Ranma 1/2 Fan Fiction / Sailor Moon Fan Fiction ❯ A New Future 2 - First Blood ❯ Winterborn ( Chapter 36 )

This was originally published by me under the name Anduril at Anime Addventures, with the only changes being a few corrections in spelling, punctuation and the occasional word choice to make things clearer. If you like the beginning of my story but think I've gone off the rails, or have your own ideas for a great branch-off, or think I'm taking too long to update and want to continue the story yourself, come to Anime Addventures and join in the fun!

I claim no ownership rights to any of the works of Rumiko Takahashi, Naoko Takeuchi, or anything in the GURPS Ogre and GURPS Tales of the Solar Patrol settings published by Steve Jackson Games. Everything else is mine.

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Colonel Okuda rocked gently on his heels where he stood beside Captain Nishio, commander of his reserve, hands clasped behind him and face impassive as he watched (and listened to) his men clash with the enemy rearguard. Maintaining the poise expected of him has taking all the willpower he had that wasn't being used to keep himself from sending his reserve charging into battle.

Things were not going well. Oh, he had no worries about a counterattack. What free units the enemy had, had greater concerns than his men. But while he firmly believed that the Japanese Self Defense Force was one of the best-trained militaries around — if lacking in experience — the few weeks of training his unit had received in a style of combat that had gone out of fashion almost two centuries before didn't come close to allowing them to match their adversaries, and they were dropping faster than the enemy. A lot faster. At the rate his men were falling, even with the reserve committed, by the time they overwhelmed the rearguard they'd have nothing left to carry the fight further into the park. He'd considered swinging that reserve to one flank or the other, but at the rate his men in line were falling the enemy could well force a breakthrough and be rolling up his line first. The only way to stop that was with his reserve, so here he stood, locked in place as his men died.

To make things worse, the reinforcements that had been kept farther back than his small quick-reaction force, outside the radius Sailor Pluto had reported likely to be scanned by the enemy however he did it, was delayed. While for the most part the evacuation of civilians from around the battle was proceeding in an orderly fashion, in a few places it had broken down into panicked flight. Unfortunately, one of those places had been a block over from the reinforcements' planned route and had spilled across it, and so they were being forced to detour. They'd still arrive, but not likely while he still had a fighting force worthy of the name.

Suddenly, the shouts and screams and blacksmith-hammering sounds of battle cut off, turning the world into a surreal silent movie. Even as Colonel Okuda wondered if his hearing loss was permanent, the sound returned in a massive blast, as to his left a wave of purplish energy surged through the line, obliterating friendly and enemy soldiers alike, pieces of weapons, armor, bodies and gore thrown outward, as it continued on and an apartment building behind them exploded.

Even as more soldiers on both sides were hammered down by plunging debris, he barely noticed, staring in amazement at the wide hole left in the left flank, his impassive mask vanishing in a wide grin. “Go!” he shouted at Captain Nishio. “Go now, now, now!” Matching deed to word, he snatched up a fallen soldier's bayoneted rifle and charged toward the breach. Moments later, the entire reserve was thundering after him, screaming loud enough that he could easily hear them through the ringing in his ears.

/\

Hammer was feeling more than a little put-upon. Why did she have to be the rear guard? That's not fair, you were the best choice, she thought as her eyes again swept the view before her, ignoring the camera crew as she searched for nonexistent threats. Usa-chan has a ranged attack, Ukyo-kun, Konatsu-kun, Shampoo and Mousse come in pairs and we only need one, Doug-sensei has way more experience than you do, and do you really trust Kuno that much?

Still, however true that might be, it reminded her of the way she'd felt when Ranma had first shown up, and she'd instantly gone from being the best martial artist around to last place in an ever-lengthening list. At this point the growing feeling of ill-use grinding at her soul was beginning to threaten the calm at her center.

The way Hotaru — Saturn — had finally climbed to her feet and promptly gotten into line while she had had to keep watch for nonexistent threats as the latest attack came at her from behind hadn't helped.

