Some important info before you read:
This story picks up just after the events of episode 13 "Here comes Jurai" when Ryoko is being traumatized in Washu's Lab. It is included in the DVD sets and special features. If you haven't seen it, you can watch it on Youtube. Search for "Here Comes Jurai 2" or "Tenchi Muyo DVD special."
The lab scene finally sheds some insight into the twisted mother/daughter relationship between Washu and Ryoko, setting the stage for serious development later on. Everything was building up wonderfully. The characters were dynamic and complex, and it seemed like OVA 3 would finally give us the answers behind all of them.
But then the series was put on hold for almost a decade. Many of the folks that helped produce the first two OVA's split up, and one of the original creators produced a TON of other content in the hiatus that was considered part of the same continuity. Because of this the story changed dramatically in OVA3. It wasn't just the plot that took a major shift, but the way that the story was told. A lot of people liked this new direction. It's personal preference. I, for one, think they fudged it big-time.
So in the perfect little fantasy of this fanfiction, I'm pretending OVA 3 (episode 14 and up) didn't happen.
This story is mainly about Ryoko and Washu. As this story does not simultaneously incorporate many of the other plot elements building up at the end of OVA2 (Tokimi,Zero,King Asuza's plotting, the SHUNJA, Ryoko's lighthawk wings), it may not be how a properly-done OVA 3 would have started. But who knows? Several of the OVA episodes have focused on only one or two of the characters, and don't tie in with the larger plot of the series, so why not? Please enjoy the story, and tell me what you think so I can make it better.
Chapter 1: The Pleasures of Motherhood
"WASHU!? Dear little Washu? ANYBODY?"
Ryoko hung limply in the suffocating abyss. The lights had gone out an hour ago. The steady hum of the machinery had stopped, and even the small blinking lights on the servos had been extinguished. Yet the vice-grips of the restraint devices remained steady as ever.
"Washu's not the forgetful type... She's playing me! Can't believe I thought she actually gave a damn..."
The thoughts seemed to echo in her head, like her shouting had echoed through the lab before. It was that godforsaken cave all over again.
That memory had always been unpleasant. But the merger with Zero had unlocked a whole new spectrum of unpleasant, and for someone like Ryoko that was really saying something.
Like the long, spindly arms holding her aloft now, the roots of Funaho had crucified her in that cave...forcing her down into that pool of frigid water. The thought made Ryoko shudder.
In that cave there had been no way to tell the time. Seconds had begun to seem like minutes at first. Then hours could have been months for all she had known. She had fallen into a trance, one devoid of any meaningful sensation. Memories had flickered like cinema through her mind over and over again until they became too boring to watch.
Now, as in the cave, memories flickered across her eyes, projecting onto the pitch black of Washu's lab. The nine months of her life at the Masaki household felt more like a century when compared to the record of her former life. Everything was so much richer, had so much more emotional context. Especially after the Dr. Clay debacle.
Fond memories of teasing Tenchi and Ayeka. Drinking under the moonlight in her onsen. Dinner and games with the family. Watching soaps with the girls. Flying around Japan on the slightest whim. Drama, hugs, chores, road-trips, fights, and failed seductions. Without question, the greatest time of her life.
More memories came. This time from further in the past. She was truly back in that cave now...remembering when she had ran out of memories to watch. There was only one thing she had thought of.
"Nothing is forever. I will get out of here...!"
The only outlet for her mind. That and perhaps "What will I do when I get out of here?"
Ryoko spent centuries learning astral projection. Oh how beautiful colors had seemed on that first day out of the cave! How wonderful the birdsong sounded in comparison to the lapping of water against her corpse. Then she had spent another century learning to make her own gems. Slowly concentrating her energy into solid form.
Time continued to peel backward.
The raid on Jurai, the fight with Yosho... her throat seared through and the life sucked out of her by the Tenchi-ken.
The millenium of piracy before that; the life of a machine for that fiend Kagato. Fire, flames, and wholesale slaughter. Deprived of all emotion and satisfaction but that gained from pillaging and destruction. Numb to almost anything else. Everything was cut from her if it proved to be a distraction. When a certain thresh-hold for pain became meaningless, it was merely dished out in greater quantities as punishment when she failed. She had become the perfect soldier. A tool.
She could never remember not knowing language. Not knowing how to pilot Ryo-Ohki. Not knowing mechanics or super-luminal physics. She came into the world a full-grown woman.
But she still had many things to learn from Kagato, and he was a harsh teacher.
Intimidation, torture, subterfuge, trickery, and the like.
Now came her earliest memories.
The hiss of steam and the feeling of cold air on her skin as she walked out of that stasis chamber, being bent to Kagato's will for the first time. Her first sights outside the Soja.
The very beginning of thought itself.
