AUTHOR, BE INTRODUCED! Hello, people! I'm TranslatorPS, and this is my first shot at a fan fiction. This was heavily influenced by me more than anybody else. There are two so-called OCs in this, me and a friend of mine whom I do not plan on naming.

LANG. NOTES: Natsuru is always described as masculine (he, his, etc. as opposed to she, her, etc.) despite whatever form he might be in when currently described.
I know a little bit of Japanese, not too much though. But I have made it a point to keep things like ō in place (trust me, they make a difference in the long scale) and the honorifics are used in conversations that are meant to take place in Japanese. No post-honorific to a name, it ain't Japanese that's spoken, let's put it this way.

The whole story is written in present tense first person, from the author's point of view. Tell me if you don't like that, I'll keep the thing to myself then ;)

STORY/CHAP. INTRO: A moderate knowledge of the anime is suggested, w/o E12, though. This disregards the manga altogether. I never read the light novel either. Something like half of this chapter is the final fighting scene from E11 of the anime. Also, I put this story in the future to match my own timeline rather than any timeline the original story. For the purposes of this fanfic, I have modelled a timeline for the actions of the anime series and will follow them as such.
Currently rated T, might change to M over time, I'm afraid.

DISCLAIMER: Ah, also. There's a lot of different things in my room, but to the best of my knowledge, none of them give me a direct right to Kämpfer (the animes, the novel nor the manga). I only own myself in this story. Placenames are real, though.

Ch. 1 – PROPOSITION

Flashback January 14th, 2013 - 1.22pm - Galway, Ireland

'You, my friend, are now a Kämpfer, one of the currently three soldiers who will fight against one another. This Red Contract Bracelet is a sign to you that no matter what happens, you are in this,' she spoke to me, quietly. I looked into her eyes.

'What's the catch?' I ask.

'You die, you're gone.'

'And what about that bloody gender-swap?'

'It just comes with the package. At least for you.'

Remembering one of the many scenes from the book series "The Witcher", I look deep into her eyes. And only find honesty.

August 15th, 2019 - 10.14pm - Tokyo, Japan

There's a show going on, there's a show going on, and if I didn't stick my nose in earlier, it wouldn't have happened, you idiot! I think to myself as I run down some sort of street in Tokyo, the name of which I do not know and do not want to know. My aim is the Seisetsu High School and it shows its facade broken by the fence as soon as I turn another corner. My mistake was to leave my vehicle at home, but now it is too late to get back for it.

As soon as the goal is reached, I jump across the fencegate and run for a maintenance ladder up to the roof. As soon as my head pokes out across the ridge, I keep my sound effects to a minimum and quietly crawl on the ridge to a nice, quiet spot by a door which leads to the school building itself. Considering the time it was, it could only be dark and horrid in there, and a quick visual check confirmed at least the first opinion.

Hiding behind that same door, to prevent being seen, I quickly mutter and think of at the same time, Änderung. This forces me to change into my male body once again. As I walk out of the hiding and find myself a spot in the shadow of the little tower (I must say, it is a nice, clear sky and the moon was full) which hid me well enough. Looking at the scene ahead of me, I see something striking enough, something that one would not expect to find at 10pm on a Japanese high school rooftop.

Three girls, with their uniforms in what my friends back in Ireland would have called a state, bound by a silver-looking chain (from my experience I know that not everything that shines is gold), sitting tightly together in something reminescent of a triangle. A couple of paces ahead, another girl, standing emotionlessly, staring straight at them. And another one, this time with emotions of evil and similarities, right beside her. By the ridge stood four other girls, who were under the same near-emotionless spell as the one before.

As much as my interest does not span over the four girls at the back, the five further ahead of them are the event of the show, whatever sense that phrase makes or makes not. The tied trio are also Kämpfer – two Reds and a Blue. The Blue's name is Mishima Akane, whereas the Reds are, in what seems to be my order of importance, Sangō Shizuku and Kondō Mikoto. The emotionless gal is called by the name of Senō Natsuru, and her, or rather him, I shall explain soon enough. The last of the five there is Sakura Kaede, a double-personality source of good and evil. For clarity, this is probably the last time I refer to any Japanese name by the Japanese style of surname-first name and further on, I'm more than likely to use the more common layout of first name-surname.