Hammer realized she was grinding her teeth together, and forced her jaws to unclench as a hand traced the symbol on her chest. Hammer, not Akane. Remember, you're Hammer. Remember why you're Hammer. Hold it together. You managed to keep centered through everyone's hate and fear during the fighting, don't let this throw you.

Suddenly, her growing anger vanished as the world went deathly silent, all the screams and cries of wounded men, the sounds of the Outer Senshi's attacks from across the park to her left cut off as if someone had flipped a switch. Then sound returned with a thunderous roar she actually felt through the soles of her boots, and she whirled to stare over Xian Pu's and Mu Tse's shoulders at the mounting flood of purplish light sweeping across the park to the south. But `Taru was barely recovered from the last one!

Her watch forgotten, the white skirt-clad girl raced for the hole in the north line where Chibi-Moon had been, to find her pink-haired friend pulling Saturn along the ground toward the west side of the dimensional doorway, Saturn's hands clenched tight around the Silence Glaive. Stepping forward and glancing around at the other half of the park (and fighting not to quail at the sight of the mass of legionnaires still marching toward them), Hammer grabbed a shoulder to help, and they pulled their friend to relative safety.

Dropping to her knees beside her too-still friend, Chibi-Moon beside her, Hammer didn't like what she saw at all. The short, slight girl's eyes were closed, her face was a pasty white, shivering as sweat beaded on her forehead — all familiar symptoms of someone that had put too great a strain on her energy reserves. Ignoring MacKenzie's shout that they couldn't hold and it was time to get Vanguard out and fall back, she closed her eyes and extended her ki the way her lover had shown her, until it permeated the Senshi of Destruction's body. After a moment, she sat back with a sigh of relief. “She's overextended herself, she's in shock,” she reported tersely, and nodded toward the aid station. “She needs to keep warm. We need to get her over to Kasumi and Dr. Tofu, they ought to have blankets. But give her a few days in bed, and she should be fine.”

Chibi-Moon nodded, rising to her feet. “Right, take her over. You should be able to get there and rejoin us with the others.”

“What?”

“Everyone down!”

Conditioned after long weeks of training to respond instantly to that tone in MacKenzie's voice, Hammer dove across Saturn's unconscious body to tackle Chibi-Moon. Even as they crashed to the ground, she twisted to look toward the south end of the portal — just in time to see Mu Tse's upper and lower body and arms fall in different directions, a welter of blood and gore splashing across his lover lying at his feet.

Hammer rolled up to her knees. She stared, mind numb, as the bloodstained Xian Pu sat up and pulled Mu Tse's head and upper torso into her lap. Someone grabbed her jaw and her head turned to face Chibi-Moon. The pink-haired girl's lips were moving, but she couldn't hear anything over the roaring in her ears. Suddenly her head rocked to the side as Chibi-Moon's palm cracked across her cheek. Her hand caught her friend's as it was returning for a backhand slap as the world became real again. “What ... what did you say?”

“I said, Doug-sensei says the battle's won but we have to go, now, we can't hold them here!” Chibi-Moon almost shouted. Stopping and taking a deep breath, she continued, “Step in the portal and yell a warning to Vanguard, and get Saturn to the aid station, then join us with the other Senshi if you can.”

“Just leave Ra — Vanguard behind?” Hammer protested.

“We don't have time to wait! She's the best, she'll be able to fight her way free, now come on!”

Hammer stared at her friend, thoughts of the legionnaires arriving before Ranma could get out, pressing in close, shields together with no room for her lover to maneuver, short swords stabbing — that was exactly the opposite of what Anything Goes, at least Ranma's variant, was all about, to keep the room they needed to maneuver, not get surrounded. Ranma was the best of them, but still ...

In a sudden flash of clarity, she knew exactly what to do. Rising to her feet, she looked over at the aid station and the Amazons guarding it and her sister, then looked down again at her two newest and possibly closest friends. “Moon, get Saturn to the aid station, and stay there. We'll be on the other side of the field, and the medics may need help when these people arrive.”

