It has been a while since I've posted anything, hasn't it? Or even
posted comments.
Well, not exactally for lack of writing - more for lack of time to
polish the massive number of bits and scribbles I've gotten down. Since
I've just gone back to having actual free time, though, It's time to
change that.
Unfortunately, Youma Blues is somewhat permanently stalled. The
origional YB, based on the DIC dub of Sailor Moon, honestly has died a
most screamingly horrible death due to my being introduced to the
Bishoujo Senshi Sailormoon Manga and it's precursor manga, Code Name
Sailor V. So far, I've not figured out a way to re-write it to my
satisfaction. I still want to - but no promises.
This, However, is part 1 of a story that has mobbed my brain after I
watched Spirited Away twice in a row.
Which is probably not safe for your sanity, but oh well, as if I was
sane anyway.
As of yet, the Fic itself doesn't have a title. 'City of Gods and
Monsters' is just the title of the first chapter.
The second, 'City of Ghosts and Shadows' is about 55% done now, and I
hope to have it done before June is out.
Comments, praise, scatheing remarks, questions, accusations that the
author is a Hack, etc...all of the above are welcome at Gamlain@airmail.net.
As a Disclaimer:
Anything good obviously belongs to the creators of one of Card Captor
Sakura, Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon, Spirited Away, Ranma 1/2, Devil
Hunter Yohko, or Yuu Yuu Hakusho. Anything bad, includeing spelling,
grammar possible formatting and other mistakes the software didn't
catch, obviously belongs to me.
That being said - Here's the first little glimps of a fantasia.
Cheers,
Gamlain
Transuniversal Lunatic
gamlain@airmail.net
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City of Gods and Monsters
Chapter 1
Gate to the Other World
Aino Minako moaned painfully as the sound of her alarm dragged her back
from deep unconsciousness, wincing repeatedly as her hair, pinned under her
unconscious self when she'd turned over in sleep, was pulled by her half conscious
stirring.
Usually, an hour of sleep was not enough, but she could survive on it.
Today, however, four hours still was not enough, and she reminded herself yet
again that sleeping in full Senshi form was no substitute for true rest,
whatever the side benefits were.
She slipped silently out of bed, careful not to disturb it's other
occupant - the white cat had been up even longer than she, and although he had
not been fighting as she had, his smaller mass made the stress of constant
wakefulness worse.
Pulling on her Senshi uniform was a slow process this morning, delayed
by winces and stifled whimpers as pale white and gold Senshi armor caught on the
many bright red scars that laced her body. They were more still healing wounds
that scars, really, not yet repaired even after half a night's sleep in her
battle form.
Catching sight of the angry hatchwork across her back she shivered,
causing a sick, roiling pain to lance outward from them, and thanked the Kami
that she had gone back to a style she'd considered as Sailor V: the jacket-shirt
would help hide the damage more, once she managed to put it on. She swallowed
the nausea and willed them healed -faster-, not wanting to be held back by the
results of taking foolish chances for very long.
It had been entirely to close. Diving under youma claws to toss Sailor
Mercury out of the way of a lethal energy blast was a game for suicidal idiots
- or Senshi commanders who didn't want to loose their technologist and
doctor-in-training. Venus counted the price in pain well worth the investment.
Aino Minako just suffered the agony, and went on with her responsibilities.
She grimaced at her reflection - it looked half dead; 'Suffer' was right.
Today was not going to be a good day at all - too little sleep, too little
healing, too many friends hurt or simply /dead/, and far to much to do.
She prayed for a respite - hopeing that at least there would be no
attack that required her personal intervention this day. A little time to
handle matters of non-instant life and death wasn't too much to ask, right?
"Ah well." she whispered softly. "No use putting it off...time to go to
work again. Sleep well Art, one of us should get some rest while they can."
And with that, Mina slipped out the door, the persona of Sailor Venus
firmly in place as a blockade against fatigue, pain and heartache.
As always.
Tendou Kasumi rubbed tired eyes with the back of one ink stained hand
and pondered the little postcard from a few different angles.
It failed to give up it's secrets and also failed to simply disappear,
taking it's vague promises of more complications in her and her sisters
already precarious life. In those two failures, it was already quite
un-helpful; That it's content was so brief took it nearly to the level of an
aggravation.
'Tendou, bringing Ranma from China.' It read. It was signed, 'Genma'
She could construe little from this mystery item. That it might have
been addressed to her father seemed likely, but if so, this 'Genma' was sorely
out of touch. Of course, coming from the particular province of China that the
card did, that was entirely likely.
Her father would not be shedding any light on the situation from his
place in the grave; Not even if she were to go to the trouble of summoning his
spirit would she likely get any useful answer. What divination she could
practice had already been done, revealing little more than a impression of
great honor and great dishonor, and much chaos about the two names.
She supposed she would have to dig through father's Journals to at least
try to learn what this portended.
At least Akane would be able to help her there; Akane's self-study in
the Anything-goes art required pouring over those same books and scrolls
constantly and obsessively. If Kasumi were very lucky, the youngest Tendou
might well know the names without even needing to look.
Saotome Ranma was not, at that moment, being chased down the street by a
aggravated panda and shouting that (currently she) would be returning to China.
Perhaps she might have been, had the city been different, but pops and
his (at the time) return to Tokyo had been creeping both of them out from the
moment they set foot off the docks.
It was too quiet, as if the pedestrians bearly dared whisper, and there
were armed police in far to many places: More than there were in Communist China
even, and these police carried, as often as not, swords. Police who moved as if
they could actually use them, in an era where sword skill should have
been all but unknown.
No match for him or pops, of course, but still. No one spoke to the
young man and his older companion. A wall of silence was thrown in their faces
the instant they left the boat, perhaps because of their boisterous manner and
foreign clothing - but that was not what disturbed them most.
It was the continuous, ominous feeling of being watched and judged that
had stilled Genma's tongue and preserved, for the moment, the tenuous truce
between father and son.
