DementorsKiss
Jul 25, 2004, 11:45 PM
Hi guys, I'm back from the biannual visitation of family with a crapload more of my story, part of it written with pen and paper because I don't own a laptop yet wanted to write while I was away from my computer. This is how dedicated I am. http://www.pso-world.com/psoworld/images/phpbb/icons/smiles/icon_razz.gif
Part Two: Desperation
By the way, the opinions expressed by CRAZY OLD MAN are not my own. He's just a CRAZY OLD MAN, after all. Oh yes, and the CRAZY OLD MAN makes weapons, so I have made a few guns up.
Emi didn't have a very restful sleep that night, however. It wasn't that the bed in her room wasn't comfortable enough (because it was), it was simply the fact that nothing felt comfortable anymore. Instead of feelings, a superior shell of numbness came over her...either that or it was just some pain shining through. Either way, she was awake at 8:00 am, wandering the halls, bags forming under her eyes from lack of sleep, yawning and looking for a good cup of coffee. She was still wearing Sam's scrubs, however, because these were the only clothes she had. There was a convenient little cafeteria inside the complex, and she sat at a table meant for four by herself, stirring her too-hot cup of coffee with a feeble wooden stirrer and adding creamer every so often to no avail. She didn't feel hungry anymore, because her body was not yet reacquainted with the fact that it was not going to be nourished directly through the bloodstream anymore and her biological clock was out of whack anyway. She fell asleep right there, her head on the table, when Akira walked in, followed by Julian.
"I'm trying to tell you that my sword is superior to...oh my god." Julian said when he lay eyes upon Emi, sleeping there.
"Your sword is superior to God?" Akira asked with shock.
"No, Akira, it's not...look." Julian pointed to Emi. "Doesn't that shock of black hair look too familiar?" He slowly crept up to her and took a peek at all of her head. "Yeah, it's her. Emi."
"Emi, what's she doing here? She needs to be in the hospital!" Akira pointed out.
"I realize that," Julian replied stubbornly. "I feel bad about this, Emi, but..." He shook her slightly, which didn't work to awaken her, so he shook her a bit harder and she was jarred from her slumber, and spilt her coffee by accident.
"GAH! Wha'dya want?" she asked groggily, putting her eyes back into focus. "Oh! It's you two."
"Yeah, Emi, it is...and we want to know what you're doing snoozing in our cafeteria," Akira asked her.
"I moved in," she replied. "Under a pseudonym."
"When did you move in?" Julian asked, more than slightly shocked.
"Last night. Do you guys have any clothes I can wear? I don't particularly like wearing the clothing of a man I killed." Emi pulled on the collar of Sam's scrubs.
"Um...sure," Julian said with a shrug.
---
"Mmm. You guys really know how to do coffee," Emi said, satisfied, as she drank a properly-brewed cup of coffee. "So why do you guys live together?" She wiped some of the coffee off her upper lip.
"We're roommates," Akira replied.
"That doesn't help her any, Akira," Julian said with a slight snarl on the end of the sentence. "Emi, do you remember five years ago?"
"Too well, why?" Emi asked between sips of coffee.
"You were eighteen, right?" Julian asked with a nod.
"Yeah..."
"Well, Akira here was only sixteen, whereas I was seventeen then. Hell, it's not even Akira's birthday yet, but I was born in April so I get a nice early birthday. So do the math. I'm twenty-two now and he's twenty," Julian said.
"College age," Emi muttered.
"Exactly! How did you know this?" Akira asked, seeming slightly embarrassed about being the baby of the group.
"Guard told me." Emi drank some more coffee.
"Okay, so now you tell us everything about what happened last night, how you got from being comatose to being here," Julian demanded.
"All right. After you two left, well way after, Sam comes into the room--"
"Which explains why you've got his nametag on how?" Akira queried, raising his eyebrow.
"Shut up, Akira, she'll get to it!" Julian told Akira, waving his hand violently in his direction.
"So Sam comes in along with this really greasy old man who won't stop whistling. I'm still pretending to be in my coma because I need to know what's going on here, then Sam tells Mister Greasy that the price is 5,000 Meseta." Emi snickered.
"For what?" Akira asked.
"SHUT UP!" Julian screamed.
"For me," Emi told the two obviously curious men.
"Oh, you mean to bury you?" Akira asked.
"No, to fuck me." The room went uncomfortably silent. "Thankfully, Greasy knew that self-defense is number one and had a switchblade, which I used on both him and Sam. I stole Sam's scrubs because I needed something nice to wear, hospital gowns are not nice, and I saw a wheelchair waiting there so I crawled into it, then down to Sam's car. I got in the back seat and willed my limbs to resume movement after fifteen of the worst hours of my conscious life, then started driving only to find that it's a stick shift."
"You never got taught how to drive a stick," Julian observed.
