[FFML] [Fanfic][Ranma/X-COM xover] The Road to Cydonia Chapter_18

[Justin Wagner]

For six years, mankind has waged a Secret War against an enemy from
Beyond the Stars. The UNETCO timetable moves ever forward, but a new
complication has arisen as the alien forces in the Far East surge out in
unexpected numbers and with surprising fury. India and Juliet Squads
have been tasked with taking the Procyon, a cargo ship operated by the
alien enthralled Sirius Group. Facing the unexpected power of an alien
Sectopod terror unit, the two squads are soon to be confronted by the
true nature of the weapon designed by the sadistic Doctor Aliyev.

-----

The Road to Cydonia

Chapter XVIII
The Meaning of Fear

-----

Written by:
Capn Chryssalid
jbraveboy at gmail.com

-----

A sharp pain, like a pinch, shot up Akane's leg from where she had been
hit, and she nearly stumbled and fell into the bush directly ahead of
her. Breathing heavily from fatigue and excitement, she pushed through
the bushes, trying to find cover from the invisible laser that had just
tagged her. She scrambled, on two legs and one arm, keeping her rifle
close by her side and off the ground. She could just see her target
through the trees: a dark silver shape. But she had to watch out, too.
It was just the small moving enemies she had to be on the lookout for.

There!

Steadying her shoulder against the sturdy surface of an old tree, she
took aim and fired up at the round saucer shape in the air. First, a
snap shot to check her aim, and then a trio of blasts up at the hovering
platform. Finally, a red light flashed above and below it, signaling a
hit. That was two out of the three disks on the course, but she hadn't
scored a single hit on any of the mobile targets yet.

Heading back, she zig zagged around trees, keeping her profile low.
Unlike when she'd practiced with Ryu, she didn't have any of the normal
functional equipment this time: just her existing training, reflexes,
and endurance. Aside from her helmet and visor (which she was forbidden
to remove, even though it was non-functional), a little over a hundred
pounds of dead weight on her back and midsection helped to wear her
down. The thick forest area was actually something of a relief compared
to what inevitably came next.

Ahead of her lay a boulder strewn field with high grass.

There was next to no cover to hide behind, and the terrain was about as
rough as it could possibly get. Worse still: she had to go uphill. There
was little time to pause and catch her breath, though; the last target
was somewhere across the field, and she couldn't see it yet. Her only
hope was that she could sprint across before any of her opponents took
up good sniping positions, or figured out exactly where she was. At
least there wasn't any barbed wire around to get in her way.

Moving around the edge of where the forest and the rubble strewn field
met, she picked out a good path that partly made use of a rise in the
hill for cover. Steeling herself for the attempt, she broke out into the
open in a run, making her way around the larger rocks and counting on
her balance and honed instincts to compensate for any unseen obstacles
underfoot. There was nothing to warn her if she was being shot at
already as she made her run; the lasers they were using had tracers, but
they weren't easy to spot, especially when you didn't know where to
look.

Her torso body armor suddenly shook, and a small shock made sure she
noticed she'd been hit. She cursed; a torso shot was considered a kill.
She was dead. Again. Still, she kept going, taking cover behind an
exceptionally large boulder, looking for where the rest of her team had
placed the third and final saucer. It could be almost anywhere:
suspended between the trees, on the ground hiding in the bushes, or
sometimes just out in the open, daring her to peek out from under cover
and shoot it.

>From her current position, she could tell that part of the landscape
ahead was concealed by particularly tall dry grass. It was a good bet
that it was there. Ducking behind a small copse of trees that stood out
slightly from the next major tree line, Akane crept towards a spot
overlooking that location. She saw the slivery shell almost immediately,
and wasting no time, she picked it off after two successive semi-
automatic bursts. The red light on top lit up, indicating it was "dead"
and Akane breathed a sigh of relief.

Course complete!

And she'd only lost her life, her left leg, and her right arm twice. It
was certainly an improvement from the first time she'd given the course
a try. Walking slowly out of the cover of the trees, she looked up at
the nearly cloudless sky and silently wished it would snow. Of course, a
layer of frost on the ground would have made her easier to track, but
she certainly wouldn't have minded being able to smear a bit of chilly
wet snow on her face at the moment.

Gradually, the others melted out of the wilderness, wearing gear
identical to her own, even down to the weights on their backs. The first
had a slightly more female build, identifying her even from a distance
as the other woman in Golf Squad: Janis Lohse, from one of the Baltic
States. A short distance behind Janis, Akane saw a larger figure she
guessed to be their leader, Sergeant Karl Winther. He was from Austria,
and a veteran of UNETCO who had been with the organization since 2001.
The last member of their squad dipped out of the shadows from a
different direction.

Akane frowned at him - he had been the one to pick her off then, just a
minute ago. His name was Ashgar Khan, an Indian, and a superb marksman.
Not a large man, she could see that the weights simulating their gear
were giving him more trouble than either Janis or Sergeant Winther.
Still, he had kept up well enough to find a good spot to shoot at her
from. Akane considered that; next time she would have to try and shoot
him, first, or try and wear him out by leading the group on a chase.

