Ch.11 The Ghostly Spirit
The group teleports into the inside of an airship with an unfamiliar setting; both Akane and Hiro recognize the internal design as being the same model as the fraxinus, but it isn't. Ellen takes a moment to look around and she has the answer.
"This a DEM airship but I can't remember the name. It was built in my time shortly before I left DEM."
Mana doesn't recognize it because it is a newer model that was created after she left the organization. Mana is uneasy working with Kurumi and Saori but is rather happy to be working with the kind Ellen in their group since from the brief moments they've talked, Mana has formed a good opinion about her loving attitude especially compared to the Ellen she knows. Hiro and Mana, oddly enough, don't really react to the teleportation and instead keeps straight faces. Everyone else is already used to the teleporting due to past usage.
The group looks around the ship but is on edge because the ship has an eerie feeling. The group makes their way into the deck of the ship and sees an entire crew. Hiro quickly pulls out his dual blades and prepares to fight, but Shido tells him to wait and adds with a calm yet unsure tone.
"Something isn't right."
Shido is right, because the crew is working like machines since they don't pay attention to anything other than their station and don't turn around when the group enters the cockpit. Being cautious, Hiro slowly approaches the commander who is sitting in his chair and shakes his shoulder and tries to talk to him.
"Hey sir, are you okay?"
After a few seconds of shaking, the commander in the chair falls over with his eyes opened. Shido, Akane, and Aki trembles a little as Hiro checks the man's pulse and shakes his head as he says.
"He's dead."
Shido is mortified at seeing a dead body especially since he was sitting there as if he was alive, Akane hates seeing dead bodies in general and has never actually seen a dead person, and Aki is tempted to scream since he's so shocked from seeing a real dead body. The others are indifferent to the dead commander but are on edge since they realize something is very wrong. All of the sudden, the other crew members fall over dead just like the commander and leave the ship without anyone to control it and the ships alarm goes off a little. Ellen immediately starts telling everyone to take the ships controls and she'll guide them through it. Luckily, Hiro and Akane are familiar with the ships controls. Kurumi, Saori, Shido, and Aki are the only party members that don't need to take the controls since Ellen, Akane, Mana, and Hiro drive the ship. The alarm eventually stops and everything calms down. Saori gathers the bodies and instantly realizes what killed the crew as she thinks in her head irritated.
"He sent her!? Damn it Shinra, why did you give HER permission to fight this early?"
Saori tells everyone that the crew was poisoned by someone, but Kurumi is suspicious of her since she has a different idea. Saori then says to everyone in a calm and sweet tone.
"Oh I think I have jet lag so I'm going to find a place to lie down."
Saori leaves the deck and Kurumi makes up the same excuse and follows Saori into one ships resting quarters. Aki and Akane, understandably, are very distrustful of Saori; Shido is also uneasy about what she's done, but wants to help her and having her in the group is one the best way to make sure she's close. The room Saori and Kurumi went into is the sleeping quarters for the commander. Inside the room, Saori sits on the bed in the room and Kurumi begins to question her in with her innocent demeanor.
"Saori, what are you up to exactly?"
Saori reacts with the same innocent demeanor.
"Whatever do you mean?"
Kurumi's tone turns into her more serious demeanor.
"You don't expect me to believe you joined out of the goodness of your heart, do you?
Saori chuckles a little as she asks.
"What do you want me to say? But then again, why would you trust anything I say at this point?"
"Then I'll ask this, what do you see me as since I'm your mother?"
Saori summons her longer sword and points it at Kurumi's stomach and says with a more unsettling tone.
"That"
Kurumi is a little confused and asks gently.
"What is "that" exactly?"
"Tehe that's-a-se-cret"
Kurumi summons her shadows and has the hands grab Saori and hold her to the bed and walks intends to get some straight answers.
"Okay let's try this again, what is that you intend to get from me?"
Saori closes her eyes and starts laughing a little as the shadows begin to release her which surprises Kurumi a little. Saori then stands up and continues laughing softly, until suddenly she opens her eyes and has a rather disturbing smile on her face.
"I don't think you understand who you're dealing with Kurumi."
Saori gets really close to Kurumi's face as her expression gets toned down.
"Telling now would be pointless considering who's been following your movements from the beginning."
Kurumi maintains her composure since she doesn't intend to lose at mind games against Saori, but is also curious.
"Who is this person Saori?"
Saori backs up and gets in the bed and answers softly.
"You'll see."
Saori then closes her eyes again and goes to sleep in the bed. Kurumi realizes that dealing with Saori at the moment is useless since she is at a disadvantage against her other timeline daughter.
