For all Disclaimers, Acknowledgements, and other Notes please refer to the previous three chapters of this work. Sorry folks, it was getting to be too much of a bother to copy and paste and tinker with it for every chapter.
NOTE: The Adam Bolton refered to herein does NOT refer to any actual Adam Bolton in real life, living, dead, or otherwise reading this.
This chapter is dedicated to Nugar, who provided editorial assistance and was a great help.
Watch yourself Slip away Go back to sleep Lay your head down, child I won't let the boogiemen come Counting bodies like sheep To the rythym of the wardrum Pay no mind to the rabble No mind to the rabble Head down, go to sleep To the rythym of the wardrum
- A Perfect Circle "Pet."
000
Lady Ramia Juraihelm stood gazing out of the viewport of her palatial office on her fortified tree-ship. Kai-oh, the flagship of Jurai's 7th fleet, currently patrolled the outer reaches of Jurai's border with the Galactic Union. A star cluster, classified as Ornalius B, was silently twinkling and minding its own business as the much shorter lived inhabitants of the universe went about their conflicts and glories. The stars had been there for a long time, and would continue to be around a lot longer than this current...disturbance. Or so, that was the plan.
Ramia sighed as she watched the star cluster, a just read Intelligence report sitting on her desk, the fiery-haired Jurain noblewoman was not pleased with what she had just read. She shook her head, contemplating the message on the electronic note tablet and briefly running through the events that had brought her where she stood now.
She had read the tablet after she had admonished the female lieutenant for violating dress code by not being mindful of the inner kimono of her duty uniform. Ramia smirked involuntarily, an idle thought drifting through her mind of how her admonishment would had gone if she had ordered the pretty, raven-haired blushing lieutenant in here for the dressing down session for the Lady's and another's amusement---
No, now was not the time for daydreams and flights of fancy. Ramia turned, looking back at the electronic document on her desk. It was not long, just a few pages of summarized data headed by a memo. It read:
TO: RAMIA, LADY JURAIHELM, MISTRESS OF TREE-SHIP KAI-OH FROM: OFFICE OF INSPECTOR-GENERAL OF INFORMATION INTELLIGENCE WITHIN GU TOTALLY SILENCED. SUSPECT COUP IMMINENT. ALL JURAIN SHIPS WITHIN GU SPACE HAVE BEEN ORDERED TO RETURN TO THEIR RESPECTIVE BASES AT ONCE.
SIGNED,
FUNAHO QUEEN JURAI
Scowling, Ramia turned back to the view port. If Queen Funaho saw fit to affix the main report with a direct, written order than it had to be something serious. No matter, Ramia was not young, and she and Kai-Oh had been all around the outer rim of Jurain space and on the frontier. She had the utmost confidence in her crew, her ship, and herself. Ramia was ready for anything.
Ramia's fist clenched, then un-clenched. She sighed, her gaze shifting slightly to the right and one of the flanking battle cruisers, the Courageous. At this time her fleet was at its full one hundred ship strength, she could shift her gaze to the left and see five troop carriers and nine assault gunboats if she so wished. She did not, her thoughts turning back to the star cluster and how she would meet the coming challenge.
'Incursion...if not full invasion, that is what the victorious faction in the Galactic Union will desire,' she nodded at her reflection, a small smile curling her lips. Her little brother, Rumiya, hated this habit, but he wasn't on Kai-oh at that time, he was (as per his big sister's orders) studying at Seto University in Jurai City.
"He had better behave himself," Ramia spoke to the glass. Rumiya wasn't the best student, and seemed to want to spend most of his time practicing his trouble-making skills than academics. Ramia thought about Rumiya often when she was out on deployment, she had practically raised him since their parents' tragic death years earlier when she was only Rumiya's age now. Ramia worried he was not adequately preparing to enter the military and become a great warrior-noble like his mother, father, and big sister.
Ramia scowled again, turned away from the viewport and returned to her desk, pulling up the current deployment of the fleet on Kai-oh's computer. The holographic display popped into existence suspended in the air just above her desk at eye-level. This was the fifth time she had checked the deployment in the last hour, her duty shift beginning in thirty minutes and her having been awake for the past three hours.
She silently reviewed her fleet, making no new notes. They were ready. Ready for anything that would come across the border. And as Tsunami as her witness, Lady Ramia would be victorious for her family, her King, her Goddess... and most of all herself.
Ramia stood up from her desk, her statuesque figure robed in the manner of a Jurain warrior noblewoman, her hair as red as any ruby framing her face, and several Navy medals on the front of her kimono along with her Admiral rank insignia. Her head was adorned with the key of her ship; the blue jeweled tiara of her noble house with its immaculate yellow streamers framing her hair.
She strode over to the small bathroom, and proceeded to splash some cold water on her face from the sink. The water cleansing and not disturbing the delicate blue facial battle tattoos on her face; applied by the priestess of her house on the occasion of her first duel. "This venture will make me the greatest my clan has ever seen," she told herself, and her Tree Ship's mind through her key, "there are more prestigious assignments out there for us, Shinjiro."
Shinjiro expressed his agreement with Ramia on this.
Ramia smiled, "and there's no limit to the dukedoms, earldoms, viceroyalties...planetary governorships, the stars truly are the limits."
Shinjiro cautioned Ramia to focus on the tasks at hand. Shinjiro went on to express that he feared fell involvement in recent events.
"As do I," Ramia responded as she walked out of the bathroom, gathering up her data pads and other printed reports into a type of attache case. There was a senior staff meeting this morning, and Ramia wanted all of her senior staff caught up with what Jurain Intelligence had for them.
Shinjiro inquired about Ramia's recent sleepless nights, and oftentimes borderline nightmares.
She shrugged off the question, "I'm fine, Shinjiro... really." Ramia decided to catch a quick breakfast in her office instead of going to Kai-Oh's mess hall. She sat down in the small dining area with an inadequate wafer of Melange bread and a cup of strong coffee.
Shinjiro reminded Ramia of the latter's promise to take a vacation. Kai-oh's angel expressed concern over how Ramia was pushing herself too hard lately.
Ramia smiled, "I promise that when this finished, and maybe when I'm Viceroy of an entire sector, we'll take a couple weeks off or so."
The angel frankly found the idea of a 'couple weeks' vacation for a Jurain noblewoman amusing. Ramia grinned back as she ate, responding to the playful prodding of the impressions in due time. "No, Shinjiro, I'm not trying to avoid talking about us."
Shinjiro indicated that Ramia had not been eating well lately too.
"Oh come off of it," Ramia sighed, exasperated, her amber eyes glinting. "My Tree's angel dotes after me worse than my mother did!" She swallowed the rest of her wafer, and took a hearty swig of her coffee. She rose from the dining facility, and turned around face to face with a man dressed in simple white robes. His hair was light blue, eyes a clear green that reminded Ramia of the seas of Jurai. Shinjiro, Kai-oh's angel, stood before Lady Ramia favoring her with a worried expression.
