Slayers PERSIST
Because it's been a long time since I posted this, I decided to send it again
before I released the following chapters so people wouldn't be totally lost.
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Slayers PERSIST
Episode One.
"Monthly Denials! Attack of the Big Flying Skeleton Thing!"
He wanted to be strong.
That was, essentially, all there was to him. To the world. The need to
be stronger.
The need for strength.
And so he hacked at the nothing about him. His sword sliced through
the nonexistent air with a clean, thorough precision that bespoke of
unmastered potential, but it wasn't near good enough.
At once he could feel the presence was behind him; it was a presence
he had long learned to expect. He turned to face his grandfather and
great-grandfather, the great sage and priest heralded as a saint, a worker
of miracles, the kindest soul alive. Except this was not any saint; this
was a half-mad vessel of vain ambition ruled by the Lord of Mazoku. Any
humanity this man might once have possessed was now stored away as Ruby Eye
Shabranigdo ran the show. He knew this, and the knowing made it horrible,
because he was unable to run.
The two of them appraised one another for a moment, his own sword
blows stilled as this vessel for destruction walked towards him, the
ghostly kind of walk that never exists anywhere but with the supernatural.
The rings of his staff clanged noisily together with each staff, ironic
that the last remaining anchor between this vessel and his once cherished
Priesthood would resonate so loud, despite being so weak.
When the corrupt priest stopped before him, he was still unable to
run. He knew he should, knew it even more clearly now that this man was
before him, but he was rooted, and could not. He gazed at his ancestor with
tremidity, and his ancestor's sealed eyes gazed back.
It was then that he realized it was happening; like a demon's darkest
dream, the red robes of who was once a great sage coiled towards him with
the silken ease of a serpent, twining about his legs, his arms, his torso,
his neck; pulling taut all about him, holding him as his sword dropped from
a weakened grasp and fell beyond his line of sight. He struggled, he
screamed, he flailed, and it had no effect; it never had any effect. He
could feel the robes somehow coiling within his skin, getting deep into his
life's blood, surging through him with a power at once exotic and horrible.
He felt himself grow heavier, his hair constrict, tighten, and a sudden
unexplainable sensation, an explosive increase in his senses.
When the robes withdrew, their job complete, his grandfather did not
so much disappear as he was lost in a sudden torrent of emotion, as he
looked at his hands, felt his face, and knowing again the pain of his fate,
screamed a loud, wild scream.
Zelgadiss sat up in his bed, chest heaving. Sweat rolled down his
cheek, a sensation almost completely lost to him because of the granite
that composed his skin.
He sat, for a long time, breathing and staring at the sheets knotted
in his fists. Then his face hardened, he uttered an obscenity, and thrust
his head back against his pillow...
...wherein his spiky hair became promptly entangled. After a moment of
comical wrestling with the downy softness behind his head, he managed to
pry it off and reassert a little dignity into the serious scene. With a
mutter curse, he rolled over and closed his eyes.
"Lina-san?"
"Hai?"
"Why do all bandit leaders always look like apes?"
Lina blinked, for that was not a question one usually expects to hear.
"Huh?"
"Look at him," Gourry insisted, motioning to the scarred man cowering
in her shadow.
Lina, seeing no harm in humoring her sidekick, indulged him and
looked. "Hey, you're right! If you squint a little bit...."
"Oi..." the bandit began, quaking as he was.
"But apes usually don't have buck teeth."
"True."
"Oi!" the bandit tried again.
"And actually, I think they're a little less hairy."
"Really?"
"Oi!!" the bandit said, climbing to his feet and huffing. "You already
ran off my band, took all my loot, and ruined all the credentials I ever
had in this business! There's no reason for you to bring me down on my
looks!"
"Gomen," Gourry said, quite politely. "It's just that all the bandit
leaders we've fought look a lot like you. With maybe a few changes to the
scar pattern."
"Animators slacking off with the character designs, probably," was
Lina's suggestion.
"Hai," Gourry agreed.
Unreconciled, the bandit stomped a foot. "What is it you want from
me?"
Lina looked over at him, her eyes wide and innocent. "You mean you
didn't figure that out?"
"No," the bandit answered in the voice of all grudgingly admitted
idiots.
Gourry cleared his throat and looked away. "Poor, poor man," he was
heard to murmur.
