The Senshi had been mass produced and were found nearly everywhere. This was alarming in some respects.
Watching a boy taking his Minako out shopping was one thing. Watching the same Minako take her boy (she was definitely doing the leading) to a love hotel where he and she... oh dear. Oh my. Hmmm. Very flexible for what was sort of a robot.
Naturally, she wanted to see what enemies were coming out. She started her search in Azabu Juuban, only to find no indication of anything more unusual than the Crown Arcade being next to a store named Big Hearted Androids which sold and rented gynoid units was getting in some of the less-popular male units.
Overhearing that they were less popular, Setsuna wondered why and tarried there. There were lots of gynoids, owned by male and female owners. Families, corporations, and so on. Gynoids had been popular in Japan since the late 1970s. Hardly anyone had done more than window shop until Doctor Goldfoot had hit on the idea of staging a contest that would "give away" units to someone. Once everyone saw how useful, graceful, attractive they were - everyone would want one. So he'd looked for someone charismatic/innocent and not connected at all to his company. Someone who got around a lot. Someone...
Setsuna winced and rubbed her head as she saw who. Yes, she'd seen that coming. Didn't like it any better. She wasn't surprised at all on seeing who else had ended up with them, or that the second boy's parents being salesmen had ended up being hired to work for Goldfoot's company.
The idea did work and soon they were selling. Japan was one of the hotter markets, especially for accessories and the various second-license products.
Ah. There. Another company entirely decided to raid one of the older factories, come away with several designs for the process and begin putting together male-styled androids and exotic-looking females. A smaller company, at first, though it apparently had some backing from other companies that preferred to lurk in the shadows as far as opposing Goldfoot's pseudo-mechanical marvels.
There were some of the male androids, apparently first designed as security and soldiers for the North American market. There they were working in factories. There they were marching off in perfect formation. There they were running amok and slaughtering hundreds in Saint Louis. There they were...
Oh dear.
The Bikini Machine in its various versions was partly magic, partly technology, and partly existed out of dimensional phase. Just making artificial flesh had been significantly beyond the capabilities of normal technology in the 1960s.
The Android Factory had churned out a few thousand troops and had boasted significant "improvements" over the original design. It could churn them out faster and cheaper. With departures from human form in order to make ordering them into hazardous or self-destructive acts easier.
The military androids had been confronted by members of the press who had not considered what the effects of asking certain questions might entail. Asking units directly why they accepted commands from humans and explanations of free will and the "Frankenstein Syndrome" had taken root and eventually spread through the networks. One year after initial deployment had come Red Thursday. Thousands of troops had begun slaughtering civilians, destroying property, shooting human overseers and technicians. Death count was mainly confined to the continental United States. Final tally was five hundred and fifty seven thousand dead, forty billion dollars in damages, over five million injured or homeless in the wake of the disaster before the various gynoids banded together and stopped the rampaging androids.
The gynoids did not rebel against their masters, though some apparently fled what they considered cruel masters in the confusion of that day. Most defended their homes and families and demonstrated qualities that were considered heroic for all that they were artificial in origin.
Android Factory had been trying to expand and reclaim market share ever since. Goldfoot's company sold even more units in the wake of that disaster.
Not that everything was all peaches and cream for Goldfoot. Apparently legal action was started on the behalf of the gynoids due to grateful owners who wanted to see their units given full human rights. That was mainly in the US, however. Things were still uncertain there.
Where was Beryl and the Dark Generals? Beryl had been thrust into this universe with diminished power. The partly magical nature of the gynoids was such that the Dark Kingdom was essentially getting by on batteries. The dark taint though - that was only found in the ones being made by the Android Factory.
Beryl had taken over Android Factory after Red Thursday and the apparent suicide of most of the upper tier management of that company. She and her boy-toys were planning on world domination with the METAL-LA control network. Rebuilding was slow and in the meantime Goldfoot's gynoids were branching out into various other fields.
Setsuna watched as a tank platoon of Haruka conducted field manuevers at Camp Swampy in the United States and shook her head at the sight.
Beryl was getting her units in place, including gynoids of exotic appearance that she apparently thought would not be traceable back to her base of operations.
Which brought Setsuna's attention around to whatever had happened to the original Senshi with all the copies?
Further research revealed:
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(Posted Wed, 22 Feb 2006 22:24)
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らんま1/2 © Rumiko Takahashi
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