"My Lady," he began, "I worry for you."
Ramia shook her head, a small smile evident on her lips. "It's going to be all right, after this Galactic Union matter is dealt with."
Shinjiro smiled in response. "Please, promise me, my Lady." They stood close, but apart, as if almost afraid of who might be watching. Instead, they merely expressed their emotions for each other through their eyes.
"Tsunami says that we must beware of Lady Tokimi," Shinjiro stated, his tone becoming more ominous.
"As always," Ramia reasoned, "does the Goddess feel the recent strange occurrences on Alonia have been instigated by the Lady?"
"Yes. In fact, the Goddess is certain of it," Shinjiro shuddered.
Ramia thought for a moment. "It would not surprise me in the least if what's detailed in the Intelligence report on Alonia is happening in the Galactic Union right now."
"My Lady," Shinjiro's voice seemed to catch a bit, "things are beginning to unravel fast, and we must be prepared for what is going to follow. I do not think this will be just another border dispute, or garrison duty," Shinjiro's voice trailed off into melancholia.
"Don't worry, Shinjiro," she placed a hand on the angel's arm, "we'll be careful," she smiled. "We will not be defeated, by whatever our enemy is." Lady Ramia nodded confidently, standing straight and regarding Shinjiro in the pose she knew he admired her best in. "It is time for my shift, give me strength, my angel."
Shinjiro nodded, smiling radiantly in the manner he knew she always admired. He phased out, but continued to be a comforting presence in the back of Ramia's mind as he guided and protected Kai-Oh from its Tree core. Lady Ramia made sure her appearance was regal yet threatening, and made her way from her office to the bridge. She would be victorious, no matter what the enemy, no matter what the challenge may be.
000
Colonel Thomas Crane of the United States Marine Corps, currently in command of all troops in the area south of Flint, Michigan to the borders of Indian and Ohio, stood on the other side of a one-sided mirror in the Detroit Metropolitan Airport's infirmary next to his second in command, Major Alan Stephens and their CDC representative Dr. Millard Ralse. The subject of their surveillance lay on a cot in a small concrete box of a holding cell measuring nine by twelve feet.
"Dr. Ralse," Crane began, "give us your staff's report on our guest here," he motioned to the figure in the cot, who seemed to be struggling back to consciousness.
Ralse shifting his bulk slightly, amazement glittering in his eyes. "He is unlike anything we have ever seen or heard of before, Colonel."
Crane nodded, allowing Ralse to continue without interruption.
"It's amazing... simply amazing," Ralse seemed almost giddy, "his hormone levels are so... so accelerated I'm not remotely sure how he can even function!"
"Dr. Ralse... " Crane began, carefully holding impatience in check, "please save it for the science journals."
Stephens shifted his stance slightly, supporting his weight minutely more on the left foot than the right foot. He did not say a word.
Ralse nodded, almost feverish. "My apologies, Colonel." He began leafing through a column of white military flimsy. Not that Crane and Stephens had never seen the report before, they just wanted to see if Ralse contributed, fabricated, or otherwise modified what they had read or got reported to them by their own people.
"Age . . . indeterminate--" Ralse started from the top.
"Indeterminate?" Stephens snapped his attention from Ralse, to the subject (who was starting to wake up), and back to Ralse.
"Yes," Ralse replied, "blood and skin samples are unable to pinpoint his exact age. Though he appears to be between thirty and thirty-five years of age."
"He could easily pass for twenty-five if he didn't look like hell," Crane commented. The subject laying in the cot was covered in sweat, his orange prison garb already sticking to him.
"From what the test results are pointing to, his tolerance for sensory stimulation and extreme environments, especially pain, hot or cold weather is literally off the scale," Ralse almost seemed to squeak the last word.
"Obviously," Stephens added dryly, "we already know about his unusual tolerance to sedatives."
"Al," Crane threw his subordinate a sideways glance, "they hit that son of a bitch with SEVEN darts, one would have knocked you or me out for six hours or so. And even then they needed to pump more into him to make him go under." Crane chuckled, shaking his head, "if that boy had been smart, he'd have played dead then nailed them when they got too close."
"Yes," Ralse nodded, flipping through a few other pages, then continued: "Chemical tolerances are unspeakably high as well. His metabolic rates are . . . quadruple that of a normal man."
Crane shook his head in dismay. "My God."
Ralse reached the last pages of the data. "His respiratory system matches the rest of his body in its adaptability to adverse conditions. It seems he only needs a fraction the amount of oxygen a normal human needs to survive," Ralse admitted, a big smile on his face. "Merciful gods!" he proclaimed.
Both military men glanced at Ralse for a moment, surprised at the declaration, but not disagreeing with it either.
Stephens looked to Ralse. "What about that laser-light show he put on for the surveillance team?"
Ralse shuffled over to the table, where a laptop computer sat. The computer was connected to a prefab view screen; both obviously military issue, just set up. Ralse manipulated the simple computer mouse and soon the view screen's screen saver was replaced with slightly blurry time-coded surveillance tape. Various information was on both sides of the screen, and in smaller windows there was the same scene shown in thermal imaging with accompanying information.
"Here," Ralse pointed at the figure standing in the back of the A&P, surrounded by zombies. Obviously the footage was shot at quite a distance by a zoom lense, quality was beginning to suffer but it was still discernable what was happening.
Crane and Stephens could see the subject fighting the zombies around him with such agility and skill that Stephens slowly gripped the end of the conference table as he watched closely, trying to commit the entire recording to memory. To the two military men, who had read and listened to written and verbal reports about this, as well as seen still photographs, it could not prepare them to see this plainly dressed man fight with all the agility of something possessed.
"Watch closely," Ralse said appreciatively to the soldiers' collective astonishment; he had already watched the tape some twenty-six times himself. Ralse pointed to the thermal imaging and also to the unmodified image; advising both men to watch both.
The subject on the screen seemed to stop fighting, after running out of ammunition and losing that curious (but effective) antique sword he was fighting with. After pulling off some genuinely daring shows of strength (Stephens literally gasped when he saw the man dropkick a zombie's head clean off its shoulders), he seemed to have given up. To untrained eyes it would look like he was giving up, but almost immediately the soldiers saw what had been only vaguely reported to them by the soldiers that had apprehended this . . . man, if he could even be called one after what he had done.
Light seemed to appear from the man standing there. Actual, multicolored rays of light the likes of which the soldiers, and even the scientist, had never seen before. Stephens and Crane gaped, and Ralse grinned with something nearing manic glee. The thermal imaging showed absolutely no change in heat density whatsoever. The light seemed to break off and disappear as soon as it had appeared and the man's attire now completely changed from the drab blood stained clothing of a drifter to something that could only be described as radiant.
