Two Times, One Sword (Closed)

Hanako wept on the floor of the parking lot after Ruga was out of sight. All the tears she held back flowed out. She had tried to replace Mei with a new family, and now that family had been taken away from her as well. She knew that she had her summoning ability, despite what Ruga had said. She had summoned the Moon Blade when the shadow guy from the cult attacked her in the warehouse. Why then was she now unable to summon anything to help her fight, especially when the stakes had been so high? Now she was a slave in a cult who believed that she was a goddess, a husk of one or some other false thing. She had served Paxton and Gin. Ruga felt like just another name of someone more than willing to deprive her of her freedom, and pull her into battles she had no business fighting in.

Mei would've loved this future, at least for a while, before the city block burst into flames, which had started this mess. Mei and Izumi would've made for quick friends, and she would've approved of Reo, boisterously pushing Hanako to make her move. If she were here now, Mei would assure her, trying to convince her that they'd break their chains soon and be free to do what they wished without a master.

When she cried into her hands, she felt like she was falling, and that was when she remembered the first time she had met Mei, in the meditation room without a floor to stand on. Hanako wiped the tears of her eyes, placing her palms on the cold and smooth parking lot floor. The tears dripped from her fingers to the ground. She felt a warmness in her heart over the sensation of her finger glided over the water, reminding her of the beautiful memory of them painting the meditation room and each other without reservation, completely in the moment when nothing else mattered.

She thought she heard footsteps and got up suddenly. Her eyes darted around the basement parking lot, but she had been wallowing in pitch black darkness. The tears dried up as she wiped the streams from her face. From the doors leading into the building exited another cult member, for Hanako could only see the robe with that stupid cult symbol of theirs.

"Your boss said I start 7AM."
"You should only refer to him as Lord Ruga." the cult member warned. The voice sounded female, and hence Neza concluded, someone she hadn't met before.
"Yeah?" said Hanako. "And who are you to give me advice? All you people already know my name, think you know who I am."
"Leira." she replied.
"Are you my attendant now?"
"No."
"Then how am I supposed to know where your boss wants me to sleep?"
"Lord Ruga doesn't care for petty details."
"Your boss is a prick. He can't really expect for people to read his mind and know what he wants."
Leira shrugged. She bent down to take a door stopper and put it under the door, and let it slide so it was slightly ajar for the light inside to trickle into the basement. Hanako walked towards it. On the knob of the door there was a lanyard with a key card and a sticky note with a floor and room number.

---

It was early morning when Hanako went back to the basement of the office building. Having gone up the floors alone the night before without an attendant through the elevator was surprising, until she realized that there were floor cameras everywhere, and that it was clear Ruga felt assured Hanako understood her place for the time being, and wouldn't do anything stupid as long as her family was in danger. She simply went into that empty spartan apartment room and tried to go straight to bed, not even bothering to put on pajamas. The clothes that she wore she had bought for herself over the time she had spent with Reo and Izumi. She was still Hanako, despite the call for her to act as Neza again. Though she had enjoyed her fight with Ruga, that sensation felt alien.

The morning after, she woke up at 6:00. She opened the closet to put on the simple clothes inside, with the purpose of simply being under the robe that hunt adjacent. So even though she had been called the goddess, or a husk of one, or whatever, she was just a simple goon now. She checked the drawers and found a burner phone. She almost started to dial for Reo, but remembered the inconvenient truth that number no longer existed. She folded her 'Hanako' clothes neatly into a pile. After that she took the backpack in the corner of the closet, folding the robe and putting it in first before she put her 'Hanako' clothes over it. She hoped to find a laundromat, though this would be a petty detail according to her new boss, like how her clothes collection had been left behind, ruined, and just as it seemed petty the house she was happily living in had been riddled by bullets, with her family almost being killed. She checked the fridge; there was nothing.

With nothing else in her room, she left it. She walked down the halls to nowhere in particular, letting herself absorb the details of the place, but it was all so nondescript, like an actual office. What business was actually done here? What prevented other organizations from uncovering the cult? She guessed at least the main floor above the parking lot was public. She checked the contacts on the phone. They were alphabetical, but only had first names.

Leira sounded groggy, as though just roused by the phone called. "Yes?"
"Where do I eat?"
"Fridge wasn't stocked?"
"Another petty detail."
"Meet me at Temple. I'll be right there."
Hanako remained silent.
"... right." said Leira. She gave Hanako general directions for how to get there, still groggily. "That's where we're all meeting anyway to discuss the next job."
"What job?"
"Not over the phone."
---

Hanako met Leira at the Temple before everyone else, and saw the familiar Book on the pedestal. She couldn't believe her eyes. It was unmistakably the same book she had read in the distant past, the one that almost took her life if it hadn't been for Mei to drag her out of the pits of despair. She didn't say anything, though. She was happy to not let the cult know anything beyond what they thought they knew. How the Cult knew about her now seemed more plausible.

Leira was more beautiful than Hanako had anticipated, with long blond hair, and her lovely black dress. Leira handed her a sandwich, an apple, and some bottled water. Hanako sat down in a back pew and ate in silence and just stared at the book.

