Chapter 13

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In less than five minutes, Nonami, Elisabeth and Iris found themselves in an expansive room that had once been home to an olympic sized swimming pool for GARDNA staff to enjoy in their off time. Now, though, the very spacious room had been converted into a laboratory stacked from wall to wall with gestation tubes and other equipment used in the cloning process. Inside the silver/white tubes, suspended in a dark green fluid, were dozens if not hundred of fetal clones perhaps halfway through their development cycle. As she slowly walked through the room, Nonami could not help but shudder at the sight. Yet, at the same time she felt... was it pity? Yes, pity for these poor creatures. They had not asked to be created, yet now here she stood, essentially as their executioner. Was it fair? What other choice was there.

"Alright where's the kill switch?" blurted Elisabeth, "Gotta be something like that here yeah? Could just start smashing things I guess..."

"I... I don't know," whispered Nonami, her voice sounding as conflicted as she felt, "I mean these... things, they exist through no fault of their own. If we do this, it needs to be humane. Iris, could you use your powers to fry the system and shut down the life support?"

"I get what you're saying Nonami, but these things... they could be a huge threat down the line," countered Elisabeth, "Imagine if Usoko had developed her powers naturally, now factor in her doing so without any support system in place to help her. It's not easy, but it's the best option we have available."

Nodding once in acknowledgement, Nonami turned her gaze to the doorway as Iris set to work hacking into the system to try and initiate a shutdown that way.

"There, it's done," she sighed a moment later as the lights in the room flickered, and a powering down sound could be heard. The lights in the tanks faded, and the stream of bubbles that had been present a moment prior disappeared.

"I know it wasn't easy, but we did the right thing," said Elisabeth in an attempt to comfort Nonami, "Now, we need to get out of this place. I'm sure that shutting this down triggered some sort of security syste-"
Elisabeth's sentence was cut off as a bullet lodged itself in her throat. Without even a gasp, she fell to the ground in a heap. In the doorway stood Modred, eyes red from tears, jaw clenched in fury, with a pistol held out in her trembling hands. She whipped over from Elisabeth to Iris, firing once more, though without the element of surprise, Iris was able to deflect the bullet with magnetism. Without a care for her own safety Nonami fell to her knees next to Elisabeth, holding the Dhampir's hand and desperately trying to think of a way to save her friend's life.

"I'll handle blondie, you take care of Elisa," shouted Iris, "Don't worry, I won't kill her, I think I get why she's here. Now go!"

She did not need to hear another word. Being careful not to move Elisabeth's neck, Nonami picked her up and carried her off at high speed. She knew one place that they would be safe long enough for her to figure something out, the only question was if they could make the trip to Sakura Tower in time before Elisabeth bled out entirely.

Back at GARDNA, Modred's rage had only ramped up after Nonami and Elisbeth's escape, and she was directing every ounce of it at Iris. For the Dragon's part she was doing quite well against the knight despite her own self-imposed limitations. Iris knew she could end this in a heartbeat if she needed to, tough though this human was she would not be a match for Iris' dragon form. This was not that sort of fight however, this was an adversary blinded by, to a point, justifiable grief from the loss of a sibling. Iris had been there once herself, so she knew where Modred was coming from, but also how dangerously unhinged she might become as a result. Fortunately she seemed to still be relying on her firearm, the shots from which Iris could manage dodging and deflecting with relative ease. Even without her Magnetism powers she was fast enough to avoid most projectiles as long as she could at least see them coming. It was when Modred finally ran out of ammo that Iris started to get concerned. Tossing her now-useless gun aside, Modred summoned Excalibur to her outstretched hand.

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