The end.

Kind of a strange way to begin a story, isn't it? It's weird for two different reasons. One, it isn't the end…it's really the beginning. And two, because no matter how badly we failed, we always fought back, and no matter how badly our spirits were wounded…we never gave up.

Ken and I discovered the mysterious force called the Li-Kang Power one day while hiking in Japan, a few days after I had finally convinced him to come there for a sort of reunion. In hindsight, I wish I hadn't.

But I should really let the story tell itself…

"Aw, c'mon, Ryu, you're falling outta practice," Ken laughed as he flung his hands up, blocking his sparring partner's latest attack. Ryu, the tall, broad-shouldered Japanese street-fighter knew that he was joking.

Neither of them looked like they were even close to becoming weaker. Ken, habitually wearing his normal red, was still, perhaps even more, athletically looking than the last time his friend had seen him, leaning against his motorcycle on the shore. Ryu knew that he, himself, looked equally as…well, buff.

Ken launched an attack of his own, but no matter how hard either of them tried, neither could out-match the other.

Finally, Ken just sat down, hard, and began to laugh. Ryu collapsed next to him and joined him.

"Look at that!" Ryu pointed, chuckling still, "We were fighting for nine minutes straight! No wonder we're both tired out!"

"Speak for yourself," Ken grinned and stood, reaching out to help his friend up.

Chun-Li stepped into the room, clapping as the nudged the door closed with her hip, "Very impressive, boys."

"Hey, Chun-Li! We haven't seen you in forever!" Ryu gained his feet.

"Yeah, I know," She smirked, crossing her arms over her gray t-shirt.

"What are you doing here? I thought you were still with Interpol," Ken grinned and went over to the bench, reaching for his towel to wipe the sweat from his face, "Did the job fall through?"

She laughed, "No way. I was sent to tell you guys of a force that has been developing around here. Magnetic sensors in orbit are picking it up and it's scrambling international communications like mad. I thought that I should find you two."

"Magnetic? I'm not a science wiz, Chun-Li, but that says something pretty powerful, right? Anything like the Psycho Power that Bison used on us last time?" Ryu took a quick sip of his water.

"I can't tell you for sure. All I know is that it's centered in the mountains," She shrugged, "Anybody up for a hike?"

Ken and Ryu both groaned at the same time.

"Ah, the free mountain air, the bird singing, not a cloud in the sky," Ken took a deep breath, spreading his arms. Even that little gesture stretched the red button-up tightly over his chest, "Makes you wonder, huh?"

"Wonder what? If you're gonna get hit by a falling rock?" Ryu jabbed him in the side good naturedly, his grey hooded sweatshirt proudly displaying the words 'Property of Ming-Shai Gym, XXXL.'

"No, about the horrible things that always happen when life is this good," His comment was unnaturally serious for him, but he managed to put it into humorous context, "And why Chun-Li didn't come with."

"She said that she'd meet us near the top, remember? She went ahead because I had that morning class to teach," Ryu chuckled, "You could have gone ahead with her, you know. Maybe worked out a few of those old-guy-kinks in a sparring match."

Ken punched him lightly in the shoulder and they began to walk again, their jeans swishing in the quiet mountain air. Ryu began to notice the swishing more and more often, then it hit him that there was no other noise.

"Ryu…buddy…"

"Hey, Ken…"

They both began at the same moment. Each had sensed the same thing.

"Birds?"

Ryu shook his head, "Something's weird around here. I guess the 'whatever' is scaring away the other wildlife."

"Yeah, but that doesn't explain where the wind went," Ken retorted, suddenly becoming very on edge. He held out his hand to silence his friend, then turned off the path, climbing up into the bushes.

Ryu waited for a few moments, then he threw caution to the wind and followed his friend. He did not see Ken, but he did see a small trail and hear the light footsteps of the American ahead on the thin track. He shrugged and followed, not willing to call ahead and ask him to wait.

After a few minutes, he was about to break the silence and call ahead when he saw Ken, motionless, standing in the center of the trail.

"Ken?" He came up behind him and was about to touch his shoulder when he turned and grabbed his wrist.

Holding a finger up to his lips, calling for silence, Ken jerked his head towards the clearing that stood before them. It was dark, despite the sunlight that filtered merrily through the other tree leaves, and they could both feel an aura of cold radiating from it.

"What do you think it is, Ryu?" Ken whispered.

"Let's find out," He pushed past his friend and stepped over the threshold of light and dark. A hand shot out of the blackness and clawed at him, trying to find his face or heart. Ken pulled Ryu back just before another hand tried to grab his ankle.

The hands would sound better if they called them talons. Their claws were inches long and blood-red, and the skin was a grayish red that reminded Ryu of a dying whale. Even as they watched, transfixed, more hands slipped from the blackness and reached and slashed, as if trying to find some trace of them.

