But rather than go in guns-ablazing, he instead took over leadership and dismantled the organization from the inside out until it was little more than an over-glorified catering service.

“So that’s what you’ve been up to these days,” Zeno now seemed completely unbothered by either the harsh weather or the distance walked so far, “But how have you not gotten taken over? I doubt your goons like the direction you’ve taken, and it sounds like you’ve left your ‘family’ vulnerable.”

Just then, Sibilo stopped walking.

“Stay close to me.” He said.

Suddenly, a ragged-looking young man jumped out from a pile of debris he was hiding behind. He broke out into maniacal laughter as metal blades emerged from the joints of his body.

“Mwahahahaha, blood for the Emperor!!!”

Just as suddenly, the laughter stopped, his eyes turned vacant, and he collapsed. Blood dribbled out of one of the man’s ears, a couple of energy ladybugs flew out of his ear canal and were reabsorbed into Sibilo’s body.

“That,” Sibilo declared, “Is how I’ve kept my position as don.”

“Holy shit.” I accidentally said aloud.

“Frankly, I prefer to use my words.”

There was no doubt about it, that man was completely dead.

“Whoa, you killed that guy before he could even make a move.” Zeno was in awe.

“Technically, I killed six different people that had been stalking us since you two entered the city.”

More energy ladybugs flew out from several different places.

Sibilo looked contemplative as the ladybugs returned to him, “All these peoples’ memories tell me that we should be getting close.”

And just as he predicted, there were only a couple more streets to cross before we finally made it to the Vatican Ruins.

“Well, my job is done here,” Sibilo said, “Now if you excuse me, I have an entourage to attend to.”

No one within Sibilo’s crime syndicate knows about his ties to QUILL, and he would prefer to keep it that way. Before he left, he told us one more thing,

“This raincoat isn’t just to conceal myself by the way, it should be pouring sheets tonight, be sure to set your camp on high ground.”

“You got it, secret contact we don’t know~” Zeno gave a playful goodbye.

Since Vatican City was built on top of a hill, it wasn’t too hard to find a place to set up camp that would be safe from potential flooding, as well as somewhere to hide the tent in.

After scouting out a good entry point, the mission truly began.

“Remember Ilia, your target is the vault complex underground. Spend as little time in the surface level building as you can.”

“Way ahead of you, the last thing I want right now is to get ganked in these guys’ lair.”

What does “ganked” even mean? Whatever, at least that means he isn’t going to act recklessly.

Zeno soon found an entry point into the underground portions of the former palace. Unsurprisingly, there were potential hostiles spotted throughout that area as well. Mapping of this area isn’t particularly extensive or accurate so there wasn’t a lot I could do navigation-wise.

“Huh, that’s weird.”

Uh oh, that’s one of the worst phrases an operator could hear next to “I’m surrounded!” or “It was a setup!”

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing… I think? It’s just that I keep hearing these noises, and everyone else here keeps shouting and running towards it to kill it or something.”

That does sound weird, but convenient for us as long as it keeps drawing away the enemy’s attention.

“What kind of noises are you hearing?”

“Mostly shooting, jets firing, and singing.”

“Singing?”

“Like from a virtual idol.”

Just what is going on down there?

“Try to hurry up before you get caught in… whatever it is.”

“You don’t have to tell me twi—”

“Ze– Ilia? Ilia?”

The signal was cut off, but it didn’t seem that anything had been broken, Zeno might have been killed…  or communications were just being jammed. Whatever’s going on down there, it can’t be good.

After spending more than a few minutes thinking about the feasibility of getting any sort of backup, Zeno nonchalantly responded.

“Yo, just got through a boss fight.”

“I’m glad to hear you’re alright… After you got cutoff, I wasn’t sure whether or not you were alive on the other end.”

“Aw come on Lupa, have a bit more faith in me than that. Jamming happens all the time.”

I don’t remember the last time I got that close to losing my cool in a mission (excluding right after Asimov died). Perhaps Zeno isn’t the only one who should be worried about “growing soft.”

Soon enough, Zeno returned to our campsite hidden in the overgrown ruins of the radio tower. All that blood covering him made him red as the dye in his hair.

“That’s an awful lot of blood… How much of it is yours?”

“Most of it, but I’ve already healed.”

Because of his septima, Zeno’s probably completely fine but it always turns my stomach a bit whenever I see him after an “exciting” mission.

But what’s even more surprising is what, or who, Zeno’s carrying.

“By the way, we’ve got a guest and a half.”

Chapter Text

“By the way, we’ve got a guest and a half.”

Zeno’s mission was to infiltrate the underground treasure vault within these ruins and gather valuable artifacts that could be sold for money… Instead, he brought back a person and some strange sphere.

“Zeno… What is this?”

Zeno scratched the back of his head and smiled sheepishly.

“It’s kind of a funny story—”

“Before that,” I interrupted, “Did you get anything that can be sold?”

“Pssh, who do you think I am?” He hefted his backpack down and opened it, revealing a plethora of shining gold and jewels.

Seeing that our part of the mission had been accomplished, I was now willing to hear Zeno’s “funny story.”

“As I was saying,” Zeno sat down, “So I was doing my thing when all of a sudden this guy got all up in my face,” he pointed to the white-haired boy lying on the ground, “And he was all like ‘Demon scum! How dare you desecrate this holy place?!’”

“So you fought him.”

“Really didn’t have a choice, the sad part is that I barely even needed to do anything before he collapsed on his own. Exhaustion, I guess.”

“If he was so hostile, why did you bring him here?”

“Well, you know how I mentioned everyone else in the ruins seemed to be distracted by something?”

“You did.”

“That was all him.”

“Even the singing?”

“Nah, his lil’ robot friend did that… Dunno why she collapsed too…”

That would explain the sphere.

“Anyway, if I left these guys there they’d get eaten alive.” He sighed, “Felt sorry for ‘em.”

“I understand.”

“Had a feeling you would.”

Not long afterwards Zeno headed out again to “find a place to wash up.” He was covered in an awful lot of blood, but it wasn’t hard to see what his real intentions were when he told me to give him a call after the guests had left. Zeno also warned me not to mention anything about adepts should this person and I talk, definitely not a good sign…

But before I had to worry about talking to this stranger I needed to make sure he was still alive. Just from the rise and fall of his chest, it was easy enough to see he was breathing. Next, I wanted to check his pulse, although most of his body is covered in armor. I attempted to check his pulse from the carotid artery as the armor was considerably thinner around the neck. However, when I lightly pressed my index and middle finger there, sparks flew out of the spherical robot next to him and she jittered back to life.

“Hey! Whaddya think you’re doin’ to the boss?!”

I soon found myself surrounded by six smaller floating spheres, all pointing some sort of targeting laser at me.

“Hold on, I was only checking his pulse!”

“Easy, 99 BPM. And his blood oxygen level is at 96% SpO2.”

“Isn’t that kind of high for a resting pulse?”

“Well yeah but…” The sphere now realized that she was in an unfamiliar place, “Wait, how did we even get here?!”

If I tell her the truth, I’ll probably get shot at six different angles. Thank goodness I have so much experience in lying.

“I was trying to take pictures of the inside of the ruins when I found you and that boy passed out. It would have been irresponsible to leave you in such a dangerous place. My name’s Moniqa, by the way.”

That seemed to be enough for the robot, because she retracted the extra spheres after that.

“Thanks Moniqa, sorry about that… It’s just that the boss is real good at making enemies so I gotta be a lot less friendly than I care for…”

All things considered, it’s probably safer to be overly wary of strangers in a place like this.

“So, um…”

“Call me Lola.”

“Lola, I saw sparks fly out of you when you reactivated, are you alright?”

Most of the robots I’ve encountered were various mindless security drones, but Lola seemed to be sapient, so it would only make sense to treat her as I would a human.

“You see, I haven’t been able to get any good maintenance since we left Japan so…”

“Japan?!”

“Haha, yeah… I thought Copen was just gonna go back home by the time we reached that airfield…”

“Copen…”

“That’s his name, what about it?”

The white armor, the religious zealotry, the hatred towards adepts… It all makes sense now, this had to be the person Gunvolt fought in Sinner’s Row.

“Aw… I don’t think he’s slept so heavily since we left either.” Lola was hovering over Copen’s face, still asleep.

“Are you sure it’s just sleeping and not, say, a coma?”

“He’ll be fine, you wouldn’t believe how hard it is to keep that guy down.”

He did seem like the overly stubborn type from what I’ve heard…

“Anyway, it sounds like you’ve had quite a journey. I’m curious to know more, but I don’t want to pry.”

“Eh, I don’t think it’ll do any harm to tell you the deets. But I’m warning you, it’s a long story, and most of it probably won’t make much sense to you.”

It wasn’t like I had much else to do.

“…So basically, he’s not taking his sister being an adept very well.”

“Oh my god…”

“I guess that was a bit too much to drop onto you, sorry ‘bout that.”

That was an understatement. I don’t even know where to begin. Eden is no more, Joule is Copen’s twin sister (maybe?), and Gunvolt’s alive???

“Umm… Your tear ducts are active…”

“I…”

I didn’t know what to say.

Just then, Copen woke up.

“Nnngh, what is this place?” His voice was raspy.

“Hey boss!” Lola chirped, “This nice lady saved us and brought us back to her hideout!”

He looked at me with suspicion.

“And who are you supposed to be?”

“A photojournalist.” I lied while passing a water bottle over to him.

Copen reluctantly takes the bottle and stands up.

“It doesn’t matter how good a story you’ll get, this is no place for civilians.”

He was struggling to open the bottle…

“I could say the same thing to you.”

“Don’t bother,” Lola interjected, “He gets like this everytime someone is even a little bit nice to him.”

“Lola, we’re leaving now.” Copen said from outside the tent.

“Whatever you say, boss!”

Just like that, the boy and his robot disappeared into the ruins.

Since they’re gone, now’s the time to call Zeno back over and tell him everything I learned, of which there was a lot.

It turns out after Zeno washed the blood off of him, he waited for me to call from the top of the radio tower above our campsite, so it didn’t take long for him to get back here at all.

“So, did he tell you about the impossible-to-kill adept bastard he fought?” Zeno was joking, but had a hint of genuine curiosity in his voice.

“No, he didn’t, but his robot told me something very important. You might want to sit down for this.”

“Oh yeah?” Zeno didn’t sound entirely convinced, but sat down anyway.

“Zeno… Gunvolt is alive.”

The smirk on his face vanished.

“You… You’re joking, right?”

My silence told him otherwise.

“No way… That means we just left him behind! Don’t tell me he really was taken prisoner?!”

“Nothing like that! In fact, he might just be trying to live a normal life… I think?”

Zeno exhaled in relief.

But still, Gunvolt was alive this whole time, even after we gave up our search he was still out there somewhere. Maybe if we just looked a little harder, then…

“Hey, this is really good actually!” Zeno interrupted my train of thought, “If we can find each other and just talk things out, then we can all take on Eden together!”

“Well…”

“I mean, I think I get why he’d wanna distance himself from QUILL, but surely he’d listen to his good buddy Zeno, right?”

“It’s not that. We don’t need to worry about Eden anymore. GV and Copen already destroyed them and their leader.”

“Huh? Like… Together?”

“Definitely not, they just happened to have the same goal.”

“So… Shit, we just did all this for nothing, huh?”

“I guess so.” I sighed.

“We should probably call Bolero about this…”

“Right.”

I had completely forgotten about the mission amidst learning that everything we had been working towards for the past couple of months was entirely for naught. Then again, based on the battles Lola recounted, it’s unlikely we would have been able to stand up to Eden at all. So in a way, Gunvolt (and Copen) saved our lives by complete accident.

Still, we needed to report back to Bolero. Since there was no more signal jamming (likely Copen’s handiwork), it was easy enough to set up a video call.

For some reason, Bolero wasn’t on the other end of the call, instead Clarke answered.

“Hello there, Mo—”

“Lupa.”

“Oh I’m sorry, I didn’t realize you were using codenames on this mission.”

“Sir, if I may ask, what are you doing out of the hospital so early?”

“It’s simple, I got better.”

“From a heart attack?”

“Everyone always makes such a fuss about how painful and fatal heart attacks are,” Clarke harrumphed, “But do you know what really hurt me?”

He was going to answer no matter what I said…

“All the debt we’ve accrued from that stupid submarine!”

This can’t be healthy for him, But I know he’s too stubborn to take a break.

“Uh, no offense old man,” Zeno butted in, “But if The Exodus is that much of a money drain, then why not just cut our losses and sell it for scrap?”

Clarke deflated.

“I’ve been thinking about that more and more, but I know Asimov and Heinlein wouldn’t want that.”

“Yeah but they’re also dead.”

“I know, but they were like sons to me…”

Clarke knows the truth by now, his “sons” wanted nothing more than his head on a platter, and yet he still mourns them so deeply…

“Is Mars here?” I asked Clarke, who had a real knack for going off-topic.

“Who?” He didn’t know Bolero’s self-imposed codename.

“Lupa? Is that you?” Bolero shouted from a distance.

The sound of frantic pacing could be heard and they were soon visible in the video feed, holding a coffee pot.

“Hello there, you have awful timing,” Bolero placed the pot down and turned towards Clarke, “And you shouldn’t be working right now! Are you trying to kill yourself faster?!”

“But QUILL’s all I have left to live for…”

“Should we call back later?” I tried not to let my discomfort be too apparent.

“That depends, are you about to tell me good news or bad news?”

“Good news,” I was able to say honestly. A nice change of pace.

“Very well then, we could all use a bit of good news.”

Zeno started, “First of all, I got a bunch of nice baubles our ‘anonymous contact’ will definitely be able to auction off.”

“Excellent, Great work you two!”

“Next” I added, “Our long-term goal has changed.”

“How so?”

“Eden… is no more.”

“Goodness, you two really do work fast!” Clarke was genuinely impressed, too bad it was all misplaced…

“It… wasn’t us…”

“Oh.”

“So, if you want your car back—”

“No no, that’s okay. I have a feeling I won’t need it in the future.”

Grim. But probably not wrong, Clarke’s high-strung disposition has probably shortened his life quite a bit by now, and it seems to be catching up to him in his advanced age.

“Eden or no, we could probably use the money so I’ll get a hold of our contact as soon as we can.” Bolero stated.

“Speaking of, Palatine was a nice surprise.” Zeno mentioned, “Wish I could’ve known about him in advance but I get why I didn’t…”

“That’s about the reaction I expected from you.” Bolero said in an almost teasing manner.

“That concludes our report.”

“I see. Our contact should call you directly for your next instructions. Mars out.”

The transmission ended, and the waiting began.

Hours passed, the sky grew dark, and we still haven’t gotten that call.

“Phew, good thing we brought that rain-fly after all…” Zeno commented.

It also started raining. A lot.

“…But seriously, if Sibilo takes any longer then he won’t get to try any of our gourmet instant curry and rice. Mmm, so good.” He lamented in an overly dramatic tone he only ever used for sarcasm purposes.

“Is the food that bad?” I didn’t give him the satisfaction of his joke being acknowledged, but I also didn’t think our dinner was that bad. Then again, it’s hard to go wrong with a hot meal on a cold night.

“Nah, but it’s total crap compared to the five-star stuff he probably eats these days.”

Sibilo, the QUILL operative turned mob boss (who still secretly works for QUILL) is supposed to call us about where to hand off the treasures we’ve collected so he can sell them off and raise funds for QUILL still hasn’t done so much as give us a text that he’s busy with his traveling party.

“Hey, should we be worried that he’s taking so long?”

“That brain-eating septima’s nothing to sneeze at, he’s probably fine. It’d take someone really strong to kill him.”

“Like Copen?”

“Oh come on, he could barely stand up when we fought!” Zeno’s words were confident, but his voice had a tinge of doubt.

“And how many did he fight before encountering you?”

“Let’s… just hope they don’t cross paths…” He was no longer hiding his doubt.

All we could do is wait to see what happened next.

By now, Sibilo had taken so long that we had to start sleeping in hour shifts. Despite only having an hour to sleep, today was so tiring that I quickly passed out. I even started dreaming, it was the kind that you know is just a dream, but it feels so real that it may as well be reality.

I was back in Japan, Zeno had just finished setting up the encryption on the router in the apartment GV and Joule used to live in. While this definitely happened last year, I was never there for it. And yet here I was, waiting outside.

“Thanks again for everything.” Gunvolt said as he opened the door, showing Zeno out.

“Anytime, man!” Zeno said while walking out.

“You should come over again soon,” Joule said, still wearing that vaguely medical-looking minidress she was found in, “I’ll know how to cook by then and we can all have dinner together!”

“Ahaha, that’s okay…” Zeno did his best to be nice about it.

“What? Do you think I won’t be able to cook by then?” Joule pouted.

“Well…” Gunvolt murmured.

“Not you too!” Joule huffed, “Just you wait! One of these days I’ll make a meal so tasty that you’ll wanna eat your own words!”

I don’t think she was ever this outspoken in real life…

“Hopefully that’s not what you’re cooking…” Zeno further antagonized her.

“Huh?” Joule didn’t get it.

“Thanks for setting things up here.” Gunvolt desperately wanted this to end, his glasses had become all fogged up from secondhand embarrassment, “See you later.”

He shut the door.

“Thanks for waiting, Moniqa.”

“No problem, but you really shouldn’t tease Joule like that.”

“Yeah I know, those Sumeragi asshats kept her from having a normal life for so long…”

“Here’s hoping we change that with this apartment.”

“It’s definitely a start.”

Just as we started walking down the hallway toward the elevator, Zeno stopped dead in his tracks.

“Aw man, I left my copy of MILF HunterZ in there!”

“Your what?” I’m not sure if that game even existed outside of this dream.

“I gotta go back!” Zeno rushed off to the apartment.

Zeno was frantically twisting and pulling at the doorknob, to no avail.

“You're turning it in the wrong direction…”

“Oh yeah? You try it then.”

I knocked first, considering Zeno seemed to forget that step. But when there was no answer, I went back to trying to open the door, this time twisting the knob in the opposite direction from Zeno’s attempt. After hearing a satisfying click, I pull the door open, only for it to violently wrench itself out of the way, as if a large robot arm tore it open.

“Whoa, didn’t need to pull it that hard.”

I couldn’t tell if Zeno was being a smartass or not.

The dream shifted gears when we entered the apartment, because it looked less like a living space inside and more like a warehouse.

At first glance, it resembled the inside of the defunct QUILL storehouse extra equipment was once stored in, but upon further inspection it’s only alike superficially. Many wires of various sizes hung from the ceiling, as if I was under the desk of a very poorly organized computer setup.

“Zeno?” I realized he was nowhere to be found.

I progress further into this not quite warehouse, but find my movement impeded by all the junk strewn out on the floor. I didn’t look down to see what exactly I kept stumbling over.

“Zeno, where are you?”

I had already made it to the end of the building without seeing even a hint of him. All that greeted me was an insect collection that covered the entire wall. Something seemed off about it, and when I looked closer I found out why. Despite being pinned to the wall, all the insects were still attempting to move. I paid close attention to the futile flapping of a blue morpho’s wings.

“Huh.”

I stepped on something without realizing it. When I looked down, I saw Zeno’s disembodied hands. A chill ran down my spine.

The morpho’s wings stopped moving, as did every other insect pinned to the wall. When I breathed, a visible puff of air followed my exhalation. It must be too cold for the insects to struggle now.

Beep… beep… beep… beep… beep…

“A bomb?!”

There was no time to think about the frozen bugs or discarded hands, I had to get out before I got caught in the explosion.

Everytime I tripped over something on the ground, I could have sworn the beeping got louder. I could now see that the “junk” on the ground were actually poorly made taxidermies. Of what? I couldn’t tell.

The beeping was deafening now, but I finally made it to the exit. Unfortunately, the double-doors were frozen shut.

I clawed at the door, there was nothing else I could do to open them. I kept going, even after there was no hope of the doors opening. It just kept getting colder and colder.

My fingers grew brittle and snapped off, one by one. I still kept clawing at the doors. Anything to escape.

“Help me…” I called out to no one, “Somebody, anybody, please… HELP ME!!!”

“GAH!!” I yelped in the real world.

The beeping noise was coming from Zeno’s phone, it must be time for a change in shifts.

“Mornin’.” Zeno greeted, “…You alright?”

I checked my fingers, they were all still firmly attached to my hands, just as Zeno’s hands were still attached to his arms.

“Yeah… Just a bad dream.”

Zeno yawned, “Yeah? Hope it isn’t contagious because I’m about to—”

He was interrupted by the ringing sound of an incoming call.

“It must be Sibilo!” Zeno’s sleepiness ceased to exist.

“About time…” I grumbled, still frazzled from the nightmare.

Zeno accepted the call, and an extra hologram screen popped up.

Sibilo’s head was seen on the other end disembodied, viscous dark liquid oozing out of every orifice.

Chapter Text

Sibilo, the one who saved Zeno’s life and gave him something to live for. The same person who kept us safe in our travels through the ZER, whose decapitated head now stares back at us through a screen.

“Oh, are these the guys you were trying to call?” A gruff voice spoke from the other end.

A gloved hand emerged from the darkness and cupped Sibilo’s chin. A body and face attached to the hand followed. The eyes had black sclerae, something I’ve only seen in Sumeragi adepts that have undergone transformation from a glaive.

“You’re… a Sumeragi swordsman?” I tried not to let my fear be audible.

Have they been following us this whole time? Wasn’t it enough that we left Japan? Why have they taken so long to kill us?

“Tch, as if I’d ever stoop to being some corporate monkey.”

Zeno had completely frozen up, as if he had returned to the timid ten year-old he once was.

“Hey, now that I think about it… You’re that cutie that knew ‘Captain Falcon’ back home, aren’t you?”

I knew the voice sounded familiar, but I was frankly too distracted by my ally’s gruesomely severed head to wrack my memory to put together what he’s talking about.

“I had a feeling you’d stand me up~”

Suddenly, it came back to me.

“I think he went by Kuore?”

“You know, if you wanna’ stay a little while, I wouldn’t mind if you know what I’m saying.” He flirted.

“Maybe we can meet for dinner later~” I lied.

“H… How?!”

“It’s simple babe,” Kuore had far too satisfied a look on his face, “I did business with whoever I could use to help me get to the top. QUILL, Sumeragi, didn’t matter who as long as they were useful.”

I would have asked how this brought him to the Italian peninsula, but I figured he was going to answer that anyway (he did).

“And once the opportunity presented itself, I took a little trip over here to usurp the one the locals call ‘Emperor’. Couldn’t find him though,” Kuore pinched Sibilo’s cheek, “But you’re a good lil’ consolation prize aren’tcha?”

Kuore pushed Sibilo’s head out of view, putting himself in the center of the camera.

“Sure my new ‘family’ is gonna be fixer-upper, but it sure beats taking orders from someone else!”

By now Kuore’s noticed that nobody has interrupted his monologue. This seemed to frustrate him for some reason.

“Well, if you wanna get that sweet sweet vengeance out on me, you can find yours truly at the Colosseum. You know the one.”

Kuore then kicked the computer hard enough to end the transmission.

Zeno and I just sat there in silence, I don’t know for how long.

Time resumed when a sickly heat pressed into my stomach, then my throat. I ran out of the tent before it spewed out of my mouth all over our sleeping bag and equipment. When I regained control of my faculties, I could see partially digested curry melting away in the rain.

