Disclaimer: The characters in this story belong to Rumiko Takahashi, not I. Some characters are from my imagination, but not many. Do not use this story without my permission.
At the Palace of Amaterasu!! The Earthly Errand Ends!!!
Ataru and the crew stood in total awestruck shock as they stared down the heavenly palace of the Sun, without a ship, without a breath and without a single inkling as to how they managed to get there. Lum's grip around Ataru's arm continuously tightened as time around them in the divine, astral plane. Mendo finally stirred and looked up from the ground, his mouth falling wide and his voice cracking in surprise.
"WHAT HAPPENED!?" he shouted. A simultaneous breath was released from every mouth. Everyone was waiting for someone to speak up, despite everyone being as much out of the know as even their fearless leader Ataru was. Mendo struggled and pushed himself from under Ataru's feet and stood up, walking hypnotically a half-step forward. He turned with a start at everyone and started waving his hand at the heavenly palace gates before them. "Whe-where are we? How did we get here!? Moroboshi, what have you done!?"
"We're in heaven" Ataru said. "I guess....my plan worked."
"Darling!" Lum shouted, jumping into his side and squeezing him with both her arms and her legs. "I knew you could do it! I knew I knew I knew!!!"
"You're the craziest bastard I've ever met" Benten said as she walked up beside him.
"Thanks" Ataru said, still voicing his total shock and astoundedness. "I guess we should....go in now."
"In?" Mendo said as he began to laugh. "Into the palace of Amaterasu? You? YOU!? HAHAHAHA!!!" Mendo's obnoxious laughter began echoing across the golden, cloudy planes around him. "Moroboshi, there is obviously an error in the cosmos, for if we are in heaven, and if this is truly the heavenly palace of the great sun goddess Amaterasu, and you are the one who truly brought us here, then it means that heaven has fallen to HELL! A demon like you cannot possibly come to this place as you are!!!" Mendo snapped. He unsheathed his sword and charged Ataru with a bellowing howl of rage. Lum tried to shake and drag Ataru away but she couldn't move him. His stubbornness in his stead had activated at an inopportune time, and Lum was forced to retreat while Mendo's sword cleaved him down the middle.
"DARLING!" Lum shouted. Benten was stunned. Mendo had followed his slash through to the cloudy ground. The edge of his blade parted the clouds beneath it. He grinned smugly, so proud of himself for finally ending his lifelong foe of some odd few years, and looked up to admire his efforts.
"MAH!?" Mendo shouted. He saw Ataru, not only in one whole and uninjured piece, but looking over himself with some apathetic curiosity from hand to hand.
"Huh" Ataru grunted. "I guess, in heaven, you can't die or hurt people." Benten tested his theory by punching him in the head. Ataru's neck bent and slammed his head onto his opposite shoulder, but he was uninjured. He just took his head in his hands and snapped it back upright.
"How bout that?" Benten said, flexing her arm and looking at her now ineffective fist.
"Too bad, Mendo" Ataru said, now with a wide grin of arrogance. "The first time you manage to land a fatal blow and I'm already dead! HAHAHA!!!" Mendo was lifeless. His face was white and his eyes were wide with astonished horror. He fell to his side, his body remaining perfectly stiff in its position, and stopped breathing.
How.... Mendo thought. In all the universe there is no greater lech, no greater nexus of misfortune humanized into such a repulsive form. And yet this same man has delivered us into the most holy of all realms! He has ascended us to heaven! How? How!? This is impossible! I, the son and heir of the great Mendo clan, the closest thing to divinity on Earth, could not act in any way similar at all, and yet here I lay, at the feet of Moroboshi who has saved us all! How.....how is his luck so twisted and confusing that it saves us all at the same time we all die!? I can't take this....I must atone for my own failure....
"Single file!" Ataru called. While Mendo sulked and prosed to himself Ataru was rounding all the crew up to enter the palace in as respectable a manner as possible. "Get in five columns, please! I don't wanna have to explain to anyone that their loved ones got lost in heaven! Stick together! I'll go first, since I called us here. She's probably expecting me."
"What about Shutaro, Darling?" Lum asked. Ataru looked over and saw Mendo on his knees, a small dagger before him with a sterile white cloth wrapped around the handle.
