Hi!
Hello, Morgan! It's been a while, ne? ^_^
And a Happy Thanksgiving to all of my fellow Canadians! ^_~
Um, yes, Happy Thanksgiving, people! ...Whatever that is. :-p
Yes, I know that I originally planned to release this last weekend. Blame
my professors, with all their blasted essays and assignments and the like.
SIX IN THREE DAYS! I'm lucky I'm still alive. :b
No, WE, the fans, are lucky. If you had taken another week in releasing this
chapter, I don't know if my poor heart would have resisted it.
However, I am alive, and what's more, I've got yet another chapter ready
for your reading enjoyment. First, however...
Yes, he remembers! This proves ANYONE can be taught. ^_~
<SNIP PLEASE AND URLS>
Of course, I recommend you to visit these sites, be it to find great
crossovers (at Joy Lin's) or to read the previous Ronin Summer story arcs.
Or reread, in my case. ^_^
And, with all that out of the way, here we go! ^_^
Gee, and you called MY notes long-winded? ^_~
Characteristic "Bye to Slow Internet" joke:
Say Bye to Slow Internet!
LATIN_D: Yeah, you do that. 'Cause now it's all mine! MINE! Forever, I'll
have Slow Internet, and there's nothing you can do about it!
BWA-HAHAHAHA-HAHAHA!
^_^
As always, and I bet you know that already, every comment I manage to make
should be taken with a pinch of salt, a squeeze of lemon, some crackers, two
cups of coffee and a pie. This way, if you happen to disagree with me, at
least you'll have something to keep your mouth busy.
What's it gonna be, pal? Blue pill, red pill, or Jell-O? ^_^
Let's start C&Cing!
OBLIGATORY LEGAL DISCLAIMER : Some of these guys aren't mine. The
Sailor Senshi belong to DIC and Kodansha, while the Yoroiden are owned
by Sunrise and Graz Entertainment. Okay? So don't bother suing me. I'm
a student.
See it this way: if they sue you, you won't have to worry about essays any
more. ^_^
RONIN SUMMER VI : DARK CRUSADE
A Sailor Moon / Yoroiden Samurai Troopers cross-over
by Morgan Hudson (dataraven_659@excite.com)
Chapter Eleven : Safekeeping
Hey, I like that word. However, if you want to stay consistent, you might
want to drop that space before the colon. ^_~
With a cruel scowl on his face, a winged man soared through the
heavens. His massive ebony wings stretched wide, stiff and unyielding
as he looped and drifted on the wind currents, his emerald eyes
scanning the terrain below him. Miles of river blurred past, sparkling
magically in the cold and silvery light of the huge full moon rising
behind his lean body, casting a huge winged shadow onto the thick
Which is pretty logical, as he was a winged man. Or, in other words, maybe
you should drop "winged", as I feel it redundant. Maybe that's just me, and
probably I'm being picky, but this is such a wonderful introduction it
seemed jarring to me.
Is there such thing as _over_describing?
tree canopy as he angled towards the forest and continued his search.
On a whim, he dipped one feathered appendage and twirled like a leaf
in a fierce breeze, spinning and twisting as he spiralled down closer
to the trees and skimmed his fingers through the thick foliage like a
child playing in the water. His name was Vyne, and although a new
I always wondered how it feels flying like a bird. When I was a kid, it was
(and still is) one of my longed fantasies, and this paragraph induced me to
think about it.
Very good description. Excellent.
arrival, he was the undisputed master of the skies. His problems,
However, I believe you misused "although". IIRC, it can't be followed by a
noun. "In spite of", maybe? "Despite"? The truth is, I'm not entirely sure
what you meant here.
legion that they were, were for the moment at least very far away from
him. He would find his prey, and destroy them quickly, the better to
Um, I really can't remember whether "prey" had a plural. Isn't it "preys"?
return his focus to his true enemy: Pedri.
"HEY!"
With a confused look on his face, Vyne rolled over onto his
back and scanned the sky above and around him. That voice had almost
sounded like...
"VYNE! OVER HERE! I'M SUPPOSED TO TELL YOU TO- ah, screw it,
he's not listening. I'm going home."
Heheh. Now we all know who's talking. ^_^
Vyne grinned. Yes, he thought, that was the distinctive cry of
his sister Holts, all right. Catching himself in mid-air, the bishounen
man slowly rotated in a full circle as he examined the foliage for-
This is a bit too abrupt. Why don't you finish the sentence and move "there"
to another paragraph?
<BABI-SNIP>
"Oh, THAT? Holts blinked. "That was a moment ago. I don't care
Missing quotation mark after "THAT?".
about that now. I'm going back to bed, assuming I can find it..."
HOLTS: In fact, do I really need a bed? I could just lay on the grass and...
zzzzZZZZZZZZZZZ.
