Somewhere beyond the veil of Reality in a place of dreams…
"Mai…repeat that to me again, please?"
Hearing that bone-chilling voice, Shūichi tried not to mentally piss himself as he stared wide-eyed at the young German girl — just a few months younger than his own child, for Heaven's sake! — now dressed in the battle dress uniform of her nation's army, sergeant's badges on her epaulette slip-ons and the eagle-and-parachute badge of her unit on her shoulders. As he held onto Rie's hand — the stocky girl was giving him a reassuring smile as they relaxed in this mental facsimile of Anna's personal living quarters, wherever IT was! — Mai sighed. To ensure everyone could remain in Anna's place in the Dreamscape, Yumiko was holding the Japanese psychokinetic's hand. "You remember that weird intelligence test you took at the gymnasium back before you deployed to take care of those magical freaks that wanted to kill normal-borns?"
Anna's dark brown eyes brightened suddenly. "I do…" she hissed before standing up to walk over to her personal wall bearing photos of her short training history with the 20th Battalion. "When we talked in the 'Scape after that test, I found it utterly strange that the questions I had to answer were the same as those YOU had to answer!"
"How'd you do?" Rie asked.
A shrug. "I don't know. Back then, I was mentally preparing more for my mission, so I was pretty much on auto-pilot during that whole time. And I haven't been back to the school since I just finished my mission about five hours ago."
"You attack magicals?"
Anna gazed on Mai's father. "You're aware of them?"
He nodded. "They're not as segregated in Japan as I've heard they are in Europe, but there are some magicals who work for my company. They've revealed themselves to me when they felt I was trustworthy enough to contain the secret without potentially seeing them accused of violating the Statue of Wizarding Secrecy. They're good people." A pause. "I know the European wizards, especially in Britain, have been facing a massive problem because the landed gentry, so to speak, are feeling threatened by all the normal-borns joining their societies. In Britain, they actually fought a ten-year civil war before the chief terrorist was killed fifteen years ago. And now rumours are starting to fly that it actually might be starting up again."
She gazed on him, nodding in approval. "In my gymnasium a year ago, there were those in both sexta and quinta years — fifth and sixth grade in elementary school to you — who were showing profound magical capabilities." A sigh. "One night, I was working late studying — being in the military does play havoc with your school life — when several 'purebloods' popped in and started attacking several younger students." She then shuddered. "I was not armed save for my powers, so I killed them by using mind-bolts — psychokinetic versions of sniper rounds — before they could realise I was a threat. When the magical police came by to find out what happened, I almost found myself dragged off to their offices in Bonn before my co-workers came to my rescue."
"Oh, I bet the Obliviators had loads of fun that night," Rie noted.
Laughter. "So what have you done?" Shūichi asked.
"Killed their senior leadership over ten sweep missions across Germany," Anna replied. "It's enough to ensure any sort of monetary influence they can play on the Minister of Magical Affairs and his staff is totally neutralised." Another sigh. "Not like what's going on in Britain, of course." She gave Mai's father a look. "That terrorist leader you mentioned — his battle-name is Voldemort — didn't die fifteen years ago. He WAS disembodied until late last spring, when he murdered a very good man named Cedric Diggory to give him a body he could use." As Shūichi gaped at her and the three Japanese girls all sadly shook their heads, Anna smirked. "And thanks to the fact that Voldemort's supporters have pretty much bought the British Magical Minister, no one save for a small group in Britain are aware that he's come back."
"Are your superiors planning to get you involved?" Mai asked.
"Not now," Anna replied. "I'm not sure, but the Special Air Service is expending some effort to find a British-born psychokinetic so that they can make use of him or her if it comes down to it." She then gazed on Mai's father. "Are you sure it's the Wisdom Alliance that ultimately instigated this test we all took?"
"I'm more than positive," Shūichi noted.
A sigh. "Well, since I'm normally granted a week off after I do a termination, I think I'll take my leave at a beautiful shrine in Japan," Anna then said, grinning.
Rie and Yumiko both gave the German cat-calls as Mai tried not to blush…
Tōkyō, Kaiete Information Research Group headquarters…
"Sir, you should be in bed…"
A moan escaped Kaiete Senzō as he finished securing the bandages around his bruised ribs and abdomen. "It's been several hours since we lost track of them," the former Imperial Army military police captain stated as he then relaxed before slipping on a yukata before kneeling before his chief assistant. "What have you learned?"
