A/N: Hey, I'm back and with the sequel to "The Devil's Bodyguard." I know it's been a while, but with university and other things it's just hard to find time to write. If you haven't read my previous fic, then I highly recommend that you go back and read it or otherwise you're going to get confused. A big thank you to Ragnarok666, as they have given me some insight and some ideas for this fic and I'm sure that I'll utilise them with ideas from others and my own ideas to come up with another story. Enjoy :D
Disclaimer: The characters and anything related to Tekken are the property of Namco.
Prologue- Mark of the Devil
Three months ago...
Her slender body was laid upon that cold metal slate, confined within a massive tube-like machine as it scanned her body. Three months had passed since Azazel disappeared from the world, and the Devil Gene was supposed to go with the beast. However, the curse still existed in the body of one woman.
Originally, Nina thought that it would take some time for Devil to leave her body and die. Days turned to weeks, then weeks turned to months and the mark was still evident on her right forearm. This wasn't how things were meant to turn out. Jin sacrificed himself to rid the world of the curse that plagued the Mishima bloodline, and of Azazel, the one who had threatened to destroy the planet. In the end, there were still questions that had to be asked...
Was his death in vain? What good had it done if the world was left in destruction and Nina was left with the curse?
The clean-up campaigns around the world were all travelling soundly, with the expectation of them being completed within a couple of months. No word had risen about any activity from the G-Corporation, who had gone quiet since the end of the war. Nina figured that they were rebuilding their numbers and she was prepared to fight again if they dared to oppose the Zaibatsu. Of course both Kazuya and Anna had survived the fight at Azazel's temple, the media had been swarming around, like a bad pest, in attempt to get information from both organisations. In the footage, her sister was seen alive and well with Kazuya in attempt to escape the reporters as they headed into Millennium Tower.
Nina never noticed the bright lights being switched off as she had her eyes closed the entire time, but opened them once the sound of moving gears rang through her ears. The cold metal slate slowly emerged from out of the body-scanner and revealed her form, only clad in her black undergarments, to the outside. She cringed as the stinging of the lights of Boskonovitch's laboratory impaled at her sapphire blue eyes, as if sand was being rubbed into them.
She really needed to stop ending up having to be scanned, it was just like that time after the third tournament when she first attempted to get her memories back. To stare up at the faces of the elderly doctor and Anna while she was lying there scantly dressed was less than ideal, in Nina books at least. But still, the former assassin had to do what she had to do in hopes to finding an alternative means to rid herself of this curse. Never in her life had Nina thought she would end up being like a laboratory rat, continuously tested upon until a solution was found. It was only until the good doctor himself appeared in her field of vision that she allowed her thoughts to be spoken.
"How many more of these tests did you say that I would have to do through?" the blonde woman asked as she squinted, the bright lights above her stung her eyes. Instinctively, she raised her arm and covered her eyes.
Boskonovitch laughed lightly, sensing the woman's frustration. It was hard for him to determine how much longer that Nina would have to be subjected to the extensive battery of tests. He did feel sorry that she had to go through this, but there was no other way around the issue.
"Hard to say at this point," the elderly man responded. "It will be a matter of weeks, or even months before we find something."
Nina rolled her eyes and sat up slowly. She swung her legs over the edge and looked down at her bare arms, to where uncharacteristic dark bruises formed down near her elbows and forearms. For three months, she had been scanned, poked and prodded to the point where she became a human pin cushion and her eyes began to have dark circles form underneath due to a lack of sleep. Devil was constantly in her sub-conscious, taunting her from just below the surface, attempted to get her to just give up and accept that she was stuck with that curse.
At one point, she did come close to succumbing to the wish of Devil. However, it was Steve that told her not to lose hope, that there was a way to defeat the evil power that was planted inside of her. He found her one night in her office, furniture turned over and the entire room looked like a warzone. The former boxer saw his mother in the middle of the darkness, clearly visible as her eyes glowed a deep red and markings started to appear up her arms.
It was the soft voice of a son that made a mother break away from the dark binds of Devil and return to her mortal self. That night, continued to plague Nina and she just wanted to get to the answer and put an end to it.
"You will have to excuse me for being impatient," she apologised and stepped down, grabbing the robe that the doctor held out to her and shrugged into it. "I just want to get to the bottom of this, and soon before somebody gets hurt."
Boskonovitch nodded sincerely and flicked through a clipboard.
"Well, we're starting to make some steady progress," he replied and looked at her. "We know that Devil is stable within your body and isn't likely to pose any threat any time soon. But I am curious, however..."
"Curious about what?"
"I'm wondering about what triggered that episode a while ago. Tell me, did you experience any distressing dreams or thoughts that night?"
Truth be told, the former assassin couldn't remember what triggered Devil to take hold of her body. All she could remember was the voice chanting and taunting within the confines of her mind, feeling Devil struggle out of the chains that bound him within the prison that was her body. Then afterwards, her consciousness woke in the arms of Steve, who then contacted Boskonovitch immediately and informed him of what happened.
