Still Waters 3, Book 2, Chapter 11, The Festival Second Day, Tournament Finals
Saturday, June 27th, 2009, Afternoon
"Nodoka-chan?" Jennifer said aloud, then swore under her breath. She just couldn't get used to using Nodoka's telepathy-based network... She had no problem using spells or artifacts to gain access to other people's minds, but she just couldn't get used to the idea of letting herself open up enough to let someone else into hers; she had too much up there she didn't want anyone to see...
Yes?
Jennifer looked around the large, shadowy room hidden deep within the maze of drainage and sewer tunnels under Mahora, probably something designed for storage of equipment or, on second thought—she could see large metal boxes on the other side of the room with big pipes going through them to the floor and ceiling—some sort of pumping station...? "She's not here now, but I think I found where Possum's been staying."
Are you sure? How do you know?
Jennifer eyed the writing recently scratched into the concrete ('I'm Sorry' written in English in foot-high letters), glanced over at Asuna, who stood in the far corner of the room holding up a dead rat by the tail with two fingers before dropping it back on top of the neat little pile of dead animals from which she had taken it, and tried to ignore the general stench of blood and vomit that permeated the place. "...I'm pretty sure."
Jennifer took a longer look around the room, trying to find some clue as to where Possum may have gone, but the floor was bare concrete and the room contained nothing notable but for the pile of dead animals, the vomit, and the writing scratched on the wall. It certainly looked like Possum was well on her way to turning into a vampire...she hoped, if nothing else, that the change wouldn't be too hard on the girl. "I hope she's alright," she muttered under her breath. Eva had demanded to be notified immediately if Possum was found; she wondered what exactly that meant for the poor girl.
"Eww," Asuna said, standing on one leg to better see what she had just stepped in.
Madoka circled warily, watching El Buho carefully. The masked girl was extremely familiar, but Madoka just couldn't put a name to her; the mask lifted straight from Lucha Libre certainly wasn't helping. But in any case, the girl was hurt; that much was obvious simply by watching the way she moved. 'I'd better end this quickly then,' Madoka thought to herself. The other girl had certainly done well thus far, especially with the defeat of her opponent in the second round of the tournament, but she was in no condition to even give Madoka a fight, not now. In the future, maybe...El Buho attempted a feint, then changed mid-move into an actual attack that Madoka narrowly avoided. 'Give her a few years, and she really will give me a good fight,' Madoka thought, smiling in anticipation at the idea. But for now, she had a third round fighting tournament match to end.
When El Buho feinted again, Madoka darted forward, snagged El Buho around the waist from behind, lifted her thin form high in the air, and slammed her down to the ground before going for an ankle lock. The girl kicked free before she could lock it in however, and scrambled back out of reach. When she got back to her feet, however, it was obvious something was wrong.
Madoka watched warily as the girl stood across from her, breathing oddly as she wrapped one arm around her midsection just under her ribcage. "Are you alright?" she asked. The girl hesitated for a long, long moment, then shook her head and collapsed to her knees, wrapping both arms around her midsection. Madoka turned to the officials in alarm as the other girl started to cough up blood, and they swiftly ended the match as emergency personnel rushed the fighting stage.
Ako was quickly bundled into the back seat of a beat up, older model car, wedged between two strange men who kept as far away as the interior of the car allowed. As the car drove out of the parking lot, she turned back, hoping to get one last glimpse of Rale, but he was nowhere in sight. She settled back down and looked uneasily at the two men sharing the back seat with her, but neither one would even look at her. She looked at the big man riding shotgun in the front seat, the same one who had stopped her and Rale earlier, but from his bored expression as he looked out the window he might as well not even been aware of her presence. The driver was equally silent, focusing on following the car in front of him.
"Um...where are we going?" Ako asked. The two men in the back seat seemed to shrink a little, while the driver visibly cringed. "Um..."
"We're going somewhere safe," the big man, who had introduced himself as 'Cort', replied, glancing back at her, his expression hard and stony and brooking no argument.
They rode along in silence for almost five minutes before she spoke up again.
"Where is my bag?"
"Amos has it," Cort said gruffly.
Awkward silence as the string of cars passed out of the city and headed in a vaguely eastward direction.
"Where is Rale-kun? He's not in trouble is he?" Ako asked, glancing back at the city of Mahora as it slipped out of sight behind a large hill.
"That all depends on you," Cort said, looking forward through the windshield.
"What do you mean?"
Cort crossed his arms, the muscles bulging and stretching the sleeves of his shirt. "Look, what it looks like he was in the process of doing when I found you two could get him killed." Cort turned around in his seat and met her gaze, the only one of this strange bunch of kidnappers who seemed to have the nerve. "He wasn't trying to run away with you, was he?" he asked, his stare intensifying as he cocked an eyebrow. "He wasn't trying to run away, right?" he asked again.
Ako hesitantly shook her head, and Cort nodded. "Good. Then the kid's not in trouble. Now sit back and try to get some rest; we'll be on the road for a while. And don't even think about trying to get away." With that, Cort leaned back in his seat and closed his eyes, seeming to fall asleep at once.
Ako just wished she had put her cell phone in her pants pocket instead of in her bag. 'How long before they realize I'm gone...?' she wondered. Misa, old friends though they were, probably wouldn't notice for days. Madoka would notice her absence right away, though she might assume Ako had chosen to pull another all nighter at the library or Eva's resort, as she often did when she had free time. Sakurako would definitely notice, but whether she would realize anything was wrong was another matter altogether. She didn't spend enough time with any of the others for them to notice that she was missing until several days had passed, and even then most of them would probably dismiss her absence as a coincidence.
If this had happened to one of the others, Asuna or Akira or Yuuna or really anyone else, they would have already escaped by this point, and probably captured the kidnappers as well. But Ako...she began playing with the hem of her shirt to give her hands something to do. 'I'm not a fighter...' she thought. She hated the sight of blood; it made her head hurt and the scar on her back burn, and it made her feel as if her mind was twisting in on itself, trying to recall something horrible. Her forte was more along the lines of manipulating magic, anyway, or 'buffing' her friends, as several of them called it. That was something that would be of little use here. Sure, she could pull off the occasional small series of magic arrows, and a single magic arrow cast inside the car would probably kill her kidnappers, but she didn't think she could do it; having any more blood on her hands would- She paused mid-thought. 'Now why did I think something like that...?' she wondered. 'Any more blood'...? As far as she was aware, she had never killed anyone...though she had a distinctively uneasy feeling that that wasn't technically true. She certainly couldn't recall doing such a thing, but it wasn't completely out of the question, not with the other side of her abilities.
