Chapter 233 - 232: Resolve

"We have two ways to fix this," Kaito said, pulling his chair out and sitting down.

Makoto stood near the projector. She crossed her arms and offered a supportive smile.

She watched the sidekicks lean in, eager to see the plans.

Snatch reached out and opened the first folder.

"Path one is a Quirk Awakening," Kaito explained, tapping the top page. "We put you through a brutal physical training camp. We push your cells to the absolute breaking point. We force a genetic mutation to unlock full-body sandification."

Snatch read over the training requirements. He saw the medical warnings and the extreme physical trauma listed on the paper.

He closed the folder and pushed it away. He gave a dry, tired laugh.

"I'm pushing forty, Manager," Snatch said, shaking his head. "I run a police escort agency. I have zero interest in torturing myself in a boot camp just to force a mutation."

Kaito smirked. "Fair enough."

He slid the second folder across the table.

"Path two," Kaito said. "We use engineering to bypass your biological limits."

Snatch opened the second folder. He looked at a detailed drawing of a heavy-duty backpack and two sleek forearm gauntlets.

"This is a pressurized reservoir rig," Kaito explained. "The backpack rests on your spine. It holds high-grade silica sand. Before you go out on patrol, you mix your own sweat and sand-transformed cells directly into that tank every single second."

Taro frowned.

He leaned over Snatch's shoulder to look at the paper.

"Why carry sand when he can already make it?" Taro asked.

"Because Sandification uses his actual body mass," Kaito answered casually. "By mixing his DNA into the tank beforehand, that stored silica becomes a living extension of his body. The gauntlets emit a magnetic field that links specifically to that pre-charged sand."

"..."

Snatch froze. He stared at the blueprints.

"I use the sand from the pack instead of my own flesh," Snatch realized out loud.

"Yes," Makoto chimed in, walking closer to the table. "With this gear, you draw the ammo out of the backpack. You can now launch high-speed pressure strikes from a distance, and your upper body stays completely safe."

Kaito leaned forward, tapping the table.

"We are going to completely change how you fight," Kaito told him. "We are going to speed your sand up. You will spin the grains so fast they act like a buzzsaw. You can slice right through steel doors."

Snatch blinked, imagining the cutting power.

"You can be immune to heat," Kaito continued. "We will train you to grind your sand cells against each other mid-air. The friction creates a super-heated dust cloud. You can blind and scorch targets instantly."

Kaito pointed down at the concrete floor.

"You can alsk pour your sand straight down into the asphalt cracks," Kaito said. "You vibrate the street and break the structural bonds. You turn a solid road into a quicksand pit to swallow giant targets. You can also wrap a dense shell of sand around a villain's face to cut off their oxygen. You can even form a loose cloud in front of your convoy to absorb explosive shockwaves. There are a lot of ideas and moves after we solve your problem of not having enough sand."

"..."

The small room went completely quiet. Snatch and the sidekicks just listened.

Kaito was casually describing how to turn the veteran hero into something else.

Snatch rubbed his chin. He traced the lines of the heavy backpack.

"What about water?" Snatch asked quietly. "If my sand gets soaked, it clumps."

Kaito pointed to the lower half of the blueprint.

"We are building a set of leg guards," Kaito explained. "They have high-speed air jets and heated strips. If water gets close, the gear blasts super-heated air outward. The water turns into steam before it ever touches your sand."

Snatch stared at the blueprints. His defense, offense, and utility were maximized.

"Good.. goood.," Snatch said firmly.

He pulled a pen from his trench coat pocket and signed the approval form on the back page.

Kaito took the folder back and handed it to Makoto. He then turned his attention to the sidekicks standing around the table.

"Taro," Kaito addressed the stocky man. "You stand completely still and shoot cables."

Taro rubbed the back of his neck, looking down at his metal wrist bracers.

"You need to move and don't stay stationary," Kaito told him. "You shoot a cable into a building and swing across the street or throw a wrecked car using the tension. You set up invisible tripwires across an intersection to trip up a villain strike team. You tie your cables to the concrete and use your body weight to catch crashing vehicles."

Taro stared at Kaito.