"He looks busy" Ataru said. "He's a smart guy, so he'll catch up. Alright! Company forward!" Ataru led the crew in their march as they calmly entered the great palace walls. Shutaro attempted Seppuku without success multiple times, stabbing his blade harmlessly through his flesh and grinding it as if it was twisting in the air, until he began sobbing hysterically in forfeit.
"It's not fair!" Mendo shouted. "It's NOT! WAAAAHHH!!!" Tobimaro picked Shutaro up and slung him over his shoulder as he rolled his neck from one shoulder to another. Shutaro kicked and whined the whole way as Tobimaro carried him to walk with the rest of the crew as they entered heaven. When the last man crossed the glorious golden threshold of the palace gates, the divine panels of heavenly wood reinforced with glorious glowing steel and iron were shut behind them. A symphony of bells and chimes sounded out in the boundless, heavenly sky of sunny gold to announce the arrival of her absolute-highness' expected guests, waking the palace guards and waiting staff to meet them as they ascended the mountain of stairs that led to the entrance of the deity's royal mansion...
Time passes differently in heaven than in the living realm. What seemed to be days of ascent were actually only minutes that passed slowly on the heat-blasted Earth. While it was hard to measure the passage of time in a land where there was only sunlight and where the pains and needs of hunger and sleep were not present, Ataru was able to gauge the approximate amount of time that they had wasted climbing up and up the steep stairs and whined about it the moment he had cleared the last step.
"Who builds five-days worth of stairs!?" he shouted, looking down at the wide steps which his crew continued mechanically scaling and scaling. Lum floated down beside him and wrapped her arms around his shoulders. He shrugged her off with a light roll of his shoulder and she stepped down, settling for his single arm instead. "You got off easy, you know" Ataru scowled. "You can fly!"
"What's to stop you from flying, Darling?" Lum asked. "This is heaven. Shouldn't you be able to fly too?" Ataru looked down at his feet and hopped up, hoping to stay in the air. He landed back down. He tried jumping higher but landed just the same. "Hmm. I guess that's just a rumor."
"From who?" Ataru asked. "Who would know enough to make that rumor!?"
"Take it easy, Moroboshi" Ryuunosuke said as she mounted the final step and turned to sit on it. "At least we made it. There's no reason to complain as long as we get the good results, right?"
"That seems more like something you would say, Darling" Lum said, turning to Ataru. "Maybe all the sunlight is changing your personality."
"I hope not" Ataru said. "Let me check." He crouched down and started rubbing Ryuunosuke's back, up and down her spine. Lum just watched, knowing full well that whatever she did wouldn't hurt him and whatever Ryuunosuke wouldn't hurt him either. Ataru then reached around and suddenly grabbed her breasts, prompting both women to glow with rage.
"HEY!" Ryuunosuke shouted. She grabbed Ataru's arms over her shoulders and tossed him down the stairs. He didn't hit any stairs as he fell until he had completely cleared the sluggishly marching crew. It was about two days before Ataru managed to climb his way back up and meet with everyone, still smugly giggling and smiling at his triumph.
"When we get back to Earth" Lum lowed "I'm going to send you right back here!" Ataru waved his hand and giggled.
"How should we proceed?" Mendo asked, taking the front of the movement. "Moroboshi is the one who brought us here, in one way or another, so I believe he should go first to announce our arrival."
"Ah, good idea" Ataru said. He walked to the front of the group with Lum close behind and entered the great entrance hall. He led the company some distance into the gilded hallway, paneled with the cleanest and largest rice-paper walls with the bright glowing of sun-light lamps overhead, looking in all directions for a direction to head. "Hello?" Ataru called. "Anybody home?"
"Isn't that rude, Darling?" Lum asked.
"Well, we were sort of invited in, weren't we?" Ataru said. "I think it's rude that we haven't been received yet. HELLO!?" he called again. "Amaterasu? Are you in right now? We've come from space to see you! Helloooo?" Ataru sighed and stopped in the hall to rest. He had come to the first departing in the hallway and was wracked with the indecision of which way to go. He could go straight, down the same continuous hallway that stretched on into a fog of yellow light, or take a left into a hallway that was gilded with more ornate coverings of gold and silver and glinting, precious jewels adorning weapons and shields that lined the walls. Of course, Ataru chose the path of riches.
