Chapter 12: Welcome Home, Mira

“Zero…Zero, wake up!”

“Come on, talk to us…shoot, I need to get him back to the others!”

“Hey, is he gonna be okay?”

“What…”Zero felt himself coming to. As he tried to sit up, he hissed from pain. "Oh, that hurts. Just what…Mira?" he asked, looking up at the concerned gaze of his leader. When did she get here? Wasn't she meant to be in a different direction?

Mira sighed, some of her worry fading now that he was awake. She had arrived just in time to spot Mylene’s jet take off, the Vexos member never seeing her, or maybe she did; she wouldn't have known since Mira saw the slumped-over figure of Zero, his battle gauntlet still strapped to his hand. "At least you're awake; that had to be an intense battle."

“Battle?” Zero asked before, like a slap to the face, the memories of the last 30 minutes returned. “Oh, right…Mylene-!” Mira held him down before he hurt himself more.

"She's already gone; at least, she was by the time I arrived." Her words calmed him, especially when he could see Juggernoid and Sirenoid both still present. "Good work on the victory. You got to show off that you're not just a mysterious face." Mira congratulated him as she helped him shift so that he could sit against the mushroom.

“It wasn’t my victory, not completely,” Zero stated, turning his attention to the Bakugan of the hour. “Thank you, Elfin. If not for you, I could have lost Sirenoid and Juggernoid to the Vexos.” She couldn’t see it, but he was smiling.

Mira was pleased to hear that, as to lose someone as powerful as Sirenoid to their enemies; well, it was a good thing she didn't need to think about that. “Speaking of, I don't recognize you, are you…" Mira directed the question to Zero, as when she had arrived, she hadn’t had time to question the third Bakugan and why she was fretting over their Aquos brawler nearly as much as Sirenoid.

“She’s the guardian of these woods. We met earlier and were in the middle of a conversa-” Zero hissed as a stab of pain went through his side. “Discussion when Mylene appeared looking for Bakugan.”

"Take it easy. You took a pretty bad hit there. In your shape, it wouldn't be a good idea to ride back to the others; we'll just have them come to us," Mira advised. If he tried now, he might just fall off, and that'd only make things worse.

“That’s… an acceptable idea, Mira." Zero relented.

“Acceptable? My, what high praise.” Mira teased him.

“Indeed, for I don’t give it out lightly.” He shot back, as he was injured, but he still had his wits. But as fun as the banter was, something needed to be resolved. “But Elfin, about that talk.”

“You don’t gotta say anymore, Zero. I admit, I was on the fence, but you’re a real stand-up guy…or girl, I can’t tell with the mask.” Elfin noted that he sounded like a guy, but she'd met some eccentric Bakugan before. “The point is, after seeing you put so much on the line for your partner and the Bakugan…well, I wouldn’t mind coming along for the ride.”

“Are you sure? We’re sure to have many more battles, many of which I can assure you will be much harder than this one.” Zero cautioned as this victory was partly because Mylene hadn't known what Elfin could do; that wouldn't be the case next time.

"All the more reason for us to get going now, get stronger, and keep kicking butt and taking names." Elfin, however, was undeterred.

“You have a…particular style, don’t you, child?” Sirenoid noted.

“Child, who’re you calling child, old lady?” Elfin shot back, which only caused Sirenoid’s ire to rise.

“Old?!”

As the two argued, Mira turned towards Zero. “Well, sounds like we just gained a new ally.”

The masked man sighed. "Let's hope that they learn to coexist. The last thing I need is to see what the base looks like flooded."

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Waiting for the others to arrive, they were as concerned over his condition as he would expect, even if Ace tried to keep his cool about it. Loading up his bike, they made a beeline to another location before Mylene or someone else could find them.

Baron offered to tend to his wounds, but Zero politely declined, as he had learned how to handle these things himself. Besides, that would require him to remove his mask, and he didn't wish to do so, which got on their nerves. With the promise from Sirenoid and Juggernoid to watch him, they relented.

Thankfully, his wounds weren't as bad as they could have been, mainly cracked bones over broken ones. Still, he was confined to light work for the rest of their trip towards Alpha City. In the interim, his Bakugan didn't always stay with him and could often be found with the others. Elfin was something of a social butterfly and made easy friends with the rest, while Sirenoid…well, Sirenoid could converse with the other Bakugan.

When they finally could see the giant dome in the distance, the masked man had recovered enough to get around again. So they parked their base under some dense canopies and trekked the last of the way.

