I'm back from church retreat (been back since Saturday evening)! I'm honestly surprised that there is currently only one review for this chapter during the five-day break, but I'm sure that the other readers are busy with their lives. They will surely get back to reading this story once they're done with whatever
Also, the previous chapter's title has been changed into 'Girls are Driving' as well the preview title in chapter 33, Falcon Punches a Strange Boar. I originally saw a phrase called 'Girls are Preparing' on a user's signature at the forums called Maidens of the Kaleidoscope. It wasn't until after I came up with the original title for the previous chapter did I think about the phrase that I saw. After much consideration, I decided to change the previous chapter's title because 'Girls are Driving' sounds rather neat if you ask me, and it's also fitting considering that the girls are indeed driving in the previous chapter, even if it's simply a simulation. I hope that you can understand this change and have no problems with it.
BTW, it's actually called Dark Million Organization and not simply Dark Million. This mistake has been corrected for the previous chapter as well.
Chapter 35
Millions of Dark Attacks
"Rise and shine!" Captain Falcon said to the girls as they walked out of the elevator and into the lobby room of the hotel that they spent the night at. "Did you all get a good sleep?"
"I sure did!" Meiling said. "Sleeping on a bed sure is comfortable! I've already forgotten about when the last time I slept on a bed was!"
"You haven't slept on a bed for a long time already?"
"That's because she's a gatekeeper, so she either sleeps standing up or sitting down outside my mansion's gate," Remilia said. "Actually, she was given the chance to sleep on beds when we were in the previous worlds, but she always chose to either sleep standing up or sitting and outside of the room if we are inside one. This time I told her to make herself comfortable for once by sleeping inside the room and on a bed."
"Thanks to Mistress Remilia, I've managed to sleep comfortably for once! This isn't to say that sleeping in standing or sitting position isn't comfortable, mind you… Those sleeping positions are still comfortable for me!"
"I fail to see how one can sleep comfortably in those positions…" Reisen said.
"Meiling sleeps like that most of the time, she it's nothing special for her," Reimu told her, and then the shrine maiden said to CF, "Are we going to head for where the Light Essence is now?"
"Jody said that she is going to ask for permission to get the Light Essence for us," CF told her, "but I don't see why we can't head over to that place to take a look. You can also get to see what the place where they hold the race looks like! By the way, you should go and eat breakfast first. Eating a healthy breakfast is good for your body!"
Within the alleyway somewhere in Mute City, Zoda was sleeping on the cockpit of his Death Anchor, snoring loudly. Suddenly, a ringing sound woke him up and then he quickly took out a cell phone-like device that had a small screen on it. After pressing the green 'answer' button, Black Shadow appeared on the screen and said to him, "Zoda, get ready to move! I have a plan in my head already, so listen up!"
"I'm ready to listen, Black Shadow!" Zoda told him. "What do you want me to do?"
"First, you have to gather together as many Dark Million Organization members as you can, and then…"
After eating their breakfast, the girls got onto a hovering van that Captain Falcon rented in order to take them all to the place where the grand prix would be held.
"Going to that place won't take very long if there is no traffic jam," CF told the girls while driving down the street, "and it so happens that there is very little amount vehicles out on the street today! We should be able to get there in about fifteen minutes. Enjoy the view there while we're still on the road!"
Sanae looked out the window and said, "There sure are a lot of strange-looking people around here."
"The strange-looking people that you said are aliens from another planet," CF told her. "As technology becomes more and more advanced, contact with life forms in outer space also becomes easier and not to mention more common; therefore, relationships with alien life forms have gotten better as a result. F-Zero grand prix are also very popular among aliens, so popular that F-Zero racetracks are even built on their planets as well as several other planets!"
"So this is what the future of the world is like!" Nitori said. "I really love this place!"
"Then stay here as long as you can and imprint the best memories into your head!"
As the van was traveling down the street at a moderate speed, two F-Zero machines suddenly caught up with it from both sides. The one on the left was a green vehicle with two large fang-like extensions at its sides and the vehicle was numbered '15'—Big Fang.
The vehicle on the right was colored red, had black stripes on certain parts of its body, and was numbered '09'—Deep Claw.
The pilot of the Big Fang, Bio Rex, looked at the van and smiled, showing his massive fangs in the process, while waving his claws at the girls who were looking back at him through the window. On the other side, the pilot of the Deep Claw, Octoman, waved his tentacles as if he was greeting them.
"Who are they?" Aya asked.