The subject, previously seeming on the brink of collapse, now stood firmer, refreshed as if newly baptized in the light that came and went just as suddenly. The man stood, his right hand going out and making a slight cone, immediately a shaft of light blinked and glowed into existence in his palm; a line of light resembling a blade. It was a sword, plain to be seen by the men. Even on the muddy recording the brightness of the colors; contrasting with the bloody reds and the white building provided a rather incongruous sight.
The man brandished the sword, and in the space of exactly nineteen seconds he performed a feat that Crane and Stephens (and the first time he saw it, Ralse) had only thought possible in the bad movies watched by those under their command. The subject (which was now completely awake and seemed to be calmly surveying his surroundings from his reclined position on the cot) looked around, seem to catch his breath for a minute, the blade dissipating into nothing before the light appearing around him again. Again, just as soon as the light had appeared, it was gone.
To Stephens almost wry amusement, the man in the video was now standing in the clothes he had been wearing before--now clean. "I'll be damned," Stephens chuckled quietly, almost feeling the urge to pinch himself or rub his eyes.
Crane merely nodded slowly.
Ralse stopped the playback on the computer's console and stepped back, waiting a moment to reflect on the soldiers' reaction to what they had just seen.
"It seems he's someone very unusual," Crane stated as he threw a glance to Stephens. "Do we have any idea who he is, Major?"
Stephens shook his head in the negative. "We're attempting to identify him in various criminal databases... but obviously that is proving problematic at this time."
Ralse smiled. "No need, the FBI agent assigned to my team... an Agent Smith, seems to have all the relevant information."
Crane raised an eyebrow. "He does?" he asked with undisguised suspicion and disbelief.
Ralse simply nodded surely, pointing back to the subject in the holding cell, now sitting patiently on the cot, legs out, his hands folded in his lap. "Now sirs, let us watch."
As they waited for the subject to take in his new surroundings, Crane noticed a faint impression of a broad smile well hidden on Stephens' face. Something that was similar to the look on Ralse' face. Crane disliked it instantly, and feared he would soon find out why.
000
Warren Hudson sat on the cot, his legs touching the antiseptic white and gray floor. His eyes made movement within their sockets, taking a good look around at his surroundings. The room he was in (a converted small infirmary/observation room, from the looks of it) measured nine by twelve feet. At one end was a large, stainless steel door with a slide-plate at the very top around eye-level with a bigger, wider plate at the middle where they'd probably feed or sucker-punch him. There was no window in this room, and the light overhead was a bright, florescent column of tubes.
His gaze traveled along the wall and noticed various graffiti done in black marker, pen, and even pencil here and there. Such random and archetypal images as wildly exaggerated penises and vaginas and various sex acts along with such storied declarations as "ADAM BOLTON IS GAY," "LIFE SUCKS DICK," and; under that, in the same handwriting as the first, "SO DOES ADAM BOLTON."
But all this, while being noted, did not matter much to Warren at this moment. Straight ahead of him was a mirror above a sink-toilet combination. There wasn't a camera in the room, so Warren assumed that the mirror was one-way glass. Warren gazed directly into the mirror, a silly smirk on his face. After all, why does a holding cell really need a mirror anyway? Warren wondered how long he had been out, his internal body senses telling him probably no more than a day or so. Idly, Warren wondered how long those immediately on the other side of the mirror had been watching him.
He knew that he could make a real ruckus if he wanted to, but it seemed pointless. Only complete fools would think that he was just blankly staring in the mirror. Warren just had to sit tight and wait for them to make their presence known. After that, then what? Warren mentally willed himself not to think of what may or may not come next. Instead he closed his eyes and recited the calming exercises all Jurain Knights knew, and also said a silent prayer to Tsunami for courage, strength, and guidance.
Warren did not have to wait long. Only about seven minutes, actually. As Warren opened his eyes and peered out of the corner of his right eye, he was honestly disappointed in their lack of patience.
The man who strolled in with armed escorts (who stayed outside, their steely gazes and accompanied weapons trained expertly for Warren's chest and stomach) in black suit, blond hair...and black sunglasses.
"Oh, hello," Warren acknowledged, "can't say you give a guy an opportunity to get bored around here."
The door closed behind the man in black, who casually did not acknowledge Warren's acknowledgment. In response, Warren gave the man in black's lack of acknowledgment of his initial acknowledgment no acknowledgment of its own. Warren shrugged, smirking even more as he turned to look up at the man in shades. "Nice sunglasses."
The man in black stopped about two paces in front of the cot. He carried a black stainless steel briefcase in his left hand and regarded Warren for what seemed like the first time. "You will remain silent unless responding to a question."
"Whatever you want, scooter."
The man in black shot a withering glare at him.
Warren sighed, shrugged, and remained silent.
The man in black held out the hand with the briefcase, Warren could see him depress a type of switch on the inside handle, and to Warren's amazement legs sprouted from the corners of the briefcase like a metallic insect. He watched in a fair amount of amazement as the briefcase was set down facing him. The next thing that happened amazed Warren even more.
"Any aggressive move you make will be severely punished," the shaded man stated, drawing from the holster inside his jacket a small, mean pistol.
Deciding it was worth it, Warren spoke up, "Secret Service or other more secret organization?"
The man in shades merely shot him a sharp look for a half-second before continuing to set up the metallic briefcase apparatus. The top opened at a signal from a type of small hand-held device in his palm (Warren suspected it was inside the man in black's West Point class ring) and it seemed the entire purpose of the briefcase was for a view screen. The screen was about 13 inches by 13 inches, a flat screen with very little lights or instrumentation on it.
Warren sighed inwardly, mentally preparing himself for whatever came next. The screen activated, and he was faced with a recording of himself in the alley behind the A&P in Monroe. Warren winced, but hid it, remembering his indignation at being caught and subsequently drugged. He reminded himself that he was in control now, and that he, almighty Tsunami as his witness, would get himself out of this situation.
"Now," the shaded man intoned ponderously (which elicited a flash of annoyance from Warren, which he quickly quashed) inclining his blonde, oil slicked head forward a millimeter, "perhaps we should start with who...or what you are." He pointed at the screen.
For a good thirty seconds Warren was at a loss as to what to tell him. How much did they know already? How long exactly had he been out? Could he escape from this installation? If so, how soon? Suddenly, Warren got a flash of inspiration. He tried to push it away, telling himself seriously that it would likely get his ass kicked, drugged again or worse. But, persistent as a wind in the summer night, Warren could not--no matter what gruesome consequence he could think up--resist himself.
"Maybe I'm Paul Bunyon, and my car's Babe the blue fucking ox," Warren managed to hide his inner-smirk, but he did glance quickly around his holding cell. "Speaking of which," Warren wondered out loud, "what did you do to my car anyway?"
While Warren's smart ass remark was intended primarily for his own amusement, he was genuinely pleased to see a split-second of annoyance flash across the man in black's one-note face. "We have ways of finding out," the shaded man cooly intoned.
