Part one

August 20

Deep within his subconsciousness, Kuniva found himself wondering the deep void that with no end. Searching for a way out he encountered a figure blocking his path, he walked past the figure, but it ended right in front of him again. The figure giggled walking around the lad.

"Your true purpose has been long kept from you; tell me, who are you?"

The figure asked Kuniva tilting it's featureless head. Kuniva obliged the figure giving it a simple answer.

"What kind of question is that? I am Kuniva Eurodyne," he replied bellowing at the glowing figure with his beady red eyes. The figure laughes as if he told a joke, the figure transitioned behind him.

"Kuniva Eurodyne, child of future past, our testament, the executioner, the one of Agony,... the Bane of the Supernatural World.... you are Harbinger!!!!! "

Kuniva swings his arm around hitting the figure, but his arm passes through its body like a knife through smoke.

"Who are you? why wont you let me leave?!"

Kuniva asked stopping his useless assault against the ignigma. The figure caressed the boy's face and body, it pressed its face up against his.

"Reunification, Reunification, Synchronicity."

The entity pointed its index finger at the him.

"She calls for you, Kuniva. Bring her home, Kuniva. She wants to come... home..."

―With just a wave of its finger, Kuniva feels a change in him, a change that was highly noticeable but at the same time unbearable. He can feel his body pleading for the insurmountable pain to stop it felt as if his entire body was on the verge of bursting like a balloon being overfilled with air, the dialect from the figure's mouth was unrecognizable to him, trying to understand the language made his brain throb and ears bleed.

An undesired amount of electricity surged through his body it was like a foreign parasite had invaded his body, feeding on him and growing exponentially. He collapsed to the ground holding his head, his body convulsed without any end. The female figure stood over the lad watching him as the pain worsens.

"Oh, dear child, you've strongly inherited an overwhelming gift like no other. That gift well evidently be your downfall taking everything from you. Reflect upon your choices as you progress forward. From here on out, your life will become a living nightmare, how will you react to the ones that you deem as fellow humans? we'll be watching you, Kuniva-------"

The figure vanished with a crude smile. A gentle tone reverberated throughout empty space, the humming grew louder along with the pain.

The gentle tune brought Kuniva to his knees, bellows of pain spews from his lips.

"Wait.... come.... back..."

Kuniva tried to grab the enigma by the arm, but it was far out from his grasp, his vison blacked and before he knew it he collapsed.

Kuniva gradually regained his consciousness.

Roused by the warmth from the sunlight beaming through the window, the ceiling that suddenly greeted his eyes was unfamiliar to him and had the feel of a long history behind its creation from the depiction a group of woman on the ceiling aiding what appears to be soldiers.

Kuniva squints his eyes to get a better description of the woman's facial features, carefully examining the painting he knew who it was.

"Florence Nightingale, 1867 Crimean War."

Just as he gets out of bed, Kuniva couldn't help but let a heavy groan upon sitting upright.

"!?"

The sensation of pain that ran through his entire body, bones and muscles told of the reality of his enduring what could had been a fatal encounter.

It was also an indication that he regained some of his sense of feeling again. His right hand was swathed with bandages to treat the horrid wounds on his arm and fist.

While his torso, and neck were all bandaged nearly his entire upper body was all bandaged up he would have been mistaken for a mummy. Although it wasn't to the point of restricting all of his movement, it was enough to prevent any excessive motor skills. It would then seem to be a better option to rest quietly for now. He leans his head back against the pillow.

Feeling the stabs of pain only made him feel more alive a second sign that he was still amongst the living and not dreaming or dead.

However―

"It feels like someone else in this room."

Since waking up, his em field was at its lowest functionality since he was in a hospital filled with sensitive equipment, but his intuition convinced him something or someone else is present in the room with him.

He looks over to his left noticing an chair but no one was sitting in it. Instincts compelled him to reach for the chair, before he can get closer something stops his hand and nearly yanks him out of bed.

"AHHH I KNEW IT! Who's there?"

Instantly Serra appears out of thin air.

"You're awake."

Kuniva sits back comfortably blinking his eyes several times. "What did you do to my eyes?"

"I did nothing, I just blacked myself out from your environmental filters. I wanted to be here when you woke up."

Kuniva wasn’t sure what was going on.

"I feel like crap, I can't remember anything from last night or how I got here?" Kuniva looks his sister dead in the eyes. "How did I end up like this, Sierra?"

"You hurt your--"

"Don't bs me, sis the last thing I remember was you splattered across the floor like someone's mosaic art! and that girl.... who is she?"

Sierra breaks eye contact with her brother, despite her emotionless expression, guilt clung to her as brother waited for an answer from her.

Kuniva looks at the bandages on his right arm. "Forget it." he muttered.

