A Reaper's Vacation

xxx

Sylvas fought to control the burgeoning yawn within him as Genryu introduced him to his men. And their Pokegirls. That was about the only interesting thing about this whole round of introductions, the fact that they had shebeasts of their own on their side. Granted, most of them didn't seem capable of talking much beyond the occassional grunt, growl, or muttering the name of their 'Type', but it was a novel experience anyway.

But frankly, after he was introduced to Genryu's Amachoke, Grey (after her skin), and his Kitten, Tasha, the experience got a lot less interesting. Basically, the only important people were the ones who had at least one Pokegirl partner. The rest were all pretty much grunts who just provided fire support.

So aside from the captain, there was Simmons the sniper and his partner, a nameless Fairycute that spent most of her time either flitting around his head, sitting on his shoulders, or napping in a nest of his hair. Given that Simmons was a grizzled, scarfaced man with at least three weeks worth of facial growth, this presented an odd picture.

Then there was Jack, heavy weapons and munitions. Basically the guy to go to if you needed stuff to make something go boom. His partner, a Nymph named Jess, didn't seem to quite match up either, but given that she seemed more interested with snuggling with Jack than saying or doing anything else, it probably didn't matter.

Then there was Sam. Or rather, Samantha, but she only responded to Sam. His brain had nearly fried when he and the captain had walked in on her, shirtless, necking with a blue-skinned girl with tentacles. A Titacruel, apparently. He'd completely missed what the Titacruel's name was, and what Samantha actually did for the unit, because he'd had to reboot his brain when he realized that two of those tentacles were somewhere in Sam's shorts, and it looked like a third one was about to join them.

By the time his brain was working again, they were in the hall and long since away from Sam's quarters.

"... In any case, lad, you have to understand what Pokegirl's are to survive in this world. They're weapons, plain and simple, created by a mad scientist to take over the world or something like that. Sukebe came damned close to it too. Try to wander the wilderness without a Pokegirl partner or two of your own, and you're just going to end up dead unless you're really lucky. You've seen that for yourself."

Sylvas got the feeling that this was the point where he should nod to give the impression that he was paying attention and understood, and so did.

"The thing is, gun's are pretty much useless against most of them unless you're using the biggest kind out there, and even then only if you're using armor piercing rounds, the kind that can put a hole through a tank. Even then, if the Pokegirl knows the bullet is coming, it rarely matters how large it is because like as not, she's going to dodge it anyway. Simmons told me about your little run through the town yesterday... seems to me like that alone used up at least a lifetime and a half's worth of luck."

Genryu paused a moment, then sighed.

"Under other circumstances, I wouldn't have drafted you into our little battle, but we're far too shorthanded to expect to survive much longer without help. I'm going to have to send you out there to gather supplies from the nearby town. I'm not sure what buildings have power running and which don't, but there's sure to be canned food in some of the houses, and I'm pretty sure that there was a grocery store somewhere in there. Most everything else will likely have been scavenged by the ferals, but canned food and bottled water would be a good bet, you should try to scavenge whatever weapons and ammunition you can find, and with luck you might find a car in reasonable condition to help haul it back."

At this point, Sylvas finally grasped what the captain was saying and his eyes widened.

"Hey... wait... weren't you just saying something about how incredibly dangerous it is out there, and now you want to send me back out there alone?"

"Hm? Oh no... not alone."

He swung the door he was standing next to open.

"You'll be partnered with her."

He looked in the room. She looked out. A chain clinked as they both raised a hand to point at each other.

"YOU!"

Then Sylvas paused, blinked, then cocked his head lightly to the side.

"Wait... I don't recognize you. Have we met?"

A long silence fell, then Genryu coughed.

"She, uh, just put a three inch long, inch wide hole in your chest a couple hours ago. You... really didn't recognize her?"

Sylvas stroked his beard for a moment, lost in thought. Then his eyes widened and he snapped his fingers.

"OH... right. I'd completely forgotten about that... and she was behind me, so I kinda never saw her face."

"... You're giving me to him? You can't just... I dunno... kill me now, maybe?"

Genryu shrugged and stepped out the door, tossing a key at Sylvas... who flinched as he missed catching it and it bounced off his head and fell to the floor. He reached down and fumbled after it as Genryu began to close the door.

