Chapter Two

Chapter Two

“Do you understand the meaning of my concubine?” Kikiou demanded in a loud voice. “She conquers and combines. A body made for the bewitching of men. Spend one night with her, and the most virile man alive would be drained dry as a mummy. Not only that. See her naked body once, and even if flesh never touches flesh, you will feel her everywhere. How is it? Has she pressed her lips against yours? Does her tongue lave the skin?”

Setsura didn’t answer. Perhaps he couldn’t. His eyes stared off into the distance, but couldn’t disguise the raw emotions roiling inside. If Kikiou was telling the truth, he would now be reaching the heights of sexual union.

A large shadow descended. Despite the raptor’s swooping descent, setting him up for the certain kill, Setsura was moving all too sluggishly. The two shadows merged together. A scream erupted, followed by a splash of blood.

Kikiou shouted—not because of the bird’s severed head. This was a woman’s scream. The bird’s talons sank into Pretend Takako’s neck.

With a roar of anger, he was about to unleash a bolt of qi when a writhing wing obscured his vision. A slight delay as the mysterious energy disintegrated it, and Setsura and Pretend Takako had vanished.

“Where did they go?” he screamed at Yakou in the air above him.

The young scion only shrugged. “The barriers are in place. They can’t have gone far.”

Kikiou ground his teeth and set off running. That secret source of power propelled him forward, bounding a dozen feet at a time. As he landed, another kind of energy came at him from another direction.

“Bastard!”

Feeling his legs twisting off beneath him, he knew the source of the blast was Yakou.

“Sorry about that! I planted those land mines for Setsura, but it looks like my timing was off.” High in the sky, the winged man laughed.

In a grove of trees a hundred yards from the manor house, Setsura laid Pretend Takako on the ground. Her head was no longer bleeding as badly, but only because her face was drained to a waxy complexion. The bird’s claws and beak had torn at her arteries and punctured her heart.

“Finally—” Pretend Takako gasped. “I was finally able to return the favor. If it were possible—I would want—want to become the real—me—”

Setsura clasped her white, cold hand. With her other hand, she touched the comely countenance looking down at her. “Covered with blood—and yet so beautiful—you wear it well—I only wish—I could have met you sooner—”

The light dimmed in her eyes. That certain something disappeared from her pupils, and all that was left was Setsura’s face reflected in their black depths. Setsura bowed his head, as if saying a prayer for the dead. Above him came the sound of wings.

“Nice escape.”

Even when Yakou alit silently upon the ground, Setsura didn’t raise his head.

“The powers of the concubine are such that, if she doesn’t touch the skin, it should disappear away after a night. A regular person would be desiccated in that time. But you’ll hold up. How did you kill that raptor? Can you wield your devil wire yet?”

Yakou hadn’t noticed the devil wires that’d flown from the underbrush with split-second timing. No need to say these hidden weapons were originally intended for him.

“You’re not Kikiou?” said Setsura, his head still bowed.

The expression froze on Yakou’s face. This was Setsura’s voice and Setsura’s form. And yet somehow different. From the outside looking in, he had changed only from the inside looking out.

“But I’ve no objection to you either.” Setsura slowly raised his head. “So now you have met the real me.”

Yakou stiffened. With a single rustle of his wings, he could sense that all the possible ways of escaping the web of devil wires were blocked by the dreadful presence of the suddenly transformed Setsura’s being.

“Shall we get down to it?” the beautiful voice asked, as if from far away.

“If I say no, shall we leave it be?” An unusual proposition for him. A spur-of-the-moment decision.

“No.”

A quiet, cool reply that made his hair stand on end and sent a cold steel hand down his back.

“Does it have to come down to you and me?”

“Where is Kikiou?”

“He was over there, catching his breath, arms and legs scattered hither and yon.”

“Why is that?”

“It seems that somebody left dangerous explosives just lying about. As they say, close does count when it comes to hand grenades.”

“Meaning that he will be tying up his own loose ends and not settling matters here.”

“So I would imagine. If you proceed back down the same path from which you emerged earlier and head west, after five minutes or so you should find a staircase leading underground. Descend it and continue west. You will understand what to do when you get there.”

“I have one other request.”

“What is that?”

“Last rites for this woman. Even a shallow grave would suffice. That should not be difficult with your qi.”

“I am agreeable. However, it is my duty to quarantine you as well.”

“Do you want to try?”

“No. Not for now. Not until I can see through the man you are now.”

On that note, Setsura emerged from the grove of trees and set off toward the manor house.

Blocking Princess’s path was that same silver pod, the compact armored personnel carrier belonging to Lieutenant Matthews of JGSDF Special Forces Operational Detachment F. Floating a yard above the road, it turned its cold magnetic eye towards them.

“So we meet again. I won’t tell you to leave this time. Persistently appearing before me again and again bespeaks a death wish. Come.”