"That's right, so I put it in fifth gear thinking since that was the highest it was the best to drive with--obviously wrong, as the car died on me and told me to check the gears. So I walked here, and it hurt like hell because I wasn't used to walking. Any questions?" Emi's eyes surveyed Julian and Akira silently.
"Are you just going to wear those scrubs forever?" Akira asked.
"No, I'm not, which leads to my next question. Until I get some more Meseta and get my feet back on the ground, can I borrow some of you guys' clothes? Something of yours is bound to fit. Akira, you've got a small waist, I'll probably fit into jeans of your size, whereas Julian--I'd fit into your shirts," Emi told the men, pointing to each of them as she mentioned them.
"How do you know this?" Julian asked, just plain shocked.
"I don't know, but anything is better than these, so give me a break and give me some clothes!" Emi's face changed to displaying an angered expression.
"All right, all right...as for your training, though. As long as you live here you kind of have to go through training, or else they'll kick you out and force you to go to a place where you have to pay rent, and you don't want that. Here, we'll take you down to the facility as soon as you change clothes," Julian offered.
---
Now wearing a grey tank top and slightly baggy black pants with a belt, Emi shuffled behind Julian and Akira as they headed for the training facility, which required a trip on a small bus fit for about twelve people to another building nearby.
"Don't be nervous," Julian told Emi.
"Don't lie to her, the guy who works here is fucking crazy! He tore me apart in Korean or something for about five hours and...urrrgh, he's awful," Akira added.
"Don't listen to Akira, he's just bullshitting you to try and scare you," Julian assured Emi, but it turned out that Akira was more correct as the bus stopped at the training facility, which was built in the style of a Shinto shrine.
"Now, we can't stay with you for some reason, but when you're done just hop back on the twelve-person bus and eventually it ends up at the residential area." Julian paused. "Good luck, Emi." With that, the two men left to try to catch the bus again and Emi watched them leave until she was sure they wouldn't come back, then went inside.
"Hello? Is anyone here?" she asked nobody in particular, as the inside of the shrine was about as large as a typical office's break room and there were no lights on anywhere. "Anyone?"
"Ah, someone's here," an old male voice observed in Cantonese as he snapped his fingers and a Foie spell lit up a torch, illuminating Emi for the old man to see and for her to see him. He was a few inches shorter than she was, whatever was left of his hair was hidden underneath a skull cap, he had a scraggly grey beard and wore a full kimono with the collars turned the wrong way, the way Emi knew people wore kimono when going to funerals. She was slightly intimidated by this. "An Asian, huh? But still a woman...not fit for anything...What language do you speak?" he asked, still talking in Cantonese.
"Not whatever you're speaking," Emi replied in English.
"English...intersting," the man observed in Cantonese. "Tell me," he added, switching to Mandarin. "You speak Mandarin?"
"Huh?" By now, Emi was plain confused.
"I have no pity for you!" The man spat. "Do you speak Japanese?" he asked in Japanese.
"Yes," Emi replied in Japanese with a nod.
"TOO BAD, BECAUSE I DON'T!" he screamed in Japanese. "I FUCKING HATE JAPS AND THEIR BIG HEADS!! I will speak to you in English, although it pains me to know you are Asian but of the wrong ancestry, so now I must speak to you in a third-rate language meant for round-eye." He cleared his throat, then switched to English. "So, what is your name?"
"Sam Nakagawa," Emi replied.
"Sam, that is a name meant for a man, not a frail little girl such as you. Tell me, why did your parents name you Sam?" The old man glared at Emi.
"They named me Samantha," she lied through gritted teeth.
"Ah, a girl's name, fitting for a pathetic scum like you," the old man said dismissively.
"Sir, may I ask you something?" Emi asked feebly.
"NO! But now that I am speaking to you, and you will speak when spoken to, yes. What is it, Sam?"
"Why must you insist on calling me a scum without knowing anything about my background? Like the fact that I've been comatose for five years, I have a plate in my skull, and my child's been kidnapped?" Emi asked, pointing to her temple when she mentioned her plate.
"Why? Because...BECAUSE I DO NOT CARE! I am not your psychologist! Go cry on someone else's shoulder. I am here to teach fighting, not crying! Now, tell me, what is it you want to be?"
"I'm sorry?"
"What is it you want to be, Hunter, Ranger, or Force?" the old man asked, taking on a tone that adults used on very young children usually when asking them about what ice cream they liked best.
"Ranger," Emi replied sternly.
"A stern reply! Very good!"
"Really?" The light at the end of the tunnel was starting to become visible to Emi.
"NO! I was joking! So you want to be a Ranger, huh?"
"Yes, sir."
"I HATE Rangers! They are so pathetic! They don't even race bravely into the battle, but prefer to stand in the back and shoot random things. I hate Forces, too. The only good ones are Hunters. I admire their courage. You Rangers, though, are cowards! Not to mention women Rangers!" The old man was waving his finger so often that it was beginning to ache.
"Why must you despise women so?" There went the light at the end of the tunnel, as if it never existed.
