New Life, Old Problems.
By Tekkenicus.
Chapter 1: The Awakening of the Rivals. The old complex in the Mishima Laboratories laid there, untouched by any scientist who valued his life. Going into restricted areas was something you shouldn't do, especially when Heihachi Mishima regained his post as CEO of the Mishima Zaibatsu and owner of the Mishima Financial Empire. The world has changed so much since 1996, the year of the climatic events of the 2nd Iron Fist Tournament. It was the new century, and the new millennium. Technology had advanced so far, along with a technology the MFE had recently acquired, biotechnology. Kazuya had started on it, then something he didn't expect happened, and he was defeated and killed. When Heihachi took back control, all those who went over to Kazuya's side lost their jobs, including Heihachi's own stepson, Lee Chaolan. He lost a lot of workers thanks to that miscalculated decision, but he quickly regained workers, especially in the laboratories. But, due to his earlier decision to get rid of anything Kazuya had started, the cryogenics complex was closed off. Heihachi was merciful to the poor subjects locked in the capsules and didn't switch off the power to the complex. Now, something was about to change.
There were two capsules submerged in the freezing liquid nitrogen. Originally, there were three, but one was abducted mysteriously. The two that remained contained two fighters missing from the end of Tekken 2. The Williams Sisters, Nina and Anna. Both had been "asleep" for 15 years, nearing the end of their term in cryogenics. But something strange happened with capsule 1; the one Nina was contained in. Stuck in a near-permanent dream world, Nina was wandering through the outer reaches of her mind, when she envisaged a tall man with green skin, dressed in the suit of an Aztec Warrior. She couldn't speak, but yet the man spoke to her.
"You have.strong.. fighting spirit" he spoke
Nina felt confusion.
"You.kill too" he continued, and then produced a picture of a young boy, lying unconscious in a woodland. He had such handsome looks, and was well built. Compared to the giant muscled mass of the green man, he didn't pose such threat, yet the man gave his request.
"Kill the boy," he said
Nina refused mentally
"Kill the boy," he repeated.
Nina refused again
The man frowned, his face grew dark, but his eyes glowed bright red. He lashed out his arm and grabbed Nina's forehead, holding it tight. Nina struggled to break free, but started to convulse. Shaking all over, she couldn't break free from his grip. She felt the Hoover-like suction, along with the feeling of her brain leaving her skull.
"Kill the boy," he said again, this time in a threatening manner, "Or you will lose more then what I have taken from you!"
The man then let go. Nina's form fell to the floor unconscious, and then, for the first time in 15 years. She opened her eyes, in her physical form, and saw the dark, black ceiling of the complex. She didn't recognise the building at all, she just stared at the ceiling vacantly for a few minutes before sitting upright. She felt dizzy and sick when she crawled out of the capsule, flopping to the floor when she got her whole person out. Cold, naked and ill, she looked back to the capsule. The technology of it looked so strange to her, like an alien spacecraft, only that she was sure she came from Earth. A sudden beeping shot out from nowhere, she looked to where the beeping had come from. She looked at it and saw the inanimate object, with assorted bits and bobs, buttons, levers and lights. In curiosity, she pressed one. The beeping blared out again, followed by the sound of bubbling water. She looked towards the pool and saw that another capsule was rising out of the freezing liquid. When it was fully suspended out from the pool, a giant hiss shot out from its sides and it opened up. Nina, though dizzy and shivering, walked towards it and stared a puzzled gaze. For the first minute, nothing happened, then a figure shot out from the capsule. Nina jumped back in fright and saw what jumped out. The shapely curviform figure that seemed familiar to her lay beside her. She stuck out her hand to see if it moved. She touched the figure, and her hand was swat back. The figure got up and looked at her.
"You!" it spoke and swiped at her
Nina jumped back from the swipes, and then something pulsed in her mind. With this sudden pulse, she spoke.
"Who are you?" she said
"Don't play such mind games, you know who I am!" her opponent replied and took another swipe at her.
"What mind games? I'm not fooling you!" Nina exclaimed, "Who are you? What is this place and why are you attacking me?"
The figure stopped swiping.
"Are you sure?" she asked her
"Yes!" was Nina's irritant reply, "I don't know where the hell I am, and you swiping at me isn't helping!"
That when they heard something. They looked to the side and saw the heavy steel door open, making a potential exit.
"A way out!" Nina's unknown copain cried, "Let's go!"
"What?" said Nina dumbfounded, "Right now? Without clothes?"
"Hmm, you're right there" she replied, and thought for a minute, "Don't worry, I have a plan."
"What's the plan?" Nina asked
"You'll find out soon enough" she replied and headed for the exit, with Nina following behind her
"Wait, what's your name?" Nina asked
"Huh? Oh yeah," her partner replied, "My name's Anna."
Chapter 2: Stuck In The Middle. Nina followed this "Anna" person. She kept sparking something familiar in her head. Her looks, figure and even hairstyle, though wet and dripping, seemed too familiar to be just a helping hand. She felt that she should loathe this woman, hate this woman, banish this woman to the darkest depths of hell, but she had no reason to. It's impolite to hate someone you don't know. Just then, Anna stopped, whisking out an arm behind her to signal Nina to stop.
"Guards!" she whispered to her. There were 2 guards, dressed in a kind of black armour clothing, with guns at the ready and plenty of ammo.
Anna jumped to the darkest side of the tunnel, with Nina following.
"How are we gonna get past them?" Nina asked quietly (so as not to attract the guard's attention)
Anna thought for a moment, then a smile came across her face.
"Don't worry" Anna replied, "I have an idea". She gave a slight giggle at her idea.
She stood on the edge of the tunnel's end (whether exit or entrance) and just waited for the guard's to notice her, which didn't take long. These guards worked up to 20 hours a day, so a naked woman just turning up on their post would be surprising.
"Well, hello there," Anna purred, "I'm kinda lost."
Nina looked on at Anna's flirting with the guards. Another spark of familiarity, another spark of hatred, yet no sparks of jealousy. But then, would you want 2 middle-aged men dressed as soldiers drooling over you?
Just then, the sounds changed.
"HIIYA!"
"URGH!"
The guards were lying on the ground, down and out. Anna dragged them into the tunnel, and started to take one of the guards' armoured suits off.
"What are you doing?!" said Nina, with some shock in her voice.
"Getting us something to wear" Anna replied, "Unless you wanna walk around this freezing place in the nuddy."
Nina raised an eyebrow.
"They can keep the underwear," Anna sighed, "Who'd wanna see that anyway?"
After the two got fully suited up, you couldn't tell whether they were male or female, nevermind their identities. They left the tunnel, leaving the guards in their vests and boxers lying dazed in the tunnel. They walked around the laboratories and saw what you'd expect in any laboratory. Dangerous chemicals, smelly gases, men and women in long white coats and glasses, yep, your average laboratory, apart from a certain dinosaur and kangaroo locked in two separate cages in the corner. Nina looked back at the complex she had left. It was dark, dusty and almost falling apart, how long had she been in that freezing pool. Anna was more focused on finding an exit, though she thought about her sister's condition. When she came out of the pool, she expected Nina to lash out at her in a fight like old times, not reply with "Who are you?". This was serious, though Anna lost many an argument (as did her sister from time to time) she enjoyed their little sibling rivalries. Mainly the ones where she won, like the high school Christmas Disco fiasco involving the punch bowl. She and her boyfriend became the school's couple of the year. Nina, not very happy, picked up the punch bowl and doused Anna in it. Anna smiled underneath her dark helmet. She didn't like it at the time, but not only did it symbolise a win in the long-going rivalry, it was a precious memory. Just then, they came up to the exit.
"Shit!" Anna exclaimed
The exit had guards asking for ID, not to mention a vocal-recognition test to ensure the ID. Though it was mainly for the scientists, she was sure guards coming in and out of the laboratories were tested as well.
"Why have we stopped?" Nina asked, but Anna couldn't reply. Like spacesuits, you had to speak to your partner through a walkie-talkie device within your helmet at a certain frequency. The helmets in the laboratories were soundproofed to cut out noise, but the noise of what was unsure, the loud bangs or the screams of pain?
Anna walked tentatively towards the exit, with the unsure Nina following behind. They got to the exit, when a guard popped up, a voice sounded through both their helmets.
"Did you find out the problem with the doors at the old complex?" the voice spoke.
Anna, nervous, replied in the gruffest, masculine voice she could muster.
"Nah, haven't found out yet" she replied, "We were going to sort it out after our.lunch break"
The guard, underneath his helmet, put on a thoughtful face.
"Your voice sounds a bit lower then usual Naoka" the guard stated, with his face still thoughtful
"Oh, er" Anna fumbled, then she faked a cough, "sore throat" she croaked
"Ah, I understand," the guard said, reassured, "Off you go."
Anna was safe and sound and made her way out, Nina followed her but was stopped by the guard.
"You haven't said much" the guard stated, "What's your problem?"
Nina, nervous, put a hand to her throat and shook her head.
"Laryngitis?" the guard guessed
Nina nodded
"Ah, I see, well, off you go then" the guard replied.
Nina and Anna were both scot-free. They headed towards the double-doors at the end of the wall and had entered an elevator. Anna, with a sigh of relief, took off her helmet and pressed the button symbolizing the top floor. She slumped against the edge of the lift and sat down, with Nina doing the same.
"Finally, a way out of this place!" Anna sighed, "When I see that Kazuya, I'll-"
Anna then noticed Nina's puzzled look at her.
"What's the problem?" she asked
"I still don't know who you really are" Nina replied, "All you've told me is that you're called Anna."
"You didn't recognise anything from that name?" Anna questioned, in surprise
"Only the feeling that I should recognise you," Nina answered, "But apart from that, nothing at all.
Anna thought for a moment again. Nina looked on.
"Do you know your own name?" Anna asked her.
Nina thought, but came back empty-handed
"No, I can't remember anything!" she said, with the emotion fading in on her face.
Anna looked at her upset sister. Her old personality of impatience and independence was either hidden or replaced with the confused, emotional shell of her sister. What had happened to Nina in that capsule? Anna looked up and spotted something that drained the blood from her face and the shock fill her face. A security camera was perched in the corner of the elevator.
"Quick!" she yelled at Nina, "Put your helmet back on!"
Nina looked up, puzzled.
"Huh? What's going-"
"Just put your damn helmet on!"
The elevator stopped and the doors opened, with eight guards, 4 in black, 4 in green, with guns aimed at them, just before the two of them could put their disguise back on. Anna's earlier hope of freedom was lost.
Just then, an old man in a maroon coat and white waistcoat and trousers shoved his way through the guards. His face was gaunt, haggard and wrinkled with age, yet his build of body had not decreased in any way. He looked at the two and gave a thoughtful frown, he recognised them on the spot. He spoke to the head guard.
"Send them to the changing rooms and give them keys 224 and 225. When they're dressed, send them up to my office." He said in his grated, deep, booming voice.
The two women had heard what the old man said and couldn't believe what they were hearing, nor the way they were treated when two of the guards pulled them out of the elevator and prodded the barrel of their guns into their backs, barking orders to move. But more curious to both of them was what did the old man want?
Chapter 3: A Hasty Retreat. The two women sat in the big office, the same office that had belonged to Kazuya. Though he wasn't in sight, nor was anyone else for that matter. Just Anna and Nina. Nothing had changed. The bookshelves were neatly placed on the left wall, the carpet was still the same patterned carpet, and the brown, hardwood desk in front of them still had the carved words 'Obey, Obey, Obey', each time bigger in size as it was repeated. The two women had changed into more comfortable clothing, though it stood out more. Anna was back in her red ball gown and Nina was back in her purple cat suit. The long silence was deafening, with only the clock on the wall breaking the silence.
'Tick.tick.tick' it went to its regular rhythm
'Tick.tick.tick', getting louder
'TICK.TICK.TICK', were getting louder
Then.
'Tick.tick.click!'
The door at the end of the room opened and the old man from before entered the room, his maroon, fur-lined jacket swaying behind him along with the two limbering spikes of hair at the side of his head, emphasising the bald patch in the middle. He pulled the black, leather swivel chair from under the hardwood desk and sat it in, facing Nina and Anna. His face shown how time is merciless, as with his forehead showing permanent brow lines, more evident when he frowned, along with various other wrinkles. He leaned back in his chair and spoke.
"How did you infiltrate the Cold Sleep Complex?" he asked in his thick Japanese accent
"We didn't infiltrate anywhere!" Nina spoke up, "What's this 'Cold Sleep Complex' anyway?"
"The building you and your sister were reported leaving from" the man replied
"We didn't get inside it on our own accord," Anna spoke calmly, "We were in it."
The man thought for a moment.
"That seems truthful" he replied unexpectedly, "After all, how else did you keep your youthful looks? I'll have to get my secretary to check up on the old records."
"Lee Chaolan still works here?" Anna spoke, absentmindedly putting her thoughts into words, with Nina raising a quizzical eyebrow.
"Lee Chaolan? Oh no no no," he replied, "He 'retired' ages ago"
Anna's hopes of someone she could trust went down the drain. Nina was unsure of what was going on; just then, she lashed out. She got up from her chair and banged her fists down on the hardwood desk.
"Just who the hell are you anyway?!?" she burst out, "What happened to us and why the hell are we here?"
The old man frowned. He picked up something on his desk, an identity bar which said 'Chief Executive Officer and Owner' on it and turned it around, so it said.
"'Heihachi Mishima'?" Anna said in shock, much to Nina's surprise, "You took back control?"
"Of course," he replied, "It is said that a teacher's happiest moment is when his student surpasses him. I haven't reached that happy moment yet"
"What happened to the previous owner?"
"That is private and confidential, Ms Williams"
"Excuse me," Nina butted in, "But what the hell is going on?"
Just then, a voice on the intercom spoke up.
"Mr Mishima? Hello?" it spoke
It was a brand new type of intercom, projecting a holographic image of the person calling up to it. The image projected a man in his late thirties in a long white coat, wild unruly hair, which looked uncombed from the previous morning, and a Western face. Western people were hard to find around the Mishima Zaibatsu. Nothing to do with racial issues, but it was accounted that there were only 20 westerners out of the main total of 700 employees (100 employees per site building, 200 in the laboratories).
"Yes?" Heihachi replied to the voice
"I have the records of who went into the Cold Sleep Experiment" the man stated, "Do you want them now or should I wait?"
"No, bring them up," Heihachi replied, "And try not to drop them this time!"
He pressed a button on the intercom and the image disappeared. With both of the sisters still looking at it in awe.
"Technology has come a long way since 1996," Heihachi spoke, "That is, if you were-"
The door opened and revealed the man shown on the intercom. Though with a neatly buttoned-up white shirt, you could still read the words on the T- Shirt he was wearing underneath, with black trousers stained yellowish- white in some places due to experiments with bleach, his hair dark brown, long and wild and his face, though not ugly, wasn't good looking either, with such facial qualities improved by a neat moustache. He bowed to Heihachi and the two sisters, as is the custom to in Japan, and then presented Heihachi with a single sheet of paper.
