Megatokyo: 2026

     In her opinion, the earthquake which had killed millions of Tokyo's 
citizens and leveled much of the city had been just what the city needed. 
All the masks were off now; the truth that so many people -- so many other-
wise intelligent people -- hid from themselves, now on display. Wild beasts 
roamed  where overstuffed penguins had strutted before, and fire burned out 
of control.

     Kozue Kaoru had dreamed of Heaven once. It had looked just like this.

     She wasn't blind to the fact that the quake had also killed a few 
members of the gang who'd begun to look sideways at a girl who hadn't aged a 
day since she'd joined them, and left her in an excellent position to take 
over. But those were secondary matters, at best; who really cared, in the 
grand scale of things, who ran a dying motorcycle gang? Their primary source 
of income had dried up, since nobody had any money to pay for drugs. That 
had caused a steady withering of the gang's membership, until those who 
remained were those only interested in kicks.

     And to her, kicks always were the primary matter.

     As she motored the cycle down the darkened street, the wind in her 
hair, the scent of burning flesh in her nose, and the sound of distant 
screaming were like ... there really wasn't a word for such a blissful full-
immersion sensory experience, was there? It was better than sex.

     Well, depending on the circumstances, anyway.

     She glimpsed the arranged meeting place, waved her hand to let her 
posse know that this was it, and steered the bike towards it. Ozchezowski 
was standing in front of the burning trash can, the face beneath his touque 
lit from the flames. The rest of his "followers" were lounging around the 
wrecked gas station in little groups, probably trying to convince each other 
that they could be strong together.

     Suckers.

     The bike screamed a bit as it stopped, while the rest of her crew came 
to a halt somewhat more sedately. Dismounting, Kozue pulled off her helmet 
as though she hadn't a care in the world -- which she didn't, really. She 
looked around the ruins as though evaluating the situation. In fact, she'd 
already done so; now she was just letting them see her, or at least the 
school-girl punk image that she let them see, to trick them into under-
estimating her.

     Only when she judged that she'd gotten all the effect that she could 
from her first weapon did she turn to look directly into Ozchezowski's 
eyes. "Well?" she asked.

     "We want out," he said. He'd learned from her; there was no real point 
in hiding his intentions.

     "So," she replied, taking another look around, this time catching the 
eyes of other long-timers, both on her side and his. When she came back to 
look at him, she started to walk, slowly and calmly until she was standing 
on the other side of the can from him. "You know damn well that there's only 
one way that you ever get out," she said, without any particular heat or 
emphasis.

     "There's no percentage in this crap anymore, K," he snapped. "I'm 
getting too old for this shit. We want out. And if you wanna make it the 
hard way --"

     "-- you'll oblige?" she finished the sentence. She looked deep into 
his eyes, then shrugged. "All right then."

     And before the words could possibly have registered, her left hand 
streaked out to grab the edge of the touque and yank downwards. Before 
Ozchezowski knew what was happening, she followed up with a right hand blow 
to the back of his neck which made him bend forward even further -- just far 
enough to let the flames lick at his face and make his stomach rest against 
the edge of the can. She let go of the touque, and pressed down on his back 
with her left hand as she grabbed hold of the waistband of his pants and 
*pulled* forward.

     Result: one rebel leader with his head and shoulders firmly inside a 
newspaper-and-oil fire, being held there even as he screamed; assorted 
colleagues of said rebel leader staring at the sight in horror, paralyzed
beyond hope of assisting him.

     Her face never changed.

     After only a few minutes, Ozchezowski stopped kicking and shaking. She 
let go, and the body slumped. She elaborately dusted off her hands as she 
looked at the members of the gang that he'd talked into supporting him for a 
third time. Then she turned to look at her chief lieutenant. "Kill 'em."

     Knives, chains and a few crappy guns sprang out as the purge began in
earnest. Kozue calmly walked to one fragment of wall to lean back and watch 
-- both the killing and the killers, the latter to make sure that none of 
them held back.

     Kind of a waste, really. Ozchezowski had managed to convince a lot of 
the younger, cuter members of the gang that he could out-bluff her. Like 
that girl who was always hanging around him ... what was her name again?

     And where was --

     Quite suddenly, she felt something scrawny wrap itself around her neck 
and pull backwards, yanking her over the shattered wall that only came up to 
her ass. Her back hit the ground behind it hard, and she only caught a quick 
glimpse of dirty brown hair and terrified brown eyes as the knife punched 
through her leather vest and went into her heart.

     Her killer held onto the shiv for a few seconds before letting go. Her
hands ... no, her entire body were trembling as she backed away from her 
first kill. The terror Kozue had seen in her eyes didn't seem to fade, just 
because she'd finished the job.

     She just stood there, staring at the young-looking body as the sounds 
of a continuing fight echoed not far away.

     Then Kozue blinked.

     The girl's jaw dropped.

     One shaky arm reached up to pull the knife out as her face twisted in a
rictus of pain and fury. "F-fucking little bitch-whore-slut," she hissed as 
it came free. She twisted into a crouch, facing her attacker always, holding
her hostage with her eyes.

     It was the girl she'd been thinking about, though her face failed to
bring to mind a name. One of the thousands of quake-orphans, one of the
dozens who'd ended up fleeing the orphanages to end up in gangs. Frankly,
her name hadn't mattered even before this.

     "Such a pretty, pretty bitch," Kozue crooned. "You're scared? Oh, you
should be scared. You and me are going to get to know each other *real* well
now."

