"What do you need to know that information for?" the observer demanded.
"It would be useful to know how much ammunition will be needed," Leon said.
"You don't actually plan to go into that maze, do you?" the technician demanded. "You don't understand what's going on here!"
"Certainly they do," the observer said. "They're probably at the cause of this fiasco, as I have said already."
"I at least probably do understand what is occuring better than you do," Cologne said. "Though you probably have more in the way of specific information. We would like descriptions as to what you have seen so far, capabilities and habits especially. So, if you would be so kind as to answer Miss Valentine's question..."
"Ahh!!" Nabiki gasped as she paused in filtering through the operable cameras.
The monitor revealed what on the surface appeared to be Kasumi Tendo sitting calmly in the center of many milling forms, obviously the walking dead.
"That's my sister," Nabiki snapped.
"Not anymore, Miss Tendo," Jill said turning to look at the screen and feeling a little ill at the unusual attitude taken by the zombies on the screens. "That's just a thing. Your sister isn't there anymore."
"That one...she's the worst of them," William said. "She calls herself the Queen of the Dead."
"'She' calls 'herself'?" Carlos repeated. "It talks?"
"Kasumi would never..." Nabiki said.
"Your American friend probably has the right of it," Cologne said in as comforting a tone as she could. "That isn't Kasumi any longer. It merely looks like her."
"We keep trying to explain matters," Genma said. "These aren't animated bodies and animalistic mutations anymore. These are true demons we face now."
"Your lot have taken up religion then?" the observer asked. Nabiki stood up from her console and slammed her fist into the man's face.
Streaming off in a hail of Japanese obscenities ending in a "Fuck you!" highly accented by anger and grief.
"Hold off, Miss Tendo," Leon said, grabbing her and pulling her away from the man. "That won't do any good...just see what else you can find, we'll deal with him later."
"What?" she demanded. "In a court? Where they can bring money to pay the bill?"
"Just look for any information in their computers that will be useful," Leon said putting her back into her seat. "Don't lose your edge now."
Nabiki returned to that activity with a collection of muttered Japanese curses.
"Well, Umbrella succeeded in creating a monster that can think," Carlos said to Jill.
"I'm not sure this is what they were talking about," Jill said, watching the collected images of the monsters, working as groups. "What are they looking for?"
"The King of Hell," William said. Everybody looked at him. "That's what the techicians call this Tyrant."
"It's Mousse," Nabiki said harshly. "There's no file on what he looks like now. But the file indicates that they did too much damage on him for him to survive...so instead of making him a 'counter' they made him a 'Tyrant' as you call it." She glared death at the observer.
"Ah," Cologne said. "That must be what started it. The Jusenkyo curse Mousse carried."
"Curses and demons," the observer noted. "You STARS fools have gone insane."
"Wait," Genma said. "Go back one screen."
"It was just a..." Carlos paused. "Jill look at this...they're tending to one of their wounded."
"Akane..." Nabiki said. "That big one is Akane." She fidgetted around with the keys a bit and pulled a schematic up to denote where the monitor was viewing. "Sound is off."
She switched it on and a horrendous howling sound came through the speakers before she cut it off.
"What was that?" Leon asked.
"We don't know," the technician said sheepishly.
Nabiki growled at him and opend the monitors for the space beyond the door the counters were currently pausing at. She saw a large body of water and frowned suspiciously until she caught sight of some ripples in the water. And glimpses of something...large briefly breaking the surface.
"Do you have intercoms?" Nabiki snapped angrily.
Read the comments on this episode
See other episodes by Thrythlind
(Posted Wed, 09 Apr 2003 18:21)
Questions? Problems? Suggestions?
Send a mail to addventure@bast-enterprises.de
or use the contact form.
らんま1/2 © Rumiko Takahashi
All other series and their characters are © by their respective creators or owners. No claims of ownership of these characters are implied by the authors of this Addventure, or should be inferred.
The Anime Addventure is a non-profit site.