Just as I headed back into the tent, Zeno hurried out, not even noticing that he pushed me over.

“Ow, hey!” I saw that he wasn’t coming back, “Hey, wait! Zeno!”

He completely disappeared into the wall of rain.

I returned to the tent to see that Zeno took every single weapon we brought here with him. As if those cut-rate arms could seriously stand up to someone strong enough to kill Sibilo, whose septima literally destroys you from the inside-out.

It was then that I realized I have to stop Zeno before he kills himself.

Zeno didn’t leave me with anything to defend myself with, so heading out to find him was probably a terrible idea, but I didn’t care. At the very least I had a rain poncho to keep myself dry… and a second rain poncho because Zeno didn’t think to put one on before leaving. Then again, self-preservation clearly isn’t his top priority right now.

I had a flashlight too, but I’d rather not turn into a beacon saying, “Here I am, kill me now!” so I’m only using it when I need to… Slowing me down considerably due to how careful I need to keep my footing in the jagged uneven terrain all around. Perhaps this same terrain made Zeno trip a bunch? That would certainly slow him down. Then again, healing septima mixed with an adrenaline rush can easily compensate for that.

As I traveled southeast toward the Colosseum, I found that my poncho kept getting caught on rubble… or I thought it did. After pulling the snagged portion of the poncho away it was caught almost immediately again. I shined the flashlight directly into whatever was causing it to snag only to see that it’s stuck in thin air… thin air that wears rags and has the silhouette of a small child.

What could I have possibly done except give that kid the poncho that was meant for Zeno?

After successfully pulling the hood over their head, the child briefly became visible and smiled at me. They then saw something to the south that made them jump, and they disappeared (except for the rags and poncho) again and ran past me towards the north.

I couldn’t tell what exactly spooked the child until I heard an effeminate, robotic voice cut through the downpour.

“…And I keep telling you! This shelter sinks! You’re totally soaked!”

Copen and Lola were sitting under a few warped planks of wood, barely protecting either of them from the rain.

“It’s fine Lola, the armor is keeping me warm.”

“You can’t lie to me about that sort of thing! I have direct access to everything going on inside your body, you’re gonna catch a cold at this rate!”

“Oh no, a cold, how terrible.” Copen’s words oozed with deadpan sarcasm.

“Last time you blew off a cold it turned into pneumonia!”

“I got better…”

“Then why did you get your butt whooped by that one guy back at the cathedral?”

“…”

“How can I protect you if you won’t take care of yourself, boss?”

Listening to their bickering, I came up with a new idea. A high-risk/high-reward type of idea.

“Good evening, or should I say morning?” I donned a well-put together façade.

“It’s you again!” Lola sounded overjoyed, “Help me convince this big dummy to practice some self-care!”

“Or,” Copen added, “You could mind your business and leave us alone.”

As much as I would rather not deal with Copen’s self-destructive angst, I don’t think I could get Lola to help me without him.

“My camp is set up on the hill. It’s dry, has a roof, pretty warm too.” I had to really sell the comfort of that tent and surrounding ruined museum.

Copen glowered at me. Perhaps I made the wrong move…

Just as I was thinking about walking away, one of the planks gave out, drenching both boy and robot.

Lola yelped and dropped out of the air, she made various glitchy noises after impacting the ground.

“Lola!”

Copen carefully scooped up the fallen pod.

“You didn’t make her chassis watertight?!”

“How stupid do you think I am?! Of course I did!”

“Stop that, both of you!” Lola interjected, “I’m fine…I think?”

“I don’t believe you.” Copen said, turning Lola over.

“Why don’t you ever look after yourself like this?” Lola grumbled.

I shined my flashlight over Lola to give Copen greater visibility as he inspected her. He soon found the source of the issue, the bottom of her chassis had gotten scraped hard enough to expose the electronics inside to the rain.

“I bet it would be super easy to patch that up at Moniqa’s campsite…” Lola wasn’t being subtle.

“Fine,” Copen sighed, “But only because you won’t let me hear the end of it otherwise…”

Perhaps this might work after all.

Once we made it back to camp, it was easy enough for Copen to weld shut the compromised part of Lola’s chassis.

“Not my best work, but it’ll do.”

“Jeez, I’m glad Mytyl’s not around to see this…”

The welding on Lola’s underside resembled medical stitching. It was unsightly, yes, but the straight line across demonstrated the steadiness of Copen’s hands. I hope that one day, he grows out of the horrible mindset he’s stuck in, because he really is quite talented.

“I’m sure some sanding down and a new paint job can fix that.” I tried to console Lola.

Copen put his pocket-sized toolkit away and could now broaden his focus outside of Lola’s well being.

“So what’s your ulterior motive?” He asked me.

“Boss!” Lola jumped to my defense, “Why do you keep assuming—”

“No, he’s right.” I shut her down.

“Wha?”

“I need your help.” I said in earnest.

“…With what?”

Copen didn’t leave as soon as I confirmed his suspicion, that’s probably a good sign.

“I didn’t come here alone, I came here with another photographer, a friend of mine.” I omitted the detail that Zeno is an adept (and also not a photographer), “I went to get pictures of the Vatican, and he went to get pictures of the Colosseum.”

“Well that was stupid of you to split up like that.” Copen commented.

“Anyway,” I tried not to let his condescension get to me, “We maintained a consistent flow of communication until recently.”

“I had Lola jam the communication signals so the guy we fought in the cathedral wouldn’t call for help, but that was hours ago…”

I pulled up a screenshot I had taken of Kuore during the video call, but I made sure to crop out Sibilo’s head first. It would only raise unwanted questions otherwise.

“The last thing he sent me was this image.”

I showed them the cropped screenshot. I didn’t know it was possible for Copen’s expression to become more serious.

“Lola, let’s do another checkup and then head to the Colosseum.”

“So you’re going to help me?”

“Your friend is dead, but I have an obligation to slay weaponized monsters like the one in that picture.”

Could Zeno really be dead by now? I doubt it, but it might make this easier if there’s no one for Copen to “rescue”. I just need to make sure Zeno doesn’t really die, whether from Kuore or Copen, it’s a delicate tightrope to walk, but I have to keep my balance!

“All systems green, let’s do this!” Lola finished her self diagnostic.

“Lola, I need some light.” Copen was carefully inspecting the jets on the sides of his boots, it seems that he was going to take a bit longer to get ready.

“Um, before you go…” I opened the various programs I use for operating on my tablet laptop, “Let me help you.”

“No offense, but that adept you showed us looked really strong, I don’t think you can help us out here.” Lola misunderstood.

“Not that kind of help, I have a lot of experience in combat navigation.” I corrected her.

Copen’s eyes narrowed.

“Just what kind of photojournalist are you?”

“One that’s covered wars.”

In a way, that’s not a totally inaccurate statement.

“Wow, you sound like the real deal!” Lola was certainly convinced, I guess she doesn’t have any lie detectors built in… Then again, most lie-detecting technology is misleading trash anyway.

“Hmm…” Copen was still skeptical, “Lola, give Moniqa temporary access to whatever systems she needs to help us out from here.”

“On it!”

Several windows popped up, live video from Lola’s cameras, vital monitors from Copen’s armor (apparently called White Tiger), scanning systems, and more.

“That was fast.”

“Ooh, you’ve got some neat files on that thing.” Lola observed.

“Anything I should know about?” Copen asked her.

Uh oh, my cover might be blown.

“…Just that she was underselling how long it’s been since she talked to her buddy.”

Lola lied to her master? …Why? Does she even have anything to gain from that?

“It’s true, we had an argument earlier and I thought he was just ignoring me…”

Oh well, it would be best to take this opportunity while I can.

“I see.” Copen began to head out, “I’ll make sure to avenge him.”

“Before you go!” I pulled out some cold medicine from the first-aid kit in my backpack, “Take this.”

“…Okay.” Copen took the medicine out of my hand.

Lightning gave him and Lola a dramatic silhouette, but they were gone before I could hear thunder… And I was left with a strange sense of déjà vu.

Chapter Text

“This navigational array is incredible, I’ve never seen anything like it!”

Not only did I have a real-time video feed from Lola and every one of the P-Bits’ cameras (which left me on the verge of motion sickness), but also that the scanning systems had a far greater range and accuracy than anything I had seen from QUILL.

“Of course it’s incredible, I made it.” Copen bragged in his usual deadpan voice.

“Wow, and so humble too .” I snarked.

Then again, if I could do even half of what he could do at age 14, I’d probably be super full of myself too.

“It sure is quiet out here…” Lola observed.

“Perhaps they’ve all scurried into the Colosseum to watch some bloodsport.” Copen theorized.

The radar told a different story.

“…It looks more like anyone near you is either fast asleep or running away. You could easily kill them if you want to.”

“No… I have a bigger problem to take care of.” Copen’s mumbling could barely be heard.

Interesting, it would seem he isn’t as bloodthirsty as he lets on.

“So the Adept Slayer is merciful after all.”

“I never said I was letting them go. Their deaths have only been delayed.”

“Like how you just happened to lose track of that girl back in Tangier.” Lola teased.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about…” Copen did a poor job at playing dumb.

“What happened in Tangier?” I asked.

“Nothing happened,” Copen insisted, “And Lola doesn’t recall anything remarkable happening there either.”

“Oh yeah, my memory totally got fried and those 48 hours are totally gone for some reason.”

Lola silently sent a .txt file detailing what had happened in Tangier. Apparently some time last month, a grain distribution company turned media conglomerate was trying to make use of some discarded Sumeragi technology that Copen personally wanted to destroy. Along the way, he encountered a little girl on the run from some scary looking armed men. Neither of them thought much of it at the time when they saved the girl and took her back to the ancient ruins they were using as a hideout. When they left to carry out their sabotage mission, all they knew was that she had been kidnapped from her family in the countryside. After an entire action movie’s worth of misadventures and a fight to the death against the CEO,  it was revealed that the girl was an adept with some sort of ion manipulation septima that the company was trying to forcibly shape into a bootleg version of the Muse. In the end, Copen brought her back to her family, and claimed that if they ever crossed paths again he would kill her. Which, of course, is his way of saying he won’t kill her.

By now, Copen and Lola had made it to the makeshift fortress set up all around the Colosseum. Before jumping into the fray, Lola sent out a couple of P-Bits to scout out the fastest route to the inside of the Colosseum. This left the both of them just sitting around for a few minutes.

“So, what were you doing under the Vatican earlier? Seems like an odd place to pray.”

“Awfully nosy, aren’t you?”

“What can I say? Nosiness gets you far in journalism.”

Lola made a sound approximating stifled laughter.

“Is there something you’d like to share, Lola?” Copen sounded like a disappointed teacher about to scold a student.

“Sorry, I was just thinking about what a sun dairy you can be, boss. Teehee~”

“A what?”

I think she meant to say tsundere…

“Anyway, if you must know,” Copen grumbled, “I was originally above ground when I was using the confessional but was ambushed by some ragged heretics that dared to call this place their home.”

“I assume it escalated after that.”

“It did.”

“Aside from that mishap at the end, it was pretty good practice for when we fight the Emperor!” Lola chimed in.

“So that’s why you’re here.”

“Yes, the demon who brought this city to ruin two decades ago… I’ve always wanted to cremate him in his own hellish caldera.”

They’ll probably be looking for a long time… But before I could tell him that, the scouting P-Bits came back and a route into the Colosseum was calculated.

The quickest route into the Colosseum involved running across crumbling rooftops and through a section of the enemy camp. It was the exact sort of path Gunvolt would have taken in a place like this, just the sort of thing to make me all nostalgic for Japan. Although, back then Copen was a mysterious new threat. Now I know he’s just some traumatized kid with a suspiciously enabling maid… who is still far more of a threat than most grown adults.

“Hey, Moniqa!” Lola got my attention, “I bet you’ve never seen a human being fly like this~”

“Huh?”

Before I knew it, Copen was dashing around at speeds that I most certainly have not seen a human being move at (aside from Gunvolt). Anybody that stood in their his way wasn’t standing for much longer.

When I had finished my training as an operator, I was well used to watching small dots on a screen appear and disappear. That was the only way I had seen death for years. Now I can see it happening behind a screen, as if it was only a game.

Then again, it’s not like this is the first time I’ve ever seen a human life end in front of me, that would have been back in Haunted House (technically it was Asimov’s corpse in Japan, but I wasn’t thinking about that at the time). It’s already been three months since that’s happened, but it also feels like it was last week and last year at the same time.

What am I doing? I… I can’t let this get in my way, I won’t let it get in my way. All of this bloodshed is so pointless… But I have to see it through to the end! For Zeno!

Copen scaled the Colosseum and found himself with a primetime view of the carnage in the arena… Or he would’ve if it weren’t for the unnatural vacuum of light occupying that area.

“Woah, there’s no light coming in or out of there!” Lola reported.

“Have you tried switching your camera to thermal vision?” I suggested.

“A non-starter,” Copen answered, the visor he typically used for detecting septima was pulled down, “it’s almost like a black hole…”

I could hear the faint crack of gunshots below, meaning that soundwaves could still travel freely… and that Zeno’s still fighting.

“Boss, shouldn’t we go down there?”

“It sounds like there’s already a fight happening, I would rather wait to see if the combatants kill each other first.”

“Hmm…” Lola seemed to have an idea.

“Yes?” Copen said with a tone that implied Lola did this often.

“How about I send another scout to stream the fight for us?”

“Would you even be able to communicate with it once it passes the barrier?” I was open to ideas, but I wasn’t sure it would even work.

“I would rather not lose any P-Bits, they’re quite difficult to replace these days.”

“Do you have any better plans?!” Lola huffed.

“What about the directional microphone I installed in you last month?”

“The one you totally didn’t make from the artificial septima in the body of the CEO you definitely didn’t fight?”

“…Just use it.”

“A ‘please’ every once in a while would be nice.”

The directional microphone worked flawlessly. This convinced Copen that it would be safe to send a P-Bit into there to provide visuals.

“Ugh, it’s him again.” Copen groaned.

Visible light had been completely purged from the inside of the barrier, but infrared light was perfectly visible. I could now see Zeno wildly firing at any possible movement. Even after his assault rifle jammed, he began to swing it around like a club. Somehow, Zeno managed to land a hit on Kuore, briefly separating him from the pulsating mass of darkness he was using as cover. Unfortunately for Zeno, Kuore used this as an opportunity to summon two scythes that severed both of Zeno’s arms at the same time.

“Looks like I’ve disarmed you!” Kuore busted a gut laughing at his extremely predictable joke.

Zeno took a deep breath… and instantly grew back his arms, creating another pair of arms under them.

“Whoa… Good thing I didn’t try using Hailstorm Blade when we fought him!” Lola exclaimed.

“What a hideous power…” Copen hissed.

“You two should commentate on sports, you clearly have a knack for it.” I said the most neutral voice I could muster.

“Maybe after every adept is dead.”

He could have just said he’s not interested…

“Moniqa, are you alright?” Lola asked, “You sound kinda sick.”

“Huh? Oh, it’s just some motion-sickness from the visuals, I’ll be alright.”

“If you say so…”

Back to the battle: Zeno’s movements were unbelievable, he must have done this before. Each hand was wielding a different handgun, all working in perfect tandem as if he was the god of bullets.

“Look at him go, no way anyone’s dodging a volley like that!” Lola was getting really into it.

“Human pectoral muscles aren’t designed to support two pairs of arms,” Copen stated, “Just how long can he keep that up?”

Not very long, it turns out. Zeno had managed to stab Kuore with four knives at the same time. However, when Kuore threw Zeno, the bottom pair of arms tore off of Zeno. The hands of the discarded arms still clenched the knives boring into Kuore’s abdomen. He pulled the knives out, and threw them directly at Zeno, who nimbly dodged the first knife only to get immobilized by something I can’t see due to the lack of light.

Opportunistic as ever, Kuore threw the last knife directly at Zeno’s heart. He couldn’t pull the knife out, but his body kept trying to regenerate around it. Kuore seemed to count this as a victory, as he shifted from a battling stance to a gloating stance.

“V…Vai a farti… fottere…” Zeno struggled to speak.

“Don’t worry, I won’t kill you yet,” Kuore untransformed, “Much more entertaining this way.”

The septimal void dissipated, bringing visible light back into view.

“It was so easy you know, I was hiding in the shadow of his raincoat the whole time, and not a soul noticed.”

“Wonder what he’s talking about?” Lola mused.

Kuore must have been talking about how he murdered Sibilo, but I won’t tell them that… Then again, there’s a good chance Lola already knows what’s going on due to her looking through all of my tablet laptop’s files, but is feigning ignorance for reasons I still don’t understand.

“He was alone, and distracted getting that call ready, by the time I relieved him of his body, it was too late!”

Zeno said nothing, I couldn’t tell if he was even alive.

Kuore then stared directly at the P-Bit, now far more noticeable due to the increased visibility. He then looked up at Copen and Lola.

“Are you not entertained?” He sneered.

“Not particularly!” Copen said.

“What? I can’t hear you!” Kuore didn’t have a directional microphone of his own to hear Copen’s backtalk, “Come down here so I can kick your ass!”

Copen did indeed jump all the way down into the arena, Lola and P-Bits dutifully following him.

“I think you’re the one whose ass is gonna get kicked!” Lola retorted.

“Let’s cut to the chase then!”

Kuore pulled out what must have been a false glaive, it had a similar design motif but was shorter and bulkier, it resembled a massive box-cutter.

After transforming, the void returned as well, causing Lola to switch to thermal vision once again, Copen following with his visor.

Bullit dashing ended up being far more challenging than expected due to Kuore somehow being able to find a different dark corner to hide in.

“He’s molding the landscape like it’s clay!” Lola pointed out.

“How troublesome…” Copen muttered.

Clearly, something needed to be done to rid Kuore of this unfair advantage.

A stream of lightning shot out from a group of P-Bits, illuminating Lola and Copen but not doing much more than that before they fade back into darkness.

“Looks like we’re gonna have to use our thinking caps for this one, boss!”

Kuore’s voice echoed out from multiple directions.

“Now you see me…”

The P-Bits’ pseudo prevasion blocked a flurry of shadowy slashes.

“…Now you don’t!”

Within the void, it would seem that Kuore is able to distort sound to some degree, at least enough to make it impossible to locate him that way.

“The way his septima affects your surroundings…” I pondered, “It reminds me of how everything becomes harder to identify at night, making it more dangerous even if it’s something otherwise mundane, like the corner of a table.”

“Is there a point you’re trying to make?” Copen leapt onto a ledge only for it to fall out from under him, “Or are you just trying to chat?”

“What I’m trying to say is, he would probably become a lot less dangerous if you find a way to get natural light back in here.”

“I could have figured that out on my own…”

Whether or not that statement was true, Copen fired a laser beam accompanied by small explosions, tearing apart the artificial darkness.

“It worked!” Lola cheered.

But she would not celebrate for long, because the area Copen blasted through was quickly replaced.

“Was that supposed to do something?” Kuore taunted before throwing what appeared to be bidents made from shadows.

“Me and my big mouth…” Lola sulked (through a speaker, because she doesn’t actually have a mouth.)

“It worked better than what you tried before,” I schemed, “If only there was a way to break through the darkness faster than it can regenerate…”

“The only way to make the beam stronger would be to overload Lola’s AS drive.”

“But that would make us sitting ducks if we don’t kill him!”

“Unless…” Copen thought out loud.

“Unless?”

A proverbial lightbulb turned on in Copen’s head, his brainwave patterns changed a bit too if that counts for anything.

“Lola, switch your EX Weapon to Prism Break!”

“Prism Break!” Lola announced, “What now?”

“I need you to make as many crystals as you can.”

“But that’ll take forever!”

“It’s fine, I’ll keep him busy.” Copen switched out the bullets in his gun.

“You guys schemin’ without me?” Kuore asked, telegraphing what was supposed to be an attack from behind.

Copen answered his question with a shot to the face. Unsurprisingly, Kuore survived the hit, but not without dropping to the ground. This must have been the power of Greed Snatcher.

“What the hell?!”

The darkness slithered away from Kuore, as if a spotlight shone down on him.

Copen then shot him several more times, but with regular bullets.

“Oi, fuck this!” Kuore barked before pulling a shadow in front of him as if it were a curtain.

Copen chased Kuore through the darkness, only for the floor below him to change to a swampy terrain that he sinks into. Not much of a problem for Copen, as he can just Bullit dash out of there.

From then on, my view of the fight was somewhat unclear due to only having Lola’s camera to see from, the P-Bits had been sent off to various locations to generate large crystals and drop them off, just as Copen told her to.

Kuore threw Copen into a ceiling that shouldn’t have been in an open-air arena.

“Woah ho, I didn’t know that was there!” Kuore jeered.

“That’s right, you wouldn’t have known it was there.”

Copen grabbed the "ceiling" and flipped it, revealing it to be one of the crystals the P-Bits generated.

“Oh shit! Since when did gems come in that size?!”

Several P-Bits gathered around Copen, all charging a beam in tandem with his revolver.

“Time to fill your dark soul with light!”

The resulting beam was not only amplified through the crystal, but was also split off into multiple beams going in different directions due to the formation of the faces.

“Ha! You missed!”

The laser beams hit more crystals, which further extended the beam's range while generating more beams. The light was breaking through faster than the darkness could snuff it out.

By the time Kuore realized what was happening, it was too late.

The early dawn light was almost blinding in comparison to the total lack of light earlier.

“Finally,” Copen flipped his visor, “I’m going to get a headache from using infrared vision for that long…”

“Boss, look up!”

Kuore stood atop a crumbling podium, he was smoldering like an exploded cartoon character, but still standing.

“Heh heh, yer a real asshole,” he coughed, “So I’m gonna stick you where the sun don’t shine!”

Copen braced himself.

“Um… Uh… I’m not really a haiku kind of guy…… FALL OF MANDRAKE”

Kuore darted all around the arena, in a seemingly random series of directions, until he disappeared entirely.

“…Was that it?!” Lola was dumbfounded.

“Oh come on, you know it’s never that simple.”

“I know, but I was really hoping it would be for once…”

Suddenly, Kuore seemed to rise from a faint shadow… And then another Kuore rose from a different shadow… and another… and another… and another… and so on.

Every single Shadow-Kuore seemed to be more sluggish than the original and were easily dispatched.

Another sweep over and the real Kuore was nowhere to be found.

“I guess he really must’ve run away.” Lola said.

“So he tucked his tail between his legs and fled?” Copen was still looking around, “Whatever, we have an ‘Emperor’ to kill.”

“Still, something feels kinda’ off…”

Lola wasn’t wrong about that. I was unquestionably relieved that Copen and Lola were just about done and were going back to their quest, because that would mean I could sneak into the colosseum and rescue Zeno! If he’s still alive that is… But something kept nagging at the back of my mind.

“It was so easy you know, I was hiding in the shadow of his raincoat the whole time, and not a soul noticed.”

“Copen! Your Shadow!” I shouted.

The real Kuore was rising out from Copen’s shadow, which was angled behind him.

“Not today!” Lola cried out.

She rammed her body directly into Kuore, knocking him back several meters.

“Nice one!” I cheered Lola on.

“Oh, really? Thanks!”

Relieved that Lola had saved Copen in the nick of time, I turned my eyes to his EKG (Electrocardiogram) that I could watch in real time expecting his heart rate to spike. Instead, it was completely flat.

