Sector 25: The Abandoned Factory District [19:50]
“Our time is almost up, Kenji. We should head back….” Kyou was walking behind Kenji through the dead trees on the edge of the factories. They had patrolled through this area for an hour and a half now and had come up empty.
“Not yet,” Kenji’s eyes were crawling all over the surrounding area.
Kyou sighed. The longer they stayed in a high sector like this, the longer they would have to stay in the quarantine chamber when they returned.
Kenji suddenly dropped to the ground. Kyou instinctively followed suit, “What?!”
Kenji’s gaze was focused straight ahead, “Shhh!”
Kyou followed Kenji’s gaze, but saw nothing. But then he heard it. The hum and grumble of an old engine. How did he hear that? The car was driving extremely slow as it came into view. It was rare to see a pre-war car. Not that they were valuable, almost all of them were shredded for scrap and piled in junkyards out in these high sectors. This one looked to have been pieced together using scraps. The lights were off. It pulled slowly in front of one of the many empty factory buildings before it clunked off. Kyou watched carefully. A man emerged from the car and looked around carefully before opening the trunk. Kyou pulled out the binoculars to get a better look. The man lifted what looked like a girl from the trunk. There was a black bag over her head and her body hung limp in the man's arms.
“Whaddya think partner?” Kenji whispered.
The man fumbled to walk carrying the person. He slipped slightly and the bag fell off the person’s face. Kyou froze.
Kenji grinned, “Isn’t that the shapeshifter?”
Kyou’s gaze was locked on her face as the man struggled to put the bag over her head once again. Arisa.
“Looks like we got lucky eyy?”
Kyou was grinding his teeth. His mind was in a panic.
“Let’s go in there now and grab her,” Kenji was already shifting his weight to push to his feet.
“Wait!” Kyou grabbed Kenji and pulled him back to the ground, “Why does he have her? We should scope the place out first. This man might be a major threat….” he hoped he could buy time to make a real decision this way.
Kenji huffed.
“Look-” Kyou barked, pointing to the other side of the warehouse. Another woman, this one in a white lab coat walked up to the entrance of the warehouse. She looked around before knocking twice. The man opened the door for her and she smacked him before entering and shutting the door behind her.
“Seems like something interesting is going on down there….” Kenji licked his lips as he gripped onto his spear.
Kyou furrowed his brow. It’s not Arisa. It can’t be.There’s just no way…please don’t let Arisa be the shapeshifter.
Sector 12: Hans’ House [20:01]
“Oh god what a mess,” Seiji held his hand over his mouth as he came to the bathroom again, “This is horrible...”
He was overseeing the forensic clean up. The bathroom was covered in blood. Hans’ deceased wife was sitting in the bathtub. The amount of blood alone was enough to send Seiji’s stomach in knots, but the truly horrid part of the experience was seeing the woman’s body torn and ripped. All mothers died when giving birth to a mazoku, but only the unlucky few had their babies hatch from them as if they were an egg. The forensic team moved swiftly and quickly to finish their samples and photographs so as to allow the mother to be taken back to STAM.
“Do I really have to watch this???” Seiji gagged as he called out to Shou.
Shou was in the living room. He ignored Seiji’s cries. He didn’t like this atmosphere. The immense sadness from the husband didn’t pair well with the ‘just-doing-our-jobs’ attitude of the STAM officers. To his left, Hans was answering questions by some normal officers. There was a thin piece of paper on the mantel in an evidence pouch. Shou lifted it carefully and read the final words of Hans’ wife.
My dearest Hans. I am so ashamed to tell you the truth only after I have died like a coward. There is no excuse and if I could relive this life I would have never hid this from you because I know you would have loved me just the same. Our child is a mazoku. I know this news may shock you as the both of us are humans and in our 12 years of being together we have never faced the reality of the mazoku. But I carry the pain of our child being a mazoku. The last time I went to the hospital without you I had a different nurse. A mazoku nurse. She told me the truth. I knew I would die, as all mothers do, when our baby would be born. Hans I beg you, if you ever loved me- and I so desperately hope you still do- send a message to the number at the bottom of this letter. People will come and make sure our baby is protected. If you so choose, they can take our child with them and you will not have to worry about their safety. I am so sorry Hans.
I love you now and till the end of the world,
Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.
Adrianne
The bottom of the paper had been ripped, hiding the number Hans was to have called. Shou sighed. He hated sad stories like this one. This poor father lost his wife...and now his child.
From across the street, Keiko saw the caution tape field that surrounded the small house. Somehow STAM had beaten her to the scene first. She made her way cautiously closer to the scene. She was across the street, perched in a tree. The house was surrounded by concerned neighbors trying to see what was going on. There were two STAM cars, 8 officers photographing and collecting things. Two officers in forensic suits carried out what was no doubt the mother on a stretcher. Must have been a hatching considering the blood. Maybe it was her screams that alerted STAM. She sighed. If that were true it meant the father had called MRPA to save his baby from this exact fate in the first place.
“DON’T YOU TAKE HER!!” a man, who Keiko presumed to be the father, was pulled from the house by two officers and held to the ground as he tried to fight, “NOT MY BABY! DON’T YOU DARE!” he wiggled and screamed under the force of the officer. From the house walked Shoutarou, a small baby wrapped in his hands. He looked back at Seiji and said something, prompting Seiji to fiddle with his dog tags and pull out a small infant cage. Keiko knew the tech well. The cage was omega blocking. While the tech wasn’t strong enough to work against a fully developed mazoku, it would work easily on a newborn.
