Post by Tako on Jun 26, 2015 6:02:38 GMT
“Sooner or later.” The Blue Banner Captain snarled, “You will tell us what it is we wish to know.”
The village was silent. The mayor had been dragged out into the square and thrown to the ground by the Blue Banner thugs, and now the soldiers were watching on, some of them smoking, others fingering their weapons just in case someone decided to do something stupid. Captain Maroon was not a cruel man by nature, but it was important that everyone thought that he was; that way, they would be more inclined to give him the information that he required.
“Tell us the location of the artefact.” He said, “And me and my men will get out of here. Continue to hide it from us, though…”
He fingered the plasma pistol at his hip. The weapon was shiny, well maintained, and very, very deadly. The mayor’s eyes lingered on it for a moment, and then he looked up into the cold, dead eyes of the Blue Banner Captain.
“HEY!” Cried a young woman’s voice, “LEAVE THAT GUY ALONE!”
And that was the moment that someone did something very stupid.
THREE DAYS AGO
The rainbow-haired stranger wandered into the village on a whim. She had set off on her journey with no destination in mind and didn’t even really know what she was looking for here. It seemed like a pleasant enough place, though. The little village was picturesque in its way, with a crystal clear stream running through the middle and a smattering of small homes which seemed to exist largely to tend to the wheat fields and apple trees around the place.
The walk to get here had been pleasant, though, and she strolled into the village’s one bar and went to order herself a drink. It didn’t take her long to feel right at home.
The man behind the counter was large and fat, and always had something to polish – be it a glass or a surface. He also had the most delicious apple juice that Tako’s money had ever bought. Tako sat herself on the stool and drained fully half of it before he spoke up to her.
“Don’t get many visitors around these parts.”
She put down the glass and flashed a smile, “Oh yeah? I’m surprised, this place is really nice.”
Herbert – for that was the man’s name – chuckled heartily, “Nice, yes, but we don’t get many of them city folk, much less a colourful gal like you. How’d you get all that stuff in your hair, anyway?”
Tako shrugged her shoulders vaguely, “Oh, well, you know. It isn’t that hard.” Which was a total lie. Maintaining that dye job, especially in her pilgrimage into the wilderness, was in fact extremely difficult – but you had to make sacrifices for style, right? If you weren’t expressing yourself in how you looked, how would you choose to express yourself? But nobody was ever that interested in the intricate details of how such mundane things were accomplished – not really.
“Didja hear about the big fight?”
She smirked at that one, “You’re going to have to be more specific.”
The barman spat into his mug and polished it with his rag. “The one on Vegeta? Heard about that there Saiyan Queen done got her ass kicked and now there’s a new one. Sounds real exciting.”
Tako laughed, and leant against the bar top. “Really?” She asked, “I don’t see how. That’s a long way away and it isn’t really going to change a thing here on Earth, is it? One of our small mercies. Nobody really cares all that much about us.”
“You're probably right. Ain't like them saiya-djinnis come round any more often than gals with rainbows in their hair.” Harold replied, filling up Tako’s half-drunk glass with a wink. “But you’d be surprised what folk can bring themselves to care about.”
The girl strode out into the middle of the square, and the soldiers didn’t know whether they should train their weapons on her or burst out laughing. She didn’t look like much of a threat; with her dazzling hair and her sports vest, with her cheerful, bright pink eyes and the golden rings piercing her ears, the teenager looked more like a joke than a warrior. They were all trained soldiers! What did they possibly have to worry about?
The Captain was smarter. Maroon hadn’t always been in the Blue Banner Army, and even in his short stint here, he’d seen more than enough to know that sometimes, someone who didn’t look like a threat could prove to be a terrible one. He flipped the visor on his helmet down, and a readout of numbers scrolled down the inside of the plastic.
