Warning: The scene with Galatia in it contains a brief description of self-mutilation. Nothing real bad, but if you find that too disturbing then please consider yourself forewarned. ------ Sylia held the sobbing young woman in her arms as she silently cursed herself for letting her go out alone, and for using up her ammunition in the temple so that she couldn't use her pistols to blow Galatia away yesterday. In between the sobs and near incoherent babblings she and the others had managed to put together a fairly accurate picture of what had happened. Galatia, it seemed, had developed some sort of a fixation on the Russian born Knight Saber. Meiji was patting the blond on the back, trying with Sylia to comfort her, when both Linna and Priss came out of the woods. His right eyebrow arched a bit when he realized Priss was wearing a pair of men's hakama pants. Priss met his look, looked down, and shrugged her shoulders. "They're comfortable." she explained, answering his unasked question. "Sensei," Linna said, "Me and Priss-chan searched the woods. There's no sign of her." Sylia wasn't surprised. If Galatia didn't want to be found, she wouldn't be. "Alright, listen up." she began, "From this point on, the armor will be worn at all times, except for sleeping, unless I say otherwise. Also, no one leaves the camp for any reason under any circumstances unless accompanied by another. Does everyone understand?" All nodded. Nene, pulling herself together a bit, slowly pushed herself off Sylia. "Understood." she said. "I'm sorry if I lost it there, I..." Sylia put her hand up to Nene's cheek, a look of sadness on her own face. "I think you can be forgiven for loosing it there, Nene." she said, adding, "Are you going to be able to continue now?" Nene looked at Sylia, and, mistaking her tone of concern for patronizing, surprised the leader of the Knight Sabers by her angry response. "I'm not dead weight." "Wh... What?" "Nor am I some damsel in distress, Sylia. I'm a Knight Saber. I got caught off guard, and I got scared. It won't happen again." "Nene, I didn't mean..." Nene didn't stick around to listen. She walked off in a huff to the wagon to get her armor. Linna looked over to Sylia. "I'll go talk to her, Sensei." She said, just before following the younger woman. Priss stood by silently, watching the proceedings. The emperor now went up to Sylia, putting a hand on her shoulder. "It's not as easy as it looks, is it?" he asked. "What isn't?" Sylia asked back. "Leading. I've been Emperor since '67, and I can honestly tell you, there are times I wouldn't mind being just another subject, with no responsibilities or cares other than providing for his family. My family..." Meiji suddenly took on a melancholy air that Sylia immediately picked up on. "You miss the Empress and your children, don't you?" Meiji smiled a bit, "Yes, but I'll be seeing them again soon. You see, I trust your leadership Sylia-san. You'll get me back." He said, walking over to the wagon where Linna and Nene were talking. Priss and Sylia were now alone again. "Let me guess; you're going to bring up that damn gun again, aren't you?" Sylia asked acerbically. "No. That can wait. We have the more pressing matter of that sword-wielding lunatic out there to contend with. How much about Galatia have you not told us about? And just what kind of danger is Nene is?" Sylia stared at Priss silently before walking off toward the dying embers of the campfire. Priss watched her walk off alone before turning around herself and joining the others near the wagon. ------ Mason looked critically at the group of men in front of him. Representatives of the yakuza, various wandering ronin for hire, and a good number of the dispossessed daimyo filled the conference room. Mason looked around and frowned when he noticed one particular former daimyo was missing. As he raised his hand, the chatter in the room ended and all eyes in the room focused on him. "Gentleman..." he began in a loud voice so all could hear him, "I need men. I need men to rid me of four very grievous annoyances." "We've given you men." one of the yakuza bosses pointed out, "We've given you many men, in fact. And now, many men are dead. No one wants to work for you anymore. Not if it means dealing with those demons." Mason's frown deepened. "They're not demons, you superstitious fool. They're human, same as you or me. The problem is they're better fighters than you." Mason ignored the outraged look on the yakuza's face as he continued, "We've been attacking them in insufficient numbers up until now. This isn't a job for ten or even fifteen men. This is a job for an army." One of the ronin looked at Mason incredulously. "An army? Against four women?" "How large an army are we talking about?" one of the former daimyo asked. "Thirty armed men, maybe forty." Mason stopped