Chapter 31: Intelligence Officers

Laura followed the Intelligence officers very closely. She had changed her form to the version she used last time she was in the city and made herself an apparition. If she's being honest, war was useful. The amount of negative energy being generated is enough to sustain her every day without the need to drink essence.

Of course, using abilities still drains her connection, but it was slower than before. She's yet to get into a situation that could drain her completely and she wasn't about to risk it with the officers in front of her. They, despite being called intelligence officers, were clearly fully trained in combat and most likely had powers.

The rest of her team was following as well, but unlike her, they had to do it the old fashion way. Since Laura could sense everyone, she could easily spot them by just tracking that feeling. Except for Kathrin. Even when she looked towards the location she sensed the rabbit, they were nowhere to be seen.

Laura was starting to feel weirded out by the Kathrin.

The officers clearly knew they were being followed however and were leading them to somewhere more deserted. Which was perfect for them. They followed them into the warehouse district, and watched as the officers entered one of the abandoned buildings.

Laura pulled back, and signaled for the rest of her team to group together. They ended up in an alley between the warehouse their targets had entered and another abandoned building. Kathrin had appeared with them suddenly, slightly straddling the Elites. Since Laura could sense her, she wasn't surprised.

"They're inside. You two will enter from the left and right of the building to flank them." Laura said, pointing to two of the Elites. "You will circle around to the back, while Kathrin will walk up to them from the front."

"What about you Ma'am?" Kathrin asked.

"I'll descend from the rafters, we'll only attack on my signal while Kathrin draws their attention."

Once she got the others confirmation that they understood, she teleported to the roof of the building. She quickly located the stairwell door that led back into the building and approached it. It was locked, but that wasn't a problem for her. Channeling some energy into her arms she forced the door open, muting the sound around herself first just in case.

She descended down the stairs, and found access to the rafters over the main area. She quietly crossed them and waited for everyone else to get into place. Looking directly below her she saw the five officers standing in the middle of the floor, but with enough stuff around to take cover if needed.

Looking away from them, and towards the giant shutter door, she saw Kathrin stroll into the open space without a care in the world. Like Laura she had changed her appearance slightly and her normally white fur was now dyed black, with green contacts placed over her eyes. She refused to get rid of her sword and the unsheathed blade had a dim silvery glow unique to mithril coming from it.

"Who are you?" One of the Intelligence officers asked, pointing their gun at Kathrin.

Laura almost laughed since she was almost certain that woman could knock a speeding bullet out of the air. Like she thought Kathrin just continued to walk forward as if she wasn't being threatened by a gun. The five targets bristled at this blatant display of disrespect.

"One step closer and we'll shoot." The same victim yelled.

When Kathrin didn't stop he pulled the trigger. A burst fire of three bullets shot out all at once, heading straight for the rabbit. The clangs of metal hitting metal resounded through the abandoned warehouse as Kathrin stopped moving. She stood there, with her sword still lowered looking completely unfazed.

She didn't think anyone else saw it, but Laura was able to clearly see the rabbit moving her sword to swat away the projectiles. Laura needed to have a long conversation with that woman once they finished everything. For now she continued to observe as the other three men got into position.

"... Where are the others?" The officer that shot asked. He clearly didn't see what she did, but he seemed to realize she did something and was now even more wary of her.

"What others?" She asked with an innocent voice and a tilt of her head.

Laura almost did laugh this time. She didn't realize Kathrin had such a side to her.

"Don't play games with us." Another one of the victims seethed, but kept their voice leveled and raised their own gun. They clearly thought the other had just missed. The fool. "We know about three of you were following us."

"About?" Kathrin repeated. "So you aren't sure. Then how can you claim that I wasn't the only one following you?"

As much as Laura found this amusing, especially with the new speaker growing more frustrated as his eyes narrowed. But the others had gotten into position and it was time to start the attack. They needed to do this swiftly and move on.

She silently dropped from the ceiling, and crushed the one standing behind them underneath her heel. Her black boots keeped her feet safe from the blood and gray matter from the crushed head. She swiftly grappled onto the closest person to her and put them in a choke hold.

At the same time, when she began to fall from the ceiling, Kathrin charged forward. The agitated officer fired, but instead of hitting the black rabbit, he witnessed as her arm seemingly became invisible, and every bullet bounced off of something. She was deflecting every single round.

Seeing this, he set his weapon aside and raised his arms. Kathrins was stopped in her tracks.

=-=-=-=

The three Elites lived up to their namesake. Instead of being surprised their boss jumped from roughly three or four stories up and freezing, they took that as the signal and engaged the enemy. The ones on the left and right flank had already been aiming and fired their weapons the moment they saw Laura jumped.

Both Aims were true and two officers fell, their heads pierced by several bullets. The third one had fired at the one standing at the back of everything as well. Unfortunately They had hit them at the same time Laura had crushed them. He couldn't help but feel incredibly useless.

He then noticed that the one Laura didn't grab was using telekinesis to hold Katrin still and aimed at them. Pulling the trigger several rounds pierced through the agitated officers back, causing them to fall to the floor. The third Elite smiled.

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Laura had retrieved the last person and dragged them into a separate room to consume their soul for information. She had ordered the others to search the bodies, and take anything that seemed useful or important. By time she had emerged everything was in a pile and she knew what she was looking for.

The Elites stepped aside and saluted her when she approached, but she scowled at this.

"Don't do that while we're out here, understand." She demanded. "Do it again and I'll have to reprimand you until you understand."

"Yes, Ma'am."

"Good." She nodded approvingly. "Now practice the White Ash version of a salut until it's second nature, okay?"

They nodded to indicate they understood. Happy Laura looked through the pile of stuff left for her. She quickly located what she was searching for. Five black metal coins with distinct glowing orange veins. Pressed into the metal was the symbol for the Intelligence Bureau. An owl on one side and a spear on the other.

"Infernal Platinum." Kathrin muttered surprised.

Laura raised an eyebrow at the woman. She herself felt surprised that the rabbit knew what it was.

"Correct. You know about it?"

"I've faced those with Infernal weapons before." Kathrin admitted.

"... Weird." Was all Laura could say. She didn't know what to make of that information and decided to file it away for later.

"Anyway, these will be the key to mark us as them." Laura said. "First I need to erase whatever mark is connecting them to these."

She looked up at the other four people in the room and realized she needed space. "I'll be back. I'll call you all one by one into that room when I'm ready."

She stood up from her crouching position and walked and shut herself back into the room with the empty husk of a body once more.