A New Passion

An hour later, Mia pulled their Jeep over on a stretch of road beside a snowy forest, with Bilibino covered in smog beyond it.

"Be careful." muttered Mia. "Don't say anything unnecessary, and be cautious for anything camouflaged."

In the distance, the four saw vines covered through the snow and dashing between the trees towards them. Spores flew out of the smog's top, but fell back in to Bilibino.

Mia felt the snow shift below their Jeep, and in the next instant -

- one explosion launched them fifty feet up, and a hundred vines burst out of the ground below -

- shooting through where they had just been; another hundred vines burst out and grabbed their Jeep tight, starting to tear in mid-air -

- but a sweep of burning purple went through them and cleared the vines at Mia's side; as Serena's Miasma Cloud cleared the others, she noticed mushrooms growing on their tires, and in the next instant -

- the fungi exploded in to a cloud of spores that flew up & past them, their Jeep starting to fall with more vines rushing to meet them below -

" - Medicinal." whispered Yuruko, MGL forming -

- and six Worldwide-shots disintegrated a landing zone without a single ash left, four landing in the midst of a hive of branches swarming around them. More mushrooms formed and shot spores in to their eyes, sealing them shut as they coughed, and as one vine grabbed Yuruko's MGL and split its grip open -

- a cloud of white herbicide burst out of it -

- and the vines shot back like a hand over a hot stove; Serena's fog cleared their eyes and they saw miles of vines retreating back through the forest, snaking through the snow & between the trees. Mia vaulted out of their Jeep & lashed out with a wave of dark-blue flame that disintegrated half the forest & every vine that couldn't make it out in time, stragglers retreating with some damage as they disappeared below the horizon

Her three stepped out and took position, Yuruko ahead of Mia with Samuel & Serena flanking their leader. As they started walking forward, they felt the ground shudder underneath them as the underground dirt decomposed -

- but ghastly hands solidified their path as they walked through what-was-a-forest. As they came to the apex of the hill with smog-covered Bilibino starting 100ft below it, Yuruko handed Mia a set of thermal goggles.

She looked through them and winced as she showed it to Yuruko, who showed Samuel & Serena, snow still standing on the hill's slope. Mia slashed through it once and melted it in to a wave of water that rushed in to the cloud-covered city, and when her electrical swarm dived inside a rain of gore burst up from the streets.

One hundred feet separating them and the start of the cloud below, Mia whispered to Serena, who nodded as she moved down alone. They watched her approach the edge of the smog, and as streams of fog touched it -

- a set of vines burst out from below & yanked her underground; a wind went through the smog, clearing it just enough to see *something* beating on the wall as Yuruko hit it with six MGL shots -

- and as it disintegrated without a single ash left, Serena climbed out of the sudden hole and rushed back up to them, a few drops of acid dripping off of her jacket. She pointed out the pool she'd crawled out of, bits of plant corpses bubbling at the top before corroding away.

Mia nodded and the four stepped forward. Once they reached where Serena had just been, Outcast's ghastly hands peeled the start of the smog aside -

- and revealed another dessicated but still-beating corpse attached to *something* -

- but the smog's curtain closed back before they saw what was behind it, also-beating. Mia tapped Samuel's shoulder, and a pillar of ice formed within the smog; in the next instant, a hundred jets of wind burst out of it -

- and revealed a Soviet-style apartment covered in still-beating vines; hundreds of brambles shot to the frozen pillar to shut it up -

- but an electrical bolt hit them and sprayed bits of plant gore in to every direction, ghastly hands redirecting away their spores, and Mia sighed as she heard the entire city begin to shudder. Ahead, the apartment collapsed and started falling towards them -

- but one explosive shot blasted in to dust, and ghastly hands directed it away -

" - no rubble?" muttered Samuel, and the four frowned.

"Wasn't me." whispered Yuruko.

"Corpse was dry." whispered Serena. "Dries stuff out?"

"Possibly." muttered Mia. "Stay cautious. Find the host."

Another pillar of frozen winds cleared the smog as the four stepped past the lack-of-ruins and in to a street full of dessicated corpses with still-beating tumors. Serena watched left, Samuel right, and Mia behind as they walked up the center, purple flames disintegrating every body they saw. Streams of fog checked cars as they walked between fungi-covered buildings.