Along with Ako's buffing and manipulation of magic came the ability to take magic away, to draw it into herself not as a spell, but as if she was filling up a car with gas. There was the normal harvesting of magic power performed with highly specific spells or rituals or combinations of magic circles, but what she did was distinctly different. What she was able to do didn't require any of that; it was natural, almost instinctive...she looked at a spell or magic power made visual, and simply...pulled it in. She had done a lot of research in the lower levels of library island, but it had all been fruitless until earlier this year, when she had stumbled upon a long-forgotten room deep in the sub levels that contained a book on famous ancient mages. One of them, known as Laureyn Fallen, The Ravager, The Magic Eater, The Empress Of Antipathy, could do the same thing, the exact same thing, as she could. What she had, Ako had discovered, was the extremely rare ability known only as 'Magic Eater', wherein the user, without the use of any sort of magical aid, could 'eat' magical energy. Of course, it went further than that. Ako had discovered, much to her horror, that she could do the same with...something else. Not only could she 'eat' magic, ki, that strange, distinctive power that the youkai seemed to have, even the power that demons possessed, but beyond all that, she could 'eat' a person's life energy, and she had a truly terrifying feeling that she had been doing that very thing her entire life, from the time she was born, maybe even earlier. Ako was a naturally kind, friendly person, but she wasn't foolish enough to believe that everyone else was as well; the first and only time she had used the darker side of her ability purposely, the mugger who had pulled her aside in the city had keeled over, gasping for breath and clutching at the air, his skin so pale it was almost white, his eyes unseeing and bulging in terror. She had fled, horrified at what she had done, terrified at the tremendous feeling of life coursing through her body. It had felt good, and that was even worse. From that time to the present, she had actively avoided using that horrifying ability of hers, making sure to stop immediately whenever she realized she was siphoning off power from her friends. This was an ability she had to keep secret from everyone; there was no way she could face them if they knew she had been stealing their lives from them for so long. She had a feeling Akira might know, but as far as she could tell Akira hadn't told anyone, and none of the others had ever shown a hint that they even knew such an ability existed.
She could use that power here, she knew. She could drain the driver; the big man who had called himself Cort seemed capable...he would probably be able to steer the car off the road into a parking lot or something before they crashed. Cort would be the next target, and then she would go after the two in the back seat with her, cannibalizing the life energy of them all...and end up a monster. She shook her head to clear it, biting her lip. She couldn't do it; she couldn't bring herself to do such a thing at all. Some of her old friends had become scarily used to bloodshed, but for her part...she just couldn't do it.
Ako turned around to look in the direction of Mahora but, as expected, the city was lost to sight, blocked by trees and the occasional building, not to mention the hills just outside of town. Even the world tree wasn't visible from her current position. She looked forward through the windshield, sending up a silent prayer that someone would come to save her from being forced to use her horrid ability, soon.
The first thing El Buho became aware of was a bright light shining directly into her eyes. "Ugh..."
"Welcome back to the world of the living," a familiar voice said in an amused manner.
"Ugh," El Buho repeated and raised her hand up to block out the light. She looked blankly at the blood pressure monitor on her otherwise bare arm for a moment. Wait a minute, blood pressure monitor...? She couldn't recall...had she been unconscious? What about...what about her mask? She heaved herself up to a seated position, groaning in pain, but the woman who had spoken before gently pushed her back down. She felt stiff all over.
"If it's about your mask, don't worry. I told the paramedics to leave it on."
Her eyes finally adjusted to the lights and she sat up again carefully, fully expecting to feel broken ribs grinding together, and was confused to feel nothing but stiffness. "What...?"
"Heh, don't worry about it. It turned out you were suffering from food poisoning; they pumped your stomach and everything will be fine," the woman said.
"Food poisoning...?" El Buho repeated. There was no way that that had been food poisoning; she had felt her ribs cracking and coming apart! She had felt it from the moment that her opponent in the second round had landed that hit that cracked them! She had—she froze mid thought and looked up at the woman seated by her cot.
It was Kakizaki Misa.
She started to sweat and quickly turned her head to hide what little could be seen of her face through the eye and mouth holes of her mask. "U-um, I think I'm alright now, so you can go back to what you were doing!"
"Oh~? Is that so? I'm sure Madoka will be happy to hear that," she said. El Buho could hear the smile in her voice as she spoke.
"I-I'm really fine! You can go now! Really!"
"Is that so? Well, I must say I'm happy to hear that...Miyako-chan."
Miyako froze again and hunched her shoulders. "I-I-I'm not Miyako-chan! I don't even know wh-who that is, ah hah, ha ha ha! I-I'm El Buho!" She wanted to bury her head under the blanket.
Misa grinned. "He~eh...whatever you say, Miyako-chan. I don't know why you're hiding it, but you're actually really good. That guy in the second round was a real monster; defeating him was a real achievement on your part; Madoka wanted me to tell you you did a good job. But you just know I've gotta ask: why are you hiding like this? If you wanted, you could join one of the fighting clubs and go pretty far."
Miyako looked away again. "I just...don't like hurting people."
Misa cocked an eyebrow and leaned over the cot so she could see Miyako's eyes. "Miyako-chan, you just participated in a martial arts tournament. You know, where the idea is to hurt the other person."
Miyako shook her head and gingerly took off the mask she had been wearing. She put the mask in her lap and smoothed it out, smiling slightly as she looked at it. "No, a tournament is different from a fight. My grampa always said that in a fight, you're just trying to hurt the other guy, but in a tournament, you're testing yourself against the best." She smiled as she smoothed the mask again, then held it up so Misa could see. "He used to wear this when he went to America. The way he spoke of it, you could find some of the best fighters in the world practicing Vale Tudo there."
