Chapter 3

I chewed on my nail, watching the torn remains of Jouster's signed cards go down the drain.

The worst thing is I wasn't sure if that was enough. It could be the simple act of touching them put trackers on us, if not a whole slew of sensors sending readings directly to Protectorate.

Perhaps I gave myself away by immediately getting rid of them. Perhaps it was wiser to pretend like nothing was amiss.

Perhaps.

Remote tracking, remote viewing, remote listening, psychometry, empathic abilities, telepathy, body jacking, mind control. According to my research, all those things were possible.

I did not want to take any risks. I did not know what parahumans were capable of.

Logically, the Wards had no reason to suspect I was anything other than an ordinary civilian. I never used my magic near them or indeed never used it outside my bedroom.

There were no mandatory checks in school to find new parahuman recruits. I did not find anything about conscriptions within US legal framework.

That did not mean I wouldn't be drafted if identified as more than an ordinary citizen. That is, if I didn't find myself on a dissection table in some black ops facility, since by now I was reasonably sure that parahumans didn't use magic. Or at the very least, they did not use the same magic as I did.

I couldn't sense their magic signature. Back in the Empire, my range was measured in miles, but here a parahuman could literally be holding my hand and wouldn't be able to tell the difference. 

And the opposite was not a guarantee.

I leaned back against a bathroom stall's door and took a deep sigh.

If only Protectorate handsign codes were available online. Then I could tell what Jouster signaled his colleague.

Yeah, right. But now I will have to be extra vigilant and monitor the outside of our apartment complex. Will have to sweep it for bugs too. How viable would it be to convince Shirou to keep watch if strange people and conspicuous cars are following him around?

I will look paranoid unless I explained my reasons, and I had long since decided it was better for him not to know I was a "parahuman". Can't give away what you don't know. He's far too easy to read anyway.

Leaving the stall to wash my hands, I kept repeating that whole encounter in my head.

I wanted to say this whole outing was a mistake but at least Shirou was having a blast. Meeting heroes had genuinely lifted his mood. When was the last time I had seen him smile so much? Not counting his usual smirks that predated some inane comment or an attempt to baby me of course.

Washing my face, I tried to assure myself that there was no reason to panic about proverbial blood in the water. Which in turn immediately alerted me to the smell of blood in the air.

…

Now, spending many years in the body of a female taught me that the smell of blood in women's bathroom was not an immediate reason for panic. Even if I myself had never reached the point where that particular problem would be a concern for me personally. Though I did often shared quarters with…

A girl's head explodes by a spell. Everything turns gold.

Of course, there is no harm to check if anyone needs help. Female bathroom etiquette, and all that.

I moved to the only other occupied stall.

"Miss, are you all right in there?"

"Fuck off!" was immediate and quite rude response. My frown deepened.

"Miss, if you need help…"

"I said, FUCK OFF!"

By now, I was close enough to recognize the smell of arterial bleeding. But before I could force myself into the cabin, I heard the commotion outside the bathroom. Shooting.

Assault rifles.

Suddenly the door in front of me flew of the hinges and send me into the sinks.

A sharp pain exploded in the back of my head.

"Now we ballin'!"

Through my blurry vision, a woman jumped out of the cabin. She wore red and sculls and spikes. Her limbs were covered in blades. She reeked of blood and violent intent.

"Shoulda stayed home, girlie!" she jumped at me wielding her limbs as if she wanted to skewer me.

Home.

Shirou. 

Everything came into focus as reflex enhancements spun into place. I threw myself to the side.

Red blade sunk into the wall and turned liquid. The ghoulish woman turned, raising another hand but I was already in position.

Reflex enhancements dropped as another spell took its place.

The woman was cleaved cleanly in half at the waist.

I dropped mage blade and took out my pocket calculator. It was still workings.

These things were delicate. Not only because I did not have combat proof protective casing but the very act of channeling mana through them fried their circuitry fast. I will have to carefully ration my spells if I wanted for it to last throughout this fight.

I ran out of the bathroom and into the mall.

It was pandemonium.

To my left, I saw Wards huddled behind some kind of forcefield, shielding them and the civilians running away from the hail bullets.

I saw the back of a girl with a crossbow as she took potshots from behind the cover of the forcefield.

To my right…

Shirou was weaving in between an endless stream of screaming people wielding pipes. He was cutting them down with… falchions?

Why wasn't he running?

Why was he fighting?

I run to him and almost fell over, stumbling over bleeding Jouster lying on the floor behind my brother.

I saw red.

"YOU IDIOT!"

He turned at the sound of my voice and got immediately punished with a hit to the head.

But I was already on them.

I spun as the mage blade cut and cut and cut everything around me in a whirlwind of gore. Reflex enhancement carried me through the hits, morphine formula took away the pain. At some point Shirou got up and joined me, expertly joining in between my strikes as we danced in the red mist!

"Fuck it! No more kiddie gloves!" someone shouted.

The wave of enemy soldiers has finally expired.

The next one came at us with guns.

My eyes widened as I hastily run calculations for shield spell. Only to for it to fail with an acrid smell of burnt plastic.

"RHO AIAS!"

Seven petaled flower bloomed in front of me, shielding us from mad screams and vicious lead.

I turned to my brother and saw him glowing with green lines, as his outstretched hand held the purple shield.

"You… are… parahuman?" I was out of breath. My body hurt.

"… You are smiling."

I was! We are alive! I was falling!

Ah. Too much morphine too fast. This body isn't used to it. Adrenaline too…

Brother caught me before I hit the floor. He held me as I drifted into oblivion.

"…don't… Visha."

The last thing I saw was him being sprayed with yellow foam. 

A/N

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