Chapter Nine: Back in Business

The Hunters that the crew were now facing had their focus divided amongst the group. There were more Hunters than there were of The Six Guns. However, as Zia took a fighting stance, Siran did the same. "Hold on" Finn interrupts, "what was that just now? Did Zia just overkill that guy? Also, why don't any of them seem the least bit shaken by what just happened!? I'm on her side, and I'm shaking!".

"Finn..." Alex says, "now would be a really good time to shut your trap".

The Hunters give each other several hands signals, then stop. Suddenly, they all reach under their mask and turn a small knob in synchronicity. "What are they doing?" Tanya asks, getting worried.

"Does now seem like the time to ask that question!?" Vivi yells. "Stop them!".

The tubes and vials full of endo throughout the Hunter's uniforms start to empty, as endo begins to violently pump into their bodies. Before the crew could reach the Hunters, the Hunters threw the crew back with a powerful wind spell. Siran barely managed to stay on his feet, and saw one of the Hunters pointing at another, then pointing at Zia. The other Hunter suddenly took off towards Zia at an enormous speed, catching Zia off-guard. Suddenly, Siran appears in front of the Hunter, and smacked the Hunter with the back of his hand. When Siran's hand meets the Hunter's mask, the air shattered as Siran set off a massive distortion spell. The Hunter's mask shatters as his body flies, spiraling away from Zia. "I'm going to need some answers!" Siran demands.

The Hunters reply with only a low growl, all in unison. A low, echoing growl that sounded more like thunder than any noise a human could make. "What the hell are these things?" Rose asks.

"Whatever they are" Holly says, "they're not good news".

"I don't think they're gonna talk either" Zia says as more endo begins to swirl around her feet.

"Then we'll need to get ahold of that Yamamoto guy" Siran says. Siran then shifts into his beastly form. His skin grows into a dark color, his sclera turn black, his iris grow a deep glowing red, and he grows short horns on his forehead. "Nobody threatens my wife and gets away with it" he growls. Siran dashes into one of the Hunters with his open hand and grabs the Hunter by the mask. Siran tackles the Hunter into the ground, and digs a trench with the Hunter's body. When Siran picks the Hunter back up with his hand, he crushes the mask and shatters it. When he sees the Hunter's face, he sees black sclera, glowing golden eyes, and pale white skin. The only noises the Hunter could make were low growls in frustration, as he tries to pull himself out of Siran's grasps. "This is like when we fought Naris..." Siran says to himself. Suddenly, the Hunter sends a concussive wave of pure endo out of his body, pushing Siran back. "No..." Siran says, "not like Naris. This is different somehow... the energy and cognitive actions seem different".

Suddenly, the first Hunter that Siran hit got back up and charged at him. At the same time, the Hunter in front of Siran also charged at him. As the two came close to him, Siran slashed both of them in half with a reactive endo spear. As they both fell in half and hit the ground, Siran made a second spear. Wielding one spear in each hand, he pinned the top half of both of their bodies to the ground, and the reactive endo caused the ground beneath them to implode, completely destroying the top half of each of the two Hunters. As Siran destroyed the next two Hunters, another one charged at him, only to be stopped by Blake. "This doesn't seem good" Blake says, as he pins another Hunter to the ground with a sword made of ice. Ice begins to spread over the Hunter's body as Blake prepares his sword to stab through the Hunter's head. Just as Blake was about to bring his sword down, the Hunter broke out of the ice and kicked Blake. Blake was sent flying onto his back and Zia charged in from above. Zia kicked straight downward on the Hunter's shoulders, and created an impact so heavy, that it shoved the Hunter into the ground; breaking several of his bones. "Whatever the case may be" Zia says, "it looks like that Yamamoto guy is controlling them".

As Siran looks around, the rest of the team was already fighting off the others. "If that's true..." Siran says, "then doesn't that mean that Yamamoto is the one giving them all endo?".

"Now that you mention it..." Zia says. "Wait, even I can't do that! You're the only one who can!".

