Chapter 22 - From the Shadows
By namek_kaia
As Captain Yemman and his new partner Kazuma walked calmly in the dark toward the Comdot Estate, a figure waited in their step. Said figure had casually propped themselves against the estate wall, his glasses glinting in the scarce light as they were adjusted. The glass cross around his neck also caught the light with his movement.
Kazuma stiffened. “Just who the hell are you?!” He grabbed his arm in case he needed to use it.
“My name is not important. I’m only here to give you the wise words of a Quincy. Following it is a choice of your own.”
“And what advice might ye be givin?” Yemman asked.
“Yeah! We don’t need no advice. Specially not from you, four eyes!”
The Quincy bit his tongue and tried hard not to retort. “Turn back and regroup with the Syndicate. If you storm in there, you’ll only die. If that’s what you want, then by all means, proceed. But things are not as simple as they seem. You might be of actual use if you run along, back to the Syndicate while you still can.”
“Ye be on thar side, do ye?”
“I’m not on anyone’s side. I’m only here to say what I’ve said, and leave you to decide. That is all.” With that, he pushed off the wall and started in the opposite direction.
“Have a nice life, gentlemen. Use it well, or save everyone else the trouble and march right past those gates.”
They were suddenly left in the darkness, alone with each other and their thoughts.
***
Kaia paced the length of the back room again… and again. Everyone had reported in except Schwartzwald, who was supposed to be looking out for Furion. Why did it have to be him? Why was he the one that was late? Why did he have to go off and put himself in danger for the sake of the Syndicate?
Proof peaked in from the doorway. Cid’s head appeared below his and both watched as she went back and forth, back and forth.
Proof spoke up. “Has there been any word…”
“About Mr. Furion yet?” Cid finished.
“Does it look like there’s any word yet?!?” she yelled, her arms flailing at her side. Suddenly she composed herself and cleared her throat. “No… no word yet. We’re still waiting.”
“Do you think…” started Cid.
“That something’s happened to them?” Proof finished.
Before she could respond, the front door burst open with a loud bang followed by distressed voices and groans of pain. She heard Swartzwald bark her name. She didn’t even need her powers to get there in less than a second. When she did… all she could see was red.
Blood from his shoulder that had easily soaked through the makeshift dressings. Schwartzwald was carrying him none-to-gently, seemingly unconcerned with Furion’s wounds. Or he may have been. It was always hard to tell exactly what he was thinking with his face covered in those wrappings.
Everyone who had gathered in the front room stood and followed Schwartzwald with concern. Except Aoi, who calmly turned the page in the book he was reading, and Hedwig, who was too busy trying to sneak up on his friend Proof with a knife to notice whatever else was going on. Kaia pushed past them all in attempts to see what had happened. When she got to the front of the crowd, Kuze was already there, assessing the damage to Furion’s shoulder.
“It’s bad. But…. I don’t think it’s fatal. From what I can tell, this was a sniper’s job – one with one hell of a gun.”
“Caine the Longshot, if I had my guess,” interrupted Swartzwald. “Because of his quick reflexes, they fragmented and diverted away from the vitals. If those have clean exits, he should be fine after it’s cleaned and dressed properly. If not, it could be difficult to find them and extract them.”
What kind of people are in the Echelon? For a bullet to be so powerful that even fragments go through clean… Kaia thought.
Everyone let out a breath of relief, some of them not even realizing they had been holding it. Most of them went back out to the front room, waiting on Swartzwald to give them their orders. Kaia searched the receding crowd.
“Band? Band!?!”
Like a flash the young priest was before her, his face bright with anticipation.
His eagerness made her smile despite the situation. “Could you get me the first aid kit from-“
Before she could finish, he had gone and returned. His inhuman speed came in handy at times like these. “Here you go, Miss Kaia,” he said as he handed it to her.
I thought I told him never to call me that. But she had no time for trivialities. She thanked him and turned to her wounded friend, intending to tell him that everything was going to be fine. That’s when she noticed-
“OMG! WTF happened to your beautiful face?!?! How did this happen?! Who did this do you? Where are they?! I’LL KILL HIM!!!” Her arms were flailing again, and she nearly dropped the first aid kit.
Furion smiled despite his wavering consciousness. “Kaia-chan. I’d know that ranting anywhere.”
She was immediately at his side. If Kuze had still been kneeling beside him, she probably would have knocked him over. Her hand rested gently on his chest and she began to transfer her energy to him.
“Just what the hell were you thinking? What happened to-
“No connections, no regrets” they said in unison.
“I’ve already been given this lecture from Swartzwald.”
“Well you’re going to hear it from me!” she snapped. “You weren’t supposed to get this involved. You weren’t supposed to do anything that would make you a target. What would I have done if you hadn’t been this lucky?”
“You would have gone on, Kaia-chan. Just like everyone else.”
She got gauze and peroxide from the kit with one hand, the other still on his chest. “You know how I feel about you. I wouldn’t know what to do without you.”
“Kaia-“
“I know you don’t feel the same way. I get it. But it doesn’t change anything. Next time, if you get a next time, you’re going to have to be more careful. If you die, I’ll kill you.”
She stopped the transfer of energy so she could work on his wounds with both hands. “Do you know why I did that?”
“So I’d feel better?”
She smirked. “Hmph. So you won’t pass out from the pain. You’re going to be awake for every minute of this. So you’ll remember it.”
“I have a feeling no one’s going to let me forget it.”
***
Eric Ominae drove the three-wheeled motorcycle as fast as it would go, speeding almost recklessly down the still-rubble-strewn streets – a result of the civilian uprising a few days ago. After driving a few miles from his home, he had ditched the truck and traded it for a new, unmanned, totally (probably) abandoned motorcycle. He didn’t really like the truck, and didn’t know why he was driving one in the first place. This suited him much better.
With one hand, he flipped open his phone and dialed a number. (He wasn’t wearing a helmet. Helmets are for chumps.) It rang several times before someone picked up.
“I know I’m not supposed to call you at this number, but this is important. Things have gotten out of hand. We need you.
“Are you ready?
“Then get ready.
“You’ll see what this is about when I get there,” he said as he weaved through broken and vandalized cars without dropping speed.
“Yes, I’m coming! I’m already on my way. I’ll see you in five minutes.” And with that, he flipped the phone closed and veered away from a small pile of rubble.
He srsly did not look forward to the upcoming conversation.
5 minutes later….
Eric hopped off his vehicle, tucked the newspaper under his arm, and pulled out the special-made key to unlock the door to the hideout. He took a breath, oh so looking forward to the tongue-lashing he was bound to receive. And it wasn’t going to be the fun hawt kind either.
The hideout was of the tall and narrow variety, an abandoned law office in a rarely used part of downtown Actonia. He took the stairs up to the second floor where he knew he’d find who he was looking for. The whole place was dark and filled with enough dust to choke someone. If he didn’t know exactly where to go, Eric probably would have tripped, fallen through the old, termite-ridden floorboards and killed himself. Not a horrible way to die, but completely unawesome.
He opened the door toward the back of the room. Dim light from the corner illuminated a figure sitting Gendo-style behind a desk. “And what was so important that you drove all the way down here? Your speed might have rivaled Straight Cougar’s.”
“Speaking of which, I recently left Cille in his care. But –” he tossed the newspaper on the desk and it slid so that the article indicating her death was facing the other man. “He failed.”
Without unfolding his hands, he read the article, and read it again for assurance. “I see.”
Eric’s jaw nearly dropped.
“I see? I f#cking see?! That’s it? She’s dead! For god’s sake, Landon, she was your fiancée.”
“Have a seat, Eric. Calm down. I already know all about this.”
“But the paper only came out this morning.”
“I’m not talking about the paper. I’ve known about this for a while. I guess you could say I’ve been waiting on it to happen before going ahead with my plans.”
Eric’s brow furrowed. “You mean you planned this? Then why did you ask me to protect her?”
“Oh no… I certainly didn’t plan it. That’d be cruel. I just knew it had to happen and made plans for when that time came.”
“Landon, you’re not making any sense. How did you even know that Cille was going to die? None of us knew! Half the syndicate still doesn’t know.”
“Someone told me it was going to happen.”
“Oh come now, Landon. A psychic?! Are you that desperate to get back at the-”
“I’m not a psychic,” said a voice from behind him. The voice was female, and a curvy figure stepped into the light. “It’s been a long time, my good friend.”
“Friend? I’ve never seen-” He paused as he got a better look at her face. A face that was familiar yet strange. Her face kinda reminded him of…
That’s when it dawned on him.
“But how? I don’t understand. You’re supposed to be dead!”
***
Kirara sat in the darkness of the kitchen at the Order’s headquarters. Most everyone else had left after receiving their orders, but Father Sadar was her friend. After everything he had done for her, she hadn’t done much to repay him. She couldn’t just leave him now that he was so badly injured. More than that, she was still new to the Order. She didn’t really know anyone besides him. Swartzwald had given her no orders. What else could she do but sit and wait?
She had been sitting in the dark staring at the flame from what was left of her candle for what seemed like forever. What was taking so long? It was already a few hours after dawn. Maybe she should just go and knock…
The door to Sadar’s room opened and she heard footsteps coming her way down the hall. In walked the tall girl that had fussed over Sadar once he’d arrived here. She watched in silence for a while as the girl sighed, wiped the sweat off her brow, and retrieved a beverage from the fridge.
“How is he?” she finally asked.
