Tenchi Muyo Fan Fiction ❯ Ryakudatsu Muyo (No Need for Piracy) ❯ Kenage na Dakkai Muyou (No Need for Daring Rescues) ( Chapter 5 )

Chapter V

Kenage na Dakkai Muyou

(No Need for Heroic Rescues)

"I am not a hero. I just did what any decent person would have done."

-- Miep Gies (1909-)

The air shuddered with isometric forces as the formidable mass of Ryo-Ouki's starship form hovered, motionless to human perception, at an idling altitude of several meters. Minute fluctuations in the equilibrium between the Earth's gravity well and the ship's kinetic induction field generated a drawn out, shuddering thrum and produced turbulent but short-lived air currents which spiraled and wove across the ground below.

"Myaaaa!" complained the ship, impatiently.

"Well, you'll just have a wait a bit longer," answered Ryoko reprovingly, her arms crossed. "Personally, I'd rather leave her behind, but Tenchi insisted we should take her."

More accurately, Aeka had insisted on joining the group, and Tenchi had supported her argument on the grounds that she had been close childhood friends with the girl they were planning to rescue; and once that precedent was established, it was impossible to dissuade Sasami. Although the plan had been to leave that morning, the schedule had been pushed back to leave time for Aeka and Sasami to pack.

Aeka and Sasami arrived promptly at the newly appointed time, each carrying a valise, and both of them followed by a moving heap of luggage. Only after the bags were stowed away inside was a worn out Tenchi revealed, and Ryoko was latched onto him immediately.

"Poor Tenchi!" she cried, wrapping her arms around his head and clasping him tearfully to her chest, ignoring his struggle to resist. "Look at how she's already turning you into a porter, condemned to years of hard labor!"

"Unhand him at once!" Aeka grated furiously, while reaching quickly to cover Sasami's eyes. "If you hadn't noticed, Lord Tenchi hardly needs to handle any more baggage."

"Hey, you're the one treating him like a pack animal," Ryoko answered, and-never one to be shamed by charges of impudence or sauciness-smirked defiantly at Aeka.

"As for myself," she added, suggestively, "I'd have him doing things he'd like much better."

Aeka reddened at the implication, wishing for a second pair of hands to cover her sister's ears, as well-and perhaps a third, with which to throttle Ryoko-but resigned herself to only glaring fiercely. "Will you at least let him breathe?!"

"Nrgh... r-Ryoko!" Tenchi gasped in the most castigatory tone he could muster given the distraction, grasping her shoulders and pushing with all his might for air.

"Okay, okay," she sighed reluctantly, loosening her grip and hovering around to hold him from behind, pressed close against his back and grinning tauntingly over his shoulder. "You see how tired you got him, Aeka, forcing him to carry everything for you? If you're going to wear him out, you could at least do it nicely."

"Agh... cut it out already, Ryoko!" Tenchi objected embarassedly, trying to pry her hands off of himself. "And I offered to carry all those bags, so it's not really fair to pick a fight with Aeka over it..."

"But Tenchiiii-" Ryoko began, plaintively. Why are you taking her side? she wondered.

"Uh... hey, if we're going," he interrupted gently, "shouldn't get on board and start off quickly? I mean, we're already behind schedule, and everything."

Ryoko paused briefly at his less than surprising evasiveness, keeping her disappointment internal; she might be willing to put her pride on the line over him, but not without a chance of profit. "Yeah, you're right," she answered in a mischievous tone. "Just make sure you hold on really tight."

She grinned, grasping Tenchi close against her, as though squeezing out of him just one more moment of entertainment; she couldn't help but enjoy the way he got flustered, the way he so clearly liked it but struggled not to, the way Aeka lost instantaneously that prized self-control she was so haughty about.

"For the last time-" Aeka started, eyes blazing.

Ryoko laughed out loud, interrupting Aeka's furious reprimand, and released Tenchi as she turned in the air to face her Cabbit companion.

"Ready to go, Ryo-Ouki?!"

"Miyaaaaaaa!" replied the starship.

"Then bring us on board, and take off!"

