Entry 7- Origins I
…
When the war of the giants is over the wars of the pygmies will begin.
-Winston Churchill 1874-1965
Everyone in the bus was shocked to see a old friend like Misao had made it, she was standing there in front of her best friends from back in the day. One could only imagine what she was thinking. "Well?" Apparently she was still on the topic of 'what the hell are you doing in by bus?' Good question, wrong time to ask it. She stood there expecting a response, Kagami rose first to give a response but clearly Misao was waiting for her to stand up and respond so she could deliberately cut her off mid sentence. "Ah who the hell cares, what's up guys?" She said as she entered the bus closing the door behind her.
"Uh well." Kagami had prepared to say something else involving why they were in this bus. But after what had happened a matter of minutes ago, she was starting to think that it wouldn't be appropriate to say that. She paused before she continued. "It's just…" She really hesitated to say it. "Matsuri…" That was about all she could get out. Misao looked at where Matsuri would be right now. She understood, for a moment she looked pretty sad too.
"Alright well… lets dig a hole." She said a lot more enthusiastically than she really should have. Kagami looked at her with disgust wondering, what the hell is the matter with you? Just as Kagami was going to likely go punch her in the mouth, Konata held her back.
"Let me handle this." She told her as she got up to go deal with Misao. Konata left the bus with Misao. Kagami didn't really know what it was she was going to do, especially now since Konata was the only person around who knew what the fuck was going on. Damn it sucked to be anyone right now.
Kagami was all alone in the bus with Miyuki and the others. Tsukasa sounded like she was in pain, Miyuki must have been sewing a wound back together and didn't have any anesthetics to use, believe me, that fucking hurts to have a needle drivin through your skin with a thread. She moved over to where Miyuki was working on her injured sister. She looked at where she was working on, her whole left arm was practically shredded by bullets, yet she was still pulling through. Tsukasa had seen some shitty times since the rods destroyed everything, but nothing like what had happened here. At least she was getting help, which was a whole lot more than what had actually happened for Matsuri. Kagami watched Miyuki, she threaded a needle into her arm over and over and all Tsukasa had the ability to do was scream in pain, she had really drawn the short stick. Kagami had to be near by Tsukasa in case she lost it again, which would literally kill everyone in the bus if she did.
Tsukasa moaned and groaned as the last few stitches were put in. Kagami held on to her little sister arm, the one that didn't turn into paste i mean. She stayed here, she needed to. Poor little Tsukasa was too frail and unstable to be left alone. She glanced at Miyuki, then to Kagami, and then she glanced at Minami, Tsukasa was trying to get a hold of herself, even she knew how much of a danger she was to everyone. "Kagami." Tsukasa said to her twin.
"What Tsukasa?" She replied. She got closer, Kagami leaned in on Tsukasa only to have the most surprising thing she would have ever expected. Tsukasa grabbed her neck and she started to shake her violently, Miyuki immediately backed off, she knew it was best to let someone other than the moe character try to break up a fight. Almost as if on cue, Minami had reached in to try to separate the two. At the moment, Minami honestly didn't care if she was on their side or her own side, for now it didn't matter, stop Tsukasa, find out why later. She grabbed Tsukasa's arm and twisted it off of Kagami's neck. She immediately let go of Kagami, Tsukasa looked at Minami, she really did lose it for a moment. All she could do was apologize for doing that.
"I'm sorry" She said in her usual tone, she wasn't the type of girl to choke out another just for the hell of it, Kagami was, but Tsukasa wasn't. Minami nodded, she knew she was being genuine, or she was an excellent liar, one way or the other, one ordeal over, now Miyuki has finish patching up Tsukasa. Just then Misao came back into the bus with the others. She looked as she usually does, big smile on her face… Why?
