yey, After several weeks, Chapter Three is finally done. Writer's block must be conquered a few paragraphs at a time, people~ At any freaking rate, Chapter Three is a go. So without further adieu, "Here We Go". Enjoy~
Shadow City - Eastern Sector, 12:14 pm
"DAMN…" The sound of metal clashing against metal rang out through the seemingly night sky. "YOU…" Again. "TO…" And again. "HELL!" A fourth and fifth time the sound echoed, and then all went quiet. But before too long, more banging commenced.
Sweat poured down the face of the boy that held a large axe-like weapon as he swung it time and time again against the metal bars of the gate in front of him. Yet no matter how hard and relentless, and no matter how many times he swung, they never budged.
"Dammit all…" After what seemed like hours, he finally threw down his weapon and sat down. "This is the worst situation possible." The boy scanned the area in his sight. He was on an incredibly long bridge that seemed to stretch on for miles.
At even intervals along the bridge, there were wooden benches with metal railings bolted into place on the concrete. Laying on one of these benches was the small figure of what seemed to be a child, wearing black clothes and a flat cap that covered his sleeping eyes.
"I've been walking for at least three days, haven't eaten in longer, Yuri's nowhere to be found and to make matters worse…" His eyes settled on his sleeping companion. "I'm stuck with this little brat." The boy sighed to himself.
Off the side of the bridge was a fairly deep trench filled almost to the top with murky water. Trees grew in and around the river, but most weren't identifiable as 'trees' anymore. And behind him…
"And what the hell is this thing even supposed to be?"
A large gate, at least two kilometers tall and seven meters wide stood behind him. The area behind it was shrouded in mist, so he couldn't see where it lead. He just knew he wanted to get through it.
"Dammit, Yuri… Where are you?"
Chapter Three: Leads and Discoveries
I ran. I ran as fast as I possibly could.
'Dammit, dammit, dammit!' My legs moved faster than I ever thought possible, carrying me to where she was. 'Kanade… please be okay!'
I didn't exactly know why, but I could feel it; something besides Takamatsu's sudden vanishing was off. I had this impending feeling that all of my friends were in grave danger the very second after I saw him vanish.
What led me to that conclusion, though I don't know why, was a sharp pain that continued to pound at me from within my head even at that point.
'Damn… this hurts so much! I don't know how much longer I'll be able to… huh?' It stopped. The very instant I thought the pain was going to kill me, it subsided. And the reason was clear, even though I had no idea why it felt that way.
I came across a horrific scene.
Hundreds, perhaps thousands of them swarmed a large plaza; no matter where you looked you would only see massive cloud of pitch black darkness.
Every inch of object they came into contact with broke apart and faded into dust - pavement, the ground beneath, benches, railings… even the air itself seemed to decay.
And at the center off all of it…
"KANADE!" I instantly pulled my Glock and began to fire at the cloud. I wasn't even aiming properly but every shot tore through several of them due to their crowdedness. "GET AWAY FROM HER!"
"YUZURU!"
Her screams didn't help subside my rage, and I just kept unloading clip after clip into the endless waves. I had already wasted several dozen bullets by the time I realized I wasn't making a dent. But even then, I didn't stop.
"You're wasting your bullets, dude."
"…Huh?" I felt a hand on my shoulder pull me back and another one push my gun down. It took me a second to realize what was happening or who was even speaking to me.
"Here, this might do the trick. Ya might wanna stand back a ways." With that, the hand on my shoulder threw me backwards. As I staggered, I could see the back of an SSS Battlefront uniform, but only for a second. After that…
An explosion rendered everything around me into a pure white. I fell upon the ground as everything became enveloped in a strange light, the likes of which I had never seen before in my life. It was bright enough to blind, and loud enough to deafen.
And he had used it so close to me?
Though it was unbearably painful, the after effects of the explosion only last a few seconds and subsided. The noise and the light faded.
"What the…?" And along with them, the Shadows had disappeared as well. "What… happened?"
"Good to see you're more or less okay. Goes double for Angel, though, huh?" The light was still etched into my eyes, so it took a few seconds before I realized what was going on. "Need help getting up?"
