Assassin Drones: The original saga

Fuyuki's training Arc. De Arimasu!

By Alex Young

The Drop Zone Beacon site in Afghanistan, 6:01 am. St. Patrick's eve, 2003

It has been nearly one year since the St. Patrick's day incident, and Zanronite's ground invasion had already spilled over into southern Afghanistan. Jared had already returned to the beacon room to awaken the ancient army of Earth within the Middle East.

This was to be done before Zanronite established a foothold with the construction of a portal to the greater negaverse. Otherwise, the prophesied army will be absolutely ineffectual as they can't attack structures built on Earth's soil.

However, Radon, several Undertaker cells, the Eleventh Heaven, Task Force Zulu Lambda 409, the Afghan military, and the U.S. Marine corps would stay in Afghanistan to stave off the invasion using EX.W.A.T.I. FOB Whiskey Delta 74 as a defensive staging area.

It was this Achilles heel that the Sailor Order, and EX.W.A.T.I. for that matter, sought not to let Zanronite exploit in his latest show of force. The Sailor Order had its own military, economic, business, cybernetic, and technology arms commanded indirectly by what they refer to as "the inner circle."

The Shadow of Allah is by extension affiliated with the Sailor Order, and has therefore been supplied with what the latter considered "a sacred material" that is especially effective against Youma forces.

That's the same material used as an ingredient in sacred bullets and sacred armor plating alike. Some smaller paramilitary affiliates have also been using EX.W.A.T.I. spec hardware with some Sailor Order spec upgrades.

For instance, the Bell/Boeing OV-11 Mountain Lion compact tilt-rotor support gunship designed for export to various ground forces and for domestic use with the USMC and the U.S. army. That, along with its maritime counterpart, the AgustaWestland SV-11 Sea Lion for export to various navies all around the world.

The Gulfstream KG-200 Cockatrice lightweight airborne refueling craft providing the goods in refueling several Boeing F-99K Super Kiba ground attack aircraft, and the EC-1A Whiplash electronic warfare turboprop aircraft, all three of which were carried over from the NGTF era.

The aircraft that the Stinger Squadron were flying were no longer the YF-41 Mantises, but rather full blown, and upgraded production spec F-41A Mantises as they, too came to join the fray in the air, with their two B-2B missile trucks not far behind.

The reason being that the YF-41 Mantis stealth aircraft had proven itself to be so unbelievably proficient during prototyping that it was to be put into production well ahead of schedule.

There was also the Lockheed Martin/Raytheon XV-11 Triton anti ship ballistic missile, the XV-14 Banshee surface to air ballistic missile, and the XV-31 Nemesis sub-orbit to surface ballistic missile on the munitions side of things.

All three were part of the XV family of hypersonic ballistic missiles as a joint venture between the Lockheed Martin and Raytheon corporations. Lockheed Martin was in charge of the design and upgrade processes, and Raytheon handled the manufacturing aspect of the joint venture.

Most of these less advanced, older variants of these weapons and weapon systems were supplied to the local fundamentalist guerrillas currently fighting Zanronite's occupation in Islamabad and Karachi.

Just outside the occupied cities, Amara, Michelle, Team RWBY, and most of the guerrillas were all ordered to infiltrate Karachi near the heart of the invasion, while EX.W.A.T.I. would support some of the remaining guerrillas in their attempt to liberate Islamabad as a diversion.

It rained Nemesis ballistic missiles and kinetic kill rods off the coast, hitting and killing the Youma warships one by one as they surfaced. However, that only slowed the invasion down to a crawl for several minutes before picking up steam again in between volleys.

All of those tasked with the infiltration of Karachi made it safely inside with the multitudes of mechadrone guards none the wiser to the fact that there are two outer sailor scouts among the group.

Several hackers from the Sailor Order's cybernetic arm were already in Karachi having recorded a massive spike in Youma activity concentrated in Pakistani waters before having warned EX.W.A.T.I. about it just hours before the invasion took off.