The room around them flickered, they were no longer in a hospital room. They were now on the lunar surface sitting face to face.

Kuniva head darts left and right unsure at the same time astonished by the divine view of earth, also the feeling of nostalgia erupted. Virtual space? she can easily bring me down. She holds more sway than what she's leading on. On the contrary, I never knew I was capable of creating or entering virtual spaces without a vr.

"I wish I can tell you everything, Kuniva. I honestly wish I could but the confidentiality protocol prohibits me from releasing top secret research and experiments that can be threatening to the both of us."

Kuniva frowns at his sister. "Forget our personal history. I need to know more about Helix Industries. I refuse to ignore it when one of my closest friends are on their hit list."

"I know how frustrating it is to be kept in the dark but it's necessary--"

"Yeah, because you be terminated? you said that before."

"Beside my termination, powerful corporations and other entities are in a fervent tech race-"

He pulls away from her gentle touch.

"They won't stop at anything to upend the other. And that means getting their hands on someone like you."

"First Professor Wingate and stigmata enhancer what hell that was and now, you and this ridiculous experiment. You just show up out of the blue claiming to be my sister. How do I know you're truth and not a lie?"

She raised her hand to her brother’s face, their iris flashed in sync before a strange map appeared between them vast parts of the holo-gram brain are darker than the rest. "What you felt was a piece me die, an actual piece when my look alike was destroyed. Splitting my consciousness has costed me dearly."

"Then why part take!?"

"When Tojo found me beneath Fort Ticonderoga, I hadn't made a full recovery after my last assignment didn't go as anticipated. The damage delt to my frame's internals and externals forced me into a deep state hibernation to conserve power until repairs were completed. That never happened, his special operators got to me first forcing my repairs to be delayed and the sudden disappearance of my mother. His engineers implanted a small but effective explosive device in my spinal column, below the brain stem."

"Then we'll have one of the doctor's it removed." Kuniva hastily stood up, pulling his sister’s arm, but she didn't budge an inch, like pulling on a fixed object.

"No, they can't help me. It's not some improvise device, it's secured by biometric locks only Helix Industries engineers can remove it successfully without any losses."

"Then let me help you! i cant learn more about our relationship if you end perishing."

Sierra looks at her palm, she takes his hand. For a brief period, his eyes flashed a crimson, his iris shifted followed by a faint glow from his pupils.

"What did you do? I'm seeing things that I normally don't see."

"Ignored a minor field protocol, I lifted the block on your cyber assess matrix, you’ll have a easier time bypassing cyber security software, diving directly into the security network but you must be in close proximity of a terminal 200 yards max. You can't help me directly but you can indirectly, I managed to find an unsecured connection and copied a small list of corporations having direct influence and the most impact on the project."

Before Kuniva could get a word out of his lips, Sierra vanished.

"I have to go their looking for me and I can't allow him to find you. Head to the coordinates and activate the sequence code my inside source will meet you, please bring an end to this nightmare not just for me."

The room shakes and crumbles around him, the crumbling walls digitized when it strikes the floor. He closed his eyes. And opened.

His eyes were greeted by a familiar ceiling. Home.

Kuniva rubbed his right arm, only to see it has fully recovered in such a short time not even a scar to show from the encounter.

Kuniva heads to his closest as a bright green square flashed from the other side. He opened his closet and on the floor was a medium sized metal suitcase. He placed his hand on the suitcase, four holo-gram symbols flashed green releasing the locking mechanism.

He reached in taking out a data pad.

"Now to pay the professor a visit."

After cleaning up himself up and skipping the most important meal of the day. On the contrary, the thought of hunger didn't exist to him.

He closed the suitcase and vacated his apartment.

*******

Harlem, Manhattan noon

"There's still some numbers that need to be crunched. I'll give you the updated formulas, once we return from lunch."

Professor Walkings was exiting the building with a few of her colleagues. Just as she crosses the street, she diverts away from the store, making a right onto a quiet street inaccessible to vehicles, taking a seat on the bench.

"I'm doing everything I can to slow down the experiments, I'm not sure but I believe I may have been subjected to suspicion," Professor Walkings whispered as she interacts with the data pad.

"The experiment has been shifted into overdrive ever since last night's incident."

"What kind of incident?"

"A data breach, sensitive documents consisting of people data who participated in the prototype apms and the deceased file was leaked to public internet sub forums. Helix Industries has been cleaning up the mess, as a side-effect of the breach many top officials and researchers were slated for relocation to different sites. Soon I'll be backed into a corner if this madness doesn't end."

"Professor Walkings, why did you participate in the project?"

"At first I didn't see it as good vs evil. I saw human advancement, the only thing that mattered were producing satisfactory results and how good the numbers were to profiteers. Results just don't appear out of thin air or the imagination, research needs subjects, willing subjects, not forced."