"I know that lizard," Remilia said while looking at Bio Rex. "He was at the bar that Reimu, Marisa, Meiling, and I visited yesterday."
Bio Rex steered his vehicle away from the van, but then he steered into the van without a warning and rammed against its side forcefully, shaking it and making the girls inside bump their heads against each other. "Ow! What did he do that for?" Meiling cried while rubbing her head, and then she apologized to Remilia who was sitting next to her. "I'm sorry for bumping my head into you, Mistress Remilia…"
Octoman also steered his vehicle away from the van and then came back again, ramming it in the side using his vehicle forcefully.
"Ow! What are they doing?" Reimu cried while rubbing head due to bumping into the side of Captain Falcon.
"Looks like they want to play with you in a rough way," CF said. "Tsk! Can't they find some other time to bother me and not when I'm giving other people a ride? You girls will be experiencing a wild ride if I were to fight back against them."
"Go ahead and fight back if you want to-ze," Marisa told him. "Don't worry; we can handle a wild ride with no problem!"
"Okay, if you say so," CF said as he drove faster, but the two vehicles sped up as well to catch up with up the van. "Man, they sure are persistent…"
Bio Rex and Octoman moved their vehicles away from the van again to get ready to ram into the van from both sides at the same time, and because CF knew what they were going to go, he quickly stepped on the brake to let the two vehicles go ahead of the van. Because both Bio Rex and Octoman were not expecting this, they ended up crashing their vehicles into each other.
CRAAAAAAAAAASH!
After crashing into each other, the vehicles continued moving for a while before finally coming to a stop and smokes came out of their busted vehicles. "Well, that should teach them," CF said.
"Why are they attacking us anyway?" Sanae asked.
Just as she was asking this, three more vehicles went past their van and came to a stop beside those two busted vehicles, and then another vehicle drove out from the alleyway to join those group of vehicles, and then the cockpits opened up to allow their drivers to come out. The street was also blocked by those F-Zero machines and the other vehicles on the street were sounding their horns to tell to get out of the way.
CF took notice of one of those drivers and said, "Zoda!"
"Hahaha! Captain Falcon, are you surprised to see me?" Zoda asked him. "Or are you more surprised to see us all here?"
"Who is that guy?" Reimu asked.
"That's Zoda, a criminal that has been on the run from the Internova Police Force for quite a long time already," CF replied. "All of them are also members of Dark Million Organization."
"Dark Million Organization?" Marisa said curiously.
"Oh yeah, I haven't told you anything about Dark Million Organization yet. To put it in simple words, it's an evil organization formed by the villainous Black Shadow, and Black Shadow is my sworn enemy who always wants to destroy me in front of everyone."
"Well, it looks like we've got ourselves into some sort of mess again… Sigh…" Reimu said with a sigh.
CF stepped out from the van and said to the members of the Dark Million Organization loudly, "I'm busy right now. What do you want?"
"Isn't it obvious?" Zoda told him. "You can easily tell that we are here to mess with you! You know that Black Shadow wants to get rid of you, so it's obvious that he would send us to mess with you!"
"You better not mess with me! There are innocent people onboard the van and I do not want them to get involved in this! Wait until I'm done with my business and then we'll settle things the rough way if that is what you want!"
"Unfortunately, those girls on the van happen to the ones we're after! Getting at least one of them involved is part of our plan!"
Hearing this, CF narrowed his eyes and said in a threatening voice, "You better not do anything to those girls, or else you will regret it!"
"Did I hear right? It seems that those people after us!" Aya said.
"Why are they after us?" Reisen said in shock.
"It seems obvious that we are destined to run into trouble every time we visit a new world," Remilia said.
CF got into stance and said to Zoda, "This is your last warning. Get out of my way and leave these girls alone at once or else I shall teach you all a lesson!"
"The only person here who is getting taught lesson is you!" Zoda said as he whipped out a machine gun and started firing energy bullets at him.
CF immediately ran to the side to avoid the bullets as they struck the van. The girls quickly ducked down to avoid getting hit by the bullets, but fortunately for them, the van's exterior was hard enough to keep any bullets from going inside.
As Zoda continued firing from his machine gun, CF quickly got back inside the van and then stepped on the gas pedal to start moving down the street. "Fasten your seatbelts, girls!" he said.
The van zoomed towards the villains at a fast speed, but then Bio Rex and Octoman came out from their vehicles with a bazooka in their hands, and then they fired at the incoming van. Seeing the incoming bazooka shells, CF quickly steer left and managed to avoid getting hit. However, Bio Rex fired from his bazooka the second time and this time managed to hit the right wheel at front part of the van.