He always used his quirk like a simple pair of handcuffs.

Using it for high-speed mobility and heavy rescue was a totally new mindset.

"I can try," Taro said, his voice filling with confusion.

Kaito turned to the young woman with the heavily bandaged hands.

"Rina," Kaito said. "We can design a new support gear for you, a ceramic gauntlets to store your heat. This way your skin will no longer be burnt."

Rina nodded quickly, giving him her full attention.

Kaito explained. "You can shoot a flash of heat at Snatch's loose sand to instantly turn it into a solid glass barricade. You can even draw ambient heat away from explosions to cool an area down and protect the civilians inside the vans."

Rina looked at her bandaged hands. A massive, relieved smile broke across her face.

"I will train hard," Rina whispered.

"You'll be keeping the whole team safe," Makoto assured her gently.

Snatch looked around the room. His sidekicks were completely energized.

"Alright," Snatch slapped his hands on the table. "What's the immediate plan?"

Kaito instructed. "The gear takes two weeks to fabricate and ship. The quirk training waits until the boxes arrive."

Snatch nodded. "What do we do for fourteen days?"

"We split the schedule," Kaito answered. "During the morning, Makoto will guide you through the Agency development."

Kaito looked at all of them, his expression turning serious.

"In the afternoon, I am putting all of you through brutal physical conditioning," Kaito stated flatly. "Sprints, weightlifting, and stamina building. Your bodies need raw physical strength before we carry and operate this new gear. And train each of your quirks."

Snatch gave a firm nod. His sidekicks agreed immediately, completely fired up and ready to work.

...

Location: Otheon

Naomasa Tsukauchi stood in a dark observation room. He held a paper cup of vending machine coffee.

He looked through the large two-way mirror.

Beros sat cuffed to a steel table in the interrogation room.

She wore a dark green tactical suit. Her green hair was cut short. She glared at the empty chair across from her.

Clair Voyance stood next to Naomasa. She wore her red and blue hero suit.

"She hasn't said a single word in two months," Clair said quietly. "My team pulled her out of a sniper nest last January. We tried every standard interrogation method on her. Nothing works."

Naomasa took a sip of his coffee.

"She is loyal enough," Naomasa noted. "Flect Turn need subordinates like her."

Clair crossed her arms. Her grip tightened on her sleeves.

"I'm going to dismantle this cult," Clair said, her voice dropping lower. "They forced an inventor to become part of them. I won't let them ruin a family. We need to find their base."

"I know," Naomasa said.

He set his coffee cup down on the console. He picked up a folder and straightened his tie.

"Let's see what she knows," Naomasa said.

He opened the heavy metal door.

CLACK.

He stepped into the interrogation room. The door shut behind him.

Beros snapped her eyes toward him. She sneered, leaning back in her metal chair.

She recognized immediately that he wasn't a local Otheon officer.

Naomasa pulled out the chair across from her.

SCRAPE.

He sat down. He placed the folder on the steel table and opened it. He pulled out a detailed map of Otheon and a red pen.

Beros stayed completely quiet.

"My name is Tsukauchi," Naomasa introduced himself politely. "I'm the one asking questions for you this time."

Beros glared at him. She clamped her jaw shut.

"For the record," Naomasa said, holding his pen over the paper. "Is your name Beros?"

Beros stared at the wall. She kept her mouth shut tight.

TING.

Naomasa felt a sharp pull in his mind.

Her conscious effort to hide her identity registered as a deception. His quirk officially calibrated to her silence.

"Hmm.."

Beros narrowed her eyes. Her breathing shifted slightly.

Naomasa looked down at his map.

"We found chemical purchases routed through shell companies," Naomasa started, tracing a line on the map. "We know Humarise has several bases in Otheon. We just need to narrow down the districts."

Beros stared at his tie.

"Is Eddie Soul being held in the industrial district?" Naomasa asked.

Silence.

Naomasa felt nothing. His quirk remained dormant.

"The central commercial sector?" Naomasa asked.

Silence. Nothing.

"The coastal shipping yards?"

Nothing.

He took his red pen and drew a circle around the coastal district on the map.

