Hihi, DB! Late response as usual, but I was busy finishing Awakening 7. :)
C&C are my opinions and suggestions only.
DB Sommer wrote:
Malgaunt's whisper carried on the wind just into Funuyaki's hearing. The
marshal-turned- potential-revolutionary wasn't quite correct about that. It
was she and Ariana that were almost on top of it. They were the ones that
had taken the point and would encounter the Shihana first. And the only
reason it was not Ariana alone was because Malgaunt had insisted Funuyaki
go along to accompany her. The look the taller woman had shot Funuyaki told
all she needed to know about the enforcer's feelings concerning their
shared responsibilities.
"Oh, Funuyaki! Let's take some time off and have some fun together." :)
And now they found themselves nearly on top of where the Shihana should
have been. Ariana had been assigned the task of scouting forward. Funuyaki
had been ordered by Malgaunt to go as well so that Stargrave did not have
one up on him. Being treated like a pawn so openly made her pride swell,
she thought bitterly.
Suggest: 'Being openly treated like a pawn made her feel just so proud to be
part of the group, she thought bitterly.'
A sharp intake of breath from above snapped Funuyaki out of her reverie.
Ariana stood at the top of the pile, looking down on the other side, her
attention focused on something. Worry and disappointment had replaced the
usual mask of anger Stargrave's first mate wore. Since the taller woman was
not behaving in a threatened or cautious manner, Funuyaki opted to rush
quickly up the side of the pile and look down to see what the cause of the
disturbance was.
Only to take a laser bolt in the stomach and discover that Ariana never behaves
in a threatened or cautious manner. :)
"Maybe it was a computer malfunction," Onita offered. He had caught up to
the others and had watched with more detachment than either Stargrave or
Malgaunt had.
Suggest: 'and had reacted with more detachment...'
All eyes looked down the pass. Ariana was still more than hundred meters
away, but her voice had carried over the low din of the rain. She was
running towards them as fast as she could, shouting out over and over again
that she could track them.
Just in case they had all fallen inconveniently deaf at one shot, of course. :)
Another soft sigh escaped the gray flesh that passed for lips on Autolycus.
"I know where there's a space tree you can bond to." All eyes looked in
confusion upon the diminutive being's form. Seeing he had Stargrave's
undivided attention, Autolycus continued. "I had been meaning to save this
for when you had learned a great deal of more self-control, but I can
clearly see that if I don't act now, you're going to make mistake from
which you'll never recover."
'...make a mistake...'
"It's the Sirocco."
The others were the Zephyr, the Tsunami, the Hurricane, the Kamikaze, the
Typhoon, the Tornado, the Whirlwind, the Arashi, and lastly, the
Great-Wind-For-Which-We-Have-Run-Out-Of-Names. :)
Sensing he was getting through to Stargrave, Autolycus decided it was time
to reveal more. "The main reason I've remained at your side for the last
couple of decades is because I've sensed potential in you, boy. Real
potential. The kind that can change the face of the galaxy for millennia,
but only if you utilize it correctly."
Autolycus: I sense a great force in the boy.
Yoda: Bah, the boy too old is.
Autolycus: Then it is my mistake to make, Master Yoda.
"But you're different, and I don't mean by that power within you, although
that is part of it. I can feel inside you the ability to affect all of
those around you, and I don't mean in simply taking over a gang of thieves.
I've only felt the potential in just under two dozen people in my
considerable lifetime. Less than half of them ever managed to achieve the
greatness they had within them. Don't be a failure like those others;
listen to what I'm saying. On your own, without becoming a lackey to
others, you can become a force in this universe that could conceivably make
the Jurai Empire tremble. It doesn't matter what they did to you before.
You have to go beyond petty schemes of vengeance. You have to be willing to
let go of the past and move forward with the future, otherwise you're
doomed to failure. That I can guarantee."
Hmm. I'm sensing a probable outcome of the story here. :)
"And what purpose would that serve?" Stargrave gave Ariana a disappointed
look. "He's free to come or go as he pleases. It just means he'll be cut
out of the deal when the time for rewards comes." He shouldered the back he
'backpack'? or 'pack'?
It would have felt like a complete exercise in futility if not for the fact
that Tenchi had a bad feeling that their troubles weren't over and that
they were being followed. It was not as though he had actually seen any
indication that there was anyone following them, not even the quick
movement of a shadow out of the corner of his eye, and yet the feeling
would still not go away. It was making him slightly paranoid. Slightly,
only because when you hung around people that could move through walls,
summon floating logs, and turn your storage closet into an access portal to
another dimension, and all of said people had an active interest in you,
you already had a tendency to be paranoid, and you got used to the feeling
after a while. When you were almost certain you were being hunted by one or
more bad guys intending harm upon your person, the paranoia was higher and
more constant, but remained at acceptable levels.