"I take it Helix Industries aren't playing by the books." The stranger asked.

"Whether the life in question is artificial or not any means necessary to obtain the unreachable. I understood to find a cure living beings are the most valuable resource, willing subjects produce better results, not only numerical but mentally. They have no recognition on the concept of out right murder, numbers is the only thing Helix Industries sees."

"You're still passing out those creditsheets?"

Professor Walkings takes out a creditsheet from her lab coats inner pocket, sliding it into the crevice of the bench. "Yes, but it's slowly losing its effectiveness in gaining attention, Public Safety has been on high alert because of it. Can biotics, live freely like us?"

The anonymous stranger stood up looking straight ahead, "All life is valuable to the world. We're all capable of freewill. I now have an obligation to burn down everything that belongs Helix Industries."

Professor Walkings continues interact with her data pad, "How are you planning to carry out such an bold move? there are 157 research facilities and prefabricated laboratories in Helix Industries name."

"Their prized bioamp is where I'll start." Those where the last words uttered before taking off, leaving Professor Walkings by her lone some.

"If she could show how she's currently feels, my bet is it's fear," Professor Walkings whispered.

*******

"Director, another prefab lab just went silent and we're getting reports of a significant data breach at the DNA storage facility."

"Damage report?"

"Estimations put the damage in the hundreds of millions, but we're predicting the calculations can put us deeper in the dirt if acceptable actions isn't taken with utmost urgency."

As the director and assistant walked the halls a researcher swarmed them. "Director, the manufacturing plant responsible for next generation bioamps was hit a few seconds ago followed another attack at the Foreign Medical Research Center."

"Simultaneous terrorist attack. Have security tighten their control on other facilities, put the Sentinental Task Force on Standby. Back up all data to the local site database upstate immediately and get me Administrator Tojo on the line right now."

However, just as one researcher left another one would appear, desperate than the last. "Director, three more prefabricated laboratories went up in flames."

"Source of the fire?"

"In the main and secondary server rooms. We did pick up an electromagnetic irregularity on the site moments before the fire started." The researcher hands the director her data pad.

"Hmm, methods of sabotage?"

"Where currently investigating. What makes it more troubling, there hasn't been a single sign of forced entry or software hackings."

The assistant hands the director another datapad. "Its been labeled cyber terrorism." She added.

"Cut all forms of wireless communications with the remaining labs from the outside world, switch over to local lan lines for communication, up security level to red and have staff report back hourly. This is biotic terrorism, a few Sentinentals are going to be enough to prevent a full scale biotic assault. The project will continue at any cost."

*******

part two

August 26

The Bronx, late evening.

"Good, their communication network is still down. Just as I hoped they would."

Kuniva tossed the data pad into the suitcase, it's been a 6 nights since he started carrying out his operations, not a single hour of rest fell upon him. He puts on his helmet, and black trench sweater, sliding the his hoodie on. As he overlooks the artificial light city from a skyline view. "Infiltration will be in my favor." The helmets voice synthesizer altered his voice to a deeper pitch.

The gear that Kuniva currently wears was given to him by his sister. An worn-out wetworks helmet, it looked more like a relic from the past than a functioning piece of head protection. However, it's outdated heads up neural interface to the materials used for the helmets composition came to life. The crystalline horizontal visor shifts colors from silver to midnight black matching the nigh sky.

Kuniva changes radio frequencys picking up the chatter between the security employees and researchers. "The first to go down tonight is the Blackwater Chemical plant. Despite their bad public reputation and violations, they've been funneling vast amounts of time into Helix Industries, providing resources and manufacturing capabilities for Helix Industries latest experimental toy." Kuniva scoured the data before his eyes.

"The same amps being used in [Project Ascension], with a bit of sabotage here and there should put a massive dent in their operations... I hope." He leans forward off the building's ledge, plunging straight down. The skyscrapers holo advertising-display flickered and flashed as he sailed through the holo-gram.

*******

"Director, in a span of 6 days we've lost 40 prefab labs and 5 more manufacturing plants tonight. We're expecting the asalient to strike again tonight at the manufacturing center in Queens. Should I call the authorities to take care of this problem?" The assistant asked.

"No, if government authorities get involved we'll have a lot more to worry about than lost equipment and security breaches. Besides, I have another way to deal with this."

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

"I hope so director, the company is hammering money like no tomorrow to recupe the losses taken in these last few days, it's predicted to only get more costly as this terrorist gets dangerously close to the more advanced prefabricated laboratories and manufacturing centers."

