Disclaimer: I do not own the copyrights to Gundam Wing, Endless Waltz, Rurouni Kenshin, any movies, books, or any songs that are used in this story. All copyrights belong to their respective owners.
Notice to Readers: To understand certain parts of this story, you'll have to read the other stories before this one. It is recommended by not required.
Gundam Wing and Rurouni Kenshin
The Gundamslayer
Chapter 4: Back to Kyoto
*
As Johan was making his report to the office of Preventer, the Kenshin-gumi were all telling stories to the Preventers of their adventures as well as the funny moments of their lives. They even shared their own terrible and often troubled pasts. Yahiko once being a pick pocket just to pay off a family debt, Sanosuke once being part of the Sekihoutai whose captain was killed and framed by the very people he served, Kaoru how she had to fend for herself as well as for her dojo, and then there was Kenshin. His past was the most troubling, but to the ears of the Gundam pilots, it sounded so much like their own pasts. The way that they had killed people during the Eve Wars and how Kenshin became a wanderer after swearing never to kill again, it seemed to both Kenshin and the Preventers that they were fighting for the same causes…never to kill again. It was as if for that brief moment in time that they were family all sharing stories around some camp fire.
"So there I was outside the bath house." Kenshin said, "I was trying to counsel Kaoru through this tough time, and I tried to listen but there was no sound. Fearing that she was going to kill herself I rushed in telling her that suicide isn't the answer. Then to my surprise I found that she wasn't."
Kaoru nodded, "And that was when I shut him up in the storage house for peeking in on me. Then again I think the score was evened when I saw him at a hot springs resort."
Kenshin did blush in thinking about it. How when he and his friends had stopped by this place where there happened to be a natural hot spring for them to use. Of course it was split up into the men and women's bath, with only a row of bushes separating the two. Kenshin remembered how he heard Miss Kaoru and Miss Megumi's conversation. Struck by it, Kenshin burst through the bushes to tell them how he thought about it, failing to realize that he was still naked from using the hot spring. Of course, Miss Kaoru and Miss Megumi did catch a good glimpse of him in that state. So that did make Kaoru and Kenshin even in that area.
Johan opened the sliding door and sat back down with his wife, friends, and the Kenshin-gumi.
"Did you file a report?" Duo asked as he chose some tempura
"Yes, I did." Johan answered picking up some miso soup, "I told our offices to be on the look out for anyone paying for large items with gold."
"Do you really think that they'll expose themselves like that?" Sanosuke asked, "If these guys are really good ninjas then they won't be that stupid."
Johan grinned, "The eyes of Preventer are everywhere…" he paused to take a sip of the soup, then continued, "it's funny that in the old days Preventer only consisted of a handful of people. Now its become a network of people, myself and the other Gundam pilots are simply the enforcers, the only ones allowed to have mobile suits in this time of peace."
"What's a Gundam? And what's a mobile suit?" Yahiko asked
Johan scratched his head for a moment; he knew that since these people weren't from their own time, he had to find a way to explain it to them in a way that they could understand. He kept wrapping his mind around the problem, sort of like trying to tell a child who still thinks concretely about abstract thoughts. At last the simplest explanation seemed the most rudimentary but he figured that it would do.
"Best way I can put it," He started, "Is that a mobile suit is a machine. Sort of like…a suit of armor that a person wears. Except its much bigger, more complex, and with weapons that can do more damage."
"If it's bigger, how can anyone fit in it?" Sanosuke asked, "I tell you Kenshin, this is starting to sound a lot like that stuff about the train."
"The train?" Duo asked
Kaoru shrugged, "Sanosuke still believes in the superstition that a steam train is powered by a ghost."
Immediately Duo started to laugh about this, but Sanosuke wasn't as amused, "You laugh now, but I tell you that there's no way that huge tea kettle can run on its own!"
"Calm down, Sano." Kenshin said and turned back to the Preventers, "Weren't you about to tell us what a Gundam is?"