Then had come the rain, and their change from man and boy to panda and
girl - and suddenly the streets packed with silent people streets became
abandoned wherever they went, hundreds- thousands - of Japanese falling
quickly and practicedly into the nearest building. Before either father
or son could quite comprehend that they were being run from, the harsh
sound of thrown deadbolts sounded out from those shops and houses in a chorus.
It was only a few minutes after that they had spotted the first of
the watchers leaping from the top of one ten story building to another as if it
were no more matter than jumping over a puddle.
Perhaps either father or son could have made such a leap across an open
alleyway. Neither, however, would care to do it while ten stories up -the fall
might not kill them, but it would not leave them unmarked either.
Genma believed that they had been caught up to by the Amazon peoples
they had offended, and was making for his old friends Dojo with all the panicked
speed that his panda body could muster.
Ranma doubted this assessment, as she had seen one of those silently
and distantly following figures shrug off a direct lightning strike, and was
becoming more unnerved by the second.
Kino Makoto launched herself from the top of one rain slicked roof to
another, paceing the two racing figures below and shaking hands that still
crackled with static from that lightning bolt absently.
The report of two shapechangers in the streets had caught her in the
middle of grocery shopping, and dragged Sailor Jupiter into a rainstorm,
paceing two people who did not feel like monsters.
Then she had been lightning struck, and possibly seen. Luck was not
part of today's work environment, and she suppressed the urge to complain to
the Kami. If the two below were not Youma, then today's Luck would be good
enough.
Across on the other side of the street another warrior also followed
along. It was difficult to tell just whom, in the wall of water at rooftop
height -Mano Yohko, she thought, or maybe Ayoko. There was another flitting
ahead of them - too fast to be identified, which narrowed the field to about
five or ten people.
That the shapeshifters knew they were being followed - and felt that
they needed to run - did not bode well, however. They had not attacked anyone
yet, so they were still left alone, but that rarely lasted.
Several Rooftops later, she thought she detected something of a
pattern to the erratic path the Panda-man had been leading the girl on:
Nerima-wards.
Outside her usual haunt and jurisdiction, but there were guardians
for that ward, to, and it felt like courtesy to notify them of mystery
intruders of possibly dangerous nature, so she stopped briefly and fished
her communicator out of the not-space the Sailor Senshi had access too,
then began punching numbers on the run.
The Temple number was busy, of course, and the Kuno Estate number,
so she tried the third outpost from that ward and got through on the third
ring, smiling as she heard the polite tone and gentle strength of the voice
that answered.
"Moshi Moshi?"
"Kasumi!" She shouted in reply, "It's Jupiter! Listen - there are
two shapechangers running away in the streets - spooked for no reason! An
old man and a boy who became a panda and a young girl, the Ginza citizens
said! They're headed for your neighborhood, so be on the lookout!"
A moments static-crackle, then - not from the communicator, but from
the phone lines it tapped into to make that call, and the Kasumi's answering
voice, sounding curious and..possibly a bit enlightened. "Thank you, Mako-chan,
I will certainly keep an eye out for them. Have they done any wrong?"
"Nothing yet," Makoto shouted over the roar of more lighting above,
"It may be they're just sensitive enough to know they're being watched, and
panicked, but.."
"I understand. Please be careful on the rooftops, Mako. It is slick
in the rain." The gentle chiding note of caution in the older sorceress's
voice was underscored by a near slip, and Makoto resolved to be much more
careful indeed.
Kasumi may have been less supernaturally experienced, but her
common sense could not be faulted.
"Dammit pops," Ranma yelled out as she skidded haphazardly around a
corner that was ankle deep in water, "Wait up!"
As slow and ponderous as the Panda body looked, once it got up to
speed, there was little Ranma could do to even out the difference between
their strengths and heights in a straight sprint, especially in the
girl-body she'd been cursed with, and the panda was fast leaving her behind.
In the rain, the panda's better traction even made it take corners
better than she did.
"Stupid old fool," She plunged blindly into the rain - at full tilt,
vision was nearly impossible - and concentrated on hearing his footfalls in
order to follow him.
So intent was she on this task that she nearly over-shot him when his
bear-form stopped, and 'Growf'ed at a closed gate.
Desperately stop peddling, she managed not to collide with the old
idiot and turned to squeezing some of the excess water out of her flaming
red hair while she looked at the sign that pops was so stunned by.
'Tendou Training Hall' It read, and under that, further
clarification in neat Kanji.
'Enlightened Warrior Arts. Demon Slaying Kenjitsu. Unrestricted
Grappling. Training by special appointment only. Tendou Akane, Sensei.' Was
added, and a line of messier, bright red Kanji below that read, 'No
Trespassing. Violators may be shot, impaled or invited in for tea.'
The Panda looked confused, scratching it's head, and Ranma snorted.
"Let me guess, 'Tendou Akane' isn't your old friend Soun, right, pops? You
lead us to the wrong Dojo! We're still being followed, you know!"
The Panda smacked her over the head with a sign that read 'Respect
your elders, brat!' and growled, but before Ranma could do more than glare back,
the rattle of iron chain disturbed both of them, and the gates swung wide.
Beyond them was a cozy house and Dojo, far more spacious than it had a
right to be in land-desperate Tokyo, and before that was a pretty young woman
in a yellow and blue Kimono, a paper umbrella shielding her from the rain.
She was pretty, in a regal, motherly way, with long brown hair and
enigmatic brown eyes and her clothing was very traditional; She could almost
have been a figure from a hundred years ago - or five hundred, but that was
not the most striking thing about her.
The paper lantern that glowed brightly above her free hand was. It
hovered with no visible support and Ranma shuddered.
Magic, in 'her' experience so far, was something it was better to be
wary off. Still, the girl was polite enough to open the gates, and her
greeting sounded sincere and friendly - a quiet, "Welcome to the Tendou Dojo.
I am Kasumi. May I help you, young miss?"