"Myaa Myaaaa!" Ryo-Ouki answered, transporting her passengers on board in a flare of red light, and launched off into the sky at dozens of Earth gravities, leaving a shockwave in the air behind it.

* * * * *

When Asahi woke, a short time passed before she remembered the terrible situation she was in, captive to a dangerous outlaw with unknown intentions. Her head swam in a frenzy of fears and questions.

How long had she been out?

What was he planning to do with her?

Why had he taken her, rather than a member of the royal family?

What would end up happening to her dear Mimasaka?

She shook her head in a vain effort to clear it of her worries, but in her state of uncertainly, danger, and helplessness, it was a struggle to keep herself from weeping-a struggle at which she could feel herself slowly failing as the tension built within her and her breath caught in her tightening throat. She wiped at her face with the sleeve of her robes and tried, uselessly, to wish away the tears slowly welling in her eyes. Her situation was troubling enough without making it humiliating, as well.

"Shh, now," said a voice at the side of her bed. It was a distantly familiar voice, casual and prideful by nature, but sounding in a gentle tone. "I hope those tears aren't on my account."

Asahi looked up toward the source of the voice, and almost dived entirely under her covers when she laid eyes on him, but restrained herself with effort. She had only glimpsed him before-that much, she could remember, and it explained at least some of the nagging sense of familiarity-but now she had a better look at him, and it made her that much more uncomfortable.

Silently, she wished he was more frightening; she wished that had were ugly and terrible with leathery skin and tusks, like a real monster. But he was shockingly handsome, in a classical way; as a sculptor and aficionado of artwork, Asahi had an eye for form and detail, and this young man was a contradictory image. His features were almost regal, but his attitude was rakish; his raiment was formal bordering on military, but in an unorthodox, leather-heavy style, and his carriage was quite debonair.

His complexity and good looks were what made her uncomfortable, for it was hard to fear him in the simple, clean-cut way she knew she should, and that left her to worry whether she was thinking reasonably. When he flashed a grin at her, it seemed playful yet ultimately benign, and it left her unsure whether to be terrified or embarassed.

"W- who are you?" she stammered feebly as she came out of her reverie, peeking at him over the edge of her covers and keeping her face hidden as best she could for fear that she might blush-knowing that, having thought of it, it was inevitable.

"Captain Takeo Kobayashi," he answered, sitting in a chair close at her bedside. "Number one most wanted outlaw in the galaxy. Shh, now, don't look so worried, Asahi-chan. If I was planning to hurt you, we'd be well past that point, by now."

"And here," he added with a playful grin, pulling a handkerchief from up his embellished coat sleeve and handing it to her. "I hate to see such a pretty face stained with tears."

Asahi timidly accepted the handkerchief, murmuring an uncertain thanks, and dabbed at her eyes, covering the blush on her cheeks with the immaculate white cloth. Its pure whiteness was compromised only by the tastefully delicate silver embroidery along the very edge.

With her eyes dried, Asahi peered over the handkerchief to see the pirate still sitting motionlessly and watching her with a quiet thoughtfulness and a quasi-pensive expression halfway between amusement and profound contemplation.

"Why-" she began to ask, haltingly, finding her voice reluctant and timid with an apprehension more disabling than fear of bodily harm. "W-why do you stare at me like that...?"

Takeo casually smirked, returning instantly from the twilight inner realm he had inhabited between attention and introspection. "Why do I stare, Asahi-chan?" he echoed, and flashed half a bright, rakish grin like the muzzle flash of a warning shot fired across a ship's bow. "Well, since you asked, I only wait until you move that kerchief aside and let me decide for myself as to whether you're quite as pretty as I've heard tell-although I can assure you it's a near thing, and so far, certainly in your favor."

All the more resolutely, in response, Asahi held the shielding white cloth in place, feeling the dull crimson warmth of embarassment rising heavier in her face. Proper and demure as she was, her youth had been an exceptionally sheltered one, as well, and she had scarcely learned at all to think of herself as more than a girl. Although almost childlike in appearance and demeanor, preserved in the same manner as her peers Aeka and Sasami, she shared their centuries of age.