Warren nodded. "But you already know."
The interrogator regarded Warren for a moment, "you seem rather calm," he said, clicking a button on the unseen remote; the image on the screen changed to Warren totally losing it, "for how you reacted not too long ago."
Warren sighed. "All right, since I'm wearing prison garb I gather you've found out my name is Arnold Penniman; a drifting menial laborer with less than one hundred dollars to his name."
The response of silence was so swift Warren could almost hear the air shifting around them. In fact, that's what it was. His interrogator inclined his head to the left ever so slightly, "why put up this front, Warren Hudson? It only makes you look even worse." He cocked his head up a bit. "Along with the brown roots in your black hair."
Warren inwardly fumed, it had been a while since he dyed his hair black, and he had not noticed in a mirror that his original brown hair color was starting to show through.
"Since you seem to know so much about me, why not tell me, exactly, who you are and what organization you represent," Warren narrowed his eyes; as if seeing the man's eyes behind the prescription (undoubtedly) sunglasses.
A grimace or smile flitted across the jaw of the man in black. "Indeed," the shaded man said nothing else seemingly allowing Warren to go on. Obviously hoping for a few more tasty morsals.
Warren did not take the bait. He sat in sullen silence for a few more minutes. The man in black was patient yes, but Warren detected that here was a man who, at the very least, enjoyed his work just a little too much. The shaded one seemed to need to show Warren who was the Big Shit over Warren's Little Shit. "Very well then, Mr. Hudson. My name is Agent Smith, of the Majestic 12."
Warren was ready with an acidly sarcastic 'do they call you that at home?' after Smith had said 'Agent.' Warren simply now let his gaze focus in more. No, he could not have heard that.
"Excuse me, Agent Smith, but did you just say--"
"Majestic 12, yes," Smith nodded officiously. Warren was sure Smith was going to eagerly watch the surveillance records of this meeting later. That is, if any surveillance records were going to be kept at all.
The different possible reactions that warred within Warren Hudson in that moment bordered on the absurd (laughing like a loon at Smith's declaration) to the dead sober (clamming up or stalling for time). All the while, Warren could scarcely believe that Smith didn't even seem to care about what he had just told him.
"I suppose that the requirements for brains in today's secret government organizations have gone down some. Even if the organization's name sounds like a damn fool spagetti western cowboy posse." Warren looked aimlessly at a point just above the laptop monitor.
Smith was obviously insulted, but hid it expertly. "Come now, Mr. Hudson, we both know that the world we once knew is rapidly passing into history. Besides I, at least for the moment, now work for the FBI. In the near future, who knows who I will be working for... or you, for that matter."
Warren drew his breath in slightly, "I don't know what you're talking about." Warren thought he could hazard a quick glance to the mirror, wondering if whoever was at the other side was really, truly hearing all that Smith was saying. Warren got his answer in the last place he ever expected; he glanced back down the laptop monitor, and instead of the surveillance footage from the Monroe A&P there scrolling across the screen was a line of text:
HELLO MR. HUDSON. PLEASE DO NOT ACT ALARMED. THIS WAY I CAN ASK YOU MY REAL QUESTIONS WITHOUT AROUSING TOO MUCH SUSPICION.
Smith, the 'speaking' Smith, went on about Warren's dubious identity as Arnold Penniman. Warren suddenly felt sick again. The line of text continued right before Warren would have had an open reaction.
IF YOU DON'T WANT TO GET ID'D AS A SERIAL KILLER
At that moment a new screen flashed momentarily on the monitor, a mug shot of Warren (meticulously fabricated from the looks of it) along with an arrest warrant, all the proper documentation, etc.
--ACT NORMAL.
Warren did an excellent job, his gaze flickering occasionally back and forth between the monitor and Smith's smug expression. Smith continued with a perfectly convincing song and dance for those watching.
"...clearly, in these troubled times a drifter such as yourself traveling in a restrictive area does not leave the right impression..."
On the screen:
DO NOT FRET, MR. HUDSON, AND DON'T WORRY ABOUT ANSWERING MY QUESTIONS. THAT WILL COME IN TIME. FER NOW, JUST MEDITATE ON THEM.
Warren racked his brains in order to come up with a verbal answer to one of Smith's cover questions. "I only was trying to reach safety, Agent Smith..." Warren's eyes cast down.
Warren's lips quirked. "Agent Smith?" He had an idea.
"Yes?" the shaded blonde asked impatiently.
"There's a spelling mistake here," Warren pointed at the display, right at 'FER NOW.' He looked right up at Smith, saying no more. 'Let him chew on that,' he thought defiantly.
Smith digested this action for a brief moment longer than he normally would. Warren could sense extreme agitation at him from Smith, but also from Smith at his own actions. For Smith could not challenge or comment on this 'spelling mistake' without tipping off Crane's people about the real text on the laptop screen directed away from their vantage point at the other side of the one-way mirror.
Smith mentally scowled. Warren's action was cunning, but also a daring gamble on his part that Crane and company were not being fed a fake feed of the surveillance footage of Warren in Monroe that Smith was presumably still showing to Warren. Now he would have to somehow explain this, if he was asked. A small nod was all Warren got as an acknowledgement of his sly trick from Smith.
"Indeed," Agent Smith clicked on the remote in his palm again; the screen changed to mug shots of people Warren had seen before, and not seen before. His alleged 'running buddies,' Warren surmised briefly, a few beads of cold sweat were beginning to form on his upper back.
IN ANSWER TO ONE OF YOUR UNDOUBTED QUESTIONS...YES, I DO UNDERSTAND THE NEED FOR PEOPLE LIKE US TO KEEP SECRETS.
'Just when you think things can't get any worse.' Warren sighed, reciting calming exercises silently.
Smith smiled even more officiously as they continued their song and dance of mutual covering up of true intentions; though Warren was at a distinct disadvantage. The thought almost made Warren's lips crack up in a slight smile. In fact, Warren had to make an effort to keep his facial expressions as normal as possible. It seemed so likely that he would either erupt in geysers of hysterical laughter or just go into a berserk rage.
I WILL GO THROUGH THIS ONE BY ONE FOR YOU, MR. HUDSON. ONE. YOUR CAR AND 'PERSONAL POSSESSIONS,' SUCH AS THEY ARE, HAVE BEEN IMPOUNDED.
Warren conceded this fact.
TWO. WE KNOW WHERE YOU ARE TRYING TO GO.
Warren felt his fists clinch together in his lap ever so slightly.
Smith smiled.
THREE. WE ARE NOT GOING TO ALLOW YOU TO GET THERE.
Eyes closed, almost instinctively, Warren's defenses slipped and he whispered. "Please Tsunami, no...."
Smith stopped speaking about a militia organization that Warren was apparently suspected of having a connection to. "What is Tsunami, Mr. Hudson?"