"This tells us the names of who went into the capsules of the Cold Sleep Experiment." the man said, his voice deep and yet, nearly incomprehensible, but vocal enough to be heard and understood.
Heihachi read through the various paragraphs and terms and then came across the names:
Cap 1: N. Williams Cap 2: A. Williams Cap 3: S. Boskonovitch
"It appears that the two women arrested by our guards were part of the experiment," the man continued, "Not trying to get confidential information, wouldn't you agree?"
Heihachi growled at the man's insolence and impertinence.
"Yes, you're correct Mr-" he spoke, then stopped and did an about-turn, "Mr- X. But let me remind you that if you continue your impertinent ways, you'll never work again!"
The two sisters looked on, unsure of what was going on. First they thought they were going to be 'eliminated', so to speak, but then they're brought up into an office, now discovered to belong to the CEO and Owner, Heihachi Mishima, or whoever he was, and were accused of trespassing, now some weird guy walks into and things get more confusing then how they started.
"Would someone mind telling me what the fuck is going on here?" exclaimed Nina, frustrated and angry, "What the fuck does that piece of crap say?"
"This 'piece of crap' as you call it, proves your innocence of trespassing," Heihachi replied.
"Oh, thank God!" Nina sighed with relief. Anna hid her brief moment of happiness, was her sister back to normal? Did she regain her memories?
"Mr-X will take you two to the airport to fly back home," Heihachi stated, passing two aeroplane tickets across the hardwood desk to them, along with 2,000 Euros, 1,000 each, "That money should be enough to get you two back on your feet"
The sisters looked at each other, shrugged off other questions and took Heihachi's offer. Mr-X then led them out of the office, letting them both out the door first in the gentlemanly manner. As the two sisters left, Heihachi couldn't help but smirk slyly.
'Something tells me,' he thought, 'That it's not going to be long before I see them again' Chapter 4: Recent Memories. Nina and Anna were relaxing in the warm sunny weather of Florida. Both were sunbathing in recliners, Nina in a black swimming costume and her sister, Anna, in a red bikini. As Nina looked up to the sky through her sunglasses, she reminisced back to a few months ago to when she and Anna were escorted to the airport. From being prodded in the back by the barrel of a gun, to a door to a shiny, black-velvet limousine being opened for them. The limousine was freshly clean and shone in the sunlight of the setting red sun. From being treated like crap to being treated like royalty was surprisingly fast. The mysterious Mr-X was their escort and had so entered the limousine with them, carrying a big, leather briefcase. The long white coat now replaced with a black, neatly buttoned jacket.
"Driver, to the airport please" he told to the chauffeur
"Nan no hanashi desu ka? (What are you talking about?)" was his reply
The man got a dictionary from his pocket and looked up the word he needed
"Kuko (airport)" he replied, and soon the limousine was rolling
"For someone working at the Mishima Zaibatsu," remarked Anna, "I'd thought you'd be more resourceful."
"For a daughter of Richard Williams, I'd thought you'd be more cunning and decisive" Mr-X replied, much to the chagrin of Anna Williams
"What's in the briefcase?" she said
Mr-X opened the briefcase and revealed tons of aeroplane tickets, each to a capital city in the world.
"I know that if either one of you returned back to Ireland," he stated, "That your enemies would easily kill you. So here are tickets to any place in the world, or at least any place decent. Go ahead, take your pick."
The two sisters picked out two tickets from the briefcase and looked at where it destined them.
"Florida," Anna read hers, "Not bad."
"Manchester?!?" Nina read hers, "Think I'd prefer Florida"
"Easily sorted," Mr-X replied, "One ticket can gain both of you a flight."
They looked at the tickets and saw he was right. Sometime between 1996 and 2012, the air business devised a plan to get more people flying by making a two-for-one flight deal.
"Thanks" Nina politely said
"Best be grateful," he replied, "It's costing me a fortune."
The limousine then stopped. Mr-X looked out of the window and saw they stopped outside a gas station. He sighed.
"I dunno," he said, "15 years of working here and I still haven't broken the language barrier!"
He got out of the car to talk to the chauffeur, leaving the sisters in the limousine. There was a long silence in the car, excluding the argumentation of Mr-X and the chauffeur and the rush of cars driving by. Just then, Nina decided to ask Anna the question that was poisoning her brain.
"Anna," she asked, "who am I?"
Anna, though surprised by the sudden question, remembered back to her sister's amnesia.
"You'll find out soon enough," She replied, "You have amnesia, which means that you won't remember anything for a bit, but it'll all come flooding back"
"How do you know?"
"TV soaps, they use amnesia in their plotlines nearly all the time"
"Can't you at least tell me my name?" she questioned, "I don't want to spend the rest of my life as 'unknown'"
"Well, ok," Anna relented, "You're called Nina, Nina Williams."
Nina relaxed a bit, then went to ask another question before being interrupted-
"-And yes, we're sisters!" Anna concluded
"I was going to ask when you'd think we'd get moving again," a surprised Nina replied
Just then, Mr-X came back.
"Apparently we need to get a refuel of petrol," he stated, "Anyway, this gives me time to tell you what the consequences of the cold sleep process might've generated or de-generated you two physically."
"Go on, we're listening" Anna said
"Well," he started, "do you want the good factors or the bad factors first- "
"Just get to the goddamn point!" Nina exclaimed, before calming back down again, "please."
Mr-X quickly picked up his notes on the Cold Sleep process and read from them.
"Well," he began, "Good factors are you won't age for the next four years, the summer heat won't be a problem as you'll feel cooler, but this feeling gets progressively less susceptible through the four years of youth, and you'll feel more energetic through those four years as well."
"And the bad factors?" Anna questioned
"The bad factors," he continued," Are that both of you are more susceptible to illness, and the general sickness you feel as your bodily functions start up again, though will go away after a couple of weeks, won't be pretty. The general cold-sleep illness, or GCS symptoms you should expect are shivering, vomiting, increases in (ahem) urinating and lethargic tendencies."
"Lethargic tendencies?" Nina said dumbfounded
"Loss of energy," Mr-X defined, "It won't kill you unless you spend about 6 months living without shelter in somewhere like., Finland per se. Best treatment for it is to spend the few weeks of illness somewhere in a warm climate."
"Good thing we're going to Florida then" Anna replied happily, "Doesn't seem too bad"
"Actually, it is that bad. It's only supposed to last a few days, not weeks," he assured her, "But your immune system has to get used to working again so you'll feel really rotten in the first week or so."
"Oh, way to bring down the mood!" Anna replied, the happy feeling gone.
"Hey, just think about the good factors and go through the bad factors," he advised, "The bad factors only last a few weeks, whilst you'll get 4 years of beating the ageing process!"
That's when the limousine stopped again.
"Kuko." The chauffeur spoke
"Ah, arigato Nakatani-san (thanks Mr Nakatani)" Mr-X replied and got out of the car, holding the door open for the two sisters to get out.
Just then, three guys 'dressed to impress' dragged her from her thoughts.
"Hey babe, check out these pecs!" one of them said, flexing, looking somewhat familiar with a certain flat top hairstyle. She just smiled it off and went back to sunbathing. Then when she looked back up to see Anna leaving with the three of them, she couldn't help but feel a bit jealous. That's when some objects sparked in her mind, a shower, a Polaroid camera and an embarrassing photo. Nina smirked. Using her old stealth techniques, she snuck up behind Anna and undid her bikini top. She left an embarrassed Anna, and three excited guys with a smirk. The Silent Assassin was back in business.
Chapter 5: Rebirth of The Silent Assassin. Nina sat on a chair, looking out through the window at the twinkling night sky. It had now been 4 years since she had been released from that cold abyss of sleep. Nina, along with her sister Anna, had spent about 3 years, 11 months and 17 hours of those 4 years living in an apartment in Miami, Florida, excluding time out of the apartment, on the plane towards their home and the experience within the Mishima Zaibatsu. Nothing exciting had really happened, apart from that she found out about her past life from her sister Anna, that she was a grade-A assassin, she was related to Anna and she had targeted both Heihachi and a man called 'Kazuya' before being forced into the Cold Sleep Experiment. But still she had so many questions. How old was she? Where was she born? Who were her parents and what were their names? Who's Kazuya? Questions of which Anna could only answer a few, and that others shouldn't hear nor answer. She felt empty and unfulfilled.
Anna was out. She obtained a job at some clubs as a waitress. Nina didn't think much of her 'sister', but she was the only person she could trust, after all, they both went through the same thing, apart from one thing.
CRASH!
Nina covered her eyes from the flying shards of glass that once were a windowpane, falling out from her chair amongst the fallen glass pieces. She looked up and saw him. The visage of the young boy the green man had shown her, only now he was older, mature, bigger, stronger, but yet still with that caring look. He looked harmless, but yet she gazed upon with the image with a look as if the Devil himself stood before her. Then a familiar voice boomed at her.
"Kill.the.boy"
A strong breeze blew around the room, knocking magazines off a coffee table, blowing away the leaves of glass from the ground, making Nina's golden blonde hair flap and flow like a flag at high mast. Nina's expression changed from shock and surprise to blankness, with the pupils of her bright blue eyes dilating, her movement stilled. A mysterious and powerful force had her under its spell.
"Kill.the.boy! I command you!" the voice boomed again, "You now serve your god, THE only god! The God Of The Fight!"
Nina's body went limp, swaying in the strong breeze, rising from the ground in mid-air. The only sound coming from her was that of her breathing, now hoarse and growling.
"I will," she uttered, and yet she didn't utter, "I will appease you."
"You serve your God well," the Ogre spoke, "Head for the Land of Wood and complete your task, or be destroyed!"
Then, just as fast as he appeared, he disappeared. The visage of the boy was gone and the breeze dead. Nina dropped from her floating repose back to the ground with a thump. She lay amongst a mass of strewn magazines, broken glass, overturned furniture and other broken property. She saw the bright light shining from the window, and then she fell into the deep dark slumber of forced sleep, unconsciousness.
She woke up much later in a hospital bed. Her vision, blurred at first, cleared and she looked around the room. The walls were white, as they are in nearly every hospital, with a tinted window overlooking the streets. Then she saw a familiar face, donned in a red jacket and white shirt, going down well with her black jeans.
"She's finally awake" said Anna.
"Oh, it's you," Nina replied, "What happened?"
"I could ask you the same question," she stated, "I came back from work to find you lying unconscious amongst a hell of a lot of mess."
Nina sighed, clutching her temples.
"Why am I here?" she questioned
"Well, to be honest, I was worried about you," answered Anna, "So I phoned an ambulance and, well, here you are."
Nina groaned. Her head was aching ever since she woke up, rubbing her temples in vain so the ache would subside
"What's wrong?" her sister asked
"Damn fucking headache," she growled, "It's like someone's trying to drill into my skull."
"I'll see to a doctor about it," Anna excused and left the room, though it wasn't a doctor on her mind. As she walked out of the room, she leant with her back against the wall and took two envelopes out of her jacket pocket. She knew what they were; the Mishima Financial Empire's 'Iron Fist' logo was easily recognisable. Both were addressed to her and to her sister Nina.
'She won't know of such things' Anna consoled herself in her thoughts, 'She has had amnesia ever since she got out of that.experiment.'
Anna shivered at the very thought of the Cold Sleep experiment. Put in there against her own free will, she had no idea what employees for the past 15 years whilst she was in there might've done to her, or Nina. But then, why was she looking out for Nina? She hates Nina; She hated Nina ever since her teenage years. But now Nina was vulnerable mentally.
'What the hell happened to her in that capsule?" she thought, frowning. She turned her attention back to the envelopes and sighed.
"She'll find out soon enough anyway" she sighed, put the envelopes back in and went back into the room. Nina noticed her and sat up in her bed.
"What did the doctor say?" Nina asked
"The doctor?" Anna questioned, and then remembered, "Oh, the doctor! He said just to take some aspirin, and if it didn't subside, to call him in the morning."
Nina growled and dropped back down on the bed.
"This is goddamn frustrating!" she exclaimed
Anna looked at her jacket pocket, and took the envelopes out, giving one to Nina. Nina received it and looked at it, sparking another image within her head, it was of a red painted image of that on the envelope, the M.F.E 'Iron Fist' logo.
"The King Of Iron Fist Tournament," she uttered, much to Anna's surprise
"How did you know?" she said, with a hint of shock appearing on her face.
Nina tried to find a reason to how she knew, but she didn't.
"I don't know," she admitted, "I just saw it and out it came."
Anna raised an inquisitive eyebrow.
'Maybe she's remembering,' she thought to herself, 'But how.?'
Anna shrugged off her mental repose. What was was.
"Anyway," she said, "You can leave here now."
"Ah, good." Nina replied.
The two sisters left the hospital as soon as possible. For the whole of the long journey back home, Nina stared at the M.F.E letter. She was right, it was an invitation to the King Of Iron Fist Tournament, with full paid flight and an allocated room. Would it be the holiday of a lifetime? Or a one-way ticket to destruction and death? She wouldn't know until she found out. Then, Nina suddenly stopped.
"Huh? What's wrong Nina?" Anna asked, and then she looked into Nina's eyes. She gasped. The lights were on, but no one was home.
The breeze died back down, Nina shuddered and fell to the floor.
"Nina!" Anna exclaimed, shaking Nina madly to try and revive her "What's wrong?"
She kept shaking her for what seemed like ages, and then she got a response. Nina coughed, then groaned.
"Hey, stop shaking me!" she moaned, "I'm fine!"
"What the hell happened back then?" asked Anna, her nerves shaken
"What? What happened?" Nina replied. She was unaware of what happened.
Anna sighed. "Nothing, forget it."
The Next Morning.
Anna was up early, not exactly for any particular reason; she was just in a good mood. She looked out the window and gazed at the sun-kissed golden beaches getting brushed by the aquamarine waves from the deep blue seas and smiled.
'Beats the rocky shores of Ireland any day!' she thought to herself.
After getting dressed, she went to wake up Nina. Ever since they got to Florida, Nina was a heavy sleeper. Anna didn't know why, but neither did she care. She opened the door to Nina's room and entered without looking.
"Hey! Rise and Shine Blondie!" she called out.
Then she looked. The room was a complete mess, the bed was broken along with the dresser beside it, not to mention various clothes and other possessions were thrown all around the place. CD's, bed sheets, shirts, jeans, underwear, broken wood from the bed frame. It was a complete mess. Anna gazed at the room in shock and surprise.
'How come I never heard any noise?' she thought to herself.
Then she noticed the broken window.
'No! She couldn't have!'
