Wild Boot: The Net Games
By David Farr
Tenchi Muyo is copyright of AIC : Pioneer LDC, INC. ReBoot is the
property of Mainframe. Ranma 1/2 is copyrighted by Rumiko
Takahashi/Shogakukan,Inc. All are used here respectfully for the purposes
of fanfiction. This story may be redistributed only if unchanged and no
fee is charged.
The prequel to this story "Wild Boot", other parts of this story, my
other works of fiction and a full list of copyrighted material used in
this fiction may be found at:
http://www.homepages.co.nz/~djfarr/
*****
Gosunkugi: We come from the Net,
Sasuke: No we don't! We came from a shop!
Gosunkugi: But coming from the Net sounds better!
Sasuke: Look, just say it the way we discussed.
Gosunkugi: We come from a shop,
Our code:
To blindly follow and obey.
Sasuke: That's right! You command, we obey!
Gosunkugi: No. Kuno commands, we obey.
Sasuke: That what I meant!
*****
v2.4.1: A Tangled Skein
Deep beneath the streets of Mainframe, in the very superstructure
of the system, rivers of sickly glowing energy wound their way through
darkened tunnels. Usually, the tunnels were thought too dangerous, thanks
to the mutant nulls roaming them and the sudden surges of liquid energy
waste, threatening to carry away sprite and binome alike. However, an
intrepid band of sprites were using them in an attempt to sneak up on
their prey.
It was perhaps unfortunate that the band of virals were being
lead by the two bots Gosunkugi and Sasuke. Certainly that would explain
why they were closer to Al's diner than to the Principal Office. The plan
had been said to be fool proof, the two black bots had proven that wrong.
A loud clang rang out as something metallic fell onto the
concrete beside the river, only to bounce and disappear into the green
goo. Sasuke, in the lead of the column, turned, raising a finger to his
dome, and shushed his partner before turning back. Gosunkugi turned and
shushed the viral binome immediately behind him. That viral turned and
shushed the next spy in line, who copied the maneuver and shushed
Fuchikoma. Quickly the large red mecha spun and shushed Akane, who
slapped her forehead.
"Eep!" squeaked the last spy in line, right before Akane vaulted
over Fuchikoma and knocked him to the ground.
"Would you keep quiet!" Sasuke exclaimed, spinning around. His
eyes popped open in surprise when he noticed that instead of a dozen
virals, he was being followed by a single trench-coated spy, a pissed off
looking defender and a large mecha.
"Fuchikoma, take care of the bots while I take care of our
friends." Akane waved at the two virals.
"Yes ma'am!" Fuchikoma cried and leapt forward to tackle to the
two bots.
Ignoring the melee, Akane quickly took down the last spy.
Grinning, she pulled out a file locker. Once both virals were encased,
she tapped the air, summoning up a vid window. "Kasumi, all clear down
here. I've got all the virals. You can take them in to be reformated."
"What of Gosunkugi and Sasuke?" The Command.com inquired.
Sasuke's domed head bounced a couple of times before coming to
rest at Akane's feet. "Oh, they're out of the PIC." She kicked the dome,
sending it skittering into the energy flow.
"Hey, she kicked me!" Sasuke complained as his head floated out
of view. Moments later, Gosunkugi and the rest of his parts joined it.
"Good job, Fuchikoma," Akane said, turning to smile at her mecha.
"Shank you, ma'am," he slurred, then collapsed to the ground.
Akane groaned. "Back to the repair bay for you."
*****
"How could you fail?!"
Gosunkugi and Sasuke glanced at each other, then looked at their
boss. He stood before his floating throne, swinging his energy sword
wildly. His dark blue visage was twisted in anger as he loomed over the
pair.
"That plan was fool proof!" Kuno exclaimed.
Behind him, sitting provocatively on the arm of the throne,
Nabiki was examining a display window. She still wore the bitmap-hugging
glossy black armour that she had emerged from the cocoon in. Absently,
she tapped one of her black claw-like nails on her black lips.
"Obviously not proof against these fools," Nabiki mused, slipping
off the thrones arm. She started to saunter over to the pair of bots,
grinning as she stalked them. "According to the map they ended up
wandering through every part of Mainframe but the Principal Office. I
don't know why you put up with them.
