Chapter 23

 When the effects of the glitching finally wore off, Vera, the case, and Ghost were nowhere to be found. At first, Hanabi tried to track them but Irene said to forget them for now. She’ll just have her drones look for them, it was clear that Vera girl — a possible former Gatekeeper — was way too dangerous for Hanabi to deal with alone. They’ll deal with her with the others, as skilled as Vera was, her specs were several generations old. There was no chance she’d be able to beat the entire squad.

Hanabi agreed, but she still felt frustrated. Only her second battle, and she got her ass kicked. That was pathetic and shameful. Though Irene did try to cheer her up, tried to tell her that it happened sometimes. Though, because she was Irene, she also peppered in some backhanded statements.

Regardless, they had their prior issue to deal with. That took priority right now. Whatever they were planning, she had to rely on Irene’s drones. So she followed Irene’s drone to their original destination.

The house they came upon was an old house on the outskirts of the settlement, it certainly stood out. Standing solitary on that lonely hill, it almost seemed like just a normal house. Was this the place?

“I’m detecting two figures on the top floor, odds are they’re the targets. Can you confirm?”

She cycled through her vision settings, and sure enough she could detect the faint forms of two figures crouched in a low profile in the back of the room, far away from any window. “I see them, engaging!”

“Wait, wait wait!” Irene’s drone blocked Hanabi from advancing! “We don’t know for sure it’s them, so before you go in, guns blazing and kill some innocent, let me make a visual confirmation first, okay?”

“I… guess that’s correct.”

“Great. Wait here I’ll check it out.” Irene’s drone floated off to the house, leaving Hanabi to wait by the fence.

That was a pretty amateur mistake, Hanabi was likely still rattled by the fight. Or rather, losing that fight. Why was she so frustrated. This wasn’t helping, she was dwelling on it too much, fantasizing too much about a rematch.

“Memory Lock initiated… are you sure you’d like to lock these memories?”

“Yes. It’s too distracting, so I just need to lock it for a while.”

“Memory locking in progress…”

The memory of the fight flowed back into her mind as if it was happening all over again, then she paused on the memory of the masked boy. She felt a strange sense of something familiar, this boy… he knew her. He had to have known her. If there was a chance at finding out who she was, it was through him.

“Who are you…” she asked to no one in particular. She didn’t want to lock this particular memory yet. The rest, were fine, she just set certain triggers to refresh the memory. Like if she saw Vera again.

“Hey, quit spacing out!” Irene’s angry drone showed up again.

“Right, sorry. What’s the situation?”

“I did confirm the nemesis markings on the two figures, they’re just sitting there alone, no guards. That seems suspicious, but from what I can tell. Fighting is going on everywhere, so maybe they just thought no one could make it this far?”

“Probably. Sofia would probably say that we’ll sort it out later?”

“More of a Kumoko thing actually, but close enough.”

“So, how do I get in there? Just sneak in through a back door and make my way upstairs? Breach the front door and rush upstairs? Or maybe-”

“Or you could just fly to the window and take them by surprise.”

“Oh. Right. I guess I could do that.” Hanabi quietly activated her flight protocols and started slowly floating towards the window, Irene’s drone following along next to her. The two of them were silent.

“....Did you forget that you could fly?”

“...” She didn’t want to answer that.

“I… I didn’t… I didn’t know that was possible.”

“...”

“Did… did that fight damage something in your-”

“Can we not talk about it, please?” The memories were surfacing agai- ‘nope! Repressing! Putting stronger filters on that.’

She floated beside the window, no movement from the targets. The plan was simple here, just breach and take them out. Just two shots should be enough.

Hesitation.

Did these two really need to die? Could she not try talking to them, convincing them to surrender? She wavered, was this her old human instincts. She’d only fought monsters before but… these two, Supers or not, were still human. Could she really take their lives based on probability.

She remembered Sofia and the others; Kumoko, Mariposa, Claire, Naomi, Irene… they were all still fighting. Every moment this siege went on, the more likely it was they’d be destroyed. Maybe Irene was right, but there was a greater chance that these two were the targets she was looking for. Maybe it did cheapen their lives, but…

‘Now!’

Hanabi swung around the window into the room, gun in hand, she confirmed the two targets. Watched their eyes widen in this unexpected turn of events, they’d probably expected someone to come in through the stairs but the window, the window was unexpected.

She saw the man raise his rifle at her, but it wouldn’t do any good now. Her reflexes were much faster than his. She pulled the trigger, firing two shots at them.

They should’ve hit, but instead were stopped by the sudden appearance of a barrier. A hardlight, hexagonal plated barrier covered the two of them, separating Hanabi and the terrorists by half the room.

Hanabi skidded to a stop, and fired several more times at different angles. But no matter where she shot and how, her bullets couldn’t penetrate the thick shell.

“It’s useless!” The man stated confidently, taking a breath and lowering his gun. He tapped the woman on the shoulder, and she resumed her activities. A smoke-like substance engulfed her hands as she placed them on the ground and had it spread out through the floor. That was likely the fog-maker, which meant the man was the spawner.