They met up in the middle of the rocky field, exchanging their personal
experience during the exercise. Winther and Khan were both soft spoken
men, very much the opposite of the sorts of guys Akane was used to. Khan
in particular took a very analytic approach to his performance, and his
strategies. Janis, on the other hand, was more aggressive and outspoken.
During her runs through the exercise, she had always tried to pick off
the rest of the team (whose job it was to get in her way and "kill"
her), saving the target saucers for later.

"Just because they won't fire at you, doesn't mean you should take them
lightly," Winther reminded her, and through her, Akane. "In the field,
you'll find Cyberdisks more than formidable."

"During terror missions involving Sectoids, I believe up to twenty five
percent of fatalities are due to Cyberdisks," Khan agreed. "This is
disproportionate to their actual deployment numbers."

"Well, it doesn't help that we're restricted in what firepower we can
use during terror missions," Janis argued, taking the point of view that
in a modern battlefield, the bigger the target, the sooner it got
killed.

"I've seen films," Akane said, feeling more confident than she had
initially been about contributing to a conversation between admittedly
much more experienced XCOM soldier recruits. She was one of them now,
didn't that show that UNETCO had confidence in her ability to fight and
improve?

"But I was wondering... why is it that most Cyberdisks tend to stand
still so often?" she asked. "We know they can fire on the move..."

Janis and Khan quickly turned to Winther, who considered the question
for a second before answering, "That is most likely a limitation of the
Sectoid controlling the disk, rather than the weapon itself. Just
because your target seems robotic, or non-organic, you should not fall
into the trap of thinking you can predict what it will do. Think of them
as simply heavily armed and armored aliens."

"When you think of them like that," he concluded. "Their weakness
becomes clear. After all: what is the first thing you do when you spot
one in the field?"

-----

"Command! We have a problem here!"

"A really big fucking problem!"

The sound of the plasma beam hitting tempered steel was like static from
a hundred television sets, and what metal it struck peeled away as if it
were paper from a flame. It created an expanding molten hole large
enough to walk through and passing through three bulkheads. One could
look through the damage done, from the inside of the ship, and see the
South China Sea.

The Sectopod took another step forward, port plasma cannon growing red
hot in preparation to fire. Ukyou stood, stunned. Next to her, Ranma had
just barely moved in time. The Beam had passed right past them, right
next to her; the heat from it could be felt even through her insulated
stealth suit. Stunned as she was, if she had been the target instead of
Ranma...

"Ukyou!" Ranma's voice snapped her out of it. "MOVE."

Instinct kicked in. Instinct honed by years of fighting and training.
Instinct honed in battles against the relentless sea. Powerful leg
muscles flexed, slamming her heels against the ground, and sending her
forward in a blur of sudden acceleration.

'Attack!' her mind screamed, 'Defense is suicide! Attack! ATTACK!'

A solid line of strawberry red, flashing gold at the front and growing
darker near the tail, passed over her shoulder. So close! So terribly
close! Even without thinking as to whether they would be effective or
not, she skipped right past her normal repertoire of techniques and un-
strapped her UNETCO modified MSG-90b carbine. Even as she took aim, like
slow motion, she saw the massive alien robot shifting its body and
onboard weapons to reacquire her. The starboard plasma cannon was
starting to glow.

She aimed for it, pumped the under slung grenade launcher on her
carbine, and fired. The explosive self-propelled cartridge rocketed out
of the underside of her weapon like a bat out of Hell, crossing the room
even as Ukyou's shoulder hit the ground and she started rolling towards
cover. Her aim was dead on - the small self propelled grenade hit the
exposed iris of the plasma cannon just before it could fire, engulfing
it in fire and a concussive explosion powerful enough to shred an
unarmored human body.

A millisecond later, a lance of plasma extended from the cloud of smoke,
the force of the rapidly heated and expanding air blowing away the
kicked up cover in a single pulse, like ripple of water radiating from a
thrown stone. The excited particles cleaved a pillar holding up the
helipad in two, and cored a boiler like barrel. Superheated steam tore
the metal fixture apart.

The Sectopod took another step forward, totally unharmed.

A blast of blue telekinetic ki slammed into its body as it emerged from
the smoke, followed by a thunderous spark of green and black that
impacted and rippled harmlessly against the nearly indestructible alien
alloy that made up the Sectopod's hull. Ukyou, having disappeared from
sight and presenting little apparent threat, seemed to lose the terror
unit's interest as it turned to face the three men in the room. Ukyou
rolled onto her feet and jumped, heading for the wall.

Her carbine had four small grenades in stacked cartridges loaded inside
the tube of its grenade launcher. She intended to use every single one.
There was always the chance of a golden BB, or of crippling it against
the odds. It wasn't like anyone else present could do better. Taking two
steps against the horizontal surface and pushing off, hard, she fired
again and again, the first two shots harmlessly impacting the top of its
armored shell, and the third hitting the ground at its feet. Despite the
blast and shrapnel, the Sectopod didn't even look scratched.

