"It is easier to strike down many birds with one stone than it is to strike down a ship with a sword. But you're going to try anyway, aren't you?"
"A true Kiryuuin," Ragyou breathed, marveling at her handiwork. True to the Grand Couturier's words, the refitted kamui had fit Ryuuko perfectly.
Magnificent.
A hand snaked onto the younger's thighs and under the ruched material, finding the taut muscles rippling under the thigh-high boots pleasing to the touch. Ryuuko twitched, movements sluggish and restricted by the anchor points embedded within her skin. An involuntary shiver ran down her spine, rattled through her bones, and came back up as a choked whimper between chattering teeth. The hand lifted, and soothingly patted the halfling's hair, toying with the bright red bangs that hid underneath the messy mop.
Then, gear-pupil'd irises dilated pleasingly before shrinking once more, and the minor resistance ceased. Ragyou smirked and leaned in close, breath tickling the other's ear as she started weaving a false childhood, imprinting her values within the fake memories and burying the true memories underneath. Poor girl. She had lost her way, with her fool of an ex-husband misleading both of his daughters with a metaphorical carrot and laughable human values. It really was a good thing her mother came to... correct such an injustice. Mind stitching with one thread was too weak for the extraordinary daughter, so she, Ragyou Kiryuuin, had taken the liberty of tying her down with many threads like a giant among ordinary men. And now, the glorious irrefutable truth was bared. All that mattered was how it would be presented.
"You understand, don't you?" Ragyou cooed, her grin widening even more upon a tiny, hoarsely whispered "yes".
'What an oddly similar situation,' she mused. A mother and a daughter. Naked and yet clothed at the same time. A question of understanding, and an affirmation. 'Except,' she mulled, lightly tracing a hand down the younger's middle, 'without pretense and posturing.'
Her captive was deathly still, the point of submission long passed. With an errant flick of a hand, the tethers loosed themselves from their target's skin and let her hang there by their master's hand. Ragyou settled both of them down atop a mesh-like building, allowing Nui to sandwich the older sister between them while the stitching completed. Junketsu still squirmed underneath their flesh, undoubtedly still busying itself with the task of bonding with its new host. But its fidgeting soon ceased, and a light blue glow emitting from the cobalt trim confirmed its absolute integration.
"People... exist for the sake of clothing," came a muted voice after a lengthy silence, much to the elder's glee.
"Indeed," Ragyou nodded, errant strands of impossibly shaped hair lightly fanning the younger's face. "The very beings that stand at the apex of life on this planet. That's what life fibers are."
Ryuuko deferentially allowed the two's touches against her, even leaning into them. Absentmindedly, her fingers brushed against herself, hands feeling the luxurious cloth above her. This feeling... Junketsu... was this how life fibers and humans were meant to be connected? In due time, her ministrations led her limbs to contact with three metal bits, reveling in its design before toying with the epaulette above.
Nui took notice. Gently, she guided them back, unnaturally soft fingers curled around torn and calloused ones. "Show us, Ryuuko. Show us how you look in your very best," the blonde whispered.
The fingers pressed them in. Three clicks signified three needles being locked into place, and Ryuuko exploded in a brilliant flash of blue, azure tracer lights twinkling above.
Power. So much power…
Pleasure rolled off of Junketsu in waves, threatening to catch the remaining bits of consciousness in its undertow. Thoughts raced, leaving many uncompleted before swiftly moving to another. Ryuuko's body trembled, barely noticeable under the activated kamui's protection. Everything was bright- too bright! The world was saturated in sound and color, turning even a placid blue sky bizarrely filled with buzzing, lines, and light- how tragic it was to see all, and yet nothing at once! A raw, primal hunger filled her at the sight; it was driving her mad. Her eyes rolled in their sockets, a twinge of pain accompanying every movement. She needed an anchor point to hold on to... something to focus on.
"My lady, Satsuki has escaped," Rei's voice faintly wormed its way into her head, temporarily breaking the madness's hold.
'Satsuki...'
The world suddenly gained clarity. Definition. Sanity. An old foe, it seemed, would do the trick just fine- the pursuit an obsession in and of itself. Ouroboros. A sick kind of rapture twisted into her gut and bubbled upward, where it kissed her heart and locked it in a frenetic embrace. Her mind spun, nerves aflame with barely-restrained impulses. The next two words barely registered to her ears; they sounded so loud, and yet so far away at the same time.
"Satsuki did?"
Ragyou turned and fixed her brainwashed daughter with a knowing smile.
