"Yo!"
People turned to look as the woman in the grey jumpsuit with the white lemniscate insignia on a rather slender teenage chest appeared out of the darkness, and then Rampage walked over, holding up her right arm in something similar to a Nazi salute, though the hand itself was held vertical to the ground. "Yo!"
Pause.
"Ah! Jessica-chan! Elizabeth-chan! Winston-kun! O-ha!"
The Academician and Lightmage chuckled. "How are you, Ayumu?" the former then asked as the newcomer lowered her arm. "I assume that when Professor Wyszynski came by…"
"Yeah! My memories came back when Ataru-kun stabbed himself with a soulsword right into his head!" the woman born Kasuga Ayumu — now the twenty-sixth incarnation of the Goddess Who Walked Amongst Men, Infinity — stated as she waved her hand in a "so-so" motion. "You would'a probably remembered it sooner or later…"
"Probably by this time tomorrow, everyone who WAS affected by what happened to Ataru WILL remember what's going on," Lightmage then said as he exchanged a high-five with the most powerful of all Yizibajohei. "And once that happens…"
"They'll be probably beating down the MIB's doors to find out who it was that mucked up Ataru's brain," Rampage finished for his classmate. "So how long did you know about him, Ōsaka?" she then demanded as she thumbed Lightmage, glaring at Infinity.
A smirk. "Jessica-chan, I don't go blurting out people's secrets like that!"
"Oh?"
"They're not hearing the names," the Academician assured her sister, keeping her voice down. "Ayumu put up a probability field around us to prevent them from listening in."
Rampage blinked, and then she nodded, a sense of relief flooding her. While she certainly didn't have problems with magicals — yes, they were SO retro in things, but they were okay people…except for the natural heels like Voldemort, Baron Mordo or Felix Faust — she certainly didn't want them to know her real name. After all, heels on Earth had this ugly habit of trying to target a face's relatives and loved ones just to provoke a fight scene. And there was NO WAY IN HELL that Rampage was going to tolerate anyone putting her parents or her brother Steven in the hurt locker! No, sir! "Well, that's a relief," she mused, glancing out of the corner of her eye to see that the local mages — and Dumbledore, who had stepped back to give them some privacy; Thank God for English good manners! the younger Wakefield sister mused — were now whispering excitedly to each other as they gazed on Infinity. "Where are the others?"
"Oh, Kagura-chan's already gone ahead to look in on Ataru-kun's house," Infinity answered. "Chiyo-chan's gone with her. Tomo-chan's chomping at the bit to start a fight scene; Yomi-chan's working overtime to keep her calm!" Everyone snickered at that; trying to keep Takino Tomo — the Wild Warrior of Passion, Warwind — calm was a full-time job for the current incarnation of the Mistress of the Mind-Dive, Soul Searcher (born as Tomo's childhood best friend Mizuhara Koyomi). "Sakaki-chan's gone off to meet Kotatsuneko-kun; Kaori-chan's with her. And Yukari-sensei and Nyamo-sensei are moving to get Ataru-kun transferred out of Tomobiki High School right now."
The others nodded. "We should get him transferred to Sweet Valley High," Rampage then mused. "The guy's English is natural; he'll fit in perfectly there."
The Academician glared at her. "So you can drag in every other girl who wants to sleep with Ataru and start fight scenes all over town, Jess?! You KNOW how much Ataru hates it whenever girls fight over him! It makes him cry!"
Rampage jerked. "Still…"
"Don't worry, Jessica-chan!" Infinity said. "I'll share him with'cha!"
"HEY!"
"My gods! Do you SENSE the power that one possesses?!" Kataragi breathed out.
"That girl makes even Doctor Strange look like a mere babe!" Akashi hissed.
"She is that…" Dumbledore breathed out.
The other mages all blinked; the headmaster of Hogwarts seemed quite calm. "Albus, is this girl ever loses control of THAT level of power…!" Takahata warned.
"Takamichi, you need to look at her with a more empathic eye," Dumbledore advised the younger man. "Yes, I will not dispute that this young lady is indeed the equivalent of what Miss Rampage called her: 'The Goddess Who Walks Amongst Men.' But underneath all that cosmic-level power, there is a very normal girl — with a unique viewpoint on all things, I confess — that would never hurt a fly if she could avoid it."
"I'm glad I'm not the only one who can see that."
Everyone perked, and then they turned as two people stepped out from the darkness thanks to two large alien mushrooms that had grown out of the street at the edge of the containment zone the Kantō Magical Association had erected around Tomobiki six days before. "Stephen! Zatanna! How are you two?!" Dumbledore stated as he walked over, hand out to grasp that of Earth's Sorcerer Supreme, Doctor Stephen Strange…and then he delivered a courtly kiss to the hand of Zatanna Zatara, the resident magical heroine of the Justice League of America. "Don't tell me this event…"
"Is well-contained, Albus," Strange assured him as he nodded greetings to the Japanese mages nearby, all of whom bowed respectfully to the Heir of the Ancient One. "I must confess, that mystical illusion field our hosts used to blind the aliens as to the limited effect of the fungal plague on Earth is quite a feat of magic. Well done to whoever did that." He then smiled as Sister Shakti blushed at the complement the former surgeon just gave. "I do confess to a little professional curiosity."
