Chapter 2: The Sound of a Dark Howl
The next day had arrived nice and early for the Blasters of the Shooting Star Squadron, not a single call in the dead of the night to suddenly throw everybody off schedule. Even after the incident concerning a Shmoopie named Freya going absolutely berserk and nobody really knowing the cause, it was up to the Shooting Squadron and their newest member Subaru to get to the bottom of this. They had a lead, that being the Wicked yokai, and they would have to solve it from there.
Though, there was a call in the morning, ringing throughout the third floor where the four main blasters stayed and rested.
"Ahgh! I'm not used to such loud ringing noises!" Subaru muttered, quickly rushing up to get the phone that was ringing. "Hello?"
"Oh um yeah, you're one of them blasters aren't ya? I need some help with somethin' " A rather southern voice said from the other line.
"We sure are, you need help with something?" Subaru asked on the phone, looking around frantically for the other members to see if they were remotely up and awake for the day.
"Yep, I'll need you to come here since I dunno if you like humans showing up in your base or not," The voice said on the other line, seeming a bit flustered.
"Humans?" Subaru asked a bit puzzled. Why was this yokai with a human…? It didn't make any sense to him, weren't all yokai supposed to be invisible.
"Anyways I'll be over by the ol' Everymart in Uptown Springdale, you got that?" The southern sounding yokai asked.
"G-got it, we'll be on our way!" Subaru finished, the other line clicking. The rabbit yokai took off his headgear to scratch behind his long black ears in confusion.
"Yokai befriending humans? That's a new one..." Subaru muttered to himself, rather confused.
"Huh?" Ryuusei pipped up, walking into the room with the phone upon hearing Subaru. "Well, I wouldn't say it's a new one, yokai have been befriending humans for a long time now."
"They have?" Subaru responded in shocked intrigue. "Thought no human could see us."
"That's true on the surface," Akoya chimed in, adjusting her pearl earrings. "But some humans have something called a Yokai Lense, it's most commonly used in a device called the Yokai Watch. It's also seen in a more gem-like state on glasses and other accessories for more subdued yokai spotting."
"Also, some yokai can disguise themselves into the human world as well," Ryuusei added in, rubbing the back of his head. "Usually as a human, but sometimes an animal or an object."
"I see I see, so some humans can see us then," Subaru concluded, putting his headgear back on. "Hopefully nobody saw me running like a buffoon..."
"It's likely nobody saw you," Ryuusei reassured, before looking a bit distant. "I hope once I become a strong blaster I can find a human watch holder to help out!"
"Hey, Eros, could you hurry up? We got a yokai to help today!" Akoyka asked from one of the dorms, knocking on the door.
"Give me a moment, I have to make sure I'm ready to look like the most stunning Blaster of them all, ohoho!" Eros said rather haughtily from the other room, Akoya pinching her brow in frustration.
"I'm gonna assume we just, run on out, right?" Subaru asked, Akoya getting out the dual screened device that Eros seemed to have yesterday.
"No not really, I'll explain once we get to the bottom floor..." Akoya informed, giving a bit of a huff. "...And when somebody is done concerning looks over innocent lives!"
The trio went down the stairs swiftly, ringing a small bell on the second floor as they went over to the garage.
It was a pretty big and empty looking room, with a few spare parts and storage boxes laying around. But, in the very center was a large motorcycle, the headlight styled to be an eye like most vehicles in the Yokai World. It was a bright blue with silver and golden accents, and an emblem resembling a shooting star on the side. To both sides of the vehicle were two matching sidecars.
"This our ride huh?" Subaru asked, looking at the motorcycle with inruige. "Would it be easier to have a car?"
"To be fair, a car really isn't our style," Ryuusei commented with a shrug.
"So, who's drivin?" Subaru added in to his neverending questionings.
"Well me and Eros can't since we don't have proper legs," Akoya remarked.
"Why don't you try, Subaru?" Ryuusei asked, the rabbit yokai nearly loosing his balance from shock.