“What the…”

“Uh oh.” was all Lola said.

Kuore hadn’t managed to decapitate Copen, and yet he still lay dead on the ground.

I gasped in horror.

"Don't give up, boss!" Lola yelled to her deceased creator.

After that, the readings that Lola shared with my tablet laptop turned into complete garbage data and ate up so much RAM that the computer was forced to power down from overheating.

Chapter Text

I can’t tell you what I was thinking when I barrelled out of the tent, because I wasn’t thinking, I was feeling. And what I felt was that I just let three kids (yes I’m counting Lola) die while I sat back and watched through a screen.

The rain had stopped by now. That and the morning light made it much easier to move across the ruined roads. It didn’t keep me from tripping over a couple of times, but I wouldn’t let it stop me.

Right before I reached the Colosseum perimeter I fell again. But this time, I felt a small hand try to help me up, I couldn’t see the hand though, because it was invisible.

“Oh, it’s you again.” I said to the invisible child wearing Zeno’s rain poncho.

“N–Non andare, è pericoloso.” The child warned.

They only spoke Italian, which made sense as we’re literally in Rome… What’s left of it, anyway. My spoken Italian is quite a bit worse than my reading, but it’ll have to do.

“Io devo.” I told them.

I had to go, I couldn’t live with myself otherwise. I pray that my parents never find out about this.

The child nodded and told me to wait. Then they ran off into the opening of a dilapidated building, not long after they came out struggling to carry an iron pipe with two keychains attached to one end.

“[Mamma used this to fight bad guys, but it’s still too heavy for me…]”

The child then handed the pipe to me.

“Grazie mille.”

“[Umm… I dunno if that would be enough against a bunch of them, so let me help you.]”

“Huh? [How so?]”

The child became visible and took a deep breath, then they strained themself as hard as they could and turned invisible again. But this time, their clothes became invisible too, and so had I.

Not being able to see your own feet under you is disorienting, to say the least. Luckily I soon found out that I could avert this by simply not looking down at my own feet. It wasn’t perfect, but it worked well enough. Still, if it weren’t for the child’s hand holding mine, I would’ve had no way of knowing where they were. It’s a relief that someone so quiet seems to be on my side…

The camp around the Colosseum was mostly abandoned by now. I can only imagine how bizarre a night this must have been for these people Sibilo had brought to this place. First their boss was killed, then a teenage boy bursts in to try and kill their new boss, and then another teenage boy guns down anyone in his way. It’s not a stretch to say that most people would just quit and go home at that point.

As for the stragglers, they never saw a thing.

Right before we entered the Colosseum itself, I noticed that I had become visible again.

“What the…”

“[I… I smell blood in there…]” The child whimpered.

I have a feeling they won’t be going any farther. That’s fine, this is my bad decision, not theirs.

“[It’s okay, you don’t have to come with me.]”

The child nodded… probably. I wouldn’t know, they were still invisible.

“[P-Please… Don’t d-die…]”

The only way into the arena itself was through the hypogeum underground. For once, the unstable state of the structures around me made it easier to go further. As I climbed down the broken rocky wall, I was suddenly very grateful for the rock-climbing training I had to take before going to Japan. It wasn’t useful at all back then, but it’s definitely helping me keep my cool (what’s left of it) now!

Once I finished my descent, I started running. I’ve wasted so much time already.

“[Ugh, I can’t believe the new boss is making me stand guard here…]”

I was so preoccupied with getting to the arena that I didn’t notice the man I had run into until I had already collided into him.

“Ahi! Che caz—”

I smashed his skull in with the iron pipe. If he didn’t want to die, he shouldn’t have made any noise. Unfortunately, right after I silenced the man for good, the noise his body made upon hitting the floor alerted two other mob lackeys.

“[What was that noise?!]”

Uh oh.

“[Over there! She killed Bianchi!]”

The two shot at me faster than I could run. But instead of dying right there, a floating shield appeared from thin air to block the bullets. Additionally, the pipe now had a spiked flail attached to it.

They shot at me again, to no effect.

“Shit! Not another adept!”

Before they could run or call for reinforcements, I ended both of their lives with that flail.

When the present threat had passed, the shield and flail reverted to a parasol and beach ball keychain, respectively. These must be the remnants of the septima of that invisible child’s mother.

But none of that mattered right now, I had an arena to get to.

Finally, I made it to the arena. The first sound I heard was an almost hypnotic, robotic singing. I then saw the source of the singing, a floating girl with pale green hair.

I realized the girl was actually a projection from Lola when I saw Copen under her, still alive and in a fighting stance.

“Any last words?” Copen asked someone.

“Oh come on, you know how this ended last time…” Zeno panted.

Zeno’s alive!…but he’s exhausted. And now he’s going to fight Copen again.

“A poor choice of last words.”

This plan couldn’t have gone more wrong, I can’t believe I just thought Copen and Zeno wouldn’t notice each other. But there’s no choice now, I’m going to have to see this stupidity through to the end.

“STOP!!!” I screamed.

That got their attention.

I ran towards the boys (and robot girl), not even realizing I had dropped the pipe that would have kept me safe. Sorry invisible kid…

“Moniqa?” Zeno looked more baffled than upset, “What are you doing here?!”

Zeno didn’t know that he just revealed that I’ve been lying to Copen this whole time.

“Ah, so that’s what this is about.” Copen’s near-monotone voice was chilling.

“Wait, what’s going on?”

Poor Zeno, he was completely out of the loop.

“That’s right, I lied to you because I couldn’t think of any other way to save Zeno.”

“What???” Zeno looked at me like I stepped on his breakfast. He’ll probably be mad later, but I’d gladly take an angry Zeno over a dead one.

Copen turned his attention to Lola.

“Lola…”

“What’s up, boss?” Lola asked while music continued to blast out from her built-in speakers.

“Surely you must have found something on her computer that didn’t line up with the story she told us.”

“Well…”

“So why didn’t you tell me?”

“Uhh what can I say? Her encryption was top-notch stuff!” Lola lied through her non-existent teeth.

“…We’re going to talk later.”

“Fiiine.”

Zeno was trying to sneak away in the meantime, but Copen and Lola didn’t bicker long enough for him to move a significant distance.

“Don’t think you’ll get away that easily, adept.”

Zeno was well past the point of snappy comebacks and only sighed.

I stepped in front of Zeno, putting myself between him and the so-called Adept Slayer.

“If you want to hurt him, you’ll have to get through me first.” I bluffed.

Copen raised his pistol towards me.

“Boss, wait! She dropped her only weapon at the entrance!”

“I did?”

By now I realized that I had dropped the iron pipe.

“Adepts are weapons, Lola.”

Copen was still talking instead of shooting.

“But, she’s not a— Oh whatever, you won’t listen to me anyway…”

Everyone was hesitating in some form, I had no way of predicting what was going to happen next.

“So, are you gonna like, kill us or not?” Zeno brazenly asked.

Copen continued to stand there pointing the Border II at us like a statue with murderous intent.

After what felt like an eternity, he pulled the trigger… and fired a bullet right into my chest.

I didn’t regain consciousness until I had already hit the ground. Copen and Lola were long gone by now. There was a mild pain in the right side of my chest, but the wound was already gone, and there was blood all over me. Zeno’s septima is a (literal) lifesaver…

Zeno had squatted down to get closer to me.

“Moniqa… What the hell were you thinking?”

He sure had a lot of nerve to ask me that considering none of this would have happened if he didn’t leave the tent to fight Kuore.

“What the hell were you thinking?” I echoed back.

Zeno cringed.

“He killed Sibilo… I had to make him pay…”

“Would Sibilo have wanted you to do that?”

“I’ll have to think about that…”

“Why don't you do that back at the tent.”

“…Sounds good.”

As we stumbled out of the arena, I noticed the puddles of shadowy goop splattered out at every which way. Considering the way glaive-users tend to explode upon death, it’s not hard to imagine what happened to Kuore.

I made sure to grab the iron pipe before we left, even though it felt much heavier to lift than it did before.

Thank goodness the Colosseum was entirely evacuated by the time we left the arena. The invisible child was nowhere to be seen either, I hope that just meant they were still invisible or had already left; there was really no way of knowing.

With no weapons and barely standing, Zeno and I would have made easy targets for whoever wanted to take us on. No one came after us in the end, I guess all the commotion in the area (mostly from Copen) made it too scary for even the most desperate of opportunists to bother.

As soon as we got into the tent, Zeno immediately fell asleep. He didn’t even make it into the sleeping bag, he just sprawled out on top of it. I wanted some rest too, but I didn’t want to risk having another nightmare so soon. So I boiled up some instant coffee and started packing up instead.

In truth, there wasn’t that much to pack up without taking down the tent. And that’s not happening until Zeno’s awake. In the meantime I rebooted my tablet laptop, it has to have recovered from overheating by now.

I let out a sigh of relief when the bootup sequence finished without any issues. Unsurprisingly, any attempts I made to record footage from Lola’s camera was wiped from the hard drive, as well as any evidence of whatever programs she installed to sync with Copen’s systems.

Everything was deleted… except for a .txt file I hadn’t seen before titled “FROM LOLA.”

My curiosity now piqued, I opened the file.

Hey there Moniqa,

If you’re reading this, that means I’ve gotten rid of any evidence of Copen’s existence (and mine.) Don’t take it personally, I do this to everyone we come across. I don’t usually leave messages like this though, I only did this time because I think there’s a few things you deserve to know.

First, I figured out that everything you told us was a big load of baloney after I scanned your computer’s hard drive. It only took me 0.43 seconds to scan the whole thing you know! Of course, it didn’t even take 0.1 second to find some files that contradicted that whole “photojournalist that rescued us from the annoying regenerating adept man” story you fed us earlier.

At 0.11 seconds I was considering bricking this machine and telling Copen to hightail it out of here, but at 0.15 seconds I found out about the real reason you needed our help. I don’t know anything about the guy’s head in the video, but talk about a horrible way to die...

0.23 seconds in, I found out that you and Gunvolt used to work together. I don’t know him very well, but he didn’t seem to be a bad person, so you probably aren’t either, right? Maybe that’s a bit naive, but you’re really not a threat either way.

By the time 0.32 seconds had passed, I remembered how things used to be with Copen. Back when we had a nice, big mansion to live in... and how much I missed those days. I know we can’t go back, but I thought that maybe just this once we can have someone support us from behind a screen again.

When I finished looking through everything, I made a decision. There’s a good chance Copen and I were gonna run into that shadow adept anyway, so we may as well work together, right?

Sorry Copen shot you BTW. If we ever meet again, I hope he’s chilled out more. That’ll probably take a really long time though... So bye-bye for now!

-Lola

So that’s why Lola kept up the façade for as long as she did? Well, I guess nostalgia’s as good a reason as any. Besides, if it weren’t for her, Zeno would’ve died and I wouldn’t have been able to do a thing about it. Maybe one day I can properly thank her.

I had just finished packing away every loose thing hanging around into the backpacks when Zeno woke up.

“Haha, I feel like shit…” Zeno sounded weak.

“I imagine you would after having a knife stuck in your heart for so long…”

“Aw man, you saw that?” Zeno sounded more like himself with every word, he was definitely recovering, “Gimme a break…”

“Bleeding yourself to heal me probably didn’t help either…”

“Eh, it’s all in the past now, right?”

Zeno sat up and noticed the pitiful remains of the uniform he’s wearing.

“Ya know, I hear the sleeveless look is in right now.”

Somehow, that got a chuckle out of me. It wasn’t even funny, but it sure did catch me by surprise.

Zeno looked very satisfied that he got me to laugh at one of his stupid jokes for once. He then got up to help finish packing, seemingly fully recovered.

“I uh, had kind of a weird dream earlier.” He said.

“Did you happen to trip over taxidermies in it?”

“Not that kind of weird, more like a memory… that I don’t think ever really happened.”

“So what did happen?”

“Hmm… I was still living with Sibilo, so it must have been a while back. My memories from that time are pretty hazy…” Zeno motioned to me to help him fold up the rainfly, “We had just finished up dinner, and he told me he was going to be gone all night. It got kind of blurry after that for a while.”

“You don’t remember anything else?”

“I didn’t say that. But it felt like I was just waiting forever and ever, I got so worried about Sibilo that I went after him and ended up at the Naples Marina—”

“Wait, how did you know where he had gone?”

“Moniqa, I really hope I’m not the one who has to tell you that dreams don’t have to make sense.”

Of course I know that dreams don’t make sense!

“You haven’t exactly been clear on what’s a dream and what’s a real memory…”

“Fair enough,” Zeno shrugged, “Anyway, I just happened to find Sibilo when he was right in the middle of a firefight.”

Zeno laughed sheepishly.

“We both got out alright… But he was really mad at me afterwards. It was the ‘actually really worried’ kind of mad though, I could have died in the crossfire for no reason…”

Zeno’s subconscious didn't seem to be a particularly subtle storyteller.

“You know how you just said ‘dreams don’t have to make sense’?” I asked.

“Well, now that I’ve actually talked about it, I can see that my dreams are telling me that it was pretty stupid to fight a souped-up adept with the world’s shittiest arsenal…”

At least we’re on the same page.

“See, you don’t even need to say ‘I told you so’,” Zeno said for me, “Now let’s have some breakfast, I’m starving.”

“Breakfast” consisted of little more than whatever snacks we hadn’t already eaten. Maybe it was the hunger and exhaustion talking, but those partially crushed granola bars tasted heavenly .

Right before Zeno tore open another wrapper, his attention was drawn to the entrance of the ruined building we had camped out in.

“Hey, is that my raincoat?”

I looked in the direction he pointed to and saw the invisible child. Well, the raincoat I gave them at least.

“It was your raincoat.”

Zeno sighed.

The child continued to stand there, almost as if they were trying to remind me of something (they were).

“Oh, I almost forgot!” I picked the pipe up from where I had put it down, “[Thank you for your help!]”

The child cautiously crept up to grab their late mother’s weapon.

“Zeno, I didn’t get the chance to tell you this, but this child is the reason I made it to the colosseum unharmed!”

“That so? Good thing I was there to get you out unharmed…”

Unsurprisingly, the child still struggled to carry the iron pipe. This made them slow to leave, giving Zeno an idea.

“[Hey, before you go…]” He beckoned the child over with his granola bar, “[To survive in a place like this, you must be either pretty strong or pretty sneaky, right? I’ll give you all of my food if you help us get to the nor—]”

The child already snatched the bar away, tearing apart the wrapper with their teeth before gobbling it up in two bites.

“[—thern barrier.]” Zeno took out a baggy of trail mix, “[Guess it’s a deal then. Don’t eat so fast though, your body won’t like that one bit.]”

Luckily, the child didn’t just take Zeno’s food and run, but actually ended up helping us find a safe way out of the city ruins. However, we ended up having to take lots of detours on account of most of the child’s best sneaking routes being too narrow for Zeno or I to move through, much less our backpacks.

One of the detours we took brought us into a dense thicket of obsidian crystals the size of human beings. They were as beautiful as they were sharp. Large size aside, what felt extra peculiar about these crystals was their arrangement. They all seemed to radiate out from a center, what was at that center was even stranger.

“Whoa…” I breathed.

In the center of this crystal field was a vague obsidian effigy of a person, frozen in an anguished howl.

“You know,” Zeno said, “They say that The Emperor’s septima was like a ‘human volcano’.”

If this is truly what’s left of the adept that spearheaded this city’s destruction, then Copen might keep looking for him forever if he doesn’t find this… Surely Lola will talk some sense into him before that, right?

“[What are you looking at that for?]” The child asked, “[It’s just a rock.]”

“What a pain, all this treasure’s making my backpack so heavy…” Zeno complained.

We weren’t able to exchange our findings with Sibilo before he was killed, so we’re going to have to figure out what to do with them later.

After a convoluted and meandering path avoiding main roads at all costs, we finally made it to the northern edge of the Roman Exclusion Zone. We thanked the not-so-invisible child for keeping us out of danger and waved our goodbyes.

…I felt bad about leaving the child in those ruins. Sure it’s their home, and they know the ins and outs of that place, but it didn’t take a genius to see how hungry and scared they were.

On the other hand, is the rest of the world all that much safer for an adept child? Whether it’s cruelty from individuals, the state, or megacorporations, the world is a truly terrifying place. I don’t think it’s for the best to stay in the Roman ruins, but I don’t know what is for the best. Only that child can say for sure.

The clouds had broken up somewhat, but it drizzled anyway.

“[I can tell you’re still there, you know.]” Zeno teased the cold air.

Sure enough, the air revealed itself to be that small child once more.

“[You could have just said you wanted to come along.]”

“[Ummm… Where are you going? Is there really anything out there?]”

Zeno gave a warm smile.“[There’s a lot out there. Both good and bad. Like, there are hot showers but there are also microtransactions.]”

“[I d-don’t know what those are…]” The child had a determined expression, “[But I want to!]”

I knelt down so my eyes could meet theirs.

“[We aren’t coming back here. If you come with us, you won’t come back either.]”

The child is probably making the right move, but I had to make sure they didn’t have any second thoughts.

“[That’s okay. This is the longest I’ve talked to anyone since mamma died… And I wanna keep talking.]”

“[Lucky you,]” Zeno smirked, “[Cuz I’m a big ol’] chiacchierone!”

…I don’t think the child knew what that word meant (and I don't either), but they looked happier than ever.

The two of them really chatted it up as we continued to travel further north. They were speaking in Italian so quickly that I could barely keep up with most of what they were saying. Something I was able to understand was the reason why the child never gave us their name. They don’t even know what a name is, so of course they wouldn’t have one.

Finally, we made it back to the giant billboard with the tree-sized shrubs growing around it AKA where I parked the car. And as if fate decided to finally smile down upon us, it was perfectly intact.

A brief acclimation period was also needed for the yet-unnamed-child to adjust to the fast speeds of an automobile… I couldn’t do anything about the motion sickness, but at least they have a better idea about what’s going on.

“Ah–Ahh—CHOO!!!” Zeno's sneeze was almost a roar.

I passed him a tissue.

“Blech, I think I caught a cold…”

“There’s some cold medicine in my backpack in the top pocket.”

Zeno reached for the first aid kit and proceeded to rifle through it.

“Moniqa, I don’t see any cold medicine in here.”

“That’s strange, I could’ve sworn we packed it—”

I suddenly remembered that I had handed Copen the entire packet of cold medicine before he left for the Colosseum.

“Oh well, guess we both forgot.”

“Yep, guess we did…”

It wouldn’t be too much longer until we reached towns and cities that weren’t in ruins. But before that…

The child gasped.

My eyes darted to the right and I soon saw why. A brilliant rainbow draped across the morning sky, ushering us toward the future.

Chapter Text

A lot has happened since that disastrous excursion into the Roman Exclusion Zone. A lot happened before it too, but I don’t think I need to retell all that so soon.

We had barely left the Italian peninsula when Clarke had another heart attack, fatal this time. No one stepped up to any sort of leadership role, so it didn’t take long for QUILL to dissolve… on an official level at least.

It all happened so fast, no one even had time to figure out what to do with the treasures from the Vatican ruins. Most of what Zeno and I had worked so hard to collect “disappeared” when the Rama Building was being cleared out, but I managed to hold onto a couple of bejeweled scroll cases and golden candle holders. When I got the chance to get a better look at them after leaving the exclusion zone, I could tell they had come from religious minorities that had suffered at the hands of the church… I felt bad that I was working to profit off of that same suffering.

But since there was no longer a reason to sell the artifacts, I made it my personal mission to return them to the cultural centers and museums they belonged to in the first place.

Now, little more than two years later, I’m just another university student in Geneva. May as well try to finish that poli-sci degree, right?

The current semester’s almost over with, only a single final remains. I’m about forty pages into a thesis paper on how the biometric ID policy in Germany has done more harm than good. Forty pages sounds like a lot, but the paper needs to be at least eighty pages… And I only have two days left to finish it. Not to mention all the Christmas shopping I kept putting off! At least I won’t have to worry about getting back to my parents’ house on Christmas Day, considering my immediate family doesn’t celebrate it.

But still, what a week!

I find myself browsing a video hosting site yet again. It’s not procrastination, I’m just taking a break so I can focus better in a few minutes.

The first thumbnail to catch my eye has an image of a boy wearing a brown and orange hat seemingly choking out another boy with green highlights in his hair, it was titled “I Pranked My Roommate and THIS Happened?! #Pranked #GoneWrong #SponsoredbyCocoCola”. Out of morbid curiosity, I clicked on the link to the three year-old clickbait.

After an obnoxiously edited preview segment played, the video started out with the wearer of the brown and orange hat introducing himself as Asroc, and that he’s going to demonstrate how to bake a colorful assortment of macarons efficiently. Every moment Asroc ducks away from his lovingly arranged stockpile of ingredients, something turns into green pixels and disappears. At first, Asroc just thinks he’s misplaced something, but after his bag of confectioner’s sugar vanishes right in front of him, all becomes clear.

“LMFAO, did you really think I’d just let you use my setup for free?!” A somewhat familiar nasally voice taunted Asroc from behind the camera.

“Teseo…” He fumed.

“What, you triggered? LOL!”

Teseo let out a hyena’s laugh. He didn’t get to laugh for very long though, because Asroc soon lunged towards him, accidentally turning the camera to Teseo, showing him getting strangled.

“Pretty… cringe…” Teseo could barely speak.

“YOU’RE CRINGE YOU UTTER TROGLODYTE!!!”

The video then cuts to an angle from another camera, bringing the focus back to Asroc. He was too angry to notice the green pixels above his head turn into a large soda bottle, which then fell directly onto his head, knocking him out.

“Hyuuuu…” Teseo breathed, “You never know when you need a Coco Cola™!”

The rest of the video was a sponsored segment for a soda brand. During the outro to the video, a bunch of arrows kept pointing toward an icon with an attached link, which led to a 404 error page.

When I looked back at the name of the channel the prank video came from, everything made sense. “World Vlog King” is the side channel to the streamer “World Hack King”…Both channels served as stealth recruitment platforms to the now defunct adept supremacist group known as Eden.

I had met World Hack King, or should I say Teseo, himself not long before his demise. He seemed to get a real kick out of antagonizing his teammates… I had encountered Asroc too, he seemed very angry, but it wasn’t hard to see why. His coworkers seemed… difficult, to put it mildly.

…Thinking back to those times, I remember how lucky I am to still be alive. Everything from that year feels like a fever dream, but no matter how much I return to civilian life, the slight numbness in my fingers and face will always remind me of what had almost happened.

Forty-two pages in, I take a break to stretch my body. I’d rather take a walk outside, but the falling snow on the other side of the window tells me otherwise.

I go back to looking for random videos. This time I found a title in Japanese, a cover of the Lumen song “Stratosphere.” I click on the link to the video.

Immediately, I could see that this was an amateur production. Nothing wrong with that, in fact, in a world full of professional influencers, seeing some nobody pour their heart into a grainy video with tinny sound is a breath of fresh air.

A girl awkwardly mills around in a bedroom that may or may not be hers. She looks an awful lot like Joule, but a bit taller and with longer hair. The song’s instrumental track starts to play.

“Hatano, hurry up! The song’s already started!” The Joule look-a-like scolded another teenage girl, now on screen.

“Aw man, now I gotta edit this part out…” Hatano complained (and didn’t edit out).

