"I do not like confident interrogation subjects. You follow me?" Special Agent Tanya was a trifle.. upset, even for her. The notion of watching the war happen a second time, this time from the relative sidelines while she hunted down Yuri.. it rankled. So she really could be forgiven for not liking the grin on the face of her putative prisoner.
Ranma snapped back to her situation and did the only thing she felt was right. She looked Tanya over to ensure there wasn't any Soviet-issue gear on her person and it really was the same person she'd defended from that sub, then she scowled ferociously with a twinkle in her eye, all the while saying in a sing-song voice "Well, then, try actually talking with the gu-gal who just took a swim to *save* your ass, why don't ya? That makes a helluva lot more sense than acting like some sonuvabitching Hitler!!" Idly, Ranma was glad she'd paid attention to those Army post guys while watching her Dad spar with the Close Combat specialists before getting taught the techniques in turn later the same day for those few weeks. She liked English and could handle it FAR better than Hinako any day--just in soldier-style.
She'd been stashed in the back of the hasty HQ set up in the still-renovating Allied base in Frisco, so it would be assumed no-one would have heard that comment, much lerss understood the reference. After all (if unknown to Ranma at that point), Hitler had never risen to power, or even lived long enough to take that as his name! But the likely evades Ranma as easily as Ranma normally evades snail-fu. So it was no surprise (but of great interest) to the watching Chaos God Toltiir when the one soul that would get the reference.. did.
"Ungaublich!!" The already confused Agent Tanya whirled at the bewildered and somewhat strangled German expression of disbelief from offside, where the passing Professor Albert Einstein was now staring with a totally stunned expression on his face, staring directly at the redheaded prisoner!
"Excuse me, sir.. I'm no Einstein Although you really kinda look like him yourself, but why would Hitler's name freak you out and why isn't this lady trying to pound me one?" Ranma was very confused by the lack of success in her usual mastertrait.. namely, pissing people off.
Before the even more annoyed and disconcerted Tanya could speak, the pale scientist shuddered, then spoke with a firmness and seriousness she had only heard when he spoke of the threat of Yuri. "I am Professor Einstein, young lady.. and I am surprised because I never expected anyone outside the High Command back in my German homeland to even mention that name."
Tanya let the Professor speak from her own curiousity as well as not wanting even more confusion. She did close the room door and lock it, however, even as Ranma said "But.. I know I'm hardly a genius, but Albert Einstein *died*. And Hitler's infamous, especially among us Japanese!" She had a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach, but she just had to ask..
The professor blanched, then shrugged to himself. Ranma was very good at reading faces outside of gambling, so she knew this guy was telling the truth, so she saved the disbelief and her breath, watching as the Professor got to and started tapping away at a computer.
It took a moment or two, but he nodded decisively before fishing out a rather large cellphone (by Ranma's standards) and starting a intense and rather aggressive conversation in German. She just shrugged at Tanya's expression while all that went on, thern returned her attention to the Professor as he faced them both. "I have been authorised to reveal to you both the darkest secret of Germany, and in fact of our history.. It is the tale of redemption, and of how actions have consequences. In the early 1930's there was a young man of whome you, Agent Tanya, have never heard--a man that was a soldier, a painter of houses, and a prisoner in the dispirited Germany of the day. He was named Shickleguber, or something like, but he changed his name when he entered politics--changed it to Adolph Hitler!" The pure fury and loathing in Einstein's tone was such that Tanya Adams didn't even *think* of interrupting him. He continued "This.. man rose to power because he had charisma, could voice his dissent and fury in terms that his countrymen would empathise with. And Germany was desperate, depressed economically and repressed militarily. He created a following, and they helped him rise to the Chancelorship. Then.. He transformed Germany into a fully military power, creating a mythical goal of perfection. A myth of the Aryan 'superman', and of his need for living space. He led the Germans of his time into war, into alliance with the then-nascent Soviet power and with Italy's Mussolini, attempting to crush the world beneath his heel. He gathered those seen as a drag to his vision.. the Gypsy, the Jew, the political enemy--and he first ghettoised them, then had them systematically slaughtered.. over 11 million people were killed in cold blood, in what was thought of as 'ethnic cleansing' or as crazed medical research."
Tanya was about to speak, to ask what nonsense the man was going on about, but she saw something that appalled her and made her stop and listen. Ranma Saotome was crying, silent tears running down her cheeks while her eyes burned like oddly colored suns.
