Disclaimer: Inuyasha and co. are not my property. The storyline, however,
is.
The Alpha and Omega:
Chapter One- The Start Program
"As far as my organization is concerned, the legal implanting of R-chips in men is completely immoral, and needs to be- Justice, I demand order to speak!" The woman pounded her fist vehemently, shaking the podium with her fervor. Papers fluttered down wildly, unnoticed in her incensed tirade, her face lined with stern frown lines, making her already chiseled features more intimidating. The wrath oozing from her body language had no effect on the audience on its feet with rage, waving their arms and yelling more than opposition- Boushu heard threats to her family and children screamed by red-faced women.
They were all women. All of them. 'All who count in this room, at least', Boushu seethed silently, noticing those still calm who sat dumbly in their seats, most with dull frontal stares. They made up the men of the world. 'What men in our society have been reduced to,' Boushu corrected herself, taking her own seat with a sigh, and watched the orderlies force the women down and away from Boushu herself. Boushu had no pretty ideas of what just one of these women would do to her if they managed to actually put their hands on even an inch of her skin. She wished the board that set this conference up had been thoughtful enough to ensconce the auditor area with a defense shield to remove such a threat. Boushu remembered the women's faces as they appraised her request, each one filled with disgust, disbelief or a mix of both. How many women like Boushu existed in the world anymore? Sometimes it felt that she was the only one. Who else would petition for the things she did? Who else had (Boushu scoffed at the term) the balls to fight a globe of women for the right of men?
Who else wanted their return?
Examining her polished nails and only half extending her attention beyond her thoughts, her eye caught bemusedly on a holoscreen hanging from the ceiling. A technician, she saw, had chosen to project the Dead Zones during her presentation. A chuckle rose in her throat. The crowd's fury was explained. Even she found it difficult to watch the torched landscapes without bile rising in her belly. And yet... and yet, she came to things like these, Boushu thought bemusedly, and spoke the words she did.
It all fell on ears as mute to her opinions as those that lay in the Zones.
Enough was enough. The crowd was unwieldy, refusing to cooperate with the authorities; in fact, Boushu could see it would only be a few minutes more before the women overwhelmed the line of officers and a riot broke out completely. Boushu got to her feet, motioning with one hand to her bodyguard to prepare herself for a quick escape, and approached the podium once more.
"You who run this unbalanced society have heard my words too many times to count, and yet, what is truly heard? How many of you will go home tonight and think of the slave who serves you dinner as your zuri?" She used the word for biological male progeny purposefully, ignoring the gasps of shock from the blasphemy. "How many of you," she pressed on, slamming her hand against the straining wood, "will see the man you claim as husband, and see nothing but dead eyes and rape? Who here will end the blame game for the war that lays on both shoulders of the sexes- a game that has taken itself too far, despite all that you people say about statistics and casualties? We came into this universe as two- one man, one woman. How will we end it? With the slow death of a race of bitter women, their men gradually replaced with these robot men we've created, excusing their existence by saying they are less dangerous, despite the level of youkai crime rates? And however much we try to deny it, birth rates are dropping, by hundreds of thousands 'each year'!" She paused to breath, forgetting in her tirade her own biological necessities. "Men can no longer be denied, can no longer be pacified and 'enslaved'! Woman was not brought into this world alone. She has her counterpart, and that... must be man, not some fake reproduction youkai. If you do not end it soon...blood," she intoned slowly, "will end it for you." Her ultimatum issued- the single reason for the conference- Boushu stepped down, and walked off the stage into the circle of bodyguards that roughly shoved her between them, just as the crowd broke across the police line, and rushed toward her.
***
"Please, please! Oh, god! It's coming this way again, I can hear it! I can 'hear' it! Oh god! HELP ME!!"
Kagome whirled around, throwing the headphones off her ears as the line went dead, bounding out of her seat with enough force to tip it over. "Shit! Tanni, we lost the line!"
A head popped up two cubicles away, Tanni's face locked in a chiseled state of concentration. "We got the coordinates."
"Where?"
"East Side, south," Tanni said, her voice clipped with urgency.
"Right." Kagome nodded, blue eyes narrow slits. "Get it downloaded, print it out, and send it to YD."
The other woman's eyebrows darted up in surprise. "Youkai department?"
Kagome wasted no more time with the woman. "Suri! Where the hell are you?"
"Right here boss!" Another head popped up, like a mushroom in a creek bed, although this one dyed her hair a vivid shade of red every two weeks. They matched the contacts she liked to wear. "We've got an identity match!" She called, waving papers in the air that looked like they had a face printed on them.
Kagome huffed impatiently, striding briskly out of her office and snatching the documents Tanni held out for her. Flipping through them with a trained eye, Kagome saw she was dealing with an apartment building complex. Suri met both women, darting looks at Tanni in between trying to see the papers her boss leafed through. "Well?" Kagome barked suddenly, glaring at Suri.
The woman jumped guiltily, throwing her a hurt look before saying rapidly, "Oniya Surawitz. A Russ-Asian. Forty-seven years of age. Ownership of one youkai-" Kagome threw Tanni a withering look- "Model XA- 76651b." Suri blinked, "That's a really cheap model, Major. And I think it was up for recall just two weeks ago."
A snarl broke out across the woman's lips. "I don't care what you think! I want the goddamned facts, and I want them now!"
Suri bowed her neck, shamed. Kagome felt her own neck heat with an embarrassed blush, before she shook her head violently, the anger in her eyes returning. 'I don't care how much of a bitch I am right now. These girls don't understand the meaning of a life-or-death situation', Kagome thought silently.
"I'm very sorry, Major Higurashi. I'll get back to the facts," she cleared her throat noisily. "She lives in a Class D apartment, on the East Side, alone except for the slave." Suddenly she pressed her finger against her ear and cocked her head like she could hear something. "I'm just getting in- our girls made a few calls- the woman's a recluse, but the neighbors hear strange things in the walls. They suspect tampering with the youkai."
Tanni exhaled, all the color in her face draining out like spilled ink. "Tampering?"
Kagome dismissed Tanni's anxiety with a gesture. "Happens all the time. It's a psychological thing, Private. Slaves can't feel emotions and when things become more than just Master and slave... get my drift?"
Finely penciled eyebrows jolted upward as Tanni's brain followed Kagome's train of thought. "You mean..." Her stomach gave a nauseating lurch. "That's disgusting."
Kagome ignored her. Newbie, she thought scornfully. "Here, take this, Suri," she said, shoving the maps at the startled woman. "Transfer all the information to the YD and get a team on the move. We've lost far too much time as it is. I'll make a call to Major Hiraikotsu personally." Kagome strode off, leaving the women standing in the middle of the bustling Emergency Department staring at each other. Kagome gave them five seconds before she bellowed over her shoulder, "Move your asses now, Privates," and left the room, tapping at her bracelet the while.
