"Good?" He asks the kynde, after zipping her up.

  She moves around in her new clothing. Thick wool socks. Insulated boots. Thermal underwear. Ski pants. A wool sweater. Ski jacket over the sweater. Thick knit hat. A scarf around her neck.

  "Very good. Do I look foolish from a human perspective?" She asks, still blindfolded. She waits in front of a mirror as she hears the lights in the room click off. She takes off her blindfold to see the dim reflection, the light filtering in from the windows. White with yellow accents. Not as bulky looking as it feels. Undoubtedly expensive. A large investment. Requires recompense, to be certain.

  "Nope. Maybe strange since it's 75° out, but not stupid."

  "It is sufficiently warm, therefore I like it." She puts the blindfold back on. "What are we doing today?"

  "I'm going to the military base. You can do whatever you want. I'll pick up more firewood while I'm out, too.

  Martin watches as she stays silent for a moment, probably thinking. "I would like to come."

  "Figured you'd like to leave that place behind." Not just figured, Martin thinks, took as a fact.

  "I want them to comprehend that I am not a dangerous animal. It will ease future relations between your institution and I."

  He takes a low breath. That can't be a good idea, right? "Alright then. We're leaving in an hour."

  The familiar crunch of the gravel lot announces their return to the military base. A different guard on duty allows both the hunter and guest inside the base. It's laid out almost like a college campus, complete with winding pathways and unhelpful signage. As they walk along the newly renovated concrete path to an administrative building, a siren blares out in staccato from all around. The kynde instinctively covers her ears, annoyed by the loud sound.

  Looking around in confusion, Martin draws his revolver, ready to fire. The siren's specific pulsing means an unrestrained magical beast is on site. He looks around for a second before uttering a "for God's sake" as a half dozen armed soldiers surround them both. A hand signal from one, an officer of some kind, shuts the signal off. The kynde slowly removes her hands from her ears, looking between the soldiers without expression, hands slowly moving from her ears.

  The officer holds up a fist, and the soldiers train their weapons on the kynde. "Martin C, I am 2nd Lieutenant Andre Norwood of Counter-Magic. Please remove yourself from the kynde. It is highly dangerous, and in a very volatile state."

  Martin pinches his temples with his left hand. Norwood looks a mix of infuriated and terrified in equal measure, he notices. "It's just a sapient magical beast, not a damn kaiju. The kynde is my partner, you can relax."

  Norwood's aggravation starts to outweigh the fear, urging him forward. "No, we can't. The kynde is not obeying the procedures we set out, and seems to be stockpiling heat and light to fuel its projections."

  Martin's eyes start to narrow. Apparently the 'guidelines' were more of a 'rule'. "The kynde can have as much heat and light as she wants. She saved my ass yesterday, and almost single-handedly beheaded an omukade. I trust her, she's under my control, so calm down."

  The officer makes a short call on the radio. A few tense minutes pass, until a familiar researcher jogs over. He breathlessly warns Martin to stay back, until the officer catches the researcher up to speed.

  "Doctor Stolatz." The kynde says. "Hello."

  The researcher flinches, clearly startled that the kynde remembers his name. "Martin. That creature is not human. I understand if you were deceived, but please listen. It only cares about how to seek out heat and light. All of its actions were dictated by that. It will kill you the second you can't provide for it."

  Martin looks at the kynde. It's only been a couple of days, but... really? It'd be a pretty elaborate ruse to let him shoot her in the head.

  "I am operating in the same manner as humans, as you require food." The kynde says, seemingly genuine. "My understanding is all life seeks survival, when practical."

  Dr. Stolatz shakes his head. "Martin, if ordered, would skip a meal. Kynde, take off your winter clothes."

  The kynde blinks twice, impassive.

  Martin glances at her, worried. "Kynde..."

  "Yes?" She asks Martin.

  "Do what he says."

  "Per our arrangement, I am beholden to you." She unzips her coat, and takes off her boots and ski pants, followed by her sweater and hat. She's left in only her thermal underwear, staring at Martin.

  Martin looks at both the officer and the researcher for approval. Dr. Stolatz shakes his head. "We'll see how long she lasts. Once she starts shivering, she'll stop faking loyalty."

  Martin scratches his nose. "And if she does obey?"

  "Then I'll personally apologize for my actions up until now." He says, his eyes still fixed on the kynde.

  The kynde's face continues to remain impassive. "Shall I release my reserves of heat to expedite the process, Martin C?"

  Dr. Stolatz scoffs. "You won't."

  And yet, after a nod from Martin, she does. She expels her reserved heat through her hands and onto the concrete walkway, the intense heat making one freshly poured slab crack along a corner. Within a minute, the kynde is shivering again, though Martin can swear he senses a faint smugness.

  Martin rolls his eyes. "This is ridiculous. Can we go?"

  "No. She's neutralized now. We are going to reclaim her. We were wrong to let anyone take a volatile, sapient magical beast as a partner. Martin, we can find you a better option, one less unpredictable."