The girl across the room took a long swig of her drink before trying to answer. “He’s resting. I gave him something for the pain and something to help him sleep. All he needs right now is a lot of rest. We’re going to have to force him to take it easy for a while. He’s not exactly the type to sit around and do nothing.”
“I know the feeling,” she responded.
“You’re Kirara, right? I don’t think we got a chance to really meet before you and Furion were sent to the Syndicate.” She walked over and pulled out a chair. “Mind if I sit?”
She sat before Kirara had time to reply. “I’m Kaia.”
“Kirara Amour.” She said with a nod. “Do you mind if…. I ask you something?”
“Sure… ask away.”
“Why does everyone call him Furion?”
Kaia shrugged. “Cuz that’s his codename from back when he was a thief. He acquired the name John Sadar after joining the order and becoming a priest.
A celibate priest,” she grumbled. “Still, everyone in the order calls him Furion. It’s the name most of us knew him by first. He answers to both, so it’s not really a problem. Besides, no one really knows if Sadar is his real name or just another alias.”
“I see.”
“Furion recruited you, didn’t he? To be part of the Order, I mean.”
She nodded.
“Did he even tell you what we’re about? What our mission is?”
“Well, I know we’re not supposed to get involved with people from the Syndicate or from Echelon. We’re not good or evil, just mediators.”
Kaia sat silent for a minute. “That’s all? I swear, that man!”
“Well, I got the Syndicate assignment right after I got here.”
“Don’t make excuses for him! You deserve to know what you’re getting yourself into. Why did he recruit you in the first place? What’s your specialty?”
“I do mostly undercover work. I’ve found out that I’m a particularly good spy. Sadar, err… Furion helped me keep my cover once when it was about to be blown. In return, I agreed to lend my spy skills whenever he needed them. And here I am. I don’t really have any motives for or against the revolution, so nature of the Order seemed to suit me.”
“I see. I’m glad you’re here then. They had me do spy missions and I’m not that good at it. I tend to want to take the hands-on approach more that is needed.” She laughed a bit nervously.
“Then… wouldn’t you rather be part of the Syndicate?” Kirara asked suddenly glad that she felt comfortable talking with other people from the Order of Glass.
“Sometimes. I grew up in Toonamia, which is a lot like Actonia. Actually, it’s almost exactly like Actonia. We all came from the Land of the Rising Big Red Dot but ended up in different places when we settled here. I grew tired of the childish treatment of the local government and joined the Toonamia sect of the Order. That was almost 10 years ago.”
“Wait. There are other divisions of the Order? I thought we were the only ones!”
“My dear Kirara. The Order is about more than just the mediation between the Syndicate and Echelon to make sure things don’t get out of hand. Our real objective is more large-scale, hence the need for global divisions.”
At that moment, Proof and Cid giddily popped in.
“Good morning, Miss Kaia!” Cid said.
“We brought you the morning paper!” Proof said as he tossed it her way. As he did, he flipped on the light switch. “Why are you two…”
“Sitting in the dark like this?” Cid asked.
“Because it ruins the dramatic atmosphere, you idiots!!” Kaia yelled back, temporarily forgetting her previous conversation. “And how many times do I have to tell you not to call me Miss?!”
“Fine, fine. We’re leaving,” they said in unison. As they walked off Proof dodged another one of Hedwig’s knife attacks, and slammed him face first into the wall.
“Why is he trying to kill you again?” Cid asked.
“Because we’re mortal enemies, of course.”
“But you two are best friends!!”
“That too.”
Kaia sighed and opened the newspaper, expecting more lies spread by the government about how the revolution was not a problem and everything was just fine.
“You were about to tell me what the Order does…” Kirara prompted.
“Oh yes!” Kaia said as she began to read. “The Order’s true objective is….”
Kaia sat straight up as she came across a rather suspicious article. “What was the name of Landon’s fiancée again?”
“What, you mean Cille? What about her?”
“Holy sh!t!!” She threw down the paper and rushed from the room. Kirara picked up the paper and skimmed it, trying to find what all the fuss was about Cille. Then she came across the headline in question.
Woman Found Dead Near Cow Farm.
Swartzwald’s turned as his office door was slammed open to see a rather frantic Kaia.
“I already know. I’m contacting the Comedia Order as we speak.”
Just then, a deep baritone was heard on the other end.
“I thought I said I would contact you when I knew more about the situation, Swartzwald.”
“The situation here has changed, Dr. Girlfriend. We’ve just received news that Cille Compton has been murdered, most likely by Ozzal or one of her Echelon agents.”
“So?”
“Cille Compton is the fiancée of Landon Blacken.”
“Then that does change things. We’ve sent one of our agents to test the security and motives of the Comdot Estate. We’ve received no report from her since. I would assume she’s been eliminated only our inside agent has reported that Ozzal is making efforts to acquire test subjects for some experiment.”
“I believe it’s time to launch the full-scale attack. The Comedia/Actonia war should commence as soon as possible. Swartzwald out.”
***
Hikki stared almost mindlessly at the morning newspaper’s front page. Now Cille was dead too? Was their actually any hope left for them at all?
At the moment, there didn’t seem like much hope for him. Sure he was now the owner of Café de Lune… soon to be Café de l’Argeno. And sure he had had the most amazing sexual experience with one of the hawtest guys ever, but at what cost? Argeno was dead. Luna was gone.
Now Cille was dead too, along with however many people fell victim during the Echelon raid on all the Syndicate hideouts. And everything was that **bleep** Ozzal’s fault. In less than 48 hours, she had successfully torn his world apart. What exactly was he supposed to do?
He sighed and held his head in his hands, ignoring the steaming cup of gourmet coffee he had just made himself. Coffee and baking usually improved his mood. But he usually wasn’t coping with deaths and disappearances left and right.
Samson watched with a heavy heart from the doorway to the café’s kitchen. He thumbed the cross in his pocket, the cross that Sadar had given him before he suddenly disappeared. Was it an invitation or a keepsake? If it was an invitation, should he accept? If it was a keepsake, did Father Sadar really plan on never coming back?
A ding from the oven interrupted his thoughts. He look toward his friend, expecting him to get up and take the scones out of the oven. But Hikki just sat at the table with seemingly no regard for his perfect baked goods.
Samson pushed himself from the door frame and used the help of his walking crutch to make his way to the oven and set the sheet of scones on the counter. With his one good arm, he set them all on a cooling sheet, save for one, which he put on a plate and placed it in front of his troubled friend.
“You should eat something,” he said as he carefully took a seat next to Hikki.
“Ee don’t feel like zit.”
Samson had never seen Hikki like this before. If Sadar’s cross was some kind of invitation to leave the Syndicate and join another group, how could he do so when all his friends were going through so much? He hadn’t really known Cille, but he knew that most of the Syndicate did. He didn’t think Hikki knew her all that well either, but still felt the blow of her death as much as anyone. He knew that his friend had gone through a lot in so little time, but he wished he could see the old Hikki for a moment, the flirtatious bubbly one he had always known and gotten used to. For once in his life, he actually wanted the Frenchman to hit on him.
As much as it would make him uncomfortable, if it would bring Hikki out of his funk….
“Would it make you feel better if I let you cop a feel?”
Samson waited, half hoping it would cheer him up and half hoping he’d reject the offer.
Then Hikki’s eyebrow rose. He slowly reached up to bring it downward, attempting to play it cool.
“Do go on…”
“I’ll let you cop a feel. No backing away, no objections. But just one. And on one condition.”
“And what iz zhat?” Hikki asked as he propped his chin on his hand.
“You need to cheer up, Hikki! We’re still alive. We can still fight and avenge our comrades. Argeno wouldn’t want you sitting here moping so bad you don’t even want to bake. He loved your food. You should go on making them, for him and everyone else who loves them! I’m not saying that you don’t have a reason to be sad. But don’t lose hope, Hikki. After everything she’s done to us, we won’t less Ozzal win!”
Suddenly, his crutch fell to the floor and he felt arms encircle him.
“Merci, mon amour!” Hikki said in his usual vibrant tone. “Zhu always know what to zay.”
Luna had basically said the same thing to him in the letter she had left, but for some reason, it clicked better when I was Samson saying it in front of him when he needed it most.
Samson endured the hug, ignoring the pain in his arm. It paled in comparison to the fact that Hikki was about as normal as he was going to get.
Then he felt a hand moving lower and lower, and….
“Hey!!”
Hikki pulled back to face the object of his affection with the poutiest sad face he could manage.
“But zhu zaid I could, Zamzon. Remembher?”
Samson still grumbled as he fought the urge to pull away. “Fine.”
He felt the hand move somewhere entirely different.
“HEY!!!”
At that moment, Clarice walked in from where she was repairing the damage made to the front of the café. Her eyebrow twitched at what she saw.
“Just what the hell is going on in here?!?!”
Hikki pealed himself off of Samson, quit crushed that his golden moment had been ruined by that person. “Nozing… Nozing at all.” He got up and set the cooling scones on a decorative plate for the display case out front. “Not zhat it concerns zhu aneeway.”
Clarice growled and stormed out of the kitchen. If she didn’t have more important things to do, she’d assault the Frenchman like she thought he deserved. He was lucky that she had left her tools behind and she had nothing to throw at him.
Hikki smiled and leaned over Samson’s chair to wrap his arms around him again as soon as Clarice was gone. That hand was on the move again.
“Would you stop it already?!?!”
At least one thing was back to normal in the life of Hikki Follet.