She allowed a smug smile to curve on her lips as she fiddled with the gadget on her wrist- a communicator complete with MainFrame connection, holophone, and more than Kagome knew how to work yet. The latest thing on the market, Kagome had personally requested the equipping of one for each member of the force and coincidentally, officers were more efficient and organized when they were in almost constant communication. 'And I earned major kudos with the boss,' she thought happily. Right now she needed Hiraikotsu, though, and the call was not going through.
"No, no, no! Who is this? You're not Sango's normal secretary," Kagome accused, looking at the unfamiliar face with suspicion. "Where the hell is the woman?"
"Ma'am, I don't like the way you're talking about the police officers. If you don't change your attitude, I'm afraid I'll have to transfer you to my superiors!" She woman snapped prissily, her curly white locks bouncing as she spoke.
"Fucking hell, that's what I want- oh you bitch!" Kagome cursed as the woman closed the line with a glare. Frustrated, Kagome pounded in a new code, one that linked directly with Sango. "Please have your bracelet on today, please have your bracel- Thank the gods, Sango!"
Her friend's face materialized on the floating screen, frowning with consternation, but an otherwise a soft gleam in her eye as she saw her friend on the other line. "Who the hell is- ohh, Kagome. How're things, babe?"
"Okay. Busy busy. I'm en route to the Trans Station."
Sango popped a piece of gum in her mouth as she nodded distractedly; Kagome heard clicking from the other end of the line and bet Sango was on her computer. "Yeah," Sango said eventually, "I see you've sent one of my teams out."
Kagome nodded tersely, "We suspect tampering."
Sango lifted an eyebrow, "I see. We'll, I'm just glad I transferred out of the damned department. I hate those horrible calls."
"It's just business," Kagome shrugged, darting around a group of slow movers in the hall.
Sango turned her whole face toward the screen and propped her head on an elbow. "So, babe, what is it you want?"
As if expecting opposition, Kagome quickly said, "Permission to join that team."
Scarlet red lipsticked lips pursed at the request, knitting together Sango's eyebrows, "What for? It's not your department. Oh wait," Sango started, rolling her eyes to the ceiling, "Please tell me it's none of that 'I have a feeling about this' bullshit now!"
Unexpectedly, Kagome's face took on a pleading turn, "Come on Sango, you know I'm always right about that stuff. I think this is gonna be a big one!"
"You don't even like fucking youkai! That's why you switched the hell out of this god-forsaken place!"
Jutting her upper lip out, Kagome whined like a ten-year-old trying to convince her mommy to buy a toy. "Please Sango, I beg you! As a personal favor. If I'm not right about this one, then..." She searched desperately, "...I'll buy you a pound of chocolates!" Her blue eyes gleamed devilishly, aware of the one thing that would make Sango do practically whatever she asked.
Sango jerked as if struck. Glancing warily about her office, her mellifluous voice dropped to a conspiratorial whisper, "An entire pound?"
The grin breaking across Kagome's face was ferocious, "A whole pound."
"You swear?"
Her right hand pressed against her chest, Kagome said, "I swear it on my life!"
Sango's eyes narrowed, "Then you better fucking come back alive," she turned around, and Kagome heard busy clicking. When Sango's face reappeared, her lips were curved up a fraction. "Alright. It's done, you goddamned sneak. Now get the hell out there before my boss gets in here to snap my neck on paperwork." The screen flickered out of life, leaving Kagome standing alone in front of the elevators.
"Damnit, can these things take any 'longer'?" she hissed through clenched teeth. She rubbed the twitching muscles, forcing them to relax like her doctor had said, but couldn't help her foot, which suddenly started tapping. "Forget it!" she groaned, and opened the stairwell door.
Sprinting down the stairs was dangerous activity done only in emergencies, and for good reason, Kagome realized. The steps hadn't been renovated since the Before War era and crumbled a bit with each pounding step she took. Even the rail was made of corrupted iron- a metal not used in a century- and she knew she would be safer falling than trying to get a hold on the perilous rail.
"Oh shit!" she cried out, cement scrabbling loose under her heavy boots. Her hands flailed uselessly in their air as she fell backwards, her butt hitting the steps with a shudder to the whole structure. Oh gods, it's going to collapse completely! Fear overwhelmed her senses as she slid, bumping painfully on each step until she collided with one of the flat platforms on each door level. The shivering continued, loose pieces of the stairwell breaking apart and jumping into Kagome's face and eyes. With a cry, she batted the debris away, crawling backwards.
Her back hit the wall with a shocking thud, jarring Kagome's cerulean eyes open - in time to watch in horror as the railing she was so afraid of even touching moments ago collapse, leaning backward in slow motion, and disappearing down the atrium. Silence thundered pregnantly, marred by Kagome's fingers frantically searching for the knob on the door next to her.
Then the railing hit the bottom floor with explosive loudness, and the well burst into shuddering chaos.
The floor beneath her feet wrenched apart from the walls just as Kagome fumbled the door open and heaved herself through, landing sprawled on the carpeted floor of whatever department she had ended up in.
'Ohgodsohgodsohgodsohgods'. Rational thinking was so far out of reach it was all Kagome could do to breath and lie there, sucking in panting breaths like a drowning woman. 'I could have died, I could have died, that would have been it. Icouldhavedied!'
"Holy fucking hell," she whispered brokenly, the burning tingle in her body spreading up hot and wet in her eyes.
"Excuse me, ma'am. Are you in need of assistance?" A mechanical monotone said from above her.
'Oh shit.'
***
She was twelve. It wasn't rainy, or dark, or even cloudy like most horror stories she had read in her library books were- and she liked horror. The stories were the only ones that could spark her imagination- all the 'how's and 'why's, and using her brain to figure out the antagonist's pathos. Those were the only tales that could spark shivers at noon on summer.
But right now it was fast approaching sunset, the kind she always liked to watch with Saniya, where the whole sky was lit by fire and candy pinks. Fall air came early, saving itself for nights when the sun couldn't banish the cold brisk. Mother was inside, just beginning dinner- spaghetti, a strange summer food- and Saniya... Saniya was right where she'd left her: gazing in awe at the mechanical monstrosity sitting dead in the living room.
Mother had adopted Saniya two years ago. She was a War orphan. She needed a home with extra love and money to nurture her. Especially the second, because the radiation sickness still gripped her regularly and her handicap required "special consideration" as the Welfare woman had put it. It had taken almost a year before Kagome accepted Saniya as her little sister, or even looked into that scarred face, missing its left eye and half a nose. Saniya couldn't go to school. Saniya was a living reminder of Men. And that, Kagome knew...was bad.
At twelve she was past that, and Saniya was adorable in a way that wasn't physical. But Mother was alone in trying to raise them, and she needed help. .