KABOOM!
The explosion caused the van to tumble over to the side until the entire thing was upside-down on the sidewalk.
CRASH!
"Hahahaha!" Zoda laughed. "There's no escape for you now!"
"But what if they all got killed because of this?" a dark-skinned man dressed in a purple jumpsuit and a yellow, tiger-striped helmet—Baba—asked him. "We're supposed to take one of those girls as a prisoner so that we can force Captain Falcon to hand over the Light Essence if he values the girl's life."
"Now that you said it… At least Captain Falcon should survive this, and we can simply beat him up until he's willing to hand over the Light Essence if Black Shadow's plan goes wrong."
"Just who do you think is going to die so easily?" Remilia said as she crawled out from one of the van's windows. She quickly shielded herself from the sunlight using her parasol and then said to them, "You sure have the nerves to mess with my comfortable ride, don't you? I don't like it when people disturb my peace!"
"And I'm sorry to break your bubble as well," Reimu said she crawled out the van. "We're not the kind to die so easily from something like this, and we're not even hurt either."
CF crawled out from the van as well and said to the villains, "You've really done it! I'm going to show you the consequences for trying to hurt not only me, but as well as my friends!" The other girls also crawled out from the van one by one and then they all got into fighting stance to get ready to face the members of Dark Million Organization.
"Haha! They're still alive!" Zoda said, sounding pleased. "Good! Now we can go along with Black Shadow's plan and not change anything! C'mon, give that captain a beating of his lifetime and kidnap one of the girls, preferably a weak one! But then, they're probably all very weak!"
"You shall see for yourself how weak we are," Remilia said sarcastically with a sinister grin.
Zoda fired from his machine gun again, but Captain Falcon and the girls quickly got out of the energy bullets' way.
Marisa landed from her jump and the moment she looked up, she saw Bio Rex pointing his bazooka at her. When the bazooka shell was fired at Marisa, she quickly hopped out of the way again and managed to avoid the attack altogether. "Take this! Radial Strike!" Marisa said as she fired star-shaped projectiles from the back end of her broom.
The star-shaped projectiles struck Bio Rex in the body, causing the anthropomorphic dinosaur to yelp in pain and drop his bazooka, which fell onto his right foot and made him jump up and down in pain while holding onto the injured foot.
While Bio Rex was still in pain, Reimu threw a paper amulet which taped itself onto Bio Rex's head, and then the paper amulet exploded and blasted the dinosaur backwards.
BANG!
Bio Rex fell back with a charred face and was unconscious. Octoman then turned to Reimu and fired at her, but she jumped out of the way along with Marisa. Octoman turned to them and fired another bazooka shell. "Cautionary Border!" Reimu shouted as she formed a blue wall in front of herself. The wall was durable enough to stay intact even after receiving a blast from the bazooka shell, and then Reimu pushed the wall from behind to send it flying towards Octoman.
Octoman tried to destroy the wall by firing another bazooka shell at it, but the wall was not destroyed. The wall emerged from the smoke created behind by the explosion and then crashed into Octoman, pushing him back through the air a few meters before disappearing, and then the octopus-like alien fell onto the floor.
Suddenly, a bullet whizzed past Reimu's face and left behind a streak of blood on it. She turned to the source of the bullet and saw a green-skinned alien wearing yellow and orange armor that resembled a turtle shell pointing a gun at her—Pico.
Pico fired from his gun again and Reimu managed to dodge the shots this time. She took out two paper amulets and threw them at him, but Pico shot them down with superb accuracy. Pico took out another gun and then fired from both firearms at Reimu, but the shrine maiden moved around swiftly to avoid getting shot.
While he was trying to shoot Reimu, both Marisa and Youmu jumped at Pico and were going to hit him with their broom and sword respectively. However, Pico displayed quick dodging skills by ducking down and then he kicked off to the side and turned to face the two girls before firing at them, but Youmu spun around in time to deflect the bullets with her sword.
Pico was going to fire again, but he noticed a bullet flying towards him and thus stepped to the side before looking at the person who tried to shoot him—Reisen.
Pico then pointed his guns at the lunar rabbit and fired rapidly, but Reisen rolled out of the way. After coming to a stop on one knee, she fired from her finger at Pico, but he got out of the way as well.
"Take this! Radial Strike!" Marisa shouted as she fired from her broom at Pico, but he ducked underneath it before pointing one of his guns at Marisa to shoot her. Marisa managed to step out of the bullet's way in time and then pointed one hand at Pico before shooting out a rapid stream of stars. "Meteoric Shower!"