As for Natsuru, despite many differences between the two of us, especially in the background of our lives, we share one major common trait – we are the only two male Kämpfer that I'm aware of. And there our common things end, really. We're from completely different places, different age, different look at things, and not to be rude, different headlevelness. Of course the positive side being for me...

As I think all over what is happening, or what might happen, I skip the fact that the chain-bounded trio awakes. Only Kaede speaking out, 'Oh my, you're finally awake' wakes me myself up from my somewhat complicated train of thoughts.

'You fucking bitch!' I forgot that Akane was still transformed...

'What do you want?' ...but to my thankfulness, Shizuku managed to keep her political face on.

'I want to get rid of you,' Kaede replies. Coldly, as a matter of fact. 'Was her name Tamiko?' This seems to have brought an unexpected reaction from Shizuku. 'You're just like her.'

'No, don't tell me you...'

'Hmm, I wonder.' Bitch. 'You're all just getting in the way of the Moderators. I'll get rid of you for rebelling against them. These girls are neither Red nor Blue, but White Kämpfer. They were made just to defeat you.' Bitch.

'What... What do you plan to do with Natsuru?' Mikoto asks, with a hint of anger in her voice.

'We'll make her our ally. We don't need the male Natsuru, but we do need the female one.'

'What do you mean?' interrogative sentence by Shizuku, thank you.

'Thanks to you, my plan was ruined. I never imagined Red and Blue would combine forces. Natsuru-san was the deciding factor. If Natsuru-san chose to be a boy, you would win. If he chose to be a girl, we would win. Simple, right?' Simple enough. 'Mishima-san, do you know why your side would win if he chose to remain a boy?'

'Like hell I do!'

'Because he loves all of you,' striking to the three, not so striking to me.

'Fuck it, I don't get it!' Akane replies, confirming the striking part of Kaede's last sentence, if not statement. I'm actually more keen to it being a statement. 'How does that decide anything?!'

'That's how it was. And he's chosen to be a girl... She chose me,' I'm literally stopping myself from just breaking into a run and dealing a fatal-slash-final blow to Kaede. 'Wanna know why I didn't deal the final blow?' Speaking of final blows... 'I wanna show you a little mercy. So I'll let Natsuru-san defeat you instead. After all, Shizuku-chan, you're my best friend!' Kaede... that is NOT how you deal with best friends now, is it?

After this idiotic, semipointless monologue, Natsuru walks towards the chain-bound trio. He raises his hand and conjures a fireball. After a few seconds, his fireball increases in size.

'Goodbye, Shizuku-chan,' Kaede says, as coldly as for the past good few minutes. Natsuru then raises his hand up above his head, lowering the head itself. He notices the little present he gave to Shizuku on their date a good few weeks back, and my senses feel that this broke off Kaede's spell on Natsuru. Kaede, of course, has a shock moment.

'What's wrong, Natsuru-san? You'd better hurry up if you want your reward.' At this, Natsuru lowers his hand and extinguishes the fire. 'Natsuru-san?' Kaede still shows signs of shock.

'I don't need a reward,' Natsuru replies.

'But how?'

'I love you,' Natsuru replies. I hear his sentences starting with ore (俺), the Japanese rude-speech word for I, used only by males. This brings a certain bit of happiness to me. As for the trio, they look up and make a sound of shock.

'If you do...'

'But I won't team up with you! I love you, but if I choose you, I'll lose something precious to me. So... I'll choose Shizuku, Akane and Mikoto!'

'Natsuru!' the trio shoots up. I'm glad myself to, because I'd be darn peeved off if the lad decided to lose the man part of him. As for Kaede, she walks back in disgust.

'Then I'll make you choose me!'

The actions that follow soon afterwards are complicated and I couldn't make most of the mess going on on the scene. Kaede summons her katana, and attacks Shizuku, who is able to break free of the chain and counterattack. I hope that the flying katana didn't hit anybody down at street level. Soon, the other two girls also summon their weapons, and so do the four at the back, at Kaede's order. However, at this stage, even my six-and-a-half years of Kämpfering around doesn't help much, as some sort of undescribed before energy flows around Akane, Mikoto and Shizuku. For once, I actually think the same as Kaede, when she says, 'What is this power?!'

'What's going on?' asks Natsuru, and I think the same myself.