The Captain’s mouth suddenly felt very dry…
When the workers had come in from the fields, the bar picked up in spirit, and Tako was the life and soul of the party. She was surprised by how quickly they had opened their hearts to her – how swift they were to share their laughter and their joy. She’d always been in the City, or on her own – in the City, nobody cared about who you were or what you were doing so long as you got out of their way.
In the wilderness, she had been able to confront herself; her own heart and passions had made themselves manifest and she had done all she could to come to terms with the loss she had suffered in combat…
And that was what this reminded her of. In combat, she felt most at home; there, she expressed herself without fear of judgement or self-doubt. There was no room for such things in a true battle; it was only when she had to stop and talk to people that she got confused, that she worried about whether or not there’d be a right way or a wrong way to phrase things. Words had never been Tako’s strong point, it was far easier to find meaning in her fist, and to extract what her opponents truly meant through their fists as well. There was a purity in combat…
And there was purity in this, too, wasn’t there? In the village life, where people were happy to share what little they had and lift you onto their shoulders, to dance and sing the night away because the night was dark and the bar was warm and the songs drove back the loneliness that silence would bring instead.
“I said leave him alone.”
Tako repeated her demand, and the soldiers finally decided to take her seriously. A dozen of them in total, they raised their weapons, and her eyes remained locked on the Captain’s. He let his hand rest on the butt of his pistol.
“These people are holding back from us. They’ve got a magic stone that purifies water. If we take that back to base, we can use it to make the world a better place!”
The Mayor had managed to scurry backwards across the ground, and now rose up to his feet, dusting himself off. “The namekian who gave us that stone made us promise to keep it to ourselves! Without it, the stream would be a polluted mess and the village would die!”
The two men glared at each other, and now the soldiers were pointing their weapons in two directions; some at the mouthy mayor, some at the strange girl who seemed intent on making trouble.
“SHUT UP!”
The girl’s voice cut across the argument before it had a chance to get really heated – and the guns waved back in her direction.
“I don’t care about any of that! I just don’t like seeing people tell other people what to do with guns, so pack up your goons and get out of here, or I’ll throw you out myself!”
That first night, she had slept in a spare room, and enjoyed a soft, warm bed for the first time in over a week. When she woke up the next morning with the cockrel’s crow, she felt absolutely wonderful.
It was as though she hadn’t spent all night enjoying juice and dancing. She was surprised, but she found she didn’t really want to head on; perhaps she could afford to spend a few days here, that was the whole point of her training, wasn’t it? To train how she wanted, to have her journey and learn what she learned just by trying to be herself rather than trying to structure herself around any particular rules.
She staked out a piece of ground near the stream, and enjoyed watching the cool, clear water flow past her. She practiced her breathing exercises, and performed the katas which she had performed a thousand times before in a whole new way; in this light, in this peace, it was always different. She kept going until each slashing movement, each slicing chop and lashing foot, carved a path through the water in front of her and left small fishes to flop around in confusion until the water remembered that it was supposed to be flowing again and started to fill in the hole again.
“That’s amazing!”
The young kid – a girl with startlingly pink hair – who had snuck up behind her looked truly startled at what she’d been seeing, and Tako gave a delighted laugh. “You think so? Thanks, I guess. I don’t really think about it much these days.”
“No really! How do you even do it?”
Tako smiled, and waved next to her, “You want to learn? I guess I could show you a few things…”
Tako’s eyes drifted to the pink-haired girl who was standing at the edge of the village square, herded into place by the soldiers, and she felt a hot flush of anger rush through her stomach.
“You are stronger than any one of us.” Maroon conceded. “But do you really think you can stop us killing all of them? Stand down or I’ll give the order.”
The soldiers around the square began to fondle their trigger fingers nervously, looking at each other. Tako's face, though, had fallen into a very serious, dark expression. Under the circumstances, it was difficult to think of a worse sentiment to have expressed to the young, rainbow-haired martial artist. Her arms fell to her sides, and she exhaled slowly. The stupid man actually thought that she was listening to reason. She wasn’t; instead, she was looking deep inside herself, for that focus she had touched on in the past.
