The food court was a sea of overturned plastic chairs and abandoned trays of half-eaten fries. The emergency shutters were beginning to rattle down, a heavy metallic thud-thud-thud that signaled the mall was entering lockdown.
"In here!" Rebecca hissed, grabbing Carrie’s hoodie and yanking her behind a giant, neon-pink counter for a place called Sugar-Rush Shakes.
"Ack! My sneakers!" Carrie stumbled, ducking just as a volley of kinetic-tipped bullets shattered a glass display of sprinkles above them. "Okay, rude. Those sprinkles were innocent bystanders!"
"Focus, Carrie!" Rebecca was already fumbling with her tactical jacket. She hit a hidden pressure point on her forearm, and the matte-black plates of her Bunny armor began to expand. "I don't have my full compression rig. The suit is going to be loose in the joints."
"At least yours is a jacket," Carrie whispered, looking at her locket. "I have to hit a high C to trigger the sonic-seal, and we are currently in a very quiet 'hiding from gunmen' situation."
Rebecca peaked over the counter. Near the fountain, five men in tactical masks were corralling a group of shopkeepers into a circle. They weren't just common robbers; they were carrying high-grade tech—the kind of black-market gear that had started flooding the streets after The Grey’s fall.
"We have to move," Rebecca whispered. "If they get those civilians into the vault room, we lose our line of sight."
"I have an idea," Carrie said, a mischievous glint in her eyes. "But you’re going to hate it."
"If it involves a dramatic entrance, I already hate it."
"It involves the escalators," Carrie pointed. "And a distraction. I’ll go up to the second-floor balcony. When I start the show, you hit them from the flank."
"You don't even have your suit on, Carrie! You're in a hoodie!"
"Correction," Carrie smirked, popping her locket open. "I'm in a hoodie with a very loud heart."
The Messy Transformation
Rebecca watched as Carrie crawled toward the maintenance stairs. She had no choice. She slammed her own helmet into place, the bunny-ear sensors twitching as they calibrated to the mall’s acoustics.
Hiss. Click. Whir.
The suit didn't fit right. The left leg-servo was sticking, and her shoulder guard was crooked. She looked less like a professional guardian and more like a high-tech project that had been finished in a hurry—which, to be fair, was exactly what she was.
Suddenly, a voice boomed over the mall’s PA system. It wasn't the calm, recorded emergency message.
"HELLO, CENTRAL DISTRICT!"
It was Carrie. She had somehow snuck into the DJ booth above the ice rink.
"I know we’re having a bit of a crisis," Carrie’s voice echoed, upbeat and dangerously loud, "but I’ve always said that every robbery needs a soundtrack! Hit it!"
A deafening blast of Carrie’s latest synth-pop single erupted from the speakers. The gunmen spun around, confused, their weapons raised toward the ceiling.
"Now!" Carrie shouted, her voice hitting a glass-shattering frequency.
In a flash of lime-green light, her hoodie tore away, replaced by the shimmering, "Tron-like" lines of the Mini Mic suit. It wasn't a perfect transformation—she was currently tangled in a stray string of festive mall lights—but she was glowing.
Rebecca sighed, her HUD flickering as she launched herself over the Sugar-Rush counter. "I really need a new roommate," she muttered, even as she fired her grappling hook toward the lead gunman.
The civilians watched in awe as a black-clad rabbit and a glowing pop-star descended into the fray. It was messy. It was uncoordinated. It was a total disaster.
It was their first official mission.
ns216.73.216.141da2
and then Add to home screen.