A Bio-Weapon’s Rhapsody

"We will move with the standard formation." [Golem] started as soon as the door closed behind them. "I'll go ahead, Skye will be over watch and you Ale, are in take down duty, if possible keep them alive and able to function."

Able to function?

Oh… was this because what she had done during the school sports festival?

"… But these are criminals, unlike the ones at the school who were victims." Ale pointed out, just for the sake of being combative to be honest, she… was not entirely sure why that had been her train of thought, she wasn't against such decisions, even to this day. But it was… highly hyper efficient way to solve it.

There was no taste on it or even a way to identify her work from it, just a series of paralytic victims, wonder what had happened to those?

"That may be so, but we can't discard the possibility of them being minions from a powered organization." [Golem] stated as he started moving forward.

"Found em, two coming our way, four blocking the exit routes and another three waiting at the gateway towards the plane." Big Sister said as she closed her eyes and sighed, "Want me to teleport us ahead? I could probably land us outside the plane, that thing has some weird stuff going on that stops me from getting a read from the interior."

"No." [Golem] said shaking his head, "We already exposed you to Vulcanus and some Lieutenants, unless you are going to come out as a space core instead of a Wind one, then we should refrain on that."

"Noted." Big Sister said nodding and having the space mana settle around her, now it was just turning into small twisters around her.

[Detected high concentration of space mana… Mana Density lowering… Detected change in atmospheric pressure.]

So she was probably opening a door somewhere with high speed wind to prepare to fake her wind powers? Ale wondered how that was working, but then again, she probably could detect the wind currents and then just stick portals here and there. That felt like a little too… excessive for what she wanted to achieve, she could probably pass as some kind of sensory type core user more easily.

But then again, Ale was not the one who was pretending to pass as a wind core user, not that Ale could do it, or could she? Maybe if she set up some kind of compressor within her torso and then set up some channels to her hands? But then the sound of the wind compressor would probably get her…

Unless she called it some weird moniker? The Queen Engine? Would someone even believe her? Also Queen? That was kinda… over the top, maybe Fallen Angel Engine? FAE? That could work, the FAE engine…

Ale would see about doing something with that later, heheh.

"Then I need to go for submissions that will not cripple them?" Ale said stretching herself, she pinged the Nanites within her body and they started crawling over her skin, she was not going full throttle with her suit, instead she only materialized the under skin body thightsuit. This would provide her with some limited protection, not that she needed it…

But since her biological manipulation was somewhat diminished, she didn't want to discover the hard way that her wounds weren't healing as well as before, she could probably get Alexa to fix her body… But that was for another day.

"Correct." [Golem] nodded and sure enough, as Big Sister had said, two hostiles came to a stop in front of them.

They were wearing a full black body armor, it was similar to those that the police forces used, not that this made them police of course, they probably bought some version from the black market, they had some oversized rifles too. Ale felt that she had seen those somewhere else…

"Halt!" One of them said, his voice was being distorted by some kind of device and it didn't came from his head, instead it came from the shoulders, were those helmets hermetically sealed? "Alexandra Saintsworths, you will be coming with us."

That was not a question nor a suggestion, but an order, and that annoyed Ale to great deal, as much that Ale wanted to get her claws out and rip their throat off.

"We refuse." [Golem] said standing in front of Ale, covering her.

How did Alexa used to refer to him? Meat shield? Yeah, he was acting as one right now, to the two hostiles that is.

"Eduardo Herrera, code name:Golem." The one from before spoke raising the rifle at [Golem], "These are Saintsworths endorsed bolter rifles, charged with AP-HP rounds, they are rated to make a dent into Saintsworths grade armor."

…What?

"There are no way that is true." Ale said from the side, "There is no logical way or method with which you could combine an Armor Penetration round with a Hollow Point, they are… the designs are not compatible, or safe, the bullet would explode in your gun."

"…We don't question the Saintsworths overlords, they have testimonials that these rounds have high armor penetration and explode like the hollow points." The criminal said pointing his gun to the side and discharging a single round.

