When we last left our hero and his crew, they were working to bring down the fortress of Cain - a megalomaniac hell-bent on infecting Yamatai and Nepleslia with a deadly virus, turning people into gelatinous killing machines!

However - there have been a few setbacks, major injuries, a broken shotgun and an incorrect syringe, to name a few.
Now, Luca is locked in a showdown with an old fiend in Hitori's past - Michael!

Who has won the duel? Let's find out in another episode of ISC PHOENIX!!

MISSION 5.5 - START!!

Luca had come out of the brief exchange of steel and diamond kneeling at one end of the room, breathing deeply. On the other end of the room, with his back faced to the captain, Michael was in a similar pose, but he seemed confident.

"You see, I sliced you like an onion!" Michael boasted. Out of curiosity, Luca wiggled around a little to see if he would, but didn't.
Confused, Luca began patting his chest for cuts, coming up fruitless and asked: "Are you sure? Who cut who?"
He stood up and turned around to look at Michael, who wasn't responding, but quivering madly.

"I did." A somewhat computerised, masculine voice from nowhere said.
Surprised, Luca looked at Hitori, and her binding ropes had been cut to ribbons, but she was still sitting down, equally surprised as Luca.

"...bastard... lone wolf..." Michael muttered to himself before falling neatly and bloodlessly into a life-sized 12 piece puzzle with a few thumps.
"WHOA-Bugger me sideways!" Luca stepped backwards, but stepped into something he couldn't see, "AH!" He turned around with with his fists up and swung a left hook, but found that something had caught his hand mid swing, and it felt like a hand.

Luca froze and maintained his one-handed grab, looking at the crew around him.
"I thought I already fought you!" He scowled.
"Different person." The person responded, as his cloaking device wore off. It appeared to be a person in a sleek, navy-blue suit of land-based powered armour of Yamataian design, and a vibroblade katana was in his other hand. The armour's face was made up of 6 red eyes, effectively giving whoever was inside 180 degree vision.

"You've grown..." The man inside the armour said before pushing over Luca effortlessly and sprinting away, cloaked, and cutting through the door with a single swipe and disappearing as quickly as he came.

"Well how 'bout that..." Luca mumbled to himself as he put his handgun back in its holster and bent down to help up Arin, "A guardian angel with a katana..."
Hitori picked herself up and gave Luca a pat on the back with a smile, "Much appreciated," She commented with a nod.
"No worries," Luca replied.

The poison that Arin was infected with had subsided, and Vincent, with a helping hand, could stand up. Meanwhile, Luca got his headset back on and called Jimmy.

"Jim, I need a search for a guy named 'Lone Wolf', he just gave us a helping hand. Try looking in public SAINT databases or the Bounty lines..."

Robert came into the doorway of the cell, after accidentally running past Hitori's holding cell and into three rather large Red guards. The ensuing fight caused him to miss the fight in Hitori's cell. As he got back, though, he was determined for a quick grab-and-go. So upon entering the room, he drew his knife and tried to slink into the armor's blindspot without being noticed.

The man in the armour heard Robert coming with a sort of echo-location, and turned around to anticipate the attack.
"Please," He said as he bent his neck away from the blade. He stared at Robert for a moment and deduced that he was probably working for Luca. He pointed his Katana to Robert's face and told him: "Don't."
As he moved the katana away, he applied the personal cloaking device and disappeared.

His word drifted off as he disappeared from sight, and from sound.

Robert decided not to argue with a guy who had a bigger blade than him and sheathed his blade almost immediately with a quick glance towards Luca. With a shrug, he replied, "There are nicer ways to make a guy feel inadequent."

Vincent shivered at the large tear across his chest as some crewmen lifted him to his feet. His duster and combat harness were miraculously intact, but the Red Army uniform beneath was torn asunder, as was the ballistics-resistant jumpsuit beneath it. There was an added wound beneath the the suit's torso, stretching across his ribcage about six inches below his collarbone, which had been crudely dressed with a ludicrous amount of absorbant padding and Ace bandages which wrapped about his torso. Grunting as he bent slightly to retrieve his fallen brass knuckles, he noticed (suddenly) that bending over any more than how he normally stood would send pain shooting through his veins.

"Well huh." Vincent said, brushing off the intense pain as best he could (though the exertion it took to keep from shouting was evident on his face). "Guess we got rid of that Michael fellow pretty easily... Everyone else alright? Arin, Luca, Hitori, Robert? All good, everyone?"

Robert smiled at Vincent. "Well, I don't like speakin for everyone, but I think the rest of us are fine. It's you who needs a bit of help."

With Luca's help, Arin popped up from the floor. She first took a step back from the adventurer and looked away because of his previous lecherousness. But then she saw the neat hole Vincent's pants and looked away from that too, blushing.

"Maybe we need a PA in this group."

"It'd be handier than using me as a ballistics shield; that's for sure-GODDAMN BURNING BUNNIES!" Vincent ducked to the floor as a 10mm bullet whizzed past his head. Vincent came up with his own Hand Cannon and fired into the doorway; satisfying himself with the sound of metal shattering composite materials. He looked up...

To see none other than Sergeant Ames staring dumbstruck at her empty hand.

"Alissa, what the fuck?" Vincent gaped as an angry Alissa stomped towards him.

"That gun cost me four months' salary! How do you expect me to make that amount again now that I've been discharged?!"

"Discharged?" Vincent looked confused as he stumbled back to his feet. "Damn, what did you do?'

"I was nearly executed for 'assisting rogue elements' in the facility; meaning your ass just put me out of a job!" Ames stood on her tip-toes in an attempt to look intimidating although she only came up level with Vincent's collarbone. Vincent was dumbstruck.

"... The private sector is booming, I hear." Vincent deadpanned. Ames sighed, grumbling something before heading off the other way, but not before tossing the all-access card onto the ground in front of Vincent.

"I don't need the thing anymore." Alissa shouted as she sprinted back up the stairs.

Vincent looked around at the various stares he garnered as he picked up the card.

"... What? She's just in a huff because I stole the Junker from her."

Robert, after a moment of stunned silence, laughed. "Wow, Vincent, you know how to piss off the wrong people."

"Look, Robert." Vincent's face was stern, scolding, and lacking much but pain and a forced smile. "I've been sliced open like a fish for the first time in two years and it's been a long day, so I would very much prefer it if we could get this mission over with so I can go back to base and take a nap." He holstered his Hand Cannon.

"So until that happens, I'm going to kill what I have to, break what I have to, until this psychotic bastard Cain stops threatening my home- and more importantly my beer and my shuttle."