The New World

by Tankou001

In a World where the dead walk there are those who would destroy the zombie menace. This is not their story. This is the story of the new World and the government instated when gods put mortals in their position. M For drug use, citrus, gore... Context...

4. The Separate Party Appears

The New World

A Crossover

Hey All! Tankou001 here with an all new chapter of The New World!

{HR}

Chapter Four: The Separate Party Appears

The light of Bend was a pleasant sort of light. It was cool but crisp and a calm breeze spat out of the valleys that allowed this alternate version of Oregon to enjoy quality rainstorms even past the mountain ranges. They had all come together and decided that the new capital of civilization would be Semiaghn. The spelling was something mismatched. There was no origin. Originally it was an argument. Yuko wanted this, Blackstar wanted that. Chouji felt another way. Kaede stayed quiet with Osaka for most of the time as the group debated and squabbled. In the end there was a silence and Osaka blurted out the name. Everyone just looked at her for a time but, after some time they all agreed it wasn't a bad name: Se-main it was pronounced, though spelled differently.

Ed, however, didn't see the beautiful Oregon day. She was underground, working in the lower basement level on her machines. She seldom left it. She had to set up a functional electrical system before winter came along. Chouji had returned with Sekai Mae no Obake: bears to do the work of men, bears who didn't have to hibernate, though they would be sluggish for some time during the winter. With that three hundred people for the new city that was to be. Francois Edward Wong How Pepilou Tivruski III would not be outdone by a person from a world that didn't even have guns. She had already set up the wireless power system and small matter converter. It couldn't do everything she needed it to but it was at least functional. What she needed now was raw materials. She had had an idea. Portland in her Earth... well she didn't know much of it. History wasn't her major, after all. She worked with the human body. But the city was a major city and Portland was larger than Salem in this world. She would mount a mission and Vincent, the master gunman, would be her partner.

But approaching Vincent Valentine would possibly be more difficult than Ed would have liked. Not that she had ever crushed on anybody in her life but she felt strange around the caped gunman. She was twenty-two. He was 444. The difference was very real in their ages. The fact that Ed couldn't shake the initial reasons for her being here in Semiaghn didn't help. All of them had to foster a new generation... and generations beyond that and those and so forth. If Ed wasn't remembering poorly, she would be spending eternity looking over this new civilization. There was magic and there were jutsu (magic) and science that defied physics. One person was normal. One person looked normal, though Ed was sure she wasn't. What one of the Legacy Of Eight flaunted another refused to show anything of entirely.

How could one live eternally. Ed understood that Vincent was 444 and according to Vash the blond was several hundred years old. Who knew how old Yuko was. First Immigrant Miyuki was twenty years beyond her physical age and didn't show signs of aging anytime soon. But eternity, really? Forever was such a long time. Hundreds of years maybe. Thousands of years possibly but forever easily included radical numbers like millions, billions and trillions! Easily! How could it be that any human being like Ed, Chouji, Osaka and Kaede be able to truly live forever as the United Coalition Of Existences willed them to. Wouldn't they want to eventually retire? Couldn't they?

Nothing could stop nagging at Ed's head, the mind that nagged twice as fast as it should and four times faster than anybody else's could. To Ed everything was quad speed. It wasn't her fault either, though it had been something to get used to. "Bebop Tech" included brain coding techniques to further unlock proper advanced evolution in human beings. Ed's chief coding mishap had been an advanced subjective time rate to allow her to experience two seconds for every one second felt outside. It had bee screwed up and now it was a four to one ratio. Didn't age you faster, just let your brain organize what time you had better and allow your body to follow.

Slinking around the basement (still not finished... ) Ed found Vincent lying on an unconnected pipe. He was usually in the lab; chillin, smoking, contemplating. Vincent never did much but he never seemed to be very far from thinking of something relevant. Largely, now that bears were building houses, Vincent didn't even need to do anything. Ed could tell what Vincent wanted to do though. She'd been a bounty hunter once and so had Vincent. He missed the importance of it all, the pay in experience, not in money. "Willin to go on an adventure?" Vincent turned his head. "We need to get me supplies, as much as we can. Gonna go to Portland and see what we can scrounge. I'll need a partner who knows combat unlike myself."

"Vash seems a good partner then." Vincent said somberly.

"I'd rather have someone who wasn't slaving over doughnuts, love and peace all the time. You seem you have a better wit about you. Care to indulge my wandering instincts?" A smile stretched across Ed's face, her fiery hair bouncing somewhat as she spoke to the former Avalanche member. It had been years since she had tapped into that old youthful energy she used to have, what kept her alive and alert on the Bebop, what got her to say her words twice and be all wacky around everyone se met, wild and redheaded and without a care in the world. When she signed into the Complex that all changed and the wacky redhead learned fast that all she needed to do was her work. Now it was different. Ed knew that, in time, she may yet recover what the government secretly hidden inside the old remnants of Bebop Earth made her forget. Her smile was the first to come back in. Her mind ran at quad speed but when she sucked billowing white clouds from her pipe and felt the slowing effects of the herb she felt a closer connection with what she had been forced to leave behind. She missed the wild redhead in her. Times of being a prosthetics technician were over. Times of the future were now.

Vincent didn't seem so convinced. Doubtless he had seen this sort of act. He was an old one, after all. "Busy..." he spoke, leaning his head back to look away from Ed.

"With what?" Ed asked, inverting her own head to look at Vincent upside down

"Weapon maintenance..." Vincent said simply, now trying just to avoid eye contact.

"You can work on that whilst traveling, right?" Ed snapped back at him. "Looks fine to me though. How maintained can you get a gun before it stops being maintained?"

Vincent sat bolt upright. "You're rather persistent, aren't you?"

"When I have to be."

"Any chance you'll go away now if I just tell you no once more?"

"Hardly."

"Whatever, I'll go with you."

"I thought as much..."

The trip started out easily. The valleys were open and the sun was high in the sky. It was mostly walking, of course, but Ed knew what to do once they got into Portland. There were bound to be vehicles. Ed could hack into one and they would be riding in style before the end of the day. That's how it worked, right?

But by mid-day they hadn't even gotten into the valley proper. Ed's feet were already hurting and the world was just a lot bigger than Ed guessed she had ever given it credit fr. Where were her tough soles barefoot everywhere like back in the Bebop? Then again... those were her old feet. After getting her job in The Complex pretty much everything was replaced at least once. Her bebop feet weren't hers anymore. They were in some vat of protomatter, also protomatter in waiting to be purified and changed into what they needed to be changed into. She could feel the blisters forming on hr tender heels in the hiking boots she wore. Just ahead of her Vincent was just fine, walking along all the rocks and slick ground, moss ad nettle, thorn and ledge as though they weren't there He truly was a experienced adventurer, Ed knew. "Don't suppose there's a secret t walking so smoothly for so long?" Ed asked , forcing a grin despite the fact that she was pretty sure a blister had just burst inside her shoe.

"Practice and perseverance." Vincent said simply as he stepped over a bed of briars, just tromping on through like some hardened animal. "You need to take a break?"

"I need a bebop..." Vincent cocked his head to the side. Ed sighed. "Bebop was the ship I was on back in my world. Big ol' ship that could go through outer space. If we had a bebop with us we could just fly to Portland in a few minutes."

"Simplicity only breeds weakness..." came Vincent's words as he continued walking, never looking back to check if Ed was alright. "Rub some dirt on it. Walk it off."

Ed was finding herself less and less thankful for bringing Vincent along in the first place. At least Vash The Stampede would have made a more lively travel partner, if still sorely lacking in the flight department. Still, Ed couldn't shake that feeling off about Vincent. It was something about him, something otherworldly, all puns aside. It was like even where he had been from he didn't precisely belong, though he had at one point... possibly. "What's your world like?" Ed found herself asking somewhere between the big ledge at the "far" end of the valley and the rivulet that they cross at the bottom about three miles into the valley proper. How long had they been walking? Three hours into the valley? Couldn't be too far could it?

"Big, with a lot of dead land that is regrowing..."

"Moon explode there too?" Ed asked, trying to make a joke.

"No, the essence of The Planet was sucked out of it and used for fuel to the upper echelons of the corporate masses. Four hundred years later, when I was brought here, it's starting to put itself back together. Though there have always been green areas... It's mostly just like here but not."

Well that hadn't helped. "How long do you think it'll take for us to reach Portland?" She asked again, maybe an hour later through all the silence in the world sans nature sounds.

Vincent stopped, finally. Ed almost just sat where she was. The sun was coming down, had been for a hour or two probably. It was hard to tel for a girl who had literally been stuck in an underground base for the past ten years. She'd lost all touch with anything natural since. Her legs hurt so much and the small pack Ed had filled up before leaving was already half empty of the food she had prepared. So much for her rations. She hadn't thought it would take so long to get as far as they were. "According to the map I had seen... week and a half, week if we make good time..."

"That'll take forever!" Ed blurted.

