Chapter 10

The elevator pinged and the doors slid open, letting in a rush of cool air scented with the sharp tang of cleaners. Kagura led the way. My skin prickled at the cool temperature in the massive concrete chamber we entered. The drab gray walls matched a concrete floor splashed with dark stains.

“This is about as creepy as you can get.”

Kagura ignored my quip. She tromped into the center of the room with her heavy tactical boots sending echoes through the cavern. I followed. When we reached the halfway point about fifty yards from the door, she held up her hand to stop me. We stood ten feet apart.

Her neat brows arched expectantly. “Transform.”

“Here? Just, like, do it?”

She just stared at me with those unrelenting eyes.

“Well, here goes nothing.” I closed my eyes and pictured the armor covering my body. Nothing happened. I flexed my right hand dramatically, then wiggled it around, but nothing changed.

“Do you not know how to transform?” Kagura’s voice was dry as a desert.

“Hey, I did it before.” I wiggled my hand a few more times, then thought at Blossom.

Feminine giggling filled my head. I knew the smug mirth was entirely at my expense.

The scale in my right hand vibrated with life. The gleaming silver plates unfolded in a cascade of blurry movement that kissed my skin as it enfolded me. The first transformation had been agony, but this felt like sliding into my favorite laundered shirt the few times that notorious miser Evie accidentally spilled extra fabric softener into the wash. As the armor flowed down my arms and legs to completely encase me in protection, the voluminous scarlet cape unfurled over my shoulders with a rustle of cloth. The red headbrush popped up last with a boing.

Overwhelming energy filled my muscles. I hadn’t noticed the first time when I was so focused on sheer terror, but wrapped inside the armor, I felt powerful. Invincible. I felt like I could tear the ears off a kaiju and eat its face for breakfast. I raised my gauntlets and crushed my hands into fists, feeling them shake with raw power.

I crowed at Blossom. She laughed aloud, her joy echoing inside my mind.

Kagura stood impassively until I dropped my fists to my sides. “Now, punch me.”

“Come again?”

She must have been able to hear me through my helmet, because she nodded. “Punch me in the face as hard as you can.”

“Uh.” I raised my right gauntlet and curled the fingers a couple times. “Just… hit you?”

“Yes.” Kagura stared me down with those intense black eyes.

I flexed my fingers a couple more times as I stared at her through my visor. My helmet’s inside was perfectly clear, so I could see unobstructed as her eyes bored into mine. She shouldn’t be able to see my eyes at all, but she was dead on target.

“Right in the face?”

“Yes.”

“Are you ready?”

“Yes.”

I flexed my hand a couple more times. “You’re sure?”

“What is the problem?” Her voice was sharp as steel. “I told you to hit me.”

“Yeah.” I clenched my fist tight and drew it back, then paused. “You’re really sure?”

“Are you unable to hit me because I am a woman?”

I hesitated, then let my arm down slowly. “Yeah, I guess so.”

“Then allow me to make the first move.” Kagura moved faster than my eyes could track, her body becoming a blur as she rocketed forward. Her leg snapped around in a roundhouse from hell that caught me in the side of the head and hurled me ten feet. I pounded into the cement and slid to a halt with a harsh scraping sound.

I tried to get up but she ran over and kicked me in the stomach, throwing me for another short flight with a painful and abrupt end, this time landing on my face so my helmet clanged in my ears.

I got up faster this time, just fast enough to meet her fist to my visor. The blow snapped me backward off my feet. She planted her foot on my breastplate and stomped down, not hard enough to dent the armor but enough to rattle me and cement my humiliation.

She glared down at me, then lifted her foot and stepped back. “Again.”

I leaped to my feet and raised my arms to defend just as she snapped off another kick. She was fast, but my massive bulk made it easier to block her attacks, even if my movements were clumsy and slow. Or so I thought, until she slipped inside my guard and pummeled my torso in a rising flurry of punches that ended at my Adam’s apple. Her knuckles slid between the plates and I gagged as she dug into my throat. I staggered back and she pursued me, slapping aside my feeble defenses with lightning speed to deliver more humiliating punches.

Anger boiled up inside me. “You want to play rough? Fine.” I blocked one of her attacks, missed the next one, and took an elbow to the face. She retreated, bouncing lightly on the balls of her feet. I pursued like an angry bear trying to grapple her.

When I made a swipe with both arms, she slipped under my arms, dodged behind me, spun, and delivered an axe-kick to the back of my head that knocked me forward. She swept my feet from beneath me, spilling me forward onto my face again.

I lay there gasping for breath as my forward visor just showed dark concrete.

“You fight like a moron.” The ice queen’s tone could have froze lava. She wasn’t even out of breath.

I pounded the concrete with my gauntleted fist, leaving a shallow crater, and hauled myself to my feet. “You’re too fast.”

“Is that really what happened? I asked you to punch me. I invited it. You refused, so I hit you. I knocked you down. I humiliated you. I continued to beat you. Not once did you throw a punch or a kick. The worst you tried to do was embrace me to halt my attacks, not attack me yourself.”

I replayed the fight and realized it was true. “So what am I supposed to do?”

“You are supposed to hit me. Can you?”

“I could if you weren’t so fast.”

“You could not do it even when I was standing completely still and inviting you.”

I growled in frustration. I knew she was right.

“Not every opponent you face will be male.” She swept her hand down over her body, though her athletic figure was hidden by her trench coat. “If you and I are out on a mission together and a female opponent appears, I cannot halt my objectives to come handle her for you. You began this fight grappling against both your biological imperative not to harm a female and your social conditioning toward chivalry. Those may be admirable qualities in a romantic relationship, but they will get you and your team killed on a mission.”

“So what do you suggest? That I just get comfortable punching women in the face?”