when he saw the man coming into the room. One look told him where the lecherous daimyo had been. He could even smell the brothel from here as its scents wafted off Kiyoshi's clothes and towards him. Dismissing the others, he now looked at the degenerate pig in front of him in disgust. He was a drunk. He was known to have victimized young girls and to have cheated his peasants almost to the point of starvation. And, finally, around the fall of the Tokugawa government, he was part of a failed attempted coup. In short, he was perfect for what Mason had in mind. "You wanted to see me, Mason-san?" Kiyoshi asked, his breath reeking of strong drink. Mason smiled. "Kiyoshi-sama, how would you like to become Imperial Ruler of all Japan?" ---That Evening--- Sylia watched over the camp under the starlit canopy of night. Sitting by the campfire on an overturned log she watched as Nene stirred uneasily in her sleep near the Emperor, no doubt haunted by the nightmares of what had happened earlier today. She looked on sadly as the youngest Knight Saber struggled with her night terrors. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Priss and Linna, holding hands, walk up to her. "Yes, ladies?" Sylia asked, judging by their looks that they wished to talk. "Sylia," Priss began, "We need to know about Galatia." Sylia grimaced, partly from the pain in her still tender wounds of yesterday afternoon, partly from reluctance to re-open old wounds. "I already told you all you need to know. She's a betsushikime, an assassin. Her style involves a two handed attack much like Linna's, and ..." "That's not what we mean and you know it." Priss said, narrowing her eyes. "Sensei, please." Linna interrupted, "We need to know everything. We need to know all of it. Does not Sun Tzu teach to know the enemy better than they know themselves?" Sylia looked away from both of them. "Please... Please don't make me do this. You don't know what it is you're asking. Some pains are best left in the past, some wounds..." "Everything." Priss said demandingly. Sylia turned back to them, the look on her face speaking of pain and heartbreak as her mind raced back to seven years ago. "I... was sixteen," she began hesitantly, "A student at Sensei Raven's dojo when I first met her. She... she was only a few months older than me, but acted so much more mature that I always thought of her as my ‘big sister.' Her father was a Missionary Priest, and her mother a woman who met him in the confessional. Obviously not the best of scenarios, the mother was sent off to a nunnery, where she had the child. Galatia was immediately given up for adoption to an abusive family, running away from the household in her early teens. How she learned martial arts, and how she became so proficient at it I never found out. Sensei teamed us up as sparring partners and I... I fell in love at first sight." The sad look in Sylia's eyes only intensified as she took a deep breath and continued her story. "I can still remember the first time we kissed. It was my first time kissing anybody. She guided me in the encounter that followed." Sylia closed her eyes, as the long buried memories came flooding back, memories both good and bad. Galatia had been both intense and relentless that first session of love making following the kiss, leaving her breathless afterward, almost physically drained. "Things began to sour in short order." Sylia said as she picked up her story, "I'd fallen in love with the older girl, but soon realized she didn't love me as much as she loved my body. She... lusted for me, but she didn't love. I don't know if she can love, to be honest. As time began to go by, Galatia began to, well, introduce things into our time together." "Things?" Linna asked in concern, "Sensei, what kind of things?" Sylia took another deep breath, "Bizarre things." she almost whispered. "I can remember one morning waking up early, before anyone else at the dojo, or so I thought. I went out into the garden, and saw Galatia standing there with her back to me, about four or five dead birds surrounding her. She must've heard me, because she then turned around, another bird in her hands. As I watched, she broke the thing's neck. She then looked at me, and smiled. Looking back, the incident was a foretelling of things to come." "Galatia seemed to get some perverse pleasure from inflicting pain on others. I'm... I'm not sure why I put up with it for so long, other than at first I still had feelings for her and..." as Linna and Priss watched, a tear began to run down their leader's right cheek, followed by another down her left. Sylia fought to keep her voice steady as she continued, "...and she was tutoring me on the side in exchange for our sessions together." Sylia paused for a moment before continuing. "Near the end, all romantic pretenses were set aside as