"Um..Hi. I'm Saotome Ranma. Um..Sorry, we're looking for Tendou Soun?"
Kasumi looked slightly Melancholy and at the same time curious as
she answered, "So you are Ranma..and I expect that your companion is Saotome
Genma in another shape? I am afraid that Tendou Soun can no longer be found
amongst the living, Saotome-san. My condolences, Genma-san. Please, both of
you, come inside and share tea with me. It is not often that we Tendou
sisters are visited by any of Father's old friends."
Neither panda nor boy turned girl could refuse their host's polite
request, so gently was it phrased, and they found themselves following her
without a single moment to consider refusing.
It was not until they had crossed the yard and come under the roof of
the porch that Ranma realized the sensation of being watched was gone. She
turned back, and shivered when she saw that the iron gate had closed itself
behind them.
From the dojo, the streets of modern Tokyo were unseen, and Ranma
fought off the impression that if she were to go to the gate and open it, that
the city of steel and skyscrapers would be gone, replaced by something out of
a legend.
Ranma turned away from the gate and headed inside. Behind her, thin
white ofuda pasted to the inside of the yard walls glowed dimly, unnoticed
kanji shining red in the darkness, and the gates stayed closed.
The rain was coming down more gently now, as if the heavens were
perversely slacking off now that the chase was over and all concerned could be
under cover. Ayoko Mano thought it likely to be the case - her experience with
the various celestial governors left her with no particular trust in the innate
goodness of the ones who controlled the weather.
So, instead of calling down curses on their heads for inconvienceing
her, she found refuge under a balcony and began squeezing water out of her
hair - and the sodden blue silk of her battle dress. The Mamono-hunter's
Uniform was a lot of things, but waterproof wasn't particularly one of them,
and now it was thoroughly soaked, and plastered to every inch of her body like
glue by the wind.
She considered reversing the transformation and calling it up again -
the flare of magic would certainly dry and clean her costume, and it had
gotten to the state of feeling patently offensive, soaked as it was by
smog choked rain - but dismissed the idea.
A transformation would also be noticeable, and it was now after dark
- no telling what a flare of magic could attract.
Although she had an idea. Three years of devil hunting gave her an
excellent base of knowledge of what to expect to be wandering the streets of
Tokyo after dark.
"Ayoko-chan?"
Such as the person calling her name from the roof. You couldn't live
in Tokyo and not know about the Sailor Senshi, and you couldn't hunt devils
without having met them.
"Under the balcony, Jupiter-san! I'm soaked." A moment later the green
and white uniform of Sailor Jupiter - occupied, of course, by the rest of her -
landed on the lower rooftop Ayoko was sheltering on. Jupiter immediately
stepped back under the balcony and out of the rain, wringing water out of
her own slightly waved brown hair.
Ayoko cast her an envious look; Jupiter's Serifuku-uniform was made of
some sort of flexible white and green armor-cloth, and unlike the Mamono-hunters
enchanted silk dress it shed water as if oiled.
Jupiter replied to the look with a helpless shrug and said, "I guess
this one was a false alarm. Any impressions you care to share? They didn't
act like enemies that I could tell."
"A pair of frightened chickens..but skilled frightened chickens. I
think they were running from something other than us." Ayoko replied absently
and sighed. "I don't know why I bother with wringing this dress out, I'm just
going to be soaked again in a minute."
"Completely awful, Ayoko-chan. Look on the bright side though, it's
silk, it won't chafe." Jupiter replied absently and then nodded to herself. "I
think you're right about them, too. Listen, you're waterlogged. Go home,
report this and take a hot bath - I'll keep watch over Kasumi and the Tendou's
tonight. I'm more suited to storm work."
Ayoko smiled gratefully, and pushed herself away from the wall. "I am
not fooled - you just want to get out of answering V's interrogation for a few
hours. But I'll take you up on that offer tonight."
Jupiter laughed a little embarrasedly. "Well, maybe a little. Now go,
before it starts coming down again."
Ayoko saluted her friend and did just that without another word. Few
of the guardians said goodbye, a practice that amounted to an unspoken invitation
to survive to meet each other again.
As Ayoko vanished into the rain, Kino Makoto settled against the wall,
concentrating patiently as she stretched her meager senses over the house of
one of her few non-Senshi friends, quietly waiting for even the smallest sign of
trouble.
A Senshi, she'd learned, couldn't be too careful with her friends
safety.
Inside, the house proved to be almost as spooky as the grounds - there
was no evidence that Ranma could find in the front room or foyer that this was
a house in 20th century Tokyo; Instead, every perfectly, formally arranged part
of it was antique - well used, well worn antiques that could have come from a
Samurai fairytale of two hundred - or five hundred - years ago.
Nothing, however, matched the floating lamp, which Kasumi had hung on
the porch in passing as she let them in and instructed them to wait there
while she retrieved towels - and the hot water Ranma embarasedly requested when
Kasumi politely asked if they needed privacy to assume their true forms.
Her knowing that they had true forms didn't seem at all odd, and it
wasn't until the girl had faded into the house, still bearing a umbrella
that didn't seem at all wet, that Ranma realized it was odd that it didn't,
and gave her father a dubious look.
"Old man, this place is creepy. I hope we're not getting into more
trouble than we can get out of -again."
Genma would have read his obnoxious offspring a riot act, if he had
not been still in shock, disbelieving of one thing he had heard.
'Soun, dead? But, uniting the schools, it seems his daughter doesn't
even think of it, could it be she doesn't know? Ah, my old friend, what
happened here? Your house, it is so changed..' If any of Ranma's words
penetrated the racing thoughts chasing themselves around Genma Saotome's head,
he gave no sign, too busy trying to figure out how to ensure that Ranma was wed,
so that he could be supported in his waneing years.
Genma's ruminations - and Ranma's glowering - continued until Kasumi
re-appeared, lying out a steaming copper kettle, towels, and a change of dry
clothes for each of them - loose robes that would fit Ranma very loosely, and
Genma quite a bit less so, even in human form.
