Chapter 3.

Operation Deep Impact

In the following weeks, things went over into a bullet train, when it came to new people arriving in the Afterlife. More and more, friendly and cheerful looking people kept appearing, but to my sorrow, they mostly wanted to stick being cilvilians. Only two of them became memorable, who also joined Tamaki's Team. One of them was a girl, Riku. Greenish blue eyes and hair, loud and fowl mouth, and a strange liking in causing everyone a hard time. The other one was to no surprise a boy, Yuta, pretty tall and handsome, dark brown hair and black eyes. I've quickly made some really good friends with them, and we often gathered together at the Fountain, which became a meeting place to us all, and talked our problems off our shoulders. Even on that day I remember, sitting down with my friends at the fountain, along with Sora, who wasn't too far away either, working on her song as always. To my surprise, Yuta took a box of cigarettes out of his pocket and offered us all some. We, like anyone else were just staring at him like crazy.

"What?"
"Isn't this forbidden?"

He just burst into laughter.

"Are you kidding? By Who?"

And so right he was.

"Come on! It's for free and it's not forbidden! Come on! you won't come to any more harm anymore!"

Where he was right, he sure was right, and of course Riku was headfirst to accept. I hesitated for a bit, but it was true, it couldn't hurt anymore, so I took one myself. It really was horrible at first, and I needed to clear my throat a lot, but soon I got used to it. Sora just stared at me with that mad look in her eyes, but it wasn't really like she was angry at me, she was jus kidding around. It is true though, she didn't take any.

"So? Who wants to get started?"

I was the one, who asked my friends to tell me all about them, as they could, since they already knew I had amnesia. Yuta let some smoke go.

"I'll get it started!"

He took a deep sip out of his smokes and started slowly.

"So... The thing is, I was a professional Dancer! Like, you know, Tango, Chachacha... Competitive even."
"And what happened?"
"Well... I had a lot of bad habits... Includin Casino for one fine example. After a pretty bad fight, I got stabbed into my lung and left to die."

A mighty horrible way to die, that one was for sure.

"What about you Riku?"

Riku just looked at me and for a second she just smiled.

"Would you believe, I was the only member of a Mute and Deaf family, who could hear?"
"That's interresting to hear! But what happened to you?"
"The Third Heart attack was one too many for me."

That was hocking to hear.

"How old were you even?"
"44! No doubt I was a little overage compared to you all!"

True it was. Sora was 22, Yuta 28, and me... Well I guess I was 17. But Riku 44, that was a stunning long life she had, yet she ended up here... I guess She still had a lot to do before she died, and that may be why she was with us now.

"So, how does it feel, being 17 again?"

Sora's question was quited unexpected. Was she gonna add that to her song too?

"Tell you the truth, it feels great!"
"Wonderful even!"

Riku and Yuta laughed, but that laugh wasn't really honest. Now they stood and Yuta stuffed the cigarette and the lighter in my pocket.

"You can have the rest buddy!"

Yeah right, two entire pieces... Like that will last long! Well I still have some for the evening at least. Or so I thought. Sora was unheadingly working on her song, and it was slowly coming together, at least on the instrumental part.

"Sounds pretty good!"
"Thanks! It still needs a lot of work though!"

I watched her with her notes and guitar, constantly playing and writing, taking notes, erasing errors, and couldn't help but feel some slight romantic passion overrunning me.

"Do you want me to share my remaining smokes with you?"
"Na-ah! Not with me! Cancer, remember?"

I let my head hang for a few seconds, but then I came to a bright idea.

"It's okay! I mean... You can't be ill anymore! Besides, what kind of Cancer did you have?"
"In my brains if you want to know so much?"
"But that isn't influenced by smoking you know!"

She looked at me with inspective eyes for a second, and I held the box out to her. She thought of it for a second, but ultimately let a smile go, and and took one, and the lighter. Soon enough we were letting big smoke clouds go, and she seemed to losen up more and more.

"See! I told you it's not so bad!"
"Yeah! I feel like my head's getting refreshed!"
"Did you smoke while you were alive?"
"Only once, but... Well it wasn't as good as this... I don't know what changed!"
"Maybe the thought of doing it without any consequences..."

She nodded and when we ran out of all, she asked me to leave her alone for a bit. I didn't need to be asked twice, even though I loved being with her, and I could, I'd be with her all the time. Suddenly I saw Tamaki running my way.

"Assembly at the command center, now!"

No more need for words. within the next five minutes All possible people, up to 60 in total found themselves in the office sitting or standing, watching Misaki pointing out important portions of our next operation on a giant screen with a laser pointer. It was all abot a controlled Detonation that would cause a Cave in, completely burrying the Demon Well, the source of all our problems.

