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 5: The Gundamslayer
*
The cross-over had been done. The Gundams had watched as the world around them had changed. Much like how it did back then, during that time when the Preventer Gundams had met another team of Gundams, the Shuffle Alliance. They saw for themselves back then how much different it was for them to go from one world to another. It seemed so odd to all of them that all those times other people had come into their world, that time with the Shuffle Alliance was the first, and that time going into the world of 1878 Japan would be the second. They remembered at least in some latent way how advanced everything looked in their own world. Yet, when they stepped through the tear like going from one room to another they saw how vastly different the world was so many centuries ago. The sky itself seemed so much more blue, and the forests that they saw in 180 degree directions were fuller, thicker and greener. It was incredible but they had to face the reality that they were only there to stop the ninja's. For a moment, there was no sign of them.
As each of them looked, the Kenshin-gumi were all safely tucked away in the Preventer Gundams core landers. It was a small piece of technology that the Preventers had brought back from the Shuffle Alliance's universe. Looking to the far left the Kenshin-gumi had reported where they were.
"Look." Kenshin said leaning over the cockpit chair, "There." He pointed to the far left.
Heero looked and saw a city, a primitive city with stone roofs or roofs that seemed to be fashioned out of stones into decorative tiles. He saw the sun rise over the ocean casting its brilliance across the water and onto those roofs.
"It's Tokyo." Kenshin said, even though he was only gone for a few hours it felt as if he was gone for months. Then again time was something that seemed far away to the wanderer ever since he took up his reverse blade katana and wandered all across Japan. Time seemed to be as blurry as the bottom of a muddy lake, unclear of what day it was, only the sun, the temperature, and the color of the leaves to tell the time of day and the seasons.
"But where are the ninja's?" Heero asked as he looked all around him in his 360 degree cockpit view.
It seemed to be an eternity when Heero asked that question, seconds being stretched like taffy into infinity amounts of time. Then his reflexes kicked in as he saw movement in the trees, those newtype reflexes that Heero never lost no matter how much time had past. He saw the Virgo's fly out of the trees like grasshoppers in a field. He and the other Gundams were quick to act. Kenshin, Kaoru, and Yahiko watched with amazement as the Gundams moved with such speed, power, and accuracy. These kinds of moves were ones that they had only seen in Kenshin whenever the occasion had arisen for it.
They watched as beams of light came across the screen and they sliced through the metal as if it was paper. To Kaoru she was scared when she saw these people do such things. She wanted to cry out to them to stop before they killed the ninja's, but she remembered. She remembered that it was the policy of Preventer to never kill just like Kenshin's oath. All of them saw that they weren't aiming to kill the ninja's inside those Virgo's as the Preventers called them. It seemed as if they were only aiming to disable them by cutting off the arms and legs of these enormous "suits of armor". It truly was a good thing that they were fighting in the forests away from Tokyo otherwise there would be catastrophic damages and the loss of life would be greater than the revolution that brought about the Meiji era.
As the torso's of the Virgo mobile suits fell to the ground, they Preventers watched as the cockpit doors opened and out came the ninja's who were running into the forests. This was when they saw the opportunity to switch the gears of combat. It was time to go hand to hand with these men. Each Gundam knelt down to the forest below and opened the cockpit doors. Each of the Gundam pilots and the Kenshin-gumi jumped down and into the forest below. Kenshin went for the hilt of his reverse blade katana making sure that he was ready for whatever or wherever the ninja's were going to come from. While the Preventers went for their specific weapons, some chose their side arms while others chose their beam weapons.
Most of them were out, except for Trowa Barton who was trying to wake up Sanosuke from the knocked out state that he put him in. Trowa would have been lying if he said he didn't regret doing that to Sano, but then again what choice did he have? He didn't exactly have a tranquilizer on him, nor did he have time to get one. Plus with the state that Sano was in, it would have been nearly impossible to bring him back without some kind of force.
"Hey, wake up." Trowa said as he continued to give Sano a good smack.
Finally Sano came around, "What? Where am I?"