A moan filled their ears. Vincent turned on his heel, drew and shot. One zombie fell down the face of the valley. Twenty more willfully tumbled down the face, landing blow. Some landed head first. The rest stood again and started shambling toward Ed and Vincent, hellish moaning coming out. Ed could hear more moaning as well, from other parts of the valley.

In a valley sounds get eaten up a lot. The sound of two people having a decent conversation is hardly ever noticed over the sound of the natural noises of nature. When an individual yells, however, it creates a bigger pocket of sound for enemies to hear. Normally this wouldn't bear too much ill fortune but when that pocket catches the attention of an individual, say a zombie, on top of the valley a single moan can be heard miles in all directions. Ed hadn't taken that into account when she had blurted out her words and doubtless Vincent hadn't cared whether his gunshot would attract more attention. Ed looked to her right and Vincent, who had been standing there just an instant and a half ago, was nowhere to be found.

He was already leaping toward the action, three zombie heads flying in seconds. Ed turned round to check her six and a couple dozen more zombies careened off the opposite edge of the valley. They were everywhere...

And combat was something that Ed just didn't. In any way, any scenario. She scrambled after Vincent, eager to get him as close to between her and them as possible. But Vincent moved surprisingly fast... and vertically. He almost flew from ledge to ledge. Ed could outrun a horse and out-pace a wolf but she could not do what Vincent was doing, fly.

Seeing that Vincent was obviously too busy picking heads off the walking dead Ed thought best to exercise her best trait. She ran, The footing was not stable and the plant life leaped out to grab her as se ran but running at thirty miles an hour helped make such things less noticeable. Vincent became a speck in not too long and then the zombie moans faded followed by the muted blasts of Vincent's tri-barreled Cerberus gradually hushing back into nature sounds. How far was she from the action, she wondered. Eventually she found reason to stop. Eventually she tripped and landed face first into a muddy rivulet. She muffled the yell of pain. She didn't want to make too much noise. She slowly rose her head, cautiously at first, more hearing than seeing. Then se raised her head further, vision coming into spectrum. The night was falling slowly. Ed could see the sun fading at the far end of the valley. She turned... Then she screamed.

A dead man lay next to her, head broken open and body half eaten by the walking dead. Flies didn't cover his body. He was clearly infected. Animals didn't eat rotten meat... Slowly she felt herself rise, a slow stand to make sure that she was alive. There was so much quiet again, back to the sounds of nature sans animal noises. Animals stayed away from the infected, even dead bodies. She wanted to be back in the Complex. Sure she was horribly indebted to them but what employee wasn't? Ed had developed her plan for her Half-Price Card and it would have paid off given twenty more years. It wouldn't have been so bad to spend twenty more years in bondage to spend a super powered life back in her world. Why did she have to spend eternity with the walking dead?

The scream that had been I her voice settled. She didn't feel the need anymore. In Bebop she hadn't seen anything graphic. A child back then wasn't to see such things and it wasn't like Spike and Faye didn't do all the heaviest of work. But working in The Complex Ed had see much worse than dead bodies half eaten. She'd taken apart the worst and the best and put them all back together better than new. She stood peculiarly and something in her brain twitched. Something unlocked... her thoughts muttered to her.

Vincent was there. When she turned he stood behind her, as though he had never left her, as though she had never left him. "Are you alright?" He asked. Ed nodded. "Any bites?" Ed shook her head. Vincent looked her up and down, drew in through the nose, exhaled through the mouth. Again and again and again... Ed felt, for a time, like his eyes were specimen needles and she was being pinned down for display. Eventually, however, he turned away. "If you could move so fast in the beginning we should have started this trip on a jog...

Ed didn't know what to say. "But you can fly..." She whimpered.

"And yet I still walk..." Vincent said as though it was something amazing to behold. "Let's get moving." he said, back to his usual somber tone, stepping ever forward.

"Where are we now?" Ed asked, not bothering to check her map.

Vincent instead procured one of his own, seemingly from nothing. "According to the a Yuko gave me when we got here... We should be just past the Three Sisters... But it doesn't seem like they exist in this world..."

"Well that doesn't help..." Ed said simply. "Do you recall that the Earth I was born in is a blasted wasteland with big chunks of the moon constantly falling on it?"

"About half way through the valley. We've made surprisingly good time. According to the map we should be able to make it into the Eugene area within the day. We're walking through the night."

"What about sleep?" Ed asked innocently.

"They don't, that's what." Vincent said quietly, pointing the barrel of his gun back at where they had been. "Only reason we didn't see them the first few hours was because they didn't see us. Now they're on us and they'll just keep walking in the same direction until they find something. We're picking up the pace." He handed Ed a handgun; something simple that even Ed could figure out. Pull the hammer, pull the trigger, don't point the open end at anyone you don't want to kill. "Don't use it unless their hands are on you. Just keep moving if they get too close."

Ed was going to ask a question but Vincent leaped into the air and became his cape, a whirling of crimson that flew off into the setting sun. Ed had little choice but to start moving again. Thirty miles an hour was little intense for prolonged travel but twenty she could do, more than likely, for some time. She was always in shape when she could be and ate well. Her organs, all of them, were new and biologically advanced, only just starting o be put to pollutants. She could afford to jog for a few hours.

And that few hours was hell. By the time she caught up with him, Francois Edward Wong How Pepilou Tivruski III was exhausted. They were still in the valley, though it was very clear that there wasn't long to go. On her map it would have been McKenzie River that she saw in front, which must run parallel to the valley up top through some natural phenomena. There would be a highway soon, more than likely, that ran across the top too. The sun had crested the dawn. The new day was starting. Edward didn't want to walk anymore... "I feel..." Ed began, panting for air, "Like an empty gas tank..."

"Feel like a truck with an empty cab and two full jugs of gas?" Vincent's voice asked. Ed looked at him, his hand pointed somewhere west. Ed tried to figure it out. Then she saw it. It was a jeep with a small bed, two 5 gallon jugs in the back. That would work. It was some walk away but they were far out of the way. As they approached they noted a zombie within, still locked to its seat after dying at the wheel. The dead driver had run out of gas without hitting anything, turned and was left in his seat, unable to process that the seat belt was holding him back from freedom and precious flesh treats.

Needing no food he naturally lasted several years perhaps, as he was still quite rotted when they found him, though still whole enough to moan and reach for them. Ed was the one who shot, blowing through the eye without penetration on the other side. The zombie slumped against the door and Ed gave a double tap to the back of its head. Vincent let the smallest of smiles slip when she wasn't looking.

They pulled the deceased zombie from the cab and filled the tank with gas. Ed had packed rubber gloves for the need of moving zombie bodies, of course. In the back a rifle lay, having been under the gas. Ed kept this, giving Vincent's handgun back. Some of the gas they poured on the zombie and burned. Ed's eyes were tired. She was having a hard time keeping them open. Glad that she brought cleaning supplies, Ed washed down the interior of the jeep. The seats were leather and hadn't degraded badly at all. This had only happened a couple years ago and the leather was good enough to hold through the relatively dried up zombie body. There was a smell they just couldn't wash out but there were spare air fresheners in the glove compartment along with a flashlight and screwdriver as well as some useless stuff that would be thrust idly in a glove compartment.

As soon as they got on the go Ed fell asleep. Vincent sort of envied her, able to appreciate sleep like she did. He didn't sleep anymore, just waited. He was hundreds of years old and with so long of a life Vincent Valentine had long grown out of humanity, his unique structure from Jenova Cells making him something altogether different from humanity, though able to interbreed his line would never run true. There was no Jenova on this world and he wouldn't will it on anyone. Within the hour the reached a highway, broken up and wide, littered with cars and crashes. But Vincent could drive it with the beast of a vehicle easily. He flipped on the four wheel drive and went off road when he had to. However, eventually that became an issues. Anywhere that road was not solidly over there began to be trees, forty feet tall with thick stalks two and a half arms thick. Some were smaller but definitely of the same variety. Vincent stopped the car to investigate. No reason to wake Ed over it. Didn't seem like anything more than obnoxious terrain really, which Vincent just couldn't find a reason to be angry at. He still wanted a bird's eye view. They'd been driving at fifty for a good hour but civilization was scarce in the bad sort of way. No houses, nothing. Even for the country it was weird. The forest was digging in deep, with small trees and large tree. Anywhere from three feet to twenty feet to forty feet tall were deep green plants, a forest of marijuana mixed with other species of flora.

Yuko's powers had proved that plants in this world were more than just plants. They felt and understood in a sapient way like humans, in their own plant way though of course. At least that worked in some instances. This forest was thriving, rich skunky buds on the lower branches and plumes of deep green leaves over the plant. Never trimmed, these must have expanded from recreational growers and, with windows smashed in and walls busted down, surrounded by zombies that didn't notice plant life, the cannabis forest propagated, super well bred and in contact with other superior strains. They bred into taller, denser more healthy plants. With the good winds filtering in through the valley assured strong stalks and healthy plants. The free weather patterns watered them well and the climate was just right at this part of the world. All plants flourished, especially cannabis.