"So that's it…Alpha city," Zero stated, once again amazed by vestal science. Britannia might have created megastructures like the Tokyo Settlement. Still, over the years, this entire city, home to millions of people, had been built off the world and transported as a solid piece. Just thinking about what they could do with their know-how created many possibilities.

Mira didn’t respond at first, her mind in other places before she started walking ahead. “We should keep going, I know a way in.”

“Any chance of patrols or cameras?” Ace asked as they all caught up with their leader, the woman walking confidently, as if she wanted to be seen.

"Not outside the city, though. We would need to worry about the guards if we used one of the entrances." Mira explained that even though there was at least 1km worth of empty ground between the forests and the city, the place was nearly abandoned. Anyone who ventured out here were people wanting to have Bakugan battles outside the rings, but even then, you'll see them from a distance, and it looked like today, no one had such inclinations.

Approaching the city, they came across a group of massive pipes sticking out of the ground, bent at a 90-degree angle about 6m off the ground. Lucky for them, they had brought some climbing tools and managed to get in. Looking down the shaft, Zero and the rest saw that there was no light, and what did get in framed 3 massive fan blades lazily spinning at different speeds.

"This duct goes underground and comes up again in the city," Mira explained.

“Smart way to get in without being seen, but how’d you know about it?” Ace asked, curious about this, as Mira turned a light smile his way.

“I used to live here, remember? And I was never…the most well-behaved spoiled girl.” Ace chuckled as Zero shook his head. Not like he had any room to talk when his hobby before he started a rebellion was high-stakes gambling against all manner of unsavory individuals.

“Well, it’s not like those who live on the edge and over it don’t understand things others simply wouldn't. It's helped me several times, and it seems now is no exception." Zero mused as he had made use of those gambling connections to acquire goods before Kyoto became the Black Knight's backer and built up his financial assets…till Tamaki started wasting his money like an idiot.

“Be careful with your timing, and mind the fan blades; they can be a little slippery," Mira advised before she took the plunge. The resistance brawler easily managed to land on the first fan blade, then went down to the next and the one that came after. Not once did her form break.

"Oh yeah, that looks amazing; let me try!" Baron went next, but he slipped on the first blade, tumbling face-first into the second and smacking his butt into the third before coming in for a hard landing which had Ace wince.

"Well…he's got spirit," Elfin noted.

“He’ll need more than that if he wants to live to 30," Zero replied as he turned to Ace. “Now, shall we follow?”

“Age before beauty.” Ace teased, to which Zero grunted.

“Quite cute, shadow-brawler.” Nevertheless, Zero and Ace took the plunge. Zero managed to follow Mira's example and land without issue as Mira helped Baron and led them through the tunnels.

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As Mira explained, the service tunnels were deserted, with only a few marks of graffiti now and then. Other than that, they were barren. The city's age did not give enough time for the wear and tear one would associate with such dark spaces to set in, leaving dirt along the walls and floor, along with pipes carrying water and electrical lines to the side.

"How long until we make it to the surface?" Ace asked as Mira walked at the front. A flashlight lit the path, as the tunnels were near pitch black without it.

"It shouldn't be long, maybe another 10 minutes. We don't want to get out on the outskirts; that area often has a greater security presence." Mira replied, though if Zero didn’t know better, he would have asked if she was doing all right as she came off as…distant.

But that wasn't his place. She hadn't given reason to do more than slight unease. If it got worse, he'd ask, but he'd give her space. His intuition would prove accurate, as Mira wasn't just thinking about the mission but of her past. She wasn't born in Alpha City, but she had lived there for years. And if her sources were right, her father still lived and worked there.

Her father, a man whose work put him in a direct position to see the truths that the rest of the vestal populace were never told, yet…he didn't seem to care. He could just carry out his tasks and research without concern for the Bakugan he was experimenting on. She had confronted him once before, shortly before she left, but he hadn't even responded to them, just walking out on her.

He was the same when her brother vanished, but she had to get answers from him. Maybe she couldn't flip him to their side…but she at least wanted to know why. Why would he do all of it? What reason did he have to be a part of something so awful?

‘But to do any of that, I’ll need to give them the slip,’ Mira’s gaze went to the side, but she didn’t turn her head to better see the rest of the group. Rather, she needed to find a time and reason to slip away.

As she pondered possible plans, Wilda came up to her shoulder. "You seem troubled, Mira. Is there something on your mind?" Her partner Bakugan asked.

"No, nothing like that." She didn't like lying to him, but it would be best if such a talk happened away from their present company.

"Well, just remember that rain or shine, I'll be right here," Wilda assured her, which relieved some tension from her shoulders as she offered a small smile.

