Short story time! Today you guys get a short story about one of my very favorite characters in my current work in progress, several years before it takes place. Today you guys get to meet Claire Kimura, the Kitsune. She’s one of the most powerful Muts (a group of super-powered people, or ‘mutants’) to have ever been on the Olympians. It’s a lot of fun writing for Claire, you’ll probably get to see more of her here and there.
Kitsune (Vol. 1)
Claire Kimura sat on the bench of the dropship, feeling the rhythmic thrum of its engines. A twenty-three-year-old daughter of two Japanese immigrants, she was the first Mut in her family to be a member of a vigilante team. And not just any team. The Olympians. The most well-known, most prestigious team in the world.
She opened her eyes, running a gloved hand through her close-shorn jet-black hair, and tightened the straps on her harness. It never escaped her how the benches were always built for someone considerably larger than her slight frame. Ryan Powell, a forty-something tall, muscular man with lightly tanned skin, blond hair, and piercing blue eyes, the team leader, stood near the jump door, barking instructions to the team. She could see his mouth just enough to make out something about ‘not handing,’ whatever that was supposed to mean.
Claire knocked on her teammate, Vanessa Johnson’s shoulder plate, a very slender, average-height dark-skinned Black woman in her early forties, nodding towards Powell. She was Powell’s second in command, a fearsome woman who could shatter steel with just her voice. Johnson nodded back at her, signing what Powell had said for Claire.
“Drop time two minutes. Everyone, prepare your gear and get ready for a hot landing. Remember the plan. Anyone have questions?” Claire nodded in thanks.
“What’s the situation on the thunderstorm?” she signed. Johnson relayed her question to Powell.
“Why do you think there’s a hot landing?” he replied. She grinned devilishly, rapping the golden nine-tailed kitsune insignia on her left chest plate twice. Her namesake. A thunderstorm is always a good sign, she thought. Not that the mission should be hard. Provide cover for the team to get into the compound, rescue the governor, and get back out. Should be five minutes. Ten, tops.
The red light next to the jump door flashed three times, then turned green. All eleven of them that were seated stood up, grabbing onto the handgrips suspended above them.
“I guess we’re jumping early,” she signed.
“Guess so. Helmet up,” Johnson signed. Claire pulled on her hair-sock and her helmet, tapping a button on the side to activate the HUD. Instantly, her faceplate lit up with her vital signs, tags for all her teammates, weather conditions, and so much more. The information was almost enough to be overwhelming. A blue indicator light popped up in the upper left hand of her HUD. She opened it with her eyes.
“Drop order: Kimura, Johnson, Winston, Gold, Mendelssohn, Delgado, Chao, Kovalenko, Adjei, Perez, DeAngelo, then me. Kimura, light the area up on your way down; don’t let them get off any shots at us,” Powell said. Claire grinned wickedly as all twelve of them formed a line. She was the vanguard. Just where I want to be, she thought, without a hint of sarcasm.
The jump door opened, and the green light flashed three times. Claire rapped twice more on her kitsune insignia for luck, then dove head-first out the jump door without a second thought, a look of pure exhilaration on her face. She watched altimeter on her HUD rapidly count down, then closed her eyes, enjoying the sensation of the wind ripping through her armor.
Right as the altimeter hit three thousand feet, her eyes shot open, crackling with yellow electricity. Claire extended her hands, using the Earth’s electromagnetic field to slow her descent. She then reached out with her mind, feeling for the static electricity building up in the air. It was a lesson she’d learned long ago. You had to gently coax the electricity. You couldn’t force yourself onto it. Not if you wanted it to cooperate with you.
She willed it into a bubble around her, firing out arcs towards the ground, creating a flak screen for her teammates to land in. She had complete control of every volt. Not a single arc would go where she didn’t want it to.
As she landed gently, she reached out again, feeling the static build in the surrounding air. The militia opened fire on her, but their bullets dissolved in the force field the static electricity around her was creating. Arcs fingered towards each of them. Claire was careful not to hit anyone- she wasn’t here to kill anyone, just provide cover for the rest of the team to make it inside the compound. Another blue indicator pupped up on her HUD.
“Kimura, watch out for the group approaching from the south-west, about one klick out. Overwatch says it’s around fifty or so. I’ll drop the coordinates on your HUD,” the readout from Powell said, a blinking red indicator popping up on the mini-map to the lower right side of her display. Claire grinned. Fifty will be fun. She closed her eyes, feeling the static building up in the air above her.