Director sighed heavily, leaning back in his chair taking a sip of his hot cup of Joe. "I've submitted a request to the higher ups to relocate all major operations farther upstate, the second is for a few "Exterminators" from the Underworld for the pest removal. Their the most effective and experienced team the Underworld has to offer."

*******

"Syeda, EMR irregularities detected, the comms are a bit staticy, but it'll hold. I'll maintain radio silence until the target has appeared."

Sade positioned herself deep in the facility airducts, interacting with her holo heptic-interface. Whoever this person is went a long way to sabotage the company. Not a single trace of DNA was found at the other burned down facilities. But at the beginning of the attack. Multiple em abnormalities were recorded, the only problem with this data none of the irregularities matched any in the biotic database. But we know that our culprit is a biotic with tech interference capacity. Glossing over the data a chime resonate through the tight quarters but something didn't seem right.

"He's here but I'm picking up an unregistered frame packed with unknown software and hardware... something doesn't feel right be careful. It may be a military infiltration drone."

"Got it, start."

*******

"Updated 2hrs ago, they didn't move the latest data recordings from this terminal to an off site server, but majority of the data is useless to the operation. Its all shipments records, list of employees and ect." It's been a few days since Kuniva kept tabs on the projects accelerated progress. A surge of electricity burst outwards overloading the computers.

Time to head down to the manufacturing leve―!?

Just as he takes a step forward, the floor tile beneath him shune with great radiance filling the entire room, the brilliance followed an ear shattering explosion.

Unphaseded by the violent rumbling Seda didn't peel her eyes from her display. "Nadine, we'll lose some of our money if you don't take caution."

"I know, I know. My synthesizer is out of wack since the upgrade, might have added too much oxidizer to the ratio," Nadine replied as she enters the charred room. Light from her helmets visor illuminated, but the smoke was thick blanketing everything around her. Nadine's visual feed switched to the thermals. The sound of her wet foot steps echoed as the fire suppression system soaked the room.

"You see him?"

"No, thermals isn't picking up his body temperature. Not even a body―"

Nadine grunts loudly as the sound of metal slaming into something then her comms suddenly turned to static.

"Nadine? Nadine!? Syeda, you need to move in now."

*******

Nadine backs way from the intruder to the far wall extending her arm, a knife ejects from under her forearm, but the knife misses Kuniva. "The comms are scrambled."

She yanks on the thin wire attached to the bladed weapon, the edge of her knife humms as it's energized. Nadine swings the energized weapon cleaving through a steel support beam. On the defense, Kuniva was nicked several times by the energized blade, just sticking his arm in an attempt to catch the whistling blade through the air.

"I don't have time to play with you!" Kuniva summersults back, raising his hand into the air. The floor sub subterranean supports burst through the floor striking the ceiling. Nadine lost her footing, plunging to the low levels.

Going for his escape, his leg is suddenly pulled from beyond the hole in the floor. Forcefully pulling him to the sublevel of the facility.

Nadine had looped her wire in a network, zigzaging around and under the fallen rubble. "Nadine!? come in!"

"You're visual feed is dead, whats going on?"

"I'm busy with something!"

Sade ran the scans one more time, only this time something was odd. "I'm picking up both organic and inorganic signatures from our mystery person.... what?"

The rubble round Nadine shifts, morphing into a hand swatting her to the side. As a result from the impact, her helmet was damaged, the helmet hissed and crackled from the damaged components.

From Sade's neural interface, her visual and auditory feed cuts out, seconds after her vital sensors cuts out. Panic begins to immediately set in, everything was taking a bad turn. "I lost contact with Nadine! Get to her now!" She shouts over the scrambled comms.

*******

Kuniva kept his distance, he slowly walked around the rubble to see the girl unconscious as her helmet emergency release function actives, breaking the air tight seal.

In his attempt to flee, several canisters drops the ceiling. The canisters bounced off the floor before exploding before his feet, the blast force from the explosion knocked Kuniva forward but he was quick to recover. He grunts as he leans forward on his knees, he reached behind him touching his back feeling around until he made contact with a few metal fragments that penetrated his back. He groans as he stood up.

Getting a grasp of the situation, he turns back sharply only to find the girl was gone, only the broken helmet and a strange device. He picked up the peculiar piece of hardware closely examining it. He looks down to his right, drips of blood trails out into the corridor. "She can't be far."

Kuniva’s changes his ocular filters, picking up thermal radiation. The trickles of blood still radiated warmth as he walked the pitch black cordor into an underground storage facility.

Isolated and injured, she frantically checked her compartments pulling out a broken medical device. "There goes my first aid. And nearly half of my inventory. I don't think my armor can take another hit like that―" her ears twitched, she quickly covered her head as an explosion hurled a few containers and canisters into the air. "That was my last pressure plate mine, should have made more."

