Chapter 11: Nocturne Hospital
The next morning, Katie ran up to the Nate's hotel room, with Whisper and Komasan in tow.
"Ya think this is serious?" Komasan asked as they ran.
"Based on how Nate was on the phone," Katie said as she began to knock on the door. Almost immediately Nate opened it, "We came as soon as we could, what's the problem?"
"Take a look," Nate said pointing to Damona, she was lying on the bed, bandages on her stomach, purple sweat roling down her face. No-bot was near here applying medicine to the wound, while jibanyan was on her yokaI-pad.
"What happened to her?" Katie asked concerned, "...and why is she wearing your shirt."
"That's not the issue here!" Nate scolded her than tried to calm down, "Last Night, she got attacked by a yokai, he looked kinda like Komasan, except bigger, leaner and covered in warpaint."
"Will she be ok?" Katie asked.
"Negative. :(" No-bot replied catching everyone's attention, "Mistress Damona's wounds are in critical condition, her cursed skin makes her immune to negative inspiritments, but is vulnerable to Holy Fire. :("
"But yokai can't be killed, Right?" Nate asked.
"While that is correct, Master Nate, we can still be injured. :( I am afraid if she does not receive professional care immediately the wounds may become permanent. :(" the yopple-bot replied.
Jibanyan looked up from the yokaI-pad, "At least there's SOME good nyews," the nekomata turned the tablet revealing a chat-room about lion dogs, "Turns out Insomnyi's got a lot of friends, she and I set up a yokai chat room for anyone who seen a suspicious lion-dog."
"Good thinking, Jibanyan," Nate nodded, "but what do we do now?"
"I'll skim the yokai wiki for any near by medical yokai!" Whisper said before No-bot replied, "No need. Searching for nearby yokai hospitals."
"Yokai have hospitals too?" Katie asked.
"My thunder was stolen by a tin can!" the butler yokai whined.
"One Result!" the robot finally announced, "According to GPS, the nearest Yokai Hospital is the Nocturne Hospital in shoppers row!"
"Nocturne Hospital?" the human boy asked in confusion.
"Well you see-" Whisper began, but Katie connected the dots, "Oh, of course! The Nocturne Hospital was mysteriously closed about fifty years ago due to sudden, unexplained structural damages, of course yokai would hangout there!"
"Oh Come on, can't I just have ONE moment?" Whisper complained.
"Shut up, Whisper!" the two humans said in unison.
"Well then let's get her over there!" Nate exclaimed.
"Affirmative):)" No-bot said as its chest cavity opened up and a hospital bed was folded out. The two humans went to damona's sides and shifted her from onto it. Jibanyan jumped up onto the hospital bed, circled around damona's legs then lied down.
"Lead the way," Nate said to No-bot, who nodded and began to drag the bed south west. The humans and yokai following behind. After about a half hour of walking and weird glances from pedestrians, Nate could see the grey, condemned building covered in vines, with a lot of holes in the structure.
"This place is a hospital?" he asked quizzically before they entered.
"Affirmative, though it is specifically for yokai. -_-" No-bot said floating toward the door as most of the group followed, Nate stopping.
"What's up?" Katie asked him.
"This is the closest yokai hospital… and that blast from the lion dog needs to be professionally treated… What if he's expecting us to come here?" Nate wondered.
"Wow, You're right, if he's after Damona then putting her in a situation where he has all the cards would benefit him," Katie replied, "So what do we do?"
"Set up some security!" Nate said taking out Insomni and Yoink's yokai medals, "Come on out my friend, Calling Insomni! Yokai medal, do your thing!"
Summoning, EERIE!" the watch chimed as he inserted the medal, "Oogly, boogly, flip'a teedee, oogily, boogly, bubba, Eerie!"
"Insomni!" the one-eyed djinn said as she made her appearance, "Need my help so soon?"
"I'm getting Damona to a doctor," the boy replied, "but I think that lion-dog from last night might have thought ahead and is coming here too."