Misa looked at Miyako's smiling face and distant eyes as she spoke of her grandfather, and couldn't help but wonder how the girl had managed to become so good at fighting while remaining so gentle. Every fighter Misa knew, and she knew quite a few, was a little rough around the edges; even Madoka, the very epitome of a cute girlfriend, behind closed doors at least, had in recent years started to appear cold to most outsiders and could even be too forceful with her closest friends on occasion. Misa smiled and stood up, ruffling Miyako's hair as she did. "Well, I've got to go. My sister's match is up next. Congratulations on making it all the way to the semifinals, Miyako-chan...but I don't want you to overdo it, okay? Oh, and the No Name Band did real good yesterday, especially you. When you see Ayumi, tell her I'd like to talk to her, okay? Keep it up; you guys are already better than we were at your age~ See ya later!" Misa said as she walked away.
Miyako looked shyly down at her lap while the older woman walked away. Misa-san was so pretty, and nice, too! She smoothed her grandfather's mask again and couldn't help but smile. Today had been a really good day...
"So we meet again," Ayaka said as she stood on the fighting stage, facing her opponent. The breeze was picking up, whipping her long hair around, even braided as it was, as she took in every detail of the woman standing opposite.
Hatsune grinned slightly and dipped her head a fraction of an inch in acknowledgment of the fact.
Ayaka's confident expression as she watched Kakizaki Hatsune from across the fighting stage felt a little wooden, even to Ayaka herself. She clearly recalled everything she had seen while watching the other woman's matches, looking for weaknesses or even clues to her fighting style, but Hatsune had simply avoided attacks until the end of each match, when the attacks she did launch inevitably ended the match in a flurry of swift brutality; Hatsune did not seem to know the meaning of the words 'holding back', and what she had done to poor Sachiko...Ayaka didn't like to say she hated anyone, but what Hatsune had done was almost unforgivable. Ayaka was well aware of just how fragile the cold, distant class rep of Negi's class really was, and Hatsune had torn her down in the ways that would hurt her most.
Hatsune was smirking at her.
Ayaka made sure her gloves were properly fitted and began to circle, forcing Hatsune to move. Ayaka took in every detail she could, but the only distinctive trait Hatsune employed seemed to be a distinct economy of movement, a manner of maneuvering using the smallest amount of movement possible. Fuuka had fallen prey to underestimating it, while Sachiko had simply gotten angry and allowed herself to be manipulated.
Hatsune's smirk was suddenly tinged with boredom.
Ayaka's anger at the other woman instantly welled up at the disrespect she was showing, but she stopped herself before could do anything stupid; she had seen the other matches...Hatsune knew exactly what she was doing.
Ayaka tried a feint, darting forward a step or two while moving her arms as if to grapple, but Hatsune didn't seem to react and Ayaka darted back out of range and continued circling. The match reached the one minute mark without a single punch being thrown, then the two minute mark with little to show but a few feints and that didn't go anywhere and a lot of circling.
"So," Hatsune said, speaking up for the first time since the beginning of the match. "Is this all you have to show for yourself? What is the style you use, kickboxing? I've seen better. I've beaten better."
It was hard, but Ayaka bit her tongue and kept quiet. 'I can't let her bait me into doing something stupid, she's just-'
"Savate is far superior to kickboxing," Hatsune went on. "And Krav Maga is superior to that. You're just wasting your time."
Ayaka was fuming. 'My grandfather taught me kickboxing...! Wait! Come on Ayaka, calm down! This is not the place to get-'
"Pathetic."
'-to get angry...' Ayaka thought to herself, clenching her teeth to keep from snapping at the irritating woman. She stopped circling and took a deep breath to calm herself. 'Come on, I'm better than this! She's just trying to make me lose control; I have to stay calm. It's no wonder Sachiko lost her temper...' She took another deep breath. 'Good...good. Stay calm.' She had always had a quick temper, and it had taken years upon years with the help of Asuna and the others to work out how to control it enough to remain effective in a fight. It had been a long, hard road, but she had ultimately succeeded; she was often aggravated or angry at her opponent when fighting, but she had reached the stage where she rarely let that anger control her.
"Maybe after I finish you I'll go and wipe out whoever trained you-"
Ayaka blinked, barely taking in what Hatsune was saying.
What.
"Heh..." Ayaka couldn't believe what she had just heard. Hatsune defeat her trainers? Ha! Even with the ability Hatsune had shown thus far, any one of those who had trained Ayaka would wipe the floor with her...Ku Fei, Madoka, even Asuna or Max. Ayaka knew she was far from the heights any of them had reached in the past six years, but the idea that someone could easily win against any one of them was so hilarious that she had to fight the urge to laugh out loud. A match, with rules and regulation that must be followed, might last a minute; a real fight would be over in an instant. Hatsune was good, but she was far too theatrical in her fighting; her tendency to let the opponent make the first attack would be a fatal mistake, especially against Ku Fei. Ayaka shook her head to clear it, and smiled at the woman standing across from her. "You? Defeat any of them? Don't make me laugh! You may defeat me here, but I won't go down without a fight. And besides..." Ayaka paused, grinning at Hatsune. "And besides, you won't be able to win against Madoka."
Hatsune's expression tightened, and Ayaka knew that last one had hit a nerve.
"I can see I will have to do this the hard way," Hatsune said through clenched teeth. In what seemed a mere instant later, her knee rammed hard into Ayaka's gut, and it was all Ayaka could do not to collapse from the pain. But there was no time for that, as Hatsune was going for a throw. Ayaka's years of training took over and she blocked the throw and tripped Hatsune, forcing her off balance long enough to snag her around the middle. Ayaka let out a roar as she lifted the startled woman up over her shoulder and fell back, coming down with Hatsune's chest acting as a shock absorber between Ayaka's back and the ground. The other woman let out a pained gasp at the impact, but quickly shoved Ayaka off and was up on her feet a moment later, her eyes wide and startled, but Ayaka was up an instant later, backing out of range and grinning even though her stomach felt as though it were on fire from Hatsune's first attack. Ayaka realized the crowd was roaring, and her grin widened further.
"You've never lost before, have you?" she asked. "You've probably never even been hurt in a fight. Tell me, how does it feel?" Ayaka asked, smirking at Hatsune as she circled to the right.
Hatsune's expression lost any attempt to look composed and she snarled as she darted forward and tackled Ayaka in the midsection before she could react. Ayaka hit the ground hard, the air driven from her lungs, but Hatsune didn't waste a moment; she climbed on top of Ayaka and straddled her, squeezing her arms tight against her sides with her legs, and punched Ayaka in the face with all of her might.
