<center>Chapter 11: Who will be our Hiro?</center>
Hiro was annoyed. It was bad enough that he had to help them get in to the facility, and let me tell you maintaining a field of invisibility around two people for that long was no easy task, but no, they just couldn't be content with that. Now he has to free a scientist and help him escape too. Hiro had half a mind to just leave him here, but Hiro'd said he'd help, and he wasn't the type to break his word.
The lab was a fairly high class place, work benches lined the room from wall to wall, with aisles for walking between every bench, all sized exactly the same. Some benches had electronic devices, others had a near endless supply of drugs and chemicals.
Hiro located the small sphere called the Dagon Core he'd come here to get almost immediately. It was just sitting unattended on a desk near a group of scientists arguing over the hacking into the base's security. Hiro "liberated" the core without anyone noticing.
Then came the matter of Dr. Nanami. Hiro quickly realized he had no idea who Dr. Nanami was, or any idea what he looked like. Luckily for him, it appeared to be standard policy to issue all employees name tags and so Hiro began his long search for Dr. Nanami.
After half an hour of searching and many close calls of people almost bumping into his invisible self, Hiro finally located Dr. Nanami working inside a small room with two guards standing watch outside of it.
Hiro walked behind Dr. Nanami and whispered, “I wouldn’t make a sound if I were you. Seishero should be on her way out of here as we speak, if you want to escape as well, I suggest you do exactly as I say, now stand up.”
Dr. Nanami rose to his feet slowly and muttered, “Are you a friend of Seth’s?”
A strange invisible force surrounded Dr. Nanami making him invisible as well as Hiro grabbed onto him, “I’m currently assisting him in his mad plan to free you, but I am by no means his friend. Now, start walking out of here slowly and don’t make another sound.”
Hiro and Dr. Nanami managed to slip out of the lab without being noticed and get into the hall.
Hiro dropped his field of invisibility as soon as the two of them were no longer in sight of the labs windows and leaned against the wall, obviously tired from keeping the spell going as long as he did.
Dr. Nanami stared at Hiro, Seeing him for the first time and said, “You’re just a boy too, Sorry, What do we do next?”
Hiro handed Dr. Nanami his personal organizer with a map of the fastest way to the roof highlighted and began to speak. Before he could mutter a word he suddenly jumped in front of Dr. Nanami, stones glowing. A moment later the wall beside them exploded sending shrapnel flying against an invisible wall of force Hiro had projected.
After the dust cleared a brown haired girl in a red Kimono looked at them coughing and sneezing. “Like, wow, I totally didn’t expect anyone to be on the other side. Which way is the research lab?”
Hiro’s face looked like it was about to pop a vein as he clenched his fists in irritation and mumbled, “10 more seconds and it wouldn’t of been my problem, just 10 more seconds.”
The girl stared at Hiro for a moment, holding a strange braided-leather cylinder in each hand and was taken totally by surprise when Hiro suddenly blasted her away with an orb of sheer force.
Hiro grabbed a confused Dr. Nanami and pulled him away from the hole in the wall as a blast of fire comes through melting the wall they’d been in front of just a moment before into a smoldering mess.
Hiro started running down the hall with Dr. Nanami in tow as he heard someone jump through the hole behind him. Suddenly an explosion rocked the wall in front of him and he once again threw up a wall of force.
Hiro stared at the two figures who step through the hole and recognized them both instantly, “You’re the two from the hospital.”
Celest and Cory stood in front of Hiro as the brown haired girl stood behind them.
Celest looked at Hiro for a moment, “Yes, I don’t believe we’ve been formally introduced. Now this is interesting, Dr. Nanami is with you. If you surrender him quietly we can forget you were ever here.”
Hiro smiled nervously, “What’s so important about him, if you want a scientist there’s a whole lab full of them down the hall.”
Cory glared at Dr. Nanami angrily and shouted, “You’re the one who developed the compound aren’t you? You’re the reason I’m being slowly eaten alive by the Gregin X, aren’t you?”
Dr. Nanami stared at Cory, “What are you talking about, I’ve never given you the Chemical, and you’d be dead already if it was going to kill you.”
Cory laughed, “Even if you didn’t give it to me, it somehow got into the sewer system.” Cory then glanced at Hiro annoyed and resumed speaking,“I guess Seth and Seishero asked you to rescue him didn’t they, too weak to do it themselves. You’ll have to tell him I’m sorry.”
Hiro looked around around quickly calculating the best way to escape. “I’m afraid I’ll have no reason to say that.” Hiro’s stones glowed white once again and Celest, Cory, and the brown haired girl all grabbed their heads screaming in illusionary pain as Hiro and Dr. Nanami started to flee. Dr. Nanami looked back at Cory concerned but continued to run.