"He's wandering the wrong way" Mendo said as he watched Ataru dash of giggling. Lum lingered behind and listened to Mendo talk. "Obviously, the path to heaven is paved not with riches but with good will and patience. If we are expected to find Amaterasu, her heavenly graciousness, on our own, she will expect us to be smart enough to know which hallway to take when the divide comes up. Moroboshi, obviously, is not that smart."
"Smart or not" Lum said defiantly "Darling is the one who got us here. Besides, what kind of Godly being would test people if she's supposed to love them so much?" Tobimaro stifled a giggle at the irony of Lum questioning the wrath of a heavenly being. She floated after Ataru and was followed quickly by Benten and Ryuunosuke.
"Everyone!" Mendo called to the crew, his sword held over his head heroically. "Please, follow me! I shall ensure us-"
"Quick! After Ataru!" a man in the front of the group shouted.
"He's quick, don't let him get too far ahead!" a woman called.
"No man left behind, Dappya!" a Dappya-monster shouted. Mendo was left in shock as the entire crew veered down the hall of riches after Ataru and Lum, leaving Mendo and Tobimaro standing at the crossing alone with a lonely, warm wind sweeping past them.
"Cheer up, Shu-chan" Tobimaro said as Mendo sank to his knees. "I know better than they do as well, riches do not lead a man to heaven alone. Let's embark alone. We'll find them all before too long." Tobimaro looked down at Mendo and found himself surprised at his reenacted attempts at ritual suicide for the umpteenth time, his eyes streaking tears and his mouth blubbering syllables.
"It's over" he said as he vainly wiggled his dagger into his gut. "All my respect, gone. All my command.....gone...." Tobimaro sighed and blew his bangs out of his eyes. He picked Mendo up by the arm and led him, a wobbling staggering former respectable man, down the royal hall without riches as was his original intent....
After what seemed to be hours of aimless wandering and admiration of the great, heavenly treasures in Amaterasu's hall, Ataru and the ship's crew came to a great, golden gate guarded by two giants in heavy armor wielding great, bejeweled spears. The giants took no notice the the group initially, as they were like ants to them, but when Ataru and Lum crossed the royal threshold together the spears were swung down and pointed down at the frozen couple.
"Ambush!" Benten shouted in reflex. Ryuunosuke slapped her back to her senses and pulled her forward. The giant guards parted their spears and aimed both parties down.
"Who art thou!?" the right guard demanded.
"From where doth thou come?" the left asked.
"Uhhhh...." Ataru groaned, stunned into silence.
"Greetings" Ryuunosuke began with a polite bow, undaunted by the huge weapon aimed at her chest. "We are humans from Earth, Fukujinn warriors and one Oni, come to see Amaterasu."
"An Oni?" the right said, drawing back his spear. The left giant drew back as well and they shared a glance. "What state is our heaven in when Oni may come hither and thither as they please?"
"Mayhap it is not the Oni we think it be" the left said. "What Oni is this? Show them promptly!" At his command, Lum hesitantly detached from Ataru's arm and flew up into plain sight of their eye level. The giants leaned forward and gave Lum a detailed leering. "Oh, so it be this Oni?" the left one said.
"She's far too pretty for an Oni that I've ever seen" the right declared. "Is she perhaps some crossed-spawning of a human and a demon?" Lum huffed and furrowed her brow. "Ah! Look now! Her demon side comes out!" Lum's fangs jutted up from her lower lip and lightning began crackling around her in a cloudy nebula. "Her furious rage shall level this place! We must quell her at once!" The giants stepped back and held their spears tight while Lum fumed and hovered back down in a huff.
"Ah! Don't attack!" Ataru shouted. "She's harmless, except to me, I swear!"
"What's that mean!?" Lum shouted, trying to zap Ataru, forgetting in her subjected embarassment that in heaven there was no pain. All her angry electricity was drained out and crackled off of Ataru in a brilliant glow. She hung onto his shirt, panting and smoking from her powerful discharge, her uniform from space tattered and hanging in strips off of her skin. Ataru patted her back and she fell into him.