Back in the bridge, things have settled down a bit and Ellen has activated the auto-pilot and everyone takes some time to cool off and chat while they ascertain the situation. Mana goes to check around the ship to find any food or any survivors and Hiro insists on accompanying her; Mana doesn't hold any ill will against Hiro and is curious about some things about him since he's so different from the others. They walk around the ship and Mana asks him something.
"Hey Hiro, why'd you think I was a DEM wizard when we met? I mean I wasn't using my special realizer."
Hiro is quick to respond.
"Oh that's simple; you see Mana in my time, the AST has a new system to monitor the realizers we use. DEM used to supply realizers to us, but once the war began, the AST forbid the use of DEM realizers and we only use ones made by Asgard Electronics. Each realizer also has a serial number that any high ranking member can scan. In this way, we can monitor and control which realizer is being used at what time and by whom."
Mana then puts it together.
"Oh I see. I'm using an older model by your times standards without a serial number."
"Yes, and you encountered a lieutenant class wizard who scanned your realizer."
Hiro stops walking and Mana stops as soon as she notices him not moving. Hiro then looks at Mana with a casual look on his face.
"By the way Mana, I can't help but notice that you're tense around Kurumi, why?"
"I'm worried about Nightmare being with us. I'll attack her if she tries anything funny."
Hiro snaps at Mana's words and shouts at her.
"You will do no such thing!?"
Mana is startled a little by the loudness of Hiro's voice. Hiro then apologizes to her.
"I will not permit anyone to harm a spirit while I'm alive."
Mana is shocked a little and responds.
"Do you know what Kurumi has done?"
"You mean kill people? I don't care honestly. Mana, I care for the people of the city, I do, but I love the spirits. All of them are precious to me."
Mana is baffled a little by Hiro's explination.
"I don't know how you can say that."
Hiro lifts his face to the ceiling and actually says.
"Maybe I'll tell you another time, but not now. I don't think you're ready to understand. But don't misunderstand me, I am tickled pink to fight alongside you."
Mana thinks that while she doesn't understand the young man who is supposed to be the son of a girl who hates spirits. Regardless, Mana decides that the best idea is to accept that he feels this way and decides to go with it. Hiro turns his towards Mana and sees her arm extended to shake his hand, he smiles, accepts her handshake, and says.
"It's an honor Mana Takamiya. I Colonel Hiro Itsuka, codename Ratatosk, will fight with you until the end."
The two continue the search around the ship and talk battle tactics to each other. Unbeknownst to everyone, in a special portion of the ship meant for detaining spirits is Kotori. Kotori ended up in this time, but unfortunately ended up inside the ship during a mission. She ended up being captured since she couldn't resist. However, she has only been in this time for about five hours from her perspective. Freki is guarding the cell from the shadows. Kotori is worried about Shido, but keeps calm under the pressure and patiently waits since she has no idea she's in another time.
Aki goes to look for survivors alone since the others a sure he'll be okay in this ship by himself. Meanwhile, Ellen and Akane are looking into their location using the ships map. Shido is sitting doing nothing on the bridge; then Kurumi enters the bridge to check on Shido since she's a little worried that Saori may do something to him. Ellen then starts checking the ships cameras from one of the crew seats to see if anything is out of the ordinary, and then she sees Kotori inside a cell and immediately tells Shido.
"Shido I found someone we've been looking for."
Shido immediately stands up and walks over to Ellen to look at her screen and sees Kotori, and is both surprised and happy.
"Kotori is here?"
He is also a little relieved since Aki is near that area according to Ellen. Kurumi advises Shido to stay in the bridge with her and Ellen because she's now uneasy about leaving Shido alone while Saori is on the ship. Akane is now looking into the mission log at the commander's seat while Ellen is guiding Aki towards Kotori's location and he's happy to help his aunt. They know it's her because she is still wearing her school uniform. Akane is so caught up in reading the mission log that she doesn't notice that the base-timeline version of her mother is on this ship. Then she sees something peculiar about this mission and tells Ellen.
"Hey Ellen, something is a little off here."
Ellen turns her head to see Akane and listens to what she has to say. Akane then reads that the mission the crew was on is a scouting mission with the intent to gather details on a spirit that appeared recently around Tengu city. The spirit in question hasn't been photographed since she's only been seen once and she reportedly wears a pearl white cloak with a hood covering her head. Also, this world's Ellen is supposed to be on this mission and her body isn't among the deceased crew. Akane then asks the question on everybody's mind.
"So where is she?"
As Akane asks, the alarm goes off on the ship because someone was knocked against the roof of the ship. Immediately Ellen switches the screen to a camera showing the roof and the group sees this world's Ellen covered in injuries and panting while equipped with her realizer. Then another person gently lowers on the roof, a woman wearing a pearl white cloak, pearl white boots, and pearl white pants. Everybody then gets the impression that this person must be the spirit who recently appeared. The woman looks into the camera and waves to everybody as if she can sense them. Her weapons catch everybody's eyes; she has a pair of black energy blades with white lines extending from her hands.
