Lord Alkanphel nodded to him when he
arrived, and when he looked toward the remaining Overlords, he
saw that they seemed to have been waiting for him. He nodded to
his fellow Zoalords to show that he was prepared to give them
his full attention. It was Fried’rich van Purg’stall who spoke
first.
"We have considered the matter of your
son very carefully, Lord Imakarum," stated the silver-haired
Lord, looking kindly at the Twelfth Zoalord, "and we have
decided that, after Lord Hamilcal performs a minor operation on
your son, he will be allowed to stay here."
"What kind of a minor operation did you
have in mind, Doctor?" Imakarum asked, deliberately not using
the Second Zoalord’s formal title. Imakarum’s eyes fluttered
briefly as the white-bearded Zoalord sent a summary of what he
planned to do directly into his mind.
Imakarum supposed that he could
understand the necessity of the operation, and it wasn’t as if
Kenji had had any real time to acclimate himself to the power of
his Zoacrystal. Having it removed and replaced with a less
powerful variant was not likely to cause him as much concern as
it would have if he had been allowed the extra time to adjust.
Imakarum nodded his acquiescence, then teleported back to his
son’s side.
He was still asleep, but Imakarum could
sense that his son was just about to start waking up, which
would doubtless make transporting him somewhat more difficult
than it had to be. So he gently insinuated himself into Kenji’s
mind and put him back to sleep, making sure he would stay that
way until after he was transported to Lord Hamilcal’s
laboratory.
Gently removing Kenji from their bed,
Imakarum turned and walked out of his room, his son’s sleeping
form still cradled in his arms. The walk to Lord Hamilcal’s
laboratory in Cloud Tower was not a long one, since they were
merely five levels above the processing divisions, and the fact
that they were also very close to an elevator was also a good
thing in Imakarum’s estimation. Once they were both inside,
Imakarum took out his identification card and inserted it into
the slot set into the elevator’s control panel.
Teleportation, while a useful skill,
took a great amount of concentration, and in situations where
the intended destination could be reached through physical
means, Imakarum knew that it was better to use them rather than
to waste the energy and focus to teleport when it was not
necessary. The humming of the elevator’s motor was loud enough
to be somewhat irritating, and he only hoped that Kenji wouldn’t
be woken up by the noise.
Then again, Kenji was a very deep
sleeper once he had actually drifted off, so there was most
likely no reason for Imakarum to worry. The elevator doors slid
open with a hydraulic pumping sound that Imakarum could have
easily done without. Walking out with Kenji still cradled in his
arms, Imakarum turned and headed down the hall, turning right
when he reached an intersection of three hallways before he
looked down at Kenji again.
His son was still comfortably sleeping,
and Imakarum gently lifted Kenji up to his face and pressed a
soft kiss to his forehead. Standing in front of the door to Lord
Hamilcal’s private laboratory in Cloud Tower, Imakarum input his
entry-code and waited for the door to slide open. Once it had,
Imakarum stepped inside and looked around, finding Lord Hamilcal
standing next to a fluid-filled processing-tank.
Imakarum did not need his telepathic
power to know what Lord Hamilcal wanted him to do. Walking over
to the unoccupied medical table, Imakarum gently set Kenji down
and began to undress him. He could hear Lord Hamilcal moving
around in the background, presumably readying his surgical
instruments, and was of two minds whether or not to stay with
Kenji.
On one hand, Kenji was
unconscious, and Imakarum was not particularly eager to watch as
Lord Hamilcal cut into his son’s head, but then, Kenji
was
his son, and therefore it was his duty as a father to stay by
his son. In the end, he knew that there was only one decision
that he could feel comfortable making, so he stepped forward to
take Kenji’s left hand and waited for Lord Hamilcal to begin.
The procedure itself was relatively
simple and ended quickly, though it was mildly curious that Lord
Hamilcal had chosen to operate when Kenji was in his Zoalord
form. Holding Kenji’s clawed hand, Imakarum looked away just as
Lord Hamilcal extracted Kenji’s Zoacrystal from his forehead,
hearing the clink as it was placed on the tray that Lord
Hamilcal had brought over.
Imakarum also thought he heard Kenji
whimper softly when his Zoacrystal was finally removed, but that
might have been just his overactive imagination, since he had
made certain that Kenji would be asleep for the entire
procedure. Also, Kenji had not been given the time that he would
have needed to fully acclimate to his new power, so there was
simply no chance that he had been adversely affected by the
surgery that Lord Hamilcal had performed.
Not a
chance.
Looking back at Kenji, Imakarum saw that
Lord Hamilcal had just finished affixing the new Zoacrystal into
the formerly vacant slot on his son’s forehead. Sandwiching
Kenji’s hand between both of his own, Imakarum watched as Lord
Hamilcal checked to make certain that the new Zoacrystal would
remain in place during his inevitable reprocessing. Imakarum was
not certain if he would be able to remain with Kenji during that
time, since there was still the matters of the Los Angeles
branch and the Anti Chronos Task Force to be dealt with.
Imakarum knew that his earlier
experiences with the humans who had formed the Anti Chronos Task
Force would be useful, since Lord Alkanphel would doubtless want
to have them destroyed. Still, the fact that the Fourth Guyver
was working with the Anti Chronos Task Force was somewhat
troubling, since Guyvers were dangerous by their very nature.
The obvious example was Guyver I, of
course, and the thought of the First Guyver, drew up a surge of
hatred unlike anything Imakarum had ever felt. Sho Fukamachi—the
one that had defied Chronos from the beginning—would die by his
hands alone. Yes, to protect both his son and Lord Alkanphel,
Guyver I could not be allowed to live. Looking back down at
Kenji, Imakarum saw that Lord Hamilcal was now ready to begin
the reprocessing.