Pico quickly ran to the side to escape the barrage of star-shaped projectiles, and when Reisen fired energy bullets at him again, he jumped into the air and flipped upside-down before pointing his guns at both Reisen and Marisa to fire at them. Both the girls got out of the way and then Youmu jumped at Pico while he was still in midair to slash him. Quick as a flash, Pico whipped out a knife and blocked the sword strike in the nick of time and then fell back onto the ground at the same as Youmu and then they both stared at each other. "You're good…" Youmu commented.
"Thanks for the compliment!" Pico replied.
"Gotcha!" Baba shouted as he suddenly leaped at Youmu from behind in an attempt to grab her. However, Youmu spun around and slashed him across the body.
SLAAAAAAAAAAAAASH!
"AAAAAAAAAAYEEEEEEEEEEE!" Baba screamed as he was sent flying to the side after receiving a slash wound to his chest, and he crashed into the side of a trash can before passing out on the sidewalk.
While Youmu hadn't turn her attention back to Pico yet, the green-skinned alien quickly fired from both his guns at her. Youmu reacted fast and ducked down to avoid the bullets and then ran at Pico to swing her sword horizontally at his legs, but the green-skinned alien leaped back into the air and onto the sidewalk before continuing to fire at her.
"Strange Half-Body!" Youmu raised her arm underneath Myon and then half-phantom glowed with pinkish-purple before firing a rapid burst of energy bullets at Pico. Pico was surprised by this, but he managed to roll aside in time to avoid getting shot and then ran as fast as he could into an alleyway.
Meanwhile, Sanae, Cirno, and Alice were looking at the sight of a living skeleton dressed in red and brown clothing—The Skull.
"It's a living skeleton?" Sanae said in shock.
"Is this skeleton being controlled using the same method as how I control my dolls?" Alice wondered.
"I am The Skull!" The Skull said. "Through the combination of science and black magic, I have come back to life in order to continue racing! I may be over two hundred years, but I still have the skills and minds of when I was still in my prime! Hear this and be afraid, young ones: I am invincible! There is no hope for you in destroying me! This is all thanks to the power of science and bla…" Before he had the chance to finish speaking, Shanghai used a sword to cut off The Skull's head.
"I don't have any interest in what you're going to say," Alice said as she moved her fingers to bring Shanghai back. "If you are here to fight, then get started already."
"How dare you use such a cheap tactic?" The Skull's head, which was lying on the pavement, angrily said. "In F-Zero grand prix, one uses sharp thinking and strategies to overcome opponents, not dirty tricks like this!" While he was saying this, his body was crawling on the pavement, looking for its head.
"Hooray!" Cirno exclaimed as she ran up to the head and kicked it far into the air.
"HEY! WHAT WAS THAT FOR?" The Skull shouted as his head landed somewhere in the distance, and then his body headed towards the head's general direction.
"That serves him right!" Sanae said. "Black magic is evil and should never be used!"
Zoda was still going trigger-happy with his machine gun, and the bystanders were running for their lives like crazy to avoid getting shot. "Cease your firing at once!" CF shouted as he jumped at Zoda to punch him in the face, but the villain tilted his head to the side to avoid getting punched, and then he proceeded to avoid the series of fast punches that CF threw at him by moving his body around swiftly and yet never taking a step away from his current position. After a while of dodging the punches, Zoda did a back flip to get farther from CF and then fired at him, so the captain quickly jumped out of the bullets' way.
"Yahahahaha! You're still a million years too early to stand up to me! Yahahahaha!" Zoda said while laughing maniacally. Suddenly, Remilia swooped down from the air and rammed him in the head, knocking him onto the front of his F-Zero machine. Zoda got back up and turned around to see Remilia flying into the air with her parasol in her hand. "Why you?"
"A million years too early to stand up to you?" Remilia asked. "Well, it seems like that 500 years isn't too late if you know what I mean."
"Eat this, bratty little girl who can fly!" Zoda said as he fired in her direction.
Remilia moved out of the energy bullets' way and then closed her parasol before swooping down at Zoda, ramming him in the head again. When Zoda got back up and turned around to face Remilia, Meiling suddenly came jumping towards him and landed a flying kick right in his face.
KICK!
"Oof!" Zoda cried as he flew back into his vehicle's cockpit and passed out with a shoeprint on his face while Meiling flipped back into the air and landed upright on her feet.