"Eh!?" Subaru remarked in shock.
"I mean, you seem to be the type who could ride a motorcycle like ours," Ryuusei added into his reasoning. "I mean, you got the scarf, cool helmet, the kicking and punching techniques..."
"You know that's pretty valid reasoning..." Subaru commented back, stroking his chin. "I'll give it a whirl. It's just like riding a bike but with an engine, right?"
Subaru slowly got onto the motorized bicycle, finding it rather easy to adjust to the large vehicle.
"Alright, we seem to be ready," Akoya stated from one of the sidecars, tapping on the double screen device and a pathway began to light up on the garage floor ground. The blaring of an alarm begin to sound throughout the house.
"L-Let's go, yeah!" Subaru shouted, starting to accelerate faster and faster down the path. Within no time at all, the trio was on their way out on their Blasters Vehicle. Using muscle memory, Subaru was able to quickly navigate to the location the southern speaking yokai spoke of.
With a swift ride later, the gang arrived to the proposed location the yokai had requested the squad to arrive to. Just your average Everymart in Uptown Springdale, nothing too much of note or out of the ordinary.
"Oh good, you fellas have arrived alright!" The southern voice yokai called out, revealing to be a Komajiro. Though with much fluffier, milk tea colored fur compared to the usual members of his species. Around his neck was a bright yellow bow tie, positioned to the left of his neck.
"So, what's been giving you the trouble mister?" Ryuusei asked, the Komajiro brushing behind his ears.
"Well there's a lotta to unpack, some of it is from my summoner as well, but she had to check somethin' in Everymart," The milk tea dog introduced. "Anywho, I'm Mimi. I didn't have a name before, but now I do!"
"Anywho, basically what happened is my brother, Kiki, went missin' recently," Mimi explained to the group. "Not too sure how though..."
'Well, what does Kiki look like?" Subaru asked.
"He uh, looks a lot like me but with snow white fur, blue swirly flames, red face swirls, and a cross body coin purse," Mimi explained, before realizing he forgot something. "Oh! And he has a big ol' bowtie like mine, but red and to the right!"
"Lastly just who is your master anyways?" Aykoya questioned with an eyebrow raised. "Seeing how they managed to help give you an identity."
"She's a real nice gal named-" Mimi began to explain, the sound of some doors sliding open and something flickering back in Subaru's mind.
"A real nice girl, huh?" Subaru thought to himself, seeming to recall things from a life before becoming a yokai. They were hazy in the rabbit's mind at best, but seemed to be that of a warm summer's day and being held by a small girl…
"Subaru?" Ryuusei asked, Subaru snapping right back into place with a bit of a fumbling stance.
"Mimi, are these the friends you said you'd call to help?" The girl asked, pointing to the group of yokai curiously. She had fluffy brown hair tied into a ponytail with a big pink bow and deep brown eyes. Around her neck was a pink and white watch held with a blue strap.
"Yes they would be these friends of mine," Mimi introduced. "Anyways, fellas this is Katie Forestar, Katie this is uhhh..."
"I'm Akoya, and the boys behind me are Ryuusei and Subaru," Akoya informed, being the one to take up the need for introductions on their end. "Togehter, we're the Shooting Star Squadron. We also have another member, Eros, but he's not here."
"It's nice to meet you three, it's certainly easier to have a group to look for a missing yokai," Katie thanked, shaking hands with everyone. "There's been a few people going missing it seems...and I can't even just, summon Kiki back since I lost his medal..."
"You're sayin there's more people that have gone missing?" Subaru asked, tilting his head to the side.
"A bit actually, since there's a new kid at my school who showed up for two days and then has been missing for about a week at this point," Katie explained. "I'm a bit worried for him, since he seemed to be very easily frustrated and got chewed out frequently because of it..."
"What's his name and what does he look like so we can keep an eye out on him?" Ryuusei inquired. "He sounds like he could get into trouble easily."