Vyne sighed and placed one hand over his eyes. "Tell you what,"
he said calmly, "if you give me that message I'll... I'll... Personally
Caps: personally
escort you back to your room."
Holts looked sleepily suspicious. "I could get back faster
by myself, you know."
Heh. You're evil, m'friend, you really are. You've just implied a LOT about
Holts' powers. I bet she'll get to fight and show us what she can do before
the story ends.
<THE FORMER SNIP'S YOUNG BROTHER>
"He has purple armour, and a patch over his left eye." Holts
smacked her lips and began to wriggle around, nuzzling the side of
Vyne's neck as she tried to find a comfortable position. Vyne, already
badly overbalanced, began to find his flight much more unstable than
he preferred.
Er, he's carrying her in his back, and still manages to fly? If this were
DBZ, I'd believe it. But he's using wings, and he needs to flap them.
The black-haired man began to sweat as he remembered the two
people that had gone over that cliff earlier. Hadn't one of them been
wearing an eyepatch? "Does this Masho of Deception have long sliver
hair, too?"
HOLT: Nope.
VYNE: *sighs in relief*
HOLT: But he does have _silver_ hair...
VYNE: *facefaults*
Or, in other words, you have a typo there. ^_^
His only answer was a light snore, as Holts finally got herself
comfortable and promptly returned to her favourite state: slumber.
"Sorry, sis," Vyne muttered, "but I think we may need to make
a little detour..." Veering off, he began heading back the way he had
come as quickly as he could. Maybe if he was lucky, one of those two
Wouldn't it be "Maybe, if he was..."? I'm not sure, and people say I tend to
use too many commas. *shrugs*
had survived the fall. He doubted Pedri would believe him if he argued
that the Masho had leapt over the cliff all on his own, and it wasn't
Vyne's fault that he had fallen.
One of the most important lessons Vyne had learned in his long
life was that treachery required no mistakes. His fellow siblings were
each growing more and more agitated with Pedri's rule, but someone
needed to keep adding fuel to the fire, or the pot would never boil.
If he had, however inadvertently, just openly defied Pedri, he was as
good as dead. He could not afford the delay of returning, not when the
time was so ripe.
Would Pedri really kill one of his siblings? Now that I think about it,
didn't one of the siblings mention that it had been brught back to life
(something like "in one of my lives")? Maybe I'm wrong--my memory isn't what
it used to be. ^_^
Vyne began flapping his wings even harder, doubling his speed,
and prayed with all his might that the Masho of Deception was unhurt.
**********
Floorboards creaked softly under the man's feet as he padded
along the narrow hall. His long red hair stirred as he walked, swelling
behind him like a crimson cape. Pausing for a moment, he nudged the
screen open with one toe, careful not to unbalance his cargo as he
slipped into the room.
Finally we get to see Shuten again! I like this guy. He and Vegeta would
make an interesting duo, don't you think?
As rooms go, it wasn't much. In its own defence, however, it
was a whole LOT of not much, so large that any sound loud enough would
likely echo. The floor was covered in tatami mats, and the entire north
wall was lined with giant windows. Gossamer curtains of rich purple
silk billowed in the breeze, sweeping into the room and writhing as
though with a life of their own. The walls were bare, bleached white
rice paper screens with black bamboo frames.
The man made a slightly sour face as he examined the cavernous
bedroom. It was regularly and rigorously cleaned, just like every
other section of his home. Despite that, it seemed a bit too barren for
his tastes. The only real furniture it had was a futon and a small
table with short legs, crouching low to the ground. Folding his own,
much longer, legs under him, the stern young man sat next to the bed
Um, too many commas, IMO. Why not:
Folding his own much longer legs under him, the...
<SNIP SOME PARAGRAPHS>
With a blush, the frail young girl tried not to stammer
incoherently. Here she was, a guest in this man's home, and she had
been blatantly staring at him like he was a side of beef she was
considering buying. Setsuna would spank her on the spot if she ever
found out Hotaru had been so rude and ungrateful a guest. "Sorry,"
SETSUNA: You did what?! Oh, you deserve a good spanking. Come here.
HOTARU: No!
SETSUNA: Come here!
HOTARU: I don't wanna, I don't wanna! *sniff* Death... *sniff* Reborn...
SETSUNA: JOKE! Joke, it was a joke!
she managed to whisper. "I didn't mean to-"
"No matter," he said, cutting her off with a swift motion of
the one hand not holding his cup. "I am more than used to such stares,
young lady. Your mother invented those stares. They never bothered me
when she used them, and I assure you that I have nothing to hide.
Nothing, at least, that I think you could find quite so easily."
"Did you go to school with Michiru-mama?"
SHUTEN: Michiru-mama? What kind of name is that?
Shuten paused with the edge of his cup resting against his
lips. "No," he said calmly, "I've never heard of anybody called by that
name. And I never went to school. We didn't have them." He sipped.
