Fan Fiction / Crossover Fan Fiction / Magic Knight Rayearth Fan Fiction ❯ Tragic Heroes ❯ Mad Scientist ( Chapter 10 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

Tragic Heroes
a Magic Knight Rayearth/Metal Gear crossover
Chapter 10: Mad Scientist
11-22-2003
by Grey Fox

Disclaimer: Solid Snake and Metal Gear are the creation of the gaming genius Hideo Kojima and the property of Konami. Hikaru Shidou and Magic Knight Rayearth are the creation and property of the talented ladies of CLAMP studios.

*****

Hikaru had watched the whole thing from the window of her cell, horrified that Snake had been overpowered so quickly and easily. Trudy Nolan - or the Geneticist as she called herself - was right about how dangerous she was. Super-strength gained from using genetic engineering technology on herself.... there was no way Snake could face an enemy like that alone! And the Geneticist had tossed Snake out of the room and out of Hikaru's view, so now she couldn't even SEE what was going on. Worse, while she was still trapped in this cell, there was nothing she could do to help him.

"That's it," Hikaru thought aloud angrily. "I must get out of this cell and help him." But that was easier said than done, since Trudy had made sure she wouldn't be able to use her magic and blast her way out. If she made so much as a spark, the gas would ignite and.....

*Wait a minute,* thought Hikaru, suddenly realizing that the Geneticist may have overlooked something. She said that the gas she had flooded Hikaru's cell with would only cause an explosion if she used her powers in such a way that it would IGNITE the gas. But since arriving at the Sierra Outpost, she discovered a new set of powers allowing her to absorb and redirect heat energy. Perhaps.... she could try using her new powers to focus that heat energy without causing a spark and setting off the gas.

Placing both hands on the cell door, Hikaru shut her eyes and concentrated, calling forth the stored energy within her. Yes.... she could feel it.... the power was slowly building up. Fortunately for her, it seemed as if she now had some level of control and could use this strange new power as easily as her old magic spells. Hikaru then focused the heat energy through her hands and onto the cell door. It was working.... she could sense that the metal was beginning to heat up.... almost as if she could see the molecules in her mind's eye, becoming more energetic. Hikaru figured if she could keep this up, the metal would melt.

After a while though, it became evident that this plan of action was not going to work. This strange metal, whatever it was, was just too strong; no way for her to simply get it to melt away and let her out. Hikaru slumped down onto her knees, succumbing to despair. The once chance she thought she had of escaping was just an empty hope. If the door was too strong and too thick to let her melt it.....

*Hold on,* thought Hikaru, having another flash of inspiration. *I can focus my energy anywhere I want. Instead of just applying it directly, maybe, just maybe, I could somehow trigger the lock inside the door to....* Wasting no time, Hikaru got back up and placed her hands on the door again. This time though, she tried probing inside the door, trying to find anything that might be a lock or switch. She wasn't quite sure she'd find anything; she'd never tried a stunt like this before. She might....

All of a sudden, Hikaru found something deep within the cell door that might be the lock. But how to apply her energy to release it? Hikaru concentrated, trying to figure out where to set off a tiny spark and trigger the door to open. Since it was inside the door, Hikaru was certain certain there was no danger of setting off the gas and blowing herself up. She just had to focus.... focus.... and she had it! A mechanical clanking sound confirmed the success of her daring plan. And slowly, the door began to slide open....

And after only opening a few centimeters, it stopped. It was jammed.

"WHAT?!!" Hikaru cried out in an enraged tone. After all that work and finally figuring out a way to get out of her cell, the stupid door jammed on her! And even though the door was slighty opened and the gas let out, it was now lingering in the laboratory, so she would still set it off if she used her fire magic. Now how was she supposed to get out?