***
Kagome had her pistol out of its holster and pointed into the youkai's face before blinking, before even realizing what she was doing. "What the fuck do you want?" she spat, levering herself onto her knees. The harsh pain that lanced up her thigh told her the fall had probably injured them, but at the moment she focused on nothing but the bright green eyes staring at
her dully.
"Where the fuck do you belong, huh? You piece of fucking youkai trash!" Her voice quavered with strain, sounding unnatural as it came from her throat. The finger hovering above the trigger twitched a millimeter to press on the strand of metal that stood between her and turning the youkai into a junk pile. "Answer me!" she shouted at it, feeling her stomach twist nauseously as the too-perfect head cocked to the side as it processed her words.
Somewhere deep inside her brain murmured, 'It's a harmless youkai. Probably a personal processor.'
Her lips bared back in snarl she wasn't even aware of. "No youkai is harmless," she whispered, and pulled the trigger.
"NO, STOP!"
Out of reflex, Kagome swerved her arm away and the bullet punched a whole in an elevator instead of the youkai's genteelly smiling face. "I'm afraid the word 'fuck' does not appear in my dictionary," it said pleasantly, and walked off.
"Oh thank GOD!" A woman cried, embracing the youkai heartily. "I thought you were a goner, love," she cooed to it, making soothing motions and petting the soft blonde hair cascading down its naked back more perfectly than any human's could. "Now, go see Doctor Kurima, she will have to wipe this out of your poor databanks," she turned as it set off dumbly down the corridor, and murmured, more to herself, "Poor thing."
Kagome flopped onto her back in surrender, staring up at the bland white ceiling, wishing she could turn time back to this morning so she could call in sick and not come back for a week. Or for ever. "Today is so shitty," she said to the plaster, scrubbing at her eyes and slamming the gun back in its place on her hip.
"Your day is shitty?" A very angry voice growled, "Your day is shitty? How would you like to see the work of ten years blown to pieces in a split second?"
'Ah...I hate the Research Department'. "It's not blown up, for gods' sake. I didn't shoot it."
Undaunted, the voice rumbled on, "He was my most special project. He was going to be the next thing since these nifty bracelets, and save police women's lives the world over!"
Kagome ignored the backhanded compliment and bounded up, suddenly strengthened by the anger and adrenaline surging left over in her blood. Her attacker was old and plump, with a bulging stomach; but her eyes were sharp and beady black pearls in the wrinkles of her face. "Stop talking in the past tense, you old hag! The goddamned monster is still working!" Actually, her one eye was beady and sharp. The other was covered by bandages that wrapped around her head, pasting to her skull the little bit of thin hair she had left. That's strange, Kagome noted. Surgery could fix anything these days- from aging to replacing lost limbs and organs. An eye should be a simple procedure.
"Don't you take that tone with your elders, miss! I'll have you written up so fast it'll make your hair spin! Major Higurashi or not!" The old woman hissed, waddling toward her aggressively. Kagome's mouth shut with a snap.
"You know me?" she asked.
The hag's countenance turned suddenly mysterious. "I know many things," she said, and bent double.
A shocking pain gripped Kagome from her knees, and she tilted forward, bracing her weight on the old lady's shoulders. "What the hell are you doing?" she gasped out, but not before the sensation faded, leaving her with the feel of a spray moving quickly across her knees. "What the hell was that?" she gaped when the woman straightened up, brandishing a tiny cord attached to what appeared to be a perfume bag.
The woman grunted, "Just ready for use. Heals scrapes and cuts- nothing too serious. But it can be helpful to the cop in need." It disappeared into a voluminous pocket of many on the white lab coat. "Also quickens the recovery of deeper injuries," she waggled a finger in the air and wobbled off in the direction the youkai had disappeared in. "But it must be topical! Nothing internal. No, no. Nothing internal." She fixed the younger woman with a piercing glare. Kagome swallowed convulsively, feeling as though the hag's one eye was seeing more than any two eyes ever had.
Halfway down the hall, the woman croaked out, "What the hell are you doing standing there like a frog waiting for flies? Get over here, girl!" Kagome hustled so quickly to her side she found herself blushing in embarrassment.
"Don't you dare order me around!" Kagome gritted, silently surprised to find the pain in her knees gone, although she would need new pants before next week. "And how do you know who I am? I think I'd remember if I met you," she added, the distasteful twist at the end telling the researcher exactly what Kagome thought of her.
"Oh shut up, Kagome Higurashi!" she snapped peevishly. "I'm old and tired of your nonsense. How do I know you? How do I know who Kagome Higurashi is? How many people in this entire police department possess the hatred and cruelty towards youkai like you do?"
Blood drained out of Kagome's face like water out of a bullet-riddled glass. "Excuse me?" she said, choking.
"What?" the woman crowed, "You thought it was some little secret that all youkai in your department are treated with enormous hostility? And that while every other branch of Tokyo province has assimilated youkai somehow, you are the only branch that hasn't?" She shook her head slowly, "Such things do not go unnoticed, Kagome. Especially," she smirked at her, "by the Lab, when we so often provide the youkai used."
Leaving Kagome stunned and groping for something to retort, they reached two heavy doors, a web of blue electricity crackling protectively across them. "Although I am the Chief of the Research Department, I'm sure you've never heard of me. You can call me Kaede," she said, punching a code into a screen next to the doors. "And this," she waved broadly at the gradually appearing laboratory, "is the lab."
***
All manner of mechanical creatures existed in the lab, being created or tested on or imagined. Kagome looked around with two minds, one disgusted to the point of sickness, and the other full of wonder at the top-line work going on here. The latter twisted her head in every direction, trying to follow the movement of each machine, and logic their business; the former twisted her stomach into a roiling mess. 'Laboratory' seemed too tame a word for the place, but 'factory' was too pale. Everywhere, things were happening at a pace impossible to quite keep up with.
On a rapid conveyor belt, youkai heads were rolled along and picked up to be screwed on skeletal bodies of bare metal and wire. Smart-looking women with narrow eyes observed the process and darted forward, plucking weird tools from their pockets and cranking or adjusting a number of knobs and wires all over the bodies. Another belt churned out small cords like the one Kaede had used on her knees, while yet another produced unfamiliar guns.
"Ah," Kaede said, spotting the direction of Kagome's eyes. "Those are new, like this little bugger," she flashed the healing cord at Kagome before stalking to the guns and pulling one off the line, and earning them a glare from a spectacled lab-girl. "They use lasers, you see. Finally," Kaede sighed, "we have produced something of fantasy, less crude than that bullet-launcher you wear," she shot the gun on the other woman's hip a look. "It's more accurate too. Would you like one?" Kaede pushed it into Kagome's hands and waddled off before Kagome could refuse.
"Uh," her eyes caught the unfriendly stare of the lab-girl, still glaring at her. "Can I?" Kagome asked sheepishly. The girl sighed and shouted back over the din, "Take the damn thing! She's the fucking boss, woman!"