"See?" Ataru said.
"You, boy" the right giant declared, pointing the spear back at Ataru who nervously retreated a step and threw up his arms in surrender. "You sound familiar. Pray tell, doth thou have some relation to the Divine Mother of All Creation, Amaterasu-Sama?"
"Uhhh" Ataru began, "well, I kinda brought us here by calling her earlier. You didn't happen to hear that....did you?"
"Ah, but we did!" the left giant said with a smile. The giants turned to each other and nodded. "Her Heavenly Graciousness has been awaiting your arrival, Ataru Moroboshi." The human company (and the Dappya-monsters) were shocked at the mention of Ataru's name.
"You know who I am?" Ataru said.
"Of course we do" the left giant said. "Twould be a disgrace for a heavenly body such as I to admit that I have never heard of the living embodiment of misfortune, Ataru Moroboshi! HAHAHA!!!"
"From up here" the right giant noted "you all look so small. I know your face well from closer up, mind." Ataru was fuming now too, but much more calmly than Lum was. He folded his hands into his pockets and stepped forward with his brow furrowed and his jaw tensing his words with an agggravated bite.
"So!?" he called. "Are we invited in or what?"
"Ah, of course, master Moroboshi and guests" the left giant said. The great golden gate swung slowly open, revealing a blindingly bright room of pure sunlight within. "The Great Heavenly Hostess awaits you within."
Both giants took their spears to their sides again and bowed respectfully. "Please, enter, our gracious guests of heaven." Ataru shielded his eyes and walked forward at their invite. The crew did the same, though most of them already had shades of some kind on and merely adjusted them as they proceeded.
"You think this is safe?" Benten asked. Ryuunosuke turned to her, keeping her eyes in the shade of her arm, and shrugged.
"There's no reason to think it's not" Ryuunosuke said. "I mean....it is heaven."
"I mean this meeting" Benten said. "I'm glad we made it and all, but can Moroboshi maintain himself long enough to hold a serious, legitimate pleading with the creation goddess of the world?" Ryuunosuke didn't give her an answer. Benten turned to her and saw that Ryuunosuke was holding back sweat and her pupils had shrunken in deep thought. She turned again, restoring seriousness to her face, and replied.
"Well...just believe in him" Ryuunosuke said. "That's what got us here, right? M-maybe that'll work."
"What's with the stuttering?" Benten asked.
Meanwhile, as the crew of the ship led by its relatively fearless captains and supernatural experts headed to see the divine goddess of all creation and light on Earth, Mendo and Tobimaro had hit another predictable snag.
"Come on, Shu-chan!" Tobimaro roared. "Quit killing yourself for a second and walk on your own! I'm getting tired of carrying you everywhere, you spoiled, princy, bastard!" Shutaro was huddled over himself on the ground, stabbing into his ethereal gut with his useless, cleanly polished dagger. His face had lost all its emotion and was now a blank, pale glazed-over stare into the void of space before his eyes. Tobimaro sighed and shook his head. "Come on now, are you really that useless that you can't pull yourself away long enough to get up and walk? What a pathetic son of royalty you are..." Instinctively, Tobimaro forgot his place in heaven and caught the downswing of Mendo's blade as he attacked him with a full anger sweeping over him.
"Pathetic, am I?" Mendo lowed.
"See?" Tobimaro said. "Now you're fine! Just concentrate on that anger." Mendo continued to push his sword against Tobimaro's grip and had him against the wall. From far down the hall, catching the attention of both boys with just a glimmer, a light began to approach. It illuminated the floor and moved with a rhythmic, uneven pace, like the hopping sprint of an animal. Mendo released his blade and sheathed it with a stylish swing.
"Could it be?" he wondered aloud as he walked to the middle of the hallway. "The divine, earthly avatar of Amaterasu?"
"Huh?" Tobimaro grunted.
"You uncultured trash!" Mendo growled, gripping a fist at Tobimaro. "Don't you read!?"