Out of nowhere, besides the chaos, I hear a song ringing. Something to the rhythm of Ode to Europe, but I dare not pluck out the Japanese words coming along with it. The chaos starts, with multiple attacks from the trio and no defence from Kaede or her allies at all. I slowly come out of my hiding spot, keeping in the shadow still, to make anything out of things. But it's all fuzzy nevertheless. Girls flying, girls shooting, girls standing confused. Even girls swinging katanas all around. My brain thinks record! but I kindly kick this thought aside as there is already a recording device on the rooftop there, working even. The CCTV camera.

'At this rate, we'll...' Kaede jumps aside. She then turns around and looks at Natsuru standing there by the railing. She grins, in a matter anything but positive.

'Natsuru-san,' she walks up to him. 'Natsuru-san, will you lend me your strength? You do love me, right?' Shit.

'Sakura-san...'

'You can call me Kaede. If you choose me as a girl, that is. So please defeat them. I'll give you your reward now, so...' Kaede says as she grabs him by his neck and leans closer to kiss. I decide, enough! and start walking towards the two.

'I... I've made up my mind!' Natsuru replies, to my relief. He forces a change on his bracelet and his body shines as he changes. As soon as he does, Kaede awakes and I stop myself.

'Eww, a boy!' she shouts out as she slaps Natsuru across the cheek.

'Kaede-san...'

'Don't call me Kaede!' she shouts out in further fury as she slaps him repetitively across the cheek and pushes him backwards. Then, a loud 'Natsuru!' comes from elsewhere as he is brought down by the trio's weapons to the ground.

'You filthy male. I can't believe you'd call me Kaede. Just who do you think you are?!' Kaede shouts at him with clear anger, as he, rather powerlessly, lays on the bare concrete. 'Hitomi! Sayaka! Rika! Ryuoka!' she calls out. This is actually the first time I hear the four girls' names properly. 'We're done for today. Let's go!'

'Yes, ma'am!' they come along and reply in unison. Then, after a few seconds, which only suggest that Kaede was thinking of something evil, they just fly off. Like bloody birds.

You may be finished for today, but I'm not even started. Let's hope we get a chance to spar. And let's let me win.

'Natsuru, you bastard! I saw you trying to kiss that bitch! Didn't you choose us?!' Akane runs up and shouts at Natsuru. As for the running up, so do the other two.

'Hey, wait! This isn't the time...' Natsuru tries to defend himself. Seeing that the action is gone, I back up to the door, where I check my phone. It's nearly quarter to 11pm, time flew fast in this action-filled 30 minutes, but I still have business to do here. As the four over there do something that any fan fiction writer could potentially describe as lemon-peeler, I look up some random things on my phone. Some news, some photos I shot a while ago, I simply compare some data. After five minutes or so, I put my phone back into its case and put that then into my pocket.

As I walk out to the rooftop once again, I see the little tense action continue. I walk with a rather brisk step. I chose good shoes for the occasion, as they mark each and every one of my steps with a nice little 'thud!' against the concrete. Yet, they only notice me when I'm about 10, maybe 12 steps away from them. They look a little bit startled, but I can already notice their eyes spanning my body. For the Bracelet.

At this, I raise my right arm and say, 'Red.'

Flashback January 19th, 2013 - 1.47pm - Galway, Ireland

As I walk out of the primary school complex where I take some extra classes on Saturdays, I look at the sky more than at anything else. This then turns out to be a mistake, as I walk into her.

'Seriously? I didn't exactly expect you here,' I greet her.

'Ah come on. Want an answer for a question today?'

'Hm... why blue and red? Why not another combination?'

'I wish I knew myself...'

Once again, her eyes only show honesty.

August 15th, 2019 - 10.51pm - Tokyo, Japan

Natsuru and Akane are slightly startled, but I also say, 'I've no intentions of fighting this evening. It's pointless, and the lot of you are probably tired after what happened here just a while ago.'

'Have you watched us?' Mikoto asks.

'I'd kick myself in the buttock hard if I didn't,' only when I say this I realise that it may not have the same meaning in Japanese that it does in English... They smile at this, though, which is a relief. So I continue.

'Now... this whole thing is reaching its climax. But I'd like to direct your attention towards a little detail which myself I probably could've missed. Take a look at your Bracelets,' I say to them as I point towards their arms. 'What do you notice on the underside?'