"I've been alone for two-thousand years! Ever since the day I was born! I was... born...?" Ryoko remembered saying.
This dark corner of her mind had always come up blank, but now it felt like there was something there. Something just out of reach, the fingertips of her mind just barely brushing at its surface. It brought on a nasty headache, so she made another attempt to escape her restraints, and crush the humming device that nullified her powers. But again it was no use. Every time she moved about the robotic arms around her would compensate. She got close to prying off one of the clasps on her arm, but then more arms came and squashed the attempt. They had been designed by Washu, after all.
Exhausted, Ryoko's mind betrayed her and again sank towards the past. There were no images yet. But there was a feeling. Surprisingly it was a good feeling.
"How did I know inter-stellar navigation the day I was born? How did I know Ryo-Ohki before I had even met her? Was I programmed?" Thought Ryoko.
To her astonishment, a blurry memory came into focus, along with vague sensations and emotions. Emotions and sensations that had never existed for her on the Soja.
It was a time when she had to reach higher to operate Ryo-Ohki's controls.
"I was shorter?"
Thousands of years ago her space-ship maneuvered much more clumsily. A smaller Ryoko fought with her mind and the controls, trying to complete a predefined track.
A familiar voice came from beside her. The words were unclear, but the meanings seemed apparent. "Well done," and "try this," and "look out for that!"
She was learning to fly.
"I never remembered that before..." Mused Ryoko, temporarily forgetting about her predicament.
Another memory came. This one was in a lab. It was one of Washu's labs. She was smaller again.
In her mind's eye she sat at a computer terminal, working on some sort of program. It was something with heavy mathematics. Even though she supposedly didn't need sleep she was exhausted. But she continued working anyway, taking stimulants to remain focused. Why?
Then came another unclear memory. This one was quite a shock. She could recognize other children. She was playing with them in a field somewhere. Tag or something. There was laughter as they ran, tripped, got up, and ran again.
"I was... a child?"
It was unbelievable. Fantastic. beautiful.
Now came a group of memories. Individually they were mish-mash, but together they formed something coherent.
It was something... warm... a hug! It had a lot of red hair and it had skin... a person! A lady! The lady would give her hugs. The hugs were very nice.
Sometimes the lady would tuck her in at night. Mostly she was very busy. She gave Ryoko lots of things to read and work on. It was always time to learn something. And learning something meant more hugs.
Tears pitter-pattered on the cold metal floor below.
"Mom..."
Not very much like Tenchi's mom. This one had always kept herself somewhat distant. It was wonderful all the same.
But the memory faded, as another came into view.
One that was much more vivid. So vivid that Ryoko lived through it. She was a little girl again. There were no gems on her neck and wrists.
It was cold, and dark. And little Ryoko was alone in one of Washu's labs.
Even with her supernatural vision she could see almost nothing. It was an artificial, unholy blackness. She groped about, finding sealed exits and broken lab equipment. Shrapnel and debris on the floor cut her many times. The cuts would heal quickly, but blood still came out. It smelled coppery.
Her mother had said she would be back hours ago. Where was she? The life-support in the lab was failing, and soon the temperature became freezing.
"Mommy?" Squeaked Ryoko into the darkness. She huddled in a corner, shivering in fear. Or was she strung up half-naked in the air again? It was hard to tell.
"Mommy! Please release me!" She shouted again in despair.
"Don't leave me here! Don't leave me behind!"
She said she'd come back! It's been so long!
"Please! I don't want to be alone!"
The little girl, and the grown woman reliving that memory, cried brokenly into the darkness.
"It's dark! It's scary! Mommy! Mommy!"
But there was no-one.
The little girl sobbed again and hugged her knees to her chest. She had been abandoned, left with the rest of the broken equipment in the lab.
An odd sound raised Ryoko's head from her chest. She looked up to see a garish green ball of light coalesce in the space in front of her. It lit up the lab, revealing the frightening and contorted shapes of destroyed equipment.
Out of the light floated a man. A man she had met before. The reason her mom had left her there.
"Hello, hello, little Ryoko." He said with a jackal-like grin. His voice was vile and cunning, as if he were some sort of snake.
"Where's my mom! What did you do!?" Shrieked the little girl in the corner.
"Why, in our new home, of course. Come with me, I'll take you to her right now. We can be a happy little family." Kagato began to float towards Ryoko menacingly.
"Get away from me! Or else!" Ryoko put her hands together, making a bright red energy sword. It hummed and crackled as it burned the air around it.
"Impressive, for someone so young. I might have a use for you after all." Kagato hovered just out of her reach, poising to strike. Little Ryoko slashed at him in a panic.
"Bring her back right now!" She swung at his outstretched hand, keeping her back plastered to the wall.
