Here we go again
This fic now has a page and a character page on TV-Tropes… that I created. Please check it out, see the path the series will take in the future (yes, I'm taking this baby all the way to 18 books, 19 if I can figure out how to work the Mass Effect 'verse into things), and (if you're a Troper) add in any Tropes not already there (including "Subjectives" – "Awesome Moments", "Funny Moments", "Tear-Jerker", etc):
/Fanfic/TeanasTravels
/Characters/TeanasTravels
As a matter of fact, if you're a "Known" Troper, see if you can get this fic added to the "Fanfic Recs" page (/FanFic/Fanfics); there's a rule against adding one's own works to that page, so I can't do it, but other Troper(s) can. Try and find other Trope pages to mention this fic in, too, to help draw attention to the Trope Page.
PLEASE BOYCOTT "A GAME OF GODS" AND "TWILIGHT OF THE GODS" ON TV-TROPES. If you're feeling like taking a risk, if you see "SOCR", "Colonial", or "Fusionman", be hostile; they're the trio responsible for permanently kicking me out of both (well, I admit I pulled a Jerkass moment, but they all coldly shot down my sincere apologies despite my pleas). Be nice to "Psyga-315", though; he's the only chap of the entire AGOG/TOTG group who stuck by me to the end and tried (and failed) to prevent my exile.
Also, check out my Contributor Page if you want to; just click on "DKN 117" toward the top of the Teana's Travels page and have a look-see. Look but don't touch, though.
…NOOO!-!-! IRONHIDE!-!-!-! Sentinel, you wretched, treacherous bastard!-!-!-!
-CHAPTER START-
Mahora Academy
Outside Evangeline's Cottage
DATE UNKNOWN
The gang had split up, covering various grounds, with Teana & Negi heading back to Class 3-A. And that's where the trouble started. No sooner had the duo reached the classroom then Negi was swamped by the girls there… who nigh-immediately revealed that they all knew he was a mage. As their questions continued to hound an increasingly freaked-out Negi, there was suddenly a very loud 'crack' sound, causing everyone to freeze and look over to Teana, who stood with Mirage Pistol pointed at the ceiling, the hole from a .45-caliber bullet visible in the ceiling.
"All of you girls" she said, using her signature Death Glare, "calm the fuck down, give the poor kid some space, and answer my questions. Got it?"
Everyone nodded, some of them a little pale.
"Now… We just spent some time in a special training chamber where every 24 hours passed equals one hour in the outside world. We were in there for three days, so it should be 9:50 pm of June 21st, and the perfect time to stop Chao's plot. Where in that plan have things gone wrong for us?"
Akira stepped forward. "Today is… July 1st. If you were trying to stop Chao, she must've booby-trapped the time-displaced location you guys were in. Thanks to her, magic is known all throughout the world now."
Negi went very pale.
"Negi-kun?" Makie said worriedly.
"Girls…" Teana said with utmost seriousness. "That we failed to stop Chao means that unless we think of something… Negi will be taken away, turned into an ermine, and locked up for at least a decade, as punishment for failing to stop Chao."
Shocked silence for several seconds, and then
"WHAT?-!-?-!-?-!"
"Why would they do that?-!" Ayaka screamed.
"I've gotten the impression that the head honchos overseeing this branch of magical law are composed of stuffy obstructive bureaucrats" Teana replied. "But… now that I think, there might still be hope! A while back, Negi got his hands on a time-jumper device. It's normally limited to about 24 hours, and he used it to make sure he got everything done during the festival. But if it's only been a week, there might still be some Ancient Magic left in the World Tree's roots. If we can get down there, we could channel it through the Time-Jumper and make a jump back a whole week, and stop this mess from happening!"
"But… what about us?" Makie asked. "We know something incredible about Negi-kun, but if you go back and stop Chao…"
"Hey" Teana said with a smirk. "Knowing this kid's luck, and mine, you'll all find out eventually sooner or later in the proper timeline."
"Y-You really think that?" Negi said shocked.
"Yep! Let's go, kid!"
Teana grabbed hold of Negi's wrist and took off, the boy gathering himself after a few seconds and running alongside her. They soon reached the outside and started hopping across the roofs. However, they suddenly had to break off and land in a courtyard to dodge a series of stun-blast spells. A dark-skinned man landed in front of them, clad in a sharp suit and glasses.
"Gandolfini-san?" Negi asked. "What are you doing?"