These hackers also wore radar jamming trench coats, which they distributed more of to any incoming guerrilla fighters. Team RWBY locked and loaded their weapons, with Amara and Michelle doing their Topaz Uranus and Aquamarine Neptune transformations respectively as they, too joined in.

This had almost immediately lent itself to being surrounded by a smallish portion of various soldiers from Hazu's army, with Hazu the Nightstalker himself showing his face not a moment too soon.

"Hmm. What's this? The Sailor Order begins to come out of hiding already?" Hazu queried as though with an ulterior agenda of his own. "Join me, all of you, and together we may destroy the Youma bastards once and for all." Hazu offered as he extended his left hand.

Strangely enough, this was as part of a plot of his own to have the sailor scouts assassinate Zanronite so that he can essentially consolidate the balance of power of the Youma armies all to himself.

"Why should we have to join someone like you?" Ruby spat calling Hazu out on his treachery. "Heheheh. Fair enough. I'll be going, now. Kill 'em." Hazu ordered of his soldiers as he returned to his post by teleportation.

This was when another, more realistic interpretation of his master plan surfaced itself exclusively for the reading audience. Instead, he would simply let the Sailor Order chisel away at Zanronite's resolve, and kill the Youma leader himself when the latter's at their most vulnerable point.

Back in Karachi, Sailors Uranus and Neptune fought the Shadow Blade soldiers one by one with Team RWBY by their side. Weiss air stepped dodging the Shadow Blades' weapons and slashed some of them open.

Hazu re-entered the battle riding a Strike Mantis supersonic gunship, and faced Weiss head on reaper claws to magic rapier. As soon as the other five combatants slaughtered all the deployed Shadow Blades, Hazu began fighting them all at once.

Amid shotgun braces, magic dust action rapiers, pistol scythes, sniper scythes, and the sailor weapons, Hazu was ordered to retreat by Zanronite to assist him in Islamabad. "I'm afraid our time is up. The next time we meet, you won't be so lucky." Hazu forewarned before teleporting away into Islamabad.

Hazu had left too small a force behind to really resist much as the hackers unveiled several hidden guerrilla platoons that were previously cloaked with radar jammers and optical illusion systems. All and all, any forces occupying Karachi were now easy meat for the Sailor Order as they won it back in a hurry, to stand guard against any possible retaliation from Zanronite.

At a local park walkway in Nerima, 4:00 pm. March 18, 2003

Raikoume and Kamikase were out on a walk discussing how to deal with Fuyuki Hinata, and to retrieve the hive mind from Ranma. "That's kid's pretty dangerous, ya know." Kamikase piped up worriedly.

"Yeah, shit just hit the fan as soon as he awakened the Habu kris, and I don't know how long that the berserker drones will take in their Middle East invasion before returning to our side." Raikoume added. "I mean, who knows what the fuck he'll awaken next? Plus, If he awakens them all to unlock the chimera cannon, then Alpha 134 is officially fucked!" She finished.

"Stop worrying so much, big sis!" Kamikase reassured. "I was just trying to tell you that we should try and stop him from threatening our invasion, lil sis." Raikoume asserted. \Alright, you two, cut the chatter!/ Moaghen hissed through the intercom.

"Wait a sec, Moaghen. I have an idea." Raikoume chirped as she spotted Ryoga and Mousse about to spar with each other. \Whatever it is, it had better work!/ Moaghen sneered as he cut off the connections.

As demonstrated with the atmosphere in this match up, their relationship between each other along with Kuno is on average, so-so. Sometimes they all fight together, other times they fight against each other.

"So, you call yourself the legendary lost boy 'Ryoga Hibiki,' huh?" Mousse spat. "Yeah, that's what I am, aren't I?" Ryoga sneered back. "Alright, then COME AT ME WITH ALL YOU GOT!" Mousse fired out with Ryoga making the first move.

Mousse dodged the first punch, and then the next, but not the third. Mousse then motioned to wrap Ryoga's arm up in chains and drag him in all the way into a beautifully executed headbutt.

