Soul gear main

Titus blinks, looking at the snoring Dax curiously, then shrugs, going back to the movie, which was now rambling about the various forms of government and which country had what. Next,after that, was the basic, important facts of history of each country. Chuckling as Dax reawakens, the two scientist watch as well.

Dax smacked his lips a couple times. Had he fallen asleep with his mouth open? It was really dry and had that 'I'm dying!' sort of taste to it. He looked around for a mint. Did the scientists even carry mints? Was he brave enough to ask? Bad breath had no excuse, his parents used to say so yes. Yes he was brave enough.

"Hey you got a mint anywhere around here?"


Naomi spewed out her answer, having been well practiced in the question when the Daemons first interogatted her. "I joined the Rippers to do damage control after my sister was murdered and I had taken revenge on her killers. I fled my home country and was found b the Rippers. I was in a bad place mentally. If I could help the Ripper captives escape, I would. If I couldn't, I put a bullet between their eyes and saved them weeks of torture. Sadly, that only barely makes me the lesser of two evils. Anyways, the higher ups started to find out and a Handler was placed on me to try and end my existence. So I'm not with them anymore because one time my unit got too close and I slaughtered them all. They considered that my resignation letter. At the scene of my murdered comrades another group, Anti-Rippers, found me and recruited me instead of killing me. So here I stand."

Jack listened closely to the girl's response, noting a few key points. Ah, family and revenge. The two great motivators. he thought, noting the irony in the similarity between him and the girl. Still, at least she's willing to admit her mistakes, and it sounds like we're both on a similar path now. Not really something I can call her out on. So, onto the next question I suppose. "Alright, seems to make enough sense. You're certainly skilled enough for everything you've mentioned. Next question then. You've left the Rippers, but you still work with an anti-Ripper team. Do you know anything about an attack on a Net research lab about a year ago? Rippers destroyed the lab, the research, and everyone inside."

The scientists blink."Shoosh, were getting to the good part." " indeed, you should have gotten some at the snack counter my boy!" Whohoohoohoo!!" Bricker reaches into his pocket,bringing out a mint and hands it to the giant, and chuckles at how avidly Titus was paying attention to the movie." Huh...guess anything is interesting to someone who knows nothing about the world..."

Dax thought about that. Titus really did know of nothing. The way he viewed the world must be eons different from Dax's view. Something as simple as popcorn could garner Tius's full attention and wonder. Then came another interesting thought. Titus had no knowledge of the world so he wouldn't use his surroundings in battle the way others would. That made predicting his style easy. In fact, all of their styles were predictable if you knew the personality. What if they launched a main attack on the Ripper compound fighting as someone else? Any intelligence that the Ripper's had would be faulty. Not only that but if he leaked information about their set up to the Rippers, they would go into the battle overconfident and thinking they know their enemy. It would be the element of surprise done in an inconventional style. He stared down at Titus intently.

"You're a genius you know that kid?"


Naomi nodded. "That was my last gig with the Rippers. We were split into three units. The first paved the way for the second group and the third protected the second on their way. The second group extracted the info and then groups one and three were left behind to clean up any survivors. After that group three stayed behind because they had the easiest job in the beginning phase and destroyed the building."

There was one minute left on the timer, but she was intrigued. She turned it off and set Leela on the ground.

Jack listened once again as the girl told her story, starting to shudder as she wrapped up. All this time...one year of searching, and this is what I find... "Jack...maybe we should leave..." Bowman chimed in, seeing the boy's uneasiness. "No...no, I need to hear this. Two of the scientists that were there, they were...I was close to them. Man and woman, both thinner with brown hair. The man was taller than average, the woman was probably about your height. Which unit were you in, and did you see these people?" Jack continued, clearly shaken up. The girl would possibly notice that the man's description was fairly close to the teen standing in front of her.

Naomi put two and two together and understanding lit her eyes. That night had been the bloodiest night she could remember. Her Handler had put her on the field as long as possible, hoping to tire her out and make and easier target. She had been in both groups one and three. And she remembered every moment perfectly. Right down to a small picture taped to the wall at a desk station. The face had only aged a couple years. Her attacker was the son of the two leading scientists in Cross Fusion. That accounted his battle capabilities.

"Your name is Jack." She sighed. Now she definitely couldn't leave. Jack deserved closure and she was the only person left alive that was willing and able to give it. Naomi wondered over to a nearby bench and patted the seat next to her. This was going to be a long story.

She would be lucky to be alive by the end of telling it.

Jack watched the girl for a response after giving his question, noticing the sudden change in her eyes. While Bowman had mentioned the boy's name before, the girl's acknowledgement of it gave him the feeling that she definitely knew something big. Nodding as she gestured to him to sit down, he walked over and joined her on the bench, leaning forward slightly and putting his hands on his knees, taking a couple deep breaths. "Are you sure you're..." The boy silenced his Navi with a wave of his hand before looking at the ex-Ripper. "Alright, it sounds like you know quite a bit about what happened that day. Time to talk."

Naomi shot Jack a soured look. She had never taken well to being ordered around. Just this one time she would allow it. People got weird under stress.

"I was positioned in the first group at the beginning of the attack. The group advanced down the main halls, pairing up to go into rooms that branched off. We killed everything that didn't cower on sight. There may or may not have been some friendly fire." Naomi shrugged. "Who can say? I digress. The objective was to raid the information. All the information. Meaning the lead scientists. The Rippers wanted the operation under their wing. Anyone who was indispensable was captured. That includes your parents. When the first group was done my Handler sent me to the third group. Second group made off with the information. Almost."

