"U-Um..." I stammered, the gun pressing harder against the back of my head.

"What have we here? Someone that doesn't conform to the dress code, for certain. You're one of those wannabe rent-a-cop types, aren't you? Or are you part of the little Magical Girl Squad causing a ruckus downstairs, hm?" the woman growled, her distorted voice carrying an undertone of menace.

I gulped, doing my best to stay calm as I decided what to do.

"Rai-chan?" I reached out in my mind. "You said back then I needed to be in contact range to Hijack her drone, right? I'm guessing we're in contact range right now?"

She gave me an electronic hum, as though in thought. Then, I I felt the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end once more as a torrent of |00⟩, |01⟩, |10⟩, |11⟩s rapidly streamed across the bottom of my visual field.

I gulped as the woman pressed her foot into my back harder. I needed to give Rai-chan a few seconds to work. "Haha... yep. You've caught me, Miss," I laughed, playing along. "What gave it away? My dashing good looks?"

My voice was muffled by my face mask, but she seemed to understand what I'd said well enough.

She gave me an indignant huff and pulled me up to a kneel.

"Cute. Now tell me, who are you working for?" she said, and the sound of her gun clicking filled the hallway.

"Ikki!" Rai-chan suddenly spoke in my mind. "I have root privilege access now and her drone is completely compromised. She doesn't even know it yet." she said in my head, the slightest hint of smugness seeping into her voice. "What should we do? Want me to just shut her down?"

My heart raced, my breath quickened. My hands were shaking. But, no. This was an opportunity. A chance to figure out what was going on here.

"Wait, wait. Let's keep her talking. Maybe she'll let something slip," I said. "Figure out what you can about her drone too with Analysis."

"Okay," she said. "I just wanted to let you know you're safe now. She won't even be able to fire her gun if I don't let her, and the only reason she's holding you right now is because you let her grab you. So don't let her scare you."

I gave an imperceptible nod, and gulped.

"Look," I said, raising my hands up and trying to act as casual as I could with a gun to the back of my head. "I'm pretty broke so, uh, I'm not working for anyone. I just came to check this place out. Figured I could score some free loot in the chaos. If you could, uh, put that gun down. It's not really helping with the whole conversation thing," I laughed nervously, trying my best not to let my voice shake too much.

I had an out, sure, but that did nothing for my nerves. She pressed the barrel of her gun into my head.

"Oh? That's cute," the woman said in that contralto voice. "So, you mean to tell me you're just a petty thief, eh?"

She grabbed a fist full of my hair and yanked me back, pressing her boot into my chest and pushing me back down into the ground.

"Well then, that changes things," the woman growled, pressing her boot down on my neck, her distorted, metallic voice dripping with menace. "If you don't have anyone to protect your worthless little neck, that makes this a whole lot easier for me, doesn't it?"

Before I could even get my bearings, I felt her lean down and yank the mask from my head. She grabbed my face roughly and turned me toward the cameras that serve for eyes. I could hear the lenses whirr, focusing on me.

The grip of her metallic fingers tightened on my cheeks.

"Oh? Oh ho ho! It's you!" the woman said. Her laughter echoed in the corridor, the harsh sound of it grating against my ears. "Seems like it's my lucky day."

"Uh, hey. Nice to meet you again?" I said, trying to force a smile despite the circumstances. "Small world, huh? I promise, I don't know anything and just want to get the hell out of here!"

"You expect me to believe that? That's rich. It's not every day I get to see a face again," she mused, releasing me and pacing back and forth in front of me.

"What can I say? I have one of those faces. The kind people love to remember."

"Just some punk kid in the wrong place at the wrong time, huh? And you've got the nerve. You're telling me you broke in here, dressed in a hoodie to try and rob the place?!" she laughed, the metallic timbre of her voice sending a shiver up my spine. "Say I buy that story. Are you really so desperate that you think you could steal from these people and get away with it?"

These people? What?