The impact was tremendous; it drove Ayaka's head back into the surface of the fighting stage and made her world explode in bright lights. Her vision cleared just in time to see Hatsune's fist speeding toward her face again and she lurched to the side, throwing Hatsune off balance and taking most of the force out of the blow. Ayaka, thinking only of stopping Hatsune before she could pound her face into mush or lock in a submission hold and break a bone, snagged her around the wrist with her left hand before Hatsune could scramble out of range and, rearing back as far as she could with her right, proper form and style utterly forgotten, yanked Hatsune toward her while she let fly, driving her right into Hatsune's face with all the force she could muster. Hatsune cried out as blood droplets flew, and Ayaka felt a tremendous blow to the side of her head as Hatsune let fly with a wild roundhouse kick, and next thing she knew she was lying flat on her back, looking over at Hatsune, down on her knees a few feet away, cupping her bleeding nose with both hands, her eyes wide and...could it be?...scared. Ayaka laughed through her puffy, bloody face, and got a good, long look at the delicious expression full of shock and fear the other woman wore before she snapped out of it.
"What? What are you laughing at?" Hatsune demanded, her voice oddly nasal.
Ayaka giggled deliriously; her head was swimming and she felt really, really strange, but she couldn't help but find Hatsune to be immensely funny at this moment in time. "That's it? Heh, that's all you've got? You may have beat me, you may not have lost yet..." she trailed off as her vision went cloudy and shook her suddenly heavy head to clear it.
"Shut up!" Hatsune screamed, actually screamed; Ayaka couldn't help but find it hilarious.
"Y...you may not have ever lost, yet...but you haven't faced Madoka," Ayaka slurred as her vision faded.
"Wow," Misa said, watching the monitor as staff members rushed in to keep Hatsune away from Ayaka, who had fallen unconscious. She had returned from her visit with Miyako just before the final match of the semifinal round had begun. "She actually hit her!"
Madoka smiled crookedly. "She hit her hard, too." 'Good job, Ayaka; we'll have to get a video of the match.' She wasn't particularly worried about Ayaka's condition; Konoka would fix her right up, maybe put her in a cast or bandages for a week or two so nobody would ask any questions. Besides, that level of damage was normal during training in Eva's resort.
"Ha! Did you see the look on her face when Ayaka flipped her over? Oh wow, that was hilarious!" Misa continued, exploding into a fit of giggles at the end.
Madoka nodded, thinking about what she had seen from Hatsune during the match. The woman was incredibly dangerous; though she seemed to follow no specific style of fighting, the power behind her strikes was tremendous...a natural genius. No wonder Misa had been worried... She looked over at the other woman and couldn't help but smile as Misa talked so animatedly about how she had never seen Hatsune get hit that hard before. Madoka leaned over and threw her arm around Misa's shoulder. "Don't worry," she said when Misa gave her a curious look. "I don't know why it's so important to you that I beat her, but I'll win. I promise you that."
Their eyes locked, Misa couldn't help but smile as she threw her arms around her. "Thank you," she murmured into Madoka's hair. "Thank you..."
Sakurako paused halfway through her ice cream cone, cocking her head to the side as she gazed off absently to the east. "Huh..." she said after a moment. For a moment there, she thought she had heard someone begging for help, but it didn't repeat, and she went back to her ice cream cone.
Some time later after a pause while the fighting stage was once again cleaned, Hatsune sat by herself in the back as she waited for the next match, wrapping her hands and wrists in tape.
She's wrong. I won't lose. I won't.
She looked down at the piece of paper she had been using to keep track of the tournament bracket. Finally, it was down to the last match of the tournament...everyone she had faced had been easy, up until the Yukihiro girl...Yukihiro Ayaka had given her a lot of trouble. Yukihiro Ayaka had given her more trouble than any of the legitimate martial arts masters she had fought in the last ten years, in fact. Yukihiro Ayaka had actually managed to hit her, not to mention throw her, and it really, really bothered her.
"Yukihiro shouldn't have been that good," she murmured aloud. Yukihiro Ayaka should have been just another pushover, like all the others, but not only had she disrespected her, she had landed a hit. A good hit, at that, as well as a throw. No one, not in the past twenty years, had ever hit Hatsune so hard or managed to throw her in such a manner. Even the three Judo masters she had faced hadn't been able to throw her, and while she had occasionally been hit, it had never been as hard as...as that. It had been shocking; she had never been hurt like that before, not by another person... Hatsune sighed as she set down the ice pack she had been holding to her nose and picked up a small hand mirror. That punch from Yukihiro Ayaka...Hatsune had thought it had broken her nose, but it appeared at the very least that it was still straight; Hatsune wasn't averse to corrective surgery, but she hated the idea of appearing ugly. She came from a family with a long history of beautiful women, and, she admitted reluctantly, her vanity would suffer a terrible blow if she suffered such an injury. She sighed and picked up the ice pack again.
'You've never lost before, have you?' Yukihiro Ayaka had asked her. 'You've probably never even been hurt in a fight. Tell me, how does it feel?'
Hatsune growled in frustration. Stupid rich girl; Hatsune had researched what she could about the other fighters, and had been pleasantly surprised to find Yukihiro Ayaka had a history not dissimilar to her own. She had thought...no, it would be better to not focus on bridges that had already been burned.
'I shouldn't have taunted that girl like that,' she thought reluctantly as she again removed the ice pack and took a drink of water. What she had done to that Nakamura Sachiko had been brutal, even by Hatsune's standards.
Yes, she had definitely gone overboard in her attempt to play the bad guy. But...now that it was done, it was done; she had no choice but to continue on as she had been. And besides...
'-you may not have ever lost, yet...but you haven't faced Madoka-'
Yukihiro Ayaka's words had been strangely infuriating...perhaps it had been the idea that Hatsune could be so easily defeated, perhaps it had been the implication that Hatsune had no idea what a real fight was; she didn't know, but one thing added to the already insulting statement by the Yukihiro heiress: Hatsune just couldn't bring herself to like her younger sister's girlfriend, and the implication that this 'Madoka' was better than her was...well...
"Excuse me?"
The interruption cut through her thoughts and brought her back to the real world, where she sat in the waiting area that had been assigned to her at the start of the tournament. She looked up at the speaker, a young man with glasses, a headset, and a clipboard. "Yes?"
"You're up next; it's time to go," he replied, looking down at his clipboard.