Then, yet again, she had another flash of insight. Hikaru drew her sword out and stuck it through the small opening. Then, she proceeded to use her sword like a crow bar to pry to door open. At first though, this seemed to be another futile venture; the door was so massive, and she wasn't particularly strong. But just when Hikaru was about to lose hope, she heard a metallic creaking sound. She looked at the door, and saw it had opened up a couple more centimeters. All she had to do was keep at it, and eventually she would open it enough to slip out.

"Just hang on Snake!" she thought aloud. "Just hang in there. I promise I'll come and help you! I promise I'll come and save you!"

*****

The mercenary-scientist who identified herself as the Geneticist began to slowly advance toward Snake. "You've caused too much damage here already, Snake. I won't allow you to cause us any more trouble," she said, glaring menacingly at him from behind her glasses. Snake immediately got up and raised his pistol to fire at the Geneticist, although he was unsure about how much effect it would have on her, considering what he had seen already. He fired half a dozen rounds at her, all hitting her dead-on. She winced and bent over, covering her abdomen with her arm, but Snake's attack didn't seem to stop her outright. "Agghh! Damnit, that stings!" she hissed. Apparently, all the bullets did was slightly hurt her instead of kill her.

*Oh just great, her body's super-tough too. She's like something out of a damn comic book,* Snake thought bitterly, holstering his pistol. Obviously, she was going to be a very difficult enemy to overcome. But before he could even begin to think of how he was going to beat her, Geneticist suddenly leaped up into the air, jumping much higher than any normal human possibly could, and came crashing down with an earth-shattering stomp. She had meant to come down right onto Snake, who managed to leap backwards just in time. But her stomp created a powerful shockwave that knocked Snake off his feet. *Damn! How am I going to beat this psycho?!* Snake mused worriedly.

Geneticist didn't give Snake any time to answer his own question. She quickly lunged at him with a punch, but Snake saw it coming and easily sidestepped to avoid it. Then he grabbed her arm. As he did so, he swung her around and slammed her facefirst into a huge, steel container that was right next to them. Taking out his FAMAS rifle, he quickly unloaded half a clip of ammunition into her backside. Snake wasn't really the type that liked to shoot an enemy in the back, but she was too powerful an enemy to take chances with.

"YEEARRRGH!" screamed Geneticist, holding her hands against her backside and turning her head to face Snake, a look of pure hatred on her face. Snake could see and hear some of the rounds he had fired at her fall to the floor and clatter, spattering little driblets of blood on the ground. Apparently, his assault rifle couldn't kill her either, but apparently it hurt her a lot more than his handgun did. *Maybe if I keep at it, I'll wear her down,* figured Snake. It was a longshot, but at the moment, Snake didn't see anything else he could try.

Geneticist quickly made her next move, and it was a move that surpised Snake. She dug her hands into the steel cargo container Snake had slammed her against and lifted it high above her. Then she turned around, leaped, and tried to bring it down right onto Snake. Once again, Snake managed to dodge her lethal attack just in time. The steel cargo crate smashed into the floor and slightly embedded itself into the ground and sent chunks of concrete flooring flying in all directions. Not only that, it caused the entire room to shake, almost making Snake lose his footing again. *Damn! Just HOW strong is she?!!* he thought to himself.

*****

Hikaru had managed to open up the doorway by about ten centimeters. It still wasn't opened wide enough for her to escape, but at this rate, Hikaru was certain she would be able to slip out and help Snake within a few minutes.

All of a sudden, there was a large booming sound from the adjacent room, and her entire cell shook violently. Startled, Hikaru lost her footing and dropped her sword. "Wha... What the....?" she thought aloud. She had no idea what had just caused that, but she was certain that whatever it was, it wasn't good news for Snake. Hikaru snatched up her sword and got back on her feet, and continued prying open the cell door. "Just a few more minutes..... Don't worry Snake, I'm coming!"

*****

After having failed at trying to crush Snake with the steel container, Geneticist came at Snake yet again. She lunged at Snake, trying to grab hold of him. But Snake had other plans. Just as Geneticist was in reach, Snake grabbed her and threw her over his shoulder, using her own momentum against her. She skidded along the floor for quite a long distance before coming to a stop.