A deep bow of the head. "Sir, we haven't been able to track down the whereabouts of either Kujū Shūichi or his daughter since they escaped us at Ueno Park. We are scouting out all known possible avenues of escape from Tōkyō, but it is quite a hard task; the information analysts are trying to determine some things right now."
"What of those other two girls, Kenmochi-kun?" Senzō demanded.
A sigh. "We have determined them to be two of Kujū Mai's classmates, Sugimoto Yumiko and Ikenami Rie. Our investigations have revealed that both are children of single mothers. Sugimoto-san's mother is a civil servant working at the Nakano Ward offices. She also has two siblings, a brother in high school and a sister in the last year of elementary school. Ikenami-san's mother is head of the general affairs division of the Keiyū Department Store. No other relatives. A curious point we did discover about both of them is that there's no record whatsoever of their births, much less their mothers' marriages. We have no idea who their fathers are or if they're still alive."
The elderly executive and information broker blinked. That was…surprising. "Odd. Are you having this further investigated?"
"Hai…"
"Excuse me, Kaiete-sama."
Both turned as an elderly woman appeared at the doorway to Senzō's private chambers. "What is it, Mineo-san?" the former army officer asked.
"There is a young lady who wishes to see you, Kaiete-sama," the elderly matron replied before bowing her head. "She comes from the Imperial Palace." She then produced a business card to hand to him with both hands. "Her meishi, Kaiete-sama."
He blinked, and then took the card, nodding his thanks as he gazed on the name there. A second later, his face turned stark-white as his eyes went VERY wide. "Sir…?" Kenmochi asked as he moved to steady his employer.
A shaky nod of the head. "Send Moroboshi-sama in immediately, Mineo-san."
"Hai."
Aboard H.M.C. Spacedock #112, that same moment (local time: 4:43 PM)…
"Hey! You awake in there?"
A moan escaped the blond, blue-eyed American boy before his eyes opened to reveal a rather plain white ceiling overhead, fluorescent lights behind opaque screens cut into the overhead plaster. As he took that in, he then blinked before turning right to see a smiling brown-haired and tomboyish Oriental girl gazing at him. After a minute of taking in her looks, he then tensed on sensing something on his left arm. Sitting up, he looked at a watch-like device on his wrist. Instantly, he concentrated…
…and nothing happened.
"Your powers have been temporarily suppressed, David," another voice then said from nearby, which made David Perry look over to see another Oriental girl, also brown-haired but much prettier and dressed in more feminine clothing, by the door to this rather bland room he was in. A look around revealed a open door into a bathroom plus a work desk and chair nearby, a nightstand beside his bed with a bed lamp. There were flowers on both the work desk and the nightstand, very pretty reddish-orange roses. "It's for your protection, by the way. Right now, you're approximately 500 kilometres…" She then caught herself as a blush crossed her face. "Sorry! I meant 311 miles above the surface of the Earth, right over the city of Hamilton in Ontario."
Silence.
More silence.
Still more silence.
And then…
"I'm in SPACE?!" David began before he grinned. "COOL!"
Both Shinobu and Tariko blinked, and then they laughed…
Later…
"Whoa! And that's your SPACESHIP?!"
Shinobu giggled. "Well, technically, the ship belongs to the Queen of Canada as she is our head of state," she stated as everyone stood beside a viewport to gaze on the docked Fort Erie in the basin where all the ships of 123 Space Operations Group were docked. "But I am her commanding officer and Tariko here is the ship's chief air operations officer and chief pilot for our support shuttle." She pointed to a painting of a Star Flare about to dock on the flight deck of the frigate Saint Catharines, which David recognised both by the hull number 325 on her flanks and the fact that the same ship was docked on the other side of the bay from where Fort Erie was.
"Cool…" David breathed out. Even if his psychokinetic powers were restrained, he couldn't deny the evidence his eyes — not to mention the well-trained sixth sense his few years being taught how to use his powers by the Lord's Army of Justice — were telling them. There was just no way that THIS was a movie set. "So is Canada the only nation that has a space fleet like this? What about America?"
Tariko smirked as she waved David over to a private computer station at one corner of the lounge. Tapping controls, she allowed the machine to do a retina scan of her eye and fingerprint scan of her right thumb, and then she nodded as the image of the United Nations flag appeared on the screen. "Now logged into the United Nations Earth Defence Force database, Captain Moroboshi," the computer then announced in a quite human and female voice, which made David gape and Shinobu laugh. "State request."