She started talking to them in the manner she always did. "Hi guys." Completely oblivious to the fact that someone is dead. "How's it hanging?" Miyuki and Minami ignored her seeing how they were busy healing Tsukasa. Kagami only looked at her puzzled as ever. Yutaka looked happy to see a someone she knew was still alive and Tsukasa… She couldn't see her, or hear her for that matter, so she is just kicking back and waiting to be healed. "Well?" She asked so bluntly.
"I'm trying to work over here, please, i need focus." Miyuki told Misao
"Sorry." She said to Miyuki, she leaned up to Kagami and Yutaka and then started whispering. "So, how's it hanging?" This clearly her first encounter with another human in a long time. "Well?" She was obviously anxious to find out what the poor old Hiiragi's had going for them.
"Well, Matsuri and Inori are…"
Misao cut her off mid sentence. "Yeah, Izumi filled me in on the details." She started, "She volunteered to dig the hole. She says its the least she could do to help take that weight off your shoulders." When Kagami heard that, she like Konata actually cares and was sorry, plus it was getting dark and she was already tired as it was, the fact that she was volunteering to do something no one wants to do that is already annoyingly hard said a lot. Misao continued. "So, other than your dead sisters-" Kagami's face went from semi touched back to pissed in 2 seconds flat. "How are things with you guys, meet anyone new? See any new movies? Been anywhere?" She was trying to sound as casual as possible, if that was even possible.
Kagami shrugged, she tried asking Misao the questions this time. "Misao, what have you been doing this entire time?" She started "What have you done since the good old days?" She asked sarcastically. Kagami wasn't expecting a quick response from her, maybe a 'i get the point' kinda toned answer or at least sorry. What she got was something totally different.
"Oh, i've been living on my own for the past 2 years!" She almost yelled that one wit joy. Miyuki, who was just about done with Tsukasa, stopped and looked at her. No wonder she was crazy, hasn't seen anyone for the past 2 years. At least no one nice to her. "It all start 2 years ago."
Kagami couldn't help but say. "Duh!"
"It all happened one Christmas Eve. I was with Ayano, Hiyori and Patty. Well, with Ayano and Patty at the time. It all happened there."
Origins I- Misao
Misao Kusakabe, Girl
A residential home in Japan
12:09:09.03
Misao and Ayano were playing a simple game of chess, literally. They were sitting at a small dinner table, the table had only the chess board, the pieces to chess and a lamp. The lamp was lighting the game while they played. Misao was behind, which was pissing her off, a lot. 4 months since the rods impacted and all they had to do to pass the time was play Chess and read Hiyori's Doujinshi, most of them were themed around one thing of course, Minami and Yutaka, so they knew just about everything that was going to happen in every single one she wrote. Of course they didn't tell her they were reading them, everyone knew how she would react if she had found out they were reading her special books.
"We were waiting on Hiyori that day, she said that the day before she found some ham at a place not too far from our house, so she left to get it, Ayano told her to grab some extra clothing layers because of how much snow there was outside, around 8-10 inches of it. On that day, a lot of shit changed."
The two sat in total concentration, the only other sound, other than breathing, was Patricia turning the pages on one of Hiyori's Doujinshi. Hiyori was supposed to be there around now, she's late and being late in times like this is a really concerning thing. Misao had just about gotten herself in checkmate, Ayano's queen had Misao's king locked between it and a Night, Nowhere for her to go now. She knocked her King over to show she lost. She wasn't too thrilled she lost, for the 4th time in a row… today… man she sucks. Ayano chuckled at that, she knew it was funny that she was trying to beat her, for the past few months, every game Misao challenged Ayano to, she lost. Except for chutes and ladders, that game is all about luck, not skill, so she won at least once while playing that.
Patty finally got bored of reading the same Doujin for like the 3rd time in a row, Hiyori needed to write a chapter to this soon, this was boring her. Patty walked over to the table where Misao lost to Ayano. "Who won this time?" She asked as if she didn't already know the answer to that.