"Why? Because they are the weaker sex, meant to do menial work and produce children, not fight battles or kill anything. However, this old face has seen many a cultural revolution, and this latest one makes me want to throw up! Women's rights, who would have thought? Unless, of course, they are fighting for a valiant cause. Why do you wish to fight?"
"Revenge. I want revenge on the man who tried to kill me. Is that a good enough story?" Emi asked, raising her eyebrow.
"NO! But it interests me. Who was the man who tried--and failed--to kill you?" the old man asked, and when he said tried and failed, he seemed genuinely disappointed that Brad failed.
"The father of my child," Emi said sadly, not trying to mask any emotion anymore.
"He wanted to kill you why?"
"I wish I knew," Emi continued. "I have a reason to believe he kidnapped my child, too. I want my child back, and then I want bloody satisfying revenge on him and his minions." She chanced a glance at the old man, who was nodding slightly.
"Oh, I'm sorry, I almost fell asleep during your little pity story there!" he told her, and Emi's heart sank. "But...I am still intrigued by your story. Please, impress me with gun skills."
"Therein lies the problem, sir. I am not very proficient with guns, which is why I sought your help. However, if you are unwilling to help me, I will go seek help elsewhere, maybe from a Japanese man..." A smirk punctuated Emi's sentence.
"THAT I will not tolerate! You women and your wiles and deceit. You have tricked me into training you. You will satisfy my requirements or face grave consequences. Now I will go retrieve a suitable weapon. You say your mission is revenge, so I shall find you a nice powerful one..." The old man exited the room through a door Emi couldn't see, she heard a few clattering noises, then the old man emerged holding a gun. He lit another torch with a Foie spell and handed her the gun to examine. She took the gun from him and grasped the handle tightly. The gun was a smooth, shiny black with a long body and a little viewfinder for her to use. She held the gun as if to fire it and squinted her right eye to look inside the crosshairs and nodded in acceptance.
"I like it. What's it called?"
"Master's Sniper 440-Z," the old man said proudly, as if describing one of his grandchildren to a passerby. "It is very strong, however, but there is no kickback! It is perfect for someone as frail as you. Come, let us step outside to the firing range." He led Emi out to a firing range, which was really just a clearing with some stone platforms there. "Since you are a Ranger, you must learn to shoot from far away." He snapped his fingers and tin cans appeared atop the platforms. "You will shoot these until you have satisfied me, and only then will you be ready."
"Do I get a break?" Emi asked, getting ready to shoot.
"Break? What is this break? It's a new concept to me. You work until I am satisfied!" The old man spat on the ground again as Emi assumed a firing stance that was apparently unsatisfactory, as she was moved like a clay statue until her stance was good enough, and this took up a good twenty minutes because of the old man's unbelievably vague descriptions of how to move her limbs. Once that was finished with, she squinted into the crosshairs until the first of ten cans was inside it, then fired. A small Photon blast emerged with a 'pow!' sound, then hit the can on its lip and it tumbled over. "You hit things right on the head, I see. NOT satisfactory! You must hit their vital organs!"
"To be honest, sir, I believe that I would know the brain is a very vital organ." To make her point clearer, Emi knocked on the metal plate in her head and it made a clang sound. "May I continue?"
Seven agonizing hours later, the shots Emi produced were satisfactory.
"I am impressed, Sam," the old man told Emi. "You, a Japanese woman Ranger, have managed to impress me in only seven hours. This will be noted! You may keep the Master's Sniper. May you put it to good use." He bowed to her, who bowed deeper with her hands clasped together to him.
"Thank you, sir," she said with another deep bow as she left the weird Shinto shrine, Master's Sniper in hand, and waited for the bus back home.
---
"A Master's Sniper 440-Z?!" Both Julian and Akira were shocked beyond explanation when Emi returned, beaming and holding her sniper.
"Didn't he stop making those?" Akira asked Julian, who nodded slightly. "Emi...you got the crazy old man to make you a Master's Sniper 440-Z model!"
"And that has what significance?" Emi asked.
"He quit making those. In fact, he usually gives Rangers pretty shoddily-made guns, and us Forces get crappy staffs. I had to buy a staff at a pawn shop and it was so much better than what he gave me!" Akira growled angrily. "My staff...had the most terrible accuracy. Did he mention how much he hates Japanese people?"
"A few times," Emi replied. "I seemed to impress him somehow, I think personally that it was my metal plate that horrified him." She tapped her plate once more. "Maybe this thing is good luck?"
"I can't believe you got a Master's Sniper! Can I look at it?" Julian asked.
"No," Emi replied sternly. "You can look with your eyes, not with your hands." She allowed both Julian and Akira to eye the gun only when the trio returned to her bare-bones apartment. Since she was not rooming with anyone else, her space was smaller than Julian and Akira's space. The door opened up to a kitchenette on one side and a living room on the other, then a small hallway led to the only bathroom and bedroom in the house. There was also a closet for good measure, but the decor was plain white, the way the government built it in the first place. The only furniture was the bed in her only bedroom and a couch in the living room, as well as bathroom fixtures. There was no oven, microwave, fridge, or any other kitchen appliances, no television, nothing but a damned bed and couch.