"Please come in and change. Once you have dried off, please come to
the kitchen, and we will have tea, and you will tell me why you had come to
visit father. I feel that it was no casually undertaken journey." Kasumi
bowed again, and then turned her back with careful deliberation and
glided out of the room.
Something in her manner of doing so set off subtle alarm bells in
Ranma's head - there had been too much tension, too much waiting action
in her stride.
Tendou Kasumi hadn't liked turning her back to him and pops one bit,
politeness or no.
Ranma continued to throw his father dark looks after availing himself
of the hot water, and for several minutes while he dried off and changed into
the robe he had been provided. They had a change of their own clothes, of
course, but something in Kasumi's manner indicated that it would be rude to
ignore their hostess's hospitality, and already he could tell that being
rude to Kasumi would take an effort of will that Ranma wasn't certain he
possessed.
His father might have been made of sterner stuff where rudeness was
concerned - but Ranma doubted that even Genma would be dumb enough to
deliberately insult a sorceress inside her own home.
Not since Jyusenko, anyway.
Then he followed the path Kasumi had taken and entered the kitchen -
and sighed with relief. This part of the house, at least, wasn't a part of
some Samurai flick's set. Sure, he'd spent enough time in places that were
really like that, but it was just weird to find them inside a city.
Then he realized that Kasumi wasn't the only person waiting for them
in the kitchen, and his relief went away.
The other person was a girl - and not a normal one, either. She was
sprawled leggily across two chairs next to a high table across from the stove,
back leaned up against the wall, legs covered by tight denim that could have
half-passed for a second skin, and wearing a teashirt with some obnoxious
English slogan printed on it in bold red.
Short black hair - dyed, he could tell - was bobbed off at chin level,
and at his entry, hard brown eyes raked him up and down, a scathing judgment
of his character blazing in their depths, and a cigarette burned dull orange
at her lips - one of only two sources of light in the room, the other being
another of those lamps that floated by themselves. She was startlingly
pretty, in a coldly predatory manner that put all of Ranma's fighting
instincts on guard.
None of that made Ranma as nervous as the guns the unknown girl had
strewn apart over a corner of the table that Kasumi was setting teacups down
on with delicate precision.
A disappointed look at the unknown girl from Kasumi lead to the
cigarette being stubbed out in an ashtray, and an apologetic sound before the
unknown girl turned her gaze back to Ranma.
"So, sis, who's our gawking guest? He doesn't look smart enough to be a
Tong or a Yak, and he's definitely not police, so he's not here to see me."
The sharp eyed girl's voice was as cutting as the rest of her, and Ranma
realized he was staring - especially at what her hands were doing, as they
stripped, cleaned and reassembled guns from parts before her, without any
need for their owners attention at all.
"..Sorry. Saotome Ranma. Sorry, I didn't mean ta stare, I mean.." Ranma
desperately tried to say the right apology, but every word sounded
progressively more wrong. He never had been to good at polite society, and
Pops had never really cared to help him learn.
Sharp-eyes chuckled at his attempts to satisfy protocol.
"Not ready for us big city girls, hum? I've heard about a Saotome Ranma
recently..Sit, sit. I don't bite..much. I'm Tendou Nabiki, the untraditional
girl of the family..every family needs someone to keep up with the age, after
all." Ranma sat at her instruction, with only a nervous glance her direction
as she sat up straight, dropping her legs off of the chair he had been
directed too.
Nabiki briefly turned her attention to the weapons in front of her
then, metal shifting across metal in her hands with only a soft sliding chime
and the occasional sharp click of springs locking into place to be heard from
the process.
Momentarily, she had seven firearms reassembled, and began packing
them carefully in a briefcase that she brought up from the floor.
Genma frowned at that sight when he entered, and asked loudly, upon
sitting, "Kasumi, please tell me the circumstances of my old friends departure.
I must know." It was a question only in phrasing - from Genma's voice, he
expected an answer, and now.
Kasmui's response was not, perhaps as direct as he might have liked.
"Please keep your voice down, Saotome-san. Our little sister is sleeping. If
you wake her, Nabiki will shoot you, and that would be unpleasant." Tea was
poured then - too much of it to have all come from the tiny teapot Kasumi
used, although perhaps that was merely Ranma's imagination.
The hard glare Nabiki had directed fully on his father wasn't, however.
The person who was not human had been too slow; A sharp rap of the
short swords's sheath underneath it's gun hand slapped the submachinegun
upwards, directing the slugs into the brickwork behind him.
Kuno Tatewaki thought nothing of it, as the muzzle flash and roar
erupted mere inches from his face. Thinking was a luxury he did not
presently have time for.
A circling dodge allowed him to draw the blade as the thing
masquerading as a Yakuza sprayed more bullets across the alleyway and
it's would be victim shrieked in terror behind them both. That action
accomplished, the motion became attack; A one handed Iajitsu blow that
took off the thing's gun hand at the elbow as Tatewaki spun around
behind the first opponent, the right sleeve of his hakama trailing
emptily behind him as a reminder of the price of delusion.
The return path of his blade both removed the first possessed corpse's
head and caught and blocked the iron pipe the second had struck out with.
Metal shrieked and sparked as it was cut, and Tatewaki was pleased: This
blade was proving superior. At the least, it had yet to break.
He allowed the second thing no recovery from it's surprise at holding
a now much shortened length of common iron, and cut it down, exploding
around it's toppling corpse to catch the third one's axe below the head
with the back of his blade, stopping a blow that would certainly have
killed the girl.
It pushed down with more than human strength, and he reacted with
human skill, not stopping the blow, but moving it's target, until the axe
head buried itself into the side of the iron dumpster crowding the back
of the alleyway.