Then the scans and tests soon followed...
"No, I can't remember anything," Nina replied as she shook her head. "It's just like when I woke up from cryosleep a few years ago. But, Jin did say to me that he couldn't remember anything after his transformations."
Boskonovitch hummed to himself, tapping a fragile finger to his chin.
"Hmm, I wonder...perhaps this form of amnesia, is a side-effect of the transformations," Boskonovitch hypothesised. "Maybe Devil has managed to suppress whatever thoughts had triggered him to awaken deep back into your unconscious thoughts."
"So what do you propose we do about it?"
"I don't know yet, but at least now we have a new path to look into."
Nina rolled her eyes, she knew what this had meant.
"Let me guess, more tests and scans?"
The elderly doctor nodded sincerely.
"I'm afraid so, my dear. But I think you've had enough for today," he suggested. "Go back to your quarters and rest, I'm sure that your son will be able to handle those meetings on his own."
The woman chuckled lightly and turned her back to him.
"Well I do hold some faith in his abilities," Nina replied and glanced back over her shoulder. "But for the time being, these are matters that I wish to deal with personally."
The scientist was about to reply, but Nina had already started to walk towards the exit. A loud sigh passed through his lips and he scratched the back of his head, the former assassin no longer in visual field.
'That poor woman, how she ever got herself into this mess will forever remain a mystery to me.'
Present Day
November 30th 2008
Location: Nina Williams' Private Villa (outside Tokyo)
Time: 0645hrs
Toned arms burned with each thrusting motion, legs snapped quickly as a well aimed kick was thrown at her opponent. Her male training partner managed to block the onslaught, but at the cost of losing balance and fell hard onto the wooden floor of the make-shift training hall that the two fighters were in. It was just the typical morning ritual for the two, training at the break of dawn for an hour before taking on the events of their normally hectic days.
Training...well that's what it was supposed to be after all, but the woman in front of him always managed to turn training into something more serious, in Steve's opinion anyway. The blond-haired man stared up at the former assassin that stood at his feet, glaring down at him with a small smirk planted across her lips.
"Looks like we're done here," the woman said to him and offered Steve a slender hand. "But I must admit you are getting better."
"Tch, you got lucky that time, mother," Steve replied and grabbed the trained hand of the former killer.
"Hmm, luck has nothing to do with it," Nina told him and helped her son onto his feet. "You know that you don't have to call me that."
Steve nodded and crossed his arms.
"Whatever you reckon, Nina," the boxer responded and walked over to the bench nearby, reaching for the towel that was there and wiped off the sweat that had beaded on his face. "Have you got that appointment today?"
The blonde woman squinted a little and looked away. The thought of having more needles and scans didn't quite settle with her, the marks on her arms were evidence of that. Every time she looked down at the dark bruises that had formed there, all it did was made Nina nauseous and wonder how one mark representing a curse could cause so much trouble. Months of being a laboratory specimen had left her wrecked and constantly fatigued. The lack of sleep resulted in her skin complexion being slightly paler than usual, making the dark circles under her eyes more noticeable, but the muscle tone and physical strength still remained as Nina maintained the body that many years of training had honed it into.
"I feel like a bloody pin cushion, I'm beginning to think he's enjoying injecting needles into my body." Nina sighed before glaring at Steve, who was chuckling to himself. "What?"
Steve seized his chuckling and threw the towel over his shoulder.
"I'd never thought that a hardened assassin such as yourself would be worried about tiny needle pricks," he mocked her, a cocky grin appeared on his features.
"Tch, you do know that I have been out of action for quite sometime," Nina replied as she scowled at him. "I can still get contracts whenever I want, it's just hard with the Zaibatsu to take care of...and there's that damned ninja tracking my every move."
Even though most of the population had forgiven the actions of Jin and the Mishima Zaibatsu, the organisation was placed under surveillance. This had put the minds of those that were still critical of the Zaibatsu at ease, figuring that if at least one of the major players of the war was restricted, then all hell won't break loose again. But only if they really knew what was going on behind the scenes.
"They all think they can sleep soundly at night, just because we're being watched. Guess we have to behave ourselves from now on," Nina continued and glanced out of a tiny window to her left, to where the sun was starting to seep through. "Looks like it's time for us to go, can't keep him waiting for too long."
"You sure sound excited about that meeting with him," Steve said as he watched Nina walk past him to the showers.
She stopped at the doorway and looked over her shoulder with an unamused glance. Today was just going to be full excitement, she could tell in a sarcastic sort of way. Tests, meetings and dealing with someone who constantly disappears like a magician. Indeed, this is what the life of Nina Williams had turned into. It's certainly different from the life of an assassin that she had once lived.
"Hmph, best to get it over and done with since that guy doesn't seem to stay in one place for too long," his mother replied and proceeded to enter the shower room, closing the door behind her.
A/N: By the way, the title will be unconsciously explored in the next chapter. Please note that this will be a darker story compared to "The Devil's Bodyguard."