"You- you'll make me blush..." she murmured through the kerchief, half-truth as it was.

"Oh, will I?" Takeo laughed, good-humoredly, as the color risen in Asahi's face crested as high as her eyes, unconcealed. "But Asahi-chan, how better to be assured of your beauty? In fact, I swear to you sincerely that it'll be no trouble at all on my account to see you with a blush in your cheeks."

Asahi hesitated, only reddening further. "You swear," she responded timidly, "that you really intend no harm...?"

He rested formally his right hand over his left breast and grinned with a rakish charm.

"Pirate's honor."

* * * * *

Tenchi stood aboard Ryo-Ouki, watching stars drift into his peripheral vision from behind and gather slowly together in the distance ahead. They all wandered lazily toward a single, unexceptional point of light, each one moving at its own pace.

I've never been so far from home, he thought, and then laughed quietly at himself for it. It sounded like something he should think if he went to college in Okinawa or something; he knew he must have already been lightyears away, by then, and his sense of distance was made meaningless by the sheer scale. Kilometers, he could sort of grasp, but how could he fathom the length of a lightyear? He didn't even want to imagine the speed they must have been travelling at.

"It's amazing," he murmured, forgetting his immediate surroundings for the scenery.

"Mmm, isn't it, though?" purred a soft voice in his ear as arms wraped around him diagonally, and a soft body pressed close against his from behind. The voice was soft in as much as an enraged tiger's fur is soft, for Tenchi instantly felt an all too familiar warning of danger arc up from the base of his spine; but the brief, silent visceral cry arrived too late for any defense to be prepared.

"R-Ryoko...!"

"Come on, Tenchiiii," she cooed, either pleadingly or coquettishly. "Can't I even enjoy the view with you?"

Can't you do that from another window? he considered. Then, what's that got to do with grabbing me? Or maybe didn't you speed hundreds of years seeing this view?

Tenchi sighed and shook his head the least amount, discarding each dismissive response he thought of; even if she was too forward to handle, he still couldn't bring himself to knock her down like that when she was just being affectionate.

Even if it was totally unsolicited.

"Uh... yeah, I guess so, Ryoko."

He repressed another sigh in response to her gleeful reaction; there was nothing he could do to avoid cringing, but she didn't seem to respond to it, so Tenchi simply relaxed as much as he could and watched the stars flee into the distance behind Ryo-Ouki.

All the distance she's covered, the things she's seen-both of them, both Ryoko and Miss Aeka-and she wants to be near me; and me? I want to push her away when she gets close. Now there's something really amazing.

Or maybe, he thought, I'm just imagining all of it; maybe she's just playing, like a cat with a mouse. I know I didn't do anything to deserve getting surrounded by girls like these... and I'm sure I never asked for it!

"Tenchi?"

Blinking out of his reverie at the sound of Ryoko's voice carrying a tone of concern, he realized how tense he had grown, and made himself relax as best he could. Does she really act that well? he wondered. Could all of it just be a game?

"Uh- I'm fine, Ryoko. I've just really got a lot on my mind, that's all-the upcoming fight, and everything. Especially after all that talk about how dangerous this'll be, from training. You know?"

Ryoko's voice fell silent for a short time before answering; when it did, it was with only a hushed few words, but they meant far more by their tone and context than those words alone.

"I know, Tenchi," she answered with an uncharacteristically pure and sincere tenderness. "Just don't worry too much, all right?. I have faith in you."

Tenchi would have been deeply moved, but Ryoko's statement didn't have the chance to sink in entirely; he only got as far as blushing.

"You two should get a room, at this rate," observed Washuu, who hadn't been there-who hadn't, for that matter, boarded as far as anyone could tell-standing less than a foot away.

Ryoko fell to the floor with a CRASH, and Tenchi jumped away reflexively from the unexpected appearance.

"W-Washuu?!" Tenchi stammered in surprise.

Ryoko was on her feet again almost instantly, clutching the miniature scientist by the lapels of her vintage late-era Imperial Science Academy uniform.

"When did you get here?!" the pirate growled in vexation.

"Before we took off, obviously," Washuu replied coolly, green eyes unhesitant to meet golden, sparking that much more frustration.