She ran out the room to check her jacket pocket. Nina gave her back the letter and invitation in the envelope and she put it back there.
"Please let it be there!" she said, rummaging through the pocket frantically. She took out all the contents out of it. She sighed a sigh of relief as she found the two envelopes. Hers and Nina's. She picked them up and went to put them somewhere safe. She walked into the kitchen area of the apartment and put them in a drawer, as she did this, she noticed something significant. Nina's envelope was lighter in weight. She looked into it; the letter and the invitation were gone.
"She wouldn't!" she exclaimed, "She just wouldn't! .Would she?"
Chapter 6: The Call Of The Iron Fist. A month later.. Nina's progress in the tournament was better than average. In just the few 4 weeks, she had eliminated 6 opponents easily. It would've been more, but there were only 2 bouts a week in the preliminaries. Up next were the quarterfinals; her next fights would be against a mystery opponent and Paul Phoenix, but there was a confusion in all this. Contrary to the tournament rules, her fight against her mystery opponent would be unsanctioned by the Mishima Zaibatsu, meaning all the rules went out the window and into the front yard. Only one rule was kept in, no weapons. She felt this unfair as she saw a robotic ninja nearly slash someone to death with a big glowing sword. But she didn't care about winning, all she cared about was getting rid of the entity plaguing her mind, the God Of Fighting, or whatever he called himself. She worked out what the "god" meant by the 'Land of Wood' just as she received the invitation envelope over a month before. In the past, Japan was a hard place to build stone buildings, so traditional houses and pagodas were made out of wood. She knew the tournament was the key, but to what door was still a mystery. A way out for her? Or a way in for the green man?
She was sat in her allocated room, the room she unknowingly had been in about 20 years before. There was no trace of her first entrance there; when she got there it was bare. Now it was like a little home. As she looked out of the window on that rainy day, watching a fight in the distance, she remembered her first day at this tournament. She, along with the other fighters, were directed to a vast hall, like the ones you get in schools, only it was much bigger, and was built like a theatre. The wall behind the stage was curved so that sound would seem louder and wouldn't bounce back, the stage and the walls were brightly coloured, with various artworks displayed along the sides, including a very curious one of a cliff painted red under a dark cloud and with a gloomy background. It didn't say the artist's name. She was surprised that such a business conglomerate as the Mishima Financial Empire, concentrating in the most analytical and technological, would bother with art and tradition. Just then, a voice spoke through some hidden speakers
"Fighters, please take your seats. Mr Mishima will be here shortly"
It was the voice of Mr-X, the man who had de-briefed her and her 'sister' Anna on the cryogenics situation, and had given them a new life in Florida. She took her seat, as did the other fighters. She looked around the crowd and could see the colourful backgrounds they all came from. Many of the fighters seemed to be from the local area, a few were from odd places, the biggest minority were the ones she couldn't pinpoint, and the rest were from the West. She was in a good mood that day, didn't know why though. Was it Mr-X? Seeing new people? The beautiful artworks surrounding the hall? Or the tournament itself? She looked to the stage and saw him, Heihachi Mishima, CEO of the Mishima Zaibatsu and Owner of the Mishima Financial Empire.
"Greetings Fighters from all over the world!" Heihachi said in his thick Japanese accent, "Each one of you is obviously strong, but who is the cream of the crop?"
"Just get to the point old man!" cried out a brash voice
Nina turned to where the voice came from and saw another blast from the past. She saw a man dressed in a black leather biker suit standing up out of his chair. His looks showed that time had really wanted to make a face that cried middle age. The thing that stuck out the most about this man was the tall tower of blonde hair that shot out from his head. From her angle, it looked like a giant cube, but when the man sat back down (after being chided by Heihachi), it took on a different shape. She turned away from the man just before he could recognise her stare, and looked back at the stage, listening to what Heihachi had to say. After he went through the basic terms and conditions of the tournament, he then went on to announce something special.
".And the person who successfully beats me," Heihachi declared (though obviously didn't want to happen), "Will face a surprise opponent, of whose identity I will not declare."
This caused a spark of chatter from the crowd of fighters. Now all talking with acquaintances or friends they made along the journey to the tournament, or like Nina, were quietly thinking about the subject.
'Could this surprise opponent be that boy?' she thought, as a slow breeze flew past her. A loud voice screamed out through her head.
'The gift of the Evil Mist!' it cried, then disappeared as the breeze died down
Later through the tournament she would find out what the voice meant by the gift of breath. The 'god of fight' had given her the power to make a smokescreen of purple gas to weaken her opponent's guard so she could be ready to retaliate with a move, but at the time she had been caught off guard. The voice made her jump, getting a couple of stares from the fighters sitting beside her and the fighters in the chairs in front of her and behind her. She shrugged it off; they'd be eliminated shortly anyway, either by her or someone else.
Nina looked away from the window when the fight ended and stop reminiscing. The man who won the distant fight was an oriental guy who hung out with the brash middle-aged biker. She was bored, and her fight wasn't for ages. What else could she do? Apart from continue her mission. Find the boy and 'terminate' him, it was the only way to go, and the only move to make.
She got dressed in a tight purple suit, not dissimilar to a past purple suit. This one covered more of her person. It was hardly to put on, the legs of the suit were easily put on, like tights, but the material the suit was made from didn't make it an easy ordeal. From then, you just had to put your arms in the shoulder straps and zip up round the back. It had an odd zip, it didn't go straight down the back, and it went around the sides under her bustline, from front to back.
'What has the fashion world come to?' she thought to herself in disdain, resting her face in the palm of her hand, shaking her head. She zipped up and sighed in relief.
After moving around in the suit to get used to the feel of it, she strapped a makeshift backup weapon on her left thigh in case things got brutal, and her trademark stiletto's. Ever since Nina have seen them for the first time in 15 years in Florida, they were her main shoes, and nothing would replace it. She took a deep breath, and set off on her mission. She walked out from her room and headed down the numerous stairs and out of the room complex. As she headed for the main Zaibatsu building, she heard something in another building.
"YAH!" 'THUD!'
She looked through the window of the building and saw the boy, just as he was in the 'god's' visage. He was thumping away at a sandbag with powerful blows, whacking the big heavy sandbag nearly right off its chain.
'Impressive' she thought, and then she felt the breeze again, growing into a gale. She looked around defensively, trying to find who or what was making the gale. She knew nothing on Earth could speed the winds this fast. She turned around and saw him, the green man, The God Of Fighting. The green man glared into her eyes deeply with his red glower. Nina tried not to look back, but succumbed eventually, her eyes dilating, with the pupils glowing bright red like 'her god of fighting'.
"KILL THE BOYYYYY!" the god growled and broke the windows to the nearby building. Then the god did his disappearing act again, leaving a dishevelled Nina on the ground. The boy looked through the broken frames and saw her. He gasped and leapt through the hole to check on her.
"Hey, are you Ok?" he asked politely in near perfect English, "You seem hurt."
Nina coughed and got up from the wet puddle of rainwater she dropped in. Her golden hair stained with mud from the gutter.
"I'll be Ok, just leave me-" she replied, and then stopped. Her mental repose glowered back up again, with the eyes glowing red. The boy looked back in shock.
"Wh-wh-wha?" he stuttered.
Nina growled an unearthly growl. She bunched up her fists and shot them right into the boy's stomach, sending him through the wall and back in the building. She had lost control of her own body and mind. The thing that controlled her now was the God Of Fight, The Toshin.
The boy got up painfully, clutching on the opposite wall to drag himself back up to his feet. The possessed Nina walked into the building through the hole she made and looked upon the wounded boy.
"What are you doing?" he said in a strained voice, Nina's double-fist strike had winded him badly.
She growled and ran towards the boy, tripping him up with a heavy sliding kick to his ankles, knocking him off his feet and sending him to the ground once more. Nina, with eyes of fire, glowering upon the struggling boy again.
"Weak child." She said in the unearthly voice, "You will never defeat me!"
'Toshin!' the boy thought, 'It can't be!'
"It is young Jin," she boomed, "I merely got this woman to eliminate you and so far she's proving to be a success."
The boy, Jin, got up, his face screwed up in anger. His fists were shaking and his breathing was heavy, he knew he was going to have to fight.
"Are you really going to hit a poor, defenceless woman?" she taunted
"No, I'm going.TO HIT YOU!!!!" Jin growled and hit the possessed woman with two stinging jabs to the face, followed with a sweep. Nina rolled up on her feet and raised a strong Nicolella kick at her adversary, smacking Jin right up the jaw, into the air, and back down to the ground. Nina mocked the grounded Jin by grinding her heel into his chest.
"Would you like to be my next sacrifice?" she chuckled
Jin groaned in pain, then grabbed her foot and brought her down to the ground with a heavy crash. Jin leapt up on his feet and looked on at his opponent.
"I'll only fight you in your true form Toshin!" he stated, "Leave the lady out of this!"
"No, I'm not going to give up my latest slave to you, child!" the Toshin within her growled at Jin, "I'm going to dispose of you and her right now!"
Nina rushed at Jin and gave him a powerful kick to the head, and then landing alongside his prone form, she clutched his right leg with her left arm, held him down with her left leg and pushed away his left leg with her right leg. She gripped his right leg tight and tugged at it sharply, throwing her upper body back for extra force, making Jin growl in pain. Then Nina got up and twirled around Jin's already painful left leg and clutched her arms and legs around it, pulling it round the wrong way. Jin growled even more in pain, the pressure on his leg was mounting up so far that he was sure that his kneecap had already broken apart. Jin looked at the malevolent Nina, and decided that he had to retaliate in a way that would be dirty fighting.
He poked Nina in the eyes, disabling her long enough for Jin to break free of her hold.
"I'm not playing this game with you, Toshin!" he replied, "I will get revenge on you!"
Just then, an army of Tekkenshu soldiers stormed into the building and surrounded Nina, with guns aimed. Nina looked around the Tekkenshu, looked at Jin one more time, then lapsed into unconsciousness.
Chapter 7: The Return of Purple Vs Scarlet. Part 1- The Fight With The Hot Blooded Martial Artist. Nina woke up and sat straight up in her bed as if she was waking from a nightmare. Was it a nightmare? She looked around the room and found that it was her room back in Florida. She breathed a sigh of relief. She was in no more trouble and everything was alright. Then, the door to her room burst off its hinges and the Toshin came back, lunging himself at Nina-
And then she woke up. Sitting straight up in her bed, waking up from her nightmare, doused in cold sweat. She looked around the room and saw she was back in her allocated room. She pinched herself, but it wasn't a dream. Was her attempt at taking that boy's life a simple dream? She remembered everything from the moment she smashed him through the wall, to the moment she fell unconscious. She deducted that the Tekkenshu simply carried her back to her room and left her there, and if so, why were they so merciful? She tried to KILL that boy! The grandson of The CEO Heihachi Mishima! What if she did kill him? Would they still carry her back to her room? She groaned a pained groan as she tried to get her head around these facts, when-
"Ms Williams to the Arena, Ms Williams to the Arena. Your fight is about to start!" spouted a voice over an intercom.
Nina groaned, she got out of bed to get her fighting clothes, but then realising she already had it on. She sighed.
'I'm seriously losing it!' she thought to herself, and set off towards the arena.
At The Arena. Nina looked around and saw the loud crowd of people. All clambering around each other like grapevines. They were your usual fight-fan crowd, ranging from amateur martial artists and martial arts teachers wanting to see their own style in action from a safe distance, to simple kids and hicks wanting to watching something different then wrestling.
'Sick freaks,' she thought, 'Enjoying such bloodshed.'
She looked towards the opposite end of the arena and saw her opponent. The brash, flat-topped biker she saw on the first day at the tournament, donned in the very same biker outfit. Something about him just screamed familiarity in her face, but she couldn't put her finger on it. She needed more clues.
"Hey doll face, looks like we're gonna have to get brutal now," he called over to her, "Watch out that you don't break a nail!"
The crowd laughed, at Nina's expense. Nina frowned and glowered at the middle-aged biker.
"They don't allow 'Rebel Without A Cause' rejects here," she retaliated, "So eat shit and fuck off!"
The biker thought to himself one name in the questioning sense.
'Nina?'
Then the intercom voice spoke up again.
"Paul, you were the first person to the arena, which battlefield would you like?"
The name sparked more of that sense of familiarity in Nina. She got images of a motorbike, the oriental martial artist, the biker himself and.other things racing through her mind. But she had to shake it off; the fight was about to begin!
"Hmm, battlefield, how about the alley's of #New York, New Yorrrrrrk!#" Paul delightfully sung in response, getting another laugh from the crowds. He was fan-favourite to win the tournament.
The background of the crowd suddenly disappeared behind a mould of a dirty, windswept hovel that was the alleyways of the NYC slums. She shook her head, but saw that the mould didn't disappear. The biker, named 'Paul' walked up to her.
"In case ya missed it," he began, "They make these scenario-deals so the fighter will feel more comfortable and not see loads of eyes staring at them. The crowd can see us, but we can't see them."
Nina fumbled for the appropriate answer, but only came up with a simple retort.
".Ok." she muttered
Paul walked back to his side of the arena, cricked his neck and fingers, and got into a fighting stance: a generic fighting stance with hunched shoulders. Nina looked back, gave a cutthroat motion towards her opponent and smirked evilly at her opponent before moving into her stance: another generic fighting stance, but with her hands held up, shaking sideways like a metronome.
"Fighters, are you ready?" the intercom voice cried
"Ready as I'll ever be." Nina sighed
"Hell yeah, get on with it already!" Paul replied, eager to fight.
The voice started the countdown.
"3.2.1."
"Get ready to have your butt whooped girl."
"In your dreams you pervert!"
".FIGHT!"
Nina cast the first stone as she lunged towards Paul with a hefty flying roundhouse kick, of which Paul blocked in time, Nina then quickly followed up with a low kick, connecting with Paul's ankle, then a head kick that sent Paul on the ground. Paul leapt up and flew towards Nina with both arms out in front of him in a Superman style, this knocking Nina down whilst Paul rolled up to his feet. Nina hopped up and smacked Paul with two severely stinging jabs, followed by a strong spinning back roundhouse kick. Paul locked his arms around the kicking foot, and smirked, retaliated only by a surprised gasp from Nina. Paul spun his arms around, sending Nina spinning through the air and landing on the ground with a hefty thud. That's when the taunting started. Paul got out a nail file and filed his nails.
"Ooh, I broke a nail." He said in a Marilyn Monroe-style voice (or at least the best Marilyn Monroe voice a gruff, tough biker could do)
Nina got up and looked at Paul in the most vicious way. If looks could kill, then Paul would looked even worse then a victim of Jack The Ripper. She got up on her feet steadily and slowly, much to the boredom of Paul, still filing his nails. When she got up to her feet, she looked back and Paul and gave a evilly sweet smile. Paul looked back in confusion. Nina charged at Paul, Paul simply putting away his file and getting back into his stance, but too little too late. Nina struck Paul with 4 stinging jabs to the face, followed by a head kick, moving fluidly down into a low kick, then she came back up quickly to respond with a backhand body chop, followed by another stinging jab and low kick, and then sending Paul skyward with an amazing kick, like a Nicolella, only that it wasn't airborne, and was much more powerful. She called the specific kick the 'Divine Cannon'. Paul flew up into the air and landed back down with a heavy crash.
