"Where the hell am I going, Ume?" A hooded figure shouted as he leaped over the rooftops of the bustling streets of Midtown Manhattan. Their navy blue and gray camo cloaks fluttered in the night sky as they moved silently over the brightly lit city streets.

  "I have no clue, and please, we’re on the clock; it’s Sage." A voice echoed inside the figure's hood.

  "How do you have no clue? "

  "This is Midtown; there’s not a patch of grass, let alone a tree. I’m stuck using this weird device Sensei and The Twins created, ok."

  "Are you serious? Do you not know how to use it?"

  "Not really; I was just given a crash course for like 2 hours. Don't worry; I'm a fast learner." Sage's half-confident voice chuckled over communications.

  “Look on the bright side, the target is a normal human, and I managed to narrow down her location to 4 general areas. I’d say this is an amazing success.”

  The figure groaned, annoyed.

  “We have a head start on our competition. So focus up and get to searching.” Sage responded.

  “Why are we chasing after this woman again?”

  “Dr. Desire Lea Hamilton. She is a brilliant Nanotech Engineer. It seems she is the first civilian scientist to catch up to Chaser technology. She is in the process of designing similar nano-machines that we use.” Sage reported.

  “I see if she came that far on her own. Then giving her access to the knowledge we have...”

  “Correct, she could make tremendous bounds in her research and further improve on what we have,” Sage confirmed.

  “So we need to get our hands on her before the Oleanders or Adders?” The figure responded.

  “The Oleanders and Adders know they won’t be able to keep her, even if they get their hands on her. So their best bet is just to kill her.”

  “Right, and our group was chosen for this because?”

  “I insisted that it be given to us. If we are the ones to save Dr. Hamilton, she’ll be indebted to us. That brilliant mind giving us preferential treatment when she joins us is ideal.”

  “You’re sounding more like Zac every day.”

  “Thank you.”

  “That wasn’t a compliment.”

  “I don’t see a world where that isn’t a compliment, and you’re one to talk. That snarky sarcasm oozing off you reeks of sensei.” Sage responded.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Trigger, denied.

  “And we went over all of this before. Were you not paying attention during The Conductor's briefing?” Sage asked.

  “Well, I’ve had a lot on my mind lately.” The figure sighed as he stopped to look at the overcrowded time square.

  “Right. Have you talked to your father yet? It’s been three months since Canada.”

  “Talk to? No. We fought at the training grounds a few times, though.” Trigger responded.

  “You fought and didn’t say a single word?” Sage scoffed.

  “Look, I already had this conversation with Akiko. I'm not having it with you. I haven’t even told Mom that I’ve seen him. Just drop it, alright?”

  “Fine, but in this line of work, regardless of how strong your father is, he or we could die at any time. Better to air things out sooner rather than later. ” Sage informed.

  “Yeah, Akiko said the same thing.”

  “Of course she did,” Sage spoke with a twinge of annoyance.

  “Look, he had 17 years to do anything to let me know he was there, anything! Why is it on me to make things happen? He was passive then, and passive now. I-I can’t stand it.” Trigger sounded enraged and annoyed.

  “I just need a little more time before I can stomach talking to… hold up. I think I got something. I’m moving in.” Trigger jumped from the building into the busy streets, his figure vanishing from sight before touching the ground.

  “I’ll contact the others,” Sage responded.

  “Damn!” A young black woman, no older than 24, looked over her shoulder to notice the same four individuals trailing her since she left her lab. She had the wherewithal not to run home and instead head towards the most crowded place she could think of, to try and lose them. However, she was having no luck.

  “They must be after my research. Who are they with? The UN has shown interest, but there’s no way they would send someone to kill me, right?” The young Doctor thought to herself.

  “Dr. Hamilton.” A voice whispered into her ear. She looked around, trying to see where the voice came from.

  “Keep looking straight. I’m here to help.” The disembodied voice spoke again.

  “I’m just supposed to trust someone I don’t see?” Dr. Hamilton responded, not knowing if the voice could hear her.