"I know they say there are no stupid questions," she added, shaking her head disapprovingly, "but sometimes I really wonder."

"Why you little-" Ryoko began, twitching furiously with bright red arcs of plasma-lightning crackling around her, and resisted the impulse to throttle the redhead without entirely knowing why.

"What the hell are you doing here?!" she growled, instead.

"Research," Washuu answered, with a placid, almost childlike expression. "Are you done wrinkling my collar, yet?"

"Shit," Ryoko hissed under her breath offhandedly and released Washuu a little more roughly than necessary, although the latter took it entirely in stride, calmly straightening her creased lapels.

"This suit is nearly 20,000 years old," Washuu scolded casually. "You should be more careful with it, Ryoko." Ryoko crossed her arms and glared defiantly, ignoring the suggestion.

"Umm," Tenchi interjected, "so what are you here to research, anyway, Miss Washuu?"

"Just `Washuu,'" she corrected sternly. "In part, to observe how Ryoko performs under stress. So far, it's pretty depressing, especially for her mother."

Ryoko twitched and fumed quietly, off to the side.

"But there's the more pressing issue of a strange subspace disturbance; that transverse space-time geometry fluctuation decoupling I mentioned, all the way back in Chapter One."

Tenchi and Ryoko could only stare blankly as Washuu demolished the Fourth Wall.

"Anyway, I studied the phenomenon as much as I could from Earth, but I need to do some on-site investigation to get a complete picture of that subspace anomaly, and you just happen to be headed my way, so I hitched a ride."

"I'll probably regret this," Tenchi began, "but what's a `subspace anomaly,' and why's it important?"

Washuu smirked quietly, taking a short moment to bask in the glow of her own vast mastery of science, ready to be imparted to those thirsting for knowledge; then she snapped her fingers, and a projection screen dropped from nowhere, behind her.

"I'm glad you asked," she answered, swinging a pointer to indicate a diagram of a simple light blue plane on a black background.

"As you may know, but probably don't, even Earth's science has progressed to the point of beginning to understand our spacetime as being a four-dimensional membrane, or brane, within a series of higher dimensions, or superdimensions. If you think of three-dimensional space being analagous to this plane, here, then the space around it is the first superdimension, which is usually called subspace."

The image changed to one of Ryo-Ouki's starship form in the midst of a red-on-black grid.

"Now then, because energy equals mass times the square of the speed of light in vacuum, the faster you move, the more mass you gain from kinetic energy. That means that as you accelerate, you asymptotically approach a certain velocity-and that's the speed of light. But obviously, in a nation tens of thousands of lightyears from edge to edge, lightspeed just isn't fast enough."

The grid began, on one side of Ryo-Ouki's image, to buckle like bunched up cloth, and those wrinkles spread outward around it like ripples in a pond.

"The way most ships get around the lightspeed barrier is by manipulating subspace to create wrinkles in the natural brane. The ship thus slips in and out of four-dimensional spacetime; the bigger the wrinkles, the more normal space gets covered in a unit of time. The galaxy police use a related principle to create an artificial brane inside of subspace and tie a point on it to the natural brane, creating an almost inviolable prison."

Ryoko was fast asleep on Tenchi's shoulder. He rubbed his eyes, and tried to resist the vertigo of abject confusion.

"Um-"

"I'm not done yet," Washuu scolded.

"Err- yeah," Tenchi continued, "but could you break it down a little?"

"I am breaking it down," Washuu objected, scowling and crossing her arms. "But fine. The anomaly involved decoupled transverse subspace waves, which normally only occur in stardrive wake or near spinning black holes-but they appeared in a sharp, one-time burst, and I've been watching their echoes off of large gravity wells. It was almost like an artificial brane collapsing, but it had strange harmonics. Anyway, that's what I'm investigating."

"Okay," Tenchi answered. "One more question."

"Go ahead!" Washuu beamed enthusiastically.

"Do you have an aspirin?"

Ryo-Ouki shook as the great scientist in the universe collapsed with exasperation.