Soon enough, the two were singing along with the music. I can’t speak for Hatano, but the other girl sings almost exactly like Lumen did! It was almost uncanny how similar her voice was.

Just hearing that voice gets me to reminisce about that year or two I lived in Japan as a part of Team Sheeps. Those certainly aren’t days to be nostalgic for, and yet, there was an optimism about them. It was all so simple back then: take orders from Asimov, pretend I didn’t have a crush on him, be a good “big sister” to GV and Zeno, and complete the mission. Even after the debacle on the train, nothing changed all that much, except now there was living proof of the bright future I dreamed of when I joined QUILL… and since GV lived apart from the rest of us, he was no longer subject to that horrible .mp3 recording of Reveille that Asimov used to wake the rest of us up every morning. I was pretty jealous he got to avoid that din.

…I still don’t know what GV’s been up to since then, aside from that vague snippet Lola told me back in Rome. It’s wild to think that Copen actually did get into Firmament, what was he even trying to accomplish there? Did Copen even know? Probably not, now that I think about it.

Anyway, whatever’s happening now, I just hope Gunvolt is happy. The problems of the world that made him fight in the first place haven’t gone away, but I hope that he at least gets the chance to grow up, and live a life of peace.

The video’s ended. I leave a like and get back to writing my thesis.

Forty-five pages into the paper, my phone starts to ring. I check the caller ID and see that it’s someone I know.

“M-M-Merry Christmas, Moniqa!”

“And a Happy New Year to you, Florin!”

Florin is the name the formerly nameless child chose. It didn’t take them long to figure out what a name was, but they struggled for a bit to figure out what they wanted to be called. Zeno came up with the idea of letting them look through the treasures for inspiration. Eventually, they took a liking to a medieval Florentine gold coin called a florin. So they’re called Florin now.

“So how’s Iceland been?” I asked them.

“School’s out, so I’ve been having a lot of fun! A-Also I helped a ewe give birth earlier today, and her lamb’s so cute!”

“Wow, I wish school was out for me…”

“Oh no, did I call you in the middle of class again?”

“Nah, but I still have to finish an eighty page paper.”

“That’s really long…”

“It is, but I’ve been through worse.”

“Before I go, here’s a picture o-of the aurora last night.”

I received a notification that an image had been sent to me. It was indeed a picture of the Northern Lights, a bit overexposed maybe, but always gorgeous.

“How beautiful, it must be nice to live in a place where you can see something like that right out of your window.”

“You betcha! This never happened in Rome!”

Zeno and a bunch of other former QUILL operatives ended up in Iceland once they needed a new home. Thankfully, there was already a QUILL facility there… kind of. Long story short, there are a bunch of adolescent adepts living at a sheep ranch in Iceland, and Florin ended up there too because Iceland is a relatively safe country for adepts.

“Umm… One more thing…” Florin mumbled.

“Yes?”

“There was a scary lady that came by earlier today… She and Zeno talked for a while, but when she left, I couldn’t find Zeno…”

It’s likely that Zeno’s just reuniting with an old friend, then again he could be in serious trouble…

“What did this ‘scary lady’ look like?” I asked.

“Sh-She had one eye and one arm, and-and short green hair.”

“Hm, I’ll see what I can do from here. Just remember that Zeno’s a fighter, he doesn’t go down easy.”

“R-right. Thank you Moniqa…”

The call ended… And now I have something else to do on top of the thesis paper and holiday shopping.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t think of anyone that fit Florin’s description off the top of my head, so I get back to my paper.

A couple more pages complete, and I finally have an idea of who the person Florin was talking about might be. I never got the chance to see her in person, but QUILL used to have a so-called “R&D Queen”, who was missing an arm and an eye. She quit not long before I went to Japan, but I’m not sure what that could mean…

Before I can really get thinking, I get a notification from my email inbox.

There was a new message from Bolero, whom I hadn’t heard from since they left the country a couple of years ago.

Happy Holidays Moniqa,

It’s been a while since I’ve been in the area, so I’ve decided to host a tea party at the old man’s old cottage at 15:00 today. Bring something, or don’t, it’s not a potluck.

Well Wishes,

—Bolero

Two years of radio silence, and now they send a casual invite for tea like it’s nothing. Either it’s an obvious trap, or they’re really desperate for help.

I really shouldn’t bother with stuff like this right now, I have a paper to finish.

…I left my apartment and drove a dead man’s car towards a dead man’s house. No, I did not bother with buying any cookies, I’m wasting enough time as it is.

When I arrived at the forlorn cottage in Collex-Bossy, the lights were on, and there was a strange looking vehicle parked next to it. I knock on the door.

“Come in!” Bolero’s voice barely passed through the door.

Cautiously, I enter the building.

Entering the home, I was greeted by a small sitting room, dusty photo frames and various souvenirs from around the world are strewn about. Hearty laughter could be heard from behind the wall separating the sitting room from the kitchen.

Sure enough, Bolero was sitting at a table, enjoying tea and conversation along with two others. Zeno, who has swapped out his stripe of red hair dye for several bottle-blond streaks, and a woman with short green hair, missing an arm and an eye.

“Wow, I can’t believe you really came.”

I couldn’t tell if Bolero was amused, in genuine disbelief, or both.

Zeno finished his cup of tea and gently set the cup down.

“Yep, I still don’t like tea.” He said confidently.

“At least you know for sure now, little man!” The one-eyed woman playfully ruffled his hair.

Looks like it really was just a tea party, better call Florin so they stop worrying.

As I wait for Florin to pick up, the others continue their bantering.

“Aw come on Tezzie, you can’t call me little man if I’m as tall as you are now” Zeno pretended to sound offended.

“Yeah, but average-sized man doesn’t have the same ring to it…”

Florin answered the call.

“Did y-you find anything?”

“Yep, everything’s alright. Want me to put Zeno on the phone?”

“Yes please…”

Zeno finally noticed me.

“Oh hey Moniqa, who are ya calling?”

“Find out for yourself.” I handed him my phone.

Zeno took the phone, and as soon as Florin started to speak, his smile turned into an embarrassed grin.

“No, Tezla’s just an old friend, sorry about that…”

“At least leave a note next time!” Florin’s agitated voice was easily heard even though the phone isn't on speaker mode, they must have been really upset…

Tezla shoved another finger sandwich in her mouth.

“Hm? Is that the Roman kiddo you told me about?” She asked.

“Yeah, they thought you kidnapped me or something.”

Tezla burst out into tearful laughter. Zeno then handed her the phone so she could personally reassure Florin that she wasn’t up to anything bad.

I sat down and took out my trusty tablet laptop.

“You know Bolero, it’s not that I don’t appreciate this sudden reunion and all,” I opened the window with my thesis paper on it, “But couldn’t this have waited a few more days?”

Bolero continued to flip through one of Clarke’s physical photo albums.

“You didn’t have to come, you know.” They told me.

“And you knew that the second you sent that email that I was going to come over.”

“Hm, I suppose you’re right.”

Bolero flipped through another page of photos, and quietly chuckled.

Meanwhile, as Zeno was finishing up with Florin, Tezla turned her attention towards Bolero.

“No way, he kept pics of that?!”

“It would seem so.” Bolero smiled.

I peeked over at the other side of the table.

“What… is it?” I asked.

Bolero handed me the album.

The first picture I saw was of Asimov and Tezla, both younger. Notably, Tezla also had both arms, but was still missing an eye. They were both smiling, although Asimov almost looked like he was sweating nervously.

“Yeah, so…” Tezla sheepishly explained, “I bet Heinlein that if I could beat Asimov at least once out of ten arm-wrestling matches that he’d have to give me a hundred bucks.”

Just as she said, the next ten pictures were all some variation of Tezla desperately trying to best Asimov in arm wrestling or her getting thrown around.

“Ugh, I had to give Heinlein my only Benjamin…”

In the final picture, Tezla could be seen rolling her eye as she handed the cameraman (presumably Heinlein) a one hundred dollar bill. Asimov was occupied using someone’s coat to tie a makeshift sling for Tezla’s damaged arm.

“Dude, did you seriously think you could take him?” Zeno was truly confounded by Tezla’s past (admittedly pretty stupid) decision. He also passed my phone back to me.

“Yeah, I did, I was like stacked back then, dude.”

The next few photos were all mundane images of the ocean.

“What were you guys doing here, sightseeing?” I asked.

Bolero and Tezla turned their attention to the pictures of the sea.

“Kinda, we were looking for possible openings in Kamishiro.” Tezla scratched her chin, “What you’re lookin’ at is when we tried the southern end of the barrier near Okinawa.”

She pointed to one particular image, aside from a few rocks poking through the horizon it just looked like more ocean.

“Take a close look.”

“It’s… some small islands?”

“Not islands, shipwrecks.”

Upon a closer look, I could see that the “islands” were actually rusted ships and airplanes poking out of the shallows.

“Ah yes, Mission ‘Find a Way In’,” Bolero reminisced, “It was certainly much nicer scouting the seas around the islands of Okinawa than Kuril or Sakhalin…”

“Only for us not to find even a single weak point in the end…” Tezla added.

“‘Find a Way In’? Man, Asimov never was discreet about mission names, was he?” Zeno chuckled.

It was annoying to be pulled away from my work, but… I really enjoyed seeing Zeno and Bolero, and meeting Tezla too.

Chatter aside, something about the tea and snacks really kicked my mind into overdrive, and I was now fifty pages into my paper.

“Everyone having fun?” Bolero asked.

“Yeah!” Tezla exclaimed.

“You know it!” Zeno beamed.

“Yes, this has been quite nice actually.” I replied.

Bolero smiled.

“Good.” was all they said before pulling a tablet out from under the table and opening several holographic windows of maps, blueprints, and candid photographs. “Let’s get down to business, then.”

I guess it wasn’t just a tea party after all…

Chapter Text

QUILL was disbanded two years ago, and yet here I am, at a mission briefing as if nothing had changed.

“Our target is a prototype AFV (armored fighting vehicle) called Scorepion.” Bolero stated.

They pulled up a window displaying the schematics for Scorepion, its hull looks to be around the size of a tanker ship, the “pincers'' at the end of its “arms'' appear to be Mantis tanks, and the “stinger” on its “tail” seems to be a Fazent. A truly ridiculous and excessive piece of artillery.

“So, is this some new Sumeragi thingamajig?” Zeno asked.

“Don’t tell me we’re going to have to go back to Japan…” I complained.

Tezla took Bolero’s tablet and pulled up a different window, a satellite image of some old air base in a desert.

“Don’t worry, we won’t have to worry about getting anywhere near Japan for this one. As for who’s behind it…” She pulled up a different window, a picture of woman that looks eerily similar to Tezla, but with all eyes and limbs and a more well put-together look in general, “It’s the Americans up to some weird BS again.“

Last time I heard of QUILL operations in the United States of America, it was the sabotage of a covert laboratory underneath a prison in New York where adept prisoners were forced to be test subjects to develop American glaives. By the time the infiltrator trio had gotten there, all of the prisoners were either dead or dying, the only remotely successful subject was brain-dead and his body was forced to fight by a machine puppeting his septima around. At that point, all that could be done was to put him out of his misery and destroy the facility.

This doesn’t seem related aside from the country responsible, but you never know…

“So, who’s the person in the photo?” I asked Tezla, “She looks a lot like you.”

“That’s the on-base supervisor for Scorepion’s development, her name is Edie Benz.”

Bolero smirked in Tezla’s direction.

“Tell them the rest, Tezzie.”

“She’s… also my identical twin sister…” Tezla groaned, with a dejected look on her face.

Zeno put his hand on her shoulder.

“Hey, sometimes you gotta fight people you once cared about. It’ll be hard, but if it’s what we have to do—”

“What are you talking about? I’ve never cared about Edie, she’s a lameass fed.”

“Oh… Then what’s with the tone?”

“It’s just that… everything she’s involved with gets really annoying really fast. I just hope that doesn’t extend to this mission, ya know?”

I raised my hand before asking my question.

“The longer I look at Scorepion’s schematics, the more I start to think this thing can’t possibly be real. There’s no way anything this large could have a practical application. Are we sure this isn’t some kind of trap?”

Bolero took a sip from their cup of earl gray tea.

“I get why you would think that, but the fact of the matter is that it’s already proved to be effective during earlier testing.”

A satellite image appeared, showing small villages in a desert.

“This is what the area closest to Stellantis Air Base looked like at the beginning of the month.”

Bolero switched to another image of the same area, there were no more villages to be seen.

“This is an image of the same place, just last week. Even incomplete, Scorepion still reduced people and their homes into dust.”

I nod in grim understanding.

“So we gotta bust it up before it kills more people,” Zeno commented, “How are we gonna do that?”

“I’m so glad you asked!” Tezla replied.

She pulled out a small whiteboard with a marker from under the table. She opened the marker cap with her teeth and continued to talk.

“First: after we’re done here, we’re all going into my plane to fly over to the disputed territory Stellantis sits in.” Tezla drew a little plane flying from snowy mountains to desert plains while Bolero held the board.

“Next:” Tezla then drew two stick people jumping out of the plane with parachutes, “The two of you’ll perform a HALO jump—”

“Just a minute!” I shouted.

“Yeah?”

“Wouldn’t I just be Zeno’s operator from inside the plane? I’ve never even skydived before, much less done a HALO jump of all things…”

I’m not a fan of heights, to put it mildly.

“The problem with that,” Bolero said, “Is that Stellantis has one of the best communication barriers in the world, there’s no way Zeno would be able to contact anyone on the outside once he’s in.”

“Couldn’t I just disable it from within? Or would that be too complicated?” Zeno asked.

“Normally it would, but…” Bolero started looking for something in their pockets, “This is part of why we need Moniqa down there,” They found what they were looking for and placed it in the center of the table, “Or should I say ‘Wolf Grrl’?”

The object placed onto the table was a USB flash drive, there was a sticker that had “WOLFGRRL’S” written on it by an indigo gel pen.

“‘Wolf Grrl’?” Zeno was confused.

“I was… going through a phase…”

“Always full of surprises, aren't you?” He smirked.

“Um, anyway,” I changed the subject, “Where did you even get that? I haven’t seen it since we wiped Bibio Technik’s servers a few years ago.”

“It was such an impressive feat of viral engineering I just had to hold onto it. I wouldn’t trust anyone but you to deliver the payload,” Bolero confessed, “And I’ve made sure to update it so it’ll actually have an effect on current servers.”

Zeno had another question.

“How are we going to get in undetected?”

“After we drop you off,” Bolero put down the whiteboard and started a video call, “The plane will head over to pick up our diversion guy.”

On the other end of the call was a teenage boy with large spiky hair, he was wearing a puffy parka.

“Hey dudes!” He greeted.

“Yugo, is that you? How are you still alive?!” Zeno was flabbergasted.

Based on the tone of Zeno's voice, I'm guessing that Yugo was another survivor of the Haunted House takeover.

“Well, when the vibes are bad, you leave, right? And that Tenjian guy’s vibes were mega bad, dude.”

“Why isn’t he here with us?” I asked Tezla.

“Trust me, this’ll take way less time.”

Not a very reassuring answer…

“Sorry I couldn’t join y’all for the briefing, I just got into Norilsk and I wanted to film at least one abandoned factory.”

“Please stay safe, I don’t think we can do this without a diversion.” I told Yugo.

“You got it dudes!” Yugo gave a peace sign and ended the call.

Zeno leaned back on his chair, “He’s no GV, but his septima’s pretty damn flashy. We’ll be fine with him drawing the enemy away.”

That made me feel a bit better. But still, this is an awfully precarious plan… Then again, since when have QUILL plans not been ludicrously risky?

“That concludes the mission briefing.”

Bolero put their tablet away, and opened up a large suitcase full of various weaponry.

Zeno’s jaw dropped in awe.

“I picked up some ‘toys’ on the way here. Do take good care of them.”

“Woah, these are high end… Seriously Moniqa, take a look! …Moniqa?”

I hope I can make some progress on my paper in the plane…

We left the cottage and headed for the strange vehicle parked next to it. Turns out this was Tezla’s plane the whole time.

“This,” Tezla gave the hull a firm pat, “Is Speedcore, and she’s my beautiful metal baby, so you better not be rough with her.”

“Weren’t you just smacking it like a punching bag when it wouldn’t start up back in Iceland?” Zeno reminded Tezla.

“Percussive maintenance is super different from being rough. Hitting something until it works is the sign of a well-made machine.”

“Whatever you say, Tez…”

The inside of Speedcore didn’t look any better, it was like a mix between a wrecked fighter aircraft and an old station wagon.

As I took my seat, Zeno asked me a question.

“Would you mind if I borrow your laptop for a sec? I just got an idea for something that might help us later.”

“Alright.”

I carelessly handed him my tablet laptop. I didn’t realize that I had made a grievous mistake until the window for the internet browser I was using popped up. There was a tab opened for the homepage for Zeno’s streaming persona.

“Oh? I didn’t know you were such a big fan of me~” Zeno teased.

After all these years, he still loves to rile me up…

“Yes you did, I’ve literally commented in your chat during that time you played that horrible visual novel!”

“Huh? Whatcha guys talkin’ about?” Tezla was curious.

“I didn’t tell you about what I do for a living these days?”

“You don’t just tend to the sheep like the others?”

“I do, but I also play video games online as an anime butterfly girl.”

“Like Lumen, but a gamer?”

“Nuh-uh, Farfallina is a monarch girl, totally different from a blue morpho girl.”

I flashback to the time I overheard Zeno and Gunvolt chatting, particularly when he was telling GV about how much he wanted to be a butterfly girl like Lumen (as a joke, he claimed).

An involuntary snicker leaves my mouth.

“Ugh, I guess I deserve that…” Zeno heard my laugh.

He then fiddled around a bit on my laptop and gave it back to me.

“By the way Zeno, I noticed that you advertised some kind of mystery stream for tonight. But that’s probably not happening now, huh?”

“Well, we’ll just have to see~”

The mischievous grin on his face makes me nervous. I really hope this idea isn’t too dangerous, whatever it is…

Tezla was now trying to start up Speedcore, only for it to make some sad sputtering noises.

Whack!— Whack!— Whack!—

“Come on you hunk of junk! Wake the fuck up already!”

Her “beautiful metal baby” huh?

Bolero turned around from the copilot’s seat they were sitting in.

“It appears our pilot is having some technical difficulties. In the meantime, let’s go over our preflight checklist.”

They motioned for Zeno and I to look under our seats.

“Can you find the parachutes?”

There was indeed a fully prepared parachute under the seat.

“Yep.”

“Mhm.”

“Good, there are a couple of extra things Tezzie wanted to gift you two in case the going got rough.”

I then noticed an erotic magazine and a small plastic bag with a pill shaped like a gift box placed under the parachute.

“Uhh, how is this supposed to help us?” Zeno asked before I could.

Tezla finally got the engines to start up properly.

“If I was about to die,” She turned around to speak to us, “I would wanna die with my blood full of drugs and my face full of tits!”

She turned back around to the control console.

“Anyway, you should hold onto something stable. We’re gonna taxi for a while, but takeoffs are kinda rough if you’re not used to them.”

“Ugh, tell me about it…” Zeno moaned.

I start to work on my thesis paper so I can take my mind off of how horrifically unsafe it is to fly in Speedcore. Only 30 pages left!

After using a highway as a runway, Speedcore took to the skies. I could mention how I could see pieces of the plane break apart as it was taking off, but I’d rather bring up that I was able to complete another page of my thesis paper.

I’ve got a seven-hour flight ahead of me, so I’d better make the most of it.

As I begin to work on the next page, Zeno asks Tezla and Bolero a question.

“So, how’d you guys even find out about Scorepion? Were you just happening to look at one specific part of the world or something?”

I really shouldn’t let myself get distracted by their conversation…

“Funny story about that,” Tezla answered, “So, it was Thanksgiving dinner, and I was on a video call with my family. You see, I can’t really go back to America because of the kill order on me and—”

Focus on your paper Moniqa.

…

Who am I kidding, this story sounds way too interesting to ignore.

“At first, when Edie started blabbing about some super important project she was in charge of, I thought she was just trying to make herself sound more important than she really was.”

“What changed?” Zeno was eager to hear the rest.

“She just kept going on and on about how she was making sure to bring Stellantis back to its glory days like when dad was younger, and it made him really nervous. He told Edie that he’d ‘rather not lose his high position in the government’ but she didn’t get the hint and kept talking.”

“What did the current president of Eunos have to say about it?” Bolero asked.

“Heh, mom really breaks the glass ceiling with her war profiteering…” Tezla snapped out of her tangent, “Uh, anyway, she started going ‘Edie darling, shouldn’t you be more careful with proprietary information?’ And that’s when I knew I had something special on my hands.”

“There’s no way Edie’s dumb enough to just give you all of that intel, are you absolutely sure this isn’t a trap?” I thought this all sounded too convenient.

“Oh please, Edie’s not smart enough to think of something like that.”

“And you’re so confident that you’re willing to endanger Zeno and I if you’re wrong?”

Tezla sighed, “If I’m wrong, you two have my permission to hunt me down and kick my ass personally. I’d deserve it at that point.”

I guess that will have to be good enough for now. Back to the paper.

“Hey, do you know what this all reminds me of?” Bolero asked Tezla.

“What?”

I can’t help but listen in, so much for making progress on my paper here…

“Isn’t this almost exactly how Asimov got into Japan?”

“You’re right! Man, I still can’t believe that actually worked, haha.”

As Zeno lets out his boyish “No way!” and “That’s bad ass!”, I feel the gravity of the mission I absentmindedly accepted weigh down. 

If what Tezla and Bolero are implying is true, Asimov jumped from almost 14,000 meters in the sky to not only electrocute Kamishiro, but hit it with so much physical force that it would have no choice but to have a hole punched through it. How could I possibly do something even half as insane as that?!

Tezla changing the subject distracted me yet again.

“Man, all this talk about the past made me realize how long it’s been since Vila Azul… Sometimes, it feels like it was only yesterday…”

“Vila Azul?” Zeno and I asked in near unison.

“Wha?” Tezla scoffed, “You guys call yourselves a part of QUILL and don’t even know what Vila Azul was?”

“In their defense,” Bolero interjected, “I think you and I are the last people from those days who are still alive .”

“Well, what was it then?” I asked.

“Don’t you have a paper to write?” Bolero deflected.

“Aw come on, she can write it later,” Zeno egged the others on, “I gotta know!”

“Well, if you insist. Tezzie, why don’t you tell them?”

“Why me?”

“Because your perspective will be far more interesting than whatever comes from little old me.”

“Still committed to the ‘cryptic at all costs’ bit, eh? Alright, I’ll humor you…”

You’ve heard of the first adept, right? There’s a whole lotta rumors about who they are, anything from an ape man with green skin, to a runaway feral princess, to the incarnation of a god. All we know for certain is that they were found in the Brazilian side of the Amazon and wielded the septima we now call Azure Striker.

As time passed, Brazil became a sort of holy land for adepts all around the world. One day, some Brazilian adepts got tired of being treated like they were less than human (who wouldn’t?) and formed a commune in the rainforest. They called it Vila Azul, or Azure Village in English, in honor of the first adept. Bolero was also one of the founders, I’m only telling you this because they’ll never mention it on their own.

I just couldn’t wait until graduating high school to run away from home, and a place where you could just be an adept without hiding yourself sounded like the sort of place I’d really feel at home in.