Shou slid the child into the cage, tasking Seiji with carrying it. The father was still resisting. His screams made the onlooking crowd cover their mouths in shock.
Shou knelt down to father and tried to talk him down, but the father broke down in tears. Shou called the officers to free the father.
Keiko watched the father closely. She had seen this scene unfold a number of times. The father, once he realizes the severity of having a mazoku child, would surrender and allow STAM to take the child peacefully. STAM had the law on their side. Persuading humans to give up their children for science and the good of humanity was an easy choice with death on the line.
As Shou talked down the father, Keiko saw his resolve weaken. He was docile and the tears that were only moments ago streaming down his face were all but dried up.
She stood from her perch, if the baby was in STAM’s direct custody there was little she could do. She couldn’t fight against these overwhelming odds or with all the civilians around.
Suddenly the father shoved Shou out of the way, sprinted toward Seiji and slammed his body into him. The father grabbed the small cage as Seiji fell to the ground, “ADRIANNE!!!!” the father screamed as he ran through the crowd and the shocked officers. Keiko gawked as he made it through the caution tape projection and ran into the street.
“GET HIM!” Seiji shouted at the officers as he stood to his feet.
The father tripped over the curb to the side of the street Keiko was on and fell to his knees, protecting his child in the cage.
Officers ran to surround the father.
Keiko jumped down from her tree and surrounded herself and the father in a wall of first water, and then ice. She could hear Seiji scream something about the elemental.
“Adrianne,” he held te cage containing his daughter in his arms protectively. He looked up at Keiko, “Y-you?”
Keiko knelt down and helped the father to his feet, “I’m from MRPA. Are you alright?”
“My baby-” he pushed the small cage into her hands, “Adrianne!” his whole body was shaking.
Using a small amount of ice around the edges of the cage, she safely took the baby from the cage, “She isn’t harmed,” her gaze shifted to the ice wall around them. It shook and cracked slightly from Shou and Seiji’s attacks, “There’s no time.” She handed the baby to the father.
He sniffed his tears back as much as he could and held the child close to his chest, “Adrianne, Adrianne,” he kissed her forehead gently, “Your mother and I love you more than anything in this world.” he held her back out to Keiko, “Please take her.” the words barely made it through his cracking voice, “Please.”
Keiko took the child in her arm, “We will protect her.”
The father once again fell to his knees, “Thank you. Thank you.”
“ELEMENTAL!!!” Seiji screamed as another large crack formed in the wall.
Keiko turned the wall into water and took off into a sprint away from the scene. She turned back and froze the now soaked Seiji in place, before continuing to run.
Shou, who had been further away from the wall and so had remained dry, ran after Keiko, “HAHA Seiji you idiot!” he couldn’t help himself.
Trying to be more serious, Shou attempted to aim for 013 while running. He fired many shots, but couldn’t hit because of the movement. If he stopped running she would get out of range. Keiko knew where she was going. On the outer edge of the houses there was an entrance to the abandoned underground that would take her to sector 27. Even if Shou did manage to follow her in, he would succumb to the radiation effects once entering the dead sector. She couldn’t be sure that he wouldn’t follow her underground, and if he did he would most likely die or pass out before being able to escape. She had no choice. She had to stop him.
She ran only a handful of paces ahead of him out from the housing area and into the big open wasteland. The land was soft and muddy- nearly flooded with water. Her boots sunk into the mud as she ran.She knew once Shou reached this area he would stop and properly aim for her. She checked behind her shoulder and saw Shou push his front foot into the soppy ground to stop himself and line up a shot in mere moments. She dropped the baby, catching it softly with water and setting it on the ground and immediately changed direction, charging for Shou. She raised a thick ice shield around her arm to block his shot.
Shou reeled back and fired three more times. The earth he stood on suddenly flooded with water and he sunk deep into it.
She quickly kicked the gun from his hand only to feel her leg fall limp from his last shot. Keiko grunted and froze the earth he was now sunk into from the mid-thigh down. Before Shou could pull another gun from his dog tags she ripped them from his neck and threw them from his reach.
He struggled in the frozen ice, “What the hell?!”
Keiko sighed and caught her breath, “There’s never a dull moment with you agents...”
Shou pulled a knife from his belt and pointed it at her, “Don’t think I’ll let you kill me without a fight!”
Keiko rolled her eyes and turned back to where the baby was soundly sleeping, “We don’t kill humans,” she limped on her paralyzed leg.
“Where are you going?!”
She shouted back without turning, “Home! Don’t worry I’ll let you and the disposer go once I’m far enough away.”
Shou stared at her back, unsure of how to respond. She did nothing to him. Didn’t hurt him, didn’t take the dog tags, didn’t kill him. He didn’t understand. He watched silently as she gathered the small baby and hobbled into a small shack off in the distance. After a few moments the earth and mud thawed completely and Shou pulled himself from the muddy hole. He stared off in the distance where she disappeared.
“SHOU!!!!” Seiji fell to his knees beside him soaking wet and out of breath, “Where’d she go!?”
Shou sighed, “She escaped.”