"I could understand their defeats by Ranma, he was always very
tricky and had so many friends, but now..." she reached out and tapped
her nails against Gosunkugi's chest, causing him to roll backwards,
"...they're losing to my guileless sister. If anything, they're hindering
our - sorry - your rise to power. Get rid of them."
"Stupid they may be," Kuno rumbled, "but they are useful in both
their loyalty and their power. Still." He paused and glared at the pair
of bots. "Should they fail me once more, it shall be to their regret."
*****
The doors to the core control chamber hissed open, letting Akane
in. A few of the technicians glanced up at her, but quickly got back to
work. Kasumi worked behind the main control panel, her fingers dancing
across the keys at a frenzied pace.
Wearily, Akane trudged up the ramp to stand next to her sister.
"Anti-virus chamber up and running," she reported.
Kasumi replied with a sound and a slight nod.
"What are you doing?" Akane peered over her sister's shoulder. On
the desk next to the console's display was a small file folder displaying
an open document. Curious, Mainframe's Guardian cadet peered at the
document's filename. "Indexer[Nabiki].Uninstall()?" she cried. "Kasumi,
why do you have an uninstall file for Nabiki?"
Kasumi paused, and turned to her sister, placing her hands on her
hips. "For just this eventuality," she replied. "I also have detailed
plans on the removal of all access for you, father, Ranma, and Ranma's
friends. I had to be sure that if any of you turned against the system,
for any reason, I could minimise that damage." That said, she turned back
to the console and got to work again.
"But..." Akane stuttered, "how could you...?"
"Mistrust you all? I didn't, but I had to be ready, just in case.
Please Akane, it's hard enough to do this to my own sister without you
questioning my actions."
"Ah... okay." Akane shuffled backwards. "I think I'll just go
offline for a little while."
"Do that. You need your rest."
Akane stood for a moment, watching her sister work, before
turning to head for the door. She paused once, leaning against the
doorway, and stared at the girl tapping busily at her console. Her
hesitation passed, and the doors slid closed behind her.
*****
The doors slid open, sending a rectangle of light across the
room. A single figure stepped in to be framed in the doorway, then
reached out to into the darkness beside her. Light swept through the
room, revealing the desk sitting in the corner and the bed against the
wall.
"What a day," Akane grumbled, stumbled across the room. Her foot
struck a dumbbell, sending her belly flopping onto the bed with a grunt.
"Oh, great." She rolled over and stared at the roof. "What else
can happen?" She reached up and tapped her Icon. A fuzz of energy ran
over her body, exchanging her blue cadet's uniform for a pair of pink
pyjamas.
A vid window popped open, showing a telephone with the receiver
ringing off the hook. "Ring ring ring, ring ring ring, phone call, phone
call."
Akane pulled herself up out off the bed and stared at the window
for a nano. "Accept call," she murmured. The window flashed and a sprite
dressed in black armour appeared, glancing over her shoulder.
"Nabiki?!" Akane exclaimed.
Nabiki whipped her head around, surprise showing on her face
momentarily before relief replaced it. "Akane, about time. Do you know
how long I've been trying to get through?" She shook her head. "Never
mind, I don't have long."
"What's happening?" Akane demanded. "I mean, why are you calling
me?"
Static passed over the screen for a moment, and Nabiki's image
wavered before becoming clear again. "Look, I've had to hack through both
Kuno's and Kasumi's security, and neither of them are making this easy,
so I have no time for stupid questions. As you can guess that stupid
machine of Kuno's didn't work."
"But why haven't you done something before now?" Akane blurted.
"I haven't had a chance," Nabiki replied. "I've had to play the
evil schemer for Kuno to get this moment. Look, I need your help. There
is no way Kuno is going to let me escape, so we're going to have to
assemble up something."
Akane leant forward. "Okay, what do you want?"
*****
As the sound of Nabiki's stiletto heels striking the metal floor
approached Kuno minimised the window he was looking at. The corrupted
sprite's hips swung seductively as she walked foot before foot. She wore
a sly grin. "It's all set up, Kuno-baby."
"Excellent, take the men you need," the virus waved at her. "And
do not fail me."
"Of course not, Kuno-baby." She spun on her heels, then turned
back, a cunning gleam in her red eyes. "Do you mind if I take along the
two henchbots?"
"Go ahead. I'm sure you'll put them to good use." He drew out the
last word.
