A/N: Alright! Chapter 4 time! I don't own King of Fighters, Fatal Fury, or Art of Fighting, although as of February 17, 2006, I can get to Geese Howard in Art of Fighting 2! Funny, I think he's cooler with long hair… but I digress. Onto the first epic fight of the story!
P.S. I scratched out that Ikari Warriors line from last chapter. It makes no sense that Leona would go there right away, but don't worry! She'll get there eventually.
"Last chance to back out," Goenitz said as he and Geese stared straight into each other. "We have no idea how strong I'll be."
"I'll manage," Geese answered back, "besides, I'm fighting for things I value."
"Money and your own life?"
"Exactly."
Maki, Chizuru, Leona, Vice, and Mature just kept their distance, along with the other Yata clan members, noticing immediately as Goenitz bent over, tendons erupting like cables around is neck and head as he then looked back up, eyes showing a malevolent blue color.
Orochi Goenitz was out, and before Geese could even notice a significant difference in his fighting stance, the German man just stuck his hand out as a huge gust of wind literally blew Geese away.
"I was hoping," the evil man stated as Geese tried to get to his feet, "That you'd be more of a challenge for my new powers." He looked around, seeing the others surrounding him and Geese. He'd deal with them all later, well… not all of them.
Two blue beams flew out of his hand, striking both Vice and Mature in their hearts as they too bent over, the people around them running away.
Well now we got what we wanted, Vice thought miserably as she and Mature both coughed up a significant amount of blood, now I just hope… The Orochi overtook her, That all these bastards die!
She and Mature jumped down on two fleeing men, slamming their feet into their targets' backs. The sounds of bones shattering erupted from the arena before Maki rammed into Vice and kicked behind her to catch Mature.
"Always trying to cause problems, bitch?" Vice growled as she charged again.
"Maki!" shouted Chizuru as she ran to help her sister, but Maki shook her head as she managed to deflect Vice's kick.
"Just get away from here! If I die, you have to carry the responsibilities of Yata clan!"
Chizuru, like the others there, left Geese and Maki to stem the forces of Japan's greatest evil.
Okay… Geese thought as he did his best to keep up with the ungodly (if Geese only knew why) Goenitz, but it was rather apparent he was on the defensive, for once.
WHAM! He managed to catch Goenitz with a full power Reppuken, knocking it into the priest's leg and causing the Orochi king to stumble. Geese followed up with a harsh rising kick to the jaw, falling down in the process to knock Goenitz in the gut with his other foot. He rolled away from the monstrosity, hoping he had done at least minor damage.
And Goenitz just laughed, and then grinned wide. Not a single tooth was chipped, not a speck of his own blood on his entire body.
"Geese Howard," Goenitz stated as he suddenly appeared in front of Geese, gutting him with a brutal punch before tossing him around like a rag doll, "God as a little patch of Hell all set out for you, and I'm the man to send you there!" Geese managed to stop himself from being slammed into the ground with his hands, then swung his left hand up into his enemy's groin with all his strength.
The act finally caused Goenitz to show minimal signs of injury, but Geese followed up with immediately with his favorite attack as he freed himself for even more damage. Geese caught Goenitz in the face with an uppercut, knocked away a brutally fast punch, and continued the abuse as best he could. Punches, kicks, uppercuts, knees, elbows, everything Geese had in his repertoire of physical attacks slammed into Goenitz, ending with a particularly painful, glowing, open-faced palm.
And yet Goenitz just backed up a few steps, and wiped the negligible smear of blood from his lips. "Deadly Rave, eh?" Leopold asked, "I never thought a man such as yourself would be so underpowered." A quick glance over to Vice and Mature showed them holding Maki in a stalemate, and unfortunately, no one had died yet. Best to start with the strongest.
Goenitz thrust his hand out again, this time a huge blast of wind knocked into Geese, lifting him up in the air and holding him there. Goenitz then casually walked over to him and punched him…
Right into a tree. Howard was sure he heard bones breaking as he tried to move again, but another intense force of wind held him there as Goenitz again just walked over and smiled. "Your Deadly Rave is a chain of attacks stemming your own emotions, correct?" He asked to the struggling Geese. "Perhaps I can show you how I do it." A blur of rapid-fire punches blasted into Geese's body, and the best the American businessman was able to do was dodge enough that no vital area of his body was hit.
"Stop!" cried a voice as Goenitz turned away from the black and blue Geese to see that little girl standing there, Leona.
Goenitz just smiled. "Four Orochi awakened today?" He laughed. "Perfect." Another blue cable struck out of his hand, this time catching its target in the head. The little girl's eyes went wide and she howled in pain as a strange blue aura enveloped her and her hair again turned blood red…
Yet no blood frothed from her mouth, it seemed that something quite different had emerged in the little girl. Leona just stared back at Goenitz, and for the first moment of his new life, the Orochi in him recoiled.
"You made a mistake in breaching the doors of exorcism inside of me," Leona said in a confident voice of someone that acted older than they actually were. "For a far more powerful snake has taken the Orochi's place inside of me."