No sound after a minute, Mia glanced forward, then heard something tearing up the road behind; with the speed of light she turned -

- and suddenly fell forward, ground & road decomposing hundreds of feet ahead, creating a slope that the four began stumbling down -

- with a maw of brambles & vines & mushrooms at the bottom of it, thorns for teeth growing as it kept chewing towards them -

" - Outcast!" shouted Samuel; ghastly hands grabbed three cars and threw them towards it -

- but more brambles grew and swallowed them un-whole, two hundred feet separating them from death below as they kept running up. Six cars falling by them, ghastly hands threw them towards the maw & six MGL shots crashed through the windshields -

- and the fluroantimonic acid within exploded every vehicle in a flash of gas, corroding away the vines and setting them retreating as the four kept their rush up. Nearer to the apex, Mia was forced to wait, for if Daigo was waiting to ambush her, and as she ran over it past Serena & Samuel -

- she heard Yuruko shouting thirty feet below, and turned to see her tripping with a red vine slashing her right arm; a hundred vines rushed back in to pull her back, grabbing her legs and hanging her upside-down, and as a plant might snap a wishbone -

- the next scene was instant. Her left hand swept up and her boots kicked back; two midair metal poles formed, her elementally-immune body closing the circuit -

- and when a lightning bolt struck the pole the quintillion-volt current blasted every vine off of her & tore them in to gore; as she fell, she swept her legs underneath and a platform formed as she rushed back to others.

Once she caught up, Mia nodded to her, and stairs formed under Yuruko's boots as she led the three over the road & fifty feet mid-air, Medicinal keeping it from falling & no sight of the maw below. More vines were spewing out clouds of spores in the distance. Yuruko squeezed her MGL's trigger at every still-beating building they saw and pillars of purple flame demolished them. Smog rushed in towards the four, but more frozen pillars blasted them away.

"The smog is tracking us." muttered Mia. "Yuruko, ground-level."

Privately, she thought Yuruko's aim was worsening as they rushed down in to another street of still-beating corpses. One was covered in red mushrooms, and as Yuruko dumped an MGL shot in to it -

- it exploded in to a flash of red, and she turned to Mia as a knife formed in her hand, then lunged at her -

- but a spray of purple disintegrated her weapon instantly; electrical sword forming, Worldwide revoked Yuruko's immunity as Mia bashed her -

- but the weak current barely staggered her, her hands reaching for Mia's eyes as her fingers dripped acid -

- but Mia's eyes burned purple and disintegrated the acid; her grip shot to Yuruko's arms, hands still clawing for her eyes as she muttered out an apology -

- and snapped both of her arms backwards so fast Serena heard her scream before she heard the cracks.

"I had to do it. She's mind-controlled." winced Mia, relevantly; Yuruko staggered back, one leg swinging for Mia's stomach -

- but Serena caught Yuruko with a running tackle that sent them both crashing in to the road, and Serena pinned her to the ground, Yuruko's legs thrashing as Mia crouched over her.

"God damn, it's scary how easy you made that look." muttered Samuel and Mia winced.

Acid leaked out of Yuruko's boots, but streams of fog neutralized it as she grunted.

"Vines are showing up." muttered Samuel, glancing up the rest of the street. More brambles were moving in two hundred feet away. "Still more cars."

"Go." said Mia.

"Blackburn." Streams of fog gave him a set of explosives & detonators, and he nodded as he rushed off to plant them.

A scarab crawled on Yuruko's neck.

"Her temperature isn't right." muttered Mia. "Serena, I need a knife."

Streams of fog gave her a knife, and Mia made an incision in to Yuruko's right arm -

- to reveal a set of roots wrapped around her veins, blood flow slowing but not stopping yet. Mia heard an explosion and saw three cars blasting through the wall of vines ahead.

"Can I pull these out?" winced Serena, tentacle forming. She set her suction cups over the roots and started pulling them out -

- but stopped as Yuruko screamed like a woman in agony, kicking Serena's face. "She's -"

" - are they regrowing?" winced Mia and Serena nodded, then winced as she pointed over Mia's shoulder. Mia glanced back and saw another wall of vines growing on the other side, and shouted for Samuel to return before whispering to Serena for the next instant scene.

"Worldwide!" "Blackburn!"

A set of scarabs flew in to Yuruko's wound; streams of fog followed it -

- and Yuruko shrieked as a flash of purple disintegrated all the blood & roots from her limbs -

- but streams of fog filled her back up in the same instant, Serena grabbing her tight as she screamed again, no aggression towards Mia coming.

"O-Okay?" whispered Serena and Yuruko winced.

"O-Okay."

"It's water-based." muttered Mia. "Serena, I need you to make sure we aren't infected."

Serena nodded, streams of fog extending out of her tentacle & keeping permanently dipped in the Four's veins as Samuel came back. Nodding to him, Mia rushed to the sidewalk and up to one still-beating building, and a dark-blue Solar Beam disintegrated it without a single ash left. No time to waste, the four rushed through it and on to another road, and as they turned their eyes right -

- they saw the enormous hall of brambles & vines & fungi 300ft ahead, unfurling like a bowl of snakes to reveal what they contained -

" - Worldwide!" shouted Mia, and an enormous half-dome of ice formed over them -

- just in time to block the flood of spores from above. More scarabs reinforced it to keep it frozen, entire hall of vines still unfurling, and revealing one still-beating building -

- and a still-beating, dessicated & three-headed man, enormous tumor growing over his heart that they knew was their foe.