"Good because I've had enough of them even through I only stepped on two tonight." Nadine crawls backwards into a wall as the transformer was ripped from its fixed point.

"Using highly volatile elements and chemicals for your explosives and the gear that you're utilizing is something you get off the black market, a pocket sized explosive synthesizer. You're not some regular gun for hire, private mercenaries?" Kuniva crushed the synthesizer, tossing to her side.

"What? not man enough to meet face to face? big you are, using a robot instead."

Kuniva remained silent for a few seconds before pressing on with the interrogation. "Where’s the rest of your team?"

"What team? I came alone."

"Sade would strongly disagree. What are they offering you to keep their secrets buried?"

Nadine chuckled maniacally, "For our own needs."

"!?!?!?!"

Bursting into a backwards electric slide, Kuniva breaks way from the injured girl as a beam of red energy punches through the walls, metlting containers and its contents entirely.

"Sorry it took me long, electronics are out of wack..." The woman in the skin tight suit plated with armor glances down at her injured companion, her helmet visor shifts its transparency.

"About time..."

A thigh compartment consisting of four hyperdermic needles opens, she takes one and stabs her companion's thigh. It wasn’t long before she slipped under.

"A wetworks drone? and by the looks of its condition its been preserve―" in mid sentence a 32 foot stainless steel tank was violently hurled at her.

Without lifting a finger a wall of energy appeared between her and the thrown object. The stainless steal tank slowly disintegrates upon contact, rushing hot air swirled around her as the tank is atomized.

The wall of energy condenses into a tiny bead of light, with just a touch of her finger, a beam of charged electrons erupted melting the floor upon release.

Kuniva dodged, hurling containers that will utterly be obliterated the wall of energy.

"My, aren't you a hand full. I can see why Helix Industries turned to the Underworld for help," She said looking up at Kuniva hanging upside-down from the ceiling. That helmet I've seen it before, but where from?

She tried hard to remember trying to quell an brain itch, the deep void color, the ruin like engravings etched onto the helmet left-hand side, visible hasty repair work.

She rolls her shoulders, taping on the wrist of her suit.

"Syeda! finally a connection. I have your video and auditory feed but its weak. I take it you got to Nadine in time?"

"She's pretty bandaged up, she wasn't prepared to take this machine on her own."

"Listen, I don't know what is going on but our mystery person is giving off two different signals one organic and the other inorganic. But I bet it's that thing scrambling communications relays...."

Sade comms turned to static. "I can't keep changing frequencys for too long. At some point he might decide to come after me. Syeda and Michelle should able keep him focused. While I set up her type-g targeting matrix and activate the Q.C.C."

Sade inhaled and lifted her left eyepatch, in the socket of her left eye was an artificial eye. It was identical to normal human eye in all its features but this was an targeting assist module. Syeda's particle beams hits with devastating force, punching through ten inches of reinforce concrete, turning solid metal into molten pools of slag. With such lethality, each shot from the beams has its drawbacks, that was accuracy.

"Sade, the bastard slipped from my sight, I need to locate him."

A glowing cyan ring materialize around her shaping itself into a 4d map of the facility interior, before her was a holo heptic-interface. The interface changes to green, two glowing spheres of hardlight appears by her side before changing color, each having a specific role to play.

"Type-g matrix active, Heimdall Targeting System online," a feminine synthesized voice chimed from the red VI a weapons assistant.

"Short range quantum communications online connecting to Syeda's ascension terminal," a masculine synthesized voice chimes from the blue VI a communications assistant.

She triangulates and isolates the inorganic signal passively emitted by their target from its organic counterpart and locks it into the Heimdall Targeting System. Sade hones in on the moving blip, she tracks it zipping through halls at inhuman speeds. "He's trying to make a brake for the eastern service elevator. I can slow him down with a bit of hacking."

"Divert him towards Michelle's position, I'll flank him from above," Syeda replied, as she treated Nadine's head injury. After carrying her team mate to a safe couner, her helmet encased her head as she heads back through the melted hole in the wall.

*******

Darting through the darkness, Kuniva comes to an abrupt stop taking a second to scann his surroundings, he glances up at the ceiling. That cyber specialist, has absolute control over the facility systems. She's countering my electronicwarfare measures.

Kuniva knew escape wasn't easily doable with such a thorn in his back side. She's been feeding her mercenary partners critical combat data across their private battle communications network, which he was able to temporarily distort but a work around was immediately found even he knew that.

He knew there's currently 2 more on the facility grounds, but unable to efficiently tackle them all at once. His logic led him to incapacitate the brain of the group but finding her was another challenge on its own, she can easily change positions and hide her own bioelectricity.

Such a move would draw the attention of the other members to the heart of their command, countering multiple combat capable foes wasn't up his alley. He knew he was capable himself but not invincible.