The bandit blinked. "Wha? Wha?"
Lina took a step forward, shoving up her sleeves and looking very much
like a cat about to pounce. The bandit's arms flailed a little as he
tottered back, tripped over the root of a tree, and fell on his ass.
Lina Inverse, the evil and terrifying antagonist to all mankind, had
shown up less than twenty minutes ago; before she had popped in, everything
had been grand. His gang, known unoriginally as The Bad Guys, had just
looted a small town an hour or so away, and had been partying with their
money stolen wenches when a spheric chariot of fire burst out of nowhere,
landing right in the center of their hideout (which was a grassy knoll, and
not too hidden at all actually, the bandit leader mused too late). And of
course the chick standing there after the flames dispersed had to be the
notoriously evil Lina Inverse, who killed and then devoured the bones and
inner organs of bandits and their kin. She had made short work of half the
gang in under two minutes with a Fireball here and a Flare Arrow there. The
Bad Guys fled every which way, leaving piles and piles of money and nude
wenches behind. He himself was apprehended by the pet swordsman, who
grabbed hold of the back of his shirt and held him in place until The Evil
One had finished spilling all the littered gold into her pouches. Not a
noble capture, the bandit groused to himself. It was then that Blondie had
begun making rude comments about his appearance.
Lina towered over him frighteningly. He cried out and hid behind his
arms, cinching his eyes tight and shivering uncontrollably. "Don't kill me!
Please, I beg you, I have four kids and a wife and a dog and a monkey and
parents and a sister and a cousin-"
"We won't," Lina said simply, and crossed her arms.
The bandit blinked. "Huh?"
"I said we won't kill you!" Lina repeated, louder.
"But..." The bandit's ape-like mind raced to understand this. "Aren't
you... the evil devil woman Lina Inverse?"
Her eyes narrowed, and her teeth clenched.
"She Who Is Enemy To All Living Things?"
The corner of her eyelid began twitching. Her hands bunched into
fists. A sweat drop appeared on Gourry's head.
"The Dragon Spooker, The Wicked Breastless Girl From--"
At that moment Lina very nearly made herself a liar; Gourry's reflexes
were much quicker than his brain, however, and he managed to hold the
wildly flailing sorceress back.
"LEMMEATHIMLEMMEATHIMI'LL--"
"Lina-san, calm down!"
"--USEHISHEADASAPAPERWEIGHT--"
"Keep her away! Keep her away from me, I'll do anything!"
"--ANDGOUGEOUTHISEYESAND--"
"Lina-san, remember the treasure!"
"--THENI'LLUSETHEMTOMAKESTEWAND treasure?" Lina blinked twice to a
cute sound effect, calmed down, then slid out of Gourry's arms and grabbed
the bandit by the hair. "Okay then! You're gonna tell us where you guys
hide all your treasure!"
The bandit righted himself, drew tall, and, being a typical bandit,
stubbornly refused. Lina, being a typical Lina, threatened to tear his body
apart and then feed the remains to the local werewolf tribe. The frightened
bandit, being a typical frightened bandit, handed her a key and give her
detailed directions to the stash he'd been saving for his child's college
fund.
"Arigatou!" Lina said with a wide smile, twirling the key around her
finger.
"Can I go now?" the bandit grumbled.
"Of course not! How are we supposed to hunt you down and tear you
apart if it turns out you were lying? Running across the country in search
of a bandit wouldn't work with my image."
"You have a point," the bandit was forced to admit, and was dragged
along by the pet swordsman yet again.
We shall interrupt this scene of hiking for just a brief moment to get
us all back into the swing of things. Six months have passed since Lina and
her group saved the world for the nth time, fighting off the engulfing
insanity of the malevolent Dark Star and the tortured but attractive
Valgarv who summoned him into their world. The group had dispersed after
that and out of consideration for the reader, we won't get into any
spoilers. Suffice to say things are as they usually are when a new Slayers
season begins; unimportant fluff used to start up the setting without a
trace of plot in sight.
And indeed, after a quarter of a mile's worth of hiking, the three
found themselves at a big long expanse of meadow with a few trees and
flowers and other pretty things. As good a place to rejoin the action as
any, one would think.
