Like the last chapter, this edition of Guardian will be rank with bloodshed, fanservice, and off-camera sex.
Or maybe not. But if there is all that stuff, don't sue me for it.

Guardian
Chapter 24
Exposition and Decay

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Considering the array of scenarios that either erupted from or were terminated at DAPC headquarters, the scene in the main lobby of the building could hardly be considered unique.
There were no robots or aliens among the group save Hunter, who seemed thoroughly disinterested with the lack of enemies to kill and devour. There were no terrorists around. Mutants were not emerging from Seras' lab. There weren't even any vicious, brain-eating, jagged-toothed worms crawling about pestering people.

BLAM!!
Snake frowned at the bloody spot under the desk and stood back up, replacing the shell in his twelve-gauge.
"Got 'im. Wish I knew where those bastards were coming from."

Well, okay, there was the one, but it was a short and routine interruption to the more important scenario.
Speaking again of the situation at hand, this wasn't even the first time that a non-DA authority had dragged Junko Chikiko into the station while she was wearing nothing other than a ripped-up tarp and a nervous blush.
This was, however, the first time - for all the other officers knew - that Junko had violated orders, left her superior wounded and vulnerable, slaughtered a dozen or so superhumans by herself, and more-or-less raped a random protector of the peace.
All things considered, most agreed that Asuka was approaching this matter with an impressive amount of control.
On the other hand, there's a good chance that was just the morphine at work.

"All right Chikiko..." the police captain started gently, idly tugging at the sling that held her right arm steady. "You ARE Chikiko, right? Junko, not Akina?"
Junko nodded silently, hugging the plastic tarp tighter around herself. On either side of her was an armed Core soldier, their rifles aimed at the floor but ready to fire at a second's notice. Across the room, Mizu was fussing over Ranma as he toweled off vigorously, which had the dual benefits of getting him dry and allowing him to avoid eye contact with the redheaded woman.
"Wonderful. Now that we've confirmed that you're mostly sane, do you have an explanation for that little episode back at the pumping station?"
Junko sighed and nodded.
Asuka planted her hand on her hip. "Well? We're waiting."
The redhead fidgeted nervously. "Uhm... c-could you get the Core guys out of here? This is kind of personal, and while I don't really mind telling you guys..."
"Fair enough," the police captain said. "You guys can go. She doesn't appear to be any danger to us."
The two nameless Core infantrymen left without delay. Despite their curiosity, they had no real desire to stick around the DAPC any longer than absolutely necessary, and couldn't imagine why they would be needed to guard a single unarmed woman in a room full of other armed authorities.
Mizu was not nearly so apathetic. "There's no WAY I'm leaving until I get an explanation for what happened back there."
Junko winced. "Oh. Uh... do you know Corporal... er, Tsuya? Was that his name?"
"Corporal? What corporal?" Mizu asked in confusion. "I'm talking about you nearly raping Ranma, you freak!" The pigtailed man next to her flinched.
The redhead sweatdropped. 'Of course she'd be concerned about me trying to take Ranma, and wouldn't care a bit about me actually taking some other guy.'
"Your concern is appreciated," Asuka said calmly, turning toward Mizu, "but Junko is totally within her rights to divulge this issue exclusively to her own department. As her superior officer, I'll then decide if it warrants telling everyone else. I'll have to ask you to leave."
Mizu narrowed her eyes. "And I'll have to ask you to shove off; you're not my superior, and I have a personal interest in this matter. Don't try and reduce it to an inter-departmental situation!"
Many of the others winced at the response, and watched the tension rise as the Core solider glared into Asuka's eyes.
The bluette raised an eyebrow, and glanced back toward Junko. "Chikiko, what do you say? If you want her out, we'll get her out."
Junko groaned when the raven-haired girl turned to glare at her. "No, no, it's okay. Though I'd appreciate it if you didn't repeat what I'm about to tell you to anyone else, Kotetsu."
She took a deep breath.
"Question," Snake said suddenly, interrupting the redhead while raising his hand. "Is there a REASON why she's going to give us a long-winded backstory wrapped up in a plastic tarp instead of getting dressed first?"
There were sweatdrops all around.

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"Ah, much better," Junko said, feeling less self-conscious and ashamed now that she was clothed again.
Asuka patted the back of a chair meaningfully as the other officers stopped talking and gathered around. Junko sobered and sat down.
"Well, I suppose I should start at the beginning," the redhead said as she leaned back into her chair. "I was born twenty-five years ago next June as Akina Chikiko, loving daughter of Touryu and Shinane Chikiko."
Asuka nodded silently as everyone else stared in confusion.
"Wait... so your, uh, 'other personality' is the REAL personality?" Ranma asked, tactlessly as usual.
Junko rolled her eyes. "She would be the original, yes. But she's no more or less 'real' than I am. I have a unique form of multiple personality disorder. There are two personalities: me, who you know as Junko, and Akina. Except under certain circumstances, I'm in control by default. The personality traits and parts of my brain that make Akina who she is - what makes her different from me - remain totally dormant until she wakes up, and I become dormant as a result."
"But back to the beginning: all things considered, Akina had a pretty normal infancy. Nobody noticed anything particularly strange about her, except that she seemed extremely empathetic. While babies can often pick up the general mood of the surrounding people and tend to emulate it, Akina did so with a level of frequency and accuracy that easily qualified as bizarre. If someone was troubled but trying to hide it, she'd become sullen and unresponsive. If someone nearby was visibly frustrated, instead of crying she'd usually get grumpy and throw things at the wall of her crib. When her parents became aroused, she'd become extremely affectionate and demand attention."
Tiro winced. "Ouch. There's a mood-killer."
Asuka remained silent, but took careful mental notes. It didn't escape her notice that Junko clearly referred to the experiences of her youth as those of another person.
"The thing was, Akina was... uhm, is, a psychic," Junko explained nervously, scratching her arm. "She responded easily to other people's emotions because she was experiencing them as if they were her own. Nobody really knew anything was wrong until she started going to kindergarten."
Junko looked very nervous now. "Being put in a room with so many over-reactive, short attention spans drove her senses into overload. She found just being in the same room with so many kids exhausting, and started having seizures and fainting spells. But the doctors could never find any explanation for her problems, or why it only happened at school."
Tycho raised his hand. "So, can Akina read minds, or what?"
"No. Or at least, she's never succeeded on the few occasions she's tried. She's extremely sensitive to emotional responses because they resonate with her on a very basic level. Organized thought is too complicated for her to pick up, and she's never bothered to try and practice to see if she could manage it with effort." Junko explained. "Because she didn't have anyone who even understood what was wrong with her, much less how to deal with it, her subconscious picked up the slack by trying to erect barriers around herself. And it mostly worked. The mental walls she used to keep the barrage of emotions out ended up isolating her, and emotional walls soon followed the psychoreactive ones."
The redhead sighed. "So Akina, the bouncy, passionate little girl soon became cold, dispirited and detached. Depression set in soon afterwards, but it wasn't any big deal. At the very least, Akina had become functional and no longer had trouble staying conscious at school, so everyone let things be for a while. Looking back, it was probably the lesser of two evils; either be shut off from others completely and suffer withdrawal from the lack of emotion, or be driven further into a frenzy by the uncontrollable cascade of feelings until she began going insane from the stress."
Junko's face darkened. "Of course, then something happened to her. Something that crushed the imperfect mental barriers like styrofoam. Something that happens to everyone: puberty."
Ranma looked confused as everyone else winced and nodded somberly. "Whoa, wait, whaddya talking about? What's the big deal about puberty?"
"What's the big deal?" Sakura asked, shocked. "It's such an awkward age! The body's changing, and all the hormones!"
Ranma's brow furrowed. "Hormones?" Of course, he understood the change in his body; finally getting longer arms and legs had been the turning point in his training, as he was finally able to compete with Genma in everyday sparring once his father no longer had such an extreme advantage in reach. Other than that, he couldn't think of any notable experience with adolescence.
"Yes. Hormones," Junko said bitterly. "The emotional and psychoreactive barriers had never had to deal with anything like it; with Akina's emotions surging behind her shell, they were too weak to hold it back for long." She winced, as if recalling a particularly painful memory. "And then, they broke."
"They broke? And then what?" Snake asked excitedly. "Did you light the school on fire? Murder an annoying teacher?"
"No, nothing like that," Junko deadpanned. "Though the effect was spontaneous, it wasn't so spectacular. Akina had become a virtual calculator with her psychic powers subdued; no emotion, no empathy, only logic and fact mattered. When the repressed emotions of about ten years suddenly spilled into her, she did her best to keep them repressed, pitting her own cold will against the overpowering urges. She probably would've succeeded too, but her psychic power interfered. Over the time her powers were dormant, they had grown and matured; instead of helplessly absorbing emotional output, her powers emphasized HER emotions and thoughts, amplifying them and relentlessly seeking similar psyches to absorb. I guess that because her mature powers finally broke free when Akina was experiencing a lot of lust and aggression, they became her central focus. She doesn't think of much other than sex; she barely CAN. The sensations dominate her."
She shook her head. "It was such a HUGE shift, too. Akina didn't date at all because she thought of relationships as being pointless expenditures of time and energy without any real benefit, and always brushed off guys who hit on her. And then, suddenly..."
Tiro nodded seriously as he and Tycho leaned forward, completely entranced. "Fascinating. Continue, please."
"I assume that there's a story of blooming teenage romance that goes along with all this background?" Tycho asked hopefully.
Junko frowned. "Nah. It's just a bunch of hormones and cheesecake. Not much romance."
"We'd be willing to listen regardless," Tiro said quickly, squeezing the redhead's hand comfortingly. Asuka rolled her eyes.
"Well, okay. It was when Akina was fifteen years old, and had this biology project to do with a classmate..."