"I heard that, Sandy," Kaede snipped, returning from wherever she had gone. She had a whole array of foreign devices crushed to her ample chest. "You will get these things sooner or later anyway, dear. You might as well take them," she said, dumping to load into Kagome's arms.
Kagome wailed from beneath her pile, "I don't even know what these things do!" She juggled the junk, keeping most of it from spilling on the floor, but a slippery piece of wire attached to what looked like an ear escaped her fingers. Then it all tumbled down. "Oh hell!" she cursed, irritated by her own clumsiness. Kaede put a hand on her shoulder as she bent down, clucking like a mother hen, "No no, dear, don't bother with that. I'll just get our favorite boy to help out. Sani! Come over here and pick this mess up, will you?" Kagome jerked away from her touch like it was electric.
"What did you say?" she said, a wild look on her face.
Kaede frowned at her. "Oh, I know you don't like youkai, but Sani has his uses."
'Sani?!?'
A green-eyed youkai approached them, naked except for its long blonde hair. Kagome exhaled hard. Kaede looked at her sharply, "Who did you expect, girl?"
"You named the youkai Sani." It was ridiculous. Kagome was overreacting. The youkai was picking up the things into its well-muscled arms, skin as white as milk.
Kaede shrugged, "Yes, well, we all liked the name Saniya, but that's only for a female you know. And there are, of course, no female youkai," Kaede scoffed at the thought.
'Saniya. Saniya! SANIYA! MOTHER!'
Kagome didn't realizing she was stepping backwards until she collided with a conveyor belt, sending a youkai head flying into the air. Shouts of outrage and anger raged with the noisy machinery. "Girl, what are you doing!" Kaede shouted as Kagome broke into a run.
"I have to go! I have to go," Kagome expelled, running at the doors and pounding at them when they wouldn't open fast enough. She bolted through them as they allowed a sliver enough to let her through. Saniya, Saniya! The name kept running through her head, over and over. Kagome reached the elevators, and thumbed the button, wanting to cry with relief when a light 'dinged' agreeably.
"Girl, you forgot your things!" Kaede waddled into view, the youkai Sani marching behind her. His dead green eyes turned with a whirring snap toward her.
"I have to go!" Kagome cried as the doors slid shut. "And the stairs are out!" she added as an afterthought, realizing irrationally the need to tell someone.
Kaede's creased face was replaced with steel and the eerie reflected image of her own. 'Saniya, Saniya,' her mind mourned.
***
Kagome stared up at the pale face with twelve-year old eyes. It seemed dead to her. Dead was familiar, but had never been so close.
"Sani," she said after a while, "what is this?'
"Momma brought this home," the scarred face replied. Saniya used "Momma" the second she was brought to the Higurashi household, and no one told her different.
Kagome poked the thing in the cheek, and felt cold flesh. It was disturbing. "What is it?"
"A new thing."
"Uh huh?"
"'A youkai'."
***
Thankfully the elevator was empty, and Kagome slid down the opposite wall, clutching her knees to her chest. She couldn't stabilize her breath; it was like the asthma she had had when she was five, and found that oxygen was something everyone else could breathe. Although the surgeons had used their clever knives to fix that problem forever, she wondered if they could get into her mind and fix the other one too.
The elevator settled on a floor just as Kagome jumped up, knuckling her eyes and brushing her hair back into place expertly. 'Nothing is wrong', she told the world silently. 'Everyone will see that nothing is wrong'. Cops and formally dressed secretaries jumbled for space, barely giving the woman a glance. The woman closest to the buttons said, "Floors?" earning half-shouted responses.
"And you, honey?" Kagome saw the woman was looking at her.
"Uhh," she stalled, looking around. Her bracelet blinking at her brought a flash of lightning to her brain. "Holy shit!" Kagome said and a couple eyebrows knitted together at her language, "Holy shit. I need to go to Transportation, and right now!"
A curt bark left the woman, "Well," she said, punching in the button, "I think you'll get there just as fast as this elevator can take you, hon." Quiet laughter fueled red in Kagome's cheeks. 'Hell, you don't need to be a prick about it. Oh shit, I can't believe I forgot about the mission! Sango's gonna flambé my ass!'
Someone jabbed an elbow in her ribs, "Hey, hon, doesn't that mean a call for you?" She pointed at the flashing bracelet.
"I still haven't gotten those goddamned things figured out," put in a prissy secretary with the nametag Sara Miyu.
Another woman- butch haircut- nodded enthusiastically, "Yeah! I thought it was so much better before. At least I knew what the hell I was doing!"
'I don't believe these people!' Kagome fumed, setting her mouth in a compressed line. "Well, hon," the first girl said, "Aren't you gonna take that call?"
Kagome frowned at her, "I'll wait till I have a little more privacy, I think." The woman lifted her eyebrows slightly. "Right," she agreed, then turned her back to Kagome. Kagome fought the instinct to stick her tongue out at the woman.
"This is Transportation, miss!" the woman upfront called. Kagome shoved her way out obediently, wondering if the extra force was really necessary.
Trans Department was as chaotic as usual, coppers and miscellaneous women running every direction; this was the one place Kagome had never worked, and thanked the gods everyday for it. "Okay, Sango, please don't kill me," Kagome began, tapping the holoscreen up.
"Kagome? Oh thank gods!" Sango sounded seriously distressed. When she came into the picture, Kagome was surprised to see her friend's hair in disarray, and her lipstick fading.
"Sango? What's the matter?" Kagome said, worried.
"Oh this morning is completely fucked up!" the woman said, mashing her face in her hands. Kagome felt a prick of resentment. "I can't get a hold of the team- they've completely disappeared- it's been twenty minutes already since they breached, I don't have a fucking clue what's going on-"
"Wait, Sango, you can't make contact with the team? Twenty minutes?" Kagome repeated, feeling disembodied, as though the conversation was happening to anyone but her.
"Kagome, where are you?"
"I'm in Trans," -Sango groaned on the other end- "I got held up..." 'The understatement of the year.'
Sango squeezed her eyes closed, rubbing her head with long fingernails like it ached. "I need you to get over there and see what happened. Everyone is going crazy. It's absolutely dead on the other side, but the Chief won't even let me send another force in to see what's going on." Her eyes opened, gazing intensely at her friend, "Kagome, we're not getting calls from anybody. There's nothing."
The silence between them was full of communication. "You think they're dead."
Sango hesitated, "Kagome... I shouldn't be saying this, but... don't go. Don't go on this mission."
"Sango!" Kagome was shocked.
The woman shook her head, "I have a really bad feeling about this one. Kagome, I know you. Please, I'm begging you. Be sick. Go to the Infirmary. Don't go."
"...Youkai..." Her body trembled with anger. 'I hate them all.'
Sango's eyes were tense, "Kagome," she pleaded.