Not like it was perfect or anything. Food was never easy to come by, and we were always being harassed by someone, whether it was bigots, logging companies, prospective ranchers, whatever, they all wanted us dead. Though, it didn’t matter too much to me back then. I was just some dumb kid that wanted to get high. If it really got so bad, I’d just leave, right?

So one day, a group of us were just passing a blunt around. Nothing to write home about until Bolero got up and started getting really sweaty instead of handing it to me.

“There are two people approaching the village.” They said.

This, of course, ruined the day immediately. Some people hid, some braced themselves, I didn’t feel like getting up and just hoped they weren’t armed.

Sure enough, the two people Bolero warned us about entered Vila Azul.

One was wearing sunglasses, even though there’s barely any sun on the forest floor, and the other had a hell of a resting bitch face. 

They didn’t attack us, although RBF started giving some kind of soapbox speech about how the Sumeragi Group is the root of all adept suffering, and how we need to stop cowering in fear and fight back. He really put his all into the speech… but there was a reason we were all trying to sing Kumbaya in a jungle instead of causing Rome II, Electric Boogaloo, none of us were fighters, at least we didn’t think so at the time.

“Oh, come on! Don’t tell me you’re all just gonna sit here and take this?!” RBF was furious at the way everyone ignored him.

His buddy with the sunglasses kept quiet, he looked like he was trying to fight off a nasty headache.

“If we don’t fight back, they’ll just keep trampling over us! Is that what you want?!” He whispered to Sunglasses, “Hit ‘em with the testimonial, you were actually there!”

Sunglasses just shook his head. RBF groaned and went back to his rallying routine.

He just kept going, and going, and going… It was really starting to piss me off.

“Hey!” I barked.

“Yeah?!” RBF responded.

“Can you give it a rest already? We all know you’re undercover cops or feds or whatever, and we’re not giving the state an excuse to gun us down!”

I had no idea these guys weren’t actually undercover cops or CIA agents. What can I say? They had mad “How do you do, fellow adepts?” energy to them.

“WHAT?!” His resting bitch face just turned into a bitch face at that point, “How dare you accuse us of being your enemy?! We’re trying to help you ungrateful shitheels!”

Calling us shitheels really didn’t do anyone any favors.

“Fine!” He shouted, “Good riddance!”

Just as the duo began to walk away, Bolero did something I didn’t understand at the time.

“Just because no one’s listening to you doesn’t mean you have to leave.” They told the two men.

“Huh?!” RBF and I exclaimed at the same time.

“Maybe you’ll be less hostile to us if you understand why we live the way we do.”

“Bolero, what are you saying?! There’s no way these guys are up to anything good!”

“Of course, if you stay for longer than overnight, it would be much appreciated if you could help us out with the chores.”

They ignored me…

“Huh? Um, okay???” RBF was almost at a loss for words.

“Thanks.” was all Sunglasses said.

…

So, they both moved into Vila Azul. RBF also introduced himself as Heinlein, and Sunglasses as Asimov. I still wasn’t convinced they weren’t sent here to fuck everything up.

Life went on. The others might have gotten less icy towards Heinlein and Asimov (especially since they helped with the chores so much), but I stayed suspicious.

One day I noticed Sibilo looking all sad.

“Hey, what’s wrong lil’ man?”

“Someone… picked the flowers I planted… and didn’t even ask…”

“Don’t worry kiddo, I’ll get to the bottom of it.”

I was totally gonna use this as an opportunity to get Heinlein (and Asimov too I guess) kicked out of the village… which was honestly kind of a dick move, but it’s what I wanted at the time.

As I was skulking around, I could hear Heinlein’s voice from behind a tree. When I saw Heinlein holding the missing flowers behind his back, I felt that I had hit the jackpot. All the evidence I needed was right there, but then I wondered what the hell Heinlein was planning to do with the flowers in the first place.

“I, um, I’ve been meaning to tell you something” Heinlein mumbled.

Suddenly, it all clicked into place.

“Ever since we’ve met, I’ve… always felt something about you, a-and—”

I couldn’t believe what I was seeing, Heinlein was acting like a flustered schoolboy!

“There’s… something I want to tell you too.” Asimov said.

“Y-Yes?”

“…Have you ever noticed how pizza in this country has like, everything on it?”

Looks like Heinlein wasn’t going to score, Asimov always was totally clueless of his “best friend’s” feelings towards him.

“No, I uh, didn’t notice that about the pizza here…”

The flowers fell out of Heinlein’s limp, sad hands.

“More countries should do that.”

“Mhm…” Heinlein sounded like he was fighting back tears.

I couldn’t help it, this was just too good to stay quiet for.

“WHAT ARE YOU LAUGHING AT?!”

Heinlein’s angry screeching only made me laugh harder. It took a hot minute for me to finally catch my breath.

“Heh, don’t worry about it. I’ll just tell Sibilo some critter ate his flowers.”

“Hmph.” Heinlein stormed off.

“…Where did these flowers come from?” Asimov only noticed the flowers after Heinlein left.

The laughter started all over again, I bet I must've sounded like a howler monkey. Aw man, my gut hurt something fierce that night.

I still didn’t trust either of them, but how could I possibly pass up more opportunities to witness comedy gold like that ?

…

So, in Vila Azul, it was customary for adults to be on lookout for anyone approaching the village. Usually, Bolero can sense when someone’s coming, but it wouldn’t be fair to place all of the responsibility on them.

But one night, it was Bolero’s turn to be lookout. I really wanted to go to bed, so I went to their hut to see if they were in there. And they were! …they were also piss drunk with Asimov. Heinlein was there too, but he just looked kinda sick. Guess he couldn’t hold his liquor like the other two could, huh?

“Are you here to laugh at me again?” He grumbled to me.

That almost made me laugh at him, but I was mostly focused on getting someone else to make sure we aren’t caught in an ambush.

“Nah, I was just lookin’ for Bolero. I’ve got a feeling they won’t be able to keep watch tonight though…”

“Ah, yeah… Asimov seemed to get along with them pretty well…” He had such a defeated look on his face.

I was just about to walk off and resign myself to staying awake all night when Heinlein asked me another question.

“Hey… What’s your deal, anyway?”

Yeah, Heinlein had the gall to ask me what my deal was.

“Me? I’m just trying to live my life.”

“That’s it? Guess I should’ve expected something boring…”

“Well what about you? Is your ‘tragic backstory’ more exciting?”

“Hah, not compared to that guy,” Heinlein pointed to Asimov, who snored like a faraway thunderstorm. “I’m boring, just like you…”

“Nothin’ wrong with having a boring life.”

“Maybe… But is that what you really want?”

“What do you mean?”

“Don’t you want to do more than just live? Don’t you want to thrive?”

“Ugh, don’t tell me you're trying to recruit me to your cause or whatever again…”

“No dammit! It’s a genuine question!”

He looked so tired that I don’t think he could be anything but genuine. I never did like Heinlein, but he was always a terrible liar, probably why he liked non-answers so much.

“Okay, I’ll believe you… But I really haven’t thought much about the difference between living and thriving.”

“Let me put it like this, is this place really the best adepts can do?”

“What the hell’s that supposed to mean?”

“This is a shanty town in the middle of the boonies! I dare you to tell me this is the best we deserve!”

Heinlein made a really good point…

“Huh… that’s—”

My sentence was cut off by the din of gunfire.

Heinlein and I rushed out of the hut to find cops raiding the village. I could barely see what was happening from the bright light of their jeeps flooding the area. But the sounds of screaming were crystal clear. They were trampling over our gardens, knocking down our homes, cutting down children!

In the past, I said I would have just moved on if it had gotten this bad. Now it had gotten this bad, but I didn’t want to just run! How could I just let those pig bastards get away with this?!

Legally speaking, we were squatters, but do you think I really gave a damn about the law at that point?

“Tezla, wait!”

Heinlein probably wanted me to stay behind him, but if I was done running, then I was done hiding too.

Fusing shrapnel into a combination battering ram and shield, I used my septima, Caskett, for violence for the very first time. I probably would have been horrified at the way I crushed human bodies like bugs, but I was too full of rage and grief to care. Vila Azul was supposed to be a safe haven for adepts, but the rest of this shit world just couldn’t wait to barge in, huh?

The shield was surprisingly effective against bullets, but not rocket launchers. Taking a rocket head on, the shield shattered from the explosion, putting me out of commission.

My consciousness was pretty spotty by then, but I remember one last thing before passing out.

I was pinned under rubble, and my eye had been gouged out. This has to be the end, right?

But then lightning struck, and strong winds blew every which way. It was almost like a hurricane suddenly barged in. If I could barely comprehend what was happening before, then I was pretty much completely lost now. Maybe the Azure Striker had come to save us, maybe this was all just some weird dream. I laughed at it all and lost consciousness.

When I came to, I found that I had been carried to some other part of the forest, along with the other survivors.

Heinlein got ready to yell at us, but Asimov cut him off and just said.

“They’ve been through enough.”

The two of them began to walk away. I had waited for them to leave for so long, and now they had! But… I couldn’t stop thinking about what Heinlein had said, that we deserve better. Everyone who died that night couldn’t be brought back, but maybe those of us who lived could fight for a future where that would never happen again.

I got up, and began to follow Asimov and Heinlein. Before I knew it, so was everyone else.

“So you see? If those two assholes hadn’t stuck around as long as they did, we all would’ve died and there’d be no QUILL.”

“Woah, I had no idea.” Zeno said solemnly, stealing the words right out of my mouth.

Bolero had been quiet for the entire story, which I had assumed just meant they were being a good listener. But Tezla took her hand off of the steering apparatus and gently placed it on Bolero’s shoulder.

“If I hadn’t gotten drunk that night…” Bolero whispered to the point of near silence.

“Hey, if my septima made me hurt all the time, I’d drink a bunch too.”

Bolero had a gentle, sedate laugh.

“You probably shouldn’t let go of the steering.” They said, no longer seeming quite as melancholic.

“Ugh, really dude?” Tezla begrudgingly took back the controls, before joining in the laughter.

In the story Tezla told, despite her grievances, both Asimov and Heinlein sounded… heroic. Not only with the way they fought back against their violent oppressors, but with what Heinlein had said too. Then again, when he advocated for “adepts deserving better”, did he mean prosperity at the cost of non-adepts, or was he only just trying to soften the people of Vila Azul to the idea of genocide under the guise of a freedom fighter? But considering Clarke had already taken in the two as family (if his old photo albums were any indicator), maybe they didn’t start out so closely aligned to who they ended up becoming, and therefore wouldn’t have had to hide any sinister intentions. What happened? What changed? Does it even matter anymore now that both are dead?

It’s not productive to think about this, I should wait until the mission and the paper are complete.

Nearly seven hours later, and I’ve completed almost ten more pages of my thesis paper. It’s been much easier to focus ever since I’ve stepped aboard Speedcore. Who would have thought all it would take to make me a faster writer would be to put myself in mortal danger… I get the feeling I’ll be thinking that all night.

Bolero turned to talk to Zeno and I.

“Good morning, Zeno~” they said.

Zeno blinked awake.

“Oh, are we here?”

“Almost! But before you leave, we should go over codenames.”

Ah, right, codenames. I guess we had all forgotten about those earlier.

“Let’s start with our field operatives: Zeno, you’ll be ‘Mouse’, Moniqa, you’ll be ‘Grasshopper’. Is that okay with both of you?”

“Of course.” I said.

“Squeak, squeak!” Zeno poorly impersonated a mouse.

“Excellent,” Bolero clapped their hands in approval, “In that case, I’ll be ‘Meerkat’.”

“Hey, what about me?” Tezla jeered.

“Hmmm… How about… ‘Vesper Bat’.”

“Sounds pretty cool~”

“Since that’s all sorted out, let’s check the parachutes one more time.”

Oh god, I’m about to jump out of a plane. I was so focused on the paper that I had forgotten that I’m about to experience what falling at terminal velocity feels like.

We all confirmed that the parachutes were in usable condition. The only thing preventing our descent now is my own inhibitions.

“You scared?” Zeno asked me?

“Who, me? Of course not!”

I’m not scared, I’m terrified!

“Yeah, sure.” 

Zeno’s oxygen mask was already on, but his skepticism was still quite obvious despite the lack of visible facial expression.

“Ready to drop?” Tezla asked.

If I act calm, this ordeal will be over sooner.

“YEP, YEAH, UH-HUH, SUUUUUUPER READY!” I involuntarily screeched.

“More like ready to get this over with, hey-oh~!” Zeno quipped.

“Good enough for me,” Tezla turned to Bolero, “Hey, pass me a cig.”

Bolero opened the out-of-place glove box on the control console and grabbed a pack of cigarettes, placing one into Tezla’s mouth.

“You gonna light it?” She asked them.

“At least wait until they’re out of the plane.”

“Fiiiine.” Tezla sulked.

If I just follow what Zeno does, it should be okay.

Zeno and I crawled out from the control/passenger cabin into the compartment under the plane, it best resembles a bomb bay, but there are no bombs to be found, just us.

“One minute until I open the ventral hatch!” Tezla shouted.

In less than a minute, the floor under me will open up and I’ll be sent hurtling into oblivion.

“Thirty seconds!”

Just! Relax! And! It! Will! Be!! Fine!!!

“10… 9… 8… 7… 6… 5… 4… 3… 2… 1…”

If I die, at least I won’t have to deal with that thesis paper anymore…

“Good luck everyone!”

The hatch doors opened, and we were thrown into the howling twilight sky.

Chapter Text

Wind rushes all around me. Electric pink, dull blue, and deep gray swirl throughout. It was a beautiful and ethereal sight to behold… That’s what I thought before I remembered how I got here.

That’s right, I was just dropped out of the worst airplane ever and am rapidly falling towards oblivion, how could I forget.

“GHH—!”

That noise was supposed to be a scream, but my fear was so great that I couldn’t let out more than a gasp. Or maybe that had to do with how fast I was falling.

What’s more pressing is that I couldn’t tell which way up was supposed to be. Obviously, the dark ground was below and the sky was above, but I was spinning so much that I couldn’t get my bearings straight.

I wanted nothing more than to helplessly thrash around, like that would somehow do something. But that wouldn’t do anything, and I knew it. If I just let myself be scared, I’d die for sure, so I had to fight it!

Finally, I stop spinning around and find myself falling headfirst towards the ground. New problem: the longer I look at the ground, the darker it gets. How am I supposed to be able to tell when to open the parachute like this? If I open it too soon, the anti-air system at Stellantis would shoot me down instantly, but if I wait too long, then I die or get seriously injured.

When I look at the ground again, it’s even less distinct than before! I have no way of telling how far I am from the earth anymore! …No choice, better open the parachute now.

Suddenly getting jerked around by the harness wasn’t exactly painless, but at least I’m not falling at super speeds anymore. Only time will tell if I get detected. While I’m waiting, I may as well look for Zeno.

I look below, nothing but darkness.

I look around me, only mountains and a few scant gray clouds.

I look above, and can barely see another parachute, which must be Zeno.

Does that mean I could have opened mine sooner?!

Oh well, what’s done is done. All I can do until I land is hope nothing goes wrong and cling to my risers like my life depends on it (which it does.)

Outside Stellantis - 17:30

Despite how long it took to drift down, landing felt abrupt.

“Ouch!”

Somehow, I made it to the ground alive and in one piece. After checking for broken or dislocated bones (there were none), I rip off my oxygen mask and kiss the ground. I know I look ridiculous, but I truly cannot bring myself to care. If Zeno makes fun of me for this, then so be it.

Speaking of Zeno, I look around to see if he’s landed yet. I don’t end up seeing anyone from an immediate glance, but I hear a mellow “flomp” from behind, which turns out to be where Zeno landed.

As soon as he hit the ground, Zeno detached his harness and stood up. He must have really known what he was doing. Once a soldier, always a soldier, I suppose.

“Nice one Zeno, you’re a real pro at this.”

Zeno said nothing.

“Zeno?”

He raised his hands, still trembling, and struggled to take off his oxygen mask. When Zeno did finally get it off, he revealed a facial expression that could best be described as overwhelmed.

“They… make that look a lot easier in video games…”

“Huh?!”

So neither of us had actually done a HALO jump before this after all… It’s a miracle we’re both alive and unscathed.

Since we’re both accounted for, I should reestablish communication with Tezla and Bolero so they can know Zeno and I are alright… and to give them an earful for endangering us like that.

“Wait, what ?!” Tezla seemed genuinely shocked when she learned that Zeno had never skydived before, “Dude, why didn’t you say anything?! This whole plan hinged on you making sure Grasshopper didn’t go splat!”

“I mean, shutting up and following orders has served me pretty well… ” Zeno scratched the back of his head, “Yeah I was scared, but I thought if you were trusting me enough to do this, that it meant I could handle it.”

“Shit, I can’t believe I let Heinlein teach you kids to think that was okay…”

“Anyway,” Bolero cut in, “Do either of you see anything flying in the sky?”

I look up and only see the first stars of evening.

“Not a thing.” I said.

“Ditto.” Zeno added.

“Good, see what happens when you save up for high-quality cloaking devices?” They directed the question to Tezla.

“You’re never gonna let me live that down are you?” Tezla was now distracted by whatever Bolero was referencing.

“I’m not the one that got stuck in the Ural Mountains.”

“Hey, it worked out in the end, didn’t it?”

Oh great, they’re getting off track…

“Awaiting further instructions.” I interjected.

“Oh, right.” Tezla was brought back to the mission, “You and Mouse find a good spot to camp out, I’ll fly as fast as I can to pick up our ‘fireworks guy’. Meerkat or I’ll send a long distance transmission in a few hours.”

“Understood.”

“Toodle-oo~” Bolero said before ending the call.

Considering our surroundings were primarily made up of dust, rocks, and rubble, finding a good place to set up camp was easier said than done. At least it’s easy to bury a parachute here…

“Ugh, typical Tezla, never thinking things all the way through.” Zeno grumbled while laying face up on the parched ground.

“I’d say…”

I don’t think I’ve ever heard Zeno badmouth one of his allies like that, but it’s not like I’m going to disagree with him.

“You know, if it wasn’t for me, she would’ve died a long time ago.”

“Care to elaborate?”

“Sure, after we set up camp.”

“Of course.”

Oops, I’d almost forgotten about that.

Eventually, we find a door to a mostly intact cellar. There weren’t any complete corpses inside, only mangled bones with scant shreds of rotten flesh attached. We gave the best burial we could under the circumstances. We can’t fix what happened to them, but hopefully we can make sure nobody else suffers their fate.

After that, just waiting around in the cellar wasn’t all that difficult.

“So, what was that about Tezla?” I asked Zeno.

“Huh?”

“You said you’d talk about it after we set up camp.”

“Oh yeah.” Zeno put down the handgun he was inspecting, “This happened before I transferred to the Combat Unit. I used to work in R&D like most of the other small fry.”

“This was back when Tezla would have been in charge of that, right?”

“Yep. So me and the other kids made a thing out of watching this mecha anime that aired on fridays. It didn’t take long for us to think ‘Hey, we should make a mobile suit!’”

Zeno giggled a little before continuing his story.

“We um, made a whole slideshow presentation about why QUILL would benefit from having a mobile suit in our arsenal. We showed Tezla the presentation first, since this was her department. Can you make a wild guess for what she did next?”

“She… let you make a mobile suit action figure as a compromise?” I guessed, knowing he wouldn’t be telling this story if she had actually done something responsible like that.

“Ha, she said, ‘That… is the best idea I’ve ever heard!’ Tezla’s only stipulations were that no one tells Heinlein, because he’d call it ‘A waste of resources’ and that she does the dangerous parts. She’s irresponsible about herself, but not about us.”

That definitely lined up with how she talked about herself.

“Anyway, development on ‘Thrash Metal’ was going fine, until one day she was trying to fuse a gatling gun to its arm. What no one realized was that it was still loaded… Her septima must have lit the gunpowder inside, because it blew up, making her fly off of the platform all the way onto the ground.”

“Is that how she lost the arm?!”

“No, even I don’t know what happened to her other arm. She was super lucky I just happened to be right there while she was bleeding and broken, I cut myself as soon as I could.”

Ever-living really is an incredibly useful septima, I just wish Zeno didn’t have to hurt himself to heal other people with it…

“I was all like ‘Miss Tezla, please don’t die!’ It took a while for her to catch up with everything, it all happened pretty quick. Covered in blood, she looked at me and said,” Zeno cleared his throat before getting into his Tezla impression, “‘Woah, little man, you just saved my life…’ and then she got up to wash the blood off of her like nothing happened.”

“Wow, I’ve heard of living every day like it’s your last, but I don’t think it’s supposed to be taken so literally…”

“Haha, yeah… Thrash Metal ended up getting, well, thrashed. I transferred to the Combat Unit not long after that, and then a few years later Tezla would quit over some ‘creative differences’ with Heinlein over submarine construction.”

“Well, that was um, quite the story.”

“Really, it’s nothing short of a miracle that Haunted House didn’t explode from the sheer lack of safety measures.”

In contrast, on the other side of Eurasia, the Rama Building was basically just a dingy old office space. Remembering Geneva reminds me to get back to my paper.

Another five pages done before I’m interrupted by an incoming call. This must be the long distance transmission we were told to wait for.

“Grasshopper, Mouse, you both here?” Tezla asked.

“Affirmative.” I replied.

“Well, I’ve got bad news, we can’t find him.”

Uh oh. If Yugo isn’t here to distract security, this whole mission falls apart.

“What happened?” Zeno asked.

Bolero stated, “I’ve tried again and again to sense him, but there’s so much interference from weather and pollution that I just can’t discern what’s what down there.”

“He’s not responding to any calls either,” Tezla added.

“So what now?” I asked.

Tezla sighed.

“Neither of you are strong enough to make this work without a diversion, no offense.”

None taken. Zeno’s septima makes him nearly indestructible, but doesn’t have any offensive capabilities… and I have no septima, so I’m even more of a liability.

“This really sucks, but I don’t think we have any choice but to abort the mission. So, I guess just wait a few hours for me to come pick you up. Feel free to call us back if anything changes.”

The call ended.

“Well, I guess that’s that.” Zeno took out one of the erotic magazines Tezla gave us and started flipping through the pages, “Probably for the best, I’m kinda out of shape anyway.”

“Yeah, and now I have more time to finish my paper, but still…”

“It bites, but what can we do?”

What can we do indeed…

Within the next hour and a half, I only ended up writing two more pages to my paper. Since I don’t feel like I’m in immediate danger (even though I still am), I’m not quite as speedy a writer.

As I inspect my most recently written paragraph, I find myself overcome with an urge and stand up, moving to leave the cellar.

“Where are you going?” Zeno asked, not looking up from the game he was playing on his phone.

“I have to uh, relieve myself.”

“Kay, just be careful. They’ve got surveillance on the ground too.”

“I know.”

I walked out of the cellar into the wasteland. The only light came from the floodlights surrounding Stellantis Air Base in the distance, which would have been a pain to deal with if I was actually going to sneak in tonight.

While I think about how much I miss toilet paper, I notice something strange among the shadowy debris, it looks almost like a toy ball. Perhaps it was a child’s toy, never to be played with again.

If only Yugo hadn’t decided to go urbexing in one of the northernmost cities in the world in the dead of winter for some godforsaken reason. Who knows what further horrors Scorepion will cause once it’s finished?