"Well," Johan said, "A Gundam is basically a machine, a very complex suit of armor made out of a very special metal."
"Stronger than iron?" Yahiko asked
"Oh, very much so." Johan answered
RING! RING!
Johan reached into his pocket and pulled out the cell phone.
"What is that?" Sanosuke asked
"A communication device." Johan said as he answered the phone, "This is officer Rodriguez."
"Officer Rodriguez, you've asked to be informed of any activity regarding large purchases using gold as payment."
"Have there been any?" Johan asked
"Yes, sir." The Preventer reporter answered, "In the country of Japan, a group of individuals have purchased several old Virgo suits. There has also been a report given that this person did not wish to give his name, only to buy the suits."
"Bring in that dealer in for questioning."
"He's already been brought in, sir, which is the reason you and the other Preventer Gundams have been called. We are holding him at the Preventer office in Kyoto, Japan."
"Understood" Johan said as he hung up, "Everyone, it looks like we may have a lead."
* * *
The trip was made, the Preventers Duo Maxwell, Johan Rodriguez, Haruka Tenou, and Hilde Maxwell, along with the Kenshin-Gumi all made the trip down to earth. Though for the Kenshin-gumi this was the first trip that they would ever have in space. Come to think of it, it would be the first trip that they would have flying at all. Needless to say some of them were amazed, stupefied, and just blown away at the accomplishments of that universe. Though Sanosuke was just absolutely scared out of his mind, he had the same superstitious nonsensical ideas of what was powering and controlling the craft he was riding. It became a little too much for him, so Johan and Haruka had a brilliant idea to calm him down. Using a drug that's known to be a great relaxant, they crushed it and placed it into a glass of water and gave it to Sanosuke. He took the drink but drank it with a very nervous hand, though eventually he began to relax a little bit on the trip down to Earth.
"Where exactly are we going?" Kenshin had finally asked, when they left the restaurant they had no idea of where they were going, but then again the question did slip Kenshin's mind only for a moment.
"We were told that the dealer is being held at the Preventer office in Kyoto, Japan."
"Kyoto?" Kenshin asked with surprise
"Kenshin." Kaoru said as she place her hand on Kenshin's who looked out the window into space with that look on his face. That worried, deep thinking face, the one where she knew that Kenshin was troubled. She knew this all too well through the things that she and her dear loved one had been through. Kyoto was a place that held a lot of memories for Kenshin…painful ones. It was the very place where he was the legendary swordsman, Battousai the Manslayer who ushered in the Meiji era with the blood of his enemies. For Kaoru, she wished that it was somewhere else, somewhere far away from Kyoto where Kenshin wouldn't have to face such memories again. In Kenshin's case, Kyoto reminds him of the one who was buried there. At least that's what he told his master. It seemed ironic in a way that Kyoto was a place where so much blood was spilled, but there was a time where Kenshin went back to stop another manslayer, Makoto Shishio. Now, he was going back to stop another group…but from doing what is something that Kenshin was going to find out.
After landing at the Tokyo space port, they took a train from Tokyo to Kyoto. To Kenshin's eyes, he couldn't help but look out the window and see how Tokyo had changed in the centuries between his world and the one that he was in. He saw how incredible it all was, it seemed so incredible that he wondered if it was all real. In his time, it would have taken hours to reach Kyoto, but thanks to the train and the advanced technology that these people had, they had arrived in Kyoto in only 15 minutes.
"Absolutely amazing, that it is." Kenshin admired, he even looked out the window at modern Kyoto and it looked so much different than the Kyoto that he remembered. He tried to remind himself of what was explained that things in this universe weren't the same as his. Thinking of that, Kenshin made the connection that perhaps in this universe there was no Battousai the Manslayer, but then he thought about the Meiji era and how it was long gone. Then again there was another kind of era all across the world as Duo and Johan had told him, where there were no national borders, no weapons except in the hands of Preventer, and that the people do not live in fear anymore. It was the very era that Kenshin was fighting for.