Gulping, Hudson stared straight ahead at the mirror, knowing he was now in deep shit and that it was now only worse because of his lack of self-control.
FOUR. WE'LL CONTINUE THIS LATER, WHEN YOU'LL BE ABLE TO ANSWER PROPER QUESTIONS...
Warren looked back up at Smith, who was smiling again. This time, however, Smith dipped his head a bit in an almost pitying gesture to Warren's weakness. For a millisecond, Warren could see Smith's left eye; its grey iris winking back at him. Warren sprang to his feet and took one solid swing at Smith's nose; belting him square in the nostrils and sending him crashing against the opposite wall. Warren smiled, feeling better, even though he held back his full strength significantly. He stayed standing in the spot he was as he watched Smith crash against the wall, and regain his footing as he glared back at him.
The door slid open. Warren barely had time to get in a defensive stance as the two bodyguards fired two shots a piece. He tried to dodge them, but was only partly successful. The darts hit Warren in his upper right arm and his upper right hip; missing his chest and stomach which was where the bodyguards were aiming at. He was asleep before he slumped back on the cot behind him.
"You're good," Smith said looking down at the unconcious man. "No doubt about that, Mr. Hudson."
Smith straightened his suit, relieved that the newest mixture of sedatives had worked. He gingerly produced a red cloth handkerchief and began to daub his broken nose. Smith waited with the two members of his personal guard detail for the nominal MPs to come crashing in along with Dr. Ralse, Crane, and Stephens. Smith mentally ran down what would happen to Warren Hudson, alias Arnold Penniman, alias Walter Canton, a.k.a. Raymond Jackson. After Hudson was securely strapped into the cot and checked out by the doctors, Smith would give the signal for his boys to move in, tell the military folks to relax, and Hudson would be moved to a secure location for more... intense interrogation away from the eyes and ears of the military.
Smith faced the open door where his guards still had their weapons pointed at where Warren Hudson was sprawled out on the cot. He contemplated what he would tell Crane, since Ralse and Stephens were nothing to worry about.
000
September 17th, 1945.
Eventually, the tears and pain were too much for him and Warren fell asleep in Tsunami's arms, his frame draped across her lap. Tsunami smiled down at him, smoothing his hair, gently willing any bad dreams away as she gazed out at the creek, enjoying the soft breeze. After a few hours Warren awoke, feeling a little bit better. He groggily opened his eyes, tasting the dryness in his mouth and Tsunami looking down at him upside down. "Why hello, sleepyhead." She smiled.
Warren's eyes slowly focused on where he was laying, and the Goddess' radiant smile above him. He could not help but to smile in return. "Did I fall asleep?"
"Yes," she answered.
"You held me..."
"Of course I did, Warren," Tsunami's expression became serious, "I was not about to leave you when you needed me."
"....tha-thank you, Goddess," Warren stammered slowly, still getting a feel for the word.
Tsunami smiled radiantly at him this time, pleased that he not only spoke the words, but accepted them as well. "You are welcome."
He seemed to be forming another question. From the feel of it, Tsunami noted, it was a rather large question.
"You...you are my creator...?" Warren whispered in wonder.
"I am," she nodded simply.
Warren nodded slowly, obviously working up the courage to continue. A few moments passed while his fists clenched, and he seemed to search for the right key to this question all around them. Bird song wafted around them, and another breeze rolled through the little hidden place under the tree, bringing the scent of flowers and caressing her luxurious hair.
Tsunami smiled, waiting patiently for her charge.
"I--I wish to repay your kindness to me!" he blushed sharply.
She blinked, "Warren, no you don't have to. As soon as you are healed, I will set you back down on Earth." A hidden hope spoke in Tsunami's words and face, but for what choice Warren did not know or care at this point.
Gratitude shown brightly in the young man's eyes. "No, you saved my life and healed me. I owe you that many times over."
Tsunami seemed to grow a bit worried and apprehensive. "Warren, you do not know what you are asking."
Warren only nodded confidently. "Yes, I do. When my country called, I volunteered. Hell, I even lied to do so," his gaze flickered down, "and I was escaping my Uncle but I heeded my nation's call."
The Goddess nodded. "For which I am very grateful but you've done enough already."
Tears now threatened to stream from his eyes again. "But I can't just not repay you."
She enfolded him in her arms again. "Yes, please, you earned the gift. You can have a normal, happy life like you always wanted."
Warren gazed up into her eyes. "I wish to enlist with you, Goddess."
Tsunami seemed shocked to silence and elated beyond belief at the same time. It even took her a few moments to find words to respond. "Warren, Warren, you do not know what you ask. The trials you must undergo and the trails you must tread are long and arduous for those who serve me."
"I will do anything to assist you, Goddess," Warren pleaded, "just say it, please.'
She shut her eyes, as if trying to block this offer out. Inwardly, a debate seemed to rage.
"Goddess?" Warren whispered.
"Warren," she whispered back, opening her eyes to mere slits, "there is a way to help me, but it will mean long, long years of toil from you in the Great Labor against the Dark One."
"What is this 'Great Labor'?" Warren asked, still showing every sign of readily signing up. All Tsunami needed to do was produce a contract or point in the direction of a recruiting office and Warren would be off and running. Probably marching and singing, too.
Apparently sensing this intention in him, Tsunami winced; remembering. Silently, she resolved herself to present the facts of the situation as accurately as possible. "Have you thought about evil, Warren?"
Warren almost gawked and answered "what?" but he was determined enough (and observant enough) to not slip up. "Yeah, I have thought about it... a lot."
Her eyes opened fully now, and the pink orbs seemed to drown into his. Warren could just about see his own reflection in them. "What have you found out?"
"It seems to never die. And we are all at risk."
She nodded, giving the impression she knew all too well about what she had just asked. She reached into her kimono, producing a book that Warren wondered how exactly she had secreted it upon her person; it was a very thick volume by the looks of it. She handed the ornate book to him. "Warren, if you are serious about service to me, then you must read this book."
Warren held the volume in his hands. It truly felt as old as time itself. He opened the latches and the cover. "I have translated the words into your language," Tsunami said amid a flicker of a smile.
The book was the story of creation in a way that Warren had never dreamed it could have been. The story of the three sisters, and the universe they shaped and crafted. Also the story of Tsunami and her husband, Kami. The story of their love, and much to Warren's blushes, of their craft of lovemaking. And later, the joys of childbearing and rearing. Her sisters Washu and Tokimi, and their reactions to this were also told. Washu's reluctant, but eventual enthusiastic acceptance, to Tokimi's smoldering jealousy and well-concealed hatred of what Tsunami and Kami were able to create and she unable to do on her own.
And the ships.
