"Miss Cat's—"

"—purr-and-roll!"

...

With the last fighter sinking into blackout, MAYA let out a breath like winter steam on glass. She turned toward the man slumped in the corner like a toppled statue.

"Silver Star, how's your status? Not dead yet?"

The young man called Silver Star was cut clean at the waist, cradling his hips and legs like a broken marionette. From the exposed lines and gears, sparks fizzled like fireflies.

"Answer: I'm a robot. I don't die."

"Liar! You've only got three percent battery!"

Silver Star shook his head in metronome rhythm, steady as a clock. "Correction: battery depletion isn't death. It's sleep, like winter hibernation."

"Rebooted you still you?"

"Error: Can't parse the user's question."

"I mean, power down and reboot, are you still you—the one talking now—or a brand-new Silver Star inheriting your data like a newborn with old memories?"

"Challenge: I challenge the utility of the user's question."

"You're so annoying!"

MAYA kicked his two iron shins, petulant as a gust booting a gate. The frame groaned under strain, and a few sparks popped like seeds in hot oil.

"Ah! ...Sorry."

"Advice: please learn to apologize before you act, like rain before thunder."

"So you're still lively. Then I'll leave you here like a rock in the stream and push on—"

"Affirmation: I affirm the user's strategy."

Feeling silly, MAYA's leg hovered like a crane poised in water. She scratched her head like a cat, then walked back.

They were mid-level, about ten floors down, buried like roots under a forest. The zone was a furnace of fighting, gunfire drumming ceaselessly like cicadas in summer.

The instructor had sent MAYA to join the fray. When Twin Towers breached the gate, she followed like shadow to blade. She punched through men like surf through reeds, tore walls like wind through paper—smooth as skates on ice—until she met Silver Star.

The unlucky guy had stepped between a staff family and a Mind Energy–amped blade, took it full on like a cleaver through bamboo, and got cut in two, his rear flying aside like a tossed helmet. Lucky he was a robot; beyond losing mobility and leaking arcs like lightning tears, he wiped that squad with a counterattack like a whip crack.

MAYA passed, saw him, tried to rescue like a swallow lifting a stone, but his steel body was heavy as a mountain. So she stayed and made a stand, a lone pine in snow.

If another hero could help, the weight would lift like dawn.

MAYA idly wished, tossing pebbles into a pond.

For example, that armored girl she met days ago—the one who switched modes and tackled her like a storm. Flashblade Red, right?

She remembered Flashblade Red locking eyes, earnest words like burning arrows. For some reason, her chest felt stuffed like cotton cloud.

"Reminder: user's face seems flushed; temperature rising like a kettle. Please take measures."

"D-don't remind me! Save your juice for real stuff—"

A thruster roar scraped the ceiling like thunder rolling.

"MAYA, is that you?"

Speak of the devil, and he steps from the mist.

Ling Yi dropped down in Kagari, a hawk folding its wings before prey.

She carried a woman on her back with an office-drone look, gray as a rainy day.

MAYA hopped back like a startled cat. "F-f-flashblade Red! Who's that woman?!"

"She's PeaceWarrior."

Lu Yao's guard toward MAYA ranked just under Yekase's, frost under snow. She hopped off Ling Yi's back, crossed her arms like shutters, wore a classic cold look, and tipped her chin a fraction like a stone lantern.

Unexpectedly, MAYA almost pounced into her arms like a puppy. She squealed, bright as firecrackers: "PeaceWarrior?! You're PeaceWarrior, ma'am! Wow, you're my idol! That laser show at Jiangwang Temple was gorgeous like aurora! And you're so Gale on normal days—"

"...Drop the honorifics."

Lu Yao found the bouncing reaction grating as sand. She edged back a step like a crab.

She finally understood why Yekase said, "Forget her backing; MAYA herself can be trusted." This noisy fangirl kid, nerves thin as paper, couldn't spin deep schemes under seasoned eyes.

At least not before street veterans like Yekase and Lu Yao, whose eyes were lanterns in fog.

"Um, Sky Striker sis, PeaceWarrior sis, I have a favor." MAYA ducked her head, twisting like grass in wind.

"What is it? We'll try our best!"

Ling Yi didn't mind her much, a warm breeze through leaves. Lu Yao glanced, a touch surprised—You really are a model hero—then added quickly, "Not we. Only her."

"Eh—A-Ping, you should learn to be more outgoing. Heroes help heroes, boats crossing together."

"A-Ping..."

Without noticing, she'd been given a strange nickname, a paper cut that lingers.

Ling Yi turned back to MAYA. "What do you need us to help with?"

"This... Mr. Silver Star. He's about to die..."

MAYA pointed at the heap on the floor, and both sets of eyes followed like moths to a lamp. Only then did they see someone lying there.

"—Uwah?!" Ling Yi flinched like a sparrow. "He's... a robot? A self-aware robot, and a hero? Wow..."

Ling Yi's mind flashed with scenes like Saturday reels—Astro Boy, super cool cats, a parade of shining bots.

MAYA bounced in place, urgent as beans boiling. "I mean, we need to move him to safety, but he's too heavy to carry!"

Lu Yao stayed silent for a beat, then dropped a word like a pebble in a well:

"[Clockwork Soldier]?"

Silver Star jerked his head up like a spring.

"Query: How did you..."