Predictably, the axeblade stuck there for a crucial instant, and in
that moment, Tatewaki struck three times: A leaning knee kick to drive
wielder and axe both sideways, wedging the other weapon more firmly into iron,
and then two invisibly fast slashes, turning the thing into an armless,
hamstrung body that toppled backwards into the street with a buzzing snarl.
Tatewaki distantly realized that the prospective victim had subsided
from terrified shrieks to even more terrified whimpering, but paid it no heed,
for the moment. Instead, he carefully watched the bodies, waiting, and in a few
seconds more was rewarded, and their torso's ripped open - disgorging three
chitenous armored bodies - Mosquito Demons, wings still slick with the fluids
of stolen bodies, but game for an attempt at escape.
A thing which the Demon Flies did not attain. Tatewaki flicked his
wrist, after slicing the three parasites to pieces, and splattered smoking
blood across the length of the wall - including a door, which opened with an
angry clank, to reveal a horror: An Oni, seven feet and more of corded
muscles under deep blue skin, with a mouth filled with fangs and tusks,
and a single horn projecting from it's forehead.
Behind him, the girl fainted without further comment as the Oni growled
at him. "What's the racket, brat? You messing with my door?"
Tatewaki did not sheathe his sword, but neither did he attack - a true
Oni was no less a citizen of this city than any of the more well known
residents; He was on friendly terms with several - including this one. "By
no intent. There was garbage that needed be removed, Murizura-san. Please
pay it no heed."
"Ah, Tatewaki. That garbage would be the Demonflies, then. Well, take
the rest of the garbage away with you. Reputation aside, I don't eat
schoolgirls - at least, not that young. Need more spice." It wasn't difficult
to tell that the Oni was mostly joking about the last as it slammed the door
shut.
Tatewaki waited until he had heard the tell-tale thunk of the deadbolt
being shot home before he sheathed his sword anyway, and turned to the girl.
Carrying her was going to be a chore, with only one arm to do it with,
but unto a samurai's life came a multitude of hardships, it was written.
The head of the Kuno household knelt in ankle deep garbage,
gathered up the source of his evening's hardship as best he could, and
walked quietly away from the carnage he had left behind.
It wasn't until Kasumi didn't yell at Nabiki for it that Ranma noticed
the gun. "Nabiki," Kasumi chided, and the snub nosed little revolver in
Nabiki's Left hand disappeared as if by magic - in a move Ranma knew perfectly
well was nothing more than slight of hand.
Genma didn't notice it pointing at him at all before the untraditional
girl made the thing disappear, and that made Ranma even more uneasy than
Kasumi's particular way of making a soft voiced word of disappointment seem
worse than being screamed at.
His father settled down a bit though, and apologized. Oddly, it
sounded sincere - usually pop's apologies were less than heartfelt, but this
time he sounded actually contrite. "My apologies, Tendou-san..I am..overwrought.
I had come with hopes of fulfilling an agreement between your father and I. An
affair of honor and friendship. But now you tell me that he is gone, and
I...do not know what to do."
Nabiki's hard eyed glare softened at those words, bringing the overall
impression from that of being a wall of razor edged diamonds to merely a wall
of spring steel. It wasn't reassuring. Ranma thought he could take her in a
fight - she didn't have a really good stance, sitting - but guns were
dangerous, and she was quick and had a really good center and he wasn't
sure he could take her before she shot pops. Himself, he wasn't worried about.
Kasumi bowed her head. "I should apologize as well. I should not keep
this story from being told long, not to a friend, and I am delaying. It..is
not a story that we wish to dwell on, for all of the changes we have suffered
through because of it."
Ranma frowned at Genma, but closed his mouth on a flood of angry
questions for his sire at the elder Sisters gentle look. Being on the
receiving end of that look was weird - this girl could do more with a minute
change of expression then all of the Saotome school insults combined - and he
decided to stay quiet until he at least had heard the story.
Then he could kick pops across the yard until the old man spilled
whatever it was he'd been hiding.
Neither man noticed the questioning glance that Kasumi gave Nabiki,
not with the younger girl's prompting of, "Get it over with Kasumi. I can
listen to it, at least."
Baffled by this exchange, neither boy nor man interrupted further as
Kasumi began.
Once upon a time Futohara Motoki had run an unremarkable video game
parlor and caf�, and thought nothing more of the parade of pretty girls that
had taken to frequenting it than to bless them for the business their frequent
presence attracted.
That time had disappeared with much of his innocence as to the true
nature of the world on the day that three battered Sailor Senshi had dragged
four of their wounded comrades into the shop and setup a hurried field
hospital in his front room, while running a city wide communications network
from a secret room behind one of his more popular games.
He still ran a Video game parlor and Caf�, but was no longer able to
think of it as unremarkable, and his thoughts on those pretty schoolgirls who
brought him so much business had changed quite a lot. It was hard for them
not to, once he had learned their identities on that day, and he had actively
pursued that change, learning as much about them as he could, and helping as
much as he could.
It wasn't much, perhaps, but it was -something-, and so Crown Games
changed in a number of strange but very useful ways; Now the games were open
all hours, and the grill was always staffed, just in case one of them came in
and needed food. A cache of medical supplies had been hidden in the back room,
too, and the building had been warded by a local Shinto Temple at his request.
And Futohara Motoki found that he had become the de-facto surrogate
father of several perfectly nice, absurdly powerful, and often desperately lost
young women in the process. His fianc�e', learning of it, had returned home from
her work abroad and joined him. They both thought that this job - being the host
of the building that was becoming well known as the control center for those
who kept the city from sliding into an anarchy of rule by malevolent spirits
- was far more important than what she had been doing.
Even if it did leave him bored senseless most nights, when he ran the
Games as the nightshift. Especially when it rained, as few came to the games
in a downpour.
Few, but not none.
The door of crown games opened with it's usual chime - a combination
of the bells at the top and the spirit wards along the frame - and admitted a
perfectly soaked Aino Minako inside. She shed her coat immediately, hanging
it on the rack over floor drain, and started squeezing out her hair.