But I can’t do anything about it now, I should just go back to the cellar and continue to hide until Tezla arrives in her horrible scrap airplane.

I look at the ball one last time before I go back, and see that it’s disappeared. Maybe it rolled away while I wasn’t looking?

When I shut the decrepit wooden doors, I find that I can’t stop thinking about that toy ball. I think that maybe it embodies my anger at my lack of ability to do anything about the atrocities surrounding me, but something about that theory doesn’t sound quite right. Don’t get me wrong, I’m furious about all this, but there’s something else, almost like a strange familiarity. Have I seen that toy ball before?

“Hey, don’t get so bent out of shape. They can’t all be winners.”

Zeno’s comment distracted me from the strange toy ball.

“You know, you’ve really mellowed out over the years.”

“Have I?”

“Yeah, if this was happening a couple years ago back when Team Sheeps was still around, you’d be furious.”

“I guess so. Then again, as cool as Japan was, it’s not exactly a relaxing place to be.”

“Especially when I have to live in a musty cabin in the middle of nowhere with you for four months.”

“That statement goes both ways, Moniqa.”

Zeno and I stared at each other with mild contempt, and then we broke out into laughter. We really annoyed the hell out of one another back then, huh?

“Uh…” Zeno muttered.

“What’s wrong?”

I turned around to find a laser sight pointed directly at me.

“Oh.”

“PUT YOUR HANDS WHERE I CAN SEE THEM.” A distorted robotic voice commanded us.

We had no choice but to comply.

“GOOD. NOW PLACE ALL OF YOUR FOOD AND WATER ONTO THE GROUND.”

Neither of us had much of either, considering the short-term nature of our mission. Nevertheless, we complied because it beat getting blasted in the head.

“WHAT? IS THAT REALLY ALL YOU HAVE?”

“Yep.” Zeno replied, maybe a bit too nonchalantly.

“LIAR.”

“The two of us can only carry so much!” I retorted.

“YOUR VOICES, THEY SOUND FAMILIAR…”

Is this really how security around Stellantis is? It seems… just a touch unorthodox.

“I REMEMBER NOW!” The voice changed from a distorted robotic sound to a robotic voice that resembled an adolescent girl, “Moniqa, Zeno, what are you two doing here?”

“Lola?!” I cried out in surprise.

“The one and only~!” She boasted.

Lola appeared from under a discarded plank, the two P-Bits that had been threatening us floating behind her. Getting a better look, it seems the “toy ball” I lamented over earlier was actually just another P-bit…

“But seriously, why are you here?” She asked.

“We were going to destroy a giant tank made out of smaller tanks that’s being built around here, but the plan fell through…”

“Hey,” Zeno interrupted, “If you’re here, does that mean he is too?”

“Um, about that… It’s kind of a funny story actually.”

The P-Bits swarmed around Lola to generate a miniature laser show depicting a tired Copen and Lola.

“It’s pretty exhausting wandering around all the time, right? Especially when you have to walk around on two feet.” The lasers then changed positions to depict some sort of spaceship, “I could tell how much this was getting to Copen, so I thought about what I could do about that. And then I remembered that one time he snuck into that Sumeragi space station—”

“He what?!” Zeno suddenly asked.

“Yeah, he used a small spacecraft,” I told Zeno what Lola told me two years ago, “Didn’t I tell you back in Rome?”

“No???” Zeno was dumbfounded, “Rich people are crazy…”

“As I was saying,” Lola didn’t seem too pleased about getting cut off during her story, “We found the ol’ Cosmo Copen and everything was great!”

The laser rocket then exploded in a burst of light, changing back into a depiction of Copen and Lola, lying face down.

“…Then we flew too close to the ground, the cloaking device failed, and we got shot down. We’ve been stuck in the desert for like, a week now.”

The lasers dissipated.

“If this happened in the past, we probably would have been long gone by now. But it’s not the past, and Copen…” Lola sank, “Copen holed himself up in some ruins and refuses to move. He’s just letting himself waste away, and won’t even let me help him!”

Lola’s incapable of crying, but if she could, I’m sure she would be right now.

“What do you want us to do about it?” Zeno asked rather coldly.

“I just thought that if I got him something to eat or drink, he’d get out of this funk…”

Zeno picked his phone up off the ground and resumed the game he was playing.

“Yeah alright, take whatever you want, just don’t bother us.”

“Really?! Thanks a bunch!”

I briefly thought about the logistics of Lola and the P-Bits trying to carry our ultra compact water and nutrient packets.

“Lola, before you go, do you need any help carrying these?” I asked her.

“Actually, I have that covered. But… maybe you could help me talk some sense into him?”

I wasn’t sure that was a good idea, but Lola was desperate. May as well give it a shot.

“Seriously?” Zeno sounded annoyed, “If the plane arrives before you come back, I’m leaving without you.”

“Did you get a rock stuck in your boot? Why are you acting like this?” I needed to get to the bottom of Zeno’s sudden crabbiness.

“In case you forgot,” Zeno put his phone away and stood up, “Copen shot you.”

“Yeah, but—”

“And me, a lot. If he wants to die here then that’s his problem.”

Lola said nothing and started to float away, I followed close behind carrying the packets she forgot about.

Outside Stellantis - 20:00

Lola and I wandered through the wastes until we reached what looked like a partially reconstructed shed.

“Thanks for coming along, you really didn’t have to.” Lola told me.

“I don’t have much better to do tonight.”

I did have the other thirteen pages of my thesis to write, but I could take care of that on the plane.

“To be honest, this might just make things worse… But we won’t know until—” Lola suddenly stopped speaking.

“Lola? Are you alright?”

“Someone’s watching us.”

I pull out the handgun I brought along with me. Although, with Lola standing next to me, I don’t think I’ll need it.

“Come out or else you’ll regret it!” Lola threatened.

Zeno rose up from the shattered remains of a wall.

“Jeez, I really must be rusty at the whole stealth thing…”

“Or maybe I’m just that good~” Lola teased.

“What are you doing here? I thought you didn’t want to get involved.” I asked Zeno.

“I don’t, but if Copen tries some shit again, I’m going to make sure he doesn’t.”

He sounds awfully confident for someone who only stood a chance against Copen when he was on the brink of exhaustion. Then again, Copen doesn’t sound like he’s faring much better these days either…

We entered the shed to find Copen laying at the other end of the room, somewhat resembling a crumpled piece of paper.

“Boss, I brought you some stuff to eat. I bet you’ll think of a super smart plan as soon as you're not running on fumes.” Lola spoke quieter than I’ve ever heard her speak.

A closer look at Copen made me realize how sunken his cheeks have become, I’m not sure I want to think about how thin he’s gotten under his cracked armor.

“Why… do you keep coming back…?” Copen muttered.

“Stop asking that and eat something!” Lola pleaded.

Copen’s vacant eyes moved to stare at the wall, away from Lola.

“Please boss, I can’t bear to see you like this!”

“Too bad, it’s what a demon like me deserves…”

This really is painful to watch. There probably isn’t anything I could say to get Copen to change, but I should at least try for Lola’s sake.

“What do you think you’re trying to accomplish here?” I asked.

Copen paid attention to my voice, probably the first one aside from Lola’s he’s heard all week.

“Oh, you didn’t die.” Copen sounded neither relieved nor disappointed, “My sins… are too heavy to bear, all I can do now is let them crush me.”

“But that’s not helping anyone. In fact, you’re only hurting the one person that still cares about you.”

“Yeah! At least let me use that new Healing Mode you installed, you big dummy!”

“Lola…” 

Copen sounded apprehensive, could this actually work?

“I made Lola to care about me, she doesn’t count.”

…Nevermind.

“I don’t count?” Lola was rightfully offended.

Zeno had seen enough and left the room.

Copen struggled to sit up, and looked directly at Lola.

“You don’t have to take this from me. Just leave if you want, I don’t deserve your help anyway.”

An uncomfortable silence permeated the air, until Lola spoke about a minute later.

“…Okay.”

She left the room after that. I couldn’t think of a good reason to stay either, so I joined Lola outside.

“Sorry Lola, you did your best.” I tried to console her.

Lola made a resigned sighing noise.

“Man, it’s just failure after failure tonight, huh?” Zeno remarked.

“So… how exactly did that plan of yours ‘fall through’, anyway?” Lola asked us.

“Another person was supposed to meet us and distract the Americans,” I answered, “But he went missing…”

“That’s gotta bite…”

We all sat silently in the rubble for a bit after that. Eventually, Zeno remembered something.

“You know, even if Yugo showed up, I’m not sure he would’ve been as good a distraction as you and Copen were back in the Vatican.”

“Ehh? Were we really that loud?”

“Yeah, pretty much.”

As the two continued to converse, I noticed that Zeno warmed up to Lola pretty quickly. I guess his ill will is exclusive to Copen, which is completely understandable all things considered.

Just as the topic of conversation began to shift to how Zeno’s streaming persona totally isn’t a ripoff of Lumen, we all heard a shuffling noise.

“Boss?!”

Copen had left the ruined shed and was barely standing.

“I’ll do it.”

“You’ll… do what?” I asked.

“You need a diversion, right? I can do that.”

“In your condition?!”

“If I die, I die.”

“Sounds good to me, welcome to the team.” Zeno snarked.

“Lola.” Copen rasped.

“Yes?”

“I give you my permission to heal or revive me.”

“Really?! Yippee!!”

Lola started glowing and then transformed into the green-haired girl I saw singing back in the Roman Colosseum. Only this time she seemed to be wearing a costume that resembled a scantily clad Catholic nun. I don’t even want to begin trying to think what was going on in Copen’s head when he came up with that look, that’s for his future therapist to unpack.

Copen’s eyes became slightly less vacant, and a festering wound on his face instantly scarred over. I also heard several painful sounding crunching and popping noises, but Copen hardly seemed to react to those.

When Lola healed all she could, the nun cosplay vanished. Copen now stood up straight.

“What are you all looking at? We have a plan to form.”

As we exchanged information, it became clear that Copen and Lola were unlucky enough to be flying right near this area at the same exact time Scorepion was in the middle of a field test using civilian homes as targets.

When I showed Copen the leaked schematics of Scorepion Bolero sent to me, he confirmed that the machine was indeed a sloppily put together abomination of Sumeragi and Eunos machines, and that it should have a whole plethora of weaknesses to exploit.

“This has to be the single worst design I’ve ever seen. Is this really what shot the Sabertooth down?” Copen sounded disgusted.

“So how do we destroy it?” I asked him.

“It will destroy itself.” Copen stated, not answering my question.

“Okay but how do we make it destroy itself faster?” Zeno added.

“You have a lot of options, but with your equipment I would personally go for the joints.” Copen pointed to the diagram and zoomed in, “Not only are the front arms the only way for the console to operate the Mantises, but they also bear a significant portion of Scorepion’s weight.” He pointed to the remarkably small section of the joint structure connecting a Mantis tank to the rest of Scorepion, “I bet that part there has to be constantly maintained, because if it’s warped even a little bit, the whole arm would tear itself apart, understand?”

“Sounds easy enough.” Zeno said.

“And you’re sure that there won’t be any safeguards to make up for that structural fault?” I comment.

“I doubt it, military contractors love cost-cutting measures.”

“And with something this big? They’re bound to slip up!” Lola cheerfully added on.

Just then, I was interrupted by a pop-up window asking me to accept or decline a video call. It appeared to be from Tezla, so I accepted.

“This is Vesper Bat,” Tezla spat out the remains of a cigarette before continuing to speak, “We’re within rendezvous range up in the sky, how’re things on the ground?”

Oh right, because the plan is back on, Zeno and I won’t be leaving so soon.

“Grasshopper speaking,” I angled the camera to my face, away from Copen, “Operation Antivenom is back on.”

“It is?” Tezla was unsurprisingly confused.

“How did you and Mouse manage that?” Bolero asked.

“It’s kind of a long story…” Zeno glanced over to Lola, who was casually rolling around to pass the time.

“You know what?” Tezla interrupted, “We don’t have time for a long story. If you think you can make this work, then go for it!”

Guess we’re doing this after all… for real this time.

“Ok, see you soon probably.” Zeno calmly said his goodbyes.

“I’ll be around in case you need an emergency pickup. Vesper Bat, out!”

The call ended. Tezla’s right, the night only goes on for so long, and we’ve lost enough time as it is.

Clouds have begun to gather, blotting out the stars. This would provide a great advantage for sneaking into Stellantis if it were not for the fact that the exterior of the air base is so well lit that it may as well be noon.

“So, since you’re a part of this now, do either of you want a codename?” Zeno asked Copen and Lola over comms, “Maybe something like… Catboy and Yarn Ball?”

Zeno and I crouched behind a boulder Lola tossed onto a cracked runway using a capture field generated from the P-Bits (apparently that’s how she would have brought food and water to Copen), providing us with some extra cover from the lights.

“Oooh, what a cute theme~!” Lola sounded delighted.

“You are absolutely not going to call me ‘Catboy’.” Copen hissed.

“We’re going to need something to call you by.” I reminded him.

“I’m starting in one minute, cut the comms unless you want to lose your hearing permanently.” Copen deflected from the codenaming question.

Copen and Lola were positioned on the exact opposite end of Stellantis from where Zeno and I will enter from.

“Whatever you say, Catboy.” Zeno taunted him and then took off his earpiece before Copen could get mad at him about it.

Right after we stopped talking, Zeno took out the earplugs he put in for the HALO jump and put them back in his ears. I followed suit with my own earplugs.

Zeno then paid close attention to his phone’s stopwatch, after around fifty seconds passed, he put the phone away and held up three fingers, then two fingers, then one. The moment he closed his fist, several explosions could be heard in the distance.

He darted out from the boulder and sprinted towards the gates as a horrid screeching rang out from the same direction the explosions could be heard from. I pushed myself to the very limit to keep up with Zeno, but I believe I was only able to keep up because I knew the consequence for slowing down would be fatal.

By the time we reached the shutter that would normally shoot down unauthorized persons on sight, the entire facility was already in the midst of a power outage. All we had to do was push the shutter out of the way, and Zeno’s lockpicking skills did the rest to open a way in.

My heartrate had barely begun to calm down before Zeno yanked my arm and brought me into the base with him. Emergency power was already switched on when we had infiltrated the outer perimeter of the air base. And when we entered the interior of the main building, the power was fully restored.

Stellantis Building 1 - 21:10

Copen’s plan for the infiltration truly was a feat of efficiency and quick thinking. All of the runways around Stellantis are in various states of disrepair and therefore have a plethora of exposed wiring where lights would have been. Lola was connected to one of these exposed wires, which gave her enough energy to kick into overdrive mode on command and blast soundwaves reaching well over 140 decibels for four minutes straight. When Lola’s display of audio warfare was done, she would send a fierce electrical output through the wires to cause the blackout Zeno and I just used to get past the gate and the stretch of land between that and the air base proper.

And now that we’re inside, there’s no calling Tezla or Bolero for help until we get out. The goal now is to find the server room that every computer system on base is connected to. Once we find it, I can upload the virus and destroy any data stored here.

In the meantime, I’ve been hiding in a rather cluttered storage room, waiting for Zeno to finish scouting a safe route to said server room, and trying to find where exactly Scorepion is stored as well.

“Mouse here, I found a route, so hang tight until I come back.”

The communications barrier only applies to signals entering or leaving the outer gates of the base, otherwise it would be impossible for work to be carried out as usual for the staff. This also means that Zeno and I can call each other so long as one of us doesn't leave.

“This is Grasshopper, I’ll just keep doing what I’ve been doing then.”

I attempt to work on my paper when I hear footsteps. Either it’s Zeno or some American soldier that may or may not get shot with a tranq round from my Schaf pistol, depending on how nosy they get of course.

“Ugh, stupid water rationing…” an unfamiliar voice complained, “I’m thirsty and my ears hurt…”

Definitely an American, voice sounds like a woman’s too.

“Were these boxes always arranged like this? Hmm…”

Uh oh.

I could hear her footsteps getting closer… and closer… and closer… until—

“What the—”

I fire a dart right between her eyes, she passes out before she could finish her sentence.

…And now I have an unconscious body to deal with that could probably wake up at any moment. Fantastic.

“Nice one,” Zeno’s voice startled me, causing me to accidentally fire another dart, wasting my limited ammo…

“When did you get here?!” I tried not to shout.

“Not long after that guy went ‘thunk’.”

“Great, let’s get out of here.”

“Before that… I just got an idea~”

Zeno crouched down and began to peel the unconscious soldier’s fatigues off.

“Hey ‘Grasshopper’, do me a favor and change your clothes.” Zeno asked me way too casually.

“Excuse me? ”

“You’re gonna be sitting around a bunch once we get to the server room, so you may as well blend in, right?”

“Oh, right, of course…”

“Jeez, get your head outta the gutter. I’m not even into 3D women.” Zeno turned the other way so I could change in (relative) peace.

In the end, I was able to just slip the disguise over what I was already wearing, but I appreciated the courtesy anyway.

Moving aside from that awkward reunion, the uniform I hurriedly donned is a lot heavier than it looks, so keeping up with Zeno is still a challenge.

“Attention: Hostile intruder sighted in Building 2. Approach with extreme caution.” An automated voice alerted personnel, completely oblivious to the other two intruders wandering about.

After a cautious procession across the corridor, we encountered a freight elevator. With the swipe of a (stolen) keycard, we entered said elevator and went up to the second floor.

Much like the first floor, I find myself following Zeno through nearly identical hallways studded with entrances to rooms of varying purposes. Zeno stopped and clung to a corner wall, it didn’t take long for me to hear why.

“—And we’re stuck here guarding this dumbass computer room!” An agitated voice grumbled.

So there’s at least one guard stationed in front of the server room, probably two considering he said “we’re” instead of “I’m.”

“What?” A lower, duller voice replied to the agitated one.

“You heard me. This shit sucks.”

“Not really, my ears are like, all fucked up man.”

As the agitated guard continued to complain about how bored he was, Zeno leaned over to whisper a plan to me.

Zeno finished explaining the plan and then moved behind me, mimicking the movement of my legs exactly as I walked, almost like something out of an old cartoon.

The guards didn’t seem to notice me until I was almost directly in front of them.

“What’s up dude–I mean Sir!” the agitated soldier greeted me, as I’m still disguised as one of them.

“Huh? When did you get here, Sir?” The dull-voiced soldier’s hearing must be pretty messed up from Lola’s initial assault.

“You’re both wanted at the southern watch tower, I’ll be taking over here.” I said in my best American accent.

“Heheheh,” the agitated soldier giggled for some reason, “You doing an accent or something?”

I might have overcompensated on sounding American…

“Is she? I can’t tell.” The dull-voiced soldier asked.

“Well, howdy-doo? I’m a rootin-tootin cowboy!” The agitated soldier no longer sounded bored to the point of agitation.

“Yee-haw.” The dull-voiced soldier joined in.

They continued to talk like cowboys for a while. It’s good that they’re distracted, but they’re still right in front of the server room. If I talk again, it might snap them out of it and I don’t think I should risk that.

Just as I started to worry about my current predicament, the sound of a stack of papers flying across the hall caught my attention, as well as the guards.

“What was that?!” The once-again-agitated soldier asked.

“What was what?” The dull-voiced soldier’s hearing had not improved.

“Maybe we’re finally under attack!” The agitated soldier sounded almost excited.

Both guards ran towards the direction of the noise, leaving the server room unattended.

“Wow, just look at these things!” Zeno exclaimed in a hushed tone.

The server room was packed with row after row of towers, all full of state-of-the-art computing hardware.

“Now to find a terminal…” Zeno started walking into the hall of computers.

He went in one direction and I another. There wasn’t a lot of ground to cover, but that would be all the more reason to be quick with this, just in case those guards come back and get curious.

“Hey! Come over here and look at this!” Zeno must have found something.

I wander in the direction his voice came from until I end up in the back of the room.

“Did you find it?”

“Yeah, but look!”

Zeno giggled and pointed to a beige monitor sitting on a desk placed between two sleek, black towers.

“This is the terminal? It looks ancient!” I was aghast.

“I know right? A beauty like this should be used for playing sexy point and click games, not greasing the wheels of the war machine!”

“Seriously though, is it safe to have your modern, prohibitively expensive systems managed by a machine that probably still uses floppy disks?”

“No need to badmouth old tech… But you may have a point…”

Zeno’s eyes drift towards a sticky note stuck to the side of the monitor. We both take a closer look at what’s written on it and see:

CONSOLE FOR AGENT BENZ USE ONLY

PASSWORD: S@S0R1

“I, uh, think I found the password.”

I rub my eyes and squint to make sure what I’m seeing is real.

“There’s no way Edie’s dumb enough to just leave the password here.”

“Her sister would beg to differ.”

Zeno turned on the monitor, and before I could tell him to slow down, he inputted the password from the sticky note.

The blue desktop background became cluttered with a pile of folders.

“Oh cool, it actually was the password.”

“You really shouldn’t be so cavalier about this…” I chided Zeno, who didn’t listen.

While Zeno browsed the massive library of unencrypted files, I crouched down to look for a good USB port to deliver the viral payload into the servers once we get whatever information we need.

“This is incredible,” Zeno was in awe, “Every other computer in this room takes orders from this little thing! I could probably turn off the communications barrier from here if I really wanted to.”

“But that might trigger some sort of automated alert.”

“Yeah, probably…”

First I look at the front of the computer, the wires are nicely organized, and I do indeed see a slot for 3.5 inch floppy diskettes, but nothing for USB. I crawl over to the back, there’s usually a better chance of finding something there. The back of the computer has a lot of different ports… but none of them are for USB.

“Uh oh.” I mumbled.

“What do you mean ‘uh oh’?”

“This computer is so old that there are no USB ports!”

“For real?!”

“I’m serious!”

Zeno crouched under the desk to look for what I just told him wasn’t there. In the meantime I took over browsing duties. He had been searching for where Scorepion is located, but could only seem to find the same schematics we had seen earlier.

“We might have underestimated Edie…” Zeno rose up from under the desk, defeated.

“She put her password on a sticky note, I’m sure one of us will figure something out.” I didn’t fully believe what I said, but it’s more productive than moping around.

“Yeah, you’re right,” Zeno stood up and stretched himself out, “Well, let’s get to it.”

Zeno had found tons of information on Scorepion’s construction, down to the material of each screw, but still not where in the base it’s being built. In the meantime, I attempted to communicate with Copen and Lola, the communication barrier shouldn’t be an issue as long as we’re all inside the air base gates.

“This is Grasshopper, how are you holding up?”

It took a moment, but Lola finally responded.

“Oh you know, we’re hanging in there.”

“We just fought a knockoff Plasma Legion,” Copen added, “It was puny and shoddily assembled.”

“I see. That reminds me, Ca—”

“Just say Copen.”

“Copen, I couldn’t help but notice that your hearing seems just as keen as ever. I’m sure you were right near Lola during her sound attack, so how did you avoid it?”

“I damaged my eardrums in advance. Couldn’t hear a thing until Lola healed me.” Copen said in a monotone voice that implied that the string of words he just uttered was normal and not completely deranged.

“Oh yeah, I’m super good at healing!” Lola boasted.

“Glad to hear that,” I replied hesitantly, “Things on our side have been—”

The sound of heavy machinery jumping cut through the comms.