  “Look ahead to your right.”

  Dr. Hamilton did as instructed, but she didn’t see the person; she saw a transparent figure wave at her and then vanish completely.

  “What the hell is going on?” Dr. Hamilton whimpered.

  “Your research has made quite a few people aware of your brilliant mind. Some wish to use that mind; others wish to get rid of it.” The voice clarified.

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  “Which group are you?” Dr. Hamilton whispered as she continued to walk through the crowd briskly.

  “The one trying to keep you alive. Turn right.” The voice instructed.

  Without giving it much thought, Dr. Hamilton turned right. She didn’t know why she trusted this voice, but it was better than simply walking around Manhattan without much of a plan. She doubted the authorities would do much of anything, and anything they did would be a temporary fix.

  “How exactly are you going to help me?”

  “I’m not alone; the rest of my team is on the way. We just need to keep you alive until we find an extraction point.” The voice answered.

  “What the hell is happening?” Dr. Hamilton questioned.

  “You’re about to enter something that… shit! There’s more here. Hurry, run down the alley to your left now!”

  Dr. Hamilton quickly ran to her left; as she entered the alley, she saw a small hooded figure standing there.

  “Keep going, Doctor; I’ll hold off these 4.” The small figure then tossed a handful of seeds as Dr. Hamilton ran past her.

  The Doctor heard screams and then looked over her shoulder to see a mini forest had grown in the middle of the alley. She didn’t have time to ask questions; she just continued to move her feet as fast as they could take her.

  “There she is!”

  Dr. Hamilton saw cloaked figures jumping from the rooftops above her. They were performing athletic feats impossible for humans.

  “You gotta be shitting me.”

  “And there you are!” Another gruff voice called out.

  Tendrils coiled out and wrapped the figures. The Doctor looked up to see the Hoarder’s beefy cloaked self crouched on a fire escape, with the Doctor’s would-be attackers dangling helplessly.

  “Keep going, Doc.” He told her.

  “Take a right out of the alley.” The voice called to her again.

  She didn’t know how far and long she had been running, but she was exhausted. The adrenaline finally faded, and she noticed the sound of busy streets had disappeared. There were fewer and fewer people as she went. She looked around to find herself near the docks.

  “Go down the alley to your right.”

  She followed the voice’s instructions again.

  “Slow down, Doctor” Dr. Hamilton looked behind her and saw a new group of six cloaked figures behind her.

  “When did they get there? What are these people?” Both the ones chasing her and the ones helping her were impossible.

  “We just want to talk?” The Cloaked figure said.

  “The dead should remain silent.” A cold voice called out.

  The lights within a 4-block radius sparked at that moment and then went black. There was complete darkness. The next moment, popping and humming filled the darkness, and a stream of blue light streaked through the alleyway. The lights returned, only for the Doctor to see the six cloaked figures lying there unresponsive and a new cloaked figure sheathing a plasma blade.

  “You should be fine now.” Amaterasu's spritely voice comforted the young Doctor.

  “Amaterasu, let’s go. Trigger can guard her; we need to prepare the landing zone.” A cold commanding voice boomed.

  “What the hell?” Dr. Hamilton gasped as she saw The Conductor floating in the middle of the alley. He then whisked away while Amaterasu scaled up the side of the alley so fast that the Doctor could only make out a slight blur.

  “Wait, who the hell is Trigger?” The Doctor called out.

  “Hi! I’m Trigger.” Trigger said as he appeared next to Dr. Hamilton.

  “Jesus!” Dr. Hamilton jumped in shock.

  Dr. Hamilton gathered herself as she looked at the "face" behind the voice guiding her. His face was covered mainly by that hood like the rest of them. A black mask still blocked the parts that she could see.

  “Can you please tell me what's happening?” Dr. Hamilton all but demanded.

  “Long story short. Your Nanotech research caught the attention of an ancient order of monster hunters, who use similar technology to enhance our hunters. As you’ve just seen.” Trigger explained.