  In response, Martin simply helps the kynde get dressed, despite the officer's warnings and the guns pointed at them both. Once she is back in her ski gear, he side-eyes Stolatz. "No one here has the authority to remove a hunter's partner, the minimum rank is major for that. I wouldn't have brought her if I wasn't certain. Now, kynde, how do you feel?"

  Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.

  "C-cold." She mumbles.

  "Then maybe the good Dr. Stolatz should stop wasting our time and confirm the omukade's removal." He guides the kynde off to the Jeep, where Dr. Stolatz hesitantly follows behind. After another ignored warning, he signs off on the omukade's death, and has a pair of the Counter-Magic soldiers take the chelicerae for research. Anxiously, Stolatz returns to his lab, certain this is going to end poorly.

  The lieutenant, Norwood, stays behind for a moment. "We actually need hands for something urgent. If you're sure you have that thing under control, we could use it." He offers Martin a sealed envelope, which he snatches from Norwood wordlessly as he returns to the Jeep. He doesn't have to do what Norwood says, he knows, but having a stronger relationship with the guy who was about to shoot him seems like a good idea.

  The kynde finds her way back underneath the blankets in the car now, soaking in the heated seat, watching Martin intensely focused on the dossier through a small slit between a quilt and comforter.

  Martin almost tosses it into the backseat, before pausing. "Can you read?"

  "Yes." Is the simple response, as she politely takes the document from his hands and reads it for herself.

  A tech magician, once. A former human being, currently threatening to disintegrate several city blocks unless demands are met. A typical case of brainraze, where a magician subconsciously incorporates the magic they once wielded into their body, turning them from a human into something else. In this case, his head has turned bulbous and wrinkled like a half-dried grape, eyes and mouth pushed out further than they should be. Brainraze has no cure, and in more cases than not, leaves the newly created monster a shell of what they once were, personality and morality boiled away into ego and hate. Tragic, but dangerous enough that you can't waste pity on them.

  The rest of the day is spent at his home, preparing. Martin cleans and loads his gun, checks on various pieces of equipment, breaks out an automatic weapon from a gun closet, and goes over the plan with the other team they'll be working with over the phone. The target's dossier says the brainrazed beast had experience with weapon manufacturing. No wonder they're on a time crunch.

  The kynde sleeps in front of the fireplace, after writing a short note headed by 'If the Kynde is Injured'.

  The white Jeep parks a few blocks away from the target's location: an abandoned manufacturing building with a large basement. A dungeon, if there ever was one.

  Martin speaks, calmly and collected. "We're linking up with the other team, and then move to the warehouse a block down together. Okay?"

  "Yes, sir." The kynde salutes, slipping on her blindfold.

  "Great, but don't call me sir. Or salute me. Just call me Martin. The meeting spot is just ahead. Try and stay mostly quiet, and only answer direct questions. We don't want to spook the other team." Martin guides the kynde inside the supposedly closed pawn store, where two others wait patiently. Upon seeing them, Martin lights up. "Ferret! Moth!"

  The man named "Ferret" waves in return. He's a bit studious looking, but still reeks of urban investigator. Blonde hair, green eyes, and thin glasses frame an easy, casual smile.

  "Moth", on the other hand, is the exact opposite. She wears full body armor, with a silenced submachine gun in her hands. Though she shares a broad smile, its tinged with impatience. She welcomes Martin, and asks "Who's the new partner? And were we supposed to bring weather gear?" She turns to Ferret, who shrugs.

  "Just something my partner does." Martin says, a bit of regret in lying to his friends. "She's a bit unique. You know sorcerers."

  Ferret nods, an eyebrow raised. "What's your name, sorcerer?"

  The kynde freezes in place, turning to Martin briefly. Ferret laughs. "If you haven't been given a name yet, you must be only a day or two in. Hell of a first mission."

  The kynde tilts her head slightly, making Martin sigh. Screw it, he's know Ferret and Moth since training. "'Sorcerer' was bad cover story. I'll skip the dramatic last minute reveal. She's not a sorcerer. In short, this is my moon-rank partner. She's a kynde."

  Ferret rolls his eyes, while Moth scoffs at Martin. "Yeah, right." She says, checking a large, square iron plate on the right side of her gun. "And I'm Bigfoot. Can we just get moving?" Ferret is quick to agree with Moth. Not much time to debate, Martin thinks.

  The three of them enter the abandoned warehouse, and quickly locate the basement. One after the other, they climb down the concrete stairs, and see before them the first roadblock the rogue magician set up to stop intrusions. A simple passcode protected lock. Ferret starts prying it off the wall, before rewiring it altogether in a few moments. The door hisses open, and the eclectic group once again proceeds.

  Coming in to view across a long hallway is an actual threat that stands before them in a large conference room: an aluminum sentry. Vaguely humanoid but seven feet tall, reflective to most magic, and incredibly durable. Moth grins, raising her weapon. She taps the square plate on the gun, drawing a peculiar symbol on it with a finger. "Disruption rounds," she says for Shrike's benefit, before spraying bullets at the golem.