Kagome looked at her friend. "No," she said and closed the call.
The Alpha and Omega:
Chapter One- The Start Program
"As far as my organization is concerned, the legal implanting of R-chips in men is completely immoral, and needs to be- Justice, I demand order to speak!" The woman pounded her fist vehemently, shaking the podium with her fervor. Papers fluttered down wildly, unnoticed in her incensed tirade, her face lined with stern frown lines, making her already chiseled features more intimidating. The wrath oozing from her body language had no effect on the audience on its feet with rage, waving their arms and yelling more than opposition- Boushu heard threats to her family and children screamed by red-faced women.
They were all women. All of them. 'All who count in this room, at least', Boushu seethed silently, noticing those still calm who sat dumbly in their seats, most with dull frontal stares. They made up the men of the world. 'What men in our society have been reduced to,' Boushu corrected herself, taking her own seat with a sigh, and watched the orderlies force the women down and away from Boushu herself. Boushu had no pretty ideas of what just one of these women would do to her if they managed to actually put their hands on even an inch of her skin. She wished the board that set this conference up had been thoughtful enough to ensconce the auditor area with a defense shield to remove such a threat. Boushu remembered the women's faces as they appraised her request, each one filled with disgust, disbelief or a mix of both. How many women like Boushu existed in the world anymore? Sometimes it felt that she was the only one. Who else would petition for the things she did? Who else had (Boushu scoffed at the term) the balls to fight a globe of women for the right of men?
Who else wanted their return?
Examining her polished nails and only half extending her attention beyond her thoughts, her eye caught bemusedly on a holoscreen hanging from the ceiling. A technician, she saw, had chosen to project the Dead Zones during her presentation. A chuckle rose in her throat. The crowd's fury was explained. Even she found it difficult to watch the torched landscapes without bile rising in her belly. And yet... and yet, she came to things like these, Boushu thought bemusedly, and spoke the words she did.
It all fell on ears as mute to her opinions as those that lay in the Zones.
Enough was enough. The crowd was unwieldy, refusing to cooperate with the authorities; in fact, Boushu could see it would only be a few minutes more before the women overwhelmed the line of officers and a riot broke out completely. Boushu got to her feet, motioning with one hand to her bodyguard to prepare herself for a quick escape, and approached the podium once more.
"You who run this unbalanced society have heard my words too many times to count, and yet, what is truly heard? How many of you will go home tonight and think of the slave who serves you dinner as your zuri?" She used the word for biological male progeny purposefully, ignoring the gasps of shock from the blasphemy. "How many of you," she pressed on, slamming her hand against the straining wood, "will see the man you claim as husband, and see nothing but dead eyes and rape? Who here will end the blame game for the war that lays on both shoulders of the sexes- a game that has taken itself too far, despite all that you people say about statistics and casualties? We came into this universe as two- one man, one woman. How will we end it? With the slow death of a race of bitter women, their men gradually replaced with these robot men we've created, excusing their existence by saying they are less dangerous, despite the level of youkai crime rates? And however much we try to deny it, birth rates are dropping, by hundreds of thousands 'each year'!" She paused to breath, forgetting in her tirade her own biological necessities. "Men can no longer be denied, can no longer be pacified and 'enslaved'! Woman was not brought into this world alone. She has her counterpart, and that... must be man, not some fake reproduction youkai. If you do not end it soon...blood," she intoned slowly, "will end it for you." Her ultimatum issued- the single reason for the conference- Boushu stepped down, and walked off the stage into the circle of bodyguards that roughly shoved her between them, just as the crowd broke across the police line, and rushed toward her.
***
"Please, please! Oh, god! It's coming this way again, I can hear it! I can 'hear' it! Oh god! HELP ME!!"
Kagome whirled around, throwing the headphones off her ears as the line went dead, bounding out of her seat with enough force to tip it over. "Shit! Tanni, we lost the line!"
A head popped up two cubicles away, Tanni's face locked in a chiseled state of concentration. "We got the coordinates."
"Where?"
"East Side, south," Tanni said, her voice clipped with urgency.
"Right." Kagome nodded, blue eyes narrow slits. "Get it downloaded, print it out, and send it to YD."
The other woman's eyebrows darted up in surprise. "Youkai department?"
Kagome wasted no more time with the woman. "Suri! Where the hell are you?"
"Right here boss!" Another head popped up, like a mushroom in a creek bed, although this one dyed her hair a vivid shade of red every two weeks. They matched the contacts she liked to wear. "We've got an identity match!" She called, waving papers in the air that looked like they had a face printed on them.
Kagome huffed impatiently, striding briskly out of her office and snatching the documents Tanni held out for her. Flipping through them with a trained eye, Kagome saw she was dealing with an apartment building complex. Suri met both women, darting looks at Tanni in between trying to see the papers her boss leafed through. "Well?" Kagome barked suddenly, glaring at Suri.
The woman jumped guiltily, throwing her a hurt look before saying rapidly, "Oniya Surawitz. A Russ-Asian. Forty-seven years of age. Ownership of one youkai-" Kagome threw Tanni a withering look- "Model XA- 76651b." Suri blinked, "That's a really cheap model, Major. And I think it was up for recall just two weeks ago."
A snarl broke out across the woman's lips. "I don't care what you think! I want the goddamned facts, and I want them now!"
Suri bowed her neck, shamed. Kagome felt her own neck heat with an embarrassed blush, before she shook her head violently, the anger in her eyes returning. 'I don't care how much of a bitch I am right now. These girls don't understand the meaning of a life-or-death situation', Kagome thought silently.
"I'm very sorry, Major Higurashi. I'll get back to the facts," she cleared her throat noisily. "She lives in a Class D apartment, on the East Side, alone except for the slave." Suddenly she pressed her finger against her ear and cocked her head like she could hear something. "I'm just getting in- our girls made a few calls- the woman's a recluse, but the neighbors hear strange things in the walls. They suspect tampering with the youkai."
Tanni exhaled, all the color in her face draining out like spilled ink. "Tampering?"
Kagome dismissed Tanni's anxiety with a gesture. "Happens all the time. It's a psychological thing, Private. Slaves can't feel emotions and when things become more than just Master and slave... get my drift?"
Finely penciled eyebrows jolted upward as Tanni's brain followed Kagome's train of thought. "You mean..." Her stomach gave a nauseating lurch. "That's disgusting."
Kagome ignored her. Newbie, she thought scornfully. "Here, take this, Suri," she said, shoving the maps at the startled woman. "Transfer all the information to the YD and get a team on the move. We've lost far too much time as it is. I'll make a call to Major Hiraikotsu personally." Kagome strode off, leaving the women standing in the middle of the bustling Emergency Department staring at each other. Kagome gave them five seconds before she bellowed over her shoulder, "Move your asses now, Privates," and left the room, tapping at her bracelet the while.
