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Do not go gentle into that goodnight,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that goodnight.
Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
-Dylan Thomas
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The scenery of the world passed him by slowly; he did not
hurry. He drunk in the world around him, knowing, deep within,
that it was no longer his. When, he wondered, had the world
abandoned him? Not at his death, for he knew with great
certainty that it had been far older than that. In the twilight
of his life, he had known that all was not right in his world. On
his deathbed, the truth had been shown to him. He had cringed in
its light, the pain far greater than that of his failing flesh.
His world had ended on a cold autumn afternoon, fifty-
eight years ago. All that he had been, all he might ever have
become, was shattered in a single instant. The words said that
day to him had broken from him all that remained of his warrior
self, his honorable life. "I'm sorry, Hibiki-san. She... She
died early this morning."
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|_|. \__\ |_|. .|_|.|_|...\/..|_|.|_|.|_|.|_|. \|_| \
/\ \ /
Created by Chris Willmore / \ \ /
<willmore@thekeep.org> / / \/
Based on a story by Rumiko Takahashi and /
Developed by C. Michael Schumacher / /
\ /
R2096 pages: http://www.thekeep.org/~willmore \/(Logo:Armakuni)
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THE RESURRECTION OF THE LIGHT
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A Ranma 2096 side-story by Karrde
(Karrde@death-star.com)
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Characters owned by Takahashi are used without
permission, please don't sue me, I'm poor
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Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that goodnight.
Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
-Dylan Thomas
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The Assassin sheathed her blade and wiped the sweat from her
brow. Her target of the evening had in life been a rather
formidable martial artist, and Skeride enjoyed her victory. Few
foes had ever forced her to exert herself to this degree.
Only one had ever beaten her. Her ancestor, the one that
had nearly destroyed Tokyo in life, had returned. They had
fought, and Nutkin cast her soul into Limbo, where it belonged.
So she had thought, anyway. Somehow, she had failed. The demon
returned to plague her dreams and steal her confidence.
The Assassin knew that to fight a foe this powerful, one
that could elude destruction, she would need to know more. Words
came to her from a half-forgotten class in Wester literature:
"Know thy enemy, and know thy self". What she knew of Ukyou was
limited to what the history books told. What she learned did not
improve her mood.
Ukyou had been a fearsome warrior even before the onset of
her madness. She was a woman who had committed every aspect of
her soul to what she wanted, a soul that could not be stopped
even in death.
What Skeride now feared was that even an exorcism would not
delay this once-woman from her quest. The dreams came nightly,
turning rest into a memory. She found herself driven to face her
ancestor. Again. Perhaps it was a desire to prove her right to
judge the dead. Perhaps it was mortal embarassment at having
lost to a spirit. Or... the girl thought back to her latest
kills. Except for this one, how long had they taken? Three
minutes? Five? A week more of these and she'd grow soft. Maybe,
just maybe, she needed a foe that could drive her to great
lengths, that could challenge her and bring forth her true
strength.
"..."
Thinking of herself as living for the hunt was never
pleasant, even if it were true. Not that she'd ever go to such
extremes, but... it reminded her of her Sister. And that was
something best not done. She cast the thoughts from her mind with
a shake of the head and slunk through the shadows, more out of
habit than any need for stealth. Nutkin dared quick glances at
those about her and wished she'd been blessed with less effective
ghost-sight so that she wouldn't have to wonder which of the
night-wanderers lived, and which only dared to think so.
She made her way down the aged streets, surrounded on all
sides by broken walls and potholes the size of craters. She
always shivered walking through the Nerima district. Here, the
imagined eyes of her ancestors peered at her from every perch and
shadow, chiding her and what she had become.
Not that in a region this psychically disturbed all the
watchers need be fantasies. Skeride felt fairly certain that at
least one of the unseen glances raising her neck hairs was of her
bloodline, its body long grown cold beneath the ground which she
trod nightly.
An ill wind blew this night. Skeride drew her jacket tighter
about her bodysuit and fled the yellow streetlights for the
comfort of shadow, her one true ally.
* * * * *
He watched from a neighbouring rooftop as she scaled a wall
and clambered into the building he watched, through an unlatched
second-storey window. Skeride was a threat and menace to his
kind, but he would not interfere. Not tonight. He'd promised
her.
Ukyou deserved her chance at vengeance.
But if she failed...
The Wanderer willed his cloak taught and leapt in behind
the Assassin. Once in, her scent beckoned like a signalf fire.
He took his time to follow her, and kept his distance. Her ghost
sight trumped his own capacities for invisibility.
Then again, he'd never been the subtle type.
She navigated with uncharacteristic laziness, but not without
precision. She knew where she was going. Conveniently enough,
it was where Ryouga _had_ to be, this night.
What drew Gosunkugi Skeride so late upon this anniversary to
his wife's prison, he wondered? Was it remembrance, enlightened
curiosity, or an informed attempt to turn him into prey?
* * * * *
Skeride had browsed the stacks of the Tokyo Institute for the
Criminally Insane more than once in her search for information on
Ukyou, but tonight she had a different purpose She'd been through
the files enough times to recite them, and the photographs... she
didn't need to look at them. Sometimes... sometimes they looked
at HER. Walking past the darkened rectangles brought illuminated
likenesses to her mind's eye. Hopelessness, resentment, hatred
and a drugged despair were captured by the film, and an
unrequited ooze from vengeance bled from their grayscale edges.
She knew well the power contained in that anger and fear. It
had leveled much of the suburb that she had just passed through.
She knew of the Shishi Hokodan, having been told by Sicarii of
the strike that had killed the Healer. And... she briefly
fingered her phurbu in its hip-holster. Much as she hated to
admit it, she had inherited much of that might and drive for
retribution.