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Pant! Pant!
Akina looked in the mirror as bright red, wet hair clung to her cheeks, a desperate, nearly enraged expression on her face.
She threw aside the towel that had been wrapped around her, and watched as her breasts - coming in quite nicely so soon after her fourteenth birthday - bounced gently, free from any restraint.
As she grasped the edge of the sink, she brought her face closer to the mirror as she panted for breath, watching intently as sweat beaded over her forehead and over her body, indistinguishable though they were from the ordinary droplets of water from her bath.
"Gotta stop this... gotta get a grip," the redhead mumbled to herself as she kept staring in the mirror.
It wasn't working. It wasn't enough. It was never enough. Each time she pleasured herself to try and reach some level of satisfaction, the relieving calm that followed was shorter and shorter. This time it hadn't worked at all; even after climax, she still couldn't stop the images from bombarding her, the temptation growling at her like an empty stomach demanding it be filled.
Akina grit her teeth. 'No. Just calm down. Drink something cool, start reading your notes, and think about the project. THE PROJECT! Not your partner.'
Her eyes glanced at the clock that hung above the toilet. Twenty minutes until Ryuji Toda arrived, unless he came early, which he usually did.
Akina rubbed her forehead as she felt heat roll through her body like a bolt of lightning. This was wrong, completely wrong! She couldn't be reduced to a hyperventilating wreck just thinking about a boy; she wouldn't!
And what a boy to be losing it for, too... Ryuji was shorter than she was, bespectacled, and had all the muscle definition of a bowl of oatmeal. She was the very definition of a blooming beauty, with round, curvy hips and a swelling bustline. If she was going to be going after any man, it should have been the cream of the crop; star athletes or wealthy scholars. She had the body for it, and a comparable intellect. She could have had anyone she wanted.
But that didn't matter. No star athletes or wealthy scholars would be coming alone to her house while her parents were out celebrating their anniversary. Instead a run-of-the-mill nerd with a fast food job and glasses you could use to fry an anthill was going to be knocking at her door. A kid with no prospects beyond computer repair and who considered being able to name every pilot who attempted the Death Star run from memory a worthwhile talent. And this annoying little nobody was going to come to HER house to finish up the models for their biology project because she didn't have a ride to get to his house instead. Just her and the ubernerd. All alone.
Her mouth watered at the prospect. She wanted him. She NEEDED him. His looks and prospects didn't matter, only his biology. He was a man, and tonight she would become a woman.
'NO!! I have to calm down!' She thought, squeezing her eyes shut as she started splashing cold water from the sink onto her face.
It would be so easy. She was the very definition of a hot, young piece. He was a random geek who couldn't even talk to a girl unless he was being paired up with her in class by the teacher. What was he going to do, say no?
Hell, if he did say no, could he stop her anyway?
Slap!
She stared wide-eyed into the mirror as the red mark on her face slowly faded. 'Did I just seriously think about raping my biology partner?' Akina's grip on the sink tightened as she felt more conflicting emotions welling up inside her.
'What's wrong with me? Is this normal? What should I do?' Her teeth clenched in frustration, and she didn't notice as small cracks began to appear in the sink where she gripped it.
"Just stop it! GET A HOLD OF YOURSELF!!" She suddenly screamed.
Then she reached her hand back, and punched her reflection.
To say Akina was stunned was quite the understatement. As the sound of breaking glass and twisted metal echoed in her ear, bits of glass cascaded into the sink below, and the redhead stared at the hole she had made in the door of the medicine cabinet.
Gasping, she immediately pulled her hand back and started to whimper reflexively, expecting blood and a series of sharp pains all over her hand.
A lighter gasp came from her lips. Her hand wasn't cut. It wasn't even scratched. She didn't feel any soreness that would normally come from punching a hard surface. It was as if her hand hadn't impacting anything at all.
Akina looked back to the medicine cabinet. Typical bathroom setup; a mirror atop a thin plate of stainless steel. It was hardly made to take impacts, but there was no way she should have been able to put her fist through it without slicing up her knuckles but good.
She tried picking up one of the shards of glass, and then winced when a sharp point stuck her in the finger. Most odd.
Though she really should have been concerned with her hand above all else, she couldn't help but feel her libido pressing her once more, almost as if it was upset about being briefly forgotten amongst the sudden adrenaline.
That's when she saw it through the hole she had made in the mirror. A non-descript blue paper box with a picture of its product on the side.
'Condoms. Protection. Yeah, I'll need those,' she thought briefly before shaking her head violently. Why were these in her bathroom?
A memory surfaced. Oh, right. After getting "the talk" from her mother, they had been purchased and put there "just in case" (without her father's knowledge, of course, as he didn't want the temptation of safe sex burdening his sweet, pure daughter). She had ignored the entire affair and hadn't given it another thought.
Akina came back to the here and the now just in time to catch herself reaching for the box. She snatched her hand away. 'I WON'T need those,' she thought.
Ding-dong!
The doorbell rang. Her heart jumped.

Ryuji Toda sighed as he stood outside the Chikiko home, his backpack hanging off of his arm.
He was feeling just a bit depressed that this was the last time he and Akina would be working on anything together; after their presentation tomorrow, they'd probably never make eye contact again.
It wasn't that he expected, or even dared to hope for anything different. Despite the rambunctious cheers and encouragement from his friends, there was no way he was going to make a move on Akina Chikiko; girls like her chewed up nerds and spit them onto the sidewalk like gum. The best he could have hoped for was that the redheaded beauty would do her full part with the project and tolerate his presence when it was required.
She had done so, and he was incredibly relieved. Ryuji found Akina extremely intimidating, and he was pretty sure that if she had winked at him and asked him to whip together the whole thing on his own, he couldn't have managed to stutter out a protest.
But she hadn't, and instead had taken charge and divided up the work in a cool, professional manner that he found quite comforting. Soon it became apparent that Akina Chikiko was more than just eye candy; she had a good head on her shoulders too, and Ryuji had barely stopped himself from talking about subjects other than biology on several occasions.
He shook his head. 'Don't even try, man. She's so far out of your league it's not funny. If you ask her out she'll just humiliate you.'
The front door opened.
"Ch-Chikiko?" Ryuji asked worriedly, immediately concerned. Akina looked like a complete mess; her hair was uncombed and still wet from a recent shower, her face was flushed, and her sweatshirt and jeans looked like they had been thrown on in a hurry. "Are you all right? You look terrible!"
He immediately flinched back at the look she gave him, though he wasn't entirely sure what it was. It didn't LOOK like a glare, but it was definitely... intense.
"I... just got out of the shower..." the redhead mumbled staring at the ground.
"Oh. Were you working out or something?" Ryuji asked curiously. The way she was panting heavily, it made perfect sense that she'd be exercising, and then maybe rushing into the shower when she realized that he'd be over soon.
"Yessss... or something..." she mumbled again, finally moving so that Ryuji could move past her. "You're early again."
"Yeah, sorry," he said quickly as he moved past her. "Just a habit I guess. I could've waited if you were still toweling off, though."
"... Don't worry about it," Akina said softly as she watched him move into the living room, her eyes glued to his rear. All other physical inadequacies aside, he DID have a cute butt. She licked her lips.

Ryuji turned around as he heard a slapping noise, and his eyes boggled as he watched the redheaded girl strike herself in the side of the head repeatedly. "Uh... Chikiko, look. You're obviously not feeling 100%. The project is nearly done anyway. Why don't you go to bed and get some rest, and I'll wrap things up at home? I can give you the presentation notes tomorrow."
"Oh, I'm going to bed, all right," she mumbled as her eyes narrowed at him. "But you're not going anywhere... No! Sorry!"
"What?" Ryuji asked in confusion as his partner started slapping herself again. He was starting to get seriously worried. While he had seen Akina getting slightly flustered in his presence before, usually at the end of a long research session, she looked absolutely frantic and exhausted now. "Chikiko, here, let me help you to your room, okay?" Putting down his backpack, he carefully took the redhead's arm and pulled it over his shoulder. Akina offered no resistance; it was as if her arms had become rubber.
"Ryuji... you're so sweet," Akina mumbled in a daze. Her face had flushed even deeper, and she started perspiring even more heavily.
Absently, her free hand slipped into her pocket, grasping a small foil-wrapped package.
She could feel him. Not just the soft, warm body holding her up, but the swirl of emotions besieging his mind. He was concerned, and more than a little scared. But she could feel something else underneath his emotional shell, something familiar and comforting: hot, raging, throbbing lust. He wanted her as much as she did him. They wanted each other. Acceptance. Pleasure. Excitement. Satisfaction.
She pulled the condom out of her pocket.
"Ch-Chikiko, try not to t-tighten your arm, okay? You're pressing your... uh, your chest is-CHIKIKO?!?! What're yommMNPH!"

