Arisa descended from the sky about a block from the address they'd gotten from Shimizu. It was kind of odd. Not that long ago she'd been wistfully thinking of how her bike reminded her of how Nanoha and the others felt when flying. Now, for the first time she had done the real think and she'd barely noticed any of it. Her destination meant everything to her, the journey nothing.
I wonder if Nanoha feels that way on a mission, she thought. Did her friend get so caught up in what she was doing that the amazing things she did were reduced to just routine? Or did she still manage, now and again, to feel that amazement, that sense of awe that being able to use magic should carry?
The flight had managed to do one thing, though. It had cleared Arisa's head a little from where it had been. At the mansion she'd been completely at the mercy of her emotions, caught up in fear for Suzuka's safety and anger at the people who'd hurt her and Falin. She was still afraid, still angry, but she was also under control. She knew that she'd have to stop and think before crashing in.
Arisa's
first thought, of course, was that she shouldn't be there at all. The smartest decision would have been to wait for Noel and whomever else she could get to help. That was the plan that was most likely to work. A failed try by Arisa not only would mean that she'd be unavailable to help with the main assault later, but also would put Morris on alert. He'd know that
they knew where he was holding Suzuka, and he'd ready his defenses, or call in help, or--worst of all--move her to another location they
didn't know about. That was a long list of things that could possibly go wrong.
Even so, she had no intention of turning back.
She just
couldn't wait, not when those monsters had Suzuka at their mercy. The last time they'd had her, she'd ended up as a ravening monster that had killed Arisa out of pure bloodthirsty instinct--killed someone who was not only a close friend but someone she'd apparently loved for years. And that had been with only a few minutes' time, without even getting back to the lab.
Arisa wasn't willing to risk it. This Professor Morris couldn't be allowed to have his hands on Suzuka for even one second more than was possible. Arisa
had to try--no, she had to succeed. That was all there was to it.
The only question was how.
Barging in had made complete sense to her when she was angry. She was already dead, after all. What could Morris's security do, kill her again? But maybe they could, how did she know"? And they could absolutely hurt Suzuka, hold her hostage to Arisa's good behavior. She had to play this smart. She didn't have floorplans, security system details, or anything like that. She'd have to enter carefully, use stealth.
Too bad I can't turn invisible like in ghost stories, she thought.
Then again, she
was invisible in one sense. Security systems weren't going to notice her. All she needed to do was avoid being seen by people. She went intangible, the cursed when her cell phone dropped through her pocket to crack off the pavement. She couldn't take it with her unless she stayed solid, which she couldn't unless she wanted to break in physically and maybe set off alarms. The fancy lock with its electronic card reader on the door said that alarms were likely.
Fine. No phone, then. Meaning no backup. That was how it had to be.
She thought about walking through the wall, but decided against it because she might easily wind up face-to-face with a half-dozen people. Instead, she stepped through the door and into a bare hallway with a cheap linoleum floor. Someone had done some work converting the old warehouse into workspace, but the job was a second-rate one. There was a camera at the end of the hall, eyeball-sized and -shaped, in the corner where two walls met the roof. Whomever had installed it was going for unobtrusive rather than the bulky, obvious cameras one saw on television. Arisa crept up the hall, keeping her eyes and ears open.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Kazuo Mizuhashi had been assigned to work security at the offsite lab by Dr. Mizuki, along with several other discreet and loyal members of the species "goon." He figured that the work going on there was unethical and probably illegal; he just didn't give a damn so long as he got his weekly paycheck.
So when an alert lit up on his security board, he checked it at once, then punched his intercom switch.
"Lab, this is security control. We have a situation."
"Tengu speaking."
"Mr. Tengu, I'm showing an alert on the Professor's monitor but nothing on any of the cameras. It might just be a false alarm, but protocol says I report in and--"
"Where?" Tengu cut him off.
"It just moved out of the entry hall into Corridor 2."
"Send someone to investigate and keep me informed."
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Arisa had just rounded a corner when a door flew open and two dark-uniformed men stepped out. Being, apparently, semi-legitimate security officers, they weren't carrying guns but instead short, boxy devices: Tasers.
They're a few days late if they want to take me alive buzzed through her thoughts.
"Control, there's a teenage girl here," one of the men said into a hand radio. "Do you want us to bring her in?"