As he landed, however, Vincent was sure there were no zombies around. Even if he hadn't cared in the valley until the walking dead showed their faces he cared now. They had been much to close for comfort and now a horde of several hundred zombies were shambling in their direction. Even with a jeep, with only one gas jug remaining full, there had to be rest for humanity. Zombies didn't need it though... Vincent thought for a moment. Would he wake up the tired, attractive redhead who needed sleep and had been maintaining a consistent jog the entire night or wait until she was well rested?

"I'm tired! Can't we go back to the Jeep and wait till morning?" Ed complained.

"Morning's already come..." Vincent said as he bend down all of the trees, using a new handgun with a suppressor to shoot the stalks to weaken them.

"I meant tomorrow morning..." Ed whined. Her eyes were darkening from lack of sleep. Reasonably speaking, this was the first time her body had ever not gone a night without proper sleep. Her mind couldn't even fathom the feeling of exhaustion anymore. "We've walked..." Ed yawned, "So far so much faster. There's no way they could catch up before we're on the move again..."

"Then I suppose you'd like to make tomorrow all jogging, and the next day?" Vincent asked somberly.

Ed gasped. "Of course not!"

"Well they would." Vincent countered. "Every day we walk that we sleep a full night is two of our days and more they walk. I'm doing you a favor for when we will sleep. You'll wake up with more energy than you've ever had. Be glad we aren't jogging..."

Jogging to Ed, Vincent now knew, was around 20 miles an hour, his relaxed fly. 24/7 of 4 miles an hour didn't exactly match up to a full day of 20 but Vincent never liked taking chances where a single scratch ended a life without recovery. Anybody who got bit would experience a death no less real than Aerith's. Vincent remember, briefly, his old party-mate. He didn't get to know her for long but the fate she got was not what she deserved, a death she never should have had to experience. Vincent didn't want that fate to become of Ed, whoever she had been in her old world to whomever.

Ed stayed quiet after that, a muffled yawn every now and then. They had left the Jeep behind, preferring (Vincent, that is) to walk on foot. Half through the day Vincent stopped Ed. There was complete silence, no sounds of nature in the hilly forest of Cannabis with bigger plants mixed in. Vincent knew something was wrong. There was something nearby, he could tell. He waited. There was a sound, very quiet. Ed opened her mouth but Vincent's gauntlet slapped over it. He placed his current pistol on the ground, drawing Cerberus slowly.

It all began. Two screams from the forest, one of them Ed's. The other voice, Vincent couldn't say. A spear came his way. He moved his head just enough. He fired but his hand wrenched sideward, veering the shot almost toward Ed. He turned and repelled the spear wielding assailant with a foot, catching a glimpse of the person who had his off-hand. A young woman, blond of hair with pigtails, long and streaming. He twisted out of her arm-lock and turned just fast enough to fire the spearhead out of the way before it took his head off. The man who used the spear had spiky brown hair and a blue suit, stylized almost like a military outfit though no ranks or badges. A banner swung from the spear's shaft. It floated through the air almost as if wind really held it.

The man wielding the spear twisted forward as the forceful tri-shot repelled the spear's edge, front-flipping for a downward slice. The blond came in from the opposite side. Vincent could see her hands. She wanted one of his spare pistols. By the trajectory, she would get it. There was nothing he could do. He back-flipped. The spear missed him by a hair and the blond got his gun out of the holster but he had lined it up. One shot and the silenced pistol flew through the air, useless with three high caliber bullets having gone through it.

The fight stopped. Vincent stood in front of the two combatants, his Cerberus raised to his shoulder, ready to lower for a shot. He man with Shinpaku's Flag stood in front of the blond. The long whispered in his ear. Vincent could see it in her eyes. This girl needed a gun of some sort to work at maximum efficiency, just like Vincent himself. Without that silenced pistol Cerberus was the only one she would have been able to see. Vincent knew that the blond would work to get it.

Vincent was the first one to step forward. They hadn't finished whispering when he moved and the flag-bearer had chosen to not wait for the rest. The blond shook her head only most briefly and raced after. Vincent prepared to accept the spear wielder's attack but as Vincent went in to blow is head off the man leaped and flipped over him. He pulled the trigger, missed and was brought face to face with the blond. She went for a grab, Vincent lowered his gun and raised his right foot, catching the spear before it could come up and rip him wide open. Thankful his boots were made of good metal. Her free hand came right up from under to strike him but he blocked with his gauntlet. The force of hand against hand was harder than Vincent would have imagined for someone of such size, even taking into account that she may have as much martial arts training as Tifa had.

Instead of staying in the awkward stalemate, however, Vincent used the force of the blond's blow to get out. He pushed off the hand and spear tip, spinning through the air long enough for the spearman to swing at him. He turned to cape and flew for a few feet, solidifying behind the spearman. The man in blue spun round and the blond came up on the opposite flank quicker than Vincent had thought she could. He kicked back, foot landing square on the blond's face to halt her movement. The spear nearby hacked his face off but he caught it in his hand, the spearhead squealing as its metal slid noisily against the metal of Vincent's gauntlet. He raised his gun to the spearman's face, began pulling the trigger.

"NO!" that separate scream's voice came from the forest. A woman of long hair more red than brown came out. She had red eyes and something on her face, or was it part of her face? Vincent couldn't tell. Her legs were those of a bird, at least from the mid-calf down. More or less, however, she looked completely human, if you could ignore the few inhuman differences. A girl walked out from behind her, looking completely miserable.

Ed finally made herself seen. Vincent didn't know why she couldn't have just used the rifle or handgun she already had, or at least throw one out there. It would have evened the odds out a lot quicker for him in the long and short of it. "Who are you?"

The spear wielder cocked his head. The miserable woman had been repeating the same thing time and again since Vincent had first seen her, whatever it was she didn't know. Vincent's foot was still planted square on the blond's face. He didn't trust to let go of the pressure on her forehead. She didn't seem to be letting go of the pressure on the bottom of his metal boot. "Triela, Please stop it." The pressure on his foot eased, if only just. Vincent very slowly lifted his foot off her forehead. She didn't move until he fully set his foot to the ground. Only then did the woman marginally relax anymore. She straightened herself up and took a step between the miserable mumbler. "I'm sorry," the woman with the strange face said. Now that Vincent looked at her, she had a beak in place of a nose. It didn't take off much from her face, admittedly, though it wasn't exactly Vincent's type. "We couldn't be sure if you were safe."

Vincent paused. He wasn't sure of any of this. He could tell the same thoughts were crossing the spearman's mind. He was quite certain this "Triela" didn't care what happened as long as she protected her charge, the miserable girl in what seemed a legitimate military outfit, though horribly outdated even for Vincent's world. She was so very sad. The blond was tense, even still, her back to the miserable girl but Vincent could tell why. She was interposing herself between the military girl and Vincent. "Who are you?" Vincent repeated.

The beaked girl jumped shyly in place briefly. "Oh, I'm sorry." She bowed. "My name is Medli. This is Matsui," She motioned to the blue suited spear wielder. "Triela is the other person you fought." She spoke motioning to Triela. "And behind her is Lilly. She has said her name but understand some people's languages don't mix in this world. We are the standing members of the Shinpaku Federation. We hope to unite people to the banner in time."

"Not really going to get many friends attacking them straight off, now are you?" Ed said under her breath.

Apparently Medli's ears, however, were especially sharp (And they even came to a point at the tips), as she didn't have a hard time hearing this. Triela seemed to tense as well at the words that Vincent was sure only he would be hearing. "We didn't mean to truly hurt you. It's a posture. Matsui said it would be best to get you pinned down first, then consider diplomacy afterward."

Triela's hand slapped against her forehead and she shook her head. This didn't make Vincent feel any better and Triela seemed to understand well enough that very fact. Matsui didn't seem to understand. Apparently Medli was the mouthpiece of the party and Triela shared a language with her. Matsui didn't seem to know too much in languages. He was the party damage magnet. Chances were it was his job to get in between anybody who was attacked then seek and destroy. Triela Vincent couldn't say but it was clear she used a gun and she had martial arts experience. She also had good team tactics, where Matsui looked single combat based. Triela worked around Matsui's mistakes in combat, telling Vincent she was used to working in a small team where he was used to working alone. The girl in back, Lilly. Vincent had no way of knowing. She hadn't made any movements of hostility the entire time. She just parroted the words, over and over and over again, one of which was Lilly. It just seemed phrases of introduction.

Vincent stared at the party. At some point he locked gazes with Matsui. The two were stuck then, back and forth and back again. For however long it went on Vincent couldn't say but just as he spoke Matsui spoke as well, just as fast and just as forcefully. "Strip." Vincent heard himself say. They could have bites, that was the bottom line.

Medli jumped at the unison speech, looking back to Matsui and then to Vincent and back to her partner who had spoken. A second forehead slap came from Triela. Lilly kept repeating her name. "Umm.. W-ell..." Medli seemed at a loss for words. "It seems Matsui... w-w-wants you to s-strip." Then she turned, almost robotic, away from Ed and Vincent and back to the Shinpaku gang, speaking in a different language for a moment. Matsui and Vincent still hadn't torn their eyes from each other's. Lilly kept repeating, miserable all the while. Ed started stripping. Triela seemed annoyed but begrudgingly stripped.