"Tomorrow morning, 0900 according to ZULU time, we will commence Operation Deep impact."
"Deep impact? Quite te fitting name!"
"I was hoping you'd say that! Troups will assemble on base grounds at 0800, until then dismmissed!"

That was the last call, and as soon as the assmbly began, it was already over. Tamaki, me and the team remained behind, and Tamaki kept arguing with Misaki about some details for a bit, and the only one missing was Sayuri, who was already out to take care of our equipment. After a while, we finally left the office and Tamaki took the initiative as always.

"Alright then! Tomorrow at 8 is go time, but only for the Elite troops. For us 9 is fine! Come on!"

He lead us to his own room and there he opened a drawer and took a bottle of fine Scotch forth. He filled four glasses and drank his share.

"What are you guys waiting for? Formal invitation or something?"
"Isn't this... ?"
"Don't get me started on the "Forbidden" part!"

So Yuta told him about our little adventure with the smokes.

"Okay, but shouldn't we be Clear by the morning?"
"Don't worry about that, will ya!"

I couldn't do any more about it so we had our drinks, and after a while, even the smokes came forth. However I felt like I was in a stinking pub after a while, and I felt like the drink was a bit too much aswell. I just left the room to get some fresh air before going to bed. When I arrived at my favourite place however, I was greeted by the same song as last time, but this time a title came to my mind.

"My... Song... ?"

Yuuki looked up at me with that usual smile of hers. I soon joined her and we had our time sitting at the bottom of the stairs on the warm tiles.

"Did you drink something?"

Great, so her smelling is also sharp?

"Err yeah, but how did you know?"
"It's not hard to tell... Whiskey right?"
"Yep..."

She knew all about it.

"How do you know so well anyway?"
"Tamaki keeps drinking that stuff all the time!"
"Where did they get that stuff anyway?"
"The same place As Sora got her Guitar basically. You know everything has a way of working and if you know how it functions, how you react to it, how it affects you ingeneral, or when it comes to food or drinks, you can easily create them here... You just need help from the Guild!"
"The Guild?"

Oh, of course, the guild, the hidden organisation behind this school and the SSS in general.

"And how do you even know stuff like this anyway?"
"I am the student Council president you know! It is like a necessity for me to know stuff like that!"

Oh so that's how we are? She's the president here, and from what I can tell, Misaki is like a minister of self defense. Makes sense.

"I'll head off to sleep! What about you?"
"Guess I have nothing to do either... I'll come with you!"

So she joined me back to the dorms, and soon waved me her goodbyes, and went inside. My room wasn't too big, but it had a huge window and right now a lot of moonlight dropped in through it. I just layed onto my bed dressed up the way I was and fell asleep.

The next morning came pretty early, but fair enough, as I was all rested up and ready to go, Equippped with a Sub-machine gun, an Assault rifle, and two pistols just in case. We were left behind at school as guards, Sayuri was head first, as always.

"Morning! Have you had some good sleep?"
"Sure had!"

I was fresh and good to go.

"What about the drinks? Any probems?"
"Nope, non at all! I got cleared up by the time I went to bed."
"That's good to hear!"

And then I saw the other team members coming. Tamaki was okay, as he drank Whiskey in place of Water too, but the other two well... Let's just say, they were in no condition to be called human beings at this time.

"What happened to you guys?"
"Whiskey Steam Roller!"

Only Yuta was capable of talking. Poor Riku could barely breathe, apparently her protective suit was a little too tight, and Sayuri had to step closer and fix it for her.

"Gee... Thanks!"
"You're welcome!"

Supposedly we were the only ones in school as the Elite troops left about an hour earlier, and aside us, the only non-civilian was Yuuki. Not too many, but still as well as we were equipped we had all the chances to hold out for as long as the reinforcements could arrive.

"Yamato, we may be the only ones up here but would you mind checking if anyone was left outside of the Safe zone?"
"Err..."

Sayuri was giving orders, as if she was boss, but Tamaki just waved me off, which meant that he wanted to say the same thing.

"Alright I'm off then!"

I really wanted to know how Sayuri had any reasonable right to order anyone around, but I had a hunch, that she had a little more than just rights there. I went on a large round around chool, first the classrooms: all empty, the dorms: Empty, the Gym: Empty, the track and field grounds: Empty. All's well unless...

"Not that guitar again!"

I had my sub-machine gun ready at any second, but the guitar only meant one person, someone I liked a lot, or more than just liked even. I found her at the bottom of the stairs to the gate. I walked all the way to her and put my hand on her shoulder. She jumped up in an instance, but at least this time she didn't throw anything away.