"That's him," the bandit leader said, thrusting a finger at a tall,
lanky, eye patched gangster leaning against a tree. The young man was
holding a medium-ish pouch and giving the approaching entourage an
understandably curious look.
Apparently after a moment he recognized the leader, and waved and
called to him by the name of "Boss."
"What you up to?" the lanky one asked. "And who're these guys? They
don't look like bandit material."
"Naw, listen, I'm gonna need that loot," the boss said, attempting and
failing at nonchalance. To be fair, it's difficult to appear cool when a
swordsman's holding you by the collar and dangling you like a puppy.
"No can do, man. You know that. No one gets it."
"Listen, pal," Lina said, poking a righteous finger at him. "You
better give us that pouch there, or there's gonna be some serious trouble."
"I cannot," he proclaimed. "I am the guardian of The Bad Guys' loot! I
must not stray in guarding it, not even under orders of the boss himself!"
"Then how did you guys expect to spend it?" Lina asked, smacking her
forehead.
There was a moment of silence as the bandits pondered over the
revealed loophole to their plan.
Lina sighed. "I don't have time for this."
Gourry blinked, and ducked behind a nearby rock.
"Huh? What?!" the guardian of the loot asked.
"Dill Brand!" Lina cried, and the ground beneath the lanky guardian
bandit exploded in a bright flash of magic. The pouch he'd been wearing
fell and landed conveniently in the sorceress's hand.
"Lucky!" Lina smiled, spilling the coins into her open palm. "You can
put him down now, Gourry."
"Good luck in your future ventures," the blond headed swordsman said
with a smile, obeying.
"I hope you both rot," the ape-like bandit said with a scowl.
Gourry nodded twice. "Hai, hai. Obayo!"
Lina glanced up from counting the gold. "Three hundred, not bad.
Although I don't know how he expected to put his kid through college with
it."
Gourry smiled, rolled onto his back and looked up at the sky. "Maybe
he was going to send him to Bandit College."
"Maybe. Carry on the family tradition." She paused a moment, and
glanced sidelong at her ever faithful sidekick. "Notice how all life seems
to be lately is killing bandits and collecting treasure?" She shifted a
little, and plunked down beside him. "I've been wondering if our grand days
of universe saving is over."
Gourry's brows raised, but he kept his eyes on the big expanse of
blue. "I don't think so. Someone else will try to revive another dark
spirit, and we'll be called in again."
Lina smiled, and for some reason felt content. "I'm not so sure I want
any more hectic adventures. I'm only sixteen and I've already saved the
world, what? Eight times? That's high by anyone's count."
Gourry began counting himself, to be of better assistance. Minutes
ticked by, but he finally sat up and looked over at the petite sorceress
next to him, and answering eloquently and flawlessly the sum of all that
was in his head.
"I'm hungry."
Lina got to her feet and patted his shoulder a couple times. "The next
village on the map is known for its foreign restaurants. We should able to
get there by night."
Gourry rubbed his hands together, already envisioning the bountiful
delectable morsels that awaited them. Well, not quite, because "envisioning
the bountiful delectable morsels" was nowhere in his vocabulary. Instead,
he "thought about a lot of yummy stuff."
Alas, Gourry was not the only one with these thoughts of food.
In the dark depths of the nearby lake, a lake dragon sat licking its
jaws, glancing over and dismissing a school of fish that swam just above
its head as being too gamely, and a family of lobsters by its left hind
foot as being too crunchy.
This time of day, a lake dragon likes to dine on more simple, refined
eatery. Something like a complacent manatee or an unconscious koala bear.
Or a redheaded sorceress and an unintelligent swordsman. These kinds of
things in general.
A glimmer of gold caught the lake dragon's attention, and it swerved
its head to take in the potential dinner.
So while Gourry was thinking of "a lot of yummy stuff," a lake dragon
in the mood for a mid afternoon snack broke the water's surface and reared
above he and his feminine companion, jaws gaping and glistening, saliva (or
maybe just river water, but we'll say saliva because it has a much more
harrowing effect) running along its incisors.
Lina stared at this giant monster of a thing just long enough to take
it in for what it was; a quick and unhappy gateway to death. "For
Nightmares' sake," she grumbled. "Is the author really this pressed for
fight scenes?"
