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Chapter 7 - Chapter 6; Clipped Wings.

The sprawling night scene was upon the duo of platonic master and servant, the dark of evening serving to cover their less than covert scheme. They now had a meager hand-full of clients that were on their brand new payroll, as well as some employees. Just a small number of drug-runners looking to make a quick buck, but business was business. They'd had to spend quite a bit of time scuttling about the city, mapping it, studying it and making plans and appointments with varying clients from all around.

One could say her new business was booming, but she was so far unimpressed with results. At the pace affairs were traveling at currently, it would be imperative to expand her market to a wider audience. Her staple narcotic had been methamphetamine- more commonly known as meth- for the four months that she and her drone had been managing this business. Things had gone surprisingly well in that time, but this streak of luck was bound to run short soon, and she knew that.

Which meant it was time to change her stratagem.

To what, you ask? Elementary, dear Watson.

- One hour later; Storehouse No.3

The customers had always thought that the man who had helped the subject escape was pulling the strings, and she'd prefer to keep it that way. She managed to keep the act up by having him make the important calls, hold the meetings and confirm the quality of the product. While she sat in an office chair reading a book, he was currently with one of those important calls.

Over the months, her control of him and others had sharpened, she could now hold casual conversations and even have them express emotion through the contraction and dilation of facial muscles, even so far as to be able to control tone and pitch when speaking, controlling up to five drones at once.

"Yes, the shipment will be carried out tonight. No, please do be patient, we've only begun delivering between cities recently. Yes, one of our employees will receive the product and it will be delivered directly to you thereafter. Yes, a pleasure as always. Goodbye."

He promptly hung up the burner thereafter, stashing the device away for future use and gave his commander the same blank, flat look as always. She could have grown a sort of fondness for him, but knew it was not a sound idea. In this particular business, and her less than fortunate circumstance, people could be lost at the whims of others looking for her, ergo, it would be better to not get attached. That was how she'd gotten this far, anyway.

Though, remembering her circumstances she realized that they had plans to attend to. Due to new expanses in their business ventures, they were required to up their game, seeing as they needed to keep up with or excel against the rampant competition in the narcotics trade. Now, instead of trying to expand their payroll within the city, they skipped several unnecessary steps and moved to exporting goods to nearby towns and establishing storehouses there to obtain a wider supply of customers instead of bashing heads with the bigger players in Kathmandu. This was the new stratagem. Making their presence known and ironclad would come later down the line.

The young monarch tilted her head a millimeter, continuing to ponder current happenings. The Anthill was searching for her, they'd recently found that the main facility was destroyed, and had begun searching the nearby cities. As much as she commended them for their strategy, it was only going to be a matter of time until they sniffed her out of the hundreds of other criminal elements in Kathmandu.

Naturally, however, those same criminal elements would not simply allow newcomers to snoop about their turf unperturbed. They would most likely hold up their search, if nothing else. Inspiration struck in a moment and she passed a glance to her drone who'd been pondering his master for the time that she was thinking, and silently received a new set of orders.

If things were to turn out as she anticipated, they would have a window to strike back against Dr. Warne once again.

-- The same time, London.

The aged and greying man hobbled to the counter, an empty mug being placed down. Things have settled down slightly, since the mysterious disappearance of his most prized subject, along with all the others that were lost in the destruction of his main facility. He was not quite aware of the events that preceded the supposed 'tragedy', but it was no accident. Of that, he was utterly certain.

He heaved a deep sigh, bending to rub the area the strap fastened hardened plastic against flesh. He still struggled to become more accustomed to his new prosthesis, as he'd lost that leg in the explosion that took the facility. It had certainly made moving about an issue, but at least he could mostly focus on continuing other research projects while he recovered. The team he'd sent to salvage whatever they could find from the wreckage only found fragmental samples of the subjects that were lost, and anything digital could not be recovered.

