Wanted

Episode 16 - Protection


May 31st, 20XX, 4:26 PM , PST

Gauntlet placed his hands on his knees, his breathing slightly ragged, and synthetic sweat clinging to his ash-caked face. His uniform was a mess of burns, cuts, scrapes, and general abuse. But to the little girl before him, he was still a much easier sight to behold than the brutish PC thugs her father had entrusted with her life.

The rest of the maniacs looked a lot like Gauntlet, with various injuries painted onto their bodies, pain apparent in some of their eyes, much like Shadowman’s displayed. But despite that, the cybernetic shinobi forced himself to smile gently for Alicia.

“Hello.”

“…Hi.”, the diminutive child whispered.

“I’m Shadowman. Your name’s Alicia, isn’t it?”, he asked, unable to remember if he had asked her already.

“Yeah.”

“Alicia…We need your help.”, he said, getting straight to the point. “Can you please help us?”

“I’ll…I’ll try.”

“Thank you. Alicia, do you know anything about what happened here?”

The little girl’s eyes wandered downward, and she shook her head back and forth.

“Alicia…Please. We really need to know what you’ve seen here. I know…Your dad may have asked you not to tell any strangers anything…But…Your dad’s in trouble too. We can’t help him if we don’t know what to do, okay?”

She looked up into Shadowman’s eye, then his very slight smile, tinged with slight impatience which he desperately tried to cover up. She looked over to the other Maniacs, some of them not smiling in the least, with a couple outright frowning. But SparkChan’s ever-cheerful expression helped ease her doubts.

“There was…A lot of wind…”

“Go on…”, Gauntlet assured.

“I was really close by here. Daddy sent me here to meet with some friends of his, and then the wind.”

“How did you survive?”, Lennon asked with much urgency in his voice. Gauntlet gave him an eyeful, but didn’t necessarily berate him for asking the question so soon. After all, he was just as curious as he was.

“I…I don’t know…”

“Don’t give me that! I-“

NeedleGal grabbed Lennon’s shoulder mid sentence, shaking her head “no” firmly. In return, he freed his arm with a gruff tug, but didn’t continue his verbal assault. Just yet, at least.

“Okay, Alicia. I’m sure you’ll remember eventually. Can you tell me when your father was last seen, though?”, Shadowman continued.

“I think…”, she said as she checked a watch she kept in her pocket, rather than her wrist. “ Umm, four…five…forty-five minutes ago? I think…”

“Forty-five minutes ago? We just missed ‘im then…”, Hardman whispered to Topman.

“The soldiers took him…”, Alicia slowly managed. “I was hiding with the robots Daddy had just fixed when a heli…heli…chopper came down and soldiers came out and they grabbed him.”

“Alicia, how long were you here with your dad? Did he come with you to LA?”

“Umm…Daddy came here…at seven-oh-clock in the morning. I think.”

Gauntlet stood up slowly and addressed his team quietly. “Just as I thought…The Pale Riders brought Dr Enstehung here.”

“What? Why would they do such a thing?”, SparkChan asked, concerned.

“Leverage. They wanted him to find his daughter for them.”, Lennon interjected again, more calm than before. “A little girl is far more likely to come out of hiding for her father than some big brutish soldiers.”

“I get that much…But why wouldn’t they take her right away instead o’ lettin’ her and the Doc wander around, fixin’ some ol’ friends of ours? Doesn’t make much sense.”, Hardman added.

“Hmm…I think Dr Enstehung may have managed to get away from the Pale Riders for a bit. Is this true, Alicia?”, Gauntlet asked, looking for some sort of confirmation.

“I…I think?”

“Probably.”, the ninja reasoned. “However, now we’re onto the most important question. Namely, why are the Riders so concerned with finding Alicia when they have her father?”

“…She’s got something.”, Geminiman concluded. “Alicia, let’s have a look in that bag of yours, shall we?”

“No!”, Alicia screamed, running behind Classi’s legs. “Daddy told me to keep it safe!”

Gauntlet looked NeedleGal in the eye, silently confirming what he had already affirmed.

