Okay. No more excuse on why I haven't been writing. This is the last chapter and I hope I finish it fairly quickly because I didn't realize I left everyone with a cliffhanger in the last chapter. Oops.

It's finally come to an end. I'm proud with how it turned out. One of the longer ones.

Here's the final chapter. Enjoy!

"Do you really expect us to believe he had no ill purposes in giving you that?" Atobe yelled gesturing towards the flash drive in Yukimura's possession. "There's probably some sort of tracking chip in it or- or a virus that will take down the whole mainframe of Cardinal's network if it actually connected to a computer."

Echizen rolled his eyes. He was currently being reprimanded by Atobe, Yukimura, and Tezuka insides the communication tent. "He was dying you stupid ape. If this was some elaborate plan, don't you think he would want to see it out to the end? Do you want to ask him yourself because I can gladly lead you to the spot he's at."

"The point is he was still a Chargarde agent. You shouldn't have gone by yourself." Tezuka said.

"That's not something I can really decide when he can control people to do his bidding. Plus I didn't see anyone in camp try to stop me when I was wondering away. Maybe you should train your troops to be more wary."

"Echizen-!"

"It's all right Tezuka." Yukimura said in a calm tone. "My men should've stopped him when he was leaving the camp so that fault is on me. Echizen according to your story, he lost his control just before you got to him. That should've given you more than enough time to turn back and get someone to go with you, especially if you felt like something was off."

"I don't need a babysitter."

"Apparently you do otherwise you wouldn't have done something as stupid as this." Atobe commented in a muffled tone.

Echizen took a deep breath. "You're never satisfied are you? Can't stand to have someone else be the center of attention for once in your life."

"Both of you stop." Tezuka ordered. "You're acting like children." Atobe huffed and Echizen rolled his eyes. "Echizen, what you did was stupid and very well could've endangered the lives of everyone here; Atobe, you're the commander of a Cardinal Special Forces unit so start acting like it. Echizen, what made you trust a Chargarde agent enough to take this without a second though?"

Echizen was silent for a few seconds. "He just- he looked so sad and ashamed. He had no idea what was happening when he was bring people in. And that girl wasn't with him and when I saw her the first time, she was all clingy and probably didn't let him have a minute to himself. She died for him, so he could escape and give me that stupid flash drive. But he's probably dead now too and since you don't seem to trust my judgement I guess this was all for nothing. Just destroy it or something."

The three in the room with him were silent. With how adamant Echizen was feeling about that flash drive, it made them, sans Atobe, feel a bit guilty. Echizen was as much their comrade as anyone else in that base and being accused of not trusting him struck a chord.

"We won't destroy it." Yukimura finally said. "If you're that passionate about it, but we don't have a computer here and we've already mapped out their base for the most part so I'm afraid this was all for naught."

"He said there were other things besides the schematics; didn't say what though. I would figure it's something else important though that could help."

"Why not send it back to headquarters and have them analyze it? Can't that one with the bandana make a cheetah or something and send it off?" Atobe suggested. Echizen raised his brow seeing that was a good idea.

"An animal that large would require a great amount of energy and concentration to keep up." Tezuka said. "Everyone needs to be at their top for tomorrow."

"Why not a bird then? They're small and agile and can probably get back faster than any land animal."

"That's as good of a plan as any we have right now." Yukimura said. He handed the flash drive to Tezuka. "We just have to take care of this then it's nothing but tomorrow to worry about. If you two would take care of that." Tezuka and Atobe left the tent. "Echizen-"

"I won't go off on my own anymore until this is over. I promise." Echizen said almost jokingly.

"The main reason we don't want you, or anyone else in the squads for that matter, to go off alone is because of the what if factor. What if it was an ambush; what if you had gotten lost; what if you had injured yourself and couldn't muster the strength to signal for help; what if you disappeared? I'm not going to blame you for it but that's the first thing they teach in training when preparing to go into the field, utilizing the buddy system. I'm sure they taught you something like that in school."

"Yeah I'm sure they would've."