“Thanks a lot.”

Line Break

Eventually, they reached their entry point, a ladder Mira noted would take them up, though they had a little issue.

"We might be part of the resistance, but it'll be easier for us to blend in with the crowd without your mask," Mira noted.

Ace didn’t seem all that bothered by it. Yeah, Zero was all right, but he wasn't a fan of the mask thing. He had enough to deal with masked brawlers from Spectre. "Looks like you'll need to show off that face of yours, Alban. Not like it's that big a deal; the Vexos already know what you look like.”

Ace was expecting a fight, perhaps some witty comment from Zero before they had to argue to get the guy to remove his mask, which he insisted on wearing.

"Is that right, and pray tell?" Zero surprised them when he reached for his mask, undoing its locks with a hiss of air as he slowly removed it. Long fuchsia hair fell from its depths, two strands of it framing his face as his…her lavender eyes appraised Ace. “What do I look like, Ace?” Even the voice was completely different, having lost its masculine features, being more feminine but by no means weaker or less confident.

However, that was the last thing on their minds. They had just seen their comrade's apparent female form and had no idea how to handle it.

"What the-?!" Ace even jumped back as if he half expected Zero to explode.

“How unexpected.” Nemus was speechless, Baron’s jaw to slack to respond to this stunning revelation that Zero…was a she?!

“I thought you were a guy!" Mira, ever the logical and collected Mira, looked like her brain just short-circuited at the sight of Zero's…beautiful features.

Zero smirked, bringing attention to his magenta lipstick. “I never said that, did I? In fact, how do you know that the name ‘Alban Ganymede’ isn’t itself the mask? Or maybe this one is.” Zero then threw a spanner in the works, as now they had no clue what they were seeing, and Elfin, having kept quiet since the reveal, couldn't help but start laughing at their stunned faces. Even Sirenoid seemed to take joy out of their confusion.

“It’s a little unsettling.” Wilda had thought he had seen everything from vestals, but apparently not, as Zero seemed to have an ever-changing form.

Elfin finally got herself under control and helped explain things as Zero went about folding his mask, the design being an upgrade from the old one, being made from tougher materials, and being collapsible to fit into a special pouch in his cape. "I think it's fitting. I can change attributes whenever I want in battle. It makes perfect sense that my brawler can also switch it up."

"We already suspected this would happen and made preparations. Now, can we please get back to the mission?" Sirenoid, having had her laugh, got things back on track as Mira shook her head. Now, she had more questions about just how…or what Zero was.

“Right…” She led them up the ladder, their leader being the first one out into the light of day as Zero followed, though she told them to call her Nellis when she wasn’t wearing the helmet.

Stepping into the street, Nellis saw that the largest screen in the air was advertising something, which came in with the roar of a Darkus Anchorsaur. “Battle of the Bakugan! Many will compete, but only one will rise victorious! You don’t want to miss a minute of the action; see you there, brawlers!”

Nellis kept her eye on it, her contacts perfectly concealing the one visual cue that she…he was a human. Then, the group heard the horn of a car, clueing them into the fact that they were standing in the middle of the street with incoming traffic!

Rushing to the sidewalk, Nellis was barely saved from being roadkill when Baron pulled her the extra distance, the driver leaning out and calling them stupid kids, but that was the least of their concerns. "Mira, that entrance was a bit too dangerous for me," Nellis told her, as this would be the second time that year she was nearly killed in a traffic accident.

Mira looked a little sheepish as she apologized for the slip. "Sorry about that; it's been a while since I was here. I thought that'll open up in an alley." She pointed across the street, where they could make out a nearly identical man-hole cover in an alley. "But anyway, this is where I used to live; my father still works here." She introduced them, though they weren't all that amazed by it, either because they were vestals themselves or, in Nellis' case because they had lived in a city comparable to this for a little over a month.

Now out of danger of being run over, they walked down the streets, where they didn't receive more than a glance from most, others hardly noticing their presence. In fact, one could only describe the city as peaceful and prosperous even. People went through their days with little care. They shopped for things they needed or wanted and ate out with friends and children through the streets. Nellis could call it similar to the Tokyo settlement, only in place of Elevens working out of sight, where Bakugan was advertised as toys and pets.

“I’ve been around for a while now, but it’s always somewhat jarring when you see how the common person lives despite the reality of things," Nellis commented, her face passive as she kept her feelings bottled.