Ranma, Ryu and Ryouga were running interference on the other side of the
hangar, moving at a speed Ukyou felt envious of. It was almost unfair
how the boys in their teams were stronger than the girls. Her occasional
manly dressing aside, Ukyou did have a feminist side. Her pride wanted
her to participate, but the rational side of her brain couldn't quite
imagine how.

"Ranma!" she called, while landing and skidding along the metal floor
for several feet. "What do we do?"

Another killing beam from the Sectopod's plasma cannon blew yet another
hole in the hull of the cargo ship. Only the crisscrossing and dizzying
agility of the three male martial artists kept them from being skewered.

"Fall back!" Ranma's response came between leaps that would make an
Olympic level gymnast's eyes grow wide with amazement. "When Mousse gets
here, do exactly what he tells you!"

"Mousse?" She ducked behind a large metal crate and remembered - in this
first few frantic moments, Ryouga had called for Mousse, and the Chinese
fighter had promised to 'be right there.' That meant he was coming in
from the other side of the hangar. Behind her, she could see a plasma
stream punch a hole in the ceiling. Taking a deep breath, and getting
ready, she waited for the sound of the next shot, and ran.

Leaping out from behind cover, she saw Ryu toss Ryouga up into the air.
The lost boy actually hit the ceiling, bounced off, and shot downward,
using gravity and his own powerful legs to propel him down towards his
target. As expected, the Sectopod identified this mad gambit, and
started to aim up. It was in that instant's distraction that Ranma, the
true threat, struck.

"Shichuu Rakuchi Sei!" he cried, appearing behind the Sectopod from out
of no where using the Umisenken, and aiming for the terror unit's legs.
The 'Brace Falling Down Strength' was normally used on humans, but as
part of the 'way of the silent thief' she couldn't help but watch and
wonder if it would work on this alien robot as well. The technique
itself was designed to take out a target's legs and as a 'soft art,' it
could theoretically work without needing to penetrate layers of alien
alloy armor.

Ranma's arms spread out, trying to upend the robot's legs, and when that
failed, he rolled into a ball and kicked out in a split, improvising a
version of the technique on the fly to hit the joints. Neither worked.
Ryouga, meanwhile, turned in midair and slammed, feet first, into the
'face' of the Sectopod with sufficient force to crater the ground at the
robot's feet. It seemed to ignore the attack, and just fired, narrowly
missing the leader of India Squad as he spun out of the way.

"Damnit!" he cursed, flipping off the ground with one hand.

"That should have worked!" Ranma snarled angrily, his voice betraying
his growing apprehension with the situation. Alien alloys were actually
extremely light; there was no way they were simply weak enough to lift
or move it. Which meant: "It's anchored itself in place somehow!"

"In that case, let's bury it!" Ryu replied, and Ukyou ran past him as he
started to make the motions for his trademark Yamasenken Kijin Raishu
Dan. Ukyou gasped, slammed her foot down into the ground, denting the
metal, and suddenly reversed her momentum. Diving into the Kumon heir,
she cradled him under her and hastily adjusted the angle of her alien
alloy battle spatula.

A glancing blow from the Sectopod's particle beam, no more than the
trailing end of it, hit the flat of her Hera-sama. The imparted force
threw both her and Ryu to the side, crashing into a trio of wooden
crates. The damn machine was fast - faster than any of XCOM's heavy
weapons platforms. Using its legs and main body, it could adjust its aim
deceptively quickly.

"My god..." she rolled off Ryu, breathing heavy. Looking over her
shoulder, she could see that her battle spatula, her Hera-sama, the
weapon that she had been told was effectively indestructible, had a
ragged scar down the flat of it marring the normally perfect surface.
Bits of it had been physically sheared off by the beam.

"Thanks," Ryu offered, flipping back onto his feet. Another blast of
gold and red passed overhead, blowing a poster sized hole in the ships'
hull.

"One more time!" he set his stance, this time from behind cover. Ukyou
nodded, and held up the other end of her battle spatula, giving him a
reflective surface to aim from. She had trained with India Squad more
than anyone else in Juliet; so she knew how they thought, fought,
planned, and executed their techniques.

>From behind the relative safety of cover, in this case most of the
helipad, Ryu could see his targets reflected in the mirror-like flat of
her weapon, and hit them with his Kijin Raishu Tekidan. Ryu
concentrated, taking in the necessary angles, and started to move his
arms in sudden sharp motions. Vacuum blades shot past Ukyou at high
speed, but she never flinched, trusting in Ryu's mastery of the
technique. The blades the arched sharply behind her, and flew up at the
ceiling. Repeated strikes cut lines in the metal above their heads until
a massive panel came loose, crashing to the ground.

And landing directly on top of the Sectopod.

Ranma and Ryouga, still dividing the terror weapon's attention, howled
in approval, taking the opportunity to finally catch a breather. The
constant high speed motion wasn't so much of a problem for the two
endurance freaks, but tossing out special techniques as distractions was
immensely draining, even for men like them. Ukyou and Ryu also peeked
out from behind the helipad, looking out to where the Sectopod had been
flattened beneath several tones of steel.

