"What the hell is he doing?" Kitsurubami yelled. She was on her feet, hands running anxiously through her blonde hair. The other agents looked at her nervously, more afraid that she was going to explode than they were of the outcome of the events they were still watching.
"I'm getting just a little tired of this..." Jakun hissed as he turned to face Naota. Naota looked up at him, feeling about two feet tall. But he swallowed his fear along with the lump in his throat and kept his composure.
"Me too. So leave me and my friends alone." He started straight into those yellow eyes and tried desperately not to be afraid, even though he was at this moment more desperately frightened than he had ever been before in his life. He gripped his own base tight.
"You've got more balls than brains kid." Jakun growled. He took a menacing step forward. "Why put your own life on the line for her?"
"Because she's my friend..." Naota said, clenching his teeth. His head was starting to throb.
"Takuuun! You do care!" Haruko shouted.
"Shut up!" Jakun snarled at her. He turned his attention back onto Naota, who was starting to tremble, both with fear and with the pain starting to grow in his head. "You can't use N-O right now, kid. Those caterpillars on your head are blocking it."
"I don't need it..." Naota said, holding his groan back. Jakun narrowed his eyes, shook his head and gripped his bass.
"Too bad...you could have been something great." In a flash of movement that took both Haruko and Naota by surprise, Jakun charged in, swinging his bass high overhead, bringing it down in an unstoppable arc down toward Natao's head...
"Takun!" Haruko screamed as the blow came...
The images flowed past him at an astounding pace, yet they were all perfectly clear to him. He felt as if he were floating on air, yet the ground beneath him was solid as rock.
Naota opened his eyes. He was immediately confronted by Amarao, all cleaned up, eyebrows back in place. He was wearing his IIB uniform, looking much like he had when Naota had first met him all those years ago.
"What are you doing here?" Naota demanded. He immediately clapped both hands over his mouth. His voice had come out high-pitched and more than a little screetchy. It sounded just like he did during his first adventure with Haruko as a child. He held his hands away and looked down at them now, and realized that they had shrunken, and indeed, where now the hands of a child. He looked down at himself, and saw his whole body, reverted to as it had been when the Pirate King himself had possessed his body.
"She's got nothing. But you've got friends, and family of your own. That's normal. It's time to start acting like an adult." Amarao said, and then suddenly vanished, fading softly from Naota's vision into the darkness that surrounded them.
"There are always options..." a voice whispered next to his ear. Naota jumped and spun around just in time to see Kitsurubami vanish into the darkness as well.
"I should teach you to be a man, Takun. Just remember to swing the bat." Haruko's voice said from behind him. He spun around just in time to see her, seated on her Vespa, bass clutched in her hands, fading away with the others.
"What the hell is going on here?" Naota shouted. He looked down at his hands, and saw the bass he himself had been clutching turned into a crutch. He yelped and dropped it. As if to answer his question, a shadow loomed over him.
He turned, and found himself face to face with the gigantic form of Atomsk. Naota gasped and stumbled, falling flat onto his butt. He looked up at Atmosk, who seemed totally oblivious to his presence. The Pirate King spread his wings, spanning hundreds of feet. Naota's jaw dropped as he watched the image of brilliance hover above him. But then, Atomsk morphed, seeming to turn into a large ball of energy. It slammed down into the ground before him, and when the dust cleared, the familiar image of a bright red robot stood in its place.
"Canti?" Naota gasped as he recognized the machine coming toward him. Canti reached one red hand down, offering it to Naota. He looked at it skeptically, but finally reached up and clasped it. Canti helped him to his feet.
When Naota was standing again, he looked at himself once again, and found that his body had changed once more, back to his present state. He looked up at Canti's TV head, his eyes demanding an answer.
Canti crouched down and picked up the crutch, which had now turned back into Naota's own bass. He held it up before Naota's eyes, and then swung it high overhead, bringing it down in an unstoppable arc. Naota screamed as it flew toward him.
But nothing happened. Instead of crashing down onto his skull and splitting skin, it made a sort of splat as the flesh of Naota's cranium seemed to meld with it on contact. Canti gripped Naota's shirt by the collar and proceeded to shove down hard onto the bass, pushing it into the suddenly soft flesh. It vanished into him, melted into him, bonded to him. Canti pushed until the instrument had disappeared completely into the young man's body. Then he leaped into the air, clasping Naota's head with both hands, and proceeded to disappear into his head right after the bass. Naota stood, dumbstruck, unable to speak, his eyes rolled up, watching the bright red legs vanish into the flesh of his skull. Once the Atomsk/Canti merge had completely joined him, Naota finally realized.
There was a loud scream. For a moment, Naota thought it had come from him. He waited a moment, sensing his whole body for pain. But there was none. He opened his eyes slowly.