"Boy, you can't beat me, give it up." Nina mocked
Another count started from the intercom, if Paul wasn't up by the time the count ended, he would be eliminated.
"10.9.8.7.6.5.4.3.2.1.-"
He got up just before it reached zero. "Match continues!" the intercom voice stated
"Shit!" Nina growled and got back in her fighting stance, her ankle weakened from Paul's counter-attack, this was a battle that wouldn't be ended easily.
Paul wheezed as he got back into his stance. His face bleeding from the numerous jabs to the face, but he still managed to find enough energy to mock.
"Didn't feel a thing. Are you sure you're a fighter?" he yelled to her, though in thought, he was wondering whether this was the girl he met all those years before.
"Just shut up and fight!" Nina responded and rushed at Paul with a vicious flying kick, with a kiai to followed. Paul concentrated on Nina's moving form, and then attacked, smashing Nina out of the sky with an undetected Scissors Kick, and as Nina fell back to the ground, Paul concluded the attack by hitting Nina's just inches before she hit the ground with a quick sweep, followed up with a crushing elbow blow into her stomach. She groaned as the elbow pushed all the air out of her lungs and fell limply back onto the ground, but just getting up with a small amount of energy.
"I will not be beaten." she wheezed painfully, breathing in felt like breathing in fire, "...by the scummy shit that you are!". She lunged towards Paul and threw all her energy into one hefty kick, a kick very popular with women and often used to disable muggers, annoying guys and other inconveniences. Paul's face showed the look of surprise and shock as the kick connected, then the wincing of pain. Paul covered his pain scrotum and hopped around in pain, much to the delight of the crowd. Nina, in all her tiredness and aches, smirked.
"That's what you get for messing with me, chumpstain!" she said, "Time to end this shit!". She used all her concentration, flexing the muscles in her arms and legs, slowing moving into a Crane stance, though she called it the Swan Stance. As she charged, yellow electricity charged around her arms as she reached the climax of her move. Then she threw out her arms at Paul, aiming to connect both her fists into his gut, but she made a mistake, she miscalculated how long Paul would be detained. As she threw her fists into where Paul used to be, he has already jumped to her side. Paul grabbed her stray left arm and spun under it and used all the potential energy he gained from the spin to flip Nina so hard onto her back she bounced. Nina used this bounce to get back on her feet, but second mistake, she didn't keep her eyes on her opponent. Just as Nina turned to Paul, she was met with such a strong punch to the stomach, she nearly threw up. The force sent her rolling along the ground twice before all the force from the punch drained away into nothing. The countdown started.
"10.9.8."
No action from Nina
".7.6.5."
Still nothing.
"4.3.2."
Nothing.
".1.0! Paul Phoenix Wins!"
Paul celebrated to the crowd, rubbing his hands then throwing his arm in the air in a suggestive manner.
"Hell yeah! I am the King!" he cheered, whilst medics carried the unconscious Nina to a medical room. Paul looked on and sighed.
'That had to be her!,' he thought, 'And yet it can't be her. Jeez! What have I been drinking?'
Hours later. Nina was patched up with plasters left, right and centre. She felt humiliated, violated and upset after the fight. Beaten in the most embarrassing manner, with one cheap punch, a single punch. She lay there in the medical bed in a very bad mood, which wasn't helped when a certain visitor came along.
"I hear you were beaten in the tournament," a thick Japanese accent spoke
"Mr Mishima?"
"That is correct." Heihachi replied, "I also hear you tried to kill my grandson. You can stop me if I'm wrong"
Nina didn't reply. If she replied, she'd be in for something much worse then a defeat. She stayed silent, much to the chagrin of Heihachi.
"How are you feeling anyway?" he asked, "After all, you have another fight tonight."
"TONIGHT?!?" Nina exclaimed, "I thought it wasn't for the next couple of days!"
"There has been a change in schedule Ms Williams," Heihachi informed her, "After some certain person tried to bump off a family member of mine!"
Nina looked into Heihachi's eyes as he said that. Her eyes in turn showing much surprise, she blinked, then said carefully.
"You want him dead don't you?" she said
"Who?" he replied, playing dumb
"That boy. You want him dead!" she stated, "You don't care about him."
"Shut up!" he growled, "You have another fight tonight, and I'll be reeeally looking forward to it! Good luck, if you have any luck left!"
He turned around sharply and stormed off towards the door. Nina got out of the hospital bed, a nurse was about to stop her, but then a voice cried out from where Heihachi walked off.
"Let her leave!" the voice said, being that of the nurse's employer, she stood to one side as Nina left the medical area and back to her allocated room. The walk was long, and she passed many rooms, buildings, areas, and arenas. As she made it to the block of rooms, she saw the many colourful characters that had made it to the tournament so far, those who would go to the semi-finals, or like her, those who were eliminated. There was a red- haired Korean boy, hanging around a young native American girl and a Chinese girl.
'Heh, real player all right' she thought to herself, stifling a laugh.
She noticed the oriental Bruce Lee-like man that Paul hangs around with, along with the ninja, the scary Bryan Fury man she encountered when watching his preliminary bouts, and a brunette in a red dress.
'Wait, what the fuck?' she thought. She hid round a corner, so that the brunette couldn't spot her, just in case-
'Could it be.?'
She didn't stop to ask questions, she just ran up the nearest stairs and headed to her room, locking the door behind her. She then turned around fell onto her bed, aching all over and feeling hot and bothered.
'I've got to get out of this damn suit!' she promised herself, and decided to rid her of its tightness. Purple was her thing, but did it always have to be skin-tight?
Chapter 7: The Return of Purple Vs Scarlet. Part 2- The Conclusion and Epilogue.
Nina was sleeping in her room; she fell asleep after getting out of her purple suit. Just donned in basic underwear, she slept and dreamt of such weird things incomprehensible to other beings. When suddenly, she was rudely awaken.
"Rise and Shine Blondie!" the voice spoke in a familiar feminine form.
Nina rose sharply from her sleeping composure and saw her sister Anna, standing in the doorway in a blue version of the red dress Nina saw earlier. To say she was surprised would be an understatement. To say she was shocked would be near spot on.
"How did you get here?" she exclaimed
"The reception gave me a spare key to your room," Anna replied, "As I knew you'd lock the door."
Anna walked out from the doorway and, closing the door behind her, entered the room, turning on the lights.
"Plus, they gave me an invitation too." She concluded, "Why the hell did you come here anyway?"
Nina looked away. She thought of all the things she saw during the whole tournament, the purple breath, the brash biker and his oriental chum, numerous arms and legs fractured by her moves during fights, and of course, the green 'god' and the young boy. Could she really tell Anna? Of course not!
"None of your business!" she snapped, "Now get out!"
"Nina," Anna sighed, "We have a fight coming up in 20 minutes near the main docking area. Get ready and be there soon, to be beaten that is."
"Just piss off will you?!?" Nina yelled at her sister, "I'll be there, and you can expect to have the beating of your life!"
"You still don't have all your memories back Nina," Anna said as she headed towards the door, opening it, "Don't expect to understand anything."
Nina pulled a drawer out from her dresser and threw it in Anna's direction. She narrowly got out of the room in time before the wooden 'box' smashed against the door. Nina panted, feeling too angry to do anything else apart from stare at where her sister had been. 4 years ago, she was distrustful of her supposed 'sister', now she saw her as a nuisance. She looked down at the door to see the clothes that she had strewn across the floor. She looked down and saw a brown, furry, leopard-spot jacket. She got up from her bed and looked at it, getting back some memories, memories of shopping in Florida with her 'sister'. The jacket wasn't exactly winter clothing, it only covered her chest at the most, but it was the fashion, so Anna had said then. She looked at it and thought.
'Better then that tight suit'
She put the jacket on, though it was small, it was comfortable and snug. It got tighter and less comfortable when she tried zipping it up, so she left it unzipped. It revealed her bra, but she didn't care. It wouldn't matter when she would be fighting. Finishing off her fashionable façade with some black, figure-hugging jeans and the must-have stilettos. Now she was ready to either hit the streets, hit the shops or hit a bitch.
At The Mishima Docking Area. Nina stood around the vacant empty spot, with only the spotlights shining upon her. Her hair shone in the bright light, and yet, in the dank darkness too. Empty helicopters sat like some slob on a sofa on their helipads, Tekkenshu guards wandered around with their machineguns, looking around corners or having a crafty smoke.
'Solid Snake to the set please. To the set, Solid Snake' Nina joked to herself in her thoughts. She sighed and was about to leave when she saw her. Anna stood opposite her in some of the flashiest clothes ever. The zebra-striped suit with shoulder pads and hat stood out from the darkness of the docking area.
"If you're looking for the set to 'Dynasty'," Nina said, "Then I'm afraid they stopped the series!"
"Whatever you say, 'Buffy'!" Anna retorted.
Nina placed her forehead in her hand, shaking her head.
'Watch out Fashion Police' she thought, and slid into her fighting stance.
Anna sorted out her hat so it wouldn't fall off during the fight, then slid into her own fighting stance, with her arms close to her body, yet in the generic fighting way, slowly moving up and down.
'Of all the times you got your way,' she thought, 'Now I will get MY way!'
There were no intercom voices, or crowds, the fight would start itself. The silence as both sisters stared at each other, seeing who would make the first move, was deafening to say the least. It seemed like another millennium had passed as they stared at each other. Just then, the first move was struck. Nina charged at Anna with a lethal knife-edged chop, striking into Anna's gut. Anna gave a yelp of pain, but retaliated quickly with a hand-sweep, sending Nina spinning to the ground. She fell to the ground with a thud but quickly rolled up to her feet, she flung herself at Anna and front somersaulted in the air, outreaching her leg and striking her opponent on the back of the head as she flumped back-first onto the hard metal floor. Nina felt pain, but not as much as Anna did. She got up to her feet, as did the dazed Anna. She waited for the moment where Anna would just regain composure, as that point reached, she dashed towards her and spat out the purple gas of the Evil Mist into her face, and then followed up with a painful low kick directed at Anna's ankle, then span around and struck her side with a sharp body-chop. Anna staggered back from the assault, her body aching badly from the earlier chop, the flip kick and the low kick-body chop. She looked ahead to see Nina smirking, as she reared her hand back and slapped her across the face, and knocking Anna's hat off. Anna looked to her fallen hat and back at Nina, and growled.
"What's the problem?" Nina mocked, "Hat fall off?"
Anna roared into life and struck Nina with 3 hard-hitting slaps, insulting Nina with each hit.
"EAT!"
smack
"A!"
smack
"DICK!!!"
smack
Nina staggered back as the last smack stung across her face. Anna, using this moment, struck Nina with 3 lightning-quick stinging jabs, followed by a heavy head kick, spinning around into a strong backhand across her opponent's face followed up with a sweeping kick, sending Nina's back to the ground. As Nina hit the ground, Anna got her own stiletto heel and grinded it into Nina's chest, around the area where the heart was. Nina growled in pain as the sharp heel dug in, drawing blood. Nina thought to herself, was she going to let this harlot kill her right then and there? Hell no! She grabbed Anna's ankle and lifted it from her chest, the look of surprise crawled along Anna's face as no matter how hard she pressed, Nina lifted her foot clear from her own body. Then, Nina rolled back and sent Anna down the ground, with Nina sitting on her. Nina slid down to the side of Anna and wrapped her arms and legs around Anna's leg, the one that had previously pinned Nina to the ground. Nina held onto her leg tenaciously and pulled sharply, making the bones in Anna's leg creak horribly. Anna wailed in pain. Nina, convinced that she had broken Anna's leg, broke the hold and slid away from Anna's prone form. She looked down and her and folded her arms.
"You're immobilized, give up." She said
"Never!" Anna growled back
"Your leg's broken, how can you continue, bitch?" Nina retorted
"Like this!" Anna exclaimed and leapt up to her feet, much to Nina's surprise. Anna grabbed Nina's left arm and struck her jaw with a vicious jab, then she wrapped her arms around her opponent's left arm like an anaconda and jerked it upwards, causing Nina much pain in her shoulder, then Anna continued the assault on Nina's left arm by pushing Nina to the ground, placing her knee behind Nina's left shoulder blade, bending Nina's arm towards her and clutching it in her own left arm, sharply pulling at the arm. With each tug Anna gave, Nina gave a growl of pain, not a yelp, but a growl. More like the big cat caught in a trap, then a small kitten being teased.
"Now who should give up?" Anna mocked, "You're useless, don't you understand?"
Nina responded with nothing but a growl and a failed swipe at Anna with her free, but useless right arm. It couldn't reached Anna, nor reach Anna's clutch. Then, Anna added more pressure to her shoulder blade, pulling back so far on the arm that she finally broke a bone in Nina's arm. When Anna heard that snap, she let go quickly and looked at her sister. Nina clutched at her aching arm. She couldn't move it without groaning in pain. It looked ok on the outside, but it was the inside that the pain was centred on. Nina's face screwed up in pain, gasping and breathing heavily, with traces of tears running down her face. Anna, in regret reached an arm out to the prone Nina.
"Nina, I-"
"Don't! Get away from me!" was her reply.
Nina slowly shuffled up to her feet, still clutching at her arm, sniffing and growling like a dog. She turned around to face her sister, but with a look of pain and anger.
"Hope you're happy now!" she growled, "You won! I can't fight anymore"
"Nina, I know where you can get cast for your arm," replied Anna, trying to fix things, but Nina wasn't taking it.
"NO! YOU DID IT!" Nina yelled at her, "YOU BROKE IT! YOU FUCKING BITCH!"
"Nina.."
"NO! GET AWAY FROM ME!"
"No, Nina! Wait!"
Nina ran away from the docking area, with Anna chasing after her. She chased after her past the docking area entrance, past the main Mishima Zaibatsu buildings, and then, she lost track of her. Nina disappeared round the side of a building and when Anna got round to that side, she was gone. Nowhere to be seen. Anna sighed and then looked away, silently crying to herself.
Anna found Nina the next morning asleep on a park bench. She quickly called an ambulance and Nina got treatment for her broken arm. Though Nina was grateful for the medical help, she never forgave her sister, and just when she got the cast set and sorted, she disappeared mysteriously again. Since then, no one saw hide or heel of her. Her clothing and possessions, of which were finally claimed by her sister Anna, were still left in her allocated room when she disappeared. Where did she go? Who knows? The Silent Assassin was now truly silent.