Beros shifted her weight in the chair. Her knuckles turned white against the steel cuffs.

Naomasa pulled out a list of businesses located on the coast.

"Is the base at Pier 44?" Naomasa asked.

Nothing.

"The old textile factory?"

Nothing.

"The Horizon Shipping warehouse?"

TING.

Naomasa drew a hard red circle around the Horizon Shipping facility.

Beros clenched her teeth.

A bead of sweat formed on her forehead.

She was screaming in her own head, trying to force herself to stop reacting to his words.

Naomasa flipped to the next page of his folder. He pulled out a map of the underground transit lines.

"Let's talk about your secondary cells," Naomasa said evenly.

He spent the next thirty minutes listing off districts, tunnels, and abandoned airfields.

Beros never spoke a single word. She just glared at him, trembling with frustration. She even tried to think about something else.

Naomasa closed the folder. He had three solid red circles on his maps.

"Thank you for your time," Naomasa said.

He stood up, pushed his chair in, and walked out of the room.

CLACK.

He stepped back into the observation room. Clair turned to look at him immediately.

Naomasa handed her the map.

"They have a main base at the Horizon warehouse on the coast," Naomasa told her. "They have a secondary cell in the Sector 4 subway tunnels, and a weapons cache at the abandoned airfield."

Clair took the paper. She looked at the red circles.

"I will scramble a strike team right now," Clair said, turning toward the door.

"Wait," Naomasa stopped her.

Clair paused, looking back at him.

"Do not raid those locations yet," Naomasa warned her. "We know the bases. We do not know which specific one is holding Eddie Soul. I didn't get a proper reading for him. He should be out of the country or Beros didn't knew where he was stationed."

Clair looked down at the map. She took a slow breath.

"You are right," Clair agreed. "I will put deep surveillance on all three spots. We don't breach until we get a visual confirmation on Eddie."

...

Location: Hosu City - Snatch Agency Garage

Time: Three Days Later

SCREEECH.

A shower of orange sparks rained down onto the concrete floor.

Two mechanics wearing heavy overalls stood inside the back of a large transport van.

One mechanic used a handheld grinder to cut the metal brackets holding the old police radio to the dashboard.

The heavy radio popped loose.

Taro grabbed the unit. He carried it over to a large plastic bin and dropped it inside.

CLATTER.

The bin was entirely full of old agency equipment.

Snatch stood nearby. He watched the mechanics pull wires out of the console.

Snatch said, crossing his arms. "We used those specific radios for ten years. Gutting the vans like this just feels wrong."

Makoto stood next to the open van door. She held her datapad.

"Run the fiber-optic cables behind the plastic side panels," Makoto instructed the lead technician. "Keep them completely away from the engine block. We don't want any heat interference with the headsets."

The technician nodded and waved his team into the van.

"Change is good Boss," Taro said, wiping grease off his hands with a rag. "We'll figure it out."

...

Location: Naruhata - Kaito's Apartment

Time: Evening

BEEP.

Kaito sat at his work desk.

A blue holographic blueprint floated above the surface.

It showed the internal chambers of the pressurized reservoir backpack and the ceramic gauntlets.

"Eve," Kaito said, looking at the hologram. "Widen the spray nozzles on the gauntlets by two millimeters."

[Adjusting the nozzle diameter now, Boss,] Eve replied. The chibi avatar stood on the edge of the desk, waving a small digital wrench.

The lines on the hologram shifted slightly, expanding the nozzle design.

"Send the files to David Shield," Kaito ordered. "Tell him we need the fabrication and shipping done as soon as possible."

[Transmission sent.]

SIZZLE.

The loud sound of frying meat came from the kitchen.

Makoto stood by the stove. She wore a casual white sweater. She flipped a large piece of glazed pork belly in a hot frying pan.

"The team looked completely dead today," Makoto said, leaning over the stove.

Kaito stood up from his desk and walked into the kitchen.

"They hate throwing away their old routine," Kaito replied, grabbing two plates from the cabinet. "They will get used to it. How is the comms setup going?"

"The technicians finish the dashboard wiring tomorrow," Makoto smiled, nudging the pork with a spatula. "Then we test the network."

