--Disclaimer: I don't own AKIRA or its characters/gangs/locations. I only own Kiba and her 'friends'. So don't flame me, or I'll report you.--
AN: Sorry about the massive delay! I've been busy and lazy as hell! Plus it was my birthday yesterday so…whatever! Tetsuo's language, you know it's bad. That's it.
Tetsuo Take Ato Niban Kikai
Part
10: The 3 I's And The PPS.A second chance and a
lesson learned; that's the typical saying anyone comes up with
after disciplining a child. Or those witnesses who saw a fool
narrowly escape from death.
But in a select few cases, the child
or fool does not learn after they get their second chance. When this
usually happens, the child gets severely punished and the fool
eventually dies.
It's like a mouse playing with a sleeping cat;
the first time it rips out one of the cat's whiskers it narrowly
escapes unscathed. But if it does not learn to stop playing with
danger, what happens next?
The cat will eventually catch that
mouse and kill it, horribly depending on how many times it got away
before.
Tetsuo is just like that mouse; that little foolish mouse.
He played with his power at dangerous levels and in the end, he paid
for it.
He was incredibly lucky to get that second chance alone,
but from what the Colonel was thinking right now it didn't look
like Tetsuo would escape the cats claws a third time.
"Ah,
Professor. I'm glad you're here." The Colonel greeted,
extending a hand over his desk to shake the elderly Professors right
hand whilst he held a thick, overflowing folder under his left
arm.
After releasing one another's hands they both sat down and
stayed silent for a few moments, before the Professor eventually
handed the Colonel the thick folder, recovering any small pieces of
paper that fell out of it.
"Sir, that is Number 41's
assessment folder. I retrieved it and updated it as you requested."
The Professor explained, adjusting his glasses slightly.
The
Colonel only had to glance at how thick the folder was before rubbing
his head, an obvious sign that he was disappointed about
something.
"And the operation?" he asked as he regained
his composure.
The Professor reached into his pocket and revealed
three clear pouches, one of which had a computer chip in it and the
others held what looked like tissue samples.
"This is the
PCC Unit 1 we removed and replaced in Number 41. As you can see his
power overloaded the device and it completely burnt up; we have
fitted him with a PPC Unit 4 just to be safe…until we can analyse
these samples we took." The Professor began, handing the Colonel
the pouch with the chip inside of it.
The Professor was right
about the chip being burnt up; one side of the device was gone.
Almost as if Tetsuo's power had eaten it away, whilst the other
side looked more like a piece of charcoal than an electronic
device.
"We did a full over examination on him as well. There are no major physical deformities other than his obvious 'cyber arm' and 'stunted growth'. He has not physically aged at all since he was last here five years ago." The Professor added, retrieving the chip after the Colonel was done examining it.
"We did notice one strange abnormality in his skin, however. When you look at him from the human eye he appears normal…but when we examined him through Ultraviolet light we notices some rather odd markings on his body. So afterwards we used the body scanner to get a better look." The Professor added as he handed the Colonel a set of photographs.
"Those are the shots we took in Ultraviolet." The Professor finished as he waited for the Colonels response, sitting patiently in his seat before waving his assistant over.
"What in the world…!?" The Colonel thought
as he looked through the photographs.
In the top Ultraviolet photo
was a full body shot of Tetsuo and the acclaimed 'markings' on
his body, they seemed to twist and curl along his figure as if he was
born with them.
As the Colonel looked through the photos, more
markings where identified and labelled to point out how much of the
body-area they covered. These labels have been called 'bunches'.
In
bunches; two sets of markings lay on his torso, several small
markings (making one large marking) were spread on his face
symmetrically, two more sets of markings spread down his arms and
finally a huge set of smaller (and more tightly woven together)
markings curled all the way down his back.
The Colonels face
addressed the Professor that he had to do a bit of explaining about
this rather bizarre find…and he had yet to look at the close-ups
from the body scanner.
They where too smooth to be tattoos and far
too planned out to be drug-inflicted, so what where they? How did
they get there?
As the Colonel examined the photo's the
assistant handed the Professor a green book, more photographs and a
pen before taking the chip and samples back to the labs for
assessment.
"Colonel, sir. If you would now please look at
the close-up shots we took with the body scanner. We truly believe we
may have stumbled upon something…inhuman." The Professor asked as
he handed the overwhelmed Colonel the new set of photos.
After
glancing at them for a split second, the Colonel narrowed his eyes
and looked even more certain about what he was going to do.