The mentally slower but reflexively always-on-top Gourry Gabriev had
leapt to his feet as well, his hand groping for the handle of his sword and
slashing the blade before him in a warning arc as the beast made to snap at
him. It reared its head back in time to miss the blow, but not before the
swordsman leapt at it, throwing his weight into the blow, and shouting
"Hikari o!" and calling into being a saber of pure energy, easily
vanquishing the enemy.
Or that's what should have happened. Before Gourry could remember that
no longer possess the Hikari no Ken, the blade of his sword was jarred
aside by the tough hide of the dragon's neck. A giant claw batted the
swordsman aside like an especially pesky (but not altogether threatening)
fly, knocking him violently along the ground and into a small pine tree.
"You're such an idiot," Lina groused.
"I don't see you helping!" was the only reply Gourry could think, and
so he settled with it.
She rolled her eyes.
"Stand back and watch, kids," Lina advised solemnly, pulling her hands
together. "One simple spell ought to knock this thing down."
Gourry hurriedly backpedalled out of the line of fire.
"Source of all power, light which burns beyond crimson..."
The lake dragon blinked and tilted its head.
"...let thy power gather in my hand!"
Its eyes turned to slits, a deep growl resounded in its throat.
"... FireBALL!"
The swirling sphere of flames whisked through the air, its searing
heat promising a horrible demise to all unfortunate enough to get in its
way.
...and it plinked out of existence about five feet from the target in
a sad, pitiful little whiff of smoke.
"Ano..." Gourry blinked.
"Shi-matta!" Lina screeched, and scrambled as far back as she could.
"Gourry, kill it!"
"Just a second ago you called me an idiot!"
Lina flailed. "That was then and this is now! Go, go!"
Not so much upset as confused, Gourry turned back to the lake dragon
and clutched his sword at his side. The lake dragon lunged itself forward,
jaws open, seeking to devour this foolish young man. This foolish young man
was, however, a good deal quicker than it had originally surmised.
Gourry leapt onto the back of the serpent's neck and plunged the blade
of his sword into its base. The dragon screeched, thrashed, and fell to its
side as a lifeless corpse. The swordsman hopped safely to the ground and
turned to face an even worse danger. Lina bashed him repeatedly with a rock
before he managed to scramble away.
"What did I do?!" he asked, tears streaming comically.
"How did you learn to kill lake dragons that easily?!"
"I took notes when we met Ashford. Itai, put that thing down! It's
sharp!"
"So why didn't you do that in the first place?"
"I thought I had my old sword! You're the one with the dud Fireball!"
Lina paused a moment in her partner bashing, and in that moment Gourry
realized he had gone a little too far. He didn't know why, of course, but
this wasn't due to his lack of intellect; no man ever truly understands the
complex psyche of a woman. He just knows when he needs to back up and
apologize like crazy.
"Gomen, Lina-san. I was just a little surprised to see it fizzle out
like that."
Lina hmphed and tossed the rock to the side. He could tell she was
still trying to be angry at him and decided to make that course of action
difficult for her.
"What was the matter with it? The spell, I mean?"
"I just wasn't in the mood." She sulked a little more.
"Not in the mood?" Gourry asked. "That doesn't sound like the Lina-san
I know."
"Shut up, Gourry," Lina said wearily. "I just want to get to this
place and eat."
"Yeah, so do I, but... something's wrong." Gourry stopped and looked
at her solemnly. "Ne?"
Lina stopped too. She almost had to smile. He really was a sweet guy,
even if he was a raging moron. Still, she didn't want to talk about it, and
told him so with a blow across the head.
"Itaiii..."
"Now can we please go?" Lina asked, straightening her tunic and
marching off. "I want to get to the next village before dark."
Gourry, peeling himself from the ground, smacked a fist into his palm
and smiled. "Ah-ha!"
Lina stopped again with that soft "erk" sound she sometimes makes.
"I know what's bothering you." He walked up to her and placed a hand
on her shoulder. She looked up at him with blunt acidity which fazed him
not at all.
"Gourry, really..."
"It's that time of the month again, ne?"
Gourry pulled himself out of the lake. "I'll take that as a yes."
"You know I don't like to talk about it!"
"Hai." He smiled and shook his hair dry. "But I'm confused."
"Really?" She wasn't surprised.
"Yeah," he said. "You just took out all those bandits before using
your general spell arsenal not six hours ago."