The ships of living trees and light, the first organic life in the universe, one for each sister: The Ship of the Beginning for Tsunami, The Ship of the Order for Washu, and the Ship of Justice for Tokimi. There was love, there was joy, and there was life as each ship traversed the void. Soon, stars, planets, and other things Warren did not have a name for filled the story. Warren poured over all these details, under Tsunami's tutelage for what seemed like hours perhaps days. Finally, he was about to turn the well-worn cloth page when Tsunami's two-ringed fingers stayed his hand.
He looked up, "Halt and take heed of what I am about to tell you," her eyes were pained, and they silenced him as the Goddess prepared herself.
Tsunami gazed off into the distance of her domain for a long moment. "I should have seen it, but I was blinded by my own happiness." Her fingers slowly formed into fists on her lap. "By the time my second son, Anir, was growing into maturity, my sister Tokimi had irrevocably fallen in love with him." A sad smile formed across her lips in remembrance. "My first son grew into a man and married Washu; they had a daughter named Sari."
Warren found his hand taking hold of Tsunami's, showing his support for his Goddess. She smiled at him again. That kind, almost familial--but not quite--smile that always calmed him and made him feel more real.
"Anir and Sari were to marry," a tear fell from Tsunami's eye, "Tokimi, one day, confessed her love for Anir." This part was obviously very hard for the Goddess to recall. "Anir was flattered and was very kind and understanding to his Auntie Tokimi, but he told her that he honestly did not feel that way about her."
It was another long moment of silent tears and reflection before Tsunami could continue. Warren held her hand all along. "All-" she began, but had to stop and swallow before continuing. All of Tokimi's jealousy and deception came to a head." She wept for a bit against him. It took her several moments to compose herself enough to blurt, "She murdered my baby Anri. Then she sought vengeance on my Kami and another one of my daughters, Kamiri. They were in the wrong place at the wrong time. They tried to defend themselves, but Tokimi slew them too."
Warren's face seemed as impassive as stone, not quite believing what he had just heard. His eyes flickered down, they stayed there long enough to see the tears collect on Tsunami's and his joined hands. The tears felt like his own.
"Tokimi," Tsunami went on valiantly, giving words to pain long since buried, but carried always, "quite cleverly covered up their murders as accidents of the weather on the new planet we had just created for our children who grew restless on the Ships of the Beginning. But Washu was watching her during this 'cover-up.'" She wiped her eyes, trying to regain some composure.
"She was?" Warren asked gently.
"Yes," Tsunami nodded, "and Tokimi begged her sister not to tell anyone, that it really was an accident, that she had lost her temper, that she had been provoked, every lie that came to Tokimi's mind she tried to use to sway Washu."
She stopped, and Warren cautiously gave his Goddess a hug of support. He thought on this it was similar to the stories he had heard in the Bible, or read in other books in the library during his youth. He didn't want to speak, Warren still felt he had no right to, but eventually he did ask. "What happened next?"
"Washu refused, and informed me of the truth in the midst of my grief at feeling my husband and babes slew. It was that same connection, the one Tokimi with all her power could not detect, the connection between mother, father, and child that allowed us to know the truth. Tokimi never understood this, and she envied it. She desired that love for herself but every time she tried to create a man or find one to love her, Tokimi wished to be in absolute control of everything at all times. She would not allow them free will. And so her creations were no more than dolls, and the others rejected her." She was able to speak clearly, without halting, but the tears still fell. Tsunami's eyes were red now.
He could not find a single word to comfort her. He could only hold her.
"I made a mistake, pure and simple," Tsunami stated. "I was blind to the signs of Tokimi's developing and deepening evil. I could have stopped it if I was not so enamored with my own happiness." Her eyes seemed to dim a bit, a look that struck Warren with a feeling of bewilderment then it hit him, he was seeing the first look of hopelessness he had ever seen in Tsunami before. "I failed my sister," she whispered.
"You couldn't have known, she hid so much from what I've read." Warren felt his mouth forming words faster than his brain could quite deliberate on them. "It wasn't your fault, she was the one who killed them."
Tsunami's eyes began to climb back from that pit of hopelessness that had previously seemed so foreign to her disposition. "Thank you, Warren but it is difficult to tell myself that...."
"Well I'm telling you!" Warren was feeling tears pour from his eyes again, "it ain't your fault!"
She hugged him back, genuinely appreciating his warmth and contact in this moment. "You are so kind. I am so fortunate to have you, Warren." She smiled, resting her head against his shoulder.
Warren could only blush.
They were like that for a while, enjoying the feel of the sun, the breeze, and the sounds of the creek. But Tsunami was not finished yet.
"When Washu and I," Tsunami continued, "confronted Tokimi she resisted violently. We fought back."
Warren felt like his entire spinal column was a gigantic icicle. "Did you kill your sister?" He instantly hated himself for asking this question.
"We considered that once we had subdued our sister. But we could not do it."
Somehow that made Warren feel better. Tsunami continued. "There was a dimension that Tokimi had created, one of her few 'successful' creations. A black void of possibility; for good or ill, but totally separate from this universe. It came into use, after all. Washu and I sealed our sister there," she said, sobbed again and Warren was there with her through all of it, "in that dimension of her making, for all time."
Tsunami wiped her eyes. "Later, when we needed a place for the wicked and damned souls we sent them there as well. Thus, it is the realm of shadow; where Tokimi is Mistress over all she dominates."
And so, that was the story Tsunami told Warren. The story of the beginning and the end of the beginning. "Warren," Tsunami told him seriously, "while we were successful in sealing Tokimi away for the most part, what began as a mere flicker over eternity there has been some of my sister's darkness slowly trying to rebuild itself outside of her realm, a corrupting influence that is the Dark One I spoke of." Her pink eyes seemed to pull him right in. "The Great Labor is the preparation and the battle to prevent Tokimi my sister, the Dark Lady from what she desires."
"What does she desire?" Warren asked.
"From her past actions, and her covert actions over millenia, my angels and I suspect total conquest," Tsunami stated evenly. She then pulled a very old, charred piece of cloth from her kimono. Warren looked closely at it. The writing was at first in a script he did not understand. "Let me allow you to read it, Warren." The script changed to English; it read: "THE WHORES OF LIGHT SHALL PERISH AND THE DARK SHALL REIGN!"
For another long moment they were silent, Warren slowly comprehending what was, basically, preparation for another war against evil.
"Warren," Tsunami told him softly, "if you reconsider or wish to serve me in some other way, I will understand."
"No. I'm a Marine, and we can stand anything," he stated with absolute resolve.
A soft, almost sad smile stole over Tsunami's countenance. "You will be more, Warren. A Knight of my order, and a defender of Jurai and Earth."
And Warren could only nod, the moment even more surreal than anything preceding it.
"The waters await Warren Hudson," a voice behind them stated. Tsunami looked up, smiling. Warren spun around, surprised to hear Aria's voice.
"Aria," Warren smiled, "we didn't hear you."
Tsunami chuckled. Aria did too.
"Um, what's so funny?" he asked.
"Oh, nothing," Tsunami said innocently.