“Fortunately we do not have to rely solely on your conditioned mind.” Kagura tapped her head, then pointed at mine. “Ask your guardian what advice she has to offer.”

I crossed my massive arms over my armored chest.

An image of Hilde’s face popped into my mind, a jarring experience because it wasn’t a natural thought at all. It was like someone waving a photograph in front of my face.

I mulled that over.

I raised my fists and stared at Kagura, picturing a scenario in my head of her turning on us and threatening Hilde. I have to fight our way out of the castle or Kagura is going to kill her. I pictured Hilde with a few bruises on her face and suddenly discovered I was ready to tear Kagura apart. I didn’t even hesitate or give warning, I just lunged forward in a vicious punch.

The huntress dodged the jab, then spun into a kick. It was fast and vicious, but I got my arm up in time to block it. She ducked and lunged in close. I threw a punch with my other arm, forcing Kagura back. She darted forward again, and I launched a flurry of jabs and punches, missing her with all of them but creating enough of a maelstrom between us that she couldn’t get inside my guard to deliver a decisive blow.

A spectral image of my arm appeared in my vision, sweeping forward far more than I’d been doing.

I paid so much attention to Blossom that my defenses gaped wipe open. Kagura lunged in with a spinning sweep that yanked my legs from under me and spilled me across the floor.

Kagura backed off again. “Watch your feet. You should strike a wider stance and keep your lead foot forward so they’ve got their own circles of movement with no overlap. You aren’t trying to dance, you’re keeping your legs from interfering with each other as they support your assault.”

I climbed to my feet, breathing hard. Kagura let me pant it out as she stood back and gazed at me through those raptor eyes.

“In the field, you may be required to fight female opponents, even beautiful women. Many monsters are able to assume the form of an attractive human female. Some naturally appear this way by nature in order to deceive our species. They may even use feminine wiles and sexual tactics to distract you for the kill. Failing to identify and respond to the threat could mean death for your entire team.”

“Is that how your team got reduced to just a handful?”

“Yes. A vampiress killed one of my male teammates, then a second. I finally slew her. We have been diminished ever since.”

“Freaking vampires. You’re serious?”

“Entirely serious.” And she was. I could see it in her steely eyes.

She laughed again, and I wasn’t sure if she was messing with me or just genuinely unhinged. Probably both.

“Attack again.” Kagura beckoned at me. I lunged into the attack, throwing my hips and shoulders into the swings. She blocked the strikes with her bare hands. Even with my massively augmented strength, she easily overpowered the punches, driving them to the side and using my momentum against me.

After she’d done it a few times, I stepped back and raised a hand. “Time out. How are you doing that? My enhanced strength should turn your bones to powder.”

“My body is enhanced with numerous mutations consistent with Avalon Corp elite Hunters. These mutations are drawn from the same old Atlantean science that made your armor and allows me to exceed normal human parameters. At present, I am on-par with a Hunter Second Class. Whisper has also trained me in an extensive range of anti-monster and anti-human combat skills. These two combined traits make me an Assassin.”

“So assassin isn’t just a job description? It’s a title within Whisper?”

“Correct. Your mother held this title also, or so I am told.”

That was a gut punch I didn’t need while I was already swimming in new information. “You mean she had augmented mutations drawn from ancient Atlantis?”

“Correct.”

My head spun. I felt like I needed to sit down, but my heavy armor would probably flatten the flimsy metal chairs lined up along one wall. Then something else occurred to me.

“If they’re mutated genes, couldn’t those be passed down through bloodlines?”

“They act as recessive traits, but yes. There have been instances of separate bloodlines with enhanced ancestors breeding to produce a surprise inheritor of the mutated genes. Even then, most remain inactivated.”

“So I’m a carrier for this recessive trait?”

“With your mother’s genetics, you must be.”

Blossom’s mental voice was practically a purr.

I raised my fists. Kagura did the same. We launched into our violent dance again. I threw myself into the punches, taking her rapid blows on my raised forearms and striking out at her when I thought I could land a punch. She was fast, too fast for me, but I got close a couple of times. She also knocked me down a few more times, but she never laughed at me, and whenever I climbed to my feet I found her ready to continue.

I kept attacking until Kagura raised a hand and stopped me. “I detect no more hesitation in your attacks. In fact, I can tell now that you have experience fighting. Better than most. And yet, you were terrible when we began. What has changed?”

I stood back, panting. “I’ve never fought a woman before. I’ve put plenty of guys on the ground, but beating on women is what cowards do. I can only manage when I picture you as a threat. It also helps that I know you won’t fall apart like soggy tissue paper if I land a punch. I’m not just fighting an unarmed woman.”

“I see.” Kagura stared at me. I could see calculations taking place behind her eyes. “In that case, bear in mind that no female Proto is ever truly unarmed. Each of their species possess some innate weapon. If she seems helpless, it is likely her secret weapon is a surprise ability. But Protos are never helpless. Even at your moment of triumph over them, show no mercy.”

“Got it.” I liked the way she gave instruction, short and to the point. No fluff at all. Other people would probably find her abrasive, but I was warming to her brand of zero crap. Even if I still found the rest of her aggravating and domineering.

“One more thing. You will never be sent to hunt a Proto who has not proven themselves a threat to humans. There are even some species with whom we peacefully coexist, something like herbivores among their ranks who do not feed on humans and who mostly want to be left alone. We will not be hunting these. If you are sent to exterminate a Proto, rest assured they represent an active threat to humanity. Do not let any perceived helplessness or gentleness on their part deceive you. Their females may attempt to play into your chivalry in order to get under your guard and escape justice, but if you allow that to happen, dozens of people could die due to your stupidity.”

Kagura struck a wide combat stance. “Now, come at me again.”