Yukimura sighed. "I know you're tired of hearing the same things over and over but until it sticks, you need to understand that you're the most important person to everyone right now and you need to be more careful with your actions in the future." He smiled. "Now get out of here and have a bit of fun. It's the last bit you'll have for a while."

Echizen got up and left without another word. There was that word again, future. It seemed to come around a lot in the past few weeks. It was the only thing people seemed to care about anymore, they had a good right to, with how the world was but everything seemed to be moving too fast for him. Maybe it was his lost childhood finally starting to surface, at least the sad reality of not having one but instead of being on the run like criminals.

He went back to his tent which was, thankfully, empty. He knew that everyone was most likely talking about him right now and it would really be a bother for him if he showed his face. He almost wanted to venture out to find Kaidou and ask if he could create the cat seeing as it hadn't been around the whole day but remembered what Tezuka said about needing to conserve energy. It would also be a bit awkward to run into Tezuka and Atobe while they were instructing Kaidou on what to do with the flash drive.

He could feel the static on the air from the storm. He thought it would've been on them when they had left that morning but that just gave reality to how bad of a storm it was going to be. Maybe it would be on them tomorrow or the next day if they were lucky.

It wasn't long before Kawamura of all people came walking into the tent asking him if he would like to join everyone else around the fire pits, telling stories for past battles or discussing plans for the next day. Echizen politely declined, to which Kawamura acknowledged and left the tent to tell the others no doubt but was back in seconds later.

"KORA ECHIZEN, COME JOIN EVERYONE FOR TEAM BONDING. WE WILL HAVE A GREAT TIME."

Echizen sweat dropped as he saw Kawamura's gloved hands. "No thanks Kawamura-san."

"I WON'T TAKE NO FOR AN ANSWER." He suddenly dove at Echizen, to which the latter only escape by a hair. "YOU WILL COME OUT AND ENJOY YOUR COMRADES."

Echizen made a beeline to the tent flap in hopes that Kawamura would calm down once he saw he was outside. It was no surprise that it didn't work. Kawamura came barreling out after him and begun chasing him around the camp.

"Whoever did this, it's not funny!" Echizen shouted as he ran through groups of people.

"Tell that to them." Kaidou thumbed to Momo, Niou, Kirihara, Gakuto, and Kikumaru in particular laughing their guts out, along with a few other people around the camp. Echizen snorted and sent a shock over the ground to the group of Special Forces agents.

"Ow! Echizen!"

"You started this so fix it!"

Within minutes, the group and several others were trying to find a way to make Kawamura stop but he kept breaking through the walls and blockades people kept making. Echizen was getting tired and didn't want to know what would happen if he fell into Kawamura's grasp. Thankfully he was saved by Fuji who merely held his foot out and tripped the powerhouse, enabling him to take the gloves off.

"Ne Inui, didn't you say you had a new juice to try out? I think I found some volunteers to test it." Fuji's smile was sickening as he glanced at the five perpetrators. Inui's glasses instantly gleamed.

All in all, there were now five people swearing to whatever God there might be to save them from the poison they just ingested.

Echizen sat among the soldiers, answering questions they had, trying not to be a smartass about the answers he gave but mainly he just listened to everyone's stories about past battles and their lives, no matter how good or bad they were before they enlisted to fight. It was pretty much half and half for everyone; either I enlisted right out of school or Chargarde killed my family member. Needless to say he was slightly jealous of the people that got to attend school seeing as he only went to about first grade before having his memory wiped then jumping around from place to place. He understood everyone that had lost family members all too well though.

The day seemed to be going by slowly. Everyone was off doing something with a group of soldiers or going over plans. Echizen was lying against a tree with three other soldiers from Yukimura's squad. The three of them were casually chatting and trying to start a conversation with Echizen but he kept answering with short answers. He wasn't trying to do it but they just sort of joined him out of the blue and he was trying to experiment with his powers and they were distracting them.

"Come on Echizen-san, you must have some sort of thing you enjoy regularly." One of them said.

"Maybe music or a food." Another added.

Peace and quiet for concentration is more like it. "I never had the chance to listen to music to decide what kind I like and I'm not picky when it comes to food." He kept his eyes focus on the fire pit across the way, trying to make it light.

