Part Four: Aku Thanatos Rin hated tearing Hsu Kai Lin apart from the only other friend she had in the world, but the Ronin needed to get going and Marissa had a different obligation in life. Kailin promised to keep an eye out for Marissa's friend Kagemusha, and the mysterious entity known only as Pale, though she doubted she'd ever see any of them. Rin wanted to get a few seconds alone with Snowblood, to grill her about why she had to kill Rin and why she hated the idea, but the blind lady was long gone by then. Rin blamed Kailin for taking so much time with Marissa, but eased off once she realized One, how long it had been since the two had seen each other; Two, the conditions of their first meeting; and Three, how both girls seemed to be lacking in friends. "I'm sorry," Rin said as she and her partner distanced themselves from the arena. "I shouldn't be so pushy. It's hard for me to understand since I've been indifferent about having friends, and you're so much younger than me." "Only four years," Kailin told her. "We may be on opposite ends of the teenage spectrum, but it's not like you're old enough to be my mother. We could pass as cousins." "With our exotic names, it's not impossible, Hsu Kai Lin." "Though I do not think we are honestly related, Rin Takamatsu." They shared a smile and a nod; BaoBao yawned. Kailin instantly cheered up and tickled her "other" partner. "Oh, is Captain Cuddles bored? Well take it like a woman, Caps. You had enough excitement at the tournament to last you a long time." "I still don't see how you could've lost against Pandora," grumbled Rin. Hsu scoffed. "Gimme a break! You saw her against the others; she totally dominated the fights. Even you'd have a challenge." "Not likely," she said, smirking. "But, who knows? Now I would've liked to have seen Snowblood fight her for real! Yeah! Then maybe I could get a grasp of her powers." "Whose?" "Both. I can't help but wonder if I'll ever figure that strange woman out." "I think she likes you." "Ew. She's so weird." "And you're uptight. You need somebody liking you, even if they are going to kill you. I'm far too young, but even if I weren't, you still wouldn't be my type. I will only love somebody who Captain Cuddles can befriend, and she doesn't like you!" "From the mouths of babes..." "I told you I'm only four years younger!!" Kailin pounced on Rin and wrestled her to the ground, but she was clearly outmatched: Rin was far stronger and more experienced, and took the fight as a jest, laughing and tumbling. BaoBao shrieked away, scampering on all fours to evade a flattening. The contest ended with Rin on top; she pinched Kailin's cheeks gently and gave a merry smile before helping her friend up. "So," she coughed, "where to next, Miss Ronin?" "I dunno. Wherever you want to go, Miss Inferno." "Hmm...the beach?" "It's as good a place as any, though I don't think pandas are allowed." "Then we'll go to one that's empty." "Great!" exclaimed Rin. "I actually know a spot! Hop on!" Kailin jumped on and rode piggyback, as she sometimes did when Rin's bike wasn't around, and held on tight, BaoBao in her sling, as the older, faster girl sprinted away from the arena, across a vast countryside (wishing she had taken her bike after all), and finally towards a quiet shore with not a soul around. There they stopped, close enough to hear the waves crash and the gulls cry, yet not so close to see the eternal sand. They both took a deep breath of sea air, removed their shoes, and walked barefoot across the warm, white afternoon sand to the water. They soon discovered they were not alone after all. Rin noticed their company first; she came to a stop and stared, wide-eyed and wide-mouthed. Some distance away, perhaps ten meters, was a tall woman with short black hair, standing perfectly still as the waves tickled her toes. Her back was to them; she was not quite staring at the ocean so much as she was staring, oddly, at her hands. The strange thing was, though, that she was completely nude, from head to toe. Rin didn't even think she was real until she came closer and saw her idly flexing her fingers in and out, making quiet fists. "Who is that?" whispered Kailin. Rin swallowed. "I dunno, but I have a bad feeling about this." "Yeah." Carefully they took a few more steps towards the naked woman, studying her. Her skin was fair, her body plainly fit and muscular, her face set at an angle so they could just glimpse her profile. The eyes she had were fixed and dull, staring endlessly at her opening and closing palms, as if the mysteries of the universe were in her hands. She didn't seem aware of the company or the ocean or even her nudity, just her hands. Rin and Kailin stepped closer, until they could speak and be heard by the lady. "Uh...excuse me? I hate to interrupt—you're plainly meditating, and that's cool—and I mean, what better place than this beach, which is so private that you can stand here for hours in the buff, which you're obviously doing—but, uh...well, gee, I don't mean to sound nosy, but who are you? Are you...really meditating?" She tilted her head, trying to look full into the face of the tall woman. Kailin whimpered. "Rin...we should go. We should leave her alone." "I think I agree," she whispered softly. "But I still..." BaoBao yelped. The woman blinked. She squeezed her