Ah My Goddess Fan Fiction / Ranma 1/2 Fan Fiction ❯ The Raven 03: Apocalypse ❯ The Beginning of the End ( Chapter 3 )

Disclaimer: I claim no ownership rights to any of the works of Rumiko Takahashi or Kosuke Fujishima, and certainly not anything owned by Warner Bros.

/oOo\

As the Teen Titans walked through their favorite park (well, the others' favorite park, Raven's favorite wasn't on Earth), through scattered trees toward the stretch of lawn they played on regularly, Raven made sure to be in the lead so that the rest couldn't see her smile — her smile sometimes made people nervous, even frightened, and that wasn't what she wanted for her friends.

Actually, so far the day was recovering from the pancake fiasco handily. Remembering that culinary disaster, Raven winced — it seemed some things hadn't changed much from Ranma to Raven, like being able to admit when she'd taken on more than she could handle, even to herself. At least, when I haven't had my face rubbed in it as much as my failure to stop Father, or even slow him down.

Raven shook off the dark thoughts and focused on the happy, satisfied feelings from her comrades behind her. The alert had turned out to just be Plasmus. While the massive purple ooze monster the unfortunate Otto Furth turned into whenever he awoke was hard on the landscape, he was more disgusting challenge than serious threat. The fight had been enough to give her friends a thrill and a feeling of accomplishment without actually hurting them, and the pizza she'd paid for out of her own allowance afterward (silent apology for the pancakes) had put everyone in an even better mood. And now it was a beautiful mid-morning in a park filled with happy children at play (and their sometimes frazzled adult minders). Things were going so well that she was getting nervous.

“Dude!”

Beast Boy's excited shout from the rear of the team had Raven's heart leaping into her throat and she whirled in place, lifting off the ground as one hand thrust out, glowing black — and she forced herself to freeze in place at the sight of the jokester of the team holding up a penny he'd just picked up off the ground.

“Find a penny, pick it up ... something, something, something ... good luck! It's my lucky day!” the green-skinned boy enthused, practically dancing in place as the rest of the team stared.

Raven shook her head wryly as she sank back down to the ground, shivering a little from her adrenaline-fueled rush. I don't think I've ever known anyone so easily made happy, she thought as she drank in her friend's uncomplicated joy.

Apparently the others agreed, from their smiles at Beast Boy's antics.

Then Cyborg held up the rope of cloth soaked in the foulest smelling chemicals the boys had been able to find and twisted around itself into a ball. “Anyone up for a game of extreme stank ball?”

“Yeah, sure,” Raven said nonchalantly. Why not? I can survive the stench for one game, and it'll make them happy if I join for once. It's not like Plasmus didn't stink worse, and I already got thoroughly splattered when I finally knocked him out.

Unfortunately, she'd gone one step too far. The rest of the Titans turned to stare at their gray-skinned friend, eyes wide, radiating shock. Beast Boy managed to say, “But you hate anything extreme, or stanky.”

Raven shrugged. “Maybe I never gave it a chance,” she said in an attempt to get back her friends' happy feelings. She hid a wince — she wasn't much better a liar as Raven than she'd been as Ranma.

Abruptly Starfire was floating in front of her, hands clasped and smiling, radiating hope. “Raven, would you still have time to join me in the painting of the toenails, later today?”

Raven hid another wince, and smiled. “Sounds like fun.” She was rewarded by Starfire's instant blaze of happiness.

Unfortunately, that happiness wasn't shared by the boys, who were all staring at her suspiciously. Eyes narrowed, Robin asked, “Okay, Raven, what gives? Pancakes, pizza, stank ball, toenails?”

“Yeah,” Beast Boy added, “and she hasn't called me stupid all day. Did someone replace Raven with a Raven robot?”

Still smiling, Raven tried for a lighthearted tone as she replied, “I just want everyone to have a nice day, today.” She floated away from her friends, turning to hide her watering eyes. “Come on, we have a lot to do ... before ... sunset....”

Even as she spoke the mid-morning light dimmed, and the Titans' eyes looked upwards at a sun turning dark as a formless shadow stretched across the sky.