The other cult members filed inside just as Hanako was finishing eating, and Leira was nowhere to be seen, having slipped out unnoticed. In front of the group was Kivees and trailing behind, Kimaru. They all took their seats, except none sat in the same pew as Hanako. Unlike her, they were all in their robes.

"I will not mince words." said Kivees. "Today is the day that we attack Ieyoshi Manor. Lord Ruga has shown that we didn't need the goddess to do this, but she's here with us today. There is no question in my mind. Today we make history. Today, the Ieyoshi line dies!"
There was a roar of approval from the crowd before they promptly exited the Temple, this time Kimaru leading the pack.
"Put on your robe and leave the backpack." said Kivees to Hanako.
Hanako did as she was told, though she didn't see the sense of it until she realized that the cult members were using a service elevator to evade public view and filed into tinted window vans. Inside there were racks of guns and swords covered by a simple metal cage unlocked by key.

While they were on the way to the Manor, the plan still seemed wrong. Why would Lord Ruga order the attack at morning and not at night? Was it to send a message? Was he that confident? Hanako didn't know what she would do when she got there, except follow the closest cult member and fight, but that seemed like a dead end. Whether the cult won or lost, she was still a slave. There had to be a way to get out of the situation, but that involved getting the blackmail out of the picture, which meant saving her family somehow despite being under constant surveillance. This raid might perhaps be her only chance to break surveillance and make something work.

"The Goddess is with us."

Hanako heard the words repeated, whispered, but didn't know the mouth it came out of. It wasn't a voice she was familiar with. A goon, perhaps, but sold to what this Lord Ruga was selling him. As soon as the vans barreled down the road, all hell broke loose. There was gunfire as the vans blast through the perimeter fencing and several rockets were launched at the Manor itself as the van windows opened as the vans veered to the side.
 
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"What happened!" Touma rushed into the central security room.

People were running around the room in a panic, lights and sirens were going off, and no had a clue that he just addressed them.

"HEY!" He yelled and everyone stopped. "You." his pointed to an officer. "Whats happening here."

"Several vans have busted down the gate and we are being bombarded with rocket fire sir!"

Touma looked at the main computer screen "Keeves is making his move. Alright, I want security mechs four, five, and twelve dispatched to the front gate. I want all entrances locked down, no one gets in or out. I want a security detail put on the Ieyoshi's and moved have them moved to the safe room. Am I clear!" he called.

"Yes sir!" everyone answered and got to work.

Touma took his swords and went to make sure Yori was locked down.

A garage door on the front of the building opened and three security mechs came running out. "HALT. STOP WHAT YOU ARE DOING AND SURRENDER." one proclaimed.

"MECHS!" One of the cult members shouted. A rocket was fired at the machines and exploded. As the dusts settled it could be seen that one had a dent in it but the other two were fine.

"DEADLY FORCE AUTHORIZED." One said and the three hulking machines started to open fire on the group, the sound of heavy machine gun fire roared through the air. A few members were killed, and a few dozen injured. Anyone who could took shelter anywhere they could find it.

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"KIVEES YOU FUCKING IDIOT YOU DIDN'T SAY ANYTHING ABOUT DEATH MECHS!" Neza called from behind a van.

"YES WELL I WASN'T INFORMED THEY DID!" he called back.

"WELL FUCK NUTS WHAT DO YOU INTEND TO DO ABOUT THIS!"

"KIMARU CAN YOU TAKE THEM OUT?"

Kimaru peeked from around the corner of the wall he was hiding behind. He held out his hand and shot an ink bullet at one of them, it landed with a wet slap on the mechs shoulder. The ink exploded into spikes and the arm plate flew off "I CAN TAKE THEM DOWN PART BY PART! BEST I CAN DO FROM HERE!"

"Fuck. DO IT! NEZA TAKE A FEW MEN AND HEAD TOWARD THE LIFT I'LL COVER YOU!" he stood up and started to shoot at the mechs, drawing their fire.

Neza took off for the lift and made it "Get ready boys this is where the fun starts." he drew the sword she was issued ready to fight.
 
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Full circle. Once Gin had been the commander of a golem army, and now the Ieyoshi's had the mechs. The heavy mechs shredded the cultists in front of her with their chainsaw arms, their swords unable to pierce their armor. Kimaru popped off more metal plates and bolts as ink sprayed from his hands in a burst and fell like rain. Hanako weaved past their bulky movements and cut the areas that were exposed, making a warpath towards the lift.

The lift lowered into a sub-level of the Ieyoshi Manor. Hanako didn't see Yori among those fighting on the surface. Where was he hiding? He didn't wait for battles to come to him. There was a open area with several mechanical doors.

"Fan out!" ordered Kivees on the comm link. "Spare no one. Secure any technology you can and destroy the rest!"
This was the opportunity that Hanako was waiting for. She needed to get to Yori.

Two cultists followed her, one on each side, like her own personal guard. They knew Pax Style at the most fundamental, using their side arms to suppression fire Ieyoshi staff behind bunkers before Hanako cut them down with her sword passing by. They were useful, a quality that she didn't expect. Suddenly a giant fireball came busting down the hallway and both the guards jumped to intercept it, vaporized in an instant. Just before Hanako took cover, she saw a reinforced door and a man. The attack had been just like Yori's. The man in front of the door wasn't Yori.