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Junko sighed. "And that was Akina's first time. Right there on her living room floor. The front door wasn't even entirely closed."
Mizu and the DAPC officers stared at Junko silently, stunned.
It was Tiro who spoke up first. "I think I speak for everyone here when I say that story is SUPER HOT."
"Well, it was both of their first times, actually," Junko explained, "so physically, the session was short, awkward, and a little painful. Especially when Akina was so aggressive. Despite that though, the flood of emotions released with his climax, the synchronization of two minds in heat, was more intense and intoxicating than an orgasm." The redhead shifted uncomfortably. "By the time Ryuji finally staggered out the door, they had gotten a lot better at the physical act, too. Practice makes perfect," she said wryly. "That was the breaking point. After that, all the dams had been broken and all bets were off."
Kyle raised his hand. "How'd their biology project go?"
Everybody else sweatdropped and gave him disdainful stares.
"What? It's a fair question!" He protested, crossing his arms over his chest.
Junko scratched her head. "Well, they didn't completely FAIL it... but Ryuji was way too tired when he got home to get a full night's sleep, much less finish the project by himself. And then they ended up being late to class because when he handed off her notes to her the next morning, she pulled him into the maintenance closet and... uh..." she frowned and lifted up her hands, as if trying to figure something out and then mime it with her fingers, "well, it's complicated to explain, but she pinned between the back wall and a mop bucket, and then used a broom to-"
"That's quite enough, thanks," Asuka snapped, earning a disappointed look from Tiro. "However, I'm much less concerned with the sex than I am with the killing."
"Well, it's a long story," Junko admitted, sighing once more. "After the initial release, Akina was a monster uncaged. Sexual experience became the central focus of her life, like some sort of drug addiction. There wasn't a man she'd turn down. And if no one was coming to her, she'd come to them. If he was single - or at least told her he was - she was all over him."
"And this is different from the way you act... how?" Mizu deadpanned, still flanking Ranma.
To her credit, Junko didn't respond to the jibe beyond answering the question. "I know I don't think anything of casual sex, but Akina is an addict; a true nymphomaniac. She needs physical pleasure like the captain needs coffee. Akina cut a serious swath through the high school after breaking in Ryuji. She left for school with a fresh box of rubbers, and bought another one right after classes let out."
Sakura winced. "Okaaaay... how have you not gotten pregnant yet?"
"That's a good question," Asuka said, rubbing her chin. "For that matter, when you were describing Akina's behavior, you implied that she'd leave a man alone if she thought he was dating someone already. If she was so out of control, why was her behavior tempered like that?"
Junko frowned deeply as she tried to come up with a good way to phrase her response. "When her mind, well... snapped, her whole brain pretty much became subservient to her psychic sensibilities. That didn't mean that her previous personality vanished completely, though. It's hard to explain... in certain ways, she was calculating and logical, and in other ways - which were far more obvious - she gave in to every impulse and lost herself to her emotions. She recognizes right from wrong, but as a system of possible consequences for bad actions that can be breached if she decides the consequences are worth it." The redhead shrugged. "The possible consequences of not using protection weren't worth the convenience of not having to use it. That's pretty straightforward. When it comes to dishing out punishment for wrongdoings... that's when things started getting ugly."
Snake started rubbing his hands together. "Ah, now we get to the good stuff!"
"As you can imagine, a lot of people were upset about Akina's behavior. Most of them girls, of course. Akina left attached guys alone because she didn't want to provoke a girlfriend when she had plenty of legitimate targets around, but plenty of people were still pretty upset. The thing was, Akina didn't care what girls thought of her; she spent all her time around men, even when she wasn't busy riding them. If you didn't have a penis, she couldn't see any reason to acknowledge your existence, much less listen to your views on how women should behave. So it came down to a confrontation."
"Go onnnnn," Snake said encouragingly, and Ranma too started to lean forward in anticipation.
"It wasn't that big a deal," Junko mumbled. "A bunch of girls headed by a senior in the Kendo club cut Akina off one day and said that she was an embarrassment to the school and the female gender, and that she should be ashamed. They told her that if she didn't knock it off, 'something bad might happen to her.'" The redhead snorted. "It's really amazing when you look at the mob dynamic between men and women. A mob of boys might have charged if someone had broken their leader's nose. The girls bolted at the first sign of violence from their 'victim'."
Asuka shrugged. "From what I can tell, that was the intelligent thing to do."
"Regardless, that incident got swept under the rug somehow, but more and more started to emerge," Junko began again. "It wasn't that Akina was becoming more violent, but rather that she started taking action more and more often in affairs where she deemed a violent response appropriate. For example, Akina never really cared about bullying until that day, but a week later she punched a jock in the stomach for badgering some other kid, and smashed a girl's locker in when that girl planted a threatening letter in her bag. Her violent responses were consistent and measured; she didn't exceed whatever retribution she thought was 'appropriate'. Of course, that wasn't too bad on a high school campus, but a week later, a local street gang turned up dead."
Snake frowned. "What? No flashback? Tiro got a flashback!"
Asuka swatted the Texan on the head. "Shut it. So after that, the cat was out of the bag?"
"Ironically, no," Junko deadpanned. "The murders were never solved; nobody seriously thought that Akina could actually KILL anyone. The first major screw up actually involved the sex, not the violence. She and her physics teacher were caught making out in his car one day, forcing the administration to address this one-student wave of delinquency."
Sakura looked alarmed. "She even slept with a teacher?"
"She slept with several. Only one of them got caught, though," Junko explained bluntly. "So the teacher was fired and Akina was expelled." She sighed wistfully. "It was really hard on her... on OUR parents. They had absolutely no control over her and made their throats hoarse lecturing Akina about her behavior. Akina's grades were diving because she saw school as a hunting ground for men and didn't care about education anymore. They tried to rekindle her interest in learning, and warned her about the difficulty she'd have in the future without an education. In return, she nearly gave Dad a stroke by asking how hard it was to make a living as a prostitute."
"Despite that, she got the point that teachers were more trouble than they were worth, so when she started classes at a different school, she stuck to students. Other than that though, it was just more of the same. Day in, day out, she'd drag boys into broom closets, bathroom stalls, and the back of the library while happily beating anyone who she thought really deserved it. People had plenty of complaints, but there wasn't much anyone could do, and since people who threatened Akina tended to either get threatened back, hurt, or just seduced, things sort of stabilized despite her presence." Suddenly, Junko made a face. "Then along came Kitane."
The redhead looked up at the others. "I don't really think it needs to be said, but both me and Akina are absolutely, positively, 100% straight. Like, we wouldn't even CONSIDER kissing another woman. We don't have any problem with homosexuals in general, but the thought of touching another girl ourselves is just gross."
"There's another workplace fantasy down the drain..." Mumbled Tiro, only to get elbowed by Asuka.
Junko continued, heedless of the interruption. "Kitane Kamezaki... not so straight. She transferred in the middle of the school year, and though the rumors started pretty quickly about her sexual preferences, that topic hardly seemed as interesting with Akina around. I don't know why she took an interest in the school bicycle of all people; I'm guessing it was the lust aura Akina put out all the time. Most girls who might have been interested would pick up on it, but were either turned off by her jumping every man in sight or were intimidated by her disdain for other women and the occasional spurts of violence."
Junko lowered her head and ran a hand through her hair. "Kitane was brave, though. She decided Akina was worth a shot, and cornered her one day after class with the excuse of needing help with homework."
"Akina immediately knew something was wrong. For one thing, she never DID her homework, and had a reputation to that effect. But more importantly, she was sensing a lot of lust coming from Kitane, and had no idea why. She agreed to try and help out of curiosity, but Akina wasn't QUITE curious enough to participate with Kitane when she started feeling her up."
"Any chance we can get a flashback of this?" Tiro asked. This time Asuka slugged him in stomach.
Kyle, who had been mostly thinking of fortune cookies ever since Junko had said the word 'psychic,' finally decided to try and get a handle on the explanation. "So Akina freaked out?"
Junko nodded. "Big time. Her mind was an overpowered, hard-wired machine. For the first time since adolescence, it was taking in lust but had nothing to give back; there was no physical or mental synchronization, no nothing. She had no idea what to do. Kitane was trying to convince her that this was good; that it was okay to 'experiment'. And Akina accepted that, but REALLY didn't want to. She wanted to run, but felt she always needed to confront problems and overcome them. She tried to convince Kitane that she wasn't interested, but the girl kept pressing Akina. And at some point she even felt that a violent reaction might be warranted, but that wasn't acceptable since she had made the same sort of advances on reluctant men in the past. Normal minds are capable of rationalization and even hypocrisy, but Akina's was too well-ordered, and at the same time too unstable. It was drinking in Kitane's psyche, and then it suddenly short-circuited."
The redhead sighed deeply. "The good news is, she didn't hurt Kitane. Akina did scare her terribly though when she had a seizure and literally split the school building in two with an uncontrolled psychokinetic blast."
Tycho winced. "Yowch. Couldn't you just shout ignorant slurs at her like all the other homophobes?"
Junko glared hard at him, which was the most emotion she'd showed since she started the story. "FIRST of all, me and Akina are the same person in body only; that was her reaction, not mine. Second of all, we're NOT homophobes. I happen to be an avid yaoi fangirl!"
All the men in the room groaned.
"Oh, so it's okay when men do it, but not women?" Tiro deadpanned.
"Right, like you have steamy fantasies of two of your own gender together!" The redhead snapped back.
"People, people! Shut up!" Asuka yelled. "Chikiko, while this is all very helpful in explaining the motivations and backstory for someone who we've seen for a combined total of two minutes, I think you should get to the part where you stop being Akina and start being Junko, and how that got switched around."
"Okay... well, after that, Akina was done for. When she regained consciousness she was locked in an isolated cell, and spent a few hours gibbering to herself insanely. When she was coherent again, people started trying to figure out what she was with little success. Akina's powers were as natural to her as breathing. While she KNEW she was different than other people, she refused to accept that as an isolating influence by investigating it or bringing it to people's attention, so it came as a complete surprise to everyone that she was anything but an overly amorous teenager. But now she was locked up because the power had come loose, and something had to be done about it."
"And what was that?" Asuka prompted.
"'Mental reconfiguration' they called it," Junko said wryly, noting that the term seemed to physically hurt Kyle to hear. "There were doctors who wanted to experiment and develop Akina's psychic potential, but my father did everything in his power to steer her away from them and toward doctors who thought they could subdue the irregularity or remove it. It's pretty unsettling that I - Junko - was actually created by a desperate, half-assed chemical and hypnotic therapy treatment attempted by some no-name psychiatrist down in Nara. If I remember correctly, which I might not, there were even a few electric shocks thrown in there. Through a horrendous regimine of drugs and constant psychological bombardment and adjustment, Akina repressed more and more of her psychic potential, and eventually shut it down completely into dormancy."
"After that, there was no more Akina. I was nearly a blank slate; Akina's entire personality, everything that made her who she was, was built around her psychic abilities. Without that personality, I was like a baby who had been born seventeen years old with all the common knowledge and language skills of someone that age. My parents... our parents were overjoyed, and set up a whole new life for me, with a new school, a new community, and even a new name. Though Dad was pretty upset at how quickly I fell back into Akina's sexual habits, even if it wasn't nearly as bad as before."
"But this wasn't the last the world had seen of Akina," Asuka guessed.
Junko let out an embarrassed chuckle. "Right... the incidences are rare, and I don't think anything apocalyptic has ever happened, but on occasion I'll black out and wake up next to some strange guy. Not a completely unique experience, except that I'll never have a hangover in those instances, and sometimes I'll be carrying knives on me. Sometimes I've even woken up covered in blood."
She shuddered mightily, and then blinked in surprise when she felt someone take her arm and squeeze it gently. She was far more surprised when she saw that Ranma had moved next to her, and seemed to be groping for something to say as he tried to comfort her.