***
Keith Douglas tossed the newspaper back down on this desk in disgust. He reclined back into his desk chair and casually lit a cigarette, then looked at the ceiling as he composed his thoughts.
Something big was definitely going down. He just didn’t know what. Not yet anyway.
He was used to the paper being filled with lies and total bullsh!t about how the revolution was not a threat to the absolutely non-corrupt government. But the death of this girl… it was unusual even for Orly standards. Such a brutal death wasn’t the usual style of professional assassinations ordered from the higher ups. Yet it didn’t seem like a total irrelevant event either. Somehow, this was tied to everything else that had happened recently. His expert detective instincts told him so.
He took another long drag of his cigarette and flicked away the excess ash into the tray on his desk. About that time, his phone rang with an intercom call.
“Douglas.”
“Hey Douglas, I need you to run a grocery errand for me.”
“Sure, boss” he said without missing a beat, instantly recognizing what the code meant. He didn’t even glance at the agent that Lunge had sent, who was sitting directly opposite him just waiting for him to say or do the wrong thing.
“I’ll send the list down by my secretary. Oh, and would you grab me an Orly Review. From what I’ve heard this morning, the front page has a few rather interesting articles.”
“Indeed it does. Alright… I’ll get right on it, boss. Anything else?”
“That’s all, Douglas. Just keep your eyes open and stay on your toes.”
“Don’t I always?”
They hung up their phones. Keith was just about to get up and investigate the two articles on the front page of the paper when his cell phone rang. The Internal Affairs agent leaned forward in his chair, more intent that before on catching something, not to mention that he intended to follow Douglas on wherever it was he was about to go.
Keith flipped open the phone. “Douglas here.”
“Hey Keith! I’ve been meaning to get in touch with you-”
“Not now, yupat. Something just came up.”
“Well… you told me to contact you when I had some info. I guess if you don’t want it…”
Douglas turned in his chair away from the agent and spoke in a low voice. Besides need if only a moment of privacy, it was a nice break from having to look at that awful double-breasted black suit, and the black gloves, and the black tie, and the black sunglass. Gawd… could that guy be any more dramatic with his clothing? He looked like some Batman wannabe.
“I can’t really talk right now,” Keith said low into the phone. “I’m being monitored by the IA.”
“Can’t you shake those guys?”
“Do you even know who you’re talking to?”
“Smartass. It’s the usual spot. See you in 10.”
“Got it.” And with that he shut the phone, grabbed his coat, and went on his way. The IA agent was close behind him, but Keith cleverly lost him in record time. Given the events of the last few days, he hoped yupat could shine some light on what he was missing. Yupat was one of the few good investigative reporters still left in Actonia, one that couldn’t be bribed to print lies for the government. He came in as a handy source with big cases like this. Keith could only acquire so much information as a detective, but yupat had access to more inside sources that more often than not were essential to solving cases.
As he made his way into the city park, he checked his surroundings to make sure he had successfully lost the IA guy. From the looks of it, it seemed like he had. He grabbed a seat on a park bench and waiting. It wasn’t very long at all before he heard someone else take a seat on the bench directly behind him.
“I take you read this mornings Review?”
“Yeah… I was just thinking before you called that the front page articles were strange. They somehow fit into what’s been going on with this case I’m working on.”
“Well… I have info from my sources that say they were related attacks.”
“Related? One was a brutal murder and the other was a pub burning.”
“Some of my sources say that certain members of the Syndicate used to meet at the pub. It’s even rumored that Trunks himself is a member. He hasn’t been seen in a while, now that I think about it. A few nights ago, the pub was attacked, and now it’s been burned to bits. I’d say it’s Ozzal trying to send a message to the Syndicate.”
“Makes sense. I had heard things about Trunk’s pub from a former contact. But what exactly does that have to do with the other murder and the Heero case?”
“Cille Compton was in the care of certain members of the Syndicate. She was also the fiancée of one Landon Blacken.”
Keith raised an eyebrow. “Blacken. As in the guy who established the Syndicate almost a year ago?”
“The same.”
Suddenly, all the little pieces came together. “So the murders and the attacks were all retaliation from Ozzal toward the Syndicate. From what I gathered from that Roy Mustang, his old flame Riza and her husband might have been involved with the Syndicate as well. So… was that her doing? But why would she go to such extremes just to squash a few revolutionaries?
“There’s more to this than just a string of murders,” he said… watching the people walk through the park. He thought for a moment how nice it might be to be one of them, a sheep who lives their life thinking everything is just fine. But he wouldn’t be content with that. He was the kind of person who needed to know how things were. This new information was only taking him deeper and deeper down the rabbit hole, and now he wanted more than ever to get to the bottom of things.
But without evidence, a report would be frivolous. He needed to somehow gain information from inside Comdot if he was ever going to get anywhere.
“Thanks for the information, Yupat. You’ve always been a help.”
“And you to me. Just remember this the next time I need information about a story I’m working on.”
Keith smirked. “Once I figure out what’s really going on here, you get the exclusive.”
“You’re **bleep** right I do. I’ve been going through a lot to get all this information for you. But I better go… I think whoever was following you has somehow regained your trail. His suit is hideous.”
“Tell me about it. Yeah, you better go. I’ll contact you if I need anything else in particular. Meanwhile, just find out what you can. And I don’t think I need to tell you to watch your back. Things are definitely escalating and getting more complicated.”
“Gotcha.” And with that, he disappeared into the trees to avoid the IA guy, knowing that even if he was followed, no one would be able to keep up with him.
“Thought you could get away, did you?”
“What do you mean, get away? I just needed some fresh air. Somewhere where there aren’t suits everywhere,” he answered, having one particular suit in mind.
“Internal Affairs knows you’re up to something. And I intend to find out what it is.”
“What IA did was send you on a goose chase.” He got up and lit another cigarette. “You’ll probably die of boredom before you find whatever it is you’re looking for. Hope you won’t mind following me to the grocery store.”
What an inopportune time for IA to be sniffing around. If they had any idea that he was about to try to investigate Comdot, he’d be in deep sh!t for sure. Well… now all he had to do was make sure that didn’t happen.
Easy as pie.
On cue, his stomach rumbled. Breakfast had sure worn off fast.
Pie did sound pretty good right about now.
***
Elizabeth Saurie St. Gaurdsmen picked herself up from the dirty cell floor and turned her nose up toward the barred window high above her head. Sometimes if she tilted her head just right should could smell the fresh air from outside… or maybe it was just her nose getting used to the dank mildew smell of her cell.
She pressed her forehead to the cold clammy wall and sighed. Her wounds from her fight nearly two days ago were now scabbed over with dirt and dried blood. And from the looks of things so far, they’d get infected if she didn’t find some way to get her and her friends out of her sometimes soon. But as much as she hated to admit it, she was weak now. She had so far survived off of nothing but dingy water, gruel, and old bread.
Only her hope and strong will were keeping her alive.
It might not have been so bad if she had someone else here with her, someone to share the burden and despair, but from what she heard whispered between the guards there had been escapes and murders since the night they had locked her in this hellhole. She didn’t want to believe the ones about Cille being dead. It wasn’t the fact that she was dead that bothered her so much – it was the fact that they were saying she’s was killed brutally and mercilessly by her own comrade. Something was terribly wrong, and she knew Ozzal was behind it somehow.
She sat down in the corner and brought her knees up under her chin. She was stronger than this. She knew that. It irked her to be stuck in a cell with no real way to escape.
Her only hope was that Cille’s death would inspire a new fire in her Syndicate comrades and she would somehow be saved when they stormed the Estate. But how likely was that? And how low had she sunk to actually wish someone dead?
She sat, and she waited. What else could she do?
***
Angel roamed the streets of Actonia trying to figure out what the hell had gone on. Her apartment had been ransacked, no doubt a result of her escape, so she couldn’t go there. Trunk’s pub was destroyed and she couldn’t get in contact with anyone.
For god’s sake, she was still naked under the labcoat!
So she carefully walked the streets on her way to Luna’s café, the only other place with Syndicate connections she knew to go to. She was only two blocks away when a couple of shadows entered the street from the alleyway. Carefully, she continued after them. Walking the streets alone, unarmed and mostly naked wasn’t exactly the safest position to be in.
As she approached, she noticed that one of the figures carried a cello case.
“Cowboy!” she yelled and quickly approached.
The two figures turned in her direction. “Is that you Angel?” Cowboy asked, closing the gap between them. “It is you! We thought you had been taken by Echelon with the rest. Or worse, we thought you might be dead.”
He paused. “Why are you wearing a labcoat… with no pants?”
Angel sighed. “I’ll explain later. I just need to find some clothes right now. What the hell happened to everyone? Why can’t I get in touch with anyone?”
“We’ve moved our HQ to the basement in the café. We were headed there just now,” April spoke up. “All remaining members are going to assess the damage and decide what to do next.”
“Let’s get going then. I hope they have some extra clothes there.”
The three ventured off into the night in the direction of the café.
***
“Fuuma…. Evil… hawtness,” Emiri mumbled in her sleep. Kira stopped reading his book to check on her… since that was the first words she had uttered since he had found her sprawled across her bed unconscious. He had no idea how she had gotten there, but the important thing was that she was safe.
Just as he was about to go back to reading, when Emiri’s eyes fluttered open. “Kira?”
“Right here,” he said and sat next to her on the bed.
Emiri sat up as recent events suddenly came back to her.