"I'll leave her to you"
She would have laughed, then, hadn't her hand- her traitorous hand! - reached out and fisted the smaller girl's clothing. Ignoring her shocked cry to pull her forward in a kiss, the life fiber creature's question was silenced immediately. Ryuuko quietly mulled. She said something about her father? She wasn't sure anymore, except for the undeniable fact that he was dead and that Satsuki was the one who did it. She was the one who condemned her father to rot in a jail cell underneath the school and killed him when he provided no useful information, after all.
Satsuki. Darling older sister and literal backstabber. Former apple of mother's eye. A would-be murderer blinded by her path in following her selfish desires. Her anger increased at the very thought, bubbling underneath her skin and heating her blood. Rage threatened to boil over, a disastrous possibility in the making. Certainly, Ryuuko didn't want to harm her much nicer little sister or her mother, who had given her everything her heart desired.
So she channeled the superfluous energy into the intimate moment. Hate and love met. Two opposite sides of the coin, Geminis created by a cruel twist of fate, pressed forward until both could feel the others pulse through their skin. Electricity rippled between them, hearts skipping as it raced through pounding muscle. Like and yet unlike, they similarly attracted and repulsed one another until the very air crackled between them, the pressure becoming too great for either to bear. Ryuuko responded then, by doing what anyone in her situation would have done - shove her away and blast off in an explosive blaze of fading blue light into the heavens, far away from anything and everyone.
She didn't need to change forms to fly unlike with that old patchwork garb she used to hang around and fight in. No, this was true power- Life Fiber Override. Instead of wasting time on debacles and compromises, she used her body as an offering to the kamui in exchange for its full unbridled power. As foretold by the one woman she loved most in the world, it offered nothing but that to her and her alone. Almost selfishly, Ryuuko wondered why everyone else simply didn't cede to the life fibers' call if it meant great power - it would make everything so much easier.
The blade in her hand felt strange. She had swooped low over the courtyard to retrieve it, artfully reveling in a real kamui's power and ease of maneuverability in exaggerated displays of twisted loops and barrel rolls. An instrument made of dead life fibers built to kill other life fibers, wielded by a human fused by life fibers heeding the will of life fibers? Life was strange. But Ryuuko surmised that she could apply the same thought to herself now that the truth was revealed, and took off.
...before coming face to face with the soulless husk of a COVER. The hybrid backed off slightly, staring at the hovering suit. It stared back, the withered head of the human trapped within ghoulishly gazing upon her with shrunken eyes. Finally, it seemed to snap out of a trance and follow an unspoken command, silently moving out of the way and even bowing slightly before leaving her presence.
She pulled up, Honnouji Academy and the dilapidated city underneath becoming nothing more than a speck in the distance. Such a shame that Satsuki had put more thought into her rebellion than she did for the common good. And speaking of her dear older sister, it was well past time for a playdate. Satsuki must have been dying for some company after all this time after all, and who better to greet her than her long-lost little sister?
But how, how would she track her? Flying far above the institution held no purchase, nor did her sharpened eyesight detect anything. Ears strained against the buffeting wind currents during the nth widening circle around the academy. Impatience soon caught up to her, agitation in being unable to find what was here mere minutes ago making her tense irritably. Her ears soon twitched, finally catching the whirring buzz of a helicopter flying away.
A cat-like grin spread across her lips as she rode on heated wind currents to her destination.
Oh. Yes.
"Projectile inbound at excessive speeds!" Houka shouted, desperately looking up from the impromptu control panel that the raised dais supported.
"What!?"
The several cries of surprise were cut short as a flaming blue bolt fell from the sky and impacted the deck solidly, leaving a wide crater of destruction in its wake. The boat groaned under the strain, flopping about the churning waves dangerously. Satsuki ground her heels into the steel, frowning as her worst fears came true. The figure at the epicenter of the deformation looked up at the terrified group of people above her, mockingly giving a half-wave with her free hand. From the inner deck, peering out a porthole, Senketsu's eye widened visibly. That looked suspiciously like -
"I'm going to destroy it all! Every last thing!"
Ryuuko.
Tsumugu wasted no time in attacking the hybrid, sliding down the ramp into the custom-made DTR. Peppering her with modified life fiber-jamming needles, he closed in on the distance between them, hoping to drive her away at the very least. Ryuuko lazily dug her blade into the flooring beneath her and balanced against it, leisurely kicking her heels up. Amused, she stood there and took the assault, cleaning the spaces between sharpened teeth with an expertly caught needle as his futile assault continued. Humans were such weird creatures.