"How'd you like that?" Meiling said while making a victory pose. Suddenly, several energy bullets whizzed past her. She looked to the side and saw several yellow-eyed robots that were mostly gray in color standing at the sidewalk. Armed with laser guns, they fired at Meiling who 'danced' around to avoid getting shot. "Whoa! Be careful with that!"
"Dark Soldiers!" CF gasped upon seeing those robots. "When did they get here?"
"Shouldn't it be obvious? Black Shadow had them sent here since this morning," Zoda, who had gotten back up, explained.
The Dark Soldiers closed in on Captain Falcon and the girls while firing from their laser guns rapidly. CF ducked down to avoid getting shot and then he performed fiery sliding kick at a group of Dark Soldiers and kicked them away. "Falcon Kick!"
KICK!
Youmu deflected the bullets while approaching another group of Dark Soldiers, and then she rushed past at a speed equivalent to the blink of an eye. Just like that, all the Dark Soldiers were sliced into pieces.
"Disorderly Fortune Slip Bulk Discount!" Sanae shouted as she threw packet at yet another group of Dark Soldiers. One of the Dark Soldiers caught the packet in his hand and looked at it curiously while two other Dark Soldiers who were besides looked at it as well. Suddenly, the packet exploded like a firework and blasted those Dark Soldiers into pieces.
KABOOOOOOOOOM!
"Disbelief Aspect!" Reisen shouted as jumped to the side, and then an illusionary clone of herself appeared on the spot that she was originally standing on. Both Reisen and her clone fired bullets at the Dark Soldiers and shot them down one by one. Once the Dark Soldiers standing before them were shot down, the clone disappeared.
Suddenly, a bullet whizzed down from the air and went through Reisen's right shoulder. "Ya!" She placed her hand over the wound on her shoulder and then looked up to see Pico standing on top of a building and he had a sniper rifle in his hand.
Taking aim at Reisen again, Pico got ready to pull the rifle's trigger, but then he noticed that Reisen's eye were glowing and then a pair of eye beams were fired at him. He quickly rolled away to the side and then immediately got onto one knee before firing a bullet Reisen, but she managed to dodge it this time and then used her finger to fire at Pico. The green-skinned alien quickly ducked down to avoid getting shot.
After Reisen was done firing, Pico stood back up and fired from his sniper rifle again. Reisen quickly hopped back to avoid getting shot and then continued to fire bullets at Pico, trying to shoot him down. While she was doing this, a Dark Soldier pointed his gun at from behind and was about to shoot her when suddenly he was shot in the head by a green laser beam. Reisen turned to the side to see Nitori standing there and the kappa was giving her thumbs up. "Thanks!" Reisen thanked her.
Suddenly, a Dark Soldier showed up behind Nitori to hit her in the back of the head with his laser gun, but Reisen quickly headshot the Dark Soldier before that happened. Nitori turned around to look at the fallen Dark Soldier and then turned to Reisen to thank her. "I guess it's my turn to say thanks you to you. Thanks!"
Two more Dark Soldiers showed up and ran to Nitori from both sides. A pair of mechanical arms shot out from both sides of Nitori's backpack and grabbed the two Dark Soldier's heads, and then the mechanical arms lifted them into the air above Nitori and smashed their heads together before throwing them away into another group of incoming Dark Soldiers.
"Domination Dash!" Aya swooped down and dashed through a group of Dark Soldiers and knocked them all down. After ascending into the air again, she took out a card and threw it into the air before swinging her fan at it. "Headwind: Route Forbidden to Man!"
When the card was hit, it disappeared in a bright flash and then strong wind suddenly started blowing in the direction Aya was facing. The wind was so strong that the Dark Soldiers were sent tumbling and flying backwards, but some of them quickly grabbed onto the streetlights that were situated around the place to prevent being blown away.
Unfortunately, Captain Falcon and the girls were also blown backwards by the wind and they had to grab onto the streetlights in order to stay in one place. "Stop it, Aya!" Reimu shouted at her. "You're blowing us away as well!" And then a soft drink can flew into her face.
CONK!
"Ouch!"
Asides from a few Dark Soldiers, Cirno also did not grab onto a streetlight and was therefore blown back through the air. "YAAAAAAA!"
"Cirno!" Meiling gasped. She quickly let go of the streetlight that she was holding onto and allowed the wind to blow her towards Cirno in order to rescue the ice fairy.
"Gah! What is this wind?" Zoda cried as he held onto a streetlight for dear life. "How can these girls possess such power?" And then an old boot flew into his face.
BOOT!
"Ow!"