Kagato quickly reached out and snatched one of her wrists. Little Ryoko cried out in agony and lost her weapon. She punched and kicked at him, hitting him in the nose. A little bit of green blood dripped out.
"You'll regret that." He said coolly.
In a swift, twisting motion, he broke her arm below the wrist, eliciting a scream of agony. Taking her by the other arm he dragged her struggling body back through the portal to the Soja. She cried, bit, and screamed all the way. He prepared a restraint device and forced her onto it. "N-NO! P-please! Stop!" She pleaded.
He had not yet broke into her mind, and so he settled on beating her until she stopped struggling. Then he could insert a neural uplink and gain control. So he could morph her into what he needed. The blows and searing energy pulses came again and again and again.
The pain was like nothing the little girl had ever experienced.
"P-please stop! I'll do anything!" She begged, writhing in agony.
To her surprise she was released. Ryoko fell to the floor of Washu's lab in a heap. The shock of the impact was like a switch.
Her eyes flew open and she sprung to her feet, her energy sword and combat suit appeared in a flash of light. Roaring like an animal, she slashed at the retreating restraint devices, sending sparks and writhing worms of metal flying. The area around her glowed a hellish red.
Overhead lights activated, blinding Ryoko for a fraction of a second. Reflexively ducking to the side, she crashed into a computer terminal. She lashed out, cutting it in half. Then she dove and took cover behind the wreckage, scanning her surroundings like a caged animal. The seasoned warrior was hyperventilating; unusual considering that her gems made breathing unnecessary.
The room came into focus. I'm in Washu's lab... She had me strung up... and I... I...
Her vision blurred again as tears threatened to fall.
The sword in her hand disappeared with a chest-wracking sob. Ryoko slowly slid down to the floor, staring at the ceiling vacantly. She had never relived something like that before. Pain of that magnitude meant little to her now. How could it hurt her so much, millennia later?
Ryoko groaned as the headache returned.
Gods I need a hot bath and booze right now. Got to get the hell out of here before -
"Woah! What a mess!" Came a nasally voice from nearby.
The sound of Washu's voice made her cringe. Just what I need right now.
Ryoko's eyes found a tuft of crimson hair bobbing into view over processors and bits of equipment.
The footsteps came closer. Washu's head poked around a corner and she noticed Ryoko sitting on the ground haphazardly.
"So it was you little Ryoko! I thought that Mihoshi had wandered back in. Didn't think you'd still be here!" Little Washu stopped in front of Ryoko, smirking.
Outrageous as usual. As if this was some sort of accident.
Ryoko was not as angry as she had anticipated. At the moment she regarded the woman in front of her with softer emotions. There was a little pity. Maybe even a bit of compassion. She had come to a new understanding.
Yes. Washu was her mother. Had even acted motherly at one point. But she had played that role as part of a larger project:
Create a being capable of wielding the power of the gems. Study it. Use it.
How many failures had come before her? How many little children had died when they integrated with the gems for the first time? How many times had Washu played the mother, then discarded the corpse and started over? There was simply no way for her to become attached to such projects. But the mother-act was necessary. To get the research subject to trust her. To give them a motive for... what? It sickened Ryoko to the core. Why had she been making weapons of mass destruction? Washu's toys had enough blood on their hands already.
Ryoko remembered Mihoshi's words from earlier. "A message from the Galaxy Police... they were wondering if they could borrow Ryoko - I mean Zero!"
Like I'm a piece of her property or something!
Funaho and those damned Jurians wanted to manufacture more of her. Let other children know what it felt like to be a tool. What it felt like to be parentless. Damn them.
Washu stopped in front of Ryoko, her hand on her chin as if making an astute observation.
"Oh! What's this? Were you having a little episode just now?" Washu leaned over Ryoko, eyeing her closely.
Ryoko imagined she looked pretty pathetic at the moment. Not that she cared anymore. There was no point in fighting Washu. The damned imp had read her mind on a few occasions and always seemed to keep a step ahead. A walking enigma. It had taken a few days to figure out how to cut off that damned mental link, and longer to be able to keep it closed. Ryoko had seriously contemplated killing Washu when she moved into the house. Questions were met with questions, clever evasions, lies, and insults. Washu was only sincere when she wanted to be.
Like mother like daughter. Thought Ryoko with a hint of distaste.
Ryoko wiped her eyes and gave her temples a brief massage. Then she stood and began walking towards the exit.
"And where are you going? You don't expect me to clean all this up now, do you? You naughty child!" Came the voice of Washu from behind her, obviously expecting to get an outburst in response.
There was none. Huh... that usually gets Ryoko riled up.
So Washu went a step further and tried opening up their mental link again.
Maybe she'd get to see what was going on in her crazy daughter's head. At the very least Ryoko would make a scene about it.
But the only sound that came back was the rattle of the crab-shaped noisemaker above the door.
And then silence.