The End
Chapter 1: The Awakening of the Rivals. The old complex in the Mishima Laboratories laid there, untouched by any scientist who valued his life. Going into restricted areas was something you shouldn't do, especially when Heihachi Mishima regained his post as CEO of the Mishima Zaibatsu and owner of the Mishima Financial Empire. The world has changed so much since 1996, the year of the climatic events of the 2nd Iron Fist Tournament. It was the new century, and the new millennium. Technology had advanced so far, along with a technology the MFE had recently acquired, biotechnology. Kazuya had started on it, then something he didn't expect happened, and he was defeated and killed. When Heihachi took back control, all those who went over to Kazuya's side lost their jobs, including Heihachi's own stepson, Lee Chaolan. He lost a lot of workers thanks to that miscalculated decision, but he quickly regained workers, especially in the laboratories. But, due to his earlier decision to get rid of anything Kazuya had started, the cryogenics complex was closed off. Heihachi was merciful to the poor subjects locked in the capsules and didn't switch off the power to the complex. Now, something was about to change.
There were two capsules submerged in the freezing liquid nitrogen. Originally, there were three, but one was abducted mysteriously. The two that remained contained two fighters missing from the end of Tekken 2. The Williams Sisters, Nina and Anna. Both had been "asleep" for 15 years, nearing the end of their term in cryogenics. But something strange happened with capsule 1; the one Nina was contained in. Stuck in a near-permanent dream world, Nina was wandering through the outer reaches of her mind, when she envisaged a tall man with green skin, dressed in the suit of an Aztec Warrior. She couldn't speak, but yet the man spoke to her.
"You have.strong.. fighting spirit" he spoke
Nina felt confusion.
"You.kill too" he continued, and then produced a picture of a young boy, lying unconscious in a woodland. He had such handsome looks, and was well built. Compared to the giant muscled mass of the green man, he didn't pose such threat, yet the man gave his request.
"Kill the boy," he said
Nina refused mentally
"Kill the boy," he repeated.
Nina refused again
The man frowned, his face grew dark, but his eyes glowed bright red. He lashed out his arm and grabbed Nina's forehead, holding it tight. Nina struggled to break free, but started to convulse. Shaking all over, she couldn't break free from his grip. She felt the Hoover-like suction, along with the feeling of her brain leaving her skull.
"Kill the boy," he said again, this time in a threatening manner, "Or you will lose more then what I have taken from you!"
The man then let go. Nina's form fell to the floor unconscious, and then, for the first time in 15 years. She opened her eyes, in her physical form, and saw the dark, black ceiling of the complex. She didn't recognise the building at all, she just stared at the ceiling vacantly for a few minutes before sitting upright. She felt dizzy and sick when she crawled out of the capsule, flopping to the floor when she got her whole person out. Cold, naked and ill, she looked back to the capsule. The technology of it looked so strange to her, like an alien spacecraft, only that she was sure she came from Earth. A sudden beeping shot out from nowhere, she looked to where the beeping had come from. She looked at it and saw the inanimate object, with assorted bits and bobs, buttons, levers and lights. In curiosity, she pressed one. The beeping blared out again, followed by the sound of bubbling water. She looked towards the pool and saw that another capsule was rising out of the freezing liquid. When it was fully suspended out from the pool, a giant hiss shot out from its sides and it opened up. Nina, though dizzy and shivering, walked towards it and stared a puzzled gaze. For the first minute, nothing happened, then a figure shot out from the capsule. Nina jumped back in fright and saw what jumped out. The shapely curviform figure that seemed familiar to her lay beside her. She stuck out her hand to see if it moved. She touched the figure, and her hand was swat back. The figure got up and looked at her.
"You!" it spoke and swiped at her
Nina jumped back from the swipes, and then something pulsed in her mind. With this sudden pulse, she spoke.
"Who are you?" she said
"Don't play such mind games, you know who I am!" her opponent replied and took another swipe at her.
"What mind games? I'm not fooling you!" Nina exclaimed, "Who are you? What is this place and why are you attacking me?"
The figure stopped swiping.
"Are you sure?" she asked her
"Yes!" was Nina's irritant reply, "I don't know where the hell I am, and you swiping at me isn't helping!"
That when they heard something. They looked to the side and saw the heavy steel door open, making a potential exit.
"A way out!" Nina's unknown copain cried, "Let's go!"
"What?" said Nina dumbfounded, "Right now? Without clothes?"
"Hmm, you're right there" she replied, and thought for a minute, "Don't worry, I have a plan."
"What's the plan?" Nina asked
"You'll find out soon enough" she replied and headed for the exit, with Nina following behind her
"Wait, what's your name?" Nina asked
"Huh? Oh yeah," her partner replied, "My name's Anna."
Chapter 2: Stuck In The Middle. Nina followed this "Anna" person. She kept sparking something familiar in her head. Her looks, figure and even hairstyle, though wet and dripping, seemed too familiar to be just a helping hand. She felt that she should loathe this woman, hate this woman, banish this woman to the darkest depths of hell, but she had no reason to. It's impolite to hate someone you don't know. Just then, Anna stopped, whisking out an arm behind her to signal Nina to stop.
"Guards!" she whispered to her. There were 2 guards, dressed in a kind of black armour clothing, with guns at the ready and plenty of ammo.
Anna jumped to the darkest side of the tunnel, with Nina following.
"How are we gonna get past them?" Nina asked quietly (so as not to attract the guard's attention)
Anna thought for a moment, then a smile came across her face.
"Don't worry" Anna replied, "I have an idea". She gave a slight giggle at her idea.
She stood on the edge of the tunnel's end (whether exit or entrance) and just waited for the guard's to notice her, which didn't take long. These guards worked up to 20 hours a day, so a naked woman just turning up on their post would be surprising.
"Well, hello there," Anna purred, "I'm kinda lost."
Nina looked on at Anna's flirting with the guards. Another spark of familiarity, another spark of hatred, yet no sparks of jealousy. But then, would you want 2 middle-aged men dressed as soldiers drooling over you?
Just then, the sounds changed.
"HIIYA!"
"URGH!"
The guards were lying on the ground, down and out. Anna dragged them into the tunnel, and started to take one of the guards' armoured suits off.
"What are you doing?!" said Nina, with some shock in her voice.
"Getting us something to wear" Anna replied, "Unless you wanna walk around this freezing place in the nuddy."
Nina raised an eyebrow.
"They can keep the underwear," Anna sighed, "Who'd wanna see that anyway?"
After the two got fully suited up, you couldn't tell whether they were male or female, nevermind their identities. They left the tunnel, leaving the guards in their vests and boxers lying dazed in the tunnel. They walked around the laboratories and saw what you'd expect in any laboratory. Dangerous chemicals, smelly gases, men and women in long white coats and glasses, yep, your average laboratory, apart from a certain dinosaur and kangaroo locked in two separate cages in the corner. Nina looked back at the complex she had left. It was dark, dusty and almost falling apart, how long had she been in that freezing pool. Anna was more focused on finding an exit, though she thought about her sister's condition. When she came out of the pool, she expected Nina to lash out at her in a fight like old times, not reply with "Who are you?". This was serious, though Anna lost many an argument (as did her sister from time to time) she enjoyed their little sibling rivalries. Mainly the ones where she won, like the high school Christmas Disco fiasco involving the punch bowl. She and her boyfriend became the school's couple of the year. Nina, not very happy, picked up the punch bowl and doused Anna in it. Anna smiled underneath her dark helmet. She didn't like it at the time, but not only did it symbolise a win in the long-going rivalry, it was a precious memory. Just then, they came up to the exit.
"Shit!" Anna exclaimed
The exit had guards asking for ID, not to mention a vocal-recognition test to ensure the ID. Though it was mainly for the scientists, she was sure guards coming in and out of the laboratories were tested as well.
"Why have we stopped?" Nina asked, but Anna couldn't reply. Like spacesuits, you had to speak to your partner through a walkie-talkie device within your helmet at a certain frequency. The helmets in the laboratories were soundproofed to cut out noise, but the noise of what was unsure, the loud bangs or the screams of pain?
Anna walked tentatively towards the exit, with the unsure Nina following behind. They got to the exit, when a guard popped up, a voice sounded through both their helmets.
"Did you find out the problem with the doors at the old complex?" the voice spoke.
Anna, nervous, replied in the gruffest, masculine voice she could muster.
"Nah, haven't found out yet" she replied, "We were going to sort it out after our.lunch break"
The guard, underneath his helmet, put on a thoughtful face.
"Your voice sounds a bit lower then usual Naoka" the guard stated, with his face still thoughtful
"Oh, er" Anna fumbled, then she faked a cough, "sore throat" she croaked
"Ah, I understand," the guard said, reassured, "Off you go."
Anna was safe and sound and made her way out, Nina followed her but was stopped by the guard.
"You haven't said much" the guard stated, "What's your problem?"
Nina, nervous, put a hand to her throat and shook her head.
"Laryngitis?" the guard guessed
Nina nodded
"Ah, I see, well, off you go then" the guard replied.
Nina and Anna were both scot-free. They headed towards the double-doors at the end of the wall and had entered an elevator. Anna, with a sigh of relief, took off her helmet and pressed the button symbolizing the top floor. She slumped against the edge of the lift and sat down, with Nina doing the same.
"Finally, a way out of this place!" Anna sighed, "When I see that Kazuya, I'll-"
Anna then noticed Nina's puzzled look at her.
"What's the problem?" she asked
"I still don't know who you really are" Nina replied, "All you've told me is that you're called Anna."
"You didn't recognise anything from that name?" Anna questioned, in surprise
"Only the feeling that I should recognise you," Nina answered, "But apart from that, nothing at all.
Anna thought for a moment again. Nina looked on.
"Do you know your own name?" Anna asked her.
Nina thought, but came back empty-handed
"No, I can't remember anything!" she said, with the emotion fading in on her face.
Anna looked at her upset sister. Her old personality of impatience and independence was either hidden or replaced with the confused, emotional shell of her sister. What had happened to Nina in that capsule? Anna looked up and spotted something that drained the blood from her face and the shock fill her face. A security camera was perched in the corner of the elevator.
"Quick!" she yelled at Nina, "Put your helmet back on!"
Nina looked up, puzzled.
"Huh? What's going-"
"Just put your damn helmet on!"
The elevator stopped and the doors opened, with eight guards, 4 in black, 4 in green, with guns aimed at them, just before the two of them could put their disguise back on. Anna's earlier hope of freedom was lost.
Just then, an old man in a maroon coat and white waistcoat and trousers shoved his way through the guards. His face was gaunt, haggard and wrinkled with age, yet his build of body had not decreased in any way. He looked at the two and gave a thoughtful frown, he recognised them on the spot. He spoke to the head guard.
"Send them to the changing rooms and give them keys 224 and 225. When they're dressed, send them up to my office." He said in his grated, deep, booming voice.
The two women had heard what the old man said and couldn't believe what they were hearing, nor the way they were treated when two of the guards pulled them out of the elevator and prodded the barrel of their guns into their backs, barking orders to move. But more curious to both of them was what did the old man want?
Chapter 3: A Hasty Retreat. The two women sat in the big office, the same office that had belonged to Kazuya. Though he wasn't in sight, nor was anyone else for that matter. Just Anna and Nina. Nothing had changed. The bookshelves were neatly placed on the left wall, the carpet was still the same patterned carpet, and the brown, hardwood desk in front of them still had the carved words 'Obey, Obey, Obey', each time bigger in size as it was repeated. The two women had changed into more comfortable clothing, though it stood out more. Anna was back in her red ball gown and Nina was back in her purple cat suit. The long silence was deafening, with only the clock on the wall breaking the silence.
'Tick.tick.tick' it went to its regular rhythm
'Tick.tick.tick', getting louder
'TICK.TICK.TICK', were getting louder
Then.
'Tick.tick.click!'
The door at the end of the room opened and the old man from before entered the room, his maroon, fur-lined jacket swaying behind him along with the two limbering spikes of hair at the side of his head, emphasising the bald patch in the middle. He pulled the black, leather swivel chair from under the hardwood desk and sat it in, facing Nina and Anna. His face shown how time is merciless, as with his forehead showing permanent brow lines, more evident when he frowned, along with various other wrinkles. He leaned back in his chair and spoke.
"How did you infiltrate the Cold Sleep Complex?" he asked in his thick Japanese accent
"We didn't infiltrate anywhere!" Nina spoke up, "What's this 'Cold Sleep Complex' anyway?"
"The building you and your sister were reported leaving from" the man replied
"We didn't get inside it on our own accord," Anna spoke calmly, "We were in it."
The man thought for a moment.
"That seems truthful" he replied unexpectedly, "After all, how else did you keep your youthful looks? I'll have to get my secretary to check up on the old records."
"Lee Chaolan still works here?" Anna spoke, absentmindedly putting her thoughts into words, with Nina raising a quizzical eyebrow.
"Lee Chaolan? Oh no no no," he replied, "He 'retired' ages ago"
Anna's hopes of someone she could trust went down the drain. Nina was unsure of what was going on; just then, she lashed out. She got up from her chair and banged her fists down on the hardwood desk.
"Just who the hell are you anyway?!?" she burst out, "What happened to us and why the hell are we here?"
The old man frowned. He picked up something on his desk, an identity bar which said 'Chief Executive Officer and Owner' on it and turned it around, so it said.
"'Heihachi Mishima'?" Anna said in shock, much to Nina's surprise, "You took back control?"
"Of course," he replied, "It is said that a teacher's happiest moment is when his student surpasses him. I haven't reached that happy moment yet"
"What happened to the previous owner?"
"That is private and confidential, Ms Williams"
"Excuse me," Nina butted in, "But what the hell is going on?"
Just then, a voice on the intercom spoke up.
"Mr Mishima? Hello?" it spoke
It was a brand new type of intercom, projecting a holographic image of the person calling up to it. The image projected a man in his late thirties in a long white coat, wild unruly hair, which looked uncombed from the previous morning, and a Western face. Western people were hard to find around the Mishima Zaibatsu. Nothing to do with racial issues, but it was accounted that there were only 20 westerners out of the main total of 700 employees (100 employees per site building, 200 in the laboratories).
"Yes?" Heihachi replied to the voice
"I have the records of who went into the Cold Sleep Experiment" the man stated, "Do you want them now or should I wait?"
"No, bring them up," Heihachi replied, "And try not to drop them this time!"
He pressed a button on the intercom and the image disappeared. With both of the sisters still looking at it in awe.
"Technology has come a long way since 1996," Heihachi spoke, "That is, if you were-"
The door opened and revealed the man shown on the intercom. Though with a neatly buttoned-up white shirt, you could still read the words on the T- Shirt he was wearing underneath, with black trousers stained yellowish- white in some places due to experiments with bleach, his hair dark brown, long and wild and his face, though not ugly, wasn't good looking either, with such facial qualities improved by a neat moustache. He bowed to Heihachi and the two sisters, as is the custom to in Japan, and then presented Heihachi with a single sheet of paper.