"That'll open her chains up. I don't suppose you have to tame her immediately, if you can convince her to stick with you otherwise, but it would be a good idea to get around to it as soon as possible."

"Yeah, yeah..."

Genryu nodded and closed the door, completely forgetting that he hadn't yet gotten around to explaining what Taming was to the apparent amnesiac, and so while he was thinking one thing, Sylvas was thinking quite another. Mainly involving tiny chairs and burning hoops.

'But where would I find a three-ring circus at this time of day?'

He shrugged and unlocked the manacle on the girl's left wrist, completely missing the way her eyes widened, first with shock, then with savage glee. She balled her hand into a fist and swung with every ounce of her strength at the idiot's head as he turned to unlock the other wrist.

"Whoops."

And ended up slamming her fist into the stone wall as he dropped the key again and bent over to pick it up. She grit her teeth for a moment, trying to hold it back, but the idiot bumped her arm slightly as he stood back up, sending a throbbing wave of agony all the way up to her shoulder.

xxx

"GYAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!"

Captain Genryu Saotome couldn't help but whistle at the piercing cry.

"Damn... he works fast."

"AH-AAH-AAAAAAAAH!! NGYAAA!!"

xxx

"Geez, hold still... wow. That's a mess. I can't believe they didn't notice that when they chained you up. It looks like your knucklebones got smashed somehow. I wonder how that could have happened?"

The Pokegirl sweatropped and winced at the same time, then whimpered as he began poking at her arm.

"Looks like you cracked your wrist too. (Poke.) You'll have to be careful with that. (Poke.) Too much pressure in the wrong position, and that'll break too, and I don't know how long it'll be before we can have the doc take a look at this.(Poke. Poke. Poke.)"

"ALL RIGHT, I GIVE UP, I'LL BEHAVE, JUST STOP POKING THAT!"

Sylvas blinked, then his eyes widened as he realized what he was absentmindedly doing and he jerked his hand away as though scalded.

"Ah... sorry about that... let's get you out of those chains and take you to see the doctor."

This time, the Warrior didn't try to attack him as he released her from her bonds, being too preoccupied with cradling her injured hand to her chest.

xxx

Hojo paused and spun around rapidly as someone entered his domain.

"Vhat do you... Oh. It's you. I vas joking vhen I said I vould haff one of my assistants make you a sandvhich, you know. If ze captain has drafted you, zen ze military cafeteria is..."

Sylvas blinked, then shook his head.

"No, it's not that. It's... well you're a doctor, right? Do you think you could take a look at her hand?"

Hojo arched an eyebrow, apparently only now noticing the female that had followed Sylvas in the door. He grabbed her by ze forearm, ignoring the wince of pain it brought, and inspected the hand closely. Then he shrugged, pulled a small bottle out of a cabinet and handed it to Sylvas.

"Ze damage is relatively minor, though I am unsure how you could have managed to injure her hand zo zeverely during a taming session, yet leaf her uzzervize unscathed. Haff her drink ze potion, and she vill be good as new in five minutes."

Sylvas blinked again, image of a burning hoop once more leaping to the forefront of his mind.

"Nah... I didn't bother with any of that, just let her out of the chains."

A long silence fell between them as Hojo's hand zipped out to clamp down on his before he could pass the potion off to the wounded pokegirl.

"Right, right... I had forgotten about ze amnezia thing. Tell me, did ze Captain Zaotome tell you exactly vhat vas involved in ze Taming processez?"

"Er... I don't see how it matters... isn't it just like what those people in circuses do when they put their heads in the lions m-EEP!"

Hojo lowered his glare and rubbed tiredly at the bridge of his nose. Then he leaned forward and began whispering into Sylvas's ear.

Sylvas's face went white, then red, then white again with wide eyes and a tiny spot of blood hanging from his nostril. In his state of shock, Hojo reclaimed the potion from him.

"Wait a minute... what's the point of that! I mean... I mean... doesn't that..."

"I see... you are a virgin, zen."

"WHAT THE HELL DOES THAT HAVE TO DO WITH ANYTHING!?"

"Vell, if you vere a real man, zen you vould be jumping out of your pants vith excitement at zuch an opportunity."