Jakun was standing almost directly in front of him. His eyes bulged, disbelieving. He stared down at his own bass. Naota followed the crazed alien's gaze down, and was a little startled himself to see the wreck that Jakun was clutching in his hands. The blades that had previously whirred along the edge had been chipped away, leaving only glittering shards. The wood had been splintered, broken as if it had broken by being struck against stone.
He looked up, and felt himself awed. The whole world was different! Every sight, every sound, suddenly had a whole new meaning. There were lights, colors, shades, and countless other small details that all of a sudden were clear as day. He felt the vibrations of the earth moving beneath his feet, heard the whispers of the water as it flowed beneath them, smelled the crispness of the air. He felt every cell of his body, working all together, to create him, a creature unique and different from any other. And finally, it was all clear to him.
He reached up with the simplest gesture, and peeled the eyebrows off. They fluttered to the ground and lay, like the feathers of a bird floating on the wind down to earth. Jakun gaped.
"What?! How?? I don't understand..." then his eyes narrowed in rage "The N-O...those things were supposed to block it! How...?"
"It can't be blocked..." Naota said, his voice now more calm and stable than it had ever been. "It can't be blocked, because its part of me. Its not my head that controls it...its me. Its just a single part of everything that makes up me."
"I guess I'll just have to take you apart, piece by piece then!" Jakun snarled. He dropped down to one knee, hefted the remnants of his bass onto his shoulder, and fired one of his rockets at Naota. He grinned maniacally as it tore through the air, and then his jaw hit the ground when it froze suddenly. The flame that propelled it sputtered and died. It clanged to the ground, spent and useless. Jakun could only stare in utter disbelief.
Moving with a simplicity and grace that he had never before possessed, Naota tucked his bass under his arm, raised one hand up, and then strummed it across the strings. The note it struck blasted like an explosion tearing the silence of the quietest night. The shockwaves ripped along the cement, and slammed into Jakun at a velocity unimaginable. Jakun screamed as it tore into him, and struggled for a moment to stay on his feet, but finally was thrown into the air, carried along by the shockwaves, his shouts of protest deafened by the resonating note.
After finally grinding to a halt, Jakun rose, shuddering to his feet. His whole body ached with the force that had just flown through him. When he finally rose up, he looked down and gasped with emberassment as he saw the blast had torn his clothes from his body, leaving him in just a pair of heart-specked boxer shorts. He looked up, stared down the long way he had been thrown at Naota, who looked back at him as if he had not a care in the world.
Jakun was silent only a moment, before roaring with rage and frustration. He charged down the length of the bridge, gaining momentum with each step. Naota did not move, did not flinch, did not show any sign of concern. Jakun's bloodshot yellow eyes bulged, nearly the size of golf-balls as his lungs burned with each breath that steamed out from them. He swung his arm back, like a massive cannon being prepped for firing. He swung his fist forward with momentum to crush mountains.
It collided against Naota's face, and there was a sound like whet broccoli stems being snapped. Jakun screamed with pain and stumbled back. His arm hung at his side, limp and useless. The broken bones nearly burst through his skin, leaving visible bumps and indentations along his arm. And then, there was a sensation that one feels as a jet slowly lifts from the ground into the air. Jakun looked down, and found himself unable to speak as he watched his feet slowly leave the ground. His stomach fluttered as he was lifted up into the air. He writhed and struggled, but against this invisible force he was powerless.
Naota swung his bass with a casual motion. It slapped into Jakun, and hurled the protesting monster into the air. His roar of outrage echoed as he faded from view and then vanished into the sky, thrown from the planets atmosphere.
Naota stood for several breaths, just staring up into the sky where his enemy had disappeared. Then he smiled to himself. A calm, satisfied smile.
"Now, Haruko, I..." he turned to address the damsel in distress, but was struck to find no sign of her. He spun on his feet searching for her, but found himself gazing at nothing but the bridge. His smile turned to a frown.
"Heeeey! A little help up here!" Mamimi's cry pierced the silence, bringing him back to reality. He looked up at where the girls still struggled with the ropes that bound them together. Naota smiled once again. He dropped his bass, and it hovered in the air. He leapt onto it with an acrobat's grace, and soared through the air effortlessly.
"Takun..." Eri whispered as she slowly faded away into a dead faint. He smiled as he held both girls across his shoulders.
"Relax. Its over now." He assured her. He smiled contently to himself as he glided into the horizon. Smiled for inside, he knew that in fact nothing was over, but just beginning.
Finally, another chapter up, true believers! But wait, its not over yet! We still have to find out what happened to Haruko, what was this miraculous change that came over Naota, and how will things turn out in the end? So many questions, only one chapter left! Be sure to stay tuned, true believers, for the conclusion or our story!