"It isn't enough," Ranma said, observing the rubble strewn quarter of
the hangar from his perch on top of a metal pipe jutting out of the
floor. "Ryouga!"

"I know!" The lost one jumped towards the now moving tangle of fallen
steel. He took a few steps around it, looking for the right spot, before
slamming his palms into the floor. For a split second, nothing happened.

Then Ukyou felt it, a pulse of ki running through the ground at her
feet.

"Bakusai Tenketsu!"

A gaping maw large enough to swallow a tank erupted beneath the rubble
as metal curled and deformed and split into giant shards. The Sectopod
had nearly extradited itself when it, and the tons of steel that had
plowed into it from above, fell into the hole and down deep into the
hull.. A beam of burning particles shot out in vain as it began to fall,
firing up and into the sky. Deep in the outermost section of the cargo
ship's massive hull, the alien device's fall came to a crashing halt.

"Mousse!" Ryouga barked, standing up and backing away from the hole.
"Anytime now...!"

"Almost there!" Mousse replied from over the comm..

"Well," Ranma ventured. "At least..."

The sound of something going "Thunk! Thunk!" into the ceiling cut the
pigtailed martial artist off. Ukyou looked up, trying to find the source
of the sound, as did everyone else. It was hard to see at first, but
then she saw a hint of light playing off something... like a wire?

Turning from the ceiling to the hole in the floor, Ukyou saw the top of
the Sectopod start to rise from below. It was slightly awkward, however,
as if it was rising ass first. She looked closer, curiosity overcoming
caution, and took note of the four unusual protrusions - like spines -
that stuck out of the "back" rear of the robot. Whatever it was was
coming out of the back two, and she could see the front pair begin to
swivel and face forward.

Thunk!

Thunk!

"Wires!" Ukyou could guess. "It's using wires!"

Immediately, Ryouga and Ryu let fly a bandanna and a vacuum blade,
trying to cut where they guessed the first two wires to be, suspending
the Sectopod from the ceiling. Ryu's vacuum blade seemed to hit nothing
before plowing into the wall, leaving a crescent scar. Ryouga's
bandanna, however, hit something... and itself became sliced in two.

'What the hell could cut...?' but she knew the answer. She used alien
alloy wire herself. This had to be some razor version. It made sense,
too: alien devices had to be able to operate in low or non-existent
gravity. It would have something to anchor its feet in place, and move
itself around in a weightless environment.

Facts were facts. They couldn't damage it. Physical attacks were useless
and even ki attacks seemed completely ineffective. They couldn't pick it
up and throw it if it rooted itself in place, and they couldn't drop it
into the sea, not while it had something to attach to. A Sectopod was
armored like a main battle tank; only heavy weaponry had a chance
against it. Just what the hell were they supposed to do?!

"I have a plan," Ranma spoke up, as the crest of the Sectopod raised up
and over the hole in the ground, allowing it a clear aim at everyone in
the hangar.

-----

"They're still alive!" Gregori's face screwed up into an expression of
panicked worry. "And... and that robot is punching holes in the hull!
This is terrible!"

"Please, Doctor Aliyev," he pleaded, looking behind him at the other
Procyon scientists. "We have to get out of here! It isn't safe!"

"There is always the emergency escape," Kirill ventured, wavering
between his normally slavish support of whatever Aliyev told him to
believe and his own instinct for self preservation. "Maybe we could...
could take it... and, and... get away on a life raft or something!"

"Do you know how far we are from land out here?" Iosef Aliyev spoke up,
admonishing his subordinate. "They're probably watching for just that
kind of stupid mistake. We'd never get away."

Nikolay, typically, agreed with his boss. "We're better off waiting here
for the robot to kill them. The ship can survive a few holes in it."

"Its safer being in a lifeboat waiting to be picked up than standing
around here, Iosef," Uliana argued. "You can stay here if you want, but
let Gregori and me go."

"Impossible!" Iosef declared, crossing his arms. "If any of the enemy on
the deck of the ship were around, they would discover the emergency
escape hatch."

"Damnit..." Gregori grumbled, looking out the window overlooking the
hangar. The Sectopod was hanging in the air, now, and getting ready to
set its feet back down on the ground. It was still firing at one of the
speedy targets in the room, and the helipad was beginning to resemble
swiss cheese since it generally had the misfortune of being used as
cover by the invading XCOM troops (when they weren't ducking back into
the halls leading to the two labs). What would happen if a stray shot
hit the control alcove? Everyone inside would be obliterated!

"Damnit!" he cursed again, and his eyes turned discretely downward to
the SPS - Samozaryadnyj Pistolet Serdjukova - tucked into his pants.
Unlike Iosef, he'd never fired a gun before, but they all had one,
especially given the sorts of experiments they had been performing
lately. Chryssalid venom had a runaway effect on the metabolism of the
creatures it infected, boosting strength, speed and aggression
considerably. A few rounds from a pistol to the skull would still put an
infected human down for the count, though, so it was better than nothing
(though less of a deterrent than a good old flamethrower).