“Hold that thought, we have another Plastic Legion to fight.” Copen hung up.

Zeno was spinning around in the office chair by the terminal.

“I just remembered something!” He exclaimed.

Zeno spun around again, swiping my tablet laptop in the process.

“Hey!”

“Relax, I’ll give back in a second.”

Keeping true to his word, Zeno gave my device back just as quickly as he had taken it.

It seems that Zeno had opened a couple of windows, although I am unsure what their purposes are.

“Now if you’ll excuse me,” Zeno hopped out of the office chair, “I’ve got a Scorepion to find.”

“What?! Are you just going to look around aimlessly?!”

“And whatever you do, don’t close those two windows.” Zeno ignored my concerns as he pulled out a selfie stick and donned a mask bearing his streaming persona Farfallina’s face.

I sighed.

“Please don’t die.”

“Relax, it’s all part of the plan!”

With that, Zeno left the server room.

I may not have a solution for the compatibility issue with the ports at the moment, but at the very least I can continue to search for more information through the terminal. There has to be something I can do while Zeno’s off doing his stupid dangerous plan, whatever it is.

“Psst, hey, can you hear me?” Zeno’s hushed voice suddenly came out from my headset.

“Loud and clear, did you find Scorepion?”

There was an uncomfortably long silence after I responded.

“…Hello?” I ask to make sure Zeno’s still there.

“Whoopsie daisy, forgot to turn comms back on.”

If Zeno’s communicator wasn’t on… Then how was he talking to me?

“Sorry about that, I should be able to hear you now.” Zeno’s voice had a bizarre echo to it.

“Mouse, how were you talking to me earlier? And did you find Scorepion?”

“Heh, before I left Iceland I just happened to be testing out a subcutaneous microphone one of my roommates was cookin’ up. Doesn’t seem to have any issues connecting to your laptop… And no, I still haven’t found it.”

“That stuff about the microphone is neat and all, but what does it have to do with the mission?”

“All will be clear as soon as I find a certain someone’s evil twin~”

Has Zeno always been this cryptic about his plans? It’s not coy, just annoying…

Focusing back on the terminal, just from a brief glance I am in awe at the variety of files I find: personnel files, developmental details on the communications barrier, surveillance data on the surrounding villages before they were reduced to shrapnel, and even a report on last week’s field test.

[…] surrounding areas were completely leveled. The movement of Scorepion had significantly improved since locomotion tests. However, the treads from the modified Mantis units have an issue of throwing rubble into the joints, nearly causing the left Mantis to break off. This can be remedied if additional reinforcement is added to the joints joining the Mantises to the chassis, although there is the risk of more armor hampering mobility and speed. Those attributes are not high priority for Scorepion, but if they are ignored then this whole project would be a pointless endeavor.

In an unexpected turn of events, Scorepion’s anti-air systems ended up being tested as well. As Scorepion was on its way back to Stellantis, an unidentified aircraft had suddenly appeared within the base’s designated airspace. Such a sudden appearance could only be explained from use of cloaking technology, typical of a spycraft. Before it could leave, I ordered it to be shot down with Scorepion (a report of the anti-air test is on the next page). The aircraft seemed to be privately owned, although its weapons systems were […]

The rest of the report consisted of various theories of the origin of Copen’s spaceship, none of which even coming close to the ridiculous truth. Unfortunately, there was nothing about where Scorepion is in there either. How could it possibly be this difficult to find something so large?!

“Looks like it’s showtime.” Zeno whispered playfully.

The sound was once again coming from the subcutaneous microphone. Upon closer inspection, I could see soundwaves displayed on one of the windows Zeno had opened on my tablet laptop

At that moment, I found out what the other window was for when I was suddenly getting a live video feed that seemed to be coming from a phone camera. Zeno could be seen holding the phone with a selfie stick and was concealing his face with the Farfallina mask.

“Hello there my little caterpillars, glad you could make it to my super special Mystery Stream~” He spoke in an effeminate voice.

Is this his plan?! He can’t even stream right now! (At least not to anyone outside of Stellantis Air Base)

“Mouse, what the hell are you doing?!” I screech to Zeno through comms.

“I was traveling again and I somehow found this weird place~” Zeno ignored me.

“Ugh, I really wish I could just type those weekly reports from my quarters…” A strange voice echoed throughout the hallway. It sounded almost like Tezla’s, but more uptight, and subjected to far less cigarettes.

“Whoa, there are other people here?” Zeno pretended to act surprised.

“Who said that?!” The other voice cried out.

All of a sudden, a woman that could only possibly be Tezla’s twin sister, Edie, came around the corner and approached Zeno.

“Guards! We have a trespasser!”

Zeno was quickly surrounded. If his plan was to get killed, I’d say he’s doing a great job right now.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, what’s all this?” Zeno put on an innocent act.

“Put your hands behind your head!” Edie barked, “And someone confiscate that phone and mask already!”

The selfie stick was ripped away from Zeno’s hands and I was back to only receiving audio.

“How did you even get here?!” Edie demanded.

“You see, I just love traveling to abandoned places around the world and making videos about it!”

“Does this place look abandoned to you?!”

“Kinda…”

Edie made an exasperated gasp in response.

“Well, have you at least seen a strange boy in white armor? Or perhaps a small red drone?” Edie no longer sounded as screechy, she must really think Zeno's just some annoying traveler.

“A what?” Zeno put on his best confused act.

“Don’t worry about it. I’ll escort you out.”

“Oh, um…”

“What, did you think you’d be able to stay? Don’t be ridiculous.”

“It’s not that— It’s um…”

“Do you want me to subscribe to your channel or something? All you D-list internet celebrities are the same…”

“You’d really subscribe? Wow, thanks!”

“I bet you would like that, wouldn’t you?” Edie said scornfully.

“My channel’s called ‘Travels With Isotta Fraschini’! That’s my name, by the way~”

“Hm, kind of a weird name…”

“Not as weird as someone named Edwardina in this day and age…” Zeno muttered in his normal voice.

“Wh—” Edie sputtered, “That… That’s my full first name… WHY DO YOU KNOW MY FULL FIRST NAME?!!”

“Oopsie daisy, did I say something I shouldn’t have?” Zeno taunted purposefully.

“You… I bet my sister has something to do with this!” Edie correctly guessed, “Apprehend this terrorist and bring him to my quarters! I have some questioning to do…”

Sounds of rough manhandling and the synchronized thudding of boots followed.

Edie’s voice barely came through, I couldn’t make out what she said. But considering the marching sounded like it stopped, I’m willing to bet she ordered some kind of command to halt.

“I can make my weekly report after this shit’s all settled. May as well nip this in the bud as soon as I can.” Edie was audible again.

As the marching started up again, I took a moment to think about what Edie said. If she was about to write up her weekly report, then she probably would have done so with the terminal I’m using right now. Which means that Zeno’s little stunt just saved me from having to deal with Edie in person. I can’t say I’m not grateful, but I’m really worried about what he just got himself into.

Edie and her lackeys seem to have been marching for a while, I guess her quarters must be pretty far off.

In the meantime, I continue to browse through Edie’s past reports through the server room terminal.

The reports that pique my curiosity the most would have to be the oldest ones, as they seem to have nothing to do with Scorepion.

First I look at some files titled under “Operation Chessmaster”. Dated nearly five ago, Edie details a meeting she apparently had with the founders of Eden.

[…] a boy and a young girl. Even at their young ages, they’ve already turned Tashkent, and by extension the whole of Uzbekistan, into their informal kingdom. If left unchecked, they will certainly become a threat to American national security. Giving weaponry and supplies to their organization, Eden, may seem counterintuitive, but they intend to use their force to invade and destabilize Japan. On the chance that Eden’s invasion is a success, it would become possible to gain knowledge on the secrets behind Sumeragi’s proprietary septima suppression technology. Once the United States has such technology for themselves, any threat Eden and other adept terrorists possess will be no more.

Is that really how Eden acquired their resources? If there weren’t a countless amount of historical precedents for surreptitious warfare like that, I would almost think it’s too insane to believe.

The next folder had the title of “Operation Perry.” If I had to guess, I would say that “Perry” refers to Commodore Matthew Perry, an American naval officer who essentially forced Japan to end Sakoku, leading to the westernization of the country not long after.

[…]infiltrated exactly six months ago, and not a single suspicion has been raised. Even after Eden’s little stunt, it would appear that Japan still places far too much confidence on Kamishiro. Perhaps said confidence isn’t without merit, as I still have no idea how it works.

Thankfully, I have made significant progress on my main mission. Sumeragi has many data centers around the world, but the only one with data pertaining to controlling septima is located in their home country. Of course, such data is so heavily encrypted that stealing it outright would be a nearly sisyphean task. But if one were to have the credentials and appearance of a Sumeragi employee with sufficient clearance, they would have access to a plethora of information secret to the rest of the world. Copies of relevant documents are available on[…]

So Edie was spying in Japan, leaking out documents on Sumeragi’s oh-so precious septima tech to the American government, taking a particular interest in the two sub-glaives that contained additional septima from the deceased head of Project Muse, Nova Tsukuyomi. If she was able to do this, then I’m really starting to doubt Tezla’s claims of her twin’s incompetence…

Edie’s espionage would certainly explain how that underground prison laboratory in New York could make any progress in developing glaive derivatives a couple of years ago.

A bit more searching and I found a folder containing information on a “Project Surimi.” I’m not exactly sure what surimi is, but since the folder only has two documents in it, I doubt it would take very long for me to skim through.

The first file describes the aftermath of QUILL’s attack on the prison lab.

[…]only successful subject was completely destroyed. Much of the equipment in the facility was broken beyond repair as well, as were the servers hosting project data. At the very least, IT was able to salvage enough information to allow this project to reach its next phase.

The rest of the document details the attempts to track down the trio of QUILL agents that wreck the facility. The search ended without a conclusion, which probably meant that the trio got away.

The second and last file didn’t follow the same rigid file-naming convention the other documents did, implying that perhaps this isn’t an official record.

[…]but I can’t help but feel like I’m being punished. Those terrorists were just too damn slippery! At least I know for sure I’ll be compatible with the septimosome, that’s one perk of having an identical twin who's also an adept (and a pain in the ass!)

It was so easy to track Tezla down, waltz down into the Caribbean, sedate her, and steal a pint of her blood. After I was done, she just snored in her stupid fishing net hammock. I could’ve easily snapped her neck or arrested her, but I didn’t. Why didn’t I do it? She’s only ever been a parasitic shadow in my life, and I’ve only ever wanted her dead. I don’t know, maybe that mumbo-jumbo about twins having psychic bonds is real and she manipulated my body or something. That would make more sense than actually caring about her.

Now that Tezla’s septimosome has been fully extracted, purified, cultured, tested, etc, it won’t be long until it will be implanted into me, as well as the refined version of the glaive derivative that was developed in New York. As uneasy the idea of my brain getting opened up and having machines stuck into it makes me, becoming an adept scares me far more. I’ve always looked down on Tezla for her freakish power, I know it’s why mom and dad gave me more attention when we were kids, and now I’m going to become just like her. I can only pray that I don’t turn into a flag-burning anarchist like her too…

Edie’s an adept now? It sounds like she can transform into a stronger state too, last time Zeno faced off against someone like that… I don’t want to think about it!

Speaking of Zeno’s current predicament, I finally hear sounds other than marching and the opening or closing of doors.

“The prisoner has been restrained as per your specifications, Agent Benz. What are our next orders?” A soldier asked Edie.

“Fetch me a trough and then fill it with water.”

She’s going to waterboard Zeno?! If I survive this I’m going to kick Tezla’s ass just for this alone! …Granted, I’d probably lose in a hands-on fight against her, but I’m so angry right now that I’m willing to take the risk!

“That might be an issue, Sir!”

“…Why?” Edie sounded frustrated.

“The water rationing you put in place doesn’t leave you with enough water to fill a trough!”

“Shit, seriously?”

“P-Permission to speak freely?” The same soldier asked.

“Yeah, sure, whatever.” Edie sulked.

“Agent Benz, Sir, you’re the one in charge of water here, if you really want to, you can just… allow yourself to take enough water for whatever you need.”

It seems that Edie considered that soldier’s words for a little while, because I didn’t hear anything for over a minute.

“What’s your name?” Edie broke the silence. I’m unsure if she’s talking to Zeno or that soldier.

“Private Ford, Sir.” He sounded somewhat nervous.

“Well Mr. Ford, I appreciate the idea, but it would be unwise to divert water away from Scorepion. If it doesn’t get its daily power-washing, the whole thing will fall apart and then we’ll all be in deep shit.”

The sound of a single pair of boots growing louder, then quieter, then louder again implied that Edie was pacing around. She then sighed, and spoke once more.

“Um, I’m open to suggestions.”

So Zeno isn’t getting waterboarded, thank goodness. But it sounds like they might do something worse instead.

“Agent Benz,” Ford was speaking again, “What happened to the ‘souvenir’ you brought back from Japan?”

I’m not sure I like the way he put focus on the word “souvenir”…

“Oh? Latrine talk must travel further than I thought if a rank-and-file like you has heard of my electro-whip.”

Electrocution?! Dammit!

“Whoa, déjà vu…” Zeno mumbled.

I quickly understood why Zeno commented that. It was the night we learned that The Muse was a living, breathing human being and not a machine. None of us would have found that out if Gunvolt hadn’t gotten the Sumeragi executive interrogating him to accidentally give away where The Muse’s “server” was… And now Zeno’s attempting to do the same thing.

“About that…” Edie sounded hesitant, “I might have thrown it away… But it totally wasn’t because I zapped myself with it or anything!”

Phew. Unlike GV, Zeno is definitely not immune to electrical attacks.

Edie and her subordinates spent an awfully long time trying to brainstorm a way to torture Zeno, who is probably torturously bored now. In the meantime, I need to find a way to get my computer virus into this server.

Obviously I can’t just leave and come back with a USB to serial port adapter, and due to the nature of the virus, trying to spread it through my tablet laptop wirelessly would probably destroy it before it can transfer to the terminal… All these bleeding-edge towers and a terminal from the 1990s is what’s stopping me!

Before I have a breakthrough, Edie finally gets an idea.

“You know what? Fuck it. I’ll just smack him around whenever he pisses me off. The rest of you are dismissed.”

It seems it took a moment for the soldiers to follow her orders, because I didn’t hear the found of any boots walking away.

“What are you numbskulls waiting for?! Get out of here!”

They finally left after that, leaving only Edie and Zeno.

“Ugh, I must look like a real chump after a blunder like that.” Edie lamented, “What do you think, terrorist?”

“We all have off-days, no need to beat yourself up about it.” Zeno said oddly casually.

“I guess so…” Edie’s tone suddenly grew more agitated, “Wait a second! I see what you’re trying to do!”

“What am I trying to do?”

“You were trying to get me to lower my guard around you so I’d soften up, weren’t you?”

“Hm… Maybe~”

“Don’t get cocky!”

The harsh sound of knuckles hitting flesh followed.

Zeno yelped. I recognized that it was probably an exaggerated noise to get Edie to think her punch hurt him more than it really did. Edie seemed to buy into the act wholeheartedly.

“Now that you get the picture, I’ll ask you a question: How much did my sister pay you?”

“Pay? Nah, I’m not doing this for money.”

“Then what?”

“Clout!”

“…Excuse me?”

“You know, views, likes, that sort of thing.”

“Oh come on! Stop pretending like you’re one of those internet people!”

“What makes you think I’m not?”

“Probably due to the fact that you were carrying firearms!”

I then heard what I assume was the sound of Zeno getting pistol whipped by his own gun. I know he heals quickly, but I can’t help but wince hearing all this, unable to do anything about it.

“That could mean anything.” Zeno said, knowingly full of it.

“Bullshit!!! She sent you to do something to Scorepion, and I bet you probably fucked up my New York project two years ago too!”

“You have a pet scorpion?!” Zeno’s bubbly voice was as fake as pleather.

“I said stop bullshitting me! I didn’t get clearance to push out all the vehicles in the Building 3 hangar just for your sorry ass to ruin it!!”

Scorepion was in a hangar this whole time. Of course, that would be the only kind of place large enough. Why didn’t either Zeno or I think of that sooner?!

“Building 3, you said?” Zeno went back to his serious voice… Well, as serious as Zeno can be, anyway.

“You, uh, didn’t hear that.” Edie sputtered.

“From those satellite images I saw, there could really only be one hangar here too. So you don’t have a decoy place to send me to.” Zeno was now in full “mind-games” mode.

“Oh yeah? Well what are you gonna do about it chained up in here anyway?” Edie taunted.

The sound of Zeno presumably breaking his wrists to slip out of his restraints answered Edie’s question.

“So you’re one of those martyr types, eh?” Edie had not yet realized that Zeno’s wrists have probably already healed up, “Well good luck getting to Scorepion with broken hands and—”

The sounds of a struggle ensued.

“—Pinned to the ground!” Edie finished her sentence.

I don’t know what Zeno broke to free himself from Edie, but I can guarantee that it was the kind of move that only he would be able to pull off.

“What the hell?! Are you an adept?”

“You figured it out! And here’s what you win!”

I assumed Zeno did something flashy, like a spin kick.

“Ach!” Edie cried out in pain before composing herself, “Well two can play that game!”

I really hope Zeno’s not about to wait around for his opponent to transform like the characters in an anime would.

Edie made a battle cry uninterrupted, meaning that Zeno’s probably just standing there watching it happen for some reason.

…And then nothing happened.

“Everything alright there?” Zeno asked, sounding almost concerned.

“Er, hold on a moment…” Edie grumbled.

Zeno waited, I assume because this was too amusing to just leave behind.

“I need admin permission to transform?! I’m the admin! I give me permission!! ” Edie shrieked, “I didn’t undergo goddamn brain surgery to get stopped by an ERROR MESSAGE!!!”

It sounded like Zeno knocked out Edie while she was distracted. If she didn’t have a concussion before, she probably does now.

I can barely hear Zeno’s footsteps, but I can tell he’s running.

“Hey Grasshopper, in case you didn’t hear it earlier, meet me at Building 3.” The echo caused by two microphone’s receiving the same audio returned.

“I’m glad to hear you’re alright, but are you absolutely sure that it’s not some kind of trap?”

“It’s a risk we’ll just have to take!”

“Guess so. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

Now that Scorepion’s location has (probably) been revealed, I have to figure out how to infect the air base’s servers. Even if Zeno and I manage to destroy Scorepion, should the servers be left intact, all the information on how to make another one will be right there. Also, when Edie wakes up, she could easily send whatever forces aren’t fighting Copen and Lola to Building 3.

Speaking of Copen and Lola, I should corroborate my information with them.

“What’s going on over there?” I call both of them as I gather myself to leave the server room.

“Lola’s currently scouting out the most disruptive way to enter Building 1, so if you’re still there, don’t be.”

“Sure thing, but first, have you seen Building 3?”

“The big one that looks like a hangar?” Copen inadvertently confirmed.

“Yes, that one. Would you say that Scorepion is housed there?”

“Oh yeah, there’s no way it isn’t in there!” Lola chimed in.

“Did you really think it would be anywhere else?” Copen sounded too confused to be condescending.

“Listen, it’s been a long night, I still haven’t finished my thesis, and I need to figure out how to insert a thumb drive into an old computer terminal.”

Copen asked something about what the terminal’s connected to, but I wasn’t paying attention because I just realized the solution to my problem has been all around me this whole time.

The terminal has no USB port, but all of the towers the terminal is connected to do. I slide open one of the glass doors protecting the insides of a nearby computer tower from the outside world and find a whole bunch of ports to insert the virus into. The thumb drive goes in no problem, and when I check the terminal’s monitor, I can see it replacing more and more files and processes with popup windows of art of the wolf mascot from Kiri-chan: The Giraffe Princess. In a matter of minutes, this room of supercomputers will be reduced to nothing more than a room of very expensive bricks. Since everything is finally going according to plan, I grab the USB stick and leave the (still unguarded) server room.

Stellantis Building 3 - 00:00 (Christmas Eve)

Between this, and not beelining it to the hangar immediately, I’m starting to question if Zeno and I were really the best Tezla and Bolero could have gotten for the job. I’d be angry that they aren’t doing this instead of us, but I know Bolero’s septima is actively harming them most of the time, and I’m sure if Tezla’s body could handle the chance to fight her sister one-on-one, she probably would… unless that psychic twin connection thing Edie wrote about goes both ways.

Leaving Building 1 wasn’t an issue, everyone there was far too busy dealing with their automated surveillance and defensive systems suddenly going haywire. And if that wasn’t enough, the troublesome armored intruder and his drone made a “flashy” entrance into the building.

Almost as soon as I enter Building 3 I find what we’ve been looking for. If I didn’t know better, I would just think I’ve found a Michi Mark 17 Type-C "Mantis" outside of Japan. But even with the low lighting, all I have to do is look up to see the true behemoth in front of me.

There’s no time to be intimidated by Scorepion, I have to find Zeno so we can finish this mission for good.

I stick around by the Mantis tank I encountered, looking for a good spot to climb onto it, as well as to find the fabled joint that connects it to the rest of Scorepion. But as I do so, I get the awful feeling that I’m being watched.

All it took to confirm that suspicion was turning around, where I could see another soldier looking directly at me. I don’t know what this guy is doing here away from the mess in Buildings 1 and 2, but I don’t have time for him to call for help! 

So I shot him with a tranquilizer round.

“Ow! What the hell was that for?!” Zeno’s voice came out of the soldier’s mouth.

…I then realized that I had just shot Zeno.

“I’m so sorry!” I ran over to him, “Are you okay? Was the round a dud?”

If I really hit Zeno head on, then he shouldn’t be conscious right now.

“You know, for someone who hasn’t held a gun in years, your aim’s pretty good.”

“But are you okay?!”

“I’d say I have about ten minutes before the tranquilizer overpowers Ever-Living… probably less if I move around a bunch.”

Just when things finally start to go right, I find a way to screw it all up…

“Don’t look so glum, I’ll help you find a good spot to climb.” Zeno reassured me.

“You’re sure taking this in stride.”

Zeno shrugged.

“Stressing out will only make blood flow faster—”

“Giving you even less time before you lose consciousness.” I finished his sentence.

I look up at the gargantuan death machine I must now climb alone.

“Let’s get this over with…” I sighed.

The longer I look up the Mantis, the taller it seems to get.

“You know, staring at it won’t make you climb any faster.” Zeno reminded me.

“I know that.”

“And I know you don’t like heights, but you literally parachuted out of a plane 14,000 meters in the sky earlier today, so I think you can handle it.”

I took a deep breath and hoisted myself and a toolkit Zeno found onto one of the Mantis’ long metal legs. Not so bad, but the first part of a climb is usually the least daunting. It’s when you start getting high enough that falls can break bones that climbing becomes a problem. Despite my better judgment, I keep making my way up to the top, I have to.

“See, I knew you could do it.” Zeno whispered to me over comms, which is much stealthier than shouting.

I stopped focusing all my attention to what’s directly in front of me to find that the massive (and surprisingly fragile looking) joint connecting the Mantis to Scorepion is at the other end of where I’m standing.

Steeling myself, I look down from the top of the Mantis and see Zeno looking up at me.

“Are you going to start?” He asked me.

“Oh, right. My bad.” I had forgotten.