"Apparently not anymore" Siran says. "And he seems to have much more endo than I do... these guys may be acting wildly and without much conscience, but they have more endo than The Mages did when we fought them; nearly 20 years ago".

"Just who is this guy?" Zia asks.

"Well, I think we can cross Laurence off of the list" Siran says as he presses his hands against the ground. Siran sends a single rock spike out of the ground and it pierces straight through the chest of another Hunter that charged after him and Zia. As the Hunter was suspended in midair, Siran took out his gun and blasted the Hunter's head off. "I'm not sure why... but I don't think this is Laurence" Siran continues. "I can't quite put my finger on it... maybe it's because Yamamoto seemed more... surprised to see me".

"You're right..." Zia says. "So, for now?".

"Finish up this fight, then go save the kids" Siran says. "I have the feeling we won't be able to shake these people off of our tails".

Meanwhile, in Akihabara, the concert was proceeding smoothly. Suddenly, a group of five people in the same uniform as the Hunters pushed their way through the crowd. The music came to a stop as people began to loudly complain about the sudden rudeness of these few people. The people came up to the stage, and three of them grabbed the children. With one Hunter each holding one child, Mikoto and Satomi began to panic. The two of them stepped down from the stage and came face to face with this group of five Hunters. "What do you want?" Mikoto asks.

"Why are you threatening the kids?" Satomi asks.

"We're here for The Six Guns" one of them says.

"Sir!" Another Hunter says, "we've gotten word from Dolos! He said The Six Guns are resisting, and to use full force!".

"Remove the restraints then, sir?" Another Hunter asks.

"Aye" the first Hunter says. The Hunters reach under their mask and release all of the endo in their suit.

As they began to lose their minds from all of this endo, Mikoto asks "Then is it a fight you want?". Mikoto and Satomi both look back at their band, nod at a man in their band that serves as another singer, and both of them say "Hit it!". The music begins playing again, and the crowd started cheering as Mikoto and Satomi prepared for a fight. Satomi and Mikoto each tackle one of the Hunters holding onto the children.

Dana and Carl were saved, and Silas's eyes began to grow black as the Hunter started to charge up a spell to kill Silas. However, as the Hunter charged up his spell, his spell began to vanish, as Silas absorbed all of the endo that the Hunter was using to create the spell. A sudden blast of pure endo pushes the Hunter off of Silas, and Silas turns to face the Hunter. Satomi and Mikoto jump backwards, away from the fight, with Dana and Carl in their hands. "You can use magic!?" Satomi asks Silas.

Silas didn't respond. He seemed to be in some sort of stupor, as a distortion field forms around all five of the Hunters in the shape of a dome. Silas then begins mumbling something softly to himself. Suddenly, Silas closes his fist, and the Hunters inside exploded in a cloud of pink mist from a sudden impact of sheer air pressure, barely containing the blood within the dome.

The crowd suddenly panicked and began to disperse. "I guess the show's over..." Mikoto pouts.

"What about mom and dad?" Dana asks.

"She's right" Satomi says. "We need to go meet with the others and make sure they're alright".

Satomi and Mikoto take Dana, Carl and Silas with them to the shore where the others left at. By the time they reached the shore, they could already see the rest of the crew coming back. "Silas!" Zia says as they finally arrive on the shore. "You're okay!".

"Yes, mom... I'm fine" Silas says in a somewhat irritated tone.

"You'll never believe this" Mikoto says. "Silas took out five people all at once".

"And you let him!?" Zia panics.

"What!? No!" Satomi says. "The kid has a natural talent, like Siran does. It was crazy!".

"I did?" Silas asks.

"You... don't remember that, Silas?" Dana asks.

"Not very... well" Silas says.

"It was nuts" Carl says.

"We have more business to attend to" Haru says, interrupting their talk. "That Yamamoto guy sent these Hunters after us. I'll need to have a little talk with him at the conference tomorrow morning. Find a safe place to stay... stay in the police station if you have to".

"What about you?" Ying asks. "It's not going to be safe for you there".