"Oh, I'm sure I will."
Kuno watched her saunter off, not taking his eyes off her until
the doors hissed closed behind her. He reached out and tapped the icon
floating before him. The window popped open, displaying Akane, dressed in
her pink pyjamas and reaching out to close the window.
*****
"Wow, look what I found!" Sasuke rose out of the piles of junk,
waving a pink sphere.
Sitting atop an old broken food assembler, Nabiki turned her head
slowly and laid her eyes on the bot. Her eyes tightened, and she slipped
off her perch, starting across the junkyard towards him. "Wow, Sasuke,
that's a truly impressive find," she drawled, resting a hand on his
shoulder. "It's almost as good as Peek command Gosunkugi found." She
sighed. "Why did Kuno send me on such a useless task?"
"It fits your new station," a voice sneered from above,
"traitor."
All eyes turned up, to find Akane standing atop the catwalk next
to the conveyor belt lead to the object destruction furnace. She casually
held a rocket launcher in one hand. "A viral's function in this system is
as a target."
"Capture her, and Kuno will reward us!" Nabiki screamed, stabbing
her finger at Guardian cadet.
"Right!" the bots chorused, and launched themselves into the air.
Akane gave a confident bark of laughter and dropped to one knee,
shouldering the rocket launcher. "Sorry, not going to be that easy." She
thumbed the trigger, sending a missile spiraling towards the pair.
The eyes of both bots bugged out and the moronic pair separated,
the missile sliding between them. Gosunkugi grinned at his partner, then
turned to look at the Guardian. "HA! You mis--" He was silenced as
explosions consumed both he and Sasuke.
Nabiki stood calmly as bot bits rained down about her. She
glanced at the detonator switch in her hand, the same remote for the two
mini-bombs she had slipped onto the two henchbots. Shrugging, she tossed
away it
"Sorry boys, looks like you lose." Nabiki smirked down at them.
Shouting, Akane leapt, plummeting down from the catwalk. She
landed with a crunch on one knee, then stood and took a single step
forward. "Worked just like you said it would." Akane's smile was bright.
"Yes, sister, dear," Nabiki continued forward, her grin turning
sly, "down to your naivete." She threw out her hand. "Now, take her!"
Piles of junk shifted about them and a horde of virals emerged
from their hiding places. Each carried a weapon, from file blockers to
more lethal energy pikes, trained on the Guardian. Akane looked around
about her in dismay.
"I can't believe you fell for that," Nabiki sneered. "You are so
weak!"
"I can't believe you would betray us, betray me, like this,
Nabiki," Akane sighed. She lifted her hand, revealing a small cylinder
clutched in her fist. "But I'm not surprised." She jammed her thumb down
on the end of cylinder.
The first wave of explosions caused Nabiki to throw her arms over
her head in defense. A second ring exploded further out, sending more
virals and junk flying into the air. As a third ring went up, Nabiki
glanced up at her sister, to find Akane simply standing there amidst the
fire and falling debris, watching her sadly.
A final set of explosives detonated, and the fallout crashed to
the ground, leaving the sisters standing in dead silence. The green of
Nabiki's face had paled, and her eyes were wide open. The corrupted
sprites, mouth moved silently, unable to voice her shock.
On the other hand, Akane appeared calm, almost unflappable. It
was in her eyes that Nabiki could see the pain, sadness and betrayal.
Slowly Akane stepped forward, pulling a small pistol from behind her
back. She raised it, slowly, but deliberately.
"YOU DIDN'T TRUST ME!" Nabiki exclaimed, stumbling backwards.
Akane shook her head taking another step. "Like Kasumi said, I
couldn't take the risk."
Quickly, suppressing her shock, Nabiki smirked. "I suppose now
you're going to say something cliched like: 'this is for your own good,'
then shoot me."
Gun still outstretched, Akane took another step forward. "I
thought about it but, it didn't seem right."
Nabiki's smirk widened. "Afraid not, sister dearest." Quickly she
raised her own arms, one hand thrust towards Akane, the other wrapped
about her wirst. "BIND!" A massive energy web erupted from the black
armour enveloping her hand.
"Wha?" Akane's finger twitched, striking the firing stud, as the
energy web wrapped around her. A single sizzling blast leapt from her
weapon and across the space between the sisters. Nabiki cried in agony as
the energy sliced through her armour and across the bitmap on her arm.
