Location: MID Combat Training Room 4

Time: 10:30 AM, January 4th 2108

“Fox’s fire”

With an open palm Kanon swiped her arm in a 180 degree arc in front of her body. Nine orbs of fire were left in her hand’s wake.

“Go.”

The orbs spread out before congregating toward Alec.

Alec let out an audible sigh. A wall of loosely fitted, somewhat transparent, purple hexagons appeared about five meters in front of him.

As the orbs of fire hit his hastily constructed wall the hexagons compacted on the impact sites, completely blocking the fire out.

“A barrier? Let’s see how much it can take.”

Kanon raised both arms above her head, summoning another orb of fire. This one continued to grow until it was at least three meters across. Kanon let out a scream while throwing her arms forward.

The new orb started moving toward Alec, but before it could reach him his wall wrapped around it. The hexagons that made up his barrier compacted once again, smothering Kanon’s fire.

“Annoying. I’ll just make it impossible to block.”

Kanon punched her right fist into her left palm.

“Benkei’s 999 swords.”

Katanas started appearing, floating in the air. There were far too many to count, but I’m assuming there were 999 of them.

“Pierce him.”

Each of the swords aligned themselves toward Alec before flying in his direction. It was an impressive sight, but they were all intercepted by a barrier before reaching anywhere near him.

“Why is this happening? Stop blocking everything and fight me.”

Kanon was stomping her foot on the ground while Alec continued standing around like none of this involved him.

“Fight you? No way, definitely not. You’d kill me for sure.”

“Stop being a coward and fight with honor. You’re only insulting both of our families.”

“I’m used to being an insult to my family, so no worries. And besides, this is all I can do. My augmentation is making barriers. What you’ve seen is all I’m capable of.”

“Impossible. Such a pathetic excuse for a person couldn’t exist.”

“He’s not lying, Cannon. Such a pathetic person exists.” Karen decided to involve herself in their mid-battle conversation.

“I’m starting to get used to it, but Deputy Chief, aren’t you a little too willing to casually turn any comment into an insult against me?”

“Enough! I don’t care anymore. If you won’t fight me then I’ll just end this quickly. If barrier making is all you can do, then I’ll just crush through them. Complete possession: oni.”

Kanon’s skin turned deep red, and two horns grew out of her head. As she reached out a large black club materialized in her hand.

She leapt forward and used her club to strike the barrier Alec erected between them.

“It might be strong enough to block one blow, but eventually it will break.”

Kanon continued to smash against the barrier without showing any signs of fatigue. It seemed like a pointless exercise, but eventually it paid off. Cracks started to appear in some of the hexagons that made up the barrier.

They started to break apart. More holes formed in the barrier until Alec couldn’t keep it up at all. With a final swing Kanon shattered what remained.

Without a wasted moment she charged forward, and Alec responded by doing the most Alec like thing possible.

Running away.

After putting some distance between them, Alec turned around to face Kanon once again. A new barrier appeared between them.

“It doesn’t matter. I’ll crush anything you put between us. This is just a contest of who will collapse first, and it won’t be me. The fire that burns inside of me will never go out.”

“I don’t have a fire burning inside me, and making all these barriers is pretty tiring.”

Kanon was too busy smashing through Alec’s new barrier to listen to his response.

“Hey, Chief, isn’t this kind of. . .” I directed my comment toward Karen.

“Incredibly boring? Yes. I was imagining the duel being a lot more entertaining.”

“Then why pick Alec? You should’ve known he’d turn it into something like this.” I had high hopes as well, but this result was hardly surprising.

“I just thought it made the most sense for her to start with the weakest member, and it’s not like I could have her fight Nora.”

“Is any of this supposed to make sense? It’s not like we’re here for a reason.”

“There is a reason. We’re stuck doing nothing all day and I wanted a break.” I’m pretty sure we spend most days stuck in the office doing nothing. “Besides. If you’re against it, why’d you come?”

“I wanted a break.”

During my conversation with Karen, Kanon managed to put Alec’s barrier in pathetic shape once again.

“Hey, Three Strike Alex, I’m getting bored of this, so just lose already.” I decided to antagonize Alec a little, in hopes of it somehow making things more entertaining.

Alec turned around and looked directly at me, completely ignoring Kanon.

“I realize we were just reflecting on the past, and it may have caused some confusion, but my name is Alec, not Alex.”

As he was talking Kanon burst through his decrepit barrier.

“Complete possession: cancel. Complete possession: Sasaki Kojiro.”

Kanon’s body returned to normal, and the club in her hands was replaced with a katana. It was far longer than the ones she summoned earlier.

Before Alec had a chance to realize what was happening Kanon was already behind him, preparing to strike.