"I read baseball magazines" Tobimaro said "but that doesn't make me uncultured. If anything" he roared, hotly defending his livelihood of a sport, "it makes me even more cultured than you, you sportless, un-athletic....you!" Mendo turned back to the light that approached him from the distance. It came closer and closer, bringing itself into a better and more solid view as it approached. "Hey! Are you listening!?" Mendo threw his sword through Tobimaro's head and into the wall in a sudden snap of rage, then turned seamlessly back to his stoic gaze towards the light.
"It is!" he exclaimed. "It is a wolf of white carrying the sun on its back! It is the sun herself, Amaterasu-Ookami!!!" The being that charged his way was indeed a wolf, a great white one with glowing golden eyes and a brilliant golden aura following in its running wake. Mendo opened his arms and fell to his knees with tears of joy streaming from his eyes instead of tears of desperation and sorrow. "I did it! I knew my way was right! I beat Moroboshi to the end! I knew I could! Take that, you bastard!!!" The wold barreled by with the speed of a train and swept a mighty wind across the wall where Tobimaro was pinned. He finally pulled the sword from his skull and threw it down. He saw pure light in the wolf's wake but missed Mendo.
"Shu-chan?" Tobimaro called. "You alive?" Mendo was more than alive, riding on the back of the divine beast as it sprinted its way through the halls to enter the realm proper where Ataru and the company had just been, unknown to the grateful, weeping, smiling Mendo.
I knew it! Mendo cheered mentally. When they see me on the back of Amaterasu, they will stand up and cheer, 'He's so great! Long live Mendo!' and Moroboshi will cry! THAT FOOL!!! HAHAHAHAHA!!!!! "I'm so happy!" Mendo cheered. He laughed the whole way to the hall of gold where the wolf sharply turned and followed on the path that Ataru had made earlier.....
The inner realm of the sun palace was a verdant, infinite garden with a glorious, shining mansion built at the top of a nearby hill that shone the light of the sun across the rolling, infinite land. The plants were imbued with the holy blessings of Amaterasu's light and grew taller than most men. Gardens of flowers extended for acres alone and were rowed and columned in an arrangement that imitated the greatest divine inspirations of Earth. Sunflowers were grown as tall as small houses and shaded the gilded, cobble-stone path that the humans walked upon to find their way. Lum tried to walk, but the path rejected her and threw into the thick stalks of the flowers each time, forcing her to hover and look down as her Darling walked in worry and contempt.
"Why can't I walk on the ground?" she asked in a huff.
"Maybe cause you're an Oni?" Benten said. Lum cooed at her curiously.
"Think about it, Lum" Ataru said. "I mean, you're technically a demon, right? And this is Heaven. They wouldn't let demons walk around freely, would they?" Lum pouted and hovered down the path in front of him. She flew around a bend and out of sight from the rest of the group.
"Who's they?" Ryuunosuke asked. Ataru shrugged.
"The Gods?" Ataru said. "You know....Amaterasu.....the others."
"Even I know most of the Gods, man" Benten said. "Don't be such an idiot."
"EEEEEK!!!" Lum shrieked. She came flying around the corner, pursued by angry, spear-wielding sunflowers, and hid behind Ataru. The sunflower warriors accosted them both and stomped on them briefly before leaving down the road and around the bend where they came from. Benten and Ryuunosuke were so shocked and taken aback with surprise that they couldn't move quick enough. Thankfully, some of the more strangeness-desensitized crew women managed to move to action and looked over the two.
"Are you alright?" a girl asked. Lum groaned as she was picked up, shook her head and floated up on her own.
"I'm fine" Lum said. "But....I'm really confused."
"What happened?" Ataru asked.
"Darling!" Lum called, her voice starting to waver. "I was attacked! They just pulled themselves from the ground and chased me with spears and tried to hurt me and I couldn't fight back and....I hate it here! Why does heaven hate me!?" Lum grabbed Ataru and began sobbing into his chest while the boy just looked up in total confusion.
"Then why'd they attack me?" he demanded. He turned his neck to Lum and looked at her accusingly. "They attacked me because you hid behind me, didn't they? What'd you think would happen!?"