She allowed a smug smile to curve on her lips as she fiddled with the gadget on her wrist- a communicator complete with MainFrame connection, holophone, and more than Kagome knew how to work yet. The latest thing on the market, Kagome had personally requested the equipping of one for each member of the force and coincidentally, officers were more efficient and organized when they were in almost constant communication. 'And I earned major kudos with the boss,' she thought happily. Right now she needed Hiraikotsu, though, and the call was not going through.
"No, no, no! Who is this? You're not Sango's normal secretary," Kagome accused, looking at the unfamiliar face with suspicion. "Where the hell is the woman?"
"Ma'am, I don't like the way you're talking about the police officers. If you don't change your attitude, I'm afraid I'll have to transfer you to my superiors!" She woman snapped prissily, her curly white locks bouncing as she spoke.
"Fucking hell, that's what I want- oh you bitch!" Kagome cursed as the woman closed the line with a glare. Frustrated, Kagome pounded in a new code, one that linked directly with Sango. "Please have your bracelet on today, please have your bracel- Thank the gods, Sango!"
Her friend's face materialized on the floating screen, frowning with consternation, but an otherwise a soft gleam in her eye as she saw her friend on the other line. "Who the hell is- ohh, Kagome. How're things, babe?"
"Okay. Busy busy. I'm en route to the Trans Station."
Sango popped a piece of gum in her mouth as she nodded distractedly; Kagome heard clicking from the other end of the line and bet Sango was on her computer. "Yeah," Sango said eventually, "I see you've sent one of my teams out."
Kagome nodded tersely, "We suspect tampering."
Sango lifted an eyebrow, "I see. We'll, I'm just glad I transferred out of the damned department. I hate those horrible calls."
"It's just business," Kagome shrugged, darting around a group of slow movers in the hall.
Sango turned her whole face toward the screen and propped her head on an elbow. "So, babe, what is it you want?"
As if expecting opposition, Kagome quickly said, "Permission to join that team."
Scarlet red lipsticked lips pursed at the request, knitting together Sango's eyebrows, "What for? It's not your department. Oh wait," Sango started, rolling her eyes to the ceiling, "Please tell me it's none of that 'I have a feeling about this' bullshit now!"
Unexpectedly, Kagome's face took on a pleading turn, "Come on Sango, you know I'm always right about that stuff. I think this is gonna be a big one!"
"You don't even like fucking youkai! That's why you switched the hell out of this god-forsaken place!"
Jutting her upper lip out, Kagome whined like a ten-year-old trying to convince her mommy to buy a toy. "Please Sango, I beg you! As a personal favor. If I'm not right about this one, then..." She searched desperately, "...I'll buy you a pound of chocolates!" Her blue eyes gleamed devilishly, aware of the one thing that would make Sango do practically whatever she asked.
Sango jerked as if struck. Glancing warily about her office, her mellifluous voice dropped to a conspiratorial whisper, "An entire pound?"
The grin breaking across Kagome's face was ferocious, "A whole pound."
"You swear?"
Her right hand pressed against her chest, Kagome said, "I swear it on my life!"
Sango's eyes narrowed, "Then you better fucking come back alive," she turned around, and Kagome heard busy clicking. When Sango's face reappeared, her lips were curved up a fraction. "Alright. It's done, you goddamned sneak. Now get the hell out there before my boss gets in here to snap my neck on paperwork." The screen flickered out of life, leaving Kagome standing alone in front of the elevators.
"Damnit, can these things take any 'longer'?" she hissed through clenched teeth. She rubbed the twitching muscles, forcing them to relax like her doctor had said, but couldn't help her foot, which suddenly started tapping. "Forget it!" she groaned, and opened the stairwell door.
Sprinting down the stairs was dangerous activity done only in emergencies, and for good reason, Kagome realized. The steps hadn't been renovated since the Before War era and crumbled a bit with each pounding step she took. Even the rail was made of corrupted iron- a metal not used in a century- and she knew she would be safer falling than trying to get a hold on the perilous rail.
"Oh shit!" she cried out, cement scrabbling loose under her heavy boots. Her hands flailed uselessly in their air as she fell backwards, her butt hitting the steps with a shudder to the whole structure. Oh gods, it's going to collapse completely! Fear overwhelmed her senses as she slid, bumping painfully on each step until she collided with one of the flat platforms on each door level. The shivering continued, loose pieces of the stairwell breaking apart and jumping into Kagome's face and eyes. With a cry, she batted the debris away, crawling backwards.
Her back hit the wall with a shocking thud, jarring Kagome's cerulean eyes open - in time to watch in horror as the railing she was so afraid of even touching moments ago collapse, leaning backward in slow motion, and disappearing down the atrium. Silence thundered pregnantly, marred by Kagome's fingers frantically searching for the knob on the door next to her.
Then the railing hit the bottom floor with explosive loudness, and the well burst into shuddering chaos.
The floor beneath her feet wrenched apart from the walls just as Kagome fumbled the door open and heaved herself through, landing sprawled on the carpeted floor of whatever department she had ended up in.
'Ohgodsohgodsohgodsohgods'. Rational thinking was so far out of reach it was all Kagome could do to breath and lie there, sucking in panting breaths like a drowning woman. 'I could have died, I could have died, that would have been it. Icouldhavedied!'
"Holy fucking hell," she whispered brokenly, the burning tingle in her body spreading up hot and wet in her eyes.
"Excuse me, ma'am. Are you in need of assistance?" A mechanical monotone said from above her.
'Oh shit.'
***
She was twelve. It wasn't rainy, or dark, or even cloudy like most horror stories she had read in her library books were- and she liked horror. The stories were the only ones that could spark her imagination- all the 'how's and 'why's, and using her brain to figure out the antagonist's pathos. Those were the only tales that could spark shivers at noon on summer.
But right now it was fast approaching sunset, the kind she always liked to watch with Saniya, where the whole sky was lit by fire and candy pinks. Fall air came early, saving itself for nights when the sun couldn't banish the cold brisk. Mother was inside, just beginning dinner- spaghetti, a strange summer food- and Saniya... Saniya was right where she'd left her: gazing in awe at the mechanical monstrosity sitting dead in the living room.
Mother had adopted Saniya two years ago. She was a War orphan. She needed a home with extra love and money to nurture her. Especially the second, because the radiation sickness still gripped her regularly and her handicap required "special consideration" as the Welfare woman had put it. It had taken almost a year before Kagome accepted Saniya as her little sister, or even looked into that scarred face, missing its left eye and half a nose. Saniya couldn't go to school. Saniya was a living reminder of Men. And that, Kagome knew...was bad.
At twelve she was past that, and Saniya was adorable in a way that wasn't physical. But Mother was alone in trying to raise them, and she needed help. .
