Chapter 28:
She was up again.
The kitsune had been up and down through much of the flight–repeatedly going to the window of the cabin to look out, even though there was little to see but clouds. She'd done it so much, Drew wanted to check her out. As she returned to her seat once more, the doctor opened her mouth to speak, but Finn got there first. "Memories," asked the King of Ooo? Dropping into a seat, the witch-woman muttered, "I flew on an airlifter like this to get to Shiyan village." The Chinese government had flown her there on a copy of the very aircraft they were riding on now. It was much like the airplane her half-brother had flown in the United States Air Force. There were a lot of memories here, and she wasn't happy to be re-experiencing any of them.
The airship dropped out of the cloudy sky over the forgotten city of Yakutsk in the middle of the afternoon after flying much of the night and a fair chunk of the day. The city was utterly smashed, and Katsumi stood there fighting tears at the sight. She'd heard the radio reports. An American missile had flattened the town and killed all the inhabitants. Her friend–the woman she'd worked with and struggled with and fought with–had gone up in smoke.
Only she hadn't. Somehow, Talia was still alive.
The aircraft came in for a hover, hunting up a good spot to land on the cracked and broken concrete of the forgotten airport. As the engines spooled down, the crew went through the process of unlatching and opening one of the side doors. Katsumi was all but pacing while they waited for the crew to finish. Indeed, as the door touched down, she all but shoved the crew out of the way. Just as Finn had expected, Talia was there waiting on them. The kitsune had barely taken a step towards her, when Drew shouted, "stop!"
Everybody present stared as the tall doctor brushed past the witch-woman. Drew strode straight up to Baba Yaga and immediately shoved a thermometer in the rusalka's face. "Ok, what gives," Talia burbled around that glass instrument? "You were on Zombie Island," Drew replied. "I was irritated with my husband for not bringing you back to be examined." Finn's protestations that Talia was a nature-spirit had fallen on implacably deaf ears. Drew wasn't going to be comfortable with the ending of the whole business until she was certain that none of the four principals was infected. Finn's eyes told the witch-woman 'go along to get along'.
At Drew's instruction, a tent got set up and the witch brought inside. As Finn stood near the door, doing his best to be a soothing presence, Baba Yaga got her first medical checkup in over a thousand years. "Do you do this at home," growled the witch? "Yeah, she does," Finn confirmed, earning him a glare from Drew. As Finn stood calmly watching, the humiliated witch got bent over, spun around, poked, and prodded. An irritated Drew suggested the big man shove off. "I've already seen it," Finn opined, earning a glare from Talia as well. The rusalka's eyes got big as plates, though, when Drew brought out the syringes, and she drew the line at that.
"Your body temperature is low," Drew remarked. "Something's wrong with you." "My temperature is normal," the rusalka retorted. "Your normal temperature is ninety-two," Drew demanded? "That's getting towards hypothermic..." "She spends a lot of her time in icy-water, Doc," Finn said. "You've done what you came to do..." It was a polite and gentle way of telling her to put a sock in it." "Just one," she insisted. As Baba Yaga glared at her, the pushy doctor drew a syringe full of blood before packing her gear away.
With a bounce to her step, the pretty doctor strolled across the broken tarmac to the airship. She was happy. Rubbing at her arm, the witch was anything but. "Now that that's out of the way, gigolo, why did you come here," Baba Yaga demanded? "First thing's first," Finn said, as he stood aside and pulled Katsumi in front of him. "I thought you were dead," Katsumi howled! With a shrug, Talia replied, "thought much the same about you when the bombs started flying." The nine-tailed-fox took one step... two. And then she threw her long arms around her long-lost frenemy, hugging her as the pair cried bitter tears.
Far away from that bitter reunion, an equally world-shaking event was just getting underway. The jungles were alive with the rumble and roar of machines. The sounds of animated voices filled the air as hundreds of slaves were whipped relentlessly to complete preparations for an event not seen in centuries. The massive vessels on the hill were filled to the brim with thousands of gallons of dangerously combustible fluids. The precious fluids had been provisioned by a stream of ships from across the sea, telling the imprisoned locals that their conqueror had power and money to enforce her will–maybe even to contest control of Coca-Kingdom.
