Fatal Fury Fan Fiction ❯ Fatal Fury - The Vengeful Spirits ❯ Chapter One - The Detective ( Chapter 2 )

All characters are the property of SNK/Playmore. I don't own them, the video games, or the anime.

Chapter One: The Detective

"Zapper!"

Terry Bogard saw the shockwave of light blue energy race towards him across the ground, and quickly countered with one of his own. "Power Wave!" He cried, slamming the ground with his fist. His own energy shockwave flew across the ground, striking his opponent's, and the two of them canceled each other out in a brilliant burst.

Terry found himself buffeted just a little by the energy recoil, but managed to keep his footing. His opponent, a muscular hulk dressed in blue overalls, with short black hair and a mustache, did not seem fazed by the backlash at all. Of course, he also had at least a foot of height on Terry.

The man started across the cobbled wet concrete and asphalt of the dim alleyway, and started to deliver a flurry of kicks. Terry dodged what he could, and when he couldn't, he tried to swat the man's foot away with his fist. He saw an opening, landed several blows to the man's stomach that seemed not to faze him. Terry then felt a sharp pain in his side as one of the mustached man's kicks connected, sending him flying into the side of a brick building.

He'd been trying to hold back, but Terry realized that he would probably need to use some of his energy-based attacks to even the odds a bit. He sprang to his feet, but before he could start focusing his chi, he saw a sudden blur of green and blue swarm around the hulking man, accompanied by the unmistakable sound of fists battering flesh.

It took only seconds, and then Terry's opponent was sprawled several feet off to the side, and where he had been standing, Terry saw a short, yet impassive-looking woman dressed in loose-fitting blue jeans, heavy boots, a red crop top, and a green jacket. Her shoulder-length hair was blond, her eyes like two chips of green ice, and her mouth was pressed into a tight line, neither smiling nor frowning.

Ignoring Terry, she turned to face the heavyset man. Two patrolmen ran up behind her, their guns drawn. Without turning to face them, she calmly raised a hand. "Put those guns away, boys," she spoke in a commanding voice. "I've got this."

Slowly, the men lowered their weapons. The woman reached into a pocket on her jacket, pulled out a pair of cuffs. "This will be a lot easier if you cooperate, sir," she told the man in the overalls. "Please put your hands behind your head."

She started towards him, but he lunged at her suddenly. As if she'd been expecting this, she casually sidestepped, then stuck out her leg and and pivoted her body in a spinning kick, her heel striking the man hard on the base of his spine. That, combined with the momentum from his charge, made him sprawl headfirst into some steel garbage cans.

"They never wanna do things easy," she muttered. "Oh, well, just makes my job more fun." The man was up again in moments, swinging wildly at her. Terry could tell automatically that this was a fight he would not win. The woman was smaller than him, had less muscle mass, but his anger at being interrupted was clouding his focus. Also, he was making the serious (and sometimes deadly) mistake of underestimating his opponent because of her gender.

She played upon this perfectly, dodging his attacks with no effort, only striking back where she knew it would cause the most damage. She ducked his right roundhouse punch, counter chopping to that side, bruising his kidney; ducked the opposite roundhouse, countered with her right knee, bruising his spleen; dodged his overhead swing, using his own forward momentum to deliver an elbow strike to his solar plexus.

That last blow knocked him back several paces, leaving him winded but still on his feet. Once more, she pulled out the handcuffs, dangling them in front of her face. "Are we ready to try this again?" She asked coldly. He growled and lunged, more suddenly than she was expecting. The cuffs clattered to the pavement as he tried to press his weight on top of her and knock her out that way. She quickly recovered and let herself go limp until her back was against the ground, then she tensed and thrust sharply upwards with her booted feet, flinging his body off of her with no effort. He slammed into the far wall, and slid to the ground, bumping his head on the concrete in the process. He did not get up again.

She did a handspring to her feet, then walked over to his body, knelt by him, pressed two fingers against his neck. Finding a pulse, she got up and retrieved her handcuffs, then tossed them to the waiting patrolmen. "He's all yours," she told them.

As the police moved in to cuff the man, one of them asked the blond woman: "And the other one?" He gestured at Terry.

"Leave him to me," said the woman. The man saluted, and then joined his partner in escorting the cuffed man, who was still dazed, towards the patrol car waiting outside the alley.