hands shut. Neither of the two girls knew that, eighteen minutes ago, she had been "born", and had stood there since. The very first act of this newborn woman was to whirl around, extend her arm, ignite her weapon, and cleanly slice off the heads of her visitors. And then, as if still shocked over her own existence, she went right back to studying her hands again, taking her first deep breath. BaoBao yelped in the distance, and scampered away as the bodies of her comrades fell to the sandy floor... ......... Two hours passed. The woman took her first step as an entity in the world, and remarked how well her feet left impressions in the sand. She ignored the lifeless bodies and left the beach, naked and silent. She passed the infinite graveyard of space that separated civilization and the shores, doing nothing but walking as the days wore on. She did not grow tired. She did not become hungry, or thirsty. She did not sleep. She merely walked, one bare foot in front of the other, her deep black hair waving around her head like a devilish halo. She didn't even know where she was going; she just went. She finally stopped at the very outskirts of a rusting town. A diner had been erected there long ago; its age had started to show a decade ago, and the half-hearted rejuvenation it received months earlier did little to improve its gruesome appearance. Still. It was something. It was really the first thing she had seen since leaving the beach, so it interested her. So, without any clothes on yet, she walked inside the diner aimlessly. Above all else, she believed, civility required a covering for her extremities; otherwise, nothing could be done. Activity ground to a natural halt as she stepped inside, naked like the newborn she was, quiet as the wind, her eyes empty and dark as caves. Men gawked, their forks hanging in midair, some food still balanced on them. Women gasped, some trying to cover their children's eyes. A few people whistled and gave catcalls. The proprietor of the diner cleared his throat, stepped in front of her, and crossed his arms. "We can't let you in here, ma'am," he drawled. "You're gonna have to leave, or else I'll call the cops on you." She studied him, as one could study a caterpillar they would soon step on, and brushed him aside. She continued, oblivious, searching for something, for something, what? Clothes. Women's clothes. Of course. She was a woman, so naturally... "I don't think you heard me," stated the manager, touching her bare shoulder. "I said—" Ironic, really, since he never got the chance to say anything ever again. A blazing, bright-gold sword had burnt clean through his gut. Naturally, people panicked. The woman left the man to bleed and die, and quietly resumed her hunt for an outfit. Some people tried to stop her; she effortlessly cleaved them in two, some at the ribcage and others at the pelvis. A police officer fired at her, but the energy weapon she wielded, which seemed to shoot straight from her hand, transformed itself into a shield, devouring all missiles. The shield extended and crushed the officer against the wall of the diner, until it burned his flesh and consumed him. The weapon snapped back, like a serpent, as one man rushed after her with a steak knife. It lopped off his arm before eating away at his ear, then his forehead, then nose, and finally his jaw. She mince-stepped over his body, advancing forward, towards a woman she had spotted earlier. By her guess, this lady roughly matched up with her height and build, and she had the kindness to stay put, too. On her way, for no reason other than brief amusement, she killed whom she pleased and spared those she wished. She stopped in her tracks, before the screaming woman, and touched her hair. She tried forming words, but she knew none to speak. The woman's children, innocent of the carnage and their own doom, came to battle the naked lady, hitting her on her legs and buttocks. She ignored them, and stared directly at the woman, who was white with fear. In a flash, the children lost their mother; Miss Nudity impaled her directly through the top of her head. She wanted to spare the children. She smiled at them both, wanting nothing more than for them to live, and shoved them aside with gentle care—because as even she knew, who had not yet been in that world a month, there were things much worse than death. She took her time in removing the dead woman's clothes; she took everything, from undergarments to jewels, and left nothing except her skin. Now, their roles were reversed. What a marvel. The lady, no longer nude, left the diner quietly, deciding not to kill anymore, even if they started first. That was enough for one day. She just wanted to leave and go—but where? She didn't know where to go. She just left, and started—where else?