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*** PRISS ****
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The anime this story is based upon is named BubbleGum Crisis. If you like Cyberpunk, Bladerunner or Shadowrun and you don't know BubbleGumCrisis I suggest you check it out.

P.S. For you guys who don't know BubbleGum Crisis, check out the bottom of this file. Some terms are explained down there.

P.P.S. Feedback is always welcome... contact me at anterion@gmx.net

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Chapter One

+-> 'There's a hurricane tonight' <-+

The chairman walked through the long corridor that led into the depth of the huge building that was the Genom Tower, by far the biggest building in whole Neo-Tokyo. Whole blocks of skyscrapers were overshadowed by its vast mass. He walked with the confidence of a man who commanded the world's biggest company. Genom Corp. practically controlled the world business. The legal part as well as the illegal. In front of an armored door he stopped. A green beam of light slowly wandered over his face performing a face recognition and a retina scan at the same time. With the hiss of pneumatics the heavy door opened and Quincy stepped inside. The door instantly closed behind him. The procedure repeated itself again a few steps further down the way. Now he had reached his destination. An isolated laboratory hidden in the lowest levels of Genom Tower. A crew of scientists in white lab coats worked furiously over computer terminals, test tubes and some watched simulations in virtual reality chambers.

"Professor Utada?" Quincy's low voice boomed through the lab.

Everybody looked at him instantly but quickly resumed their work except for a young man who just had stepped out of a VR chamber.

"Ah, Sir. What an unexpected honor to have you down here."

"Yes, Yes Professor. I'm a busy man. So what is the status on our project?"

"Nearly finished, Sir. ..."

---

Twenty minutes had passed since Sylia's computer had picked up an emergency on the AD-Police's frequency. It looked like boomers had gone berserk downtown. When the Knight Sabers arrived the scene looked like a nuclear battle field. Exploded and burned out police vehicles lay around everywhere. The casualties looked serious. But the boomers were nowhere to be seen.

"Sylia, I pick up three blips two blocks east from here." Nene's voice came over the radio. Her hardsuit was equipped with the best sensors of the team.

Sylia, the team's leader, watched the death and destruction and had no doubt that this was Genom's work. Despite all her work she never had been able to get Quincy for all this.

"Hey, Sylia. You sleepin'?"

"Sorry Priss. I was lost in thoughts." She took a deep breath. "Knight Sabers. Let's go."

All four took off towards Nene's direction. Soon they arrived at the battle site.

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"... We have analyzed the previous defeats of our boomers. It was necessary to find out why our boomers always lost, even Largo."

"And what was the outcome of this analysis?"

"Well, there are several factors to be recognized. To be exact there are..."

"A summary will be enough Professor."

"Yes Sir. It looks like the Knight Sabers have a slight technological advantage."

"And that's all?"

"Well, Sir, that's the only factor that can be measured. Additionally there are unmeasurable things like teamwork, fighting spirit and luck."

"So what do you plan to do against it?"

"The most efficient way to defeat the Knight Sabers is to minimize those factors. Since we can't manipulate luck and their fighting spirit we have to take advantage of their technology dependency and disturb their team work..."

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"Looks like two Type D battle boomers and one new design."

"Right, Nene. We'll stay together and take them out one by one. Destroy the Type Ds first but look out for this new one. Nene, Linna. You two cover us. Priss, we both go in for close combat."

"OK, Sylia", three voices came over the radio at once.

"Knight Sabers, it's show time!"

The four armored females launched their attacks on the first massive humanoid battle boomer. It moved slightly back, preparing for the attack. The Type D positioned itself on their flank, ready to attack. Nene tuned her sensors on the new design. Its maneuvers looked more like an evasive pattern than a commencing attack. Suddenly her systems picked up heavy electric activity in the unknown boomer. Now she knew what all those wiry extensions on that thing were. Antennas.

"Sylia. This boomer, it looks like..." In this moment all communication went blank.

Sylia immediately knew what was going on. "This new one is an ECM and tactics boomer. All it does is coordinate the other two and block our communications".

---

"... According to the simulations the Knight Saber signed Beta with the blue hardsuit should engage a solo attack. Without their leader this one is the worst team player, although the most dangerous in infight. So the Type Ds will take this one out first..."