***
Kagome had her pistol out of its holster and pointed into the youkai's face before blinking, before even realizing what she was doing. "What the fuck do you want?" she spat, levering herself onto her knees. The harsh pain that lanced up her thigh told her the fall had probably injured them, but at the moment she focused on nothing but the bright green eyes staring at
her dully.
"Where the fuck do you belong, huh? You piece of fucking youkai trash!" Her voice quavered with strain, sounding unnatural as it came from her throat. The finger hovering above the trigger twitched a millimeter to press on the strand of metal that stood between her and turning the youkai into a junk pile. "Answer me!" she shouted at it, feeling her stomach twist nauseously as the too-perfect head cocked to the side as it processed her words.
Somewhere deep inside her brain murmured, 'It's a harmless youkai. Probably a personal processor.'
Her lips bared back in snarl she wasn't even aware of. "No youkai is harmless," she whispered, and pulled the trigger.
"NO, STOP!"
Out of reflex, Kagome swerved her arm away and the bullet punched a whole in an elevator instead of the youkai's genteelly smiling face. "I'm afraid the word 'fuck' does not appear in my dictionary," it said pleasantly, and walked off.
"Oh thank GOD!" A woman cried, embracing the youkai heartily. "I thought you were a goner, love," she cooed to it, making soothing motions and petting the soft blonde hair cascading down its naked back more perfectly than any human's could. "Now, go see Doctor Kurima, she will have to wipe this out of your poor databanks," she turned as it set off dumbly down the corridor, and murmured, more to herself, "Poor thing."
Kagome flopped onto her back in surrender, staring up at the bland white ceiling, wishing she could turn time back to this morning so she could call in sick and not come back for a week. Or for ever. "Today is so shitty," she said to the plaster, scrubbing at her eyes and slamming the gun back in its place on her hip.
"Your day is shitty?" A very angry voice growled, "Your day is shitty? How would you like to see the work of ten years blown to pieces in a split second?"
'Ah...I hate the Research Department'. "It's not blown up, for gods' sake. I didn't shoot it."
Undaunted, the voice rumbled on, "He was my most special project. He was going to be the next thing since these nifty bracelets, and save police women's lives the world over!"
Kagome ignored the backhanded compliment and bounded up, suddenly strengthened by the anger and adrenaline surging left over in her blood. Her attacker was old and plump, with a bulging stomach; but her eyes were sharp and beady black pearls in the wrinkles of her face. "Stop talking in the past tense, you old hag! The goddamned monster is still working!" Actually, her one eye was beady and sharp. The other was covered by bandages that wrapped around her head, pasting to her skull the little bit of thin hair she had left. That's strange, Kagome noted. Surgery could fix anything these days- from aging to replacing lost limbs and organs. An eye should be a simple procedure.
"Don't you take that tone with your elders, miss! I'll have you written up so fast it'll make your hair spin! Major Higurashi or not!" The old woman hissed, waddling toward her aggressively. Kagome's mouth shut with a snap.
"You know me?" she asked.
The hag's countenance turned suddenly mysterious. "I know many things," she said, and bent double.
A shocking pain gripped Kagome from her knees, and she tilted forward, bracing her weight on the old lady's shoulders. "What the hell are you doing?" she gasped out, but not before the sensation faded, leaving her with the feel of a spray moving quickly across her knees. "What the hell was that?" she gaped when the woman straightened up, brandishing a tiny cord attached to what appeared to be a perfume bag.
The woman grunted, "Just ready for use. Heals scrapes and cuts- nothing too serious. But it can be helpful to the cop in need." It disappeared into a voluminous pocket of many on the white lab coat. "Also quickens the recovery of deeper injuries," she waggled a finger in the air and wobbled off in the direction the youkai had disappeared in. "But it must be topical! Nothing internal. No, no. Nothing internal." She fixed the younger woman with a piercing glare. Kagome swallowed convulsively, feeling as though the hag's one eye was seeing more than any two eyes ever had.
Halfway down the hall, the woman croaked out, "What the hell are you doing standing there like a frog waiting for flies? Get over here, girl!" Kagome hustled so quickly to her side she found herself blushing in embarrassment.
"Don't you dare order me around!" Kagome gritted, silently surprised to find the pain in her knees gone, although she would need new pants before next week. "And how do you know who I am? I think I'd remember if I met you," she added, the distasteful twist at the end telling the researcher exactly what Kagome thought of her.
"Oh shut up, Kagome Higurashi!" she snapped peevishly. "I'm old and tired of your nonsense. How do I know you? How do I know who Kagome Higurashi is? How many people in this entire police department possess the hatred and cruelty towards youkai like you do?"
Blood drained out of Kagome's face like water out of a bullet-riddled glass. "Excuse me?" she said, choking.
"What?" the woman crowed, "You thought it was some little secret that all youkai in your department are treated with enormous hostility? And that while every other branch of Tokyo province has assimilated youkai somehow, you are the only branch that hasn't?" She shook her head slowly, "Such things do not go unnoticed, Kagome. Especially," she smirked at her, "by the Lab, when we so often provide the youkai used."
Leaving Kagome stunned and groping for something to retort, they reached two heavy doors, a web of blue electricity crackling protectively across them. "Although I am the Chief of the Research Department, I'm sure you've never heard of me. You can call me Kaede," she said, punching a code into a screen next to the doors. "And this," she waved broadly at the gradually appearing laboratory, "is the lab."
***
All manner of mechanical creatures existed in the lab, being created or tested on or imagined. Kagome looked around with two minds, one disgusted to the point of sickness, and the other full of wonder at the top-line work going on here. The latter twisted her head in every direction, trying to follow the movement of each machine, and logic their business; the former twisted her stomach into a roiling mess. 'Laboratory' seemed too tame a word for the place, but 'factory' was too pale. Everywhere, things were happening at a pace impossible to quite keep up with.
On a rapid conveyor belt, youkai heads were rolled along and picked up to be screwed on skeletal bodies of bare metal and wire. Smart-looking women with narrow eyes observed the process and darted forward, plucking weird tools from their pockets and cranking or adjusting a number of knobs and wires all over the bodies. Another belt churned out small cords like the one Kaede had used on her knees, while yet another produced unfamiliar guns.
"Ah," Kaede said, spotting the direction of Kagome's eyes. "Those are new, like this little bugger," she flashed the healing cord at Kagome before stalking to the guns and pulling one off the line, and earning them a glare from a spectacled lab-girl. "They use lasers, you see. Finally," Kaede sighed, "we have produced something of fantasy, less crude than that bullet-launcher you wear," she shot the gun on the other woman's hip a look. "It's more accurate too. Would you like one?" Kaede pushed it into Kagome's hands and waddled off before Kagome could refuse.
"Uh," her eyes caught the unfriendly stare of the lab-girl, still glaring at her. "Can I?" Kagome asked sheepishly. The girl sighed and shouted back over the din, "Take the damn thing! She's the fucking boss, woman!"