"You look like you'd enjoy alternative or maybe pop." A soldier said.

"Maybe."

"I don't know, he looks like he's a closet folk music lover."

"No way. He would probably like American classic rock."

Echizen's brow furrowed. They were annoying him to the point of physically radiating heat. He wanted them to be quiet or go away. Suddenly, he was hit in the face with something that suspiciously felt like a snowball. He wiped it from his face and looked for the perpetrator, mainly for Ryoga because he was the only one he knew that would just up and do that for no reason. While searching for him he glanced at the fire pit to see that it, along with the one next to it, had started smoking. He rolled his eyes and smirked. It wasn't a roaring blaze like he had hoped but it was something.

"You need to chill out Chibisuke." Ryoga said, tossing a snowball up and down as he walked to them.

"I can't believe you just said that." Echizen sweat dropped.

"I mean it. Were you planning on catching the tree on fire? It's practically smoldering." Echizen looked behind him to see the tree did have what looked like scorch marks in the shape of his body on it."Can we have a minute, guys?"

The three soldiers quickly left. "I don't want to hear it." Echizen said. "I know what I did was stupid and I'm aware of my importance so I won't do anything stupid tomorrow so you can go back to whatever you were doing before this and leave me be."

Ryoga placed his hand on his brother's head. "Idiot." He sat next to him and leaned on the tree. "I didn't come over here to tell you how stupid you are for doing what you did. I know you're tense and nervous about tomorrow."

Echizen rolled his eyes. The first sentence in itself was contradicting. "Yeah I guess."

"That's it? Chibisuke I just watched you almost burn a hole in a tree. Can't you at least admit when you're scared about something?"

"What do you want me to say?" He threw his arms behind his head. "I'm terrified about tomorrow and how a lot of people will probably die; you or I could die and never see Nanako again. Do you want to hear the depressing thoughts of a sixteen year old before he goes to war?"

"You don't think other's feel like that?" Ryoga's voice was incredibly gentle. "I guarantee everyone else here feels the exact same way you do and that's why they're having a good time, not having a care in the world. They know very well that tomorrow could be their last day and that's why they're celebrating right now."

He felt like an idiot. He didn't once think that celebrating was a sort of coping mechanic. That did seem to prove how nervous he was about the next day though; selfishly only thinking of himself. The three people from earlier were probably trying to calm him down and he basically shunned them.

"Come on. Everyone's trying to see if they can take down Kawamura-san in his burning mode, no weapons or powers. Losers have to take a sip of Inui-san's drink and those that back out have to drink a cup." Ryoga got himself up and offered a hand. "Wanna take your chances?"

"Nope." Echizen took the hand. "There's no way I'm doing anything that has that as a consequence."

The two of them joined everyone else. Kawamura was currently facing off against Kabaji; Niou, Jackal, and several other troubles were currently passed out across the grounds, no doubt a side effect from Inui's drink. The rest of the day was enjoyable. There was no foul mood and no talk about the next day. Echizen was kind of at a loss though, no matter how much fun everyone seemed to be having he couldn't get rid of the thought of dread in the back of him mind. At dinner, Yukimura made an announcement to try to get plenty of sleep seeing at the next day was going to be exciting and everyone should be at their best. Everyone cheered nonetheless.

When it was finally time to turn in, Echizen was happy to get away from everyone. Having to put up with that mean people at one time was really draining. He laid face down on his cot, letting out a heavy sigh into his pillow.

"Are you trying to suffocate yourself Echizen?" Inui asked.

"Hardly." Echizen muffed tone sounded. "Why is it so difficult to sleep all the time now?"

"You're probably fatigued from the last few weeks. The both of you still aren't fully accustomed to our routine yet. Ryoga-san, you seem in pretty good health though."

"Ah, I was never much of a heavy sleeper." Ryoga replied. "I blame Chibisuke for waking me up when he had bad dreams when we were kids. He would start crying if I didn't wake up and read him I story."

"I won't hesitate to light you on fire." Echizen threatened.

"Ochibi, if you have nightmares you can always wake me up and talk about it." Kikumaru said. Echizen shoved his face deeper into his pillow.