Out of the middle of these claws appeared a face…female and framed by black hair that seemed alive in itself. At first, Ken thought that she was very beautiful…that is, until her jaw unhinged and she snarled at them with a mouth full of rows of razor sharp teeth.

"Holy shit!" He dove backward as the head shot forward on a neck that was longer than he was tall. The teeth nearly tore off his hand, and would have gotten him if Ryu hadn't uppercut the neck.

"What the hell is that, Ryu?" He demanded, though he assumed that his friend probably would not know.

"Do I look like I know? It's coming after us!" Ryu and Ken made to dive into the forest, but hands closed over their ankles, tripping them, "Damn!"

Ryu tore at the three talons that had him around the legs, kicking, struggling, trying to get away. But the more he struggled, the more they dug in, tearing his jeans into shreds. He managed to kick one off, then two…

Ken, still struggling with his own talons, lent his own arm pressure against the last grip on Ryu's leg. They finally snapped the fingers, freeing Ryu.

Ken let out a whoop of triumph, then returned to face his own problems. Ryu couldn't make it close enough to help, for more and more hands shot out of the veil of blackness, trying to ensnare him. He dodged them, but there were always more.

"Ryu—!" Ken's cry for help was choked off by the shriek of the head. It dove forward, locking its jaws on Ryu's arm. As Ryu tried to pry the jaws off, blood began to appear on Ken's arm as well.

They were sharing their injuries…

"Ryu! Get out of here! Get Chun-Li!" Ken's grip on his last piece of hope, a tree root, was rapidly failing, "Get Giles!"

His eyes flaring in anger, Ryu swore and put all his strength into one shove, breaking the creature's jaw. It screamed and withdrew into the darkness, talon-hands quickly following…

Ryu dove for Ken's wrists and he was barely able to snag his wristwatch.

A talon shot out, knocking him back. The watch came with him as Ken was dragged into the darkness.

Heedless of what danger lay within, he dove into the blackness, groping for any sign of his friend, one hand still clutching the watch. He called out Ken's name again and again as he searched the ground.

A beam of light hit him full in the face and he rocked back on his heels, surprised.

"Out of our league a little, huh?" Chun-Li knelt in front of him, lowering her flashlight. Her blue shirt and black jacket were smudged with dirt and her face was smeared with a small dab of blood from a broken lip.

"You're in here too?" They stood.

"Yeah. I went in after my backpack," She admitted wryly, tossing a broken strap into the darkness, "But I couldn't find it. Seems that this clearing is a hell of a lot bigger on the inside than it is on the outside."

"How could that be? I mean…" Ryu rubbed the back of his neck, something he did when he was confused.

"Where's Ken?"

His face went pale, "You didn't hear us fighting?"

"Nothing until I saw you pawing around like a lost puppy," She shook her head.

"A monster with hundreds of arms grabbed us and dragged him in," He raised his arm up for her to see the needle-like punctures in his arm, "I thought for sure I'd be able to find him or at least hear him."

"Things are really weird in here," She turned towards the center of the blackness, "But we need to find Ken and my backpack. I had a very special stone in that pack, and I know that Ken will need our help."

"What do you mean by that?" He followed, absentmindedly noticing that the bite marks on his arm were healing twice—no, three times—as fast as normal.

"One of the rocks I had was a magical stone, something called a scrying gem," She turned the flashlight beam this and that way through the blackness, but it never extended more than a few feet, "Kind of like a camera bug that you can aim anywhere and see what's happening."

"Let me guess. You looked in here," Ryu guessed and was rewarded by a nod.

"I saw hell, Ryu, worse than hell, monsters, demons everywhere, as if this was a doorway into another dimension," Oh, so now she tells me… "I saw people in here, trapped. Whatever is in here is building an army. And the door is closing."

"What do you mean, closing?" He demanded.

"That bubble of darkness is twice as small as it was when scans first detected it," She sighed and was almost about to give up with the flashlight, "If we don't get those people out before it closed, they might be trapped forever."

"Ken's sunglasses…" Ryu bent down and plucked them from the ground. They were broken and shattered, not like he'd seen them last, hanging from Ken's shirt. They seemed like they were covered with a sort of ash.

"We must be going the right way," They picked up the pace and began to run, but unwilling to begin yelling, for fear of alerting the talon creature to their presence. A red glow began to emanated from the floor ahead of them, then there were more, each human sized and shining at different intensities…

The first that they stumbled on surrounded a young woman, and they say more people, all buried beneath the floor wreathed in a glow. One man they saw was missing an arm, which looked like it had been brutally ripped off. His glow was faint.

There was another young man, but his glow was bright red. He looked in fairly good condition. An older man lay nearby, the glow around his body brighter than the injured man's, but not by much.

The bodies lay with no logical order, as if they had just been laid wherever. They began searching the forms, looking for a familiar face.