OK, here it is, finally.... if it sucks, don't blame me, blame whatever
deity though it funny to make me this bloody sick :P

Hidden Fires chapter 4


~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~


	Matsudaira slowly drew on the pair of rubber gloves, snapping them
into place around her wrist. Her weariness was only evidenced by the dark
circles under her eyes; how she managed to keep up such a professional air
was a mystery even to herself. Alone now in the morgue, however, she could
relax the facade slightly.

	As she slid the corpse out of the drawer, she reviewed the case
reports Sugishita had rushed over to the TAC early that morning. The
Shinjuku district of Tokyo had been plagued by over thirteen murders; all
the victims were young women, and all had been savagely raped and beaten
before being killed. The semen was oddly more consistent with plant pollen
than actual human products, which had been the first clue as to possible
Aragami involvement. The clincher, though, had come just that morning,
when five recently beheaded corpses were found inside an abandoned
warehouse. Not only had she had to deal with that, but some of her sources
at Tokyo University's Sciences Department had informed her about a new
"miracle drug" that they had developed. Yaegashi and Koume were both going
over there to pick it up for her; she just hoped that it would somehow
cure Kusanagi's mysterious illness. Matsudaira sighed and unzipped the
body bag dispassionately, not allowing herself to be revolted by the sight
in front of her.

	The victim's detatched head wobbled sligthly, its eyes staring
milkily up at the ceiling. In the center of its forehead was a gaping
wound in the rough shape of a comma. The skull gleamed through the wound,
unnatural holes mottling the hard white bone. Matsudaira stopped her
inspection as she sighted a ragged bit of red flesh poking up through the
skull. "That's odd," she murmured to herself, leaning in for a closer
look. "There shouldn't be anything here at all!" Pulling out a tiny
scalpel, she neatly sectioned off a bit of the flesh and began to put it
away in a specimen tube when her mind clicked in with a horrible
realization. She stuck the tube in her lab coat pocket. "Guard? Guard!"

	Two youthful men in security uniforms burst through the swinging
doors. "Yes, ma'am, what seems to be the problem?" they asked in unison.

	"Get round the clock security guards in this room starting now!
This room is to be sealed off from all contact!" Her voice was tightly
held to a commanding tone, but the horror on her face was evident. She
stepped over to a phone and hurriedly dialed a number. "Mr. Kunikida....?"


*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*


	Koume swerved around another curve on two wheels. "Slow down,
Koume!" Yaegashi yelped, clinging to the side of the Jeep for dear life.

	The feisty redhead never heard him. "Baka Aragami!" she grumbled,
racing through the streets. "First this mess with Kusanagi, then that
*stupid* snake, and now these crazy murders in Shinjuku?? What th' hell's
goin' on in Tokyo lately??"

	"Susano-oh and Kaede must have some plan, but what it is...." The
computer analyst sighed and pushed his glasses back up the bridge of his
nose. "What I don't understand is why all these incidents are happening at
once. Are they all connected to the Aragami?"

	"You're askin' ME what goes on in that little brat Susano-oh's
head?? How th' hell am I supposed to know?? Geez...." She pulled up to a
screeching halt in front of Tokyo University's Sciences Department and
leapt out of the car. "Let's just get this over with so we can get back to
headquarters, OK?"

	Yaegashi, his face plastered to the windshield, was only able to
mumble a reply.


	"So, Miss, umm..... Sawaguchi, is it? We were expecting a Mrs.
Matsudaira to come here...." The young scientist nervously eyed the huge
machine gun casually thrown over Koume's shoulder.

	"She's caught up in other matters right now," Yaegashi stepped in.
"You were supposed to have some sort of an antibiotic ready for us to pick
up...." The scientist nodded pensively and motioned for them to follow
him.

	"Yes, well, we had hoped that this antimicrobal we've developed
could help Mrs. Matsudaira's patient, but I'm afraid I have some
rather.... distressing news." He opened the door to one of the labs and
let them peek inside. 

	The room looked as though a tsunami had hit it. The shattered
remnants of beakers and test tubes littered the sticky, fluid-coated
floor. The steel-reinforced windows had been completely destroyed. Tiny
threads of smoke trailed from the borders where two incompatible chemicals
met; containment crews worked overtime trying to clean up the mess. Koume
and Yaegashi looked over the destruction with the same reluctant
acceptance of someone who had become numb to it. "What happened??" she
finally asked.

	"You see, last night our labs were broken into...."


~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~


	"Wake up, sleepyhead."

	Momiji stirred from her nest next to Kusanagi's bed and yawned.
One eye turned automatically to the monitors that were clustered around
the bed; seeing that all the vital signs were unchanged, she sat up and
stretched her arms. "Ohaiyo gozaimasu, Ms. Takeuchi."

	"Good morning to you too, Momiji." Takeuchi smiled at her and
handed her a plastic sack. "The boss had to look over some police reports
with Sugishita; he brought this over for you and told me to tell you that
he'd be back soon."

	"Oh." The teen opened the bag to see a change of clothes and a
little Mokona  UFO catcher doll inside. "How kawaii!"

	Ryoko shrugged. "I thought you might like some company besides us
at night," she explained, digging around in some other sacks. "Go ahead
and get freshened up, and I'll get this breakfast ready for us."

	She blushed, realizing that she hadn't changed clothes since
Kusanagi had appeared two days before, and dashed into the bathroom.
Takeuchi chuckled softly and turned back to her task.


*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*


	Koume sat down in the proferred seat and immediately propped her
feet up on the scientist's desk. "So what exactly happened in there?"
Yaegashi asked, noting the other man's glare at his comrade.

	"Here, I'll play the security tape for you." He fiddled around a
second with the machine before finally hitting the play button.

	The grainy image on the TV jumped and spluttered for a second,
then settled down. Scientists milled about the laboratory, checking
instruments and mixing chemicals, occasionally comparing notes with each
other. A relatively serene picture... until the windows suddenly exploded
in a flash of light. Glass shards sprayed out, slicing through everything
they came in contact with. Tables were overturned and experiments ruined
in the mass sampede as the scientists ran for shelter. A figure encased in
light descended through the shattered remnants of the window and began
gliding towards the far end of the room. Koume and Yaegashi started
forward in instant recognition. "Kaede?!?"

	The scientist paused the tape. "You know who did this?"

	"Damn right we do," Koume grumbled. "What on earth was Kaede doing
in some dumb lab anyway??"

	"Um, so what does this have to do with the antimicrobal we're
supposed to pick up?" Yaegashi asked, leaning forward.

	The older man sighed and tapped the TV screen with a pen. "This
person took the only sample of the antimicrobal to actually survive the
attack. It'll take us at least two weeks to gather up the materials to-"

	"So there is no more of that cure left," the computer analysist
stated flatly, frustration tinging his voice.

	Koume pounded her fists on the desk and snarled, "Kuso! What the'
hell can we do now??"

	As if in responce, the duo's pagers began beeping incessantly.


*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*


	Takeuchi put the last bowl of miso soup down on the table and
began to clean up her mess when she heard something rustle behind her. She
immediately turned around, thinking that somehow Kusanagi was awakening-

	Five hostile faces glared back at her, a throbbing red mitama in
the center of each one's forehead.


Jess, the LilTigre =^_^=