"Damnit!" he cursed yet again, and made a snap decision, reaching for
the pistol. He had to get to the deck; find a life boat, and get off the
ship. He had to at least try. At this rate, even if the alien robot was
able to kill those annoyingly super fast XCOM stormtroopers, it would
shoot so many holes in the ship that it would probably sink.

No! It was better to take this opportunity, the best opportunity they
would have, to get away and life to do whatever another day. After all,
he didn't have any particular loyalty to the aliens or the Sirius Group.
He just needed some money to pay off his gambling debts and retire.

"None of you move!" he whirled on the other scientists in the room,
holding the large grip of the pistol in his hands with what he hoped
appeared to be confidence in his ability to aim and fire the weapon.
Iosef and the others seemed genuinely amazed by his gambit, and seeing
their faces, Gregori started to smile. He's definitely outwitted Iosef
with this plan!

"What the HELL are you going, Gregori?!" Iosef quickly looked to
Nikolay, who was slowly reaching for his own gun.

"Don't do it, Nikolay!" Gregori adjusted his general aim. "I swear I'll
shoot!"

The gruff engineer paused, unsure whether to call his bluff.

"Gregori..." By the sound of Uliana's voice, he could guess that she was
as stunned by any of them. He beckoned her to follow him.

"We can make it, Uliana! With all this commotion in the hangar, there's
no way there'll be anyone on the top deck. We'll take a boat; get away
from here!"

Kirill started to rise from his seat. "Gregori, you...!"

"No. No!" Iosef blurted out. "They want to go? Alright. Alright. Let
them go."

Nikolay growled. "But...!"

"No. It is ok, Nikolay," Doctor Aliyev assured him. "Let them go."

"You're a reasonable man, Iosef..." Gregori said, moving towards the
emergency exit. He tapped in a four number code with his free hand, and
the door opened. Inside was a small tube that led up to the main deck
and a hidden hatch, via a sturdy ladder. There was just enough room for
one person at a time to ascend, but it was more than enough to take them
to safety.

"Good luck, Gregori," Aliyev offered amiably. "I think you'll need it."

"You, too," Gregori replied. "Come on, Uliana. You go first!"

Together, the two started to climb, leaving Iosef, Nikolay and Kirill
behind. The door had just closed, when Nikolay turned on Doctor Aliyev.

"I can't believe you let him just walk away!" the irate engineer yelled.
"He'll get caught, and...!"

"He won't get caught, Nikolay," Iosef interrupted the man. "Did you not
see how our friend Gregori held his pistol? He was like a baby. But
there was no point letting him shoot in here and accidentally hit
someone or something."

The Procyon's chief scientist slowly reached behind and pulled out his
own SPS. Unlike Gregori, he held it with a confidence that came from
repeated practice. Checking it, he walked towards the emergency door,
counting down from eight. Opening the door with the exact same code used
moments ago he casually ducked into the escape tube and fired upwards.
The sound of screams, male and female, and of bullets plowing into
flesh, mixed with the crack-crack of the 9mm ammunition as it fired.

Iosef Aliyev withdrew his arm just as the two broken and blasted bodies
tumbled limply to the bottom of the stairs. He then put two more bullets
in them, just to make sure. Smoking gun still in hand, he keyed the door
closed, and turned towards the shocked Nikolay and Kirill.

"You should have more faith in me, my friends," he said with a small
grin, walking towards the glass window. "Now, how are our unwelcome
guests doing...?"

-----

Icarus-032 was attached to Seiran Mountain's 1st Platoon, and currently
on loan to the two Experimental Squads: India and Juliet. Its main
purpose was data collection and path finding. This meant it loitered
high in the air over an area and maintained a constant vigil over alien
movements, the locations of crashed UFOs, any nearby civilian traffic,
and other matters of operational interest.

The Icarus class UAV designated number 032, call sign "Roaming Susan,"
was cruising leisurely at an altitude of around twelve thousand feet,
when an emergency control override came in from HQ. All Icarus class
UAVs were based on alien technology, and resembled UFOs to a great
degree, or to be more exact: Cyberdisks. This made them extremely
stealthy and quite maneuverable, traits well suited for reconnaissance,
but due to certain doctrinal limitations (that pesky Section Seven) they
were unarmed.

At the time of their first deployment, there had actually been some
controversy regarding the extent to which UNETCO could use alien
technology to develop better recon elements. The aliens had jamming
technology that made normal means of observation, from Radar to normal
UAVs, unreliable. On the other hand, the nations of the world were not
keen on UNETCO being able to effectively spy at will anywhere in the
world, even after they had total access to the global satellite network.
In the end, UNETCO's use of the drones had been deemed necessary, but
they were still something of a global privacy hot topic among those in
the UNETCO international cadre.

Regardless of "Susan" being unarmed, she, like all her Icarus brothers
and sisters, also had another purpose. An initially unofficial one. Soon
after they had been introduced, a Squad commander had noticed how the
Icarus class had a generous amount of unused internal volume originally
intended for weapons, but now reserved for 'electronic observation
hardware expansion.' He had gotten the inspired idea to keep one of his
UAVs low to the surface (around only a thousand feet or so) and use it
to carry an emergency heavy weapon. If the weapon was needed, the UAV
would be ordered to land nearby, and the required trooper could just
retrieve it on the spot.