"Where
is he right now!?" The Colonel growled.
--- "Hey!
Stop it!! Give me it back!" cried a little boy, who was desperately
trying to grab something in a playground.
"Awww, is baby gonna cry!?" the taller boys teased as they lowered and raised a toy robot, just high enough from the little boys reach.
"Come
on little baby! Cry!" teased the tallest boy who was holding the
toy robot.
The little boy lashed out in a fit of tears before
desperately trying to retrieve the stolen item, but in the taller
boys took advantage of their height and kicked him aside.
"Look at him squirm!" one of the taller boys laughed before kicking the fallen little boy, who was crying incredibly heavy.
"Let's teach him to respect his betters!" the tallest boy laughed, before him and the other tall boys approached the little crying boy and started to beat him up.
"Leave me alone!!" the boy cried
out as the image of the scene gradually faded into darkness.
That
was when Tetsuo jolted upright, screaming out for his attacker in the
dream to stop, before finally opening his eyes to see that it was
just a dream.
He was hyperventilating and all sweaty, his head was
sore and his entire body felt the pain he was witnessing in his
dream.
"That felt too fucking real to be a dream…"
Tetsuo huffed, drying his face with his bed sheet before finally
getting out of bed.
Stumbling slightly as he stood, Tetsuo
stretched out his metal arm to the nearby glass and used his powers
to make it fly into his hand before drinking it.
"Doesn't
matter how hard you morons try…I'll always be on top." Tetsuo
chuckled before setting the empty glass back down.
Rubbing his
head as he entered his bathroom, Tetsuo slowly unravelled the bandage
across his head and dumped the cloth into the sink, turning on the
cold water to soak it before wrapping it around his metal arm.
For
some odd reason, every time he had a nightmare his right arm would
begin to heat up and start to hurt…even thought it was metal there
was still some flesh that it was connected to, and metal heats up
very quickly. So when it started to heat up he would feel like his
shoulder was being pressed against a hot stove.
It had been 2 days
since his attempted escape, but this kind of thing happened almost
all the time whenever he woke up from a nightmare. It only recently
started to hurt quite a bit.
Heading back into his room with his
metal arm now wrapped in the cold, wet bandage; Tetsuo salvaged his
draw for a lighter shirt to wear.
After all, the bandage would
have to stay on his metal arm for a while…so he had to rip up his
current shirt to tie around his arm so that the bandage was secure.
"You look good without a shirt on, Tet."
Tetsuo
stopped what he was doing to respond to that oh-so-recognisable
voice.
And most certain, after turning around, Tetsuo saw Derby
sat down in the comfort of a plump chair by the door to the
bathroom.
"How do you keep getting in here, Derby?" Tetsuo asked before continuing what he was doing, acting as if this has happened before.
"I just ran here and got the old retard outside to unlock the door. He's usually loitering around outside your room anyway…says he likes to hear you cry out in your sleep." Derby chuckled.
"I'll break that perverted bastards neck
for letting you in here." Tetsuo cursed before slamming the draw
shut, obviously having no luck in finding a new shirt.
He
continued to curse under his breath, trying desperately to take his
mind off the disturbing looks Derby was giving him.
"They
only give you one shirt a day you know…maybe you should rip off
your pants next time?" Derby laughed.
Tetsuo rolled his eyes
before examining his room; unsurprisingly it was a mess because of
his nightmares…again.
"Why do you cry out in your sleep,
Tet? Wait! Don't tell me!!" Derby began, making a joke out of
Tetsuo's suffering.
Angered, but still under the influence of
his new medication, Tetsuo slammed his hands on the arms of the chair
Derby was sat in and stared him dead in the face.
"Shut up Derby, I'm not you're little puppet to mess around with." Tetsuo growled, narrowing his eyes at Derby, who was still chuckling under his breath.
"You're right there. You're not a
puppet. You're a toy, only right now, you seem to have become a
'toy of death' to everyone in the building. If the scientists
find out about what you're doing with your powers you'll be in
deep shit." Derby laughed.
Tetsuo's anger escalated to the
point where he really wanted to use his powers on this scumbag, whom
he hated so much, but was unable to do anything because of the 'mood
medication' he was put on.
"Wait until they find out what you did to me several nights ago. Think I'm bluffing!? I ain't afraid to rat on your ass because you're a dumb fuck with no friends to back you up!" Tetsuo growled again, still giving Derby that cold stare.
"At least I can REMEMBER my old friends!