The girl’s eyes closed and Maroon smirked, “Good girl. I’m glad to see you’re not totally unreasonable. We’re doing this to make the world a better place, you'll see—“
And then those bright pink eyes snapped open again.
For her, it was as though the world moved in slow motion. She was agonizingly aware of every heartbeat thundering in her chest, in the movement of the wind through her hairs, of the breath of every soldier preparing to open fire at a moment’s notice. She could actually sense the tension in the air; the pressure emanating from each of them. They weren’t warriors like her; they weren’t martial artists. These men knew discipline, but they knew nothing about the art of fighting… they only knew about killing.
They were soldiers – what could she really have expected?
As far as the soldiers were concerned, it looked as though the martial artist had closed her eyes, relaxed… and then suddenly disappeared. When she reappeared again, it was in a blur of brilliant, bright colour flashing through the soldiers on the left hand side of the square. Weapons exploded and bones shattered as she dove through them, and the Captain gave a startled yell, “Open fire! Open fire!”
And of course, because the soldiers were men and women who had been drilled into obedience, they did just what they were told to do. Energy blasts fired, and Tako… reappeared, landing in the middle of the square with her arms stretched to either side, the weapon’s fire having been thrown wild.
Now that attention was back on her, the remaining soldiers attempted to coordinate their fire. That worked, ironically, in her favour. Now that she didn’t need to worry so much about shots hitting people who couldn’t handle it, she just had to worry about making sure she didn’t get overwhelmed - and that was comparatively easy.
The world was full of glittering points of light, and Tako had enough time to turn around and make sure they wouldn’t be hitting anybody before she dodged and weaved through them. The few that would have actually struck someone soft and fleshy, she made it a point to intercept.
From the perspective of the unfortunate soldiers, it was as though they were trapped in a waking nightmare. The girl appeared again, and their comrades were collapsed on the ground on the other side of the square, rolling around in agony or out cold. They opened fire, and shots of light either exploded in mid air or sent puffs of dirt and cobblestones bursting upwards harmlessly.
And then she was on them as well. In just a few seconds, they too were beyond caring.
Eventually, the pink-haired girl had gotten tired and just watched her, then she had gone home. Tako had stayed and continued to train – the experience had been entertaining but, it hadn’t done an awful lot to teach her new tricks, it had just helped her to refine the techniques she’d already learned.
A few hours later, a man in a very nice suit came out to the stream, where she’d laid down to take a break.
“My name’s Punper. Punper Neekel.” He said, “I hear you been havin’ fun with my lil’ Bunne.”
Tako looked up from her half-asleep daze, and waved her hand loosely. “Yeah, I guess so. You aren’t mad are you? Everyone should know a little self-defence.”
He laughed loudly, and shook his head, “Mad? Naw, its great to see her enthusiastic about something! I’m the mayor of this here little village, and I’d like ya to join me for dinner, how does that sound?”
It sounded good! And it turned out that it was even better in reality. The food and drink wasn’t much better than the bar she’d spent the previous night in, but the surroundings were far more plush. Though Tako couldn’t really offer much useful in terms of the witty conversation, she could at least perform a few tricks which got laughs of delight – catching spoons she flung across the room before they landed, bending candlesticks and then bending them back, all good, all fun…
But in the morning, she had decided that it was time to move on – the longer that she stayed here, the longer she was going to set down roots. She’d feel tempted to stop her journey – and that wasn’t something she really wanted to get into. She wanted to see how far she could go; she’d never learn that if she stayed in one place too long.
And so, early in the morning, she had flown out of the window, intending to slip away quietly. She might even have disappeared entirely if, after a few hours of walking in the forests to the west of town, she hadn’t happened to see the troop transport helicopter roaring overhead and towards the place she’d just left…
Tako came to a halt in the centre of the square, and mopped at her brow with her scarf. The young woman looked around, and people started to emerge from their hidey-holes, peeking from cover and seeming happy. There was one thing that bugged Tako, though – she felt like she was forgetting something, but she just couldn’t remember what it was.