“Emiri-sama, I don’t think you should be…”
“Kira, I lost!” she whined and buried her face into his chest. “Sadar… he… he defeated me. How is that possible? Who the hell does he think I am!? I don’t lose. I’m Emiri, damnit!!”
“Calm down,” Kira said as he pried her off his chest and made her lie back down. He brushed back the loose hair that had fallen into her face.
“Should I try and make you feel better?”
She let him move closer. “If you know what’s good for you.”
“Only a little. You’re still badly hurt.”
“Whatever. I know what I want, Kira.”
“Of course you do, Emiri-sama.” Then he pressed his lips against hers, softly at first, but then with more vigor.
After a moment, he pulled back. “Who’s Fuuma?”
Emiri sideglanced. “Err… no one in particular. Would you just shut up and keep doing what you’re supposed to be doing!”
Minutes later….
Kira straightened his shihakusho and ran a hand through his hair to make it go back in place.
“But Kira…”
“That’s enough Emiri. I told you, you’re still injured. Your physical wounds have healed, but you still need your rest. Until then, that’s I can do for you.”
Emiri sighed and laid back in bed again. Fighting with Kira was useless. And she didn’t exactly feel like she could beat him into submission. No just yet.
“What are you going to do now?”
“I don’t know. No one’s… ever defeated me before. Killing and maiming isn’t any fun if I can only get the weak ones. I’m not saying I am… but if I decided to leave Echelon, would you come with me?”
“But where would you go?”
“I don’t know, but that **bleep** Sadar has ruined my reputation! Would you come with me if I decided to leave?”
He looked back at her with a smile. “I would follow you to the ends of the earth, Emiri-sama.”
***
Meanwhile… somewhere completely different.
John Sadar awoke to nothing but the sound of the whirring air conditioning system. After he blinked away the blurriness from his eyes, he checked his surroundings and saw Kaia with her chin in her hands dozing in the chair across the room.
As he tested and stretched his muscles, he nearly flinched at the soreness. With his good arm, he tried to raise himself to a sitting position.
“You shouldn’t be moving yet. Do you want to injure yourself further?”
He saw that Kaia was still in her same position, only her eyes were open and staring directly at him.
“How did you…?” he asked as he returned his head to the pillow.
“How easily you forget that I’m a master of chi. I felt you awaken, and your chi spiked when you tried to move, which you should absolutely not try to do again for a while,” she said sternly.
“I can’t just lie here and do nothing for days on end.”
Kaia smirked. “You can and you will. Swartzwald has put me in charge of your recovery, and I’m not letting you move until either I see fit or I know you’re ready for it.”
Sadar swore under his breath.
“Awww…” Kaia soothed as she leaned forward in her chair. “And I thought you’d be happy to spend more time with me.”
“It’s not that. It’s just… I hate being chained to a bed.”
Kaia’s expression darkened. “That can be arranged, you know.”
“As tempting as that is, I think I’ll have to pass,” he said flatly. “What did I miss?”
Her expression changed again, this time appearing more serious. “Things didn’t turn out well at all for your Syndicate friends. Elizabeth was captured, but alive. She was the only one from that location that they took. I assume the others must have died.”
“I see… but I’m glad to hear that she at least found some way to come out alive.”
“I thought you would. Cid and Proof reported that everyone in Bruce’s group is also alive and successfully destroyed the opposition. They also reported a rather strange phenomena. It seems that Jean Pierrot is actually a proxy, using his powers to absorb a rather large blast and save everyone in the proximity. Trunks escaped Vicious and his whereabouts are unknown. Hikki, Samson, Clarice and Angel were all captured but managed to escape. Spice and Elizabeth are presumed to still be imprisoned.”
Furion’s brow furrowed. “That’s a lot to take in all at once. But I appreciate the update.”
“There’s one other thing. Cille Compton has been murdered.”
“Cille?! Murdered?! My god…”
“Because we expect a fierce backlash from the Syndicate over this event, the plans for Comedia to launch an attack on Actonia and more specifically Comdot have been moved up for immediate execution.”
“So much for waiting things out until they’ve died down.”
“You, my friend, will be waiting it out. You’re in no condition to fight. But I’m not chaining you to a bed, as much as I’d like to. I’ll get you anything you need and let you enjoy the nice quiet weather outside while it lasts.”
“I wonder if Landon knows.”
“I’ve no idea. But I’m sure he read the paper same as everyone. This was an obvious move by Ozzal to draw him out. I suppose since previous efforts using his friends and comrades failed, she went straight for the heart, so to speak.”
Furion lay silent for a while. “Poor Raef,” he finally said.
“Who?”
“Cille’s son. I just hope he’s in good hands now.”
“I’m sure he is. You should try to rest now. How’s your pain? Should I go get your pills?”
“In all honesty… I think I’m too shocked to feel anything right now.”
***
Eric had never been so confused in his mind. If there was ever an OMGWTFBBQ moment in his life, this was it.
“You… you’re supposed to be dead!!”
The woman in front of him smirked and leaned her hip against the desk. “As much as I look like her, I can assure you that I’m not stabbed full of holes. See?” She then pulled back her jacket to reveal a black bodice-like top and a curvaceous body that was most definitely not stabbed full of holes.
Eric visibly swallowed and cleared his throat. “Then just who the hell are you? And how do you know Landon?”
“I’m Cille. Lucille Cille Compton.”
“But you just said!”
“I’m not the Cille you know. As Landon has already told you, that Cille had to die…. In order to ensure the future of Actonia and the eventual death of Michelle Ozzal.”
“Oka~y. I’m not stupid, but I’m completely lost here.”
“The Cille you see before you,” Landon said, leaving his Gendo position to lean back in his chair and prop his feet on the desk, “is a different Cille from the one I asked you to protect.”
“Speaking of which, if you knew she had to die, then why did you tell me to protect her?”
“For one, I didn’t meet this Cille until after I had already asked you to do so. Secondly, unless my dear fiancée died in the right way, it would have been meaningless and we couldn’t have been sure that things would have turned out the way we wanted.”
“I still don’t understand who you are or how you got here!” Eric shouted, becoming frustrated with the talking in circles. He still didn’t know any more than he did when he walked in.
“It’s hard to explain, but I traveled here through the genius of Professor Matrix. After Ozzal got what she wanted, she killed all the useless lackeys that got her to the top. Matrix escaped and built a machine that was able to send someone to the past to try to change the outcome of the war.”
“You mean the revolution?”
“It started out as a simple revolution but launched into a full scale war as more and more civilians were involved despite their innocence. Eventually everyone was forced to join either the resistance or the government. Everyone was so busy launching attacks out of revenge instead of coming together and planning things carefully that we lost numbers quicker than we could regain them. Ultimately, there wasn’t enough manpower behind the revolution to continue, and without resistance Ozzal easily assumed the first empress position of Actonia and slowly spread her control into Comedia, Toonami, and Cartoonia. As if that wasn’t bad enough, she spread her efforts on a global scale and was out for world domination. When I left, she was launching a takeover of the Land of the Rising Big Red Dot.
“The few of us who were left from the resistance put our heads together and figured out that there were two key things that lead to the defeat of the Syndicate. Disorganization… and me. So my mission in coming back to the past was to ensure the death of my former self in hopes that it would ultimately change the world that we’re being forced to endure.”
“So you’re… from the future?”
“You’re just now getting that?!” they said in unison.
“Keep up, Eric!” Cille said.
“But if you are from the future and your former self has died, why are you still here?”
“We… don’t exactly know why yet. It makes sense that I would have vanished or something, but for some reason I’m still around so I’d rather not question it. Perhaps I have to return to the future in order to disappear from this existence. But I figured I might as well stick around while I can. Until then, I feel like I can effectively advise the Syndicate on how to go about defeating Ozzal, since I’ve lived through it once and have a good idea about how things will happen.”
“The members of the Syndicate are gathering, to assess the damages most likely,” Landon said. “I plan to reassume my position as leader of this movement, organize our efforts and get that betch back for everything she’s done and plans to do. Thanks to Cille, we now know our own weaknesses, and a few of Ozzal’s as well. We will not be defeated as we have been before. I have kept myself out of the open and worked from the shadows to assume that. Now we will execute a full-scale war alongside Comedia to bring Ozzal down.
Defeat is unacceptable. Victory will be ours!!”
New Characters:
Quincy – Ishida from Bleach
Hedwig – Shins? Aka Mary
Dr Girlfriend – from Venture Bros
Yupat – Yupat
IA Agent – Roger Smith from Big O
Recurring Roles
Kazuma – from scryed
Captain Yemman – myname
Kaia – namek_kaia
Proof – NoProof
Cid – Cidthekittyisfun
Swartzwald – from Big O
John Sadar aka Furion – FurionTassadar
Aoi – from GITS: SAC
Kuze – from GITS: SAC 2nd GIG
Band – bandnerdswimfan
Eric Ominae – OMNI
Landon Blacken – Blah_canbespanish
Kirara Amour – kiraralove
Hikki Follet – Kohikki
Samson – MasterSamson
Clarice – QueenoftheDorks
Keith Douglas – kdawg
Q – q_chan
Elizabeth Saurie St. Gaurdsmen – EdSpikeSesshyGirl
Angel Sarcastica – mgangel
Cowboy – CowboyCadenza
April – Lirpa
Emiri - _Boxers_
Kira – from Bleach
Professor Matrix – matrixman
Raef Compton – Maenos
Michelle Ozzal – Mike Lazzo
Cille – Cille
As Captain Yemman and his new partner Kazuma walked calmly in the dark toward the Comdot Estate, a figure waited in their step. Said figure had casually propped themselves against the estate wall, his glasses glinting in the scarce light as they were adjusted. The glass cross around his neck also caught the light with his movement.
