Chapter 16: 16 – Intimidated

I reached up to my face and adjusted my sunglasses. The earpiece in my ear crackled and a voice spoke through it. “Princess, how close are you to the target?”

I tapped the device twice as I looked up at the abandoned hotel building. “I’m nearly there. About to enter it. Standby until I call you. I’m still not hundred percent sure this is the right place.”

“Understood.” The communicator went silent.

I let out a sigh.

Somehow, I’d managed to convince everyone that going out alone would be better than bringing bodyguards along. My reasoning was twofold. Firstly, I’d reused the same bullshit card, saying that if there were people observing me using my power, it might weaken it. And secondly, if we were to really run into Iron Pack, a single innocent-looking girl wouldn’t put her on guard, whereas having several big and scary men along with me certainly would.

Of course, the third and most important reason I hadn’t mentioned to them, was that I wanted to be alone with her for my confession. It would have been a little awkward to do it in front of others…

Anyway, the hotel building. To some, it might feel weird that the city hadn’t tried to do anything about all these abandoned buildings in this area. But the reality was that trying to reclaim the part of the city where most of the villains resided would probably result in an all-out war.

I sucked in a breath and let it out again. Here we go.

To my surprise, the main entrance door still stood strong. No amount of my feeble strength or clever insults convinced it to let me through.

But that was okay. After all, I was Princess Fox! The finder of secret entrances! Locked doors meant nothing to me!

…

I was also a complete dumbass and didn’t need to get into the character or do embarrassing poses when there wasn’t anyone around.

But enough of that. As expected, there was another hidden entrance besides the main one. Well, more like an artificial entrance. A hole in the wall, basically. Part of me wondered how this building was still standing when there were random holes everywhere, but another part of me cleverly realized that this was all meticulously planned to allow for secret entrances without collapsing the building.

Yes, this hole had been carved out on purpose. No doubt about it.

I felt a smile creep into my face.

And so, I entered the building. It was dark and eerily silent. I took off the sunglasses and pulled out a flashlight. It seemed that the hole led directly into the women’s toilet room.

Well… wasn’t entering the women’s toilets for the first time a big deal for trans girls? It was like another step in accepting yourself or something. Yeah… apparently it was supposed to be quite scary to enter this sacred place. And damn straight was this freaking scary. But that might have been for a slightly different reason. Namely, the ever-present darkness and silence.

Wait a second… why did it suddenly feel like I was playing a horror game? Just one girl exploring an abandoned building with a flashlight, only the sound of her footsteps breaking the silence… Damn it! I hated horror games!

Okay, deep breaths. It was all just in my head. And I wasn’t totally alone. I had my communicator. Speaking of which…

I tapped the device in my ear and as I exited the creepy bathrooms and into the main lobby.

“I’m inside. No signs yet, I’ll keep you updated.”

“Copy that. We’ll be waiting, princess.”

Alright, see, brain? Everything was fine. No, brain, there was no mangled monster hiding behind the front desk. There were no tall, pale-faced men watching my every movement from the shadows. There was no--

Squeak.

“Uwah!”

I spun around and shone my flashlight at the horrific abomination lurking in the corner, ready to fight for my life… or run away screaming. Same thing really.

The rat squeaked again and then dashed away from my flashlight, leaving me standing there.

A rat. Truly the most terrifying monster imaginable. A worthy reason for getting spooked and squealing like a little girl.

“Princess?! Are you alright?!”

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Argh! I didn’t turn off the coms!

“Y-yeah. Just a rat. Sorry about that.”

“No worries… it was kinda cute, though.”

“Y--!” Before I could retort, the device crackled and the connection cut off.

Ugh… why couldn’t they stop calling me cute?! I mean, it felt kinda nice but… argh!

I let out a sigh mixed with a grumble and marched on.

Cute… cute… argh! I both loved and hated being called cute! It was embarrassing! But also… it made me really happy… girls liked being cute, right? Yeah… maybe everyone was right… maybe I really was a girl.

Squeak!

“AAAH!”

I spun around and once again shot my photon beam at the culprit.

The rat seemed to smirk at me before jumping away again.

“Stop it! I was having a moment here!”

My face grew hot in what was most definitely anger and not embarrassment, and I stomped my way across the lobby.

I pushed open a door to the side and found myself in what seemed to be the hotel’s restaurant. Except it seemed like rats had replaced humans as the customers. Well, if that’s what it took for business to thrive, I wasn’t going to judge… but those freaking rats were really getting on my nerves!

After snooping around the place and getting jumpscared by rats a few more times, I decided to head up the stairs.

Snaking hallways with doors on both sides greeted me. A pretty typical hotel layout, except that I was walking through in complete darkness with just a flashlight. Luckily, the rat nation hadn’t attacked the upper floors just yet. They seemed to be content with taking over just the ground floor. But that made it even worse since everything was even more silent and creepy.

Alright, at this point, I was just scaring myself. I needed to man up! Or, uh, girl up? I needed to… human up! Ha, that’s right, rats! I was a fully-fledged human, unlike you!

… wow, that was kinda racist wasn’t it?

Ahem, anyway… enough of distracting myself from reality with random thoughts. Time to search these rooms and maybe find something. Hopefully signs of a certain pack leader of metallic creatures.

Moving on, I snooped around every room that gracefully decided not to be guarded by a locked door. Unfortunately, I ended up finding absolutely nothing.

Then, just as I finished climbing to the fourth floor, my earpiece crackled again.

“Princess! You need to get out of there! Quickly!”

“What? Why? What’s going on?”

“There’s a fight going on right outside! Iron Pack is fighting Fissure and Nova!”

Iron Pack?! She’s really here?! Wait, fighting Fissure and Nova? That’s just like the first time I met her!

Then the floor shook beneath my feet and I fell onto my butt.

“They rammed into the building! It’s gonna collapse!”

The building shook once again and I scrambled to my feet. But just as I began sprinting for the stairs, the wall to my right exploded and an iron lion came hurling across the hallway.

Ah… shit.

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