Yuruko's anti-materiel rifle formed and Mia gave her her frozen shoulder to dampen the recoil; Serena & Samuel rushed ahead as the swarm of vines began closing in. Walls of brambles formed, spores pouring out as it began advancing, but ghastly hands fed the vines their young; more brambles grabbed Serena and tried slashing through her tentacle, but one Outcast-punch ripped a solid hole through them.

Inch by inch, the pressure of the vines' strikes forced them further back. Yuruko squeezed the trigger and the first bullet blasted his head in to red mist that left a still-beating heart on his neck. A wall of fog formed and when it pressed forward in to the vines it dispersed with nothing left. Electrical scarabs flew over Samuel's head and when they popped, an explosion of green lightning tore the brambles apart, more reinforcements rushing in.

One enormous bramble burst up below Samuel and he stomped on its neck, gripping its head as it writhed in Outcast's hands, and as a man might uproot a weed -

- tore it out in a shower of blood & gore, and streams of fog flowed in to its decapitated neck -

-and the two saw the vine it belonged to wither as it drank another gallon of acid, bursting in to green clouds that melted the skin off of the rest as one Xenocyclin shot flew past them -

- and as their host screamed in agony as the vines withered, then disappeared in to dust as the smog & spores cleared, leaving only civilian corpses, they knew that he was dead again, as Mia with some hesitance formed a cross-shaped puddle of water.

++++++

Three hours later, Russia's primary agency sat across from the four at the other end of the table, waiting for their translator. A man, young for hosts by his appearance, stepped inside.

He said a codeword to the nine Russians, then stared at Mia. "My name is Oleksandr Volgin, and I assume you do not wish to shake hands."

Mia shook her head as he sat down.

"What did you find in Bilibino?" he said. (Mia relayed their fight, adding that she thought they had seen a man who looked like Daigo.) "You know Daigo's normal appearance, then?"

"I've read the government's profile on him. I doubt he's changed his face." said Mia, relevantly.

Oleksandr muttered something in Russian to the others, and five men left. "We'll search near it, then. As for your Revenant, you are… Worldwide, the Revenant formerly belonging to…"

"Ryumi Egashira. Queen of Scarabs."

"Queen of Scarabs, yes. And where is the rest of the Eastern League?"

Mia frowned. "They... died nine years ago."

"What?"

"They were killed by a host, and Worldwide was given to me without Xenocyclin." She held her purple hand out. "This is my squadron - Miasma, Boar, and Genesis."

One of the Russians muttered something to Oleksandr, who nodded. "…we will discuss the Eastern League later. As for… Ryumi. If Daigo has reappeared, then she failed to kill him the previous time, yes?"

Mia relayed Ryumi's failure to reach Absolute Hot, answering what questions she could from Oleksandr about it. Judging by the others' expressions when he translated it, she doubted they believed her, but no matter - no one else had any desire to fight Daigo.

"…concerning." muttered Oleksandr. The other Russians began speaking amongst themselves as he stood and waved her to the side. "They'll be discussing our next course of action. I would like to hear more about the Eastern League's… passings."

Mia glanced to her squadron, then nodded as she went off with him. She relayed what Magnus had told her about murdering the Eastern League, leaving out Akira's survival, and he stood silent for a long while. Mia tried to read his expression - if he was pained he did not show it.

"…and Rita?" he said. "Weatherwoman. Meteorologiya. Is she also dead?"

"Yes. There's a Urasaria student hosting Meteorology now."

"Is she a good student?"

"Yes." lied Mia.

"Ah. Not like Rita at all, then." He shrugged. "She spent twenty-five years in America, and the next ten begging to be allowed back in Russia. Fortunately, our agency does not allow such dysfunctional employees. She was unteachable: teach her to kneel to pray and she smashes her head into the concrete."

"Did you ever meet Magnus?"

"No." he said, then followed with nothing.

Mia looked over to the Russians, then back to her squadron staring at her. She nodded to them, then looked at the opposite wall. A few seconds passed, and she glanced back at her squadron, awkwardly smiling to Serena.

"…er." she mumbled. "At least this went better than last meeting."

Oleksandr laughed. "Dmitri told me that your last translator got in to a shouting match."

"And said something under his breath as he left."

"Would you have preferred he call you a bitch in private? He thought the same of Ryumi. Perhaps it's something about Worldwide that causes its host to be so stubborn."