"All right," Hatsune said as she rose from the chair she had been sitting in. She put the ice pack in a bowl on the table and took up the hand mirror for one last look at her nose, sighed, and put it next to the bowl. "I'm ready."
The young man nodded and led the way.
Hatsune stepped out through the opening into the blindingly bright sunlight; when her vision cleared she could see the fighting stage ahead of her: it appeared that Madoka had come out already. Hatsune kept her expression carefully neutral as she strolled to the fighting stage, the perfect picture of composure in spite of the crowd's yelling, and climbed up. She moved to her side and waited while the announcer worked the crowd into a frenzy and finally climbed down, beginning the match.
Hatsune simply stood there on her side of the ring, watching Madoka as the wind started to kick up again, blowing her long black hair out to the side while only rustling Madoka's much shorter cut.
When the noise from the crowd had died down, Hatsune spoke.
"So you're Madoka...I've wanted to meet you for quite a while."
Madoka simply watched her for a moment, refusing to show any sign of weakness that Hatsune could detect. "Why did you hurt them like that?"
So, here it was, then...might as well play it to the hilt. Hatsune cocked an eyebrow and gave Madoka an imperious stare. "This is a tournament correct? Where one must defeat her opponents?" she said, disdain practically dripping from every word.
Madoka didn't react. "Sachiko is in the back right now, crying her eyes out on Taro's shoulder. There was no need to go that far." Her words were neat, concise; Hatsune had no doubt Madoka was deeply enraged, and, to be honest, Hatsune couldn't help but feel good that the object of so many of her own troubling thoughts should be upset...she couldn't help but try and make it worse.
"Wasn't there?"
The next thing she knew, Madoka's fist was rocketing toward her face and Hatsune jerked her head to the side, narrowly avoiding what could have been a knockout blow had it connected. Madoka didn't give her a moment's respite and pummeled her in the belly with both fists before she could get away, landing half a dozen hits before Hatsune struck Madoka hard in the face with the palm of her hand, pushing her back and off balance. She followed it up with a short, hard punch to the ribs that made Madoka cry out and stagger back, but Madoka ducked under the vicious knee strike that would've taken her flush on the chin.
Back on the offensive, Madoka darted forward before Hatsune could recover and tackled her in the stomach, lifting her off her feet and slamming her to the ground. Madoka didn't give her an instant to recover, but climbed up on top of her in a mirror of what Hatsune herself had done to Ayaka in the previous match, and punched her again and again until Hatsune managed to work her arm free and strike Madoka across the face with a backhanded blow that knocked her off balance. Hatsune heaved herself up, furious with the other woman, and kicked her hard in the ribs as she climbed to her feet.
With the anger Hatsune had inspired earlier burned away, Madoka watched Hatsune warily. That last kick to the ribs had really hurt...she'd probably cracked one. Still...Hatsune was angry, and that was for the best; angry fighters were sloppy fighters, and while Madoka was no slouch, it had been clear from the start that Hatsune was far superior to Madoka as far as technique went; Hatsune couldn't hold a candle to Ku Fei, however. One thing Madoka had noticed, however, was that Hatsune...was soft. A blow that Asuna or even Ayaka would have shrugged off had a much larger effect on Hatsune; even now the other woman was trying to keep from showing any weakness by fighting the impulse to wrap her arms around her midsection, where Madoka had landed so many hits mere seconds ago. But still, with all that, Hatsune's punches hurt. The woman also understood footwork and leverage, and reacted almost instinctively to just about anything Madoka tried. She didn't seem to have much of that rare quality called heart, but...
This was...sort of fun.
Hatsune bit her tongue again to take her attention away from the sheer agony that was her stomach, and focused on presenting a confident image to her opponent. Kugimiya Madoka...she had known Madoka was something special—Misa would never have chosen her otherwise—but she hadn't expected this. Madoka was fast, strong, tough...she didn't seem to have any polish to her technique, but she had shrugged off blows that would have sent grown men to the hospital, and the match was barely thirty seconds old. What she had to do, she knew, was to throw some sort of joint lock on Madoka and force her to submit before the match got out of hand. This wasn't about her bet with Misa; it never had been...she had never intended to follow through on her threat to take Misa back home with her if she beat Madoka. No, this was about pride, and the insulting thought that some unknown could beat her, her! Hatsune had met all comers from veteran street fighters to twenty dan blackbelts in karate to the best hand to hand specialists Russia, the US, and the UK had to offer, and had beaten them all. And yet, in this little no name town in the middle of Japan, she had allowed herself to suffer humiliation after humiliation by no name locals in this pissant little martial arts tournament, and she had had enough...!
It was time to get serious.
The only warning Madoka had was a slight tensing of Hatsune's legs before she shot toward her, spinning a kick aimed directly at her head. Madoka barely managed to get her arms up in time to deflect the blow, but the impact still knocked her down. Hatsune was on her in an instant, trying to force her into an armlock, but she leaned forward a little too far and Madoka flung herself back as she swung her leg up, kicking Hatsune in the head. It was only a glancing blow, however, and Hatsune was on her again before she could get up, this time going for a headlock. Madoka slipped out of position before she could lock it in, but Hatsune refused to give her an instant's rest and went for her left elbow. Madoka drove it into Hatsune's stomach, still hurting from the beating she had given it such a short time ago, and the woman gasped. Madoka took the brief opening and pistoned her foot straight into Hatsune's gut. Hatsune let out a cry and fell back, but she was up again in the same instant as Madoka, and rushed her.
Madoka set herself and took Hatsune's charge in the stomach, halting the taller woman's advance. Hatsune tried to heave her up, but Madoka grabbed her around the middle and threw herself backward, driving Hatsune's face into the ground.
Madoka scrambled away, hurting from the impact of Hatsune's charge, and tried to catch her breath while Hatsune slowly climbed back to her feet, her long dark hair wild, flying loose in the brisk breeze that had been blowing since the start of the match. The hair blew out of her face, and Madoka could clearly see the blood flowing from Hatsune's nose and the ugly scrape on her forehead.
"I'm going to kill you," Hatsune stated calmly.
Only her long years of training saved Madoka from horrific damage to her face as Hatsune darted forward and jumped at her, snagging her by the head and flinging her around, viciously driving her face down toward the ground, there to be crushed between Hatsune's hip and the fighting stage. Madoka managed to twist just enough, mid flight, to take the impact on the side of her head rather than her face, a ringing blow that left her stunned and left an ugly, bloody scrape across the side of her face.