"Look... Junko..." Ranma said slowly, scratching the back of his head as he avoided eye contact, "I don't really know what to say. I didn't know how much you've been through... and I'm REALLY sorry."
Junko blinked. Repeatedly. "You're sorry? Sorry for what?"
"Well, partially for running away and leaving you alone in the middle of a mission, and partially for almost shooting you. Or rather, Akina. Although I guess if I shot her it's hardly any different from shooting you, 'cause you share the same body and stuff," Ranma started to babble, feeling quite uncomfortable.
"You shot at me?" Junko asked, shocked.
"You missed?" Snake asked, just as shocked and looking rather condescending as well.
"I missed on purpose!" Ranma snapped. He sobered quickly. "Anyway, I sort of panicked, and I abandoned you. I hope you can forgive me."
Junko flushed slightly and started twiddling her fingers as she looked down at her lap. "Ah, well... it's no big deal! I should have come clean about this long ago just in case, so it's not your fault! All's well that ends well, right?"
Asuka took Junko's other arm and squeezed it. The squeeze was NOT gentle, and it was far from comforting.
"Not so fast, there..." the bluette said evenly. "There are still questions to be answered."
"Uh... like what?" Junko asked nervously.
"Well, most importantly, what causes the transition between you and Akina?"
"Ah. Right..." Junko began feeling over her head, pressing on different parts of her skull. She winced slightly when she pressed on a point on the back of her head. "To be honest, I have no idea just what happens that I end up switching personalities. I remember what Akina does, but the memories are incomplete and distant, like trying to remember something in a book I read long ago. But every time I wake up from blacking out, I have a bruise somewhere on my head."
There was a long moment of silence as everyone processed this at their own rate to come to the most obvious conclusion.
Kyle frowned and scratched his head.
"So... you change when you take a blow to the head?" Asuka said, rubbing her forehead with her good hand.
Junko shrugged. "Best I can tell. It takes more than just a tap, though. Sometimes I have to get treated for minor concussions afterwards."
Kyle's expression of concentration intensified, and sweat started to bead on his forehead.
Junko gulped as Asuka started looking around, and then picked a stapler up off the desk. The way she was gripping the device seemed to indicate that the police captain wasn't looking to staple anything. "Uh... you're not going to do what I think you're going to do, are you?" The others - except Kyle, who was now smacking the heel of his palm into his head in frustration - all looked surprised at the turn of events, and Ranma looked downright terrified.
"I don't like it either, but I feel I should talk to this 'Akina' personally," Asuka explained calmly, looking totally remorseless for someone who was about to deliberately smash a subordinate's skull in.
"Wait! Wait! Captain! Don't!" Ranma protested, stepping between the two women. "Look, I understand where you're coming from, but it isn't worth it! You don't want to wake her up!"
Asuka frowned. "What, do you seriously think that you and Snake can't handle her?"
Ranma shook his head. "No, it's more like her handling-" Thock!
The pigtailed man jumped at the sound of an impact, and whirled around to see Junko slump down into her chair, insensate. Behind her, Snake lifted up his shotgun and rested it over his shoulder.

"Oh, you did NOT just do that," Ranma said evenly.
Snake shot him a look. "We have to deal with her sooner or later. Now is fine."
Mizu looked uneasy. "I'm with Ranma on this; how do you know you can control her?"
"I don't," Asuka said simply. "I don't intend to control her. Akina isn't a robot or a weapon. She's just a woman with some freaky abilities and a sex addiction. I want to talk to her as a person, not as a tool." Her expression hardened. "And if I decide she's too dangerous, then I'll lock her up as a person, too."
"B-But even so-" Mizu began to retort, before a cry of surprise and the sound of falling furniture shifted their attention to the side.
"Hey! No! Stop!" Ranma cried as his pants went flying off to the side. Kyle didn't seem to notice as they landed on his head, as he had shifted into a pose reminiscent of "The Thinker" and was staring at the floor.
Akina cackled gleefully as she pinned the pigtailed man on the floor. "You're not getting away this time, cutie! We can do this the easy way, or..." she licked her lips. "The HARD way."
"B-B-B-But," Ranma stuttered out, "we're in front of other people, here!"
Akina blinked. Then she looked up.
"Oh. Good point," she mumbled, noting that two of the three women surrounding them were glaring hotly at her, while the third merely looked exceptionally irritated.
Clearing her throat, the redhead planted her fists on her hips while still straddling Ranma. "Okay. All you girls? Beat it. Guys, the line forms in the locker room. Can we have some privacy now, please?"
Asuka glared sharply at Tiro and Tycho. "If you take even ONE STEP toward the locker room, I will stab you." She turned her gaze back toward Akina. "Akina, please get off my subordinate. We need to talk."
"Bugger off," the redhead snapped. "If you won't leave, then WE will." Standing up, she tried to grab Ranma's arm, only to have the pigtailed man dart away and glomp onto Asuka's leg.
"Don't let her take me!" Ranma cried desperately. "She's already ruined two outfits! My clothes can't take much more!"
Asuka sweatdropped, and idly noted that Mizu was looking more irritated by the moment. 'She's probably quite a bit upset that he didn't run to her for safety. Why me?'
Mizu wasn't the only one upset, and while Sakura was too meek to try and interfere, Akina was the antithesis of meek.
The psychic frowned down at Ranma, and then glared up at Asuka. "You're getting in my way. You'd best stop that. Quickly."
Asuka brushed off the threat. "Your personal affairs are your business, and for the most part, I don't intend to interfere." Her eyes narrowed. "However, at the moment you're under MY custody, meaning that you're going to sit back down in that chair and answer my questions."
Akina's eyes narrowed back. "I see your arm is injured. Give me one good reason why I shouldn't give you a matching set."
Chak! Cha-chak! Click! Chak! Click! Clack! The response was instantaneous, and even Asuka was impressed at how quickly Akina had six gun barrels of varying sizes surrounding her. Mizu and Sakura had drawn as well, and even Ranma was aiming his Jackal from down below, though he was still clinging to her leg with one arm.
The only person who wasn't ready and willing to make the redhead into Swiss cheese was Kyle, who suddenly stood up while scratching his head. "So... what changes her personality is... bruises?"
Asuka sighed. 'Why do I even keep him around?'
Akina, meanwhile, started bigsweating as she glanced around at all the weapons aimed at her from all sides. "Oh. Okay. I guess that's a good reason."
"Sit down," Asuka said calmly.
Akina did so, but gave her a dirty look in the process. She wasn't used to being in situations where she didn't have control, and the fact that she had apparently stepped on the toes of the local alpha female made it much, much worse.

"Okay then. Now we begin the question and answer session," the police captain said. "First, a debriefing. You sort of stepped in at a time when your counterpart, Junko, was in the middle of a critical counter-terrorism raid. First off, congratulations on performing above and beyond Junko's capabilities," she said neutrally, surprising the redhead. "On the other hand, you left me bleeding on the ground after the area was secure when I requested assistance, but as you're not technically my subordinate I'll let that go. I consider it far more important that you killed nearly all of the enemy units yourself."
Snake twitched and leaned over her shoulder. "Those were MY kills you stole, by the way."
Akina blinked up at the Texan. Then she smiled lazily at him. "Mmm? Maybe I can make it up to you."
"How? By finding bad guys for me to blow up?" Snake asked disbelievingly.
"Oh, there'll be explosions, all right..." Akina gave him a cat-like grin.
Asuka cleared her throat. "If we can stop with the innuendo for FIVE BLOODY MINUTES, I can wrap this up and figure out what to do with you," she growled. "You engaged most of the enemy yourself. I've already gotten Ranma's description - Would you let GO of me already? It's embarrassing! - of the enemy soldiers as having a much higher degree of physical ability than the average human. Do you have anything to add to that?"
Akina frowned and tapped her chin. "Not really. I was WONDERING why they seemed a bit tougher to cut up than usual. Then again, it's been a few years since I last killed anyone, so it's hard to compare."
"Do you have any details at all on the enemy? Were they doing anything suspicious, or planting any bombs? Did any of them get away?"
Akina shrugged wordlessly.
Asuka's eyes narrowed. "Fine. I wasn't expecting much help from you, but I had to at least check. Now that we're done with that, what are you going to do?"
Akina blinked. "What? What do you mean?"
Asuka rubbed her chin thoughtfully. "Junko's made it pretty clear that you two are mentally independent. Junko is employed by the Department of Abnormal Phenomenae Containment to defend the populace against supernatural threats. You, however, have no obligation to the populace or to this department. This is complicated, not only because you may resurface in the middle of a dangerous operation, but also because that technically makes it illegal for you to run around killing people who you think deserve it. So I'm asking you to make a decision."
The redhead stared at Asuka, stunned. "A... decision? Me? What are you... I mean... but..." She shook her head to clear it, and her expression hardened somewhat. "Look, when I underwent that 'therapy,' they-"
"I don't know what those doctors did or tried to do to you," Asuka interrupted. "And to be blunt, I don't care, either. That's somebody else's job done long ago and I'm not interested in dealing with it. But you..." she frowned. "Despite whatever problems you may have in sharing a body with Junko, I'm not prepared to deprive someone of their right to live as they so please without good reason. The way I see it, you have two choices. Three, if you count incarceration, though I doubt that's really necessary."
Asuka held up her index finger. "Option one is that you can simply fade back into Junko's psyche and become a weapon for the DAPC. You'll go back to being a prisoner in your own mind, and whenever we get in a tight spot we'll just bang the tramp on the head and set you loose on the enemy. You'll be a tool for killing our opponents; never anything more than Junko's trump card."
A second finger joined the first. "Option two is that you start over. Get a job; hell, go ahead and whore yourself out for a living if you really want to. You can try and find a solution to the nutty mind-warp thing, or maybe a compromise. Maybe find a steady boyfriend and have an actual relationship. Start a family. You know, the things normal people do. You'd have a life of your own again, or at least part of one."
The tension in the air was palpable as Akina stared at the blue-haired woman like she was crazy.
Then Akina snorted. "Thanks, but I'll take the weapon option."
It was only Ranma's expert reflexes that saved Asuka from impacting the floor face-first and possibly injuring her arm further.