"This tells us the names of who went into the capsules of the Cold Sleep Experiment." the man said, his voice deep and yet, nearly incomprehensible, but vocal enough to be heard and understood.
Heihachi read through the various paragraphs and terms and then came across the names:
Cap 1: N. Williams Cap 2: A. Williams Cap 3: S. Boskonovitch
"It appears that the two women arrested by our guards were part of the experiment," the man continued, "Not trying to get confidential information, wouldn't you agree?"
Heihachi growled at the man's insolence and impertinence.
"Yes, you're correct Mr-" he spoke, then stopped and did an about-turn, "Mr- X. But let me remind you that if you continue your impertinent ways, you'll never work again!"
The two sisters looked on, unsure of what was going on. First they thought they were going to be 'eliminated', so to speak, but then they're brought up into an office, now discovered to belong to the CEO and Owner, Heihachi Mishima, or whoever he was, and were accused of trespassing, now some weird guy walks into and things get more confusing then how they started.
"Would someone mind telling me what the fuck is going on here?" exclaimed Nina, frustrated and angry, "What the fuck does that piece of crap say?"
"This 'piece of crap' as you call it, proves your innocence of trespassing," Heihachi replied.
"Oh, thank God!" Nina sighed with relief. Anna hid her brief moment of happiness, was her sister back to normal? Did she regain her memories?
"Mr-X will take you two to the airport to fly back home," Heihachi stated, passing two aeroplane tickets across the hardwood desk to them, along with 2,000 Euros, 1,000 each, "That money should be enough to get you two back on your feet"
The sisters looked at each other, shrugged off other questions and took Heihachi's offer. Mr-X then led them out of the office, letting them both out the door first in the gentlemanly manner. As the two sisters left, Heihachi couldn't help but smirk slyly.
'Something tells me,' he thought, 'That it's not going to be long before I see them again' Chapter 4: Recent Memories. Nina and Anna were relaxing in the warm sunny weather of Florida. Both were sunbathing in recliners, Nina in a black swimming costume and her sister, Anna, in a red bikini. As Nina looked up to the sky through her sunglasses, she reminisced back to a few months ago to when she and Anna were escorted to the airport. From being prodded in the back by the barrel of a gun, to a door to a shiny, black-velvet limousine being opened for them. The limousine was freshly clean and shone in the sunlight of the setting red sun. From being treated like crap to being treated like royalty was surprisingly fast. The mysterious Mr-X was their escort and had so entered the limousine with them, carrying a big, leather briefcase. The long white coat now replaced with a black, neatly buttoned jacket.
"Driver, to the airport please" he told to the chauffeur
"Nan no hanashi desu ka? (What are you talking about?)" was his reply
The man got a dictionary from his pocket and looked up the word he needed
"Kuko (airport)" he replied, and soon the limousine was rolling
"For someone working at the Mishima Zaibatsu," remarked Anna, "I'd thought you'd be more resourceful."
"For a daughter of Richard Williams, I'd thought you'd be more cunning and decisive" Mr-X replied, much to the chagrin of Anna Williams
"What's in the briefcase?" she said
Mr-X opened the briefcase and revealed tons of aeroplane tickets, each to a capital city in the world.
"I know that if either one of you returned back to Ireland," he stated, "That your enemies would easily kill you. So here are tickets to any place in the world, or at least any place decent. Go ahead, take your pick."
The two sisters picked out two tickets from the briefcase and looked at where it destined them.
"Florida," Anna read hers, "Not bad."
"Manchester?!?" Nina read hers, "Think I'd prefer Florida"
"Easily sorted," Mr-X replied, "One ticket can gain both of you a flight."
They looked at the tickets and saw he was right. Sometime between 1996 and 2012, the air business devised a plan to get more people flying by making a two-for-one flight deal.
"Thanks" Nina politely said
"Best be grateful," he replied, "It's costing me a fortune."
The limousine then stopped. Mr-X looked out of the window and saw they stopped outside a gas station. He sighed.
"I dunno," he said, "15 years of working here and I still haven't broken the language barrier!"
He got out of the car to talk to the chauffeur, leaving the sisters in the limousine. There was a long silence in the car, excluding the argumentation of Mr-X and the chauffeur and the rush of cars driving by. Just then, Nina decided to ask Anna the question that was poisoning her brain.
"Anna," she asked, "who am I?"
Anna, though surprised by the sudden question, remembered back to her sister's amnesia.
"You'll find out soon enough," She replied, "You have amnesia, which means that you won't remember anything for a bit, but it'll all come flooding back"
"How do you know?"
"TV soaps, they use amnesia in their plotlines nearly all the time"
"Can't you at least tell me my name?" she questioned, "I don't want to spend the rest of my life as 'unknown'"
"Well, ok," Anna relented, "You're called Nina, Nina Williams."
Nina relaxed a bit, then went to ask another question before being interrupted-
"-And yes, we're sisters!" Anna concluded
"I was going to ask when you'd think we'd get moving again," a surprised Nina replied
Just then, Mr-X came back.
"Apparently we need to get a refuel of petrol," he stated, "Anyway, this gives me time to tell you what the consequences of the cold sleep process might've generated or de-generated you two physically."
"Go on, we're listening" Anna said
"Well," he started, "do you want the good factors or the bad factors first- "
"Just get to the goddamn point!" Nina exclaimed, before calming back down again, "please."
Mr-X quickly picked up his notes on the Cold Sleep process and read from them.
"Well," he began, "Good factors are you won't age for the next four years, the summer heat won't be a problem as you'll feel cooler, but this feeling gets progressively less susceptible through the four years of youth, and you'll feel more energetic through those four years as well."
"And the bad factors?" Anna questioned
"The bad factors," he continued," Are that both of you are more susceptible to illness, and the general sickness you feel as your bodily functions start up again, though will go away after a couple of weeks, won't be pretty. The general cold-sleep illness, or GCS symptoms you should expect are shivering, vomiting, increases in (ahem) urinating and lethargic tendencies."
"Lethargic tendencies?" Nina said dumbfounded
"Loss of energy," Mr-X defined, "It won't kill you unless you spend about 6 months living without shelter in somewhere like., Finland per se. Best treatment for it is to spend the few weeks of illness somewhere in a warm climate."
"Good thing we're going to Florida then" Anna replied happily, "Doesn't seem too bad"
"Actually, it is that bad. It's only supposed to last a few days, not weeks," he assured her, "But your immune system has to get used to working again so you'll feel really rotten in the first week or so."
"Oh, way to bring down the mood!" Anna replied, the happy feeling gone.
"Hey, just think about the good factors and go through the bad factors," he advised, "The bad factors only last a few weeks, whilst you'll get 4 years of beating the ageing process!"
That's when the limousine stopped again.
"Kuko." The chauffeur spoke
"Ah, arigato Nakatani-san (thanks Mr Nakatani)" Mr-X replied and got out of the car, holding the door open for the two sisters to get out.
Just then, three guys 'dressed to impress' dragged her from her thoughts.
"Hey babe, check out these pecs!" one of them said, flexing, looking somewhat familiar with a certain flat top hairstyle. She just smiled it off and went back to sunbathing. Then when she looked back up to see Anna leaving with the three of them, she couldn't help but feel a bit jealous. That's when some objects sparked in her mind, a shower, a Polaroid camera and an embarrassing photo. Nina smirked. Using her old stealth techniques, she snuck up behind Anna and undid her bikini top. She left an embarrassed Anna, and three excited guys with a smirk. The Silent Assassin was back in business.
Chapter 5: Rebirth of The Silent Assassin. Nina sat on a chair, looking out through the window at the twinkling night sky. It had now been 4 years since she had been released from that cold abyss of sleep. Nina, along with her sister Anna, had spent about 3 years, 11 months and 17 hours of those 4 years living in an apartment in Miami, Florida, excluding time out of the apartment, on the plane towards their home and the experience within the Mishima Zaibatsu. Nothing exciting had really happened, apart from that she found out about her past life from her sister Anna, that she was a grade-A assassin, she was related to Anna and she had targeted both Heihachi and a man called 'Kazuya' before being forced into the Cold Sleep Experiment. But still she had so many questions. How old was she? Where was she born? Who were her parents and what were their names? Who's Kazuya? Questions of which Anna could only answer a few, and that others shouldn't hear nor answer. She felt empty and unfulfilled.
Anna was out. She obtained a job at some clubs as a waitress. Nina didn't think much of her 'sister', but she was the only person she could trust, after all, they both went through the same thing, apart from one thing.
CRASH!
Nina covered her eyes from the flying shards of glass that once were a windowpane, falling out from her chair amongst the fallen glass pieces. She looked up and saw him. The visage of the young boy the green man had shown her, only now he was older, mature, bigger, stronger, but yet still with that caring look. He looked harmless, but yet she gazed upon with the image with a look as if the Devil himself stood before her. Then a familiar voice boomed at her.
"Kill.the.boy"
A strong breeze blew around the room, knocking magazines off a coffee table, blowing away the leaves of glass from the ground, making Nina's golden blonde hair flap and flow like a flag at high mast. Nina's expression changed from shock and surprise to blankness, with the pupils of her bright blue eyes dilating, her movement stilled. A mysterious and powerful force had her under its spell.
"Kill.the.boy! I command you!" the voice boomed again, "You now serve your god, THE only god! The God Of The Fight!"
Nina's body went limp, swaying in the strong breeze, rising from the ground in mid-air. The only sound coming from her was that of her breathing, now hoarse and growling.
"I will," she uttered, and yet she didn't utter, "I will appease you."
"You serve your God well," the Ogre spoke, "Head for the Land of Wood and complete your task, or be destroyed!"
Then, just as fast as he appeared, he disappeared. The visage of the boy was gone and the breeze dead. Nina dropped from her floating repose back to the ground with a thump. She lay amongst a mass of strewn magazines, broken glass, overturned furniture and other broken property. She saw the bright light shining from the window, and then she fell into the deep dark slumber of forced sleep, unconsciousness.
She woke up much later in a hospital bed. Her vision, blurred at first, cleared and she looked around the room. The walls were white, as they are in nearly every hospital, with a tinted window overlooking the streets. Then she saw a familiar face, donned in a red jacket and white shirt, going down well with her black jeans.
"She's finally awake" said Anna.
"Oh, it's you," Nina replied, "What happened?"
"I could ask you the same question," she stated, "I came back from work to find you lying unconscious amongst a hell of a lot of mess."
Nina sighed, clutching her temples.
"Why am I here?" she questioned
"Well, to be honest, I was worried about you," answered Anna, "So I phoned an ambulance and, well, here you are."
Nina groaned. Her head was aching ever since she woke up, rubbing her temples in vain so the ache would subside
"What's wrong?" her sister asked
"Damn fucking headache," she growled, "It's like someone's trying to drill into my skull."
"I'll see to a doctor about it," Anna excused and left the room, though it wasn't a doctor on her mind. As she walked out of the room, she leant with her back against the wall and took two envelopes out of her jacket pocket. She knew what they were; the Mishima Financial Empire's 'Iron Fist' logo was easily recognisable. Both were addressed to her and to her sister Nina.
'She won't know of such things' Anna consoled herself in her thoughts, 'She has had amnesia ever since she got out of that.experiment.'
Anna shivered at the very thought of the Cold Sleep experiment. Put in there against her own free will, she had no idea what employees for the past 15 years whilst she was in there might've done to her, or Nina. But then, why was she looking out for Nina? She hates Nina; She hated Nina ever since her teenage years. But now Nina was vulnerable mentally.
'What the hell happened to her in that capsule?" she thought, frowning. She turned her attention back to the envelopes and sighed.
"She'll find out soon enough anyway" she sighed, put the envelopes back in and went back into the room. Nina noticed her and sat up in her bed.
"What did the doctor say?" Nina asked
"The doctor?" Anna questioned, and then remembered, "Oh, the doctor! He said just to take some aspirin, and if it didn't subside, to call him in the morning."
Nina growled and dropped back down on the bed.
"This is goddamn frustrating!" she exclaimed
Anna looked at her jacket pocket, and took the envelopes out, giving one to Nina. Nina received it and looked at it, sparking another image within her head, it was of a red painted image of that on the envelope, the M.F.E 'Iron Fist' logo.
"The King Of Iron Fist Tournament," she uttered, much to Anna's surprise
"How did you know?" she said, with a hint of shock appearing on her face.
Nina tried to find a reason to how she knew, but she didn't.
"I don't know," she admitted, "I just saw it and out it came."
Anna raised an inquisitive eyebrow.
'Maybe she's remembering,' she thought to herself, 'But how.?'
Anna shrugged off her mental repose. What was was.
"Anyway," she said, "You can leave here now."
"Ah, good." Nina replied.
The two sisters left the hospital as soon as possible. For the whole of the long journey back home, Nina stared at the M.F.E letter. She was right, it was an invitation to the King Of Iron Fist Tournament, with full paid flight and an allocated room. Would it be the holiday of a lifetime? Or a one-way ticket to destruction and death? She wouldn't know until she found out. Then, Nina suddenly stopped.
"Huh? What's wrong Nina?" Anna asked, and then she looked into Nina's eyes. She gasped. The lights were on, but no one was home.
The breeze died back down, Nina shuddered and fell to the floor.
"Nina!" Anna exclaimed, shaking Nina madly to try and revive her "What's wrong?"
She kept shaking her for what seemed like ages, and then she got a response. Nina coughed, then groaned.
"Hey, stop shaking me!" she moaned, "I'm fine!"
"What the hell happened back then?" asked Anna, her nerves shaken
"What? What happened?" Nina replied. She was unaware of what happened.
Anna sighed. "Nothing, forget it."
The Next Morning.
Anna was up early, not exactly for any particular reason; she was just in a good mood. She looked out the window and gazed at the sun-kissed golden beaches getting brushed by the aquamarine waves from the deep blue seas and smiled.
'Beats the rocky shores of Ireland any day!' she thought to herself.
After getting dressed, she went to wake up Nina. Ever since they got to Florida, Nina was a heavy sleeper. Anna didn't know why, but neither did she care. She opened the door to Nina's room and entered without looking.
"Hey! Rise and Shine Blondie!" she called out.
Then she looked. The room was a complete mess, the bed was broken along with the dresser beside it, not to mention various clothes and other possessions were thrown all around the place. CD's, bed sheets, shirts, jeans, underwear, broken wood from the bed frame. It was a complete mess. Anna gazed at the room in shock and surprise.
'How come I never heard any noise?' she thought to herself.
Then she noticed the broken window.
'No! She couldn't have!'
She ran out the room to check her jacket pocket. Nina gave her back the letter and invitation in the envelope and she put it back there.