  “If you already have the tech I’m researching, why come after me?”

  “Because you’re not just researching, are you? You’ve made a breakthrough. You made a breakthrough on something that shouldn’t exist for another 50 to 100 years, minimum. You’re too brilliant for your own good, Doc.” Trigger responded.

  “So, I stumbled on technology reserved for your secret superhumans, and now some of them want me dead?” Dr. Hamilton asked.

  “More or less, but not us. You figured that much out on your own. We want to give you access to all our tech and research and see what you can do with it.” Trigger clarified.

  At this thought, Dr. Hamilton’s eyes glowed. She saw what these people could do. She had made a breakthrough, but she’d be in trial phases for years, and she wasn’t even sure she could get even 30% of the results these cloak figures were exhibiting. It would be a dream if she could get her hands on their research and technology.

  “Nothing is free; what will you want from me?” Dr. Hamilton asked.

  “Psst, I don’t know, I’m just doing a mission,” Trigger responded.

  The Doctor was caught a bit off guard. How big were these organizations, to the point that this superhuman knew nothing outside of the scope of the mission? She sighed, she had no idea what she had gotten herself into, but there was no going back now.

  “I’m not going to go missing or something, am I? I don’t think my dad can handle me disappearing.” Dr. Hamilton asked.

  “Nothing so dramatic. We have relatively normal lives surprisingly. You know, outside of fighting monsters, and superhumans empowered by nano-machines.” Trigger jokes.

  “So monsters are real?”

  “Yeah… that one took me by surprise too. The superhuman stuff was whatever. Because you know, sure, technology and all that. But the whole vampires and Bigfoot being real, that’s the part that gets you.”

  Dr. Hamilton started to chuckle a bit as she looked at Trigger. She could feel that he was very young, still a teenager. It was shocking that someone so young was already involved in such things. Although she supposed she couldn’t talk. She received her Doctorate at the young age of 19, and made a world altering breakthrough not longer after.

  Dr. Hamilton took the opportunity to fill her curiosity about the monsters in the world,

  “So vampires are real?”

  “Yep!”

  “Werewolves?”

  “Yes…”

  “Chupacabra?”

  “Ehhhh, technically yeah.” Trigger, didn’t feel it necessary to go into detail about skinwalkers.

  “Leprechauns?”

  “They are literally just Dwarves, so yeah.”

  “So Dwarves are real. Are Dragons?!” She said her face was visibly excited.

  “Tsk! That one’s tough. They definitely did exist, but we’re not sure if they still do. They have so many abilities. So if they do exist and want to hide, nobodies finding them… it’s complicated.” Trigger answered. That was the one he was curious about himself, but he couldn’t find any definitive information on them in the Renegade Monster database.

  “Fascinating, what about-”

  At that moment 11 cloak figures appeared at the end of the alleyway, making her lose her train of thought. Five wore maroon cloaks with the Oleanders crest on their shoulder, and the other six wore dark-green cloaks bearing the Adders crest.

  “Renegade, hand over the Doctor, and we can all go on our way.” One of the figures spoke.

  “I don’t think I will,” Trigger responded without turning to face the enemy Chasers.

  “Fine, we’ll just kill them both.” A maroon cloaked figure responded as they jumped forward, blasting out a large orb fire.

  “Why does this feel so familiar? Stay behind me, Doc.” Trigger chuckled as he turned to face the fireball.

  Dr. Hamilton looked to be in a panic until she saw the calm in Trigger’s body language. She watched as Trigger extended his palm, and that fireball dispersed, leaving a gust of wind behind. That gust of wind blew the hood off Trigger’s head, revealing his masked face. The 11 Chasers stared at that mask and panicked,

  “Shit! Run!”

  “Too late. Stop.” Everything in the area went still. Those retreating Chasers froze in their tracks as Trigger drew his guns. At that moment, In that lonely dark alley, near the docks of Manhattan, faint sounds of gunshots rang out.