The Neon Knight Sabers
A Multiple Crossover / Alternate History
By Ammadeau
Roy.Fokker@UNSpacy.org
http://members.tripod.com/~Ammadeau/fanfiction.htm

Special thanks to Angus Macspon, Mistral Coldwind, David Farr, 
and all those who sent me e-mail on the first Program.
C&C, comments, and questions are extremely welcome.
Part B should go out tomorrow (I hope).

Program 2a: A Job Offer, part A
	
	Keiichi Ayanami woke up feeling better than he had in 
years.  It was all due to a certain person who was now living with 
them,  the girlfriend that he had wished for.  It occurred to him 
now that he could have wished for either Ranko or Mihoshi, but 
somehow Belldandy was better that that.  She was sweet, kind, 
beautiful, and well . . . perfect, just like a goddess.  Which was no 
surprise since that was exactly what she was.
	He grumbled a little, though, as he started to get dressed.  
Having a new girlfriend didn't change the fact that someone had to 
make breakfast and that someone was him.  Keiichi loved and 
respected his big sister; she was a brilliant scientist with a true gift 
for theoretical mechanics.  But no matter how smart she was, Rei 
wasn't that creative when it came to the kitchen.
He remembered the meals she had served him when he was 
younger.  For breakfast, they would have miso soup and rice, 
always prepared in the exact same manner as the day before and 
the day before that.  The miso nearly always tasted the same no 
matter how many times Rei had made it, which was always so 
bland that is was almost tasteless.  His sister never used spices or 
anything like that.  Cooking, in her opinion it seemed, was for 
sustenance and not enjoyment.  Even stranger was that 
occasionally her meals would have the faint taste of blood.  Keiichi 
wasn't a great cook, but at least he managed to give his meals some 
flavor.
	It was with a great deal of surprise that Keiichi sniffed a 
delicious aroma coming from a kitchen, which was normally home 
to easy-made and mass-produced food.  He heard a sweet voice 
singing what sounded like "Fish heads, fish heads, rolly polly fish 
heads."  He shook his head, that made no sense, he must had 
misheard.
He was stunned to find Belldandy in the kitchen mixing 
something in a bowl while what appeared to be pancakes sizzled 
on the stove.  Where did she get the apron? he wondered for a 
moment, then shook his head.  It was sometimes easy for him to 
forget that this girl who looked like a teenager was in actuality a 
goddess.
	"Oh, good morning, Keiichi," she said to him and smiled.  
It was one of those smiles that weakened his knees and froze up his 
mind.
	"Good morning," Keiichi eventually managed to stutter out.
	Belldandy noticed Keiichi glancing around the kitchen, so 
she explained.  "While I was doing a little tidying up around here I 
found this cookbook and wanted to make breakfast.  You see, this 
is my first time on Midgard so I've never cooked before and 
wondered what it was like.  I hope that's all right.  Do you think 
your sister will mind?"
	She smiled at him again.  "No, it's okay, really," he 
managed to say, quickly finding a chair and sitting down before his 
legs gave out completely.  How could he say no to a goddess?