"I mean. I'm just trying to do my best in this economy, you know? I thought if I got lucky I could pawn some expensive equipment for a bit of money. Honest. I didn't mean any trouble."

"Oh, you didn't? That's so cute!" she mocked, laughing. "And what? You think I'd believe a load of crap like that? Why don't I just shoot you in the head and get rid of the problem?"

Rai-chan practically growled in my mind.

"Hey, I mean, you're a criminal yourself, aren't you? It'd be one thing if you were an upstanding citizen or something, but we both know that's not the case, isn't it?" I retorted, staring the woman in the 'eyes' as she glared down at me.

She scoffed, and I could hear her snarl behind her mask.

"Who says I'm a criminal? You have no idea who I am. Or what I do. Or what this is all about," she growled. "This is your last chance, kid. You either start telling me what I want to hear, or I'll blow your fucking brains out"

"Oh yeah? Is that a threat, Miss?"

"More like a promise, kid," she snarled, the metal hand gripping her pistol twitching.

I could feel my heart pounding against my rib cage. She was intimidating as hell.

My throat was dry. My hands were trembling, but I tried to keep my composure. I couldn't show weakness. Couldn't afford to give in. Not now.

I looked her dead in the eyes. Despite the mask, I could practically see her glaring at me.

I glared right back.

"I'm just a student," I said, trying to sound confident. "I'm not working for anyone."

Her laughter echoed through the hallways. "Just a student?! Don't give me that shit!"

"Are you with the people who own this building?" I asked. "What do you mean, these people? Who's in charge of this place?"

Her eyes narrowed behind the lenses, and she cocked the hammer of her pistol. She didn't answer, and the silence dragged on for several seconds.

"Rai-chan, any chance of getting anything more out of her?" I asked. "Analysis, maybe?"

"Hm. I've got a lot of stuff to parse through later. But... Well, she has a bomb inside her chest. A pretty big one. Powered by a mana crystal. Big enough to blow the top off this building if she just goes up two or three more floors," Rai-chan said in my head.

That made my eyes go wide.

A bomb? What the fuck?!

I looked her in the eye. "My wallet is in my right pocket. I have a student ID. St. Antonia's High. Go ahead and look."

She didn't respond, and I could feel the pressure of her grip on my face increase.

"Look. I don't know anything! Please! I'm just a highschooler! I'm not here to cause trouble! I just wanted to see if there was any loot worth pawning!"

I was starting to sweat bullets.

"Fine," she growled, roughly shoving a hand into my hoodie while keeping her pistol leveled at my head.

I could feel her fingers rifling around inside my pocket.

"You don't work for the people who own this building, do you?" I asked.

She didn't respond, her metallic hand pulling my wallet out. She popped the clasp and pulled my ID out, turning it over in her hand. She held my license up to the lens, inspecting it carefully.

"Fifteen years old and already a criminal," she said with a scoff, shaking her head. "I'm almost impressed. A little."

She shoved my wallet back in my pocket.

"So?" I asked.

"So what?" she retorted.

"Can I go now?"

"Hah. No," she laughed. "You're a witness."

I frowned. "Be careful here."

"Oh?"

I sighed, stepping back with my arms raised.

"Look. If we part ways here, I'll let you continue with your mission. Bygones be bygones, but I threw a wrench in your plans back at the Mana Exchange, and I definitely didn't intend to get on your shit list," I explained.

She raised her gun and pointed it right between my eyes, and I flinched.

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"Sorry, kid. It's not personal, but I've got a job to do," she said coldly.

"I mean it. Choose carefully here. I say one word, and your drone will go boom. You'll fail whatever your mission is. And... then you'll be out another drone. And I've fiddled around enough with the first one to know it cost a pretty penny. We're on the same side here. We're just trying to figure out what's happening with the mana in this district, and stop whoever is responsible. Just put the damned gun down and let's talk. Please."

She paused. The pistol lowered by just an inch, but it was still aimed at me. I could hear the cogs turning inside of her head. I could almost hear the gears whirring as she won

"Rai-chan?" I whispered. "Are we really in complete control of the drone?"