This world's Ellen then charges at the cloaked woman, but she counters by swinging her left blade at Ellen's throat and the sound of slicing echoes causing everybody who's watching, except Kurumi, to gasp, and the Ellen in the party gently grabs her own throat as if she just imagined herself in the same position. The cloaked woman then reveals her face; she has waist-length pale white hair, ghostly white eyes, and very pale skin giving her a ghostly appearance. She smiles into the camera and introduces herself to the party.
"Hello Shido, Kurumi, and other people."
Everybody is speechless and the woman says something a little unsettling.
"Don't waste words on me Shido. I'm not a spirit who you have a chance with. To the point, I want to you send me Kurumi and Kotori, and I know they are both on this ship, and she is the one from your timeline Shido."
Everyone is surprised since this mysterious woman appears to know too much about what they're doing and about their timeline jumping. Moreover she has this familiar presence, like Shido and even everybody feels like they know her. Then it hits Akane like a punch in the face.
"My mo…Kotori is on this ship!?"
Downstairs, Aki finally arrives at Kotori's location and sees her through a glass door. She's asleep and Aki begins to knock on the door. Kotori looks at him and sees that he's wearing the uniform of Shido's high school and then Aki immediately says.
"I'm a friend of your brother."
Kotori is surprised a little and immediately approaches the door and asks.
"You're a friend of Shido?"
Aki nods and says in a friendly tone.
"Uh huh, my name is Akihiko but please call me Aki."
Kotori decides that Aki isn't lying and trusts in his words for the moment. Aki then looks around for a switch or something to get her out and asks.
"So how'd you end up here?"
Kotori , who is currently wearing her black ribbons, explains that she literally ended up here in the ship and tells Aki.
"One of the worst things is that the food here sucks."
Aki then thinks to himself.
"HEHE that's my aunt all right. Well as soon as I get you out of here, we'll get Shido to make something okay."
Kotori already decides she rather like Aki a little.
"You're alright."
Unable to find a switch, Aki decides to just enter his spirit form and pry open the door with his sword. Upon seeing his spirit form, Kotori immediately notices the resemblance to Tohka and asks Aki while he gets ready to get her out.
"Hey Aki, do you happen to know the name Tohka Yatogami?"
Before Aki can answer or pry the door open, someone enters the scene and tackles Aki away from the door. Aki gets up and sees a familiar character, the girl who attacked him in his time; he can tell because she's holding the same sword but doesn't have her small axe out. He gets angry and utters.
"It's you."
The girl then slices the door to pieces, looks at Kotori, and says in cold tone.
"Get to the bridge, your brother and his friends are there."
Kotori is hesitant to leave Aki alone with this girl since she can clearly see who to trust, but Aki says.
"Kotori get to the bridge she's not lying. I'll handle this."
Kotori is still unsure and asks in a serious tone.
"Are you sure."
Aki nods and Kotori immediately gets moving to the bridge. Aki stands up and tells the girl.
"If you want a fight, then come on."
The girls chuckles a little at the young swordsman and says in a casual tone.
"I have different place for us to fight, so follow me."
Geri then dashes past Aki and he begins to chase her and shouts.
"Get back here!"
Geri doesn't answer Aki's yelling and continues to run away and lead him to a different room. Aki chases her into a large room that heavily resembled the training dome back in Akane's timeline Fraxinus. The girl runs over the end of the room and stops moving, Aki stops at the opposite side and asks.
"Who are you?"
The young girl smiles smugly and retorts.
"Why does it matter who I am?"
Aki then holds up his sword and says in a slightly angry tone.
"Well, I learned that it's polite to introduce yourself when asked."
The girl responds in a sarcastic manner.
"Well then, what's your name then?"
Aki simply states his name and ignores the sarcasm.
"Akihiko Itsuka."
"Akihiko Huh, so this is this the kid Shinra wanted me to push."
Aki has doubts he can beat Geri, but is still unsure if he should use his new sword or not. Geri chooses to not use her axe for this fight and waits for Aki to make the first move.
Back in bridge, Kotori makes her way into the area and immediately meets eyes with Shido who immediately walks up to his sister and hugs her, and asks in a worried tone.
"Are you okay?"
Kotori responds in her serious tone.
"What, no good to Kotori, or a simple hi?"
Kotori then smiles and hugs Shido back and says in a more sweet tone.
"I missed you like crazy big bro."
Akane looks at the siblings and she instantly reminisces about her parents, and then buries herself in the mission log to distract herself from seeing Kotori. Not long after, the woman in white interrupts the happy reunion by throwing something at the camera which causes Ellen to feel even more uncomfortable as she is the only person who sees it. The woman then proclaims.
"I believe I made a demand."