"We both have felt her from time to time," Zatanna added as she gazed on Infinity, who was chatting a mile a minute to the other American-born metas nearby. "She's not the only reality-warper that's appeared on Earth quite recently. There's another one who lives in Hyōgo Prefecture close to Kōbe. That place is a massive metaphysical mess of warped and looping alternate realities and odd probabilities…" She shuddered. "I was tempted to try to fix it up, but the energy bleeding from that girl…"
"Is quite intense," Strange finished for the daughter of Giovanni Zatara.
"Oh, dear…" Dumbledore breathed out.
"Don't worry about it, Kōchō-sensei."
Everyone turned as Infinity came up. "What do you mean?" Dumbledore asked.
"Weaver-chan — that's her battle-name — woke up to her memories the same time I did," the transformed Kasuga Ayumu assured him. "She told me she needed to spend some time cleaning that mess she was made to make when she forgot Ataru-kun. It'll be okay by morning." A sigh. "She'll probably have to take a day off school, though…"
"It's Saturday," the Academician stated. "Actually, it's Sunday here. Day off."
"Oh! That's good!" Infinity breathed out.
Zatanna tried not to giggle at the sight of a being — like Strange, she had a pretty good idea what Infinity truthfully was — being so concerned about something so mundane as attending school…even if this living goddess-in-mortal flesh was clearly a high school student herself! As Strange gave her a knowing look, Dumbledore then hummed. "Madame Infinity, you mentioned some friends came with you…"
Infinity perked, and then she smiled. "Oh, yeah! They're all my classmates — and two of my teachers — from school. They're okay, Kōchō-sensei."
"But given your obvious connections to Ataru — and certainly keeping in mind Miss Rampage's more than platonic interest in him — what will they do to our visitors from abroad?" With that, Dumbledore nodded up to the Oni cruiser hovering over Tomobiki.
"That is a very good question."
The Academician, her sister and Lightmage came up to join them. "What does that mean?" Takahata then asked. "If you launch an attack on them…"
"It will provoke what we Yizibajohei always call a 'fight scene,' which I'm sure you're all quite familiar with when it comes to metahuman battles," the transformed Elizabeth Wakefield stated. "Such could unleash a lot of unnecessary destruction — with all sorts of collateral damage and innocent casualties — if it got out of control."
"There is the other aspect of it," Lightmage stated.
"What do you mean?" Strange wondered.
"The FEAR other races — especially those races that live close to Yiziba — have when it comes people such as us, Doctor," the transformed Winston Egbert explained. "Have you ever travelled to planets closed to us before?" As both the Sorcerer Supreme and the resident magical of the Justice League nodded, Lightmage then asked, "Have you ever heard any alien speak of the 'You Know Whos' or 'They Who Must Never Be Named?' Usually in very hushed tones? As if even THINKING of them was a curse?"
"Several times," Zatanna admitted…and then her blue-grey eyes went wide. "You?"
"Our adopted race, Ms. Zatara," the Academician nodded. "Over two centuries ago, the then-Urusian Empire tried to conquer Yiziba. My sister's past-self, the fifteenth Rampage, was the elected champion for our world. Unfortunately, the Oni never did their homework about our people. Said tag race ended in 7.72 seconds." As the mages all gaped, the woman born Elizabeth Wakefield added, "When he realised that his attempt at conquering the planet had spectacularly failed, the Oni commander decided to invade anyway! And since our predecessors had taken well to the sportsman-like attitude the Oni had shown to date, that they turned around and planned to do THAT…" A shake of the head.
"How bad?" Takahata asked.
"The Mother of All Fight Scenes."
Silence.
"How bad…is that?" Zatanna hesitantly asked.
The Academician sighed. "Remember the fight between Superman and Doomsday?"
"Yes," Strange stated as the other mages nodded.
"Consider that on a PLANETARY scale, Doctor. WITH the casualties."
A terrible chill flooded everyone else present…
Meanwhile…
"I wish I never had him…" Click! "I wish I never had him…" Click!
"Chiyo-chan, can you PLEASE shut that damned thing up?!"
"I wish I never had him…" Click! "I wish I never had him…" Click!
"Hai, Kagura-san!"
"I wish I never…"
Beep!