"Inui-san, not to spoil the mood but do you think we can have a rundown of what to expect to happen tomorrow?" Ryoga asked sheepishly.

"Certainly." Inui went to his back and pulled out some documents. "This is the layout of Chargarde's base. There's the building itself, lower level basements, and lowest level labs where they most likely conduct experiments on unwilling subjects. The three groups that are assembled at this camp will be heading out to meet with the other groups, and then we'll commence our attack. We need to get to the labs and destroy the main computers and their equipment. Right now our best bet is to keep all the heavy action on the front lines while a group attempts to sneak in and get it done as quick and with as few casualties as possible. The task is relatively simple enough but it'll always be proven more difficult to see it out, especially with an army opposing us.

"The others should be waiting for us but depending on the situation, they might have already stated the assault. Echizen, you and a group of others will head to the lab to dismantle everything while everyone else stays above ground. There's no doubt there will obstacles to get past and in those times, we try not to kill if it can be helped. Right now everyone will have two radios, one for the overall of every squad and one for each single squad, for general use, along with Kaidou's scouts and Hiroshi's telepathy- though Hiroshi is more of emergency than anything because it puts a tremendous stress on his mind if he has to keep several people linked at once."

"Are you listening Ochibi? This is important." Kikumaru said. Echizen rolled to face them. "Has it been decided who's going with who?"

"Tezuka and Kawamura decided they're going and Ryoga-san is a definite. Smaller groups would be better for sneaking around but in this situation, a larger group would probably be better strategy wise."

"Wouldn't it be better for a small group if we're trying to be discreet?" Echizen finally asked.

"I agree; if we're heading into an enemy base then I would feel more comfortable knowing that there's less of a chance to be found out." Ryoga said.

"All right. I don't think Tezuka would have any problem with it." Inui flipped a few pages. "The base layout is quite simple so the only problems you should encounter are the soldiers and locked doors." He handed Ryoga an internal map. "Both of you should memorize this before tomorrow."

It all seemed too simple; get in, destroy something, get out. Echizen knew it was too good to be true though. No way was anything going to be as simple as it seemed.

They talked a little while more about what was happening the next day before finally deciding it was time to sleep. Echizen couldn't tell if everyone was actually asleep after about an hour of lying awake. They seemed to be tossing every few minutes. Talking about everything seemed to calm his nerves though, even if just a bit. He sort of knew what to expect and what he was up against. What the old man said was still in the back of his mind, nagging at him that if there was a problem, it would be his fault. There was nothing he could really do about it and that was the most annoying feeling.

When morning finally came, everything got packed rather quickly and everyone piled into trucks and headed off. It was at least a few hours' drive from where they had been set up to the base which wasn't too bad considering Kikumaru and Momo kept cracking really bad jokes to keep everyone's spirits up, and the fact Atobe and his squad were in a different truck so Echizen didn't have to put up with the whining.

It didn't exactly feel like they were going off to fight a battle. Everyone seemed rather calm overall but that was probably because they were used to fighting, but Fuji had said before that they hadn't ever attempted to take down a base like this one, mainly just camps that had been set up. Echizen himself seemed to be rather indifferent about the whole thing; maybe he subconsciously suppressed the nervousness frim last night and it got replaced with- strength? No, that wasn't it, but the overall feeling to get the job done and get everything over with was definitely there.

As they were nearing the base, whatever calm feeling that was there left when a surge of power struck one of the trucks, overturning it completely. The other trucks screeched to a halt before they could be struck as well and everyone piled out. Yukimura was yelling for everyone to help the people out of the overturned truck and run for cover.

Echizen could feel the raw power surging through the air. It was nothing compared to Kintarou's power though. He threw up a ball of lightning and diverted another strike so everyone could get everything together and move. A few people were injured from the crash but all in all they were well enough to move. They were able to make it to where Shiraishi and his squad were set up. Looking around, they saw Fudomine and Josei set up a fair distance away.

"It's rude to start a party without the guest of honor." Fuji joked as they joined.

