Ranma 1/2 Fan Fiction ❯ Chained World: The Fall of the House of Kuno ❯ Tripwire ( Chapter 56 )

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. 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, or anyone else's published work.

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Kuno strode into the command center for the mansion and glanced around at the men and women manning the various consoles lining the walls underneath the banks of monitors, all showing different locations around the mansion and the streets beyond the clear zones outside the walls ringing the estate grounds. The Family retainers had looked up at his entrance and quickly bowed in their seats, but per emergency protocols had immediately turned back to their duties rather than further acknowledge their lord's presence. His gaze fell on two retainers that hadn't looked up, and he strode over to join the Master of Servants and the Kuno Family steward.

As Kuno came up behind him, Kasuse Morimasa was saying, “ ... get your men out while the escape route is still clear. Let them have the building — the records are all backed up down to the secretaries' personal playtime files and none of those secretaries are there, if the rioters turn it into a pile of rubble all we've lost is cost of renting temporary office space while rebuilding, and the lording gets a public holiday while the temporary space is set up.”

“Thank you, Kasuse-sama, I'll get right on it,” Kuno heard a voice thick with relief respond. A vidphone window disappeared, and Pyo and Morimasa turned so they could see their lord while keeping an eye on the stack of monitors. Several monitors showed aerial views of buildings Kuno recognized as the slave center and the lording government building, from the slow circling and accompanying sound the images sent from helicopters.

“Report,” Kuno ordered.

“My lord, there hasn't been any real changes since we spoke,” Pyo replied. “The mobs have moved into the slave center and the government building, but are still holding back from the station and estate — possibly because the first two are lightly defended at best, and the second two aren't.”

“Any casualties yet?”

Morimasa said, “A retreating security guard at the government building went for his gun when rioters cut him off and demanded his surrender. From the amount of blood other guards saw from across the room as they were leaving, he probably took a knife to the throat. But that's the only casualty that we've heard of, though there might be more at the slave center. Security there didn't link into the lording security `net.” The steward abruptly winced, and Kuno followed his gaze to the monitors to see fire belching from a government office window. Morimasa added, “But however bloodless tonight might be, it's going to be expensive.”

Kuno shrugged. “You were right earlier — if it's just property, it can be replaced. Now, I would review the dispositions of the estate defenders.”

Pyo stepped over to a station against the wall to the right that wasn't being used and windows with floor plans and a map of the estate grounds opened on several of the station's stack of monitors. “Here you are, my lord, the blue dots are various remote controlled and automated defenses, the green dots are our people. Move the trackball over a dot to find out what or who it is, right click for details. The red mass along the border of two sides of the estate grounds is the gathering mob.”

Kuno stepped over to join him and sat down at the station, shifting his swords in his obi as he sat so that they could still be drawn. “Thank you. Return to your duties, if I have further questions I will call.”

Pyo bowed and turned away. As the Master of Servants began a circuit of the room checking each occupied station, Kuno turned his focus to the maps. The one for the estate grounds was glanced at and then ignored — he was already familiar with the estates defenses and no personnel were outside the mansion — but when he checked the floorplans he frowned. Even with Kuno Security scattered everywhere but the home estate, there weren't enough green dots — he knew there were more ninja assigned to the mansion than he was seeing. Perhaps some were flanking the mob? He quickly expanded the map, but no additional personnel appeared. Kuno's frown deepened, and he continued bringing more and more of Nerima into view, until more green dots appeared on one edge, an amorphous group moving toward the Kuno estate at running speed, and from the way their path failed to follow the street map they were obviously roofhopping.

Kuno leaned back in his chair, so deep in thought that the continued chant of “Cat Café!” coming from other consoles' speakers barely registered. Something was off about the whole situation, both the mob and the Kuno retainers returning. The coincidental timing was troubling, but how could the two events be related? Wherever his people were coming back from, it wasn't the Cat Café. He certainly hadn't ordered any major strikes, and the numbers looked to be a sizable majority of the ninja stationed at the estate.... Kuno straightened and quickly typed in a query, and stiffened at the number reported — the combined total of Kuno retainers present ... ninjas, under the current circumstances — was actually higher than the number he'd understood to be permanently assigned to the home estate. So either a sizeable contingent had been transferred back from outlying properties or an equally sizeable number of ronin had been hired, and either way he hadn't been informed of any major operations.

Come to think of it, where are they coming back from? he thought, then shrugged microscopically. The returning force was moving in a more or less straight line, so ... Kuno shifted the position of the estate on the district map from the center of the screen to one edge, drew a line from the mansion through the reinforcements, and froze when the line crossed the all too familiar Tendo dojo, where another single green dot glowed. Heart sinking, Kuno did something he should have done to begin with, searching for images of the destroyed Cat Café, only to gasp at the video that came up of the massive hole where the café had been, and the piles of rubble that was all that was left of the buildings around it. There was no way that had been an accident, not that level of destruction, and combined with the timing of the apparent strike on the home of his beloveds' people —

“Here they come!”

At the loud shout from one of the retainers across the room, two instant keystrokes shifted the map on Kuno's monitor to the monitor directly above it, replacing it with a montage of the cameras along the estate walls facing the mob. He sucked in his breath at the images of the suddenly screaming mass of his subjects charging the wall, toward the invisible line that would activate the automated defenses. Heartsick, he closed his eyes and waited for the sound of chattering machineguns for a moment before forcing himself to again open his eyes and stare at the screens. How many of his people had Pyo's stupidity killed? How many more were about to be added to the list? If he couldn't prevent it without killing his own retainers, he could at least watch.

Then the first of the rioters were across the invisible line, and a red light flashed on his console as the defenses activated.