She raised her right hand and gestured to the pod.

Her eyes cast a glow with that bewitching light—which unexpectedly faded. Her left hand was clasped around her upper right arm. Dark red oozed from between the fingers, dripping down onto her glistening stomach.

“That fucking Bey, he cursed me somehow. Or I expended too much energy. Or there’s just something about his nature.”

She slumped forward. An electronic voice said, “You’re obviously in a bad way. Not even the greatest vampire is truly immortal. How about you let us handle things?” Princess’s wounds and blood loss gave Matthews a shot of confidence. “Right now, outside the city, preparations are underway to receive you. It’s too bad about the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Complex, but a little hike to the tax rate and they’ll have that hole filled in, pronto. Come along. We’ll patch you up too.”

“Patch me up? Your filthy fingers touching my skin? The flies swarming on a corpse would be a more lovable lot.”

“Some things can’t be helped. I know you weren’t eager the first time we met, but you’ve got to be hurting now. This APC pod of mine is brand new. Like a vampire princess, she can take a licking and keep on ticking.”

“Like me?” All expression vanished from her face. “Do it!”

Arrows of blood red light hit the surface of the pod, bouncing at odd angles up into the sky. The pint-sized APC had repelled the 120 mm laser cannon of the hovertank, three times its size.

Lying on the reclining chair inside the pod, Matthews gritted his teeth.

The day before, he’d returned to headquarters and commandeered the latest and greatest in the product line, a testament to the pull that Special Forces Operational Detachment F had.

This new model had three times the armor capability of the previous one and twice the firepower. It was slightly larger, but overall mobility had only been sacrificed by half a percent. This was but one of many reasons the Defense Ministry’s Technology Corps now lorded its capabilities over America’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and Russia’s Military Engineering Technical University.

The pod’s monitors provided a 180-degree external panoramic view. The large frame of the hovertank currently occupied most of it. Its obvious strategy was to throw off the pod’s navigation using its sheer weight and the strength of its magnetic field.

“Piece of junk,” Matthews sneered, taking hold of the joystick in his right hand, through which he had access to all of the system controls.

The pod retreated before the magnetic field could touch it. The hovertank’s laser lit up against the night sky. The pod’s surface consisted of four layers of quarter-millimeter heat-resistant paint. The top layer could last seven seconds exposed to 600 thousand degrees. Five seconds for each of the next two, three seconds for the fourth. The heat-resistant ceramic armor underneath would last ten seconds.

A small glowing dot alit like a firefly on the body of the hovertank. No sooner had it made contact than a million-degree jet of plasma traveling at eight thousand yards a second punched through the 20 mm titanium skin, turning the inside of the vehicle into an incandescent hell, instantly killing the pilot.

A new fire blossom bloomed on the highway overpass. The strange creature ate itself alive, bright blazing blood oozing from seams in the armor, melting through the road’s surface and falling like dripping wax to the streets below.

Seconds later, a thunderclap exploded upwards from the abyss. Moving forward while effortlessly dodging the falling embers, Ryuuki came to a halt. The flames illuminated his fearless visage. A different emotion colored his face. Surprise.

Princess stood ten feet in front of him, directly confronting the cylindrical pod that had destroyed the hovertank. Her presence communicated not so much an intent to fight as to protect. Takako was behind her. That was who she was protecting.

The pod silently advanced on the two. “Why not come with?” said Matthews, a note of triumphalism in his voice. “Or shall we resort to drastic measures?”

“You should take that up with him.”

The unusual reply prompted Matthews to check out the man in the right-hand corner of his monitor. One look at the big, long-haired, one-armed man in Chinese dress told him who he was.

“Your lover boy?” he spat out.

It didn’t matter. No living thing could defeat him here. The fierce warrior spirit of a soldier, together with his unrivaled armaments and weaponry, bestowed upon him an exaggerated sense of pride.

“Well, then. I’ll settle things with him first. Watch how I do it and you’ll be licking my feet and begging for your life.”

The nose of the pod itself seemed to scowl as it turned to Ryuuki.

“Settle it, Ryuuki.” Princess smiled thinly. It was impossible to tell whether it was the pod or Ryuuki she held in so little regard. “But take your time. This man takes me for granted. I want him to feel the terror down to the marrow of his bones.”

“I understand.” Ryuuki nodded as a strange smile rose to his lips.

Thoughts of battle stirred this old general’s blood. Or perhaps it was the unearthly presence of a beautiful princess. Matthews witnessed it as well—and felt a sense of dread more than his own anger.

He pushed the pod forward, concentrating the magnetic field at Ryuuki’s feet. Chunks of concrete and the figure of a man sprang up as if propelled by hidden springs. They sailed over the guardrail and were swallowed up by the darkness below. Matthews once again turned his attention to Princess.