Misao looked at her aggravated as all hell. "Who do you think?" She told her. Patty chuckled, she then glanced at the clock and saw it was really late, if Hiyori wasn't back soon, they actually might have to go out and get her, which would not be a good thing for this small group. Patty had recently taking one hell of a hit a few weeks back and had a limp and Misao… well she just wasn't in the mood to leave the house.
"We should probably find her you know." She told the group. Ayano agreed by nodding her head, she was in charge of getting the stuff for Christmas. Mainly the water and ham.
"I say she might be off looking for Iwazaki and Kobayakawa. You know she can't get enough of those two." Misao told them.
They both knew how true that was, they just didn't want to believe she would endanger everyone else just to go look for two people who were likely dead. "We should at least consider looking for her." Ayano told Misao.
"If we leave, then we might end up dead too." Misao responded.
"If we don't do something, then Hiyori will die." Ayano argued.
"But if we leave then we all die" Misao argued in reply.
Just as Misao made that statement, the door starting banging. Someone was there and wanted in. Ayano drew her pistol from her pocket [FYI Pistol in the pocket is a shitty idea, get a real holster] she walked with caution as she prepared for what might be at the door. Misao had drew her Machete as Ayano got closer. The door had stopped banging, but they knew someone was there. The closer they got, the more likely someone was going to burst through the door and kill them. Misao kept the Machete as close as could be. Ayano quickly opened the door with her gun drawn out. Nobody was there. Wrong. Misao looked down and dropped her Machete in horror, Hiyori was on the floor bleeding out. "Oh Shit!" Ayano exclaimed as she dropped her pistol… lucky it didn't go off. She dragged Hiyori back into the house, she was desperately trying to breath but there was a large stab wound in her chest making breathing a difficulty. Patty, who was hiding behind the couch because she didn't have a weapon to defend herself with. She saw that Hiyori had been severely injured. She rushed over to help them, she was the only one here who knew what the fuck they were doing when it came to medical attention, thank god for them. Misao put her on the couch she was on and began to check her wound. Patty was the first to begin working. Hiyori had been stabbed in the gut with presumably a knife and was bleeding out every second, whatever had happened with her, it must have been bad, he glasses had a big crack through it and had blood staining the right lense and she was also moaning in pain every second, basically crying.
"I need some help here." Patty told the others. Hiyori was trying to speak, but she was having extreme difficulty getting anything more than a grunt out. "Now!" She commanded. Ayano was busy trying to get some medical supplies from the cupboard over in the kitchen when Misao spoke to her.
"Well, that worked out perfectly huh?" She told her while trying to keep Hiyori from dying by doing what patty was informing her to do.
"What did?" Ayano asked as she grabbed the last of the penicillin.
"Not going to get, her." She told her. When she said that, it clearly pissed off Ayano because she dropped the Penicillin in anger.
"What do you mean?" She said angrily.
"I mean she came home anyway." Is what Misao had responded with. Ayano looked at Misao with anger, what she just said pissed her the fuck off.
"Uh guys…" Patty tried to interrupt. "I need you two to put some pressure on this wound." Ayano ignored her and
"She was stabbed! Is that really what's important here!" She asked loudly as her blonde hair was slowly getting covered with sweat and blood.
"Well, just saying." Is what Misao responded with.
"I'm just saying if we had gone out sooner to find her-" she started as she tried to apply as much pressure to her wound as she could. "-Then maybe she wouldn't have been stabbed."
"She would have been anyway." Misao had replied.
Patty again tried to stop the two from fighting. "Please, she's… very hurt."
Misao had completely ignored Patty and continued to argue with Ayano. "She was clearly stabbed not long ago, even if we had left-" She paused to try to keep applying a steady rate of pressure "She still would have been stabbed. There really wasn't anything we could do."
Ayano now enraged by Misao's latest comment stopped helping Patty with Hiyori's injury and yelled at Misao "Saying there was nothing we could have done to help her is like saying you just gave up!"