Snake now realized that the Geneticist had one major weakness. She had superhuman strength and was fairly quick, but obviously she had no formal training in hand-to-hand combat and thus was very clumsy in battle. Therefore, it wouldn't be that hard to keep avoiding her attacks and wear her out with his own. He reached into his pouch and pulled out a fragmentation grenade. Just as Genticist was getting up to face him again, Snake pulled the pin and tossed the grenade her way. It landed right at her feet before blowing up and knocking her down again. Not letting up, Snake opened fire on Geneticist again, who howled in pain.

"That's it!!" she screamed, her voice shaking with rage. "No more holding back!! You're going to pay for killing the Cyborg Twins and hurting Piranha!!" With that, she leaped upwards again, almost reaching the top of the storage room, and tried to come down with a powerful stomp onto Snake. Snake had deftly ran out of harm's way before she came back down with a deafening smash and leaving an impact crater in the ground, but Geneticist immediately jumped up and tried again. This time Snake barely avoided an unpleasant end, rolling out of the way just as she came crashing down. She was still mad as hell and ready to fight, but Snake noticed that she had gotten a little slower. Hopefully she was beginning to get tired.

Snake tossed another grenade at Geneticist just as she was getting up, and it rolled to a stop at the center of the impact crater she had left from her leap-and-stomp attack. She didn't even move to avoid the grenade, and it went off right under her. Judging from how she had failed to even react in time, Snake realized that she must be getting weary. It looked like his plan was beginning to work. He reloaded his rifle with a fresh clip of ammunition, and then pulled out another grenade - this time a stun grenade. Snake quickly pulled the pin and tossed it over at Geneticist. She was immediately blinded by the flash-bang combo, and thus an open target for Snake. He completely unloaded another ammo clip into the Geneticist, who let out an eardrum-splitting screech.

"I'VE HAD IT WITH YOU, SNAKE!!!" she shrilled. Then Geneticist did something unexpected - she dug her hands right into the floor and pulled up a huge chunk of concrete. "Eat this!!" she cried, hurling the chunk of concrete at Snake. Snake quickly laid flat on the ground, and the deadly projectile passed over him with a powerful rush of displaced air. Breathing a sigh of relief, Snake got back up and reloaded his rifle again. He readied his weapon and faced Geneticist yet again, but this time she had beaten him to the draw. She ran straight at Snake and connected with a vicious right hook, and this sent him flying halfway across the room, his backside slamming painfully into the wall. He briefly saw stars and his spine was aching, but forced himself to get up again and continue fighting. Fortunately, he had managed to hold on to his assault rifle. *Thank God,* Snake thought bitterly. *This and the grenades are the only things that seem to do any good against her.*

Snake recovered just in time to see Geneticist dashing across the room, fists at the ready. No doubt she was eager to beat him to a bloody pulp. Naturally, Snake wasn't going to allow her to do that - he came here to rescue Hikaru, and that's exactly what he was going to do. And he wasn't going to let the Geneticist stop him, no matter how powerful she was. He opened fire on her, and this forced her to leap aside to avoid his attack. But she was still speeding towards him, rapidly closing the distance between them. Snake bolted to his right, all the while keeping his rifle trained on the Geneticist and letting out short bursts of fire to impede her progress. She kept leaping aside to evade his fire, and this gave Snake an idea.

Taking his left hand off his rifle, Snake reached into his pouch and pulled out another grenade. Then he fired at Geneticist again. With only one hand on his gun, he couldn't aim as accurately and Geneticist easily leaped to her left and avoided it. But Snake hadn't counted on shooting her. He tossed the grenade at the spot Geneticist was going to land; what he was counting on was making her land on a spot where he could toss a grenade. His plan worked - the grenade exploded right as she landed on her feet, and this knocked her back off her feet and onto her back again. Snake could also see that her glasses got knocked off her face this time, clattering noisily onto the ground. Snake then realized she may have another weakness.