As my sight finally went back to normal, I saw him leaning over me with his hand stretched out to pull me up.
"Matsushita the Fifth." He smiled as I grabbed his hand, gladly accepting his offer.
"Not just me." Using his thumb to point towards where the mass of Shadows had been, he showed me another sight for sore eyes. "Take a look."
T.K. smiled as he began walking towards us, a small girl in his arms.
"Kanade!" I immediately ran over to him to make sure she was okay.
"All clear, enemy defeated." She had passed out during the explosion, but was fine nonetheless. "Friends safe?"
"Yeah, I'm doing alright now… But I dunno what would've happened if you two hadn't shown up when you did." T.K. held Kanade out to me and I scooped her up into my own arms. "What did you even do?"
"That's a question I'll have to delay the answer to for now." Matsushita's strange response and serious tone threw me off a little. He clarified when I gave him a confused look. "There's something we have to show you."
Shadow City - Middle Sector, 12:21 pm
"Hey, Hinata? What exactly is it that you found?"
"Don't worry, we're almost there." Hinata, Fujimaki, and Ooyama continued to walk down the street in (what seemed like) the dead of night. Each held their weapons at the ready for a specific reason. "Still… this area must be infested if the buildings look like this."
Hinata was, of course, referring to how much damage the surrounding area had suffered. Wooden buildings with large sections missing, decaying bricks, shattered concrete; it looked as though it had been left alone for several dozen centuries.
"You're right. I'm guessing we're closing in on the center of the city based off of how it looks. And yet…" Fujimaki looked around, and even as he said that, he could see them looking back. "What do you think they want?"
"Well, at this point…" Hinata saw one move out of the corner of his eye. "I can't imagine they're planning a surprise attack."
Mostly out of sight, but not out of mind, the Shadow Beasts watched the three as they continued on their way to the place Hinata was taking them. Their beady red eyes flashed like lights in the darkness of the decaying buildings, only visible out of the corner of the eye.
"Think they're scared?" Fujimaki smirked as he twirled his Shirasaya around in his hand. "It is a freshly polished, and extremely deadly, blade."
"Don't get too cocky." Hinata lifted his pistol and ejected the clip to make sure it wouldn't jam. "If they attack, we won't have an easy time defeating them all."
"How many ya think there are anyway?"
"…Eight thousand, nine hundred and ninety nine?"
"Yeah, you're not funny." The three continued onward, despite the hundreds of obvious pairs of eyes watching them, and just as they rounded a corner…
"Here we are."
"Wha…?" Around the corner was a wide open area, probably twelve meters in both directions. The street sort of curved into the area but only went a few centimeters inward before stopping. And inside was, "completely untouched…"
Shrubbery inside of concrete planters lined the edges, still green as green can get, wooden benches sat perfectly intact, and the center held a large fountain, still spraying jets of water in all four directions.
"What the hell?"
Shadow City - Northern Sector, 12:25 pm
"What the hell!?" I was almost at a loss for words upon seeing the scene that Matsushita the Fifth showed me. A large plaza area that was still brimming with life; bushes, trees, flowers, benches, and crystal clear water spouting from a fountain.
"Yeah, that was pretty much our reaction." Matsushita stopped only a few steps away from me and looked across the scene. "Take a step inside, try to interact with it."
"…Interact?" Doing as he said, I began to walk forward. But as I neared, each step became harder to take; my chest tightened, my heart skipped several beats, my head stung, and other thing made it feel like this plaza wasn't natural at all. 'What in the world is with this…? It feels like it's getting further away every time I move closer…'
And that's just what it felt like. Every step I took, it moved three away and, before I realized it, it looked like it was miles off.
'My head… My head hurts!'
"Otonashi!" I felt my eyes open with a jerk as Matsushita's voice called out to me. "Get a grip." It took me a few seconds to find my bearings, but I quickly realized it.
"I haven't moved…"
"That about covers it. You started to take that first step, but you never actually went anywhere."
My eyes remained transfixed on the plaza like there was nothing else in the world that concerned me anymore. It captivated me, mind and soul.
"Matsushita the Fifth… Just what the hell is this place?" I heard him sigh and turn to walk away.