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"Shit! Sylia, do you read me? Sylia!"

As soon as the communication died Priss knew that the team depended on her now. She was the solo player in this team. Without further hesitation she launched her attack at the Type D in front of her. Her targeting system locked on it.

"Now you're finished"

But before she could trigger her stinger gun the second Type D blasted her at full force from the side. She lost her target and was thrown several yards before she smashed into a wall. Her hardsuit protected her mostly from the impact but she still winced in pain. "Got to get up. Come on...", slowly Priss stood up only to be pushed over by another assault of the Type D. This time it hauled her right through the wall. Her systems blacked out shortly before coming back online and Priss felt as if every single bone in her body was broken. As she staggered back to her feet she looked around. Both Type Ds were in heavy infight with the rest of the team, the ECM boomer had turned its back to her.

"Suckers. They think they've got me down. I'll show them. Yeeaaaaarrrr!!" With a loud yell Priss launched towards the ECM boomer ready to rip it to shreds.

In this very moment, the boomer's "head" turned around and fired a beam weapon at Priss. The white glowing EM Pulse hit her full force. Instantly all displays went black as every system the hardsuit had short circuited. Electric sparks burned Priss' face and body and she screamed out in agony. The hardsuit's emergency system triggered the opening sequence to protect the user from even more damage leaving Priss totally unprotected. And the boomer was closing in for the kill.

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"Now with approximately 32% of their fighting power gone the second wave should wipe them out."

---

"Oh no. Four more blips on the screen and I can't tell the others." Nene was busy dodging the incoming attacks. "I've got to tell them somehow, wait... my high speed laser... If I only could redirect my radar display to it's control system.... DID IT!"

With her fast adjustable pointing laser, Nene projected her radar readings on the smoke the battle had risen like a light show at a festival. Sylia and Linna understodd what this meant. Sylia fired a blue flare high into the air. That was the signal for the Knight Sabers to retreat and for the Motoslaves to cover them. They would be destroyed but they were replaceable. Shortly after that an vector-thrust aircraft hovered over the battle scene, laying an array of cover fire. Sylia was barely able to get the heavi1ly injured Priss into the vehicle when the new boomers arrived. But then, they were safe.

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"Very well Professor. Although we did not destroy them it seems that your concept worked very well. You may proceed to develop it further."

"Thank you very much, Sir. I think we will find interesting information in the salvaged hardsuit. The Knight Sabers' secrets won't be so secret any more soon."

---

"The Knight Sabers will disband for one year."

"What? Why?",screamed Nene and Linna in one voice.

Sylia and the two other girls had just returned from their visit to Priss who was still in a deep coma.

As soon as everybody had sat down Sylia had already made her decision. "I've got two reasons. First, I'm sure Genom has salvaged Priss' abandoned hardsuit and is already analysing its data banks. Although I never put too valuable data in your suits they still get an advantage on us that we can not let them have. So I'll need the time to finish the new suit designs. They are different enough from the previous models that the data Genom now has will be worthless. Second, Priss' healing process will take about three quarters of a year." She made a pause to clear her thoughts. "We will meet on a regular basis to keep up with our training schedule but besides that the AD Police is now on its own as far as Genom is concerned."

There was silence after Sylia spoke. Only the quiet sounds from the city below could be heard. "Um... Sylia, I wondered how Priss will recover." Nene finally broke the silence. "Her injuries looked so damn serious that I thought that she will either die or be crippled for the rest of her life."

"You are right Nene. Normally she would have died already. It's only thanks to the machines she's hooked up to that her brain is still alive. To be honest, that is the only part of her body that is still alive."

"So how in god's names will she ever recover?"

"I can't tell you that yet. I have to ask you to have faith in what I'm doing."

"Sylia... ".

After the remaining two members of the Knight Sabers left, Sylia went back to the room where Priss' broken body floated in a translucent blue liquid with dozens of wires and tubes attached to it. Nobody saw the tears dwelling up in Sylia's eyes when she touched the window to the healing chamber and wordlessly mouthed the words "Forgive me." to her unconscious friend. She then pushed a button that sent an emergency e-mail to Germany. Recipient: "Macky Stingray".