Without waiting for a reply, she turned and strode over to where true US Marine and true samurai now stood waiting beside a keening Xian Pu still kneeling on the ground. Hammer glanced for a moment at the rapidly approaching enemy formation, then closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and fought to let go of the fear and anger beating at her core and again seek her center, staggering slightly as overwhelming anguish radiating from the girl by her feet hammered into her, the fear of Ukyo and Konatsu, the camera crew increasing the pressure as they joined them.

But from one person there was no fear at all, only calm acceptance of whatever came, and Hammer turned to the young man that had tormented her for years. “Kuno-san ... Tatewaki, our princess has need of you.”

Kuno dropped to a knee. “Command me, my lady.”

Hammer pointed at the enemy formation. “Go, kill as many as you can, as long as you can. Buy me the time I need to get Yasuko out of this trap.”

“Yes, my lady, it will be done!” he said eagerly. He sprang to his feet and whirled to charge the oncoming formation alone.

Ignoring the shock from most of those around her (MacKenzie alone was unsurprised), Hammer turned and with a few strides stepped through the portal.

/\

Kuno smiled broadly as he charged toward the scores of legionnaires quick-marching to attack the Princess and her handmaiden, unable to maintain the stern expression expected of a warrior about serious business in the face of the joy filling his soul. The previous day when the Princess so easily forgave the dishonor he had heaped upon her, she had demonstrated the feminine generosity that she hid behind the fiery part of her nature that she used to protect herself from the world. Having done so, he would not have dreamed of adding to that dishonor by refusing her gift. But her forgiveness did not wipe his honor clean, and as his charge brought him close enough to the foe to see the hard, determined expressions on faces framed by shield edge, cheek guards, and helmets, he thanked all the kami that what one lady had denied him in her mercy the other had given him in her need.

Without breaking stride, he gathered his strength, focused, and while still several strides away swept his katana in a horizontal arc at neck height, his grin turning fierce as half a dozen heads leapt from shoulders from the mere shock wave of his blow. Even as the next rank was stumbling over the corpses in front of them, some frantically wiping at eyes abruptly blinded by blood spraying from neck stumps, he slammed into them. He'd learned in the earlier brief encounters that though his will might strengthen a bokken to the point that it could slice through a tree, it could not strengthen one of the finest swords ever forged enough to cut through these shields. But that merely meant that he'd shifted to the smaller targets, and screams mixed with shouted battlecries as sword hands and forearms fell away and his blade swept across eyes and throats.

For long minutes he whirled in place as the enemy surrounded him, instant crippling or death for anyone that came within reach of his katana. But finally he was completely surrounded, and a concerted rush behind shields from all sides pinned him in place as shortswords slammed home into stomach, kidneys and back. Even as the pain ripped through him and he felt his legs go numb from the thrust that severed his spine, his eyes sought the portal he had just left, and there staring at him was the blood-drenched form of Princess Yasuko. As he felt more strokes thrust home and the world darkened around him, he again smiled — his loves would live, and his honor had been redeemed. Perfect.

/\

Again, Vanguard was dancing. Since she had retreated from the dimensional tunnel's exit into the enemy's world to where she had encountered the first of her victims (and “victims” was what they'd been — however experienced or well-trained they may have been, they might as well have been children for all the chance they had to match her), she had been alone, waiting for the next assault that hadn't come. As minute after slow minute had dragged by and the memories of what she'd just done mixed with the fears of what she'd have to do, the tension had mounted until she'd been holding on to the calm at her core with metaphorical bleeding fingernails.

Then she'd remembered the day on the roof of Akane's high school when she'd first learned that her life now came with a standard set of bodyguards, whether she liked it or not. And the way she'd been dancing when she noticed Xian Pu's presence. So now she danced, shifting from one slow, smooth, graceful kata to another, every one that she could perform in the limited space she had. She ignored the occasional sight of the corpses, the stench of ruptured bodies filling the tunnel, the way her boots sometimes splashed in the wide runnel of blood slowly making its way along the floor, and the red-splotched footprints her dance left when she wasn't splashing. All her attention was focused on the motion of flesh through space, and keeping herself open to the expected “glow” of approaching life.