Kenshin reached into his kimono and pulled out a small gift that Johan had given him. He looked at it remembering what Johan had told him about it. It was simply a long round silver object, almost like that of a swords hilt, yet Johan told him it was a sword of a very different type.
"It has been customary to give a gift when someone visits us." Johan has said on the train to Kyoto, "I wish to give you this, one Preventer standard issue beam saber. It is much like your sword but this one can definitely kill if used properly or at the most you can slice off their limbs. This sword has a blade of light, a light so powerful that it can cut through anything, even metal and stone itself."
Kenshin reluctantly took the beam saber and asked, "Why would you want to give me such a dangerous weapon?"
"Because I have a feeling that you will need it" Johan explained, "we intend to stop these men and if they are intent upon their purpose they will be willing to die for it. Yet, this weapon is only a gift, you can choose to use it or choose not to use it."
The train stopped, they were in Kyoto, and they came to the Preventer office and through a two-way mirror, the Kenshin-gumi watched as Johan and Duo spoke to the dealer. A man who looked tubby as well as pasty, as they spoke the Kenshin-gumi could also hear them.
"Do you know who these men were?" Johan asked
"No." The dealer shook his head
"You do know that it's illegal to own mobile suits, much less deal them." Duo said, "That is a minimum sentence of 10 years."
"You can't do that!" The dealer said, "I want to speak to my lawyer."
"You already admitted to selling those parts." Johan said, "You gave up the right to remain silent so therefore that can be used against you in court. So, if you tell us about these men who bought the parts we may be a little more lenient on you."
The dealer took a deep breath in frustration, "I didn't catch their names. They wouldn't give any, all they wanted were the suits and as I've said before they paid in gold bars...a hell of a lot of them, if I might say, enough to retire on."
"How many suits did they buy?"
"12 of them, but they did ask for something very unusual."
"What?" Duo asked
"They said that they wanted to Mobile Doll program removed so that they could be controlled manually. I didn't know why they would want that, why put yourself in danger when you can sit back comfortably and have the mobile doll fight for you? But hey…the customer is always right."
"Did they say anything unusual or cryptic?"
"I over heard them say something about taking back the country."
Behind the two way mirror Kenshin was already developing questions about this whole situation. He didn't understand a word about this thing called a mobile doll, its program being removed. All he knew was what was explained about these things, that they were weapons of a very dangerous sort. Yet, they mentioned taking back the country. Kenshin suddenly felt a small tinge of panic thinking that they were going to take back the country of Japan in this era. It seemed perfect; no one has weapons so there'd be little to defend against them. Yet, the whole idea of that broke down when he thought of these Preventers and how they mentioned that they were the only ones with these mobile suits.
"Thank you for your cooperation." Johan said
"I'm free to go now?"
"Well, you're still going to be held accountable for selling mobile suit parts. But because you've admitted it up front I think that you're sentence will be shortened, but that's up to the judge to decide not me."
Johan and Duo left the room and came into the backroom with the Kenshin-gumi.
"So, it looks like we got a ruthless group of people with very dangerous weapons."
"Do you think they'll try to take this country?" Kenshin asked
Johan shook his head, "I don't think so. Because we can take care of those mobile suits easily, which is why none of this adds up…they came to this universe with gold and bought mobile suits. But what do they intend to do with them?"
"It is puzzling." A voice said from behind Johan. He turned to see his friends, Heero Yuy, Trowa Barton, Quatre Raberba Winner, and Wufei Chang.
"Heero." Johan smiled, "I'd like to introduce all of you to our latest visitors."
Johan introduced the Kenshin-gumi to the other Preventers, after the introductions all of them tried to weight the whole situation. They all went to one of the many meeting rooms of the Preventer office building. Looking at what they had on their hands, all they knew was that there was a group of ninjas who came to this universe with gold and they bought mobile suits with them.