Kazuma stiffened. “Just who the hell are you?!” He grabbed his arm in case he needed to use it.
“My name is not important. I’m only here to give you the wise words of a Quincy. Following it is a choice of your own.”
“And what advice might ye be givin?” Yemman asked.
“Yeah! We don’t need no advice. Specially not from you, four eyes!”
The Quincy bit his tongue and tried hard not to retort. “Turn back and regroup with the Syndicate. If you storm in there, you’ll only die. If that’s what you want, then by all means, proceed. But things are not as simple as they seem. You might be of actual use if you run along, back to the Syndicate while you still can.”
“Ye be on thar side, do ye?”
“I’m not on anyone’s side. I’m only here to say what I’ve said, and leave you to decide. That is all.” With that, he pushed off the wall and started in the opposite direction.
“Have a nice life, gentlemen. Use it well, or save everyone else the trouble and march right past those gates.”
They were suddenly left in the darkness, alone with each other and their thoughts.
***
Kaia paced the length of the back room again… and again. Everyone had reported in except Schwartzwald, who was supposed to be looking out for Furion. Why did it have to be him? Why was he the one that was late? Why did he have to go off and put himself in danger for the sake of the Syndicate?
Proof peaked in from the doorway. Cid’s head appeared below his and both watched as she went back and forth, back and forth.
Proof spoke up. “Has there been any word…”
“About Mr. Furion yet?” Cid finished.
“Does it look like there’s any word yet?!?” she yelled, her arms flailing at her side. Suddenly she composed herself and cleared her throat. “No… no word yet. We’re still waiting.”
“Do you think…” started Cid.
“That something’s happened to them?” Proof finished.
Before she could respond, the front door burst open with a loud bang followed by distressed voices and groans of pain. She heard Swartzwald bark her name. She didn’t even need her powers to get there in less than a second. When she did… all she could see was red.
Blood from his shoulder that had easily soaked through the makeshift dressings. Schwartzwald was carrying him none-to-gently, seemingly unconcerned with Furion’s wounds. Or he may have been. It was always hard to tell exactly what he was thinking with his face covered in those wrappings.
Everyone who had gathered in the front room stood and followed Schwartzwald with concern. Except Aoi, who calmly turned the page in the book he was reading, and Hedwig, who was too busy trying to sneak up on his friend Proof with a knife to notice whatever else was going on. Kaia pushed past them all in attempts to see what had happened. When she got to the front of the crowd, Kuze was already there, assessing the damage to Furion’s shoulder.
“It’s bad. But…. I don’t think it’s fatal. From what I can tell, this was a sniper’s job – one with one hell of a gun.”
“Caine the Longshot, if I had my guess,” interrupted Swartzwald. “Because of his quick reflexes, they fragmented and diverted away from the vitals. If those have clean exits, he should be fine after it’s cleaned and dressed properly. If not, it could be difficult to find them and extract them.”
What kind of people are in the Echelon? For a bullet to be so powerful that even fragments go through clean… Kaia thought.
Everyone let out a breath of relief, some of them not even realizing they had been holding it. Most of them went back out to the front room, waiting on Swartzwald to give them their orders. Kaia searched the receding crowd.
“Band? Band!?!”
Like a flash the young priest was before her, his face bright with anticipation.
His eagerness made her smile despite the situation. “Could you get me the first aid kit from-“
Before she could finish, he had gone and returned. His inhuman speed came in handy at times like these. “Here you go, Miss Kaia,” he said as he handed it to her.
I thought I told him never to call me that. But she had no time for trivialities. She thanked him and turned to her wounded friend, intending to tell him that everything was going to be fine. That’s when she noticed-
“OMG! WTF happened to your beautiful face?!?! How did this happen?! Who did this do you? Where are they?! I’LL KILL HIM!!!” Her arms were flailing again, and she nearly dropped the first aid kit.
Furion smiled despite his wavering consciousness. “Kaia-chan. I’d know that ranting anywhere.”
She was immediately at his side. If Kuze had still been kneeling beside him, she probably would have knocked him over. Her hand rested gently on his chest and she began to transfer her energy to him.
“Just what the hell were you thinking? What happened to-
“No connections, no regrets” they said in unison.
“I’ve already been given this lecture from Swartzwald.”
“Well you’re going to hear it from me!” she snapped. “You weren’t supposed to get this involved. You weren’t supposed to do anything that would make you a target. What would I have done if you hadn’t been this lucky?”
“You would have gone on, Kaia-chan. Just like everyone else.”
She got gauze and peroxide from the kit with one hand, the other still on his chest. “You know how I feel about you. I wouldn’t know what to do without you.”
“Kaia-“
“I know you don’t feel the same way. I get it. But it doesn’t change anything. Next time, if you get a next time, you’re going to have to be more careful. If you die, I’ll kill you.”
She stopped the transfer of energy so she could work on his wounds with both hands. “Do you know why I did that?”
“So I’d feel better?”
She smirked. “Hmph. So you won’t pass out from the pain. You’re going to be awake for every minute of this. So you’ll remember it.”
“I have a feeling no one’s going to let me forget it.”
***
Eric Ominae drove the three-wheeled motorcycle as fast as it would go, speeding almost recklessly down the still-rubble-strewn streets – a result of the civilian uprising a few days ago. After driving a few miles from his home, he had ditched the truck and traded it for a new, unmanned, totally (probably) abandoned motorcycle. He didn’t really like the truck, and didn’t know why he was driving one in the first place. This suited him much better.
With one hand, he flipped open his phone and dialed a number. (He wasn’t wearing a helmet. Helmets are for chumps.) It rang several times before someone picked up.
“I know I’m not supposed to call you at this number, but this is important. Things have gotten out of hand. We need you.
“Are you ready?
“Then get ready.
“You’ll see what this is about when I get there,” he said as he weaved through broken and vandalized cars without dropping speed.
“Yes, I’m coming! I’m already on my way. I’ll see you in five minutes.” And with that, he flipped the phone closed and veered away from a small pile of rubble.
He srsly did not look forward to the upcoming conversation.
5 minutes later….
Eric hopped off his vehicle, tucked the newspaper under his arm, and pulled out the special-made key to unlock the door to the hideout. He took a breath, oh so looking forward to the tongue-lashing he was bound to receive. And it wasn’t going to be the fun hawt kind either.
The hideout was of the tall and narrow variety, an abandoned law office in a rarely used part of downtown Actonia. He took the stairs up to the second floor where he knew he’d find who he was looking for. The whole place was dark and filled with enough dust to choke someone. If he didn’t know exactly where to go, Eric probably would have tripped, fallen through the old, termite-ridden floorboards and killed himself. Not a horrible way to die, but completely unawesome.
He opened the door toward the back of the room. Dim light from the corner illuminated a figure sitting Gendo-style behind a desk. “And what was so important that you drove all the way down here? Your speed might have rivaled Straight Cougar’s.”
“Speaking of which, I recently left Cille in his care. But –” he tossed the newspaper on the desk and it slid so that the article indicating her death was facing the other man. “He failed.”
Without unfolding his hands, he read the article, and read it again for assurance. “I see.”
Eric’s jaw nearly dropped.
“I see? I f#cking see?! That’s it? She’s dead! For god’s sake, Landon, she was your fiancée.”
“Have a seat, Eric. Calm down. I already know all about this.”
“But the paper only came out this morning.”
“I’m not talking about the paper. I’ve known about this for a while. I guess you could say I’ve been waiting on it to happen before going ahead with my plans.”
Eric’s brow furrowed. “You mean you planned this? Then why did you ask me to protect her?”
“Oh no… I certainly didn’t plan it. That’d be cruel. I just knew it had to happen and made plans for when that time came.”
“Landon, you’re not making any sense. How did you even know that Cille was going to die? None of us knew! Half the syndicate still doesn’t know.”
“Someone told me it was going to happen.”
“Oh come now, Landon. A psychic?! Are you that desperate to get back at the-”
“I’m not a psychic,” said a voice from behind him. The voice was female, and a curvy figure stepped into the light. “It’s been a long time, my good friend.”
“Friend? I’ve never seen-” He paused as he got a better look at her face. A face that was familiar yet strange. Her face kinda reminded him of…
That’s when it dawned on him.
“But how? I don’t understand. You’re supposed to be dead!”
***
Kirara sat in the darkness of the kitchen at the Order’s headquarters. Most everyone else had left after receiving their orders, but Father Sadar was her friend. After everything he had done for her, she hadn’t done much to repay him. She couldn’t just leave him now that he was so badly injured. More than that, she was still new to the Order. She didn’t really know anyone besides him. Swartzwald had given her no orders. What else could she do but sit and wait?
She had been sitting in the dark staring at the flame from what was left of her candle for what seemed like forever. What was taking so long? It was already a few hours after dawn. Maybe she should just go and knock…
The door to Sadar’s room opened and she heard footsteps coming her way down the hall. In walked the tall girl that had fussed over Sadar once he’d arrived here. She watched in silence for a while as the girl sighed, wiped the sweat off her brow, and retrieved a beverage from the fridge.
“How is he?” she finally asked.