One out of every ten thousand Muts, give or take, had the ability to harness electricity. Electricity you had to be gentle with. If you wanted it to do your bidding, you had to work with it. Not against it. It was like a river- it needed to flow, you just could try to direct where. But lightning was something else. Lightning was chaotic, random. It had no sense of direction, no sense of purpose. Lightning was just untapped chaos. And if you wanted to control it, you had to dominate it completely.
Out of those one in ten thousand, only a dozen or so had that ability.
And she was one of them.
Her eyes flew open, electricity crackling through them. She reached up to the sky, feeling a familiar tug in her gut. With a cry, she ripped a massive bolt of lightning from the sky, scattering the approaching militia forces. The force from the thunder was enough to shatter the surrounding windows, the shattering glass dissolving in her static bubble. She felt the blast reverberate through her whole body. Imagine how bad I’d be out if I could hear, she thought, grinning.
“Militia scattered,” she signed, her armor’s motion trackers interpreting her signing into text for the rest of the team to read.
“Good job. We’ll be out in ninety seconds. Hot exit,” Powell said. When isn’t it? she thought. Claire glanced at the mini-map on her HUD, tracking the Olympians’ path towards the LZ she had laid a marker down on. She might have to get a little aggressive, maybe risk sending a few of the militia members to the ICU. But the thought of a few less of the skinheads out there wasn’t a thought that sat poorly with her.
Claire ran towards the spot she marked, careful to keep her static bubble around her. She wasn’t bulletproof, after all. She wasn’t the legendary La Fortaleza. Her heart threatened to beat out of her chest. This was the part she hated. Landing, she could always know exactly what was around her, who was where. But once she was on the move, the entire map shifted. She never knew who was approaching from behind. There was no way for her to know if someone was flanking her.
Three militia members popped out in front of her, about a hundred feet away or so. Close enough that she could see the 88 badges on their vests, far enough she couldn’t make out the details of their faces. But it didn’t matter. With a running windmill kick, she sent a three-pronged arc of electricity hurtling at them. They instantly crumpled when it made contact. Good.
Just as she rounded a corner, a young man with a swastika tattooed on his neck, holding a large rifle, jumped out. He was pointing his gun at her and shouting wildly. She could read his lips just well enough to gather something about surroundings. Looking around, she saw over a dozen of his fellow militia members slowly surrounding her.
Claire took a deep breath, trying to keep her nerves from betraying her. They were too close for her bubble to have any effect. But she had trained for this. This wasn’t a situation she couldn’t handle.
She quickly dropped into a full sweep kick, a whip of electricity arcing off her leg, knocking everyone off their feet. Before any of them had a chance to react, she reached up, ripping a lightning bolt into her body. It wasn’t nearly as powerful as the last bolt- that much electricity would fry even her. But it was enough. Dispersing it out from her body in a wave, she sent everyone flying. Whether they were dead or unconscious, she didn’t know, and cared even less.
Another blue indicator.
“Waiting on you, Kimura. ETA?” Powell asked.
“Ninety seconds,” she signed, taking off towards the LZ.
Reaching the dropship, Claire saw Powell waving for her to hurry furiously. She saw Delgado gripping Winston’s leg like a vice, blood soaking through her gloves. He had been hit. Of course it had to be him. The one Olympian who had any sort of healing mut.
She jumped onto the dropship, and Powell turned to the pilot, yelling something.
“Hey, bud, you gonna be okay?” she signed.
“Hurts like a bitch, but I’ll be okay. Johnson’s on the line with Hernandez back at the tower for the Healers,” Winston signed back.
“Make sure they take good care of you. We need our team Healer,” she signed, grinning. His body shook with laughter.
“Hey, Kimura, don’t make me laugh. That hurts.”
“That’s what you get for being shot.” Winston said something to Delgado, who rolled her eyes. She could read just enough of what he was saying to get something about sympathy. Either that or something about someone named Cathy. Delgado’s reply was completely unreadable. If Claire had to guess, she was probably speaking Spanish.
“Ana María says to be nice to me, I just got shot,” he signed.
“And I got shot last week. Are you really saying a little five-foot nothing girl is tougher than you?”
“Yes.”
“Then yeah, you’re right,” she signed, grinning at him.
THE END
Hope you guys enjoyed the story!
Until next time.
-Nick
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