Oh, do I see your own personal wishes being fulfilled through your
characters? ^_~
"Nice try, though," he admitted, nodding his head.
Hotaru knitted her brow and looked down at her hands. "But you
said you were an old friend of my mama, the last time you showed up,
and if you don't know Michiru-mama, then who do you mean? Are you a
friend of Haruka-papa?"
Oh, how clueless can this girl be? >_<
"No." Shutendoji said sharply, as he took another sip of his
tea. "I've never met either of those two. I don't plan to meet them any
time in the future, either. People in general bore me, with one or
two notable exceptions." Lowering his cup, he smirked at the young girl
as she drank her tea in confusion. "Finish your drink," he said, "and
let's see what the leaves have to say to you."
I still think it'd be great to have him meet Jun--and make him actually like
the brat! ^_^
Seriously, this isn't so silly as it seems. After all, you showed us that
Shuten likes courage, and Jun has that in spades. Besides, I believe that if
there's someone who could understand Jun's struggle and eternal battle to
help his friends, despite his lack of power, it's Shuten.
<SNIP! ...MAKE MISTAKES, MAN!>
BTW, the scene between Hotaru and Shuten was the best of this chapter, IMO.
It was surreal and, at the same time, very compelling. Besides, as I told
you, I simply love Shuten's character.
"So," he said, with almost clinical precision, "it would seem
you have survived, young Miss Tomoe." His thin lips twitched upwards
in an approximation of a smile. "Excellent. I've put far too much work
into this puzzle just to lose one of the more interesting pieces." The
...of the most interesting?
<YA KNOW>
"Fine. Farewell, Sailor Saturn; I am not your keeper." With a
MORGAN: This chapter's title says otherwise, buddy.
wave of his hand, Rajura turned away and continued walking into the
bush. Hotaru stood and watched him leave, biting her lower lip and
rubbing her shoulder as she looked first down the stream, then back at
his receding form, then back downstream, and finally breaking out into
a run as she chased after him. Setsuna may have warned her, but so far
Rajura hadn't actually done anything to hurt her, and if there was one
thing Hotaru's life had taught her, it was that anything was better
than being alone.
Walking along in the forest, Rajura vaguely noticed the small
form of Sailor Saturn tagging along in his peripheral vision. "Took
And the nitpick of the day: two "along" in the same sentence. ^_^
you long enough," he snorted, and continued on in silence.
**********
Vyne drifted down the cliff and landed, his talons digging into
the mud and gravel of the riverbank with a loud scrunch as he folded
his wings behind him like a thick, feathered cape. Gripping Holts by
the wrists, he gently pried her hands away from his throat and took a
shaky breath. Asleep, the girl was like a dead weight pulling on his
back, yet she remained far lighter than he had expected her to be.
"I could have sworn this was where I left them," he murmured
to himself, turning and trying to reorient himself. "Where the hell
could two corpses get to in such a hurry?" Yes, he told himself, that
was definitely the rock that he had seen the one-eyed Masho sprawled
on, and right over there was the river where that dark-haired girl had
washed up after she fell. Surely they had been killed: they must have
fallen over two hundred feet!
Holts yawned loudly in his ear and smacked her lips as her
lower pair of eyes blearily opened. "What's going on, here? Home,
Rover! You said you'd tuck me in and everything!"
HOLTS: Let's go, Land-Rover!
VYNE: Brum, brum, brrrr, brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.
Bad joke, yes. :-p
"Just a second, Sister Holts. I need to find a few bodies that
went and moved on me." Scratching his head, Vyne placed his other hand
on his hip and tried to do the mental calculations. First, he thought,
they were here, and then I turned my back for a few minutes, and now
they're both gone. Cripes, I know I wanted them alive, but did they
have to be quite so lively about it?
Heh. Great line; I love the way you put it.
<SSSSNIP!>
"Simple. We have one advantage over our enemies: I know how
Anubis thinks." Rajura slowly creaked his way out of the cold water
and onto the muddy bank, kneeling and squeezing his eye shut as his
breathing became ragged. Hanging his head low, he coughed once and
cleared his throat. "Anubis is sore, tired, and hunted. If he were
alone, he'd pick a nice open area, put his back against something
hard, and go down swinging, but it's not just him. He's got Kayura
and the Outer Senshi with him, and in his mind, he has to look after
them. So... He's going home."
Caps: he's
"Home?" Hotaru stared at the Spider Masho. "You mean, back to
the castle? But that's a horrible idea! Pedri and his troops are all
over that place!"
Rajura groaned and shook his head. "I didn't SAY he was going
back to the castle," he explained, "I said he was going HOME. We've
...explained. "I said...
been in that castle for less than a week, and he wasn't even there
for most of that time. He's headed back to the Keep, whether he knows
it or not."