On the far side of the site, in a stonework bunker named the 'Hellcave' by the natives, the author of the slaves' suffering watched the clock with one eye and the terrified occupants of her lair with the other. The tall woman was pacing again. She was pacing, and the captive scientists were very nervous. Seemingly always on the ragged edge of violence, she was particularly on edge today. Today was the day. They were going to make a splash–literally–by launching their first rocket. It was time to get the King of Ooo's attention in a really spectacular way. Of course, if the evil ogress was feeling the pressure, her captives were feeling it even more.
The cost of failure had been made abundantly clear. It was death for anyone who caused this attempt to fail. The unofficial leader of the kidnapped scientists glanced down at the ancient electrical panel and offered a prayer to glob. He knew the risk, and he was utterly certain they were going to be slaughtered. The machine on the launch pad was massive. It was a massive construct of steel, filled with an ocean of alcohol fuel and peroxide oxidizer.
And that was the problem. It was much too heavy to fly. Certainly it would never attain the range their captor sought, but James Starchman feared it would never leave the ground. If it failed particularly badly, it would kill them all. The little pastry thought of his happy little family in the Candy Kingdom, wondering if he'd see them again. "You there," snapped the ogress! "Where are we at?!" Glancing back down at his gauges, the candy-person replied, "the tanks are full. We are ready to remove the service tower." Turning to one of her runners, the ogress snarled, "make it so!"
The business moved quickly then. Slaves got whipped into action, bodily hauling on the heavy steel structure with drag ropes. Slowly at first, then with increasing speed, they hauled that mass of machinery away from the tall cylinder with its deadly fuel. When the machinery, supports, and pumps were cleared away, the countdown began. Back in the bunker, the captive scientists began switching on systems, cycling fuel pumps, and engaging primitive computers as the death-rocket slowly came to life there in the jungle. The Bandit Princess could feel the tension slowly melt away as her captives signaled that all was ready.
"Ignition," shouted Mr. Starchman, as he pressed the button on the console. The ground shook, and a terrible roar filled the air–felt more than heard. The ancient site shook with a sound and fury not felt in a thousand years. The Bandit Princess rushed to the bunker's gun-slit window to observe the triumph. The machine was rising! At the same time, it seemed much slower than the first one. And then the machine toppled, disassembling itself in a flash of light that burned retinas and left everyone blinded and deafened.
Back in Yakutsk, Billy found himself enjoying Talia's dubious hospitality. The witch was in a bit of a snit, whether from the sudden surprise visit or Drew's poking and prodding. She'd gotten back in her rattle-trap wreck of a car and basically driven off, leaving them with tacit permission to set up shop on her airfield. Finn had put the crew of the airship to work digging in for the night, placing defenses to keep them protected from whatever awful thing might wander in from the wastelands, while an oblivious Drew went up into one of the working spaces on the upper deck to get busy on her analysis of the witch's blood.
Billy had found himself somewhat at loose ends. When Katsumi retired to one of the small cabins, the younger man found himself following, as much out of curiosity as anything else. "Not what these things were built for," she opined, as she laid out bedding on the narrow bed. Staring around him with a frown, the big man admitted, "I don't know a lot about these things. The Grid-Face people scrounged them up... A lot of them were just laying out in fields, rusting away." "There were tens of thousands of airplanes when I was your age," she said. "People flew just for the pleasure of traveling." Billy whistled as he tried to imagine that.
Glancing around him, he said, "you say this thing wasn't built for this..." With a shrug, she said, "the Russian military built this thing to carry soldiers and weapons." Billy's jaw dropped. They'd played around with that, but not at anything like a large scale. Nodding, Katsumi said, "your cyborg friends... have a history, William." Wryly, Billy said, "well, there's a reason they became pacifists I suppose." Katsumi goggled at him. Nodding, the big man said, "won't touch weapons. Even if it kills them." Shocked, the tall woman sat herself on the bunk and stared into space.