Punper Neekel walked over, and adjusted his jacket, smiling to the teenager who had saved his life – and the rest of his village. “I don’t think we can thank you enough, Tako!”
Ah well, whatever was bothering her couldn’t be that important. She smiled, and shook the Mayor’s hand heartily – though she was careful not to hurt his hand. “No problem.”
And it was at that point that Maroon’s battlesuit landed back in the square with such force that it cracked the ground, and everyone except Tako – the Mayor included – scurried away as quickly as they possibly could.
“This machine is a work of art!” He crowed – and Tako had to admit, it definitely looked… impressive. Stretching some eight feet tall, it towered over her, all shiny steel and glimmering edges. “You killed my men! Now I’ll—“
The girl scratched behind the back of her head, laughing in the face of the giant machine. The Captain's voice was an angry screech of feedback and hate.
"What are you laughing about?!"
“Actually, I didn’t kill anybody.”
The correction took the wind out of the Captain’s sails, at least a little bit, and the man actually looked… disappointed, but it was true! She hadn’t taken a life before, she had no intention of starting now, and the moans and groans of the downed soldiers were ample evidence to that fact.
“Well it doesn’t matter!” He shouted back angrily, “I’m still taking you out!”
The mechanical monstrosity lunged forwards with deadly intent, and Tako leapt into the air to avoid it, twisting as she went. She landed on the other side of the robot about the same time as it plunged its claw into the earth, sending up a shower of dirt and stone.
“In the world of martial arts.” Tako said, sagely, “It is often speed which determines the victor. Your robot looks strong, but you’re slow. Are you sure you want to do this?”
With a roar, the Captain flung his battlesuit around, bearing down on the arrogant little punk with both arms raised above its head--
And then Tako wasn’t there any more, she was directly in front of him, leg sweeping around to take out the feet of the robot and send it crashing towards the earth. As the large robot started to fall, Tako’s leg swept out behind her and she took up a careful stance, waiting until just the right moment to snap her leg upwards…
“HELTER!”
The girl’s foot impacted hard with the machine before it could right itself, and the Captain was flung up into the air with a squeal of shock on his lips. Tako didn’t hang around on the ground, though. She tore upwards after him, carving a trail of bright white light in her wake in a spiral pattern, and winding up above him – both legs coming down to smash bodily into the robot’s cockpit.
“SKELTER!”
The machine was sent hurtling towards the ground once more, where it impacted with a powerful crunch, creating a deep crater in the middle of the village. Broken pieces of wreckage lay scattered all around, and Tako walked up to the machine slowly, exhaling and allowing her focus to leave her now that the immediate danger seemed to have passed.
“Well?” She demanded, stern eyes looking down at the crumpled robot. “Are you sorry?”
Inside the robot, the Captain just groaned, and Tako nodded her head, “That’s what I thought.” She said, clasping her hands behind her head. “Now you guys clean up the mess you’ve made and get out of here, you’ve caused enough trouble for these nice people!”
After the Blue Banner had swept up their shattered weapons and bandaged their injuries, they did troop on out of town with their tails between their legs. Tako stuck around to make sure that they weren’t going to be coming back.
“We should give you something.” The Mayor said, “You saved the whole village! Do you want money? A medal? A place to stay? We don’t have much, but I’m sure we can work out something!”
Tako just laughed, and shook her head. “No, no. I did it because it was the right thing to do, you guys keep your… stuff. I guess if I come back this way, a bed and a warm meal would be nice?”
The Mayor clapped the young woman on the shoulder. “Of course. Anything you want, you just come and see me!”
And it was a funny thing, but as she set off on the road once more, this time, she didn’t leave in secret, or fly off to put distance between herself and the people. She just took her time. She had no idea where her travels might wind up putting her next – but she had a strong feeling that wherever they might lead her, she’d find people who needed her help… and people who deserved a boot up their butt!