Hanabi paced her side of the room, trying to find a weakness in the barrier. It was made up of hexagonal semi-translucent plates connected by an energy field. She tried shooting it between the plates, but her bullet just vanished.

“I said it was useless!” The man said, lowering his gun, secure that he was safe. “So, you must be a Gatekeeper, an abomination of metal and death to serve as Soluna’s watchdogs?”

“Hanabi, can you hear me?” Irene’s voice sounded off in her head. But how was that possible? Wasn’t the fog supposed to be blocking communications?

“I can hear you, but how?”

“I don’t know, I guess the fog’s weak here?”

“So that means communications are up?”

“Only between this Miimiku and you. I can still communicate with the other drones though.”

“Who’s Miimiku?”

“Name of this drone specifically, I name all my drones. Look, do we have time for this? Sync your sight with mine, let’s see if we can figure out a weakness here.”

“Got it, what do I do? I can’t shoot them.”

“Keep them talking until we uncover a countermeasure. But first I need to gather some data. Also, try a few things if you can.”

Hanabi felt a connection in her head, like she was sharing space with another entity. That must’ve been Irene syncing to her sight. So, now she just had to figure out more details about this barrier. Hanabi picked up one of her shell casings and gently threw it at the barrier, it bounced right back.

‘Right, keep them talking.’ …How exactly was she supposed to do that? She could barely talk to regular people, now she had to keep them talking while not looking suspicious.

She paced the room, and tried to touch the shield plates. It shocked her finger but was otherwise fine. “Are you the ones doing this?”

“Did you break in here and start shooting without being sure? Typical Soluna Consortium. Whatever you can’t control, you kill. Though in this case, you’d be correct.”

“I’ve run a search on Supers with that power, and I found it. FSA Super, went by Barricade, killed while attempting to raid a Katasian Republic town to kill a diplomat. Wound up being killed by an unknown assailant before the attack took place.”

“Coincidence that he goes dead and they turn his power into Forge-Gear? Wait, do other places have that capability?”

“No, only Soluna can do something like that. If there’s another Super with the Forge-Master’s power, they aren’t in my database.”

“Well, regardless, what was his weakness?”

“His barricades were nigh-impenetrable however… they had to be deployed and had a limited coverage. Meaning at the time of his death, he could make a wall, but couldn’t exactly make a barricade that covered his whole body.”

“So that means, their half of the room isn’t fully covered, right?”

“Right.”

Hanabi made for the stairs, thinking that she could probably shoot through the floor or ceiling if she had to. She was hoping they’d feel so secure where they are that they wouldn’t bother to stop her.

However…

“Not so fast!” He suddenly stood up and pulled a strange device out of his pocket. “Do you think I didn’t see what you were planning? Why do you think we set up here without any guards? It’s because we don’t need to.”

“Hanabi, that’s a detonator!”

Hanabi visibly tensed up.

“Why wouldn’t we plan to be cornered like this? No, no, no, see… we’ve packed enough explosive material in this house to blow up this town a dozen times over.”

“Are they telling the truth or bluffing?”

“A quick scan did show bomb-like objects, but it’s possible he’s still bluffing.”

“Could I survive it?”

“I don’t think so, not without severe damage. See if you can identify the shield generator.”

Hanabi stepped away from the stairs and returned to the shield wall. “Could you surrender? You’re not a target designated for death, so if you surrender then you’ll be treated fairly.”

At this, he became insensed. “Fairly? Oh, I know about your Soluna fairness. Your people are dying out in the outer-wards, stabbing, shooting, and beating other for a 2-credit bag of chips. Meanwhile, your most powerful members can not only literally get away with murder, but your leaders thank them for their service! So no, I don’t believe we will surrender. We’ve got a better chance of having reinforcements show up, kill you, and proceed with our plan.”

“I’ve got it! The emitter, that woman isn’t just using her powers, she’s hiding the emitter under her robes. Can you see it?”

She looked closely, and talked some more to make it look like she was trying to talk her way out of this. “And why are you even doing this? What’s with the coffin there?”

The man began his speech, something about how their son was killed, but she wasn’t listening. It wasn’t her job to determine if they were morally justified or not, these people were enemies of the state, threatening not just her life but everyone in the town and it was her job to stop them. That was really all there was to it regardless of how she felt.

The woman twitched, and wiped the forming tears from her eyes, but quickly covered up her mistake. She saw it. For just a brief moment. She saw the emitter. It was a small, round thing. Forge-Tech looked more normal than she would’ve thought.

“I think I see the emitter. What now?”

“Now… well, keep their attention. Kumoko and Claire are getting into position.”

“Getting into position for what?”

“Well, we know the shield doesn’t cover the whole room. So…”

It started to click, and she knew what to do. Right then. She readied herself, as soon as Claire and Kumoko did what they were going to do. She’d probably have maybe a second to disarm them of the detonator.

“Okay get ready girls. On my mark…”

Hanabi noticed the woman stir, she was noticing something off. But it was far too late to stop it.

“3… 2… 1… do it!”