XCEL

The crowds were immense. Kinuka Amibari had been in busy places before, but nothing stacked up to this. She and her friends had gone on day trips to the Tokyo city centre once or twice, but not even the crossing in Shibuya was as packed as the street was now. Though not the largest, Chiba was a large enough metropolis to disorient someone—even a local—given half a chance. The last few days’ events had been a blur. In all that time, the thought of where they had been hadn’t even crossed her mind.

She recognised this street—at least, she thought she did. Her head was buzzing with static, as though her mind had been replaced with a radio. It felt like she and Rin had been walking for ages, made more difficult by the surging masses they continually pushed against like two salmon swimming upriver. Despite that, Kinuka spotted over the heads of many, some familiar landmarks. On her left, twenty yards ahead, there was the department store; she’d been countless times, mostly to browse. On the other side of the street, she saw the corner store selling French-style crepes where she’d been to eat with friends. How long ago had that been? The atmosphere around them now was so dense, she felt her head fog up as soon as she tried to think. It got to the point where she couldn’t even see the faces of most who passed them.

It could be her imagination, but half of them didn’t appear to have faces whatsoever.

“Out of the way—” She heard Rin grumble, hood raised and shoulders hunched, following a near-miss with what was the hundredth indistinguishable briefcase-wielding office warrior. Desperate not to lose him, she darted between two women, their excited nattering only adding to the din.

Why on earth was it so busy today? Perhaps there was a local event nearby, she thought. Was there a festival going on somewhere behind them? What date was it, even? They continued wading through the sea. Rin, a determined grimace etched onto his face, went at such a stride that Kinuka had to half-run to keep up with him. While she knew it was best they hurry, her legs soon began to protest. Soon, Rin’s self-proclaimed “excellent sense of direction” took them on a sharp left turn down a side-street. Neither said a word as they turned right, then left, then right again. Before either of them had a chance to clock the fact, it seemed, the crowd around them thinned. They rounded the corner onto another street Kinuka recognised. The street was deserted.

“Hey, Rin—” Kinuka, the static in her mind cleared up, looked around. “Where did everyone go?”

“Don’t know; don’t care. We’re nearly there.”

She knew he was thinking the exact same—not that he’d dare admit a thought that wasn’t explicitly his own.

“Hold on.”

Rin put out an arm to stop her. His third eye twitched. Darting to the side, he flew into a nearby alleyway. His fist clenched around the front of her shirt, and dragged her along with him.

Kinuka cried out. She really liked that shirt.

Rin didn’t let go until they were off the street. The alley was dark, but it provided cover—cover from what, she wondered.

“Rin! What do you—”

“Shut up,” he hissed. His eyes were wide. Pushing the both of them back against a wall, the only sound for the next few moments was their breathing. The air itself hung still. After an agonising ten seconds that felt like several minutes, Rin peeked out into the street.

“What’s going on?” Kinuka whispered.

No response. Rin pressed two fingers against his temples and closed his two normal eyes. She could feel—through her own third eye—the air begin to vibrate.

Rin was listening for something, for some kind of ripple.

“Did you—” She said, “did you sense something? Someone?”

She imitated him and tried listening for herself. Nothing.

Rin stayed quiet a few more seconds. He then opened his eyes and lowered both hands.

“No use. Thought I felt a signature nearby,” he said, confused. He poked his head around the corner of the alley, drew back and pointed. “It came from that direction.”

“Are you sure?”

“Of course I’m sure!” Rin tried focusing again, but growled in frustration. “Might’ve been imagining things after all,” he mumbled to himself.

“Then, are we in the clear?”

“Seems like it.” Rin nodded. “Can’t be too careful,” he said. Still looking at her, he started walking backwards out onto the street. “After all, you never know when you might get—”

Bang!

The bullet knocked him sideways. Rin hit the ground with a thud, blood pooling around his head and onto the tarmac.

* * *

Far enough away—still in line of sight—a girl lay prone on a rooftop, peering down into the deserted street through the long scope of her rifle.

“One target down,” she said. Raising her head from the stock, she emptied the chamber. What followed was the hiss and click of an empty case ejected from the breech, and a clink as brass hit the smooth concrete tiling behind her. She was speaking to a glass orb positioned a few feet away. It wasn’t long before the orb spoke back.

“Excellent work, Tsushin,” it commended.

