Original Stories Fan Fiction ❯ Bad Anime ❯ The End Game Ends Lame ( Chapter 7 )

During the Cold War, the Soviet Navy reportedly "stretched" a Typhoon class nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarine, replacing the missile tubes with a hangar to create a submarine aircraft carrier. The director based the Red Legion mobile command post on this submarine, overriding the military advisors who insisted the design was impractical, despite the fact the command post was seen only as a shadow framed by moonlight until the season finale.

Beherit frowned at the Leviathan, his seaborne fortress, which redesigned on the director's orders to look impressive as the battlefield where Nadeshiko would face the Red Legion leader and finally avenge her father. "She looks ridiculous."

"She looks like a crocodile waiting in ambush, aggressive and menacing!" the mechanical designer insisted.

"She looks like a plush doll of a crocodile, cute and silly instead of aggressive and menacing-- ridiculous," the Red Legion leader repeated.

Triangular fins, resembling the scutes on a crocodile's back, flanked the hangar; based on the Advanced Gun System (AGS), the fins consisted of a stealthy turret and an envelope to protect the gun barrels when the Leviathan was submerged. A shark mouth adorned the sail, but a Typhoon class submarine's sail was behind the missile tubes; in Beherit's words, the Leviathan's sail "resembles a lion cub on a sleeping crocodile's back, unaware it's centimeters from becoming a bigger, stronger predator's dinner."

The director felt the mechanical designer's eyes upon him, silently demanding support. "She looks aggressive and menacing. Now make him so-- prepare to attack Pearl Harbor or something." Then he turned away.

"Damn it! I'm the incarnation of Beherit, a Grand Duke of Hell and commander of 26 demonic legions! I can accurately describe things of the past, present, and future; transmute all metals into gold; give dignities to men, and confirm such high honors and titles! I'm not some peasant-turned-soldier whose only chance for glory is to sacrifice myself in a kamikaze attack!" But the director was already beyond earshot, a sight that made Beherit's head bow so he could massage his temples. "XYZ should've made a magical girl show; those things make no sense anyways, and I would've been spared this and other headaches."

***

BAD ANIME CHAPTER 7: THE ENDGAME ENDS LAME

By Sidewinder (aim9snake@hotmail.com), 2008-2009. Special thanks to Stas Bush.

***

Linda waltzed with a middle-aged man as an orchestra played one of Tchaikovsky's symphonies. "Mister Ambassador..."

The Russian Ambassador to Japan smiled. "Please, call me Vladimir Ilyich."

The redhead returned the smile. "Mister Vladimir Ilyich, we of the EPF wish to know when your government will release its files on the man who once served the Red Army as General Chertan Krasovich Ognev." The name was derived from the Russian words for devil, red, and flame.

The ambassador's eyes expressed cold anger, one promising to avenge a great insult, although his smile didn't falter. "Ah, Beherit. Please understand, Dear Linda, the KGB destroyed most of those files before, during, or immediately after the unsuccessful coup of 1991. The GRU," Glavnoje Razvedyvatel'noje Upravlenije, the Russian military's Main Intelligence Directorate, "is attempting to assemble the remainder into a legible file, but it's like using a knife or scissors on cardboard to replace the lost pieces of a jigsaw puzzle."

Linda, no stranger to diplomatic niceties, continued smiling. "So Beherit had no parents, no caretakers at a state-run orphanage, no classmates in OCS?" Officer Candidate School. "He just hatched from a rooster's egg incubated by a toad, with a general's stars already on his shoulders?"

"What files remain are contradictory. The codename Ogon-- Flame-- has been assigned to a genetic engineering or enhancement program, one of many efforts to create a super-soldier; a paranormal entity summoned through a ritual based on those Heinrich Himmler allegedly performed in a desperate effort to reverse Nazi Germany's fortunes; and a mole in the US Army, Navy, Air Force, or the CIA. For all we know, that Vlasovite," traitor, "bastard was hatched from a rooster's egg incubated by a toad."

"And you're certain the Red Legions have no mole in the GRU to warn Beherit of the Russian government's attempt to evict their unruly tenant?" the redhead continued, referring to the "grand duchy" Beherit carved out of Siberia, now a constant source of embarrassment to the government.

The ambassador's smile became cruel-- an expression promising great and terrible consequences for anyone who crossed him. "Any moles who are not double agents under our direct control, are dealt with... in a most effective manner."

'I can imagine.' Linda suppressed her feelings-- a mixture of disgust towards a GRU officer's idea of a most effective manner, sympathy for those subjected to such violence, appreciation of its finality, and envy for the options with which the GRU dealt with traitors-- to let herself enjoy the ball the Russian Embassy hosted to improve relations with a nation that lost many sons and daughters to...

Crash, thump, clatter! "Ahhhh!" someone screamed when the embassy windows shattered. The surprised musicians rose to their feet, dropping the instruments.

The bodyguards instinctively drew GLOCK pistols-- not Makarov or Yarygin pistols, as Russian small arms manufacturers weren't sponsoring the anime-- to target the telephone poles that burst through the bulletproof glass. "How...?"