...

Location: Hosu City - Snatch Agency Backlot

Time: Four Days Later

THUD.

Taro dropped a heavy barbell onto the dirt. He bent over, grabbing his knees and panting heavily. Sweat poured down his face.

Snatch finished a set of squats nearby. His legs shook. He grabbed a towel and wiped his forehead.

"Why so much leg work?" Snatch asked, breathing hard. "I thought my upper body is enough for all the fighting."

Kaito stood a few feet away, holding a stopwatch.

"You are going to carry a metal tank full of sand on your back," Kaito explained plainly. "It is heavy. Your knees and legs need the raw muscle support to carry it while you move."

Rina finished her sprints across the lot. She collapsed onto a wooden bench, totally exhausted.

Footsteps crunched on the gravel.

A tall man with a dog head walked around the corner of the brick building. He wore a tan trench coat.

"Makoto," Chief Kenji greeted. "Woof."

Makoto walked over to him. She pulled a small black receiver from her pocket and handed it to the police chief.

"This connects the police dispatch directly to our new dashboard map," Makoto said. "It feeds live traffic data into our software."

Kenji looked at the small device. He let out a long sigh.

"My older dispatchers are already complaining about learning a new system," Kenji admitted. "It takes time to adapt. Woof."

"We will walk them through it," Makoto promised. "It keeps the transport routes secure."

Kenji gave a firm nod and put the receiver in his pocket.

...

Location: Hosu City - Highway 4

Time: Five Days Days Later

VROOOM.

Taro gripped the steering wheel of the armored transport van. He kept looking down at the digital map glowing on the center console.

"Keep your eyes on the road, Taro," Snatch warned from the passenger seat.

"The map keeps updating and moving," Taro complained, gripping the wheel tighter. "It's distracting."

Makoto sat in the back of the van with her laptop open.

"There is a traffic jam forming near the bridge ahead," Makoto reported, watching the red lines on her screen. "Take the next exit. The software is re-routing us."

Taro turned the wheel quickly, taking the off-ramp.

"Check the legal portal," Snatch said, looking back at Makoto.

Makoto typed a command on her keyboard. A green box popped up on her screen with the seal of the Supreme Hero Courts.

"The server pinged," Makoto confirmed. "We got a mock warrant approved in thirty seconds."

Snatch leaned back against the headrest. He let out a long breath.

"Thirty seconds," Snatch muttered. "I used to sit on hold with a police dispatcher for three hours just to get permission to fight back."

Taro merged onto the new street.

"It's getting easier," Taro admitted, finally relaxing his grip on the wheel.

...

Location: Hosu City - Snatch Agency Lobby

Time: 2 Days Later (2 Weeks Foundation)

RUMBLE.

A delivery truck parked right outside the agency front doors.

Two delivery drivers carried three heavy wooden crates into the lobby.

They set them down on the tile floor, had Kaito sign a digital pad, and walked back out to their truck.

Snatch, Taro, and Rina gathered around the boxes. The room was totally quiet.

Kaito picked up a metal pry bar.

CRACK.

He forced the first lid open and tossed the wood aside.

"Nice.."

Snatch looked inside.

A matte-tan pressurized backpack sat securely in the packing foam. Two sleek forearm gauntlets rested right next to it.

Kaito moved to the second crate and cracked it open.

Taro stared at his modified metal wrist bracers.

"This is better than my last one..."

They had thick spinning reels attached to the sides, built to handle extreme kinetic tension.

Kaito pried the final lid off.

Rina reached in.

"Hehe.."

She gently touched the thick ceramic plating of her new gauntlets as she giggled. The heat-absorbing coils felt cold under her fingertips.

Kaito dropped the pry bar on the floor.

"The two weeks are up and the initial changes of this agency is going well." Kaito said.

Snatch looked away from the backpack and met Kaito's eyes.

Kaito stated. "Your bodies are conditioned. Tomorrow morning is the start of your quirk training. Bring your new gears."

"Yes..." Snatch and the two sidekicks gave a firm, determined nod.

They're alse very excited to test these new babies after all.

...

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