Three days later...

Sylia sat beside her brother Macky in front of a computer display that showed the outline of a human female body and columns of numerical data scrolling down beside it. Suddenly a red flashing window opened on the screen. It read 'SEQUENCE ABORTED. RESULT: INSTANT DEATH'.

Brother and sister both sighed. "Now it's official. Out of one thousand simulator runs only one succeeded and even that showed unpredictable side effects. This is doing no good, Sylia. The Nanoprobes were designed to build artificial tissue for boomer construction. They will never be able to rebuild a complete human body."

"But it is Priss' last chance, Macky. Perhaps when we give the probes a bigger tolerance level... And allow them not only to add new cells to already existing ones but to modify those to fit better. That way we could have a bigger chance of success."

"We can try, but I'm not too comfortable with this settings. OK, let's start the simulation..." The parameters were quickly modified. Macky hit the 'Execute' button.

A blue window opened on the screen. 'BEGINNING SEQUENCE. 0% COMPLETE'. Behind Sylia's and Macky's back a red carrier liquid was infused into the chamber where Priss floated.

"MACKY! You've really started the program." Sylia called. "This now the real procedure, no simulation."

Macky's eyes widened in shock. Brother and sister hurried to the chamber's window and watched how the red liquid dissolved and invisible small probes began to modify and rearrange the very DNA that made up the body of Priss Asagiri. 'ESTIMATED DURATION OF SEQUENCE: 173 DAYS 13 HOURS 8 MINUTES. STATUS: GREEN' The process had begun. Any interruption or canceling would lead to Priss instant death. Now in front of Priss' the friends laid six months of waiting. Six months, where every second could be the last for her. Silently the countdown proceeded. Never unwatched, cause for the following six months there was always someone to stand guard at the computer console. Sylia, Macky, Linna, Nene and sometimes even Prof. Raven. took turns to sit by their injured friend and watched as the nanoprobes did their work.

To Priss the long time was as if she drifted from dream to darkness and again from darkness to dream. Her comatose mind never at rest. Weird dreams haunted her all the while. She saw herself losing her boyfriend again, although that was years ago. She saw herself losing Sylvie again. That too was a few years ago. She saw how the Knight Sabers had nearly been defeated by Largo when he tried to blow up Neo-Tokyo's nuclear power plant. She couldn't have done anything about either of this situations. Her friend was killed although she was by his side. Sylvie died, although Priss had fought to the end to save her. And it was only thanks to Sylia that Largo was defeated. Frustration and anger dwelled up in Priss' unconscious mind. She always lost. No matter if she had her hard suit or not. No matter if she was a Knight Saber or not. This damn technology had abandoned her when she had needed its support the most. Why was she so dependent on it? Why couldn't she fight without it. Only relying on her own body and mind? Those thoughts filled her all the time. And as time went by they grew stronger. More intense. Especially when unknown to her the nanoprobes began their work on her partly damaged brain...

'REMAINING TIME OF SEQUENCE: 0 DAYS 0 HOURS 2 MINUTES'. Half a year later everybody had gathered around the healing chamber. Watching at Priss now completely restored body. It seemed that she had never been fatally wounded. She looked more like someone how had just underwent some serious beauty treatment. Her skin had a healthy tone and looked flawless. Her hair had grown past her shoulders in the meanwhile to the lower of her back. Only her face looked somewhat strange. Although it was beautiful as it had always been, it looked everything else than calm and relaxed. Her eyes seemed to move restlessly behind her closed eyelids and her lips were pressed together in small line that looked like a hint of high mental tension. A sequence of beeping sounds emerged from the computer as a new green window opened over the old blue one. 'SEQUENCE SUCCESSFUL. RELEASING SUBJECT'. The nutrition liquid that had supported the nanoprobes and Priss' body the whole time was sucked out of the chamber and Priss slowly came to a rest at its bottom. Then with the typical hiss of pneumatics the chamber opened. Immediately Sylia wrapped Priss in a blanket. Firstly to protect her from the sudden change of temperature and secondly to protect her from Macky's peeping eyes. Together they brought her to bed, waiting for her to awaken.