No, it's too soon! Raven silently wailed as she turned in place to watch with wide eyes as the last of the blue sky vanished behind its dark veil, just in time for the command to hammer into her: Go! Now!

“No, never,” she whispered, ignoring the panicked questions from her friends, her body swaying in air as she fought to reject the summons with every fiber of her being. Then the runes that had come to life that morning again sprang into red glowing existence along her arms and legs, the sigil of her father centered on her forehead, and she collapsed to the grass with a thump as her muscles went limp. Damn, she thought, resignation again sweeping through her. She'd been sure there would be some kind of built-in failsafe, she couldn't be the first of Trigon's `children' to fight him during his uncountable eons of feeding after all, but for once she'd hoped she was wrong. She hadn't been.

Robin shouted, “Raven!” Dashing to kneel at her side, he gently slid a hand behind her head, lifting and turning her so she could look up at him. “Why didn't you tell us? It's happening, isn't it?” Raven forced her eyes to focus on her leader's masked face through gathering tears, Beast Boy and Cyborg on each side and Starfire hovering above them to stare down, the concern they were radiating written on every face.

Her voice shaking, Starfire asked, “Please, Raven, today is the day? It is ... ?”

Raven found she was too weak to even nod. “The end of the world,” she whispered. Her tears broke loose to roll down the side of her face into her hair, and Robin pulled her up into his lap as she wept.

/oOo\

“The last of the consignees that aren't personally assigned have been shifted to the central holding bunkers,” Ingrid, the latest lost soul assigned the task of Hild's secretary, reported from the tiny holographic viewscreen floating above the platinum blonde, star-tattooed Mistress of Niflheim's desk. “None of the demons with personal punishment details have accepted your offer to look after — or accept responsibility for — their own consigned souls, though. You would think they don't trust you.” She smirked. “It would really be a shame if something happened to any their palaces during the chaos.”

Hild shrugged, ruefully reflecting that Ingrid had been her secretary just a little too long. Not only had she gotten over her fear of her mistress, but she'd realized the nature of Hild's deception and had begun to actively tweak events in ways that she thought would help. Hild was finding that having a secretary that was not only comfortable in her presence but actively anticipating her wishes and willing to risk getting it wrong to be a very pleasant experience, indeed. It wasn't doing a thing for Ingrid's ultimate salvation, unfortunately, she was falling back into the same scheming ways and delight in others' pain and misfortune that had damned her in the first place, but Hild had reluctantly decided that breaking in a new secretary just as everything else was breaking loose was a bad idea. Once the fate of the world was settled one way or the other would be time enough to shift Ingrid to an assignment that could heal the fresh damage, and choose a new secretary. Assuming there was a point to having one for the next few million years, which there wouldn't be if Raven failed — once the Devourer moved on it would take awhile for the Earth to recover and another sentient race to evolve.

Still, just because Ingrid was getting malicious again didn't mean she was wrong, and even the comfortable relationship with the Daimakaicho that her secretary had fallen into didn't stop her from shivering at the sight of Hild's dark smile as the Daimakaicho thought of the secret assignment she'd given Trethgar. Not her Furies, not for this — giving those tasked with enforcing her laws an assignment that treated the books those laws were written in (not stored in Nidhogg, she didn't want to make things too easy for her underlings) as so much waste paper was another bad idea. After all, part of the point of the Furies was to ultimately teach the enhanced lost souls that filled its ranks of the primacy of justice over vengeance, and there was precious little justice and a great deal of vengeance in what Hild had planned. Besides, she didn't want her daughter learning about her plan until it was all over, and it would hardly be possible to involve the Furies and keep their commander in the dark. Not after how completely Urd had won their loyalty.

Speaking of which ... “Ingrid, get me Urd —” She broke off as a stud on her desk started blinking blue, and a new holographic screen sprang to like to show a familiar park (Hild had often made use of the surveillance Skuld had planted on Raven, right in the middle of her forehead). Hild's expression froze as the mid-morning light dimmed, and the view shifted upward to show a shadow sweeping across the sky. The time had come. “Belay that, I'll take care of it. Trethgar, escort Ingrid to her own bunker before seeing to your own assigned duty.”