"Sora!"
"For god's sake Yamato, would you cut that out!"
"Look I'm sorry! But what are you even doing here anyway?"

She looked at me like an idiot.

"What's it look like?"
"But you should be in the safe zone right now! We even announced it on the School radio."
"You're silly!"

She knocked on my forehead.

"You're forgetting, I'm sleeping with my headphones on!"

And I completely forgot that too, but...

"What was that?"

I heard a light moaning noise from the distance and the ground was slightly shaking aswell. Suddenly the familiar and horrid Hissing started from all sides.

"What happened?"

Noises from all sides surpressed her voice, but I could still hear her.

"The first bomb went off! It awakened the demons outside the well!"
"What well?"
"The one that keeps puking Demons upon us all the time."

I had no more time for explanation, I just grabbed her hand and tried to make a run for it, as fast as I could. She couldn't keep up with me, so I had to pick her up in my arms and carry her.

"Put me down and run! I'm just holding you back!"
"Never! I have a friend you know, who would kill me a hundred times if I left you in trouble!"

She needn't any more explanations, just hung her arms around my neck, and let herself get carried around. I was trying my best to make it back to the others, but those bone chilling shadows made it worse. I suddenly felt her soft hands screwing around with my belt.

"What are you doing?"
"Trying to help you, what else?"
"Do you even know how to handle that thing?"

She didn't answer me, and I just heard a click, then two shots fired and two demons hissing going over to a horid screaming and I knew her shots hit. I wasn't surprised actually, as I knew she was a strong and quite bold girl, but never thought she'd go this far even. We ran into the nearest building, and I put her down, handing her my other pistol, and all the ammo I could.

"Here! Now Cover me if you can!"
"Right!"

And that she did, I was shocked by how good of a mark she was, but I had my faith in her. I grabbed my radio, as it was my only chance.

"Yuuki, can you hear me? Over!"

For moments, nothing, but suddenly a familiar and soft voice answered.

"Yuuki here, What gives!?"
"We have a situation here! Sora was stuck utside of the safe zone, and I'm making a run with her, but we're cornered..."
"And outnumbered!"

Sora's note was to the point, the demons breached the building from all sides and came closer with every second. Yuuki obviously heard her.

"Where are you guys?"
"Main building, bottom floor, in front of the... 1-c Classroom!"
"Roger! I'm on my way!"

Sora had my back covered and We made a quite good team, but the demons kept swarming in like crazy. I helped her reload as much as I could, and I was really proud of her hard working. Suddenly, the bright and lightning fast white flash came, as of cue:

"Guard Skill: Hand Sonic version 2!"

Yuuki in from the left, and using her improved Hand Sonic, which had onger and sleeker blades. Soon she opened us some small corridor.

"This way! Hurry!"

I handed her Yuuki's hand.

"Take her to safety, I'll be fine!"

She nodded and rushed out of sight. I started running with all my strength towards the point wher the others were supposed to be, but wanted to check where the demons were, only to almost be caught by one of them. Two loud bangs and the Demon was gone again, like the last time, and only one person was capable of being this lethally accurate in a situation like this.

"Sayuri! I owe you my afterlife again!"
"No time for small talk, et you ass moving!"

She was right. I got up as fast as I could, and followed her, while we covered each other correspondingly. We finally made it to the others who were also in a tight pinch and Needed our help desperately. We joined in and soon enough Yuuki was there aswell. We were outnumbered and not just a bit, no matter how hard Yuuki struggled, and no matter how much we tried, they kept swarming from everywhere.

"It's no use! We can't take them!"

Sayuri was in a state of panic. She suddenly collapsed under the weight of the situation, which reminded her of when she lost her friends. I really felt sorry for her at that moment.

"Sayuri..."

I looked around, and saw everyone else fighting with their last bits of strength. Poor Sayuri on her knees and covering her ears screaming in terror.

"Nooo! I don't want this!"

I just shook my head and kneeled to her, grabbing her under her arm and dragging her up.

"Come on Sayuri! Pull yourself together!"
"But..."
"No buts! Just take a look around! What do you see? Do you see everyone else giving up?"

She took a look at everyone with her eyes wide open in fear and awe at the same time.

"See! Noone's giving up! You shouldn't do it either! Come on! Take your weapon and help us!"

I handed her her gun and she finally seemed to gain her will to live back.

"No good guys! We're short on ammo!"

Tamaki's interception was true, we were on the verhe of running out of our last ammunition.

"Let's back off to the wall and and shift to Semi Automatic! We can't waste any ammo from now on!"