Shido looks at the screen and says in a serious tone.
"I'm not letting my sister or Kurumi get near you."
Shido is concerned and doesn't want any one of his friends get near that woman. The woman then shakes her head and says with a rather annoyed looks.
"Well too bad, because I'm not a very patient woman today Shido."
The woman raises her hand to the sky and snaps her finger. Moments later, an alarm goes off, the spacial quake alarm. Everyone then gets a little worried, and in another area, Mana and Hiro are racing back to the bridge because the alarm. Aki and Geri are clashing blades in the dome area and are too distracted by their fight to notice the alarm. A few more moments later, a very sphere can be seen and it's the size of a large comet. Everyone is speechless at the massive mass of energy and the woman says.
"You can have until the count of ten to send Kotori and Kurumi to me."
Kotori backs away from Shido and says in a serious tone.
"Shido, why didn't send me up there in the first place?"
Shido gets more worried and says.
"Kotori, that woman killed Ellen without any trouble and I don't want you to get hurt."
Kotori looks at Kurumi, who she just noticed, and says.
"Come on Kurumi, I'm sure we both don't want anything to happen to Shido."
Kurumi nods and says with a mischievous smile.
"Of course not, Shido is mine after all."
"Uh no, he's my brother so that makes him mine and you can't have him."
Shido feels a little uncomfortable hearing the girls talk about him like he's property. Kotori and Kurumi both leave to go the roof of the ship and on the way Kurumi puts on her astral dress to get ready in case they need to fight. Akane, back in the bridge, says quietly.
"Please don't get hurt mom."
Back to the fight in the dome, Geri's sword begins to glow black and seems to drip a deep red liquid and she slashes at Aki and calls out.
"Blood Scent!"
Aki manages to block the first three slashes of this attack, but Geri's final blow is too powerful for Aki to block as a small burst of energy bursts from Geri's sword hits Aki in the chest and knocks him back. Geri then gathers mana into her opposite hand and calls out the name of another attack.
"Dark Presence!"
A black circle appears around Aki with dark symbols appearing along with dark flames and a burst of energy comes down on Aki slamming him against the ground hard and he lets go of his sword. Geri walks up to him and kicks his sword away and thinks to herself.
"Come on kid, summon master Shinra's gift."
Aki then gets frustrated and Geri's expression changes to one of anticipation. Finally on the roof, Kurumi and Kotori arrive to talk with the cloaked woman who now has a smile on her face. The woman looks at the girls and says.
"Welcome, so these are two of my choice…not bad."
Kotori asks the woman a question.
"Are you a spirit?"
The woman responds while walking around the roof.
"I don't really know how to answer that. I am and at the same time I'm not. I find it to be a dilemma actually."
Kotori follows with.
"Okay, then what do you want exactly?"
"Now that is something I can answer. I want what he wants; I want what should be mine."
Kurumi shoots four shots at the woman with her guns, but then woman then catches the bullets between her fingers and tosses them aside and says.
"You're no fun at all Kurumi. Maybe he likes that."
The woman then realizes something.
"Oh, I forgot to introduce myself. Really where my manners…my name is Kokoro."
Kurumi is surprised that her bullets where caught so easily and gets a bad feeling from this woman. Kokoro then turns her back to the girls and says.
"But of course I came all this way and this woman was no fun."
Kokoro then looks down at the dead body of the Ellen she killed and kicks it off the ship and into the ocean. Kokoro then turns around and points at the girls and proclaims.
"So you'll have to quell my boredom and show me what my choices can do!"
Kokoro then closes her eyes and raises her arms to the sky as red feathers begin float from around her body and her hair begins to turn black and a red wing with black lines made of energy extends from her back and flaps as black and red energy feathers fall from it. Kokoro then opens her eyes and one is now red and the other a clock, just like Kurumi. Kokoro then snaps her fingers again and shouts.
"Come Zafkiel!"
Kurumi and Kotori are both shocked after hearing her shout for Kurumi's angel, but Zafkiel doesn't appear behind Kokoro. Kurumi then asks.
"Well, where is Zafkiel?"
Kokoro extends her hand and points down to the ground. Kotori and Kurumi both look down and see a massive Zafkiel below their feet and it forms a massive barrier around itself to avoid anyone from escaping. Kokoro then says.
"Bet!"
Zafkiel 's 2 o'clock postion lights up and everything slows down outside the barrier. Kokoro then summons her energy blades which are now red with black lines and says.
"Don't worry, I don't play with my skin…much."
Kokoro licks her lips and Kotori changes into her spirit form to help. Kurumi then summons her own Zafkiel and Kotori readies with her Camael. Kokoro then says.
"Now, let our date begin."
Kotori snaps back with.
"Hey that's my line!"
Everybody takes a stance and prepares to fight.