"He seems to cause it easily, but I think it's never his intent," Katie added in. "Anyhow, his name is Claus Evered, he has dark skin, very deep brown eyes, spikey black hair and is always wearing headphones."
"Got it! We'll make sure we know what's going on and he gets back safely!" Ryuusei concluded, Subaru looking around.
"I think it's high time we all start looking for Kiki, right?" Subaru asked, adjusting his scarf.
"Absolutely, that dog can't be lost forever!" Akoya finished, starting to split off from the group. Before the mermaid split off, she tossed Subaru something.
"Here, take this, bunny," Akoya stated, handing Subaru the device. It seemed to be the same one used for controlling various things, like the garage door and bringing them back to base. Classy clam shell design, too.
"Uhh, okay?" Subaru stammered, a bit confused as to why he of all people would be given such a thing. "Am I supposed to use this if things get a bit too hairy?"
Before Subaru could even get an answer, everyone had split off for their search party. From the looks of it, this was going to absolutely be a group effort.
Everyone was searching high and low throughout the uptown area. Checking places both small and large, places that Kiki might be.
However, among Subaru's searching on his own, he seemed to be approached by someone.
"Aha!" A voice called out, being that of a shadowy feline figure. Subaru took up a fighting stance, his little fists up into the air.
"W-Who's there!?" Subaru asked, the figure jumping down from a nearby building and in front of Subaru.
They were a deep mauve colored cat yokai with black and white heroic rouge's attire and a large black cloak. On her black bandana was a very colorful wildflower, and she seemed to have a short, elegant knife pointed at Subaru.
"You, you're the one who seems to have the Soul Scanner!" The cat yokai questioned, getting closer and closer to Subaru, the rabbit starting the panic.
"That whatsits?" Subaru confusedly questioned, trying not to cower at the sight of an actual weapon. The cat simply pointed to the top of his head to his goggles.
"That is the Soul Scanner, it's a powerful device and well, shouldn't be in your hands," The cat yokai spoke up, looking around shiftily.
"Why's that? Me and my team encountered a strangely violent yokai yesterday, and using these ol' things seemed to expose a strange aura on them..." Subaru explained, the cat sheathing their knife back.
"Let's get to somewhere a bit more quiet first," The cat yokai stated, kicking open a manhole cover and climbing down, leading Subaru into the sewer to quietly talk.
"You see, the Soul Scanner...It shouldn't be out and about in the public," The cat informed, seeming to have a bit of sass. "As me and two friends of mine were sent for a meeting, only for my friends to get Corrupted. But lucky for me, I managed to snag these before they could Corrupt me."
"Corruption?" Subaru asked. "Is that the official term they use for those violent yokai?"
"Yes, that's what I at least heard overhead," The cat explained. "I was making a run like the wind and I couldn't really focus..."
"Well, you can count that I'll keep them safe! Plus you dropped them, so they could have ended up back in the hands of whoever made them originally," Subaru finished, the cat yokai looking at the rabbit with intrigue.
The feline attempted to grab the goggles on Subaru's head, but they seemed pretty hard strapped to the rabbit's helmet. At this rate, the cat yokai wasn't going even think to risk using their knife since who knew what this strange bonding would do to their trusty weapon…
"Looks like they've chosen you to scan souls and hopefully, you can help stop the corrupted yokai threat," the cat explained, having a look of defeat for a brief moment before getting their focus back. "What's your name anyways, long ears?"
"I'm uhh...Subaru," Subaru introduced himself a bit awkwardly. "I'm a member of the Shooting Star Squadron, and I haven't taken my test to figure out my branch yet..."
The cat yokai gave a smile. "Ah a rookie huh, how cute. Anyways, I'm Zinnia, Wondernyan and one of the Elite Blasters for the Jade Dragon branch."
The calm atmosphere didn't last long between the two, as a faint howl could be heard from above the sewers.
"W-What was that?" Subaru asked, looking around. Zinnia was twitching her tails in fear.
"Crud...I think that's the yokai that's been chasing me!" Zinnia cursed, starting to panic. "But, you're on a team, right?"