As if on cue, the habitable area within Ryo-Ouki suddenly began to flash with a bright, jarringly red ambient light, and Ryoko quickly snapped out of her lecture-induced stupor.

"Myaaa-myaaaaaaa!" announced the ship, as Washuu climbed dazedly to her feet.

"What's going on?" Tenchi asked, looking around at the commotion, not especially set at ease by Ryoko's expression.

She was grinning dangerously, obviously enjoying herself.

"Get ready, Tenchi! We're running the Mimasaka blockade!"

* * * * *

"Eh? Running the blockade, huh?"

Mimasaka's main unit hovered around the nefarious pirate, flitting about anxiously, almost frantically.

"Don't you understand?! According to files, that's the infamous space-pirate Ryo-Ouki, unseen for-"

"Yeah, about seven hundred years. So?" Takeo was relaxing unconcernedly in his hammock. "I've run more blockades than you could shake a stick at. No Jurai puns intended."

"Don't you know anything? Ryo-Ouki exterminated twenty-eight planets and sixty-nine colonies! How can you be so relaxed?!"

Takeo flashed a grin. "Because Ryo-Ouki works for the Demoness Pirate Ryoko. And I already wiped the floor with her. Glad you've been cooperating with me?"

Mimasaka fell silent for a moment in dumb shock, pausing to process that new information.

Then it hovered a little lower, shaken by growing worry for Asahi.

"W-what are you planning to do, then?"

"I'm planning to deal with it myself. There's no sense having you pick a fight with Ryo-Ouki, or trying to keep Ryoko from boarding, if she wants to. But don't worry, it's all going according to plan."

He flashed a rakish grin, which seemed to produce no great relief on Mimasaka's part.

"Well," the interface unit answered uneasily, "somehow that is still less than reassuring."

"Hahah! Don't be such a nervous nelly, eh Mimasaka? I promise I'll not allow Asahi-chan to be hurt in the upcoming exchange-on the condition that you'll apologize to her on my behalf."

"Apologize?" Mimasaka echoed as mockingly as it dared, and with its nervous energy channelled into a certain indignation. "Ryo-Ouki is at 100 million kilometers and rapidly closing. If you think you can clear yourself of this crime simply by-"

Takeo laughed heartily and shook his head. "Mimasaka, Mimasaka. I'll miss these little chats. But I'm afraid I'll have to ask you to perform a full higher functions diagnostic, now."

Mimasaka fell briefly silent.

"What? But do you not realize I will be incapacitated for hours? This is hardly the time-"

"That's an order. Start at once, or you'll be incapacitated until they find a way to fix a bullethole big enough to squeeze through. Careful, now, how you play your cards, or I'll have even more to apologize to Asahi-chan for."

The interface unit hung silently in the air for a moment, almost vibrating with frustration and outrage at its total impotence.

"Very well," it answered at length. After another brief pause, the crystaline interface unit went entirely silent, its soft radiance dulling to only the faintest impression of a glow.

It was a less than a minute later when the first of the expected guests burst into the open main deck from the residential section: Tenchi stood in the open door, clutching the Tenchi-ken in his hand.

"Well, Masaki," Takeo began convivially, "it's nice to see I didn't put too much of a damper on your heroic impulses. I'd be pretty badly disappointed if one little gunshot made a coward of you." He flashed a grin, leaning casually against the great tree at the center of the ship's habitation area.

"You're not getting away, this time!" Tenchi answered, trying to ignore the taunts. "You've got nowhere to go, now-there aren't any other ships close to Mimasaka, and you're surrounded, here."

Takeo chuckled and stepped away from the tree, spreading his arms to the sides. "Well, it looks like you've got me cornered, then, doesn't it? I guess all that's left is to come and subdue me, right?"

Tenchi scowled suspiciously. "Why don't you just give up already? Even if you're a criminal, I'd rather just see you arrested-but I'm not sure about Ryoko, or even Miss Aeka, after everything you-"

Tenchi stopped in midsentence, seeing Takeo flash a dangerously feral and strikingly familiar grin.