Helpless, trapped within the bonds of Nabiki's bind command,
Akane fell heavily to the ground. She watched as Nabiki limped over,
clutching at the gash down her arm, energy leaking profusely.
"You'll pay for that," she sneered. "I promise you." With her
good arm, she snatched a small communicator from her side. "Get a
recovery team here immediately! I have Kuno's prize!"
*****
Kasumi sighed deeply and hit the save button for the umpteenth
time. Finally she had finished deleting Nabiki's access codes from the
registry. A last keystroke sent a progress bar slowly across the screen
as the files recompiled.
She looked up at the binomes set at the stations about the
control room. A few were gazing blankly at their screens, eyes glazed
over in boredom, another was playing chess against the computer, and one
was even snoozing at his station. The only person in the room that still
seemed busy was Kasumi's own assistant, the geek binome.
"Enty?" she called sweetly.
The one binome lifted his head and adjusted his glasses over his
eye. "Yes Kasumi, ma'am?"
"Is there anything that needs my attention?"
"No, ma'am. Everything has been quiet since Akane dealt with that
last attempt to break in."
Kasumi nodded distractedly. "Good, I think I'll go relax. If you
need me, I'll be in my workshop, fixing Fuchikoma." A thoughtful look on
her face, the Command.Com swept out of the room.
*****
It was a bound and gagged Akane that was dragged before the virus
Kuno. Nabiki and her battered virals strode victorious off the elevator,
the later carrying their struggling captive above their heads. Their
footfalls on the wire mesh rang out across the platform, causing Kuno to
look up. He absently noted the reassembler patch attached to Nabiki's
arm.
"Here we go, Kuno baby," Nabiki grinned. "I told you she would be
gullible enough to fall for it." She slunk over to the virus, and lay a
conspiring arm up onto the virus' shoulder. "So what are you going to do
with her now that you've got her? See if you can force an interface?"
Kuno gave her a droll look. "Please, my villainous ally, do not
speak so crudely of the lady I desire. She is, after all, your sister!"
Nabiki snorted. "She's also a sickeningly sweet goody-two-shoes."
She turned and strode away. "You'll never get her to serve you. Not
willingly. And you can't use that machine on her, the way you did with
me."
"In that you are correct, my twisted lieutenant." Kuno stalked
over to where Akane was still being held by the virals. He gazed into her
eyes, meeting only strong defiance in return. "It pains me to do so, but
I must take drastic measures to win her over."
Nabiki turned to look over her shoulder at him, an eyebrow
raised. "Such as?"
"Needs must that I forcefully extract her PID." He stood, arm
raised to his forehead in a symbol of tragedy.
A feral grin broke out on Nabiki's countenance. "Well then,
Kuno-baby, since it pains you so much, why don't you let me take her down
to the PID extraction room?"
It was Kuno's turn to stare at her inquisitively. "Surely the
prospect of torturing your own sister disturbs you."
Nabiki shrugged casually. "Not in the least."
"You are truly evil."
"Thank you, Kuno-baby." She strode past him. "This way boys!" The
virals, still carrying the helpless Akane, tromped off after her.
*****
The PID extraction chamber was a torture room designed for only
one purpose: forcing a sprite to give up the code that would allow
another to control its every action. Since time beyond measure, all
process had been given an identification that registered the connected
sprite with the system, in case of backup or upgrade.
Unfortunately, Viruses and Hackers had discovered that the sword
had two edges. Not only could it protect a sprite, but it could also be
used to access that sprite's higher functions, including their very
thoughts. And so, the PID extraction chamber was built.
It was one such chamber that Akane was now held in. It was a
large metal cylinder, with metal bars and chains that held the sprite
spread eagle and hanging in mid-air. She had fought, of course, but the
collective strength of the virals had over whelmed her.
Nabiki stood behind the glass door to the cylinder, smirking at
her. She reached up and slid aside a small panel. "Well sister dearest,
soon all that pride and righteousness of yours will be gone, and you'll
be the unwilling slave of Kuno!"
"Better unwilling than corrupted!" Akane spat back.