  The golem twitches and wavers at the firehose of magic-disrupting rounds. Soon, the golem's chest starts to liquify before it can so much as attack, a glowing orange sphere peeking go the surface. Martin raises his pistol, and fires once. It pierces through the orange core, spewing neon orange liquid. The golem topples over like a broken refrigerator.

  Shrike watches the sentry fall down. It seemed... oddly routine. "Martin, is this the typical level of resistance we will be facing?" She asks, looking over at him with intrigue.

  Moth answers for him with a chuckle. "We're just damn good at our jobs. If you ever see us struggling, it means we screwed up somewhere."

  The kynde avoids asking if Martin 'screwed up' in his attempt to kill the omukade, or if it was the original intention for her to handle it.

  Another minute of walking, and another lock shorted, an old rusting door opens into what was once a spacious office, with a ceiling fan dangling at an angle off a single cord that obscures the top of their view.

  In the office, the brain-razed beast waits, frowning deeply over a makeshift workbench, long nails half-formed into claws, leg muscles thickened and squat. He's not fully transformed yet, but is getting close to it. He sneers down his pug nose, upper lip quivering in anger.

  "I knew they would send hunters!" It says, spittle flying across the scrap in front of him. "But I have ascended beyond your pathetic race! Tell m-"

  He's cut off by Moth spraying him with a stream of bullets, until he anticlimactically collapses to the floor like a deflating basketball. Moth looks at the others, Ferret and Martin both giving her a forced smile. It was the right move, Martin thinks, but Moth didn't hesitate for a second. A bit scary.

  On the workbench, past the monster's corpse, rests some kind of device, fashioned from the remains of an air conditioner. It's easily recognizable as a bomb, judging by the smell of gunpowder.

  Ferret looks it over first. "Shit, this is magic tech. Outside my purview. Why the hell did no one tell us he would be making a bomb?"

  Moth scratches her head. "I can disable the magic part, but the regular explosive would blow immediately, and I have no idea how strong it would be. Any ideas, Martin?"

  Martin thinks deeply for a moment. "I got nothing. Damn it."

  The kynde awkwardly raises her hand. Moth asks, "Whatcha got, newbie?"

  "If you disabled the magic aspect, I could significantly reduce the explosion's force." It says.

  Moth groans. "Martin, control your partner."

  Martin looks over at the kynde. She seems confident, though her eyes are covered still. "If she says she can, then I'm inclined to believe her. She's a kynde, remember?"

  "This isn't a time for joking, ass!" Moth says loudly. "We have probably less than an hour-"

  The kynde cuts her off by standing at the bomb, taking a deep breath in, and taking her blindfold off. The dim artificial light burns into her eyes, but she focuses intently on the bomb through the pain. Concentric, hexagonal polyhedrons of pale gold sunlight start to surround it, one after the other after the other, a full four of them surrounding it by the time Moth points her gun at the Kynde.

  "What the hell kind of magic is that?" She barks, finger resting on the trigger guard. "That's not normal projection, you don't have a spell book, and that's way too complicated for a sorcerer."

  The kynde tilts her head back in irritation, before facing Moth with squinting eyes. "I am a kynde. This was established multiple times. I am unaware of the miscommunication."

  "That's not... Martin, is she..?"

  He nods in silence, stone-faced, as he takes a few defensive steps towards his partner.

  Moth curses under her breath, gesturing for Ferret to leave the room. He does so without complaint, hustling out of the building.

  After a moment of inspection, Moth confirms the timing on the bomb. Maybe twelve minutes, not nearly long enough to get a proper diffusing team here. No other choice, then... Moth and the kynde stand next to the threatening air conditioner. She holds her weapon to the bomb, casting the disruption sigil once again.

  Moth shares a glance with Martin, who follows Ferret out of the building after a final glance at the kynde.

  "You're going to die too if you screw this up, kynde." She says, irritated. "Do you even know what a bomb is?"

  The kynde does not respond.

  "Screw it. Martin owes me a beer in hell." She fires her gun into the bomb.

  The magic fades.

  The bomb explodes.

  Only... the swirling shrapnel and force are contained place by the series of golden hexagonal plates, which start to brighten rapidly as the explosion presses against them. One starts to cracks, and another is there to replace it as soon as it shatters. The kynde flinches, before quietly getting out a single, strangled word through a faint frown.

  "Go."

  Several more plates shatter with a sound somewhere between breaking chalk and a knife running lengthwise across glass. The first of the four polyhedrons shatters at once with a bone-shivering screech. The kynde's attention is shortly diverted to Moth.

  The kynde's face is resigned. Apologetic, even. Moth takes a step back towards to door, before sprinting away.

  The second polyhedron bursts, the final two compressing down as much as possible, the kynde's hands straining as she tries to coax the projection to stay intact just a bit longer.

  The third glowing polyhedron bursts along its pentagonal ends, followed immediately by the final layer.

  Approximately 85% reduced, judging by original force and existing force, she figures. Sufficient. She feels several bones break in the instant before unconsciousness.