Tsushin Techukara showed no sign of recognising the praise. Her face was stony and cold, even her skin was tinged with a little grey. Her black bodysuit and jacket blended with her hair, a little of which she brushed out of her eyes—three of them—before she lent back down to load another shot.

“Which one?” The man’s voice continued.

“Rinkaku Harigane,” she reported back without a moment’s hesitation. “The other’s hidden in the alley. She’ll show her head soon enough.”

“You’re doing a fine job, my dear.”

Again, not a single ounce of emotion.

“What are your orders, sir?”

“Take out the girl, then move in to confirm,” the voice ordered. “Harigane will likely have the blade on him. If so, take it. If not, search the girl. Incapacitate and interrogate her if you don’t kill her from afar. If neither, I’ll come collect you. The boss will be very pleased to hear your report regardless.”

A harsh chuckle from the other end.

“You’d eliminate the problem before it had even begun.”

“Understood.” Tsushin clicked another bullet into place as she refocused her sight, staring down a hundred yards into the street below.

* * *

Rin was— Rin had just been—

Kinuka stood there for a moment, unable to think, unable to breathe. She wanted to scream, but all she could do was stare. Her balance then went, and she fell to her knees. Instincts took over, and she had grabbed the boy by the ankle and had pulled him back into the alley. The blood leaking from the bullet wound in his head painted the tarmac.

Her hands went to his head. Rin's black hair was matted with sickly crimson, oils from the scalp congealing with the blood into an ungodly mess. Now, her hands were covered in it. She felt bile rise in her throat, her stomach wringing itself out like a sponge. The expression on his face was frozen in irony; he looked so proud of himself.

He couldn’t be dead, could he? No, he couldn’t be!

Her fingers scrabbled to clutch around Rin’s throat, desperate for a pulse. Something was pounding, though whether it was Rin’s blood or her own she couldn’t tell. She felt hers rushing through her head, which only worsened the waves of nausea rolling through her like a tide.

Practically tearing the fabric off his arm, Kinuka took apart Rin’s sleeve with Threadwork. The shirt was cheap polyester, but if she rearranged the threads, it’d soon have nearly the same properties as something like cotton. The threads then wove themselves into a bandage which she wound tight around his head. She wanted to cry, but the shock had her heart in a vice.

Despite that, despite everything—her heaving chest, the sickness to her stomach, the clamminess of her skin—she felt something else.

A steady ripple, like a drop of water into a still pond.

A familiar voice then whispered into her ear.

“Kinuka…”

She looked around, before noticing the female figure draped in flowing silk shawls shift into view over her shoulder, slender hands holding her face.

“Don’t be afraid,” said the Seamstress. “Listen to the signature.”

She felt it again.

Drip.

Drip.

Drip.

Someone was nearby.

Kinuka inhaled shakily, then swallowed. “I hear it.”

Seamstress nodded, then faded away.

Sitting Rin upright, Kinuka tied him to the wall, in the hope of stemming the blood loss. How much this was worth—given it might already be too late—she neither knew nor cared. She now had another thread to follow.

Placing two fingers either side of her temples as Rin had done, Kinuka did her best to concentrate. Her vision darkened, as the pulsing of the signature became louder. It pinged like sonar; a mass of psychic energy given form on the horizon. The longer she concentrated, the clearer it became.

Soon, she could practically see it off in the distance. The signature remained burned into her vision when she opened her eyes.

Ice-like resolve coursed through her veins, flushing her system of the shock. Kinuka’s breathing slowed. Her vision narrowed, her pupils dilated, and only one thought in her mind remained: how to take down their assailant.

She’d felt so powerless when the Rejected attacked their school. Now, she had the power to do something.

She couldn’t see the spirit, but Kinuka felt Seamstress’ comforting presence over her shoulder, a guardian angel.

She looked out towards the street. Whoever had taken out Rin had a gun. If she poked her head out beyond the alley, she’d soon have a matching hole in her skull. That wasn’t an option.

So, she looked upward. She’d take the rooftop.

This morning, she’d figured out how to use her own arms as elastic cords. By taking apart her own arms into thread, she could create ropes that could support her own weight. By contracting the material once extended, she could pull herself up.

Now was the time to exploit that.

“Threadwork,” she thought aloud, and her third eye glowed. Her right arm then began unravelling, the thousands of threads twisting themselves into a long rope which then shot upwards, wrapping around a metal outcrop on a ledge close to the roof. Tugging on the rope, Kinuka lowered herself towards the floor and then jumped, contracting the rope to pull herself up. It worked even better than she had thought. She soon found herself crouching on the building’s ledge. It took a moment, but she managed to restore her arm as well. She raised her hand and flexed her fingers. Everything felt normal.