"So valiant in your resistance." Nabiki reached up to the control
panel beside the door. "I hope you stay that way. Remember I said you'd
pay for hurting me? Well, I've set this machine to a low setting. It'll
hurt, probably worse than losing Ranma did, but not enough to break you
quickly." She chuckled. "Hopefully, you'll be screaming for microseconds
before you give up you PID."
Behind her, in the shadows, two pairs of eyes shared a worried
glance.
Nabiki gave a quick salute to her sister. "Goodbye, Akane," she
sneered, then slapped the controls.
Akane's scream cut across the room.
*****
Kasumi stepped into her workshop and gazed around. Before it had
been a peaceful place, with strange machines and robots hanging in
spotlight amidst the darkness. Now, however, the room was fully lit, and
the sprites she had gathered for her think tank were busily doing what
they did best, inventing.
Doc and Cid were sitting over in one corner, pouring over some of
the disassembled drive parts of Ukyo's fighter. Every so often one would
scribble something on a file folder and pass it to the other. It looked
like the job was going to take a lot longer than they had expected, but
would indeed be worth it when they had finished. For one thing, they had
already started work on a new frame for the vehicle, and it was going to
be much bigger than the original.
Scotty and his crew were progressing a little better, but they
weren't working with hardware. Instead they were altering the very
firmware of the system. They had simulations up and running. The only
thing they had shown was that they would only have one chance with this,
there could simply be no test runs.
Fuchikoma was the only one there not doing anything. Well, he was
lying on the floor groaning every so often, but that wasn't much. The
pounding he had received fighting Gosunkugi and Sasuke had bent his frame
in places, and they'd even managed to get in a lucky punch that started a
slow energy leak.
Kasumi knelt down next to the red mecha. "Its okay, Fuchikoma,
I'm here to make you better."
"Thank you, ma'am," he managed weakly. "How's Akane?"
This gave Kasumi a reason to pause. She hadn't seen or heard from
her sister for many hundreds of nanoseconds. "I don't know. I'm sure she
must be off relaxing somewhere."
*****
The tortured screams could be heard even in smelter room deep
beneath the Tor. Of course, it helped that the chamber was also deep
beneath the Tor. Gosunkugi and Sasuke, the two black henchbots, glanced
towards the source of the cries, then each other, and finally returned to
staring mournfully down at the river of molten metal below.
Gosunkugi hung himself limply over the railings and sighed
deeply. "I hate this."
"I know," Sasuke commented. "I wish Nabiki would close the
chamber so we could have some peace."
"I wish Ranma was here."
"Yeah, I... WHAT?!" cried Sasuke, then he tried to hush his
partner. "Don't say things like that. If Kuno hears there'll be trouble.
Come to think of it, why would you say something like that?"
"Because if Ranma was here, he'd have rescued Akane by now. Then
she wouldn't be suffering, and we wouldn't have to live with doing all
this bad stuff."
Sasuke paused. "You don't like doing bad stuff?"
"It was okay when he was around, cause we knew we'd be stopped,
but now..." Gosunkugi deflated a little more. "Fighting Akane isn't
right. Neither is hurting her. Everything been wrong since he quit file."
Sasuke rolled over to his partner and looked down at the molten
river below. "Yeah, even Kuno doesn't want us anymore." The smaller bot
rolled over to his partner. "Maybe we should change sides." His tone
suggested a joke.
"Yeah, maybe we should."
Sasuke looked thoughtful. "I'm sure Kasumi would pay us a lot
more than Kuno does."
Next to him Gosunkugi lifted his head to gaze at his partner.
"Kuno pays us?"
"Ah..." Gosunkugi considered it for a second. "No."
"Then I guess she'd have to." He went back to hanging over the
railing. "They'd never trust us."
Glancing around to make sure they were alone, Sasuke leant in to
whisper in Gosunkugi's ear. "Maybe they will if we rescue Akane."
Like a bullet, Goskungi shot upright. "Let's go!"
*****
The door to the barracks slammed open, startling the CPUs inside.
Cards, chips, and rom went flying everywhere as binomes scrambled to
their feet. Many relaxed when they saw it was not the defender, sorry
Guardian-cadet, on a rampage, but instead the red bug-like mecha. Others
were smarter.
"Where's Akane?!" Fuchikoma demanded, doing the best stomp his
short legs would allow.
Zeros and ones exchanged confused or blank stares while making
unknowing sounds. A zero looked thoughtful for a moment before speaking.