After a year, this caught on, and the engineers at several bases had
made custom modifications to their UAVs to improve on "in combat
drop/lift capability." So when Susan got the signal from HQ that someone
down below needed something, it wasn't anything terribly new or
unexpected. The fact that it would have to perform an insertion at sea,
a first for any of the Icarus class, never crossed its relatively simple
and straightforward programming. Susan treated it like any other
insertion event.

Two seconds after the message was received it had already calculated how
it would insert, and the tiny matter-antimatter Elerium reactor onboard
began to radiate directed gravity waves. It was a maneuvering quirk of
the gravity drive that propelled it that the most efficient movements
were not curves, but straight lines. Aerodynamics did not factor into
it; the alien drive could propel a brick at Mach 6 in any direction...
provided that brick was made out of alloys and properly shielded against
the stresses of being torn through the air.

Susan, like any of its UFO forebears, thus moved in a nausea inducing
zig zag fashion, zipping straight from one way point to another, without
any respect for this thick atmosphere it pushed its way through. It
moved to a point in space, stopped on a dime exactly there, and then
moved on. For navigation purposes, it pulsed its reactor, moving in
characteristic skips like a rock skimming across the top of a lake.

Shampoo shielded her eyes as a blast of hot air and light appeared
nearby.

Lowering her arm, she approached the hovering saucer, and a second later
its underside opened up and peeled back, like the lid of a can. Fixed in
place there was a large weapon and a spare medikit, and on top of them,
another large device. Shampoo grabbed the both, and strapped the device
to her back. Its insertion accomplished, "Roaming Susan" shot straight
back up into the air to resume its previous flight course, moving in a
perfect square in the sky.

"'Section Seven repealed for this mission,' huh?" the conscripted Amazon
asked, hefting the 23 pound T-8A1 Advanced Tactical Laser Platform and
getting a good feel for the powerful weapon in her hands.

"Well....!" She smirked viciously; eyes alight with the promise of a
soon to be defeated enemy. Of course, the Sectopod down below would
target her above all others when it realized she could actually damage
and blind it, and there was as little chance of 'sneaking' up on it as
there was an Ethereal (a creature that perceived its environment in all
directions as once), so she would only get one free shot. Hopefully, she
could make that one shot count...

"I have the package and I am in position!" she announced, nearing the
edge of the gap she had opened between the hangar doors.

"I'm counting on all of you," Ranma's confident tone, when it came,
filled her with resolve. "Let's do it!"

-----

Ryouga watched Ranma with respect, and more than a little veiled envy.
Leave it to the annoying pigtailed martial artist to come up with a plan
this insane. If it had been up to him, he would have just let Shampoo
snipe down at the Sectopod, and hope that she and Mousse could throw
enough firepower at the problem to reduce the damn thing to molten slag.
Failing that, he'd have tried to collapse the entire room in on it
somehow. Ranma, of course, had to have some sort of elaborate back up to
seize (or steal) the win, in case the first attack plan failed.

But as he had no ostensibly better strategy, Ranma's would have to
suffice.

A second after stepping out from behind the concealing and protective
cover of the now decimated and partly crumbled helipad; he saw that half
second flicker of light descend from above on the freshly risen
Sectopod. The beam dwelled in place perfectly on the top of the 'head'
and over what they had been taught was the primary omnidirectional
sensing apparatus, leaving a scorched crack in the armor, and hopefully
blinding it as well. Still, it had just started to turn to engage
Shampoo from her perch high above, paired plasma cannons glowing deathly
hot, when Ryouga unleashed the shishi hokoudan he had been building
between his hands. Depressed thoughts of failure and inevitable defeat
mixed with the still simmering jealousy he felt towards his always happy
prodigy of a rival.

The screaming ball of ki shot from between his clenched fingers, plowing
into the front of the Sectopod with enough force to level any home
smaller than the Tendo Dojo. The mental energy fizzled against the alien
metal, but the Sectopod paused for just a moment and in that moment,
Ryouga could see that Ranma's hunch had been correct regarding the
Sectood's greatest weakness. Leave it to Ranma to notice a little thing
like that in the heart of battle...!

The Sectopod fired up, but the moment's delay had brought Shampoo just a
little extra time to haul ass and get out of the cone of fire, in
addition to confirming Ranma's plan as having a chance of success.
Paired particle streams annihilated the area Shampoo had sniped from,
raining melted steel in every direction. Hopefully, Shampoo was safe and
getting set up to take her next shot.

Ryouga pushed off the ground, adjusting his heading towards the
Sectopod, and taking the chance to look to his right. There, Ranma and
Ukyou were pushing off another wall, headed towards the same target.
Perhaps it was her alien alloy weapon, or the fact that nothing Ranma
and Ryouga had done came close to damaging the automaton, or the fact
that it had noticed she was slightly slower than either of the two Squad
leaders, but the Sectopod tended to target her if there was any
opportunity.