After being blown through the air for a short while, Cirno finally tumbled face first onto the pavement as there was no wind around this place. "Ow… That Aya… She just had to use that strong wind to blow everything away, including me…" she grumbled.
Some Dark Soldiers also landed next to her, and then they got back up again and shook their heads before turning to look at Cirno, and then they stood back up and pointed their guns at her.
Cirno quickly stood back up and got into fighting stance. "So you want to pick a fight with me? Bring it! I'll show you that I am the strongest!"
Suddenly, Meiling came flying into the scene and landed a flying kick into the side of a Dark Soldier to send him flying into his comrades, knocking them all down. Meiling then turned to Cirno and asked her, "Cirno, are you all right?"
"Hey! I wanted to beat them up myself! Why must you butt in and steal my target?"
"It seems that you're all right. Thanks goodness!"
Another Dark Soldier stood up behind Meiling and was going to shoot her in the back. "Watch out, Meiling!" Cirno shouted.
Hearing this, Meiling quickly jumped towards Cirno and then turned around to face the Dark Soldier who was about to fire from his gun. Cirno quickly pointed her arms and shot out a rapid burst of icicles at the robot. "Icicle Machine Gun!"
The icicles struck the Dark Soldier in the abdomen right when he was about to shoot the two girls, and when he was hit by the icicles, he accidentally aimed his gun diagonally upwards before pulling the trigger, and the laser was fired at a pole that was holding up a giant billboard situated on top of a building instead. After recovering from being hit, the Dark Soldier looked up at the billboard. This brought an idea to his head and then he fired at all the poles that were holding up the billboard.
"He must've gone crazy after I shot him," Cirno thought. "Now his aim has become horrible! Where are you aiming your shots, Mr. Scrap Metal?"
"No, wait…" Meiling said as she looked at the poles of the billboard being shot down one by one. "He's trying to make that giant board fall down on top of us!" By the time she said this, the last pole had been shot and billboard was starting to lean forward. "Cirno! Watch out!" Meiling quickly pushed Cirno to a safer place, but before the gatekeeper could get away herself, the Dark Soldier shot her in the left leg and made her fall to her left knee. "Ah!"
"Meiling!" Cirno gasped. "Look out above you!"
Meiling looked up and saw that the billboard was just a few meters above her face already. "Oh no!" Unfortunately, she couldn't get away in time...
CRAAAAAAAAAAAAAASH!
"MEILING!" Cirno gasped when she saw that Meiling was crushed underneath the billboard. The Dark Soldier turned to Cirno to shoot her, but the ice fairy flew out of the laser beam's way and then shot out an ice beam from her hand. "Take this!" The beam struck the Dark Soldier's body and encased in a chunk of ice, but his head and limbs were not frozen. Cirno then flew at the partially frozen Dark Soldier at a fast speed while being encased in a block of ice herself. "Ice Charge!" The frozen but conscious ice fairy crashed into the Dark Soldier and shattered the ice that his body was frozen in.
The ice shattered and the Dark Soldier flew backwards and landed roughly onto the street, and his was body was bent inward due to impact from the frozen Cirno.
The ice around Cirno disappeared and then she quickly ran up to the billboard to help Meiling. "I'll get you out of there in a minute, Meiling!" Unfortunately, the billboard was too heavy for her to remove. "Whoa! This thing is heavy!"
As she was trying to lift up the billboard, a man appeared behind her. Cirno heard his footstep and so turned around to see that it was Blood Falcon. "You're here, Captain Falcon!" Cirno said to Blood Falcon. "Hey, when did you change your clothes?"
"So this girl thinks that I am Captain Falcon," Blood Falcon thought, and then a wicked smile appeared over his face. "That's it! I can take advantage of this and then capture her!" And then he cleared his throat bit before saying to Cirno, "Listen up; it's too dangerous around here and we shouldn't be wasting our time fighting these guys. We should run away instead! I know a safe place to go to, so follow me!"
"Really?"
"It's true! Just follow me!" BF said as he grabbed Cirno's hand to run down the street with her.
"Wait a minute! Meiling is underneath that large billboard!" Cirno told him. "We have to rescue her first!"
"Don't worry; I'll get to it soon," BF told her. "Let me take you to the safe place to first."
As they were running down the street, Meiling managed lift the billboatd into the air and then hurled it away, and then she saw BF running down the street with Cirno. "Cirno! Captain Falcon!" Meiling shouted.
Cirno turned around to look at the gatekeeper and said, "Meiling! You're all right!"