Another deep breath, and I walk over to the joint base where the cooling unit would be in a normal model. First, I look into the gap right at the base that’s supposed to allow for flexibility in the joint’s movement. While it does give Scorepion more degrees of movement than it would have had otherwise, it also means that these gaps have to constantly be cleaned out to prevent jamming or a total breakdown of the joint mechanism.

To exploit this mechanical instability, I open up the toolkit and scatter an entire box of screws into the gap, as well as the box itself. A good start, but likely too small to cause any real problems for the joint.

Next, I toss more tools into the gap, going from smallest to largest in size. Then, I search the pockets of my stolen uniform for whatever was left in there. Bullets, grenades, key cards, and a packet of unlabeled pills. That last one piqued my curiosity, but it didn’t matter, they all went into the gap. Finally, I take off the bulky uniform I had been disguised in and drop it. I also gave the joint itself a few whacks with a particularly large wrench for good measure.

“I’ve finished with the right Mantis, climbing down now.” I reported to Zeno.

“Great,” There was a blitheness in his voice, “Try to hurry up a little on the climb down, you’ll get a higher score…”

Zeno’s already incoherent…

But still, he makes a good point. We shouldn’t stay here any longer than we need to.

I can’t say for sure how much faster or slower it went going down rather than up, but what matters is that I made it down.

“Psst, under here…” Zeno stage whispered from under the Mantis.

I crawled under its modified legs in the general direction, immediately I noticed how much quieter and nimbler my movements are now that I’m not trying to maneuver in those bulky fatigues. Even second-hand, these stealth suits are superb.

“How are you holding up?” I ask him.

“Not so bad, pretty relaxed actually.”

“Yeah, because of the tranquilizer…”

“Heh heh, yeah… Anyway,” Zeno handed me a nicely folded up set of clothes, it was another stolen uniform, “I don’t think we’ll have much use for these anymore, so why don’t you shove ‘em into Scorepion.”

I take the uniform from his hands.

“Looks like I came up with something before you.” I said lightheartedly while motioning to my body.

Zeno just smiled, he must be pretty out of it. I wish he had just said something before I shot him, we’d probably be done with this mess otherwise…

As I run from one side of Scorepion to the other, I hear Zeno’s voice again, once again through comms.

“Hey~”

I couldn’t tell if he was supposed to be talking to me or not until Copen cut in.

“I swear to God if you call me ‘Catboy’ one more time I will kill you right here and now!” Copen fumed.

“Oooh, did the big bad Adept Slayer just use the Lord’s name in vain?” Zeno continued to poke the hornet’s nest.

“I’m not threatening you because of who you are, I’m threatening you because you’re very, very annoying.”

“Congrats on the character development!”

“Did you call us just to make conversation?”

“Believe it or not, I actually do have a reason for calling you right now. So Grasshopper and I had a bit of a mishap, and to make it short, I won’t be conscious for much longer—”

“What? Are you okay?!” Lola blurted out.

“—The point is, when we’re done here, Grasshopper will give you a signal to head on down to give Scorepion an extra roughing up.”

“So it isn’t going well over there.” Copen assumed.

“I didn’t say that … But it could be going better…”

“I see, Lola and I will continue making a scene in the meantime.”

I guess I’m going to call Copen for help after this, we were going to have to tell him when we were done so he could leave anyway, so I guess it’s not a huge change of plans.

Maybe it’s because I had already done it once, but it truly felt easier to mess with the left Mantis. Just as I make a sigh of relief after climbing down, I get a call.

“Hey there dudes, is the barrier down yet? If not, I guess you can’t hear me…” Tezla’s voice was remarkably clear.

“Vesper Bat, is that you?”

“Who else could it be?”

“…Your sister?”

“Oh yeah, how’s she doing?”

“Can’t we talk about that later?”

That’s not the only thing waiting for later…

“By the way, is Meerkat there?” I asked.

“I guess it can wait… and Meerkat’s out using the jar.”

What’s more on brand for Tezla than having a piss jar?

“Anyway, I can guide you out of here since comms are back.” She told me.

“That’s okay, it’s kind of a straight shot out of here… and I think you should be focusing on flying Speedcore.”

“Eh, fair enough. I’ll still give you some words of wisdom: try leaving through any of the doors on the west, there are some jeeps lying around.”

“How do you know that?”

“That’s how these kinds of places are built, man.” Tezla sounded awfully sure of herself.

Stellantis is pretty unique in structure, but I’ll just take her word for it.

I had to go back to the other side of Scorepion to pick up Zeno’s unconscious body. But after that, I went over to the western exit, just as Tezla advised.

Since it was still quiet and empty in the hangar, I decided to ask Tezla a question.

“Hey, Vesper Bat?”

“What’s up?”

“Sorry if this is rude, but, why didn’t you come down here and do this yourself?”

“Oh believe me,” Tezla’s voice suddenly changed, “I would have loved for her to come down here.”

I stopped dead in my tracks.

“You’re not—”

“I knew it was a good idea to bug the boy’s earpiece~”

Edie’s rueful laughter echoed throughout the hangar. The lights switched to life, and now I could see her standing in the doorway of the western exit.

I tried to run, but didn’t make much distance before I tripped over Zeno. thinking about it, I probably wouldn’t have made it very far while carrying him anyway.

A shot was fired, I don’t know where it hit, but considering I wasn’t feeling gunshot levels of pain, and I didn’t see any blood pooling out of Zeno’s body, I’m guessing she either fired a warning shot or missed.

“If you try that again, I’ll shoot to kill!” Edie threatened.

Taking her threat to heart, I stood still and waited as the click-clack of her well-polished boots grew closer.

“Do you have any idea the kind of paperwork nightmare you assholes just caused?” Edie seethed.

I said nothing and just tried to steel myself for whatever was coming.

“Never mind, I’m sure it’ll be nothing compared to whatever you two will face when I’m done making you lure Tezla here. I’ll make sure none of you ever see the light of day ever again!”

Zeno mumbled incoherently in his sleep.

“Now then, stand up.” Edie commanded.

I stood up, there wasn’t much else I could do.

“Show me your weapon. I’ll see if it’s worthy of a proper duel.”

Reluctantly, I took out my Schaf pistol.

Edie squinted to get a better look at it, then she burst out into laughter. It’s eerie how similar she sounds to Tezla.

“Is that really a Schaf?!” She wiped away a tear, “Are you breaking into a military base or going B.B. shooting with girl scouts?”

Edie just kept on laughing, I guess she and her sister at least have that in common.

This also left her wide open, so I shot her as many times as I could, landing two darts in her before I ran out of rounds.

“You… YOU!”

Edie pulled out a handgun with an absurdly long barrel and fired. Instinctively, I drop to the ground. However, it seems that Edie wasn’t even close to hitting me as instead the bullet struck Scorepion, signified by a loud clang.

“God… Damn… it…” Edie struggled to speak before she attempted to fire again, and ultimately collapsed before she could pull the trigger.

I don’t think I’ve felt this kind of detachment from reality since I killed Heinlein.

With Edie out of the way, I drag Zeno out through the west exit. No troops to be seen, Edie must have been confident she could take us out herself. And just as she said, there were some jeeps parked just outside. Way too confident.

As I attempt to start it up, Zeno stirs.

“Nngh, whadid I miss?”

“Oh nothing much, except Edie almost got us.”

“Huh? How’d she do that?”

“She bugged your earpiece, apparently. Speaking of which…”

Talking about Edie reminded me to grab Zeno’s compromised earpiece and throw it away.

“That should take care of that.” I stated.

“Hey, did you know there’s a really easy way to exploit the ignition on these models?” Zeno brought up.

I wanted him to just take it easy, but I also wanted a fast way out of here. It’s not like it would bother Zeno too much to just tell me what to do, he could practically (literally?) provide support in his sleep.

Soon enough, the vehicle was on, and there was one more thing I needed to do before I drove it out of here.

“Copen, Building 3 is all yours.”

“…Understood.”

Outside Stellantis - 01:30

It’s finally over. Well, it’s not really over until I’m back in Geneva, but at least Zeno and I aren’t in that horrible air base anymore.

I parked near the shed Lola and Copen were hiding out in. Zeno tried to walk out of the jeep himself, but the tranquilizer hadn’t totally worn off so he needed a bit of help to make it inside. After that, I disposed of the vehicle in a ditch. I don't want it to be used to track us down in case Edie’s still after us.

And now, after all of that, I can get back to my paper.

“Hey, Grasshopper?”

“I think it’s okay to drop codenames now.”

“In that case: Moniqa, can I borrow your earpiece? I wanna know what’s going on with the Chuuni Crusader.”

“Sure thing, just remember that I’m trying to focus—”

“On your thesis, I know. Now gimme.”

I give Zeno my earpiece and wake up my tablet laptop. As the hologram windows open up one-by-one, I quickly notice the browser window with Farfallina’s (Zeno’s) streaming channel open.

Whatever Zeno had set up in advance, it made it look like the footage he shot in Stellantis was live, confusing the hell out of his chat.

“Zeno, is that… supposed to be happening?”

He just started laughing.

“Seriously, aren’t you worried?”

“You really need to catch up with my VODs more, my viewers all think these streams are all some kind of weird comedy sketch.”

“Really?!”

“Yeah, you should see what I was able to get away with in Nevada last year~ Hint: not as many aliens as you’d think.”

I guess I really do need to catch up with his VODs. But first I should really, really get back to my paper.

“Woah, look at this!” Zeno shoved a window displaying a feed from Lola’s camera into my face. Guess the paper will have to wait just a bit longer…

The screen showed Scorepion buckling under its own weight, each movement only further breaking it past the point of repair. And to add insult to injury, the attached Fazent went out of control and launched itself through the roof.

After a minute or so, Edie climbed out of the shattered cockpit. The resolution wasn’t too good, but her movements seemed to indicate that she was giving some sort of angry monologue.

“Oooooooh~” Zeno sounded like a schoolboy watching a fight about to break out at lunch, “Copen just said he could make something better than Scorepion in his sleep, and Edie- is- pissed .”

“No doubt about that.” I’m now too invested to fully ignore this, “What’s she gonna do about it?”

It looks like Edie must have solved that “Admin Permission” error, because she was now successfully transforming.

Barring any sneak attacks, Copen probably has this fight in the bag… As long as Lola’s on top of healing, I suppose.

Adrenaline still coursing through my veins, I knock out three whole pages. This still leaves ten pages to fulfill the pagecount minimum, but if I could handle Stellantis Air Base, I think I can handle another ten pages. Tezla and Bolero aren’t here yet for me to bitch and moan about the events that transpired tonight, but at least I can bitch and moan about my home country’s bullshit ID policy, in an academic way with my sources listed, of course. I have to say though, it’s more than a little odd having to refer to the terrorist attack on a biometric database as some detached event rather than something I was directly involved with.

“If you deflect her boomerang thingy, you can probably use it against her.” Zeno advised.

Just as I was citing a statistic, a window popped up asking me to accept or reject a video call. I hit accept and passed the window to Zeno.

“Yeah, don’t worry we’re alive,” he seemed to be talking to Tezla (the real one) and Bolero, “I think you’ll be happy to know that a certain arachnid went kaput~”

Another two pages down, it helps that one of them was just some graphs and tables.

“He’s fighting your sister to the death… You can get the highlights after you land the plane.”

I hope Tezla’s good at night landings, because the sun isn’t going to rise for another several hours from now.

“Yeah, the whole air base should be pretty empty right now, anyone the distraction guy didn’t kill probably ran… I guess that would extend to the runways… Wha— Are you sure?!”

What a surprise, Tezla’s doing something dumb and reckless again. At this point, I just hope I can get back to Geneva in one piece…

“Wow, that was quick.” Zeno said before turning to me, “Speedcore landed.”

“Already?!” I nearly screeched.

“I’ll go look for them. Wait here for now.”

Zeno got up and left the shed.

Just as he was doing that, something strange was happening through Lola’s camera. Edie underwent a second transformation, fiery light engulfing her body as the remains of Scorepion warp and contort around her. By the time the light dissipated, Edie had been replaced with some sort of human-tank chimera.

Before they got too deep into their fight, the rumbling of heavy machinery nearby warned me that someone else had just arrived. I didn’t have much time to worry before I found out it was just Zeno and the others rushing into the shed to watch the fight. I guess they must have reparked Speedcore.

“What a mess…” Was all Bolero said.

“You gotta listen to this!” Zeno gave me back my earpiece by shoving it into my hands.

Wasting a moment by fumbling around, I was eventually able to get it back onto my ear and listen in on what’s going on.

The first sound I heard was an inhuman metallic screech.

The next sound I heard was Copen saying “She just doesn’t give up!”

Followed by “And neither do we!” from Lola.

As the fighting continued, I found my focus somewhat hampered by the stench of nicotine. That scent reminded me of the anger I had reserved for Tezla.

I stood up and stared directly into her eye.

“So… how’d the mission go?”

Tezla may have said that it was ok to “kick her ass” if something went wrong, but I don’t really want to do that for a couple of reasons. Mainly that I would feel bad for hitting a disabled person, also she would probably beat me in a fight.

Instead, I snatched the cigarette out of her mouth.

“Wha— Hey!”

And then I inhaled it as hard as I could, and now I can say that I’ve smoked at least once… But seeing that I felt like I was going to barf out a lung afterwards, I don’t think I’m going to smoke again.

“That bad, huh?” was all Tezla said.

“Are you quite alright, Moniqa?” Bolero asked.

I attempted to nod.

“So… Can I have my smoke back?”

“No!”

Still angry, I threw the remains of the cigarette onto the ground and stomped on it.

“By the way, your sister’s a real asshole.” Zeno said while his eyes were still transfixed to the screen.

“Uh, yeah, I know.”

“Speaking of her,” Bolero added, “Zeno, you said your ‘distraction guy’ was fighting her, but I don’t see her…”

I looked at the screen again to make sure the abomination she had become was still visible.

“You can see her, she’s right there.” I said.

“…What did Edie do to herself?” Tezla sounded disquieted.

“Aw man, it was crazy!” Zeno turned his attention to Tezla, “She was using some freaky version of your septima!”

“Huh? But she’s not an adept?”

“Tezla,” I was going to answer her question with another question, “Did anything strange happen to you last time you visited the islands of the Caribbean?”

“Well, there was that time I took a nap on some out-of-the-way beach only to sleep the whole night there. I think some bigass mosquito got me because I felt like shit afterwards. But I don’t see what that has to do with—”

“Edie knocked you out and stole a pint of your blood, which was then used to turn her into an artificial adept.”

“Wh–what?” Tezla looked genuinely shocked, “She could do that?!”

“How’d you find that out?” Zeno asked.

“Data in the server room.”

A horrible realization dawned on Tezla.

Then… Edie fused herself with Scorepion…”

“She did.” I confirmed.

I continue to watch the fight, Lola’s moving so quickly that the footage from her camera is making me queasy, or maybe that’s the residual cigarette smoke.

“Hey, what was that thing the guy in Boreal Fist always says to the guy he kills?” Tezla asked.

“You are already dead.” Zeno quoted from the anime.

“What are you trying to say?” I asked Tezla.

“I… I think I’m gonna be sick…” Tezla turned away.

Looks like Edie used her septima in a way she really shouldn’t have.

Copen’s voice was overheard from comms once again.

“Oh great, what’s she doing now?” He sounded utterly exhausted.

The vaguely Edie-shaped figure amidst the warped wreckage began to glow again, likely charging up some kind of attack.

“Boss, watch out!” Lola shrieked.

A flash of white overtook the screen, which was then replaced with a “NO SIGNAL” error. The sound of an explosion in the distance confirmed that Edie’s special attack was to explode herself. Running out of the shed to watch the tower of smoke and flames on the outside further supported this.

Frigid wind blew through the surrounding area carrying pebble sized shrapnel through the air, light snow followed.

“Out of the two of us, I always thought I would die first.” Tezla stated with grim certainty, she then shrugged and returned to her typical lackadaisical demeanor, “Oh well, that’s mom and dad’s problem now. I only really kept in touch with my blood family to have the upper edge on Edie.”

For some reason, I don’t fully believe her, but now's probably not the right time to say that.

Bolero looked down at the snow, which was quickly piling up around our feet.

“Since we’re all done here, we should probably get going before we’re snowed in.”

“Oh, re-lax!” Tezla huffed, “We’re still in a desert, it can’t possibly snow that much.”

Considering Tezla’s overconfidence, we should probably heed Bolero’s word and leave. But first, I should at least find out what state Copen’s body was left in, as well as Lola’s.

“Hey, what’s that light over there?” Zeno pointed towards a light emanating from the site of the explosion, twinkling like a distant star.

Tezla and I squinted at the light along with Zeno, not quite seeing anything.

“Hmm, do any of you recognize the person floating in that barrier?” Bolero asked while looking through binoculars.

They then handed me said binoculars. Even with the zoom in I could barely recognize the person within the glowing sphere, although whoever they are, they seem awfully skinny, borderline skeletal looking… Probably like how Copen would look without his armor. Wait a second—

“It’s Copen!” I shouted in surprise.

“Who?” Tezla asked.

That’s right, I still haven’t told either of them. That's going to be quite the story for later.

Zeno, Tezla, and Bolero all went ahead to meet him and Lola. I’m worried of course, but someone should stay behind with the plane. Also, it means I can finish the rest of my paper depending on how long they take.

Snowy Wasteland - 03:00

Ten more pages done, and I’ve finally finished writing my thesis paper… Somehow, that was more exhausting than everything else that’s happened tonight. It probably needs a ton of editing, but I guess that’s on me for taking so long on this paper in the first place.

Not long afterwards, everyone came back. Curiously, no one was carrying Copen or Lola. In fact, I didn’t see either of them.

“Lola insisted on doing it herself.” Zeno explained.

And sure enough, Lola and her capture field eventually floated by, with Copen in tow. The moment she was within grabbing distance to any of the rest of us, the lights in her eyes suddenly shut off and she dropped out of the air.

“Don’t want to drop the ball~” Bolero quipped right after they caught Lola before she hit the ground.

Zeno, a connoisseur of bad jokes, found this hilarious.

As for the P-Bits and Copen, they didn’t get as soft a landing when the capture field ran out of energy.

“Phew, I did it…” Lola sounded pleased with herself, “Just don’t ask me to do anything energy intensive for the next 72 hours, 55 minutes, and 34.18 seconds…”

Meanwhile, Tezla and I ran over to where Copen was lying, although she was more interested in the P-Bits. Now that I’ve got a good look at him, I could see that Copen’s armor had broken apart entirely, leaving only his undersuit. And Just as I’d feared, he was practically skin and bones.

“I’m still alive…” Copen mumbled.

“That’s right, you are alive,” I tell him, “Do you know what that means?”

“It means I have to continue living with the knowledge that everything I’ve been fighting for is meaningless and that I can never wash the blood off of my hands.”

Yeesh, it’s hard enough to be a teenager normally, but with all of that baggage on top? Thinking about it, I’m surprised Zeno turned out as well adjusted as he did (as far as I know). Maybe he should be trying to give Copen the pep talk instead. Then again, I’m pretty sure Zeno would have been fine with him dying in Edie’s explosion. 

Still, I wish there was something I could say.

“There’s not a whole lot you can do about the past,” Zeno suddenly joined the conversation, “But that doesn’t mean you can’t do anything about the future.”

“Zeno?” I was surprised by his earnestness.

“How do you know that it’s not already too late?” Copen asked while straining to sit up.

“I don’t, but I also don’t think there really is such a thing as ‘too late’.” Zeno helped him up, “I thought I was gonna be soldiering for the rest of my life—”

“But—” Copen tried to interrupt.

“—And now I’m only part time!”

Copen seemed to chew on these words, he was also shivering quite a bit.

“Hey,” Tezla shuffled over holding up a P-Bit and a tattered bomber jacket under her arm, “You could probably use this more than me,” she tossed the jacket onto Copen, “Anyway, mind if I borrow one of these for a bit? I just gotta know how you can get an antigrav engine in something so tiny.”

Copen grimaced as he put on the old jacket and then let out a deep sigh.

“Fine, whatever, it doesn’t matter anymore.”

“Thanks, kiddo!” Tezla started walking off towards Speedcore, “By the way, it’s gonna take a while to start the plane up, so don’t think we’re about to leave or anything.”

Zeno got up.

“Well, I dunno about the rest of you, but I’m gonna warm up by the engine. See ya!”

He then walked away from Copen and I.

“And remember, as far as Florin knows, we were just goofin’ around in Geneva!” Zeno shouted before entering the plane.

Zeno must have taken a cue from my habit of lying to loved ones, I don’t like doing it, but it saves everyone a whole lot of strife.

“To change my future…” Copen pondered, “I have no idea where to even begin.”

“How about you start simple, what do you want to do today?” I suggested.

Even this seemed to be a struggle for Copen, who didn’t plan on living long enough to have this conversation.

Out of nowhere, Bolero came over to hand Lola over to Copen.

“She requested to be with you.” Was all they said before turning away to sneeze and subsequently running off to warm up in Speedcore.

At that moment, Copen’s eyes lit up.

“Lola, can you hear me?” He held the robot closer to his face, “Can you tell me what day it is today?”

Lola took considerably longer than usual to answer Copen’s question.

“Today is December 24th.” She said a bit more robotically than usual, likely to conserve power.

“…Thank you.” His voice shook, almost like he was going to cry.

I had a feeling Copen was thanking Lola for more than just telling the time.

“Huh?!” Lola snapped back into her usual energetic demeanor, “Uhh… You’re welcome?”

She also seemed genuinely confused by Copen’s gratitude.

“Since Christmas is tomorrow… Is there anything you want?” Copen hesitated to add on.

“You’re asking me? Um, I might need a minute…”

“Take your time.”

“Maybe don’t take too long,” I butted into the moment, “It is getting pretty cold out here.”

“Well, there is something I’ve been wanting to do for a while now. But I’m pretty sure you’d say no.”

“You may as well ask.” Copen said.

“Okay, here goes!” Lola made the sound of taking a deep breath, “It’s… been a really long time since I’ve seen Mytyl… I miss her a lot… Could we maybe at least take a look at how she's doing? She might not be the Mytyl we knew, but maybe this new Mytyl is worth at least checking on?”

Copen sighed.

“Hm… I guess I could think about the logistics of sneaking through Kamishiro…”

“Really?! You’d really do that?!” Lola hopped excitedly.

“Hold on, I didn’t say we’re actually going to Japan.”

“I know, but it’s the closest you’ve ever gotten to a yes! Woo-hoo!!” Lola spun around in joy, no doubt burning through her massively depleted energy reserves.

I can’t quite describe the look on Copen’s face, but I’d say he looked somewhere in the realm of relief.

Zeno leaned partially out of Speedcore’s main door.

“Just so you know, Tezla hit the engine enough times and now we’re ready for takeoff.”

“Be there in a minute!” I replied.

As I walk towards Speedcore, I start to think of a polite way to ask Lola to review and maybe edit my thesis. I don’t know for certain if she has a French language pack installed, but I’m pretty sure she’s been Copen’s translator for the past two years, so I think it’s pretty likely.

Just when I reach the door, I realize that neither Copen nor Lola have followed me. I don’t think they intend to freeze in this wasteland, so I’ll just give them a little reminder that they have an easy way out of here.

“Hey!” I shouted.

“Huh?” Lola stopped spinning, breaking Copen’s trance. Both were now looking directly at me.

“Do you need a ride?”