"We're in your world." Trowa asked
"Ow!" Sano moaned as he sat back up, "What'd you kick me for, you bastard?"
"With the superstitious nonsense your head was filled with, I had no other choice." Trowa answered coldly, "But now is not the time to argue. We've taken the ninja's mobile suits out, but they're still moving."
"Where exactly are we?"
"From what Kenshin told us, we're in the forest outside Tokyo."
Sano cracked his knuckles, "Finally, some action."
Trowa then reached for his side arm as he and Sanosuke made their way down from the Heavyarms cockpit. All of the forest went quiet of voices; the only sounds were the rustling of the leaves from the wind that blew from the west. Each member moved slowly through the forest keeping their eyes peeled and their ears open for anything…any movement and any sound that wasn't the wind. The Preventers knew how the match was stacked, there were 12 Virgo's each one having a pilot, so that meant that there were 12 ninjas. Against the Preventers there were 7 and with the Kenshin gumi on their side that makes 11. It almost seemed like an even break, but they had to remind themselves that these men were professionals in their craft of assassination. That did explain why they were such lousy mobile suit pilots…not enough adequate training.
RUSH!
There was a noise…Haruka turned sharply and looked keenly into the trees with Miss Kaoru at her side. Haruka already had her beam saber out which hummed its pitch and glowed with its purple light, but she also had her hand on her sidearm. She knew that if this was 1878 Japan, then guns like the one she had wouldn't exist and that she could take one of them down with the greatest of ease.
Miss Kaoru on the other hand didn't want to remain defenseless so she grabbed a good solid branch that was as thick as those wooden swords that she used in her style. She had her back against Haruka's as the two of them listened for movement in the trees.
There was a rush in the air, as if something had been thrown. Haruka turned to where the sound came from immediately and her fast eyes caught what it was…a throwing star. Either it was going to make a small wound in her or its tips could be poisonous. In her mind all of these thoughts ran at ungodly speeds and she wasn't going to take chances. She brought the beam of her saber in its path and the star melted on contact.
CRACK!
Haruka took out her gun and without even looking she fired a single shot in the direction of the sound. Instantly as her eyes focused on where she made the shot, she found out that she had hit the target. One of the ninja's had fallen down to the ground like a sandbag. Haruka drew back her beam saber and brought that hand to hold her sidearm. She carefully stepped close to the ninja to make sure he was incapacitated. She saw that the ninja was down on his stomach; she reached out with her foot and shoved him over. She saw that the bullet wound was fatal; she shot him right through the chest. Yet, there was something very odd about it. She looked at the wound and saw that there was no blood. Keeping one hand on her gun she reached down to the ninja's neck and tried to feel for a pulse…there wasn't one. She reached down and pulled off his mask and saw that he was a handsome young man, but she couldn't understand why there was no pulse. She placed her hand over his mouth and felt no breath, as a matter of fact his skin already felt cold. That was when she went back to the bullet wound and ripped at the clothes around it. Looking closer at the wound she saw how there was no blood, yet there was something black. She dipped her finger into the wound and pulled it out to find it covered with black ooze.
"Oil." She said to herself that was when she pulled at the wound with Miss Kaoru watching from behind, she felt sick watching Haruka tear at the bullet wound as if it was a piece of raw meat.
The skin of the ninja pulled away as easily as cellophane and Haruka found nothing but metal underneath it.
"A Cyborg." Haruka concluded
"A what?" Miss Kaoru asked
"A man made of metal, a golem, something that's made to look like a person but has no true soul."
"You're people
have this ability?"
"Yes, but we've only seen this in one other person."
Haruka was speaking of one of the other Gundam pilots, Alexandria DeLarge, Preventer Codename: The Clockwork Pilot, and pilot of the Gundam Clockwork. She started to wonder if there were other Oz programs that have been forgotten like so many others that the office of Preventer had to clean up in the past. Such as Id the Lion an experiment to create the perfect soldier, just like Alexandria DeLarge except through cybernetic means, the Gundam Vindicator to try to copy the Gundam qualities, and Rico Yuy to copy the perfect soldier.