"Are you serious?" Sakura asked, gaping. Though she had to admit that what little she'd seen of Akina she didn't like, she'd have to agree that the psychic deserved better than a life of being called into consciousness whenever they needed something difficult done.
"Well, all that other stuff sounds hard," Akina reasoned, and Ranma again had to strain to keep Asuka from facefaulting. "I mean, get a real job? And a relationship? Ick. More trouble than it's worth." She made a face. "I'd much rather bust out when things get interesting, find a good lay, and then let Junko handle the nine-to-five stuff."
Asuka gaped. "Uh... well... then I suppose we have no real conflict here, do we?"
"Guess not," Akina shrugged. Then she smirked and looked around the room. "And speaking of no conflicts, I see a five-to-four guy/girl ratio, and not a single wedding ring!"
Mizu immediately stepped in front of Ranma. "Then go ahead and take your pick. From one of them," she pointed a finger that crossed the other men in the room.
Snake sweatdropped. "Where does she get off giving us away like that?"
"What? What's going on?" Kyle asked. "And whose torn-up pants are these?"
Akina rubbed her chin as she stood up and looked over the four proffered specimens, noting Tiro and Tycho's hopeful expressions.
Then she turned back around with her hands planted on her hips. "No! I want that one!" She said sharply, pointing at Ranma.
"Well, you're not getting this one, so back off!" Mizu snapped back.
"I have a name, you know," Ranma mumbled as he snatched his damaged pants from Kyle and started putting them back on.
Asuka shook her head irritably. "Look, can we slam you in the head again and get Junko back or something?"
"No! I want the pigtailed guy!" Akina said, stomping her foot like a child throwing a tantrum.
"I don't understand... what do you care? Any guy will do, right?" Sakura normally wouldn't have been so quick to judge someone's sexual practices, but both Junko and Akina had made it abundantly clear how low the psychic's standards were.
Akina stopped to consider the question. "It's hard to say. He's... special. It's like he's more receptive, or puts out more psychic energy than most people or something."
This got Ranma a few stares, and the pigtailed boy winced. What Akina and Junko knew of as psychic energy, he knew of as ki. While it seemed apparent that Akina was born with tremendous ki reserves and an instinctual ability to use them, he had obtained a similar level of ability with the energy through bloody-minded effort and sheer will.
'Hmmm... if that's the case...' Consciously, he closed his eyes and slipped into the Soul of Ice.
Akina blinked. "Hey! Stop that! You're doing that on purpose!" She complained angrily, waving her arms about comically. The other people in the room could only stare, having no clue what was happening between the two.
As Ranma's psychoreactivity continued to decrease to the point where Akina could barely feel anything from him, she stopped complaining, and then frowned deeply, her shoulders slumping.
Snake rolled his eyes. "Oh, boy. Here it comes."
Sniffle!
"Gack!" Ranma's concentration snapped immediately. "Wait! Don't cry! I'm sorry! I didn't mean to-"
Glomp! "HA!! Gotcha!"
"Get off of him, you little slut! Barbie, help me out here, would you?!"
"Don't call me Barbie!"

Asuka started massaging her head as the situation promptly began to decline. "Well, crap. Either the drugs are wearing off, or these people are simply too stupid for modern medicine to handle."
She turned to the side, ignoring the swiftly escalating sexual harassment conflict taking place in the HQ lobby. "Snake, I'm going home for the evening. I've been shot; I figure I deserve it. I want you to take over giving nasty, threatening responses to anyone who calls to complain about how we handled things back there."
"Aw, man," Snake complained, "I hate taking office calls. The sound of a shotgun being cocked just isn't as scary over the phone."
"Spare me the whining, please," the blue-haired woman snapped. "Also, I want you to get Seras down here, and you two can personally handle the containment of the bioweapon container. There are quite a few researchers who want to get their hands on samples of that stuff without having to try and dig it out of zombie flesh."
"Well, that sounds slightly less boring," Snake mumbled, glancing around the lobby. "Say... where did we put that thing, anyway?"
Asuka blinked as she got one of her occasional feelings of impending Doom. "Wait... who was carrying the container? That thing was too heavy for any normal person to carry it."
Snake easily completed the thought to its logical conclusion. "And the only two people we have abnormal enough to cart it around are Ranma and Kyle."
Kyle perked up upon hearing his name. "If you're looking for the big metal thingy, I left it in the garage. Hunter looked like he wanted to play with it, so I figured we wouldn't want it spilling that virus gunk inside if he broke it."
Asuka felt the need to insult him, but whether it was from a lack of vocabulary or the lasting effects of the meds, she just couldn't think of a term strong enough before something else caught her attention.
That something else was the zergling in question, who was trotting into the room after hearing his name called.
In Hunter's jaws was the biohazard container... already split open, and spilling little puddles of thick, green goo onto the floor.
Kyle clicked his tongue. "See? This is exactly what I was afraid of. Bad zergling!"
Some of the others had a more expressive response in mind. "GYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!"

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Igov's face would have been likened to an iron mask whether or not there had been a shred of actual iron in it.
Given that a decent chunk of his visage WAS actual metal, complete with glowing red sensor that most people imagined (incorrectly) could shoot lasers, being stared down by Igov was a lot like staring into the barrel of a tank's cannon.
Rain poured down from above, muting the Russian's heavy footfalls as he paced the length of the courtyard. His gaze wasn't piercing, angry or hateful.
But every man standing in the long line out in the rain could attest to the power of his stare. Each one could feel a cold ball of ice form in their stomach when they made eye contact, as if the gentle caress of the Reaper had crossed them along with the general's gaze.
Igov came to a stop before the middle of the row, and regarded the men silently as heavy droplets pelted his shoulders and dripped from his hair.
"All of you come from Japanese maximum security facility," the Russian began calmly, hands clasped behind his back. "Freedom's Angels go to great expense to free you from imprisonment, just or unjust as it may be. Angels grant you freedom, as is moniker."
His cybernetic eye made an ominous humming noise as it rotated, somehow standing out perfectly above the sound of the rain and the men's own pounding hearts.
"You all here, however, judged to be weakest link." He held up a finger and lowered his gaze, as if in regret. "Those too weak. Too sick or injured. Too frightened. Or, at least, not frightened enough of Freedom's Angels."
He waited until the ex-convicts finished gulping nervously.
"There some, among you, even refuse service on... MORAL ground," Igov said the word curiously, as if he was unfamiliar with the idea. "Some of you never kill before. Others intend to leave life of crime. Is understandable."
Despite desperately wanting to believe that the last sentence was indication of approval and compliance, none seriously thought it was going to be that easy.
"Not everyone is suited to be soldier," Igov explained, pacing once more in the rain and rubbing his chin. "However, there ways you may serve in... what is term... 'other capacities.'" The Russian looked quite pleased, and smiled amiably at the freed criminals.
One of the more suicidal men growled. "You can take that shit and shove it! I 'aint stickin' around you clowns! I'm no fan o' the government, but I'd rather be locked up than shot!"
"You bastards are sick!" Another idiot shouted. "What point is there in killing all those innocent people? What'd they do? Where's the profit in that?"
Igov simply shrugged. "Terrorism has always been more... long-term crime than you probably used to. You have to see big picture."
"I see a big picture, all right! It has a big graveyard full of you idiots and littered with your burning war machines!"
"We won't join you! Either execute us or let us go!"
Igov chuckled.
All other speech stopped at the noise, each man suddenly feeling incredibly insignificant and helpless before the cyborg.
"You cannot be freed. You have seen our facility and may find this area again. You will not be executed. Is a terrible waste after Igov go to such trouble to free you."
He gazed up at them, a slight smirk stretched over his face. "You will be recycled. Is trendy thing to do with moderately useful rubbish like you."
The ex-convicts didn't know exactly what to make of that, but they certainly didn't like the sound of it.
"Recycled? The hell we will be!" The first man to speak out stepped forward. "You're out here all alone, shithead! You think you can take us all on?!" Although all the convicts stepped forward, prepared to rush the cyborg, many were quite hesitant in doing so.
Igov, surprisingly, saluted sharply. "You earn respect in final moments. Is good to go out fighting for life rather than die helpless. You all strong men."
Chung! Ssshrip! Igov's left forearm suddenly burst apart into metal tubes that spun wildly around the circumference of his arm before snapping into place parallel to each other around a central rotator.
The Russian dropped his salute as he pointed the minigun forward, its barrels still spinning from the transformation. "Now die, so that you may be reborn in steel."
Brakka-brakka-brakka-brakka-brakka!