Celest closed her eyes and lowered her hands, barely able to focus with all the pain and chanted quietly, "Forces of truth and cleansing kind, I conjure a mist to clear our minds."As Celest finished chanting a pentagram appeared in the air above them and a white mist poured out entering into the ears and noses of the three Solar members.
The pain was instantly gone and Celest rose to her feet, “Firedancer, pursue Dr. Nanami. eternal and I will capture the research mainframe.”
Cory looked at Celest angered as the brown haired hurl ran after Hiro and asked, “Why did you send her?”
Celest sighed, “I know this is personal for you, But you’re the only one can can capture the research mainframe without destroying it now that Wizard is gone.”
<center>***</center>
Hiro and Dr. Nanami had made little progress. In their haste to escape =, Hiro had made a wrong turn and they had been forced to backtrack quite a way. In this panic, Hiro’s body had been completely consumed by the need to flee, causing him to forget how easily he could of abandoned Dr. Nanami a moment ago.
Firedancer was having a lot more luck. Having contacted ghost for assistance she had received directions to their location until he reached the limit of his projection and she wasn’t letting walls slow her down.
After only four minutes fire dancer had caught up to them. This time, Hiro turned to face her. She smiled at him, holding the leather handles still, 2 whips of pure flame extending from them to the ground. “So what’s a cute guy like you doing in a dangerous place like this?”
Hiro looked rather perplexed. “I could ask you the same question, However, I’d rather not babble on until security arrives.”
Firedancer laughed, “So Serious, I like that, where are you going in such a hurry?”
Seth, Edward, and Seishero ran around a corner and stopped dead in their tracks as they saw Hiro and Firedancer staring each other down.
Fire dancer glanced around as Dr. Nanami noticed Seishero and ran toward her, causing Firedancer to suddenly flare up her whips and jump into the wall to avoid incinerating him. This spooked him in the causing him to back into a wall as a mechanical fist punched through it and imploded his skull. This sent him flying to the the ground as the rubble of the wall buried him. A Human shaped robot with a rapidly sparking head stepped through muttering, “Kill Seth Davis.” In a rapidly altering version of Thomson’s voice.
Hiro stared at it horrified, “Demenstra-Tek built this!”
Firedancer looked at it a look of extreme anger consuming her face, and shouted, “You made me fail my mission you overgrown piece of tin!”
Thomson’s quickly looked at everyone in the hall until he spotted Seth and than lunged at him as Firedancer screamed, “Don’t ignore me tin man!” and unleashed a massive blast of fire at him from her two “whips”. When the flames cleared nothing but ashes and smoldering metal were left of Thomson and The rubble that buried Dr. Nanami.
Seishero stared at the scene speechless and muttered, “Daddy.” before falling to her knees in tears.
Danna walked out of an empty office annoyed, the computer showing the typical Danna++ screen. “What are you all still standing around here for? Demenstra-Tek security van’s are surrounding the building as we speak. We have to leave now!”
Firedancer looked around her nose fidgeting erratically and sighed, “You guy’s don’t mind if I leave with you do you?”
Seth looked at Hiro and asked, “Who is she?” before kneeling beside Seishero and putting his hand on her shoulder, with no idea how to comfort her.
Hiro shook his head in frustration. “I have no idea, she came here with your cousin and that Witch from the Hospital.”
Seth glared at Firedancer, “One of Solar’s dogs then? Why the hell should we take you with us.”
Firedancer pulled a knife from her pocket and drove it through her left palm.
Seth looked at her disturbed, “Um, masochistic tendencies aren’t exactly a trustworthy trait.”
Firedancer pulled a small chip from the tip of the knife, “This is the identification chip I was given when I joined Solar, without it I’m a rogue agent. I was already on bad terms with them, this failure might just push them overboard on me.”
Danna sighed, “If it’ll get us out of here before we’re all dead let’s just take her with us.”
Seishero looked up, wiping the tears from her eyes and sniveling, “Chibi- Miloe said we can trust her.”
Seth helped Seishero to her feet and sighed, “Fine, let’s just get going.”
<center>***</center>
A few minutes later they all arrived on the roof to find a giant blimp waiting for them, moving with a strange bubble jet propulsion. The plank had been lowered to reveal Science Man in full costume staring down at them. “Hurry up and get in we have to leave now.”
Hiro looked at the blimp nervously as the others boarded it and muttered, “I’m definitely not riding on that. Be seeing you all.” before he disappears and the sound of footsteps heading toward the edge of the roof can be heard. Once everyone’s on board the blimp takes off full speed blasting past the badly organized security forces below them.
End of Chapter 11
Next time, on the Videospirit Origin Story: Return to Normal