Sitting beside her, the big man said, "world changed a lot." Glancing over at his strange new acquaintance, he said, "my stepmom called it hard-won wisdom. My mom calls it a penance. Nadia's ancestors helped wreck the world." "Stepmother," Katsumi murmured? "Princess Nadia, leader of the Grid-Face People," Billy confirmed. "So your parents are divorced," she surmised. Flushing, Billy murmured, "not exactly..." She'd been about to offer sympathy. She came from a broken home herself. Now she stared at him.
Meanwhile, the King of Ooo stood underneath the rusalka's balcony, listening to her playing a haunting melody on the piano that he'd hauled up for her. He could feel the pain in her music. He hadn't wanted to do this to her. At the same time, the world needed them to cooperate to fix this. He wanted, more than anything, to give her some time and space to herself. The world wasn't waiting on them though. Heading inside the building, the big man went to the stairs and began the climb.
Talia could feel the tall man as he made his way up the stairs, and she found herself muttering curses. She didn't want him here. She wanted to be alone. She didn't want to be bothered tonight. Seeing Katsumi–seeing her face-to-face like that–was like seeing the past walking by. It brought back all the pain and everything she'd lost all at one shot. The further he climbed, the angrier she got. Rage wanted to kill him out of hand. She could kill him out of hand just by triggering that terrible burden he carried. She could age him into a pile of mouldering goo in the stairwell. Shame stayed her hand because she knew why he'd come here.
"T," Finn greeted the witch.
Her back was to the door, and her fingers hovered over the keys of the piano. "I didn't want to do this to you," he offered, as he shut her door. The witch began to play again, louder now, as if she was going to drown him out. "We promised we were going to fix this," he said. "I want..." "Why did you fucking bring her, here," she snarled?! "Because she's carrying a burden," Finn said, "and because she maybe knows some of the things we don't." Talia stopped playing, banging the cover closed on the keyboard. Her eyes were hot, as she got up. "She knows something, T," Finn rumbled. "Bandit-Princess was behind the attack on Shiyan Village. She came back and murdered a bunch of dudes in Fengdu after I left. Maybe it was to silence people. I don't know." The raging witch went silent. Striding forward, the big man hugged his strange friend. In short order, she was crying on his shoulder, letting go a thousand years of grief.
Back at the airfield, a shocked Katsumi sat staring at her strange young friend. A part of her wanted to be horrified by the life he was now leading and the strange arrangement his family had made. Another piece of her was intensely curious. His family was tied up in a strange polygamous relationship that was, somehow, keeping the world at peace. He himself was married to four and doing his best to keep a fair chunk of the world from being at each other's throats. But it was just another day. This was just what he did in the world. He wasn't proud or embarrassed or particularly emotional about it.
"I guess I never met a prince," she murmured. Billy frowned at her. "You are a prince," she reminded him. "I don't like to think of myself that way," he said. "I'm... just a dude. Doing a job." That made her laugh. "What," he asked? "You're young and naive," she laughed. "Your father's become comfortable with it, I think." Billy laughed. "That's 'New Finn'..." As the horrified witch stared at him, Billy explained the attempted murder that had caused Nadia to inject his father with some of her nano-machines–and the subsequent personality changes that ensued. "Maybe you need some nano-machines too, William," Katsumi murmured. "You... This isn't going to be easy on you. He's not a wizard. He's not going to live forever. They'll be looking at you..."
The big man's expression turned grim, and it was obvious she wasn't telling him something he didn't already know. He was clearly far south of pleased. He was, like her old self, an idealist. "I don't like that word," he muttered. "You even sound like I did," she chuckled. Turning a little to face him, the strange woman said, "I'm a communist, William. I... People used to call me that, and it made me angry because I thought they were telling me I was naive and stupid." He flinched, as he realized what she was trying to say.
Her expression gone bleak. "I... was naive, kiddo," she said. "I was as naive as you are now. I admired the Chinese and their government. I used to tell people how wonderful they were because the government of China could get things done when they were needed. They could work against global warming. They could kick people out of their cars for the good of society. I glossed over the loss of basic freedoms and tried to explain away a lot of the evils of their government because I was in love with their ideas."