"NOTHING!" Lum shouted, still sobbing. Ataru flinched at her volume and shifted his eyes to the side. He gave in with a begrudged puckering of his lips and hugged Lum as she buried her face into his chest.
"Sorry" he whispered.
"I guess they're just that way, eh?" Ryuunosuke said. "If I saw a demon walking around heaven I'd want to get it out immediately....no offense." Lum nodded her head in a nuzzle with Ataru's chest and pulled away with her eyes only brimming with tears.
"What about Benten then?" Lum asked. "Why isn't she being attacked? She's an alien too."
"Yeah" Benten said "but I'm a Fukujin, and my family's named after an actual God so....I guess they like me better. Or maybe they don't distinguish between aliens at all since the Dappya-monsters are here with us." The entire legion of fish men in environmental suits sounded off and saluted at her cue. "Calm down!" she shouted.
"Pay it no mind, madam captain" a man in black shades said. "We should proceed down the path if we must. Do not worry about the hostile plant-life. The elite Mendo guard will take care of them for you."
"HO!" a group of men shouted. They leaped into scene, before Ataru and Lum, with various gardening implements equipped that had spawned from out of the thin, angelic air.
"Proceed cautiously, young stand-in master" the head guard said.
"Alright" Ataru agreed. "Everyone, forward!" The company marched forward, led by Ataru, guarded by the expert guardeners protecting the front of the group and men lining each side of the larger procession to protect the girls and defenseless, wonder-struck Dappyas. They rounded the corner and spotted the same sunflowers casually standing and shifting their legs impatiently, like they were on break. The men held up Ataru, who held up those behind him and started a chain reaction of people stopping each other as they waited for the men at the front to take action.
"I wonder" one of the guards said in a low and halted whisper "is attacking these guys like a declaration if they're guards like us?"
"What do you mean?" the apparent leading guard said.
"If they're Amaterasu's guards" another man said "would attacking them make us....bad?" Suddenly, the sunflowers were alert and took up their bamboo-stalk spears to charge at the men.
"Whatever!" the head guard shouted. "If we sin in heaven we will repent immediately!!! ATTACK!!!"
"HO!!!" the guardeners shouted. They clashed weapons with the sunflowers and held each other in place in a powerful stand-off, struggling against their force on equal ground. Finally, one force slipped past the other and a guardener managed to cut the head from a sunflower as it guarded its side from attack.
"Nice attack!" Ataru shouted. Just as the ling was broken, the man was stabbed by the sunflower's still-moving body and he let out a deathly groan as he staggered back. He looked down dramatically at his hands and saw them fading into the air.
"Gah!" he exclaimed. "I've sinned! I have to repent before I vanish!" He got down on his knees, still with the bamboo spear shoved through his body, and began praying silently.
"Don't stop!" Benten shouted. She saw the sunflower's body praying as well, across from its foe, as it was fading just as fast for killing him. "What the hell!?"
"Well, they were attacking humans" Ryuunosuke figured "so I guess they were just as much in the wrong as we were."
"Then why didn't they vanish after stomping on me!?" Ataru demanded. "There's something wrong with Heaven's judgment policy on me, and I don't like it!"
"Well, you're married to a demon, aren't you?" a girl said from behind, irking both Lum and Ataru for different reasons.
"ENOUGH!!!" A great, commanding, booming voice roared. From beyond the high stalks of the heavenly sunflower wall a light appraoched. A light as bright as the sun, brighter than a thousand watts of energy. A divine and slender woman's hand twisted down a knob that decreased the heavenly glare to a mere, earthly 5 watts, and down from the air descended the royal, beautiful, heavenly vision that was the Great Sun Goddess, Amaterasu! She stood between Ataru and his guards, looking down on the company from her high, hovering perch, with a conceded yet merciful and benevolent look across her face. "There shall be no more violence in our realm. So declares the Heavenly One, Amatera-"
Ataru was standing directly under her, looking up her billowing dress. Ryuunosuke facepalmed. Benten bent over and sputtered stifled laughter through her pressed lips. Amaterasu descended instantly and crushed Ataru's head into the cobbled pathway beneath her shining, golden geta sandals. The encounter with the Goddess finally happened....though it could have gone better...