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
"What are you talking about?" Mizuhashi said, eyes fixed on the monitor. "That hallway's empty except for the two of you."
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
She'd messed up, Arisa knew. She'd been taken off-guard at the sight of the security men and froze, while
they'd reported in at once. Now they knew she was here. Fear spiked in her belly. She had to move, and fast!
I hope this works, she thought. Her fear made it easy to summon up the flaming aura, and she thrust her hands out,
pushing with her mind. The fire ran down her arms and leapt from her outstretched palms, streaking down the hall in two burning projectiles that burst against the chests of the two guards, knocking them sprawling. Neither one got up; they just lay there. For a few seconds Arisa was terrified that she'd killed them, but when she checked they were still breathing, just unconscious. While their uniforms had been burnt and charred, the exposed skin was intact.
Weird, it's like the fire knew I didn't want to kill or even seriously hurt these guys. They're just ordinary guards, not like that professor or his kidnappers. Maybe it was like that "magic damage" Nanoha used in her fights, a supernatural force that could incapacitate an enemy instead of physically harming them.
If that was the case, Arisa wondered if the ghostly fire
could kill if she wanted it to.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
"Mr. Tengu, two security guards are down, but I don't see what did it to them!"
Tengu scowled. Professor Morris had obviously been correct to augment the building's security with mana sensors, given the number of magical ways there were to fool cameras.
"Did the guards report anything?"
"Well...yes, sir, they said that they saw a teenaged girl, but nothing showed up on my cameras."
"There are ways to trick cameras."
"You mean like a hacker editing the feed?"
"Among others. Where is she now?"
"Corridor 4, sir."
Tengu turned to the two Hand members.
"Kill her."
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
The masked men that burst from a door near the far end of the hall were like something out of a nightmare. The exactly matched Noel's description of the men who'd attacked the mansion and nearly destroyed Falin. One had a gun drawn, the other a katana; the gunman fired at Arisa at once, putting bullets through her stomach, her right shoulder, and her left cheekbone. Arisa felt no pain as they pushed through her, just an eerie sensation as part of her body dissolved and reformed.
But she wasn't here to fight guards and now it was pretty obvious that stealth was out of the question. She went intangible and dove through the wall to her right, the same side where the men had come from. She didn't end up in the same room, just a bare space that could have been fitted up as an office if some renter wanted, so she went forward this time, passing through yet another wall.
Jackpot.
Arisa came out into a large, open area, a piece of warehouse floor that hadn't been converted into offices. Maybe the construction had been stopped for lack of funds, or maybe it had been intentional, for the benefit of clients who wanted a larger floor space. It had been rigged up as a laboratory area, with tables, computers, large- and small-scale equipment. White-coated men and women moved here and there, working on various tasks that Arisa could make neither head nor tail of. Only two things made immediate sense.
One of them was the display screens used with some of the testing equipment. They floated in mid-air, being holographic rather than a physical display. The only place she'd seen something like it outside of science fiction was in Fate and Hayate's homes, where they had TSAB-origin communications and computer gear installed. The implication was significant, and should have set loose all kinds of trains of thought. Arisa, though, gave it no more than a passing glance that registered in her subconscious.
That was because the other thing she saw was Suzuka. She was lying on a wheeled metal table or gurney, with metal shackles bolted around her wrists, ankles, throat, and hips. A skeletally-thin old man with wild gray hair stood over her with some kind of odd instrument in his bony hands, and while the expression on his profile didn't exactly qualify as
lust, it had the same kind of desperate, passionate yearning Arisa had seen when Suzuka made love to her.
She should have thought it through, made a plan, picked out an angle of attack. That's what she
should have done.
But of course, she didn't.
"Get away from her!" Arisa screamed while hurling fire at the objects nearest to her. A computer console exploded, causing three screens to wink out, and a table full of beakers, vials, microscopes, and other equipment was blown away. One scientist went staggering back; another couple of them screamed. Arisa definitely had everyone's attention. "Let Suzuka go right now!" she shouted, blasting another piece of Frankensteinian bric-a-brac. This one started to spit sparks and a moment later started to flame, sending curls of black smoke up towards the high ceiling.