"Cut me a fucking break, here! Do I look like I just fell off the goddamn turnip truck!?" Ryoga growled standing back upright before landing a vicious straight punch to Mousse's lower jaw.

"Ha! No wonder people hype you up so much! I heard that you've been giving Ranma Saotome and his apprentice Fuyuki Hinata a good workout as of late." Mousse declared as he bounded up, down, and all around with Ryoga giving chase all the way.

Then, Raikoume and Kamikase attacked both martial artists at the same time. "Lemme get one thing perfectly straight, here. You two say that you're going up against Ranma, correct?" Raikoume broached.

"Yeah, that's what it is, stupid!" Ryoga snarled as he attempted an uppercut on Raikoume with Kamikase intercepting using her left talon. Raikoume then deployed a pair of reverse trigger, high frequency gun blades.

Raikoume strafed to the left and to the right firing her weapons at Mousse, who much to her surprise had deflected them all with his mystic defense shield. The shield itself was constructed by Chinese alchemists amid predictions of World War II about 1350 years ago.

"Wow! Never thought I'd get to converse with an assassin drone face to face!" Mousse quipped respectfully impressed with what Raikoume and Kamikase can do as assassin drones.

"Hey! Whoa! It ain't what you think it is, okay!?" Kamikase spat out causing Ryoga to stop his attacks on her, only to walk up and grapple her by the throat. "Then what is it? Tell me if you want to keep yourself in one piece!" Ryoga ordered as Kamikase began to comply upon releasing herself from his vice like grip.

"Tell you what, we'll help you and Mousse to teach Ranma a lesson, but you have to help us keep that Fuyuki from coming to his sensei's rescue, okay?" Kamikase offered still compliant with Ryoga's rather hostile request.

"Alright, you two have yourselves a deal." Mousse answered overhearing the offer and holding out his hand. "Good! Glad you know where we're coming from with this." Raikoume rejoiced also holding out her own hand to shake that of Mousse with a delightful smirk on her reptilian skull face, therefore setting yet another plan to get the hive mind from Ranma in motion.

The Tendo dojo, 4:00 pm. March 19, 2003

Ranma and Fuyuki have been training together along side Momoka and Akane as of yesterday morning. Ranma, of course baited Akane into lashing out with all her usual disdain at him, who swiftly swapped places with Momoka.

Momoka was not warned about this, so she had to defend herself and fast, or risk getting seriously hurt. That was then Momoka's more brutal self took over and delivered and landed a quick jab at Akane to the nose, causing the latter to step back in faltering on the way.

"C'mon, Akane. You know that Momoka here's a cuter bruiser than you'll ever be!" Ranma taunted. "YEAH! THANKS FOR THE ADVICE, MISTER PERV!" Akane shot back sarcastically.

"Fer god's sakes, I need to see less sarcasm and more can opening from ya." Ranma spat calling Akane out on this. So blinded by anger was Akane that she failed to pay attention to the fact that Momoka kneed her in the lower jaw, causing her to crumple backwards.

The moment that Akane's own fury had reached a tipping point, a deadly crimson aura had enveloped her in the arms and legs as she angrily dug her nails into the dojo wood. She stood back upright with a blood red glare and that ever so characteristic sneer in her mouth, now more hostile than ever.

Akane let rip an inhuman scream as she tore after Momoka, jab after jab. "Yeah, that's it! Feed your anger!" Moaghen hissed from the roof of the dojo in all his familiarly sinister undertone.

After doing nothing onwards but ducking, weaving, and getting grazed a little in between, Momoka had struck the blinding fury mode's one fatal Achilles' heel; A good knock to the base of the skull was all it took for it to completely turn off, and for Moaghen's control to be severed in its entirety.

Akane may have survived in losing, but Moaghen demanded retaliation in return. "Do it, Naozi!" Moaghen ordered as Naozi launched a grappling missile onto P-chan, which deployed and latched itself onto the cute little piglet, hauling back to a crane on Gial's back.