/\

Hiroshi stood in the front ranks of the “mob” that Nabiki's message had called out, almost deafened by the mantra of “Cat Café!” endlessly bellowed out, staring mesmerized at the Kuno estate wall across the street and a wide, open space covered by lawn. Suddenly his watch on his wrist vibrated with the five minute warning and it was all he could do to keep from fainting from the shock, only then realizing that he was hyperventilating to the point that he was going lightheaded. Easy, Hiroshi, he thought as he fought to control his breathing, Ranma's counting on you, don't blow it. For a moment his mind wandered back to time- and repetition-worn speculation on just how Nabiki's plan was supposed to help, but he quickly dismissed it as useless — he didn't think for a moment that he knew enough of the big picture, and it wasn't like he could actually talk about it with anyone that had answers. Nobody could, not without possibly implicating themselves — and anyone brought up on charges after this wouldn't be spending the rest of their lives as slaves, they'd end it shrieking out their pain as they were crucified.

He shuddered at the thought and realized he was hyperventilating again. For a distraction, he glanced around at the heterogeneous collection of people surrounding him — students, salarymen, men that had gotten their muscular builds from hard labor, many others with the sleekly hard muscles of martial artists, even a few housewives scattered throughout. None from the team that had helped him destroy the slave center's massive viewing screens, though, they'd been ordered to scatter themselves through the crowd to avoid drawing the attention of any ninjas that might have been tracking them earlier —

“Found you!”

Hiroshi glanced to the side and froze, face stiffening at the sight of his former best friend Daisuke standing beside him. “What are you doing here?” he growled.

“It wasn't exactly hard,” Daisuke replied with a shrug. “Just look out the window after the Cat Café exploded, then follow the people in the street.”

“No, what are you doing here?”

Daisuke stared at Hiroshi's cold glare for a moment before turning to stare at the estate wall across the street. “When I first heard about what had happened to Ranma-kun ... remember the stories we used to tell each other, about what it would be like to have Ranma-kun's girl-side at our beck and call?” Hiroshi flushed with shame and turned to also stare at the wall in front of them as Daisuke continued, “When `Ranko-chan' was sold ... it just seemed like more of the same, the talk about what Kuno-tono was getting out of his new slave, the auction pictures going around. And when you cut me off, stopped hanging around with me outside of school, stopped speaking to me altogether, it just seemed like you were a self-righteous hypocrite — until Sayuri-chan caught me ranting at Masahiro-kun about you and ripped into me about the difference between daydreams and real life, what it would be like if I found myself in Ranma-kun's position. After I got over my shock and actually thought about what she'd said, I realized she was right. Since then, I've been trying to work up the guts to tell you I was wrong. Then the Cat Café blew up, and ... well, this just seems like the place to be.”

Daisuke fell silent, and Hiroshi continued to stare at the wall for a long minute, his recent anger and disgust with his friend warring with memories of the good times before everything went wrong, guilt from memories of his own daydreams mixed in. Finally, he sighed and turned again to look at his friend. “You haven't had any training and you don't know what's going on, so when I charge, hold back for the third wave and just stay close.”

Daisuke glanced over at him, and grinned. “You got it, this time you're the boss.”

Hiroshi grinned back, and his watch buzzed against his wrist again ... one minute. Turning back to face the wall, he found himself counting down the seconds to the final signal as the shouting quickly died away ... and it was time. At least Sayuri-chan and Yuka-chan are out of this. He charged into the street, shouting something he instantly forgot as loudly as he could. Then he was across the street, up onto the lawn, and he felt his stomach drop as portals along the top of the wall popped open and a line of what looked like submachine guns without butts rose into view with their muzzles pointed at the night sky.

/\

Tucked away in the depths of the Kuno network, a program recognized the change of status in the Kuno defenses. It had been created long before by Nabiki on a whim after her then-schoolmate Tatewaki had foolishly allowed her access to his account long enough for her to create a backdoor. After she verified that his ascension from out of favor heir to actual lord of Nerima gave her access to the entire Kuno network, she updated and improved her little pipedream before setting it loose to hide within enemy territory and wait for her signal. That signal had come less than half an hour before, and now the activation of the automated defenses pulled the tripwire.

/\

The guns along the estate wall began to come level and the shouting all around Hiroshi suddenly had a panicked edge to it. But neither of those on either side of him broke off their charge, and then the panic making his heart pound turned to a relief just as gut-wrenching as the guns froze with their muzzles still pointed at the horizon. Behind him, a deep triumphant roar went up.

Hiroshi reached the wall and whirled around to see the second rank racing toward him, all large, husky men. As soon as they reached the wall they paired off, joining hands to form cradles. Hiroshi stepped out to face one of the pairs and leaped up, foot coming down in the cradle, and with a heave they threw him upward, high enough that he was able to grab the top of the wall and pull himself up to sit between two of the gun emplacements. He swung one leg over so that he was straddling the wall, then scooted to one side to make room for another teenager and looked back toward the “mob.”

The third rank was charging forward now, and Hiroshi's gaze fixed on Daisuke racing straight toward him. Daisuke leaped, his foot caught the hand-cradle of the men below his friend on the wall, and Hiroshi and his partner caught Daisuke's arms and pulled, and he was on the wall between them. People dropped down into the estate grounds on either side of them, and Hiroshi murmured, “Wait for me.” Daisuke nodded and dropped down to join the growing crowd on the inside, and Hiroshi and his partner turned back to catch the next in line.

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I got the bit about the dead security guard from a real-world military coup in Guatemala in the `80s. A presidential guard, finding himself surrounded by soldiers and away from cover, went for his gun and was shot to doll rags. He was the only fatality, and would have been a fine contender for a Darwin Award.