"Emi, this is quite possibly the saddest little apartment I have ever seen," Akira said sternly as he entered.
"It pains me to look at this," Julian added.
"Hey, at least it's free," Emi interjected, placing her Master's Sniper in her lap.
"It may be free, but it's shitty, Emi, and we're going to change that," Julian offered. "Akira and I are going to decorate this place."
"While you can't paint the walls, it's in the rules, everything else is free game. You need a home to come to, not a nasty hotel room," Akira said with a smile. "While we're working on your room, you can stay at our place. The couch in the living room becomes one bitchin' bed, and we just got satellite!"
He smiled like a little boy in a candy store.
"Thanks, you guys, but..." Emi began, trailing off.
"But what? You've totally missed out on higher education by being in a coma, and as far as we know you don't have any money..." Julian began, then saw Emi's eyes light up. "You have money?"
"I might. Unless he's changed it sometime in the last five years, I know his bank account number." The smirk on Emi's face made her cheekbones ache.
"How are you going to pass as him, though? He's...well, more male, obviously," Akira said tensely, trying his best not to offend Emi.
"I won't, I'll use online banking. Duh, don't you two know anything? Do you two have a computer?" Emi asked with glee.
"Do we?" Akira and Julian asked in unison. "Emi, come over."
Master's Sniper in tow, Emi followed Akira and Julian to their apartment on the tenth floor. Julian handed her a pristine white laptop and she logged on to First Bank's website, then went to Account Management.
"Name..." she muttered. "Bradley Summers...Account number 426-773-1235...sign in...yes! Success!!!" She grinned brightly when she saw what the account held. "Look at this, he's got 9,999,999 Meseta in here!"
"Rich bitch," Julian muttered. "Are you going to take it all?"
"Fuck no, that's too suspicious. I'll deduct...100,000 for now. That won't look too suspicious, will it?" Emi asked as she typed in a few commands and withdrew a big 100,000 Meseta that could be picked up, no questions asked, at the First Bank.
"All I want to know is why did he give you his account number?" Julian asked.
"He didn't. I got it from him. When your whole career is based around lying and sneaking and stealing, these kinds of things are just second nature. Now what is this about possibly decorating my bare-bones place?"
Sure enough, Emi spent the night sleeping on the couch, but her body was still out of whack when it came to functions like eating and sleeping, so she wasn't getting too much shut-eye. Instead she amused herself by watching the satellite TV. She was on a news channel and at the bottom of the screen it said 3:16 AM when she heard a door opening and feet walking down the hall towards her. The glow of the TV illuminated Julian's face for a few seconds, just long enough for her to identify him.
"Can't sleep, huh?" he asked her as he walked into the kitchen.
"Nope, my body's still not used to actively having to regulate sleeping and eating for me. It's still used to being fed through I.V."
"That's too bad..." Julian trailed off as he peeked inside the refrigerator.
"Hey, Julian, what did I do?" Emi asked, looking in Julian's direction.
"What do you mean?" Julian brought out a white styrofoam box from the fridge, opened it, sniffed it, then quickly threw it in the trash can.
"What did I do wrong? Did I deserve what happened to me?"
"Of course you didn't, Emi, I know you wanted to just become a mother and have a family and a career." Julian looked back inside the fridge.
"Shit happens, I suppose," Emi added with a nod. "I just don't know why everything happened to me at once."
"While everything happened to you at once, you know you're going to get revenge, right?" Julian found a small bowl of ice cream and started to finish it off.
"You're right...at least I hope I get revenge. Sam may be gone, but Monette always put up a good fight, and Keito has a heart made of ice, Kayoko didn't stop even though she knew very well that I was with child, and Brad is just fucking insane."
"Did he know the child was his?"
"I'm not sure about that. I was 99% sure, but Mom forced me into getting the DNA test. Damn day of mourning, if only that hadn't happened maybe I wouldn't be all fucked-up like this." Emi tapped her plate and it clanged.
"That can't be good for you," Julian pointed out, using his spoon to point at Emi. "Tapping your plate."
"Why not? People tap their skulls all the time, and this is like a replacement of a skull, so it's all good, right?" Emi smiled brightly.
"I guess? But hey, now that your training is over, you can go get your Hunter's License and then you can come down to Ragol with us. You've always wanted to see Ragol, haven't you?" Julian asked, trying to cheer Emi up.
"I have. For all I know, the rest of the group could be hiding down there somewhere, waiting for me."
"And the only way you'll ever find out if that's true or not is to go down to Ragol." Julian ate a big spoonful of ice cream, then paused. "Before you ask, yes we'll come with you. You don't have to go alone." He smiled at her.