The Professor printed out a few pictures, scans of photographs of good detail and obvious antiquity, after having typed while speaking for a solid 5 minutes of decryption to get the access. "These pictures are the only remnants of a time now undone, of the time after that vast, horrid war. They were left as ballast after a man allowed his anger.. his rage to drive him to a desperate gamble." The pics were of a relatively primitive lab by Tanya's thinking, with a assistant, a enclosable spot with a gazebo-like top not unlike the dome atop the Time Machine, and..
*"Professor!"* Tanya was unaware she'd even spoken aloud until Einstein looked at her, and Ranma.. Ranma was only able to shape the words "Oh, kami" repeatedly with her lips.
"Yes, Special Agent, that is Albert Einstein.. but it is NOT me, and never was. That is Einstein as I could well have become were i to live thru those terrible times. Living in America, embittered at the horrid scars marking the soul of my homeland, that Einstein rushed a particular application of his understanding of the Chronosphere. One realised and perfected in our time and place by the Chrono Trooper. He found a risky means of travelling back in time, but to do so, he would have to discharge the temporal energies accrued along the way, or die. He.. made it work for him. I cannot, will not show you his notes taken beforehand, as the historical record tells the tale as fully as need be done." His voice was darker.. more harsh than he'd sounded since the first time he'd lived thru the Soviet Invasion, Tanya noted. Given what she suspected, it was no wonder he took Chrono technology very seriously!
"Outside a certain jail, on the day of his release, a certain painter of houses, Adolf by name, was greeted by a formal, restrained man. He offered a handshake, and the painter allowed this. It was the last thing he ever did. Upon contact with the man, Adolf was engulfed by what we now would easily recognise as Chronal energies, and subsequently erased from the timestream. Upon the completion of this, the man who'd done this.. timely execution with his handshake also vanished, in the manner of a Chronosphere transport. That was brought to my attention some time after, as I myself researched the connection between Time and Space, and how to utilise it. I was shown pictures, the ones you have seen, and notes in a near-perfect match of my own handwriting. These notes were and are the property of the Geman Intelligence Directorate, and rightly so." He heaved a deep sigh. "I am a old man now, very old. Yet I have watched the world make new steps, and have new glories and horrors. Stalin, Romanov.. Yuri. And I have sat on the worst risk of all, fully hoping to take it to my grave with me. Yet.. here I am, leading your forces to my recent past, seeking to avert catastrophe when there is truly nothing left to lose."
Tanya's head was spinning from this, but.. "What does this have to do with the girl, Prof?" A rueful chuckle was her only reply at first.
Ranma listened as Professor Einstein softly said "Only that his tone spoke of Hitler, recognising the name as synonymous with oppression and barbarism.. I haven't a single clue how, but she comes from a place where everything I told you about Hitler's ascension happened." He turned to the former Neriman and asked "I hope he lost in the end, where you came from?"
Ranma had to try a couple of times before she could speak reliably, then she said "Yes, Sempei, he did lose, although you never developed anything like this Chronosphere, near as I know. Then again, I ain't nothing close to a history expert.. I'm a martial artist, a fighter back home. I'll say this, though, there's a few people in Japan that would have done the same as that Einstein, to win or prevent their part in that damn war, so I do believe you. I've seen enough to know that strange stuff is a *lot* more common than most folks admit to! And.. I've been stranded here as a result of some. Maybe forever." She shuddered, but refused to cry for herself, as was noted by the observing Tanya.
"Stranded? I think i should know a bit more of this.." Einstein was very curious, and it looked like he was going to need reining in. But Ranma handled that herself.
"I think that'll sit until after you get done with whastever you're doing. After all that you said, I'm sure as hell you'd never drag people back in time unless there was a whole hell of a lot at stake." Ranma knew that Tanya was going to press the interrogation, but she rather liked the idea of the world she was now struck in surviving long enough for Ranma to settle down in or get the hell out of.
She was certainly accurate about Einstein's priorities--once he was reminded of them. "Ja, of course you are right! Agent Tanya, you may wish to extend these papers Leiutenant Eva brought along to the authorities, once your troops are finished with resistance here in San Francisco. I fear there is much to do if we are to dismantle Yuri's efforts while the rest of the Allies bring down Romanov.." The harried Special Agent chased off after a energised Professor, leaving Ranma alone in the room to consider her next move.
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(Posted Sun, 09 Jan 2005 07:34)
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