January 11th, 2109 [Part II]

Nellie moved before she could think.

In the form of scrambling back until she tripped over her own feet and her haunches hit the floor with a thud. The noise was solid, a true testament to the abuse her tailbone just received, but it paled in comparison to the deafening screams and trampling feet of Pure Bloods as they rushed the stage with their weapons drawn.

Mr. Creed whipped around just as platinum coils and a barrel crossed his vision, the onset of an enraged sneer curling his lips.

One second.

In one second, Leanne would pull the trigger and scatter the innards of his skull across the podium.

In one second, the Pure Bloods would take a fatal blow to their reputation and lose power over Trent City.

In one second, Nellie would witness true horror.

The thought of that combined with fear grating her veins like sandpaper and drying out her tongue triggered an asthma attack unlike anything she'd ever felt in her entire life. Her pulse roared in her ears, reverberating through the sloshing and bubbling setting abuzz under her skin. Just barely biting back a wave of vomit, a hand snapped down to her pocket frantically. Clumsily so.

No inhaler. Wrong pocket.

And the panic tripled.

Unconsciously, that same hand lashed out blindly to clench around something, anything to ground herself as her chest rose and fell. She squeezed cold metal, though she failed to place what it actually was. Breathe. Breathe. I-I gotta... But she couldn't. She couldn't breathe. The most torturous second in existence rolled through her brain for an eternity, taunting her with each tightening of the lungs--

Creeeeak...

A long withering groan.

Nellie stared wide eyed at the bar trapped in her grasp, realizing far too late that it was a support beam for the lights perched on hangars above. The column bent obtusely, before snapping in twain like a twig. Everyone on stage jolted from the noise, Leanne included, and looked up just in time to see the massive bulbs wobble and plummet.

One hit to the skull promised death.

"Shit!" Leanne jumped aside into a tuck and roll. She didn't dodge quickly enough to avoid sparks and shattered glass biting at the back of her calves, but she couldn't allow herself a moment of slack either. She carried the momentum with her and popped back up, gun raised.

Creed was already making a dash for the opposite steps with Wilhem and Kolkowsky in tow. Leanne squeezed on eye shut but with the support beams jutting at an angle against a splintered crater in the floor, she was robbed of a clear shot. Regardless, three rounds unloaded and struck metal with a series of sharp pangs, completely missing Creed. "Son of a..." The rest of her grumbles faded as she took note of the Pure Blood agents growing closer, weaving through the stampede of civilians like snakes in swamp water.

Time for the fail safe.

Two fingers flew up to her earpiece. "Mous! Set them off, now!"

"Y-yes, Lea! Hehe! All's the go off. Yes, yes."

Leanne spoke and jogged at the same time, stilettos clacking angrily as she grew closer to her new target. Nellie. Several more lights fell and chased her heels; with every smash of glass and steel against wood, another shower of sparks exploded. Flames kindled across wood and the banner of a giant crimson lily flower.

Even with the overwhelming desperation to flee, Nellie's legs were rendered useless. Full of jelly. Any chance of assistance was slated the moment Creed and the others ran right past her; in the height of pure danger, instinct took over and her safety didn't even brush the back of their minds. For a split moment, Creed ceased and pivoted to face Nellie, something unreadable staining his visage. The amount of plea in her eyes was palpable.

And yet, not a single ounce of mercy could be found in Creed's. All Nellie could see was unbridled disgust. A fresh coat of hatred. Without sparing her another glance, he sprinted to safety. If Nellie wasn't currently choking on a ball of terror, she would've felt hurt and betrayed.

Instead, Nellie snapped her attention back to Leanne and crawled away from her. Incomprehensible pleas spilled from her like the Nile River, but every syllable flowed through one of the mutant's ears and out the other. A fist curled into her collar, eliciting a clipped yelp, before forcing her onto her feet and slamming her back into the fallen beam. Aches throttled the blonde's spine.

"How in the hell did you do that," Leanne hissed. Despite the question, she paid Nellie's babbling little mind and instead snatched up the woman's wrist. A crimson lily tattoo. Definitely a Pure Blood. And yet, all Leanne gathered was more questions than before and even less time to answer them. In the end, there was only one conclusion she could draw.

This had to be the fifth mutant Mous was talking about.

"P-please," Nellie wheezed, feeling as if she was sucking in air through a tiny straw, "Don't kill me. I won't sh-shoot or report you or--"

"I'm not worried about you."