"The... time of the month thing springs at you unexpectedly, Gourry."
She sighed and patted his shoulder, apparently over her little mood swing.
"Let's just go eat. Dinner's my treat."
His attention was promptly diverted. "Really?"
Lina chuckled, turning and walking along the worn path that would lead
to the nearest town. "With a life like this, who needs adventuring?"
Gourry smiled. "Hai! Oh, and Lina-san..."
"Yes?" She looked over at him.
"I won't tell anyone else about this being your time of the month."
Had his expression been anything but simple, innocent fondness, she
would have fed him to whatever other river snakes were hanging around.
However, it was, and so she turned her gaze back to the road ahead and
smiled wide. "Arigatou, Gourry."
The meal that night was the best they'd ever shared.
He looked over the scene with a quiet frown. He did this in such a
manner because, well, he was a quiet sort of guy. His cloak drawn in around
his body and up over the lower half of his face, he cast his gaze across
the land with the calmness he'd always possessed.
The sun beat down on him in all its midday glory. Birds chittered
happily in their midday gaiety. Fish leapt out of the water, but for no
apparent reason; it was just one of those visuals that a lot of different
anime liked to showcase to depict a state of serenity. The entire scene was
peaceful, including this man in his pale cloak atop the mountain in one of
those grand man-looking-across-a-valley scenes that no one can ever get
enough of.
Below him was a town. The one he was looking for was in there
somewhere, that he knew. Or at least suspected. The size of the town itself
was rather small, which had almost thrown him off balance when he'd first
seen it. Then he'd remembered that really important things usually did
happen in small recluse towns like this, because otherwise, the author had
to address a lot of annoying issues like why the robust local security
force wasn't able to locate the cause of all the recent disappearances and
such.
He didn't really sigh, but sort of slumped his shoulders in a
pantomime of the gesture, and leapt off the cliff. Usually, that would be a
very stupid thing to do, but the drop wasn't completely sheer, and he
skirted down most of the length. This was pulled off with a lot of dust in
the air, but since it was, again, such a small village, no one noticed the
odd, pale cloaked newcomer.
He peered forward, and saw a lot of blue. Irritated, he brushed aside
his hair and peered again.
A good number of houses dotted his vision now. A lot of them were of
regular size, and in regular condition, nothing fancy like in Seiruun, but
nothing shabby like... um...
He paused, trying to think of a really shabby place he'd been to
recently so he could properly complete the analogy. Eventually, he figured
the slums of Seiruun would do, and took a few cautious steps into the
parameters of town.
Passing by a couple houses, peering into a window or two and seeing
things like little kids playing together, running around with their arms
out, couples gingerly placing a baby into a crib, and other
nice-little-town sights, he began to grow a tad restless. This was nothing
like what he was looking for.
Ahead, a young girl was walking with a woman who was apparently her
mother, the both of them pretty and brown-headed. The cloaked one paused
for a moment, watching them carry on with their conversation. Apparently,
they were discussing fruit baskets.
Then the girl saw him and opened her eyes moderately wide. The mother
blinked at the pause in their little chat and joined her daughter in her
Gaze Of Surprise.
"Ano, Mister..." the little girl started, taking a little girlish step
forward. "Who are you?"
The man looked from her to the mother. A half second passed as he
quickly processed this innocent question, and decided on his course of
action.
"I'm a tourist," he answered, and did it coolly, because pretty much
everything he did was cool.
"What's your name?" the mother asked, coming to stand beside her
daughter. The both of them were of gentle demeanors, and he could tell that
unless they were superb actors, they were asking of nothing more than
simple curiosity and even a bit of hospitality.
Thusly, he presented his true name for them. If you haven't already
guessed it, then you really shouldn't be allowed to read fanfiction, and
should be immediately put to sleep so the rest of mankind doesn't have to
bear witness to your incredible stupidity. "Zelgadiss."
"Zelgadiss?" the pretty woman asked with a smile. "What brings you to
our village? We haven't had tourists for... well, we've never had any, at
least not since I moved here."
"I'm looking for somebody," Zelgadiss answered, also truthfully.
"Oh? Who is that?" her sweet, full lips asked. "This is a small
village, everyone knows everyone."
"I don't know," he said, and that was also the truth.
The girl tugged his sleeve. "Zelgadiss-san?"