The husky ebony-skinned demon pushed himself away from the wall he'd been leaning against. “My pleasure, Mistress,” he rumbled, and strode through the door leading to the anteroom to Hild's office and was gone.

Even as the door swooshed shut, Hild was bringing up her desk's vidphone function and a moment later a new holo-screen showing Urd's face sprang up. For some reason, her daughter was blushing. One eyebrow rose, and Hild smiled slowly when she noticed Lind standing behind Urd, the Valkyrie also blushing. “My, my,” she murmured, “is there anything you want to tell me, child?”

Urd shouted, “No!” Her blush deepened at her mother's teasing laughter, then she reluctantly smiled for a moment before sobering. “Mother, you received the alert?”

“Yes, I did,” Hild replied, sobering as well, though she paused for half a second to delight in the simple label of `mother' that her daughter had used. And not simply the label, but the tone — no sarcasm, no inherent rejection and judgmental condemnation, no hatred, just simple acceptance and even a little affection. They weren't exactly close, not in only four years since Urd had rejoined her, not with the way Urd had thrown herself into her training and new duties as head of the Furies and the reputation Hild needed to maintain. But they were no longer enemies. Hild liked to think that they were even becoming friends. In a few decades, perhaps they'd be back to what a mother and daughter should be.

“Yes, I did,” Hild repeated, refocusing on the task at hand. “How goes the transference of the mothers and children?”

“We're just about done here, the last should be through in ... call it five minutes. As per the plan we'll be closing the portal from the Asgard side after that, and heading to our battle positions.”

Hild nodded. “Very well, I will see you after. And Urd ...” She hesitated for a long moment. She was the Daimakaicho of Niflheim, there were demons and Furies in earshot, she had a reputation to maintain — and she realized she didn't care, not now. Maybe not later. Voice softening, she said, “Urd, I love you, please be careful.”

Urd stared, struck speechless until Lind lightly slapped her alongside her head. Rubbing the side of her head (okay, perhaps the slap hadn't been that light), Urd forced a smile that Hild supposed was supposed to be reassuring. “Hey, I'll have Lind watching my back, nothing's going to happen to me,” she asserted. “But I'll be careful ... Mom.”

The screen vanished as the connection broke, and Hild leaned back in her office chair for a moment, smiling happily. Urd hadn't said she loved her, but that was the first time she'd called her `Mom' since before she'd angrily abandoned Niflheim — and her mother — for Asgard and her father. It would more than do.

Then she shook herself free of her happy reverie and leaned forward, fingers flying across her holographic keyboard. She had her own tasks to perform in case Raven failed, and she started the protocols for linking Nidhogg to Yggdrasil, so the two world computers could jointly bring down the Doublet System. Earth wasn't the only world whose divine and infernal sides had tied their warriors' lives together to prevent a bloodbath, and from rumors they'd heard from some of those worlds the Devourer had overrun the monster had somehow tied his own shock troops into the network so that for every one of his troops that fell the defenders lost one as well. There would be no chance of that happening here.

Even with most of the disengagement set up in advance, she was still typing in password after password when the stud on her desk started blinking again, this time a pure white. Hild paused for a moment, staring — what did her ex-husband want to talk to her about now? — before redoubling her speed for the last of the passwords so she could accept the call.

/oOo\

Belldandy smiled, leaning back against her husband as she watched her laughing children play on the lawn of the park where her family had just finished their picnic dinner. Her oldest, Norihide, and his current girlfriend had been the first to leave, taking a walk together; her oldest daughter Tamiko was playing catch with her younger siblings and some of their friends, tossing out a frisbee for the others to compete over catching; and Belldandy was in her favorite spot in all the world, her husband's arms.