Misao stopped with helping Patty, now she was more concerned with Ayano. She removed her hands from Hiyori's stab wound and swung at Ayano. Her face was that of someone determined to kill someone. Her first hit with such force that Ayano's head had flew back a bit and caused her to fall over. Misao had walked over to her body, now only semi conscious, and picked her up by her shirt. Patty, who was behind them had left Hiyori's side to try to put an end to the fighting between two of the only people she knew. Misao, with Ayano now in hands began to talk to her. "I never-" She growled her words, "I Never Give Up." She said as she flung Patty of of her, i mean really flung her off.
Ayano was not one to forget such a incident so easily and headbutted Misao right in the nose and had caused her to drop her. Ayano landed on the ground and as soon as she was able to, she turned her head to the left to see a small pipe, not 1 foot in length and a inch or so in diameter… and they just have one of these lying around in their house? Damn. She swung it with as much might as she could but by the time she swung, Misao had gained all her composure again and had blocked her swing with her hand and ripped the pipe out of her hand and swung it back at Ayano and had hit her in the head which in turn also broke the pipe. She threw the now useless broken pipe over at where Patty was sitting on her couch and started to pound her face with her bare fists. Patty at this point, every japanese word is lost from her vocabulary. She was just sitting there grumbling words in english as she watched Misao beat Ayano half to death. Each swing she made bloodied her fist ever so more. The only thing that caused Misao to stop punching Ayano in the face was the sounds of a certain Otaku in the room to try and speak. Hiyori had actually managed to get a few words out.
"Misao-" She tried to start, the blood was filling her lungs and made every breath she took harder and every word she tried to annunciate slur. "Misao stop." Two words this time, progress. "You need to stop Misao." Now there are complete sentences, Medal of Honor recipient right there. "She is your friend-" Blood filled her throat before she could finish that statement. She couched it all up and now Patty rushed over to help her out however she only pushed her away before she finished talking to Misao. "She is your friend Misao, you don't need to-" she stopped talking. Slowly she stopped breathing. Patty immediately started giving first aid to the black haired Otaku on the floor.
Misao slowly got up off Ayano. Her face was dripping with blood and by the looks of it, she had quite a few bruises that probably were going to hurt all the way up to Saint Patrick's. She only looked in horror of the one time friend she once knew, now half way dead from a beating she delivered not too long ago. Misao looked to Patty to see that she was doing the best she could to stop Hiyori from bleeding out where she lay. Misao decided that it was time to go. Obviously when Ayano woke up, she was not going to be happy that and she really didn't feel like being around when Hiyori finds out they were reading her super secret doujinshi she had stashed away. That is assuming she made it.
Misao walked away grabbing her coat before she left. Her coat, which was worn down alot since the rods made impact, was olive green, kinda like a army coat, minus the camo. She left, a little ashamed of what she just did. Weeks of starvation and thirst lead to this. This little event was all it took to drive these friends over the edge.
Patty with total regret and sadness in her eyes as Misao had left the house for what would seem like the last time.
A good 2-3 hours had gone by since Misao had finished telling the story and the usual sounds of nights in the city were heard, gunshots from the gangs and an occasional scream, although that was rare. Everyone had their own ways of dealing with what was going on out there. There were nights when even Konata couldn't cry enough to go to sleep, those were the nights where besides a kerosene lamp she read her manga.
The Hiiragi's dealt with these nights by huddling up in the living room, everyone in one place, makes you feel safe and yet was a very uncomforting thought.
Miyuki and her band of friends, Minami and Yutaka, usually just closed the curtains and shut up. they were not too far from a gang base, that meant they needed to be extra careful. That was especially true with the toddler Yukiteru.
Misao… who knows how the fuck she deals with issues like this.
Asides from that the night was going excellently. Konata however was still taking the dirty and stomach turning job of burying the dead.