Mia paused. "…er, how was she stubborn?"

"We had been working with her agency on Daigo for a while already. She showed up a week late with a list of demands - accomodations for her, asking us to risk ourselves to keep her safe, things like that. If we had gone through with half of what she requested, then… well. Perhaps Daigo would not be around now, and neither would you."

A sense of unease came over Mia and she did not like it.

He continued. "But, she was very difficult. No one wanted to listen to someone who came here and began making all these demands, these - these accomodations."

"Did she mention Absolute Hot?"

"No, but it would explain why she thought she was the center of the universe."

"I understood that from listening to her. Er, tapes of her."

"If she thought she was the only one who could kill Daigo, then it is justified. I did not say I did not like her - she was very forthcoming. She did not smile nor pretend like you do." He looked at her. "I know it is your culture, but in Russia, there should be a reason for it. There's no reason to smile for now."

Mia thought she heard something in the hallway outside, and in the next instant -

- the door froze solid, then shattered; a man burst inside -

- a cross-shaped puddle of water formed underneath Mia & her three, and the Royal Four were gone in the next, Akira & Mizuchi rising out of the puddle, Russians shouting as soon as he appeared. He recognized most of them from nine years ago, and instinctively he hated them.

Mizuchi hacked a globe of spit in to the Russians, and when it splattered in to mist it left nothing there. Twenty feet separated him from his foe, still looking at where Mia had just been.

The man looked around and started backing away, yelling at him in Russian. His right hand raised and an orange flame covered it, waving it threateningly.

Below, Mizuchi's water melted in to steam, but another coat of slime dripped off of it as it swayed. The pool was starting to expand towards his foe when he turned, then rushed back in to the hall, cloud of steam covering his retreat -

"Oh, what a poor choice." said Akira, and as Mizuchi burst out of the steam, the next scene was instant.

Mizuchi grabbed him and slammed his right arm against the wall so hard his elbow popped out of his skin. Another serpent sank its fangs in his thigh, and when it jerked away it took all of the skin with it, blood & muscles dripping. He screamed in agony as Akira stepped forward.

"I'm reminded of the one universal taboo." said Akira. "It isn't incest, as commonly believed. Several cultures practice incest. Murder was honored in China, rape in New Zealand, and theft in Sparta. The only taboo universal to every society is cowardice."

He felt a sort of passion to having a victim again. That he usually attempted to make his emotion and his work distinct halves of himself did not mean they could not sometimes meld, so long as rationality was kept. He had learned to look with suspicion & hatred on almost all others, and figured that if he was clever enough to impose his will on others, it was deserved. Though he despised Mia, in some ways because of what she represented, he knew he would never harm her, because he was cautious of the human tendency to enjoy hurting yourself & someone you hated more than what benefited you mutually.

++++++

Yuruko's laboratory was a narrow enclosure she had carved out near the back of Timepact with Medicinal, and her room there.

She set the still-beating heart, that Akira had dropped off sans host, on to her table. Mia & Serena & Samuel watched her slice a chunk of it, then sweep a superheated inoculation loop across it, killing any bacteria but Viscera exspiravit. A microscope slide formed in her hand, and she rubbed the loop against it before setting it under her wireless microscope & checking with one eye.

"…uh. Can already tell you it's not normal."

"What's up?" said Serena, ready for another Yuruko ramble.

"It's artificial. Or, uh - mostly artificially enhanced. Most of the bacteria are the exact same age." She turned the lens to 100x. "…ugh. Ability, ability, uh… start with the matrix granule…"

Her free hand scrunched as she remembered something her professor had told her before she left Urasaria. While he had never relented in her workload, he had, while on vacation, heard of her leaving the Royal Four, and called Yuruko's father to ask if she had any personal issues she would feel comfortable talking to him about.

But she never did grow to like the son of a bitch.

"…sorry." said Yuruko, glancing out. "Need an hour to check."

Ten minutes later, she finished, and twenty later she called them back.

"It's temperature-based. Control over temperature, or normalizing temperature. Keeping it from changing."

Mia felt the dread rising in her but did not show it. "To counter Worldwide."

"Yep." winced Yuruko.

"How does he know to counter Worldwide?"

Yuruko frowned. "He doesn't know about Absolute Hot, does he?"

"You said the Chinese host also had a fire Revenant, correct?" said Samuel. "Might have figured out there's a reason fire Revenants keep getting sent to fight him."

Serena nodded. "Um, or he remembers Ry-"

- Mia's head shook - " - you're not understanding what I'm asking right now, it's -" - she stifled her frustration as she sighed. "I'm asking how he knows that we're - that *I'm* investigating."

Yuruko's mouth went grim. "He was watching us."