Gial then operated the crane and plopped the still struggling P-chan into a cylindrical, gelatin container. Akane, still the sore loser, took it out on the assassin drones in re-entering her berserker beast mode.

Several aura chains broke out from the roof of the dojo slashing at Gial and Naozi, who made it out of their position just in time. "Euuugh! I think I overdid it a little!" Moaghen retched as he, too sought to vacate the place and escape with P-chan along with his companions.

Akane did initially give chase, but gave up afterwards, and returned home slumped over in defeat. "Hey. Don't beat yourself up just cuz these A-drones took P-chan away. Besides, you were giving it your all back there." Ranma consoled, with Akane smiling back for it.

"I promise. I'll get P-chan back from those things even if it kills me." Akane promised in her determination to teach the assassin drones a lesson once more.

"Here's the game plan for the week; once were done with each training sesh, we'll take the extra time to look around for P-chan. Alright?" Fuyuki proposed, with the plan meeting a resounding approval from all parties. With that, effective tomorrow, their search for P-chan begins! However...

Deep in the woods on the outskirts of urban Japan, 8:44 pm. The very next night

Mousse leaned his back against an old tree in waiting for the assassin drones to return with P-chan and their espionage mission. Surely enough, Moaghen and company made their arrival, along with the raptor twins not a minute later.

"We got the goods, right here." Moaghen declared confidently as he dropped P-chan at Mousse's feet with his appendages. "It's a little demeaning for Ryoga, but so long as Ranma Saotome comes out of hiding, we may as well get this rolling." Mousse returned as he plopped P-chan into a bush and doused him in hot water.

Ryoga emerged from this and got dressed immediately. "I didn't want to have to keep this awful secret deal of ours from Akane, but seeing her reaction, I guess I have no choice at the moment." Ryoga lamented sadly. "But it doesn't matter as long as Ranma gets his just desserts." Ryoga then stated.

"Yo! Kraank! Where've you been? Haven't seen ya in forever!" Raikoume chirped upon seeing her berserker drone companion's return from Zanronite's botched invasion of the Middle East. "It was a hell hole down there, and I had this sinking suspicion that fuckin Zanronite was up to sumpin we wanted no part of, too." Kraank replied.

Kraank and his companion Rotoran made themselves scarce setting out to report their findings to Aoryuzen at once. "I'm not at all surprised, seeing as how Zanronite was infamous for having an agenda entirely his own, even among other Youma. Anyways, let's return to the task at hand, shall we?" Moaghen cited resuming Alpha 134's newest scheme picking up where they left off.

Back at the Tendo residence, 3:30 pm. March 22, 2003

"C'mon, Akane. Why don'tcha just give it up, and wait for 'im ta come home." Ranma berated expressing no sympathy for Akane's somewhat forbidden love. "Real encouraging, Ranma." The upset Akane sarcastically moaned irritated by this lack of interest in her concern. Thus, she headed off once more in search of P-chan.

Come 10:50 pm however, Ranma's own disdain gave way to an almost grudging concern, having remembered how strangely Ryoga was behaving, therefore he too set out in an altogether different direction.

Having spotted a small black piglet wearing Ryoga's trademark bandana near a street corner, Ranma gave chase under the natural assumption that it's the former in cursed form.

After ducking and weaving throughout the various convoluted nooks and crannies dotting the suburban landscape, he just barely managed to catch it in a more bosky side of the local park.

"Oorp! Oorp! Oorp! ROOOuuouououoooop!" "Hey, calm down will ya, I ain't gonna pick a fight or nuttin." Ranma reprimanded trying to reassure "Ryoga" that he has his best interests in mind at the moment.

"Hey, what in the world? Why does your voice sound weird? Ya catch a cold or sumpin!" "Not as weird as you're gonna sound when we're through with you." Raikoume sneered confidently sounding in from behind Ranma, as Kamikase dropped in from a nearby tree.