"Damn it." Haruka shook her head, "Damn Oz."
* * *
Across the forest the others had heard the gunshot and wondered who fired it and if one of the ninja's had been killed or if the one who fired the gun itself had been killed. They knew that thinking about such things was unimportant since there was nothing that could be done about it. All they could do was try to fend for themselves and hope for the best possible outcome.
The first group to encounter a ninja head on was Quatre and Yahiko who were walking through the woods looking all around making sure that they were on their guard. Yahiko already had his wooden sword out, while Quatre had his yellow beam saber ready.
CRASH!
From out of the tress came a ninja, he came down right between Yahiko and Quatre with his straight edge sword ready to slice through Yahiko's wooden sword. Then to take Quatre's life as his own prize like a big game hunter. Yet, he didn't count upon Quatre's reaction, despite the kind of person he was. He was more of a kinder person, unlike Heero or Trowa who were very cold hearted during battle, Quatre was the kind of person who said sorry before the kill was made. Heero once told Quatre that it was a rather half-hearted way of fighting, but that was Quatre, a leopard can never change its spots. After the ninja came down from the trees, Quatre's reflexes brought his beam saber came across the ninja's neck severing it clean as if the cut was made by a brand new sword. At first Quatre was mortified by what he had done, at least until the ninja's body fell forward and Quatre saw nothing but wires, sparks, and oil spurt from the wound.
* * *
A similar event happened between Trowa and Sanosuke, though things weren't exactly silent between the two of them. Sano was on Trowa like a fruit fly on an apple never leaving him alone about that knockout kick that he made.
"Would you have preferred to stay in our world with no way back home?" Trowa offered the alternative.
"You still didn't have to knock me out." Sano refuted, after all he was never one to loose gracefully to anyone. This was especially true when he came up against Haijimae Sito, one of the few people who had been able to beat Sano, aside from Kenshin. After this, Sano realized that Trowa Barton would be added to that list.
As with Quatre and Yahiko, the ninja came down from the trees, except it wasn't a Preventer that made the finishing blow, it was Sanosuke who made his signature move.
"FUTAI NO KIWAMI!" He said as he landed his fist against the ninja's chest sending him back against one of the trees. With that Trowa and Sano had seen the truth of what this ninja was…a machine.
* * *
All of them had faced at least two ninja's. Haruka and Kaoru did after they had dealt with the one that Haruka shot. Sanosuke and Trowa faced another after Sano delivered his Futai no Kiwami. So too did Quatre and Yahiko after Quatre's lightning reflexes had given a ninja the quick beheading. Pretty soon, the numbers were adding up and up, until the last group had faced one ninja…Heero Yuy and Kenshin Himura.
"Here it comes." Kenshin said to himself as his ears picked up the motion of the ninja drawing closer. Heero could feel this too with those newtype senses.
Instantly the two of them attacked the ninja…Heero with his gun and Kenshin with his reverse blade sword. Kenshin had his sights set as he brought the blade of his sword down upon the neck of the ninja. Yet, he never counted upon what Heero was going to do, especially since Kenshin's only experience with a gun was more of a gatling gun and he was trying to dodge it. In the blur of movement when Kenshin had brought down his sword, Heero had fired his sidearm.
The bullet flew past Kenshin's Kimono and ripped right through the ninja's uniform, then drilled its way through the skin, and machete its way into its body. Heero and Kenshin examined the body and saw what the others had seen, while Heero concluded what the others had already done.
"Heero." Johan called through the COM Link, which was a new piece of Preventer equipment that was built into a normal wrist watch.
"Yeah?" Heero answered
"It seems that these ninja's were cyborgs the whole time." Quatre had reported
"I know, that's what I've found out." Heero then thought for only a moment but asked quickly, "How many are down?"
"I've heard from the others and they have reported bringing down the ninja's as well. The count seems to be ten so far."
"Including mine, that makes 11, but there's something wrong with that."