Goenitz, looking back at Geese, smacked him across the face to knock him unconscious, letting the exhausted man fall to the ground, and then turned back to Leona.
"I see, and may I have the name of the being I am fighting?" Goenitz asked, deciding to end this fight quickly.
"It's still Leona, Orochi. But if you're asking for the serpent god inside of me, it's Aido-Hwedo."
"Never heard of- grg," Goenitz grunted as Leona had managed to get the drop on him, kicking his kneecap with the heel of her foot. He struggled back and struck the girl across the face, sending Leona spiraling. Another gust of wind, pulled her back to him, but Leona angled and spun with the attack, and when the young servant of this "Aido-Hwedo" came thundering back, her small feet pounded into Goenitz's stomach.
What? Goenitz thought as he stumbled away. The power of this Aido-Hwedo possibly exceeds my own! Master, what has happened?
Yet the Orochi was silent, for it too was afraid of what it had unleashed: one of its own kind. All it told Goenitz was to kill Leona, quickly, mercilessly, and above all else, right here and right now.
Goenitz complied, managing to catch the creature in its throat and began squeezing. Leona struggled against the grip, yet it seemed that even Aido-Hwedo had his (or possibly her) limits for such a little girl. Leona managed to break free, but she almost immediately had to face Goenitz in front of her again.
Leona, having no possible fighting skills prior, was merely following what the blue snake told her, but it could only do so much against a disciplined man of god now strengthened by the Orochi and obtaining great speed, skill, and strength almost instantaneously.
Leona ducked under a swift kick, rolled to her back, kicked upwards, and managed to hit Goenitz's left leg hard enough for the King of the Orochi to cry out in pain. Leona didn't see the other leg coming, however, and was punted hard into Maki, who had just succeeded in knocking both Vice and Mature out thanks to illusions with the Mirror of Yata to distract them. Both Maki and Leona slumped down, fazed and unable to offer resistance as Goenitz walked up to them, ready for the killing blows.
Finally Master, our victory is assured, Goenitz thought before he caught a hard kick to the back of the head. He turned to see… Geese standing there, bloody, bruised, but seemingly victorious.
"You've lost a lot of your power from that little girl, didn't you?" Geese asked as he managed to form a decent stance. He was going at less than quarter power, but he was hoping Goenitz was even lower.
Goenitz didn't even bother changing his stance, he just returned the favor and struck Geese hard across the face.
Some hope. And yet… the attack seemed easy enough to recover from, and Geese managed to knee up into Goenitz's gut. He slammed his fists down as Goenitz doubled over, finishing up the chain with one good planting of his foot into the German's face.
Needless to say, it Goenitz did not instantly recover from that round of abuse, yet Geese felt his own strength quickly fading.
"Damn you!" the Orochi-powered man howled in frustration, "I will not lose to a man that values nothing!" He charged again, noticing Geese leaping into the air and falling back, slashing down with a Chi-powered chop.
"'Values nothing'?" Geese repeated as he slashed across Goenitz's face and again managed to knock him away. "Don't compare me to Bogard." But his legs gave out… he was out of steam, and Goenitz (beaten as badly as he was) was the winner.
"Just die," Goenitz said as another spurt of wind blasted into Howard as the American just gave up. He just gave up… on trying to survive this fight. His life was something he held very dearly, but maintaining his high win-loss ratio was something more important.
He would not lose.
As the gust thundered towards Geese, tearing the ground of the now blood red field, he reached deep inside of him for one, just one Reppuken. He found the strength he never thought was there and slammed it into the ground, charging underneath the ground wave, using it as a windshield against the attack and rolling right into Goenitz's face to just punch and kick. There was no grace, there was no style. Geese just punched and kicked into Goenitz's torso, ignoring the fact when he could barely lift his legs anymore and compensating for trying to punch harder and harder.
And then everything went black.
Huh? Oh shit. I'm dead.
You'd like to think that, wouldn't you, Geese.
Master Tung! What are you doing here?
I'm not here, considering this is just your mind and you're hallucinating. Now who's the senile old man!
Very funny, sir. Now do you have a reason for being here?
Actually, yes. Good job out there. You took down…"…A King of the Orochi!" shouted a voice as Geese woke up, finding himself in a hut. Standing around him was a celebrating Goenitz, Maki, Chizuru, Vice, Mature, and a whole host of other Yata clan members. They all had their various scrapes and cuts -or scars, in Goenitz's case-, but they'd all recover.
Geese looked down at himself, seeing he was bandaged up quite a bit and his hakama outfit had been removed in return for a similar white, one-piece robe. He quickly realized his entire body ached like utter hell, and tried to dismiss the people around him as best he could.
"Thank you very much," Geese said, "But I'm am crippled and would prefer being alone to recover."
"If you insist," Maki said as they group left, leaving Geese alone to do some quality thinking. Slowly, some concepts came to his head.