"That's far enough, you two" he said, his tone all business. "You failed to stop Chao. Had you not interfered when we tried to take her in last time, none of this would have happened. This is on your heads. I'm taking you both in."
"Hold on" Teana shouted, stepping forward. "We have a way to fix this! We've gotten our hands on a temporal relocation device. We can jump back a week and stop this from happening; all we need is to get to the roots of the World Tree, tap into its mana supply and make the jump back."
"Don't joke around!" the dark-skinned man shouted. "Time travel? That's ridiculous! Now come on!" he drew his magitek pistol.
Teana activated her blade. "We'll be heading back a week… so if I kill you to get past you, it won't affect things in the long run, since undoing Chao's success will erase this timeline. Don't make me spill your blood."
Before anyone could react, a smoke bomb flew in and detonated at Gandolfini's feet; the man coughed and shielded his eyes.
"Gamma-1!"
Teana and Negi turned to the voice, spotting Captain Rex running up, followed by Cody and a squad of ODSTs.
"We've been debriefed by Ahsoka, and we heard your explanation just now. Follow us; we'll link up with the others and get below the Tree."
"Thanks a million, Rex" Teana said with a smile. "I owe ya. Come on, kid!"
The group rushed on, ducking back & forth through and between buildings, while Cody explained how Chao had tapped into a series of magical nexuses in the campus that unleashed a planet-wide spell to destroy the "Willing Suspension of Disbelief" spell placed on the Mundane people of the world, followed by worldwide distribution of footage from the tournament. As they neared the entrance to underground they linked up with the rest of the group.
"You guys figure out what's going on?" Teana asked the others.
"Yep" Shion replied.
"You have to kill anybody?"
"No, but I think Marie might've broken Takane Goodman's arm."
"Can't be helped. Let's move!"
Near a shack out in the Mahora Woods, the Shadow Clones of Kaede Nagase, Kaede Fuyō, and Setsuna dispersed before the shocked eyes of Seruhiko and Kuzunoha, having bought enough time to allow the originals and the non-combatants to slip past and escape.
The group passed through the hidden entrance, making their way underground, beneath the mighty World Tree. They hurried along, Negi explaining their course of action. Suddenly, as they neared a doorway, there was a loud thudding sound… which turned out to be from a massive three-headed dog-beast, with a mane composed of serpents. Suddenly, pockets of non-space appeared and swallowed up Negi, Kaede Nagase, Setsuna, and the six girls of Gamma Team. Then, a large dragon appeared to cut off the escape of those who tried to run. As the other girls fought for their lives against the two beasts, Yue and Asuna were beset by a familiar figure.
"Takahata…sensei?"
Soon things were very wrong. Asuna and Yue were badly injured, Takahata having dealt serious harm to them in a cold and cruelly efficient manner. The others were torn up and pinned down by the two beasts, and the tiny little robed and hat-wearing figure rejected Chisame's pleas of normalcy.
"Silly girls" it said. "You're not normal anymore. You threw away being normal the minute you found out about magic."
And then suddenly, everything slowed down. There was a horrific sound, like glass fracturing, and then the world shattered. Everyone found themselves completely unharmed. The two beasts and Takahata had vanished, and now the tiny robed figure sat on the ground in shock, surrounded by a plush dog, a toy dragon, and a little doll of Takahata. Teana stared at the small figure, her Sharingan eyes glowing red.
"Genjutsu of that level cannot hold me" she intoned in a dangerous voice, glaring at the small figure, who was now trembling.
"You sought to bar our path" Teana growled as she stomped slowly toward the little figure. "Sought to harm us. Made a man we trust attack us. …You think yourself skilled in the art of illusions?"
She now stood directly in front of the little figure, who stood on shaking legs looking up at the tall girl.
"You are wrong in that assumption. Now, allow me to show you… a true genjutsu."
And her eyes transformed.
"Tsukuyomi."
The little figure stiffened as the Mangekyō Sharingan's ultimate genjutsu assailed its mind, 72 hours of terror and torture compressed into three seconds in the outside world. It stumbled back, twitching and shaking terribly… and then the hat fell off.
'Oh…' Teana thought. 'Shit'. Teana and everyone else then felt varying degrees of shock and horror when they saw and realized that, rather than some evil little gnome or summon, Teana had just used the ultimate Mind-Rape technique on a three-to-five-year-old little girl.