"No, no, no, no, no, no,
no!" screeched the thin man. "Not
now, when I'm so
close! Tengu,
destroy her!" He pointed a skeletal finger at Arisa, his hand trembling with rage and agitation.
The research staff scrambled, some running for cover, at least one going for a fire extinguisher. From among them came a raucous, harsh screech, like a crow driving a small animal away from a meal. What emerged from the milling group wasn't a crow, though, but an immensely tall man with dark skin and hair, wearing black jeans and T-shirt and heavy work boots like a street tough. Arisa didn't hesitate, but flung a bolt of fire at him. It was getting easier, becoming more natural every time she did it.
This time, though, the result was different. The bolt didn't strike home, but instead guttered away short of its target when the man raised his hand. Arisa fired another bolt at him, but it, too faded out. The man's thin lips curved into a sneer.
Then, all at once, his body changed. His light, feathery hair came loose from its ponytail and swirled up, spreading over his face. His nose and lips grew together, expanding and elongating until a glistening black, dagger-sharp beak protruded from his face. His feet burst free from his boots, and they were fork-shaped yellow talons rather than normal feet. His shirt was ripped away as great black wings erupted from his back.
T-T-Tengu! Arisa's mind babbled. The crow-like mountain spirits of legend, from whom the ninja were supposed to have learned the magic of invisibility. It was impossible!
But then, "impossible" was a silly concept for a ghost trying to rescue her vampire girlfriend, wasn't it?
Taking advantage of Arisa's startled state, Tengu leapt at her, gliding across the twenty-foot gap separating them. His claw-nailed right hand fastened around her throat while the other caught her upper arm. The force of his charge carried her back, slamming Arisa up against the wall.
"Stupid little witch!" he croaked. "You won't stop my master's plans!"
His grip tightened, his claws digging forcefully into her skin. Gathering herself, Arisa went intangible, passing through the monster to reform behind him and blast him into the wall. Tengu whirled on her, his dark eyes burning with hatred. He pointed one clawed finger at her, a tiny bullet-like ball of yellow-green light forming at its tip, and then the light shot at her, sniping through her abdomen.
For the first time since her death, Arisa felt pain, a cold yet burning sensation as a hole was punched through her. Choking in shock, she staggered back. Slowly, much more slowly than when she'd been damaged in the past, her body reformed itself, and even afterwards the cold throb lingered. Maybe guns and claws couldn't hurt her, but this was different.
Magic. You couldn't kill the dead by damaging a body that wasn't really there, but all kinds of ghost stories told of sorcerers and priests using magical or holy supernatural powers to drive off or dispel spirits.
Exorcism.
Now it wasn't just Suzuka that she was afraid for.
Tengu saw her fear and cackled.
"That's right, little girl. You're finished, now."
He raised his hand, palm outwards, a sphere of the same yellow-green hue crackling in his palm. If size was anything to judge by, this might even be the finishing blow. But there was something else, too, something that Arisa saw that changed everything.
A Midchildan magic circle beneath his feet.
Arisa knew those well. She'd first seen them at age nine, when she and Suzuka had been forcibly introduced to the world of magic. They appeared whenever Nanoha and Fate conjured powerful spells. Tengu was using magic like theirs. He wasn't a legendary monster, capable of who-knew-what. He was a known quantity, or at least a comprehensible one. A mage--or, more likely, a
familiar, like Arf.
"Midnight Striker!"
The buster-type spell blasted out, its beam at least four feet across. It tore through the lab, obliterating some of the equipment and catching up one of the researchers in its path--but not Arisa. She'd moved before he fired, leaping into flight so that the unleashed spell shot by beneath her.
"Don't think I'll make it that easy for you!" she snapped at him, and hurled another firebolt into his face. She was still scared--who wouldn't be, in their first magical battle?--but the paralyzing terror was gone. She might be new at this, but there was no way Arisa was letting some stupid crow keep her from Suzuka without a fight!
Screeching his rage and defiance, Tengu leapt into the air after her, and the battle was joined in earnest.
2009-08-23, 11:39
. (Jail needs more love, seriously. It's not because you're a mad scientist that you should be neglected.... 
)
Author
)
I'd like to see a sequel to it too. Please? 
For those that belittle their favorite characters, complain about pairings, complain about oversexed images. Stop, thank you.