This time, though, just as Ranma had predicted, the Sectopod kept facing
upward, identifying Shampoo as its biggest (or only) actual threat. Time
for Phase Three. Snagging a fallen I beam along his trajectory, he spun
as he moved, swinging the massive steel girder not at the Sectopod
itself, but at its wiring just above it. Ryouga put all his strength
into the swing, knowing just how important it was to get those razor
wires out of the way. The I-beam hit them straight on, and the force
transferred down the nearly invisible wires and into where they were
gravitically moored with the ceiling and walls of the hangar.

With a squealing crash, two chunks of the ceiling and one piece of the
wall ripped free. Just an instant later, Ukyou came in, and with a yell,
she wedged the flat of her mega spatula under the Sectopod's right foot,
slipping between the base of it and the metal floor. Whatever field held
the foot securely in place, in that instant, switched from the floor to
Ukyou's weapon.

Only then did Ranma land on the top of the Sectopod, his back to the I-
beam. Thankfully, it held against the alien wire which cut into it,
allowing Ranma to act without worrying about being sliced or skewered.
He reached down to the robot with glowing hands, each one cradling a
small ball of ki. One was confidence, and the other depression: Ranma
was using the shishi hokoudan with one hand, the moko takabisha with the
other.

Ryouga hadn't even considered such a thing possible.

Ranma then pushed his hands together and forced them both to a point
just above the 'brain' of the Sectopod. The two energies began to mix
and annihilate in a spray of sparks, sending crackles of dissonant
mental energy in every direction. The Sectopod was not a robot, after
all, it was an empty shell controlled by the aliens from afar. And the
means used to control the robot: psionics. This was why, when a
Cyberdisk or Sectopod was sighted, the first thing a trooper was
supposed to do was alert Command and identify it for a follow up psionic
attack.

Ranma was doing the next best thing: he was disrupting the mental
connection between the Sectopod and the alien controlling it. And it
seemed to be working! The Sectopod froze in position, showing no sign of
the usually active back and forth sway of target searching and
acquisition. At that moment, Ryu swooped in, ready for Phase Four.
Ryouga only hoped Ranma could keep it up.

"ARGH!" Ranma hissed, face flinching.

"Reformed Style!" Ryu cried, body blurring as he jumped within range of
the paralyzed Sectopod. "Kinshi Kinbakusho!"

The original Yamasenken 'Gold Cord Tight Binding Soar' used normal rope
to tie someone up at super high speed, taking advantage of upper body
strength and centripetal motion. The newer variant of the technique that
Ryu had developed for his Reformed style was more deadly, aiming not to
immobilize the arms, but instead to string up the neck. Even then, for
this opponent, he had to improvise.

Coiling a knot around the Sectopod's right leg, just where the joint
connected it with the main body, he rocketed upwards, jumping more than
fifty feet into the air. Everyone on the intercom could hear Ranma
struggling, and it redoubled their efforts. Ryu hooked the edge of the
open roof of the hangar with one hand, pulled himself up, and quickly
began to secure the coil with a large clip-hook nearby. In only a few
seconds, he was gone, accomplishing the task faster than any of them
could have.

"Ready!" he barked.

Immediately, the crane high above him started to retract the line. Kuno
was at the controls, thankfully getting a basic operational
understanding of them with a little coaching from an old friend back at
SigInt. At full automatic retract, it was only a few seconds before the
cable and the cord went taunt, and the Sectopod found itself being torn
from its position inside the hangar. The right leg lifted without a
hitch, since it was anchoring itself onto Ukyou's mega spatula. The
effect seemed restricted to fighting tension and not sheer stress, as
Ukyou found herself able to "slide" her weapon off the base of the foot
without great difficulty.

"I... can't..." Ranma hissed, aura fading.

The Sectopod's two weapons pods began to swivel, the ends starting to
glow brilliant white. Ryouga let go of the I-beam he had been holding in
place, seeing Ukyou have trouble wedging her weapon under the other
foot. Slamming his hand onto the floor, and triggering an unspoken
breaking point, he tore apart the metal railing around the Sectopod's
left foot, weakening it enough for the might of the cargo crane to
finally tear it free.

Ranma rolled off the side of the alien terror unit as it was dragged
bodily into the air by the coil around its right leg joint. The I-beam,
too, fell away, just before the Sectopod crashed into the open mouth of
the hangar ceiling. With a screech of tortured metal, it was pulled
through the gap. Two final plasma blasts rained down, coring the center
of the Procyon through the ground and down into the final outer layer of
the hull. Twin fountains of water shot up, threatening to flood the
section of the ship.

-----

Finally, walking out from behind cover, the pieces of his previously
hidden weapon now together once more, Mousse licked his lips. Strapped
to his back was a Mechem N.T.W. 20mm Anti Material Rifle, considered by
some to be the most powerful man-portable cannon in the world. But
resting in his arms was his first choice, and his best hope, in taking
out the alien robot: the M-144 ATX, a reuseable recoilless anti-tank
weapon, utilizing special 84mm warheads. This was UNETCO's premier
earth-tech rocket launcher.