"It's always a game changer to crash your own party." Shiraishi smiled back. "We've got pretty much all the focus on us. The Fudomine and Josei squads have done well in flanking. The scouts in the back say there's virtually no one there so if you want to try your brilliant plan, best to do it now before they figure us out."

"Yosha! The real party starts now!" Momo yelled.

The Rikkaidai and Hyoutei squads spread out amongst the other groups. Tezuka, Kawamura, Ryoga, and Echizen headed to the back along with Kaidou's cat. It all seemed too simple. There was no one at the back, hell the door wasn't even locked to get in.

"This feels like a trap." Echizen said, none too pleased.

"We just have to be one step ahead of them." Kawamura said.

They walked through the base, seeing Kaidou's scouts on the cameras chewing through the wires. They were able to get down to the first level basement before anything seemed to happen. They walked down a long corridor, hopefully leading to stairs or an elevator to go down once more. Before they were able to find the end of it, a wall slammed down, separating Echizen from the rest of them. Before he was able to register what happened, Kaidou's cat let out a yowl and he was hit across the back of the head and knocked out.

It was too simple; he hated simple.

"Echizen's down." Kaidou scowled. "He was able to get to the basement before someone got him. They're probably going to take him down to the lower levels and begin testing. I have no contact."

"Can you get contact?" Fuji more so urged than asked. "Either of you?"

"It'll be hard to find his particular wave length but I'll try." Hiroshi said.

Kaidou nodded. "I have scouts headed in the direction he was in."

The first thing Echizen was aware of when he came to was the incredibly painful sensation in the back of his head; definitely concussion status. He tried to open his eyes but it was like he was looking directly at the sun with how bright it was. When he tried to cover his face he found his arms were chained above his head and then everything seemed to make sense; he'd been captured. He didn't see any of Kaidou's scouts and he couldn't feel Hiroshi in the back of his mind.

He let out a groan and to his surprise got a response.

"Oh dear, sorry about that. The light always seems to be the worst thing about waking up after being brought down here." There was an audible click. "There you go. That should be better. Go ahead and open your eyes now."

Since the person speaking to him told him to, he wanted to resist but in some hopes that Hiroshi would be able to link with him again, he needed to look around and be able to describe what he saw. He slowly blinked open his eyes and began to look around. Standing in front of him was a man in a lab coat; very short light brown hair, glasses too big for his face, all in all a typical doctor look.

"That's much better isn't it?" The man's tone was so sweet it was sickening. "I'm so glad I could finally meet you Echizen-kun. You're the key to advancing the human genome. My name is Doctor Kren. Don't worry; you're in good, safe hands."

Terrifying. That's how Echizen would describe the man in front of him. To think that this man was responsible for the deaths of hundreds of people.

"If I'm in such safe hands, why did you knock me out?" Echizen spat. "And why am I hanging from something?"

"Oh yes, I'm very sorry about having to use force against you. It's just I didn't have my anesthesia with me and I was startled when we ran into each other. And the chains, I'm afraid it's more for my protection than yours. Can't have a repeat of what happened with the last patient." Kren laughed. "I think they're strong enough to even render your abilities useless.

"Ran into each other? You came up from behind me." As expected, the chains were nullified.

"We're going to get nowhere if you hold a grudge." His smile was disgusting. "Now if you don't mind, I'd like to take a blood sample to start out with."

"Don't touch me." Echizen struggled to see how well the chains would hold. Unfortunately it didn't look like he would be getting out without help.

"You don't really have a choice in the matter Echizen-kun. Do us both a favor and just, relax."

"Have you found any sign of him yet?" Oishi yelled over the chaos that was happening.

"My scouts keep hitting a barrier of some sort when they try to get to the lower levels." Kaidou answered. "I don't know if it's from a machine or someone but it needs to be taken down. What about you Hiroshi-san?"

Hiroshi's brow furled. "I keep getting very slight glimpses of things but I can't piece anything together. I don't know if it from the barrier or something bad is happening to the kid."

"I know how to fix everything." Fuji took out his radio. "Shirashi-san, I think it's best if we use that trump card of yours."

There was static on the radio for a second before Shirashi could answer. "I thought we agreed not to unless the situation was dire. We have the upper hand right now and friend and foe alike will most likely get caught up in it."