The girl across the room took a long swig of her drink before trying to answer. “He’s resting. I gave him something for the pain and something to help him sleep. All he needs right now is a lot of rest. We’re going to have to force him to take it easy for a while. He’s not exactly the type to sit around and do nothing.”
“I know the feeling,” she responded.
“You’re Kirara, right? I don’t think we got a chance to really meet before you and Furion were sent to the Syndicate.” She walked over and pulled out a chair. “Mind if I sit?”
She sat before Kirara had time to reply. “I’m Kaia.”
“Kirara Amour.” She said with a nod. “Do you mind if…. I ask you something?”
“Sure… ask away.”
“Why does everyone call him Furion?”
Kaia shrugged. “Cuz that’s his codename from back when he was a thief. He acquired the name John Sadar after joining the order and becoming a priest.
A celibate priest,” she grumbled. “Still, everyone in the order calls him Furion. It’s the name most of us knew him by first. He answers to both, so it’s not really a problem. Besides, no one really knows if Sadar is his real name or just another alias.”
“I see.”
“Furion recruited you, didn’t he? To be part of the Order, I mean.”
She nodded.
“Did he even tell you what we’re about? What our mission is?”
“Well, I know we’re not supposed to get involved with people from the Syndicate or from Echelon. We’re not good or evil, just mediators.”
Kaia sat silent for a minute. “That’s all? I swear, that man!”
“Well, I got the Syndicate assignment right after I got here.”
“Don’t make excuses for him! You deserve to know what you’re getting yourself into. Why did he recruit you in the first place? What’s your specialty?”
“I do mostly undercover work. I’ve found out that I’m a particularly good spy. Sadar, err… Furion helped me keep my cover once when it was about to be blown. In return, I agreed to lend my spy skills whenever he needed them. And here I am. I don’t really have any motives for or against the revolution, so nature of the Order seemed to suit me.”
“I see. I’m glad you’re here then. They had me do spy missions and I’m not that good at it. I tend to want to take the hands-on approach more that is needed.” She laughed a bit nervously.
“Then… wouldn’t you rather be part of the Syndicate?” Kirara asked suddenly glad that she felt comfortable talking with other people from the Order of Glass.
“Sometimes. I grew up in Toonamia, which is a lot like Actonia. Actually, it’s almost exactly like Actonia. We all came from the Land of the Rising Big Red Dot but ended up in different places when we settled here. I grew tired of the childish treatment of the local government and joined the Toonamia sect of the Order. That was almost 10 years ago.”
“Wait. There are other divisions of the Order? I thought we were the only ones!”
“My dear Kirara. The Order is about more than just the mediation between the Syndicate and Echelon to make sure things don’t get out of hand. Our real objective is more large-scale, hence the need for global divisions.”
At that moment, Proof and Cid giddily popped in.
“Good morning, Miss Kaia!” Cid said.
“We brought you the morning paper!” Proof said as he tossed it her way. As he did, he flipped on the light switch. “Why are you two…”
“Sitting in the dark like this?” Cid asked.
“Because it ruins the dramatic atmosphere, you idiots!!” Kaia yelled back, temporarily forgetting her previous conversation. “And how many times do I have to tell you not to call me Miss?!”
“Fine, fine. We’re leaving,” they said in unison. As they walked off Proof dodged another one of Hedwig’s knife attacks, and slammed him face first into the wall.
“Why is he trying to kill you again?” Cid asked.
“Because we’re mortal enemies, of course.”
“But you two are best friends!!”
“That too.”
Kaia sighed and opened the newspaper, expecting more lies spread by the government about how the revolution was not a problem and everything was just fine.
“You were about to tell me what the Order does…” Kirara prompted.
“Oh yes!” Kaia said as she began to read. “The Order’s true objective is….”
Kaia sat straight up as she came across a rather suspicious article. “What was the name of Landon’s fiancée again?”
“What, you mean Cille? What about her?”
“Holy sh!t!!” She threw down the paper and rushed from the room. Kirara picked up the paper and skimmed it, trying to find what all the fuss was about Cille. Then she came across the headline in question.
Woman Found Dead Near Cow Farm.
Swartzwald’s turned as his office door was slammed open to see a rather frantic Kaia.
“I already know. I’m contacting the Comedia Order as we speak.”
Just then, a deep baritone was heard on the other end.
“I thought I said I would contact you when I knew more about the situation, Swartzwald.”
“The situation here has changed, Dr. Girlfriend. We’ve just received news that Cille Compton has been murdered, most likely by Ozzal or one of her Echelon agents.”
“So?”
“Cille Compton is the fiancée of Landon Blacken.”
“Then that does change things. We’ve sent one of our agents to test the security and motives of the Comdot Estate. We’ve received no report from her since. I would assume she’s been eliminated only our inside agent has reported that Ozzal is making efforts to acquire test subjects for some experiment.”
“I believe it’s time to launch the full-scale attack. The Comedia/Actonia war should commence as soon as possible. Swartzwald out.”
***
Hikki stared almost mindlessly at the morning newspaper’s front page. Now Cille was dead too? Was their actually any hope left for them at all?
At the moment, there didn’t seem like much hope for him. Sure he was now the owner of Café de Lune… soon to be Café de l’Argeno. And sure he had had the most amazing sexual experience with one of the hawtest guys ever, but at what cost? Argeno was dead. Luna was gone.
Now Cille was dead too, along with however many people fell victim during the Echelon raid on all the Syndicate hideouts. And everything was that **bleep** Ozzal’s fault. In less than 48 hours, she had successfully torn his world apart. What exactly was he supposed to do?
He sighed and held his head in his hands, ignoring the steaming cup of gourmet coffee he had just made himself. Coffee and baking usually improved his mood. But he usually wasn’t coping with deaths and disappearances left and right.
Samson watched with a heavy heart from the doorway to the café’s kitchen. He thumbed the cross in his pocket, the cross that Sadar had given him before he suddenly disappeared. Was it an invitation or a keepsake? If it was an invitation, should he accept? If it was a keepsake, did Father Sadar really plan on never coming back?
A ding from the oven interrupted his thoughts. He look toward his friend, expecting him to get up and take the scones out of the oven. But Hikki just sat at the table with seemingly no regard for his perfect baked goods.
Samson pushed himself from the door frame and used the help of his walking crutch to make his way to the oven and set the sheet of scones on the counter. With his one good arm, he set them all on a cooling sheet, save for one, which he put on a plate and placed it in front of his troubled friend.
“You should eat something,” he said as he carefully took a seat next to Hikki.
“Ee don’t feel like zit.”
Samson had never seen Hikki like this before. If Sadar’s cross was some kind of invitation to leave the Syndicate and join another group, how could he do so when all his friends were going through so much? He hadn’t really known Cille, but he knew that most of the Syndicate did. He didn’t think Hikki knew her all that well either, but still felt the blow of her death as much as anyone. He knew that his friend had gone through a lot in so little time, but he wished he could see the old Hikki for a moment, the flirtatious bubbly one he had always known and gotten used to. For once in his life, he actually wanted the Frenchman to hit on him.
As much as it would make him uncomfortable, if it would bring Hikki out of his funk….
“Would it make you feel better if I let you cop a feel?”
Samson waited, half hoping it would cheer him up and half hoping he’d reject the offer.
Then Hikki’s eyebrow rose. He slowly reached up to bring it downward, attempting to play it cool.
“Do go on…”
“I’ll let you cop a feel. No backing away, no objections. But just one. And on one condition.”
“And what iz zhat?” Hikki asked as he propped his chin on his hand.
“You need to cheer up, Hikki! We’re still alive. We can still fight and avenge our comrades. Argeno wouldn’t want you sitting here moping so bad you don’t even want to bake. He loved your food. You should go on making them, for him and everyone else who loves them! I’m not saying that you don’t have a reason to be sad. But don’t lose hope, Hikki. After everything she’s done to us, we won’t less Ozzal win!”
Suddenly, his crutch fell to the floor and he felt arms encircle him.
“Merci, mon amour!” Hikki said in his usual vibrant tone. “Zhu always know what to zay.”
Luna had basically said the same thing to him in the letter she had left, but for some reason, it clicked better when I was Samson saying it in front of him when he needed it most.
Samson endured the hug, ignoring the pain in his arm. It paled in comparison to the fact that Hikki was about as normal as he was going to get.
Then he felt a hand moving lower and lower, and….
“Hey!!”
Hikki pulled back to face the object of his affection with the poutiest sad face he could manage.
“But zhu zaid I could, Zamzon. Remembher?”
Samson still grumbled as he fought the urge to pull away. “Fine.”
He felt the hand move somewhere entirely different.
“HEY!!!”
At that moment, Clarice walked in from where she was repairing the damage made to the front of the café. Her eyebrow twitched at what she saw.
“Just what the hell is going on in here?!?!”
Hikki pealed himself off of Samson, quit crushed that his golden moment had been ruined by that person. “Nozing… Nozing at all.” He got up and set the cooling scones on a decorative plate for the display case out front. “Not zhat it concerns zhu aneeway.”
Clarice growled and stormed out of the kitchen. If she didn’t have more important things to do, she’d assault the Frenchman like she thought he deserved. He was lucky that she had left her tools behind and she had nothing to throw at him.
Hikki smiled and leaned over Samson’s chair to wrap his arms around him again as soon as Clarice was gone. That hand was on the move again.
“Would you stop it already?!?!”
At least one thing was back to normal in the life of Hikki Follet.