"…Oops"
The little girl, face deathly pale and eyes wide and shedding tears of pure, unfathomable fear, turned and ran as fast as her little legs could carry her, stumbling a few times as she bolted for the doorway, her little mind fractured by the horrible experience, crying and sobbing and hyperventilating a little from sheer terror.
"Smooth, boss" Ahsoka snarked as she and the others walked up.
"How was I supposed to know our foe was a toddler?" the red-haired mage responded. She let out a long sigh. "Come on; let's keep moving…"
The group moved forward through the next tunnels. According to Cross Mirage's map courtesy of a seismic scan, they were nearing their destination. As they ran through the halls, they soon reached a wide-open room, with several outcroppings and a bridge that ran across. There, on the bridge, knelt the portly teacher seen about occasionally, and the little girl was clinging to him in a death grip; the man wore a look of great concern as he fussed over his daughter.
"I'm sorry" Teana spoke up, causing the man to look up at the arriving group… and the little girl to let out a short scream of terror and bury her face in her papa's chest. "If I had known we were fighting a little girl instead of some summon or goblin like I'd expected, I would not have used the Tsukuyomi."
The man stiffened; he'd read the reports. Even if it was by accident, his little girl had been hit by one of the cruelest and most mentally-damaging illusory techniques ever known?
"We have a plan" Negi spoke up. "We're heading for the base of the World Tree's roots. We'll use this temporal dislocation device" he held up the Cassiopeia watch, "and head back a week. We'll stop Chao's plan before it starts. We'll set things right."
"Well, I do hope you succeed where we failed, Negi-kun."
This voice caused several people to react as Takahata – the real Takahata stepped out from the corners.
"Go on, Negi-kun" he said. "Get to the core chamber, and save the-"
Takahata was suddenly interrupted by an unexpected source. Still reeling from him "rejecting" her, and from the illusory version of him ruthlessly attacking her, Asuna had slipped into the same altered mental state from her tournament match against Setsuna. Takahata, deeply shocked, barely dodged a downward swing of the Ensis Exorcizans that would've cleaved him in two. He looked in horror at Asuna's eyes; the light in them was gone, the slight hints of tears were visible, and her face was a mask of pure rage.
"Asuna-san?-!" Negi called out in shock. "What the heck are you doing?-!"
Asuna could no longer hear Negi in her current state. Takahata leapt upward to avoid a horizontal swing that would've bisected him at the waist, and then Asuna formed a quick sequence of hand-seals and then launched a barrage of small fireballs with shuriken hidden inside them. Takahata reacted quickly, using his Iaiken strikes to smash away the burning projectiles. The ground then fractured as Asuna launched herself off of it, hurtling upwards towards Takahata, the magic-chakra fusion power of Kankahō flowing through her. A punch infused with kanka and coated in fire chakra inadvertently synthesized the effects (though not the exact chakra nature) of the rare Blast Release kekkei genkai and caused a large explosion, a huge chunk of the wall ceasing to exist; had Takahata been half a second slower, that would've been his torso. A sword swing launched a thin blade-wave of lethal magic, which sliced off the tip of Takahata's cigarette as he bent backwards to dodge it; he spat out the rest of the stick and, though loathe to harm Asuna, fired an Iaiken bolt at the hand currently holding the sword.
That did not work. What did, work, however, was Negi shortly thereafter pulling out his copy of Asuna's Pactio card and muttering "Abeat". The magic nullifier sword promptly vanished in a swirl of light, leaving the berserking Asuna unarmed. The lost-to-madness girl did not falter much, punching her fists forward at Takahata, each thrust unleashing a compressed "bullet" of Kankahō, packing the force of a pair of tank-cannon shots. Takahata dodged the first one by a hair, whooshing past his head and blasting into the wall several meters behind him. The second hit him dead-on in the chest, blasting him backward with the sound of breaking ribs. Takahata landed on his back several feet away, gasping for air. Berserk-Asuna stepped forward, standing over him and staring down at him with cold, lifeless eyes. She raised her fist, charging it with kanka and preparing to smash it down into his head.
"Void Prison!"
Space-time warped and distorted, as Shion's power commanded the Void to bend to her will, encapsulating Asuna. Just as Asuna's power managed to break the technique, Teana had ran up and now latched on, her superhuman strength restraining the warped-mind girl.