A lone figure clicked his tongue as he dropped down from the fire escape. He was wearing a poncho to keep the rain off, and held a briefcase tightly in his arms.
"Now that was just mean, aiming low like that; look, most of them are still alive!" Wolf said. Although the criticism certainly sounded light, his expression was one of genuine distaste. Murder he could understand, even if it wasn't for direct profit, but he took no pleasure in unnecessary suffering.
"Is better that way," Igov said evenly as he watched the German approach through the rain. "The less organs damaged, the better. Legs make easy to replace." Gripping his left bicep, he pulled back on it, causing dozens of empty casings to spill out of his torn-up sleeve and spill onto the ground.
Wolf stared at the bleeding bodies in disgust. "Whatever. I'll help you as long as I get paid, but I'd rather not know the details of your work. Don't want to get in too deep, you know?"
"Is understood. Do you have goods?" Igov asked as his left arm slowly shook itself apart and started reforming back into a hand (a much more time-consuming process than the reverse). "You back much earlier than expected, you know." The Russian general found it irritating that the mercenary was holding the conversation in Japanese, but decided to do the polite thing and maintain the language of Wolf's choice.
Wolf frowned. "I had to beat feat out of the U.S. They're REALLY paranoid about this whole 'terrorist masterminds stealing superweapons' thing. Can't imagine why," he deadpanned. "I may have substantially reduced CIA headcount on my way out of America. Or at least generated a lot of workman's comp paperwork. I was too busy to worry about where the knives landed."
"Are notes complete?"
"For all I know. You can look them over, but I'd like to negotiate a higher fee for my services," Wolf said evenly, patting the side of the briefcase. "These were WAY harder to get than you'd estimated, and it's going to be a lot harder for me to move around Germany from now on."
"Hmmm..." Igov regarded the mercenary with a sidelong look, then shrugged and beckoned him forward with his left hand, twitching the blocky, metallic finger toward himself. "Very well. Come."
Wolf began to follow, only stopping briefly as he saw dog-sized, four-legged robots emerge from the rain-drenched alleys to grab onto the fallen criminals before dragging them away.
'There's something very bad going on here... I might just come to regret this...'

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"Well, that was slightly less apocalyptic than I'd initially guessed," Asuka murmured as Ranma finished wrapping up the breach in the biohazard container with a thick layering of duct tape.
"How is he, Tuko?" Snake asked as he and Sakura stroked Hunters back.
Seras peered into the zergling's mouth, though he was very careful not to actually touch the alien's beak. "Well, I don't see any signs of infection in the exposed tissue, and I certainly don't expect that the T-virus would have any effect on him anyway. Hunter's DNA is too different from Earth-based life for virii to infect easily, and his rate of regeneration would probably exceed the virus's rate of reproduction by too far a margin for the virus to take hold of the central nervous system before the immune system kicked in."
Sakura breathed a sigh of relief. "So he'll be all right?"
"I can say with near-certainty that if Hunter rips your throats out, it will be of his own unencumbered will," Seras said with a tone of formality.
Asuka nodded as Tycho finished mopping up the last of the virus spills, and then turned to Snake. "All right; NOW I'm leaving. Please see to the tasks I gave you."
Snake nodded reluctantly. "All right, fine. So, is Commander Tekai in charge?"
"Well, given that..." The blue-haired woman trailed off. "Wait. Where IS Kyle?"
Tycho clicked his tongue as he pulled back the lever on the mop bucket, squeezing the mop dry as murky green sludge dripped into the soapy water underneath it. "Akina's gone too. Do the math."
"Aw, man!" Tiro complained as he stood up from where he had been scrubbing the infected spots on the floor. "Why him?"
"I'd guess that physical superiority was a close second to empathetic reactivity," Seras said, terribly confusing most of those present. "Yamazaki, could you take Hunter for a walk? He seems rather lethargic."
Asuka frowned at the zergling, which stared forward sleepily. "Are you sure that isn't the virus trying to take effect?"
"If the snippets I heard of Chikiko's story are true, it probably has more to do with the sudden concentration of psychic energies saturating the area and confusing his senses," Seras guessed. "Though I can't rule out the possibility. If Hunter suddenly drops dead, I advise you destroy the corpse immediately."
"What?! We can't do that!" Sakura squeaked, hugging the alien around the neck protectively.
Asuka frowned. "Yamazaki, you're under orders to do exactly that if the need arises. Fighting aliens and undead is bad enough, but I refuse to fight undead aliens. It's ridiculous, and I won't have it."
Tiro groaned. "Okay, okay."
"Good. I'll drop by tomorrow to get things organized, but on the whole I'm going to be getting some rest while my arm heals. I'll see you all later."

Ranma held up the large metal cylinder as he inspected the duct tape wrap, noting with satisfaction that it was completely dry. "Okay, so now what do we do with it?"
"I recommend fire, and lots of it," Mizu said stonily, standing behind Ranma as images of her first zombie encounter flashed through her mind.
Seras planted his fists on his hips. "Maybe later. For now, that stuff's going into storage. Third sub-level, in the liquid bio-containment lab. Just put it in one of the empty fluid cells."
"Gotcha," Ranma said, lifting the containment vessel onto his shoulder and starting toward the old service elevator.
Mizu frowned, and then followed after him.

"So, Ranma... it's been a while since we've had a chance to get together," the raven-haired woman said evenly.
"Yeah, I guess it has. Have you been real busy lately? I know the city's been stepping up its defensive patrols."
"Oh, sure, but it's nothing big. I can still get a weekend off as long as there are no bombs going off or mecha roaming the streets." She wet her lips as she prepared to cut to the chase. "By the way, remember that period of time a while back where I took charge around here for a few days?"
"Of course!" Ranma said cheerfully as he stepped through the torn-out wall and into the elevator car. Clang!
Ranma winced as the container over his shoulder struck the edge of the elevator door, and lowered it so that he could bring it into the elevator. "So, why do you... uh..." he sweatdropped as he saw Mizu pressed against the far wall away from the elevator, panting as she stared hard at the heavy metal cylinder.
"Be CAREFUL with that thing!" She gasped out, her heart rate slowing as she observed that no fluid was leaking from the container.
The pigtailed man sweatdropped. "Geez, would you chill out? The container wall is like an inch thick; banging it around a little 'aint gonna do nothing."
Mizu grit her teeth. "That would be a lot more reassuring were it not for the fact that DUCT TAPE is all that's keeping lethal retro-viral toxins from spilling out all over us!" Honestly, she loved Ranma dearly, but the man sometimes acted like he had no regard for his own life.
"Calm down. Even if it does spill, it's not like it'll jump out at you," Ranma reasoned, grabbing the old operating lever. "You coming or not?"
Giving a last strangled whimper, Mizu stepped into the elevator car, squeezing herself tightly into the corner farthest from the cylinder of bioweapons. Ranma pulled the lever, and the elevator door slid shut as the entire car started to shake and begin its descent.

"Anyway, as I was saying," Mizu began again uneasily. "Do you remember what you promised me in return for my helping you out?"
Ranma was silent for several moments.
"Uh... I'm going to say yes, but why don't you tell me anyway?" He hedged. Really, he had no clue what he had said in order to get her help, but he remembered being desperate at the time.
Mizu rolled her eyes. If he had promised anything specific she might have been upset, but as her reward was to be some undefined favor, she let it pass. "I want you to take me out tonight. On a date. To a nice restaurant, and then to a movie. Complete with cuddling and a goodnight kiss."
Ranma blinked. Twice. "Wait... a date? You want me to take you on a date?"
Mizu smirked and nodded. "What? I was slimed by a tentacled mutant and nearly eaten on three different occasions. I think a date is a fair trade for my trouble, don't you think?"
"I-It's not that," Ranma stuttered, blushing suddenly. "But, don't you think dating is moving things a little... you know, fast? We're not even engaged!"
All was silent, save for the rumbling of the elevator moving past the first sub-level.
"What?" Mizu finally responded, dumbfounded. "Ranma, I know that arranged marriage business sort of... well... complicated your idea of romance and relationships, but people don't have to be engaged in order to go out on dates."
"Well, then people are crazy," Ranma mumbled, remembering the dates he had gone on in the past and reasoning that any man who would subject himself to that madness without already having a substantial commitment to his partner must be completely insane. "But for you? Sure. What time?"
"I'll pick you up at seven," the raven-haired woman said, suddenly all smiles. "Try not to get in any fights with gigantic mutants this time, okay?"
"No promises," Ranma mumbled as the elevator ground to a halt. "So, are you coming in, or...?"
"No, I got what I wanted," she said, still grinning. Before Ranma could step out of the elevator car, though, she stepped forward and hugged him, quickly pecking him on the cheek. "I'll see you later, okay?" She asked, quickly stepping back into the car as Ranma stumbled out of it, caught by surprise.

The pigtailed man blushed in silence as the elevator door closed, and he shook his head as he returned to the job at hand.
'Oh, man... Mizu wants to date me? What should I do?' Ranma thought nervously as he searched for the fluid lab. 'Why does this always happen? Why can't I have just a regular friendship with a girl without it getting complicated?'
To Ranma, romance was something that ruined relationships, not something that built them. Every friendship he'd ever had with a girl had been lost as soon as that girl saw him as a potential husband. And though he understood now that most romances were built on trust and affection rather than paranoid possessiveness and violent retribution, he still much preferred being on platonic terms with women.
'Then again, what kind of relationships do I really have with the girls I know?' He thought to himself, his brow furrowing.
Sakura had a crush on him that was so obvious even he could see it, though he made no move to encourage or discourage her. It hadn't manifested as anything other than affectionate chit-chat and wistful sighs, but he was pretty sure that if she had possessed the backbone, she would have come on to him long ago.
Junko... well, he was pretty sure she saw him just as a friend, but she had a very different idea of what friends were than most people.
Akina wanted him, period. There was no ambiguity there. Again, she wanted a different sort of relationship with him than most girls, but the psychic didn't seem to want to be "just friends" at all.
Then there was Asuka.
Ranma stopped short and put down the bioweapon container before rubbing his chin. What did Asuka see him as?
A subordinate? Hopefully he had proven himself trustworthy enough to do more than just take orders from her. Yet, looking back on his experiences with Captain Takami, Ranma couldn't recall a single time she had ever really opened up to him.
Then again, she didn't open up to anybody. Even when speaking to Junko during her psychiatric evaluation she had supposedly been very reserved and dodgy.
'Well, I'm going to be training her soon, so maybe that'll change,' he thought, nodding to himself as he picked the container up again and approached the storage vats.