Despite her intellectual demeanor, she was obviously a very impulsive woman and in tense situations easily lost her temper, making rash decisions and didn't bother to think before she acted. It would be a simple matter to lure her into more attacks and finally wear her out, free Hikaru, and get out of there. But Snake knew he had to do it soon; he was running dangerously low on FAMAS ammo clips and fragmentation grenades.

Geneticist pulled up another hunk of concrete right out of the floor and flung it Snake's way. Snake had ample time to roll out of the way and avoid it; her aim wasn't even that good anyway. Whether that was because she lost her glasses or she was finally getting tired, Snake couldn't tell. Although he sincerly hoped it was the latter. Snake reloaded his rifle yet again and opened fire on her, but once again she easily leaped up and out the way, and landed with a deafening crash dangerously near Snake. *Damn!!* Snake thought irritably. *She's still got too much fight left in her! I'm just not hurting her enough! I need a more powerful weapon....*

A more powerful weapon. Snake remembered he HAD such a weapon, but he had lost it even before the fight had really begun. His Nikita missile launcher might be just enough to bring Geneticist down. Unfortunately, she had tossed it up onto the upper level and out of his reach. But if he could keep her distracted and confused long enough....

Geneticist was coming straight at Snake again, arms outstretched, ready to grab him and tear him apart. Before she could even get within ten meters of him, however, Snake pulled out another stun grenade and chucked it at her. It went off as soon as it hit her, blinding her with its dizzying flash. While she was dazed and confused, Snake had the perfect opportunity to put his latest straegy into action. He bolted for one of the ladders that led to the upper level; he had to get hold of his missile launcher before she recovered.

Snake ran along the upper level, his footsteps echoing loudly off the thin metal flooring. *C'mon, where the hell is it?! I thought she threw it up somewhere around....* As he was thinking, Snake turned a corner and saw what he was looking for. There it was, lying right there at his feet. He hastily snatched it up and activated it.

By this time, Trudy had fully recovered from the stun grenade and looked about frantically, trying to spot Snake, and without her glasses that was a bit difficult. She soon managed to find him though, standing on the upper level. Once again acting before bothering to think, she leaped upwards and landed noisily on the upper level, right in front of Snake. "All right, time to end th...." she began, but stopped abruptly when she turned to face him. She was greeted with the sight of the muzzle of a Nikita missile launcher.

"Say cheese," Snake beamed smugly, and fired. Snake had turned off the remote-control guidance mode, so the missiles would shoot out quicker. Not even Geneticist would be able to dodge the missiles at such close range. The missile hit Geneticist dead-center, knocking her back several meters. She immediately got back up though, but her legs were very wobbly and she was clutching her midsection. Still, Snake could see where part of her shirt around her midsection had been burned away, revealing wounds caused by bullets and flying bits of shrapnel. Snake didn't hesitate to fire another missile, hitting Geneticist again and knocking her back to the edge of the upper level. One more missile attack would knock her off the top level and surely put her down for the count. So Snake fired a third missile just as she was getting up. It hit her in her backside and knocked her off the upper level, and Snake could hear her body hit the ground below with a loud thud. Snake breathed a heavy sigh of relief. It looked like he had been right on two counts; when enraged she could easily be lured into an ambush and the missiles did indeed seem to do enough damage to her to finally wear her out.

Snake jumped off the upper level, landed gracefully on the bottom floor and walked up to the fallen Geneticist, who was lying on the ground in a fetal position. She was quivering convulsively and breathing hard and erratically. Snake felt a bit of pity for having to brutally subdue her, but she hadn't given him much of a choice; it was either him or her. "You lose," Snake snapped at her. "Now, you're going to tell me how to free Hikaru and where we can find Metal Gear Gander."