"Hah! So you did bring the Crown Princess. Well, I certainly appreciate you being so accomodating. Now, if you'll just step aside, and maybe point out where she's at-"

Tenchi tensed and glared, grasping the Master Key, the sword which bore his name, tightly with both hands as it flared to life. "I'm not letting you near Miss Aeka-or Ryoko!"

"Hahahah! Well, kid," the pirate answered, "you're welcome to come over here and stop me, if you really think you can. But if you don't get to it quick I'll get bored."

Tenchi paused. However much I hate this, I can't keep stalling, he thought, hesitating briefly-and then sprang forward, at last, with all his compressed tension, launching a crosswise slash at his opponent.

But Takeo only laughed mockingly, his own searing red energy sword forming just in time to deflect Tenchi's blade and beat it aside, followed by a syncopated kick which sent the young man staggering backward, into a panel on the wall; a section of floor slid open, although Tenchi scarcely noticed it at all. He coughed, struggling to regain his breath and to keep the Tenchi-ken from flickering out.

"You're never going to make me get serious until you do, Masaki," Takeo chided in a tone half of amusement and half of disappointment. "You should have that figured out pretty well, by this point. Now quit dithering, and either fight me or run and hide."

The pirate grinned with a carefree ferocity as he dashed forward almost in a blur, his blazing red weapon slicing through the air.

"Everything you do, Masaki! Everything you do, do it for real!"

Tenchi ducked aside as the attack left a mark across the panel he had stumbled into; he spun and slashed in a rising arc which Takeo parried, returning again quickly to the pursuit, pushing Tenchi back toward the door he had entered from.

"Every step, every strike, every block, every flight-place in each of these the value of your life, and laugh in the face of death!"

The outlaw's monologue fell poetically into step with the rhythm of the battle, switching fluidly from matching Tenchi's kenjutsu into a wildly flamboyant swashbuckling technique.

"If you're serious, then do everything with every fiber of your being, or you're as good as dead!"

Tenchi continued to fight desparately, tense like a coiled spring, slowly giving ground before his opponent's strength and speed. Damnit, Tenchi thought, he's right! This is just like what grandpa's been telling me- I'm overthinking instead of doing what I need to!

Willfully forgetting offense for the moment, Tenchi returned to what he had spent all that time practicing with his grandfather, letting his fear and tension and expectation slide away; he parried quickly, but cleanly rather than frantically; he defended against attacks he felt, rather than expected, and the Tenchi-ken danced a fierce triple-time tango with the pirate's blade.

Feeling his own balance and certainty, Tenchi began to hold his ground once again-and none too soon, for he found that he was just at the edge of the open space where the floor had opened earlier. Twice he parried, then feigned and struck to keep the pirate's weapon busy. As he felt the parry, he let himself slacken, and he moved as the riposte began:

With only the most cursory parry, he slipped around to the side and quickly behind his enemy. As he pivoted, he swung as though to set free the outlaw's head; when Takeo ducked-as Tenchi had felt sure he would-he gave his own syncopated kick, and sent the pirate tumbling into the open space in the floor. Now that he had a closer look, Tenchi saw a set of four wooden sculptures in that lowered area.

"Hahah! That's better!" laughed Takeo as he sprang off his free hand from the sub-floor and landed squarely on his feet. "Infinitely better. Now you're starting to impress me!"

"I'll give you something to be impressed by, you cocky bastard!" came a fierce cry from above as a great ball of arcing plasma blazed down into the depression in the floor, knocking Tenchi clean off his feet with the force of the resulting explosion.

"W-what-?!" coughed Tenchi as he looked about, brushing away some splinters. A large cube was rising up from under the smoldering sub-floor, and the remains of the statues were strewn all about the area; and a familiar victory laugh rang out as the source of the interruption revealed itself.

"Ryoko?!"

"Aaahahaha! How was that?!" the legendary demoness grinned as much girlishly as ferally but near bursting with pride, hands on her hips. "Now who's the greatest pirate, huh?!"

"Click," said a voice behind her.

Ryoko tensed.

"Pretend I have a revolver pointed at the back of your head," continued the gratingly familiar voice, "and that you just heard me pull the hammer back. Now pretend the bullet that revolver fires will go through an inch of hullmetal easier than I go through a liter of vodka. And don't try to teleport, because we both know I'll see it coming a lightyear away."