—for the center of that rusty town. And nobody knew that this woman, beautiful and horrible, had already slaughtered dozens without a care. But of course she had. She was the goddess of death. That was her job. ...... A day passed. Fourteen lives, most of them random people, fell to her careless hands. She didn't know who they were, or what they had done, or even why she killed them—she just did, and that was that. What other reason did she need? Of course, she was still an infant, though her body was that of a woman. She had not yet even spoken. She could barely even formulate thought. Just kill. And walk. Go. It didn't matter where. Just go. She assumed she'd know the reason soon. Somebody would come along and tell her. They would come along and be her guide, and she had the distinct feeling that no matter what, she would not be able to kill them. Fifteen. Sixteen. Now eighteen. Now twenty. Now thirty. Those last ten were more fun. Her weapon seemed to form all kinds of wonderful shapes, unrestricted to any bounds, as she was. It could circle around her as a total shield, extend far like a spear, broaden like a great wall, or curl and twist so dynamically that nothing could follow or stop it. And it always came back, back to...the cylindrical object she had, the one that she had found when she was "born", back at that beach. It was an energy weapon, and like her, it did what it pleased. It served her. Maybe it was her. Forty. Forty-one. Forty-two. Forty-four. Night came. No more. She'd let the rest live. She'd smile at them. And vanish. Morning. Her first sleep. She had slept ten hours. Then came her first meal, and her first shower—something told her she'd need one—and her first secretion of bodily wastes. Her excrement and urine disgusted her, but the young mind she carried with her reasoned that all creatures produced waste, and she was no different. The bad came from the good. The good came from...... Oh, she did not know, but perhaps she came from "that place" as well. She came from "the good place", and surely, lots of bad things were coming from her. Unless death was not bad. Bacteria devours the rot. It does this so that the rot does not continue to live. The vile is wiped away, to make room for more clean. Bacteria eats it, makes it go away. So many rotting souls in the world, so little time. Something told her that; she didn't know what. Just kill. And go. It doesn't matter where. She ended up at a bus stop, but at the time, she didn't know it was a bus stop, nor did she even know what a bus was. She observed it in secret for a day, and concluded that a bus was simply a better means of transporting people around—like walking, but faster. The bus ate the people up, and spat the people out. So perhaps it too was like her, but why eat and excrete the same thing? Would a bus not eat something good and excrete something bad? Yet people came and went. And she started to recognize a few. She heard them talking about this phenomenon. "My daily routine," they said. She couldn't say it yet. She had a feeling she would, soon. She decided to be eaten by the bus, to see what happened. She went to the bus stop and sat down on the bench, like other people had before her (her mind wandered off on its first tangent that day, wondering if, like her body, her clothes too could be cleaned in a shower—because they were starting to smell like excrement). An elderly woman was next to her, friendly and dignified, and the quiet woman decided not to kill her. She rather liked her. "Going my way?" said the woman with a twinkle of her eye. The younger woman nodded, unable to say Yes. "Oh. I'm going to see my grandson!" she added with a proud hiss. "He's in construction. He says he started on a brand-new project, one that will probably be another bank or museum. He mostly does museums and banks. Do you have any family?" The goddess of death merely frowned. She didn't know how to answer that. In the back of her mind, a memory... A memory of great fire... "It's all right," said the woman jovially. "I won't pressure you." She rocked in place and talked about her grandson the construction worker until the bus came by. "Well," she said, "this is it, unless you're not on the 183." The goddess didn't know, so she shrugged. The old woman found this odd, but ignored her and stepped aboard. The goddess watched her reach into her pocket, pull out an orange-colored piece of paper with holes in it—"ticket" was the word—and give it to the driver. He punched another hole in it! "Thank you," she said, hobbling off to the back. He gave the silent woman a look of expectancy. "Well? You getting on?" The goddess wanted to get on. She mimicked the old woman, searching pockets she had no idea existed for a ticket that might not have been there. As luck had it, though, the woman she had stolen the clothes from kept a bus pass, and it had scarcely been used. The goddess held it up meekly. "Come on up, then," said the driver, like he was talking to a child. She stepped up and handed him the ticket. He punched a hole in it, just like last time! "Take a seat," he told her, so she searched the bus for an open one. Before walking over there, though, there was one more thing in the ritual to cover. She cleared her throat and whispered softly: "Thank you." And the goddess of death shuffled off for her seat, and sat down. She watched the world go by at an accelerated rate, and stared mindlessly. Just go. Just go. Doesn't matter where. She would... I will be... "You will be found, my dear." Kali was on the move. ---------- To be continued... Dark forces are starting to gather. Who is this lady? What is her purpose? What is her destination? Is somebody waiting for her? Only some questions will have answers in the next chapter, "Dark Scion". Stay tuned!
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