And with Midna's reluctant help, seeming to understand at least enough of this, the groups were nude in minutes and clothed in seconds after everyone did a quick turn and peek. Nobody had bites and now that each and every one of them had seen the other nude it eased some tension, surprising as it was to say. Hey walked the same direction for a time, speaking to each other. Vincent would have had words with Matsui if either of them spoke anything remotely similar to the other's language. From what Medli told him Matsui only spoke a few words of this continent's "English." He was Japanese. Just like First Immigrant Miyuki Vincent had thought idly. Instead the brooding spearman walked in the straight middle of the party, banner rolled and pear slung on his back. He was very militant to never let the banner touch the ground. Vincent couldn't get Lilly Stechin's Story. Triela had appeared with her, that much they knew, but harp Lilly would only ever say her name, birth date, rank, division and the name of her direct subordinate, Mercury. She hadn't stopped parroting it since Vincent had first seen her and, according to Medli, when she wasn't eating, sleeping or crying with some intensity, that was all she had said as long as they'd known her. Vincent made hesitant conversation with Medli, mostly keeping his eyes trained on Matsui, the dangerous one. More than half the time Matsui's cold stare met back, the other half on Medli or ahead, depending on when Ed turned the party in accordance to getting to Eugene, Oregon. The walk for Vincent would be silent and alert.

In the mean time Edward was making wonderful conversation. When at first Triela had seemed a hopeless tomboy fighter who longed for a trigger to pull now she seemed just what she was, a woman just like d. Ed and her got along particularly well because, largely, nothing about them was the same as when they were born. No part of ed hadn't been replaced or modified under the knife. Save for the brain and skull Triela was no different. Where she had been born she couldn't know but it had been on Earth, granted not this one but a similar one, not much unlike Ed's Earth before the moon explosion. Italy's Social Welfare Agency picked her up just outside Amsterdam. Publicly The Social Welfare Agency took in children to give them a second chance at life. What they really did was made children who had no chance to live into cyborgs, train them and put them through conditioning that made them blindly loyal to a single handler.

They had all started as children, aged 10 through 14, Triela the oldest in the division. Of six five lived to success. Afterward the agency's models got popularity in the military and government. They endorsed better models, newer looks, a method to allow the girls to "age" despite their bodies of carbon framing, fiber optic sensory organs and synthesized muscle tissue, otherwise ageless anatomy. Triela and the four remaining originals went through the change first and, as more and more cyborgs were made and the section grew, Triela and her companions became able to shunt off the conditioning, their minds having grown far enough to take charge. Only Triela had found those specifics out, however. The rest had to find out themselves as Triela joined a terrorist organization for the equality of her people, the units of Social Welfare Agency Section 2. She never finished that but informed Ed that it would still be done, definitely. When she had arrived Lilly had been alone, right beside her.

Her handler in her world had been Hilshire. Triela still had always been blindly loyal to him, even after running from the agency. She had left at his behest. However, when a fratello was broken normally the girl's mind and memories self destructed, leaving her hollow of those memories, rusty of the knowledge that she held for command. Triela's mind had held the conditioning and, instead of losing her memories of the old world, maintained the thoughts of independence. Her old conditioning, however, assigned her to serve the military and Lilly had been wearing what could be defined as a uniform. Triela hadn't known about the imprinting until she was putting down zombies for the girl who wouldn't even run, so lost in her losses. While still in complete control the polyglot gunslinger girl had a handler nonetheless. Lilly Stechin was her handler and Triela was determined to protect her in any way she could, all physical. All lethal. In Triela's old world any threat to the handler demanded immediate and lethal consequences, no matter how small. Triela still held that mindset. Though technically all of what she said was classified information that Ed would normally be shot for even knowing Triela informed her that she had somehow bypassed classification and reasoned that, in this different world, classified didn't exist, and indeed it didn't any longer.

Ed told her about The Complex, about everything else Ed told Triela about how she was modified and how the technology back in her world was so much more advanced than even Triela's body was. How Triela could have been made with true flesh and blood and bone all of which was genuine and yet still unbreakable. Ed demonstrated by drawing a knife and stabbing into her palm, moving it to show the blood run red for a few seconds before the shallow cut sealed up and the blood cleared from the site a minute later. Ed's healing factor was nothing, she informed Triela. That some people with bodies made like Ed's healed gaping mortal wounds in seconds and cuts just didn't ever stay long enough to be noticed. Ed told Triela of how, back at Semiaghn, there was Bebop tech, so they called it, just like that, though not yet quite up and running. Triela didn't quite believe it but admitted it was more likely than Medli even existing so she had no way of telling otherwise.

Both parties were going to Eugene but afterward Ed knew they would have to part ways. The cannabis forest was still just as thick by the time the sun fell and they set up camp. Ed hit the dirt hard and didn't open her eyes till morning after that.

Matsui stepped into his tent with Medli. Triela stood guard with Vincent, who didn't seem to need sleep. Medli brushed out her hair, long enough to reach the ground while she stood if she didn't put it up in a pony tail. He had grown smitten with her blessing of such fiery appearance. Nanjo Kisara had been one thing but everything about Medli spoke flame and ember. Her eyes were red as fiery coals and her hair like strung flames. He had appeared with her. He knew exactly what had happened to him. He had registered into Kenichi's Dojo for training to better serve the Shinpaku Federation and he had lost. After some weeks of grueling backbreaking training under Tosaka Shigure he was sure he died. Next thing he knew he was in this new world, not much different from his own save zombies everywhere and some geographical differences.

And before him was a woman, hiding and scared, red as fire in her body's colors yet so shy and helpless. She was so afraid of everything. Matsui had gone to her in the rain that night, almost half a year ago, trying to help her out, for he was fine, if a bit shocked. This woman he had appeared next to, she was distraught in more ways than one. And why shouldn't she have been? The martial artist thought to himself as Medli gave him a smile.

"Are you okay?" Matsui had asked her

"I... Don't know..." she had told him, curled up in a ball of fright in the pouring rain surrounded by the corpses of zombies Matsui with banner still in hand, crude spearhead atop it.

"What's your name?" He had asked her, making sure to look around to see if the zombies had all been dealt with, trying to shield her scantily clothed body from the cold that rained down on them.

"I don't... Know..." She had answered, not unlike the last time, unsure. Matsui had seen her eyes tearing up, able to tell the difference between tears and the rain that was falling all over them. "Where do you come from?" He had asked then.

"I don't know." She said a third time, looking up to him in desperation the likes of which she hadn't the ability to fathom but still held nonetheless. "Where are your friends?"

"I don't know."

"Where are your parents?"

"I don't know." she said yet again, tears flowing from her eyes and mixing with the clean rainwater at her chin, past the top half of a beak that was her nose. "What's going on here?" He had asked more to the universe than Medli.

Midna had looked up at him then. She had been starting to cry but it was then that she stopped for a moment. She stared up at him, her mind calculating what it could, he could tell. Hen, slowly, it came on like a child realizing what death was for the first time, only to find out that it was his parents who died. She made a face that was a grin, but full of so much pain. He tears again started flowing and a growl like a little girl trying to find a word for the wost sound in the world but still not trying to cry came from between her lips. "I... Dont... Know..."

And she bawled for the rest of the night, until she lay asleep eyes puffed shut and cheeks swollen. Her beak nose was so stuffed from crying that she made little snores fitfully. Matsui knew nothing of what had happened to him but one way or another this girl was in a worse place than he was. He had his memories. Eventually she had remembered her name, the grandest understanding of language skills and a little of what could only be explained as magic. Aside from that Medli remembered nothing of her old world. Medli's eyes were a bit puffy tonight, as Vincent had asked her about her world earlier. The thought that she didn't know still put Medli to fits of sobbing. She got over them fast enough and Matsui knew better than to make conversation about it. Nobody could sympathize with her. Normally when you lost your memories you never missed them. You didn't know they were gone by that point. Medli knew they were gone. She knew how important they had been to her, or at least could guess at it. She could feel the space where hundreds of loved ones and thousands of beautiful memorable experiences had just fallen out of her head, no matter how significant they may have been and she was constantly reminded of it in the sense that it was all she knew. That emptiness almost swallowed her every time she slept, Matsui felt.

"I don't like them." Matsui said plainly as he began stripping off his clothing. Medli and he had seen each other's bodies, hugged close for warmth at night in the mountains, been as one being. Six months of survival in the zombie apocalypse had brought them close together in more ways than one. Matsui and Medli couldn't be separated, no matter what worlds they had come from. "That man made you cry..."

"There was no way to know what he said would hurt me, Matsui." Medli said quietly, calmly. That was how she always was when she could afford to be. She remained composed when in public. Matsui guessed it had to do with her old life, whatever she was before the crossing from her world to this one. "And don't you remember? They come from other worlds as well. We're not the only ones in this world from another. They were sent to begin civilization anew. That's our chance for home again, Matsui. We could start a simple life together, just you and me."