You've got nothing, my little toy." Derby teased before trailing
one of his fingers across Tetsuo's fairly muscular chest, an action
which made the 20 year old feel sick to his stomach.
Eventually
Tetsuo picked up the courage to grab Derby's hand and stop him from
doing it again.
"Touch me like that again and I'll rip your fucking arms off!" Tetsuo threatened, releasing his grip of Derby's hand before turning away from him.
"…you're mentally weak, Shima." Derby chuckled before leaving the room, winking at Tetsuo before he left.
"That guy is fucked up!" Tetsuo cursed as he sat on his bed, rubbing his head slowly to ease the stress he worked up during that little argument.
Knock. Knock."Piss off Derby!" Tetsuo barked, still rubbing his head.
"Number 41!! Don't use
such language!" The Colonel boomed upon entering Tetsuo's room,
followed by three other men.
Two looked like bodyguards where as
the other looked like one really insane scientist, the scientist was
giving Tetsuo the evil eye whilst laughing crazily under his
breath.
But Tetsuo was too busy trying to ease his headache to
notice the insane man or the two bodyguards.
"I'll say whatever the fuck I want to!" Tetsuo growled.
"You most certainly will not from this moment onwards! You are now under Solitary Monitoring! So you will be treated like a lower-class test subject if you misbehave or go against the set rules!" The Colonel boomed, furious at Tetsuo's unnecessary insolence towards him and the other members of staff.
"You mean you can be treated
WORSE than this!? Don't fucking lie to me, skinhead." Tetsuo
joked.
The Colonel was now at boiling point, nodding at the insane
looking scientist before smirking in delight.
The scientist
revealed a remote controller much like the old ones used to control
Tetsuo's power, only it had a dial in the centre which the
scientist adjusted to a higher setting.
Almost instantly Tetsuo
reacted in a screaming fit of pain before stumbling off his bed and
falling face first onto the floor, the Colonel nodding at the
scientist again to tell him that Tetsuo had had enough.
"Insolence,
Impudence and Incompetence are only rewarded with Pain, Punishment
and Suffering from now on; Number 41. This rule structure is also
known as the three I's and the PPS. You will
obey since this is the last chance you get! Do you understand!?"
The Colonel explained in a stern manner, only shouting when he
demanded an answer from the stunned Tetsuo, who was only just getting
back to his feet.
Tetsuo remained silent and just eyed the
controller that was used to bring that pain to him; wondering how
much force it would take to destroy it.
Seemingly made of a weak
metal, Tetsuo thought a small sample of his power would be enough to
crush the device.
With Tetsuo's silence making the Colonel feel
a little restless as to what he was thinking, he nodded at the
scientist to use the device again. But to no avail, Tetsuo got to it
before the scientist could even touch the dial.
The controller
seemed to collapse inwards on itself before finally falling clean
apart in the scientists' very hands, leaving him in a state of
disbelief.
"Do you really think that shit works on me!?" Tetsuo laughed, brushing a hand through his hair and smiling as if pleased with himself.
"H-how is that---!?" The Colonel began, but Tetsuo's ignorance was enough to cause a disturbance. He felt very powerful right now, but at the same time he felt like he had to go easy on them…after all, they had his drugs.
"How is it possible? Well…let's just say that very time I wake up I learn something new about myself…it's quite funny…" Tetsuo laughed, sitting back down on the edge of his bed.
"You…learn more techniques..?" said the elderly voice of the Professor, who had only just entered the room soon after the crazy scientist fled.
"Well…think of me as some kind of young kid; they soak up information like sponges soak up water. I seem to be gradually soaking up knowledge of my 'power' every single day; all to my expense, like those children. I don't exactly get stronger, I only learn to do more with the power I already have." Tetsuo answered, adjusting the wet bandage around his metal arm.
"Number 41…I have several questions to ask you." The Professor requested, meekly approaching the 20 year old with extreme caution.
"Professor, I did not request you to question Number 41! He is now under Solitary Monitoring! You do not have access to free questioning anymore!" The Colonel boomed at the Professor, who simply ignored the large man.
"You didn't just come here to make me laugh, did you? Old skinhead has been good enough in doing that already." Tetsuo joked, once again provoking the Colonel to get angry at his disrespectful nature.
"No. I
have to ask you a few questions involving a certain discovery we
stumbled upon yesterday." The Professor answered.
Tetsuo, now
slightly curious as to what he could possibly know about these
scientists crazy discoveries, started to pay attention.
