It wouldn’t take long for Leon to get to his destination; the sound of his [url=http://carreleasedates2017.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/2016-Lamborghini-Ankonian-side-angle.jpg]fancy car’s[/url] engine growled as he accelerated. It was getting late and the streetlights strobed his windshield as he drove, hurting his eyes. He reached into the side console and pulled out a pair of glasses, putting them on. He pressed a button on his steering wheel and a computer like interface lit up the surface of his car windshield with a dull blue light; it looked much like a flight-path on an aircraft.
	
	“Computer,” he commanded, “take control and set destination as 5644 58th street.  Quickly.” He removed his hands from the wheel and his feet from the pedals, flicking a switch on the centre console. His seat shifted backwards, almost like he was transitioning to the backseat.
	
	“Certainly, Commander Miller. Estimated time of arrival is 15 minutes.” A female voice replied.
	
	Leon pulled his pistol out of his shoulder holster hidden under his coat and ejected the magazine, then pulled on the slide to eject the round in the chamber, catching it in his hand. The bullet was big, easily longer than the previous generation’s .357 cartridge. He checked the feed mechanism, the barrel, and finally the trigger pull. He was meticulous; some would even say borderline OCD but he wanted to be sure that everything was going to work when it needed to.
	
	The car’s acceleration slowed, causing him to look up. He saw what looked like government vehicles, although to anyone else they would just look like fancy cars; but in this neighbourhood? No way. The dead giveaway was the military style gunship hovering in the area.
	
	“Computer, pull up to the curb and stop; keep the engine running on low power just in case.” He said warily. He didn’t like the feeling he was getting in his gut; and considering that his gut had been reconstructed along with the rest of his torso only added to his uneasiness.

	He popped the bullet back into the magazine, reinserted it into the weapon, and cocked it. He made sure to flick the safety switch before re-holstering.
	
	The engine noise slowly died as the car shifted gears to slow down, coming to a stop at the closest curb. The driver’s door opened and Leon stepped out. Immediately the smell of something awful found its way up in his nose. He fought  the urge to grimace and walked towards the barricade that had been setup. Two guards had been posted and they looked in his direction as he approached.
	
	“They’ve been expecting you. Head on back; you’ll know it when you see it.” One of them said, stepping out of the way. Leon nodded.
	
	It was in the middle of an out of the way industrial park so there wasn’t much worry for people accidently stumbling upon the scene, but if that gunship kept hanging around people were bound to show up and be curious. He walked down the alley, trash littered either side and some sweet smelling chemical drained out of a pipe and onto the ground. He reached the end of the alleyway, opening up to a square, courtyard like area. Everywhere he looked there were people. Some were talking pictures, another was scrubbing something off the ground, another was carrying a human arm away; it was bad.
	
	Nobody came up to ask him any questions as to why he was here, so he decided to use his anonymity to his advantage. He wandered around the site, taking everything in.  It looked like one of the crime scenes of that murder cult that had been reported on the news lately. Leon knew that this wasn’t the case though.
	
	Then he saw it.
	
	The thing wasn’t human; nowhere even remotely close. It was big, what was left of it anyway.
	
	“So this is why that gunship is still hanging around…” He said quietly.
	
	He walked over to the creature and knelt down beside it. There was a weapon, nothing like he had ever seen before. Its face, if that’s what it could be called, was only slightly intact, having been blown away by the massive firepower of the gunship.
	
	“What big jaws and sharp teeth you have. Two eyes on one side of your head, probably means you’ve got four eyes total. Why do you need four? Two compound and two simple? That either means you have incredible vision or you have terrible vision; my bet is on the former…” He said, rambling on. He had studied Biology 102 in Uni. so he had a decent understanding of how the human – and not-so-human – body worked. He stood up and walked around to the other side of the creature, eyeing up its choice of weapon.
	
	“Are you an offshoot of some giant praying mantis?” He said, rubbing his chin. He tapped it’s skin. “Thick. It would take a lot of power to crack that shell. That gunship certainly had no problem…”
	
	“Uhh…excuse me?” A voice said from behind him.
	
	Leon turned around. A man in a white jumper stood with a large tray and a saw behind him. “I’m here to..uhh…take a sample.” The man said.
	
	“Hopefully not from me.” Leon said, raising his hands and stepping back. “Can you point me to Agent Usanagi?”
	
	“You mean Major Usanagi?” The man replied.
	
	“I’m looking for whoever’s in charge.”
	
	The man pointed over to a woman standing beside a man who looked like he belonged here. Leon thanked him and started to walk over.
	
	“Major,” he started, “I’m interested.” He removed his glasses and put them inside his coat. “I’ll go over what I’ve seen so far: These things most likely have incredible vision, picking up on movement whatever it may be. If they have good vision it would be safe to assume that they have reflexes that are off the charts. They have a natural armor, could stop anything short of a rocket; or, in our case, a gunship. They’ve probably evolved from insects, all the clues are pointing in that direction.  I can find out more but I’d have to see more than a blown apart husk.”
	
	He looked down at the dead cyborg almost literally at their feet. “And judging by the wounds on this one,” he said gesturing at the body, “and the weapon on that thing, they’ve got us beat in the firepower game.” Leon looked back at Hotaru. “So? When do I start?”