"And a whole city of other people." Matsui said begrudgingly

"And among hundreds we'll be just another couple of people, like things are supposed to be. They won't care cause we'll just do what everyone else does. We'll be the neighbors, or whatever you call them." Medli's understanding of certain concepts didn't translate sometimes She never understood what it was to have neighbors, though Matsui guessed bird people wouldn't just have houses. Medli didn't show it often but her arms turned to wings when she willed them to and she could fly, even carry people some ways. Even if she was a different race of being altogether he still loved her, and apparently their respective kinds were mutually compatible, which helped quite the bit.

But he couldn't accept it. "I want to be alone with you until we can found the Federation officially. We don't need this Seh-main place. We'll start the Shinpaku Federation and everything will work."

"Triela's thinking of going to Semiaghn and taking Lilly with her." Medli told him.

"It's probably safer there anyway for them."

"What about me?" Medli asked simply. Matsui gave her a hurt look. Medli realized quickly what wrong she had said. "Not to say you can't protect me, Matsui! I'm just saying it would be nice not to have to move every day to keep from getting eaten alive by the walking dead is all. I'm sure this Semiaghn place is great. According to Edward they have electricity," That word had taken her so long to understand, "and plenty of food and space and two hundred bears, all as intelligent as humans who know how to work metal and build houses."

And all of this gave Matsui more reason to distrust Vincent and Ed. A couple hundred quasi-intelligent bears just come out of animal mindset with hammers and forges and the knowledge to build a house. If a bear has the intelligence to build a house by himself he certainly has the wit to throw the logs made to build said house at me fast enough and forcefully enough to kill me He wanted to tell her desperately. "The more people around you and I that I don't know the more difficult it'll be to keep you safe. We're in zombie land or something here, Medli... I just don't want to lose you..." He took Medli by the hands, holding hers in his. It was so selfish of him, he knew, but he didn't care. He was allowed this at least, right?

Staring into his eyes Medli came to the conclusion that he was indeed allowed such a privilege. "Alright, Matsui... But let's at least stay with them till Eugene. It's on the way to the coast and it's better to have them than not. " Medli leaned close to Matsui and whispered. "Gave you a run for your money, didn't he?"

Matsui blushed and Medli smiled. Then he tickled her, fiercely. She giggled and squealed and eventually the two found themselves on top of each other, breathing heavily from the struggle of tickle versus get away from tickle. "Matsui?" Medli spoke into the once more quiet night. Matsui grunted acknowledgement. "Where are we going?"

"To the coast." he said. "We'll search up and down the coast for a few weeks. If we can find a boat big enough we'll stock it up and make way for home."

"Where's home?" Medli asked innocently.

Matsui chuckled. "Home will be Japan, which we'll reorganize and found as the Shinpaku Federation."

Medli sighed. "I can't help but feel I've been with another boating fan in the old world for some reason..."

"Think he was good with a weapon as me?" Matsui asked with a smirk

Something tells me..." Medli started, looking to the ceiling of the tent, as if to the stars, "Something tells me he is, or at least was. I think... I think he loved me a lot... maybe he was my lover. I can't recall..."

Matsui realized that Medli was doing it again. She was remembering something but she never remembered enough to remember anything other than that she didn't. Poor girl was reminded at every turn and normally she didn't act like it bothered her at all. But Matsui knew her private times. He knew it hurt her all the time, not just when she showed it. "Don't worry about that now. We have our goals and we have a good future ahead of us without them around. We don't need them. We are starting a new life together."

"I hope so, Matsui. I just hope, whatever it is, we have a life where... maybe where I don't have to remember. Let's have a life where wherever I come come from doesn't need to have definition." Medli pressed herself against the spearman. "We are compatible. I'm sure it works this way. If we have children, over the years they will breed down into humanity and it will become commonplace. Nobody will think my nose is weird in this new world we make."

They fell asleep soon enough. Triela slapped her forehead in the next tent over. How silly these people all were. Not a lick of common sense among them. Triela guessed she was the only one around who came from a world defined as "normal," even if she herself was not. She had learned a lot in the past few months. Four months ago Henrietta had nailed her in the chest with her own shotgun. Consequently Triela didn't have the gun with her now. Still, she was alive where ordinarily Henrietta would have walked away leaving a dead Triela behind for the cleanup crew.

Instead she arrived next to a miserable girl who was actually older than she was. She spoke German, which was Triela's second language. She spoke ten. All she had said since then was, "Lilly Stechin. War Relief State Section 3: Pumpkin Scissors. My first subordinate is Mercury Stechin, former best courier dog the military ever had.." Again, all Triela had ever heard from her lips. As Lilly spoke it yet again her sobbing grew heavier and she sobbed into her pillow, one of the few things she had from her world. The pink, super frilly thing somehow had managed to survive just fine along this entire trip, not what Triela could say about their ratty clothing relics from their old worlds. What she wouldn't give for her Winchester right now, full bayonet, fully stocked ammo with the extra choke for the super wide spread. Combined with the extra magazine she could blow a zombie horde out of the picture in seconds. All of the specialized cyborg units were trained in unarmed combat but their true shine came through with their signature weapons. Triela's was the Winchester 1857 shotgun. She missed it so much.

But this was to be her new handler. She would decide what weapons Triela used... That was she would if she would stop sobbing. It was annoying Triela more than Elsa had back in the old world but she had to try to give encouragement. It was what was needed. "Now there, there's no reason to cry anymore. Think I can get some words out of you tonight?"

The miserable girl just cried more. Triela was finding day by day, ever so slowly, that her new handler annoyed the shit out of her. She couldn't raise her hand to a handler, of course. That was just programed against her, whether she liked it or not. Instead she did something rash. She grabbed the miserable little woman from her place and lifted her off the ground, turning her and placing her on her back. "Now you listen to me. You're acting like a child." Lilly stopped crying. "Now don't think you're the only one who left a world behind. You had family and so did I."

Tears started welling up again as Lilly started to say her name, "No!" Triela snapped at her with a shake. "You keep saying you're part of the military but you can't even shake off the stupor that you're not where you used to be. You think you're the only one who lost... everything?" Triela remembered Hilshire, Jose and Henrietta, who had killed her. They had been wonderful friends too. A teardrop hit Lilly's face from Triela. Her eyes were crying but her face was just trying to stay serious. "I lost everything... too..." The strength left Triela's body and she let herself fall to Lilly's embrace. She cried and, finally, Lilly didn't. The black haired girl of a woman simply lay still, hugging her, realizing finally that she wasn't the only one with problems. "You're my handler now... You give me orders and decide what is done with me." Triela said after crying for some time. "I don't have a gun... but I will get one and I will keep you safe, as is my directive."

The next morning Lilly didn't talk much, but what she did say was innocent, still hurt and afraid of this new place. She understood she was here now, however, that she would have to become something. Triela was a bit more relaxed, even to Vincent. Matsui seemed more solidly settled in his beliefs but he wasn't as aggro about everything. Vincent was largely the same, as were Ed and Medli. Nothing had truly changed about their lives. Everyone was more friendly at least a bit. Matsui even spared a few minutes every hour to speak civilly with Vincent. Ed had to give it to him, Matsui knew when to brighten up. Vincent had been ready and able to blow them both to pieces the day before. Even she'd never have been able to see that kind of fighting coming. Ed wondered idly, as they walked, where he'd gotten his training. Wherever it was Vincent was no doubt going to keep it to himself. What one member of the Legacy of Eight flaunts the other denies completely. Ed thought to herself.

Yuko and Chouji showed their true colors often and even Ed herself wasn't adverse to using them publicly. Blackstar's only true power, so it seemed, was to beat the ever loving hell of of someone, which he was ever eager to show off but Vincent abstained from people entirely most of the time. Kaede was loath to call herself anything but a normal woman in the public eye (or even to the other Legacy Of Eight members) and Vash, when asked of his abilities, would go into long dramatic speeches about a being messenger from the cosmos come to spread love and peace for the good of mankind, blah, blah, blah... But you would never get anything useful out of him. On that note Osaka, the one with a completely mundane background, considered simple things like childhood secrets important on the large scale. She didn't have power save for the logical mind of a normal person.

Ed was lost in it all. She was "normal" in that her path wasn't some magic storybook. But it wasn't normal on a stage of the twenty-first century modern world. Ed had interplanetary space travel in the course of a week. It would take these people months just to get a few trained people in a clunky shuttle to get to Mars or Venus at the top of their tech level. Ed, knowing what she did abut mechanical and electronic systems, would have given them about a 20% chance of return success at that.

Eventually they left the forest of hand shaped leaves and came across a decent sized minivan on the crowded highway. It was a good model, almost new. Ed didn't know much of these "clunky" past models but Matsui, Vincent and Triela could manage just fine in the old style vehicles. It had a lot of canned food in the back and a bottle of water or two, which was sad because everyone was thirsty and not as many people had water as should have. Triela handled herself well enough and both Matsui and Vincent wouldn't let themselves be caught complaining about something as simple as thirst (Vincent didn't even need water) Ed and Lilly were quickly complaining about their lack of hydration. If Medli had any problems she didn't make it apparent but Ed could see it even in her strange face.