The village was silent. The mayor had been dragged out into the square and thrown to the ground by the Blue Banner thugs, and now the soldiers were watching on, some of them smoking, others fingering their weapons just in case someone decided to do something stupid. Captain Maroon was not a cruel man by nature, but it was important that everyone thought that he was; that way, they would be more inclined to give him the information that he required.
“Tell us the location of the artefact.” He said, “And me and my men will get out of here. Continue to hide it from us, though…”
He fingered the plasma pistol at his hip. The weapon was shiny, well maintained, and very, very deadly. The mayor’s eyes lingered on it for a moment, and then he looked up into the cold, dead eyes of the Blue Banner Captain.
“HEY!” Cried a young woman’s voice, “LEAVE THAT GUY ALONE!”
And that was the moment that someone did something very stupid.
THREE DAYS AGO
The rainbow-haired stranger wandered into the village on a whim. She had set off on her journey with no destination in mind and didn’t even really know what she was looking for here. It seemed like a pleasant enough place, though. The little village was picturesque in its way, with a crystal clear stream running through the middle and a smattering of small homes which seemed to exist largely to tend to the wheat fields and apple trees around the place.
The walk to get here had been pleasant, though, and she strolled into the village’s one bar and went to order herself a drink. It didn’t take her long to feel right at home.
The man behind the counter was large and fat, and always had something to polish – be it a glass or a surface. He also had the most delicious apple juice that Tako’s money had ever bought. Tako sat herself on the stool and drained fully half of it before he spoke up to her.
“Don’t get many visitors around these parts.”
She put down the glass and flashed a smile, “Oh yeah? I’m surprised, this place is really nice.”
Herbert – for that was the man’s name – chuckled heartily, “Nice, yes, but we don’t get many of them city folk, much less a colourful gal like you. How’d you get all that stuff in your hair, anyway?”
Tako shrugged her shoulders vaguely, “Oh, well, you know. It isn’t that hard.” Which was a total lie. Maintaining that dye job, especially in her pilgrimage into the wilderness, was in fact extremely difficult – but you had to make sacrifices for style, right? If you weren’t expressing yourself in how you looked, how would you choose to express yourself? But nobody was ever that interested in the intricate details of how such mundane things were accomplished – not really.
“Didja hear about the big fight?”
She smirked at that one, “You’re going to have to be more specific.”
The barman spat into his mug and polished it with his rag. “The one on Vegeta? Heard about that there Saiyan Queen done got her ass kicked and now there’s a new one. Sounds real exciting.”
Tako laughed, and leant against the bar top. “Really?” She asked, “I don’t see how. That’s a long way away and it isn’t really going to change a thing here on Earth, is it? One of our small mercies. Nobody really cares all that much about us.”
“You're probably right. Ain't like them saiya-djinnis come round any more often than gals with rainbows in their hair.” Harold replied, filling up Tako’s half-drunk glass with a wink. “But you’d be surprised what folk can bring themselves to care about.”
The girl strode out into the middle of the square, and the soldiers didn’t know whether they should train their weapons on her or burst out laughing. She didn’t look like much of a threat; with her dazzling hair and her sports vest, with her cheerful, bright pink eyes and the golden rings piercing her ears, the teenager looked more like a joke than a warrior. They were all trained soldiers! What did they possibly have to worry about?
The Captain was smarter. Maroon hadn’t always been in the Blue Banner Army, and even in his short stint here, he’d seen more than enough to know that sometimes, someone who didn’t look like a threat could prove to be a terrible one. He flipped the visor on his helmet down, and a readout of numbers scrolled down the inside of the plastic.
The Captain’s mouth suddenly felt very dry…
When the workers had come in from the fields, the bar picked up in spirit, and Tako was the life and soul of the party. She was surprised by how quickly they had opened their hearts to her – how swift they were to share their laughter and their joy. She’d always been in the City, or on her own – in the City, nobody cared about who you were or what you were doing so long as you got out of their way.