Galatia used me as her gunny pig, trying to see just how far she could push me. Our sensei first began to suspect something was wrong when he saw the teeth marks on my upper arm..." Linna allowed a gasp to escape. Priss (suddenly feeling ashamed over making her former lover relive such painful memories) went over and sat next to Sylia, putting her arm around her as she did so. "I'm sorry, Sylia. I had no idea. If you don't want to go on, we'll..." "Do you remember the scar just above my tailbone? The one about six inches long?" Priss looked over nervously to Linna, then nodded back to Sylia. "Yeah, the battlefield injury." Sylia wiped a tear from her face as she looked away from Priss and Linna. "I lied. It wasn't a battlefield injury. It... it was the final straw. The one that prompted me to ended my relationship with the older girl." Priss was stunned. "Sylia, you're the most confident, strongest, in control person I know. How could you have allowed..." "I was young, Priss. I was inexperienced, and I was blinded in my desire for revenge against those who killed my parents into believing that it was worth it if I could become a better warrior afterward. Later, I caught her trying to steal scrolls from Sensei Raven containing secret fighting techniques. I turned her in. I heard stories of what happened to her after the expulsion. Stories of murder, cruelty, assassinations and sadism. I came to realize that the girl I fell in love with in the dojo long ago was nothing more than a sociopath who killed and maimed only secondarily for the money. It was the thrill of inflicting pain that moved her, that still does move her. Those who hire Galatia don't hire her to simply kill a target; they hire her to mutilate." Linna now came over, a feeling of dread falling upon her. "Sensei," she began, "If what you've told us is true, then if this monster, if she got her hands on Nene..." Sylia stood up and looked Linna in the eyes, forgetting her painful memories for the moment. "Linna, don't loose focus. As much as we care for Nene, we're all in danger. Our top priority is still the Emperor. Do you understand?" Linna looked Sylia in the eyes as she nodded. She then quite unexpectedly went up and hugged the older woman. "Sensei, I'm sorry you went through that. I... I wish I knew what to say." Sylia smiled as she hugged the former geisha back, being careful to avoid touching her still injured nose. She let Linna go, and turned to Priss. "Priss," she said, as she wiped her eyes again with her hand, "The Emperor was right; you'd better be good to her." She said, pointing to Linna. Linna was glad the dark sky would be able to hide her blushing. ---Four Days Later--- She watched the blood slowly run down her arm, her face an emotionless mask as she focused on the pain. Using her katana, she cut into her arm again. She was in control now. She was the one giving the pain, and she was the one who could stop the pain. Not like her childhood. Not like her adoptive parents. Not like her adoptive father who snuck into her bedroom and... Galatia closed her eyes, smiling with satisfaction as she remembered what she did to "dear daddy" after her expulsion from the dojo. Opening them again, she looked through half-closed lids to see the patterns the blood made on its trip from her upper arms to her fingertips, where it clotted and dripped down onto the grass under her feet. Besides giving her a sense of control, the pain helped her to bring herself into focus. She then knelt by the nearby stream, watching the blood drip from her arm into the water as she began to consider things. Drip. Drip. The blood diffused in the water, loosing its color. Drip. Sylia. Her dear sister from the dojo. Galatia frowned when she thought back to the fun that she was having playing with Sylia being interrupted by that damn nuisance in the nun outfit. She then chuckled a bit remembering her trying to get up, looking like a fish thrown onto dry land every time she'd kicked her back down. She was looking forward to the fun her and her ‘dear sister' would be having together again in the near future. Drip. The emperor. Galatia killed for the thrill, sure. But nothing was more thrilling than to kill a man. First off, she had a natural hatred for the hairy beasts. And secondly, whenever she killed one, she could see herself killing her adoptive father all over again, savoring the fear and pain involved. She'd never killed Royalty before, though. That would no doubt add a whole new thrill to the proceedings. Drip. The other two. The couple. She didn't know who they were, and she didn't care. One was the annoying bitch whose nose she'd broken in order to teach the wench a lesson in manners. The other one, judging from what she'd been able to make out through the telescope, and the fact the young woman seemed to take responsibility