"Please let it be there!" she said, rummaging through the pocket frantically. She took out all the contents out of it. She sighed a sigh of relief as she found the two envelopes. Hers and Nina's. She picked them up and went to put them somewhere safe. She walked into the kitchen area of the apartment and put them in a drawer, as she did this, she noticed something significant. Nina's envelope was lighter in weight. She looked into it; the letter and the invitation were gone.
"She wouldn't!" she exclaimed, "She just wouldn't! .Would she?"
Chapter 6: The Call Of The Iron Fist. A month later.. Nina's progress in the tournament was better than average. In just the few 4 weeks, she had eliminated 6 opponents easily. It would've been more, but there were only 2 bouts a week in the preliminaries. Up next were the quarterfinals; her next fights would be against a mystery opponent and Paul Phoenix, but there was a confusion in all this. Contrary to the tournament rules, her fight against her mystery opponent would be unsanctioned by the Mishima Zaibatsu, meaning all the rules went out the window and into the front yard. Only one rule was kept in, no weapons. She felt this unfair as she saw a robotic ninja nearly slash someone to death with a big glowing sword. But she didn't care about winning, all she cared about was getting rid of the entity plaguing her mind, the God Of Fighting, or whatever he called himself. She worked out what the "god" meant by the 'Land of Wood' just as she received the invitation envelope over a month before. In the past, Japan was a hard place to build stone buildings, so traditional houses and pagodas were made out of wood. She knew the tournament was the key, but to what door was still a mystery. A way out for her? Or a way in for the green man?
She was sat in her allocated room, the room she unknowingly had been in about 20 years before. There was no trace of her first entrance there; when she got there it was bare. Now it was like a little home. As she looked out of the window on that rainy day, watching a fight in the distance, she remembered her first day at this tournament. She, along with the other fighters, were directed to a vast hall, like the ones you get in schools, only it was much bigger, and was built like a theatre. The wall behind the stage was curved so that sound would seem louder and wouldn't bounce back, the stage and the walls were brightly coloured, with various artworks displayed along the sides, including a very curious one of a cliff painted red under a dark cloud and with a gloomy background. It didn't say the artist's name. She was surprised that such a business conglomerate as the Mishima Financial Empire, concentrating in the most analytical and technological, would bother with art and tradition. Just then, a voice spoke through some hidden speakers
"Fighters, please take your seats. Mr Mishima will be here shortly"
It was the voice of Mr-X, the man who had de-briefed her and her 'sister' Anna on the cryogenics situation, and had given them a new life in Florida. She took her seat, as did the other fighters. She looked around the crowd and could see the colourful backgrounds they all came from. Many of the fighters seemed to be from the local area, a few were from odd places, the biggest minority were the ones she couldn't pinpoint, and the rest were from the West. She was in a good mood that day, didn't know why though. Was it Mr-X? Seeing new people? The beautiful artworks surrounding the hall? Or the tournament itself? She looked to the stage and saw him, Heihachi Mishima, CEO of the Mishima Zaibatsu and Owner of the Mishima Financial Empire.
"Greetings Fighters from all over the world!" Heihachi said in his thick Japanese accent, "Each one of you is obviously strong, but who is the cream of the crop?"
"Just get to the point old man!" cried out a brash voice
Nina turned to where the voice came from and saw another blast from the past. She saw a man dressed in a black leather biker suit standing up out of his chair. His looks showed that time had really wanted to make a face that cried middle age. The thing that stuck out the most about this man was the tall tower of blonde hair that shot out from his head. From her angle, it looked like a giant cube, but when the man sat back down (after being chided by Heihachi), it took on a different shape. She turned away from the man just before he could recognise her stare, and looked back at the stage, listening to what Heihachi had to say. After he went through the basic terms and conditions of the tournament, he then went on to announce something special.
".And the person who successfully beats me," Heihachi declared (though obviously didn't want to happen), "Will face a surprise opponent, of whose identity I will not declare."
This caused a spark of chatter from the crowd of fighters. Now all talking with acquaintances or friends they made along the journey to the tournament, or like Nina, were quietly thinking about the subject.
'Could this surprise opponent be that boy?' she thought, as a slow breeze flew past her. A loud voice screamed out through her head.
'The gift of the Evil Mist!' it cried, then disappeared as the breeze died down
Later through the tournament she would find out what the voice meant by the gift of breath. The 'god of fight' had given her the power to make a smokescreen of purple gas to weaken her opponent's guard so she could be ready to retaliate with a move, but at the time she had been caught off guard. The voice made her jump, getting a couple of stares from the fighters sitting beside her and the fighters in the chairs in front of her and behind her. She shrugged it off; they'd be eliminated shortly anyway, either by her or someone else.
Nina looked away from the window when the fight ended and stop reminiscing. The man who won the distant fight was an oriental guy who hung out with the brash middle-aged biker. She was bored, and her fight wasn't for ages. What else could she do? Apart from continue her mission. Find the boy and 'terminate' him, it was the only way to go, and the only move to make.
She got dressed in a tight purple suit, not dissimilar to a past purple suit. This one covered more of her person. It was hardly to put on, the legs of the suit were easily put on, like tights, but the material the suit was made from didn't make it an easy ordeal. From then, you just had to put your arms in the shoulder straps and zip up round the back. It had an odd zip, it didn't go straight down the back, and it went around the sides under her bustline, from front to back.
'What has the fashion world come to?' she thought to herself in disdain, resting her face in the palm of her hand, shaking her head. She zipped up and sighed in relief.
After moving around in the suit to get used to the feel of it, she strapped a makeshift backup weapon on her left thigh in case things got brutal, and her trademark stiletto's. Ever since Nina have seen them for the first time in 15 years in Florida, they were her main shoes, and nothing would replace it. She took a deep breath, and set off on her mission. She walked out from her room and headed down the numerous stairs and out of the room complex. As she headed for the main Zaibatsu building, she heard something in another building.
"YAH!" 'THUD!'
She looked through the window of the building and saw the boy, just as he was in the 'god's' visage. He was thumping away at a sandbag with powerful blows, whacking the big heavy sandbag nearly right off its chain.
'Impressive' she thought, and then she felt the breeze again, growing into a gale. She looked around defensively, trying to find who or what was making the gale. She knew nothing on Earth could speed the winds this fast. She turned around and saw him, the green man, The God Of Fighting. The green man glared into her eyes deeply with his red glower. Nina tried not to look back, but succumbed eventually, her eyes dilating, with the pupils glowing bright red like 'her god of fighting'.
"KILL THE BOYYYYY!" the god growled and broke the windows to the nearby building. Then the god did his disappearing act again, leaving a dishevelled Nina on the ground. The boy looked through the broken frames and saw her. He gasped and leapt through the hole to check on her.
"Hey, are you Ok?" he asked politely in near perfect English, "You seem hurt."
Nina coughed and got up from the wet puddle of rainwater she dropped in. Her golden hair stained with mud from the gutter.
"I'll be Ok, just leave me-" she replied, and then stopped. Her mental repose glowered back up again, with the eyes glowing red. The boy looked back in shock.
"Wh-wh-wha?" he stuttered.
Nina growled an unearthly growl. She bunched up her fists and shot them right into the boy's stomach, sending him through the wall and back in the building. She had lost control of her own body and mind. The thing that controlled her now was the God Of Fight, The Toshin.
The boy got up painfully, clutching on the opposite wall to drag himself back up to his feet. The possessed Nina walked into the building through the hole she made and looked upon the wounded boy.
"What are you doing?" he said in a strained voice, Nina's double-fist strike had winded him badly.
She growled and ran towards the boy, tripping him up with a heavy sliding kick to his ankles, knocking him off his feet and sending him to the ground once more. Nina, with eyes of fire, glowering upon the struggling boy again.
"Weak child." She said in the unearthly voice, "You will never defeat me!"
'Toshin!' the boy thought, 'It can't be!'
"It is young Jin," she boomed, "I merely got this woman to eliminate you and so far she's proving to be a success."
The boy, Jin, got up, his face screwed up in anger. His fists were shaking and his breathing was heavy, he knew he was going to have to fight.
"Are you really going to hit a poor, defenceless woman?" she taunted
"No, I'm going.TO HIT YOU!!!!" Jin growled and hit the possessed woman with two stinging jabs to the face, followed with a sweep. Nina rolled up on her feet and raised a strong Nicolella kick at her adversary, smacking Jin right up the jaw, into the air, and back down to the ground. Nina mocked the grounded Jin by grinding her heel into his chest.
"Would you like to be my next sacrifice?" she chuckled
Jin groaned in pain, then grabbed her foot and brought her down to the ground with a heavy crash. Jin leapt up on his feet and looked on at his opponent.
"I'll only fight you in your true form Toshin!" he stated, "Leave the lady out of this!"
"No, I'm not going to give up my latest slave to you, child!" the Toshin within her growled at Jin, "I'm going to dispose of you and her right now!"
Nina rushed at Jin and gave him a powerful kick to the head, and then landing alongside his prone form, she clutched his right leg with her left arm, held him down with her left leg and pushed away his left leg with her right leg. She gripped his right leg tight and tugged at it sharply, throwing her upper body back for extra force, making Jin growl in pain. Then Nina got up and twirled around Jin's already painful left leg and clutched her arms and legs around it, pulling it round the wrong way. Jin growled even more in pain, the pressure on his leg was mounting up so far that he was sure that his kneecap had already broken apart. Jin looked at the malevolent Nina, and decided that he had to retaliate in a way that would be dirty fighting.
He poked Nina in the eyes, disabling her long enough for Jin to break free of her hold.
"I'm not playing this game with you, Toshin!" he replied, "I will get revenge on you!"
Just then, an army of Tekkenshu soldiers stormed into the building and surrounded Nina, with guns aimed. Nina looked around the Tekkenshu, looked at Jin one more time, then lapsed into unconsciousness.
Chapter 7: The Return of Purple Vs Scarlet. Part 1- The Fight With The Hot Blooded Martial Artist. Nina woke up and sat straight up in her bed as if she was waking from a nightmare. Was it a nightmare? She looked around the room and found that it was her room back in Florida. She breathed a sigh of relief. She was in no more trouble and everything was alright. Then, the door to her room burst off its hinges and the Toshin came back, lunging himself at Nina-
And then she woke up. Sitting straight up in her bed, waking up from her nightmare, doused in cold sweat. She looked around the room and saw she was back in her allocated room. She pinched herself, but it wasn't a dream. Was her attempt at taking that boy's life a simple dream? She remembered everything from the moment she smashed him through the wall, to the moment she fell unconscious. She deducted that the Tekkenshu simply carried her back to her room and left her there, and if so, why were they so merciful? She tried to KILL that boy! The grandson of The CEO Heihachi Mishima! What if she did kill him? Would they still carry her back to her room? She groaned a pained groan as she tried to get her head around these facts, when-
"Ms Williams to the Arena, Ms Williams to the Arena. Your fight is about to start!" spouted a voice over an intercom.
Nina groaned, she got out of bed to get her fighting clothes, but then realising she already had it on. She sighed.
'I'm seriously losing it!' she thought to herself, and set off towards the arena.
At The Arena. Nina looked around and saw the loud crowd of people. All clambering around each other like grapevines. They were your usual fight-fan crowd, ranging from amateur martial artists and martial arts teachers wanting to see their own style in action from a safe distance, to simple kids and hicks wanting to watching something different then wrestling.
'Sick freaks,' she thought, 'Enjoying such bloodshed.'
She looked towards the opposite end of the arena and saw her opponent. The brash, flat-topped biker she saw on the first day at the tournament, donned in the very same biker outfit. Something about him just screamed familiarity in her face, but she couldn't put her finger on it. She needed more clues.
"Hey doll face, looks like we're gonna have to get brutal now," he called over to her, "Watch out that you don't break a nail!"
The crowd laughed, at Nina's expense. Nina frowned and glowered at the middle-aged biker.
"They don't allow 'Rebel Without A Cause' rejects here," she retaliated, "So eat shit and fuck off!"
The biker thought to himself one name in the questioning sense.
'Nina?'
Then the intercom voice spoke up again.
"Paul, you were the first person to the arena, which battlefield would you like?"
The name sparked more of that sense of familiarity in Nina. She got images of a motorbike, the oriental martial artist, the biker himself and.other things racing through her mind. But she had to shake it off; the fight was about to begin!
"Hmm, battlefield, how about the alley's of #New York, New Yorrrrrrk!#" Paul delightfully sung in response, getting another laugh from the crowds. He was fan-favourite to win the tournament.
The background of the crowd suddenly disappeared behind a mould of a dirty, windswept hovel that was the alleyways of the NYC slums. She shook her head, but saw that the mould didn't disappear. The biker, named 'Paul' walked up to her.
"In case ya missed it," he began, "They make these scenario-deals so the fighter will feel more comfortable and not see loads of eyes staring at them. The crowd can see us, but we can't see them."
Nina fumbled for the appropriate answer, but only came up with a simple retort.
".Ok." she muttered
Paul walked back to his side of the arena, cricked his neck and fingers, and got into a fighting stance: a generic fighting stance with hunched shoulders. Nina looked back, gave a cutthroat motion towards her opponent and smirked evilly at her opponent before moving into her stance: another generic fighting stance, but with her hands held up, shaking sideways like a metronome.
"Fighters, are you ready?" the intercom voice cried
"Ready as I'll ever be." Nina sighed
"Hell yeah, get on with it already!" Paul replied, eager to fight.
The voice started the countdown.
"3.2.1."
"Get ready to have your butt whooped girl."
"In your dreams you pervert!"
".FIGHT!"
Nina cast the first stone as she lunged towards Paul with a hefty flying roundhouse kick, of which Paul blocked in time, Nina then quickly followed up with a low kick, connecting with Paul's ankle, then a head kick that sent Paul on the ground. Paul leapt up and flew towards Nina with both arms out in front of him in a Superman style, this knocking Nina down whilst Paul rolled up to his feet. Nina hopped up and smacked Paul with two severely stinging jabs, followed by a strong spinning back roundhouse kick. Paul locked his arms around the kicking foot, and smirked, retaliated only by a surprised gasp from Nina. Paul spun his arms around, sending Nina spinning through the air and landing on the ground with a hefty thud. That's when the taunting started. Paul got out a nail file and filed his nails.
"Ooh, I broke a nail." He said in a Marilyn Monroe-style voice (or at least the best Marilyn Monroe voice a gruff, tough biker could do)
Nina got up and looked at Paul in the most vicious way. If looks could kill, then Paul would looked even worse then a victim of Jack The Ripper. She got up on her feet steadily and slowly, much to the boredom of Paul, still filing his nails. When she got up to her feet, she looked back and Paul and gave a evilly sweet smile. Paul looked back in confusion. Nina charged at Paul, Paul simply putting away his file and getting back into his stance, but too little too late. Nina struck Paul with 4 stinging jabs to the face, followed by a head kick, moving fluidly down into a low kick, then she came back up quickly to respond with a backhand body chop, followed by another stinging jab and low kick, and then sending Paul skyward with an amazing kick, like a Nicolella, only that it wasn't airborne, and was much more powerful. She called the specific kick the 'Divine Cannon'. Paul flew up into the air and landed back down with a heavy crash.