	"Here you go," Belldandy told him, presenting him with a 
plate.  "Traditional Norse breakfast porridge and some American 
pancakes that I found a recipe for.  I hope it's good."
	She gave him a little smile that melted him faster than hot 
butter.  Now was not the time to think about stuff like that, he told 
himself firmly, concentrate on the food.
	Keiichi took a deep breath. The pancakes looked strange as 
with small black bits in it, so he decided to try the porridge first. It 
smelled good enough to make his mouth water, but as he looked at 
it he noticed something a little odd. There were some greyish 
lumps in the porridge.  He moved some of the things around with 
his spoon and was startled when he found his breakfast looking 
back at him.
	"Ack!" he exclaimed and jumped three feet into the air.  
Seeing Belldandy's surprised expression, he told himself to calm 
down.  He was being silly, he couldn't have seen what he thought 
he saw.  He must still be half-asleep.  Cautiously, Keiichi peered 
back into the bowl and flinched as he saw the eye again, looking 
right at him.  He blinked, but the other eye didn't.
	Keiichi looked up at Belldandy, who quickly said, "What?  
Did I do something wrong?"  The note of worry in her voice nearly 
drove Keiichi to tears.
	Keiichi, he told himself, you got take this like a man.  
Belldandy was all sweet and nice, right?  She wouldn't try to feed 
you something dangerous, would she?  This is her first time 
cooking, another part of him argued, our first attempt at cooking 
wasn't edible.  Yes, but she's a goddess, and besides how can 
anything that smells that good taste bad?  Just got to avoid the eye, 
that's all.
	And so Keiichi took up his first tentative spoonful, slowly 
put it in his mouth, and with the utmost caution, swallowed.  
Keiichi had never had porridge before, that and due to the eye left 
him surprised at how good it had tasted.  There was an unexpected 
fishy flavor to it, but he was used to having fish for breakfast 
anyway.
	"Is it good?"  Belldandy asked nervously.
	Keiichi nodded his head vigorously, and not just to reassure 
her.  Once he got used to it, the porridge was about the best 
breakfast he had had in years.
	"Really?"
	"Yes.  I have a question though.  When you said traditional 
Norse porridge, what did you mean exactly?"
	"That's right, you wouldn't know.  Well, it's like normal 
porridge only it has fish heads in it."
	"There are fish heads in this? I can't eat fish heads!"
	"Really?  They're the best part.  They're really full of 
protein and other minerals that are good for you."
	With Belldandy smiling at him, Keiichi found it impossible 
to get angry at her for trying to feed him fish heads.  That didn't 
mean that he was going to eat them though.
	"Belldandy, I just can't eat anything with eyes, okay?  The 
rest of the porridge is delicious though, so maybe next time could 
you make it without the fish heads?"
	Belldandy nodded her head in understanding.
	Keiichi and decided it was time to try the pancake.  It only 
took him a few bites to notice that it had tiny bits of olives in it.
	"Belldandy, why did you put olives in the pancake?"  
Keiichi asked in the most reasonable tone of voice.  Fish heads in 
porridge he could understand, sort of.  But olives in pancakes?
	"Well, the recipe called for adding blueberries, but I 
couldn't find any.  I thought that cherries might be close enough, 
but you didn't have any of those either.  You did have olives 
though.  They're like cherries, aren't they?"
	"Not really Belldandy," Keiichi told her.  "You should 
check the recipe over first to make sure you have all the ingredients 
and try to avoid making substitutions.  It still turned out all right 
though."  As long as he avoided the bits of olives, that is.
	Belldandy nodded and smiled.  "I'll remember that for next 
time," she said as she picked up the cook book.  "I wonder what I 
should make for lunch?"
	Next time? Keiichi wondered, could this mean that he 
wouldn't have to endure the drudgery of cooking anymore?  He 
was free!  But wait, that meant that Belldandy would have to 
endure it.  He couldn't let her suffer, not when it was he who was 
basically forcing her to stay away from home and live among 
mortals.  She did seem happy though.
	"You don't have to do all the cooking and cleaning around 
here, Belldandy.  You're a goddess, you shouldn't have to do any 
work."
	"Keiichi, it really isn't work for me."
	"It isn't?"  Since when are cooking and cleaning not work?
	"No, actually it's a lot of fun!  Where I come from is always 
so neat and tidy and you never have to cook.  I've only heard about 
these things before, but I've found that I really enjoy doing them.  
Is it all right that I cook and clean for you and your sister, 
Keiichi?"
	Keiichi scratched the back of his head.  "Well, I don't have 
a problem with it and I'm sure it will be okay with sis."
	"Great!"  Belldandy exclaimed as she impulsively threw her 
arms around him and held Keiichi close.  Keiichi might not have 
been in heaven, but he was in the closest thing to it.