They found a full sized SUV on the side of the road as well. It had a broken window and a missing hubcap but the wheel was still on tight and the all terrain capabilities were much better than the minivan. It had a rack on the top as well, which made loading up nice. They had kept the water bottles and, as there were rivers nearby, they were able to get water every now and then whenever the coast was clear enough and the water clean. Some streams and rivulets that would have been best for drinking were already tainted, with bodies of some sort clearly upstream making the water both smell and look appealing. Some of it was a sickly rust color and other streams were thick with clouds of green sickly film. Needless to say, those water sources were passed up.

Everyone talked in the car in turns. The girls would stay quiet whilst Matsui and Vincent randomly talked about whatever they did, normally conversations on training styles and fighting preferences, normally clashing in interest but somehow respectful all the same. Then there were times the women would talk. Matsui and Vincent would make faces at each other up in the front seat while Medli, Triela and Ed all talked about girly things. Eventually Vincent or Matsui were bound to speak up, quiet individuals or not. Side conversations would spout from such comments and conversations from those.

They stopped at a rest stop, "Somewhere with bathrooms." The girls adamantly begged. Vincent, Matsui and Triela cleared the area with fascinating speed and accuracy and then Triela was the one to happily inform the men that they would be on guard duty. After Medli was the unfortunate suspect to view just what a horrible place the girl's bathroom was after years of zombie occupation the women of the two groups joined to clean it. The bathroom storage shed just next to the permanent structure, they all guessed, hadn't been touched two decades before the zombie war, much less the last twenty year, and thus it was well full of long forgotten supplies that hadn't degraded at all. Fully stocked on cleaning supplies the ladies all went to work. Matsui and Vincent used the bushes.

Vincent sat down on a curb and got out his pipe. He hadn't had much time to get to the few recreational pleasures this world provided him. Leader of a new world order, the most profound and insane thing Vincent could have thought of ever being. There was no way an ancient recluse had what it took to be a world council leader. Nonetheless he had been given something good in being here. The Planet hadn't had these green buds but Vincent found the smoking of it all very relaxing. Sure he didn't need it but that didn't keep him from also eating when in the company of others and when the food storage permitted.

He loaded the hammer of the pipe, pouring a bit of water into he bard so as to fill it. It seems all of the old sinks and fountains still worked as well as one would expect them to after so long not in service. At first Matsui took the fall on the far side rest stop fountain, struggling with his tongue for about five minutes trying to get the taste of old pipes and plumbing sludge from it. After running it for a while they determined that it was just the age of the fountain. The new water from deeper in the pipes was just fine.

The ladies were done with their cleaning by the time Matsui an Vincent sat down to smoke. The men didn't expect to see them for the latter half of the day. It was alright. Vincent symbolically blew his head off while they waited. "What's that?" Vincent didn't know quite how but he could pick out four in every five words Matsui uttered. Being in his presence just a couple days bestowed the Japanese language.

Vincent was intrigued, though only dimly, "Marijuana..." he stated bluntly, drawing long again from the artful magnum pipe.

"That stuff isn't allowed in my world..." Matsui said simply. He knew Yakuza trafficked that.

"Didn't exist ion mine and history lessons say it was fought over here for a while... before shit hit the fan." A plume of smoke into Matsui's face. "The world has ended." Vincent said. "If you follow old rules and do what civilization had told you, you're gonna die." Vincent handed the young man his pipe. "Or at least be less able to enjoy it."

Matsui took a half minute to understand the concept of glass piece smoking. Soon he was coughing and soon after that he was smiling, red eyed and largely uncaring. "I don't get it." Matsui said with a dumb grin on his face.

"Somehow," Vincent started, his eyes significantly redder as well though his face still perpetually bored, "I'm not sure you're supposed to." The smallest shadow of a smile touched his lips. Matsui laughed and slapped his knee. "Think of I this way. You believe in something, right?" Matsui nodded. "So that thing made us, right?" Matsui nodded. "and in our heads, it made these receptors that were only made to receive the chemicals of this one plant." Another cursory nod from the martial artist. "So this one plant is a flower that's covered in... crystals." Vincent's head was still fogging up. "And when you catch them on fire and inhale the smoke, it makes you happy."

"That makes a lot of sense." Matsui said with a smiling nod.

"Lot simpler than some would have it made out to be." Vincent agreed

Meanwhile the girls talked, as they had been for hours. The bathrooms were spotless, men's side included. Couldn't could the girls leave a job half done. The bathroom storage shed got ransacked and now the groups both had ample toiletries for their travels. As they looked at themselves in the dull steel mirrors that lined the bathroom wall the talked about other things than men would speak of; fond memories in their old worlds, what they missed in food, the men they left behind, all four of which had at least one choice individual. Medli didn't know names or anything like that, as she didn't remember anything about her old world, but she maintained that, in he old world, she was very sure she cared for someone and he was truly courageous and forthright if not all that intelligent. Triela talked about her old handler, only man she ever cared about really. He gave her life and purpose and, in the end, what led her to this world was turning her back on him.

Ed talked about Jet and Spike from the bebop, how they and Faye were always getting into troublesome, deadly adventures. Lille spoke of Corporal Oland of the 901st anti-tank troops, the giant man who had a heart as large as his truly massive chest, and the other men on her team... and then Mercury, who she cried for for a bit until Triela got her but of it with a few well placed words.

As the sun began to set in the distance, the sky turning pink and gray, the girls came out. Vincent was lying on a bench and Matsui was training. They had only just stopped smoking minutes before. Both were well beyond the level of sobriety. Ed tapped Vincent on the head a few times and his eyes snapped open. He cracked a small smirk, "Bout time." He muttered, sitting up and wobbling to a stand.

"Oh jeez, you're torched." Ed said with a look of concern in her eyes. "Triela, could you pick this shift up?" Triela, breaking into one of the vending machines, called back a moment later positively, then proceeded to peel the steel wiring off the front of the machine and discard the grate. She looked at the menu, then to the aluminum sheet that was the front of the food dispenser. She pressed her ear to the thing, knocked on it lightly a few times. Hen she stood and punched straight through, pulling out three Coconut Clusters in her hand with a smile. She seemed very excited about it as she walked back, tearing open the first package to her king sized coconut candy bars.

Medli went to admire Matsui in the parking lot, balancing perfectly on his spearhead. He made it look easy but it would have been impossible for anyone else, they all were pretty sure of it. His body gently curved in the air, bent back on itself above the [spear, held at a forty-five degree angle to the ground. It was balance a it's finest. His eyes were closed. Medli spoke his name. Eyes opened, he crashed; face first into the asphalt. He seemed fine, his eyes red as blood as he explained to Medli the mess-up apologetically.

They got into the SUV and rode. The next couple days went by in a flash. They got to Eugene, hijacked another couple, better SUVs. Eugene was small and covered in small forests of cannabis, all having clearly grown out from the settlement. They knocked over a few gas stations, fought through a zombie horde couple hundred strong at one point. The next horde they found they opted to convoy around. Thousands strong, nobody wanted to go through it. The Shinpaku party opted, at least until Portland, to stay around. And so they rode parallel the I5, crashing through fences when need be and using the interstate bridges to gain access to river crossings. The travel was alright. Vincent took apart Matsui's language and, in a few days, the Japanese martial artist was speaking broken English. It seemed people from other worlds learned languages easier in this one.

By the time they drove past Salem, ever at their leisurely pace, the group had long distance radios in both SUVs and had conversations back and forth regularly. Despite their small size and lack of gigantic antenna display these radios seemed a bit closer to Ed's Bebop tech level. Three hundred mile call zone. Shinpaku could be in Olympia (or wherever Olympia was) and The Legacy Of Eight in Semiaghn and they would still probably get enough reception to carry on emergency calls and such, when it was really needed. They also seemed to have no battery port. They might have been nuclear powered or could have charged themselves but whatever the case they didn't come apart at all. After a night of rest in the backwoods, to thick for zombies to be prone to bothering with, they got into Portland.

And Portland was not the same as people from alternate Earth's remember it. If the old Portland alternatives had represented freedom of love and cannabis smoking this Portland represented military power embracing liberal civilian tendencies, such as cannabis and free love. The military had bolstered the town and thus it had become the capital town and boomed for population. From the seem of it all most of the town was above ground (which was apparently rare) but everyone knew there was a classified military base underneath the city. That was where everyone was interested in going. Triela wanted guns, and lots of them. Ed wanted those electronics. Medli wanted nothing but Matsui was just curious to find out what was inside. Lilly didn't deny at all that she would do to benefit from getting some new world military threads. Vincent wanted ammo, guns, everything that Triela did. They were both gun wielders. Difference was, Vincent was an immortal holster jockey. Triela left her pistols in her breast pocket with zombies and used long-arms to answer her diplomatic needs. It was good that neither one would be needing the ammunition of the other.