He continues his escape from the facility, only to stop short from his objective.

"!?"

Kuniva dashes forward just as four beams of energy penetrating the metal and concrete ceiling and floor, leaving a molten drool.

"That was near accurate―!?"

Several more beams of energy penetrated the ceiling, in mid dodge his helmet was scored by the sheer heat of the beam leaving a red spot.

Shit!

The helmets visor shifts from black to a bright red.

Just as he banks left toward an exit, he come to a full stop blocking his face from an invisible force, the force knocked him back into the corridor.

*******

Suddenly, the facility roars to life, the dark halls where now illuminated.

"We'll get a bigger reward if we manage to bring you back alive instead of a corpse, only to cover for the damages," the voice through the halls.

"Stealth Tech doesn't work on me, I can see you." Kuniva retorted, as the girl uncloaks herself from normal eyes.

Just as the rest of her companion's she too sported a helmet and a skin suit plated with armor, but the design differs from the others, her's was more ridged and bulky. Almost like a tank.

Without much say between the adversaries, they collide into each other with tremendous force and untraceable speeds.

―However, the situation immediately slipped from Kuniva favor, he repelled the girl into the large chasm all at the same time taking evasive actions to avoid the incoming beams of electrons from above him.

He electric-slides into the chasm, the girl closed in on Kuniva with her forearm plates blocking her face. She swings with a fearsome left hook with the speed of an .50 caliber bullet striking Kuniva’s helmet splitting the visor along with the right side face plating.

Kuniva attempts to dodge the relevantless blows, however, another threat kept him occupied.

"I can't keep her out of the my systems!" The glyphs on his display flickered and raced from one side to the other, the deployment of firewalls was out paced by the virus duplication rate, only seconds did his display flickered on and off.

The continuous hacking attempts only slowed him down, this was all new to him unable to simultaneously combat multiple threats at once only prioritizing the threat in front of him.

Each time he goes on the counter-offensive Sade would interfered with his helmet's system.

The assailant's hands and feet coordination where impeccable, jabs of a powerful boxer, kicks as swift as kickboxing specialist, and flow as fluid as water. It was evident that this mercenary is indeed a veteran in her own right.

As swift as she is with her hands and feet, Kuniva perception was faster but his injury was becoming an inevitable liability.

Blocking the incoming action of the woman's fist, Kuniva instantly found himself under siege from multiple threats, the tangible and the intangible.

He felt the energy fluctuations coming from beyond the darkness on the other side of the room. The energy beam force him to back off, the multi pronged assault intensified and the pressure increasing on him.

It was then his vison is obscured as he fends off the cyber intrusion. Every movement he makes felt as though the atmosphere got heavier weighing him down significantly to impact his performance, unable to keep his em field from falling below its threshold for a long duration left him vulnerable to repeated enemies physical countermeasures.

His breaths were heavy and deep, his pupils narrowed, the ambient sounds vanished, the scent of iron was heavy in the air.

Shit shit shit, he thought out loud, as the enemies tech specialist cyber warfare countermeasures intensified, distracted with his countermeasures against the intangible threat. Kuniva realized his face was in the palm of his attacker. With all her might, and flexing the synthetic arm muscles, she slams Kuniva’s head into the floor several times before the floor beneath them gives way, plunging them to the facilities underground maintenance and transport shafts.

Enormous slabs of rebar concrete flooring rumbles as Michelle frees herself, she pushed the slab to the side with one hand and in the other was a chunk of the midnight black helmet.

"Sade, they're not showing up on the radar."

"That inorganic signature is weak, it's barely showing up on my scanner. Michelle, I'm picking up a rapid change in atmospheric composition and a spike in em radiation."

As Michelle received environmental data, the sound of water flows freely from the broken cooling pipes, roaring like a water fall.

Her helmet alarm blared. "Warning! O2 and hydrogen levels spiking-"

"Michelle get out of there now-"

However, Sade's warning was cut short as communications were once again scrambled from the explosion, Syeda rushed towards the edge of the hole in the floor only to be violently knocked of her feet from the blast. She too would fall into the pit under the crumbling floor.

Michelle was buried underneath more debris, this time, her arm was damaged. Her helmet emergency release actives. She looked up, her sight was temporarily distort and blurred a second before becoming clear. Her hazelnut colored eyes met his through the right torn portion of her targets helmet.

Daemonium, Those red eyes were the last thing she sees before falling unconscious from her injuries.

Just then, in that instance something terrifying filled the air, a red blinding light grazes his torso.

He kneels from the attack. He felt the collection of dense energy gathering, his body pleads for him to flee, escape while he can.