Tsukasa now underneath Kagami's arms, sleeping. This was one of the few things that was guaranteed to keep Tsukasa from losing control and killing everyone right where they stood, not the sleeping part… if anything sleeping made it worst, more nightmares to haunt her and more hell to go through for her and anyone and everyone around her. Being in Kagami's arm's while she slept though, made it loads easier for her to sleep. Maybe being in such close proximity to her twin made it easier for her to keep the bad dreams away and the flashbacks or maybe just having someone comfort her was all it takes. Either way, it kept the crazy away.
Misao was busy talking to a rock, yeah an actual rock. Apparently his name was JT Kirk.… god what wonder what that's a reference to.
Miyuki was laying on her back trying to sleep, it was past dark out there. She was undoubtedly thinking of going home to Yuki, she missed him more than the fear she would be shot where she stood and that fear never went away, only got worst.
Minami and Yutaka were fast asleep. Minami was laying against a chair in the bus while Yutaka was asleep on her shoulder. If Hiyori were here right now…
Kagami was teetering between being awake and falling asleep. She hadn't slept so wonderfully the last few days and adding today to the mix just makes it harder for her. That was when Konata walked in, she had opened the rear door of the bus and had closed the door behind her. "Hey Kagami." She said to Kagami who was now coming back around and not sleeping.
"What?" She asked rudely.
"Someones tired." Kagami said as joyful as could be in this situation, Kagami just ignored her. "I finished by the way." She told Kagami, she had finally finished burning Matsuri, she couldn't bury Inori considering she was way the fuck back at the house, which was now a hour and a half away by car.
"Fine." Kagami responded with.
"That's it?" Konata asked as if there were supposed to be more to it.
"Yeah…" She paused afterwards before continuing. "Thanks." She said weakly. That was all Konata needed to hear to know that she had done good, or at least started to make up for what she did. It was a start, not very big, but it was a start.
For Konata, that last task was a very difficult one. It isn't a easy job to bury someone, even for a fully grown adult male. Now consider Konata, the average [American] male is about 6 foot tall, weighs about 190 [in America it's 495] and could probably dig the hole for about 3 hours before collapsing from exhaustion. Konata is 4'9 and only around 80 lbs at most. That was a tough task even on paper.
Konata sat there for a moment, just taking a break. Konata broke the silence between them. "If you want to go talk to her-" Kagami cut Konata off right there.
"No." Such a blunt answer. Tsukasa moved a little which scared the shit outta Kagami at first but after a few moments the fear in Kagami heart dissipated real quickly. Konata had to tell her.
"Kagami, i think you should get some sleep, we got a long trek ahead of us." She said worried for her.
"No, i need to be awake."
"Need?" Konata asked. Kagami didn't respond, Konata's interest fully peaked now asked the simple question. "Why?"
"Because if i don't-" She started. "-I might lose Tsukasa." Kagami told Konata. Konata had to learn what it was that had bothered Kagami so much now.
"How could you-" Konata was cut off by Kagami who sounded very pissed by the mere mentioning of it.
"You don't know what it's like." She told her. "You have only seen her lose it once, i have seen it a thousand times." Is what Kagami told Konata. In all reality, Kagami has seen Tsukasa go over the edge before, too many times to count [Likely not 1000 times, more like 450.], Konata only gave a blank stare back at Kagami, she really didn't know how to reply to that, well she did, just not without pissing her off.
"Sorry." Konata responded with. Kagami just ignored her and continued to slowly run her fingers through Tsukasa's hair. At least she had someone to be with, poor Konata was all alone.
Konata laid back and closed her eyes, she didn't actually sleep, the gunshots in the distance made sure of that, instead she laid there thinking of what to do next, she had the necessary people for the task at hand, now to get them to go with her… come to think of it, where the hell was she supposed to go?
She turned to her left and dug into her backpack pocket and pulled out the cube, it was about 2 ½ inches long, wide and tall. Perfect square, like 36, 49, ect. She pulled open the cube so that it was a triangular prism and started to swipe across it's screen until she figured out where she was supposed to go. Kagami glanced at what Konata was doing. "What are you doing with that thing?" She asked.