From her perch, Satsuki could see everything. From the reports of her loyal devas, she knew exactly how useless Nudist Beach's weapons were against an activated god robe, even when battling a Ryuuko light years away from achieving true life fiber synchronization with her kamui. Now clad and consumed wholly by Junketsu, they might as well be shooting her with marshmallows. Only one thing could help her now.
Senketsu.
She allowed herself to momentarily smile, if not internally. Strange bedfellows, indeed. Hate her as it may, Senketsu was key to their victory, and Satsuki would ensure they would succeed. Snatching life from the jaws of death, perhaps. Her blue eyes sharpened with resolve and her legs moved, bringing her ever closer to her goal.
"Lady Satsuki!"
She paused, turning her head to face her faithful companions as they proffered their respective halves of Bakuzan to her, dipping their heads in utmost reverence.
"They're better off in your hands than ours."
Satsuki nodded, gently taking the sheathed blades with her. Though she descended rapidly to the inner decks, her stride was purposeful, regal even. She had to hurry. Tsumugu wasn't going to last much longer even if Ryuuko decided to further humor the Nudist Beach operative. From inside, she heard muffled voices. She stopped in front of the door where they were concentrated.
"I'm coming in," she announced, although it was more of a formality than anything else.
Stepping past the threshold, she locked eyes with the black and red kamui, ignoring the fact that three-quarters of the Mankanshoku family had their heads stuck in the portholes and were flailing about humorously. A mutual thread of understanding passed between them in that moment, and it hopped towards her, fabric lightly dusting the floor. Satsuki extended a hand, and the kamui leapt towards her, albeit visibly less enthusiastically at it would with its proper owner. Flesh and fabric connected and melded in one point of singularity.
Snatching life from the jaws of death, indeed.
Ryuuko cocked her head, feigning interest even as the shooter realized the prolonged barrage had no effect on the kamui and started a slow retreat whilst maintaining fire. Then, with a powerful swing of her sword, the DTR was blown away and pushed into the observatory tower with a powerful gust attack. Tsumugu gasped as the weight of the machine pressed harshly against his body and acute pain flared in his chest. He swore. At least one rib was bruised, if not cracked already from the strain. He considered himself extremely lucky it wasn't anything worse.
"Oh, look. It's a guy with a mohawk riding a mech that exposes his ass to the entire world." Ryuuko sneered, hefting her blade. "Just die already."
A harsh glare caught her peripheral vision. Bright yellow beams fanned from a figure slowly being raised to the deck by cargo elevator. Easy kill forgotten, the hybrid craned her neck slightly in interest, a muted grin seizing hold of her facial muscles as its owner recognized the identity of both objects.
Satsuki. Senketsu. Her lip subtly curled in disgust. Traitors, the both of them, to the world and everything mother stood for.
"Oh," she said aloud, fully turning and letting the blunt edge of the scissor blade rest against her shoulder blades. "So that's your game! I get it. The two of you joined hands, eh?"
The sword slid down, one hand securely fastened around the grip in preparation for attack. A tongue ran over molars, flicking against them in consideration. Satsuki said nothing. How weird it was to be the one looking up at a powerful adversary instead of gazing down upon them, as per norm! But Satsuki Kiryuuin neither dithered on the present nor wallowed in the past.
"Let's do this, Senketsu!"
The god robe assented, and with a calculated flick of the short blade, the activator pin was triggered and warm power flowed through her. Wearing Senketsu was far more comfortable than Junketsu by kilometers- with the same goal in mind, the disparities between human and clothing grew few and far in between and the strain of wearing the kamui paled in comparison. Satsuki secretly was appreciative; not having to waste energy on a pointless mental battle of wills ensured complete focus. If only they could retailor-.
"Mother was disappointed that you weren't able to join us for the family reunion. But I suppose you felt too embarrassed to come in with that," Ryuuko laughed derisively, rocking on her heels and interrupting whatever train of thought the other had. "She invited you to come over today. We even had a surprise for you."
"You are a fool." Satsuki replied coolly. "Do you think she cares little for anything besides her goal of life fiber domination? She pretends she cares for you, understand you even, but you are nothing to her besides a plaything, something to toy around with in the meantime while her pet project is unachievable at the moment."
In an instant, the air around them changed, became charged with a tense electric current. Ryuuko purposely shifted her weight on the unstable platform, heels harshly clacking against steel. Forget capturing Satsuki- bringing her her severed head as an offering would just as well.