When she did she was greeted by the sight of her friends beside her bed. "Hey guys." she mumbled like someone how hadn't talked for half a year. "What's with you all. You look as if you never saw some waking up before." Now she saw the tears in Linna's and Nene's eyes. "What's wrong?"

"Oh, Priss!!!" Nene lost all control and threw her arms around Priss, now crying out of relieve that her friend was alive. Priss' surprised look made Macky, Linna and Prof. Raven chuckle. Only Sylia remained her usual calm face.

When Nene finally stopped crying, Sylia ordered everybody out of the room. "I want to talk to Priss alone." When everyone had left she sat beside the bed.

"What is it Sylia? Why is everybody acting so strange. It is not that I was dead or something. I just needed some rest."

"Priss, you were dead. Well at least as good as dead. Your body was beyond repair by common methods, so I had to come up with something... unusual."

"Unusual?"

"You know that Boomers are not completely machines. Parts of them are organic. Those organics are build by microscopic probes called nanoprobes that modify living tissue to regrow according to a specific program. I used those nanoprobes to rebuild you body but it was more than risky."

"Don't tell me I'm a Boomer now." Priss asked with a flash of serious anger in her eyes.

"No. The probes only caused your living cells to divide and regrow the dead ones." 'That's close enough to the truth. If I told her that the probes modified most of her body she would think that she's a Boomer now. And she couldn't live with that', she thought.

"Now get some more sleep. When you feel better we'll talk more."

"Just one more question Sylia. How long was I out?"

"Six months." She closed the door behind her, leaving a dazzled Priss behind to her own thoughts.

After one more week Priss was strong enough to leave the bed completely. Although she wanted to, Sylia didn't let take part in the Knight Saber's training yet. So most of the time Priss sat at the monitors and watched how Lina and Nene lost every time against Sylia's brilliant tactics.

'There is no way, the two beat her', thought Priss. 'Neither of them can reach her fighting skills, not to mention her tactics. If I only could be with them...'

Her gaze wandered to her right. In an armored, electronic sealed cabin laid her new hard suit. Sylia had just finished its construction.

'Do I really want to put that thing on again? I nearly got killed in it more than only once. But it's the only way I can beat GENOM. I just have to...'

Behind her the doors opened and the three remaining Knight Sabers entered the room. "Do you feel OK, Priss?", Linna asked while she went through the procedure of dismounting her suit. "You look worried."

"It's nothing." Only Sylia saw her quick glance to the 'Priss' labeled cabin.

"Priss, if you think you are up to it, we can do some light training with your new suit tomorrow."

"Yeah. That would be great.", she answered in an excited voice that even surprised herself.

The day after Priss found herself standing in the subterranean training the facility that the Knight Sabers called their own. The suit smelled new and was a little bit less comfortable than the previous model. Sylia had told her that it would soften up soon if Priss used it frequently.

'Yeah, right. And she calls this thing a hard suit. Now let's see what it can do.' She began to run down the circular hallway.

The systems recognized what she wanted to do and the mechanics supported her movement, speeding her up to 60 miles per hour.

'Not bad. Almost 20% faster than the old one. Now for some jumping.'

At the according test area she fired her jump jets. This system also proved to be much better than its predecessor. 'I could get used to this. Now for a smooth landing.'

Yet, shortly before she touched down, one jet malfunctioned. Priss came down hard on her side. Although the hardsuit was protecting her she winced in pain as the shock of the impact shook her recently restored body.

'Shit!' "Sylia, this piece of junk's jets are coughing like an old man with asthma."

Sylia's face appeared on the hard suit's HUD. "This is why we are testing the suit and its wearer at this facility, Priss. Why don't you skip the remaining mobility tests and go for some aiming practice?"

"OK. Do I have ammo?" "You do. But only a few rounds." "All right. See ya."

When Priss peeled herself out of the body suit that she had to wear under the armored exoskeleton that Sylia called hard suit she felt like a used dish rag. Her body was covered with both old and fresh sweat and her hair was a total mess. Sylia was waiting outside. No matter what Priss said, she wouldn't leave her alone.