In the wilderness, she had been able to confront herself; her own heart and passions had made themselves manifest and she had done all she could to come to terms with the loss she had suffered in combat…
And that was what this reminded her of. In combat, she felt most at home; there, she expressed herself without fear of judgement or self-doubt. There was no room for such things in a true battle; it was only when she had to stop and talk to people that she got confused, that she worried about whether or not there’d be a right way or a wrong way to phrase things. Words had never been Tako’s strong point, it was far easier to find meaning in her fist, and to extract what her opponents truly meant through their fists as well. There was a purity in combat…
And there was purity in this, too, wasn’t there? In the village life, where people were happy to share what little they had and lift you onto their shoulders, to dance and sing the night away because the night was dark and the bar was warm and the songs drove back the loneliness that silence would bring instead.
“I said leave him alone.”
Tako repeated her demand, and the soldiers finally decided to take her seriously. A dozen of them in total, they raised their weapons, and her eyes remained locked on the Captain’s. He let his hand rest on the butt of his pistol.
“These people are holding back from us. They’ve got a magic stone that purifies water. If we take that back to base, we can use it to make the world a better place!”
The Mayor had managed to scurry backwards across the ground, and now rose up to his feet, dusting himself off. “The namekian who gave us that stone made us promise to keep it to ourselves! Without it, the stream would be a polluted mess and the village would die!”
The two men glared at each other, and now the soldiers were pointing their weapons in two directions; some at the mouthy mayor, some at the strange girl who seemed intent on making trouble.
“SHUT UP!”
The girl’s voice cut across the argument before it had a chance to get really heated – and the guns waved back in her direction.
“I don’t care about any of that! I just don’t like seeing people tell other people what to do with guns, so pack up your goons and get out of here, or I’ll throw you out myself!”
That first night, she had slept in a spare room, and enjoyed a soft, warm bed for the first time in over a week. When she woke up the next morning with the cockrel’s crow, she felt absolutely wonderful.
It was as though she hadn’t spent all night enjoying juice and dancing. She was surprised, but she found she didn’t really want to head on; perhaps she could afford to spend a few days here, that was the whole point of her training, wasn’t it? To train how she wanted, to have her journey and learn what she learned just by trying to be herself rather than trying to structure herself around any particular rules.
She staked out a piece of ground near the stream, and enjoyed watching the cool, clear water flow past her. She practiced her breathing exercises, and performed the katas which she had performed a thousand times before in a whole new way; in this light, in this peace, it was always different. She kept going until each slashing movement, each slicing chop and lashing foot, carved a path through the water in front of her and left small fishes to flop around in confusion until the water remembered that it was supposed to be flowing again and started to fill in the hole again.
“That’s amazing!”
The young kid – a girl with startlingly pink hair – who had snuck up behind her looked truly startled at what she’d been seeing, and Tako gave a delighted laugh. “You think so? Thanks, I guess. I don’t really think about it much these days.”
“No really! How do you even do it?”
Tako smiled, and waved next to her, “You want to learn? I guess I could show you a few things…”
Tako’s eyes drifted to the pink-haired girl who was standing at the edge of the village square, herded into place by the soldiers, and she felt a hot flush of anger rush through her stomach.
“You are stronger than any one of us.” Maroon conceded. “But do you really think you can stop us killing all of them? Stand down or I’ll give the order.”
The soldiers around the square began to fondle their trigger fingers nervously, looking at each other. Tako's face, though, had fallen into a very serious, dark expression. Under the circumstances, it was difficult to think of a worse sentiment to have expressed to the young, rainbow-haired martial artist. Her arms fell to her sides, and she exhaled slowly. The stupid man actually thought that she was listening to reason. She wasn’t; instead, she was looking deep inside herself, for that focus she had touched on in the past.