***
Keith Douglas tossed the newspaper back down on this desk in disgust. He reclined back into his desk chair and casually lit a cigarette, then looked at the ceiling as he composed his thoughts.
Something big was definitely going down. He just didn’t know what. Not yet anyway.
He was used to the paper being filled with lies and total bullsh!t about how the revolution was not a threat to the absolutely non-corrupt government. But the death of this girl… it was unusual even for Orly standards. Such a brutal death wasn’t the usual style of professional assassinations ordered from the higher ups. Yet it didn’t seem like a total irrelevant event either. Somehow, this was tied to everything else that had happened recently. His expert detective instincts told him so.
He took another long drag of his cigarette and flicked away the excess ash into the tray on his desk. About that time, his phone rang with an intercom call.
“Douglas.”
“Hey Douglas, I need you to run a grocery errand for me.”
“Sure, boss” he said without missing a beat, instantly recognizing what the code meant. He didn’t even glance at the agent that Lunge had sent, who was sitting directly opposite him just waiting for him to say or do the wrong thing.
“I’ll send the list down by my secretary. Oh, and would you grab me an Orly Review. From what I’ve heard this morning, the front page has a few rather interesting articles.”
“Indeed it does. Alright… I’ll get right on it, boss. Anything else?”
“That’s all, Douglas. Just keep your eyes open and stay on your toes.”
“Don’t I always?”
They hung up their phones. Keith was just about to get up and investigate the two articles on the front page of the paper when his cell phone rang. The Internal Affairs agent leaned forward in his chair, more intent that before on catching something, not to mention that he intended to follow Douglas on wherever it was he was about to go.
Keith flipped open the phone. “Douglas here.”
“Hey Keith! I’ve been meaning to get in touch with you-”
“Not now, yupat. Something just came up.”
“Well… you told me to contact you when I had some info. I guess if you don’t want it…”
Douglas turned in his chair away from the agent and spoke in a low voice. Besides need if only a moment of privacy, it was a nice break from having to look at that awful double-breasted black suit, and the black gloves, and the black tie, and the black sunglass. Gawd… could that guy be any more dramatic with his clothing? He looked like some Batman wannabe.
“I can’t really talk right now,” Keith said low into the phone. “I’m being monitored by the IA.”
“Can’t you shake those guys?”
“Do you even know who you’re talking to?”
“Smartass. It’s the usual spot. See you in 10.”
“Got it.” And with that he shut the phone, grabbed his coat, and went on his way. The IA agent was close behind him, but Keith cleverly lost him in record time. Given the events of the last few days, he hoped yupat could shine some light on what he was missing. Yupat was one of the few good investigative reporters still left in Actonia, one that couldn’t be bribed to print lies for the government. He came in as a handy source with big cases like this. Keith could only acquire so much information as a detective, but yupat had access to more inside sources that more often than not were essential to solving cases.
As he made his way into the city park, he checked his surroundings to make sure he had successfully lost the IA guy. From the looks of it, it seemed like he had. He grabbed a seat on a park bench and waiting. It wasn’t very long at all before he heard someone else take a seat on the bench directly behind him.
“I take you read this mornings Review?”
“Yeah… I was just thinking before you called that the front page articles were strange. They somehow fit into what’s been going on with this case I’m working on.”
“Well… I have info from my sources that say they were related attacks.”
“Related? One was a brutal murder and the other was a pub burning.”
“Some of my sources say that certain members of the Syndicate used to meet at the pub. It’s even rumored that Trunks himself is a member. He hasn’t been seen in a while, now that I think about it. A few nights ago, the pub was attacked, and now it’s been burned to bits. I’d say it’s Ozzal trying to send a message to the Syndicate.”
“Makes sense. I had heard things about Trunk’s pub from a former contact. But what exactly does that have to do with the other murder and the Heero case?”
“Cille Compton was in the care of certain members of the Syndicate. She was also the fiancée of one Landon Blacken.”
Keith raised an eyebrow. “Blacken. As in the guy who established the Syndicate almost a year ago?”
“The same.”
Suddenly, all the little pieces came together. “So the murders and the attacks were all retaliation from Ozzal toward the Syndicate. From what I gathered from that Roy Mustang, his old flame Riza and her husband might have been involved with the Syndicate as well. So… was that her doing? But why would she go to such extremes just to squash a few revolutionaries?
“There’s more to this than just a string of murders,” he said… watching the people walk through the park. He thought for a moment how nice it might be to be one of them, a sheep who lives their life thinking everything is just fine. But he wouldn’t be content with that. He was the kind of person who needed to know how things were. This new information was only taking him deeper and deeper down the rabbit hole, and now he wanted more than ever to get to the bottom of things.
But without evidence, a report would be frivolous. He needed to somehow gain information from inside Comdot if he was ever going to get anywhere.
“Thanks for the information, Yupat. You’ve always been a help.”
“And you to me. Just remember this the next time I need information about a story I’m working on.”
Keith smirked. “Once I figure out what’s really going on here, you get the exclusive.”
“You’re **bleep** right I do. I’ve been going through a lot to get all this information for you. But I better go… I think whoever was following you has somehow regained your trail. His suit is hideous.”
“Tell me about it. Yeah, you better go. I’ll contact you if I need anything else in particular. Meanwhile, just find out what you can. And I don’t think I need to tell you to watch your back. Things are definitely escalating and getting more complicated.”
“Gotcha.” And with that, he disappeared into the trees to avoid the IA guy, knowing that even if he was followed, no one would be able to keep up with him.
“Thought you could get away, did you?”
“What do you mean, get away? I just needed some fresh air. Somewhere where there aren’t suits everywhere,” he answered, having one particular suit in mind.
“Internal Affairs knows you’re up to something. And I intend to find out what it is.”
“What IA did was send you on a goose chase.” He got up and lit another cigarette. “You’ll probably die of boredom before you find whatever it is you’re looking for. Hope you won’t mind following me to the grocery store.”
What an inopportune time for IA to be sniffing around. If they had any idea that he was about to try to investigate Comdot, he’d be in deep sh!t for sure. Well… now all he had to do was make sure that didn’t happen.
Easy as pie.
On cue, his stomach rumbled. Breakfast had sure worn off fast.
Pie did sound pretty good right about now.
***
Elizabeth Saurie St. Gaurdsmen picked herself up from the dirty cell floor and turned her nose up toward the barred window high above her head. Sometimes if she tilted her head just right should could smell the fresh air from outside… or maybe it was just her nose getting used to the dank mildew smell of her cell.
She pressed her forehead to the cold clammy wall and sighed. Her wounds from her fight nearly two days ago were now scabbed over with dirt and dried blood. And from the looks of things so far, they’d get infected if she didn’t find some way to get her and her friends out of her sometimes soon. But as much as she hated to admit it, she was weak now. She had so far survived off of nothing but dingy water, gruel, and old bread.
Only her hope and strong will were keeping her alive.
It might not have been so bad if she had someone else here with her, someone to share the burden and despair, but from what she heard whispered between the guards there had been escapes and murders since the night they had locked her in this hellhole. She didn’t want to believe the ones about Cille being dead. It wasn’t the fact that she was dead that bothered her so much – it was the fact that they were saying she’s was killed brutally and mercilessly by her own comrade. Something was terribly wrong, and she knew Ozzal was behind it somehow.
She sat down in the corner and brought her knees up under her chin. She was stronger than this. She knew that. It irked her to be stuck in a cell with no real way to escape.
Her only hope was that Cille’s death would inspire a new fire in her Syndicate comrades and she would somehow be saved when they stormed the Estate. But how likely was that? And how low had she sunk to actually wish someone dead?
She sat, and she waited. What else could she do?
***
Angel roamed the streets of Actonia trying to figure out what the hell had gone on. Her apartment had been ransacked, no doubt a result of her escape, so she couldn’t go there. Trunk’s pub was destroyed and she couldn’t get in contact with anyone.
For god’s sake, she was still naked under the labcoat!
So she carefully walked the streets on her way to Luna’s café, the only other place with Syndicate connections she knew to go to. She was only two blocks away when a couple of shadows entered the street from the alleyway. Carefully, she continued after them. Walking the streets alone, unarmed and mostly naked wasn’t exactly the safest position to be in.
As she approached, she noticed that one of the figures carried a cello case.
“Cowboy!” she yelled and quickly approached.
The two figures turned in her direction. “Is that you Angel?” Cowboy asked, closing the gap between them. “It is you! We thought you had been taken by Echelon with the rest. Or worse, we thought you might be dead.”
He paused. “Why are you wearing a labcoat… with no pants?”
Angel sighed. “I’ll explain later. I just need to find some clothes right now. What the hell happened to everyone? Why can’t I get in touch with anyone?”
“We’ve moved our HQ to the basement in the café. We were headed there just now,” April spoke up. “All remaining members are going to assess the damage and decide what to do next.”
“Let’s get going then. I hope they have some extra clothes there.”
The three ventured off into the night in the direction of the café.
***
“Fuuma…. Evil… hawtness,” Emiri mumbled in her sleep. Kira stopped reading his book to check on her… since that was the first words she had uttered since he had found her sprawled across her bed unconscious. He had no idea how she had gotten there, but the important thing was that she was safe.
Just as he was about to go back to reading, when Emiri’s eyes fluttered open. “Kira?”
“Right here,” he said and sat next to her on the bed.
Emiri sat up as recent events suddenly came back to her.