"Tch," the aggravated answer came. The slab started to fall forward, and Ryuuko shifted her weight, using the rapidly increasing momentum to launch herself at her older sister. "Let's do this, Satsuki!"
A show of brilliant force rocked the ship. Inside the maelstrom of clashing swords, a bubble encircled the two fighters, quickly expanding outward in a shockwave rivaling Ryuuko's half-expected entrance onto the ship. Red locked against black. Neither triumphed, however. Instead, both met in a show of calculated force as both owners tested the other's strength.
"That's Bakuzan, huh?" Ryuuko sneered, eyeing the two halves maliciously. "Geez, talk about being clingy. Can't let go of something mother smashed?"
Satsuki frowned, pushing back. She just had to buy a few minutes at the very least. No use holding back against someone that was unable to.
"It's not clinginess, it's vengeance! As long as one piece remains, the whole can be reconstituted. As it is unbroken, so shall the blade of my heart!"
For this, she was rewarded with a brutal blow to the abdomen with the scissor blade's dull half. Ryuuko bore down, stabbing again and again with a fever. She scoffed. Such bullshit. She had expected more from one who squandered thirteen years of her life planning a failed rebellion.
Scissor half and twin Bakuzan met again and again, leaving a trail of rent metal and wrought destruction in their wake. They broke away with explosive force. Improvising, Satsuki bounced off a protruding metal sheet and leapt like a lioness springing for the kill, but was knocked away with a brutal kick that sent her flying. Ryuuko, for her part, zeroed in on her blindside. Devastating blows brought Satsuki to her knees, but the president soon recovered. The elder barely managed to roll out of the way before the red blade crashed down where her torso was just milliseconds before.
"Senketsu Shippu!"
The kamui responded to her demands, albeit slower than she would have liked. Still, it was doing much better than expected, seeing as neither of them were synchronized with each other in the slightest. Satsuki widened the distance between her and her sister, choosing to disorient her opponent by flying in seemingly haphazard patterns. The tactical advantage of an aerial attack soon opened and Senketsu soon closed the distance in record time, its wearer managing to mete a stiff uppercut to her opponent.
"Bit-!"
"I haven't even started yet!" Satsuki declared confidently, steering the kamui around for another pass. "Senjin Shippu!"
Ryuuko merely quirked a brow as the kamui changed form again. How inventive. Less amusing was the fact that Satsuki had managed to find new uses for the sailor fuku and concentrate the kamui's power into an energy attack. The hybrid barely had enough time to raise her blade before the disk of energy connected with it, forcing both blade and wielder into the ship itself. Metal tore itself away from underneath in curled sheets, twisted steel reaching toward the skies. A strained cry pierced the rapidly misting air as the purple disk connected with its target.
Satsuki touched down, cautious. The transformation of her lower half back into a functional pair of legs cleared the smoke in the immediate area, but the locus of impact was too obscured. Still, she waited patiently. Satsuki Kiryuuin never presumed a complete victory without a body lying before her. A tongue hastily wet dry lips.
'Yield... yield...! '
Silence answered her. She knew Ryuuko would never go down this easily, but perhaps her inexperience with handling Junketsu would have destabilized her?
'Nonsense', the rational part of her scolded. 'It's Ryuuko we're talking about- the girl who literally learns new tactics as she fights... and wins.'
But still, she fervently hoped.
But when the dark smog cleared, her hopes were quashed. Calmly sitting on jutting metal, Ryuuko malevolently glared at the duo, spitting a wad of blood to the side.
"Huh. So you're not entirely useless after all."
Shocked, Satsuki reacted by backing up, although it wasn't fast enough to stop a roundhouse from being cracked against her side as the younger moved at an impossibly fast speed. A hand barely managed to stop a fore-knuckle strike from connecting with her temple, an arm failing to stop a forceful knee-smash from digging into her abdomen. Again and again the hybrid struck the many open spots Satsuki had left, brutalizing her so eerily alike how Ragyou did during the post-raid trip celebration. The elder coughed, blood spraying the other in the face. Wincing in pain, she could only endure the savage beatdown, barely managing to escape when the first opportunity presented itself.
Ryuuko licked her lips in anticipation. Satsuki's connection with the dishrag was tenuous at best. The fact that she couldn't dominate the battle quickly proved it. She could easily take big sis down and kill two birds with one stone. 'Or...' She dared to waste a split-second glance elsewhere, 'many birds with one strike'.
