Seventh Jump (Black Bullet: Part 1)

Black Bullet (Jump 7)

1000cp

Starting Location: Detroit, America

Origin: Initiator… This is what I get for allowing people to vote.

Abilities: Roach (Free): Your flesh is harder than most and your wounds quickly regenerate at a speed that allows you to quickly recover from all but the worst injuries. While you can take a considerable number of bullets or some seriously heavy blows, you have a vulnerability to varanium and weapons made of this material bypass this perk.

Rabbit (Free): You're incredibly agile and strong. Your kicks pack a punch and your punches have quite a kick - you're strong enough to easily use an anti-material rifle, but your kicks are powerful enough to render it unnecessary. Not only can you jump incredibly high, but you can double jump. Don't think too hard about it.

Owl (150cpD): Your vision is improved to ridiculous levels and you gain the ability to see in the dark. The incredible detail lets you bypass all but the best illusions and camouflage. You're also extremely effective with any kind of ranged weapon, be it a simple bow and arrow or a railgun - when you take aim, people start taking cover, or they start dying.

Mantis (300cpD): Your ability with any kind of blade is nigh precognitive - expect to easily be able to deflect firearms and defeat CQC experts in close combat while you've got a blade or two in your hands. Parrying is reflexive for you and you've managed to deflect attacks that you didn't even see coming. That's how good you are.

Dolphin (150cpD): You have improved intelligence - you almost certainly won't make dumb mistakes like accidentally using high explosives in a stealth mission. You haven't poured molten lead into your eyes recently, but if you had you'd probably be fine, anyway. You've got echolocation allowing you effective blindsight and can 'see' through walls.

Let’s Get Tactical (100cp): Your uncanny ability to analyze the battlefield even while in the worst situations has saved your life - and the lives of others - on more than one occasion. You have an instinctive knack for determining the best approach to any given fight and isolating any opponents vulnerabilities and weaknesses.

Equipment: Varanium Weaponry: Overlord Sword “Yet-to-be-named” (Free): Provides you and your companions with a supply of Varanium based weaponry. Think swords made of the stuff and varanium bullets (guns are provided). One weapon for yourself and one for each companion is provided. In the notes it states that you can have one existing weapon upgraded with the alloy for free.

Shenfield (300cp): You've been upgraded with a cybernetic neural interface that allows to remotely interact with machines. With this, you can control remote 'Electronic Eyes', floating UAVs (Four are provided for free with sensors, but no weapons), and sentry guns, turrets, and the like. You could theoretically modify other machines to work with this upgrade.

Well… What the Fuck, Jumpchan!?

            I let out a little yawn, my body rolling over on the soft bed that I was curled up on. While that wasn’t too odd, as I woke up in a bed for the last jump, I simply pushed it off to the side of my mind and slowly sat up. My hands came up to gently rub my eyes, the all-but-forgotten feeling of sleepiness still hanging over me as I pulled my hands away and climbed out of the bed as a whole. Hmm… Odd… Don’t remember having any interest in stuffed animals to such an extent as having five just laid out in one corner. Eh… They were organized, so probably nothing.

            With a small huff, I made my way over toward the bathroom, my memory functioning just enough to know where it happened to be, one hand rubbing at the top of my head as I went. I quietly hummed as I stepped up to the counter, my eyes half-closed as I grabbed my tooth brush and started to brush my teeth. Just felt like doing it after what… seventy years of not doing so because of my body mod and the settings I went to? Didn’t really matter. Either way, my eyes slowly started to open entirely. Brush to the left… Brush to the right… Brush to the left… and then jump to the right in surprise. “What in the ever-living fucking shit!?”

            My body went through the wall, hanging half-way out into the living room, the toothbrush falling onto the chair that happened be positioned there while I went into a literal fit. Only took a few moments for me to pull/break my way out of the wall that I had made a new hole in and ran off toward the TV (As it had a reflective surface) and looked at the reflection.

            Barely four foot tall… shoulder-length brown hair… turtle-print pajamas meant for a fucking eleven year old, maybe ten… “What in the fuck, Jumpchan! Why a fucking child!? I can’t spread my violent, angst-filled justice with this!? I can’t be edgy as a child! Children aren’t edgy, they’re outright terrifying! Well… Could be edgy when I get to middle school… No, wait… I wasn’t that edgy till high school and even then I wasn’t that edgy- Why is my voice so high pitched?”

            Before I could conjure up a reason as to why I was on the verge of squeaking out everything that I said, someone picked me up by my ribs and turned me around. A tall, purple-haired man stared at me with an obvious sign of distress and, to make me as uncomfortable as physically possible, he even pulled me into a hug… I think he was trying to comfort me… I think… I really hoped that I was correct.