"OH! OH YEAH! WELL THEN... wait a moment. No. No, I'm not quite that dumb yet. You'll have to do better than..."

KLONG-ONG-ONG

Sylvas's eyes crossed and he staggered a half-step forward.

"lOOk aT ThE PretTY BirDIEs..."

The Warrior caught him before he hit the ground and slung him bodily over her shoulder.

"Let's get this over with so I can get my hand fixed already..."

"Ah. Zere is a spare bedroom down ze hall, second door on ze left. Haff fun."

She snarled impotently at him as she passed.

xxx

"WAAAH!"

"Oh, shut up. You weren't complaining at all ten minutes ago."

"YOU STOLE MY PURITY!"

"Isn't that the females line?"

Sylvas paused to give that due consideration, then shook off logic in favor of pointless whining.

"You RAPED me!"

"You seemed to be enjoying it well enough."

"WAAAAH!"

"Oh, for the love of... you're doing this just to piss me off, aren't you."

Sylvas blinked, the red rims around his eyes and tearstreaks vanishing.

"Wow. You caught on a hell of a lot quicker than I expected."

She grumbled something under her breath and stood up to step out the door, ignoring his look of rising panic.

"Hey, wait, you're not going to... to clean up, or put on some clothes, or your armor before you go out?"

"Nah."

He opened his mouth again, but couldn't think of a viable argument before she'd left the room. Shrugging he plopped back down on the bed... and sat up again almost immediately.

"Wet spot. Ew."

He stood up and began searching for a shower. It didn't take long to find, as there were only three doors and one left out to the hall. The first other he checked was some sort of walk-in closet, so that left only one. Sighing in gratitude for whoever made the floor plans for this place, he stepped out of his clothes and began twisting the knobs until he was enveloped in mist and hot water. Then a pair of slim arms wrapped around his chest.

"Didja miss me, boss-man?"

xxx

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH!"

Genryu grunted as he dropped a paper back to the desk.

"I'm not denying the boy his fun, but sooner or later he's going to have to get to work. ...I'll give him another hour... and a half. That should be plenty of time."

xxx

Sylvas was panting heavily as he staggered out of the shower, slumping into a wall and clutching at his chest.

"G-goddamn... you nearly gave me a heart attack."

"Oh. So? We need to get moving, 'Boss'. They aren't going to wait forever for food. Got a plan?"

"Why of course I have a plan! We go to the village, get the food, and come back. The perfect plan."

"That... that's just great. And here I thought I was the dumb one. At least I can think, if I apply myself."

"Eh?"

"The ferals, you retard. What are we going to do when set upon by dozens of angry ferals?"

"Ah... oh. Well, we run for our lives. Duh."

The Warrior's hand was nearly vibrating as she held herself back from belting the idiot.

'Must not kill... they'll put me down... must not kill... they'll put me down... deeeeeep breaths... in... out... in... out...'

"Riiight. And you don't actually have any other plans?"

"Well, the 'Scream' and 'Flee' combo package has worked pretty well for me thus far, and I see no reason to abandon it just yet."

Her fist tightened so much that her knuckles cracked loudly.

'MusT nOt kILl, mUSt Not KilL, MUsT noT kIlL...'

She spun on her heel and began strapping on her armor.

"Let's just go. With any luck, we'll somehow manage to die painlessly."

"That's the spirit!" Sylvas exclaimed happily, thumbs up with his eyes squinted closed.

"Do... do you have to work at being so stupid, or does it just come naturally?"

"I totally have no idea what you mean!" Sylvas countered, still posing like a retard.

xxx

The Warrior was on her guard as they finally got around to leaving the military complex, flitting through the undergrowth from bit of cover to bit of cover. Sylvas, by contrast... eh, not so much. She yanked him to the ground when she realized that he was just ambling along like he was out for a casual stroll.

"What the hell are you doing?" She hissed softly. "You're going to get us both killed!"

"Mmphmflmp." He countered eloquently. With more than a slight degree of reluctance, she removed her hand from his mouth.

"As I was saying, I doubt they really expect us to return at all, with or without food. And, given that there are at least a few varieties of she-beasts that can track by scent alone, I doubt it matters how cleverly concealed from sight or quiet we are. There's nothing we can do about leaving a scent trail..."