Meiling saw that the 'Captain Falcon' who was taking Cirno away had different color schemes and said, "That person is not wearing the same colored clothes… Is he Captain Falcon?"
"Uh oh…" BF said in his mind, but he kept on running down the street, dragging Cirno by her hand along with him.
"Wait! You're not Captain Falcon, right?" Meiling said as she gave chase. "You're not wearing the same clothes and you even ran when I pointed it out! You must be an imposter!"
"What are you talking about, Meiling?" Cirno asked her. "He is Captain Falcon. He simply changed his costume during the fight." And then she turned around to face BF and asked him, "Isn't that right, Captain Falcon?"
"Yeah, I did change my costume…" BF replied in somewhat nervous tone.
"You may be able to fool Cirno, but you're not fooling me!" Meiling shouted.
BF quickly ran around the corner and headed for his vehicle which was colored red, but its front part was colored yellow and the vehicle was also numbered '25'—Blood Hawk.
He jumped into the red vehicle along with Cirno and then closed the cockpit. "Hey, your big metal container that can move really fast looks different as well," Cirno said. "Do you have two of these or what?"
"Shut up!" BF told her as he took out a cell phone-like device that had a small screen on it. He quickly dialed a number and then Black Shadow's face appeared on the screen. "It's me! I've got one of them! Quick, transport me back to the base!"
"Got it!" Black Shadow told him.
Suddenly, Meiling popped out from around the corner and ran towards the Blood Hawk as fast as she could. "You're not getting away from here! Let go of my friend at once!" she shouted. BF quickly stepped on the gas pedal to move his vehicle backwards, but then a few seconds later, the vehicle suddenly disappeared in a bright and instantaneous flash. Meiling was shocked at the sight of the vehicle's disappearance and then looked around the place for signs of it. "Where did they go?"
"Falcon Punch!" CF shouted as he landed a powerful fiery punch into the chest of Dark Soldier and sent it flying backwards into other Dark Soldiers. With that, all the Dark Soldiers were defeated. He dusted his hand and said, "Well, that take cares of that, but Zoda and Pico seem to have gotten away." He turned to look at the girls and asked them, "Is everyone all right?"
"We're fine," Reimu told him, "but blame Aya if the wind from earlier messed you up in form."
"Sorry about that…" a somewhat embarrassed Aya apologized. "I almost forgot that you will all get caught in this move as well…"
"These guys aren't tough at all-ze," Marisa said as she used her broom to sweep up the remains of some Dark Soldiers to pile them up together.
Remilia looked around the place and said, "Meiling isn't here. Where'd she go?"
"Cirno isn't around here as well," Sanae added.
"Everyone!" shouted the voice of Meiling as she ran up to them in panic.
"Where have you been, Meiling?" Remilia asked.
Meiling stopped to take a break from the running and then said to them, "Someone who looks like you, but dressed in different color clothing and helmet, took Cirno away! They got into a red vehicle and then it disappeared a few seconds later!"
"Someone who looks like me but wears different color clothing and helmet?" CF said curiously. "Wait a minute, that's Blood Falcon, my evil clone!"
"Your evil clone?" Reimu said curiously.
"One time when I was injured and living in the hospital, Black Shadow took my blood sample and used it to create a clone of me called Blood Falcon. His believes that his sole purpose in existence is to destroy me. I can't believe that your friend got fooled by his obvious color difference..."
"I'm not surprised that Cirno got fooled by him-ze," Marisa said.
"Whatever the case is, this is a serious matter! We need to rescue Cirno at once before harm befalls her!"
"But why do they want to kidnap us in the first place?" Sanae asked. "We didn't do anything to do them at all!"
"Do you think it has something to do with Michael Chain being beaten up by us yesterday?" Reimu asked.
"Maybe, but Captain Falcon was the one who punched him down in the first place-ze," Marisa reminded her.
"I doubt it," CF told her. "Bloody Chain is mostly by itself and doesn't really work under any other organization, so I don't think it has anything to do with what happened yesterday."
"Ow!" Cirno cried as she was forcefully thrown onto the floor by Black Shadow. She stood back up and shouted at the villain who was standing in front her, "Hey you! Don't throw me like that! I'm not a ragged doll!"
"You're now a prisoner, so you better keep quiet!" Black Shadow told her.
"Prisoner? Does that mean I am captured and placed in a jail or cage?"
"It's exactly as you said!"
"But I don't see any metal bars that are keeping me from getting out. In fact, there is nothing to keep me from getting out! I can just walk out of here!" Cirno said, and then she walked forward a few steps, only to bump her head into something invisible. "Ow!" Cirno rubbed her hand with one hand while using her other hand to feel the air around her, and then she touched something that felt like glass. "There's something here!"