"Now I remember. You're the one that infiltrated the Siberian Hotlabs during the war. I have to say, you're more sloppy now compared to then. Your past little trick put my specialist under for a few years, but you didn't get away untouched. Last I remember, you were barely alive to walk the frozen forest of Siberia." Syeda pressed her finger under her chin releasing her helmet from her head.

"So, tell me. Did your failure haunt you enough to force you out of retirement or did someone hire you?" she demanded.

And Kuniva simply replied, "What are you talking about!"

Operation Bullthrough, she's talking about Sierra.

"Fine, I'll beat it out of you." With those word she reached into her left thigh compartment taking out a syringe filled with a red crude liquid and injecting herself with the unknown compounds into her neck.

This was going from bad to worse, it's one thing to fight an artificial intelligence than to fighting experts mercenaries who have years of experience and knowledge on the means of war. Unlike a machine, the people he's facing are sentient killers. Kuniva's heart raced as he focused on his foe.

At his near limit, no surprise since he's been active for a few nights without rest along with his injuries, nor did he expect others to be here.

Warning system blared once more, a massive shift in particle wavelength was detected coming from the woman. Spheres of red energy shifts to a deep blue.

Shit! Kuniva pulls him backwards using magnetism into the corridor.

The violet beams of energy raced at the speed of light, Kuniva cross blocked the beam of energy.

The energized beam strikes his em field, scattering the beam in different directions.

"Warn-ing, ul-tra vi-let r-adi-ation dete-cte..." His helmet announced, in a glitched voice. But it was clear that Kuniva was well aware of the energized frequency.

Syeda wasn't stunned, she knew that to countering ultra violet rays required a vast amount of energy to successfully block, energy was something her foe was dangerously running low on.

She fires for a second time, only to witness the ray to be redirected with a wave of a single hand.

Kuniva leaps over the gangway just as a third volley of violet light is fired.

Syeda looked over the ledge.

"Sade, whats your status?"

"Michelle took a big hit and is in need of medical assistance."

"Done, eta 10 minutes, and what about the target?"

"He's still in the facility, he's heading to one of the testing grounds. I've taken out the elevator to the north and south only leaving him with no road to escape. Get this, our "friend" is the saboteur we encountered in Siberia."

"Sorry to break it to you but thats not the same person, I ran a cross search on that synthetic signature, and electromagnetic irregularities, it don't match any on record."

Syeda reaches into her inner pocket taking out a visor. "He's an imposter."

"Hey, we've been requested to abandon the mission, apparently the client doesn't appreciate us turning his facility into a crumbling pile."

Listening to her specialist, Syeda noticed a large pool of blood on the gangway.

"Negative, I'm continuing the pursuit. He's injured, this can be chance a to finish him."

Another voice chimes in but wasnt from the other on her team comms. "Syeda, you're to fall back at once-"

Sade cuts the comms. "Oops."

Without a single thought Syeda leaps over the ledge following her prey into the abyss as she merciously grins ear to ear.

*******

Weaked, battered, stumbles in his walk. Kuniva walked some distance before entering what appears to testing ground, blood drips down from his left fingers onto the pristine white metal tiles, his shoes soaked in his blood left prints in his wake. As he stumbles to the other side of the spaceous testing ground, the door seemed to get farther away from him.

A few feet way from freedom his em field weakly reacts. Here she comes! Kuniva breaks hard stopping his forward momentum making a hard sharp right out of the blue energy beam trajectory.

"You hurt my girls now at this point I want you dead," Syeda replied scowling, as five spheres of particle energy hums around her.

"Well, self-defense is rated E for everyone," Kuniva said sarcastically, holding his injured arm.

Syeda was in no mood to chit-chat any more, the thigh compartment opened. She takes another syringe filled with a darker fluid and injecting herself for the second time. Her eyes where blood shot, veins swelled showing through her skin. The floating spheres of energy shifts from blue to a deep violet.

Kuniva inches back one stop at a time. "We don’t have to do this!"

Syeda snickers, "Oh but I do, "

Kuniva goes full on offense, drawing on his nearly empty electrical energy. Releasing electricshocks against Syeda. However, Syeda redirected the bolt of electricity to the ground followed a volley energized beams, but no matter how many repeated strikes, she will only come so close to actual hitting him.

Kuniva skates around Syeda, the white metal floor tiles were ripped up as he springs into the air, the metal tiles accumulated above his head.

With a mid-air front flip, the ball of metal floor tiles nearly decimated Syeda but she formed a shield of energy instantly disintegrating the wreckingball of metal.

She turned around to face Kuniva but he was faster but didn't mean she was unaware of such ploy. Then from her left another bolt of electricity was redirected off to her left, but then her eyes widened. Michelle!!!