The girl’s eyes closed and Maroon smirked, “Good girl. I’m glad to see you’re not totally unreasonable. We’re doing this to make the world a better place, you'll see—“
And then those bright pink eyes snapped open again.
For her, it was as though the world moved in slow motion. She was agonizingly aware of every heartbeat thundering in her chest, in the movement of the wind through her hairs, of the breath of every soldier preparing to open fire at a moment’s notice. She could actually sense the tension in the air; the pressure emanating from each of them. They weren’t warriors like her; they weren’t martial artists. These men knew discipline, but they knew nothing about the art of fighting… they only knew about killing.
They were soldiers – what could she really have expected?
As far as the soldiers were concerned, it looked as though the martial artist had closed her eyes, relaxed… and then suddenly disappeared. When she reappeared again, it was in a blur of brilliant, bright colour flashing through the soldiers on the left hand side of the square. Weapons exploded and bones shattered as she dove through them, and the Captain gave a startled yell, “Open fire! Open fire!”
And of course, because the soldiers were men and women who had been drilled into obedience, they did just what they were told to do. Energy blasts fired, and Tako… reappeared, landing in the middle of the square with her arms stretched to either side, the weapon’s fire having been thrown wild.
Now that attention was back on her, the remaining soldiers attempted to coordinate their fire. That worked, ironically, in her favour. Now that she didn’t need to worry so much about shots hitting people who couldn’t handle it, she just had to worry about making sure she didn’t get overwhelmed - and that was comparatively easy.
The world was full of glittering points of light, and Tako had enough time to turn around and make sure they wouldn’t be hitting anybody before she dodged and weaved through them. The few that would have actually struck someone soft and fleshy, she made it a point to intercept.
From the perspective of the unfortunate soldiers, it was as though they were trapped in a waking nightmare. The girl appeared again, and their comrades were collapsed on the ground on the other side of the square, rolling around in agony or out cold. They opened fire, and shots of light either exploded in mid air or sent puffs of dirt and cobblestones bursting upwards harmlessly.
And then she was on them as well. In just a few seconds, they too were beyond caring.
Eventually, the pink-haired girl had gotten tired and just watched her, then she had gone home. Tako had stayed and continued to train – the experience had been entertaining but, it hadn’t done an awful lot to teach her new tricks, it had just helped her to refine the techniques she’d already learned.
A few hours later, a man in a very nice suit came out to the stream, where she’d laid down to take a break.
“My name’s Punper. Punper Neekel.” He said, “I hear you been havin’ fun with my lil’ Bunne.”
Tako looked up from her half-asleep daze, and waved her hand loosely. “Yeah, I guess so. You aren’t mad are you? Everyone should know a little self-defence.”
He laughed loudly, and shook his head, “Mad? Naw, its great to see her enthusiastic about something! I’m the mayor of this here little village, and I’d like ya to join me for dinner, how does that sound?”
It sounded good! And it turned out that it was even better in reality. The food and drink wasn’t much better than the bar she’d spent the previous night in, but the surroundings were far more plush. Though Tako couldn’t really offer much useful in terms of the witty conversation, she could at least perform a few tricks which got laughs of delight – catching spoons she flung across the room before they landed, bending candlesticks and then bending them back, all good, all fun…
But in the morning, she had decided that it was time to move on – the longer that she stayed here, the longer she was going to set down roots. She’d feel tempted to stop her journey – and that wasn’t something she really wanted to get into. She wanted to see how far she could go; she’d never learn that if she stayed in one place too long.
And so, early in the morning, she had flown out of the window, intending to slip away quietly. She might even have disappeared entirely if, after a few hours of walking in the forests to the west of town, she hadn’t happened to see the troop transport helicopter roaring overhead and towards the place she’d just left…
Tako came to a halt in the centre of the square, and mopped at her brow with her scarf. The young woman looked around, and people started to emerge from their hidey-holes, peeking from cover and seeming happy. There was one thing that bugged Tako, though – she felt like she was forgetting something, but she just couldn’t remember what it was.