Zelgadiss looked down at her, the interruption pausing his hand and
thusly his cool anime-ish psychological plan. "Hai?"
"Ano... why are you wearing a scarf over half your face?"
A pause, as he realized a good anime-ish type of psychological
opportunity.
"Hold on," he told her amiably, and reached up to remove it. The
mother dropped her fruit basket and the girl shrieked in a high, shrill
octave.
"That's why," he said with a scowl.
"MAZOKU!" the girl screamed and raced off with her mother, leaving
fruit and basket alike.
Satisfied, Zelgadiss leaned forward and grabbed an apple. Judging by
that reaction, nothing out of the ordinary had happened in this small town.
Obviously whoever was at work here was doing it secretly. That had been a
safe assumption to begin with, but now he was sure.
He turned to make his way back up the mountain to make further plans,
and do further scouting. He got a total estimated amount of zero steps away
from the spot he stood before another pretty girl, because, really, almost
all anime girls are pretty, was blocking his way with a length of death
wielding steel.
"Ano..." Zelgadiss started, startled enough to sound like Gourry.
"Who are you?" the girl asked sternly, and suddenly Zelgadiss was
taken aback. She was pretty, her apparent courage only adding to the
physical beauty she flawlessly possessed. With blue hair and a golden sort
of circlet on her head, a finely honed sword, deep eyes and a stance that
screamed of skill with the sword. But she was young, just about his age...
Now, keep in mind Zelgadiss is not one to usually get caught up in a
woman's looks. Which is what made this revelation that he could actually be
attracted to someone a pretty startling one, especially for him.
"My name's Zelgadiss," he answered. His voice and posture was still
coolly calm. Nothing less than expected.
"Zelgadiss," she repeated, and looked momentarily unsure.
A second passed, and in that second the chimera's quick brain
processed it all and stored away the unwanted attraction. The girl then
looked up and narrowed her eyes.
"I've heard of you. Are you Mazoku?" Her voice was instantly rigid.
"Hardly." He reached up and withdrew his hood entirely, so that the
light played about his spiky and shiny hair to an overall awesome effect.
"Nor do I know how or when you would have heard of me."
The girl mused this silently.
By the time she was done, two others had come huffing and puffing.
Both of them carried swords, although "carried" wasn't really right. They
kind of dragged them across the ground, while their bodies drenched
themselves in perspiration.
One of them was an old man with a spiral for a haircut. It was very
disturbing to look at, the way it protruded from his head like a cannon,
and one kind of had to wonder about the character designer's sobriety at
the time he thought it up. The other was a somewhat dopey looking man with
a narrow face and black hair tied up in a wild fashion by a bandana. He was
probably just slightly older than the girl, but the other was pretty much
old enough to be her father. Both of them heroically tried calling out
demands, but they were too exhausted to do anything but lean on their
swords and pant.
"Che," Zelgadiss muttered, and prepared a fireball. None of them
looked like much of a threat, but he didn't have time to dally.
Okay, technically he did have time to dally, but he really didn't see
any point in it.
The girl's eyes lit up, suddenly. "Do you know Lina Inverse?"
Zelgadiss pitched over a little. The two other men looked up smartly.
"Lina...?" the old one asked, and seemed about to ask more, but then
made a wheezy sound and shut up.
"Ah... Hai. I do." Zelgadiss recovered smoothly, looking at her in a
way that, privately, made her do a little shivery number. "Why?"
"You and she had wanted posters up all over the place a bit ago, ne?"
She smiled, kindly, and lowered her sword.
Zel didn't find that particularly encouraging. Most people would
raising their defenses against someone who used to be wanted by law.
"Oh, hai! I remember that!" This from the dopey-looking guy. "A face
like his is pretty tough to forget!"
"Why do you seem so cheery about my status as a wanted criminal?" Zel
asked calmly, after hitting the dopey man over the head with his own sword.
"We know Lina-san wouldn't do anything bad," the girl put in with
youthful optimism.
"And just how," Zelgadiss asked, trying not to laugh, "did you draw
that conclusion?"
"Ah, all in it's due time," said the old guy with the cannon hair. "We
shouldn't be discussing this out here. Join us at our cottage."
"Hai," the girl said, bowing a little to the confused chimera.
"Welcome to the Village of Biatz."