"Screech!" Vampire bats swarmed through the broken windows and flooded the ballroom, their shrieks drowning out the loudest screams of the panicking men and women. The bodyguards squeezed the triggers, killing multiple bats with each bullet, denying this as evidence their efforts were futile; then the brave men and women fell, their skin covered with bites, their blood burning with "chimera venom"-- the unholy union of genetically engineered virus, neurotoxin, and necromancy.

"Mister Ambassador! Bugger!" Linda cursed as she rolled forwards, a diving bat's wings caressing her hair. 'To hell with diplomacy, I'm never leaving behind my pistol again!' She grabbed a silver platter and a wine bottle from the floor, using them as an improvised shield and club to fight her way to where the ambassador was. "Mister Ambassador!" The man laid upon the floor, now stained with his blood. Linda reversed her grip on the bottle, freeing her index and middle fingers to check the ambassador's pulse.

"Grrrr!"

"Ah!" Red lights flashed-- an unnatural light shining through the bloody veil covering the man's eyes-- then Linda found herself on the floor, the ambassador-turned-zombie straddling her body and holding down her arms. Venomous saliva dripped from the zombie's mouth, igniting nerves in the redhead's skin as the now inhuman thing prepared to tear out her throat and turn Linda into another...

"Hiss!"

An invisible hand lifted the undead ambassador off the floor, but Linda's relief was short-lived; she realized she was the only human left in the room. The zombies parted to let three individuals with the strength to tear a telephone pole from its mount and then throw the pole like a javelin-- Balthild, Amelie, and Kalila-- enter the room.

Linda's eyes widened. "You...!"

"Good evening, Linda." The dhampire smiled as she approached the redhead; her eyes changed color like a flickering flame, becoming red, blue, and violet again.

"Yaaaa!" Linda threw the platter at Balthild. The dhampire caught the improvised discus; the redhead, who used the attack as a distraction, was already sprinting through the door.

Amelie and Kalila transformed into gargoyles and ran after Linda, but stopped in front of the now burning doorway, as if they feared the wine-fueled fire. Shrieks followed Linda; then the redhead lost the vampires' cries as well.

"Such ingenuity." Balthild smiled-- an expression the vampires shared-- as she approached the door, waved a hand, and psychically extinguished the fire. "I hope she survives her part in our plan; she'll be an excellent addition to my harem."

*

Peacekeeper One was the most advanced battlefield surveillance aircraft on Earth, but even it was useless against an invisible enemy; the infrared (IR) sensors failed to distinguish the zombies' low body temperature from streetlamps and other heat sources, and ground clutter shielded the undead from radar.

Abe stood in front of the holographic display, with the solidity of the sphinx guarding the pharaohs' tombs. 'This scene is straight out of "The Mummy". I might as well look for Boris Karloff,' star of the 1932 horror film. Yellow lights blinked on the display. "Death Angel, this is Command. We're getting airborne contacts at rooftop level, in grid," he read the coordinates on a military map. "Possible UAVs," unmanned aerial vehicles. "Can you visually acquire the contacts?"

"Command, this is Death Angel. Contacts visually acquired-- chimeras." ULTRA One rolled to dodge two incoming RPGs. "Armed chimeras."

Abe knew what Johnny was thinking. "Death Angel, this is Command. You are free to use direct energy weapons and the chainknife. All projectile weapons tight, I say again, all projectile weapons tight," meaning the ranger couldn't use the Carnotaurus' gun or missiles. "Avoid civilian casualties if at all possible."

"Yes, Sir." Crosshairs were projected over a human-bat-viper hybrid. "Spice, target the chimeras' wings."

"Yes, Mister Tsurugi." The golden-haired sexaroid performed multitasking so the ULTRA pilot could focus on the mission. Three Laser Lance turrets extended and sent forth beams to simultaneously sever three chimeras' wings-- Turret 4 defended the Carnotaurus from another RPG-- sending the undead hybrids to the ground below.

A Ford GT became visible as two serpents rose from nests behind the headlights, and breathed fire-- two MG3E machine guns extended from hidden compartments, and fired armor-piercing and armor-piercing tracer rounds. "Yeeeee-ha!" Linda cheered, watching bullets literally cut down chimeras, as 7.62 x 51 mm casings danced upon the asphalt.

"Miss Linda, please act in character-- the script states you're terrified by the sight of these once human monsters, not ecstatic at an opportunity to drive like your hair's on fire." The director's demands fell upon deaf ears, as usual-- not that Linda could hear him over the machine guns.

"We need but a few minutes to refilm Miss Linda in the supercar and in character," the scriptwriter said to raise his weary coworker's spirits.

"Say hello to my German friends!" the redhead modified a quote from a 1983 film.

"And re-record the dialogue so she sounds like Lin Daiyu instead of Scarface," the weary scriptwriter referred to the tragic heroine of the novel 'Dream of the Red Chamber'.

Then ULTRA One swooped down, grabbed the GT, and climbed to the waiting Peacekeeper One.