"Somehow it almost seems like they've been to this universe before." Quatre stated
"That does stand to reason, that it does." Kenshin added, "Because they bought these mobile suits in a very short amount of time from when they went through that tear to our arrival."
Trowa shook his head, "One thing we've seen with the behavior of the tears is that time seems to speed up and slow down. For all we know they could have arrived several months ago when they came through and you had only arrived just now."
"At the moment," Heero said laying the situation on the line, "It stands like this, we know that they have 12 Virgo model mobile dolls without their mobile doll programming. We know that without the programming they'd just be mobile suits and that means that they'd operate them manually."
"And we also know where they got the money for it." Sanosuke imputed
"Exactly." Heero said, "But their purpose for them is anyone's guess. However, if they've been here and know enough about mobile suits to operate them, much less where to buy them then that rules out one thing."
"Which is what?" Miss Kaoru asked
"Somehow I don't think they intend to take on Preventer." Heero answered
"Why do you say that?" Johan wondered
"If they've been here as long as we think then they know the power that we wield and how much better we've gotten. Even if they are heavily experienced martial artists we can still take them on with Gundams against Virgos."
"So, what are you saying?"
"If they don't intend to take us on, then that leaves one place where they could intend to take over."
Kenshin uttered the thing that Heero was thinking, "Our time."
"What?" Sano asked
"With such weapons against the Meiji government, Japan stands little to no chance of stopping them."
"Right," Trowa agreed, "And without knowing where the tear is, we don't even know if they've gone back yet, or if they've even gone back at all."
"It seems the only thing we can do is just sit and wait." Duo stated, "Which is always the worst part."
Just then the door had burst open and one of the reporting officers came in, "Sirs, we've just received word, there are a bunch of mobile suits all matching the Virgo description heading toward something that our operatives have described as a tear."
Johan immediately stood up, "Contact the Fortress and have it send down the Gundams."
The reporting officer saluted, "Yes sir."
* * *
The Fortress was the name given to an enormous orbiting satellite around the Earth. Yet, it wasn't just any kind of satellite that could relay communications, peer out into space, or even look down upon the Earth itself. This satellite was built by Preventer for only one purpose: To house the Gundam mobile suits. As Preventer had experienced in the past, they couldn't always haul around their mobile suits, keeping that in mind they built this satellite for just that reason. The way it was designed was that it could launch the Gundams inside mobile pods that could withstand the friction of the Earth's atmosphere. This way, the satellite could send any one or all of the Gundams to Earth (to a set of coordinates fed to it) within a matter of minutes. Yet, thanks to the built in systems of the mobile pods, they wouldn't make craters like the mobile pods from the Shuffle Alliance's universe (G-Gundam), when they would land they would have a parachute system for landing on Earth. There was also a system of "breaking thrusters" that would fire and would prevent the pod from crashing into ships or colonies thanks to their proximity sensors. Then to counter the satellite from being stolen several systems have been build into it, first is on the satellite itself which if anyone who comes near it without the proper codes would be fired upon by the automatic weapons systems. The next is the onboard computer systems, which have codes that are changed every 6 hours from several locations both on Earth and Space from the multiple Preventer locations. This allows the security of the Gundam mobile suits from both being stolen and the convenience of not hauling them around. Plus thanks to the automated repair systems onboard, the computers verify what is damaged and repair them justly. This way the suits are nearly always ready.
As the Fortress sat in space orbiting earth housing the Preventer Gundams, it awaited its orders to deliver its package. The satellite itself was almost designed much like a cannon with its round nozzle pointing downward to the Earth and a round cylinder above it that held the Gundams in different slots in a ring around the nozzle that pointed down to the Earth. Of course the satellite had its enormous solar panels with thanks to their micro-compact technology could absorb more sunlight and starlight and convert it into electrical energy.