One, considering Goenitz had jumped from pansyass to God in about five seconds convinced Geese that the Orochi power was not to be trifled with. Of course, Geese would rather not like to go crazy and kill everyone around him, considering what good was having all the power when there wasn't anyone to flaunt it over?
Two, Geese had learned there were people stronger than him, as hard as it was to admit. And with taking the Orochi power out of the question, Geese was stuck with just plain old training.
Three, that "Aido-Hwedo" was also not to be trifled with, but until he did research, this second snake would be even more of a mystery. At least he knew the Orochi legends…
And finally, Geese expected to receive the funds he had been promised by the end of the week.
Leona sighed as she wondered how she could so easily pack up all her belongings into a single bag.
"Hello?" asked a voice as Leona turned to see Chizuru standing there in her red biker jumpsuit. "I just wanted to say thanks for today and saving my sister and all."
Leona nodded before chuckling in a depressed manner. "Yeah. Any idea what this Aido-Hwedo is, anyways?"
"Just some old snake god from an African creation myth," Chizuru answered. "So it seems there's more than one ancient snake out there."
"Well," Leona said as she walked outside, "I've gotta go. Did you find an orphanage suitable yet?"
Chizuru nodded. "Yeah. So what'll you do?"
"Don't know. Probably find some sort of group later on that would help me hunt down the other four Orochi and seal them away. I'll keep in touch, though.
"No sign of the Orochi in you either," Maki stated as Vice finally could let off her pessimistic outlook for a short bit. So far, both Vice and Mature had checked out Orochi-free, and now it was just Goenitz's turn. Maki place the Mirror of Yata on to his head and delved deep, making sure that this was not just some underhanded trick.
Maki quickly sized up the surroundings as a fairly mountainous region, with significant wind blowing around. What caught Maki's eye was a giant, Aztec style pyramid right in front of her that seemed completely out of place. Cautiously, Maki walked up the steps, keeping an eye out for anything else that seemed out of place.
The pyramid was larger than Maki had thought, and her trek up it took a long while, but at the top, Maki looked around and saw a strange green jewel on the ground. Maki walked over to it and picked it up, and on closer inspection realized it was an egg.
Slowly, the egg cracked open, and Maki gasped. In her hands looked to be something that she was confused by. It looked like a cross between a small action figure, a snake, and a bird. It was in the shape of a person, yet its skin was dark green and various feathers were on it in certain places.
"Oh, hello," the little creature asked, shocking Maki almost enough to drop it. "Oh, sorry about this talking thing. Would you mind putting me down, I'd like to stretch my legs."
Bewildered, Maki complied and put the creature down as it almost instantaneously grew up to an average height for an adult male. "Who… exactly are you?"
"Well, technically I'm a part of Leopold," the snake-man answered. "I'm sort of like the Orochi considering we both have people we're reincarnated as."
"Like with Leona and that Aido-Hwedo snake thing?"
"Exactly!" The creature answered. "I guess you could say Goenitz is like my reincarnation."
"But who are you?" Maki asked, confused.
"Quetzocoatl," the being answered while bowing down. "One of the seven serpents of legend."
"SEVEN?" Maki almost shrieked. Six more creatures like the Orochi out there? Not good at all!
"Not like that!" Quetzocoatl said, shaking his hands in front of him in an attempt to calm Maki down. "Okay. I guess I'll have to start from the beginning…"
"Wow, Athena!" said a number of kindergartners around her, amazed at her incredible stories about her donning ancient armor and fighting evil. "You have the best stories!"
"But they're not stories!" Athena Asamiya said in a frustrated tone. "They really did happen!"
Of course, none of the students really believed her, and the young girl was stuck with another lunch time alone sitting on the grass. Slowly, Athena worked her way through her meal, crying quietly until a boy walked up to her.
"You okay?" asked the boy as Athena looked up at him. She quickly wiped away the tears and sighed.
"Who are you?"
"I'm Kyo Kusanagi," the boy answered. "I'm in fourth grade. I hear you tell great stor- I mean, you talk about your great adventures."
"Really?" Athena asked, looking up at the boy. "Do you really mean that?"
"Yeah. Why don't you tell me about some of them?"
A/N: The secret's out! Not only are there eight people out there powered with the Orochi, but there are also six more people that are the reincarnations of ancient serpent gods! Of course, Geese is in the mood to head back to Southtown and rebuild his criminal empire, but a few things are standing in his way… like creating a new identity in Delayed Travels.
P.S. Athena is just enough years away from Kyo so if Kyo has to repeat each grade of high school once, then they'll graduate in the same year. I planned it that way.
Also! Since Goenitz, Vice, and Mature are no longer Orochi-powered (and Vice and Mature won't work for Rugal) they will have entirely new movesets! Unfortunately, I'm not THAT creative to renovate three characters that much, so this is your chance to lend a hand in creating attacks and moves!
Example: (follow this pattern)
Name: West Wind
Used by: Goenitz
Type of move: projectile/keep away
Level of power: not that much
Description: Goenitz thrusts his hand out and a gust of wind slams into his enemy, knocking them back. The heavier they are, the less they will travel.