"Got it, I'll keep an eye out!" Insomni replied floating upward.
"And you'll have some back up!" Nate exclaimed inserting Yoink's medal.
"Summoning, SHADY," the watch chimed again, "Marvelous thee, Gutsy banshee, sing song, Shady!"
"Yoink!" the big headed yokai appeared. Katie followed suit and summoned dismarelda and Happiere to help. Nate informed the yokai not to let anyone, living or dead, pass until the came back out, Then returned to the group. The four yokai began to fan out, Insomni and Happiere getting a bird's eye view, while Dismarelda and Yoink patrolled the ground.
Meanwhile, give or take a block away, a man and a Komane watched.
"It seems your report was accurate, Komane," the man said eyeing the for yokai from a telescope.
"Let me in there, ah can take em!" the Lion-dog begged.
The man Held his hand up and Komane went silent, "the Oni Defeated you while it was injured…"
"Come on, Gabe, she caught me off guard, ah'm ready fur her this time!" Komane Cut him off.
"Gabe" held his hand up again, "This Oni is too powerful for you to handle alone, So I will send you in… with him."
"Oh, you're not really summoning that hot-head are ya" the yokai complained.
The man took out a silver stop watch with gold detailing. He pressed a button on it, flipping up its cover revealing it as a yokai watch. From his case he took out a black book with japanese ruins on it as well as a lock binding it's cover shut. He unlocked the book, flipping to a certain page, instead of literature, there were medals. Each page of the book had three rows of four yokai medals, nearly every page filled. The man stopped at a particular medal, taking it from its space.
"I summon my familiar!" He said flipping the medal into the air and catching it, "Yokai Medal, Set On!" he inserted the medal into his stop watch, causing it to glow red, "Summoning, Brave!"
"Sumo shave! Flavo engrave! Flash team'a Brave!"
"B3-NK1!" A yellow and purple machine yokai exclaimed.
B3-NK1: B rank
Brave
Back with the main group, who had just entered the hospital, were pretty grossed out.
"Ugh, this place smells like raw Sewage!" Katie gagged while holding her nose.
Nate looked through the halls, barren, not a soul in sight, save for the rats. Everywhere was covered in rust, moss, or something else disgusting.
"Again, this is a hospital?" Nate asked for clarification.
"I'm with you, this place reeks!" Whisper agreed, "I don't know how they stand it!"
Nate and Katie looked at each other for a second, then the place where pointed. Nothing was visible, so the both began shining their lights. In the halls, behind the desk and one hanging from the ceiling formed short, royal blue Onis with a single red eye, and a large purple hand.
"Thats a lot of yokai," Nate said surprised.
"Says hear, they are called Leadoni" Whisper pulled out his yokaI-pad.
Leadoni: E rank
Shady
"It says here that Leadoni can lead you anyway you may want to go, Leadoni's sense of direction is better than any map or compass in the world!" Whisper read.
"Looks like they run the place," Nate said walking up to the counter, "Excuse me?"
"Huh? What'cha doin' here? The human hospital's across town," the small oni replied.
"Oh, yeah I know, but I'm not here because of me," Nate moved out of the way, "My Fiance here, she's half oni, got a severe burn from holy fire."
"Ah, why didn't ya say so, I'll just take a look at the lil' lady and-" The Leadoni suddenly saw Damona's face, even the silent scowl she was giving him, "Princess Damona! Why didn't'cha say it was her! I'll book ya with Dr. Maddiman right away. Come on, people!"
Three more Leadoni came toward the bed and began to push it down the hall. The first Leadoni jumped down from the counter and tugged at nate to follow her. Thats right, the leadoni was female, deal with it. She and Nate followed the first three up to the second floor.
"So I guess we just sit her and wait?" Jibanyan asked.
"Cum'on, this way!" Leadoni said to Nate who was looking back and forth at the different yokai who seemed to be staying in the hospital, some we big and humanoid, others resembled bats, one looked like a gorilla, there were a lot.