"Forget it, buddy," she shot back defiantly. "I need that girl for my research, and we need Metal Gear for our plans to remake the world."

Snake had kept his composure throughout his battle with Geneticist, but now, he was swiftly losing his patience. "I don't give a damn about any science project of yours. And as for 'remaking the world,' well, I've heard that before...."

"Don't you dare compare us with your past enemies!" Geneticist shouted, outraged. "We're not out to make the world a safe haven for soldiers and mercenaries, or hatching some sick plot for revenge. All we want is set this stinking world right, to correct all the evil and corruption...."

"The only evil I see is a bunch of warped minds that actually think any good can come from using Metal Gear," Snake cut in harshly. "And just who do you mean by 'we'? You're obviously not part of the little army squad Parker charged with running this dump. What is it you're a part of?!"

Now Geneticist picked her head up and stared at Snake with a sardonic, pernicious look. "Well, that's for me to know...." It all happened in a split-second. Geneticist got up from her seemingly helpless position on the floor and reached for the muzzle of Snake's missile launcher, twisting and contorting it so that it was absolutely useless. And before Snake could even let go of the missile launcher, she twirled around and, with her hands still clenched into the muzzle, tossed it straight at a wall, and Snake along with it. Snake's backside once again crashed painfully into a solid wall, so hard he was certain his spine almost shattered into pieces, and slid down to the floor, in too much agony to get up. But he could still hear well enough - enough to hear the footsteps that could only mean the Geneticist was slowly approaching him. "... And for you to NEVER find out," she finished.

"Lemme guess.... you changed your body so that you heal super-quick," Snake managed to get out in choked, painful gasps.

"Exactly," she said triumphantly. "I congratulate you on being able to put me down, but as you can see, there's no way to KEEP me down. Now to finish this." Geneticist reached down and grabbed Snake, placing her hands at his sides, and effortlessly hoisted him off the ground. "I need to keep the little girl alive for research purposes, but I don't think anyone will shed any tears if I dispose of you here and now," she said vindictively. "Goodbye." She then began to slowly press into his sides, wanting to leisurely crush him to death. Snake had been seeing stars before, but now everything was becoming downright vertiginous. He tried repeatedly punching Geneticist in the head, but it was like hitting the trunk of a tree, and all she did was blink. And now, everything was starting to go black....

Only Trudy Nolan's blood-curdling scream of agony snapped Snake out of it.

Geneticist unceremoniously dropped Snake. He looked up to see what had happened, but only saw Trudy looking behind her.

And far behind her was Hikaru with her hand outstretched, some sort of steam rising from it.

Geneticist immediately turned on Hikaru, leaping and lunging at her. But she was not nearly fast enough for Hikaru. "Flame Arrow!" she cried, shooting a stream of fire at her. Her spell was right on target, catching Geneticist in the air and halting her attack altogether. She crashed onto the ground, her body sprawled out on the floor, her clothes charred and singed, and laying utterly motionless.

Now that the Geneticist has finally been dealt with, Hikaru ran over to Snake's side and tried to help him up, blurting out a grabled string of apologies. "Snake, are you OK?!! I'm so sorry Snake!! I'm so sorry I couldn't help you!! I should've been able to escape sooner!!"

"Ugh.... better late than never," said Snake weakly, finally managing to get up on his feet. As soon as he did, he turned to get a good look at Hikaru, a grave look of concern on his face. "What about you? Did she do anything to do? You OK?" Hikaru blinked, staring at Snake for a second. In the brief time she had known him, she figured out he wasn't the outwardly emotional type. "I said, you OK?" repeated Snake.

"Oh, just fine. She really didn't do anything to me," she answered him. Then she turned to look at the fallen Geneticist. "Speaking of her, well, what about her? Was my magic enough to put her down?" she asked, hoping she had put enough force into her attack to knock her out, but not kill her.