"Get a fucking grip on yourself!" she yelled, as Ahsoka, Mai, and both Kaedes ran up to assist in restraining the thrashing girl. Ahsoka put a hand to Asuna's forehead, and began forcing the Light Side of the Force through Asuna's mind, the calming light extinguishing the unnatural anger and then returning Asuna's primary persona to dominance. Light returned to Asuna's eyes and she ceased her struggles, looking around in silent confusion. Then she looked down in horror at the battered Takahata; the man's shirt had been blown open by the "Kankahō Cannon", revealing his bare chest… with the marks of a serious wound in the center, along with the jagged tip of a broken rib sticking a little ways through the skin.
"Not fatal" he struggled to wheeze out. "Rib shards all missed my heart. Think you punctured a lung, though, Asuna-kun."
Asuna began trembling horribly as she remembered being told about her "Berserk State" where she nearly killed Setsuna in the tournament… and realized that she was responsible for nearly killing Takahata-sensei. She went pale and her legs began to buckle, as Kaede (Nagase) pulled her into a hug, and then lifted her off the ground, carrying her bridal-style. Asuna buried her face in Kaede's neck, ashamed and horrified at herself, and unwilling to face the others at the moment. Teana took a good, long look at the situation, and then sighed and beckoned the others to follow down the next path.
As the group ran through the final tunnel, they could now see the faint glow of the World Tree roots running along the ceiling.
"We're almost there!" Setsuna called out.
Soon enough, they all reached a massive room with an ancient and arcane platform standing in the center of the room. All around them, the vibrant glow of the World Tree's roots illuminated the area as if it were daylight. Kaede N. gently lowered Asuna to her feet, and the large group moved on toward the center of the massive platform. All of a sudden, there was a roar, and as they all ran to the center a massive dragon came out through the massive doorway on the other side of the room, bellowing out a fearsome roar at the intruders.
"Kid, whatever you're gonna do, DO IT NOW!-!-!" Teana shouted at Negi. Negi pulled out the Cassiopeia and hit the primary button. Magical energy was siphoned off of the World Tree's roots, and in a whirl of space-time the whole group was sucked up, disappearing totally.
-SCENE BREAK-
June 22nd
7:30 PM
Mahora Academy
In a flash of light, several people appeared in the air.
"Hey, look! It's still the Festival! We did it!"
"All right!"
…And then they looked down, spotting the ground 8,000 meters below them.
"What the hell?-!"
"Oh, fu-"
And then gravity took hold, and they all began to plummet; Teana shouted over to Marie "As soon as this shit's done, and IF we survive this, you and I are learning how to fly!"
As they fell, Ahsoka called upon the Force and Shion upon Templar powers, both acting to slow the group's descent. As they neared the ground, Negi cast a powerful Wind-type spell that brought them all safely down… and then collapsed from exhaustion, having used a fairly large chunk of his mana in activating the Cassiopeia, which now had a crack in it. Konoka walked over and scooped Negi up, easily carrying the boy thanks to the basic strength-enhancement magic she'd learned recently. The group split into two, one to get Negi to a place to rest and the other to inform Headmaster Konoe and the other mages of the situation.
-SCENE BREAK-
"So that's our situation, sir" finished Shion, as she and several others stood before the Headmaster, Colonel Holland, and several others.
"Hmm…" the old man stroked his chin. "Quite the conundrum. I thank you for bringing it to our attention. Now, you can-"
"Lemme stop you right there, gramps" Chamo cut in. "We've seen what happens when you guys try to handle things on our own. We're helping out in this one, like it or not."
"And how do you propose we deal with what's coming without causing mass panic, Mr. Chamo?" Col. Holland said.
The ermine-fey grinned. "We've got it all planned out. We need to bring the Starshot in kinda close and link it to the World Tree's mana supply, and then…"
As the little fuzzy fey continued to outline the plan, the teachers found themselves agreeing, amazed by how it sounded.
-CHAPTER END-
I know this chap's a little short, but it was either that or make you guys wait even longer. The next chapter probably won't take QUITE as long, but there are still two BIG reasons why you're probably in for a bit of a wait. The first, and most important, is that I'm deliberately taking Book 5 slow so as to give Negima canon time to properly advance, to lessen the chance that I'll overtake it AND so I don't end up making something up that violently clashes with something that gets revealed later on.
The second reason is that, after all this time of hearing other people praise them, I just got Mass Effect and Mass Effect 2; my time will thus be occupied more than a little.
…Ah, Jack Rakan, you awesome, invincible ham. Is there anything that "a little bit of spirit" can't do?