"Echizen's in trouble and we can't get in contact with him because of some sort of barrier. We need something that would bring that barrier down and right now Kintarou is the only one with the energy to take on something this big and still be able to put up a fight afterword."

"Three minutes." Fuji could hear Kintarou in the background. "You have three minutes to get friendlies out of there."

Fuji tossed the radio and picked up the ones just meant for their squad. "Momo, Eiji, I take it you heard all that right?"

"Ah/Yes." They answered.

"You two need to get our troops out of harm's way as best you can when you see things starting to happen."

"Can do Fuji-san."

"You can count on me."

"Tezuka, be ready."

Tezuka didn't respond to Fuji's radio call. He had all the information that was needed. Plus right now they had to focus on how to get to Echizen.

"This place is like a maze. How difficult should it be to find another damn door to the labs?" Ryoga was literally steaming. After being separated, he went into a sort of panic, trying whatever he could to somehow get that door down but ultimately had to give up and head back from where they came in hopes of finding another way down.

"Ryoga-san I understand your concern but getting angry won't make it any better." Kawamura said in hopes of trying to calm him. "We'll find Echizen."

"I know it's just- frustrating."

"Thinking back to when the door first separated us; didn't it feel like the ground was moving?" Tezuka asked, to which the other two nodded. "If we retrace our path, we should come to a wall in the middle of a corridor." They agreed and started walking back, taking every turn and going through every hallway until they were separated from Echizen. When they had taken a final turn and expected to see a wall in front of them, they were met with a brand new corridor.

"You're thinking the building changed?" Kawamura asked.

"Not the building itself, the layout of this floor. It's almost as if it could be a giant elevator."

"Wouldn't we feel it if it were moving though?"

"Not unless we had some sort of spell we couldn't detect cast on us." Ryoga understood Tezuka's thought. "So we need to hit the power switch to-" The whole building began to shake and the lights in the room they were in seemed to burst. "Speak of the devil."

"That must be Kintarou." Kawamura said.

"Let's get out of here." Tezuka said as he looked to the ceiling.

Maybe it was hell, most likely not but Echizen was certain he was close to knowing how hell felt. His whole body felt like it was on fire and his torso was covered in scores from Kren getting blood samples, when in reality he was really just slicing him with a scalpel and none too gently scraping the blood off. The burning feeling might have been his body trying to fight back but as long as he had those shackles around his wrists, he couldn't do anything.

"Hmm, I don't understand." Kren said while swirling a test tube of Echizen's blood. "Echizen-kun, would you explain to me why I cannot see you're gene?!" He threw the tube to floor in a rage. "You're the one I've prepared this for. You're the one it should absolutely work on and yet you-you, it's like you don't even have an M-Gene!"

"Wouldn't that be preferable right now." Echizen smirked.

"What did you do?" Kren was fuming.

"Maybe I'm just a really good liar." That remark earned him a slap. Maybe this was what Ava was talking about when she injected him with something, a substance to physically make the gene invisible.

"I don't have enough blood. That must be it. I just need more blood. Maybe deeper this time for the fresher stuff."

"You're crazy."

He grabbed the scalpel once more. "You call it crazy when in reality, its brilliance."

Echizen desperately tried to break his bindings and fight back but his struggling only made the man in front of him laugh. Before he was able to make contact with Echizen's skin however, there was a loud rumble and all the lights in the room went out. Kren lost his focus and ran to the computers to see if they still worked.

Echizen immediately felt a tug in the back of his mind and knew it was Hiroshi trying to contact him. He quickly sent him a mental image of the room and an overview of what was supposedly happening and what his condition was. Hiroshi informed people were on their way to get him out and Kaidou's scouts would be there momentarily to help him in any way they could. That was all that could be said before Kren regained his composure and returned his attention to Echizen.

"Well, it looks like we're going to have to speed everything up if we want any of this to be a success." His smile was terrifying. He went to a desk and pulled out a pistol. "Now normally I would love to take my time in trying to- further explore and figure out the secrets you held but some are not as open to my methods as others."