By the time that chore was more or less accomplished, Motoki had
produced a hot cup of something that might have a coffee base, but probably had
more calories than fruitcake - a Mina special, as the menu now had it. It
consisted of expresso shots, cream, honey, cinnamon, ginger, and hot peppers,
mostly, and was absurdly popular as a sipped drink for various late night types - students, mostly, taking advantage of the only all night arcade and study
hall in the ward.
The contents of the cup vanished with a speed that always made Motoki
want to be sick to his stomach - and that had been before he'd learned of her
second life, and what condition her appetite was usually in.
"One of these days," he remarked, "You're going to down one of those and
it's going to come right back up. Do you have to inhale it?"
Minako smirked a bit unsteadily at him and replied, "It's the only way
to drink it fast, and I needed the jet fuel."
Motoki rewarded that admission with a searching look, and then pointed
to a chair. "Sit. You're not going near that Sailor V game until you've
eaten. I can count the circles under the circles under your eyes, Mina.
Do you ever sleep?"
"Only when forced!" Minako chirped at him, and bounced a couple of
times, as if to say, 'Look, I'm okay, I'm fine, just let me get busy', and
Motoki snorted in exasperation.
"Right. Sit there and I'll get you a special - and warn you that Ami's
here and looking to read you the riot act about taking care of yourself - again." Mina made a face at that news, and then shrugged.
Just this once, the possibility existed that the alter-ego of Sailor
Mercury had a point.
A small hand landed on Minako's shoulder from behind, pushed down and
Mina's legs collapsed under the pressure, unceremoniously dumping her in a chair.
The other of those hands had grabbed a wrist and their owner was
concentrating darkly on taking her Pulse. Minako didn't react to either
for a moment - sitting down felt so -good- that she had no choice but to
savor it for the moment it took Mizuno Ami to check her pulse and pull her
head around to see if her eyes were dilating.
Then Ami whapped Mina (gently) across the ears and shook her head,
asking, "Minako-baka - what are you doing up? Natsuna-san called and told
me you were at the precinct house this afternoon at two o'Clock."
"That's only four hours of sleep, Mina, and you almost died yesterday -
you should be in a hospital bed, not running around planing police actions all
day. Mina, no - you aren't okay, don't say that. You're hurt and exhausted
and strung out and probably malnourished and I don't know what else."
Ami stopped then, and set her shoulders with grim determination before
foraging on with, "You scared me worse than the monster did yesterday when you
passed out, Mina. I'm the one who's training to be a doctor and you're sitting
here and you're going to eat and then I'm going to -drug you- if I have to so
you'll rest."
It was much later - dawning early, in fact - when next Minako stirred
after the rest she had been pressed into. The secret base within Crown was
silent, pervasively so, with only the soft sound of Ami's sleeping breathing
to be heard over the white noise of the computers.
It had only taken the much smaller girl's ability to hold her down to
convince Mina that she had the right of the matter of her needing rest. Minako
felt that she should have been able to break out of that grip - but she had
proved not so.
And, truthfully, the weakness that had haunted her the entire day had
shaken her confidence in her remaining strength, and badly.
The world needed so much..and she had so little left to give. It wasn't
satisfactory that she could not protect everyone as perfectly as she wished, but
her mind reminded her heart that the world was rarely fair.
Ami-chan had gone to lengths to persuade her to take some time to truly
rest, and she had - although not enough, perhaps, to satisfy Ami; She'd grown
restless after another four hour stretch of sleep - all she could manage in one
sitting anymore.
It wasn't going to be enough, and she could tell it now. A step on the
road to recovery left her feeling worse than being near collapse had.
Still, Mina felt as if she were betraying all those who had died and
all those who had survived and now depended on her at once, by resting even
this overlong. As if she were being selfish, putting her own life before
theirs.
She shook her head, clearing the thoughts away. Dwelling was a bad
habit of hers, one that lead swiftly to depression and then she really
would be shirking.
But..
"Maybe," She whispered then, "Maybe I can be selfish..just this once.."
She turned to look at her friend and for a long moment did not move,
only watching.
Had Ami put on some height? Perhaps a little, although Ami would never
be tall. Certainly, her face had changed a little, becoming even more serious,
composed and elegant than it had always been. Open, her eyes would magnify the
effect - Ami's eyes were not those of an innocent anymore.
None of them were.
Minako pulled her thoughts away from that direction again and stilled
her breathing. Her mind was restless, demanding effort, action..focus. It
disliked rest, a habit that had been useful at one time, but was a detriment
just now.
She needed something to do.
And so...
"Selfish." Minako murmured, and studied the palms of her hands, held
before her face for a moment, before deciding - yes. That is what she would do.
In a moment, gold light filled her cupped hands - not the flaring,
searing gold of her attacks, but something softer, less real, less visible.
And with the light was a feeling - echoes of laughter and pain and
rage and joy and desperation and pleasure and something else that tied all
of those together.
She let it build until the unseen power should have been blinding,
if she had focused it into a light that could be seen with the eyes.
Love, after all, was her element. Fickle, difficult to use as a
weapon - in truth, her power within her element rivaled Saturn's, but her
powers were not so readily turned to destruction. Instead, it took long
hours of training and discipline that was foreign to her to master the
techniques of focusing this power into an attack. It could be
destructive, yes, but it was not eager to do so.
Instead..
Minako opened her hands and cast the power wide, soaking it into the
walls, into the floor, through the foundations and the decorations and the
echoes of people who had dwelt here, and with that action, she bid the
power to do.
"Love..this house loves...this girl..this man..these people...
comphort them..."
It was a weaving of golden chains, one echo of a soul to another
to the soul itself; The gold flowed into the crown games - and then out of it,
though the city, touching those who had touched the place; Warriors and normal
children both, it found them where they were, and touched them, bringing with
it a tiny boost of strength and a bit of concern, a tiny inquiry, learning who
they were, where they were, how they were.