Terry blinked several times, still trying to convince himself that what he saw was real. Then he remembered that she had interrupted him. "You're a good fighter," he said as he walked over to her. "But that was my opponent."

Her cold green eyes came round to him."Are you sure about that?" She asked. "Because that would mean admitting that you were engaged in an unlawful street fight."

Though he had recovered from his opponent's last blow, Terry still felt dazed. What was she talking about? "It's not unlawful if both parties consent, miss..."

She opened one side of her jacket slightly, allowing Terry to see the glint of a badge. "Detective Mary Ryan," she said. "On special assignment with the South Town PD. Obviously, you haven't read a paper recently, Bogard."

Terry blinked rapidly in surprise. "You know my name?"

"I did my homework. I always do my homework when I get an assignment." She shut her eyes, then, reading off facts from memory. "Terrance Bogard, alias the Lone Wolf, birth name unknown, mother and father unknown. Known family: Legal guardian Jeffrey Bogard, deceased, Brother Andrew Bogard. Known accomplices: Master Tung Fue Rue, deceased, Joe-Wu Higashi, Mai-Lin Shiranui, Anthony Sampson. Not much else on your sheet. Just some minor counts before your adoption by Jeff Bogard: food theft, vandalism, disturbing the peace. After you turned eighteen, just a few counts of drunk and disorderly about two years ago." She opened her eyes then. "Want me to go on?"

Terry blinked again, still trying to process what was happening. "First of all," he said. "Those people you named are not accomplices. They're my friends. And second: Jeff Bogard was my father. May want to do your homework a little better next time, babe."

Mary pulled her lips back in a snarl, then, and jabbed him in the chest with her finger. "And you may want to never call me 'babe' again. If you enjoy the use of your limbs, that is."

Terry raised his hands in mock surrender. "Yeah, I'd say I enjoy them a lot. Okay, you win. So, why should I read a paper?"

"If you had, you would know that we have a new mayor now. One who sees street fighting as this community's final tie to the days of Geese Howard."

"Street fighting is what saved this city from Geese, because the police weren't getting the job done," Terry pointed out.

"Because he owned them," Mary countered. "And after his death, we saw corruption on the force almost disappear. A new commissioner was appointed, who started to dismantle all of the remnants of Howard's criminal empire. The only one left now is street fighting. There was a time when it was needed. Now it's not. It causes property damage, disturbs the peace, sometimes civilians get caught in the crossfire. The mayor has issued an order making it illegal. Took place effective midnight yesterday. I've been brought in to help the South Town PD enforce it, until such time as my assistance is no longer needed."

"That may be a while," said Terry, still not believing what he was hearing. "The mayor is trying to cut out this city's heart. The street fight is a part of what this town is. Even long before the days of Geese Howard, when my Master Tung was younger than I am now."

Mary nodded. "That's why I read up on you. I'm aware of your history. I assumed you might be a troublemaker, and this town's most likely offender to the new law. The Lone Wolf has become a popular challenge for any upstart looking to make a name for themselves. But I'm letting you off with a warning, in gratitude for what you've done for South Town, and also because I didn't actually see you throw a punch tonight."

Terry rolled his eyes. "How magnanimous of you," he growled.

"But rest assured," continued Mary, stepping up to him until they were only inches apart. "I will be watching you very closely. From this night on, you're my new hobby. The second I see you pick a fight with anyone, you're going down. Hard." She jabbed him in the chest with her finger as she spoke each syllable.

Terry smirked at her. "Or you could just take up stamps," he said. "Some people say that's a fun hobby."

"Go home, Bogard," Mary growled, then turned sharply on her heel and started to walk out of the alley, hands in the pockets of her jacket. "And stay out of trouble," she called over her shoulder. Terry watched her walk away, unable to take his eyes off her, admiring the movement of her hips, the way that her curvaceous backside still managed to perfectly fill in the seat of those baggy jeans.

She's quite a customer, he thought. Perfect combination of beauty and attitude. And, holy shit... those moves! Then he shook his head, remembering himself. Don't even think about that. You're cursed, remember? You can never let yourself get close to another woman, or they'll wind up just like Lily and Sulia. Your heart's been broken enough. Never again.

"Never again," he repeated to himself out loud, with conviction. "Your heart belongs to the fight now." With that, Terry picked up his bag, and started out of the alleyway in the opposite direction Mary had gone.

To be continued...