Porter shook his head, clouds of darkness lifting around him. His eyes opened to vibrant lighting above him, amplified by the metallic sheen of the walls he was surrounded by. As he began to gather his wits, he made out the forms of his compatriots. Each of them had their wrists tied behind their backs, seated on the floor.
The last thing he could remember was standing in the shop and finding out that he was staring at a government officer. Then everything was blank. How they had gotten to this point, or where this point even was, was just empty space. Panic began to set in to Porter's mind as the list of negative possibilities started to pile up.
"Up you get." A large woman had walked through the door, a gun twirling around her finger. She eyed all of them individually, examining them up and down and daring them to challenge her. She quickly asserted her authority over the room, stalking in between them and glaring at anyone who made eye contact. They all slowly tried to respond to her request, struggling without the full use of their hands. Eventually they were all close enough to standing that she continued. "They're all ready for you sir."
The woman backed away and turned her head towards the doorway, waiting for somebody's entrance. A green-toothed smile preceded the smaller man, and Porter felt a rush to his head before his entire body released its tension. "Ling Shi?"
"There is only one Ling Shi," the man answered, stepping into the light. It was indeed the leader of the Jade Fang, his slim body and round-face hiding the dangerous warrior underneath. "And he is right in front of you." Ling did a bit of a bow, before he snapped his fingers and the woman disappeared, leaving the five pilots alone with the rebel leader.
"What are you doing here?" Porter could barely contain his smile. Ling Shi was the last person he expected to run into at this moment, and wasn't even on the list of possible reasons he had no memory and was tied up.
Ling Shi gave out his infamous smile, though his eyes did seem to wander around a bit, as if he were searching for something still. "I live here Porter. A better question is why you're here."
"And why are we tied up? And what happened?"
Ling leaned back against the wall, inspecting his fingernails for dirt. "Look, I asked the question after I answered yours. Piling more on doesn't really answer my question at all." The rebel leader stopped for a bit, glancing up at the five sets of eyes staring at him, and continued anyways, disregarding his prior complaint. "If you think you can walk into my country, let alone my city, without me knowing, then you certainly underestimate me. We are the Jade Fang, Porter. I am the Jade Fang. I know when foreigners come visiting, particularly ones who were deemed criminals in league with my organization by the local government. As for what happened, I believe you were about to be arrested by official agents here, due to that whole 'criminals in league with my organization thing' that I just mentioned." Ling Shi made air quotes to emphasize his point. he had begun to strut around the room, wandering aimlessly as he boasted about himself.
"Then, of course," he continued, "since you were about to be put into arrest, I thought it would be a better idea if you weren't put into arrest."
"That's not really a descriptive retelling," Ardwen cut in, his logical brain trying to catch up to the situation.
"We're not really a descriptive-retelling kind of group." Ling flashed his smile again, but it took on a much more sinister tone. "Anyways, knocking out just about everyone in that shop seemed like the best option, and to answer your last question, you're tied up because this is my place, you're foreign visitors, I only know one of you, and I generally don't trust you even if I like you." Ling Shi snapped again and the woman returned, carrying a small platter with a glass of water on it. The rebel leader snatched the cup immediately, downing half of it, then splashing the rest on his face to cool off from his lengthy speech.
"They're friends of mine, Ling, all of them." Porter could only nod towards his companions, his hands still trapped behind his body. "They're all trustworthy, believe me."
"Porter," Ling replied, rolling his eyes and setting the glass back down on the tray, dismissing his assistant, "if I like you but I don't trust you, how is you telling me that your friends are all nice people really helping the situation?"
There was a lengthy pause among the group, one that Ling Shi seemed to enjoy far too much as he tortured his captives. "That Enian general from before," Porter answered, "the one I went to the library about?" Ling raised an eyebrow, his curiosity clearly piqued. "He didn't just disappear off the record. He was traded to the Jahari for...for something." Porter glanced towards Ardwen, hoping he had kept enough information to himself about who the Enian general was. He needed Ling to know he had the knowledge, but Ardwen had to stay in the dark for now, at least until he could secure the final answers.
"What kind of something?" The Jade Fang commander sauntered up to Porter, circling around him. He suddenly withdrew a knife from his boot, flipping it in the air before holding it over the rope holding Porter's hands together.
"I don't know; that's all I've got so far. That's all I can find and then there's nothing else. But I know other things too, about other governments."
The only answer was the sound of the blade slicing through the bonds. Porter rubbed his wrists to get his blood flowing properly again before he began attending his friends. Ling Shi put the dagger away, resuming his position against the wall. "What is other things Porter? You've got to be more specific."
"You'll need some chairs," Porter responded, suddenly feeling a position of power as he had something the Jade Fang wanted.
* * * * *
Ling Shi rocked back and forth in his seat for some time. The group had been moved to a different room, all a part of the old weapons-production factory the Jade Fang occupied, and were seated around a table, their reflections visible in the metallic sheen of the furniture. Porter had finished explaining nearly everything he knew about what was going on: the war in the north, the trades with the Jahari, the Enigma Project, the Emperor Christian, and anything else he could think of. Ling Shi seemed well aware of the Jahari as a threat, as did the rest of the world, but when the other information had poured out, he had begun his process of thinking that involved his motions on his chair.