Satsuki, for her part, remained guarded. Ryuuko was pulling her punches, and it wasn't just for analytical testing purposes as their battle earlier proved. If she really wanted her dead, she would had used her sword to finish the job in place of her fists. She was actively planning something- something that Satsuki silently resolved would never come to fruition.
Unfortunately for her, however, the slightly less focused look on her face gave her opponent the much needed time to slip in a rushed stomach jab with her free hand. Stunned, the student council President recovered just in time for a sloppy haymaker to connect, then a right hook. To her credit, however, the close combat gave her the entirety of possibilities with Ryuuko's open torso and legs- something her blades took advantage of.
Blood splashed across her vision, the torn wounds seeping down the thick band of material that lay on the other's abdomen. Cuts, she had hoped, that would stun rather than filet her little sister- A hope that was rapidly dashed when the pummeling increased in brutality.
"Bitch," she heard the red-streaked teen hiss right before the wind was knocked out of her once again.
The elder cried in agony as Ryuuko's free hand twisted her arm painfully. White hot pain shot up and down her arm. She feared it dislocated, and although she suppressed the violent shudder that ran through her, she was sure the younger saw it. The hand was upon her once more, and suddenly, she found herself swept off her feet rather harshly and thrown a little ways away into the cornucopia of jutting metal.
'A lesser man would have died,' she surmised, struggling to free herself from the I-beams that held her captive.
Regaining her bearings, she noted only the tantō in her relative position. The wakizashi twin was nowhere to be found. Satsuki panicked. The blade, so lovingly protected by her Elite Four, was missing. She could only hope it wasn't shattered again.
'Where was it, where was-?'
A familiar gleam caught her eye.
Oh. Shit.
"Never knew you to be the sentimental type, sis." Ryuuko drawled, fingering Bakuzan Kouryuu and running a tongue over its bloodied flat. Satsuki stayed silent, recalculating her next move and weighing the odds that Ryuuko would simply destroy it. "The reformed pieces of your resolve, huh? Such a shame." Her face split open into a wide grin. "I think I'll keep it. A memento perhaps, of my dear, departed sister."
'Departed?'
"Tell you what. If you do manage to survive, I'll bring your body to mother as a present. Think of it as a belated homecoming gift."
Crack!
The brainwashed girl punched through the solid steel deck of the ship with a single blow, disappearing into its inner decks with ease. Satsuki swore quietly as the ship rocked unhappily. Quickly recalculating, she dug herself out with her better arm and followed after, lagging slightly only due to pain.
Try as she might to keep up, the pristine white cloth of her former kamui soon disappeared into the enormous depths. The air around her turned oppressive, as if sensing the growing seed of despair within her. Quietly resigned, she massaged her wounded appendage, ears straining against the noise of her own clumsy steps to detect her sister's whereabouts. The sporadic cries of terror and agony certainly didn't help her nerves at all. As time passed and the footsteps grew quieter, she sped up her self-examination and ascertained that it was nothing serious.
Senketsu barely tightened over her body, its singular eye staring up at her unblinkingly. Unconscious of the fact, Satsuki reached over and lightly patted the crest reassuringly before withdrawing her hand, suddenly hyper-aware of what she was doing. Indulging in the fairy tale of harmony between a parasite and its prey? Preposterous. And yet, there she was, donning the very kamui her sister wore to defy all preconceived notions about the world as she knew it.
Dismissing such thoughts and electing not to indulge until later, Satsuki followed the trail of blood down the hall, growing more and more frustrated when the path of carnage stopped abruptly in dead ends. Ryuuko was obviously looking for something she couldn't find, but what?
A sudden thought occurred to her. Realization of where her delinquent little sister could have possibly gone stopped her in her tracks and forced her in another direction. Red characters loomed overhead, and she followed them obediently. Why couldn't she have thought of this before? It was only logical, after all.
The student council president quickly cut through the maintenance area, using the god robe's superior strength to ram the doors open. Ignoring the plethora of wounded Nudist Beach operatives, she burst through the sealed entrance-way and into her desired destination- the engine room.
She was right in assuming the delinquent had gone there. A sea of black converged onto a single point, although it was a futile gesture- they were felled as quickly as they came. Satsuki combat rolled to the side as a low-ranking engineer crashed into a wall nearby, hiding behind one of the massive turbines that in turn powered a large impeller.
She remembered what her senseis had taught her once, long ago. "Look for an opening," she recited to herself, quietly. "Strike at the first opportunity."