Ale had been unable to see the bullet trajectory, but the fact that one of the walls to the side had now a hole… that went straight all the way to the exterior was proof enough that it was certainly an armor penetration round… Also each hole in the series was bigger than the previous, was that an argument to be made about the rounds being hollow point?

[Downloading video files around the facilities.]

[Slowing down Mistress' perception.]

[Do you want to peruse the evidence?]

That would be a yes then…Ale thought and felt the world around her come to a crawl, now that her awareness was extending beyond the limits of what she had been stuck with, there was many things she could see.

For one, she noticed that according to her sensors, [Golem] was pouring all the mana from his Core into the stone of his body, increasing the density of his body. Turning her awareness to Big Sister… she noticed that nothing much changed on that front.

Except her eyes seemed to have a weird green hue? How was it that she couldn't see that unless she had slowed her awareness?

[Target Skye Venti is currently channeling her Mana and has locked on spatial coordinates for emergency teleport.]

That was… reassuring, but why? There was no way they wouldn't be able to defeat these, they weren't even Minions! Or Villains, how could they get defeated by some random ass soldiers? If they wanted to defeat them, at least bring a side-kick or a Hero!

[Weapon designation status downloaded from database.]

And while Main Core was projecting that information to Ale, she went ahead and rewound the video of the bullet, and… she once again saw nothing, so she manipulated the recording and started slowing it down, she went across several tries till she just went ahead and slowed it as far back as possible.

What Ale ended up with was a series of frames, the first one had the wall destroyed and a rod about to hit the second wall, the second frame had that wall destroyed, and the next two. The rod was still fully complete and normal, how the hell was that hollow point?

Ale went ahead and started scanning the data she got, both from the video surveillance and her own mana readings and the sensory inputs that she had. Building the round up from that data Ale managed to get a good idea of what it was.

This is a nail. And what she found was that, the thing shot rods, of course it had high penetration power it was a stake-like rod, as for the hollow point allegations? It was the debris created from the impact upon the targets. The thing shot things that seemed to look like nails, and so the back of the round had that weird cap-like thing, and so, the debris that was destroyed got pulled and that was what was increasing the size of the holes as it traveled further down.

Which was a very weird design idea, because the design of the bullet was not good for prolonged travel, perhaps it had some stuff that could shot without the weird nail design?

[Correct, the bolter has multiple type of rounds available, from anti regeneration rounds, to incapacitation rounds that are designed to knock enemies down.]

Well, that explained why [Golem] was bulking up, these things could probably do quite the nasty damage, why were these on the hands of normies?

[These are Core Power hunters, they are hired to subdue Core Users.]

…Isn't this the job for minions and side-kicks? Ale asked inwardly, she was under the impression that a Core User should fight another one, wasn't that the whole thing with Core Users Heroes and Villains?

[The social dynamics between Heroes and Villains do not extend to this degree, there are organizations that dedicate themselves to neutralization and capture. A Hero takes their defeated enemies to containment facilities, from which the minion or Villain will escape eventually.]

Main Core showed some of those facilities, and they looked somewhat like the building from which Alexa had ran away from, was that one such examples?

[Villains and Minions don't restraint the Hero, unless they are working under the idea of fighting against more Heroes, but even in such instances they release the Hero at some point. Neither side works solely to incapacitate or restraint their enemies.]

But these do. Ale said turning her full awareness to the criminals, or well, hunters. Which means… That is why [Golem] and Big Sister are like that, then we need to do our best. Bring me back.

[As you wish Mistress.]

Ale felt herself be pulled back towards her body and her vision turned towards the hole, pieces of rubble falling down, "I have the bullets for you Eduardo, my coworker has anti-regenerator bullets, and as for your last companion… Either she is Sylph or she is a normie, which means no special bullets are required."

Oof…

"You came ready then," Ale said smirking, "So… Are you sure I need to play safe?"

Ale saw [Golem] sigh and shake his head, "We are no longer considering them Civilians nor Heroes, as of now under my authority I declare them enemies." Ale felt some weird change in the aura around [Golem] as he spoke, "As such, you two are authorized to go into lethal attacks."