"You're still weak Priss. There is no telling what late effects could occur." That brought a grim smile on Priss face when she entered the shower room. She enjoyed the hot water for a long time as it cleansed her body from the sweat and relaxed her cramped muscles. Her mind wandered as she soaped herself. She thought about the horrible nightmares she had when she was in coma. Never before she had felt so helpless and she wished she would never do again for it was one thing that Priss feared most. To be unable to do anything about a dangerous situation. That was why she had once accepted Sylia's offer to join the Knight Sabers. As part of this team she could really do something, could really help to fight GENOM or others. But to do this she had to be in top shape and practice with her new hard suit, because that was the only way she could fight those monsters. Some more minutes later Sylia's white car left the subterranean garage and brought both women back to Sylia's place. Priss was off to bed immediately and slept as soon as she laid down. Sylia, however, still studied the readouts of Priss' today test run. When she came to the point where the jump jet failed she frowned. There was an exceptional sharp and intense peak in Priss' brain waves at this time. 'I still need to watch her. I know that she hates being nursed but I don't dare to let her leave yet.'

More weeks went by. Priss was now in full training again and was close to her previous fitness level. Often she trained even harder than the other girls in order to improve her scores on the computer readouts just a little more. All the time, unknown to Priss, her hardsuit monitored her brain waves so that Sylia could analyze them after each training session. One evening she sat in her lab when Macky entered the room.

"Hey Sis. Still browsing through her EEGs?"

"Yes. There is something that bothers me."

"What is it."

"I don't know for sure. Here, look at this peak, and this, and this." She pointed out some red marked peaks on the papers. "Those sudden impulses appear whenever Priss misses a target, the equipment fails or she just loses. In other words, when she's getting frustrated."

"But aren't those situations when there is supposed enhanced brain activity."

"Yes, but not in these part of the spectrum. The peaks appear in parts that are more or less inactive in humans. And I couldn't find anything about what the peaks are about. They don't match the typical readouts you expect." Behind the two a door silently opened and Priss listened quietly to them.

"So you think she isn't combat ready yet?"

"No, definitely not. And until I find out what those readouts mean, I will not take her with us in a real fight. It's just too much of an unknown risk." The door closed as silently as she was opened and Priss went back to her room with an empty look in her eyes.

'Too much of an unknown risk. So that's what I'm now to them. An unknown factor in Sylia's calculations.' Silently and with bitterness in her eyes she sneaked away.

"Priss? Priss, I'm coming in now." Sylia opened the door to the guest room. After a long night of thinking she had decided to talk to Priss about her worries. Now that she stood in the room, the only light falling through the doorway. But the light was enough to see that Priss was not there. The bed was unused and all cabinets open and empty. Nothing was left of the stuff Priss had collected here during the past weeks. 'She's gone. I wonder if she realized something.' Slowly she closed the door, left the building and drove to the old trailer Priss inhabited. She found that place abandoned as well and the motorcycle was gone. The following days she and the rest of the team searched whole Neo-Tokyo for Priss. Even Leon was recruited by Nene. But she couldn't be found. She had even disappeared from the local hard rock music scene that had been practically her world.

No one knew that Priss had left the city the night she abandoned the room at Sylia's house. She was determined to leave her life as a Knight Sabers behind. She had fought and lost. She had given 150% for the team and now she wasn't even trusted. There was nothing that kept her in Neo-Tokyo now. Nothing except bad memories...

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Explanations:

AD-Police: "Armored Division" Police. Neo-Tokyo's high tech police. Its purpose is to deal with heavily armed criminals and boomers that are too much for the regular police.

Boomer: Some kind of robots with some organic parts. Some look like humans some like normal robots. They are used as workers, guards... or weapons.

Type D Boomers: Heavy combat boomer. They are incredibly strong, heavily armored and absolutely dangerous.

Knight Sabers: For female high tech mercenaries who fight against GENOM and other criminals.

GENOM: The worlds most powerful cooperation. They manufacture the boomers. So far no one was able to prove that GENOM is the source for the latest boomer rampages but some people just know it.

Hard Suit: An overall body armor with build-in weapons, targeting systems and mobility systems like jump jets and so on.

Motoslaves: Battle robots with a very limited AI and the capability to transform into Motorcycles for the Knight Sabers.

Nanoprobes: A combination of electronic and organic components at a microscopic scale, able to perform more or less simple operations on a cell of living tissue.