	Rei awoke and stared at her alarm in annoyance, almost as 
if she was using her glare to will the thing to cease its high-pitched 
beeping.  Then she shook her head and wondered why she was 
bothering to get angry at a machine.  She had had a rough night.  
First fighting off that advanced boomer, then coming home to find 
her brother suddenly had a live-in girlfriend, and finally spending 
most of the night poring over the fragments of the new boomer.  It 
had become clear to her that the boomers were no longer just based 
on EVAs.  Something else had been added to come up with an 
even more advanced design, but she couldn't identify it yet.  When 
she did, it might be possible to use it to upgrade their own 
hardsuits. The insect motif was really strange though.  What was 
Genom up to?
	Keiichi knocked at the door to his big sister's room.  
Normally, he would just let her sleep in and open the shop himself, 
but he knew that she would want to hear about the job offer in the 
newspaper as soon as possible.  Besides, the breakfast Belldandy 
had made was getting cold.  It was simply too good to let that 
happen.  Well, except for the pancakes that is.  He wondered how 
his sister felt about olives.
	
	"A job offer?" Rei asked her brother as she sipped at her 
morning coffee; black, extra strong.  The way she liked her power 
armor.  Blue was her favorite color, but there was just something 
about a metal chassis, black and gleaming, running through the 
night, that was very engaging for her.  It was a pity she couldn't 
make them all black, but then she'd never be able to tell them apart.  
And they couldn't all be called Saber-Black.  It'd be silly.  If there 
was one thing that Rei was not, it was silly.
	She had just finished the breakfast Belldandy had made, 
which she had eaten without a word.  When Keiichi had asked if 
Belldandy could do the cooking and cleaning from now on, Rei 
had only nodded once, but then that was his big sister.
	"Look, it's right here in the paper."
	Rei read it over.  There was no mention of what the job 
was, but it was from the USSD and the pay was over 20 million.  
They wouldn't try to contact vigilantes unless they were desperate.  
It was likely to be something important and dangerous.  It was 
worth looking into.  Maybe it could provide some insight into what 
Genom was up to lately.

	"And this is where I work," Keiichi told Belldandy very 
nervously.  Rei had suggested that he get his new girlfriend to help 
him with the store while she looked into the job offer.  He didn't 
think it was such a good idea, but Belldandy had been very eager 
when she had heard about it.
	The young goddess looked around.  "Oh my, isn't this a 
store that sells women's underclothes?"
	"Um, yeah, but it was the only job I could get because my 
sister owns the place."
	Belldandy wasn't really listening as she was examining the 
store's wares, fluttering from shelf to shelf like an over-excited 
butterfly.
	"Oh, how perfectly darling!" she said as she pulled out a 
red, semi-transparent teddy and held it up to herself.  It was about 
two sizes too small.  "What do you thing of this Keiichi?"
	Keiichi was too busy frantically holding back a sudden 
nosebleed to respond.

	"It's kind of strange that my sister owns this place when she 
wears such plain underwear herself," Keiichi commented as he and 
Belldandy got ready to open the store.  Apparently working in a 
lingerie shop was another fun thing that goddesses normally didn't 
get the chance to do.  He was starting to get the feeling that 
Belldandy could find anything fun.  For Keiichi, it was just another 
thing to like about her.
	"How do you know that?" Belldandy asked innocently.
	Keiichi hid a sudden blush and managed to say, "Well, I do 
her laundry along with my own."
	"Laundry, that's another thing I have to try."
	"You don't have to clean your clothes either?"
	"Our bodies and our clothes are regenerated moment to 
moment, so there is no need to bathe or do laundry.  I must admit 
though that I really enjoyed taking a bath this morning even if I 
didn't need to.  We usually only bother with clothes when we are 
down here on Midgard anyway.  When in Asgard we sometimes 
just do without them."
	"No clothes?" Keiichi said slowly, his eyes very wide.
	Belldandy nodded, smiling.
	Keiichi practically flew into the bathroom.  He didn't think 
his sister would have been happy to have bloodstains from his 
nosebleed all over her store's floor, nor did he want to explain his 
sudden eruption to Belldandy.