The bed halted at a door at the far side of the hall. Leadoni went up and knocked, " !"
The door cracked open and a larg eye poked out, "What do you want, I'm busy!"
"Uh, Sir, it's kinda important," the short oni said, "ya see we have a Patient-"
"Stick em with some other doctor!" Maddiman Yelled.
"Uh, Sir," Leadoni went up to him and whispered, "It's Plundros's daughter!"
"PLUNDROS'S DAUGHTER!" Maddiman yelled. He slammed the door, several locks could be heard being undone, then the door opened completely revealing Dr. Maddiman. He was a large mostly humanoid yokai with half blue-half pink skin, a large yellow eye in the center of his face, and five, antenna like strands of hair coming off his fore-head. He was wearing a white lab-coat, and black jumpsuit with medical slippers. His chest was exposed with a heart on top of it connected to an IV drip.
Dr. Maddiman
? tribe
"What's the issue?" Maddiman asked ushering her into the room.
"Holy fire induced burns," Leadoni replied walking in.
Nate tried to come into the room, but the doctor's hand stopped him, "Hey, kid, who're you?"
The boy was about to answer but Leadoni spoke up, "He's her fiance, he's the one who brought her in."
Maddiman took his hand off Nate's chest, "Don't get in the way. What did this to her?"
"Uh, a lion dog!" Nate replied, "Last night."
"Last night? She should have been brought here immediately," Maddiman yelled, "I need three doses of Bitter medicine, stat!"
Maddiman began to undo Damona's bandages until the blue burn mark was visible. One of the Leadoni handed him a vile of purple powder. He then took a syringe from his coat, "This'll sting for a moment. Blood refill!"
the syringe changed color to black and he injected it in the wound. After a few seconds the wound began to slowly shrink.
"There," Maddiman sighed in releif.
Nate looked at his fiance puzzled, then shifted to the larger yokai, "what did you do?"
"One of my powers is to shift my blood samples and organs to match the yokai I am operating on, thus I can do transfusions immediately and my organs regenerate shortly after," the doctor replied, "the addition of Oni-blood kicked her healing factors back in, she'll be fine soon, assuming nothing goes wrong."
Meanwhile outside, something caught Insomni's eye. She saw the same lion dog from the night prior on the approach. He was too far away to see any expression on his face, but she didn't need to. The djinn began to swirl her aura, "Never. Sle- Ack!"
Her soultimate was canceled by a slash to her back. She turned to see the robonoid yokai before his second attack reduced her to a soul.
Hearing the commotion, the remainder of the group ran outside in time to see the other three yokai fall. Both the lion-dog and the Robokai took notice and began to change direction. Komasan lept in front of the group swirling his blue aura, "Spirit dance!"
A barrier of blue flames surrounded them, the opposing lion-dog gained a scowl.
"Alright whisper, who are they?"Katie asked.
Whisper flipped through some pages on the yokai wiki before saying, "hear they are, Komane, a Komasan who has reached a mastery of unmatchable combat, and B3-NK1, a machine yokai that can disrupt any electronic device."
"Alright, let's use the time we've got to think of a plan," Katie started, but at that very moment someone yelled, "Spirit Burst!"
A shockwave of blue flame passed over their heads causing the barrier to fall. Komane had a grin as he and B3-NK1 closed in, "end of the line!"
It seemed their approach was inevitable, until something no one on either side expected. Out of nowhere, blasts of red energy began to fire at the two yokai in rapid succession. In a split second the both put their guard up to reduce the damage.
When the blasts ceased, Katie looked behind her to see the origin of the attack, and she saw… No-bot. No-bot had sprouted an extra pair of arms, both of which were holding smoking energy guns. On his face a screen read, "Danger Level: 5."
"Tarnation?" Komane asked in shock.
"Cease your assault! :(" No-bot yelled.
"What is that thing?" B3-NK1 asked examining the robot.