'A number...' Natsuru answers.

'Our number?' Shizuku asks.

'This is the Kämpfer number, unique to everybody. It's been introduced on something like this Monday. I'm guessing that they're pretty high, the ones that you carry. Senō-san, let me guess, mid-ninety-thousands? Mishima-san... high-eighty-thousands? Sangō-san, gonna hit it hard, am I not, with just below 70,000? Because I know for a fact that Kondō-san here carries six digits already...'

'How do you know our names?' Mikoto asks.

'School records, observations, the similar,' I reply.

'Ah... so what's your number then?' Natsuru asks.

I look at my bracelet to make sure that the history is consistent with me. Then I twist my arm to show the number to them. 'Three.'

Flashback February 14th, 2013 - 12.05pm - Galway, Ireland

As I pick up my cardboard cup of hot chocolate, I turn around. She's standing beside me, about half a step away from me. She looks at me, and I return the look.

'How many of us are there already?' I ask.

'You're good at Maths. Every day about 70-90 new Kämpfer join us worldwide. And it's a month now, more or less, since the beginning. Count yourself.'

'Twenty-six hundred, take or give two hundred?'

'That makes sense...'

'I don't see it stopping anytime soon, that's the issue...'

'Not to worry. Sometime it will.'

August 15th, 2019 - 10.53pm - Tokyo, Japan

'Wow... you're here for long... and may I ask, why are you approaching us?' Akane asks.

I nod towards Natsuru. 'Because of him. I intend on finally finishing this whole array of jokes and... actually, I'd rather not say what else I intend on doing here. We're too vurnerable here, and, trust me, walls can have ears if you want them to.'

'So what place are you suggesting then?' Shizuku asks.

'How about your house?' Natsuru suggests, to a minor shock to the trio.

'If my house, then we can walk, or you throw 50 yen each and I'll buy you lot some metro tickets... Having said that, consider my hospitality of throwing 600 yen myself,' I say, with a smile on my face to not to make them feel guilty, yet with an expectation of some odd extra yen from them as well.

'I'm tired, I'd rather pay 50 yen than walk...' moans Mikoto.

'Me too,' seconds Akane.

'Heck, I'll even pay 100 yen,' smiles Natsuru.

'Then that's settled, let's metro it,' finalizes Shizuku.

A bit later, a bit elsewhere...

One feature of the metro network in Tokyo that always bugged me is that one never got their single tickets back. I ended up buying an extra ticket once, just for the sake of collections. And I went cheap too, with just the 160 yen fare for that one.

When we walk up to my house and through the mini state of a garden in front of it (never been a fan of greenery much, I guess), I get a surprise that I was semi-expecting. As I take out the key chain from my pocket, I hear, more or less in this order, fire going ablaze, a gun clicking at getting loaded and a number of blades silently swishing out at me.

'Thanks for the tickets an' all, but frickin' tell us who ya exactly are before we go in that house!' Akane goes, as is her manner, rather violently at me.

'Hm... right. Great. You want details, you have them. My name's Piotr Sekuła, I'm a 21 year old guy from Poland who has been put into this scheme against his wish. I travelled to Japan in order to see what the things look like in this centre of Kämpfer activity. Because believe it or not, about 40% of all Kämpfer are in Japan.

'How did I stumble upon you lot? I heard from some random Kämpfer in Osaka, "Hey, there's this action going on in Tokyo, why not look for it there?" So I come, peek around and, kaplow! here I am in front of Seisetsu.'

'Alright, alright, tell us more of that story inside, it's starting to get a little bit chilly here,' Natsuru pops out. I nod, open up the house and let the lot inside, switching some light on beforehand. After we're all in, I close up the house, change shoes and lead them to the sitting room. By that time, they'd returned to their standard forms.

When I came to Japan, I decided to buy a house, because I had the bad feeling that things might stretch out in time. The upside was that, having the comfort of my own house, I was able to outfit it and furnish it with a strong European style to it, keeping very little of the Japanese style. The only thing that I decided not to fiddle with was the bathrooms. I mentioned Osaka though, and that's because for some time I travelled a bit around the place to see what the country was like. Amazing, I must say, without question.