Behind the bolt of hung a single flashbang grenade its pin pull by a black thin strand of ironsand. At point blank range the stun grenade goes off, blinding her. Her ears ring and sight impaired but her other senses weren't affected.

Syeda held her hand out ready to redirect the attack but the attack didn't come. She hastily opened her eyes only to see multiple blurs before being slugged out cold a fury of combs.

Her limped body strikes the cold hard floor with a loud thumb.

"It was probably for the best that I did hold on to that stun grenade when I did." Run completely ragged, Kuniva proceeded through the exit. He panted, his body began to slow down, he takes a moment to rest before proceeding. The injury under his arm worsed as he clashed with his enemy. At the end of the hall was an freightelevator, coming to a slow joging his way to freedom the elevator exploded, the doors violently burst open.

Kuniva lays sprawled on the floor glancing up at the ceiling, taking heavily breaths recollecting himself. He sit up looking at the elevator shaft that was engulfed in raging flames. On the inside were containers that once hosed volatile liquids and gasses.

The lights from the inside of helmet his flashed red before completely giving out from the damage. "Gotta go back the way-"

The hall was filled with a deep gamma green light from directly behind him, a raspy voice uttered, "You little shit, I'm going to turn you into into dust!" Syeda's vocie resonates with the utmost anger, as blood drips from the cut over her eye down to her brown chin.

She unleashed her fury unpon Kuniva.

He leaps up and over her as she blasts everything in her line of sight.

Kuniva noticed something daunting about the woman who's actively trying to unalive him, in her hand were three more empty syringes. Her neck showed signs of multiple injection sites and around her left thigh was lime green glowing band constantly rotating and shifting.

A terminal? no, Unranked don't have those only Categorie 5's.

As he raced back through the room, he suddenly found himself surrounded on all sides ball of energy.

She's out for blood! and I refuse to be her next meal. Kuniva only had one goal, escape but even that is proving to be a challenge, his reactions slowed causing him to be nicked by the particle beams. Unlike his pursuiter, human to human combat was nonexistent to him. He's never had to resort to fighting others people to such an extent.

"Even after all the abuse you still walk?"

"Yeah, tell that to your teammates when they wake up from their dirt nap."

"Oh, I will."

――Kuniva retreated back the way he came, passing the rubble pile. From the couner of his left eye, a shadow then a face. Then a devastating blow to the ribs. Kuniva couldn't focus, Syeda on his rear, Michelle to his left, Sade hidden from sight. Inspite of her injuries and tanking a devastating explosion, her fist packed enough power that ultimately when the strike lands, Kuniva can hear something breaking in his body he nearly blacks out as a second punch slugged him, denting his helmet, knocking the freely moving parts to a complete sizes.

He groans loudly as he pushed Michelle off him with a powerful magnetic force, however Michelle braced herself following another line of fearsome blows.

Kuniva leapt high, magnetically pulling the ceiling down on top of her, at the same time he pulled himself upwards through the hole in the ceiling.

―But Michelle stood firm.

Damn it! only option is to head towards the rooftop and escape fr- Kuniva turns mid air grunting as he impeads several of the gamma beams racing towards him. Then it hit him, using the force of the particle beams he accelerates his ascent upwards.

Syeda and Michelle pan their gaze up into the darkness above snarling and scowling. He was beyond their reach, the only thing to do was regroup with her teammates on the outside.

*******

Safe and far from the facility and his hunters, Kuniva drops to the gravel rooftop, placing his damaged helmet off to his side. He takes rapid breaths until eventually coming to a calm.

The glow that emitted from his iris dimed, his head slums a bit. The city lights flickered.

Kuniva pats the helmet. "Once this operation is dismantled, I'll see if Sierra can fix you, or someone that can. If I'm going to be this deep problems, I have to better prepare. I have to do something about cyber countermeasures for future engagements. That girl, Sade, easily breached the firewalls."

Fighting an artificial intelligence weapons platform is different from fighting an Unranked, another human. But he knew that there were biotics that are willing kill without a single thought, and when the time do arrive he must execute.

*******

"I can assure you that this wasn't the same person!" Syeda blared at the holo-display.

The voice over the comms sighed. "This complicates things even more, I hope Helix Industries can keep this coverd from the public eye."

"Their going such lengths to keep their pest out of their lives, for that matter. What is Helix Industries actually doing? I'm certain it has something to do with their latest tech."

The comms were silent, not even static. "[Project Ascension], they've invested a lot more resources compared to Hartford Academy."

"They must have a big stake in this project Send the dossier to my private terminal. I'll read it after I check up on everyone else."

"That won't be necessary. There's been a change of plans." The female voice beyond the display uttered. "I'll brief you in person at your penthouse tomorrow night, bring Sade with you." the comms disconnects.

"Alright, take us home."

*******