The more she practised, the less she had to think about it. Soon, perhaps the motion of taking herself apart would become as easy as breathing given time.

Focusing in, the signature she had isolated earlier soon reappeared. Kinuka broke into a sprint over the rooftops, jumping from one building to another. Psychic energy crackled around her as her legs, fuelled with adrenaline, carried her faster than she’d ever thought possible. For any larger gaps, she turned her arm into the elastic rope again, grappling around a secure point and pulling herself forward.

As she went, however, the familiar static from before crept back into her mind. At first, she heard a light buzzing in her ears. Then, the marker she had placed on the psychic signature grew fainter and fainter. Kinuka slowed, eyes widened. Her breath was cold in her lungs, her legs and sides burning from the exertion. Panting slightly, she lent against a cooling tower and tried catching her breath. That didn’t stop the static from ramping up, however. The noise in her ears grew louder; her vision became blurry and grey, filled with black and white speckles like the haze on a television.

The outside world was fading; what was once mere discomfort became a sharp pain that stabbed into her brain like a thousand little needles. Kinuka cried out and clutched at her head.

Somehow, a glint of something caught her attention: a glint of something metal. Kinuka’s focus for a moment cleared up, and the signature she’d found was given form: a girl no older than herself, sat crouched on a rooftop some way away across the street. In her arms she cradled a long rifle. The barrel glinted as it trained on her exposed head.

Kinuka fell to the floor. The bullet shattered the window of the building behind her, a splintering crash that made her ears ring. Rolling behind an air-conditioning unit, Kinuka scrambled into a low seating position.

The static stopped. Kinuka inhaled sharply as her senses returned to normal.

“Kinuka.” It was Seamstress again. “Something is interfering with your connection to the Eye,” the woman warned. “At some point, the interference will make it so that I can no longer reach you. You must be careful.”

Kinuka nodded. “Thank you.”

On the other end of the barrel, Tsushin’s keen eye was still trained down her scope. She’d missed. The itch in her trigger finger grew into an urge. The girl’s blond hair was just another target. Just then, she spotted a flash of it. Kinuka dashed out from behind cover and dived forward. Another shot ricocheted off the concrete behind her, and Tsushin cursed.

I just need to get closer, Kinuka thought, hearing the clicking of the rifle. The moment she had broken cover, however, the static immediately resumed. Just before she had taken her dive, her vision had locked in place, and she lost balance. She avoided tripping and falling only by managing to dive at the last second. Peeking over her shoulder, Kinuka knew she only had moments to make ground before the rifle was fully loaded again.

She had to move. Now.

“There you are,” said Tsushin, as Kinuka revealed herself from behind cover.

“Likewise,” Kinuka said, walking towards her.

“Don’t worry,” Tsushin replied coolly, clicking her next round into place, “you’ll be joining the boy soon, once I’ve gotten some answers out of you.”

She took aim and fired at the girl’s leg. Though there was about a whole rooftop’s distance between them, for her it was near point-blank range.

Miss, she didn’t. The bullet left the barrel and pierced through Kinuka’s thigh, only to leave another searing mark on the concrete behind. Kinuka, however, didn’t scream. There was no indication that a hit had registered at all.

Tsushin’s eyes widened. Then, she saw the clean hole in Kinuka’s leg that the bullet had passed through begin to sew itself back together.

“What’s wrong?” Kinuka glared at her, unflinching. “Your aim’s not so good anymore.”

Kinuka wound back her arm, preparing her elastic rope to grapple around the woman and close the remaining distance. “Take this, you bitch!” She whipped her arm forward. Soon, that hefty rifle of hers would be nothing but dead weight.

“Your party trick won’t save you twice,” Tsushin growled. Her third eye gleamed.

At once, Kinuka’s vision blurred. The onslaught of needles then started once more. Her arm’s transformation stopped halfway, interrupted by the conflicting signal. Kinuka cried out and sank to her knees, clutching at her temples.

“That’s right. Stay right there for me.”

Another bullet loaded, Tsushin notched the stock of her rifle into her shoulder, aimed and fired.