"While
you where sleeping, we scanned your body for any abnormalities and
found some rather peculiar markings…covering a majority of your
upper body." The Professor began, adjusting his glasses
slightly.
Tetsuo raised an eyebrow in confusion and examined his
arms and bare chest, before laughing under his breath.
"Laugh all you want to, Number 41. The reason you can't see them is because your body isn't warm enough." The Professor added, causing Tetsuo to stop his laughter and look a little more serious about the situation.
"Wait a minute…are you trying to tell me that I have some fucked up 'marking' things that only show up when I'm warm?? Heh…that's bullshit! I was roasting this morning and nothing showed up!" Tetsuo answered, chuckling slightly to give the Professor the message that he wasn't easily fooled.
"Like I said before, your body wasn't warm enough.
We took a sample and put it under testing, it had to reach a
temperature of 97 degrees Fahrenheit to at least show up faintly.
We're still doing an assessment on how hot it has to be to fully
show up. We used Ultraviolet light to make the markings clear to the
human eye…but we don't know what colour they are or how they even
got there. Those are the questions I was hoping to ask you, Number
41." The Professor answered.
Tetsuo hopped off his bed and
removed the damp bandage from his metal arm now that it had cooled
down, before throwing it aside and examining his human arm.
"…I didn't even know I had anything like that, so I can't answer anything…but you can answer my questions! Zen didn't tell me and he fucking paid for lying to me. So tell me who the hell Akira is and what Donikoto is! " Tetsuo angrily asked.
"Number 41---!!"
The Colonel attempted to interrupt, but was silenced by the elderly
Professors gesture that he needed to calm down.
A small smirk
appeared on Tetsuo's face when the Professor adjusted his glasses
and nodded at him, obviously willing to tell Tetsuo something.
"Donikoto was a demon in an old Northern Japanese story; he
was supposedly defeated by the Kitsune Tribe who lived in the
mountains and their god. But it's just a story; one that very few
know about. I only know a little bit about it and I doubt it will be
enough to satisfy you. What you need to do is hope that you stumble
upon a Kitsune Warrior at some point in your life, then you will be
able to know everything about that story." The Professor answered,
brushing his mustache as he spoke.
Tetsuo raised an eyebrow at the
Professor and looked slightly…disappointed about how little
information he got.
"If that's all you can tell me about Donikoto, then fine! But who is Akira!?" Tetsuo asked, growling slightly as he spoke; an obvious sign of his frustration and disappointment.
"Akira was just like you…but he died thirty five years ago. You'll still hear about him because he truly was an amazing test subject, the scientists who worked with him wrote quite a few positive comments about his progress. It's just a shame he died." The Professor answered.
"That's enough!! He doesn't need to know anymore!!" The Colonel boomed, blocking Tetsuo's view of the Professor.
"Is that it!? I was expecting him to be some super death-machine that killed thousands of people." Tetsuo laughed.
"So…are you satisfied now,
Number 41!?" The Colonel snapped.
Tetsuo just rolled his eyes as
a response before yawning, fiddling with the loose wires on his metal
arm as he muttered to himself.
He was ignoring The
Colonel.
"Number 41!!!" The Colonel yelled.
"Wha-a-a-at???" Tetsuo teased.
The Colonel was
furious, Tetsuo was still acting very rebellious even when he was
under the 'mood medication'. Was there anything that would set
him straight!?
Just before the Colonel could do anything to stop
Tetsuo's little laughing fits a massive smoke bomb went off in
Tetsuo's room, followed by the sound of harsh barking from a
fox.
Kyubi was back.
Using telepathy, Tetsuo made communicating
with Kyubi very easy…even though he was having a mad coughing fit
from the smoke bomb.
"What the hell are you doing here!? And why the fuck did you have to use SMOKE as a distraction!?" Tetsuo snapped at the fox, who was barking up at him.
"Shut up Tetsuo, I come to bust you out and you just whine like some little kid! Get off your ass and get down here!" Kyubi answered back, before tugging at Tetsuo's trousers.
"Wait…do you know anything about Donikoto!? You're a kitsune, right!? Then tell me who he is!" Tetsuo demanded, finally being dragged to the floor by the rather large fox.
"Just
follow me and I'll explain everything to you back at base! Once we
get out of this room I'll use my magic to disguise you as a fox
too, just so the guards don't chase you…that and we'll need you
to fit through ventilation ducts." Kyubi
answered.
The Colonel and the others where covering their mouths
with their arms and hands, desperately trying to block out the smoke
whilst they wandered aimlessly around the room to find the emergency
alert switch.