He readied the tranquilizer gun. The gas-propelled round contained a powerful drug and auto-injector, and would act instantaneously upon reaching its target. In theory, it could take down a ten-ton elephant in a second, with no side effects except pleasant dreams.

And if the target was protected by a shell or carapace, the chemical would vaporize and be absorbed by the skin and lungs.

“Overkill for humans, but we’re talking monsters here. Should be just the right dose.”

The dart struck the right shoulder of the Demon Princess. She curiously eyed the hypodermic, slimmer than a sewing needle. And pulled it out. Matthews felt the surprise like an electric shock. An anesthetic that could put a dinosaur to sleep wasn’t effective on her?

“You don’t think I’ve ever played with such piddling drugs before?” Her face filled the screen. “Every time I appear on the stage, the witch doctors and the scientists leave no stone unturned. How many times do you think thunder has rained down from heaven upon me? How many times do you think I have been attacked by invisible beasts? They even injected poison directly into my precious veins. What effect do you think this weak tea could possibly have?”

Her hands dissolved into a blur. With a snap of her wrist, the hypodermic returned on the path it had come, smashing into the electronic eye.

“Fucking bitch,” Matthews cursed. The monitor temporarily went black, before switching over to three-dimensional radar imaging. “Enough of this shit.”

In response to the trigger on his joystick, one of three tubes in the internal missile bay shifted to the launcher. This particular one had a red label, indicating its nuclear payload.

The images of familiar faces flashed through his mind, the faces of his men—Cardinal, Kendall, Meguid, Chan—they ate the same MREs, drank the same swill, traded jokes as easily as blows.

“Sorry about the wait, guys. Now we settle accounts.”

So as not to get caught up in the nuclear fires, he was moving the pod back toward the Park Hyatt Hotel when a strange force ran through it. A blackness engulfed him. Everything stopped. The pod’s power packs plummeted to zero. Even the sense of strangeness was foreign to him. This wasn’t simply mechanical failure.

Princess gazed at the big man standing at the side of the road with an air of satisfaction. “Covered with mire and you still pull through, General Ryuuki.”

“Much appreciated.” Ryuuki bowed his head, the picture of the perfect servant.

“And is that Shuuran flitting about? Hoh. She threw herself at insignificant men her whole life, and can’t stop doing it when she’s been reduced to dust. Don’t either of you miss being on that boat? How about it, Ryuuki?”

“Wherever I am, I will come when Princess beckons.” His voice seemed to soak into the earth. His own self that could be mistaken for the dark of the night.

“Exactly. You and Shuuran and all those who have received my kiss. Your new life, down to the last drop of your blood, is consecrated to me. If I beckon, you come. If I tell you to fuck, you fuck. If I tell you to kill, you kill.”

The Demon Princess staggered. Before she could fall, Ryuuki was there to catch her. He saw the wound in her chest. “Who did this?”

“That bastard Bey.”

“I understand. And where is he now?”

“I don’t know. He lost an eye and ran away. Track him down and kill him.”

“If that is your wish.”

“And what is your wish?”

Ryuuki did not answer.

“So you do not act unless I command. Fine. I know you have cast me aside. I have watched you wandering the precincts of this wretched city, drinking the blood of its inhabitants. But I left you alone. Because I knew you would come when I called you, regardless of your will. What will you do now, Ryuuki?”

“Well—”

“How does a creature with no will exercise his will? I’m curious. Let’s put it to the test, if you so choose. Destroy me and you just may gain your freedom.”

What other empress would encourage her servant to regicide?

“Surely the thought has crossed your mind. What do you say?”

“If it pleases you.”

“Then do as you please.” It took a long moment for the look of surprise to rise to Ryuuki’s features. “What are you waiting for? I told you to suit yourself. Keeping in mind, however, that you’ll never know when I will call you home.”

Another long moment, and Ryuuki responded to her icy smile. “May I ask you something?”

“What is that?”

“What do you intend to do with that woman?”

“I’ll show her to Setsura. And he will follow me. As my servant.”

“He is presently in our kingdom?”

“Nothing gets past you.”

“But Princess, why did you save her?”

“You already asked that question.”

“Setsura is being held in our kingdom?”

“Precisely.”

“So you let an interloper live, and in order to get that man to follow you, saved this woman from yet another enemy. Princess, perhaps—”

The thought that drifted through his brain was the same one that had occurred to General Bey. And as with General Bey, it made no sense to him either. What the two demons could not bring themselves to articulate was simply too incredible to imagine. Impossible.

“I’m going,” she said breezily. “You do whatever.”

She had started down the road when her eyes fell upon the most beautiful figure in the world, standing just behind Ryuuki. He was lovelier than the moon. It seemed to dim in his presence. With his white cape wrapped around him like a white mist, there was no need for him to introduce himself.

Doctor Mephisto said, “Once before, journeying to your kingdom, I saw you passing through the night.”

The Demon City Physician and the eternal, indestructible Demon Princess had finally come face to face.