Hearing blissful silence from the Life Model Decoy that had been constructed in the image of Moroboshi Kinshō — who had died alongside her husband thanks to one of the girls who had gained a Gift thanks to Moroboshi Ataru — the teenage woman born as Kagura Michiko who now lived as the current incarnation of the Deadliest Woman Alive, Caltrop, breathed out in relief. "About damn time!" the girl in the urban camouflage combat suit snarled as she moved to rifle through the refrigerator of the Moroboshi home for something to snack on. "Who the fuck was behind all this, anyway?!"
"I don't know, but I'll take them to my laboratory and check their programming out before I dismantle them," the pre-teen born Mihama Chiyo — the present incarnation of the Child Genius of the Young Guns, now calling herself Prodigy — stated as she gazed with disapproval at the still forms of the American-built androids that had been impersonating Moroboshi Ataru's dead parents for over a year, since a month or so before the first encounter with the Oni. "That's disgusting!" she hissed.
"What do you mean?" Caltrop asked.
"Can't you feel the necromantic energies here, Michiko-san?!" Prodigy demanded. "Whoever programmed these two layered them in so much magic, it's no wonder that people thought they were Ataru-san's parents! Not even the Oni could detect this!"
"Should we get Sarah-chan?"
A sigh. "Maybe we should," the young genius of Azuma High School breathed out; Sarah McDougal, the California-born adopted daughter of a Tōkyō University archaeologist, was the current incarnation of Prodigy's fellow Young Gun Cadaverine, the Mistress of the Grave. "It was bad enough that Margo-san killed them, but to BRING THEM BACK…!"
"Fuck!" a strange voice then called out. "This place fuckin' REEKS!"
Both visitors from Nagato Ward perked. "Ryū-chan?!" Caltrop called out.
"Yeah, it's me," came the current incarnation of the Huntress of the Wild, Carcajou…now living as Fujinami Ryūnosuke, the only known Tomobiki resident to have received a Gift thanks to Moroboshi Ataru (even if technically, she had been living at the north end of the Kujūkuri Beach when she had first met him after her seventh birthday, then had been taken to Yiziba to get her Gift). As she came in — wearing her Tomobiki High School gakuran, both Azuma High sophomores were quick to note — the woman who could use her life energy to create deadly ki claws from her fingertips was scowling as she glared for a moment at the still forms of what others would mistake to be Ataru's parents. "Androids, right?" she asked Prodigy. At her nod, she then asked, "Where?"
"Life Model Decoys from S.H.I.E.L.D., Ryūnosuke-san," Prodigy answered.
Carcajou snorted. "Fuckin' no respect for the dead!" she snarled. "Ataru didn't hate his parents! He just pretty much forgot all about them 'cause he was livin' with Negako-san on Yiziba! That's why he couldn't really make himself mourn them when he found out what Black did! What the fuck's going on here, Chiyo-chan?!"
"I don't know…but I WILL find out!" the young genius promised. "Elizabeth-san and Jessica-san are here, too. Not to mention Winston Egbert; he was one who got his Gift thanks to Wyszynski-hakase." Prodigy shuddered. "I WILL find out…!"
As she turned back to her equipment, Carcajou sighed before she turned to gaze in appreciation at Caltrop. "How're you doin', Michi?" the former asked.
"I'd like to say I missed you like hell, Ryū …but I can't," the latter then confessed as she walked over to draw her arms around the tomboy's neck. After they shared a warm kiss, they moved to head upstairs. "How're things with you? Your old man still acting like a total moron when it comes to you?"
"Yeah! It's even worse than what it was like before we forgot everything!" Carcajou said as they stepped into Ataru's bedroom. Given the damage to the place thanks to a large mushroom that had ripped up from the main floor to form a sort of hammock-shape, it was no wonder that there was a futon laid out across it. Smirking at that, the woman born Fujinami Ryūnosuke sat down on the futon as she gazed up apologetically at Caltrop. "He got me engaged to the son of his best friend from high school."
"Screwed up like you were?" the woman born Kagura Michiko asked.
"Yeah. Even worse, 'she' was fuckin' DEAD when I first met 'her.'"
A snort. "Ah, don't worry about it, Ryū. Sarah-chan can take care of that!"
Both girls laughed…
And at a certain storage room-turned-apartment at Tomobiki High School…
"AH-CHOO!"
At the edge of town…
"Boy! Ryū-chan and Kagura-chan are sure upset!"
Rampage perked as she gazed on Infinity. "Do you blame them?" the Californian-born meta then asked of her Wakayama-born friend. "They started shagging like rabbits as soon as puberty hit them. 'Sides, their past-selves were always together."
A nod. "Yeah, Jessica-chan, that's…"
The woman born Kasuga Ayumu then tensed as she turned her gaze elsewhere. "What?" the Academician then asked as she and Lightmage gazed on the other woman.
"Uh-oh!" Infinity said. "I gotta go!"
And with a flash of energy, she teleported away to…
(Posted Fri, 30 Mar 2012 21:29)
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