Belldandy and Keiichi had known this day was coming, and that they had two options for Keiichi and the children — stay on Earth and share the fate of the rest of its people, or flee to Asgard to wait it out there. In the end, they had chosen to remain on Earth. True, taking the children to Asgard would have meant revealing the full truth of their mother's nature to them, but that had been at most a minor issue, quickly set aside. Instead, the deciding factor had been their children's future — or rather their lack of a future — in Asgard if the Earth died. In the end, Belldandy and Keiichi had been unable to accept their children living out their lives as essentially intelligent pets in a world in which they had no purpose. So instead, after it became clear on Raven's birthday that the end was coming they had simply informed their children that some time in the next few weeks they would be having a family evening together, then settled down to wait. Skuld's call that afternoon had told them that the wait was over, and their own calls had gone out to their children that the family party was on. With their favorite cold foods and some of their friends joining them — and Norihide's girlfriend — it had been a wonderful time on a beautiful evening, full of laughter and fun.

The triangle-tattooed goddess sighed happily, snuggling deeper down in her husband's arms, then giggled as one of the smallest children (young enough she was barely walking) was lifted up by an older brother so she could — with help — catch a softly thrown frisbee, only for her helper to be tackled by several of the other youngest as soon as their triumphantly crowing sister was safely back on the ground to cries of “Cheater!” and “Our turn!” While the goddess had had no issue with satisfying the more demanding physical needs of her husband's mortal body, she had been ... uncertain ... about bearing so many children so quickly. It was not the immortals' way — in truth, it wasn't the choice of most modern Japanese. But she had acquiesced to Keiichi's unspoken desire, and now she was happy she had. As nerve-wracking as keeping track of over a hand's worth of children could be even for a Goddess 1st Class, Unlimited, every one her children was uniquely precious.

Keiichi joined her amusement and she shivered at the sound of his soft laughter, only to stiffen as the evening light began to dim. She forced her unwilling eyes upward then slumped as she watched the sign of the Devourer's coming flow across the sky, sliding over the setting sun and dimming the light to cast the land in sudden, odd, starless twilight.

A suddenly stiff Keiichi asked, “It's time?”

“Yes,” Belldandy replied, “now we learn if Raven is as strong as we hope. But while we're waiting to find out, let's have the dessert.” She stood up with a sigh, forced a smile, and called out to the children now staring at the sky that it was time for the Mochi ice cream. Dessert proved much more important that whatever was happening to the sky, and Belldandy knelt to open the cooler as the small mob of family and friends thundered toward her.

/\

It was several minutes later, as Belldandy pulled out the packets of wet wipes for messy faces and hands, that Keiichi's cell phone rang. She was turning toward the children as her husband pulled the phone out of his pocket and accepted the call, only to freeze at the sound of his “Yes, sir.” There was only one person that warranted that particular respectful tone, even after He had personally officiated at their wedding, and so she wasn't surprised when Keiichi offered her the phone and said, “Your father wants to talk to you.”

“What? Now!?”

The children all turned to look at her, eyes wide — while she had learned to be firm (eventually), they had never heard her shout like that.

She accepted the phone with a shaking hand and held it to her ear. “Yes, Father?” ... “No, Father, my family —” ... “Yes, I understand that I am not the only mother —” ... “No, Father, I have not relinquished my responsibilities as a Norn. You are right, I will be there as quickly as I can manage.”

Shoulders slumped, she terminated the call and handed the phone back to her husband. Turning to the still-stunned children, she said, “I'm sorry, Mommy has to go. Please listen to your father, and I will be back as soon as I can. Remember, Mommy loves you.” She pulled the ones that were hers into firm but quick hugs, kissed Keiichi just as quickly but firmly on the lips, handed him the wet wipes, then strode off toward the park's closest public restroom as she wiped at her eyes. There was a mirror there she could use to return to their home and its permanent portal to Asgard.

/oOo\

Author's Note: At Fanfiction.net a number of reviewers commented on the pancakes, wondering why Raven would force the rest of the Titans to eat food she knew was bad when she was trying to make them happy. I've given a bit of the in-story reasoning in this chapter, which I think works more-or-less — she expected to do a lot better when she started, and inheriting Ranma's "never admit defeat" attitude does have its occasional downside. For the more meta-plot reason, it came right out of the cartoon episode the story is based on, probably to illustrate just how hard Raven's trying even if it doesn't quite work. I felt it fit well enough to keep it.