And in return, they remembered the things they had liked about the
games, about each other, about the world, and those memories flowed back from
them to her, replenishing what she had spent in it and more.
And in the house, she wove the chains into the floors and the walls and
bound the good memories into them.
This place - come here and have fun, be free, have hope, rest and become
strong again...bring them to this place when they have need, help them when they
come to it..
And this place, where we touch, the bakery across the street..
And this, a park downtown..
And this, a candy shop..
And this person, a proud warrior..
And this, a dear innocent..
And this..
And this..
On and on and on until she could no longer continue, and collapsed on
the floor, spent of strength and brimming with silent, soft gold that wasn't
light and tears that slid silently down her cheeks.
She slept then, without dreams.
Tendou Kasumi's voice seemed to drift away as she began, and Ranma
recognized the tone; This was the voice of someone who had lived the tale,
and must put distance between herself and it before it can be told. For
once - heeding his father's suddenly serious glare of warning - the boy
schooled himself to stay quiet and listen as she spoke.
"Four Years ago. All of what you wish to know began four years ago."
Kasumi considered a moment before continuing, "Four years ago, I was a normal
girl, if you discount keeping house for us here. I knew no sorcery and stood
to inherit the position of head of the household someday - but not soon, Kami
willing."
A look at the hard eyed girl that wasn't a look - merely a tiny shift
of attention and concern that was not returned. Nabiki maintained a control
and stillness that was like Diamond or glass: Hard and sure, but brittle.
"Four years ago my little sister was second in line, and the number
of people she had killed could still be counted on no fingers at all. Four
years ago, the Tendou family would never willingly have associated with
those she nearly commands."
"You do not speak in the presence of the Head of the Tendou Family
now. As a Sorceress bound in service to another, I cannot hold such an honor.
Nabiki has set it aside, to do what she must do. And Akane..."
A moment's hesitation, uncharacteristically troubled in Kasumi's
manner, then and with sudden insight, Ranma realized what Genma did not:
It was not for herself that Kasumi found this story hard to tell.
"Four years ago Akane still loved the practice of the Martial Arts, and
was last. It was unthinkable that she should become the head of household. She
was stubborn and temperamental and undisciplined..not suitable, except to
continue the family style as well as she could, what with father's nerve
wrecked by mother's death."
"The Head of the Tendou Family is sleeping in the other room now, and
she does not practice Martial Arts, although she teaches them. Her skills have
eclipsed father's, but it is a thing she no longer loves."
"Because four years ago, father was still alive." A moment of
composing, then, gathering. Nabiki in contrast to Kasumi's gathering momentum
was a statue of glass, a shard of ice: Brittle, crystalline and nearly radiating
cold.
"It was in that time, the time where this city could still pretend to
be the world our fathers believed existed, that it happened. There were no
warnings that we could see, although I am told by others that the warnings
were writ large for those who could see them. The Veils between heaven and
earth were simply torn asunder, one day."
"It is called black Thursday, now. The day the nightmares walked.
Youma, Akuma, Oni, Kami, spirit folk..all of these and more were thrust
violently into the world, stripped of their illusions and awakened and
Tokyo was given heed that it could no longer pretend to be a city of
mundanity."
"At Furinkan High, it was a massacre. Three Akuma emerged from the
foundations of our school, and forty students died before Nabiki called
home in terror, and then one of them learned.." Here, Kasumi stopped,
briefly and visibly restrained some deeper turmoil. It was as close as either
man at the table had seen to her displaying an honest, unfettered emotion.
"Of the Three Chaos Demons who were freed from the school Grounds, one
learned that there are still Samurai, even in this age, one fled, and one died
at the hands of the Master of Tendou School Unrestricted Grappling."
"As our father, he would not loose. No mortal, with only the Art, can slay a
demon and survive the slaying. I was not there to watch, so I cannot tell you
the truth of what heights he rose that day. Akane was, Saotome-san, though you
will needs be most polite to bring her to speak of it. The Kumo was broken
through its entire body, when he stopped."
"Our father did not live an hour after that, although there was only a
single mark on him. It was not the Demon's claws or Venom that brought him down.
He had simply spent all of his life in the doing of what he did. Your
friend fell..as a hero, as..my father and I -" then the tale stopped and Kasumi
shook her head. "I can no longer speak of it. We should be proud, but all we
have is grief, for he is gone. That is the story you have come here for,
Saotome Genma. All other portions of the tale..how we three sisters came to be
what we are..can wait for morning. I have no more heart for this telling."
And the hard eyed girl spoke into the silence as Genma sat, stone faced
and trembling. "Everything will wait until morning, now. Tomorrow Akane will
try to be ready for her patrol on the edge of the Akuma Relm - you may ask
more questions as she does. I hope," Nabiki continued with a sudden, savage
relish, "She answers them."
There was an anticipation, a hope and a condemning bitter vindictiveness
in the middle sisters sudden glare at the two men that Ranma wasn't sure he
wanted to understand. "Uh..yea. Come on, pops, let's hit the sack.."
Morning sounded like a really good idea to one Ranma Saotome.
Because either these two sisters were crazy enough to believe every word of
Kasumi's admittedly sketchy tale -or, from the conviction in her voice,
Kasumi had told nothing but the complete and utter truth. And he wasn't
sure which option would be the more disturbing.
An Amazon warrior is grace and power and determination personified.
Once she has set her mind on her course, nothing short of the power of god
will turn her aside. So it was in the teachings of the elders, and so, she
had determined, it would be with her.
Xian Pu looked down the side of the mountain she had finally
crossed the summit of and felt the ashen death of the determination and
rage that had been her fuel for the past three weeks.
Her oath had been in the kiss of death: to follow the outsider who
had shattered her victory and her pride to the end of the earth and kill her.
And so she had followed - but she had not killed. And now her oath
was broken.