"Your last comment, Warren," Aria smiled, "think about it."
"Um...yeah, I see what you mean." Warren blushed. Mentally he chided himself that Tsunami could probably hear much more than he could.
"Come, Warren," Aria held out her hand for him. "It is time."
Somehow Warren knew. He knew that pledging his service to Tsunami would entail something like this. "What's going to happen?" he asked calmly.
"Your baptism into the Church of Tsunami and your assuming the title of Sir Hudson, Knight of Jurai." Aria said with great reverence, but with just a hint of fun and blush to her cheeks. "I feel so silly saying that." She chuckled.
"Hmm, perhaps I should change it." Tsunami thought out loud.
"It sounds just fine to me." Warren smiled at both of them.
"Why thank you, Warren." Aria gave a short bow. "Are you ready?"
He stood, still smiling. "I am ready." He saluted Aria and Tsunami.
The two women chuckled again.
"Go with Aria, Warren. I will see you shortly," Tsunami said.
Slowly, butterflies in his stomach like the day he escaped from his Uncle's farm, he stepped forward and took the hand Aria held out to him. A flash of rainbow light enveloped them, and they were gone.
Tsunami sat there watching the space they had occupied for some time after. She sat in the warm breeze of the scent of growing things. There was a small splatter of bittersweet tears on her now folded hands.
"It is done."
000
Tenchi exited the bathroom, stretching as his mind sluggishly looked forward to trying to get a few hours sleep. Just then as his mind settled on topics of rest, he seemed to realize just how tired he was. 'A few more steps, Tenchi,' he told himself, 'just a few more steps and barring any zombie attacks you should get some sleep,' the giddiness of fatigue and fear threatened to make him chuckle, but he suppressed it as he closed his room's door, sparing a moment to blink in the brightness of his room with its lights on.
Out of habit, he automatically flicked the light switch, throwing his room into darkness with the only light being from the large circular window. Since the moon had still not come out from behind the clouds after the storm it was quite dark in Tenchi's room.
Tenchi crossed his room in fast strides, his head pivoting this way and that for any sign of movement.
"Damn," he muttered as he turned on a small lamp on his desk. No way in hell he was going to sleep in the dark tonight. His overhead light off, Tenchi lay on his bed with Tenchi-ken underneath his pillow, waiting for his eyes to adjust to the dark. Tenchi's eyes adjusted to the different light level. His room looked just the same as when his Grandfather had woke him up earlier. A place for everything and everything in its place, really. His desk was still in disarray with his half-finished school work from a few days ago, he really needed to empty out the garbage can, his closet door was still open, and Ryoko was silently sitting in the corner of said open closet.
"Ryoko?" Tenchi asked, sitting up quickly. Why was she here? Had something else happened?
"Yeah, Tenchi?" she was looking right at him from the corner of his closet.
"Um, is something wrong?"
They both looked at each other for a moment, then laughed.
"You mean any more than usual?" Ryoko asked dryly.
"No well, yeah. No wait," Tenchi stammered, looking down at a loss for words.
"Tongue-tied, Tenchi?" Ryoko smirked.
"A bit," he admitted sheepishly, flopping back on the bed with a loud sigh.
"You're not going to ask me to leave, are you Tenchi?" Ryoko asked quietly.
Tenchi turned his head to see her better.
"After all," she said, "you've always told me to before."
He shook his head, "Ryoko, it's just that when I wake up and find out you were watching me all night it's just something I don't want you doing. You should be sleeping, not watching me."
"Hmm," Ryoko mulled this over, "I thought it was that trick I did with my eyes that got you mad."
Inwardly, Tenchi shuddered at the memory a bit. It honestly reminded him a bit too much of the dried and decayed mummy he first found in the cave. Tenchi could still hardly believe that form was what Ryoko once was. "Ryoko, I prefer you looking just the way you look now," he smiled.
In the shadows, Tenchi could detect a corresponding smile on Ryoko's lips. He sat up, swinging his legs around to the floor. "Why don't you come on out, Ryoko? I don't think either of us are going to get any sleep right now."
Slowly, silently, Ryoko phased out and phased back in sitting on the other side of the bed, only a couple of feet from Tenchi. He blushed, as if a part of him suddenly realized that he and Ryoko were alone, in the dark, in his room and nobody seemed to know about it. 'I bet Washu doesn't even know ' he started thinking before he realized how foolish and potentially dangerous such thoughts were in this house.
But there was silence between Tenchi and Ryoko at this time. Only the soft but still edgy breathing anyone would exhibit after having faced death, and still having to look forward to death itself.
Tenchi gazed down at his hands on his knees, unsure what to say, or if he should say anything. Ryoko sighed, her leg swinging in false easy-going casualness. She too seemed abnormally focused on her hands resting on the bed. Somewhere downstairs they could both hear some voices softly discussing something. Tenchi couldn't quite place the voices out at first, but soon his mind clicked in recognition.
"Sounds like Ayeka, Sasami and your Grandfather are in the kitchen," Ryoko stated, almost narrating Tenchi's own thoughts for him. "I guess they got hungry." She smiled softly.
Tenchi chuckled. "Yeah, I don't think they got to eat dessert." He gazed up at the ceiling for a long moment.
"Nope," Ryoko said dryly, "I don't think they did." She looked over at his desk. "Still got that homework sitting there, huh?"
"Yeah," Tenchi sighed, "I don't think I'll be facing any deadlines in the near future."
"Don't plan on going to school anytime soon either." Ryoko examined the crevices of her nails.
"Yeah, that too." He rolled his eyes, "after all that work to catch up. It was enough to be graduating a year late already, but now..."
She was silent for a bit. "Sorry for blowing up your school, Tenchi."
"Thanks, Ryoko," he smiled, then chuckled softly. "You know, now it doesn't seem like such a big deal at all."
"I kind of got carried away there, I guess," Ryoko looked down. "It was fun though," she grinned back up at him.
Tenchi sighed. "Yeah, I remember." He looked back at his desk with its unfinished pile of homework. "Oh well, there's always the high school equivalency test." He smiled suddenly. "Or there's just trying to get into college directly. Correspondence courses, you know, and I could avoid a long commute most of the time."
He shook his head. "Though sometimes I wonder why I'm even trying to get into college."
"I wouldn't be looking at any college catalogs any time soon, my Tenchi," Ryoko sighed in turn. She gazed up at the ceiling, then out the window. The look in her eyes frightened him.
"Ryoko " Tenchi ventured, stealing a glance at the cyan-haired space pirate sitting not more than one foot from him. "Are you okay? I--I," he stammered, "I mean about what happened out there."
"Well how am I supposed to feel, Tenchi?" Ryoko mumbled as she popped her fingers, one by one.
'She's scared,' an inner voice seemed to blare at him. 'Terrified, even.' He looked at her, worried. "Ryoko, you did great out there," Tenchi did his best to sound encouraging; never minding the sudden dryness in this throat. "I think you could easily take a hundred or a thousand of those dead creeps."