Suddenly the codes were received, and like the chamber of a revolver the mobile pods were loaded and the satellite used its thrusters to move into position. Then it fired the mobile pods down to the Earth. It fired five pods, each one marked respectively, Wing Zero, Deathscythe Hell, Heavyarms, Sandrock, Nataku, Nemesis, and Ryu.
* * *
With the Gundam mobile suits on the way to their proper coordinates, the Preventers and the Kenshin-gumi headed to the spot where the mobile suits were reported to be seen. Yet, when they got there, they were too late. For the mobile suits and whoever had them were already gone. Yet, hope was still there, for in the sky, there was the tear. It loomed there like a window without a wall. Inside its blurred edges they saw a landscape with a great mountain in the background. The Kenshin-gumi knew that they had gone back to the Meiji Era of Japan…the Japan that they knew.
"Where are these Gundams of yours?" Sanosuke asked in sarcasm
Duo was the one to answer without words. He only looked up to the sky, raised his hand and pointed upward. Sanosuke and the others looked up and then they saw them. Seven objects, at first they were only dots, but then they became bigger and bigger with each passing second.
Since they were on the short of Japan they were beginning to wonder if this was going to be a water landing or a shore landing. The pods came within visual distance and it became clear that all of them were going to land in the water. As the Preventers and the Kenshin-gumi watched they saw their parachutes open and they glided down. Yet, they still made a pretty lard wave, but that didn't matter. It was time to act and act fast. The Preventers raised their voices and called to them:
"GO GUNDAMS!"
Instantly each pod opened revealing the treasures inside: The Gundam Mobile suits, and for the first time the Kenshin-gumi saw what they were talking about this whole time. They were like suits of armor to their eyes, yet they were enormous as they landed upon the shore. Even more then what they had originally imagined like how all things are when we imagine them to be larger or smaller then what they will actually be. With their size towering over them, the Gundams seemed frightening to all members of the Kenshin-gumi. Especially when their metallic heads looked down to the ground with those bright green eyes. They seemed to have menacing souls of their own when they moved about in their human like manner. Even to the superstitious Sanosuke who was absolutely petrified by what he was witnessing. He imagined that they were possessed by demons wielding whatever kind of terrible weapons that these people had at their disposal.
They watched as the Gundams chests opened and ropes came down to the ground as if they were lowered by someone up there. Each pilot took a respective rope and called to the Kenshin-Gumi.
"Kenshin" Johan addressed, "You'll ride with Heero. Sanosuke will ride with Trowa, Miss Kaoru will ride with Haruka, and Yahiko will ride with Quatre."
"Oh, no!" Sanosuke refused, "I'm not going anywhere near those things. They're the devils work."
"Oh, for God's sake." Duo moaned
Trowa had something in mind for Sanosuke, "Have you ever suffered any major head injury?" He asked
Sanosuke looked at him confused, "No, why?"
Trowa leaped up into the air with that same acrobatic grace that he's had his whole life and made a strong kick to Sanosuke's face knocking him to the ground and out cold. After a few showoff flips, Trowa came down with the grace of a singular feather upon the ground. With the shock of Sanosuke knocked out, the rest of the Kenshin gumi are awed by this. Not very many people have been able to knock out Sanosuke like that. They watched as Trowa threw the enormous Sano over his shoulder and took him up into the Gundam Heavyarms.
All of the Kenshin-gumi were silent.
"Come on," Duo said trying to coax them into seeing their point of view, "We had to get him in somehow."
The rest of the Kenshin-gumi didn't resist, Yahiko went with Quatre, Kenshin with Heero, and Miss Kaoru with Haruka. All of them were strapped in and ready to take on a new battle in a different time and a different land. All of the Gundams stood before the tear and they stepped through into the era of 1878 Japan, the 11th Year of the Meiji era as the tear had closed behind him.
To be continued…