The bullet pierced Kinuka through the side. The girl cried out and collapsed. She clutched at the wound, blood soaking through the fabric of her shirt. She was crawling away—the pain almost too much for her to bear—but her headache cleared as soon as she made it behind a nearby wall. Her transformed arm then reverted to normal, and Kinuka was able to turn the site of her injury into thread. The wound began repairing itself, flesh stitching itself back together as the head of the bullet was discarded.

Tegata had told them resistances to specialties? The boy’s lesson started to come back to her. By working out the details of the specialty by herself, she would form a resistance to it. These sudden onsets of delirium she kept experiencing: the headaches, the mind-fog, the sudden malfunction of her psychic abilities. That must be her specialty, Kinuka thought. That must’ve been the interference that Seamstress had been talking about. For the time being, she stayed still, doing her best to level her breathing.

Now that she understood the woman’s ability better, perhaps she stood more of a chance.

There was only one way to find out.

Tsushin aimed down her sights once more, trained on the cover the girl had taken. She poised to shoot at first sight, just as her training had taught her, just as the voice in her head told her to. She wouldn’t dare disobey, not again. The Queen knew what was best, and her voice brought solace amid the screams. The Queen’s voice was the only one she knew, after all. It knew best.

Her target’s psychic signature then began to dampen. The ripples faded over time. Tsushin lifted her head from the rifle. Had her target fallen unconscious from the shock? The injury had been nonfatal, but it was possible she had passed out from blood loss. She had aimed to incapacitate the girl rather than kill her outright. She’d have the girl tell her where the blade was, and save her the trouble of checking both bodies.

Setting down her rifle, Tsushin stood up and made her cautious tracks. She peered around the box she’d seen the girl crawl behind, only to find her collapsed on the floor, all three eyes closed. Listening out for a psychic signature, she could hear none. The only sound she could hear accompanied the rising and falling of her chest.

She bent down to feel for a pulse, when Kinuka’s eyes shot open. A length of metal wire whipped around from the girl’s side, fastening around both of Tsushin’s wrists. Out then lashed another, which wound itself tight around Tsushin’s throat, choking the gasp.

Kinuka leapt to her feet. This was pure instinct. She turned Tsushin around by the shoulder and locked her neck in the crook of her elbow. Her free hand held the other end of the wire that threatened strangulation.

“Got you.”

Tsushin thrashed around like a shark in a fishing net, throwing her weight this way and that in an attempt to dislodge Kinuka, but she held fast. The thread around Tsushin’s throat tightened.

“You’ll tell me exactly who you’re working for and why you attacked us,” Kinuka started, another tug on the thread to remind her that she wasn’t fooling around. She was certain this was JPRO’s doing, what with the third eye the girl had. That still didn’t explain why.

“Do you really think you’ve won?” Tsushin said.

Kinuka had no idea how she could sound so calm. She tightened the thread even further. “If you don’t answer me, I won’t hesitate to—”

“—kill you?” Tsushin finished her sentence.

Kinuka’s eyes widened, her grip on the thread loosened.

“You don’t have the guts for that, little girl.”

Both her tone and that wicked smile, neither in that moment seemed entirely her own.

Kinuka heard a crackling, as Tsushin’s body glowed with psychic energy. With a concentrated effort, Tsushin flexed and tore apart the bindings of metal wire Kinuka had fixed, leaving bloodied grooves in the skin. Grabbing the girl from behind, Tsushin twisted sharply and threw Kinuka over her shoulder. The girl landed hard on the concrete, knocking all the wind out of her.

Tsushin stamped down on one wrist, and ground her other heel into the girl’s sternum. Kinuka cried out. Tsushin’s third eye then opened wide, as she once again unleashed her ability, casting a concentrated jamming signal into the girl’s mind. Kinuka’s eyes screwed shut to combat the blistering pain.

Tsushin gathered psychic energy in one foot and positioned her heel above Kinuka’s head. She was about to stamp down, when another coil of wire bound itself around her ankle and pulled.

Tsushin went crashing face first onto the floor. Her line of sight broken, the jamming on Kinuka ceased. Tsushin was about to right herself, when she felt more metal thread wrap around her throat. Kinuka now knelt across the small of her back.

Unable to move, Tsushin struggled for a few more seconds before going limp. For the next few seconds, the air hung still. The only noises remaining was the bustling city behind them, and both of their heavy breathing.

“How?” The girl asked at last, through gritted teeth no less.

“I didn’t expect you to break out of the binding earlier,” Kinuka said, panting a little. “Fortunately, I came prepared.” She looked at her arm. Several coils of wound metal thread were wrapped along her sleeve, all twisted into that same threaded wire.