Uh, this paragraph needs a little work, I think. Perhaps breaking up the middle
chunk into smaller sentences.
"Oh. I guess that would explain why the waiters were so big and handsome
and wore those tight leather pants muscle shirts. And here I thought it was
just because the place was really warm. Anyway, we had a really fun time
and all got along really well. The waiters were very accommodating too."
Mihoshi got a far off look in her eyes. "One of them gave me a nine inch
sausage."
Uh oh. Sausage jokes. :)
"Even Ryouko was impressed by that. She said she wanted to try too, but she
could only get seven inches down before she gagged."
Ryoko?! Only seven inches?! Well, that was still alright, thought Tenchi. I'm
only six inches at full extension. :)
"Can you really eat a nine inch sausage in one gulp?"
"Tenchi, I could do eleven if I had to."
"Wahaha, I used to be able to swallow foot-long carrots, you know," boasted
Tenchi.
I hope you realize that swallowing a sausage at a single gulp is liable to
cause all sorts of hurt to the digestive tract? :)
The atmosphere around the camp was tense, though not as depressing as might
have been expected under the circumstances. The remaining five members of
the party had said little since Autolycus had left them, choosing instead
to remain silent as Ariana led the way, tracking their opponents. Onita
mentioned that with the trail Mihoshi and whoever was traveling with her
were leaving behind, even he could have tracked them. He was content to
Suggest: 'with the trail Mihoshi's group was leaving behind, even...'
Though if they had been tracking successfully, they'd be aware that there was
only one other person with her, but the sentence would still scan better, IMO.
Everyone pitched in and helped to make the encampment. Even with their
outfits keeping out the chill, the group was grateful for the fire. It made
things seems brighter and gave them hope for the next day. The nature of
each person's hope differed slightly from the others.
At least they didn't start singing 'Row, row, row your boat'. That scene from
Star Trek V still remains as one of my worse memories. :)
"I suppose that was around the time her performance rating started to drop.
In the beginning, she was a fine officer, though I had only encountered her
at a handful of award ceremonies. I heard odd stories about her in the
early days, but you know how rumors circulate. I paid them little mind, and
her performance rating remained high. But after the first three and a half
years of her career, things began to change.
This would be when she was adopted as an Agent of Chaos then? :)
Complaints began to come in.
Bills for damage she caused rose. She began to crash her spaceship into
things. It was a drop in everything except her arrest rate. That remained
high, and she was still able to accomplish the tasks she was assigned, but
the manner in which she solved her cases began to cause chaos all around.
And the more time that passed, the worse it got. Pretty soon, everyone
began to fear working with her. A young up and coming officer was assigned
to Mihoshi in the hopes that she could somehow mitigate the damage she was
causing, while still maintaining the record of arrests. Shortly after
joining Mihoshi, Kiyone disappeared and was presumed dead.
Kiyone? Dead?! Did I miss something?
"Since she was still completing her assignments, and no one had the guts to
fire the Grand Marshal's granddaughter, Mihoshi was relegated to out of the
way areas of space where it was presumed she would cause no damage, or at
least minimize it. I believe they were successful to some degree.
Suggest: 'I believe it was successful...' since Malgaunt is talking about the
reassignment.
Malgaunt openly scoffed at that. "The idea that she somehow stumbled onto
us and foiled our scheme through luck is absolutely preposterous." He felt
sorrow at his prot�g�'s naivet�. One couldn't put stock in such intangibles
as luck. The prepared made their own luck.
Yeah, all bad.
Stargrave thought about what had been said. "If she's still that
optimistic, I can see where she would be incorruptible."
Suggest: '...I can see that she would be...'
The fierceness in her voice caused Ariana to move nearer to Funuyaki. The
lieutenant noticed the motion and turned to fully face the enforcer. "Get
any closer, and I'll feed you that vibro-sabre that's under your cloak,"
Funuyaki snarled.
Ariana sniffed with disdain. "You mean you've never done it with a vibro-sabre
before?"
Oh wait, it's a weapon, you say? Sorry. :)
This time all eyes turned to Malgaunt. Funuyaki shot him in incredulous
look.
'shot him an...'
"After about a year of that, I was reassigned. A became mobile, working a
bunch of different assignments with different partners, all of them good,
upstanding officers.
'I became mobile,'?
"We met in a large city on his homeworld. I nice, dank, back alleyway in
the dead of night; the proper place for such underhanded dealing to take
place, yes?