"You sound like Talia," Billy rumbled. Katsumi chuckled. "Yeah, babe, I do," she agreed. "Another Hollywood actress who thought she knew everything. Used to debate her all the time. She was a capitalist, and I was an avowed socialist. When her precious capitalist states started threatening each other, I gloated, Bill. I gloated and hit her with the 'I told you so's'. Never had any idea what my side was up to." The words had an edge of warning to them. Billy's blue eyes locked with hers. The nine-tailed-fox couldn't help but notice how pretty his eyes were–the blue of glacial ice.
With a sigh, she said, "you're going to be called on to grow as a man, William. Farther and faster even than you've shown so far. Your father has grown to see just how dangerous every entanglement is when you're responsible for millions of lives. I don't think it was the nanobots that drove him to seek me out. Your father calls himself the guardian of the guardians... Well, he has a point. Remember when you asked me how I came to be in Shiyan? Well, I... A friend of my dad's told him that he'd gotten tasked with retargeting some of their weapons... Shiyan village ended up on the target list. There was a suspected bio-weapons lab there, working on something called the Black Scrawl Virus. They were going to get the lab in any exchange, just to be sure the virus couldn't be released."
Expression turned bleak, the kitsune said, "I went to Shiyan-village... I went there as a human shield with some of my friends. We were going to prevent the American government from launching a bomb at the village." Of course the Americans launched the missile anyway. "And you protected the village from the strike," Billy guessed. Katsumi chuckled humorlessly. "I found out the whole thing was a lie," she said. "The Americans weren't lieing. The lab did exist. And... the villagers were members of the support staff." Billy's jaw came open. With a sigh, Katsumi said, "the lab's still there. It's buried under the cemetery on the south end of town. I... killed all the scientists and discouraged the villagers from ever talking about it. Eventually they forgot."
Billy whistled. It really was true. Pretty much every Royal on Ooo was guarding something awful. He wondered how many even realized what they were guarding. Katsumi glared at him. When he glanced over at her to see why she was angry, he found tears in her eyes. "People I admired and defended were going to spread a plague on all mankind," she sobbed. Where he found fascination, she saw shame and horror at her own actions.
"Y-you didn't know," he reminded her. He knew as he was saying it that it hardly helped. Her mistakes had cost people their lives. It wasn't on the scale of Talia's mistakes, but it was there all the same. The young man took her hand in his, trying his best to comfort and console the inconsolable as the tears fell.
On her side, the feel of his hands around her's was starting to get to her. She was calling him a naive idiot–literally telling him that he needed to grow up–and he was trying to make her feel better all the same. He pushed her buttons–checked every box on the list. Beautiful, manly, and sensitive all at the same time, he was the ideal she'd always searched for. And he was immortal, like her. He would live until the sun went out. A nagging little corner of her mind wanted her to make a play for him, when he was quite happy with what he already had and really didn't need the extra complication. And that deadly emotion had slowly been gaining ground.
She hardly even realized she was leaning towards him until their lips met. Billy found himself giving her back everything she gave him. If Billy checked a lot of her boxes, the reverse was just as true. She was as exotic as JJ had been, but without some of the uglier baggage. He found himself kissing the older woman with all the passion he had, and it was only when he realized he had his hands on her ass that he stopped.
Drawing back, Katsumi gave Billy a look somewhere between panic and utter confusion. "W-why would you let me," she babbled? With a shrug, he said, "I trust you. You... sort of needed that." That was hardly the comfort he expected as now the kitsune began to bawl her eyes out. A shocked Billy tried to calm her, doing his best to talk her down from the emotional crash she was suffering. Unfortunately, the floodgates, once opened, weren't easy to close as she continued to melt down until her makeup was running down her cheeks and her eyes began to turn red. Rushing out to the bathroom, he retrieved a towel and daubed at her face, wondering what he was going to do with this. She looked an utter mess. "I don't deserve that," she wailed. "I don't deserve to be trusted..." "Why," he asked? "You've... Katsumi, listen to me." That finally stopped the meltdown.