"What's that?" Kenshin asked
"There were 12 Virgo's and from what the dealer had reported the automatic programming had been removed from all of them. Meaning that there should be 12 ninja's, so there must be one more out there somewhere."
"I checked on that, Heero." Johan came in on the conversation, "I checked one of the mobile dolls to make sure if the ninja hadn't hidden in one of them. It looks like all of them did have their programs removed…except one. If that's the case then we've taken down all the ninja's."
"I agree." Quatre spoke out, "If the ninja's are no longer operating, then that means that our mission has been successful."
"Yeah." Heero said, but he still couldn't trust what was going on around him. It seemed foul in the way that someone would smell burnt toast in a kitchen. Heero had developed that kind of sense through the years. Knowing when something isn't right about a certain mission, it was something that he learned from Johan, and even though Johan never said anything he too could feel that something wasn't right about it. Similar to that twisting in the stomach when you're nervous and you know damn well that everything's going too smoothly for its own good.
The feelings were put aside since they had bigger things to take care of.
* * *
Preventer Report:
Officer: Quatre Raberba Winner
Code-name: The Noble in the Desert
Date: March 12, A.C. 216
Report: It has happened again to the office of Preventer in which another tear has opened and another group of people have visited us. This time they came from another time in Earth's chaotic history, the year of 1878 Japan, the 11th year of the Meiji Era as they have reported to us. They have told us of a group of ninja's that have stolen gold from their government and under the investigation of Preventer we have found the reason for this. The ninja's had planned to use the gold to buy mobile suits and use them to retake the country of Japan in the era of 1878 Japan.
Thanks to the help of these people from this era we were able to stop these ninja's. Though it seems to apparent that the tears have been functioning a little with more blatant purpose than before. What this all means in the end is something that we can only speculate upon.
* * *
Almost like clockwork, the tear had reappeared on the shores of Japan. The tear was large enough for a Gundam to go through. Along the beach where it showed its greatest contrast by leading back to space that was filled with colonies. The first to go through the tear was Johan Rodriguez who placed a call to Preventer to take care of one last piece of business.
"Ask that dealer where he kept the gold." He said, "once you've gotten it bring it to the coordinates of my Gundam."
Sure enough within an hour the gold had arrived in a large steel crate in which Johan's Gundam Ryu brought back into Kenshin's universe. Thankfully all of the gold were still in their original packaging. The Kenshin gumi had planned to make a report to the local police and telling them that they were at the beach for a walk when they found the wooden crates of gold. Though there was the temptation to keep the gold for themselves, but Quatre being the good guy told them that the right thing to do would be to return it to the government. Despite feelings of disappointment, they knew it was the right thing to do.
Plus, with the steel crate that the wooden crates of gold were brought, was also used to scrape up the damaged parts of the Virgo mobile suits. After all, why should they leave them there in 1878 Japan just for some dumb schmuck to find it? The only piece of the After Colony era technology was the one in Kenshin's kimono, the Preventer standard issue beam saber…which he never had to draw and hopefully will never have to draw.
On the beach of 1878 Japan, the Preventers had said their good-bye's to the Kenshin-gumi.
"Thank you for all your help." Kenshin said
"You're very welcome." Johan said
"I do hope that we will meet again in the future, that I do."
"I think we will." Johan said, yet he never told the truth that he didn't think that they would meet again…he had a very good feeling that they would. He never confessed the truth about what he had fully seen in that gem he had a months ago. He never quite had a full picture of the Dark Tower but he saw people at its base…dozens of them…he even saw mobile suits…Gundams…and there were more than what Preventer had. Again, he never quite got a good look at them but he couldn't help but feel a small air of familiarity about all of it…but he wasn't saying a word about that to anyone.
With the final good-byes, the Preventer Gundams had headed back to their own universe, while the Kenshin-gumi had put their plan into action. They headed back to Tokyo where they told the police of what they had found. Within a matter of days the treasury of Meiji government were there and overzealous about the gold being found and as a reward the Kenshin-gumi were given one gold bar. Yet, it seemed so much, one gold bar was enough to feed them all for the rest of their lives and they would only spend a fraction of it. Still, why would they complain? At least their money issues were settled.