Hatsune scrambled around, grabbed her by the head before she could recover, and smashed it into the surface of the fighting stage again and again.
Madoka's world exploded in bright lights with the first impact, and the second left her seeing double for an instant. The third impact, harder than the previous two, stunned her, her body became numb, and time seemed to slow to a crawl. She could dimly feel Hatsune's fingers wrapped in her hair, the sensation of small clumps of hair threatening to get yanked out by the roots as Hatsune lifted her head again, and her gaze fell on the audience, focused on the horrified expression of a woman in the front row and the the queasy look of the man standing beside her, and then her head hit the fighting stage again and her vision went double a second time. She blinked, an action that seemed to take forever, and her vision cleared as her gaze swept around when Hatsune yanked her head up again and locked on someone running out from the backstage area. She found herself wanting to smile at that familiar head of long hair, but...her head hit the fighting stage again and a clump of hair came out when Hatsune yanked her head up again. She distantly heard Misa screaming her name, and their eyes met, Madoka's hazy and confused, Misa's fearful and crying. She wanted to tell Misa not to worry, everything was fine, but then her head hit the fighting stage again and she bit her tongue hard enough to draw blood. The pain lanced through her like lightning, far sharper than the dull thud of her head against the fighting stage, and everything snapped back.
Hatsune, snarling something that sounded vaguely like "-thinks she can beat me-", slammed Madoka's head into the surface of the fighting stage one last time and staggered back up to her feet, looking around in a daze. Her gaze went to where her sister was being restrained by security on the long walkway that lead up to the fighting stage, and she realized the girl was screaming Madoka's name over and over again. She shook her head to clear it and looked over at the announcer, who was looking up at her in horrified shock. Hatsune swiped her blood-soaked hair out of her equally bloody face and tried to wipe the blood out of her eyes with her sleeve. She ached all over and for some reason her head felt all fuzzy. Maybe that kick from Madoka earlier had finally started working on her...? God knew it had almost knocked her out of the fight then and there...she probably had a concussion. She shook her head to clear it again and staggered halfway around, looking out at the audience. Why were they cheering...? Hadn't they been shocked, horrified, mere seconds before? She turned again and saw her.
Madoka staggered back to her feet, breathing more easily now. She hurt all over, true, especially the side of her head, slick with blood from repeated impacts against the surface of the fighting stage, but...she stood swaying for a moment while her opponent turned around uncertainly, looking out at the crowd. Madoka couldn't hear anything for the ringing in her ears, but the entire crowd was up on its feet, and she could feel the stage rumbling underneath her feet from the sheer volume of noise they were making. She spotted Misa trying to push through the people working security, pointing at the fighting stage and yelling something Madoka couldn't hear. She tried to smile at Misa, but she only felt her body as if at second hand, and couldn't really tell if she had managed much more than a tiny grin. But...she felt sort of...good. As if she could keep going for hours. Her gaze wandered back to her opponent, who was looking at her in horror, clearly exhausted.
Madoka rolled her shoulders, stretched her arms and popped her knuckles, and smiled.
Al glanced slyly at Eva, smirking as the vampire edged closer and closer to the screen without seeming to realize she was even doing it, her eyes alive with excitement as she watched the action, a toothy grin splashed across her face as she watched the carnage unfold on the display.
He took another sip of tea, contemplating on that oh-so-nebulous concept: The Human Spirit. Being what he was, he had never quite understood what it was, how it worked, or how humans could keep going when all hope was lost. It never failed to surprise him, but he had lived a long life; he liked surprises, especially when they involved someone he admired, who had fought long and hard for everything they had. Kugimya Madoka...he would remember her name to the end of eternity.
Madoka grinned at Hatsune and shook her head to clear it, swayed for a moment as her vision went hazy, and straightened.
"No, no! You can't get back up, you can't!" Hatsune shouted.
Madoka ignored the semi-hysterical sound of the woman's voice and took a step forward. "Looks like I finally got my second wind," she mumbled through a face puffy and swelled from the beating she had taken.
Hatsune screamed something unintelligible and ran at her, throwing a wild, looping right. Madoka slipped under it and smashed her own right into Hatsune's face, a vicious blow that staggered the woman. Madoka darted inside, too close for Hatsune to land a good blow, set herself, and pistoned her fists into Hatsune's midsection, first one and then the other, over and over until Hatsune pushed her away, using her greater height to put more force into her shove.
Madoka staggered back, and Hatsune went right after her, swinging wildly. Madoka shrugged off the blows, set herself, and delivered a wicked blow to the solar plexus. Hatsune doubled over with pain, and Madoka hit her again, and again, and finally a fourth time, the impact of the last blow almost lifting the woman off the ground before Madoka stepped back, letting Hatsune fall to her knees, clutching her stomach.
Madoka waited to see what Hatsune would do, and sighed when the taller woman again struggled back to her feet, swaying, barely conscious. "You should have stayed down," Madoka said, then turned to the side and kicked her in the chin.
'Hey, Kagami? It's me, Taro. Um...Sachiko's not feeling so well, so we can't make it to the Second Day Party. I'm gonna bring her back to the dorms, so...see ya later. Sorry I can't make it.'
Kagami frowned at the cell phone as Taro hung up without waiting for an answer. Sachiko wasn't feeling so well? Huh...
"Is something wrong?" her brother, Hiroaki, asked.
Kagami glanced back at him, then at his fellow yakuza badass Saga Jin lying in his hospital bed with an IV drip hooked up to his arm, looking at her curiously in the private hospital room he had paid for after getting into a scrape earlier in the day; the rest of the guys had gone out to get something to eat and see the sights. Kagami was a little irritated that no one would tell her what had happened to land Jin in the hospital, but after Taro's call... "No...Taro-kun called to say she and the class rep couldn't make it to the party tonight, but since I wasn't going to go anyway..." she trailed off, troubled. Sachiko of all people wasn't feeling so well?
"Come on, Kagami-chan, cheer up! A frown doesn't suit you at all," Jin said from the hospital bed. He paused a moment, looking at her. "Now I know it's probably the morphine talking, but you're lookin' really hot right now—Ow!"