'Tea, anybody?' I ask, going straight to the kitchen, not even waiting for an answer. I set up a pot of tea and bring out some mugs. We then sit down at the table, in an incomplete circle of Mikoto, Natsuru, Akane, Shizuku and me. I can tell from their stares that they demand explanations and backgrounds. And I'm ready to give them what they want in this regard.

'OK, so what would you like me to start with then?'

'How did you become a Kämpfer?' Shizuku asks. I smile.

'Good question, because it also tells a lot of the history of Kämpfer. I can't tell you how I myself became one without telling you the background. And it seems fitting to me that I'll work my way backwards in time rather than forwards.

'So, besides me, the eldest Kämpfer here, and also the second oldest person here, is Sangō-san. Yet you carry a number that starts with 69,000. I'm going to guess that you became a Kämpfer around summer 2017, and don't tell me exactly when, it's not necessary, to be honest.

'I'll also answer another one of your questions, what is my Messenger. I don't have one. I don't have a Messenger because they were introduced in June 2016, if I remember right. Right when I was sitting my Leaving Certificate papers, ironically. They took over the role of directly telling a newly created Kämpfer of what the deallio was around here.

'As to who they took the role over from, they are called the Assigners. I can't give them much of a sensible German name, but feel free to play with the verb 'zuordnen'. These lot were introduced around March I think, of 2015. The reason for the Assigners was the same as for the Messengers, they quality of fights of the newly created was dropping down, to a not-so interesting level.'

'So Sakura-san is not a Moderator after all...' Akane thinks out loud.

'Yeah, I wish too that she were one. However, Moderators don't actually interact directly with a Kämpfer ever since the Assigners came about. From my logic, Sakura-san became an Assigner shortly after the Messengers came about. You know, a series of rather unpleasing yet interesting plushy toys, that only attracted specific kind of people.

'The whole Kämpfer system, to continue the rundown of the history, began on January 1st, 2013. Myself I became a Kämpfer on 9th, but soon after that, things started pacing up. Drastically. We're running a bit above a hundred thousand Kämpfer these days. I'll drop down a bunch of numbers for you here so you can see how things paced up,' I say as I stand up, grab a piece of paper from one spot and a pen from another. Then, I write down a bunch of numbers and years beside one another to show them how the Kämpfer numbers rose. When I get near 2018, they're already looking at the page in disbelief. All of descriptions on the page are in both Japanese and English as I don't want to be looking at a random page and wondering what things mean in some time. I pass the page around.

'We've a lot of Kämpfer today...' Shizuku notes the obvious.

'Speaking of today,' I look at my watch, 'it's nearing half past eleven. I don't think that we should be discussing such things at such a late hour. I've a spare bathroom here, for some reason, and a couple of bedrooms. Feel free to stay here or go back home, but wherever you live, you rely on yourselves now I'm afraid.'

As I look at the lot, I see some looks on their faces that don't exactly mean "yep, we're staying here" nor "nyeah, we're going home", but after a short while, they all settle on staying at my place.

'OK, great, I'm gonna show you the bathrooms and the bedrooms around, but before we get up there, a quick question to all of you. A, or B?'

They get a little bit shocked, but they answer.

'B,' Mikoto.

'A,' Akane.

'A,' Natsuru.

A little bit of hesitation from Shizuku, but she does say, 'C.' The others look at her.

'C as well. I like the way you're thinking, seitokaichō-san,' I say. That also puts a little surprise on everybody's faces, but I then tell them that I have to show them the bathrooms and the bedrooms. So we stand up and head upstairs. There, I show them where what is and leave off with, 'If you're looking for me, I'll be in my room.'

When they head for the bathrooms, I turn around and say also, 'I know that I didn't tell you how I became a Kämpfer yet. But please, don't try to kill me in sleep.' With that said, they nod, smile and I turn back around to my room, leaving the door almost closed but yet open, like I've done for the past six years and a bit.

Here, that's the first chapter for you peoples there. Tell me what you think, whether I should continue or not and if the 1st person idea suits you. Second chapter coming to fill things up asap. Nothing promising though.

Thanks, over and out!

MINOR UPDATES DONE ON 1.04.2013... to make the ANs a bit more consise and some style errors were fixed.
MINOR UPDATES DONE ON 4.04.2013... ah, they changed it to 5 days a week... twelve years ago! changed the main date to keep things consise.