"Yeah, the Shooting Star Squadron isn't a one man show," Subaru informed, starting to make his way up the manhole's ladder. "Besides, you're an elite blaster, this might be nothing!"
"Well, Blasters Rule number four, newbie," Zinnia informed with a tinge of unintended sass. "You don't do anything solo, you all work together as a team or else you're cream."
Subaru was silent for a little bit as he started to make his climb out to find his teammates. Being on a team was something he was going to get used to. Hopefully it'll be like Americanized Japanese Children's Shows where the lesson about teamwork is a one episode thing and the team's in perfect sync from there on out.
The two ran on out, looking around. Zinnia looked over at Subaru.
"So, do you know how to communicate with your teammates once you split up?" Zinnia questioned, seeming to almost be quizzing the rabbit at this point.
"You uhh…Yell really, really, really loudly and hope your teammates can hear you?" Subaru answered, Zinnia pinching the small brow between her eyes with her paw.
"No you-" Zinnia tried to say, reaching the surface with Subaru only to hear a loud thud right in front of them.
"Grr...I've finally found you at last!" A vicious howl could be heard from the figure.
Said figure looked like a Komane, but extremely fluffy and very, very angry. There seemed to be a red bowtie around his neck, positioned to the right too…
"...Oh no," Subaru remarked, quickly using the Soul Scanner to confirm the dark, violent aura around the large komainu. Indeed, the aura was there and within plain sight, exposing the Komane of their grayed out palette with red-violet highlights.
"Oh double oh no!" Subaru gasped, taking up a stance as he came to realization that is must've been Kiki. Zinnia tilting her head to the side.
"You know this guy or something?" Zinnia asked, Subaru shrugging.
"Sorta, he's the guy I was assigned to save-" Subaru quickly tried to explain, only for a loud snarl and a chunk of blue fired to be tossed at the two.
"Enough of your dumb blabbering!" Kiki angrily howled, baring quite intimidating fangs for a little dog like him. He quickly got on all of his fours and lunged at the two.
Knowing that they were in serious danger, Zinnia pulled out her knife and managed to quickly counter the corrupted white dog.
"See, this is what you get for messing with an Elite Blaster!" Zinnia called out to Kiki to try and intimidate him, following up with a quick kick to try and keep him down.
Kiki didn't have another word, only a loud howl and grabbing Zinnia by the head. With her tiny paws, she found it a bit difficult.
"Subaru, quick! Call your teammates right now!" Zinnia shouted to the rabbit, Subaru starting to hustle around a bit. What was he supposed to do!? He fumbled around and found the dual screen device Akoya handed him before they split up…
"There's a bell here let me..." Subaru muttered, pressing the bell icon once. Then again. And again. And again. At least ten times to make extra sure.
"Alright I think help might be on the way now!" Subaru remarked, before putting the device away and running up to Kiki.
"Hey you!" Subaru yelled, proceeding to do a swift kick to the evil dog's arm. The recoil from the kick was enough to free up Zinnia from Kiki's tight grip.
"Why you..." Kiki lowly growled, grabbing Subaru by the arm with his intimidating white fangs.
"S-Stop it! I'm not a chew t-toy!" Subaru yelped, struggling to break free. He tried to kick Kiki in the jaw, but the evil dog's eyes furrowed and he seemed to smirk.
"It's no use, so stop trying to do it!" Kiki managed to say between his tight grip on the rabbit.
"I think I'm going to have to use something my father taught me...I'm not as good at it as he was but..." Zinnia muttered to herself, beginning to focus some energy as a ball of violet energy began to form around one of her tiny fists.
"Take this! Wild Flower Gutsy Paw!" Zinnia yelled, managing to punch Kiki right in the jaw. Once freed, Subaru followed with a rough punch on the other side of the dog's jaw.