So she waited in the dark as Ryuuko finished off the rest of her wannabe opponents with ease. Assured of her victory, a maniacal grin spread across fair features. Turning to the massive generators that powered the ship, she raised her swords far above her head, conveniently ignoring the elder's presence in the room.
Bingo.
The tantō easily whistled through the air and pierced through the girl's arm, the force pinning her to a panel. In her shock, both blades were dropped unceremoniously to the floor, droplets of red soon shedding upon them.
"Why, you little-!"
Engine abandoned, Ryuuko wrenched the short blade from where it pierced into her wrist. Red fibers soon dropped into place within the expanse, sewing the wound shut. Pretenses abandoned, the opportunity to fully disarm her enemy was forgotten and she threw the blade back with more force, thinking only to return the favor. Satsuki ducked, the short blade barely whizzing past an ear before deeply embedding itself into the bulkhead behind her.
So she had gotten her full attention. Good.
Rearmed, Ryuuko brought herself to full height and charged, seemingly disappearing into thin air before reappearing suddenly in front of her, both blades raised. The elder sibling blinked. She didn't even see the pleated folds of the hakama so much as ruffle.
Not so good.
Satsuki turned and fled down the narrow passageway before they had a chance to stab her heart, only momentarily stopping to retrieve her Bakuzan half. The cacophony of groaning metal and a low roar behind her all but confirmed the other's pursuit. Carefully setting Bakuzan Gako between her teeth, she quickly ascended the ladder and emerged topside. A thick plume of smoke following a detonated blast rushed past her, harsh waves of heat lapping at uncovered skin. Junketsu's launched pauldrons crashed into the spiraling stairwell below her again, barely missing her heels. She quickly pulled the rest of herself up and sealed the hatch, harshly bending the metal with one well-placed kick to ensure the opening could never be used again.
An indistinct hand signal quickly summoned three Elites (plus the Mankanshoku girl, for some reason) to her. With a finesse only she possessed, she quickly relayed her revised plan using only hand signals, trusting Inumuta to be observing the exchange from his vantage point.
"Quickly," she commanded. "We must get-"
A fist punched through the flooring and latched onto her ankle like a vise. Too late. Another fist soon joined the first one, widening the hole. Then, a familiar mop of messy hair emerged, bringing with it the visage of one Ryuuko, wild-eyed and tired of this cat-and-mouse game.
"Got you!" she growled, savagely yanking her sister down with her. Satsuki, however, had other ideas.
"Senketsu Shippu!"
A choked cry of surprise told the elder sibling all that she needed to know as all three rocketed into the sky. Abruptly pulling a 180, she dove towards the ship, only pulling up at the very last moment. Ryuuko was dislodged by the sudden turn, harshly crashing against the ruined plating as her grip failed her.
"Now! Hold her down!"
Five people coming from five different directions rushed her. Using the distraction provided by multiple hard-light clones of a certain blue-haired techie, Uzu easily blindsided the recovering girl with his bamboo blade. The red and black swords flew out of her grip and skidded to a stop a little ways away. A sloppy effort to reclaim the blades was halted by a black blur kicking her legs out from under her. The five pinned the brainwashed girl to the steel deck, each immobilizing a limb, or the torso with their body weight. Struggling, Ryuuko rasped a litany of swears as Nonon shifted her weight on her back and left leg, only moving enough so that the giant man could plunge the Anti-COVERS device under Junketsu's "eyes".
Mako also adjusted her hold so that she was lying prone in front of her best friend, noses practically touching each other. The hybrid made to move towards her, but over two hundred kilograms of combined weight clogged any movement. She settled for glaring daggers instead, locking eyes with the small girl even as the device fired up.
"Ryuuko, you have to snap out of it!" Mako shouted, making an incredible effort not to add dramatic flair to her speeches, as she was wont to do. "I know you're upset, but you have to wear your Sunday best again!"
"What are you talking about?" came the growled response from between clenched teeth.
"We're going to separate you from Junketsu and make you come back to your senses!" Ira thundered, further digging the cylindrical device into her back.
Ryuuko laughed lightly, the breathy sound so uncharacteristically gentle from the teenager. She didn't bother to tear her eyes away from her ex-best friend. The next words came so thoughtlessly and carefree from the roughened vocal chords that even Satsuki was visibly stunned, if only a little.
"Ever the gentleman, Gamagoori? I'll make sure to paint the ship with your blood first, then. In fact, I'll take the tiny troll next, then the dog, then the blind freak, and finally dear little Satsuki. Or should I kill the butler and the naked apes beforehand? Either way, you will all make a fine present for mother. As for my best friend, I think a friendly chat is long overdue."