The Warrior couldn't help but stare. It was a reasonable, well thought out argument despite that it made it seem like Sylvas was resigned to death. It almost made him seem... smart. Naturally, the universe could not let that stand and the next words out of his mouth nullified that.

"... Besides, it would take valuable energy that I'd really prefer to keep in reserve for the 'Fleeing For Our Lives' bit of this little endeavor."

She smacked him lightly in disgust. Of course, considering the differences in strength involved, 'lightly' was still enough to bruise his jaw and nearly give him whiplash.

"Idiot. Now that you've jinxed us, theres no possible way we can get through this undetected."

Her grumbling continued, completely ignored for the most part, until they reached the town limits and Sylvas took a moment to study the map he'd been given.

Of course, he hadn't been given any weapons, or been allowed to take one of the armored military vehicles, or even a partially retrofitted civilian vehicle that one of the soldiers had siezed, no. Just the map, good luck, try not to die, there'll be bandages, a sandwich, and a mug of some indefinable fluid waiting for you when you get back. If you get back. If not, we're going to eat your sandwich.

"M'Kay, that pawn shop I got a gun from last time is... way too far away. There's another, only seven blocks that way, and according to this, there's a Wal-Mart about ten blocks north of there. There'll probably be cars in the parking lot, if we're lucky one of them will work. If not... hey, she-beast. How fast can you run while carrying a shopping cart?"

"Uh... not... not fast enough to outrun any but the slowest of pursuers, I'm afraid. And I don't have the stamina to last for more than a minute or two, either... and by that point, any pursuers could catch up easily."

"Riight." Sylvas nodded slowly, in thought. "We'll just bump that from 'Plan B' to 'Absolute Last Resort', then. Now then... what would a good 'Plan B' be?"

The Warrior felt a headache coming on.

"Why not... Why not start by coming up with a half-decent plan 'A'?"

"Oh, those never work. I find it saves a lot of trouble and effort to just skip plan 'A's altogether..." An uncertain look crossed Sylvas' face. "I... uh... I think. I could be wrong..." He shook it off. "Eh, whatever. Either we pull this off, or we die. No real point putting it off, then."

He darted into town, sacrificing all appearance of stealth in favor of moving as fast as he could, probably in the hopes of covering as much ground as he could before the she-beasts he knew full well were in town noticed he was there and started chasing him. If so... he failed. Pokegirls started swarming out of ruined houses and filling the skies the moment he left cover, howling for his blood.

The Warrior stared wide-eyed for a moment at the display before she rushed into and through the fray herself.

"YOU IDIIOOT!" She howled, sprinting up beside Sylvas, well ahead of the horde behind them that was pacing themselves, waiting for them to tire before they attacked. "You wanna die or something?"

"First stop, weapons!" He said aloud, completely ignoring her commentary. "Then, while I grab foodstuffs, you can see if there's a car that isn't damaged too badly and will actually start so you can come rescue me!"

"That's your plan? We're going to die."

"Don't be so negative... Here we are."

Sylvas kicked the door open, darting inside and slamming it after the Warrior and quickly tipping a nearby set of shelves in front of it.

"Ah... that'll buy us a few seconds, at least. 'Kay... guns, knives... crossbow? Neat, but pretty usele- oh! I see, the arrowhead extends into a grappling hook, and there's a cord... I want that, and that, and that... but I can't carry it all and food. Cruel fate! Oh well... I'll just come back later. Oh, gasoline! I'll take a couple of cans..."

He was interrupted by a large thump of something slamming into the door. It came again a moment later and was followed by the scrabbling of claws. The Warrior, having caught her breath, smashed open a display case and ignored the sudden blaring alarm as she began sorting through the swords.

"Dull... poor quality... warp in the metal... for crying out loud, who makes swords without edges?"

"Wait wait wait..." Sylvas interrupted, ignoring the fact that she was ignoring him in her efforts to find a decent blade. "Why did an alarm sound there, but nothing happened when I broke the gun case at the other place?"

"Silent alarm." She grunted as she finally selected one and gave it a test swing.

"Oh. That makes sense."

A clawed fist slammed through the door, scrabbling wildly around as though its owner expected that one of them would have just stayed within reach. The Warrior stabbed it with the ornamental longsword she'd found. A high pitched screech and small spurt of blood later, it withdrew, and the sounds outside seemed to indicate that the horde was milling about and looking for the weakest point of defense.