"That's the question I want answered. Let's head back to T.K. for now, we shouldn't stray too far from Angel in case her condition gets worse."
Shadow City - Middle Sector, 12:31 pm
Gunshots endlessly rang out through the air, one after the other with no stops. Coupled with the air cutting power of a sword swing and the screams of those who were defeated, that particular area of the city was very noisy.
"Why do they choose now to," a slash and a scream echoed before he even finished, "FIGHT!?" Fujimaki spun the handle of his Shirasaya around to hold it in a reverse grip before jumping into a cloud of Shadows.
"Stop complaining!" Hinata ceaselessly fired his gun, making sure each shot killed several of them. "Just keep slashing so I can conserve bullets!"
"Oh, you're real… ADORABLE!" His slash was so powerful that it created something similar to a sonic boom, destroying everything in its path without discrimination. "Why don't you just… GET A DAMN sword? Sword fighting looks… TEN TIMES cooler than… SHOOTING A GUN!"
'God, Fujimaki… you're such a broken character.'
Between the overpowered slashes from Fujimaki's Shirasaya and Hinata's seemingly perfect aim, the thousands of Shadows attacking them stood little to no chance.
"Still, they're starting to get tough…" A click. "Ooyama!"
"Right!" Hinata ejected the clip of his pistol, letting it fall to the ground along with the gun, and threw his hand back. "Here!" It only took about three seconds, maybe even less, and he was already firing into the crowd again.
"Thanks, Ooyama!"
"Hinata! We're gonna hafta fall back at this rate!" Fujimaki continued to hack and slash with expert precision even at the speed he was going, but even Hinata could tell that was beginning to get slower. "I'm taking way too many hits!"
"There isn't very much I can do about that, ya know!?"
"Well, THINK OF SOMETHING, DAMMIT!"
'There aren't a whole lot of places to run to. After all, the area behind us is…' Hinata's mind quickly shot back to what was behind him; a completely unharmed plaza still brimming with life.
"GAAAHHH!"
"Uh, FUJIMAKI!" Distracted by his thoughts, Hinata wasn't able to see what had happened, but Fujimaki was hit badly. "GET OUT OF THERE!"
Blood sprayed through the air as he fell towards the ground, a deadly black spike not far behind.
'Damn…!' He hit the concrete - or what was left of something that used to be concrete - and…
Nothing happened.
"…Huh?" The Shadow Beast that had managed to get through his defenses loomed over him, its spiked arm only a few inches from his chest, ready to end it at any second. And yet… "It's… not moving?"
Hinata and Ooyama stood dumbfounded at the sight before realizing that none of the other ones were moving either. Hundreds, maybe even thousands, just sat there in whatever position they were in, almost like they had frozen.
"What the hell…?" Almost on cue from Hinata's comment, thin black streaks moved through every last one of them, cutting them all straight in half. "AHH!?"
All three of them looked up at the rooftops at the same time, pretty much already knowing what to expect. And what that was… was their savior; a slightly short girl with long, flowing, black hair, standing on a roof like the ninja she pretty much was.
'Well, well, well. Speaking of broken characters.' Hinata couldn't help but crack a smile, and Fujimaki pretty much started dying from laughter.
"…This is so stupid."
"Hey there, Shiina."
Well, well, well. "Broken characters" in-freaking-deed, Hinata. In my not so humble opinion, Shiina is the Jack Rakan of the Angel Beats universe.
For those of you who did read the original O:SA, it's at this point you can see that the content is beginning to deviate, but I assure you this is only to add more depth and mystery to the story. The plot and events are still going to be quite the same. If you have questions about what I may or may not take out, feel free to PM me about it.
I decided to change up how Fujimaki talks while he fights a bit. If you didn't catch on to it, the capitals in his dialogue are placed during the times he's gearing up for a heavy swing. He shouts at the top of his lungs, swings, and continues talking without missing a beat.
I also decided to make him a little overpowered, solely for the sake of gaining experience in writing overpowered character fights. As some of you know, I'm not very good at battle scenes, so I want to try and get some practice in during the course of this story.
Soredewa. Until Next Time~