"Great...I don't want to have to go alone, I don't know what might happen to me. Maybe I'll get shot in the other side of the head?" She let a feeble laugh escape her mouth as Julian said good night and quickly went back to his own room.
Part Two: Desperation
By the way, the opinions expressed by CRAZY OLD MAN are not my own. He's just a CRAZY OLD MAN, after all. Oh yes, and the CRAZY OLD MAN makes weapons, so I have made a few guns up.
Emi didn't have a very restful sleep that night, however. It wasn't that the bed in her room wasn't comfortable enough (because it was), it was simply the fact that nothing felt comfortable anymore. Instead of feelings, a superior shell of numbness came over her...either that or it was just some pain shining through. Either way, she was awake at 8:00 am, wandering the halls, bags forming under her eyes from lack of sleep, yawning and looking for a good cup of coffee. She was still wearing Sam's scrubs, however, because these were the only clothes she had. There was a convenient little cafeteria inside the complex, and she sat at a table meant for four by herself, stirring her too-hot cup of coffee with a feeble wooden stirrer and adding creamer every so often to no avail. She didn't feel hungry anymore, because her body was not yet reacquainted with the fact that it was not going to be nourished directly through the bloodstream anymore and her biological clock was out of whack anyway. She fell asleep right there, her head on the table, when Akira walked in, followed by Julian.
"I'm trying to tell you that my sword is superior to...oh my god." Julian said when he lay eyes upon Emi, sleeping there.
"Your sword is superior to God?" Akira asked with shock.
"No, Akira, it's not...look." Julian pointed to Emi. "Doesn't that shock of black hair look too familiar?" He slowly crept up to her and took a peek at all of her head. "Yeah, it's her. Emi."
"Emi, what's she doing here? She needs to be in the hospital!" Akira pointed out.
"I realize that," Julian replied stubbornly. "I feel bad about this, Emi, but..." He shook her slightly, which didn't work to awaken her, so he shook her a bit harder and she was jarred from her slumber, and spilt her coffee by accident.
"GAH! Wha'dya want?" she asked groggily, putting her eyes back into focus. "Oh! It's you two."
"Yeah, Emi, it is...and we want to know what you're doing snoozing in our cafeteria," Akira asked her.
"I moved in," she replied. "Under a pseudonym."
"When did you move in?" Julian asked, more than slightly shocked.
"Last night. Do you guys have any clothes I can wear? I don't particularly like wearing the clothing of a man I killed." Emi pulled on the collar of Sam's scrubs.
"Um...sure," Julian said with a shrug.
---
"Mmm. You guys really know how to do coffee," Emi said, satisfied, as she drank a properly-brewed cup of coffee. "So why do you guys live together?" She wiped some of the coffee off her upper lip.
"We're roommates," Akira replied.
"That doesn't help her any, Akira," Julian said with a slight snarl on the end of the sentence. "Emi, do you remember five years ago?"
"Too well, why?" Emi asked between sips of coffee.
"You were eighteen, right?" Julian asked with a nod.
"Yeah..."
"Well, Akira here was only sixteen, whereas I was seventeen then. Hell, it's not even Akira's birthday yet, but I was born in April so I get a nice early birthday. So do the math. I'm twenty-two now and he's twenty," Julian said.
"College age," Emi muttered.
"Exactly! How did you know this?" Akira asked, seeming slightly embarrassed about being the baby of the group.
"Guard told me." Emi drank some more coffee.
"Okay, so now you tell us everything about what happened last night, how you got from being comatose to being here," Julian demanded.
"All right. After you two left, well way after, Sam comes into the room--"
"Which explains why you've got his nametag on how?" Akira queried, raising his eyebrow.
"Shut up, Akira, she'll get to it!" Julian told Akira, waving his hand violently in his direction.
"So Sam comes in along with this really greasy old man who won't stop whistling. I'm still pretending to be in my coma because I need to know what's going on here, then Sam tells Mister Greasy that the price is 5,000 Meseta." Emi snickered.
"For what?" Akira asked.
"SHUT UP!" Julian screamed.
"For me," Emi told the two obviously curious men.
"Oh, you mean to bury you?" Akira asked.
"No, to fuck me." The room went uncomfortably silent. "Thankfully, Greasy knew that self-defense is number one and had a switchblade, which I used on both him and Sam. I stole Sam's scrubs because I needed something nice to wear, hospital gowns are not nice, and I saw a wheelchair waiting there so I crawled into it, then down to Sam's car. I got in the back seat and willed my limbs to resume movement after fifteen of the worst hours of my conscious life, then started driving only to find that it's a stick shift."
"You never got taught how to drive a stick," Julian observed.
"That's right, so I put it in fifth gear thinking since that was the highest it was the best to drive with--obviously wrong, as the car died on me and told me to check the gears. So I walked here, and it hurt like hell because I wasn't used to walking. Any questions?" Emi's eyes surveyed Julian and Akira silently.