“Tsubame Gaeshi.”

Alec was able to avoid a downward strike while turning around, but he wasn’t expecting an upward strike immediately after. With no other options available, Alec threw out his arm to block the blade. Sensing victory, Kanon followed through with her two part attack.

Everything stopped as Kanon’s sword made contact with Alec’s arm. The room went silent, making it easy for me to hear the sound of cracking metal.

In the next moment Kanon’s sword shattered, with the pieces falling to the ground. She was still holding the hilt, as if there was a blade attached to it.

A small, spherical barrier appeared to the left of Kanon, and it started growing rapidly. It expanded into her side, sending her flying across the room and into the wall.

“Bruising of the ribs and chest detected. This training exercise is concluded. Any further violence is not approved by the Ministry of Investigation and Defense. A medical team will be dispatched if necessary.”

The voice coming from the room’s speakers was one that anyone working for Mid would recognize, although it didn’t belong to a person. It was the voice given to Mid’s computer system. It was nothing like an AI, actually, we’re supposed to call them NBIs now. Either way, it was just a part of the computer’s interface.

Karen had it disabled in our office, so I’m not overly familiar with it.

Alec walked across the room and stood over Kanon, who hadn’t picked herself up off the ground.

“Hey, Kanon, someone like me has no right to be giving out advice, but let me try. You underestimated your opponent and overestimated yourself. When it comes to a real fight, you can’t be so quick to rely on your own skills while completely disregarding what your opponent might be capable of. You ended up putting your faith behind a single technique, a piece of metal. And that piece of metal will never be able to touch me, let alone hurt me. Rather than continue to try and force your way through with what you know, you should have switched up your tactics. Having an augmentation is no better than a normal weapon if you aren’t able or willing to adjust how you use it.”

Getting lectured by Alec seemed rough.

And at about this time I heard something interesting coming our way, but decided to keep quiet about it. Alec was a let down, so I wanted to see how it would spice things up.

“Why?” Kanon was speaking so softly I was probably the only one who could hear it.

“Why? Why?”

“Why?” She finally screamed it, followed by, crying?

She was crying. Definitely crying.

“Why?” She wasn’t even trying to hold it back anymore. It looked like she wanted to say something, but couldn’t manage to push it out.

“Oi, what did you do?” Karen was staring a hole through Alec.

“Don’t blame me for this!”

“It, it wasn’t supposed to be like this.” Kanon finally calmed down enough to start talking. “Why were you my first time?”

“Chief, I suggest we forget the trial and move straight to the sentencing.” I lowered my voice an octave while trying to sound as serious as possible.

“Good call, Oliver. The sentence is one month probation.”

“That’s surprisingly lenient. Don’t you think this deviant deserves worse?”

“Ah, I misspoke. I meant a lifetime imprisonment.”

“Reasonable enough.”

“Ah, I misspoke. I meant death by painful beating.”

“Hmm. Harsh, but fair.”

“Would you two cut it out?” Alec didn’t seem amused by Karen’s and my comedy routine.

“This was the first time I ever fought another augmented. I didn’t think my first time would end with my complete humiliation.” The words still seemed hard for Kanon to speak out loud.

“You never fought before? Earlier you were sounding pretty confident in yourself.” Karen’s tone was bordering on disappointment.

“Well, based on training simulations I’m incredibly talented and likely to succeed.”

Incredibly talented and likely to succeed? Was she taking advice from a fortune cookie?

“I don’t understand, all you’ve ever done is training? How long have you been able to use your augmentation? How old are you?”

Not that I read it, but I’m sure Karen could have learned all that if she bothered reading the dossier Kalder gave us.

“I’ve been able to actualize my augmentation since childhood, and I’ll turn 26 this summer.” She’s older than me?

“Twenty six and you’ve never been in a fight? Not even a duel? It’s a good thing I kept you away from Vier.”

“It’s not my fault. Okay? Father’s men always handled everything. If you give me another chance, I’m sure I’ll thoroughly destroy Agent Alexander.”

Ah, a rich girl. I suppose someone in my position should be used to dealing with people like that.

“This is why I should have lost. Now there’s another person who wants to thoroughly destroy me.” Another? So there’s more than one?

“That sounds entertaining.” I can’t say I disagreed with Karen, but suggesting that watching one of her subordinates get thoroughly destroyed would be entertaining is a bit much. “But not today. We need to get back upstairs before anyone notices we’re missing.”

“That’s quite enough, Deputy Chief Kaldsen.” Kalder was standing beside the open door.

Should I have told Karen when I first heard him getting off the elevator? Probably. If I had a second chance, would I?

Definitely not.