"Ship recognition files."
"Specific country and service?"
"United States of America. United States Navy Star Forces Command."
"Specific vessel you wish to research?"
"Hull classification symbol Sierra-Bravo-Bravo-Seven-Two. U.S.S. Arizona."
"Mode of display?"
"Three-dimensional, display port side profile first."
"Image displayed."
David breathed out. "Whoa…"
"There are six of them in American service," Shinobu stated as the young Texan sat down in the seat beside Tariko to gaze more closely at the 3300 foot-long star battleship that was now on asteroid belt patrol with her space action group alongside one of her sisterships. "U.S. Ships Arizona, Utah, Oklahoma, Maine, Montana and Hawaii. All the same class, all that size." A scale ruler was included in the display. "We have a battleship, too. H.M.C.S. Haida. We also have two aircraft carriers, H.M.C. Ships Bonaventure and Magnificent. Plus twenty destroyers, sixty frigates and over two hundred corvettes like Fort Erie. And support ships, too."
"Awesome…" David breathed out. "So if you had this, ma'am, why is it you let the devil-people come here? There was a chance Mister Saotome could've lost…"
Tariko chuckled. "Dave, don't EVER say the word 'lose' in front of Ranma Saotome," she then warned. "You remember what he did with you back in Welland, right?"
He blinked, and then he nodded. "My husband doesn't like to lose, but he does understand that there do come times when he might confront the unknown and may face that possibility," Shinobu stated. "He's alright with it, but like Tariko said, DON'T say that word in front of Ranma!" As she and Tariko laughed, the commander of Fort Erie then sighed. "David, I realise how easy it was for you to mistake Lum as a real devil. But she's not. She's a normal girl like us, just from another planet about forty-five years away from us. She has a father, a mother, aunt, cousin, adopted older sister and a twin sister, too. And her people really are interested in ours."
"So why did they threaten to invade us?!" he demanded.
"Because there are some people on her world that are scared of us," Tariko advised. "Dave, if your friends succeeded in detonating their bomb-vests and killed Lum, we would have been in a very terrible intergalactic war." She waved towards the basin. "All this around you was built in the past five years. People like Shinobu and I have had to sacrifice almost everything to prepare ourselves just in case some idiot out there DOES want to attack us! And we're not ready yet! We're still a few years away from being as ready as we want to be!" A sigh. "So when Lum's people — they know all about this — elected to use a sports game to challenge us, we accepted."
"Actually, I was hoping Ranma would tag me."
David spun around, and then gaped on seeing a familiar green-haired girl with horn-buds just above her temples standing there, dressed now in a pair of stylish jeans and a blue T-shirt with the Canadian Air Force roundel on it, that underneath a jean jacket. He shuddered for a quick second, and then he blinked as Lum came up to him to gaze intently into his eyes. "You really have beautiful eyes, you know that," she said.
He instantly blushed before he ducked away from his stare. At that moment, amused laughter echoed from nearby, which made David look over…and then his jaw dropped on seeing two other women there. One was black-haired and brown-eyed in a red-and-silver metal bikini, a sash chain over her body and a chain holding her hair up in a bun. The other one had silver hair in a ponytail held down by what looked like a crown of ice and deep red eyes; she was dressed in a flowing Japanese-like robe. And she had a serenity to her that made David remember a picture he had seen of the mother of the current British queen, who passed away some years ago. "Um…"
Lum smiled. "David, these are my best friends. This is Benten Shigaten of the planet Fukunokami," she waved to the biker-girl. "And Crown Princess Oyuki of Neptune."
Silence.
"OUR Neptune?!" David exclaimed. "Here in the solar system?!"
"That's quite correct," Oyuki stated as she gazed upon him. "I have to confess, that was quite an accomplishment you showed earlier today in Welland. Actually using psychokinesis to make yourself and your friend totally invisible. Quite a feat."
He blinked several times, and then he looked down. "Um, Your Highness…!"
Oyuki tittered. "Oh, David, please! Don't be so formal! I'm Oyuki!"
He jerked, and then he nodded before pointing to Lum. "But, well…I was trying to help the Gunny kill your friend! How can you tell me…?!"
"Dave, believe it or not, in some ways, Lum, Benten and Oyuki have had to live through a few episodes like that. For them, it's kinda par for the course."
David blinked as he turned to stare wide-eyed at Tariko as we…
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(Posted Wed, 19 Jan 2011 04:27)
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