	When he came back from the bathroom, Belldandy asked 
with concern, "What was that about?  Are you all right Keiichi?"  
She was worried; this was the second time that her boyfriend had 
acted sick and she didn't know anything about mortal diseases or 
how to treat them.
	"Yeah, I'm fine," he managed to say, making sure to avoid 
thinking about what they had been talking about earlier.  It wasn't 
easy to do being surrounded by lingerie.  "I just had to, you know, 
use the bathroom real quick."
	"Use the bathroom?" Belldandy said thoughtfully, "I 
wonder what it's like to �"
	"No!" Keiichi suddenly shouted.
	"Keiichi, what's wrong?" Belldandy responded, her voice 
filled with concern.
	'What's wrong?' she says, Keiichi thought.  "Nothing, just 
let's talk about something else."

	Ami was busy toweling off her hair when the phone rang.  
On the days when she didn't have to work until late, she liked 
lounging in bed for a while.  Pity she had no one to share it with.
	"Ami?"
	"Oh Rei, it's you, I just got out of the shower."
	"Do you have to go to work soon?"
	"No, I'm on second shift today."
	"Good, I need you to accompany me to the USSD.  They 
have a job offer for the Knight Sabers."
	"A job offer?" Ami asked.  They hadn't gotten one of those 
in a while.  It would be nice to have some extra spending money; 
but then, if Ami was really into money than she would have stayed 
a doctor.
	
	"Did we really have to take the bus?" Saber-Purple (Ami) 
asked Rei, using the private channel so only other Knight Sabers 
could hear, feeling mildly embarrassed by all the people staring at 
her.  Only her old sailor fuku could make her feel more self 
conscious.  She was thankful that her hardsuit hid her true identity 
even better than the sailor uniform had.
	"It's too far to walk and its not possible to operate one of 
the trucks in a hardsuit.  The motoroids could be mistaken as a 
threat.  This is the best possible solution," Saber-Blue (Rei) 
replied.
	Rei reminds me way too much of Setsuna sometimes, Ami 
thought, and not always in a good way.  But then again, Ranko 
reminds me of Haruka.  And Mihoshi is so like Usagi sometimes 
that it's scary.  "Don't you feel, well, embarrassed?"
	"No, why should I?"
	"They're all looking at us!"  Ami practically shouted, 
gesturing to the other people on the bus.  She happened to use her 
gun mounted hand, which made everyone look away for a while.
	"Why should I feel embarrassed by that?" Rei asked in 
genuine confusion.
	Ami gave up and endured in silence, wondering for the nth 
time why she ever got involved with this.  Life as a doctor had 
been so incredibly boring that she just couldn't stand it any more.  
But life as a Knight Saber was sometimes a little too weird, even 
for a former crusader for love and justice.

	"What are you doing here?" asked the USSD security guard 
in a panic-stricken voice as he waved his gun around and 
repeatedly stomped on the silent alarm.  How could he hope to stop 
two people in power armor with his puny handgun?
	"We were called here," Rei answered him calmly.  "We are 
the Knight Sabers."
	The phone rang.  The guard picked it up, gun still trained 
on the one who had spoken.  He listened for a while, his eyes 
getting progressively wider, until finally he hung up the phone and 
told the Knight Sabers, "You can go in now."
	"Thank you," Ami said to him.  Rei simply walked on.

	"Do you always dress like that?" the general's assistant 
asked when the Knight Sabers showed up in their hardsuits.  It was 
not what he had been expecting, at least, though he did notice that 
the general didn't seem as surprised.
	"No," Rei told him, "That would be inconvenient."
	"That's all right then, no doubt you want to keep your 
identities confidential.  Still, it does reduce our assurances that you 
will complete this job I want to give you."
	"If you wish assurances, hire someone else."
	The general was clearly startled by Rei's flat tone of voice, 
but recovered and said, "No, that's all right.  Now here's what we 
want you to do.  One of our former employees hacked into a 
special database and made off with some valuable information . . ."
	"Rei," Ami said to her leader on a private channel that only 
the other Knight Saber could hear, "My computer indicates that the 
camera in the corner of the room is scanning us.  It could be trying 
to figure out our suits or uncover our identities."
	Rei raised up her hand and embedded the camera with a 
lance, destroying it and interrupting the general's speech.  Then she 
started to make her way to the door.  She knew that no camera 
could see through their suits, but figuring out how the hardsuit 
worked would be dangerous to everyone.  Ami only hesitated for a 
moment before following Rei.
	"Wait!" the general shouted, standing up.  "I sincerely 
apologize.  It was an unfortunate mistake, but we still want to hire 
you for this job."
	Rei turned around and told him, "Speak quickly."