     No reaction from the girl; her features were frozen in a rictus of
sheer terror.

     Abruptly, Kozue noticed that she couldn't hear any sounds of fighting
behind her, and stood to roar at her gang to finish their own work before
turning to gawk at her taking care of business.

     She blinked, then, as she saw that everyone there had frozen into
their positions, even if such positions were impossible in nature -- like
something out of a lame martial arts film from the turn of the century. 
Nothing moved, nothing breathed, save for her.

     "Good evening, Kozue-san."

     She whirled, knife coming up automatically.

     The dark-skinned girl in the pale green dress was standing just where
the alley where Kozue stood met the street. Her hands were folded in front
of her waist, and her bright green eyes regarded her with cool, detached
interest -- as though she were an interesting species of bug.

     "You?" Kozue spat. "What d'you want? Come to collect me for big brother
or something?"

     If there is no time, there can be no heat change. So it must have been 
an illusion that the temperature in the alley dropped precipitously at those
words.

     "No," Himemiya Anthy replied easily, without any sign of anger. "I am
here on business of my own."

     Everything in Kozue told her to run. She ignored it all. "What's your 
`business' got to do with me? I haven't seen either of you spooks in forty
years."

     "And in all that time, you don't seem to have aged a day. Surely you
didn't think that was just a coincidence."

     Before Kozue could muster a reply, Anthy's hands fell to her sides.
"You have something that belongs to me," she said, as though reading from
a script. "I gave it to you, though you knew it not. It was never yours; it 
was always mine; it will be mine again. Now, I take it away."

     With the final syllable, Kozue felt that her heart was about to burst
in her chest. The pain of the knife going into her didn't begin to compare
to the sensation of something seeming to tear its way out. She struggled to
lift her hands up, to cover the place on her chest where the feeling seemed
to be centered, but her arms hung uselessly at her sides.

     "Now."

     A thorn burst from her chest, and the recoil almost bent her over
backwards at the waist. It streaked through the air, trailing a faint red
line of blood, to Himemiya's outstretched, waiting hand.

     She brought it up to her face, as though examining it carefully to make
sure that it was no counterfeit.

     "No," Kozue asked as she fell backwards to the ground. "Don't --"

     And then, without even acknowledging her words, Anthy pressed the hand
that held the thorn to her mouth.

     There was a terrible grinding noise.

     And then the real agony began.

     "Dear me," Anthy said calmly. "You have led a stressful life, haven't
you?" She watched the convulsions disinterestedly. "Quite a few near-over-
doses, I'd imagine. Assorted fights, including the one that I interrupted.
And of course, forty years of an over-extended childhood. All coming back to 
you now, is it? My my. Must be painful."

     The girl with blue hair (now liberally streaked with white) who lay on 
the ground before her wouldn't have been recognizable to her colleagues.
"Help ... me ..." she gasped.

     Anthy leaned closer, her vague air of amusement faded. "Wild animals
either heal quickly, or they die, Kozue-san. No one helps *them*."

     And then, with eyes filled with horror, Kaoru Kozue expired.

     Anthy turned to go. She paused as she noticed the brown-haired girl 
staring in similar horror at the place where Kozue had been crouching an 
infinite moment ago.

     There was no reason for her to help the girl; no reason to take pity on
her badly-wounded sensibilities. She could only freeze the hands of time for
a very short while before those responsible for its maintenance would begin
to investigate. There was no reason to press her luck. None at all.

     She picked up the corpse, settled it into the position that Kozue had
been in when the girl had pulled her over the wall, then pushed the knife
into the half-healed hole where it had been before. Satisfied, she turned
and walked out of the alley, unleashing time as she did.

     The brown-haired girl jerked back, staring at the corpse in front of
her. She could have sworn that it had gotten up and had been coming toward
her to ...

     No. Of course not. Shit like that didn't happen.

     Unsteadily, the girl brought herself to her feet, and opened her mouth
to yell at everyone still fighting.

     Whatever she said was drowned out by the scream of a siren as the 
entire area was painted brilliantly white by the spotlight of an approaching
police helicopter. Breaking off, Kozue's flunkies dashed for their cycles
abandoning to the tender mercies of the man those few rebels who were still 
alive.

     The girl stood filled with indecision as she looked at her fellow
rebels, and then turned to run herself. She didn't even make it out of the 
alley before the cops dropped the first tear gas bombs dropped on the crime
scene.

     Coughing and puking, she was easy prey for the cop squad that nabbed
her a few moments later. When the forensic team discovered Kozue's body,
they were quick to match up the blood stains on the girl's right arm with
the victim's blood and the patterns of the assault that they theorized.
The girl's identity was quickly deduced from her fingerprints, in the system
thanks to the disaster relief team who'd rescued her and identified her one
year previous.

     And so, shortly before her thirteenth birthday, Priss Asagiri was
arrested for the very first time, on a charge of first-degree murder.

                              TO BE CONTINUED


Chris Davies, Advocate for Darkness, Part-Time Champion of Light


__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Make a great connection at Yahoo! Personals.
http://personals.yahoo.com
	     .---Anime/Manga Fanfiction Mailing List----.
             | Administrators - ffml-admins@anifics.com |
             | Unsubscribing - ffml-request@anifics.com |
             |     Put 'unsubscribe' in the subject     |
             `---- http://ffml.anifics.com/faq.txt -----'