Hiroaki shook his hand to alleviate the small amount of pain caused by its sudden unexpected collision with Jin's face, and cocked an eyebrow as he looked at Kagami. "You don't have to stay here with us, you know; the guy's'll be back any minute now. You're still in school; you should go out and have fun with kids your own age while you can. I know you were looking forward to that party you were talking about earlier..."
Kagami paused, looking out the window at the sun, just starting to set. She wondered briefly if Sachiko had gotten hurt somehow during that big tournament she had entered...Taro had sounded all right, but... "Well, I am kinda worried about 'em..."
"Go on," Hiroaki said. "We'll be all right."
"I don't know..."
"Don't listen to him, Kagami-chan! Come over and sit on the edge of the bed, I wanna measure how you've grown~" Jin said in an exaggerated tone, holding his arms out and making a ridiculous kissy-face.
*pow*
"Hey! That hurt dammit! Come on, I'm in a hospital bed!"
"Go on, it's just the morphine talking," Hiroaki said, rubbing his sore knuckles before giving Jin's head another smack for good measure.
"Yeah..."
Kagami was lost in thought as she approached the dorm, worried about her friends. Sachiko was strong, the strongest of them all. Sachiko leveled out the group; when Kagami was angsting about her troubles with magic, Sachiko had been there, supporting her from behind. When Taro started to go wild, it was always Sachiko who brought her back down to earth. In fact, after Possum's disappearance, it was Sachiko who had kept Taro from freaking out and trying to tear the town apart to find her. She climbed the stairs and stepped through the doorway. The dorm's lobby was, understandably enough with the Second Day Party mere minutes away, crowded with girls on their way out. She worked her way through the crowd and went up the stairs, forced several times to press against the wall to let hordes of girls pass by on their way down, and finally made her way up to the floor that held the rooms of her entire class. Now, which one was Sachiko assigned to...? She walked along the hallway, looking at the doorplates until she spotted the other girl's room and knocked on the door. A moment later, it was opened by Sachiko's roommate, Sato Gin, who, like Kagami and the others, underwent training regularly in Eva's resort, though under a different master.
Gin opened the door a crack to see who had knocked, then opened it wider when she recognized Kagami, though she didn't open it wide enough for Kagami to enter. "What is it? Is something wrong?" she asked, eyeing her suspiciously.
Kagami cocked an eyebrow at the other girl. While she wasn't particularly fond of Sato, mostly because the other girl was so standoffish, they were at the very least on speaking terms due to the simple fact that they shared one vital piece of information: namely, that magic was real. Still, they may have been fellow trainees, but they rarely got along. "I was looking for Sachiko. Is she here?"
Gin opened the door further and stepped back, allowing Kagami to enter. Once she was inside, Gin quickly shut the door and locked it; she was one of the few members of the class to always keep her door locked. She turned to Kagami, looking troubled. "Did you watch the tournament?"
Kagami shook her head. "No, I was out with my brother and his friends, showing him around the city. All I know is that Kugimiya Madoka won... Why, did something happen?"
Gin paced back and forth for a moment, wringing her hands. "Well...you know that singer, Kakizaki Misa?" She waited for Kagami to nod before continuing. "Her sister Hatsune participated in the tournament, and, well...she beat up the class rep pretty bad. Made fun of her too."
Kagami couldn't help but notice the bitter tone in Sato's voice. "But...she beat up Sachiko? ...how? Nobody can beat Sachiko but Asuna-sensei!"
Gin shook her head. "I know, but that Hatsune woman beat her bad. Konoka-san was there acting as a nurse though, so she patched her back up when no one was around. I know Taro-kun was with her, but I haven't seen her since."
"Wow..." Kagami hadn't thought she'd ever hear such a thing. A regular person who could beat Sachiko in a fight...? She would have thought it impossible, but if there was one thing she knew about Sato Gin, it was the fact that Sato didn't lie, not about anything important. "You haven't heard anything else?"
Gin shook her head and checked her watch, and Kagami noticed for the first time that Sato was dressed up rather nicely; her top was pretty cute, actually, and her jeans fit her well. She cocked her head to the side.
"What?" Gin asked, crossing her arms defensively.
"Do you have a date?" Kagami asked, noting with interest the way the other girl's cheeks were suddenly tinged pink as she looked away.
"It's not a date."
"Not a date?" Kagami repeated. Any further questioning was cut off, however, by the sound of someone knocking quietly on the door. Gin gave her one last glare and rushed over to the door, unlocked it, and opened it just enough to peek out before abruptly opening it wide, allowing fellow classmate and magical trainee Mako Sylvester to enter the room. Gin shut the door after her and locked it.
"...huh," Kagami said thoughtfully as she looked at Mako. She rather liked Mako; the other girl was shy, but friendly enough once you got to know her. They had gotten along quite well once they both started training, Kagami thought. "Hello."
Mako looked down at the floor shyly, clearly embarrassed at finding Kagami also present in Sato's room. "H-hello..."
Kagami looked from Mako to Gin and back, noting Mako's carefully chosen outfit and comparing it with Gin's, and smiled. "Well, I guess I should leave you two to your date; have fun, Sato-san, Mako-chan~" she said in a teasing tone as she unlocked the door and stepped outside into the hallway, smirking at Sato's final shout of "It's not a date!"
Buoyed by the amusing experience, Kagami strolled along the hallway until she made her way to Taro's room, where she knocked on the door. "Taro-kun? Are you in there?"
After a brief pause, Taro replied with a hesitant "Yeah..."
Kagami tried the door only to find it locked, and frowned. "Is Sachiko in there? Can I come in?"
After a lengthy wait, Taro said "Okay..."
Now that the dorm was mostly empty with everyone else already on their way to the party, Kagami could hear the sounds of someone moving around for a moment, a few whispers, and then, clearly, a sob. A moment passed and then the door was cracked open. Taro peeked out at her, biting her lip in uncharacteristic nervousness, then opened the door a little further and stuck her head out to look up and down the hallway, which was deserted. When she saw it was clear, she opened the door wide and allowed Kagami to enter the room.