"He won't be able to cause a scene during the conference" Haru says. "That's when I'll bust him".

"This is getting crazy" Finn says. "Can you guarantee our children's safety?".

"I can" Haru says. "Rest assured, this wasn't the plan, but I'll make sure it's safe for you there".

The next evening, Haru came to the police station in a panic. "Wake everybody up now!" Haru shouts at Siran. "We need to go!".

"What happened?" Siran asks.

"Yamamoto has already convinced all of HQ that I'm a traitor" Haru panics. "Before I even got to HQ, they already had a squad looking for me".

"What!?" Siran panics.

"I'm out of a job here!" Haru shouts as the rest of the crew wakes up and gathers. "And what's more, I'm wanted, and so are the rest of you!".

"Wait, what took you so long to get here if you couldn't attend the meeting?" Mikoto asks.

"Because, I've found this" Haru says as she throws a military file on the table. "It was a military document that Yamamoto had".

"How'd you steal it?" Finn asks.

"I tailed him while avoiding confrontation" Haru says. "He's stolen military files to keep people blind of his identity".

"What's on the file?" Alex asks.

"Someone, somewhere" Haru says as she slams her hands on the table, "has been collecting military powers and controlling them. I don't think I need to tell you who that person is...".

"Yamamoto..." Siran says.

"The link..." Haru says as she open up the file and starts pointing out information in the file, "each military of each country that has had a similar experience to ours ended up the same way as Japan. Suddenly, a general steps up, takes particular interest in some remote location, pulls the military and civilians alike out of the areas and evacuates it, an Endo-Stream shows up out of nowhere in that exact location, then the general poses as a hero who saved all of those lives from dying a horrible death of suffocation by endo over a long period of time. Since the endo is undetectable, they wouldn't know they're dying of it, until he shows up out of nowhere and saves everybody. I'm telling you, it's just not likely that so many different generals all get the same idea! It all has to be the same person!".

"And that person is Yamamoto?" Satomi asks. "Doesn't that seem... hard to manage?".

"We've seen him shapeshift" Zia says. "So it's not impossible to think that he could change however he wants and infiltrate a military".

"So... what now?" Rose asks. "We're not safe in Japan anymore... are we?".

"I'm afraid not" Haru says. "It appears as if your biggest ally is now your enemy. The Japanese government now considers you criminals, so expect more action from China as well".

"We have to find out what this guy who calls himself Yamamoto is up to" Siran says. "But we can't engage in Japan anymore, with all that's going on".

"Any ideas?" Haru asks.

"I've got one, but it's a long shot" Siran says. "We need to get ahold of that contact we had... Laurence. He might know something".

"Where do we begin looking for him?" Vivi asks.

"I'm not sure" Siran says. "For now, let's return to Seeira, where it's safe. We'll form a plan there".

"Good luck to you then" Haru says as she takes out her badge and sets it on the table.

Siran looks at Haru's distressed face, then turns to Alex and whispers something to him. Alex hands something to Siran, and Siran then walks back up with Haru and places down a metal calling card with the number "7" engraved on it. "This is Ruby's old card" Siran says to her. "As you can see, we're one man down in our group, after that battle with Naris. Since you're out of a job and have already done so much for us, we'd like you to take that spot".

"Wait, does that mean..." Zia asks, "that we're bringing The Six Guns back?".

"Are we reactivating the crew!?" Finn asks.

"I think, at this point, we have to" Siran says.

"Yes!" Rose cheers. "I've always kinda missed The Six Guns!".

"It's not necessarily a good thing, Rose" Alex says. "That means there's work to do".

"You're offering me a spot in your crew?" Haru asks.

"I don't see why not" Siran says.

"I'll take it" Haru says calmly as she picks up the card and puts it in her back pocket. "... Thanks for looking out for me".

"Alright!" Mikoto cheers. "We're back, baby!".

Zia leans in close to Siran and whispers "Are you sure we can rely on Laurence for anything?".

"I'm not sure at all" Siran says. "There's only one way to find out though, right?".