"I heard that, Sandy," Kaede snipped, returning from wherever she had gone. She had a whole array of foreign devices crushed to her ample chest. "You will get these things sooner or later anyway, dear. You might as well take them," she said, dumping to load into Kagome's arms.
Kagome wailed from beneath her pile, "I don't even know what these things do!" She juggled the junk, keeping most of it from spilling on the floor, but a slippery piece of wire attached to what looked like an ear escaped her fingers. Then it all tumbled down. "Oh hell!" she cursed, irritated by her own clumsiness. Kaede put a hand on her shoulder as she bent down, clucking like a mother hen, "No no, dear, don't bother with that. I'll just get our favorite boy to help out. Sani! Come over here and pick this mess up, will you?" Kagome jerked away from her touch like it was electric.
"What did you say?" she said, a wild look on her face.
Kaede frowned at her. "Oh, I know you don't like youkai, but Sani has his uses."
'Sani?!?'
A green-eyed youkai approached them, naked except for its long blonde hair. Kagome exhaled hard. Kaede looked at her sharply, "Who did you expect, girl?"
"You named the youkai Sani." It was ridiculous. Kagome was overreacting. The youkai was picking up the things into its well-muscled arms, skin as white as milk.
Kaede shrugged, "Yes, well, we all liked the name Saniya, but that's only for a female you know. And there are, of course, no female youkai," Kaede scoffed at the thought.
'Saniya. Saniya! SANIYA! MOTHER!'
Kagome didn't realizing she was stepping backwards until she collided with a conveyor belt, sending a youkai head flying into the air. Shouts of outrage and anger raged with the noisy machinery. "Girl, what are you doing!" Kaede shouted as Kagome broke into a run.
"I have to go! I have to go," Kagome expelled, running at the doors and pounding at them when they wouldn't open fast enough. She bolted through them as they allowed a sliver enough to let her through. Saniya, Saniya! The name kept running through her head, over and over. Kagome reached the elevators, and thumbed the button, wanting to cry with relief when a light 'dinged' agreeably.
"Girl, you forgot your things!" Kaede waddled into view, the youkai Sani marching behind her. His dead green eyes turned with a whirring snap toward her.
"I have to go!" Kagome cried as the doors slid shut. "And the stairs are out!" she added as an afterthought, realizing irrationally the need to tell someone.
Kaede's creased face was replaced with steel and the eerie reflected image of her own. 'Saniya, Saniya,' her mind mourned.
***
Kagome stared up at the pale face with twelve-year old eyes. It seemed dead to her. Dead was familiar, but had never been so close.
"Sani," she said after a while, "what is this?'
"Momma brought this home," the scarred face replied. Saniya used "Momma" the second she was brought to the Higurashi household, and no one told her different.
Kagome poked the thing in the cheek, and felt cold flesh. It was disturbing. "What is it?"
"A new thing."
"Uh huh?"
"'A youkai'."
***
Thankfully the elevator was empty, and Kagome slid down the opposite wall, clutching her knees to her chest. She couldn't stabilize her breath; it was like the asthma she had had when she was five, and found that oxygen was something everyone else could breathe. Although the surgeons had used their clever knives to fix that problem forever, she wondered if they could get into her mind and fix the other one too.
The elevator settled on a floor just as Kagome jumped up, knuckling her eyes and brushing her hair back into place expertly. 'Nothing is wrong', she told the world silently. 'Everyone will see that nothing is wrong'. Cops and formally dressed secretaries jumbled for space, barely giving the woman a glance. The woman closest to the buttons said, "Floors?" earning half-shouted responses.
"And you, honey?" Kagome saw the woman was looking at her.
"Uhh," she stalled, looking around. Her bracelet blinking at her brought a flash of lightning to her brain. "Holy shit!" Kagome said and a couple eyebrows knitted together at her language, "Holy shit. I need to go to Transportation, and right now!"
A curt bark left the woman, "Well," she said, punching in the button, "I think you'll get there just as fast as this elevator can take you, hon." Quiet laughter fueled red in Kagome's cheeks. 'Hell, you don't need to be a prick about it. Oh shit, I can't believe I forgot about the mission! Sango's gonna flambé my ass!'
Someone jabbed an elbow in her ribs, "Hey, hon, doesn't that mean a call for you?" She pointed at the flashing bracelet.
"I still haven't gotten those goddamned things figured out," put in a prissy secretary with the nametag Sara Miyu.
Another woman- butch haircut- nodded enthusiastically, "Yeah! I thought it was so much better before. At least I knew what the hell I was doing!"
'I don't believe these people!' Kagome fumed, setting her mouth in a compressed line. "Well, hon," the first girl said, "Aren't you gonna take that call?"
Kagome frowned at her, "I'll wait till I have a little more privacy, I think." The woman lifted her eyebrows slightly. "Right," she agreed, then turned her back to Kagome. Kagome fought the instinct to stick her tongue out at the woman.
"This is Transportation, miss!" the woman upfront called. Kagome shoved her way out obediently, wondering if the extra force was really necessary.
Trans Department was as chaotic as usual, coppers and miscellaneous women running every direction; this was the one place Kagome had never worked, and thanked the gods everyday for it. "Okay, Sango, please don't kill me," Kagome began, tapping the holoscreen up.
"Kagome? Oh thank gods!" Sango sounded seriously distressed. When she came into the picture, Kagome was surprised to see her friend's hair in disarray, and her lipstick fading.
"Sango? What's the matter?" Kagome said, worried.
"Oh this morning is completely fucked up!" the woman said, mashing her face in her hands. Kagome felt a prick of resentment. "I can't get a hold of the team- they've completely disappeared- it's been twenty minutes already since they breached, I don't have a fucking clue what's going on-"
"Wait, Sango, you can't make contact with the team? Twenty minutes?" Kagome repeated, feeling disembodied, as though the conversation was happening to anyone but her.
"Kagome, where are you?"
"I'm in Trans," -Sango groaned on the other end- "I got held up..." 'The understatement of the year.'
Sango squeezed her eyes closed, rubbing her head with long fingernails like it ached. "I need you to get over there and see what happened. Everyone is going crazy. It's absolutely dead on the other side, but the Chief won't even let me send another force in to see what's going on." Her eyes opened, gazing intensely at her friend, "Kagome, we're not getting calls from anybody. There's nothing."
The silence between them was full of communication. "You think they're dead."
Sango hesitated, "Kagome... I shouldn't be saying this, but... don't go. Don't go on this mission."
"Sango!" Kagome was shocked.
The woman shook her head, "I have a really bad feeling about this one. Kagome, I know you. Please, I'm begging you. Be sick. Go to the Infirmary. Don't go."
"...Youkai..." Her body trembled with anger. 'I hate them all.'
Sango's eyes were tense, "Kagome," she pleaded.
Kagome looked at her friend. "No," she said and closed the call.