'In a nice, dank,'
He was there, smirking at me like the cat that had swallowed
the proverbial barchard. And all the time fear gnawed away at me in a way
I'd never felt before. Getting gunned down in the line of duty, that I
could handle. But to be arrested, dishonored and thrown into prison for the
sake of busting a few criminals, that was too much to take. I thought I was
going to break down, I stress was eating away at me that bad.
'to break down, the stress...'
"All the time I was looking at him, I knew the truth. The little rat would
never really be bought off. He'd blackmail me to the end of his days, and
that I couldn't live with. So I decided to scare him, convince him that I'd
kill him if he even breathed a word of this to anyone. I threatened him,
but the little shitbag didn't buy it. He was convinced I'd never actually
kill him, that I was too nice, in spite of what I had done, and that if I
wasn't willing to pay up, he'd contact one of the others and see if they'd
cough up the cash. I'd never felt so threatened in my life. And if they
didn't, he contact the Galaxy Police.
'if they didn't, he'd contact the...'
Malgaunt was surprised by the confession. He had known about everything but
the murder. However, he quickly adapted to it. It was unexpected, but meant
nothing in the larger scheme of things. "We got wind of the possibility
that someone in the Galaxy Police was using their position to pretend they
were on duty and robbing from criminals.
Suggest: 'and robbing the criminals.'
"As though the compliments of a lapdog impress me."
"Yes, but I'm Sa'bre's lapdog," purred Ariana. "No need to be jealous though,
there's more than enough for you as well." :)
"Ariana is from Andarea, as you might have been able to tell by her slight
accent. It's a small out of the way planet that has several treaties with
the Jurai, though is not actually a part of it. Andarea's world government
is a male-dominated monarchic system. Women are treated as little more than
property. Valuable property, but property all the same. And the most
valuable of all are the high born ladies, such as Ariana here."
"How come?" Onita asked.
Stargrave bit off the sharp reply on his tongue. He hated being
interrupted, but he wanted to finish his tale more than wasting time with
the reprimand. "Because they are taught almost from the moment they can
walk combat arts. They receive extensive training in most personal arms and
hand-to-hand fighting.
Heh. This reminds me of one of the earliest first season NextGen episodes
showcasing Tasha Yar, where she has to duke it out with a planetary noble
female using poison gauntlets.
Even now, there was something she could do for him. Something that would
endear her further to him, and perhaps that day she longed for more than
anything else in the universe would come at last. But she would have to
wait until nightfall to make the attempt, after everyone was asleep. Until
then she would have to bide her time and remain impassive until a moment
presented itself.
What? Run off by herself and get killed? :)
She withdrew her embrace, considerably happier that she had been. The two
began to relax as they prepared themselves for sleep. Mihoshi, still
feeling very excited, began talking. "I wonder what Aeka and Ryouko are
doing?"
Tenchi was astonished to find that Mihoshi's mention of their names was the
first time he had thought about them in the last three days.
This can't possibly be true after the sausage session earlier.
"Of course," Mihoshi said as though it was the most obvious thing in the
world. "I don't like to see anyone fight, especially when deep down inside
they're really friends, like those two are. I see more than enough people
fighting in my line of work. If I never saw two people arguing again, it
would be all right with me."
"Besides, if I can get them to become 'friends', then I'll have you all to
myself, Tenchi," Mihoshi purred.
"Wait, what about Sasami?"
"Well, Sasami's nice so I don't mind sharing with her, and besides, you'll have
to wait until she grows up, so I'll have you all to myself for a while."
Mihoshi paused, fingering her laser pistol. "You will wait until she grows up,
right?"
"Absolutely! Yep! No doubt about it!"
Mihoshi shook her head furiously. "A lot of people think that because he's
family that's how I got my position on the force, but they're all wrong. If
anything, it made my graduating the academy even worse."
"How so?" Tenchi hoped she would calm down. There was something about
Mihoshi being angry at him that he found very disturbing.
"Because he didn't want me to join the Galaxy Police," Mihoshi explained.
"He was dead set against it. He thought I should get into a line of work
that was less hazardous. But I wanted to be a police officer more than
anything in the galaxy. So I went ahead and enrolled, even over
grandfather's objections. Once I got accepted into the academy, he saw to
it I had the hardest instructors and was given the most difficult tests so
that I'd fail. But I didn't. I refused to lose. I put everything I could
into trying really hard and passing everything they could throw at me. And
I did it. It wasn't easy. I think maybe it was the hardest time I ever had
in my life. But I surprised everyone, even my instructors, by graduating
with honors, in spite of everything they tried to do." With her explanation
over, Mihoshi relaxed.
Ick. Negative nepotism. :)
"I hear you." Tenchi settled down as well. With a fire going, he wasn't
going to have to use Mihoshi's body heat to help keep him warm.