But to vanquish one of her bloodline...
She stopped that train of thought. Ukyou relinquished all
familial rights upon her death. Her shade was bloodless, soul-
less and maddeningly obstinate in its survival. She was a stain.
An error. She did not belong among the living... and she would
be removed.
The ghost had fled oblivion once, but how? An alternity
jump, a call, perhaps, to some ectoplasmic version of the
Collective? But when did Ukyou associate with... with...
The answer had to be here, somewhere, and she'd find it.
Tonight. Once she knew the spirit's secret she'd begin the
second, final endgame.
"I will hunt you to the ends of reality if I must," vowed
Skeride...
* * * * *
"...but that doesn't mean I have to like it," she concluded.
Then a whispered, epilogued confession: "obasama."
The Wanderer frowned from the entryway where he'd stood
watching. Skeride's aura had flickered from purple to his own
shade of green. Her magic had given way to silence. But why?
Once her footfalls were inaudible he cast an emerald flare.
Nothing much in the room. A few relics. Straightjackets. Molten
bricks from the explosion. Scraps of records. Pictures. He
frowned and looked more closely at the photographs. Some of
them... some of them were of... of...
He felt his own aura darken. He'd left Ukyou to that. To
those feelings, to those faces. He'd abandoned her and come too
late. Was THAT what Skeride had somehow seen?
"I suppose even the Assassin has some human traits," he
mumbled to himself.
He knelt before the shrine of photographs, bowed his head and
prayed long to his true love, knowing full well that she would
not hear him. When his eyes opened they locked themselves upon a
ring locked in a glass case behind the photographs.
Ukyou's wedding band, crafted and given to her by him more
than a lifetime back.
Stealing her mind and life hadn't been enough for them.
They'd stolen her wedding ring, the symbol of their union, and
put it on public display for the masses to mock and gawk at.
"See the freak!" he imagined the barker shouting, "Behold the
maniac's wedding ring; the golden loop that drove her to her
final rampage and despair!"
"BAKUSAAAI TENKETSU!"
Either his shout or the pressure he exerted on the case's
braking point shattered it. Glass shards flew threw him,
spreading briefly behind him like the wings of a demon or an
angel before crashing on the ground and mixing their feeble
tinkles with the building's foghorn-like alarms.
A lifetime and a year ago, to the night and hour, he'd
destroyed this building for having dared contain his Ukyou. A
government intent on history and malice had rebuilt the site as a
museum, scavenging the ashes for whatever they could find with
which to desecrate the memory and afterlives of the poor souls
who'd been held there.
This time he'd ensure nothing remained but sand and galss.
Dark tendrils of green ki formed about him, their writhing
forms engulfing the stone set into the ring. Slowly they soaked
into the ring, focusing the energies of his despair. Ryouga drew
upon all of his grief that had been welling within him since the
death of his beloved and then went further, to the collected pain
that still infused the walls of this reconstructed prison house.
There were shades of shades here, memories of spirits too ashamed
to leave, too deeply hurt to dissipate. All these, he called on.
To all these he promised relief if they would help him. And they
did.
He slipped the ring onto his smallest finger and wished
himself, the building and his wife a happy anniversary.
"SHISHI HOUKODAN!"
Steel beams melted and scorched concrete fused with glass
into a gray-blue putty. Over the din created by the ward's
disintegration, Hibiki Ryouga cried his oath and justification:
"I pledge my eternal soul to Kuonji Ukyou, my once and
forever bride!"
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EPILOGUE
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Ukyou checked Skeride's pulse and pried the miniature
spatula from her clenched fingers.
"He kept his word, but only just." She held the object
against the light of a streetlight. Yes... definitely one of
hers. Odd to see a metal one, after decades of ki replicas. "If
Skeride'd been any slower getting out, the blast would've
destroyed her and I'd have been denied the pleasure of... how is
it that you put it? Oh, yes. Of neutralising her." She paused.
"Now THERE'S a thought. Skeride as a ghost. I'm curious. Suppose
she'd died in the explosion. Does she balance out, go up, or
down?"
"You know I can't tell you that," said Miller. He wore a
plain but tasteful suit, as usual. And was rather unhelpful. As
usual.
"No. Of course not. I wonder what she thought she'd find
in there... It's not as if she hasn't already sucked the records
dry, and what little is left... scraps of clothes, this throwing
spatula, maybe some photos... Crazy girl. Tell me again why I
shouldn't kill her now?"
"I can't."
"And if I did?" She ran the spatula's sharpened edge
slightly above the Assassin's neck.
Miller answered her with a vacant look.
"Fair enough. The Three'd make sure I'd go somewhere
that'd make Limbo look like Paradise, yadda yadda. Yanno, I
can't help but think that you're AFRAID of her. ALL of you. You
want her gone, but you don't want her to die, is that it?"
"Maybe."
"What IS it that you're scared of? What would happen if
she learned about... what if I *TOLD* her about the Three?"
Miller glared at her, then vanished.
Ukyou shrugged. She slipped the spatula into Skeride's
jacket pocket, blew a mocking kiss at her tormentor and
disappeared into the lights and sirens of the approaching fire
tanks.
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And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that goodnight.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
- Dylan Thomas
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END RESURRECTION OF THE LIGHT
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I was reading through the stories today, and I found myself
thinking, how does Skeride feel about having to hunt down her
ancestor. I felt that her character certainly would fight, but I
want to see Skeride with a human side, something other than a
pure villain. I wrote this in the hopes of including a bit of
the internal conflict that I feel she must be experiencing, being
tasked with destroying her own great-grandmother.
--Talon Karrde