She raised her elongated hand to cut in, "Tenchi, I don't need a pep talk. I said we'd face down what's going on together, and we'd win. That's what we're going to do."
"I know but this is..." He smacked the bedside beside him in frustration suddenly. Ryoko almost jumped in alarm. "Argh! I don't know what this is! Dead people coming back to life, heads and stuff still moving around after you've cut them off," he said, shaking his head as the words seemed to come in an excited torrent of dry exhaustion and fear, "bad dreams, bad feelings, and all those weird news reports!" Tenchi held his head in his hands.
Ryoko blinked. "Tenchi, what did you just say?"
Tenchi rested his hands on his knees again. "About the news reports?"
"Before that you said something about bad dreams and feelings?"
He nodded. "Yes, I've been feeling on edge for a while now."
"How long?" Ryoko's amber eyes glowed.
"Um..." He scratched the back of his head. "A week. Week and a half, I think."
"So have I." Ryoko looked down again, her admission was hardly a whisper.
"This is something more than that stomach ache, right?"
"Oh yeah," Ryoko nodded, that dry tone again. Nearly lifeless. "It's a lot more than that, Tenchi."
Tenchi breathed, feeling the wide-awake sleepiness still held at bay by terror and concern. Any worries indeed, only the glowing empathy he held for the woman beside him existed for him now. "Then what?" He hitched closer on the bed to Ryoko.
She held her hands close to her, as if feeling a chill. "Have you ever looked at a dead body before, Tenchi? Really looked?" Her eyes again peered into his, unrelentingly drawing him in and yet holding their secrets at the same time.
Tenchi paled. "Um, I saw what you saw out there, Ryo--"
Ryoko cut him off by a shake of the head. "No, that's not what I meant. Well..." She frowned, thinking. "Maybe it is, but that's not all I meant."
He waited.
"Have you seen a dead body before?" she asked again.
"Y-yes," Tenchi gulped, looking down.
"I've seen a lot of them, Tenchi," Ryoko stated from a well of ancient, frozen knowledge. "Up close, far away only blips on one of Kagato's or Ryo-Ohki's scopes and those close enough to croak their last breath in my face," she said pensively, chewing her upper lip in thought, "I guess that's really what they mean on those damn silly animes Mihoshi watches when they call dying 'croaking.' And I have to tell you Tenchi, they were right on target. Those things we saw out there,
Tenchi?"
"Yeah?" he nodded.
"I kept thinking.... Everything we are, I mean all of it, could be up here," she said tapping her forehead, "that's why you kill those things by taking off or pulverizing their heads into goo. As we were fighting, I tried my best to look into their eyes and see what was there. For the most part, I saw nothing just death, but there was a voice in my head--not Washu's--that kept asking me to look into their eyes. I guess to see if their eyes would plead for me to release them? Not to release them? Something... but all I saw was myself looking back."
"Yourself?" Tenchi asked.
"Yeah," Ryoko replied, "I'll tell you, Tenchi when I know more."
Somehow, Tenchi knew that there was no use asking for more from Ryoko, considering the set of her shoulders and the determined chill of her eyes.
"You said you saw a dead body before this, Tenchi?" she asked softly.
Tenchi exhaled a trembling breath, "I saw my mother's body."
Ryoko nodded, she knew the answer already. She hitched a bit closer to where Tenchi sat on the bed.
"It it was a day or two after she died," Tenchi spoke quickly, knowing if he did not than he would simply clam up again. "The doctors finally left and others came. I mainly hid outside or around the shrine. I couldn't get away from it."
Ryoko watched as his fists clenched. She blinked, recalling the memory of young Tenchi crying his eyes out at the foot of her cave, his umbrella carelessly tossed aside as the boy wept; tears mixing with the snow. "Yeah I remember, Tenchi."
"You do?" he looked up at her, honestly surprised.
"I didn't just spend 700 years in there twiddling my thumbs and cheating at solitaire, did I?" a touch of Ryoko's occasional sardonic wit shone through.
"No... no I guess not." Tenchi acknowledged the bit of levity Ryoko tried to introduce with a small, sad smile. "So here I was and practically everywhere I went I saw a reminder of Mom. At the hill there were some men digging her grave. Dad was either drinking or sleeping... pictures in the shrine her clothes... all of it," he trailed off again and did not speak for a while.
Ryoko nodded slowly, scooting even closer to Tenchi. "You go on, Tenchi. I'm listening."
"Grandfather was supervising, I guess you could say," Tenchi felt the hot tears trying to overwhelm the chill, but they did not. "Some friends of his were preparing Mom."
Ryoko exhaled, not sure if she could hear this without holding Tenchi close, but not wanting him to bury this part of himself again.
"It had gotten too cold for me outside, I guess. So I had gone to where my room was in the shrine office. Really nothing more than a closet, which it is now," he sniffled. "I passed by the room... after they were done." Tenchi was picking intently at a stray piece of lint on his pants. "The door was slid open a crack, and I looked in."
"What did you see, Tenchi?" Ryoko was closer now.
"I...I saw her, all made up, dressed in her finest kimono. She looked so lifelike, like she really was just sleeping." Tenchi paused when he felt the kiss of a teardrop on his hand, then continued. "And I just stood there, I don't know how long, looking at her. Thinking, 'This is my mommy and tomorrow she'll be in the ground.' I thought about everything she had done with her hands, the meals, hugging me, holding Dad's hand. Everything she said, sang, all of it. All of it was going into the ground tomorrow. Somehow, I just could not believe in that moment all the stuff about a 'spirit' or 'soul' that Dad and Grandpa had been telling me I kept expecting her to move or something."
"Tenchi... Tenchi, it's okay," Ryoko soothed. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't even be talking like this."
Tenchi was broken out of remembrance, looking at Ryoko's concerned face, partially hidden in shadow, and realized he was crying. "No it's okay, it's just--"
"Everything," Ryoko supplied.
Tenchi nodded. "Yeah." Then again, stronger. "Yeah."
"Tenchi, I swear to you, I won't let those things get us. Not one of us," he looked up through tears at Ryoko now so close to him now. Amber met brown, and it seemed that words were no longer necessary or preferable. They trusted each other, wasn't that enough?
"Yeah, I know." His words sounded hollow because he felt a burning within him.
Ryoko smiled thinly, a soft trace of a blush there. "Well I better let you get to sleep, my dear Tenchi." She chuckled. "And I better go before Ayeka or Washu catch on." She threw in a wink there. "Good night," she blew a kiss and phased out down through his bed.
"Ryoko! Wait!" he called, but was too late. He sighed, before a smile cracked across his face. Tenchi lay back, and found it much easier to go to sleep. Much easier, he mused, after talking to Ryoko. Bad dreams did not dare assail him for the rest of the night.
000
End Chapter 4.