It took them a half a hour to find the military base hatch. Another half an hour to clear the area and set up a good defense structure to hide them from zombies. They went in. Triela was still unarmed so she was set at the center of the line-up. She had the speed and litheness Matsui and Vincent lacked.. Vincent stayed in back. He had superior range and his cape could spirit people away if needed. Lilly and Medli stayed on the inside, to either side of Triela. Ed right behind Matsui, who led the party. With his superior martial arts skills no amount of zombies to turn him over provided they didn't flank him. With the halls as they were, however, there was little chance of that. Ed had been watching his practice. He had a bubble around him and when put to the front, in a hallway four men wide, Matsui would be able to hold a charging herd of elephants.

Ed pointed out the way for him. She didn't know anything about this complex but she was glad for signs. Eventually they found their way to the Armory. They were well rewarded for coming there first. As they got in Vincent shot a zombie in the head straight off. The door was closed behind them. Zombies couldn't get through such heavy doors, of course, so they didn't have to worry about noise or intrusion through them whilst they browsed.

Triela got the most firepower. Where she had been lithe and mobile with no weapons to her name, complete with KS-23 (in the confiscated boxes) a mark three jackhammer and the Ithica MG-10 Roadblocker she was a tank of metal hanging off a girl too small for one to think to carry that much weight. Triela liked big guns. Pistol after pistol disappeared into Vincent's cape and Lilly found a few nice rifles to keep her safe. Her and Medli, though now armed, were still in the middle. Difference was Matsui was behind Triela and Triela right at the front where she wanted to be. Ed led from third place.

Thirty Minutes later they found the computer room. Zombie moans were loud around the halls and they had already had run-ins with old zombie military men, snatching clips from this one and that off the dead belts. The door slid shut and clicked loudly, implying that the only zombies they had to worry about were...

Triela and Vincent fired rapidly. Matsui beheaded three free zombies. The room was clear. Computer displays lined the walls, all of them.

They explored the room for a bit. Ed was now in her element. This was her domain. For that matter things seemed at least a bit more advanced than they should have been. More like the data pool from Bebop Tech. Ed started getting into the system, touching her old hacker roots. She felt the power finally back at her fingertips. "Eyes of the times, Let Ed see your rhymes." Ed muttered with a twisted smile, drawing a small receiver from her glasses and putting it on the board. A holographic board appeared in front of Ed. She types away at super speed. Closer to Bebop tech maybe but it didn't hold a hand to what Ed had seen in her short life.

A half a minute went by before something went wrong. Medli just happened to be the one to press the one wrong button. The lights blinked red and a siren went off. WEEEEEooo! The alarm sounded. WEEEEEooo! "What's going on?" Triela called out.

Lilly was at a display screen, little numbers soaring by in certain orders and algorithms. "Wait..." She squeaked. "Oh, this is way ahead of my time. Give me a second." Everyone gathered around Lilly, as she seemed to know something even that Ed couldn't, just by looking at these numbers flitting uselessly across the screen. "Gimme a second... R-I-T-Y (PERIOD) N-U-C-L-E-A-R (SPACE) W-A-R-H-E-A-D (SPACE) L-A-U-N-C-H-E-D (PERIOD) H-A-M-M-E-R-F-A-L-L (SPACE) P-R-O-T-O-C-O-L (SPACE) I-N-I-T-I-A-T-E-D (PERIOD) What's the mean guys?"

Triela dropped her shotgun. "Means we've got a short amount of time to stop a really big bomb or we all die..."

The base rumbled. Ed brought up a screen from a camera outside, looking at the launch pad. The missile took less than half a minute to launch. Ed hadn't even gotten used to the controls yet!

Medli was at the door. "Let me out!" she demanded hysterically, "Let me out!"

Matsui wouldn't be able to calm her but he tried nonetheless "Medli. We'll be fine."

"Actually," Ed was the unfortunate one to have to say, "It's lookin like that's the exact opposite of what we'll be here in a few minutes. I can't hack out the procedures. This is heavier than I thought."

Triela was the next to speak, after perhaps two seconds where Ed's fingers on keys were the only sounds outside the alarms. It was a sigh. "Alright, since none of you seem to know what any of this means all of you are going to have to pay very close attention t me and do exactly as I say." Triela turned to Lilly, "Lilly, you're the only one who can read this stuff on the screen with all the numbers. Would you please read it off?" Lilly nodded, a look of concern about her.

Triela looked to Medli, "Medli, stop freaking out. You have a crucial part in this. You can carry Matsui, right?" Medli regained her integrity, at least for a moment, to nod. "You and Vincent have to carry Matsui to th heights. He knows what to do from there. "Matsui, the little red light's where you want to cut. It's the detonation device. "I'm gonna need both of you on the sky." The missile was well airborne now, going straight up. "You're not gonna have much air up there but something tells me you won't have to work too hard. Ed, you work the systems. I what all of this shut down before t an go out of control. We're already too far in and I can't have any idea what this nuke is capable of. I already have an idea what I'm going to do." Triela gestured for the radio and Matsui tossed her the one end. "Give me directions, Ed." Triela said, "We only have one chance on this." Triela opened the door. Matsui tore through and Medli scrambled out the door. Her arms turned to wings and she got them open with just enough room to take off and down the hall with an angel's grace. Matsui would find her outside, they knew. Vincent was gone, just nowhere else. The door closed and Lilly was left alone with Ed. She kept rack of the monitors while she hacked. Two minutes ago, maybe. Now that the missile was out of the silo, there was little chance for ed to get it turned off on time. They were really going to die...

Ed lifted the radio to her lips and gave Triela the directions to the hangar and garage. "Got it, Ed. Open Hangar bay door C-84JX." Triela's voice echoed trough the radio. Ed did so.

Outside

The noise had attracted zombies. It made little difference when Vincent and Medli took to the skies. Soon as Matsui was out she swept back down and hoisted him into the air. A great hole in the ground was opening, sliding slowly to the fully ajar position. Zombies swarmed in.

Triela was in a new machine. She didn't know what it was but the controls were simple, just to her liking. Some kind of mobile power suit or something. It stood a story and a half tall. When she got in the setup was simple; On/Off. The helmet in the cockpit responded to Triela's thoughts and the leg cuffs where she wanted to move in the vehicle based on muscle twitching in her legs. There were special memory gloves that responded to her hand movements. "Fully integrated manual interface." Triela said with a grin as the hatch opened. She wondered... what could this thing do?

The thing changed as the zombies came in. It crunched and folded away from the zombies then spikes drove out and circular wheels formed under. Triela hit the gas and out the ramp the new super car flew, crushing ten zombies as it landed and accelerating into several dozen more. Soon as she had some healthy distance the vehicle went mech mode again and Triela barely had to think to swing her about and lay waste.

In the sky Matsui was having a bit of vertigo. When Medli needed a break her and Vincent would trade off and he would be shunted into the pocket dimension under Vincent's cloak, none too pleasant. The missile was way too fast. He doubted they had the chance to catch up, much less soar upward. Vincent was losing wind quickly but somehow Medli was only flying stronger with the seconds. She began to switch off less with gaining altitude and Vincent began lagging behind but launching Matsui farther with each trade-off. "Matsui," Vincent spoke to Matsui as he didn't have the drag any longer to remain aloft, "Do what it takes."

And Matsui hit a few g's as Vincent's arm pulsed while he threw the spearman Matsui could tell it wouldn't be enough but he tried for certain. Medli caught him at the apex. She was somehow flying stronger than Matsui had ever seen her fly. "Medli!" Matsui called up over the roar of the not too distant missile, "How are we going to do this?"

There had been no arc or curve. The missile was just going straight up. When it came to its apex, which was still being determined, it would fall back to Earth and leave a really big hole where Portland, Oregon once was, killing everyone and destroying everything. "I don't know!" Medli huffed out as she climbed, "But..." There was a fire in her eyes, "I'm gonna do it!" Something crackled in her eyes, a spark of memory. She lost herself in the flash inside her mind.

She Remembered

"I'm glad you've come to see me Link," she said, looking a a man whose face wasn't well enough defined, "We all thought you'd never come back." He smiled and scratched the back of his head. "I won Birdman contest. I proved that a woman can fly just as good as any man, better even than you, the former champion."

Back In Reality

She felt her pecs burning like never before. Sparks of flight in her old world flashed into her mind. Her body remembered the true strain of flight under pressure. She had rescued people and flown longer than anyone ever before. No mailman flew faster than her and she spoke some strange language of ancient prophetic times. She had magic like hadn't been seen in long years. The first she had learned was the flight to carry her faster than the wind, the powers granted to her from Helios and Cyclos.

The roar of the engine and pressure in the air didn't stop her after that and neither did the lack of good air. Medli rose higher and higher, her great wingbeats pushing her into thin atmosphere. Matsui was lucky to have climbed mountains before because he would have had a hard time breathing otherwise. The missile came closer and closer. Medli steered aside to avoid the heat. Her wings looked... longer than when Matsui had seen them out only a day before. The were redder too. This wasn't the time to think about that though. He leaped and caught the fin, Medli falling away below. It was all he needed. He was lucky he had his feet by the time he pinned himself above the fin. There was a red light, right? Matsui crawled toward the nose. He couldn't breath. He couldn't hold on... but...