	"So these are pictures of the man and little girl that we'll be 
looking for," Rei informed all of them as she passed the photos out.  
It was an odd job coming from the USSD, but they were willing to 
pay a lot for it.  Maintaining the Knight Sabers' hardsuits didn't 
come cheap.  
	Besides, Ranko had suggested, while thwarting Genom was 
a good deed and fun, it was nice to get paid once in a while.
	They were all sitting around Rei's large but rather sparsely 
decorated (meaning almost not at all) apartment.  In fact the only 
picture was a drawing Keiichi had done of his big sister and him 
when he was still in grade school.  It was framed over Rei's bed 
and made Keiichi embarrassed every time he looked at it.
Ranko was lounging in a chair, just like a boy would.  
Mihoshi had taken up residence on the end of Rei's bed.  Ami and 
Rei had taken seats opposite one another, unconsciously adopting 
the same posture.
	Keiichi was out shopping for the ingredients to dinner, but 
surprisingly Belldandy had elected to stay and serve them some tea 
she had made.  There was a faint grape flavor to it, but it was 
otherwise okay.  She had also mistakenly served it with salt instead 
of sugar, but then anyone could have done that.
	After serving them tea, however, Belldandy had elected to 
wait in Keiichi's room for him.  This was in spite of the fact that 
Rei had given her her own room.
	"Wow, Kawaii!!"  Mihoshi shouted with glee on seeing a 
picture of the little blonde girl they would be looking for, who, 
strangely enough, looked very much like a chibi version of herself.  
The other Knight Sabers hoped that her personality wouldn't be a 
match as well.  One Mihoshi was bad enough, a kid version would 
be even worse.
	"Now I can't stress enough the importance of calling in 
frequently," Rei told them.  "Especially you Mihoshi."
	"Hai," replied the former detective, nodding with her 
serious expression.
	"If you want us to call in frequently," Ranko told Rei, 
"Why not just get us all cellular phones?"
	"I did."  Rei then took out a box that was filled with 
smashed, mangled, scorched, and partially melted electronic 
components.  There were also bits of something white mixed in 
with them.  "This is what is left of them."
	"Mihoshi?" Ranko said to Rei.
	Rei nodded while the others groaned.  "It was perhaps my 
fault. Mihoshi had stopped by because she had left her work 
clothes here the previous night. I sent her upstairs to retrieve the 
cell phones that Keiichi had bought.  I thought now would be a 
good time to show her how to use one.
"Belldandy was in the kitchen making lunch at the time.  
She had decided to try and figure out how to use the blender, 
thinking that it could be used to make something called skyr.  I'm 
not sure how it happened, but it seems that Mihoshi tripped over 
the power cord to the blender, knocking it over while it was still 
going and somehow dumping the phones into it."
"Wait," Ami said.  "I really don't think that a blender would 
cause this much damage, unless they were really cheap phones. "
Rei nodded.  "It seems that while the phones were only 
mostly scratched up, they also no longer worked.  Belldandy, 
feeling somewhat responsible for the accident, tried to use her 
magic to repair them.  Apparently, her powers don't work well on 
electronics."
	And then Rei took out a pad and wrote something down.
	"What are you writing?" Ami asked her.
	"I'm making a note to myself to look for a new blender 
while I'm out.  The old one was caught in the explosion when 
Belldandy tried to fix the phones."
	Ranko and Ami face-faulted.
	"Now what are you writing?" Ranko asked Mihoshi when 
she had whipped out a similar pad.
	"So, we're going out looking for a girl, a guy, and a blender, 
right?"  Mihoshi asked, finally looking up from what she was 
writing.
	Rei joined Ami and Ranko in face-faulting.
	"Oh, did I forget something?" Mihoshi asked innocently.