"So she's completely gone, then." Gamagoori murmured quietly, increasing the device's fan speed when it produced disappointingly little results.
"That's not true!" the bowl-cut-haired girl interrupted, using the prostrated dark-haired girl's head as a mount for her palms despite the other's protests. "Ryuuko's still Ryuuko! Even if she has life fibers in her body, or if she's mad that she's not human, Ryuuko is still herself! And Senketsu's her best outfit!" she shouted, crashing heads against the aforementioned girl with an audible clack. Ryuuko, for her part, was stunned speechless.
"Why can't it separate Matoi?" Ira grumbled in frustration, almost to himself.
"You have to remember!" Mako implored, ignoring the larger man. "Don't you remember what you promised to me the first night after the trip? You said you wouldn't forget! But now you did, and it makes me so sad. But when you said to me that night that you really thought me as your friend and that you trusted me, that you would always remember! So never forget!"
"I-"
Suddenly, something flashed before her eyes. She tried to focus on it, tried to remember, but it was whisked away like leaves in the wind. Similar images danced before her, only giving her short glimpses into a life she had forgotten before they were callously silenced. Satsuki easily noticed her intense discomfort, sensing a wedge to drive between the girl and her kamui.
"Matoi Ryuuko! Have you forgotten your goal of avenging your father so easily? Have you forsaken your friend and family so easily? If you've bowed to the will of the life fibers, you have turned your back on everything you stand for, you pig in human clothing!"
The delinquent's head hurt. She needed to get far, far away from the madness and madding crowd. The pressure in her skull mounted, threatening to burst. To make things worse, the suction machine affixed to her back seized and ground to a halt, painfully pulling at the strands which bound her to the god robe.
"Release me!" she hissed, violently bucking even as the visions started to flicker before her eyes again, meld with the falsified memories, and corrupt them beyond repair.
"Ryuuko!" the brunette shouted in terror. Instinctively, she pulled their bodies closer, even as the taller girl's pained howl directly slammed against her eardrums.
"Let! Me! Free!"
Everything exploded in a shower of twinkling stars and blinding sparkles. The extraction device easily disintegrated under the force, reduced to nothing but mere scraps of metal. The three devas plus Mako and Satsuki barely managed to hold on for dear life, clinging even as a wave of pure white light engulfed them all and tore at the plating around them. A noisy range of calls answered, all varying in tone and pitch.
"Ryuuko!"
"Matoi!"
"Underachiever!"
When it all ended, the hybrid was still lying face down against the ship, with one crucial difference- Junketsu was no longer activated. Ryuuko was desynchronized. Normal. Human.
It was weird to see her in Junketsu, Satsuki mused. Even one so uncouth and disgraceful in form could appear refined when clad in the garb. Though the strict militaristic style of the uniform contrasted with the wild, disorganized style of her blood-sibling, it still bestowed her an appearance that commanded the utmost respect. A symbol of animalistic abandon paired with one whose inhibitions were practically nonexistent and expected to beat the incarnation of restraint and resolve? Laughable at most. Still, mother had joined them together, and despite their discordant styles, beat them soundly.
Speaking of Ryuuko, it was a miracle that she hadn't tried to escape again when everyone was distracted by her little light show. Perhaps she knew it was futile. Either way, her struggles, practically nonexistent post-transformation, were duly noted. She didn't complain when the group turned her over so that she faced them, nor did she move when they repositioned themselves accordingly. Only the rage in her eyes betrayed her apparent acquiescence, the desire to rend and kill still present even through her tired and battered form with every heaving breath.
Physical helplessness did nothing to dissuade her, however. With her abnormally pronounced incisors, she tried to bite the hands and arms of anyone within her extremely limited reach. The crazed appearance in her eyes was more than enough to confirm suspicions that the kamui's hold was still as strong as ever. Satsuki exhaled through her nose. Too late for the plan, she supposed. Standing over her sister, she addressed Ryuuko, keeping her tone neutral.
"Matoi, you must listen to reason. Ragyou has brainwashed you."
Indignant, her captive spat at her. The elder sister wiped the spittle off with one practiced thumb swipe, her expression a mixture of pity and righteous fury.
"Mother has shown me the truth! All you've ever done is lie to me to get your way. And where has that gotten you? Shacked up with four losers, and a group of exhibitionists that bare their asses to the entire world!"