Ranma turned to face the raptor twins still clutching the struggling, and very agitated piglet. "That ain't your 'P-chan,' ya know." Confused at Kamikase's flat statement, he looked from assassin drone to pig.

Ranma was suddenly belted with a fist from Raikoume, whereupon the pig escaped in the apparent confusion. "That's a cheap shot if I ever felt one." Ranma groaned painfully annoyed by the assassin drones' dirty tactics.

Raikoume promptly deployed several time delayed smoke bombs blinding her quarry in a cloud of purple smoke and then Kamikase used a barrage of tungsten carbide rods fired from a shotgun type weapon of hers to pin him to another tree by his long sleeve martial arts shirt, all in quick succession.

Seizing the chance, Raikoume came rushing in with a charged hive mind extraction shot from one of her railgun blades that split the tree in half, making a loud bang in the process. Just when the #4 assassin drone thought she could rest easy, she found that Ranma escaped, shucking his shirt in the process.

"What the fu-" Raikoume gasped in distress as the shirt floated onto her assassin drone head. "He can't have escaped!" "Yeah! We hafta split up, like now!" "Roger! You can run, but'cha can't hide!" The twins conversed as they split up to cover more ground in motorcycle mode, casting Ranma's shirt to the wayside.

Unbeknownst to either of them, Ranma was hiding behind the other half of the tree waiting for them to have left the vicinity. Ranma rushed out from the wreckage, grabbed his shirt, and headed off to warn Fuyuki of the conspiracy at hand.

As soon as Fuyuki was up and about in his search for P-chan, Ryoga's voice suddenly sounded from behind him, and he turned to see Ryoga standing there, fully human. Mousse then chained Fuyuki to the concrete walkway, pinning the chains with a lot of heavy lead shuriken.

As Fuyuki began to struggle, he realized the shuriken were impregnated with assassin drone technology, thus could bore holes into the ground, acting as anchors for the chains making escape an impossibility. "Hey, wait a sec. Since when did the both of you become so pathetic as to tag-team me with the assassin drones?" Fuyuki angrily asked of Ryoga and Mousse.

"Yeah, just in case you try a rebuttal, you're not the one who took advantage of Akane's affections, and you're most certainly not the one who tried to throw gasoline at the fire further driving a wedge between Ranma and Akane time and again. Huh?" Fuyuki finished calling Ryoga out on his apparent hypocrisy.

Mousse, being Fuyuki's captor walked up to him, only to get roundhouse kicked in the chest, causing him to stagger backward. "EAT THIS!" Mousse then snarled as he unleashed a barrage of some plasma scimitar shuriken in the latter's direction in response.

At that precise moment in space-time, Fuyuki seized the chance to free himself by deflecting all the plasma shuriken into the chains, thereby breaking them apart. Fuyuki then dragged the chains along and cold cocked Mousse with it in a good strong swing.

Ryoga proved no such pushover as he singlehandedly broke the chains up into their individual links. Fuyuki then struck the still airborne chain pieces one by one with his palms firing them all at Ryoga.

Mousse simply took this golden opportunity to try chaining Fuyuki's arms together with a set of rock hard shackles. "You see, any of your so called 'fancy techniques' just became one big moot issue, Ryoga, now's your chance!" Mousse declared with Ryoga taking his cue.

Ryoga charged at Fuyuki with all his usual furor, only to be met with several short jabs to the nose, a chain dragged headbutt, and a knee to the lower jaw from the latter. "Catch me if ya can, jailbait!" Fuyuki taunted as he cartwheeled backwards into Mousse.

Fuyuki knocked Mousse out of his way, stopping midway, double roundhouse kicking Ryoga in the hip from the side, eventually flipping back up and double punching him into a thicket with his still beshackled fists.

"Wow! Here I though my fists were out of action! This set of shackles is an even better weapon than I thought! Thanks, Mousse. I owe ya one!" Fuyuki appraised much to the hidden weapons master's dismay.