"This is a glass-like force field that keeps people inside from getting out," BS explained. "However, people from the outside can still go in, but once they go in, they can't come out!"
Cirno turned to look at Blood Falcon who was standing next to BS and said to him, "Captain Falcon! How can you do this to me? Don't tell me that you are a bad guy all along!"
"Ha! You're not very smart, aren't you?" BG said. "I'm not Captain Falcon. I'm his evil clone, Blood Falcon!"
"What?"
"It's too late for you to regret now! You should've listened to your friend back in Mute City!"
"This force field thingy won't trap me forever!" Cirno said. "I'll just bust it down! Icicle Machine Gun!" She fired a rapid burst of icicle from her hands, but the icicles shattered into pieces upon hitting the force field. "Eh? How about a bigger one?" She held up one arm and formed a ball of ice that gradually grew in size until it was as big as herself. "White Rose Cluster!" She fired the massive ice ball, but it also shattered upon hitting the force field. "What?"
"Hahaha! There is no way you can escape!" BS laughed. "And I have to admit that you do have some neat powers for a little girl! It would seem that you're not an ordinary little girl after all."
"Darn right! I'm and ice fairy, and not to mention the strongest!"
"Oh really? That really makes me wonder how powerful the other girls are if you really are the strongest, but yet got captured so easily."
"Maybe it's just because she's not very bright," BF told BS. "Another girl knew at first glance that I'm not Captain Falcon."
"Anyway, now that we have captured one of the girls, her friends and Captain Falcon must be very worried. Zoda should be telling them about our purpose for capturing one of the girls by now."
Suddenly, the door opened and Deathborn stepped in. Chills went down BS and BF's spine as the more intimidating villain walked up to them and said in a loud voice, "What is the meaning of this? I thought I told you to find that thing called the Light Essence and not capture some little girl! You better give me a good explanation for this pointless act!"
"Calm down, Master Deathborn," BS replied nervously. "This is all part of my plan! You see, there's this group of girls who recently came from another world to this world, and they are looking for the Light Essence as well. If we capture one of these girls, we can make them find and hand over the Light Essence to us."
"I see… Then make sure that everything goes as you have planned! You better not screw up anything, or else I'm going to show you what will happen to those who fail me!"
"I know what's going to happen and I'm not going to let it happen again…"
"Also, there's one more thing I want to ask you."
"What is it?"
"Why didn't you just use the transportation machine that your henchmen used for bringing you back from the outer limits of space to here to transport one of those girls here instead? You used it bring Blood Falcon back here, didn't you?"
"I doesn't work that way," BF told Deathborh. "You see, in order for the target to be transported, a special device needs to be attached onto it first." He then took out a black, hexagonal piece of plastic that had a red circuit board in the center of it and said, "This is the device that allows the target to be transported. The machine can transport the device to anywhere, but the target will need to be holding this in order to be transported by the machine. By transporting this to Black Shadow, he was able to grab hold of it and then be transported back to this planet. I placed this device onto my Blood Hawk in order for Black Shadow to use the machine to bring me back."
"Hmph! Your explanation is plausible," Deathborn said, and then he turned around to leave. "Do as you wish, as long as everything will go as planned!"
After Deathborn had left the room, Black Shadow sighed with relief and said, "That guy sure gives me the creep whenever he's around me… I can't believe that the Emperor of Brutality, which is I, can be resorted to such a low status by someone like him! Just you wait, Deathborn! I'm going to make you regret it if ever I have the chance to do so! And also when I have the courage…"
TO BE CONTINUED
All right; I'm glad that I've finally updated my story with a new chapter. I hope that this chapter is good enough for the long break. I'll try my best to finish the next chapter as soon as possible, so please have patience. Until then, have fun waiting for the next chapter to come out!
Dark Soldiers originated in the anime before one of them appeared in the game F-Zero Climax. Bio Rex, Octoman, Pico, Baba, and The Skull are all members of Dark Million Organization in the anime, and since I have said in the previous chapter that this arc also takes elements from the anime, the same thing holds true here. However, I have no plans for other anime-originated characters such as Ryu Suzaku (known as Rick Wheeler in English) to appear in this arc, so I apologize to those who were hoping to see him.
BTW, Aya's Dominion Dash is actually called Domination Dash. This mistake has been changed for the previous chapters as well.
Next chapter: The Strongest Prisoner