"You...All of you..." Kiki snarled, a bit shaken from the hard punches he had gotten. With his newfound anger, the dark energy around him had gotten much stronger…
"You will all pay for your crimes!" Kiki howled, a massive wave of fire bursting from him. Not even Subaru and Zinnia were strong enough to withstand it, being flung right into a nearby building's wall.
"Ow..." Both Subaru and Zinnia muttered, they didn't have the will to keep on fighting at this point…
"So you're the one giving Subaru all the trouble!" A familiar, slightly sassy voice called out, followed by a small waterfall of water striking Kiki and managing to put out some of the flames.
Akoya stood in front of Subaru and Zinnia, Ryuusei joining in with her.
"You're gonna really pay for messing with one of my teammates!" Akoya yelled, balling up her fists. Ryuusei looked a bit worried.
"Akoya, I wouldn't say something so mean, since I think that's supposed to be..." Ryuusei tried to say, only for the corrupted dog to charge up to the small dragon and knock him over. Akoya managed to just barely get out of the way and splash him with water.
"Now's not the time to worry about that!" Akoya called out to the knocked over dragon and helping him back up. "We're blasters and we have to fight!"
The mermaid yokai began to focus her energy as best as she could. "Try to keep him at bay, I'm going to charge up my Soultimate!"
"K-Kiki! Please stop this!" Ryuusei tried to reason with the dog, possibly trying to call out to him. "Your brother Mimi is so worried about you!"
However, the words about family didn't ring in the dog's ears in the slightest. He only looked at the dragon with angry eyes.
"Brother…?" Kiki muttered, before growling hard. "What are you trying to do, act stupid?"
Ryuusei tried to call upon an earth based technique, but the small pebbles singed into dust from the sheer amount of heat from Kiki. With one swoop, Kiki managed to grab Ryuusei like a small ball and throw him right at Akoya, canceling the energy channeling for her Soultimate.
"I'm in the mood for some fried fish today..." Kiki lowly said to himself, channeling his dark energy again and unleashing another wave of powerful fire to knock the other two blasters down.
Kiki didn't have anything else to say, only a very boastful howl. As far as he knew, he had won against these blasters that were acting like fools. The only thing Kiki's mind really cared about now was causing destruction wherever he went.
The corrupted dog attempted to take a step, only to notice something preventing him from moving.
"What in the…?" Kiki muttered, trying to burn off whatever it was. It seemed to be...spider webbing?
He soon got his answer as he was flung a lot like an over dramatic fishing cast, before being kicked right in the gut into the ground.
"Sorry that I took a while," A familiar and very warm, friendly voice said, before furrowing her eyes back to the evil dog. "As for you, you should really learn some manners when it comes to interacting with my team!"
"C-Commander Keiko?" Subaru muttered, seeing the usually very passive spider facing against the dog that completely mopped them.
Infuriated by some random spider ruining his victory, Kiki tried to charge up another blast of the ridiculously powerful fire attack, only for Keiko to quickly conjure up some webbing from her fingertips to make Kiki trip, falling flat on his face.
"Now, to teach you a solid lesson!" Keiko yelled, a powerful aura of pink energy surrounding her. "Take this! Spider Crash!"
Several large boulders came crashing down at an alarmingly fast speed, striking Kiki down hard before there was one last stone in the shape of a giant heart to finish things off.
Soon the rocks had all disappeared and Kiki was still up and moving, but just barely. It was at this point Subaru had mustered back up his strength to get back up. His legs were a bit shaky, but he still managed to focus up his energy.
"Time to finish this!" Subaru yelled as best as he could, running up to the now easier to strike Kiki and leaping up into the air. "Shooting Starstorm strike!"
The corrupt canine didn't have any time to react to the oncoming, shooting star themed strike that was the rabbit yokai's signature move.
What was left was not one, but two objects this time. One was the usual soul gem like object, much like what Freya left behind.
The other object, was much, much more odd.
It was a rather large looking humanoid molar tooth, dyed a deep crimson red and radiated a very eerie, uneasy energy.