"It matters not. Ragyou has never broken my resolve, and the blade of my heart will prevail in this fight. Know this, Matoi Ryuuko! Humans do not live for clothing, and they never will!"
"Get fu-"
"Ryuuko. You have to stop this." Senketsu firmly interrupted, his one eye uncharacteristically terrified and pleading. The Elites glanced quizzically at each other at the self-interruption, only understanding when their leader's brows knit together intently at the apparent one-sided exchange.
"Eh?"
"I admit, Satsuki cannot hear me when I speak, the way only you can. Our strength is dwarfed by yours in comparison, and our advantages gained only through surprise. And yet, our hearts are one. We are of one of mind to bring you back your senses."
"S… shut up..."
"Can you imagine the strain Satsuki bears wearing me during our fight? No other human could do that. No one but Satsuki Kiryuuin!"
"So what?" she snarled. "It doesn't change the fact that she's a loser."
"Matoi, you must take Junketsu off." Satsuki commanded, holding the blade to the pinned girl's throat.
"Like hell," she scoffed. "Junketsu feels so amazing; I can hardly stand it!"
"That is the bliss of slavery," the elder answered, disgusted.
"So what!?" she laughed. "By making the least possible amount of skin contact one can draw the life fiber's power but withstand their influence. Heh… It's just fear. You want the power of clothing, but are afraid of losing your mind. The pleasure of wearing Junketsu is out of this world… people are born to be worn by clothing. Adorning them should be their greatest happiness in life."
The older sibling grimaced. So this was the extent of the mental refitting dearest mother had been able to accomplish. The grave misfortune of losing the sibling she had fought for after all these years -again- just as she had gotten her was not unrecognized. Nevertheless, if she didn't do something, humanity would be well and truly up the creek without a paddle.
"Then you are truly lost to me. I will destroy anyone who stands in my way, no matter who they may be."
She pushed Ryuuko's head against the ground and deftly rolled her over, slipping Bakuzan Gako between the teenager's neck and the kamui's collar. The cold blade sent a shiver down the other's spine.
"Keep her pinned," Satsuki commanded, clenching a wad of white cloth and preparing to manually cut it away.
Ryuuko's muffled protests did nothing but place confidence in her actions' results. Engrossed in her new mission, Satsuki wasn't aware of what her younger sibling was doing until the latter's hand twitched. She realized her mistake too late, but adjusted accordingly and leapt away.
"Watch out!"
The hulking mass of humans barely had any time to react before the world exploded in a shower of light again. Ryuuko wrenched her left arm from Gamagoori's grip with great effort and slammed it into the ground, triggering the activator plates and driving three hypodermic needles home.
Her captors were blasted apart by the explosion of blue-tinged energy ringed with hundreds of small glimmering stars that followed, the blast radiating outwards before shooting into space. Nonon and Mako flew away first, then Uzu. Ira and Satsuki resisted the push and resolved to strike a Ryuuko left vulnerable to attack in that split instant after transformation, but a powerful gust of wind soon knocked them off of their feet.
Satsuki mentally berated herself from her relatively painful position on the metal flooring. Of course she would use the energy of engaging her transformation to her advantage. It wasn't like she hadn't done it before- her fight with Gamagoori during the Naturals Elections should have been analyzed more.
The hybrid slid past the sprawled group and scooped up her favored weapon before any of them could react. Shaking with barely-contained rage, she gripped it tightly with both hands. As if reacting to her very thoughts, the curved handle unlocked and the blade extended, growing over twice its normal length within seconds. Furious, she held it over her head, ready to plunge it into the ship proper.
"Scissor sword! Decapitation Mode!"
Just when Satsuki thought things could literally not get worse, a high pitched peal of laughter choked the air. She grit her teeth and mentally swore.
Harime Nui!
End of Chapter 2
Author's Note: Chapter created with 3 all-nighters, coffee, and many hours of metal/cinematic music. I'm also thinking of renaming this fic soon, because I thought of a better pun. Anyway, I apologize for the long wait! I hope a nice, long chapter is enough to make up for it! Ratings updated to reflect this chapter!
I probably should have specified that my aversion to writing specialized characters and (eg: "tantō") only applies to character names. Names of locations and objects with them will retain whatever accents they possess.
Senketsu is regarded as a "he" only to Mako, Ryuko, and Satsuki (eventually). To everyone else, the kamui is just an article of clothing. All other non-future plot related questions can be asked on my Tumblog.
Thanks to White Okami for beta-reading a very early draft of this chapter, those that left a review/comment, h0saki for the promo, and everyone that favorited this story!