            That seemed to be the case as the man reached up to give me a small pat on the back. ‘What’s the matter, Laora? Did you have another nightmare?’ I simply froze for a moment, one of my eyelids twitching as the realization, and a chunk of the memories, hit me all at once. I was a ten year old girl… In the Black Bullet universe... and an Initiator to top it all off.

Without really thinking, I popped up, grabbed him by the collar and yelled out “I will kill you until you die!” and then headbutted the man in the nose… Thankfully, I hit with only a small fraction of my strength, so I only broke his nose and not outright kill him. He dropped me to the ground, grabbing at his bleeding nose as I crawled back from him at first before eventually just dropping to the carpeted floor with a small whine.

My eyes were glowing bright red, but I forced myself to calm down, the glowing eventually fading as I did my best to gather myself and come to terms with what was going on. It was temporary, of course… It was temporary. Just ten years. Ten years… With puberty and everything… but, ten years. At least five fucking years of bleeding!... Well, I suppose that is one thing. I will finally understand what it is like to be a woman... Hmm.

As I continued to go through the various thoughts coursing through my brain and tried to correct myself, the man stumbled off to find a paper towel and plugged his nose, only taking another moment to apply a bit of gauze and a tongue-depressor to keep it all in place. He made his way back over to me and simply, and obviously holding back his anger as, if my memory served, this wasn’t the first time I had lashed out because of a scare… Good. ‘What has gotten into you, Laora? What happened?’ The man crouched down in front of me and I took a moment to pull out a small paper talisman and heal his injury. It was the least I could do and, because of the rules of this jump, he didn’t react as if it was odd.

“Nothing… Nothing. Everything’s fine. Uh… Sorry about the wall, Edmund.” At least I was able to sort through everything and remember who he was and, it seemed, that he was my promoter. Well… He was nice, if my memory served and, despite breaking his nose, he was still showing kindness. I climbed up to my feet and glanced down, wiggling my toes for a moment in the fluffy socks I had. Alright… First… These have got to go… They are comfy, but this just feels so… so wrong…

Seriously, I am a guy in a trenchcoat… This is very wrong. Ten years… Just ten years of this. I wandered off toward the kitchen, though, trying to remain calm and just act half-way normal after all of the things that had just happened. I was stopped when Edmund pulled me right back into a hug from behind. “Look… I appreciate this, but… I’m ten. This is very, very odd and very, very uncomfortable for me.” He simply patted me on the head for the moment, trying to help in his own way. I gave him five seconds before finally just breaking his grip, turning around, and giving him a sharp kick to the stomach… Being mindful of how hard I actually hit as to not outright kill him. “Fucking lolicon!”

After that event, I spent the first few months adjusting to what was going on… At least until I remembered that, given time, I would transform into a monster… Taking that into account, I spent a full year gathering the materials and worked on creating talismans. Specifically, I was creating talismans that could remove disease and, to at least remove the worry, I cast it on myself first and then Edmund. I did fight during this time, but… Even now they didn’t pose too much of a threat as long as they weren’t Class III and even they didn’t prove to be too difficult.

It took two years of this and, while they were wondering why my percentage chance of transforming wasn’t going up, the organization that I now worked for didn’t seem to pay it much mind considering the fact that it meant that they continued to keep a resource with a high-success rate, but I eventually gathered enough resources and took enough time to create the talismans that I needed.

            That was where the hard part came into play… I now had to somehow find and cure EVERYONE as only I could use the talismans. It didn’t even appear to be an easy task on paper, let alone in action… So, I did the best thing that I could. I went to the organization that was running all of this… The Civil Security Corporation. They might listen… After all, it meant that they might finally have a chance at winning against the Gastrea instead of simply surviving. Class Vs would still be an issue, but they did take one out before.

            It took quite a bit of effort, but I did show that I no longer possessed the virus by allowing them to take a sample of my blood for examination, but they finally did allow me to present to them a way of ending this threat and even a suggestion on how to combat the Gastrea after the cure is dispensed… Though, it would be very slow. Fast compared to only doing one at a time, as I could do up to one hundred people per talisman, but that is still a rather extended period of time.

            It was a rushed effort, but they called everyone to a meeting, me and Edmund standing right in front of a large gathering of the top officials of the various CSC that existed in the world. They just needed to listen and watch and, as a sign of good faith, they actually provided another cursed child for me to demonstrate.

            It was all going well… All things considered, as Edmund had to speak most of the time… Seventy two years and I still couldn’t speak in front of people, only ending up a blushing, stuttering mess half-way through the presentation. Still, it was all going very, very well… Until the man in the top hat and mask appeared…