"What the..." Subaru muttered, looking at the strange crimson red bone and holding it in his hands. Keiko picked up the soul gem and held it solemnly.
"Oh dear...We're going to have to figure out a way to get these souls back in order..." Keiko commented to herself. "Poor things, and poor dear Yoshiro probably working night in and night out trying to find out a cure..."
"Commander! Just where were you and how did you get here?" Akoya asked, getting back up and Ryuusei following back behind her.
"Well, I had to stay home yesterday, I'm a mom of three beautiful children you know," Keiko informed, giving a little laugh at the end. "But I heard your emergency call and I got into action as soon as everyone was down for nap time."
"Thank you, you really saved our hides back there!" Ryuusei thanked, Subaru approaching with the strange bone in hand.
"Uhh...Seems this was a thing that crazy dog dropped?" Subaru brought up, showing the strange crimson bone. Keiko stroked her chin in deep thought upon looking at it.
"It might be vital to what was causing Kiki to go evil," The voice of Zinnia said, joining up with the group.
"Looks like we have another piece to this giant puzzle..." Akoya commented on the situation.
"But just who might be behind all this?" Subaru asked, Zinnia's ears twitching.
"Shhh, I think I hear something..." Zinnia whispered, focusing. Subaru could hear something…
Something...That sounded a lot like chips being crunched on nearby? Whatever it was, Zinnia tackled it quickly.
"S-Squeak! M-My chips!" A squeaky, worried voice gasped, Zinnia on top of their head to try and keep them still.
The thing Zinnia tackled was a short little yokai dressed in dark purple clothing with an overall black and grey color scheme with some tints of bright reds. They had an overall mouse motif with them with their horns.
"You Wicked! My father punished you and your ilk years ago! Why are you back suddenly!?" Zinnia questioned, demanding an answer.
"That's one of the wicked!?" Subaru asked, getting into a battle stance. Just about the whole team was ready to dog pile on them.
"I-I can try to explain!" The rat like Wicked tried to say, struggling among everyone trying to keep him still. "...If you have chips that is! I'm hungry and this cat spilled those chips!"
Keiko, the only one not getting into the dog piling, simply folded her arms. "Oh we have chips alright...at our base..."
Making sure the Wicked couldn't see the way to their secret base, the group brought in the mouse for questioning. Thankfully, he started to talk since Keiko had brought him a party sized bag of chips.
"Anyways, I'm Unfairy and I was broken out of the Inferno," The rat, Unfairy, explained as he munched away. "Not sure about the whole details, but it's nice to be out again..."
"You better not be inspiriting people to do bad things," Zinnia aggressively stated to the rat, looking at him dead in the eye. She soon got back into focus.
"Are any of your friends back? And where can we find them?" Zinnia kept going with the interrogation of Unfairy.
"I'm not sure honestly, as soon as I was freed I just kept walking throughout town and then you guys showed up," Unfairy explained. "But, they shouldn't be too far from this town."
"T-There's more?" Subaru questioned, Zinnia nodding.
"Yes, four more for a total of five Wicked executives." Zinnia explained. "And that weird tooth you found is very likely to be from their master and creator…Dame Dedtime..."
"Geez you sure do know a lot about me, my brothers, and sister..." Unfairy remarked, Zinnia looking at Unfairy even more unamused.
"Of course I do, my father beat you guys way back in 1987," Zinnia stated, the room of Blasters being shocked.
"Wait, you're the daughter of Hovernyan!?" Akoya gasped in surprise.
"He...He's the only one to have ever gotten the Blasters Commemoration Badge of Greatest Honor!" Ryuusei yelped in shock as well.
Zinnia gave a nod to confirm both of these things. "That's true, but enough about that fact, we got some Wicked to find."
"...But first we should probably do some research before charging back into battle like that," Subaru suggested, everyone in the room nodding in agreement.
The group put Unfairy into a small pen made out of the sturdiest plastic found in the yokai world. They had to keep him put somehow as they researched where on earth these wicked executives just were going to be and how to stop them...