"No one would be open to torture." Echizen was subtly eying one of the top corners in the room, seeing small, green mice enter from a crack and run down a pole.

"I do wish there was some way I could find the source of your cocky attitude. I feel like we could've gone far together."

He smirked and shook his head. "Not a chance." The mice had grouped together and formed a very real looking tiger.

Kren turned to see what he was looking at and let out the least masculine scream anyone could imagine and turned his gun to it. "T-This i-isn't real. It's just a trick. Just a trick."

"But can you defeat this little trick in time to save your life?"

This time, Kren was the one to smirk. "The real question is, can it be quick enough to save yours?"

The door to the lab burst open revealing Ryoga, Tezuka, and Kawamura. "Chibisuke!"

"Too late." He fired the gun but oddly enough, it didn't hit Echizen because he was no longer there. The chains were swaying and the bullet had embedded itself in the wall. The room was silent, everyone wondering what happened and where Echizen had gone. "What did you do?" Kren turned the gun to the three at the door.

A banging noise came from one of the computers and drew everyone's attention. A panel on the side flew off in a blaze of flames and Echizen more or less fell out the side of it.

Kren started laughing hysterically. "I can't believe it. You're even capable of transfiguration. I was prepared for a lot of things but not this- not this at all. It's a shame really; the information on that computer was irreplaceable. I guess it can't be helped." He aimed his gun and fired at Echizen again but this time a wall of ice blocked his shot.

"Don't think you can get him that easily." Ryoga said with a smirk. Kren raised the gun to Ryoga but wasn't able to fire because his hand had been frozen. "Tezuka-san, I believe I've apprehended the ring leader in all of this."

Tezuka nodded. "Doctor Kren, from this day forward you will be under Cardinal Jurisdiction. For your own safety I suggest you come quietly."

"How dare you!" He started to bang his hand on a table trying to break the ice. "I am a professional scientist! I refuse to be treated like this!"

Tezuka merely shook his head and handed Kawamura his gloves. "Try to make sure you don't break his jaw."

Kawamura slipped his gloves on. "WOAH. DON'T WORRY. I WILL TREAT HIM AS FAIRLY AS HE TREATED ECHIZEN."

"W-Wait-"

"I'll take a look at the remaining computers." Tezuka said as he gestured for Ryoga to take care of his brother, both of them ignoring Kren's screams in the background.

"How you doing Chibisuke?" Ryoga asked as he knelt beside his brother, attempting to help him up.

"Just as well as anyone would be doing if they had been cut open and beaten." He winced. "They're not that deep but hurt like hell. What happened to you guys after we got separated?"

Ryoga got gaze from one of their packs and began dressing this wounds. "Don't really know; it was like we were stuck in a loop somehow in one part of the building. As it would've turned out, we were a floor below you in a maze or something. We were able to break through the ceiling and found our way back to where we were first separated. Did he do anything else besides this?"

Echizen shook his head and regretted it. "Not really but you shouldn't listen to the guy who probably has a concussion."

"Yeah, he definitely concussed you. There's no way you would tell someone to not listen to you."

"We'll have Oishi properly look you over when we're out." Tezuka said. "It appears that the computer Echizen- dismantled- was the main one. The others all have fragments of data and codes that most likely went to main files."

"You don't think that they would've made copies of anything?"

"If they did, it's probably all lost because of Kintarou's attack. It looked like he shorted out the entire base but down here, the computers at least were on a different system or generators at least. Echizen do you think you're able to short them out?"

"Not as you w-would have me do it but I can try." Echizen winced as Ryoga helped him stand. The walked over to one of the other computers and Echizen attempted to send a jolt of electricity through it but he ended up forming into pure energy and smashing himself into the wall. He held his stomach and head. "Maybe not."

They were both surprised because they were actually able to glimpse him transform. Ryoga ran over to help him up. "Aren't there other electricity users here Tezuka-san?"

"None besides Kintarou. Normally they become something simple like an engineer or technician. We don't necessarily have to short everything out; it just needs to be inoperable." Tezuka put his hand on his chin. "Kaidou, get some people down here. We have wounded that need taking care of."

He was, of course, talking towards the tiger that was in the corner of the room. "Roger. We've just about cleared things up out here."