“Emiri-sama, I don’t think you should be…”
“Kira, I lost!” she whined and buried her face into his chest. “Sadar… he… he defeated me. How is that possible? Who the hell does he think I am!? I don’t lose. I’m Emiri, damnit!!”
“Calm down,” Kira said as he pried her off his chest and made her lie back down. He brushed back the loose hair that had fallen into her face.
“Should I try and make you feel better?”
She let him move closer. “If you know what’s good for you.”
“Only a little. You’re still badly hurt.”
“Whatever. I know what I want, Kira.”
“Of course you do, Emiri-sama.” Then he pressed his lips against hers, softly at first, but then with more vigor.
After a moment, he pulled back. “Who’s Fuuma?”
Emiri sideglanced. “Err… no one in particular. Would you just shut up and keep doing what you’re supposed to be doing!”
Minutes later….
Kira straightened his shihakusho and ran a hand through his hair to make it go back in place.
“But Kira…”
“That’s enough Emiri. I told you, you’re still injured. Your physical wounds have healed, but you still need your rest. Until then, that’s I can do for you.”
Emiri sighed and laid back in bed again. Fighting with Kira was useless. And she didn’t exactly feel like she could beat him into submission. No just yet.
“What are you going to do now?”
“I don’t know. No one’s… ever defeated me before. Killing and maiming isn’t any fun if I can only get the weak ones. I’m not saying I am… but if I decided to leave Echelon, would you come with me?”
“But where would you go?”
“I don’t know, but that **bleep** Sadar has ruined my reputation! Would you come with me if I decided to leave?”
He looked back at her with a smile. “I would follow you to the ends of the earth, Emiri-sama.”
***
Meanwhile… somewhere completely different.
John Sadar awoke to nothing but the sound of the whirring air conditioning system. After he blinked away the blurriness from his eyes, he checked his surroundings and saw Kaia with her chin in her hands dozing in the chair across the room.
As he tested and stretched his muscles, he nearly flinched at the soreness. With his good arm, he tried to raise himself to a sitting position.
“You shouldn’t be moving yet. Do you want to injure yourself further?”
He saw that Kaia was still in her same position, only her eyes were open and staring directly at him.
“How did you…?” he asked as he returned his head to the pillow.
“How easily you forget that I’m a master of chi. I felt you awaken, and your chi spiked when you tried to move, which you should absolutely not try to do again for a while,” she said sternly.
“I can’t just lie here and do nothing for days on end.”
Kaia smirked. “You can and you will. Swartzwald has put me in charge of your recovery, and I’m not letting you move until either I see fit or I know you’re ready for it.”
Sadar swore under his breath.
“Awww…” Kaia soothed as she leaned forward in her chair. “And I thought you’d be happy to spend more time with me.”
“It’s not that. It’s just… I hate being chained to a bed.”
Kaia’s expression darkened. “That can be arranged, you know.”
“As tempting as that is, I think I’ll have to pass,” he said flatly. “What did I miss?”
Her expression changed again, this time appearing more serious. “Things didn’t turn out well at all for your Syndicate friends. Elizabeth was captured, but alive. She was the only one from that location that they took. I assume the others must have died.”
“I see… but I’m glad to hear that she at least found some way to come out alive.”
“I thought you would. Cid and Proof reported that everyone in Bruce’s group is also alive and successfully destroyed the opposition. They also reported a rather strange phenomena. It seems that Jean Pierrot is actually a proxy, using his powers to absorb a rather large blast and save everyone in the proximity. Trunks escaped Vicious and his whereabouts are unknown. Hikki, Samson, Clarice and Angel were all captured but managed to escape. Spice and Elizabeth are presumed to still be imprisoned.”
Furion’s brow furrowed. “That’s a lot to take in all at once. But I appreciate the update.”
“There’s one other thing. Cille Compton has been murdered.”
“Cille?! Murdered?! My god…”
“Because we expect a fierce backlash from the Syndicate over this event, the plans for Comedia to launch an attack on Actonia and more specifically Comdot have been moved up for immediate execution.”
“So much for waiting things out until they’ve died down.”
“You, my friend, will be waiting it out. You’re in no condition to fight. But I’m not chaining you to a bed, as much as I’d like to. I’ll get you anything you need and let you enjoy the nice quiet weather outside while it lasts.”
“I wonder if Landon knows.”
“I’ve no idea. But I’m sure he read the paper same as everyone. This was an obvious move by Ozzal to draw him out. I suppose since previous efforts using his friends and comrades failed, she went straight for the heart, so to speak.”
Furion lay silent for a while. “Poor Raef,” he finally said.
“Who?”
“Cille’s son. I just hope he’s in good hands now.”
“I’m sure he is. You should try to rest now. How’s your pain? Should I go get your pills?”
“In all honesty… I think I’m too shocked to feel anything right now.”
***
Eric had never been so confused in his mind. If there was ever an OMGWTFBBQ moment in his life, this was it.
“You… you’re supposed to be dead!!”
The woman in front of him smirked and leaned her hip against the desk. “As much as I look like her, I can assure you that I’m not stabbed full of holes. See?” She then pulled back her jacket to reveal a black bodice-like top and a curvaceous body that was most definitely not stabbed full of holes.
Eric visibly swallowed and cleared his throat. “Then just who the hell are you? And how do you know Landon?”
“I’m Cille. Lucille Cille Compton.”
“But you just said!”
“I’m not the Cille you know. As Landon has already told you, that Cille had to die…. In order to ensure the future of Actonia and the eventual death of Michelle Ozzal.”
“Oka~y. I’m not stupid, but I’m completely lost here.”
“The Cille you see before you,” Landon said, leaving his Gendo position to lean back in his chair and prop his feet on the desk, “is a different Cille from the one I asked you to protect.”
“Speaking of which, if you knew she had to die, then why did you tell me to protect her?”
“For one, I didn’t meet this Cille until after I had already asked you to do so. Secondly, unless my dear fiancée died in the right way, it would have been meaningless and we couldn’t have been sure that things would have turned out the way we wanted.”
“I still don’t understand who you are or how you got here!” Eric shouted, becoming frustrated with the talking in circles. He still didn’t know any more than he did when he walked in.
“It’s hard to explain, but I traveled here through the genius of Professor Matrix. After Ozzal got what she wanted, she killed all the useless lackeys that got her to the top. Matrix escaped and built a machine that was able to send someone to the past to try to change the outcome of the war.”
“You mean the revolution?”
“It started out as a simple revolution but launched into a full scale war as more and more civilians were involved despite their innocence. Eventually everyone was forced to join either the resistance or the government. Everyone was so busy launching attacks out of revenge instead of coming together and planning things carefully that we lost numbers quicker than we could regain them. Ultimately, there wasn’t enough manpower behind the revolution to continue, and without resistance Ozzal easily assumed the first empress position of Actonia and slowly spread her control into Comedia, Toonami, and Cartoonia. As if that wasn’t bad enough, she spread her efforts on a global scale and was out for world domination. When I left, she was launching a takeover of the Land of the Rising Big Red Dot.
“The few of us who were left from the resistance put our heads together and figured out that there were two key things that lead to the defeat of the Syndicate. Disorganization… and me. So my mission in coming back to the past was to ensure the death of my former self in hopes that it would ultimately change the world that we’re being forced to endure.”
“So you’re… from the future?”
“You’re just now getting that?!” they said in unison.
“Keep up, Eric!” Cille said.
“But if you are from the future and your former self has died, why are you still here?”
“We… don’t exactly know why yet. It makes sense that I would have vanished or something, but for some reason I’m still around so I’d rather not question it. Perhaps I have to return to the future in order to disappear from this existence. But I figured I might as well stick around while I can. Until then, I feel like I can effectively advise the Syndicate on how to go about defeating Ozzal, since I’ve lived through it once and have a good idea about how things will happen.”
“The members of the Syndicate are gathering, to assess the damages most likely,” Landon said. “I plan to reassume my position as leader of this movement, organize our efforts and get that betch back for everything she’s done and plans to do. Thanks to Cille, we now know our own weaknesses, and a few of Ozzal’s as well. We will not be defeated as we have been before. I have kept myself out of the open and worked from the shadows to assume that. Now we will execute a full-scale war alongside Comedia to bring Ozzal down.
Defeat is unacceptable. Victory will be ours!!”
New Characters:
Quincy – Ishida from Bleach
Hedwig – Shins? Aka Mary
Dr Girlfriend – from Venture Bros
Yupat – Yupat
IA Agent – Roger Smith from Big O
Recurring Roles
Kazuma – from scryed
Captain Yemman – myname
Kaia – namek_kaia
Proof – NoProof
Cid – Cidthekittyisfun
Swartzwald – from Big O
John Sadar aka Furion – FurionTassadar
Aoi – from GITS: SAC
Kuze – from GITS: SAC 2nd GIG
Band – bandnerdswimfan
Eric Ominae – OMNI
Landon Blacken – Blah_canbespanish
Kirara Amour – kiraralove
Hikki Follet – Kohikki
Samson – MasterSamson
Clarice – QueenoftheDorks
Keith Douglas – kdawg
Q – q_chan
Elizabeth Saurie St. Gaurdsmen – EdSpikeSesshyGirl
Angel Sarcastica – mgangel
Cowboy – CowboyCadenza
April – Lirpa
Emiri - _Boxers_
Kira – from Bleach
Professor Matrix – matrixman
Raef Compton – Maenos
Michelle Ozzal – Mike Lazzo
Cille – Cille