The first thing Kagami noticed upon entering was the stacks upon stacks of cardboard boxes, labeled in Taro's messy handwriting with things like 'PS1', 'PS2', 'C64', 'Master System', and others, as well as the wide array of gaming systems with cords wrapped around them stacked up in messy piles around the small television set, which itself had been placed atop an orange crate turned up on its side, likewise crammed with old gaming systems; Kagami could only recognize two or three, but she had never been much of a gamer. Her gaze swept to the thick curtains over the room's single window and on to the bunk beds, the lower of which was covered in boxes labeled in a manner similar to the others. What caught her attention, however, was the shape hiding under the blanket on the top bunk. Kagami looked from the lump to Taro and back. "Is that Sachiko?" she asked, whispering.
Taro nodded and took her aside. "Look," she whispered, "Sachiko's got a lot of problems, okay? That...that bitch messed with her head during the fight."
Kagami couldn't help but stare. It wasn't often that Taro used such strong language, especially with such venom in her tone. But wait... "What do you mean?" she whispered back.
Taro practically snarled at the memory of it, but quickly recovered and started to explain. "She made her feel stupid, like she's useless. She made her feel like all of her training was pointless, and her trainer was a failure. She tore her apart. But what's worse is that she could predict everything Sachiko tried to do, and humiliated her in front of everybody..." Taro went on to describe the match in detail while Kagami listened on, appalled at the behavior of her hero's sister.
Kagami took another glance at the shape hiding under the blanket and her heart went out to the other girl. Sachiko had been very, very fond of the man who had taught her the modified form of capoeira she used, and she had devoted a lot of time to mastering it; to have such an important part of who she was treated with such contempt would be bad enough, but to have her pride crushed as well by someone who was so antagonistic, not to mention the ease with which the woman had done it...Kagami had a strong urge to Twilight Breaker Hatsune, Misa-sama's sister or not, all the way to China. Sachiko was her friend...
"Did you wanna stay here tonight too?" Taro asked. Kagami glanced at her thoughtfully, and nodded.
Taro heaved a sigh. "Guess I'll hafta find a futon somewhere..."
In an office in a secret underground complex six thousand miles away in the United States, a tired man in what would be a snazzy suit if he chose to wear it properly sat behind a desk, filling out paperwork. He reached up and loosened his already loose tie further before swearing under his breath and taking it off completely. He tossed it aside and swept his hand through his shiny black hair. Byron the Water Mage, as he was called, was already well into his forties, an age in which many men began to notice with sorrow their formerly jet black hair turning to gray, but his was still as dark as it had been as a teen; his appearance was actually very youthful for his age, in a way that left strangers unable to tell just how old he might have been. He unbuttoned the top button of his shirt and glanced up at the thermostat, which was, as it had been all day, set to seventy degrees.
"Damn..." he muttered. He took up his pen again and signed the final form, one that had been due in two days ago, and dropped it into his outbox. "Friggin desk job; I never should've agreed to go off street duty..." he muttered as he stood up and stretched. He was a tall man, strongly built, and his suit had been fitted by a master tailor; he looked to be in the prime of his life. "Why is it so damn hot in here?" he demanded of the empty office. He held his hand up in front of the vent that let in cold air and frowned. "Cold air...Do I have a fever?" he wondered aloud as he touched his forehead. He sighed. "Friggin boring shit; I'm gettin' too old for this..." He took up his discarded suit jack and tie and slipped on his sunglasses before heading to the door.
He opened the door and stepped outside, nodding at his secretary, a cute young thing with a penchant for blowing stuff up; he had hand-picked her from the 'Dirty Dozen', as they were called: troublemakers who were on the verge of being sent to the ermine farms in Mundus Magicus for disobeying orders or other crimes. She gave him a startled look.
"Sire, are you alright?" she asked, coming halfway up out of her chair, her pretty eyes wide in surprise.
Byron turned to look at her as he walked by his desk, a witty retort on his lips, when his legs suddenly stopped obeying him and he found himself on his hands and knees on the floor. "What...?"
"Sir...!" the secretary said, frightened. Byron couldn't blame her; for years he had been the very epitome of the healthy manly man. Hell, he hadn't even had a cold in a decade or more...! He was a little frightened himself. He looked down at his hands, his arms and legs shaking, and he finally began to get an inkling of what might be wrong.
"Sarah," he ground out between clenched teeth as he felt his body temperature rise higher and higher.
"Sir?" she asked, pausing as she held the phone up, in the process of calling for help.
"Schedule a plane to Japan for me when I get out of the hospital," he said shakily as his wildly shaking arms refused to hold him up any longer, finally collapsing and dropping him to the floor on his side. His whole body was shaking now, and it felt as if he was burning up. "And get me a magic sink, now!"
"Sir?"
"Now, dammit! The other end's been cut off, and I'm getting overloaded. Get that magic sink here now."
"Yes sir!" the girl said.
Byron listened absently, staring at the wall and trying to keep himself calm while the inrush of magic began threatening to overload his system. "Good girl," he muttered as she confirmed the emergency delivery of a magic sink to his office and only then called for medical assistance. 'Heh, I knew there was a reason I liked that girl,' he thought woozily as his vision became almost painfully sharp. The magic sink, that wonderful device that could absorb almost any magic thrown at it, arrived a moment later with a group of frightened techs. Someone helped him up to a seated position while another held his hand up to the cube of greenish blue material. "You'd better let go," he muttered, his speech slurred. The tech hurriedly released his hand and stood back as he let fly with all the excess magic power he could muster. The process itself took several minutes and left him utterly exhausted, propped against the wall by the techs and medical personnel who had arrived in the meantime.
"Sir?"
Byron shook his head to clear it and looked up at his secretary. "What...?"
"Sir, you wanted a plane for Japan...where, exactly?"
"Oh, that's easy," Byron muttered, his head lolling to the side as the medical personnel placed him on a stretcher. "A city called Mahora. One of our agents is there," he said as they took him from the room.
As the Second Day Party continued on late into the night, Sakurako suddenly stopped what she was doing and looked around at Madoka, who was laughing at a joke Misa had just told. She quickly scanned the crowd filling the world tree plaza and frowned before turning back to Misa and Madoka. "Hey..."
Misa was too busy laughing at her own joke to listen, but Madoka glanced over at her, still smiling at Misa's lame joke. "Something wrong?"
Sakurako looked around the crowd again, and then looked off into the distance toward the east. "Hey...where's Ako?"
Author's Notes: Yes, much of what was done in the tournament matches were wrestling moves, in case you didn't know. Also, if you don't know who Byron is, give "For Absent Friends" a read; you can find it on this site in my profile. Poor, poor Ako.