"I don't think so," said Snake, taking out his FAMAS rifle and slowly approaching Trudy. Hikaru followed suit, drawing her sword and walking slowly towards their downed foe. "This girl recovers really fast. I hit her with machine gun fire, grenades, missiles.... and she still survived. I doubt one of your magic spells will do the job either."

"Wrong," Trudy said faintly. "You couldn't kill me Snake, but she can. Easily. She just exploited.... only real weakness.... you can probably guess what it is.... right Hikaru?" she asked before profusely coughing up blood.

Hikaru stared at the Geneticist, a look of pure horror on her face. She realized just what she was hinting at. "You.... You mean...."

"Exactly," Geneticist replied feebly, her voice even fainter than before. "Not only clones are vulnerable to extreme heat.... all cells I use my special engineering techniques on.... share the same problem.... including my own...." she went on. She looked up and saw Snake's bewildered expression and Hikaru holding her face in her hands, sobbing.

"Don't weep child.... perhaps, perhaps I deserve this...." she continued. "It was my research, my innovations.... they used.... those bastards used my work for their own unspeakable experiments... didn't realize it until too late.... but he, our leader, took me in.... gave me a chance to correct my mistakes.... to work with him...."

"What are you talking about?!" cried Snake, confused by her rambling.

"Never mind.... none of your concern," Geneticist said, her voice softer than ever. "At least I know.... with my death.... I'll take you two with me...." After breathing those last words, her eyes slowly closed for good.

And then deafening, bone-jarring explosions went off all around Hikaru and Snake.

"What the hell?!" exclaimed Snake. "Damn! She must have somehow rigged the whole building to explode if she got killed!!"

"We've got to get out of here!" yelled Hikaru, pointing out the painfully obvious. Bits and pieces of the ceiling were coming down in smoldering chunks, and thick, billowing flames were popping up everywhere. Well, she couldn't be hurt by fire anymore, but Snake was a different story....

"Follow me!" Snake brusquely ordered, dashing for the room's other exit, Hikaru following close behind. Snake led Hikaru through the winding hallways with the powerless electric flooring until they reached the elevator.

"Ummm, Snake, I thought you're not supposed to use elevators if a building is about to go up in flames," Hikaru pointed out.

"You're right. But this is the only way off this floor I know of," replied Snake. Just then, the elevator door opened. "Get in!" he cried, shoving Hikaru in the elevator before darting inside himself. A few seconds later, part of the ceiling crashed down right in front of the elevator. But by then, Hikaru and Snake had reached the B1 level, and Snake was leading Hikaru by the hand to the eleavtor that would take them to the ground level, explosion going off all around them. They made it there without incident; obviously, the guards knew what had happened and vacated the premises.

Just as Hikaru and Snake were doing. The duo had managed to finally make it out of the doomed facility's main entrance. After only running a few meters awat from the building, the entire structure finally went up with one immense explosion that knocked both of them flat on their faces.

--------------------------------------------

It had been about half an hour since Snake and Hikaru's narrow escape from the self-destructing research facility. After that though, they had to deal with all the facility's guards that had fanned out everywhere to search for them. Luckily, the daring duo of spies managed to expertly elude them all, thanks in part to a couple of conveniently located cardboard boxes.

But at last, it seemed as if the two of them were finally in the clear for the moment. They were currently walking through a thinly forested area. Hikaru decided it was a good time to tell Snake everything the Geneticist had told her: the cloned Black Chamber soldiers, her new pwers, what Trudy had found out by studying her DNA, New Way, her hints of the grandiose plans her group had for Metal Gear.... everything. Snake just listened, taking it all in. After she was finished, he reached into one of his pouches and pulled out a cigarette. Like he told Hikaru earlier, the only times he ever smoked a great deal was during and after extremely stressful occurences. And barely making it out of an exploding building alive would certainly qualify. Snake put the cigarette in his mouth and then reached for his lighter, but stopped when he saw Hikaru reach for the cigarette out of the corner of his eye. "Eh?" said Snake, thinking she was trying to take it away. But it turned out she was doing the opposite. She lit his cigaretter with her fingertip, using her new heat-based power. "Uhhh, thanks," he said.