"Are you just going to wear those scrubs forever?" Akira asked.
"No, I'm not, which leads to my next question. Until I get some more Meseta and get my feet back on the ground, can I borrow some of you guys' clothes? Something of yours is bound to fit. Akira, you've got a small waist, I'll probably fit into jeans of your size, whereas Julian--I'd fit into your shirts," Emi told the men, pointing to each of them as she mentioned them.
"How do you know this?" Julian asked, just plain shocked.
"I don't know, but anything is better than these, so give me a break and give me some clothes!" Emi's face changed to displaying an angered expression.
"All right, all right...as for your training, though. As long as you live here you kind of have to go through training, or else they'll kick you out and force you to go to a place where you have to pay rent, and you don't want that. Here, we'll take you down to the facility as soon as you change clothes," Julian offered.
---
Now wearing a grey tank top and slightly baggy black pants with a belt, Emi shuffled behind Julian and Akira as they headed for the training facility, which required a trip on a small bus fit for about twelve people to another building nearby.
"Don't be nervous," Julian told Emi.
"Don't lie to her, the guy who works here is fucking crazy! He tore me apart in Korean or something for about five hours and...urrrgh, he's awful," Akira added.
"Don't listen to Akira, he's just bullshitting you to try and scare you," Julian assured Emi, but it turned out that Akira was more correct as the bus stopped at the training facility, which was built in the style of a Shinto shrine.
"Now, we can't stay with you for some reason, but when you're done just hop back on the twelve-person bus and eventually it ends up at the residential area." Julian paused. "Good luck, Emi." With that, the two men left to try to catch the bus again and Emi watched them leave until she was sure they wouldn't come back, then went inside.
"Hello? Is anyone here?" she asked nobody in particular, as the inside of the shrine was about as large as a typical office's break room and there were no lights on anywhere. "Anyone?"
"Ah, someone's here," an old male voice observed in Cantonese as he snapped his fingers and a Foie spell lit up a torch, illuminating Emi for the old man to see and for her to see him. He was a few inches shorter than she was, whatever was left of his hair was hidden underneath a skull cap, he had a scraggly grey beard and wore a full kimono with the collars turned the wrong way, the way Emi knew people wore kimono when going to funerals. She was slightly intimidated by this. "An Asian, huh? But still a woman...not fit for anything...What language do you speak?" he asked, still talking in Cantonese.
"Not whatever you're speaking," Emi replied in English.
"English...intersting," the man observed in Cantonese. "Tell me," he added, switching to Mandarin. "You speak Mandarin?"
"Huh?" By now, Emi was plain confused.
"I have no pity for you!" The man spat. "Do you speak Japanese?" he asked in Japanese.
"Yes," Emi replied in Japanese with a nod.
"TOO BAD, BECAUSE I DON'T!" he screamed in Japanese. "I FUCKING HATE JAPS AND THEIR BIG HEADS!! I will speak to you in English, although it pains me to know you are Asian but of the wrong ancestry, so now I must speak to you in a third-rate language meant for round-eye." He cleared his throat, then switched to English. "So, what is your name?"
"Sam Nakagawa," Emi replied.
"Sam, that is a name meant for a man, not a frail little girl such as you. Tell me, why did your parents name you Sam?" The old man glared at Emi.
"They named me Samantha," she lied through gritted teeth.
"Ah, a girl's name, fitting for a pathetic scum like you," the old man said dismissively.
"Sir, may I ask you something?" Emi asked feebly.
"NO! But now that I am speaking to you, and you will speak when spoken to, yes. What is it, Sam?"
"Why must you insist on calling me a scum without knowing anything about my background? Like the fact that I've been comatose for five years, I have a plate in my skull, and my child's been kidnapped?" Emi asked, pointing to her temple when she mentioned her plate.
"Why? Because...BECAUSE I DO NOT CARE! I am not your psychologist! Go cry on someone else's shoulder. I am here to teach fighting, not crying! Now, tell me, what is it you want to be?"
"I'm sorry?"
"What is it you want to be, Hunter, Ranger, or Force?" the old man asked, taking on a tone that adults used on very young children usually when asking them about what ice cream they liked best.
"Ranger," Emi replied sternly.
"A stern reply! Very good!"
"Really?" The light at the end of the tunnel was starting to become visible to Emi.
"NO! I was joking! So you want to be a Ranger, huh?"
"Yes, sir."
"I HATE Rangers! They are so pathetic! They don't even race bravely into the battle, but prefer to stand in the back and shoot random things. I hate Forces, too. The only good ones are Hunters. I admire their courage. You Rangers, though, are cowards! Not to mention women Rangers!" The old man was waving his finger so often that it was beginning to ache.
"Why must you despise women so?" There went the light at the end of the tunnel, as if it never existed.
"Why? Because they are the weaker sex, meant to do menial work and produce children, not fight battles or kill anything. However, this old face has seen many a cultural revolution, and this latest one makes me want to throw up! Women's rights, who would have thought? Unless, of course, they are fighting for a valiant cause. Why do you wish to fight?"