Taking her face in his hands, he said, "you're no more guilty of a heinous act than Talia is guilty of destroying the world. You trusted people that you believed in. Those people betrayed you. They lied to you. My granddad used to say the road to hell is paved with good intentions, but that doesn't damn the intentions. Doing the right thing is never evil, Katsumi. You wanted to protect people from a government you ernestly believed was unjust because you didn't have all the facts. There's no shame in that. The shame lies buried with the liars who put you in that spot."
He believed that. She could see it in his eyes. "You're a naive fool," she muttered. "I'm a fool who watched you fight alongside us to save people's lives and defeat a pack of murderers. That's not the action of an evil woman. You've found your moral compass again. Don't lose it." The tears fell again, slower this time. She was more composed. "Don't go," she whispered. "S-stay. Please."
With every word she spoke, her face drew closer. Eyes closed as their lips met at last, the nine-tailed-fox felt an electric thrill as the strange young man kissed her again. In short order, they were losing themselves in the feel of that, tongues darting, as they explored each other's bodies. He was so hard. He was built like a Hollywood Hunk from her forgotten days as an actress. The Ice-Prince's hands stroked her flanks, gliding up and down barely brushing the base of her heaving titties.
She was the perfect that immortality gave you. Frozen in time forever in her late twenties, the kitsune was breathtakingly beautiful. Billy wanted her. How could he not want her? Taking the initiative, the big man reached up and began unbuttoning Katsumi's jacket, baring her chest in a soft camisol. The older woman let him ease the jacket off, and then it got tossed aside, as Billy went for her big boobies.
Those were a gift from her Japanese momma. Her Chinese-American dad had seen Hitomi Tsukuda in a crowd at an animation convention and been instantly smitten. An inveterate tit-man, Mike Tsui had pursued Hitomi with all his passion, never imagining the family secret she was keeping. Billy caressed those heavy-duty knockers reverently, touching them like they might break. His soft caresses sent shivers through her. The fox-girl found herself biting her lip when he bent and kissed the top of those heavy milk-jugs. Her face was flushed when they came up for air. Her blush went all the way down to the top of her breasts. No bra, but those titties were firm as anything. Yeah, being immortal sucked, but at the same time... Damn.
After a moment's pause, Billy reached out and slipped those spaghetti-straps off her shoulders, causing the camisol to slide down, allowing those big boobies to spring free. It was a different experience from the long-ago days of the twenty-first century feminism where boys were demonized for touching without begging first. She was so fucking turned on. When he reached out and began to stroke those heavy boobies, skin on skin–teasing the fat nips, the nine-tailed fox began to moan softly.
The Ice-Prince began to nibble and suck at her neck. Kissing her cheeks and almost seeming to inhale her scent, the big man continued to toy with those big titties. "Ooaaah," Katsumi moaned. She began to whine deep in her throat, as he worked her over. His hand slipped down to her waist, stroking her flat tummy. A corner of her mind wondered. Would he? A twenty-first-century guy was supposed to beg every step of the way. His hand teased her flesh, building anticipation. Would he became when would he.
The big man lay her back on the narrow bunk. His hand stroked her back, as he went for those big knockers, licking and sucking at them. He had a way of nipping at them with his sharp teeth that would make her squeal. Her head thrashed back and forth, and her fingers clawed at his shoulders and at the sheets. Somewhere in the middle of the frantic caresses and touching, she vaguely felt the button above her tails pop open. How did he know about that? The question went unanswered as the big man unbuttoned the front of her pants too. And then he started peeling the tight, white pants with their damp spot down off her long, lean legs.
As Katsumi lay there panting, the big man sniffed the damp spot insistently before the pants got tossed aside too. Reaching out, he untied the skimpy little panties she wore. A lot like JJ, he realized, probably because of the tails. "Want some of that," he murmured, as he dove into her hot snatch. "Aaaaaaaggggh," wailed the slim sexpot. Her hips jumped, and she clawed at his scalp. "You... You don't have to...," she moaned, but Billy wasn't really listening.