"I believe the last time I saw here was at the armory. She was checking
out a few hundred minibombs."
Fuchikoma stared at him for a few seconds. "YOU IDIOT! She's gone
out on her own!" He spun about, then scuttled towards the door. "Come on,
she may need our help!"
"That would be a first," a zero muttered as they filed out.
*****
Agony coursed through her pixels as the magnetic fields washed
over her, searing her body and mind like an all-consuming fire. It was
nothing like she had ever felt before, and there was no escape from it,
except corruption. With every pass she could feel her electrons being
shifted against bonds. Worse, the time between passes changed, sometimes
she would come down from one blast only to immediately be struck again.
Then there were the times, like now, when she hung there for what felt
like seconds, with nothing but the dull aching memory of pain.
Outside, Nabiki grinned. The screams of her sister were almost
musical, and certainly enjoyable. It was all she could do to keep herself
from burst into an uncharacteristic bout of maniacal laughter.
She became aware of Gosunkugi as her trundled up beside her.
"Excuse me."
"What is it?" she snapped, turning to glare at him. "Can't you
see I'm enjoying torturing someone?"
Gosunkugi wrung his hands. "Well, yes, you see, that's why were
here?"
Nabiki's clueless "huh?" was drowned out by the sound of the
metal bat striking her head.
Back inside the chamber, Akane was suffering through the longest
pause yet. 'She's probably paused the machine to wait till I relax before
giving me another blast,' Akane thought. 'I won't give her the pleasure.'
She looked up to glare at the sprite she knew would be gloating beyond
the door.
Instead, she came face to dome with Gosunkugi as he wheeled in
through the open door. "Shhh, it's okay," he sounded comforting,
confusing Akane.
'Is this some plot of Nabiki's?' she wondered as Gosunkugi
extended his hand to release her manacles. Akane collapsed weakly over
his arm, and felt his other embrace surround him. Carefully, she was
gathered up in the robot's metallic arms, cradled like a baby. She
couldn't resist the treatment, her body and mind were still too weak from
her torture.
She barely felt the movement as the robot carried her from the
torture chamber. Beyond, through eyes that kept closing against her will,
she saw Sasuke slamming a baseball bat into his hand. At his feet lay the
black clad of Nabiki, out to the world if lump on her head and the
squiggles in her eyes were any indication.
Smiling, Akane fell into unconsciousness.
"Is she alright?" Sasuke demanded of his partner.
Gosunkugi glanced down at the Guardian cadet in his arms. Akane's
normally green skin had paled so far that it seemed almost tinted white
and her brown hair had streaks of grey through it. The navy blue cadet's
uniform she wore had shreds sliced out of it, leaving it a lot more
risque outfit.
"No."
"We'd better get her somewhere safe."
"The Principal Office," Gosunkugi suggested.
"Let's go."
*****
Fuchikoma and the binome posse sailed across the sky above the
sector known as G-Prime. Normally, an answering squadron of ABCs would
have met an attack of this force. It was for this reasons that the CPU
binomes were glancing about nervously as they flew two to a zip-board.
Their leader, desperately trying to balance on a pair of
zip-boards, was first to spot bot the reason for the lack of response. A
fire-fight had broken out around the Tor, bolts of energy flying, all
missing their targets, but damaging more of the viral craft. Using his
zoom lens, Fuchikoma focused on the shapes dodging wildly about the
tower.
It was to his surprise that the targets were none other than the
two robots, Gosunkugi and Sasuke. Briefly he wondered what was going on,
then he spotted the bundle Gosunkugi was carrying and zoomed in on it.
"AKANE!"
His first reaction was to rush in and save her, however, he
quickly realised that the only thing keeping Akane and the bots safe were
the small number of friendly units in the air. So long as the virals were
bumping into each other in order to get to their targets, no one was
hitting anything.
Instead he needed a plan, but plans weren't what he was good at.
So he did the one thing no other hero in Mainframe would do. He opened a
comm channel. "Madam Kasumi?"
"Yes, Fuchikoma?"
"Sasuke and Gosunkugi have Akane and are being chased all around
the Tor by Kuno's entire force."
There was a long pause. "It sounds like they are trying to rescue
her. What are your mikes picking up?"