The outsider had run to a place beyond the ends of the earth. Down
below her was the city of crossroads, sitting the balance between heaven and
hell; The signs of it's presence here were obvious to one who had an
obsession with learning such things from the elders.
Doubly so, for one who had lost an Oathsister to it. Her comrade -
he savior of their tribe from demons, and as powerful a warrior as Xian ever
expected to meet in any lifetime - had gone back to that city, and not come back
out again. Nor had those older warriors who had followed, seeking word of her.
Xian looked upon it and felt..nothing. Powerful emotions moved
through her soul, perhaps, and she could feel their movements, but the
emotions themselves were not felt.
By the law, she had fulfilled her obligations. The outsider had won
her life and her freedom both - and if the redheaded bitch came out of there
alive, Xian couldn't raise a hand against her, under the law.
"<Like Hell in rainstorm, stupid law.>" Her mutter almost sounded like
it was coming from some other person using her voice, as she meditated on the
problem.
The thought of going back with this as the result of her vengeance turned
her stomach. After all the struggle she had gone through to be undefeated -
to finally be showed up by an uncouth stranger - and then to return, unavengend
of that humiliation, with no evidence but her own word that the stranger had
gone to a place no amazon dared follow -
Somewhere in the ashes of the rage that had awakened in her after her
only fall from the challenge log, something stirred, flared, and burst into an
entirely different flame.
It was insane. It was crazy. It was beyond the law. Beyond - but not
against. There was no law forbidding it. It was merely..something that
required more bravery than any amazon needed.
"Xian Po crazy bitch." She muttered in Nihongo, and then turned away.
But she was smiling.
A moments casting about found a gull and a quick leap plucked the
bird from the air.
A quick scribble produced a note, which she tied to it's leg, and a
moments meditation brought the memory of the village to mind, and she fed
the bird the chi of that memory, and bid it carry her message hence.
'The outsider has entered the City of Angels And Devils, beyond the
law of Vengance.
I Will follow for my own law of heart. I will bring back a corpse
or a sister.'
Xian released the bird to take her message home, and strode down
towards the borders of the other world.
She did not look back.
The Archmage of Tokyo stood atop Tokyo Tower and waited. Cloaked
and hooded, face hidden from the world a barrier of cloth expertly sewn and
enchanted to keep out the elements and more and cloaked again in power so
strong that the feel of it was a tangible thing even to those who had no
magic at all, she presented a picture of majesty and power, a splendid and
terrible enchantment.
The rhythmic beeping of her shoes against the iron decking in time
to the raucous J-pop that could be faintly heard from her walkman somewhat
ruined the effect.
Even though it was pink, the color of the cloak did not. Such was
the skill of the garments maker that even such a un-preposeing color could
be made intimidating.
Nothing, however, could make the newest Nike Squeaky-light shoes
anything but silly. The Archmage considered them a well deserved indulgence
and made people who mocked them aware that she could turn them into frogs
with impunity.
One way or another. On particularly vexing weekends, Tomoyo's Koi
pond occasionally gained guests who had learned that if you were obnoxious
enough, she didn't always warn you before amphibianism set in.
The Archmage was many things, but /patient/ wasn't particularly
one of them.
The magical population of Tokyo had long since come to the conclusion
that it could, however, be much worse. The other person who had contested for
the position of Archmage in the days after Black Thursday was much less stable,
and on the whole, they preferred that Kinomoto Sakura with all her not quite
fifteen year old faults to Shirow Kamui, as Archmage.
By the time the rest of the council appeared from nowhere - a practical
tradition, that the Magis council did not -walk- to a council meeting; It made
it impossible to trace their route to prepare an assassination - Sakura was
heartily bored, and so switched to examining the lesser masters of Sorcery in
the city closely, reading faces with what Li-kun called 'careful sight'.
Hiei was the representative of Makai; Sakura didn't think he was very
nice, but she trusted his sister, and knew that where the little Fire Demon
was concerned, that was all that had any importance at all. He looked just
as bored as ever, and gave her shoes beeping a contemptuous look that didn't
spill over into insult -this time.
The other man who might have been Archmage if his will had been
stronger one day long ago was the head of one of what had come to be three
'circles' of Mages in the city: The Burning Heaven Circle that had once been
only his own group. Kamui wasn't present, however. His second had as usual
shown up in his stead. Sakura suspected it was because Kamui knew she could
read him and the hurt he wore everywhere like a walking wound, and so sent
Subaru instead, as the extra polite head of the Sumaregi family was much
harder to read.
The Head of the Heaven Senshi Circle was Hino Rei. She had turned
her face into a porcelain mask as usual. Sakura respected the Senshi of
Mars a lot, but wished she could find her way through the mask to the
fiery temper she knew lurked there with more certainty; Reading
'Mysterious Rei' was a chore at best, and Rei grew more closed off every year.
Youtouji Satsuki on the other hand was all to easy to read: The head
of the steel dream circle, of those who did magic with machines and computers
and ideas - was impatient. Satsuki thought the meetings were a waste of time,
and sometimes Sakura agreed with her, although she did on almost no other points.
There were two more members of the council, and they appeared as was
their favored method - Kanzaki Hitomi in a pillar of blue light, standing for -
and keeping watch on -the mortal mages who clamed no membership in a circle.
The Seer of Mystic Eyes shared a long suffering smile with the Archmage as she
did so, and they waited for the last member to dismount from her usual mode of
transport. Chihiro, well, Sen when on council business representing the heavens,
rode in on her boyfriend - which always delighted Sakura. The young river
dragon's human form wasn't bad to look at one bit, and but he usually
arrived at the council in dragon form, and didn't change out of it, which
was a disappointment to Sakura and a private point of relief to Li Syaoran,
her boyfriend and head of the Li clan of magic users from china.
None of them looked too out of sorts, and the Archmage thought,
privately, that she might just get out of this meeting without gaining a headache of world splitting proportion.
"Hoe...you're all late." And perhaps get a few of her own points back
in teasing from the early days, too.
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