"Yup!" she chirped, giving me a thumbs up in the periphery of my visual field. "Watch this."

She froze. The drone stood stock-still for a moment. And then she suddenly snapped the pistol back and jerked it up to her drone's temple.

"What the fuck?!"

"Your unit's already been compromised. We have full access to your drone's system, and if we wanted to take control, we would have done so already. But while you were trying to get information out of me, we were busy figuring out exactly what the hell you're here for."

She struggled, trying to pull her gun hand down, but to no avail.

"The hell are you doing? Stop that!" the voice shouted from the speaker grill. "How are you even doing that? This isn't some cheap off-the-shelf model, kid!"

"You have a big-ass bomb inside you," I said, pointing to the chest. "If I had to guess, that's not there for your safety."

I stared at the woman, my expression grim, my hands trembling as I held them behind my back and puffed up my chest.

"I'm just a student. At St. Antonia's. I'm from Earth on a scholarship. But I also started working with some Magical Girls. And I'm in here investigating the same shit that you presumably are." I explained, hoping she would listen. "I'm here to figure out what the hell is going on at this building. That is the simple and honest truth."

I sighed and rubbed the bridge of my nose. I really didn't have time for this.

The sounds of combat were still raging outside. I didn't have much time to get the hell out of here before things went from bad to worse.

"Rai-chan, make her holster her weapon."

"Roger! Just to let you know, I've also blocked her from ejecting."

The woman grunted as she was forced holster her gun, her arm shaking with exertion as the machine moved on its own. The pistol snapped into place in her thigh holster with an audible click, and I relaxed, taking a deep breath. The woman was still staring daggers at me, her hands clenched into fists and trembling with rage.

"There. No harm no foul," I said, looking at her sternly. "We're going to make a deal. I'll help you, but in exchange you'll help us. Deal?"

She didn't reply.

I sighed and stepped towards her. This was going nowhere. I needed to wrap this up.

"Okay, then," I said. "I'll just shut you down then. Including that thing in your chest."

"Wait, wait, wait!" she suddenly shouted, panic suddenly creeping into the metallic timbre. "We have to destroy this facility! We only have one shot at this. They're scheduled to make a move."

I frowned.

Okay, that was unexpected, but now we're getting somewhere.

"Look," I said, my hands raised, palms up. "I get it. You're here for your reasons. You have your orders, and you don't have the luxury of worrying about any witnesses you find. I don't even want to know why you and your fellow goons needed so many mana crystals. I don't need to know. All I want to know is what the fuck is happening at this place, and whether the residents are in danger. What is Project Eridu, and why does Zamir & Petrov need a mana siphon that covers a such a wide radius? Why target Greenhaven?"

She stared at me, her expression unreadable behind the hound's mask. She didn't speak for a few seconds, her fists clenching and unclenching.

I decided to bluff. "It's just one Support Op on the line with me right now. They're the one that has you locked down. We're both residents of Greenhaven ourselves, and I'm damned curious about why the people from Earth are being targeted. So please, just talk to me. Talk to us. The cat's out the bag. Even if you kill me here, there will be at least one cell of Magical Girls will hear everything we're talking about here."

I took another step towards her. I looked her in the eyes.

"So please," I pleaded. "What are they after here? What are you after? Is there something in this building you absolutely need to blow up?"

She let out a long audible sigh, her head hanging limply.

"Heh. So, you've discovered Project Eridu. Well, you and your little prancing friends are on the right track," she said after a moment.

I blinked, my brows furrowing in confusion.

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

She didn't reply, her head still hung in defeat.

"These Terran bastards... They've been leeching the mana out of the residents. It's not enough to kill anyone but... they've been sucking the life right out of the people here," she hissed. "And that's the key, isn't it?"

She shook her head. "But that's just half the equation."