"Revenge. I want revenge on the man who tried to kill me. Is that a good enough story?" Emi asked, raising her eyebrow.
"NO! But it interests me. Who was the man who tried--and failed--to kill you?" the old man asked, and when he said tried and failed, he seemed genuinely disappointed that Brad failed.
"The father of my child," Emi said sadly, not trying to mask any emotion anymore.
"He wanted to kill you why?"
"I wish I knew," Emi continued. "I have a reason to believe he kidnapped my child, too. I want my child back, and then I want bloody satisfying revenge on him and his minions." She chanced a glance at the old man, who was nodding slightly.
"Oh, I'm sorry, I almost fell asleep during your little pity story there!" he told her, and Emi's heart sank. "But...I am still intrigued by your story. Please, impress me with gun skills."
"Therein lies the problem, sir. I am not very proficient with guns, which is why I sought your help. However, if you are unwilling to help me, I will go seek help elsewhere, maybe from a Japanese man..." A smirk punctuated Emi's sentence.
"THAT I will not tolerate! You women and your wiles and deceit. You have tricked me into training you. You will satisfy my requirements or face grave consequences. Now I will go retrieve a suitable weapon. You say your mission is revenge, so I shall find you a nice powerful one..." The old man exited the room through a door Emi couldn't see, she heard a few clattering noises, then the old man emerged holding a gun. He lit another torch with a Foie spell and handed her the gun to examine. She took the gun from him and grasped the handle tightly. The gun was a smooth, shiny black with a long body and a little viewfinder for her to use. She held the gun as if to fire it and squinted her right eye to look inside the crosshairs and nodded in acceptance.
"I like it. What's it called?"
"Master's Sniper 440-Z," the old man said proudly, as if describing one of his grandchildren to a passerby. "It is very strong, however, but there is no kickback! It is perfect for someone as frail as you. Come, let us step outside to the firing range." He led Emi out to a firing range, which was really just a clearing with some stone platforms there. "Since you are a Ranger, you must learn to shoot from far away." He snapped his fingers and tin cans appeared atop the platforms. "You will shoot these until you have satisfied me, and only then will you be ready."
"Do I get a break?" Emi asked, getting ready to shoot.
"Break? What is this break? It's a new concept to me. You work until I am satisfied!" The old man spat on the ground again as Emi assumed a firing stance that was apparently unsatisfactory, as she was moved like a clay statue until her stance was good enough, and this took up a good twenty minutes because of the old man's unbelievably vague descriptions of how to move her limbs. Once that was finished with, she squinted into the crosshairs until the first of ten cans was inside it, then fired. A small Photon blast emerged with a 'pow!' sound, then hit the can on its lip and it tumbled over. "You hit things right on the head, I see. NOT satisfactory! You must hit their vital organs!"
"To be honest, sir, I believe that I would know the brain is a very vital organ." To make her point clearer, Emi knocked on the metal plate in her head and it made a clang sound. "May I continue?"
Seven agonizing hours later, the shots Emi produced were satisfactory.
"I am impressed, Sam," the old man told Emi. "You, a Japanese woman Ranger, have managed to impress me in only seven hours. This will be noted! You may keep the Master's Sniper. May you put it to good use." He bowed to her, who bowed deeper with her hands clasped together to him.
"Thank you, sir," she said with another deep bow as she left the weird Shinto shrine, Master's Sniper in hand, and waited for the bus back home.
---
"A Master's Sniper 440-Z?!" Both Julian and Akira were shocked beyond explanation when Emi returned, beaming and holding her sniper.
"Didn't he stop making those?" Akira asked Julian, who nodded slightly. "Emi...you got the crazy old man to make you a Master's Sniper 440-Z model!"
"And that has what significance?" Emi asked.
"He quit making those. In fact, he usually gives Rangers pretty shoddily-made guns, and us Forces get crappy staffs. I had to buy a staff at a pawn shop and it was so much better than what he gave me!" Akira growled angrily. "My staff...had the most terrible accuracy. Did he mention how much he hates Japanese people?"
"A few times," Emi replied. "I seemed to impress him somehow, I think personally that it was my metal plate that horrified him." She tapped her plate once more. "Maybe this thing is good luck?"
"I can't believe you got a Master's Sniper! Can I look at it?" Julian asked.
"No," Emi replied sternly. "You can look with your eyes, not with your hands." She allowed both Julian and Akira to eye the gun only when the trio returned to her bare-bones apartment. Since she was not rooming with anyone else, her space was smaller than Julian and Akira's space. The door opened up to a kitchenette on one side and a living room on the other, then a small hallway led to the only bathroom and bedroom in the house. There was also a closet for good measure, but the decor was plain white, the way the government built it in the first place. The only furniture was the bed in her only bedroom and a couch in the living room, as well as bathroom fixtures. There was no oven, microwave, fridge, or any other kitchen appliances, no television, nothing but a damned bed and couch.