Leanne started dragging Nellie towards the steps, her gait strong and proud as several Pure Bloods came within reach. Those who weren't jumping on stage already had their guns poised. An electric blue glow similar to her jump portals emitted from capsules lining either side of their weapons, a cacophony of whirs making the air shake. Blazers. Only the Pure Bloods were in possession of such fearsome guns capable of frying a target on the spot, human and mutant alike.

Smirking, Leanne pulled Nellie in front of her as a meat shield.

"Be my guest," she said.

In comparison to her silky smooth tone, Nellie's voice climbed several octaves and sweat poured from her by the buckets. "Don't be a guest!"

The agents hesitated, then lowered their guns altogether to clear the gap in a mad dash, intent on grappling Leanne. Her lips brushed the shell of Nellie's ear, her purr seeping past skin and inspiring shivers. "Hold your breath."

The absolute last thing Nellie ever wanted to hear.

"W-why would I--"

Mous's laughter filled Leanne's earpiece.

"Boom, boom!"

What Nellie felt next could only be described as swallowing an iceberg while swimming through a whirlpool of peppermint. The pins and needles riddling every centimeter of her being came so intensely, so abruptly, that the final pocket of air in her lungs vanished and all she could focus on were the two arms clenching her waist tight, the sole source of warmth pressed flush to her back.

The moment her and Leanne's bodies funneled from existence, thunderous booms set off at five different points surrounding the conference. A network of electricity raced towards the center and swept over the mass, throwing everyone off their feet from the monstrous force of impact. Like the Domino Effect, one Blazer erupted at the hip of a Pure Blood, completely dismantled and short-circuited, followed by another and then another. Radio speakers burst, channels crossed, phones sizzled, comms distorted with static and cars' alarm systems triggered, flooding miles of Trent City with sirens.

The EMP's worked like a charm.

}:{

Carter could've sworn he heard his heart shatter into a million pieces.

Everything happened so quickly, but years on the field sharpened his reflexes, so he had moved much faster. A single scream. A single stutter in the audience's applause was all he needed to launch into action. On his call, more than half of their perimeter units rushed the stage to secure the mutant, Nellie, Creed and Wilhelm, while the rest scoped the area for anymore conference crashers.

It was supposed to be swift.

It was supposed to be routine.

It was supposed to end with Nellie borderline swallowing her inhaler while Carter joked her nerves away, mutants put down and danger forgotten.

Instead, after the peak of chaos subsided, he slowly blinked away the stars in his vision, sat up and came face to face with utter defeat. Ambulances burned rubber as they arrived on the scene, paramedics spilling into the throng of staggering and confused citizens. At first glance, they seemed physically unharmed but were beyond frazzled. Men speechless. Women shaken. Children crying. Pure Bloods stewing in shame and fury.

None of it mattered.

Carter pushed his way through the crowd in search of a single face. She was nowhere to be seen on or near the stage, which was now swarmed by firefighters as they tried to extinguish the flames. He switched paths and delved deeper into the sea of bodies. A little girl clutching her father's leg. Not Nellie. A group of teenagers scrambling to cameo on Trent City News as reporters manifested left and right. Still no Nellie.

Gone.

Fingers coursed roughly through his hair as he turned every which way. "Oh, Nellie... Nellie. Nellie no. No, no, no, fuck! Honty, where'd you go?!" Even with the noise rolling overhead, his heartbeat raged in his ears like the heaviest bass known to man. What-if scenarios raced through his mind, each image growing more grotesque by the second and all of them featuring Nellie injured in some fashion. He made a promise to protect her and now there was no way of knowing if--

"Yamanashi!" Creed's towering form was impossible to miss. He approached Carter, physically ripping him free of his reverie with a firm clench and shake of the shoulder. Something new kindled in the chairman's eyes, an emotion that stirred suspicion deep in Carter's gut. An unquenchable thirst. "Round up all units and report back to headquarters immediately! We have mutants to ID." His lips and nose twisted with a snarl. "And a traitor to hunt down."

Carter's brow furrowed. "Traitor? Creed, I don't--"

"Mr. Creed!" The man snapped, his massive frame seeming to double in size and cast a foreboding shadow over Carter. And yet, the Japanese-American showed no signs of flinching.

"What even are you going on about? Honty, Pure Bloods are loyal until death do us part!"

"Then I suppose Ms. King missed the memo," Creed growled. "She's one of them... a mutant. I saw it with my own eyes." He reaffirmed his grip on Carter's shoulder, this time squeezing so hard that the agent visibly winced. "You're going to bring me her and that portal jumper's heads, Yamanashi, before they try to come after mine again. That's an order."