As [Golem] spoke, his figure shifted, from the usual smooth stone/marble form, to one more rugged, his knuckles grew spikes and his torso no longer had smooth surfaces but tons of very sharp parts. Some of the strategies and attacks that Ale had seen [Golem] do included hugs and tackles, usually that would mean the objective of his attack would get a very serious concussion, but now?

Now that his body was covered in spikes and rugged parts, whoever he crashed into was not standing up.

"As you wish then," Big Sister smiled as she pulled out a mask that only covered her mouth and nose, placing it in place and securing it against her face, "Ale, try to not get too close, this will be nasty."

And with that, Big Sister jumped away from them, where she started floating.

[Detected change of temperature, detected shift in atmosphere, area surrounding Skye Venti is starting to have a lower density of O2. Care is advised.]

And that left Ale… "Well, then shall we?" Ale extended her hands to the side and stopped, usually she would just get her arm-mament out, the claws had been doing god's work and they were quite useful, it didn't matter if Ale used them as stabbing, slashing or even as a fist, they did the work. But… How was she supposed to do it in this situation?

[Golem] was barreling towards the guy with the AP-HP bullets, while the other had jumped to the side and was pointing his gun towards Big Sister, ignoring Ale, that was just rude.

So as to answer the question, Ale raised her palm towards the guy, he turned his attention for a second towards Ale, as the barrel of the gun momentarily pointed at Ale, but when nothing happened, he continued aiming at Big Sister.

"That was a mistake." Ale said in a lower voice, her arm started to change, mostly inwardly, but the changes were there, the interior of her arm remodeled itself into a gun mode, it was not the 120 mm gun, since that would leave way too much damage, and she didn't want to be blamed for all the destruction around, it was closer to a more anti personal caliber.

Ale had stolen the design of the bullets that Alexanders gave them when they escaped from the laboratory the first day, he had thrown a 9mm gun at them, a gun that P4 ate and stored the blueprint and never actually used.

With that information Ale had the design and she merely adapted it, before she started shooting though, she edited the design a little and made the gun sign with her hand, "Bang." And with that vocalization, she discharged the gun.

Of course she made it so her fingertip opened wide so she didn't damage her own skin and flesh, but even so, the sudden discharge of a gun made the other guy stagger and cover himself, had he not expected to get shot?

"Wind Cutter." Big Sister spoke from behind, right, Ale hadn't vocalized the name of her attack… Not that she was into that.

But before she could think about it, a sudden wave of wind went past Ale, she could see the wind blade moving forward the other guy who quickly pushed a button on his arm and then some kind of barrier materialized around him.

Not that it helped him much, as Big Sister's attack went straight past that barrier and hit him, breaking his armor and leaving a nasty gash on his chest.

"…Hmm…. Then does that thing only work on normal attacks?" Ale said as she made another gun gesture with her other hand and pointed at the guy.

Discharging a few shots at him and seeing how the weird light-type barrier did absolutely nothing as Ale's bullets hit him straight on, his armor was still working as the bullets didn't seem to penetrate it, so Ale slowly changed her aim and pointed at the gashes that Big sister had left, which meant that her bullets now were working.

The guy soon enough fell to the ground face first, still clutching his weird weapon and trying to push something on the side of it, so Ale quickly jumped forward and kicked it away, her original instinct had been to grab it, but a quick warning from Main Core was all it took for Ale to instead kick it away.

That single instance was enough for Ale to receive a electric discharge strong enough to stun her for a few seconds, but luckily she suffered no further harm, had it been Big Sister though… Ale couldn't help but imagine that doing quite the nasty effect on her, as she was mostly a normal non modified human.

Unlike Ale who had several modifications on her body which allowed her to redirect and absorb the electric discharge, or [Golem] who was made out of stone and minerals, so electric discharges meant nothing to him.

"So… as Big Brother likes to say…" Ale said as her arm started to shift internally and externally, her whole body was shifting to the configuration that Main Core had made as of late to deal with the extreme power of the 120mm canon, "Always double tap your kills."