"You said it; it makes heading into any of the cities feel weird and a little annoying," Ace stated as he pointed out a group of kids fanning over some pictures of the Vexos. Case in point." They listened as the children, younger than 10, it seemed, talked about the upcoming tournament and how they would work hard to be like their heroes, like Mylene or Shadow, of all people.

Watching them run off to play, Nellis snorted. “It’s not the first time I’ve been in position. Fighting against tyranny when that tyranny and those who enforce it are seen as paragons.” She was used to seeing her father's face painted on the news and in movies, and they said it was glory to the empire and glory to the emperor. Even her sister was held up as this idol when she gained fame through ruthless, bloody conquest.

"That's why we're here: to show them the truth. If they knew, they wouldn't just stand by and let it happen." Baron nodded.

‘I wouldn’t be so sure about that Baron. Human or Vestal, don’t underestimate their capacity to ignore evil for their own gains.’ Lelouch didn't voice his complete thoughts; his pessimism wouldn't help. Instead, she asked. “Still, it’s rather shameful, don’t you think?”

“Remember, it’s not their fault. All of us were the same before we learned the truth. And learning that led us here.” Mira reminded him, though Nellis wouldn't relieve her of the belief that she was 'like them'. She hadn't been blind to the world's evils since her mother died.

“I would rather he focus on destroying the controller,” Sirenoid started, hardly caring how these vestals thought about her or her people. “It would make it easier to prove our point, yes?” But she couldn't just say it outright.

“I agree with the old lady. Besides, it’ll be nice not to need to waddle around everywhere.” Sirenoid turned towards Elfin for that comment about her age.

“Where is that again?” Baron asked, leading to the other 3 looking at him and sighing.

“Baron, we went over this.” Mira reminded him, which only made Baron feel worse about asking.

"It would be best if we did so again, just to clarify," Nellis ordered him a lifeline, her gaze lighting just a little as she looked his way before she got back into business. “We’re focused on that dome, where all the official battles. Connected to it, the tower is where the dimensional controller is stored.”

"Great, then we need to get in and smash it up. Sounds real easy.” Nellis smiled at Barons optimism because contrary to what certain stubborn Japanese knights would say, she wasn't against the concept of optimism or optimistic people. She just preferred the practical type.

“Baron, I think you’re underestimating things here.” Nemus pointed out.

“Nemus is right. If it were that easy, someone else would have done it by now. Besides, after my little stunt in Beta, I doubt it'll be easy to acquire the explosives and get close enough. Something like that would probably be one of the city's best-guarded things, possibly designed with fail-safes and redundancies." Nellis pointed.

“So what, we wait?” Ace asked, to which Nellis shook her head.

"We should focus on gathering information first. Once we have that, we can ensure that when we make our move, it has the best chance. Or am I wrong, Mira?" She turned to their leader.

“H..she’s right," Mira corrected herself as she looked away from the battle arena. "Besides I can’t stay with you guys, I need to check on something…by myself.” She added before Baron could speak up.

“What? Is this about-” Nellis stopped Ace before he could get into another argument with their leader. Yes, she wasn't pleased with Mira's odd, secretive secondary goals, but she was the last person to complain about that, as a certain witch would point out. If anything, it gave her a perspective her fellow resistance fighters lacked.

"Ace, she's our leader. If she feels this is important, we should trust that judgment." Nellis stated, turning her lavender gaze towards their leader. “This is important, right Mira?”

“Yes.” Mira nodded without hesitation, so Nellis backed off.

"Then we should split, but we'll need to stay in contact, " she said, to which Mira nodded, relieved and grateful that she wouldn't need to fight them on this.

"I'll stay in touch; see you later!" She turned and ran down the street, leaving Baron in the dark, Ace angered, and Nellis contemplating what had just happened.

‘I wonder….is it related to your family that you really fight…or is it something else.' Nellis thought to her sister, the angel waiting for her at the end of this journey, but shook her head. She needed to focus on the here and now. With that, she nodded for the two younger brawlers to follow her as they approached the arena.

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New month, and with it, a new chapter! Like always, I have two chapters tomorrow, BUT with the commission's last chapter scheduled for tomorrow, that will free up my schedule, at least until I work on its bonus chapters at my own pace. Now, with this chapter, there wasn't as much confusion or back and forth from the editing to the final product, namely because I had a better idea of how I wanted things to go and because the last chapter was a really good set-up.

Also, as of now, I've watched all four released episodes of MHA Vigilantes and five episodes of 100 Girlfriends. With that new Gundam series, I've watched just one episode. With how busy I am and how many good animes there are to watch, it's been something of a slow burn for all of it.