"Good. We'll be out shortly."

"ALL RIGHT. LET'S GO CELEBRATE." Kawamura was standing over Kren's bloody and most certainly broken body.

Tezuka couldn't help but face palm. "Pick him up and let's get out of here." He gestured to the body at his feet.

"Okay come on Chibisuke." Ryoga carefully helped his brother up once more and held his waist to help him walk. "Do you even know how you were able to do that?"

"Don't make me think." Echizen held his head in his hands. "Is this what it feels like to be Momo-san, where actually thinking really hurts your head?"

"All right you're not that bad if you can still poke fun at people."

The four of them, plus a very unconscious Kren, made it outside. They went to where Oishi was and handed Echizen off to him to fully get checked out and see how bad everything really was. Tezuka explained everything that happened to Yukimura who was the only other squad leader at that location and what to expect if he wanted to send in his squad or do a bit of exploring.

Kren was put with the other people that had been captured; a few other scientists but mainly soldiers.

Oishi was panicking over the sight of Echizen's bruising face and pink tinted gaze. Ryoga gave him a more detailed explanation of what his brother told him but that didn't calm Oishi down at all. It only made him yell at everyone who was being loud because Echizen had a concussion and loud noises would make it worse.

Echizen smiled from his cot. Everyone was covered in scratches and dirt but all smiling and laughing. They had finished what the set out to do and taken out one of the main headquarters of the enemy. He looked up to the cloudy sky and felt a few drops on his face. The rain had finally started to fall.

Tezuka reached for his radio. "Seigaku Special Forces Leader Tezuka reporting."

They was static the Ryuzaki's voice came through. "Tezuka, I little longer I would have started to worry. I take it everything went accordingly?"

"THE WINNER IS ME! THE WINNER IS US!" Kawamura kept shouting over and over in the background.

"We beat their asses Ryuzaki-sama! This base is ours!" Momo yelled into the radio from over Tezuka's shoulder. "You should've seen it!"

"Nothing we couldn't handle!"

"I can't believe it!"

"I take it all that cheering as an answer to my question. Ryoma, are you there?" Ryuzaki asked over the radio.

"Yes I'm here." He answered in a strained tone.

"I don't know if it's your gut feeling or the pure dumb luck you inherited from your father but," Everyone could practically hear her smiling on the other end, "the flash drive you sent back not only had the schematics of the base you all just took down but the schematics and coordinates of every other Chargarde Headquarters in the world. Everyone's ecstatic and rushing to make copies of every bit of data that was on it and getting ready to send it to our other branches."

"You're joking right? That was the extra he was talking about?"

"Do you really believe I would joke about something like this? All of you hurry up and come back so we can celebrate." The radio went silent but that didn't seem to matter with the group of people shouting and cheering.

Tezuka smiled. "You heard her! Everyone get this mess cleaned up so we can be on our way!"

"Hear that Chibisuke? Looks like we get to eat Nanako's cooking again." Ryoga stupidly smiled.

The cheering got louder, added by the small booms of thunder, as everyone rallied together. Echizen never really cared for large groups, thinking they were too bombastic and unneeded but throughout the weeks he spent with everyone, through happiness and pain, he figured it was something he might be able to get used to.

Whooooooo that was a ride wasn't it? I hope everyone enjoyed reading as much as I had fun writing.

Oh my god I'm so sorry for the long wait. It's been a busy few months for me; my sister came home from her four year stay in Japan and I've been hanging out and playing video games with her and it really left me drained so I didn't really have any time to think about this. And my internet has been spotty so I've had to worry about that. Also I'm officially Pokemon GO trash so that was also a thing. But all you awesome people who waited for this chapter, you're amazing.

I don't know if I'm going to do another story after this one, I mean not immediately. I'm working on a completely different story that I might be able to work with but eeeeh I'm not too sure right now.

Please forgive spelling and grammar and bad puns and angst and stupidness and corniness and lateness, oh my god lateness and oh my god I'm sorry.

Thank you everyone for sticking with me though this whole thing. I love you.

Hope ya enjoyed it. See ya next time!