"Now how am I supposed to do this, anyway?" Ranma wondered aloud, looking over the giant glass cylinders in the rear of the lab. Each one had a nozzle at the bottom attached to a small electric engine, complete with a short hose.
Ranma put the biohazard container down, and then searched it over. Finding a protrusion on the side that looked vaguely like a spout, he fitted the end of the hose onto it and then flipped the switch on the engine.
Vvvvvvhhmmmmmmm... The end of the hose tightened over the spout as the vacuum started up, but Ranma quickly noticed that the storage unit wasn't filling up.
After scratching his head for a moment, he grabbed the spout and tried to twist it, hoping that was how the vessel was opened. When at first it refused to accommodate him, he lifted the container onto the table to get better leverage.
"Uuuuurgh... Just... a little... more..." Ranma grunted as he felt something start to give, like a pickle jar that was just on the verge of opening.
Of course, Ranma had no trouble opening pickle jars, because Ranma was strong enough to punch a hole through a concrete wall.
Ranma DID have trouble twisting off pieces of reinforced steel that were not made to twist off, but as he soon learned, superhuman strength and the legendary stubbornness required to attain that strength would prevail over a particularly sturdy container.
CRNK! Gloosh! "Bleaugh!" Ranma cried out in disgust as a thick green substance gushed out at him, splashing over his face and then dripping down his arms as he fumbled to fit the suction hose over the opening.
Sssshloop! The pigtailed man coughed and spat up a blob of bioweapon as the hose found purchase on the container, and the containment vat began to quickly fill up with the vile substance.
"Pthooey! Yuck..." Ranma groaned as he looked down at his clothes, which were now soaked and covered with a green film. "Aw, damn it. This stuff probably stains..." then he frowned. "Wait... isn't it poisonous or something?"
Though Ranma had been present during one of Seras's explanations of the T-virus, he, like every other male officer in the group, had zoned out while thinking of personal interests. None of them particularly cared about the conventions by which the dead could rise again to plague the living, so long as they were reasonably assured that shooting the blasted things in the head would stop them.
"Crap! I've gotta wash it off!" Shutting off the vacuum engine and quickly stashing the biohazard container in the corner, Ranma dashed for the bathroom.

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"Okay, Snake? Seriously. You're going to have to reign in your homicidal tendencies for just a little while," Tiro deadpanned. "Captain's coming back tomorrow. She'll be REALLY pissed if the HQ isn't still standing then."
Snake frowned as he continued scanning under the desk. "Hey, Wattai? Can you do me a favor? Whine a little louder and see if you can coax the little bastard into fleeing for the floor vent."
The driver glared at him. "With all due respect, LIEUTENANT, the worm creature was one thing, but you don't need a shotgun to kill roaches. It's just-"
BLAM!! "Damn it! The little freak ran under the filing cabinet!" Snake growled, picking up the empty shell casing and dropping it in the nearby garbage can, which would have seemed like a substantial gesture if he hadn't just taken a chunk out of a hardwood desk.
"Hey, what's with all the noise?" Tiro asked irritably as he entered the office.
Tycho sighed and scrubbed his hair with his hand. "When Tuko made those tunnels underneath HQ, apparently he even set them up with a pest infestation. We have a cockroach problem."
"Nothing a little napalm can't solve," Snake said as he rocked the filing cabinet back and forth, hoping to crush the insect under it. "Or, if that doesn't work, we can always try a LOT of napalm."
Tiro frowned. "Are we sure that Tuko really built all that stuff himself? I mean, it's implausible enough that he set up all those traps and came up with that crazy robot scheme, but building a sub-facility that big?"
"That's an interesting point, but more importantly, who cares?" Snake asked, looking through the various grenades he had on his person. "We have more important concerns. Like making living things dead."
Seras, who was passing by at just the right moment to miss Tiro's comment and hear Snake's, stopped and poked his head into the room. "Speaking of dead things; Yamazaki, I want you to take that dirty mop water down to the lab and put it in the disposal vat on sub-level one."
Tiro stared at him. "Wait... what? The mop water? Why?"
The medical officer rolled his eyes. "Why? Oh, I don't know, maybe because it's been contaminated by a lethal retrovirus capable of turning living creatures into mutant zombies? Is that a good reason?"
Tiro was silent for a moment. "Kind of. But it wouldn't be TOO big a problem if I, hypothetically, already dumped the water into the maintenance room sink, would it?"
Seras slapped a hand over his face.
Tycho gulped. "Whoa, wait a minute... you're saying this stuff is in the sewers now?"
Seras sighed. "No, it's not. This facility was constructed, apparently by individuals of great foresight, with its own independent water and waste treatment equipment in the drainage system to prevent the spreading of any virii or other contaminants into the primary water supply."
Tiro breathed a sigh of relief. "Okay then! So it's no problem, right?"
Splurt! Sssssss...
Snake frowned as he stared at the patch of yellowish slime that had barely missed his arm as it started to melt through the side of the adjacent filing cabinet.
"Tuko? Are there any Japanese roach species capable of spitting powerful acid slime?" The weapons expert asked. "Because personally, I think I would've heard about something like that on the Discovery Channel at some point, you know?"
Seras glared at Tiro, who gulped and started eyeing the exit. "Oh, sure. No problem at all."
HSS!
Tycho, Tiro, and Seras all flinched back as the cockroach skittered out from under the cabinet out into the open. Yellowish ochre seeped from around its thorax, and its antennae twitched with unnerving severity toward the police officers. What was even more disturbing was that its carapace had grown a number of small, painful looking horns which had cracked through its wingcase.
"Uhm... so, all in favor of running?" Tiro squeaked.
Snake rolled his eyes. "You're an embarrassment to your species, you know that?"
The cockroach trembled for a moment, then turned sharply toward Snake, its thorax bulging as acidic slime seeped out of the cracks in its shell.
Splurt!
Snake raised his foot, allowing the spray of acid goo to pass under him harmlessly. Then he put his foot back down.
Crunch! On top of the cockroach.
Tycho winced. "Hey! Careful! What if those spines jab your foot?"
"'What if those spines jab your foot?'" Snake repeated in a mock-whine girly voice. "That's why we wear standard-issue thick-sole combat boots, you sissy." Without further criticisms, Snake raised his leg up and let it fall onto the desk, exposing the splattered insect for the others to see.
Tiro frowned. "But won't that acid gunk burn through your boots?"
Seras shook his head. "Treated rubber is all but impervious to most acids. There shouldn't be any problem." Then he resumed glaring at Tiro. "Other than us having an infestation of tiny, acid-spewing monsters, that is."
"Oh, big freakin' deal," Tiro shot back. "Snake likes killing dangerous things; let him handle it."
Slam! "Heeeeelp!!"

The four gathered men all rushed out of the room, and stopped short when they looked toward the men's locker room.
Kyle was struggling to get his pants on with one hand as he held the locker room door closed with the other. Junko - at least, they assumed the terrified redhead was Junko and not her psychic counterpart - seemed to be hyperventilating as she leaned back against the door, holding Kyle's shirt up against her otherwise naked body.
"R-R-Roaches!" Junko squeaked. "BIG roaches!"
Snake sighed. "And THESE are the people who are supposed to take on the most dangerous and terrifying freaks in all of Tokyo. This nation is doomed."
Tiro looked worried. "So, wait, how big are we talking about here?"
"Well, the mutagenic properties can certainly generate imbalanced secretions from various glands responsible for accelerated growth, causing a surge in body mass. In the short period of time since Yamazaki dumped the virus, I'd say it's possible they've grown... oh, maybe three inches?" Seras guessed, crossing his arms over his chest.
Clang! Wham! Clang! The steel-reinforced door to the locker room jolted fiercely as Kyle and Junko struggled to hold it closed, and large dents started bulging outward from the metal surface.
"...... Then again, I'm no expert on mutagenics," Seras mumbled, scrubbing his head with his hands.
"Kyle, aren't you super-strong or something? Why don't you kill them?" Tycho said, glancing around at the surroundings for any more of the mutant creatures.
"But there were so many!" The blond man complained as the door behind him shuddered again.
"Okay, okay, calm down, you pansies," Snake muttered. "Since being a human tank isn't enough for G.I. Jitters here, I'll have to take charge." He turned toward Seras. "So level with me; is Raid going to be enough here, or can I justify flamers?"
Sssssss! "Ow!" Junko jumped away from the door and immediately started scrubbing away at the bit of acid on her leg with Kyle's shirt, mindless of the fact that it left the rest of her body bare.
Snake frowned as Seras failed to reply. It didn't escape his notice that the drunkard was staring at the redhead rather than the long, serrated claw poking through the rapidly expanding hole in the locker room door.
"It's a sad day indeed when I end up being the most sensible guy in the room," Snake mumbled. Then he backhanded Tiro, who had been drooling on the floor. "Hey! Snap out of it and get some weapons from the armory! Flamers, napalm grenades, shotguns, ammo, the works! Go!"
Tiro sulked for a moment, staring longingly at Junko as she scrambled away from the door, abandoning Kyle's shirt to a wild burst of acid. "... You didn't have to hit me, you know..."
Thwack! "Less whining, more MOVING!" Snake shouted, clubbing the lecher over the head with his shotgun.