	"Excuse me, have you seen either of these people?"  Rei 
asked a passerby near where the two had last been seen, showing 
him the photos.
	"And what if I have?"
	"I would like to know where they are."
	"Who wants to know?"
	"I do.  I just said that."
	The man found something very unnerving the way Rei 
could just stare at him without blinking.  There was also the 
obvious fact that his sarcasm was having no effect at all.
	"No, I haven't seen them," he said quickly and practically 
ran away from her.
	Rei only smiled slightly as she watched him go.
	
	Ami quickly scanned through the AD police and regular 
police reports for descriptions matching either of the people that 
the USSD was looking for.  It might be a long shot, but it was 
about effective as asking people on the street.  
A lot easier on the legs as well.  She wasn't as young as she 
used to be and no longer had her senshi powers to boost her 
endurance.  She was in pretty good shape, she passed the AD 
Police physical with flying colors, but the other Sabers seemed 
tireless.  It was hard for Ami to keep up with them.

	"So your old man took your kid and ran off, eh?"
	The guy learned the hard way that he shouldn't make jokes 
like that to Ranko, at least he did a few hours later when he 
regained consciousness.  He doubted that he would ever walk the 
same way again.
	
	Mihoshi trotted into the pay phone, closing the door behind 
her.  She happened to miss the fact that she had been followed for 
the last ten minutes by three men, one who was large enough that 
phone booths would be inaccessible to him, along with most 
doorways.  They stood and watched her from a block away.
	Mihoshi tried to swipe her card in the slot, but missed and 
dropped it on the floor.  And so when the gun of the very large 
man shot away the top half of the phone booth, it missed his 
intended target.  Mihoshi was too busy bent over looking for her 
card to notice.
	"What the hell are you trying to do?" one of the thugs 
demanded at him, "The boss said to bring her in alive!"
	The large man started to make chittering noises that 
sounded oddly like a cricket.  Strangely enough, the other two 
thugs didn't act like he had suddenly gone crazy.
	"Enough excuses, I can't understand what the heck you're 
saying anyway.  You're the one that will have to explain to the boss 
why we're bringing back a corpse."
	Meanwhile, Mihoshi had found out that the reason she 
couldn't see her card was the fact that she was standing on it.  Card 
now firmly in her hand and set with a new determination, Mihoshi 
was prepared to swipe it through this time.  Only this time there as 
no place to swipe because the phone was missing.  In fact, most of 
the booth lay in pieces at her feet.  That was odd, she thought, 
when did this happen?  Oh well, just have to find another phone 
booth.  She had an important call to make after all.  Rei would be 
angry with her if she didn't call in like she was supposed to
	The three thugs were stunned when the person in the phone 
booth stood up, apparently unharmed.  "Now this time," the head 
thug explained once he had recovered, "can we please try to get her 
without killing her?"
	The thug did not expect is his victim to walk right up to 
him, smile,  and say, "Excuse me, do you know where I can find 
another phone?  I don't what happened to that one back there.  I 
have to make an important call."
	Not entirely sure how to react to this, the thug pointed to 
another phone booth down the street.
	"Thanks," Mihoshi said to him and skipped over to the 
phone.
The large thug, angry from being scolded and confused, 
tried to knock her out with a punch that most concrete wouldn't 
have been able to withstand.
Just as she was reaching the phone, Mishoshi saw a five 
yen piece and bent to pick it up.  She felt a whoosh of air from 
somewhere above her, followed by a loud crash.  When she stood 
up, that phone booth had also been wrecked and one of the men 
who had helped her was sitting in the middle of it, covered in 
broken glass.  The phone itself was clearly dead, smashed into 
several pieces.  Mihoshi wondered why she had had such bad luck 
with phones all of the sudden.
	Before the lead thug could do anything, she turned to him 
and said, "Excuse me again, you wouldn't happen to have a phone, 
would you?  This one doesn't seem to be in order either."
	The thug demonstrated the power of original thinking.  
"Yes, but it's a car phone.  You'll have to get in my car to use it."
	"Kay."
	The other thugs watched in astonishment as he led the 
person they were supposed to kidnap into their car.  She had to be 
the most eager kidnappee they had ever seen.

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