"Emi, this is quite possibly the saddest little apartment I have ever seen," Akira said sternly as he entered.
"It pains me to look at this," Julian added.
"Hey, at least it's free," Emi interjected, placing her Master's Sniper in her lap.
"It may be free, but it's shitty, Emi, and we're going to change that," Julian offered. "Akira and I are going to decorate this place."
"While you can't paint the walls, it's in the rules, everything else is free game. You need a home to come to, not a nasty hotel room," Akira said with a smile. "While we're working on your room, you can stay at our place. The couch in the living room becomes one bitchin' bed, and we just got satellite!"
He smiled like a little boy in a candy store.
"Thanks, you guys, but..." Emi began, trailing off.
"But what? You've totally missed out on higher education by being in a coma, and as far as we know you don't have any money..." Julian began, then saw Emi's eyes light up. "You have money?"
"I might. Unless he's changed it sometime in the last five years, I know his bank account number." The smirk on Emi's face made her cheekbones ache.
"How are you going to pass as him, though? He's...well, more male, obviously," Akira said tensely, trying his best not to offend Emi.
"I won't, I'll use online banking. Duh, don't you two know anything? Do you two have a computer?" Emi asked with glee.
"Do we?" Akira and Julian asked in unison. "Emi, come over."
Master's Sniper in tow, Emi followed Akira and Julian to their apartment on the tenth floor. Julian handed her a pristine white laptop and she logged on to First Bank's website, then went to Account Management.
"Name..." she muttered. "Bradley Summers...Account number 426-773-1235...sign in...yes! Success!!!" She grinned brightly when she saw what the account held. "Look at this, he's got 9,999,999 Meseta in here!"
"Rich bitch," Julian muttered. "Are you going to take it all?"
"Fuck no, that's too suspicious. I'll deduct...100,000 for now. That won't look too suspicious, will it?" Emi asked as she typed in a few commands and withdrew a big 100,000 Meseta that could be picked up, no questions asked, at the First Bank.
"All I want to know is why did he give you his account number?" Julian asked.
"He didn't. I got it from him. When your whole career is based around lying and sneaking and stealing, these kinds of things are just second nature. Now what is this about possibly decorating my bare-bones place?"
Sure enough, Emi spent the night sleeping on the couch, but her body was still out of whack when it came to functions like eating and sleeping, so she wasn't getting too much shut-eye. Instead she amused herself by watching the satellite TV. She was on a news channel and at the bottom of the screen it said 3:16 AM when she heard a door opening and feet walking down the hall towards her. The glow of the TV illuminated Julian's face for a few seconds, just long enough for her to identify him.
"Can't sleep, huh?" he asked her as he walked into the kitchen.
"Nope, my body's still not used to actively having to regulate sleeping and eating for me. It's still used to being fed through I.V."
"That's too bad..." Julian trailed off as he peeked inside the refrigerator.
"Hey, Julian, what did I do?" Emi asked, looking in Julian's direction.
"What do you mean?" Julian brought out a white styrofoam box from the fridge, opened it, sniffed it, then quickly threw it in the trash can.
"What did I do wrong? Did I deserve what happened to me?"
"Of course you didn't, Emi, I know you wanted to just become a mother and have a family and a career." Julian looked back inside the fridge.
"Shit happens, I suppose," Emi added with a nod. "I just don't know why everything happened to me at once."
"While everything happened to you at once, you know you're going to get revenge, right?" Julian found a small bowl of ice cream and started to finish it off.
"You're right...at least I hope I get revenge. Sam may be gone, but Monette always put up a good fight, and Keito has a heart made of ice, Kayoko didn't stop even though she knew very well that I was with child, and Brad is just fucking insane."
"Did he know the child was his?"
"I'm not sure about that. I was 99% sure, but Mom forced me into getting the DNA test. Damn day of mourning, if only that hadn't happened maybe I wouldn't be all fucked-up like this." Emi tapped her plate and it clanged.
"That can't be good for you," Julian pointed out, using his spoon to point at Emi. "Tapping your plate."
"Why not? People tap their skulls all the time, and this is like a replacement of a skull, so it's all good, right?" Emi smiled brightly.
"I guess? But hey, now that your training is over, you can go get your Hunter's License and then you can come down to Ragol with us. You've always wanted to see Ragol, haven't you?" Julian asked, trying to cheer Emi up.
"I have. For all I know, the rest of the group could be hiding down there somewhere, waiting for me."
"And the only way you'll ever find out if that's true or not is to go down to Ragol." Julian ate a big spoonful of ice cream, then paused. "Before you ask, yes we'll come with you. You don't have to go alone." He smiled at her.
"Great...I don't want to have to go alone, I don't know what might happen to me. Maybe I'll get shot in the other side of the head?" She let a feeble laugh escape her mouth as Julian said good night and quickly went back to his own room.