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"Rotten lousy no-good jackass of an American lunatic..." Tiro mumbled to himself as he stalked down the corridors of HQ, the sound of shotgun fire blaring in the distance.
Not that he had any real desire to stick around the main combat against acid-spewing, gigantic insects, but he hated being bullied as much as the next inept loser.
Also, carrying all those weapons and explosives was going to be hard; they were really heavy!
Which is why Tiro was overjoyed when he saw Ranma stumble out into the hallway.
"Ranma! Buddy! Can you do me a favor and help me carry some ammo down the hall?" Tiro asked, stepping up to the pigtailed man.
In response, Ranma groaned and shuffled forward, his arms slowly reaching out and groping blindly toward Tiro.
"Huh? Ranma? You okay?" Tiro asked worriedly, his genuine concern for a friend overcoming both the urgency of his task and his need to make it easier. Ranma was shuffling forward toward him rather awkwardly, and his head was down so that his bangs covered his eyes.
"Muuuhngh..." Ranma moaned, reaching out for Tiro's arm and grabbing him around the wrist.
"Eh? Hey! What's wrong? Snap out of it!" Tiro said fearfully, something in the back of his mind telling him that something bad was about to happen.
Ranma trembled for a moment, and then his mouth opened.
"Blaaurgh!"
"Gyah!" Tiro jumped out of the way just in time to avoid getting vomit all over his legs and feet. "Dude! Not cool!"
Ranma just groaned again as he slowly lifted his head up. "I feel terrible," he mumbled.
"Well, whatever you've got, I don't want it!" Tiro said, shaking his arm free of Ranma's grasp. "And why are you all wet?"
"Just washed up. Got some gunk on me," the pigtailed man said as he clutched his protesting stomach. 'Whatever this T-Virus stuff is, it is NASTY! I haven't felt this lousy since the last time Akane tried to make tempura!'
"Yeah, okay, fine. While you're here, come help me move some junk down the hall."
Ranma groaned again. "What kind of junk?"
"Ammo and stuff. Snake and the others need it to kill off the giant mutant cockroaches."
Ranma was silent for several moments, his expression of disbelief broken only by him wincing at the occasional complaint from his stomach. "So now we have giant mutant cockroaches attacking?"
"Yes. And before you ask if it was my fault, just remember that placing blame doesn't help anyone at this point!"
Ranma rolled his eyes and staggered toward the armory. "Yeah, yeah. Let's just get the guns. Mizu specifically asked me NOT to get too caught up fighting mutants to meet her tonight."
"Eh? You going for the gold, Saotome? Way to go!"
"...... Now is SO not the time, Tiro."

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"Well, we're all here," Alexandra said as she crossed her arms under her breasts, frowning at Yoshi who was seated next to her. "Igov, what is this about?"
The Russian bowed wordlessly to his audience, which consisted of Alex, Bei, Yoshi, and a number of high-ranking technicians that were employed directly by the Freedom's Angels rather than Wraith Labs.
Next to the cyborg was a foreign woman that none of those present had seen before; she was extremely thin, and had pure, snowy white hair that hung in gentle waves to her shoulders. Although she was wearing a lab coat, it was open in the front, revealing a fashionable blue sweater and darker miniskirt.
Alex had to admit that if it weren't for the coat, she would have pegged the woman as Igov's new supermodel girlfriend, although she personally thought that the stranger didn't even begin to approach her own stunning levels of sex appeal.
"No doubt you wonder who is beside Igov," the Russian eventually began, standing up straight from his bow. "Igov introduce Doctor Yamiko Nova." He gestured to the woman, who smiled mysteriously and then bowed herself, though it was far more shallow than Igov's.
"Doctor Nova is scientist of some... what is word... notoriety in Russian circles," Igov began, smirking himself as Yamiko's expression failed to change at the endorsement. "Doctor Nova work for long time in Russia to apply sciences of Igov's late wife. Doctor Nova contact Igov when she make breakthrough, ask for protection from Russian government that seek to track her down as well."
Alex raised an eyebrow. "And why would they want that? We're suffering enough scrutiny from Russian agents already, don't you think?"
Yamiko finally spoke up, her voice firm and confident. "My research began to penetrate areas that the cowards that try to run the current government found... uncomfortable." She snorted contemptuously. "The late Mrs. Yuchtzky's designs and theories have the potential to create fearsome weapons, but the current administration of the motherland quails at such things." Her cold expression swifly shifted into a scowl. "To think, our nation used to be a superpower threatening to shatter the world... it's shameful."
"Yes, yes, I'm not interested in your misplaced national pride," Alexandra said, sighing as she ran a hand through her hair. "I'm much more interested in what technology was deemed 'too hot' for the Russian scientific community to tolerate you."
Yamiko narrowed her eyes at the brunette, but remained silent.
Igov rolled his natural eye. "Doctor Nova, if you please?"
"No. Just a moment," Yamiko said acidly as she stared down at Alex. "General Yuchtzky explained to me who you are, Ms. Tokima, however I must demand some measure of respect, even from a potential superior."
Alexandra raised an eyebrow as an amused smile crossed her face. Bei growled slightly and scooted closer to her boss, ready to lash out at the Russian woman at a moment's notice.
"A 'potential' superior? Either you'll sign on as my inferior - no 'potentials' involved - or you'll be promptly handed over to the Russian authorities," Alex said flippantly, as if the matter was utterly unimportant to her. "In a body bag, that is. Couldn't risk you giving away any of our secrets, now."
Yamiko's hands clenched into fists, and it looked like she was going to shoot back a retort, when Yoshi suddenly snapped his fingers.
"Ah! I remember that name now!" He grinned at the startled woman. "You used to work for Umbrella Corporation, correct?"
THAT got Alex's attention, and the smirk on her face vanished.
Yamiko was silent for several moments. "... Yes... Yes, I did," she mumbled. "They hired me for a special project... to create a superior type of zombie from their T-virus experiments. The project was codenamed Nemesis."
Igov, relieved that the tension between Alexandra and Yamiko had temporarily dissipated, nodded encouragingly.
"We never completed the project, of course, because SOMEONE mysteriously attacked our labs and started buying out our resources," she said wryly, staring at Alex.
"Inexplicable," the brunette mumbled unapologetically. "Continue."
"Umbrella collapsed, as did all its plans. However, while I no longer had a job, I did have most of the materials and my previous research. I decided that I was too close to success to leave the project unfinished, so I continued it myself." She smirked. "The results were... not perfect, but VERY promising." She turned toward Igov. "Bring him in."
Heedless of their difference in rank, Igov obediently stepped to the side and slid a door open, revealing a figure behind it.
Clank! Clunk! The figure stepped forward silently, each leg making a different noise as they fell heavily upon the steel floors.
Alexandra raised an eyebrow. The fellow was a cyborg, obviously. A sensor visor had been mounted over his eyes, his face was covered in stitches, and his entire right arm was a bulky, mechanical claw that really belonged on some sort of assembly line rather than on a human being. More of his body seemed to be cybernetic as well, as there were patches of metal and the occasional bolt sticking out everywhere. The only clothes he wore was a pair of loose-fitting black sweat pants and combat boots.
"So you're building cyborgs. Swell," Alexandra said, marginally impressed at the extent of conversion. "We could use a few more soldiers of Igov's power."
Igov smirked. "He is not so powerful as that. But more importantly, do you not recognize him?"
Alex blinked. "Hmm? I can't say I do."
Bei, however, obviously did. "K-K-Kajiko! Goro Kajiko!"
Alexandra frowned. The name didn't ring any bells, so he couldn't have been anyone too important. "Yes? What about him?"
The shorter girl turned toward her. "He DIED three days ago! He made some stupid bet with his buddies and entered the mauler pits! He was torn apart!"
Alexandra turned sharply back toward the cyborg.
Igov smirked again. "Unit 01. Say hi to the lovely ladies."
The cyborg lowered his sensor visor to glare directly at the spectators, and swiveled toward Alex and Bei. Then he raised his mechanical arm, and the claw snapped open and closed a few times.
Order processed. Targets identified. Hello. Unit 01 said stiffly, his voice coming out in an electronic buzz as his lips barely moved.
Alex was stunned. "Igov... what is this? Are you telling me that this-"
"Is a zombie?" Yamiko interrupted, smirking insufferably. "More or less. I've developed a procedure called the Mortem Override to use T-virus strains to reactivate certain parts of the brain responsible for basic physical action; respiration, circulation, etc. I then used Mrs. Yuchtzky's designs to implant the key cybernetics to restore functions to damaged body parts, as well as create a neural interface so that the revived soldiers can understand and process orders." Her smirk shifted into an outright grin as she saw that Alex was obviously impressed. "Dead soldiers can now be rebuilt as cyborgs. They're tougher, stronger, and as loyal as robots, which require far more resources to construct. Implanted targeting systems increase accuracy, and programming ensures that they possess basic combat skills."
Alexandra was silent.
Yoshi was not.
"Only basic combat skills?" He asked, cocking his head to one side.
Yamiko's grin quickly vanished. "Yes. So? With internal impact armor in addition to typical body armor, and the enhanced strength, they'll need little else."
"Mmm. So they have no defense against a particularly resourceful commando, or effective tactics? They possess no creativity or initiative. All they can do is follow orders and react."
"And why would they need to do anything else?" Yamiko asked hotly. "War is a science just like any other. All they have to do-"
"Igov disagrees," the sentient cyborg in the room said suddenly, cutting off Yamiko's defense. "War is art, not science. There are rules, but rules broken quickly if help ensure victory." His normal eye narrowed at Yoshi. "Professor Konta has point. But you have done all you can. This is still great leap forward."
Alexandra nodded reluctantly. "I have to agree. I was skeptical, but if you really can produce these soldiers in any sort of considerable quantity, it would be a substantial benefit to our forces. A great leap forward indeed."
Yoshi shrugged as he got up, startling several of the unnamed scientists with his dismissal of their superiors. "It's an interesting project, certainly. Probably more useful than the genetically enhanced soldiers I made."
Alex blinked in surprise. Did Yoshi just humble himself?
"However..." the diminutive scientist mumbled as he walked out, hands clasped behind his back, "the greater the leap forward, the more severe the damage if you fall." Then he grinned at a confused Yamiko. "Nonetheless, I welcome you to the scientific community of the Freedom's Angels, Doctor Nova. Enjoy your tenure here... it's likely to be a long one indeed."

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Inmates slaughtered for cyborg parts: 18
Giant pests exterminated: 3 (so far)
Long, bizarre character backstories finally put to rest: 1

End Chapter 24