In the end, that “glow” came from her end of the tunnel, not the enemy's, and instead of the anger- and fear-soaked ki of soon-to-be-dead soldiers, it was clear, clean ki that could belong to only one person.

“Ranma!”

Vanguard finished her latest simple pattern, then turned with a wide smile for her lover, only to have it fade at the sight of Hammer's greenish-white complexion, the stunned expression on her face. “Hey, Akane, you all right?” she asked, trotting toward her.

Hammer shook herself. “Yeah, I'm fine. Come on, the enemy's coming and we can't stop them, time to go, rejoin the Senshi, now!”

“Great!” Vanguard gusted out, fighting to keep from slumping in relief. She grabbed Hammer's hand and pulled her toward the exit, not noticing her lover's wince.

Within minutes the pair was back out in the morning sunlight, the sounds of battle and faint miasma of violent death pure heaven after the tunnel. Vanguard glanced over toward the three at the south side of the portal as soon as she stepped out, as their shock hammered into her. “What's wrong?”

“Ran-chan, are you all right?” an almost panicking Ukyo demanded. “All that blood ...”

The redhead looked down at herself and stumbled, fighting for calm at the sight. Taking a deep breath, she said, “I'm fine, it isn't mine.” Hastily glancing around (eyebrows going up inside her ki visor at the sight of her teacher in sword and shield, and the familiar camera crew), she frowned in concern. “Where's Saturn an' Chibi-Moon? An' what's everybody watching? What happened ta Sham — Mousse!”

Hammer sighed. “Saturn pushed herself too hard, Chibi-Moon's taken her to big sis. Mousse ... Mousse caught one of your ... one of Genma's vacuum blades, I don't know if it was deliberate or not.”

Vanguard strode over to her old fiancée, the other girl staring into nothing as tears rolled down her cheeks and despair rolled off her in waves., and started to kneel only to pause when MacKenzie spoke. “Vanguard, you need to see this.”

She looked up, confused, then over in the direction her teacher was gazing and gaped at the sight of her long-time nemesis several scores of yards away. The kendoist — samurai — was whirling in place, the perfect form that he loved and that had helped her beat him into the ground time and again abandoned.

Around him, legionnaires charged in and spilled away, dropping swords and shields, clutching wrists and arm stumps, at throats as arterial blood sprayed, at eyes, screaming. Then they'd completely surrounded him, and all she could see was his face turned towards her as the legionnaires charged in again en masse. For a moment her eyes met his, and then he was gone, dropping from sight, buried under the mass of enemy soldiers. She thought he had been smiling.

MacKenzie sighed as the legionnaires began reforming their ranks. “That's it, time to go.”

“I ... he ... wh-wh-why ...” Vanguard stammered out, her voice shaking.

“So we would have time to get you out,” he answered, radiating sympathy, and Hammer took her hand.

Ukyo dropped to her knees beside Xian Pu and laid a hand on her former faux-rival's shoulder. “Come on, Sugar,” she softly murmured. “He'll still be here when this is over, but for now we need to leave.”

For a moment it seemed that the Amazon hadn't heard her, but then awareness seeped back into lifeless eyes. Letting go of her dead lover, she scrubbed at her cheeks with bloody hands, nodded, and without a word gently slid him off her lap and rose.

Even as the much-reduced formation resumed its quick-time march toward the portal, that portal's defenders broke into a run away, toward the fifth column and their friends and family there. The camera crew followed, pausing occasionally to sweep their camera around them.