“Alicia, we don’t have time for this!”, Lennon pleaded without much in the way of niceties.

“Lennon! Leave her alone!”, SparkChan demanded, holding the Twin Terror at bay.

“Are you mad? She may very well have the answer to everything in that bag of hers! We don’t have time to fool around here!”

“I agree, but there are better ways of going about this, rather than bullying a child!”

“Hey…Where’s Mags, anyways?”, Topman randomly muttered.

“Who cares?”, Hardman countered. "My heartburn's killin' me as it is."

"Heartburn?", Classi asked. "You mean...Your engines are cutting out?"

"Sumthin' like that, yeah."

Classi thought this over for a second, looking as though she were concentrating on something in the atmosphere.

Gauntlet ignored this, however. It was a bit strange that Magnetman wasn’t around, though he felt the strange tingle in his bones usually associated with the magnetic master.

But, his prime objective was standing right before him. “Alicia, listen to me. We want to help you and your father, but we really need your help to find him. I think you’ll be able to help us out if you show us what he gave you, Alicia.”

“B-But Daddy said…He said to not let anybody see it!”

“I understand, Alicia, but your dad needs our help. We need to know what the bad guys want from you.”, Gauntlet pleaded.

Gauntlet knelt down before the little girl, still hiding behind the mango-colored SparkChan’s tall legs. With a look of genuine compassion, Shadowman did his best to reason with the young girl.

“We’re gonna save him. We’re the good guys, Alicia. You’re a good person, too, so we should all work together to help your daddy. Then we can all go home.”

“H-home?”

“That’s right. Home.”

“I…I don’t wanna!”, she screamed, tears beginning to flow.

“Th’ hell’s that all about?”, Hardman grimaced. He had enough loud noises for the day as it is.

“Poor girl…Sounds like home isn’t too great a place.” Topman frowned.

“The hell with this!”, Geminiman growled, reaching for her, almost pushing Classi aside.

“Lennon!”

“GUYS! Get outta here!”, Shadowman suddenly shouted. “MOVE!”

The team didn’t have much time. Within seconds, a Harrier jet was above them, coming from seemingly nowhere, using the maelstrom of dusty clouds as cover. A solid series of “clanks” announced that the pilot didn’t much care for Alicia’s safety, as a pair of missiles unlatched from the wings of the lithe aircraft, breathing to life with tremendous exhaust, pushing away the grey and brown dirt smog.

Somewhere in the chaos of seven bodies moving in seven directions, one Maniac managed to grab Alicia and dash for safety.

 

May 31st, 20XX, 4:47 PM , PST

“Alicia, are you alright?”, Needle asked of the shaken child in her arms. She had waited to ask her until they were clear of the explosion that separated the team yet again.

“I-I think so…Yeah…”

“Good…”

Needle looked up, watching a Hard Knuckle in the distance unsuccessfully fire towards the jet in the distance. It looked like a few of the Mechs were doing their best to keep the Harrier at bay, away from Alicia.

But the Harrier wasn’t the only one looking for the child in question.

“Hand her over…”, the dark, coated man demanded as he marched out of the dust. It was the same man who shot Hardman earlier, nearly crippling the massive Mech in the process. “I don’t want any trouble.”, he claimed from behind his plain black helmet.

Needle knew better, stashing Alicia behind her, ready to fire at him with her Needle Cannon. She was wary about fighting with a child so close by, but she was out of chances for the day. She had to keep Alicia close.

Another set of footsteps announced another presence.

“Take the girl and go, Needle.”, he demanded.

“Mags?”

“Go.”

The spiky mistress was hesitant, wary of turning her back to the dark-clothed man. However, even he motioned for her to leave upon seeing the helmeted Magnetman.

After a few seconds of stalling, she gulped, nodded to Magnetman, and ran back towards the others with Alicia riding piggy-back. Hopefully, the Harrier will have been dealt with by then.

“…Can’t say I’m glad to see you.”, the man groused towards Magnetman.

Kenta said nothing. The two simply stared at each other in the sandstorm from behind their helmets.

Then, the mystery man gave a small “heh”, and decided to remove his helmet.

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