Inception

Chapter 36: Operations Leader

Soshiro called the salute as the truck with Captain Ashiro and Hibino Kafka—Kaiju No.8—drove away. Despite having been declared fully healed he still ached. He still ran too hot, feverish, though his thoughts ran clear and cold as ice.

The moment Soshiro gave the at ease and the line of soldiers marched back inside, he gained a new shadow, one with silver hair and a resting bitch face. Neither of them spoke. There wasn't a need to and no one questioned Ichikawa Leno breaking away from the rest of the platoon. Although the aging upper brass that had come to oversee the transaction gave him an odd look.

Soshiro didn't return to his office. He went to Okinogi's.

Despite her rigid personality, Okinogi's office was a chaotic mess of plants, books, binders, and old food containers. Her trash was overflowing with wrappers and bottles from the nearby vending machine and it had that distinct smell Soshiro always equated to uniquely 'Okinogi.'

Okinogi herself was asleep at the desk using her keyboard and her arms as a pillow.

An irrational urge to throw her momentarily burned him, but he knew the signs of an all nighter well enough to see that Okinogi had merely ran herself dry.

With a sigh, he instead gently shook her shoulder.

She murped.

Soshiro was tempted to feel bad for her. With both Lena's disappearance and the shit show which was Hibino turning into a monster that they'd actually like to keep very much, Okinogi would have her plate overflowing. Sure there were other nerds on the base knowledgeable in maneuvering through bureaucracy, but Okinogi had a better lead on them than most.

"Oy, I just want an update on Lena. Then you can sleep the day away." He shook her again.

She murped again, then moved as though to stretch so he took of his hand. Instead, she did some sort of cat scrabbly thing across her desk, which stuffed the keyboard into her armpits.

"Merawadda...bastaarrrd..."

"Lena, Okinogi. Ichikawa Lena. Missing, what's the update?"

"Ichi-Len?" She blinked like a brain-dead duck over her arm, her round spectacles pushed up into the mess which was her hair. She blinked one more time, slowly, before looking over at Ichikawa junior over his shoulder and squinting.

Then, after growing and mashing her face against her forearm, she sat up.

"I spot what could've been her going through the west entrance and off campus being carried by something weird. Possibly another kaiju. Possibly Kaiju No. 9. It's hard to tell because the—the—" she yawned so wide, Soshiro heard her jaw pop. "Sensor was on the honju you were fighting. And all those involved with it. It left the opposite direction. As though the attack were—" Another yawn caught her, though she tried to keep talking through it. "Di-di-ha-ung—ugh my head."

Soshiro could feel Leno getting more and more irritated besides him based on what he could see out of the corner of his eye and the small popping of his knuckles as Leno clenched his fists.

"So attacking the base was a distraction," said Soshiro, rubbing his chin. "you said they were in the lab security vault."

Okinogi nodded heavily. "Security five," she mumbled.

"So why did they take Lena? They couldn't have known Lena would respond to the alarm. How could they even know what was in this building to begin with?"

"That's what I was trying to find out all last night," said Okinogi, rubbing her eyes hard. "Along with every code in the book that could even remotely help with Hibino's case. I was just following a trace that could have been the footprint of a hacker I think around four..." She pinched the bridge of her nose and waved towards a cabinet in the corner. "Excedrin."

Soshiro glanced at Leno, who seemed to have calmed down, although it didn't show much on his face. Then he turned to get the requested painkillers. He knew his way around her office enough to know just where in the cupboard they were along with a bottle of her favorite chocolate milk in the little fridge. He popped out two pills for his own headache and threw them back dry before returning to the desk with her dose—twice as high as his.

"You're a saint," she breathed, taking the pills and milk from him with almost a whimper.

He didn't bother asking her when the last time she'd slept was. All he'd get is the stink eye.

"Which direction did Lena go?" asked Leno.

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No beta, we die like Kafka's dreams to be on the defense force.