The younger man teased her hot snatch with his tongue, getting her hotter and hotter, tormenting her joy-button. It wasn't the first time she'd had a guy go down on her, but she'd never gotten such expert treatment. But he had four wives and a girlfriend. That was the twisted thing. He had five women getting this treatment. He got plenty of practice. Expertly, the big man got her off again and again, making her squirm and writhe on the bed. "Oooaaaaaaa," wailed the fox-girl, her body practically vibrating. She was soaked with sweat when he quit.
Mouth hanging open, Katsumi stared up at him. "I-I want it," she murmured. Reaching up, she pulled on his shirt. Straightening, Billy stood up and began shedding clothes. Katsumi licked her lips in hunger as that beautiful body came into view. A corner of her mind imagined his dad looked like this at the same age. He was shockingly beautiful for a man of his age. She would have had to admit she had a hunger for both men. They were everything she'd fantasized about for the last few hundred years alone in a village full of people who were terrified of her. Her mouth came open in shock when that huge cock came free of his pants.
Climbing back onto the bed, the big man leaned down to kiss her once more. The older woman grabbed that big dick and aimed it at her horny pussy. "Aaaaaaaagggh," she wailed as the big thing slid in. Her hands clawed at his back, her sharp nails tearing bits of meat out of his skin. Down the hall, Dr. Drusilla Princess looked up in annoyance from her work. That boy. She'd thought he was learning not to stick his pecker in dangerous places. Hope he wrapped it up, he thought. Reaching for some ear plugs, the tall doctor went back to the microscope.
The screaming went on for well over half an hour as her stepson screwed the shit out of Finn's mystery-girl. Drew faced down the intractable problem of just what the hell was in the witch-woman's blood. There were strange cells and structures that she'd never seen before and levels of strange bacteria that she would have considered lethal for a normal person. Nadia had speculated that the strange contents of Talia's blood worked a lot like the nano-machines in her own blood–keeping the witch alive in the face of some pretty horrendous experiences.
Down the hall, Billy lay on his back with Katsumi snuggled in against him in well-satisfied contentment. Stroking her lower back, Billy's fingers came in contact with the base of her tails, causing her to shiver. "Did any of your boyfriends ever," her burbled? Katsumi chuckled. "Nope," she sighed. "I was too young. You don't get a tail until you're almost fifty. The only way to get this many tails is to make a Soul Pact. I... I traded my soul for the safety of Shiyan. I'm stuck..." "In limbo," Billy howled, as he sat up? Sitting up beside him, Katsumi gave him a bleak expression. "I'm shackled to the village until the sun goes out," she admitted. Far from horrifying him, that seemed to arouse an ernest pity. Slipping his arms around her, he held her tight against him, rocking with her, while she gave vent to a thousand years of grief.
"I understand," he whispered. "I understand you." Stroking her shoulder-length, red-orange hair, the big man kissed away the tears. "My half-brother is cursed to be Lord of Vampires," Billy murmured. "He's cursed as his momma was cursed before him." Katsumi stared at him. "Marceline stood up for the last pocket of humans alive on earth," Billy explained. "The Vampire King and his host were preying on them, slowly picking them off. Marceline... Marcie's the Anti-Christ. She didn't know it at the time, but she was born the Anti-Christ–to submerge the world in darkness. Only the world ended first. With nobody to guide her, she grew up hard, but she was–and is–a basically kind person. She fought the vampires with the strength of the devil, and she beat them to a standstill. Trouble was, the joke was kind of on her. As she struck the last blow on the Vampire King, he managed to bite her and pass his curse on to her." And she'd passed that ugly legacy to her son.
The big man lay back, drawing the witch-woman down against him. For a wonder, she let him. Drawing the covers up over them, Billy said, "my sister likes to say that we're the family that fixes things. We're up to our elbows in the drama, trying to make things right. I promise you this... we're going to figure out a way to get rid of that lab and every other ugly thing on Ooo." He sounded so confident and sincere she wanted to believe it, when she'd long ago lost her capacity to believe in anything. Instead of arguing about that, the kitsune shut him up with her lips. There were other things she wanted from him than promises right now.
Katsumi comes clean about the secret of Shiyan village. The Bandit Princess suffers a MAJOR setback. And Billy bags himself a fox.