“How did you break free of my Jammer?”

“Answer my questions. What’s your goal here?”

Tsushin looked up at her out of the corner of one eye. “You’re going to have to kill me.”

Kinuka gazed down at the girl, the other end of the killing thread clasped tight in one hand. “I don’t want to do that.”

“Just get it over with!” Tsushin seethed. “You’ve won! Kill me already!”

“You’re not going to tell me anything?”

The lack of response was answer enough. Kinuka looked at her sadly, then at the wire in her hands. She let go. The fastening around Tsushin’s throat and legs loosened. The woman immediately scrambled onto her knees. In that time, Kinuka had already risen, and was walking away.

“Where are you going?!” Tsushin yelled after her.

“To get Rin,” she replied, not looking back. “He’s not dead. He may be an idiot, but he’s not stupid. There’s no way he’d let himself be taken out by something like that. That aside, we have somewhere to be.”

“But why?!” Tsushin spat, white-hot rage spitting like sparks with every syllable. “Why didn’t you kill me when you had the chance?!”

Kinuka stopped walking and paused. “I’m not a killer.” She looked over her shoulder, her glare icy. “Don’t come after us anymore. I’ve bested you once, I’ll best you again. Go and tell whoever you work for how you failed to take us out. They won’t like that.”

Kinuka had finished. Tsushin had not.

“You’ll regret that!” Her hand flew behind her, reaching for her sidearm. Training on Kinuka’s exposed back, a click readied the shot in the chamber. Tsushin’s hand shook, as did her vision. She steadied one hand with the other, trigger finger itching.

Kinuka kept walking.

The bang shook the air itself, and Kinuka stopped.

There was no hole. No wound at all. Just a tear in the back of her frilled white shirt.

“I told you. It’s useless.” Kinuka untucked the back of her shirt, and a dented metal plate clattered to the floor. Rubbing the affected area with one hand—a minor inconvenience—Kinuka’s shirt sewed itself back together. When she spoke, didn’t even bother looking back. “Give up.”

And so, she carried on walking.

Blood pounded heavily through Tsushin’s head. Her locked jaw was tensed to the point the tendons were about to snap. A film of red leaked down the backs of her eyes, vision swimming. Both hands shook violently, until her fingers all went numb. The pistol slipped from her grasp. A feeble reach forward was about all she could do, before the overexertion took hold. Tsushin Techukara didn’t even perceive the cold reality of the concrete before it hit. To her, the world had long since faded.

Kinuka Amibari took step after step in stony silence. There was so much she wanted to say, but decided against all of it. She had said enough. Nothing she’d say would convince their assailant otherwise. Just from the maddened, empty look in her eyes, Kinuka knew the girl was too far gone.

“Hey.”

A voice from her left snapped Kinuka from her reverie. A dark-haired boy approached, hands in his pockets. He wore an absolutely insufferable grin.

Kinuka stared at him, unmoved. “A corpse is talking.”

Rinkaku Harigane looked amused. “I know. Insane, right?” He peeled off the bandage and shook his head, running a hand through his hair to show Kinuka the bloodied bruise. A faint purple layer now overshadowed the skin. “I woke up and you were gone. My head hurt like hell, though.” He rubbed the wounded area, tutting. “Should’ve known they had a goon waiting to take me out. I guess I’m just that g—wait, where are you going?”

Kinuka had already walked past him. “Home,” she said, not looking back.

Rin made a weary face. “I don’t know, maybe a ‘hi, Rin, glad to see you’re still alive’ would be nice!”

“Drop dead again, for all I care.”

Rin jogged to catch up. “Hey, hey Kinuka, what gives? Aren’t you pleased to see me again? Relieved that your best friend is still alive?”

Kinuka slapped him hard across the face.

“What the hell was that for?!” He cried, now on the floor.

“That’s for making me think you were dead!”

“Oh!” He grinned. “So you were worrying about—”

Before he could finish, Kinuka kicked him in the shin. Rin howled, rolling around on the floor.

“Of course I worried about you, you fucking idiot!” She cried, tears in her eyes. She took a few shaky breaths and steadied herself, wiping her face on her sleeves.

Rin still lay on his back, clutching his leg in agony.

“Come on.” Kinuka turned and was now walking away. “Get moving. We promised Tegata we’d be back by noon.”

“You have some serious issues.”