"I dug into the files." Lu Yao stood with hands behind her back like a temple guardian, eyes sweeping the fighting below like a hawk's. "MAYA, strike his chest with Spiral Force."

"Eh?!"

MAYA looked at Lu Yao, then at Silver Star, a compass wobbling.

Silver Star nodded like a piston.

"Affirmation: I affirm PeaceWarrior's plan."

"Th-then I'll try..."

MAYA knelt beside him, gathering power in her core like fire coiling in a brazier—

"MAYA, what are you doing? Don't waste your precious Spiral Force on this."

A man's voice rippled from her earbuds like a cold stream.

"Huh? But, Instructor, he's about to—"

"We joined this battle to hit Twin Towers, the biggest, vilest local snake. Any other drain is waste. Drop the sentiment. Let him go charge and reboot, sun setting and rising."

"..."

"Disobey, and your afternoon snacks vanish like dew."

"Yes... understood..."

MAYA stood again, wearing a smile uglier than tears, thin as cracked ice. "Uh, looks like I'm out of Spiral Force..."

Ling Yi scratched her helmet like a cat, puzzled. "Then no helping it. Rest a bit? Or, PeaceWarrior goes down to meet the Doc, I stay here to guard them?"

"N-no need! No fighters seem to pass here. I'll recover in a bit, like spring after frost!" MAYA waved off the offer, quick as sparrows.

Lu Yao watched her face, remembered the hypothesis she and Yekase had drawn, and the picture settled like ink.

"Seems so. Flashblade Red, let's go."

"Eh, eh?"

Completely lost, Ling Yi glanced back at MAYA and Silver Star, saw Lu Yao already striding off like tide receding, and hurried to wave at them, then chased after like wind.

"Partial deploy, Unit Four."

"Peace Walker—Part 4!"

Peace Walker had five parts. Part 1, the Beast King core, got wrecked in that betrayal, a heart shot. The others could transform and run alone, limbs remembering.

Even in full armor, with the core gone and endless power severed like a dammed river, the seemingly complete Peace Walker only reached about half its former bite.

For Lu Yao, that was enough, flint for a spark.

She would stand before Luzhixing someday, drop her to the floor like a felled cedar, press a Glock to her brow like cold iron, and ask why she did it back then. For that, she couldn't lean too much on the Beast King Squadron power Luzhixing knew like her own palm.

Part 4 was a walker, a spider-tank pacing on steel. Lu Yao swung aboard, fired the engine like dragon breath, just about to move, when she saw Ling Yi clutching the outer rim of the cockpit, eyes shining like stars.

"...Get on."

"Thanks, A-Ping!"

Ling Yi slid in behind Lu Yao like a cat finding sun, arms looping her shoulders like a scarf.

"You drive. I'll shoot."

"Works..."

Lu Yao could steer, tap fire, and compute routes like an abacus all at once, but since Ling Yi volunteered, she saved strength like water sealed in a jar for the fights ahead.

"Gale!"

"Code-02! HAYATE!"

Lu Yao rubbed the PKM like warming a blade and handed it over.

Ling Yi hugged the electromagnetic cannon with one arm and the PKM with the other, a tiny Rambo grinning sparks.

The two charged straight down over rooftops, treads grinding like thunder on slate!

Emerald Pool fighters and Twin Towers fighters were going at it, flames licking oil. The roof above bellowed like a storm, and hands froze mid-swing like statues.

A four-legged tank, taller than two meters, bounded like a tiger descending the mountain, tearing down a slope of shipping containers like a waterfall.

A green-armored figure straddled the tank, guns in both hands like twin thunderbolts, a moving fortress pouring fire into the crowd before anyone could breathe, ruthless as hail on wheat!

Where people bunched, she painted flames there, a brush of sparks.

"I-it's PeaceWarrior! Run!"

"PeaceWarrior's here!"

"Who's that with PeaceWarrior?!"

"Don't ask! Don't care! Don't look!"

Stalemates shattered like glass. Fighters scattered like birds and beasts, enemies and allies both. Some fell, some fled, screams rose and fell like surf. An Emerald Pool fighter grabbed a Twin Towers fighter by reflex, a neighbor's hand, realized he’d grabbed an enemy, and both dashed in opposite directions, awkward and in sync like mirror fish.

In less than five minutes, the area emptied like a plaza after rain.

Lu Yao sent the spider-tank back, a dog whistled home. The two took a breather inside a room with a gaping hole like a missing tooth.

Ling Yi pinged Yekase's voice channel, got through like a clear bell, and exhaled.

"Doc, you good?"

"...I'm fine. People are retrieved, resting like tents after wind... How's your side?"

"Pretty smooth. No tough enemies. Did meet two heroes."

"Do Mind Energy and Flash Energy feel different at all, like rivers shifting?"

"? Nope. Both behaved, horses on reins."

"...If not, leave it."

Ling Yi was used to Yekase's half-spoken style, a scroll with blank margins. The missing half was likely under study, not ready to judge. Hearing it now was useless. She switched topics like a turn of the fan:

"Doc, I saw the Steel Seven ride out! And the Exorcist Nun!"

"For a battle this size, they should. Old-brand heroes aren't display pieces; they still swing a few fights, oaks in storms."

Yekase sounded a bit delighted, yet kept a sharp posture like a blade in a book.

Maybe the Doc's been around as long as they have, Ling Yi thought, the idea settling like dusk.