"I never took orders well. It seemed more intelligent to canvas the side rooms for difficult transport. You can carry a chip just fine, but people are harder to lug around. There was another section of Rippers I hadn't known about. An elite squad that was tasked with the prisoners. The elite squad I had met before. They were...corrupt at best. But they were also efficient. Two were on guard at the entrance, trust no one not even a fellow Ripper. The rest were using unsavory means to extract information. Even with Leela I couldn't take on the elite squad alone so I did the next best thing. I put two rounds of lead into each and every prisoner. One in the forehead and one between the eyes. Your parents were first Jack. They had the most information to give. Information that should never be put in the wrong hands."

She decided that what she had given was probably all Jack had wanted to hear. The rest of the night belonged only to her. Just short of death, she would accept whatever punishment Jack wanted to bestow. Then, after the Rippers had finally fallen, if he still wanted, Naomi would let him finish the job. She awaited his judgement.

Titus like up to Dax, his brow furrowed in confusion." I'm a genius?" The scientists blink, examining the giant." What do you mean?" " I know he's a bright boy, but...." Then, they narrow their eyes." What do you have planned, hmm?" "What's the idea?" Meanwhile, Titus sits with a concerned look on his face,beginning to worry about his adoptive sister.

Jack listened to the girl's story intently, becoming more focused every time the scientists or his parents were mentioned. As the girl described the series of events that led to her executing each of the scientists, including his parents, the teen breathed deeply, trying to stop himself from sobbing as tears started to form in his eyes. Jack thought long about the girl's words before finally speaking. "One year later, I come across my parents' killer, and not only does she completely outclass me, but she's now actively fighting the group who organized the attack. Man, this is a load of crap." he muttered, keeping his eyes on the ground. He knew one thing for certain, and that was that trying to take revenge on the girl would in no way work out well for him. "You mentioned an elite squad...any idea where any of them, or the people who ordered the attack are?" The boy may not have felt great about taking revenge on the direct killer, but someone had to pay for what had happened.

Dax smiled a little. It was a rare feat to interest Bricker and Breaker. They probably wouldn't stop calling him KingKong though. That was alright, the name had sort of grown on him. "I want to swap my recruits minds with each other in battle. Ripper have dirt on us just like we have dirt on them. Imagine if they knew where we were attacking, which recruits they would be facing, and came prepared specifically for that situation. Then when they match me up with a brawler, I instead fight like Naomi or Alejandro? They would be prepared for the wrong thing and it would give us the element of surprise."


Naomi could sense the defeat in Jack. It hurt now. But she was going to try her best to atone. That began with the Rippers. She did note that he didn't attempt to take revenge. Then his comment made he realize he didn't think he could beat her. There would be no need for fighting when all was said and done. She would die willingly. One day, he would have his revenge. Until then...he seemed manageable. Joking was good even if there were unshed tears in his eyes. She supposed all that was left was to retreat as planned for a few days and then resume her pursuit of the Rippers with a vengeance.

"The elite squad wasn't stupid and I was cocky. Dodging assasination after assasination can do that. After I had found my way back to group three and the job was completed, the elite squad met us there. Everyone in the organization had more or less already distrusted me whether it was because they were suspicious or outright fearful of my cold killing. It was amazing how fast the rest of group three and the elite squad joined together to fight me. But here I am standing. I didn't even burn the bodies. I just left them there."

Naomi still wasn't comfortable with that part of the story herself. She remembered the white place in her mind. Then she remembered there being destruction all around her. Blood and bodies decorated the ground like algae in a pond. She just...sat there. Then Dax found her and there was nothing left in her to resist. It was like she had died on that field with the rest of the Rippers and scientists. The night still haunted her.

The scientists hmm." ...perhaps that would work...but wed need to rig up a mental scanner of some sort, if you want to go down the techy route." " Or, if you wish, you might get it done with training." "Either way, it'll take a while." Meanwhile, the movie ends, and Titus blinks, then looks at his bowl. Nearly empty...The young geared holds his bowl out to Bracken." May I have more please?" The scientist chuckles, ruffling his hair and filling it, while Bricker stares intently at Dax." This could work, even despite the time it'll take...."

"Rushing headlong into battles so far has only ended in a stalemate. It's about time I took a leaf out of your book and sat back to plan things. Take time, fighter smarter not harder." Yes it rubbed a little on his ego that Dax was admitting this but any effective leader has to be able to compliment and learn from his soldiers. Even if they were seemingly mentally deranged grandfatherly scientists. As he was about to start proposing a plan for who to switch with who Alejandro walked in. Well...he rushed in.

"You have to hide me!" He blurted, removing items and packing a bag like he was about to go on the run. "I don't know who it was but he and Naomi were fighting. So I shot at him as soon as I could. I didn't realize dude wasn't an enemy! He could be a freakin' boyfriend and she's on her way to castrate me. I also didn't realize it was until too late that I broke her friendly fire precaution rules."

Jack did his best to keep himself composed as the girl told the last part of her story, surprised that she had taken on not only the elite squad but also additional Rippers when she had just mentioned an inability to do so previously. "So you managed to kill them...even though you couldn't before..." At this point, Jack felt a small wave of anger rise up at the fact that his parents had apparently been killed due to a false belief. While he wanted to punch the girl after noticing this, he did his best to resist the urge. Instead, he would sit for another few moments, allowing himself to cry and grieve silently before attempting to pull himself back together. "I'm not going to lie, I'd probably feel a bit better if I tried to kill you right now, but I'd also likely regret it not long after, regardless of the outcome. Still, I want someone to pay, but I'm going to need a favor from you to do that." he continued. "I want to take down as many Rippers as I can, but I am nowhere near strong enough if they're as skilled as you. It will probably be a long time before I can fully trust you, I need to get stronger, and you appear to be the person best able to help me. Are you willing to train me?"