"Hey! Knock it off! No fair using my own superior tactics against me, ok!?" Mousse growled swiftly unlocking the shackles with one jump, and then slapping another pair around Fuyuki's legs in another jump, only they're attached to a massive iron sphere, something like Fuyuki's height and four times his width.

"You cheap bastard! You couldn't have been hiding something like this! It's too big!" Fuyuki indignantly protested to which Mousse taunted an "I'm not called a true master of Hidden Weapons Style for nothing, now take this! Hyaa, yaa, yaa, yaa!"

Fuyuki promptly used the sphere to shield himself from a barrage of shuriken and other assorted weaponry, only to narrowly dodge an impending blow from Ryoga, as he cried "No, Fuyuki! TAKE THIS!"

Such a blow would put quite a sizable dent in the solid iron ball, ultimately leaving Ryoga clutching his white hot hand in pure, unadulterated agony. Furious at this sudden advance, Fuyuki hoisted the sphere above his head much to Ryoga's terror.

"For god's sakes, you never heard of adrenaline!? EAT IT LIKE A MAN!" Fuyuki roared threatening to brain Ryoga with the sphere. "Run for it, Ryoga! That orb you're about to be clobbered with is actually a giant time bomb! Don't just sit there, RUUUUN!" Mousse screeched calling it out as such exhorting of Ryoga to make a break for it with him.

"Somebody, help me!" Fuyuki pleaded as both his opponents left him to sink to his waist into the ground under all that weight. "Hey, C'mon! You stupid scaredycats!" Fuyuki snarled as he managed to escape, grab a length of Mousse's own chain and spin it around rapidly.

"Oh no, ya don't!" Fuyuki called as he tossed the chain and ensnared Mousse and Ryoga by the waist, dragging them crying and complaining back to the bomb with him. That, and Ranma jumped from out of the woods, whereupon Raikoume and Kamikase would come screaming in with inline 4 motorcycle engines at full throttle in hot pursuit.

The assassin drones came to their human co-conspirators' rescue, when suddenly. "Hey! C'mere!" Ranma spat indignantly as he, too helped the still captive Fuyuki in dragging all four of them into where the bomb was.

Ranma then undid Fuyuki's shackles, and relocked them onto those of Raikoume and Kamikase before the two took off in motorcycle mode with Ryoga and Mousse riding shotgun.

"Sure ya wanna do this?" Ranma queried smiling evilly. "Oh, yeah." Fuyuki replied vengefully as they both prepared a double fierce tiger's pride force palm aimed at the bomb.

Ranma and Fuyuki both struck the bomb, propelling it forward in their adversaries' direction. The bomb exploded as soon as it, along with a test firing Nemesis ballistic missile hit all four conspirators in the back launching them all into the air. All with a flare that for some reason turned night into day for a moment.

"After all, we are master and student. Therefore, in teaching these fuckers a lesson, we synced up kinda nicely, oddly enough." Ranma commented as they both laughed it off going their separate ways once more to catch some shuteye.

Meanwhile, Ryoga, Mousse, Raikoume, and Kamikase, were still up in the air crash landing onto Giroro's tent all at once. "Ugh, thank the progenitors we're all in one piece." Raikoume spat as she and the rest of her companions began to get up with only so much as a few cuts and bruises.

Their emergency landing has apparently flattened Giroro, and the four conspirators do not look to be too confident in their survival once the red demon wakes from his embarrassing predicament.

"Hey, guys. What's with all the ruckus?" Tamama mumbled drowsily as Fuyuki made his way home, and eventually into bed. "I-It's nothing, really." "Yeah, we're gonna be going, now." Ryoga and Mousse replied as they made a break for it with the assassin drones joining them not mere seconds too soon.

"Rrrgh. Hey! What was that all about!?" Giroro groaned dizzily asking this of Tamama, who replied with a "You don't wanna know." With that, more confused than angry, Giroro simply collapsed onto the ruined tent, and Tamama retired back into his sleeping business.