"The residents of Greenhaven," she explained, gesturing to her chest with her metal fingers, "have less mana than the average human from Terra. Not that it's a bad thing, but that makes them the ideal targets for what these bastards are trying to pull off. The perfect power source for whatever it is that they've built."

"Power source?" I muttered.

"Emotional energy. A component of what is special about human 'mana' - life force nevertheless. A big component," she said, her voice dropping to a low whisper, almost inaudible beneath her distorted, mechanical voice.

"Emotional energy?" I repeated too, feeling out of my depth.

"The people who own this place, they're draining the life energy from the residents. They're siphoning off the very will of the people to live and dream. They're stealing the people's dreams, kid. Stealing away everything that makes us human."

"Wha...?" I stammered, trying to wrap my head around it.

"Kid, you don't have to be so naive about it," she snapped, shaking her head. "Look, this isn't just a fancy apartment complex or something. This place has to go."

"And you're going to suicide bomb it with a drone just to take down a mana siphon?" I asked skeptically. "And... and why?! If you blow the roof off of this place, won't that just take the evidence and make things worse?"

"Those are my mission parameters. I follow orders. I've been told this is what needs to be done," she explained simply.

"You don't even know why, do you?" I said, frowning. "Or maybe you just can't tell me."

"We do believe that this shell company... the Evergreen Research Foundation... is just a front for something bigger. They'll just take the fall and become a scapegoat for someone else. We have reason to believe that the real masterminds will be able to evade capture. That they have enough connections to escape punishment," the voice from the speaker explained, sounding almost robotic.

"So why the bomb?" I asked, frowning. "If this is just some minor player in a bigger scheme, what the fuck does blowing up a building accomplish?"

"They are storing emotional energy on-site in... oversized batteries, so to speak," she said after a moment. "If I'm able to detonate, the stored energy will disperse, and it will become useless. And then the project is dead. We don't want this project going anywhere. We don't want them getting their hands on the data they've already accumulated and stored on-site."

She paused, and then continued.

"They've been targeting the Earthborn. People like you are the easiest targets, you see," she said with a slight edge in her voice. "We don't have a magical tradition on Earth. Our natural mana levels are lower, and nobody would even know what's happening. The Terrans are sucking us dry like vampires."

She chuckled, a harsh, grating noise that echoed in the empty halls of the office building.

"And that's why I'm here," she growled. "They won't stop with just us. I don't want to kill you, but I have a job to do. This building needs to burn. This project needs to disappear."

"Celestial Sonata is here to shut this place down too," I pointed out. "She's not the type to let a place like this stand."

"Of course," she replied smoothly. "But we've got different ways of operating, kid. Your friends, they would never be able to do what's necessary. They'd try to save everyone, but that's a losing strategy for dealing with the truly ugly side of the world."

I frowned, and she laughed at the expression on my face.

"Don't take this personally," she said. "We have our ways, and they have theirs. You can help them with theirs all you'd like. We're at an impasse here, and I see no reason to kill you given our goals seem to be aligned. Assuming you are telling the truth about all that."

She shook her head. "The world needs idealists like your friend. It needs those who believe in the goodness of people, that there is a happy, fluffy solution to every problem. People like me? We just get our hands dirty so that you don't have to. That's our role in all this. It's the same now as back then."

I took a step back and sighed, pinching the bridge of my nose.

"Rai-chan. Let her go. We've heard enough, and... frankly, I can't disagree."

"What?!"

"We've looked into Celestial Sonata's track record. She does things mostly above-board and would just put this place on ice for a while, at most," I explained. "This is a Zamir & Petrov building, and a lot more people would be implicated if this thing got out in the open. They'd never face punishment. But if the project's assets were gone entirely? They'll have nothing to fall back on. It'll just be another project they failed."

I stepped away from the woman and gave her some space. She was still standing there, looking at me. Her expression unreadable behind her mask, her arms hanging limp at her sides.

"I'll let you go after two minutes. I'm going to make a run for it and find my way out," I explained, looking her in the 'eyes'. "But before that, I want to know. Why did you even need all of those mana crystals?"