for the most strenuous tasks whenever they set up or took down camp each day, was the muscle of the group. Not knowing them, it was hard to bring herself to care much about them. Maybe she could have fun killing one of them in front of the other. Drip. Nene. Drip. The little one. Drip. Her little one. Drip. She was so soft, so warm. Her eyes were blue like the sky, hair the same color yellow as the sunflower. Galatia felt a shiver run through her as she remembered her encounter with the blond. She had rather hoped the girl would've come with her willingly. Drip. But if not, Galatia supposed she would just have to take her. Drip. She began to wrap a bandage around her arm where the cut marks were, thinking as she did so of all the fun she was going to have in the near future with her little one, after she got rid of Sylia and the others of course. She left the stream she'd been kneeling by and moved forward into the woods. ------ The telegraph operator in Osaka was an older man with a small gray mustache and a wife at home preparing a meal of pickled vegetables and fish for when he got off work. At the sound of the bell hanging over the door, he looked up to see a rather unusual sight. A Japanese man in his late twenties traveling with two European women. While both his escorts wore bonnets over their heads, he was able to see that one of them had light colored hair, almost of a golden color. "Hello, may I help you?" "Yes, good sir." the man spoke up, "We wish to use your telegraph machine for a few minutes." "'Wish to use...' If you give me the message I'd be more than happy to sent it for you sir." "Unfortunately, we can't do that. The message is of a highly sensitive nature and..." "I'm sorry sir, but as the operator I'm not allowed to let anyone else use the machine but either myself or another authorized operator." As he began at length to explain the rules and regulations involved with the high office of telegraph operator, the taller of the two women with the stranger began to slink forward. As he turned his attention over to the attractive woman, she smiled at him and reached out a hand to cup his left cheek. She then began slowly lowering her hand against his face and down his neck, sending goose bumps down the operator's body as she did so. Once her hand reached his collar, her expression changed as she gritted her teeth and pinched hard on the pressure point, applying an almost vice-like grip to the baroreceptors of the carotid sinus located there. The telegraph operator's eyes rolled back as he fell unconscious onto the desk. "My word." Meiji gasped. "Nene, get over here and send out the messages to the British Military outpost and the Imperial Guard station." Sylia ordered. "I'm on it." Nene said as she ran around the counter, began rewiring the switch board frantically, and started telegraphing out the two messages. "And hurry." Sylia said, looking nervously over toward the door. "We don't know how long he'll be out or how soon before someone else may come in here." "Sylia-san," Meiji broke in, "Are you sure it's such a good idea to contact the Imperial Guard? After what has happened, how do we know we can trust them?" "Before we left, an informant on the inside assured me that while your cabinet ministers have all betrayed you, your guard has not." "Yes, but that was then. I've been gone a while now and... You have informants inside the palace? My palace?" Sylia fought the urge to roll her eyes at Emperor Meiji's reaction to her unfortunate slip of the tongue. As she looked back over to the telegraph, Nene was finishing up rewiring the board the way it was when they first entered, both requests for help now having been sent. Sylia wasn't happy about having to contact others for backup. If it were up to her, she'd rather have the Knight Sabers complete this mission on their own. Unfortunately, Galatia was a joker in the deck she hadn't counted on. Nene crossed over around the desk to join her and Meiji just as an attractive lady came in. Looking over at the group and the operator slouched out across the desk, she was about to scream bloody murder when the Emperor suddenly spoke up. "Thank goodness you came!" he said excitedly. "Something's wrong with this poor man, he fell over as we were talking to him. Could you stay here with him while we go and get some help?" "What? Oh, of course." the woman said, obviously relieved her earlier fears were unfounded; "I'm a doctor myself, out here visiting a sick friend anyways. Hurry on; I'll tend to him until you send some help." "Thank you, Miss..." "Megumi. Now go, get help." "Thank you, Megumi-san." Turning to his two traveling companions, "Well, shall we go?" "Yes, lets." Sylia said, as she and Nene followed the Emperor in a hasty exit. ---To Be Continued---
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