Then the missile broke apart...

And five hundred one-foot wide balls fell slowly from the sky.

Underground

Ed was going ballistic. "They've broken apart! Triela they've transformed into a cluster effect! We didn't see this coming!" Ed signed off the direction giving to Lilly. She needed only read the code to get the directions, which she seemed to be getting even better at with the passing seconds. She was reading it faster and easier. Francois Edward Wong How Pepilou Tivruski III would not be beaten by the technology she hacked! She dove into the system, immersed herself in cyberspace, the ocean of digitalization. "Nuke coming down, You're such a clown!" Ed spoke aloud in the real world, her eyes wide open in her glasses screens. She could feel it again! There it was, her power! Her hands types at the holoscreen ever faster and she infiltrated system after system. Half of this would be taking over the right systems, no relation to overriding the nuke itself. Get clearance!

"Five hundred one megaton cluster warheads inbound. UGT is intercepting at west side of cluster." Lilly spoke into the radio " Two UATs on rise to contact cluster field. Field-Mech 4 strike target Alpha, Zeta, Epsilon, Beta, Mu.

Above

Triela switched to vehicle mode again, drove for about ten second and heard the radio call in her system. This thing was neat. She noticed a screen appear on her left side. Chancing a look at it se thanked herself for caring. Integrate weapons into combat system. All weapons fully accepted for integration. That was the fastest Triela had every pressed "Yes" to something in her life.

Her weapons were pulled from her body and into the metalwork behind her. "Weapons Integration stand by. Modifying active transformation system for weapons integration." the computer spoke into Triela's helmet. Her seat shifted and began moving upward. He metal around her wait tightened up but above her wait became more free. The gloves on her arms bulked up and the frame around her opened in many areas. Triela could feel the wind, breath the air. She could see the collection of newly modified guns rising in the racks around her. The zombies were attracted by the noise but, as Triela lifted her arm the left half of the system lit up in firepower, peppering down a swath of zombies.

"Coordinated received" The computer voiced attractively, "Accept new computer coordinator for reception?" Triela accepted. Where the old computer voice was attractive and feminine this one was Nordic and masculine, wrathful in all of it's aspects. "Alright Bitch, now we go'nn destroy everyt'ing! Light de sky up with red!

The remaining systems loaded up. The guns she had given away to the machine had been cannibalized but if they got through this Triela wouldn't care anymore. If we don't succeed will I care anymore either? Triela wondered as she aimed for the skies and fired off, keeping Matsui out of her targeting range. Her car mounted guns kept the zombies at bay and her torso cannons fired at the warheads. I hope this doesn't go completely wrong Triela thought, indeed suspecting bombs to explode when shot out of the sky, as any reasonable person would. But orders from the top were as such. Her handler had given the word.

In the air Matsui leaped from stage to stage. These one foot wide balls of matter were nuclear and each one of them had that little red light. They made for easy targets if you remembered to cut them before you landed, right? His movements were fractaline, bouncing from the most convenient location to the next. Now that ground fire had been initiated Matsui felt better at the odds of cutting five hundred little wires in midair about to fall to his death.

"This is CRAZY!" He realized in full Japanese wail, cutting through yet another warhead and bypassing it entirely. It was insanity, he was going to die, surely! A shell zipped by his body, cutting his shirt open as she fell. "Watch out down there!" He rared as his spear swiped through the air to cut out another bomb. He didn't like the look of it bu the ground was getting uncomfortably close and the number of warheads taken care of only crawling toward the desired 0. There was only one thing to do...

The sky brightened. Below Triela jerked to cover herself but the light was not an explosion. Matsui's body came alight. He almost seemed to float. Medli soared nearby. Her head itched fiercely. She didn't want to die. What was that feeling in the back of her head? She wanted to sing, to play her harp... harp? What did that mean? She blacked out suddenly.

Matsui floated, still falling but slower, glowing bright. The Shinpaku flag's lettering emboldened itself in the light of the day, little as was there any longer. The day had been dragging on. "Shinpaku Slash!" He called and the spear glowed brightly. He swept the tip through the air slowly and the edge erupted into a blade of energy, cutting the air like a traveling blade. Everything it touched was cut perfectly. And it went some way. Another cutting beam and another after another. The warheads split left and right but it wasn't enough. Matsui was no true master as Kenichi's teachers had been. What would Tosaka Shigure do? A picture of the tall, buxom weapon master "hmpphing" came to his mind. Matsui gave one hopeful look to the ground, his confidence shattered to notice that, soon enough, he would splatter. Kenichi wouldn't be scared by this fall, would he?

Back Under

Ed frantically hacked at the system. This was years before her. She had to reroute all of her good skills and then reverse engineer them to work in stupid! Lilly read off status calmly, as though none of this affected her. What else could she do though? Ed struggled in her head briefly before slapping herself mentally back into place. If she didn't hit the right buttons here... would Semiaghn matter at all anymore? A pair of delicate fingers went to Ed's glasses, then pulled a string out, attached it to the console. There wasn't an adapter or any kind of place to plug it in but suddenly her glasses lit up. The screen worked double time. Ed was inside. Her digital body floated through the abyss, moving data from here to there. She could concentrate better in complete digitalization.

"T-minus seventeen seconds until impact." Lilly's voice echoed into the radio. Please don't explode, Ed wanted to say. But she really did have that option, that control. She had to actually use it.

Matsui fell on the monitor. He had stopped glowing; he was out of steam. Medli caught him. Triela fired on hordes of zombies, peppering shots into the sky to knock out other warheads. How many more? Lilly would know. Shut it all down. Shut it all down! Vincent soared about, doing what he could. "Ten seconds until impact." Lilly's voice echoed through the system. Medli was screaming or speaking or something on the screen. It was clearly not to Matsui. Ed applied audio. She was... singing. Ed went back to work. Vincent got struck on the head by a dead warhead. He was falling. Triela was being overrun. "Five Seconds Until Impact." Lilly read.

Triela's unit self destructed. The gunslinger got out, pistol in hand as her body tumbled from the flaming wreckage into the horde. Vincent regained his flight, soaring down to assist Triela. "Four." Medli's body cast aglow the sky as Matsui's had earlier, though this glow, instead of a bright golden color, was dusty brown and earthy red, still aglow like no other light having been made on this earth. "Three." Ed scampered about the system, trying to find that off switch. She didn't have time for this. She'd gotten full clearance "Two."

There it was! That bit of data! Ed secured the operation and got through the wall. "One." Wait... Two person operation only? She needed another person!"

… There was a boom. The warheads detonated. The flash was brighter than a hundred suns. Suddenly, the world stopped. Blind from the flash through her glasses, Ed stared through the screen as time slowly rewound. The light of Medli was the only thing that moved unusually for the standard backward timing. The glow sank back into her as time rewound. "T-minus Seventeen Seconds Until Impact."

She had another chance. Never mind that time travel was supposedly impossible but she had another chance! "Lilly, stop reading from there, put your finger over this button and press it when I say!" Lilly stepped to the keyboard as Ed repeated her dive. The screens played out how they were supposed to, save Medli didn't glow this time. The number came. "Now!"

Above

The warheads hit the ground with a dull thud. Weapons systems in the base took over, after so long having been down. The hammer-down protocol terminated, Ed was able to get everything back up and working before Triela's mech was damaged too much for repair. Everyone was safe.

They parted. Ed never mentioned anything to Medli. The Rito never mentioned anything to her. But the stare-down between them when they all said goodbye... Well they both knew and they knew they were the only ones. It was a shame they had to part but Ed was able to fix up a good small aircraft for their return. Shinpaku Federation, however, took the SUV. Triela had kept her mech.

When they returned Ed was glad to see things hadn't fallen apart. Yuko was setting up Nexus and Chouji was training new recruits. Everyone else just lazed about as usual. The supplies Ed had gotten would fuel the next part of her place as a member of The Legacy Of Eight. The electronics from the Portland Base, and the nuclear warheads didn't hurt to take apart either, would help Ed recover "Bebop Tech." The sooner Ed setup her branch the better. Though it would have to wait some time Ed knew better than to think this trip had been worth nothing. She told Yuko later of who they had met. The Shinpaku Federation would be noted in Semiaghn's history.

{HR}

There ya be. Sorry if it was unlike what you wanted. Took me a while T_T

As you may have noticed, there are new characters:

Shinpaku Matsui – History's Strongest Disciple Kenichi – 23

Medli – Legend Of Zelda: The Wind Waker – 22

Lilly Stechin – Pumpkin Scissors – 24

Triela – Gunslinger Girl – 20

If you haven't guessed the pairings of this group yet, you're silly XP

For now Shinpaku is not going to have much interaction with The Legacy Of Eight, but they'll be back ^^