"And so these Enigma Soldiers are the big weapons we have against the Jahari...and each other?" Ling Shi seemed to struggle to finish the question, all of this only just now coming together in his head.
"Yes, more or less." The entire group nodded with Porter's response.
"So whomever controls them, controls quite a lot of power." Ling Shi appeared to be finishing his initial thought that had started with his question, his mouth continuing to move for a period after he was done with the sentence.
"Well, see Syn is a rogue agent at this point." Porter kicked himself mentally for neglecting to mention some of these details in his first explanation. "He wants chaos and panic and fighting. He doesn't care about any allegiance to anywhere. As for Sigma, he's with us, but he's not really with us."
"What does that mean?" Ling Shi sprung up out of his seat, one foot placed on the table and the other on his chair. He stared across the table at Porter, his excitement starting to bubble over.
"It's kind of...uhm Sigma doesn't really...you see..."
"Sigma is Porter's brother," Nami interjected, ending Porter's rambling. She didn't seem to understand the implications of her statement for some time, and it took a group stare from almost everyone else before she finally clued in. "Oops." She poked her two index fingers together, pulling out her best innocent cuteness look, but the damage was done.
"By the spirit of Ishiyama," Ling Shi gasped, falling back into his seat as though he had fainted. "And you just forgot to mention that the last time you came here?"
"I didn't know any of the other things until now and...we weren't exactly close back then." Porter's eyes moved around his companions, searching for support in their faces. "Anyways, the point is that we have one of the Enigma Soldiers with us now, and nobody else does. Meanwhile the Jahari have been tearing through the Earth, taking over entire cities and-"
Ling Shi held up a finger, silencing Porter. His smile was edging across his face, pulling wider with every second. "From the sounds of things, you're quite upset that your entire government, among other governments, were willing to betray their own people, and the rest of the world, to get an edge in a global war. And so you got upset, you have an Enigma soldier, you show up in Beijing..." Ling Shi's sentence drifted off before he suddenly smashed his fist down onto the table. "You want my help don't you! Ha! You come all the way out here to this wonderful country, looking for your old pal Ling Shi, to see if you can recruit the Jade Fang like you're playing with some kind of loaded hand."
Porter gulped. The last time he had seen Ling Shi react like this, and begin to formulate his own plans, he had ended up running from the library with a massive Goliath trying to crush him. "So then," Ling Shi kept talking, placing his hands together behind his head and leaning back, "why would you think the I would just want to say 'Oh yes sir!' to you and loan you my entire organization just because you figured out what we already knew and have been fighting for for years?"
"You knew all that?" It was Porter's turn to shoot forward in disbelief.
"Well, not the specific details with the Jahari and androids and stuff, but the corruption, the corruption stuff, you know." Ling Shi waved his hand in the air, as if shooing away the doubt could be physically achieved.
Porter held up two fingers to symbolize answers for Ling Shi to consider. "First, we're pilots of Goliaths. You've never had Goliaths behind you in your riots. Kind of makes them a bit different." It was Porter's turn to take on a more cocky demeanour, a swagger he was bringing out only to counter Ling Shi's. "Second, we've got Chandana."
"Uh Porter." Ardwen leaned over and began to whisper into the teen's ear. "We don't know if we have Chandana. Rick left the same time we did, and we don't have any of our communication equipment for Sigma to contact us with. Ling Shi took it when they brought us down here." The pair glanced at the leader of the rebels before resuming the hushed conversation. "Besides, even if we did break Chandana out, who says she will definitely help us?"
"Ardwen, for a master strategist in war, you're not very good at bluffing and bartering are you?" Porter looked up at his friend, and the two pulled away, sitting up straight. "What do you say Ling?"
The jade tooth sat on the edge of Ling's lip. This was the first time the young man showed any signs of being under pressure. But it hadn't come from the mention of the Goliath support he would be receiving, but at the mention of the leader of the Red Scarf Gang. "You have Chandana?"
"We have Chandana."
"From prison?"
"So you know about her?"
Only the humming of the lights overhead could be heard in the room. Neither end of the table was speaking, and the awkward moment continued to grow as time wore on. "If you have Chandana, if you have the Red Scarf Gang, if you can get the Silver Lance, maybe even the Orange Dawn, then you're talking about a whole different game Porter."
"But it's the kind of game you've always wanted, isn't it?" The teenage pilot was clearly in command now, the power wrestled away from his captor now resting in his lap. "We want what you want now. we want the end of the wars, the end of these massive governments and this global corruption. We want to stop all-"
"You don't have to tell me my own group's beliefs." Ling Shi held up his palm to halt Porter. "This is a terrible time to fight the machine, you know that? You would like to bring down everything that has been built up at a time when coming together seems like the best way to save humanity. That's insane. I like insane, I really do, and I want to help you, particularly if you can get me face-to-face with Chandana, but you might be a bit too far off the deep end in this one."
"What if I told you I have two Enigma Soldiers?" Porter raised his fingers again to prove his point, holding them on the table. Ling Shi's green tooth gleamed in the light as his massive smile took over his face.
A/N: Porter puts all his cards on the table. Is this the step to a mass rebellion and salvation for the world, or a step towards chaos that will be humanity's downfall?