"Don't mention it," replied Hikaru with a smile. "Ummm, Snake. Back there, when you asked me how I was, well...."

"What about it?" asked Snake, taking a long drag from his cigarette.

"It's just that, well, in the short time I've known you, you seemed like, ummm, obdurate, unemotional, and you seemed real worried about me, and...."

"I've seen too many would-be friends die right in front of me," Snake cut in. "I don't think I could live with myself if that sort of thing happened again. I've got too few people I can call friends left in this world."

Hikaru smiled again; it looked like she was really getting through to this sad, lonely man. "Well, thank you, Snake."

"Don't worry about it. I'm sure you'd do the same for me," he said, taking another drag. Then Snake thought to himself how much Hikaru's words had hit home. All his life, Snake thought of himself as someone who would fight ONLY for himself. Some people would think him a hero, but he knew he was just a lone warrior inexorably drawn to the battlefield again and again....

"OH NO!!!" Hikaru suddenly exclaimed, surprising Snake so much he almost dropped his cigarette.

"What is it?" he asked, turning to face her. She had another sorrowful look on her face.

"I....I just remembered! Trudy said that Parker's soldiers were being held somewhere else in the research facility! D-did you happen to find them?" she asked in a shaky voice. Snake shook his head solemnly. "Then that means they were still in there when the place blew. They're dead.... or buried alive." She buried her face in her hands again. "I accidently killed Trudy Nolan, not knowing my magic was so lethal to her, and I accidently caused the deaths of all those soldiers as well, and I totally forgot they were in there! I didn't even try to find them....." Hikaru then began to sob uncontrollably. "WHY?!! Why am I always the cause of so much death?!!!"

Snake couldn't help but feel for her; he took Hikaru in his arms and hugged her closely, trying to comfort her. If anyone understood what kind of pain she was going through, it was him.

Too bad this cute little moment wouldn't last too long.

"Aw, that's so sweet," came a sardonic, mechanical-sounding voice out of nowhere. This immediately snapped Snake and Hikaru to attention, drawing their weapons and frantically looking around for the source of the voice. There were only about half a dozen trees within a fifty meter radius around them, and their mystery person could be hiding behind any one of them.

"Show yourself!" demanded Hikaru.

There was no verbal reply. Instead, a small jet of water came out of nowhere, striking Snake's cigarette, tearing it in half. Snake just stared at it for a second, then spit it out. "Bad for your lungs anyway."

"Hold on... WATER?!!!" cried Hikaru. "But it can't be! She's...."

"Recovered.... and ready and willing to have the rematch you two owe me!!" cut in the voice. Now Snake had a good idea where the voice was coming from - upwards. He looked up into the treetops, and indeed there was human-shaped outline up in one of the trees - a really big human-shaped outline. Snake watched it jumped down out of the tree and land noisily about a dozen meters away.

Hikaru and Snake immediately knew who it was: Piranha. The water cannon and incredibly large, burly physique were dead giveaways. But this time, she had come prepared. She had on a thick armored suit, kind of like a knight's suit of armor with an astronaut's space suit helmet. And within that helmet, the two of them could make out Piranha's face.

Then Hikaru sensed something funny. "Uh-oh. Snake, that armor's made up of the same metal the walls of my cell were."

"That's right, kid. With this special armor, I'm safe from even your so-called magic," she spat out from within her suit. "There was only one way that research facility could have gone up, and that's if Trudy got killed. I don't know how you two managed to do it, but I swear I'll avenge her death!"

*********

Well, finally got done with this chapter. This was perhaps the hardest one yet to write. Now let's see if I can get Chapter 11 done before Thansgiving.

Yeah right.

So long,
Grey Fox