Although they couldn't see a thing, the Colonel
felt the impact of a clumsy Tetsuo running into him, before hearing
the 20 year olds footsteps running out the room.
"Number 41
is trying to escape!! Catch him you idiots!!" The Colonel boomed at
his two bodyguards as he got back up.
The two guards saluted
before scurrying out of the room in pursuit of Tetsuo.
---
Shortly after the smoke cleared, the Professor and Colonel where greeted by the two bodyguards from earlier.
"Any luck?" The Professor asked as he cleaned the dirt from his glasses using his jacket, the Colonel looking extremely furious at the escape attempt to begin with.
"Sorry sir…nobody has seen anything. He seemed to vanish into thin air." One guard answered.
"But there was a report of two rather large foxes roaming the building, one white fox and one black fox that had a damaged right paw. But they didn't seem to be a threat, so we just set them loose outside." The other guard added.
"You fool!" The Colonel boomed, slamming his
fists on his desk.
The two guards raised their arms to shield
their faces, surprised at the Colonels sudden outburst.
"It
was that darn Kitsune again! He obviously used his magic to turn
Number 41 into a fox so he could slip by!! Now get out there and find
them both!! NO EXCUSES!" The Colonel boomed.
The two guards
saluted before running out of the room in a panic, ordering other
soldiers to help them look for the two pesky
escapees.
---
Meanwhile, outside in the streets of Neo-Tokyo…
"Can I change back now!? Walking on four fucking legs sucks." The kitsune Tetsuo barked at his companion, who was trotting casually.
"Just hold on for a little longer. At least when we get back Kiba can kick the shit out of you, you're small enough for her to whack you senseless for causing this much trouble." Kyubi barked back.
"If anyone tries to kick me,
I'll bite off their legs." Tetsuo
growled.
Kyubi chuckled before whacking Tetsuo across the face
with a swift blow of his bushy tail, before dashing onwards.
"You
rotten son of a bitch! Come back here!!" Tetsuo
growled as he (attempted) to run after Kyubi.
The base was just
down the street, so when Kyubi finally stops running Tetsuo would
have him.
"OH my god!! Is that!!? IT IS!!!" cried out a
very cheerful voice.
Tetsuo stopped running and turned to look
over his shoulder, only to be picked up by a very enthusiastic young
lady and squeezed like some little stuffed animal.
"He's
so ADORABLE!!" cried out another female voice.
Tetsuo sulked and
narrowed his amber-brown eyes, his large pointed ears facing
backwards to indicate that he was extremely annoyed.
These girls
where the same ones who he saw several weeks ago; back when he was
working at Oni's nightclub.
They where with Kei.
"He's
the cutest little fox I've ever seen! What shall we call him!?"
one of the girls asked, still squeezing Tetsuo against her
chest.
Usually, Tetsuo would be overjoyed to be this close to a
girl. But when he's this size it can be quite...um…painful.
"He has a name already. It's Tetsuo."
"Oh shit." Tetsuo thought as soon as he heard that voice.
"Kyubi really did a number on you, Tetsuo. I wouldn't have recognized you without that messed up hair and metal arm." Kiba chuckled as she instructed the girls to hand him over.
"Please don't kill me.
Please don't kill me." He thought over
and over again. Right now, those girls looked very comfortable…only
because he was absolutely terrified of what Kiba would do to him now
that he was this small.
Kiba didn't say anything to Tetsuo after
she finally got hold of him; she just held him VERY tightly and
started carrying him back down the street to base.
To avoid his
punishment, Tetsuo gave that typical puppy-dog face
again…well…Kitsune face in this case, to gain Kiba's
sympathy.
"That won't work on me. Kyubi used to try that
and all he got was my boot in his face." Kiba huffed as she
maintained her very serious tone and expression.
Kiba wasn't the
only one that would greet him with a beating…Oni would be certainly
pissed off and as for Kaneda, well…even though Tetsuo didn't
remember him he knew he'd still be pissed off for all the trouble
that he caused.
He just hoped they'd go easy on him.
END
OF CHAPTER 10. AN: "That
doesn't explain why he keeps appearing in Tetsuo's dreams…" "I'm
getting to that part! Ahem…anyway; when I and several other
warriors fought Donikoto a strange being appeared before us and
swiftly fought the beast. But after he finally sealed Donikoto away
he died, leaving us only his name. But that was all we needed to
know, since we already knew why he appeared." "Really?
What was his name?" "You should know, Tetsuo. You already
told me his name."