"The what?"
Um, does this "Keep" thingie exist in the anime? Or is it just one of those
convenient plot devices? ^_~
<SNAP, SNUP... SNIP!>
I love the way you write Rajura. In fact, I never thought he would explain
what he's doing--for a moment, I got this mental image of Rajura as Sherlock
Holmes and Hotaru as poor clueless Watson... And that moment when Hotaru
mentioned Setsuna and Rajura lost himself in remembrance was very
significative.
Rajura grasped the small girl by her wrist and began racing
towards the Keep, slipping and sliding in the mud several times before
he finally reached the front gates. "Come on!" he yelled to Hotaru,
as he grabbed the steel door handle and tugged with all his might,
Period instead of comma here.
"Pull!"
Hotaru clutched Rajura by the waist and dug the heels of her
boots into the muck, helping brace the man as he hauled on the door
until it slowly creaked open. The Spider Masho gestured with his head,
and Hotaru slipped through the portal ahead of him. Ducking around the
heavy oaken door, Rajura let it slam shut behind him with a shocking
finality. The sound echoed through the empty hallway, richocheting
Typo: ricocheting
off of bare stone and circling curiosly around the room before settling
Typo: curiously
onto the floor in disgust.
Rajura groaned and clenched his fists, a purple glow seeping
from between his fingers and sheathing his undergear, dissolving the
drenched metal plates and replacing them with a pair of black pants
and a black shirt, over which he wore a grey quilted jacket. "Change,"
he said to Hotaru, who was staring at him once again, "your normal
...again. "Your...
clothes should still be dry." Pulling off his jacket, he handed it to
her. "Use this on your hair. Don't want you catching your death of
cold, do we?"
RAJURA: Do we? ...Wait, I do.
HOTARU: ...
Hotaru closed her eyes, her body becoming enveloped in a nimbus
of sparkling violet energy as her sailor fuku changed into the far
drier school uniform she had been wearing before. Accepting the offered
jacket, she threw it over her head, rubbing and fluffing her soft
raven hair dry. "Thank you," she said. "I mean, for the jacket, and
for earlier. Thank you for saving me."
"I didn't do it for you, child." Rajura grinned as he undid the
cord constraining his hair and let the silver mane hand freely down his
"Hand"? "Hung", maybe?
back. "I did it for Setsuna Meioh. You're her child, the one thing she
values more than anything else in this world. And I saved you." He
chuckled cruelly as he rubbed his hands together. "It's been far too
long since I've owned her," he said with a satisfied tone. "I plan to
enjoy it as much as possible."
"That's really too bad," Hotaru said quietly. "I feel sorry for
you."
"Huh?" the Spider Masho looked at her in confusion. "What are
Caps: The...
you talking about, child?"
"Well, it's just that you can't even save somebody's life
without needing to find an ulterior motive. You can't even let yourself
feel good when you're being heroic. You must hate yourself very much."
"I don't think you should talk any more," Rajura suggested,
and placed his hands on his hips. "You're speaking gibberish."
Oops. It's terrible when people read you so well, you can only act as if you
don't understand what they're saying.
"I don't think you're as bad as you want people to think you
are, Rajura." Hotaru smiled as she finsihed drying her hair and offered
Typo: finished
him his jacket back. "I think you're actually really nice."
<REALLY-SMALL-TINY-EVEN SNIPPY>
Never one to deny a moment its proper drama, Rajura glared over
his shoulder and gave the yung girl the most malicious smile he could.
Typo: young
Heh. I always find these at the end of the chapter. Funny, ne?
"Like me," he hissed, and faded from sight. His voice, however,
remained a moment longer. "But for now," it said, floating from every
corner of the hall, "I still have use for you. Rest secure, Miss Tomoe.
Mommy is on her way, and I will not allow whatever ghosts still haunt
this place to harm anything I still have an interest in."
Hotaru smiled to herself as she gathered up the jacket Rajura
had dropped and folded it into a makeshift pillow. "Explain it however
you want," she whispered, "but you're still pretty nice."
If the Masho of Deception heard the girl, he said nothing to
correct her.
Aw, the beginning of a wonderful relationship. If I were Jun, I'd start to
worry. ^_^
**********
To Be Continued...
Oooh, yeah.
Well, Morgan, another great chapter with the high quality I've come to
expect of you. I of course recommend this story (and the rest that form the
Ronin Summer series) to every FFMLer unlucky enough to read so far into this
C&C. It's long by now, but it's worth the time.
On the chapter itself, I have little else to comment. As I said, I
especially liked the scene with Shuten. I hope to see more of him in the
future (meeting Jun, maybe?). Is Rajura softening? I never thought I'd see
that in _this_ life. ^_^
So, pal, I only have two more things to say: keep writing--and do it faster.
^_^
See you soon!
Latin_D