"Eh, this thing is really more form than function, but it'll do for now. It has an edge, at least, and that's all I need for my techniques. Could do with a shield, but that's just wishful thinking."

Sylvas tossed her a pot lid.

"I... you... screw it. Grab whatever you want boss-man, and let's get the hell out of here."

xxx

Simmons felt a profound sense of Deja Vu as he stared through his binoculars at the scene playing out before him.

"Uh... Captain?"

Genryu sighed.

"No, don't tell me, let me guess. I can see them swarming from here, like a disturbed antpile... Is he still alive?"

"Yeah, Captain. He, uh... he's jumping between rooftops again. He's doing better this time though, and his 'girl has a sword now."

"I see..."

"He's, uh... He's laughing, sir. Either he's really enjoying himself or he's gone hysterical with terror. Suppressive fire?"

Genryu considered for a long moment.

"... No. Let him get himself out of his mess this time. He's got to learn that he can't just fly off half-cocked, or it stirs up trouble... like that. If he survives, fine. If not, then it's no big loss at this point."

xxx

"HAHAHAHA! My legs are burning!"

"You shouldn't have grabbed so much crap!" The warrior yelled back at Sylvas as she made a half-turn and swung at the level of his throat. He dived beneath the swing and it swatted a leaping shebeast aside and off the roof as he turned and fired a bullet at the flier that had begun a dive at the Warrior's exposed back. It squawked and turned away, flapping back up into the sky, and they both kept running.

"I know... but there was so much cool stuff in there!"

"Idiot."

They jumped to the next roof, Sylvas staggering lightly for the first few steps afterwards.

"Haa... Haa... Hey, I just realized. I don't even know your name."

"Don't have one." The warrior shot back, darting ahead to swat a pair of vaguely feline she-beasts out of the way before falling back to Sylvas's side.

"Well..." He grunted as he made another difficult jump that the Warrior took as though she was hopping over a puddle. ".. Surely you were called something at some point."

"... W-13-25-15-07."

"Eh... what now? That sounds like a registration code..."

"It is. I'm the thirteenth warrior from the twenty fifth set of fifteen from outpost seven."

"That's... that's a mouthful."

They were both silent as they took the next jump off the short building entirely and Sylvas winced as something in his hip shifted marginally.

"So... how do you feel about 'Wendy'?"

"I hate it."

"Oh... How about 'Jill'? Or 'Jennifer'?"

"Hate them."

"How about-"

"Hate."

"But-"

"Hate."

"I didn't even-"

"Hate."

"..."

"We're almost there, boss-man. Uh... try not to die before I can make pickup, okay?"

"Sure thing, Cecilia!"

"I- You- Dah!" She growled out as he darted through the parking lot and dived, shoulder first, through the sliding glass doors that, without power in this area, weren't sliding.

She growled again, this time wordlessly, and scanned what cars were in the lot before turning to run to the nearest residential blocks. The cars in the lot were all bad.. damaged in some way or another, with their tires slashed or ruptured, or having been smashed or slashed with something. One had the remains of some poor shmuck slammed through it's sunroof. They were all at least somewhat damaged from prolonged exposure to the elements, several so bad that they were rusting holes through the doors.

No, none of them would do. Better to look in garages, where at least whatever cars might be there would have been protected from nature.

It was a short, but still unacceptably long time later that Cecilia carved open a garage door and actually found something inside. Granted, it wasn't a car. Still, the motorcycle inside had two seats, and would be much more maneuverable than a car would, now that she paused a moment to think about it. And as civilian vehicles couldn't hope to stand up to most Pokegirl attacks, the only option was dodging them.

The deciding factor, of course, was that the keys were in the motorcycle's ignition, and it had a full tank of gas.

She was back at the store and pulling to a stop in moments, oddly not being hunted by any ferals. It was creepy, actually. She knew they were there, and if they weren't chasing her then that meant...

Sylvas interrupted her thought processes by screaming at the top of his lungs and leaping off the building, spinning and swinging two large garbage sacks that looked stuffed full of cans of some sort around him like helicopter blades to fend of the Pokegirls that were leaping after him. Cecilia's eyes widened and she cursed under her breath as she slammed the gas to bring the motorcycle into motion, spinning as she braked just beneath him. He landed on the second seat, facing backwards and eyes crossing from the impact, and she slammed on the gas again.