The only discrepancy, and the only leading clue in the investigation was that there was nothing to be found of Subject 000, other than rudimentary evidence from her living quarters. This suggested one of two possible scenarios- First, someone had exposed the whereabouts and purpose of the subject and had come to secure it for themselves.

Currently, this option logically fit the description of the event based off of some reports.

However, there was always the variable that someone within the facility was responsible for the facilities' mysterious demise.

Considering how successful the undertaking was, that very well could have been the case.

The aging male could only sigh, combing a hand through his beard in thought. While catching the train of thought that drove toward research, he remembered a crucial fact. Dr. Fuyomi had disappeared, and had not been heard from in months. Try as he had, Benjamin Warne had no success in contacting him, or any associates he may have had.

The younger scientist held much promise as his successor. He was driven, enthusiastic, and had more than enough intelligence and knowledge to take on his work should the need arise. If only he'd listened to the younger researcher more seriously, perhaps this precarious situation could have been avoided. That in itself was little more than wishful thinking, and in times like these one could not grow complacent. It was time to mount a full search, and leave no stone unturned.

- The Himalayas, one hour later.

Even through the thick layering that covered his person, he felt the biting cold of the frost and snow that the icy winds blew about. There was unfortunately no helping that fact, but a free man could endure for a bit. He was here on rather important business after all.

Dr. Fuyomi Kanrou and a small team of investigators were scanning about the snow-covered wreckage that was once the Anthill. Any information he could use to track down the now annoyingly elusive Subject 000 would be a monumental step in the right direction, seeing as he'd been doing nothing but chase his own tail about most of Asia for the past months with a dismal amount of absolutely nothing to show for it. Resources and manpower be damned if they could not obtain anything substantial, at the very least.

His breath morphed into icy mist with a quiet sigh.

Two hours of searching up and down the ruins and not a single thing that Warne's men had already found, dug up and taken.

He was peeved by the thought of his wayward former mentor, and the fool he'd been for not taking more note of the highly intelligent Subject 000. She was no mere specimen and had shown him this with great clarity in her sabotage of the facility and daring escape. But the proud Benjamin Warne would hear nothing of his warnings, only further blinding his already warped image of the subject in question.

"Alright, that's enough. Pack up the equipment so we can leave." He drawled out in a dry groan. Even scientists had their limits, contrary to popular belief of them being overly obsessed loons. It applied to one person he now wished he had not known, but that was besides the point.

He was by no means giving up on his search, however. He wanted answers, ones only the missing subject could provide to him. now that they have already combed through the surrounding continent, it was high time for a different approach. There were only so many places that helicopter could have gone, so they'd go to the place closest to their current position on the summit of Everest, the capital of Nepal, the city of Kathmandu.

-Later that night, somewhere in downtown Kathmandu.

As it turns out, plotting and scheming while running an underground narcotics trade was rather exhausting. That was the groggy thought the subject held a dry rumination to. May it be said that their efforts had been paying off handsomely, the strategy of hiding in plain sight from competition was making profits shoot through the roof. And now, the true goal of this charade was achieved as she attempted to make sense of the abundantly numerous stacks of thin and oddly coloured paper in front of her.

Having been recently woken up, her mind fuzzily processed current happenings as the image of the quaint and dimly lit room became more clear to her bleary eyes, as her thoughts continued in the ever-moving train.

Money, something she remembered as a conduit for endless trade possibilities. Something she'd learned while researching society was that money controlled the ebb and flow of every major system, be it industrial, digital, and socioeconomic in nature. The only exception were biological systems, which acted exclusively within themselves. With that having been mentioned, it is suffice to say that one could fight no battles without an army, a contingency she'd long since been preparing for.

A smile cracked onto her features for the first time in months. The feeling was so strange, almost alien. But she could not forgo the truth in how wonderful it felt. Is this what it feels like to have fun? If her vocal cords functioned, she would likely have given a humourless chuckle at her own fleeting thoughts as the moon shone gently into the blinds.