Fuchikoma paused to check. "Cries of 'mommy', and an argument
about whether or not Sasuke said this was a bad idea. Akane does not
appear to be online."
"Okay, I'm putting every CPU unit I have into the air. Hopefully
that mass mobilisation will draw off enough ABCs to let you get in and
get Akane and the bots out. But watch them, this may be a trick."
Fuchikoma needlessly saluted. "Yes, ma'am!"
*****
Nabiki groaned as she watched the battle outside the tower. An
observer might think she had a headache caused by a blow to the back of
the head with a metal bat. This was an accurate observation, but not the
cause of her discomfort.
No, her groan was, in fact, caused by the mounting causalities
being reported. So far, twenty percent of the ABCs had been taken out of
the battle by damage or straight out deleted. Kuno did not help the chaos
of the battle, shouting a stream of non-stop, and often contradictory,
orders.
Nabiki sighed. There had been some fun, but knew what would
happen next. Glancing at the long-range scanners confirmed her belief.
"Kuno! Shut UP!" She snapped forcefully.
The virus fell silent but turned to glare at his subordinate, who
didn't even look up from her panels to catch it.
"All units, we have enemy incoming from adjacent sectors. Break
off pursuit and form up into squadrons. Red, green and Blue squadrons,
intercept units on vector oh-three-five. Gold and silver, take vector
one-eight-five and one-seven-zero, attempt to flank the battlemovers
approaching from sector 10011. Copper, protect Gold and Silver from the
air support in that area."
"But my goddess!" Kuno spat.
Nabiki spared him an irritated glance. "We can always recapture
her later. I don't think you could keep her without the Tor."
*****
The sudden exit by the ABCs left Sasuke hovering in the air,
bewildered. His partner wasn't so smart.
"MOMMY!" Gosunkugi cried as he continued to dodge non-existent
blasts.
"Ah, Gos... you can stop now, they're gone."
"Huh?" He looked about at the empty sky, and at the Tor. "What
happened?"
"I don't know," Sasuke admitted slowly. "They just all left."
"We scared them off!" Gosunkugi cried happily. He would have
thrown hs hands in the air, but decided Akane wouldn't like that, seeing
as she was nestled there.
"No, you didn't!" Fuchikoma snapped, as he and his CPUs swooped
down. "They're off dealing with our diversion! Now, hand over Akane."
Gosunkugi shook his dome. "Nah ah. We're saving her."
Fuchikoma paused and stared at the bots. "Whatever. Let's get
going!"
*****
"A disaster!" Kuno cried, staring down at the scarred and
battered ruins of his fleet of ABCs. "A complete and unmitigated
disaster! How can the plots of a virus as perfect as I be foiled by such
simple sprites?! Why must nothing go as planned?!"
Behind him, wrapped in shadows, Nabiki watched him carefully. "Oh
no, Kuno-baby, everything is going exactly as planned."
*****
Blurry eyes opened to a blazing fluorescent panel boarded by
stark white that stabbed at her eyes. Her hands ached, her feet ached,
her bitmap ached, her mind ached, hell, even her clothes ached. The tired
mind clicked into something resembling gear, and buzzed over the cliche
questions. 'Who am I? Where am I? What happened? Who's going to pay for
it?'
'Akane. Don't know. I was tortured. Nabiki,' were the answers she
received. However, it hurt too much to ask questions, so instead she
simply muttered. "An unfamiliar ceiling." She immediately regretted it.
First, she discovered that her voice ached, incredibly enough. It
wasn't so much that her lips hurt to move, or her chest protested about
having to breath so much. It was that the very words hurt.
Second was that her ears immediately protested having to hear
someone say: "Akane? Oh, your awake."
Kasumi's smiling, but worried, face appeared in her vision.
"Please, don't move, don't speak. You're still suffering from the affects
of the electromagnetic torture." Her smile brightened. "You will get
better, but you don't have to hurry. I have two new defenders to help me
out while your in bed."
Still mentally fog bound, Akane could only smile at her sisters
comforting words. As she slipped back into sleep, fleeing the pain of her
body, she didn't even wonder who the new defenders were.
-----------
David Farr
http://homepages.ihug.co.nz/~djfarr/
djfarr@ihug.co.nz katsuhito@planetjurai.com
"Die-cast construction, it's a lost art."
- Optimus Primal, Beast Wars.