Well, IMO, this part sucks. So this is an official call for help. :)
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	He was dressed in his gi and hakama. The man was sitting in a full lotus
position, concentrating on willing his body to remember the perfect katana
cuts he was making in his mind. While he was meditating, he was perfectly
still. The wind only occasionally disturbing his long dark blond hair which
normally ran down his white gi to the middle of his back.
	Eventually, he decided it was time to continue. He appeared to be perfectly
still even as he rose. He calmly took hold of his katana, and unsheathed it,
holding the six-hundred year old blade at a low position, the end of the
sword close to one foot above the ground.
	Somewhere behind him, a faint, but approaching, crashing sound broke the
stillness. The man waited patiently, mentally orienting the oncoming sound.
Approximately half a minute later, he sheathed his sword, and picked up his
pistol, which had been lying a safe ten feet from his practice area. Then,
he moved deeper into the forest, closer to the undefined sounds.
	As he saw some of the smaller trees being crushed through, he quickly
jumped off the straight course of falling trees. Seconds later, a C-55
Boomer flew by. Its massive blue form didn't turn from its path, but
powerfully shrugged off the impact of the trees it was crashing through.
Speed, not safety was its major concern, though it was carefully shielding a
black briefcase from any potential damage with it's bulky and strong arms.
	A smaller, white and black form burst from the cover it had taken and
followed the fleeing boomer. It wasn't hard to follow, since the path was
quite clear after the boomer's passage.
	A minute later, three plasma shots pinpointed the boomer. The man sprinted
ahead, curious. His blond hair danced happily in the air behind him while he
dashed down the makeshift trail. He slowed when he noticed a glint of blue
on the other side of a tree he was approaching. Pistol drawn, he advanced.
	Ahead, a woman in power armor was cursing to herself. Her sensors had
pinpointed the boomer in front of her, 15 yards distant, some foolish guy
only feet behind her, and a melee made out of boomers and her friends. Shit!
What a bad position to be in. The situation was compounded when a boomer
felled a tree behind her, clearing a shot at the tree she was using for cover.
	Fortune was with her, that day. The boomer in front of her charged out. Its
chest plates flexed and opened, revealing the massive heat ray weapon this
class of boomer was noted for. Just as it swung its arms back to fire, the
woman leveled her right arm at the boomer and fired two shots. The six-inch
spikes decapitated the robot, causing the yellowish-brown nutrient fluid to
spray from its neck as it wobbled about, not quite ready to die.
	Just as the boomer started to fall, the man behind her jumped forward,
pushing her onto the ground, and out of the path of a plasma blast. The tree
she was using for cover had a large hole through it and the path of the
plasma blast could be seen going through at least four trees beyond. She
rolled over and dropped to one knee, facing the man, her right arm leveled
at him. "Shit!" Her electronically filtered voice screamed through the
loudspeakers. "Who the hell are you?"
	Reed was concentrating on a good many things at that moment, not the least
being how much of a predicament he was in. "My name is Reed." Her voice was
strangely familiar, even through the distortion, and he hoped that she
wouldn't decide to shoot the railgun while he was only inches from the barrel.
	The pilot of the power armor snorted. She turned towards the boomer and
charged. The sunlight that broke through the trees glinted off her blue
hardsuit, accenting the purple breastplates and abdomen. Reed looked towards
the upcoming fight, absently thinking she was heading towards the first
boomer he encountered, mainly due to the briefcase it had. Before the blue
suit fired, another woman stepped from the trees. Her hardsuit was very pale
blue, so much so, that it could be considered a tint of white. A energy
sword of some time swung from her right arm, and sliced the blue monstrosity
in half. Then, she turned toward the man who was watching the fight, talking
to her companion over the communications channel. "Priss, who's that?"
	"I don't know. He pushed me away from the boomer's shot." Priss was trying
to figure out just how much of what the guy had done was stupidity and how
much was bravery. He would be destroyed from a single shot, and his old
pistol wouldn't do anything to a boomer.
	"See what he knows, then report back. We got what we came for."
	"Roger, Slyia." Sylia, clad in her pale suit, turned away, and walked back
into the forest. Priss stood for a moment, then approached the man who had
saved her.
	As she was nearing, the boomer she had destroyed began shaking. It's
powerplant, being severely damaged from the explosion its head had made, was
nearing explosion itself. However, no one noticed this.
	"What the hell are you doing here?" Priss' question was spit out in a
manner that made it sound like she was ordering the answer out from him.
	No answer would be made quite yet, though, as the boomer's powerplant
finally gave up the struggle to stay as one piece. C-55 boomer parts were
rocketed through the air. A piece of the boomer's arm, including the blades
which snapped out when the boomer invoked its jets, crashed into the side of
Priss' helmet, neatly carving out her faceplate, and destroying the
loudspeaker. "Oh, shit!"
	A small thunderbolt went through Reed as he realized what made the voice so
familiar. He was standing face to face with his favorite rock star.
"Priss... You're a Knight Sabre?"
	"Yeah, I am. I suppose you're expecting some sort of reward for keeping
quiet now and for pushing me away from the boomer's shot, right?"
	"Well, no. Not really. I was standing behind the tree, and didn't want to
get hit. Call it instinct, but I didn't think you wanted to be hit, either."
	Priss' reply was a quite unfriendly snort.
	"And I don't expect any reward for that, or as 'bribery' to shut up. You
could easily get away with shooting me here and make it look like the
boomer's explosion killed me. I'm going to be quite happy to get out of here."
	"You better be. What the hell were you thinking charging in here? Damned AD
Police have better protection than you, and they get blown to bits facing
off these things." Reed only grimaced. She was right, and he knew it. "Get
the hell out of here."
	Priss walked off. Damn, now I'm gonna have to buy a new helmet for this
suit. I guess it's time for some more concerts.
	Reed just stood still for a few minutes. He'd had quite enough excitement
for a long time. He eventually walked away, mindlessly kicking a rock along
in front of him. "Damn, I should've asked for her autograph," he said,
muttering half-jokingly to himself. "I'll probably never see her like that
again." He turned towards the boomer which was now sputtering flames. He
couldn't see his rock anymore, so he just kicked something else along to
pass the time as he headed home, thinking it was a part of the boomer. It
wasn't too long before he picked it up, and realized that it was a shard off
of Priss' faceplate. Reed curled his hand around it. "Hmm. A souvenir to
commemorate the day I met Priss, the Knight Sabre and singer extrordinaire."
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Ben Kosse bmk7411@cs.rit.edu
Homepage with anime and other interests. (http://www.rit.edu/~bmk7411)
Biggest BGC otaku on the RIT campus (especially Priss).
Anime, RPG's, computers, poetry (read/write), music (listen/compose).
Author of the Bubblegum Crisis theme pack