I don't know why I said that, nor why everyone seemed to instantly obey me, but we all backed to the Office building's wall, backs to each other, covering one another all the time. The Demons were still overwhelming, and Yuuki was giving her all, but to no use. Slowly all of us ran out of our last bullets, even from the sidearms. Mine ran out first, since I let Sora use mine.

"Hang in there guys, we'll take them hand to hand if we have to!"

Sayuri drew a 20 inch Machete from her left boot, and was ready to do anything.

"If Yuuki can do it, so can we!"

We were set to give our last efforts And fight with whatever we had. However the most unexpected happened: A second explosion roared in the distance and The ground shook a second time. Suddenly other SSS member started swarming from everywhere, who were fighting their heroic battle on other sides until now but now joined us. From out of nowhere a smaller group appeared carrying crates. Inside we found all the ammo in the world, and Tamaki got himself an incredible weapon, I really never thought I'd see: A Minigun, and he hung all the extra ammo on himself.

"Come on you guys! Now we'll turn the tables on them!"

We also recieved some grenades, which were timed.

"When you arm them, you have 3 seconds to throw them as far as you can! Make sure it counts!"

Sayuri followed up on her explanation with her actions. Yuta was way better at throwing, and Riku helped him, while I threw every single one as far as I could. Soon enough the united efforts made it all worth while, and the sky started clearing out and the hissing slowly settled into silence. Tamaki finally stopped and threw the minigun down after having screamed his llungs out like a mad man.

"We won!"

We just heard everyone yelling and screaming that from all sides. Yuuki and I collapsed on our knees out of exhaustion, while Sayuri, and even Yuta and Riku were crying. I did get all of them, Riku hugging Yuta tight, and crying her eyes out. Theyonly saw their first real live action, and no wonder they broke afterwards. True I only saw my second time, but I already had some idea hw tight it can be. Sayuri was different however: She was crying out of joy, joy and sheer happiness, because she took rightful revenge on the demons for everything. I went to her and hugged her myself, since noone else would.

Only a couple hours later we were all in the office, and everyone was singing the victory song we made up in the late afternoon. Sora wrote the music to it, and we made the lyrics up together. True, it wasn't the best, but what can you do in a couple of short hours? Sora took years to work on her song, and she was still far from done. Champaigne and joy was all we needed at that point, and Misaki just put her legs up on the table as usual, smiling away. After the party was over, only me and my team remained behind. That's right, 'Me' and 'my' team. Tamaki left us alone, saying:

"I've seen a lot of strange fellows in my life bro, but you... You're something special!"

Misaki just smiled away, and not only Yuta, Riku and me, but also Sora, who was already there with us, wearing the SSS School uniform.

"I have to congratulate you! Your efforts were outstanding!"

She slowly walked around us and took a good close look at all of us.

"The elite Force has lost great numbers of men, and we could use some good handy people on the team, in case anything happens!"

She hung some Badges on our uniforms, which was a sign of our initiation into the real league.

"Congratulations! You're now officially members of the Elite Squadron!"

I was really proud of my team, and no doubt I dreamt of this since a long time now.

"Congratulations you guys! You've made us both proud! Especially you Yamato!"

Sayuri stepped out of the shadows in the corner and joined Misaki's side.

"Don't tell me! You're... !"
"Oh, you haven't met my second in command, Sayuri yet! I asked her to be the observer over you guys! And I was right when setting her on you!"

I should've known! They always seemed to act and talk different, when around each other amd not to mention the fact, that they sometimes retreated to privacy, when talking about certain business.

"All right, that is all, you're dismissed!"

We saluted and left as ordered. This time however I was walking to my dorms with Sora, and she often threw a keen stare at me, often giggling.

"What?"
"Ah, nothing!"
"Come on, tell me!"

She burst into laughter and grabbed my arm.

"I just need to get used to you being a lieutenant all of a sudden."
"Noone ever said that I think!"

She came a bit closer.

"You know, Misaki said, you're a true leader type, and inspire others!"
"Really?"
"Exactly! Misaki even said what you did for Sayuri's sake was really the heroic part! Standing up for your friends!"
"Is that so? And why did you join? Was it all because of that?"
"That too!"

She pulled me closer to herself and kissed my cheeks.

"And the fact, that a handsome guy let me cover his back in a tight situation!"

That was really great! She actually changed her mind in one afternoon because of that, and she was even willing to give her ideals of peace up for this sake.

"And she called me Handsome!"

I smiled like a silly teenager, and Held my hand to the part on my face, where she kissed me. It really felt great. She waved me goodbye, and entered the girls dorms.