Though back at the Kamiya Kasshin dojo, Miss Megumi as well as some friends of the Kenshin-gumi were very confused about what happened to them.
"You were gone for days." Miss Megumi reported like a very upset mother at her child coming home late and the next phrase made it even more so. "Where were you?"
"Miss Megumi." Kenshin smiled, "I think we should have some tea…it's going to be a long and very unbelievable story…that it will."
* * *
As the Kenshin-gumi and the Preventers were settling back into their normal routines as well as doing upkeep of the Kamiya Kasshin dojo as well as the Gundam mobile suits, there was something going on in a land that no one on Earth or in space could reach. A place filled with riches, magic, and lush with life unlike anything anyone could ever see.
It was true that there were actually 12 ninjas in those mobile suits. Only the 11 cyborgs had gotten out of the suits, but the 12th one went somewhere else. He had escaped to another place and another time. He came into a forest similar to the one outside of Tokyo but had such growth that it must have taken centuries or perhaps even a millennia to grow. Still dressed in his ninja uniform, he decided that a change of clothes was in order. He took off his mask and other dressings and discarded the weapons to reveal his true self underneath it all. His true self had short sandy blonde hair, bluish-green eyes, a wide but handsome face, basically the kind of face that make women wish that their boyfriends looked like him (despite what they say to their boyfriends face). Even his body was the same way, very built but not too built as if he was competing for Mr. Universe. It was just enough to show a good deal of definition of each muscle group. He was dressed in a deep red t-shirt and jeans along with a zip-up hooded sweater.
He looked up to the sky and saw a small bird come down, he immediately recognized this bird. Seeing its small body and yellow feathers, he raised his hand as a small makeshift perch as the bird landed. The bird squawked a little bit at him as if his squawks were actual words.
"Calm down my friend." The man had asked the bird in a very kind tone, "Let me give you the message."
He looked around and found a nearby rock that seemed perfect to write upon. He reached into his jeans pocket and pulled out a pen and a small pad and began to write upon it with the small yellow bird watching.
Master,
Everything has gone as you had planned. The skills of the Preventers and the Kenshin-gumi have been just as you had predicted. I believe that they are ready to face our enemies. I have done all I can for you now master. I await your next instructions for our next move against our enemies that hold you captive.
Your faithful guard,
Loki
Loki took the note and rolled it up, he then took out a small piece of string and bound the note so that it may stay in its scroll formation. He then took the other end of the string and handed it to the bird who then took it in its beak and flew up and away towards the northeast.
"I hope that we won't be too late." Loki said to himself as he headed northward.
To be concluded…
The time has come…the tears have opened once again. This time they've opened across several worlds. The worlds of the After Colony Universe (Gundam Wing), the Future Century Universe (G-Gundam), Tokyo in the present day (Sailor Moon), Earth in the year 2015 (Evangelion), the planet Gunsmoke (Trigun), Japan in the 11th year of the Meiji Era (Rurouni Kenshin), a hotel in Paris (Lupin the Third), and in space on route to Heyfong (Outlaw Star).
All of these people are pulled into a world that defies imagination as well as reason. Each one of them is guided by a sense of danger, of mystery, a wanting to know more about this place that they've come to, and the desire to get back home. Each group is guided by forces that they can neither comprehend nor deny. They will encounter great friends from other worlds, people of extraordinary powers and skill who say that they are "The Guards of The One", as well as deadly enemies as they trek their way across a savage land to a place that they've only seen in their dreams. A place that stands at the very center of this world, where a cry for help calls for them, and they will be brought into their greatest adventure.
From the author that brought you GW Gundam, Trigundam, and Evangundam. Comes a cross-over fan fiction of such magnitude that it will be a story unlike any ever told before it or perhaps will ever be told….one that spans across worlds and will bring them together…the tears will soon be open…and the answers will be found.
The Dark Tower
Anime's Unite
Coming soon to Fan Fiction.net