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The tribune of the First Cohort of the Twentieth Legion stared in shock at his Heads-Up Display, heartsick. Less than a minute ago he'd had a real chance of pulling victory from the jaws of defeat, with a rearguard giving better than it was taking, two centuries not yet engaged and moving on their targets and his current decimated century moving forward in support. Seconds later, it had all fallen apart with one massive wave of energy. As expected, the century he was with — his now he supposed, since Apustius had just gone down — had been hammered back by the ranged attacks of the magical girls protecting the ones bringing down the columns (women, really, now that he had had the chance to take a close look at them through an attacking soldier's vidcam). But the main assault on the same women had been obliterated by that all-consuming energy strike, the enemy's reserves were flowing through the massive hole the same wave had blown through his rearguard and the symbols in his HUD for its soldiers were vanishing like candle-flames in a wind, and his final unengaged century had first been hammered along one side by some sort of energy attack he'd never dreamed of and now had stopped in its tracks as a single warrior was dealing an unbelievable amount of damage to its front ranks. Even as the warrior dropped and the century quickly began to reform, he doubted it would be able to force the portal. It was over.

Suddenly, his jaw dropped and he stared, gaping, as the warriors guarding the portal moved away, toward the column almost directly between them and his century, and the magical girls around it. They were abandoning their post? But ... But they see it, too. You've lost, and there's no point wasting their lives fighting for a position that no longer matters — at least to them. Hastily, he sent out a `Hold' order to his century, designated the portal the immediate rally point, and broadcast it to every legionnaire left on the field. That done, he toggled his inherited century's frequency. “Relax, men, we aren't staying behind,” he assured them. “We're just waiting for the warriors in front of us to move on. No point in wasting lives trying to push through them, not now.”

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The first thing Vanguard saw as they jogged up to the other Senshi and Nerimans was a badly worried Tendo Soun kneeling in a shallow crater, the unconscious naked form of his lover cradled in his arms, armored Endymion with his sword drawn and Sailor Neptune standing behind them. “Hinako-sensei! What happened?” Vanguard gasped, dropping to her knees next to the Nerimans with Hammer right beside her.

“Your father,” Sailor Pluto replied, stepping around the column where a shaking Sailor Mercury was standing with her arms upraised and freezing cold fog rolling against the column where it came up against the stream of fire on the other side from a sweat-drenched Sailor Mars. “When he killed your friend, Hinako-san tried to drain him and overloaded. Don't worry, she's a little cooked and would be dead within days, but she'll survive long enough for you to save her once we finish mopping up. Your father ran away.”

Vanguard stared up, battered by the waves of anger, sorrow, satisfaction and pride coming from her old friend. “Mopping up?” she repeated.

“Yes. We still have six pillars to take down, but it's all over but the shouting.”

At that Vanguard broke, her calm shattered, leaning over with arms across her stomach as she lost what was little she'd been able to eat less than an hour before. As Hammer leaned over and tried to put an arm around her shoulders, Vanguard pushed her away, smearing blood across her lover's chest. Don't touch me! I'm all ... all bloody ...”

Tears running down her face, Hammer ignored Vanguard's protests to pull the shaking girl into her lap. “It's all right,” she whispered. “It's just blood, it'll wash off ... wash off of both of us.” Gathering her lover in her arms, she stood and stepped away from her father and former teacher. “Neptune?”

Nodding, eyes watery with unshed tears, the Senshi of the Deeps held her hands up and closed her eyes. A ball of swirling water formed, grew, grew more as she opened her eyes and sent it drifting up over the heads of the two girls. The green-haired woman clenched her hands into fists and the globe broke, cascading down, the pink water pooling around their feet.

Vanguard gasped as the abrupt cleansing washed over her, but her shaking eased. Briefly hugging Hammer, she wriggled and the other girl reluctantly put her back on her feet. Closing her eyes, Vanguard fought for calm, releasing the grief and guilt wracking her, letting it sweep through her as she sought her heart's calm. After a moment, she sighed contentedly as she felt the concern from all around her. “I'm all right, guys, really. I'll be fine.”

Pluto gazed at her, the Senshi of Time's calm exterior not revealing her own radiated love and guilt. But after a few moments she nodded, then raised her voice. “Okay, girls, take it down!”

And the pillar they were standing beside began to whine as Venus's chain wrapped around it, Jupiter's lightning crackled, and it suddenly seemed to glow as Moon's purifying light washed over it.

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The title comes from the song by Cruxshadows.