"Nice... nice timing... Cecilia..." Sylvas managed to whimper out in a significantly higher pitch than normal. She ignored him as they sped off.

"So, I assume by the way your jaw is hanging somewhere about your knees that they've survived." Genryu stated, and Simmons snapped his mouth shut with a click.

"Sir... those two are either incredibly good at this sort of thing, completely and suicidally insane, horrifically lucky, or some twisted combination of the three."

"Then they are alive."

"And coming in with supplies, sir. Though... given all the running they've done, they're gonna be tired, and he ain't doing no taming until he's had the doctor take a look at his bits and pieces."

Genryu winced sympathetically.

Sure enough, they arrived shortly after that, and Sylvas made it perhaps two bowlegged steps off the bike before passing out, and would have hit the ground if Cecilia hadn't snagged him by the collar of his lab coat, herself wobbling slightly from fatigue. Genryu quickly barked orders, sending Sam and two nameless flunkies to escort the pair to Hojo, and a third flunky to take inventory of the loot and have it properly stored.

"That worked out well." He decided. "Better than I expected from a sciency-type, anyway. Speaking of which... when he gets up, let him use a lab. See what he does. Could be that even without memories, he's more useful to us there."

xxx

Sylvas groaned as he forced his body to move.

"Oh... oh god, what did I do yester-GAH!"

Hojo's leering face had suddenly popped up in front of him.

"Holy crap... that's a hell of an awful way to wake... wait." He stared down his blanket to where there was a large bag of ice sitting over his hips. "What... what the hell?"

"Unfortunately, yez was severely damaged, see." Said Hojo, in a very un-Hojo-ish accent. "Looks loik yer testicles has done a runner."

"GAAAAAH!" Sylvas screamed, sitting upright in his bed, in a cold sweat and panting for breath.

"Vat iz ze problem?" Hojo asked as he stepped into the room, reading off a clipboard.

"I... nothing. Just a..."

He paused and his eyes tracked down to his hips, where a large sack of ice was sitting, and he completely freaked out.

"Oh! Oh! Oh shit! The dream was real, they... they're gone!"

Hojo casually whacked him in the head.

"Shut up, idiot. Zey are still zere, and intact. Ze ting is, ze impact pushed zem up into your body cavities, and ve had to surgically move zem back to zey're proper position. Ve gave you a healing draft aftervards, and you vill be in perfect vorking conditions in a few hours, once ze svelling has gone down."

"Oh... oh that's good... for a moment, I thought..."

"I know vhat you thought. Now zen, your Varrior-"

"Cecilia."

"-ya, ya, she iz resting in ze next room over. Vhen you vake up, I advise you go to check on her."

"When I-?"

Hojo sprayed some mixture of chemicals in Sylvas' face and he was out and snoring before his head hit the pillow.

xxx

A shadowy female figure slammed a small knife through a photograph, visibly seething.

"This person..." She growled. "I don't know who he is, but chaos follows wherever he goes. He's playing havoc with our efforts to reclaim to local Feral population... just when they'd begun settling down, he comes back and whips them up into an even greater frenzy than before. Zan!"

A Kunoichi appeared, kneeling before her, in a slight puff of smoke.

"Yes, Mistress?"

"I want to know everything there is to know about this person. Our full resources are at your disposal, do whatever it takes."

"Of course, Mistress."

Zan poofed away, and the Mistress stared at the photo for a few moments before pulling the knife out and stabbing it again.

"Master Sukebe is gone, but his will lives on through me. I am the commander of this remainder of his forces, and I will continue to destroy all human military outposts, as ordered, until none remain. You will regret interfering in my duty..."

xxx

A.N. Cliffhanger! Dah!

Took a lot longer than expected to finish this chapter. Stupid short attention span...

I had all sorts of things I wanted to say here, but I can't remember any of it at the moment... Hnn. Well in any case, I've set up an opponent for my avatar. She has an entire army of highly trained and deadly femmes behind her. He has... a few nifty toys and a Warrior that'll probably try to kill him again herself at some point.

I'm liking those odds. Die, me, die!