Surprisingly, he found a small part of him disappointed in that. But only a
very small part.
Guess that six inches comment of mine was right on the money. :)
She found a quiet spot nearly thirty meters away from the cave and shielded
off by a large amount of foliage. She had unzipped her uniform and peeled
the upper half down to her waist, when a sharp blow struck her in the back
of the neck. She fell to the ground, unconscious.
I guess Mihoshi will have a problem getting that stain out then. :)
"I knew I could track you in the darkness."
Sigh. Goodbye, Ariana.
Ariana Taguyu had taken a chance in leaving the others right after her
guard shift had started, but it had been a necessary risk to end this whole
matter before Sa'bre placed himself in danger for the sake of the Shihana.
Ariana had been convinced she could resolve everything before Sa'bre and
the others awakened. Her skills at tracking were good enough to use even in
the middle of the night, and without having the others to drag along, she
could make better time. She hurried as quickly as she could, trying to
reach the prize while her opponents were hopefully still asleep. She had
lost the track once, and was trying to find it again, when she saw the
flash of color under the moonlit night. Approaching silently, she had
stalked her prey and was delighted to recognize the telltale uniform of a
Galaxy Police officer. All it had taken was when Mihoshi was at her most
vulnerable and striking her in the back of the head to bring matters under
her control.
Suggest: 'All it had taken to brings matters under her control was to strike
Mihoshi on the back of her head when she had been at her most vulnerable.'
Of course, she's conveniently forgotten about Tenchi. :)
A vibro-sabre cleared its scabbard. Ariana leveled the point of it with the
center of Mihoshi's chest. It would be best to leave the face intact.
Malgaunt would be able to confirm the corpse's identity then. It was not
like Ariana would risk awakening Mihoshi just to be certain she had the
right person. That sort of detail could be left for later, when they had
the time.
The other three groups wandering the wilderness that Ariana had earlier left
for dead could also be conveniently identified then as well. :)
After subtly looking around one more time to see if she could spot anyone
else, and finding no one, she looked more closely at the hilt. Upon making
out some of the details on it, Ariana gave a contemptuous laugh. "You think
using a laser sword in the shape of the Master Key will make me quake in my
boots, boy? It's an old trick. Believe me when I say I've killed
inexperienced little punks like you before breakfast just to wake me up."
"But it is the Master Key," protested Tenchi.
"Yeah, right. Next thing, you'll be telling me you're the Emperor of Jurai's
grandson or something."
The blade of energy sizzled through the air as Tenchi finished the follow
through on the strike on his opponent. The blow was nearly identical to the
one that had killed Kagato save that it had not cut quite as deeply on the
woman, though from the results of his blow, it was deep enough. Still, as
Tenchi saw the blade slice more cleanly through the woman than it had upon
his pale-skinned opponent from so many months ago, a surge of revulsion
threatened to overwhelm him. He had seen the blood and bone that the blue
blade of energy had cut through, and it nauseated him. When he had driven
his sword through Kagato, there had been nothing -not even an obvious wound
on his body- before he dissolved into a death so clean and sanitary that it
had not even seemed real.
It's always nice when your dying enemies clean up after themselves. :)
Putting his thoughts at as much ease as he could for now, Tenchi turned his
attention from himself and the dead, to the living. It had been nothing
more than luck that had enabled him to come onto the scene just in time to
save Mihoshi from the stranger's blade. When she had stepped on him, it has
served as a sort of wake up call.
'it had served as a sort...'
"AHHH!" Mihoshi screamed as she hit him with a palm thrust that connected
hard with his chin. She rolled out of his grasp and into a standing
position next to his stunned form. She gathered the top of her uniform and
pulled it up to cover her revealed flesh. "I can't believe you did that!
And I trusted you so much, Tenchi."
Heh.
"You didn't have to knock me out. If you wanted to have sex, all you had to
do was ask."
Double heh.
Once they were within ten feet of the entrance, Tenchi began to speak. "I
think we'd better..." He trailed off as he heard a gentle unlocking noise
come from the direction of the orb. For some odd reason, the smooth surface
of the polynison had begun to retract, the top pulling back and gathering
around the bottom. He stood transfixed as it continued opening until the
top half had retracted and the contents within the orb could be clearly
seen at last.
Hmm. It's reacting to the Master Key?
Well, another nice piece of work from you, DB. A fun read as always. The only
problem I had - well, minor objection really - was that you tend to kill off
your villains just after providing them with a nice amount of characterization
and depth. Judging from this, I'd say there would be another 4-5 chapters left
in the series. :)
Hope this helps.
Phil.