"I am Yopple-bot Version D5, :(" No-bots body began to shift. Its cyan wisps changed to a violent red as it grew in size, its horns extended and it gained a robotic scowl, "I am sworn to ensure my owners' safety and happiness, if you want to bring them harm, you'll have to get past No-bot! :("
No-bot: Defense mode
? tribe
"I've got this," B3-NK1 said lunging to the robot.
"NEGATIVE! :(" No-bot said. His canons focused on the other machine and began to fire multiple bullets a second. B3-NK1 began twirling his sword to avoid damage but it was to no avail as he was still hit. Komane began to sprint towards the now violent robot, ready to launch a flaming punch, No-bot noticed his approach and took immediate action! His chest cavity opened and from it he pulled a large, cartoony bomb which was appropriately marked, "BOOM!"
"Bombs Away! :D" No-bot yelled hurling the explosive sphere at his attackers. Komane stopped dead in his tracks with a look of pure terror as the bomb landed right in front of him. The Lion dog only had a split second to put his guard up before its fuse blew, knocking him back ten feet.
"Oh my swirls!" Komasan said in surprise, the others had similar looks on their faces.
"How is it doing that?" Katie asked with a shocked face.
"Huh, would you look at that, turns out Nobot has a page on the wiki!" Whisper said looking at his yokaI-pad, "Yopple-bot version D5, remind me to rename it later, a version of the hit Yopple automated… BUTLER PROGRAM! STEVE JAWS IS TRYING TO REPLACE ME!"
"Focus Whisper!" Katie said as No-bot fired a spiral blast hitting both opposing yokai.
"Fine. negh, negh, not important, AH HA!" Whisper exclaimed, "As part of their service all Yopple-bots are equipped with automated defense modes and risk analysis systems. When a situation reaches danger level 5, the defense mode will be in effect until the threat is neutralized!"
"This. Varmint's. Gettin. On. mah. Nerves!" Komane said as he blocked blast per blast.
"Then you're really not gonna like this! :D" No-bot announced. He began flailing his robotic arms as an electric aura began to swirl around him, until it suddenly stopped as he yelled, "All Guns Blazing!"
The robot suddenly began to fire all of his weapons full throttle, fire, plasma, bombs, a whole warehouse of destruction, all aimed straight at Komane and… where's the other guy? While No-bots artillery was going full force at Komane, he noticed B3-NK1 was nowhere to be seen.
Suddenly a blade was thrusted through No-bot's chest, on the end of it was a silver screw. B3-NK1 had taken the opportunity to sneak up from behind and steal a vital component to the yopple-bot's infrastructure.
"Error! System Failure, Shutting down." No-bot's screen faded to black as the robot fell to the ground. The machine yokai gained a triumphant grin as he helped his lion dog partner to his feet.
"Not good," Katie said stepping back.
"I got this!" Jibanyan said running toward them, "Paws of Fury!"
Yet before he could land a single punch, Komane knocked him into the ground, effectively knocking him out.
"Even worse!" Whisper screamed floating behind his mistress.
"Looks like we're done fur!" Komasan cried.
"Y'all shoulda just stayed outta the way," Komane said cracking his knuckles preparing for another attack.
"Hey you!" a voice from above yelled. Komane's attention was directed to the balcony of the second floor of the hospital. On it was Dr. Maddiman himself, "Get Well DOOM!"
The doctor pulled a hand-full of vials from his lab coat and threw them towards the two yokai. A majority of them hit B3-NK1, but Komane didn't get out unscathed, both were engulfed in green and purple smoke. When the smoke cleared B3-NK1 was reduced to a soul, while Komane was covered in burn marks.
"This ain't over," the injured Lion-dog growled before sprinting away.
"Yeah, run away ya big chihuahua!" Maddiman Yelled, he looked down at the damage, four reduced to souls, one unconscious, he wasn't sure what to do for No-bot, and on top of it all, he had a very awkward phone call coming, "Just great."