Punper Neekel walked over, and adjusted his jacket, smiling to the teenager who had saved his life – and the rest of his village. “I don’t think we can thank you enough, Tako!”
Ah well, whatever was bothering her couldn’t be that important. She smiled, and shook the Mayor’s hand heartily – though she was careful not to hurt his hand. “No problem.”
And it was at that point that Maroon’s battlesuit landed back in the square with such force that it cracked the ground, and everyone except Tako – the Mayor included – scurried away as quickly as they possibly could.
“This machine is a work of art!” He crowed – and Tako had to admit, it definitely looked… impressive. Stretching some eight feet tall, it towered over her, all shiny steel and glimmering edges. “You killed my men! Now I’ll—“
The girl scratched behind the back of her head, laughing in the face of the giant machine. The Captain's voice was an angry screech of feedback and hate.
"What are you laughing about?!"
“Actually, I didn’t kill anybody.”
The correction took the wind out of the Captain’s sails, at least a little bit, and the man actually looked… disappointed, but it was true! She hadn’t taken a life before, she had no intention of starting now, and the moans and groans of the downed soldiers were ample evidence to that fact.
“Well it doesn’t matter!” He shouted back angrily, “I’m still taking you out!”
The mechanical monstrosity lunged forwards with deadly intent, and Tako leapt into the air to avoid it, twisting as she went. She landed on the other side of the robot about the same time as it plunged its claw into the earth, sending up a shower of dirt and stone.
“In the world of martial arts.” Tako said, sagely, “It is often speed which determines the victor. Your robot looks strong, but you’re slow. Are you sure you want to do this?”
With a roar, the Captain flung his battlesuit around, bearing down on the arrogant little punk with both arms raised above its head--
And then Tako wasn’t there any more, she was directly in front of him, leg sweeping around to take out the feet of the robot and send it crashing towards the earth. As the large robot started to fall, Tako’s leg swept out behind her and she took up a careful stance, waiting until just the right moment to snap her leg upwards…
“HELTER!”
The girl’s foot impacted hard with the machine before it could right itself, and the Captain was flung up into the air with a squeal of shock on his lips. Tako didn’t hang around on the ground, though. She tore upwards after him, carving a trail of bright white light in her wake in a spiral pattern, and winding up above him – both legs coming down to smash bodily into the robot’s cockpit.
“SKELTER!”
The machine was sent hurtling towards the ground once more, where it impacted with a powerful crunch, creating a deep crater in the middle of the village. Broken pieces of wreckage lay scattered all around, and Tako walked up to the machine slowly, exhaling and allowing her focus to leave her now that the immediate danger seemed to have passed.
“Well?” She demanded, stern eyes looking down at the crumpled robot. “Are you sorry?”
Inside the robot, the Captain just groaned, and Tako nodded her head, “That’s what I thought.” She said, clasping her hands behind her head. “Now you guys clean up the mess you’ve made and get out of here, you’ve caused enough trouble for these nice people!”
After the Blue Banner had swept up their shattered weapons and bandaged their injuries, they did troop on out of town with their tails between their legs. Tako stuck around to make sure that they weren’t going to be coming back.
“We should give you something.” The Mayor said, “You saved the whole village! Do you want money? A medal? A place to stay? We don’t have much, but I’m sure we can work out something!”
Tako just laughed, and shook her head. “No, no. I did it because it was the right thing to do, you guys keep your… stuff. I guess if I come back this way, a bed and a warm meal would be nice?”
The Mayor clapped the young woman on the shoulder. “Of course. Anything you want, you just come and see me!”
And it was a funny thing, but as she set off on the road once more, this time, she didn’t leave in secret, or fly off to put distance between herself and the people. She just took her time. She had no idea where her travels might wind up putting her next – but she had a strong feeling that wherever they might lead her, she’d find people who needed her help… and people who deserved a boot up their butt!