She shrugged her shoulders.

"We were hired by an outside group," she explained. "Our employers wanted crystals, we didn't care for what. They didn't want them for themselves. I didn't ask for specifics. You're really pushing your luck with this one, though. Just leave it or that or you'll give me a reason to hunt you down after I'm done here."

I nodded. Fair enough.

I didn't buy her explanation for a second, but it was good enough for now.

I needed to leave, anyway.

The longer I stood here, the greater the chance that someone else would come looking for me. The clock was ticking.

"Rai-chan. Let her go two minutes after we head out. Give Celestial Sonata a warning that the building is set to blow and to get the hell out. Then... just let go. We need to make our exit," I said, already running away.

I didn't bother looking back.

"Ikki..." Rai-chan muttered, sounding a little worried.

I was panting as I made my way down the stairs, the sound of fighting echoing from somewhere above. The sounds of gunfire and shouting had gotten more distant, thankfully, but I knew that wouldn't last long.

I'd been sprinting down the stairwell for a minute, trying to put some distance between me and the top floor, but my lungs burned with exhaustion. The adrenaline that had kept me going so far was beginning to wear off, leaving me exhausted and panting. Every step was a chore, and my legs were beginning to feel leaden and heavy.

"I know," I wheezed, gasping for breath. "But what else can I do?"

"She has a bomb in her chest. That's a fact. And I don't think it's just for show," Rai-chan said in my mind.

"Yeah. I noticed that."

"A lot of people are going to die."

I froze, stopping at a landing in the stairwell. My heart was pounding in my ears, and my hands were trembling.

"What are you trying to say, Rai-chan? What the fuck can we even do?!"

She sighed, the sound echoing inside my mind. She was silent for a few seconds, and then spoke up again.

"You could stop her. If you wanted to."

I frowned, panting. "Stop her? How? I can't just—"

"It's your choice at the end of the day. I can still shut her down now - she's on the move but I still have access. But if she sets that off... this place has dormitories, Ikki. The researchers live on-site. I'd estimate forty to eighty, and that's not counting the security forces."

My stomach churned. This was all so much. Too much. My mind raced, trying to figure out what to do.

"I... I..."

I couldn't think of a response. There was nothing I could say or do. If I stopped the bomb, that meant the data would be intact. The company could just restart it somewhere else. Maybe someone would be brought to justice, but they'd just be a scapegoat.

"Fuck. What the fuck is even happening anymore? Rai-Chan. Tweak my perception for me. I need to think!"

The world around me became almost frozen in time. My heart rate slowed, the blood pumping through my veins. The sound of gunfire was just a distant echo now.

If I let the bomb go off, then hundreds would die. But whatever they were doing to the people here would continue.

I didn't have time to really think things through, even with the minute or two Rai-chan bought me. Hell, I barely even knew what I was getting myself into in the first place. This was all way above my pay-grade, and I couldn't believe that I'd somehow managed to stumble into something so much bigger than me.

"I can't make this choice, Rai-chan," I whispered. "What would you even do? What's the right thing to do? What's the just thing to do?!"

There was no answer, and the sound of the fighting was coming closer now, echoing off the walls and bouncing around me in the darkness.

This wasn't a game where I could make any choices that I wanted, and I was starting to feel like a piece being moved on someone else's game board.

"Ikki, you have to make a choice. She's still waiting. She can't do anything without me unlocking her controls. You can either let her do her job, or you can stop her here and now, but I can't make this choice for you. I don't know what's right. I can't even imagine what either choice would lead to."

Either choice felt wrong, and either choice was right. I could stop her and let the data fall into the hands of people who would use it to do even worse things, or I could let them blow it all up and kill hundreds in the process.

Neither of those sounded good to me. But... this wasn't about what I wanted.

This was about the people who lived in this district, and whether or not they would be safe after all of this was said and done. I didn't want anyone to die here tonight. No one. But...

I made my decision. I knew what I needed to do.

"Rai-chan. I..."

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