"Boy, you can't beat me, give it up." Nina mocked
Another count started from the intercom, if Paul wasn't up by the time the count ended, he would be eliminated.
"10.9.8.7.6.5.4.3.2.1.-"
He got up just before it reached zero. "Match continues!" the intercom voice stated
"Shit!" Nina growled and got back in her fighting stance, her ankle weakened from Paul's counter-attack, this was a battle that wouldn't be ended easily.
Paul wheezed as he got back into his stance. His face bleeding from the numerous jabs to the face, but he still managed to find enough energy to mock.
"Didn't feel a thing. Are you sure you're a fighter?" he yelled to her, though in thought, he was wondering whether this was the girl he met all those years before.
"Just shut up and fight!" Nina responded and rushed at Paul with a vicious flying kick, with a kiai to followed. Paul concentrated on Nina's moving form, and then attacked, smashing Nina out of the sky with an undetected Scissors Kick, and as Nina fell back to the ground, Paul concluded the attack by hitting Nina's just inches before she hit the ground with a quick sweep, followed up with a crushing elbow blow into her stomach. She groaned as the elbow pushed all the air out of her lungs and fell limply back onto the ground, but just getting up with a small amount of energy.
"I will not be beaten." she wheezed painfully, breathing in felt like breathing in fire, "...by the scummy shit that you are!". She lunged towards Paul and threw all her energy into one hefty kick, a kick very popular with women and often used to disable muggers, annoying guys and other inconveniences. Paul's face showed the look of surprise and shock as the kick connected, then the wincing of pain. Paul covered his pain scrotum and hopped around in pain, much to the delight of the crowd. Nina, in all her tiredness and aches, smirked.
"That's what you get for messing with me, chumpstain!" she said, "Time to end this shit!". She used all her concentration, flexing the muscles in her arms and legs, slowing moving into a Crane stance, though she called it the Swan Stance. As she charged, yellow electricity charged around her arms as she reached the climax of her move. Then she threw out her arms at Paul, aiming to connect both her fists into his gut, but she made a mistake, she miscalculated how long Paul would be detained. As she threw her fists into where Paul used to be, he has already jumped to her side. Paul grabbed her stray left arm and spun under it and used all the potential energy he gained from the spin to flip Nina so hard onto her back she bounced. Nina used this bounce to get back on her feet, but second mistake, she didn't keep her eyes on her opponent. Just as Nina turned to Paul, she was met with such a strong punch to the stomach, she nearly threw up. The force sent her rolling along the ground twice before all the force from the punch drained away into nothing. The countdown started.
"10.9.8."
No action from Nina
".7.6.5."
Still nothing.
"4.3.2."
Nothing.
".1.0! Paul Phoenix Wins!"
Paul celebrated to the crowd, rubbing his hands then throwing his arm in the air in a suggestive manner.
"Hell yeah! I am the King!" he cheered, whilst medics carried the unconscious Nina to a medical room. Paul looked on and sighed.
'That had to be her!,' he thought, 'And yet it can't be her. Jeez! What have I been drinking?'
Hours later. Nina was patched up with plasters left, right and centre. She felt humiliated, violated and upset after the fight. Beaten in the most embarrassing manner, with one cheap punch, a single punch. She lay there in the medical bed in a very bad mood, which wasn't helped when a certain visitor came along.
"I hear you were beaten in the tournament," a thick Japanese accent spoke
"Mr Mishima?"
"That is correct." Heihachi replied, "I also hear you tried to kill my grandson. You can stop me if I'm wrong"
Nina didn't reply. If she replied, she'd be in for something much worse then a defeat. She stayed silent, much to the chagrin of Heihachi.
"How are you feeling anyway?" he asked, "After all, you have another fight tonight."
"TONIGHT?!?" Nina exclaimed, "I thought it wasn't for the next couple of days!"
"There has been a change in schedule Ms Williams," Heihachi informed her, "After some certain person tried to bump off a family member of mine!"
Nina looked into Heihachi's eyes as he said that. Her eyes in turn showing much surprise, she blinked, then said carefully.
"You want him dead don't you?" she said
"Who?" he replied, playing dumb
"That boy. You want him dead!" she stated, "You don't care about him."
"Shut up!" he growled, "You have another fight tonight, and I'll be reeeally looking forward to it! Good luck, if you have any luck left!"
He turned around sharply and stormed off towards the door. Nina got out of the hospital bed, a nurse was about to stop her, but then a voice cried out from where Heihachi walked off.
"Let her leave!" the voice said, being that of the nurse's employer, she stood to one side as Nina left the medical area and back to her allocated room. The walk was long, and she passed many rooms, buildings, areas, and arenas. As she made it to the block of rooms, she saw the many colourful characters that had made it to the tournament so far, those who would go to the semi-finals, or like her, those who were eliminated. There was a red- haired Korean boy, hanging around a young native American girl and a Chinese girl.
'Heh, real player all right' she thought to herself, stifling a laugh.
She noticed the oriental Bruce Lee-like man that Paul hangs around with, along with the ninja, the scary Bryan Fury man she encountered when watching his preliminary bouts, and a brunette in a red dress.
'Wait, what the fuck?' she thought. She hid round a corner, so that the brunette couldn't spot her, just in case-
'Could it be.?'
She didn't stop to ask questions, she just ran up the nearest stairs and headed to her room, locking the door behind her. She then turned around fell onto her bed, aching all over and feeling hot and bothered.
'I've got to get out of this damn suit!' she promised herself, and decided to rid her of its tightness. Purple was her thing, but did it always have to be skin-tight?
Chapter 7: The Return of Purple Vs Scarlet. Part 2- The Conclusion and Epilogue.
Nina was sleeping in her room; she fell asleep after getting out of her purple suit. Just donned in basic underwear, she slept and dreamt of such weird things incomprehensible to other beings. When suddenly, she was rudely awaken.
"Rise and Shine Blondie!" the voice spoke in a familiar feminine form.
Nina rose sharply from her sleeping composure and saw her sister Anna, standing in the doorway in a blue version of the red dress Nina saw earlier. To say she was surprised would be an understatement. To say she was shocked would be near spot on.
"How did you get here?" she exclaimed
"The reception gave me a spare key to your room," Anna replied, "As I knew you'd lock the door."
Anna walked out from the doorway and, closing the door behind her, entered the room, turning on the lights.
"Plus, they gave me an invitation too." She concluded, "Why the hell did you come here anyway?"
Nina looked away. She thought of all the things she saw during the whole tournament, the purple breath, the brash biker and his oriental chum, numerous arms and legs fractured by her moves during fights, and of course, the green 'god' and the young boy. Could she really tell Anna? Of course not!
"None of your business!" she snapped, "Now get out!"
"Nina," Anna sighed, "We have a fight coming up in 20 minutes near the main docking area. Get ready and be there soon, to be beaten that is."
"Just piss off will you?!?" Nina yelled at her sister, "I'll be there, and you can expect to have the beating of your life!"
"You still don't have all your memories back Nina," Anna said as she headed towards the door, opening it, "Don't expect to understand anything."
Nina pulled a drawer out from her dresser and threw it in Anna's direction. She narrowly got out of the room in time before the wooden 'box' smashed against the door. Nina panted, feeling too angry to do anything else apart from stare at where her sister had been. 4 years ago, she was distrustful of her supposed 'sister', now she saw her as a nuisance. She looked down at the door to see the clothes that she had strewn across the floor. She looked down and saw a brown, furry, leopard-spot jacket. She got up from her bed and looked at it, getting back some memories, memories of shopping in Florida with her 'sister'. The jacket wasn't exactly winter clothing, it only covered her chest at the most, but it was the fashion, so Anna had said then. She looked at it and thought.
'Better then that tight suit'
She put the jacket on, though it was small, it was comfortable and snug. It got tighter and less comfortable when she tried zipping it up, so she left it unzipped. It revealed her bra, but she didn't care. It wouldn't matter when she would be fighting. Finishing off her fashionable façade with some black, figure-hugging jeans and the must-have stilettos. Now she was ready to either hit the streets, hit the shops or hit a bitch.
At The Mishima Docking Area. Nina stood around the vacant empty spot, with only the spotlights shining upon her. Her hair shone in the bright light, and yet, in the dank darkness too. Empty helicopters sat like some slob on a sofa on their helipads, Tekkenshu guards wandered around with their machineguns, looking around corners or having a crafty smoke.
'Solid Snake to the set please. To the set, Solid Snake' Nina joked to herself in her thoughts. She sighed and was about to leave when she saw her. Anna stood opposite her in some of the flashiest clothes ever. The zebra-striped suit with shoulder pads and hat stood out from the darkness of the docking area.
"If you're looking for the set to 'Dynasty'," Nina said, "Then I'm afraid they stopped the series!"
"Whatever you say, 'Buffy'!" Anna retorted.
Nina placed her forehead in her hand, shaking her head.
'Watch out Fashion Police' she thought, and slid into her fighting stance.
Anna sorted out her hat so it wouldn't fall off during the fight, then slid into her own fighting stance, with her arms close to her body, yet in the generic fighting way, slowly moving up and down.
'Of all the times you got your way,' she thought, 'Now I will get MY way!'
There were no intercom voices, or crowds, the fight would start itself. The silence as both sisters stared at each other, seeing who would make the first move, was deafening to say the least. It seemed like another millennium had passed as they stared at each other. Just then, the first move was struck. Nina charged at Anna with a lethal knife-edged chop, striking into Anna's gut. Anna gave a yelp of pain, but retaliated quickly with a hand-sweep, sending Nina spinning to the ground. She fell to the ground with a thud but quickly rolled up to her feet, she flung herself at Anna and front somersaulted in the air, outreaching her leg and striking her opponent on the back of the head as she flumped back-first onto the hard metal floor. Nina felt pain, but not as much as Anna did. She got up to her feet, as did the dazed Anna. She waited for the moment where Anna would just regain composure, as that point reached, she dashed towards her and spat out the purple gas of the Evil Mist into her face, and then followed up with a painful low kick directed at Anna's ankle, then span around and struck her side with a sharp body-chop. Anna staggered back from the assault, her body aching badly from the earlier chop, the flip kick and the low kick-body chop. She looked ahead to see Nina smirking, as she reared her hand back and slapped her across the face, and knocking Anna's hat off. Anna looked to her fallen hat and back at Nina, and growled.
"What's the problem?" Nina mocked, "Hat fall off?"
Anna roared into life and struck Nina with 3 hard-hitting slaps, insulting Nina with each hit.
"EAT!"
smack
"A!"
smack
"DICK!!!"
smack
Nina staggered back as the last smack stung across her face. Anna, using this moment, struck Nina with 3 lightning-quick stinging jabs, followed by a heavy head kick, spinning around into a strong backhand across her opponent's face followed up with a sweeping kick, sending Nina's back to the ground. As Nina hit the ground, Anna got her own stiletto heel and grinded it into Nina's chest, around the area where the heart was. Nina growled in pain as the sharp heel dug in, drawing blood. Nina thought to herself, was she going to let this harlot kill her right then and there? Hell no! She grabbed Anna's ankle and lifted it from her chest, the look of surprise crawled along Anna's face as no matter how hard she pressed, Nina lifted her foot clear from her own body. Then, Nina rolled back and sent Anna down the ground, with Nina sitting on her. Nina slid down to the side of Anna and wrapped her arms and legs around Anna's leg, the one that had previously pinned Nina to the ground. Nina held onto her leg tenaciously and pulled sharply, making the bones in Anna's leg creak horribly. Anna wailed in pain. Nina, convinced that she had broken Anna's leg, broke the hold and slid away from Anna's prone form. She looked down and her and folded her arms.
"You're immobilized, give up." She said
"Never!" Anna growled back
"Your leg's broken, how can you continue, bitch?" Nina retorted
"Like this!" Anna exclaimed and leapt up to her feet, much to Nina's surprise. Anna grabbed Nina's left arm and struck her jaw with a vicious jab, then she wrapped her arms around her opponent's left arm like an anaconda and jerked it upwards, causing Nina much pain in her shoulder, then Anna continued the assault on Nina's left arm by pushing Nina to the ground, placing her knee behind Nina's left shoulder blade, bending Nina's arm towards her and clutching it in her own left arm, sharply pulling at the arm. With each tug Anna gave, Nina gave a growl of pain, not a yelp, but a growl. More like the big cat caught in a trap, then a small kitten being teased.
"Now who should give up?" Anna mocked, "You're useless, don't you understand?"
Nina responded with nothing but a growl and a failed swipe at Anna with her free, but useless right arm. It couldn't reached Anna, nor reach Anna's clutch. Then, Anna added more pressure to her shoulder blade, pulling back so far on the arm that she finally broke a bone in Nina's arm. When Anna heard that snap, she let go quickly and looked at her sister. Nina clutched at her aching arm. She couldn't move it without groaning in pain. It looked ok on the outside, but it was the inside that the pain was centred on. Nina's face screwed up in pain, gasping and breathing heavily, with traces of tears running down her face. Anna, in regret reached an arm out to the prone Nina.
"Nina, I-"
"Don't! Get away from me!" was her reply.
Nina slowly shuffled up to her feet, still clutching at her arm, sniffing and growling like a dog. She turned around to face her sister, but with a look of pain and anger.
"Hope you're happy now!" she growled, "You won! I can't fight anymore"
"Nina, I know where you can get cast for your arm," replied Anna, trying to fix things, but Nina wasn't taking it.
"NO! YOU DID IT!" Nina yelled at her, "YOU BROKE IT! YOU FUCKING BITCH!"
"Nina.."
"NO! GET AWAY FROM ME!"
"No, Nina! Wait!"
Nina ran away from the docking area, with Anna chasing after her. She chased after her past the docking area entrance, past the main Mishima Zaibatsu buildings, and then, she lost track of her. Nina disappeared round the side of a building and when Anna got round to that side, she was gone. Nowhere to be seen. Anna sighed and then looked away, silently crying to herself.
Anna found Nina the next morning asleep on a park bench. She quickly called an ambulance and Nina got treatment for her broken arm. Though Nina was grateful for the medical help, she never forgave her sister, and just when she got the cast set and sorted, she disappeared mysteriously again. Since then, no one saw hide or heel of her. Her clothing and possessions, of which were finally claimed by her sister Anna, were still left in her allocated room when she disappeared. Where did she go? Who knows? The Silent Assassin was now truly silent.
The End