"Figuring out where to go." Konata responded with. She flipped through a few of the files until she remembered, the mission directives would definitely tell her where to go. She pushed a button at the top and a screen appears showing the written mission objectives, she had to make sure Kagami could not see the screen, that might compromise the whole mission. She opened up the map and saw the surrounding area. There was a little red arrow at the top pointing down moving up and down, next to said 'close for full view.' So Konata did, she closed the prism back into a cube and the whole map of japan was now open, a 3d graphic showing the area they were in, without Konata's intervention, it zoomed in on where they were. Just like a GPS System, it had lines on the ground showing them the fastest route to something. "Well i'll be damned." She said as she realized where it wanted to send her, a city to the north of where they were. A few days worth of hiking if they didn't stop. While Konata was thinking about this, Misao had secretly been spying on Konata looking at the cube.
"So-" Misao said as if she knew something top secret, Konata was hoping she didn't know anything. "That looks like a 4 day walk."
"Yeah, it does." Konata said very afraid of what this batshit crazy girl might know.
"You really think this one is going to be easy?" She asked Konata.
"Not really." She responded.
"Well, we are definitely going to need bigger guns and a lot more ammo." She said.
"How do you know?" Konata asked Misao.
"Because i was up there not too long ago, you see it all started-" Konata, not wanting to listen to her ramble on for a hour about how she found this out, she just needed the main point, cut her off.
"Get to the point!" She exclaimed.
"There are around 6 very big and powerful gangs that way and it's a rod wasteland." She started. "If we are to have any hope of getting to that city, we need a lot more supplies and manpower than we have now." More manpower, they were already carrying more people around than was needed. Why would they need more people?
"So what you're saying is-" Misao cut her off before she could finish.
"Here, hold JT" She started by underhanding the pet rock JT Kirk into Konata's hand. "Meet me at the old Burger Town by the mall tomorrow at 7. I got an idea!" She exclaimed excited. She got up and grabbed her worn, old, olive colored coat and headed out the door.
Konata got up to try to stop her. "Wait!" She called as she plowed out the door. "It's too…" By the time she got that out, she was already gone. "...Dangerous" She sat down on her knees. Did she just get another person killed?
Kagami saw the whole thing go down, of course she didn't say anything, she felt it would be a bad idea to do so.
Oh well, regardless of what happened. They needed to go to the Burger Town by the mall, that was only a 10 minute walk from there. Konata again laid back, she was ready to cry. But she couldn't not in front of her best friends and cousin. She really needed a nap right now. She closed her eyes and tried to fall asleep, she really tried to sleep. That's when Kagami spoke to her. "If you want." Konata opened her eyes and looked up to see Kagami was offering her a hand. "You can sleep over here, if that would make it any easier to sleep." Kagami told her, even Kagami must have been lonely over there with just Tsukasa. Konata smiled and got up and crawled over to Kagami's spot and laid her head down next to her.
"You should sleep too you know. Don't want little JT here to tell Misao you refused to sleep in her bus." She told Kagami showing her the little rock. Kagami smiled.
She layed down next to Konata and closed her eyes. Even Kagami needed a break, in the morning they would have to wake up and go to Burger Town, but for now, they could sleep peacefully through the night.
Konata always did want to sleep with Kagami. Well, now Konata is literally sleeping with Kagami. Get the joke?
As Konata closed her eyes to sleep she realized something. This was the first time she ever could sleep without crying. Maybe Misao bailing wasn't such a bad thing after all.
Good Night.
A/N. Okay, done with this one.
Next chapter i swear will be the last of Part One: Initiative. You know what that means, time to earn the masks, and that means the Ghosts will rise.
By the way that is the next chapters. Ghosts will rise.
Oh, also, there was a MW2 Easter Egg in it. If you played MW2, you will know what it is.
Okay, let me know what you think and i will see you guys later.
Peace.
-CJM80
