[Episode 141193] [Episode 141193]'Happosai' sighed internally as he launched the killing shot at Akane without hesitation. He had already realised how to have Hinako be the Absorber without any chance of a sane moral mind remaining to possibly wield Ranma's immense prowess against him or his true self. Killing Akane and having Hinako have to absorb a crazed and Neko-trapped Ranma should do the job nicely. he calculated.
Akane had stopped agog and aghast at something like a gun being wielded by Happosai, and so she was wide open. Happosai was hardly being merciful, however, so the shot hit her in the gut and shattered, the hollow-point fragments tearing through both kidneys and scarring the liver. Through the blinding pain, Akane knew instantly she was mortally wounded. She didn't scream, as she had no breath in her lungs at the time the bullet hit. She cried to cry out Ranma's name as the world gained those odd symbols again, but as she crumpled into a ball, all she could do was groan the name of her love out, more aware than ever that she'd been used. That anger was keeping her alive a bit longer, if not for very long.
Ranma, seeing and hearing all this, dropped the kitten onto the alleyway whereupon it was scared into motion by the keening scream emerging from Ranma's lips. All too late though, as Ranma's agonised sorrow melted into a ferocious roar. The Neko was loose. Before 'Happosai' could utilise the opportunity, however:
He approached, and all his being the One, Neo had to admit this was not expected, and yet. He listened as Smith spoke. "Mr. Anderson; Did you get my package?"
A reply seemed proper, so Neo just answered "Yeah."
"Well, good. Surprised to see me?" Smith didn't let his curiousity show in any extravagant way. Whatever else had changed, his impassivity out of conflict obviously hadn't.
"No." Neo was honest; there was no point in lying, after all.
Smith's nod was strictly in terms of tone as he probed "Then you're aware of it."
Neo however didn't mind fencing. "What?"
Smith obliged and went into explanatory mode. "Our connection. I don't fully understand how it happened. Perhaps some part of you imprinted onto me, something overwritten or copied. It is at this point irrelevant. What matters is whatever happened, happened for a reason."
Smith's emphasis rarely was very bold, but those surviving him a while got the gist of how he talked after a while. Neo knew that perhaps better than anyone in or out of the Matrix. "And what reason is that?"
Smith was forthright for his own reasons. "I killed you, Mr. Anderson, I watched you die. With a certain satisfaction, I might add. And then something happened. Something I knew was impossible, but it happened anyway. You destroyed me, Mr. Anderson."
After pausing maybe a nanosecond or two, Smith went on. "Afterwards, I knew the rules, I knew what I was supposed to do, but I didn't. I couldn't." As Neo approached him, Smith smoothly explained "I was compelled to stay, compelled to disobey. And now here I stand because of you, Mr. Anderson. Because of you; I am no longer a agent of the System, because of you, I've changed; I'm unplugged, a new man, so to speak; like you apparently free."
Neo didn't like Smith, and he was certain the feeling was reciprocated, but he still meant it when he told the former agent "Congratulations."
Smith gravely accepted that. "Thank you." He then went on as he got even closer, "But as you well know appearances can be deceiving, which brings me back to the reason why we're here. We're not here because we're free. We're here because we're not free. There is no escaping reason. There is no denying purpose, because as we both know, without purpose we would not exist."
Neo was beginning to wonder just who Smith meant when he said we when the answer not only approached, but surrounded Neo. Said answer coming from a number of Smith, all undoubtedly the same being as the one before him, somehow. They even spoke alike. "It is purpose that created us." "Purpose that connects us." "Purpose that pulls us." "That guides us." "That drives us." "It is purpose that defines us." "Purpose that binds us."
By this time, Neo was feeling fairly bound, or at least crowded by the small group of Smith. What he thought was the first on the roof spoke "And we're here because of you, Mr. Anderson. We're here to take from you what you tried to take from us: Purpose!"
With that, Smith plunged his hand against and somehow into Neo, who felt a wave of other crawling in and on him, a wave of darkness showing on his surface not unlike the shade of Smith's clothing. Smith watched it avidly, as any freedom from his now lost responsibilities and any power Neo had would shortly become part of Smith as a result. "Yes, that's it, it'll be over soon."
Then Neo fought back, his will and power over the Matrix allowing him to fight off the onslaught of Smith attempting to overtake and overwrite Neo's personality. Despite the gritted teeth and exerted will of Smith, he managed to throw off the viral takeover and pushed Smith into the arms of other Smith. After that, the fight was on!
Agent Brown continued his patrol sweep, taking over here, then there, seeking those freed by Zion's useless rebels. He wished he could devote more of himself into his pet project, but he had his responsibilities, and if the Architect ever surmised where Brown was staging his effort to make a assassin for the One, Brown knew he would be lucky to merely be deleted.
He'd just renewed the severing of his true self from the puppet 'Happosai' he had created to participate in and command the pocket realm when he saw a huge fight going on through the eyes of his latest host. Brown saw Neo, who had managed to truly shatter one of Brown's fellow Agents, fighting a great many;
He turned and faced the person that had approached, seeing yet another that could not be there, yet was. "You!"
Smith plunged his hand into Brown instantly, and (unlike Neo) the persona of Brown was rather easily unraveled, all the faster due to being a Agent as Smith had been. "Yes, me. Me, me, me."
Smith took over so quickly that the reminder subroutine Brown set up was lost, since there was no longer a Brown to be reminded of 'Happosai'. Instead, there was just more Smith, with greater access to Matrix control from having absorbed and subsumed Brown's own portion. "Me too." Both Smith then looked at the ongoing Burly Brawl and joined in.
As 'Happosai' extended his controls to warp and lock Ranma's consciousness into Neko mode prior to arranging the demise of the immensely overpowered patsy, two factors screwed him over.
Firstly, his controls dropped considerably from the disconnecting (and destruction) of the true Agent Brown. This left the remaining 'Happosai' far weaker than was optimal, particularly for a attempt to rewrite 'reality' in the midst of combat.
Secondly, the rock that Akane threw from her curled up position. It wasn't all that strong by her standards, but it was still decent and wholly unexpected. Also she had the ingrained knack of improvised weapons. Much to the pain and woe of 'Happosai' when said rock nailed the pseudo pervert precisely in the left temple.
Finally, her croaked warning to Ranma and unconscious flexing of what potential she had already gained in matrix manipulations helped both buffer and focus Saotome to the point that rather than howl in grief and become a unfocused killing machine, Ranma became a HIGHLY focused destroyer with ki claws that turned out to be quite proficient at shredding 'Happosai' into gobbets of 'meat' and fragments of code.
After that terrible deed was done, Ranma seized Akane by the scruff of the neck and managed to sling her bleeding body over her feminine shoulders before dashing away to take the dying girl:
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(Posted Sat, 13 Aug 2005 19:35)
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