Tenchi half-rose, but stopped abruptly with a warning glance from a somewhat singed Takeo, who stood behind Ryoko with his pistol, the Havermeyer 15mm, aimed just as he'd insinuated.

"Just think, old lady," chuckled the pirate. "What I could do to your head right now would put Gallagher to shame, don't you think?"

Ryoko growled, but didn't move. "Shuttup!" was her sole response.

"Well played," Takeo answered sarcastically, with the laughter in his voice scarcely masked at all. "Well played."

"How the hell did you get out of there?!" she snarled, almost shaking with tension, but keeping still.

"Daetirian, old lady."

"Da-what-ian?"

"You don't know much, for such an ancient fossil."

Ryoko's fingers twitched, bright red arcs of plasma-lightning dancing up her arms.

"Damnit, let her go!" Tenchi exclaimed furiously. "She's not what you wanted! You wanted to fight me; so fight me! Are you a hotshot pirate, or just a cowardly bully?!"

Takeo glanced in his direction, for the briefest moment seeming entirely serious-but it was gone again in an instant, and he laughed.

"You're right, Masaki. This old bag of bones really isn't what I'm here for at all, and I don't need her now that she destroyed the lock to what I'm after. So I'd better get her out of the way, eh?"

He flashed a feral grin, flicked his thumb across one of an assortment of switches on his pistol, and casually pulled the trigger.

* * * * *

A forest in the night leaves no question as to why mankind is so very superstitious by nature. A forest in the night is a mirthless, alien landscape which births monsters and shadows and things the mind is unready to understand, in the time before light-and in the time after, those monsters and shadows and mysterious things remain. But they have taken up residence within the mind where they are all the stronger, for only the fullest light can subdue them.

A forest in the night is where Takeo stood, waiting. The forest's monsters and shadows did not quite affect him the way they did so many others; but then, while Takeo was many things, a normal man was certainly not one of them.

He stood quietly, reclining carelessly against a tree, and whistling to himself absentmindedly; Blow the Man Down, an old sea shanty from Earth, was what had come to mind, and so he whistled it as he pondered his scheme.

So far, it was going exactly as intended. He had retrieved the files from Mimasaka as planned, and the look on Tenchi Masaki's face had made all the effort Takeo had thus far expended worthwhile a hundred times over already; and things were only just getting good!

"Oi, you can stop lurking, there," the pirate said, discarding his train of thought, "or I'll start to think you're trying to look at my ass."

A tenebrous and near-formless figure drifted out from the shadows-followed by a second smaller form, and then a third, larger.

"You guys just live to do that, don't you."

"I am Hishima," said the mid-sized figure, plainly ignoring Takeo's accusative banter. "These are Mushima and Takashima."

"Gyeh," commented Takashima, the largest of the three.

"Yes," Hishima agreed: "Business. You have the files?"

"I said I have them when I called you, didn't I?" Takeo answered in an affronted tone. "Are you implying you don't have faith in me, gentlemen? After all, trust is the essential foundation of trade, and- well, if you, my business parters, can't bring yourselves to trust me-"

Hishima, having not the slightest interest in nugatose chatter, calmly but inhesitantly interrupted once satisfied that the pirate's monologue was going nowhere of consequence.

"Where are they?"

"Who?" Takeo blinked, hands clasped behind his head.

"Stop being an idiot!" grated Mushima irately.

"Well, if you're going to cop an attitude-"

"Enough," interrupted Hishima. "I apologize for Mushima, but we are not here to be involved in foolishness. If you are not here to conduct business, then you are wasting our time."

Takeo smirked and shook his head.

"Fine, fine," the pirate sighed, "be that way. But you're half right. I'm not here to do business with you at all."

"Why you-" Mushima glared from under his cowl, looking ready to pounce, but for Hishima's arm reaching across to restrain him.

"There's just one person I'm going to be doing business with, my fine lads," Takeo replied with a grin; "and that's your boss."

He paused just long enough to let them anticipate.

"Professor Yume."