The hangar had been a horribly confined space, definitely not suitable
to the use of any sort of rocket ordinance. Plus, it was so small that
even the short ranged HEAT round (much less the SABOT) would have been
unable to arm itself properly. Now, though, with the Sectopod dangling
in the air by its right leg, he was free to cut loose and unload. And at
the moment, Mousse had a 4.0kg warhead capable of penetrating 400mm of
rolled homogeneous steel, and he was just dying to make introductions.

"Say cheese!" He cried, taking aim and launching the pre-loaded armor
defeating missile. As the fin-stabilized warhead tore through the air
towards its helpless target, a vectored backblast and counter-mass in
the rear of the ATX compensated for the gout of fire and force that
erupted out the back end of the weapon. The ATX was designed to be fired
in much more confined spaces than any other weapons system of its type,
and while it could be reloaded with another missile tube, Mousse tossed
it aside.

Even he couldn't hide more than one anti-tank missile under his robes.

-----

Shampoo whistled appreciatively as the suspended Sectopod became
engulfed in a bright light. For a second, she forgot about taking
another shot of her own, instead watching to see if even this alien
monstrosity could survive a HEAT missile up its ass. As the thinning
smoke cleared, however, she saw with growing awe that the Sectopod was
charred, damaged, but still operational. The strange prongs on its back
swiveled in place, alien alloy skin shifting and reforming on command.

Thunk!

Thunk!

"It's still alive!" Shampoo cried, firing her heavy laser again at the
tenacious construct. Sectopod sensors were very vulnerable to lasers,
but that still left the body and the weapons to contend with. She aimed
for the underside, and clearly hit something. A piece of fractured alien
alloy armor fell from the now spinning Sectopod. Fire from down below
matched her own, as 20mm high explosive shells hit the thing at over two
thousand feet per second.

Finally, with a crash, its right leg tore clean off and it fell to the
deck of the ship. For a second, Shampoo let he believe it was finally
done for. Then her sakkijutsu sounded, like a scream in her right ear,
forcing her to dive to the left. A clean hole punched through the cargo
container that had been partly providing cover to her flank. The damn
thing was still alive, still firing, and still trying to kill her!

"A device of such tenacious and frightful construction may yet require
the blade of Tatewaki Kuno!" Kuno exclaimed, the sound of him running
down metal stairs also sounding over his activated comm. link. "Stand
firm, my friends! I come now to your aid!"

Shampoo lifted herself off the ground, only to duck again as a wild
plasma burst shot over her head. She could just imagine India Squad's
chief blockhead running towards the thing, sword in hand, and getting
reduced to so much charred bone. His stupid sword would probably survive
this time, while its master was incinerated.

She banished the thought and instead looked to her side. Nearby, she
could see Mousse drag himself up from the hangar, hauling the nearly
sixty pound Mechem N.T.W along on his back. He quickly found cover, and
whipped the massive weapon out; holding it like a normal soldier would a
sniper rifle.

"It's almost dead!" Mousse yelled encouragingly. "Shampoo! Let's finish
it!"

Carefully standing, getting her aim ready, she got a look at the fallen
Sectopod. It was flailing around on the ground with only one leg, trying
to turn itself so that it could get a clean shot at them. Of the four
prongs on its back, only the forward facing one on the left was still
moving, searching desperately for something to snag with a grapple wire.
But there was nothing but open air in that direction for miles.

Safely outside the crippled terror unit's line of fire, Shampoo and
Mousse circled it, firing again and again. AMR rounds exploded,
destroying anything nearby and shredding steel like cardboard. Heavy
laser beams cut into and blew holes in alien alloys, leaving the air
reeking of ionized ozone. Mousse reloaded, while Shampoo just depressed
the trigger and held her aim steady. With thunderous booms, Mousse
joined her again, until finally a red warning light flashed on the side
of her laser's command display. It was overheating.

She relaxed her finger off the trigger, and a few shots later, Mousse
stopped too.

The crumpled and ruined remains of the Sectopod didn't move.

"Huh!" Mousse lowered his weapon; it was longer than he was tall, and
smoking like a yakuza mobster from having fired so much in so short a
time. "Well, that wasn't so hard, now was it?"

"You weren't being shot at," Shampoo quipped, sighing in relief.

"Oh my god! Ranma!" Ukyou's scream interrupted them, and Shampoo rushed
over and jumped down into the hangar without a second's hesitation.
Inside was a complete mess, and as if to make matters worse, it was
flooding. Ryu and the lost boy seemed to already be working on tearing
down the reinforced door the ship scientists had been hiding behind.

Ranma, though, was holding his face, and Ukyou was hovering next to him,
holding a medikit tightly in her hands. Shampoo ran over, her pace
slowing when she realized she didn't have any idea what the problem was,
or how she could help more than Ukyou already was. Getting closer, she
still couldn't see. But if he was holding his face...

"Ranma?" Shampoo asked, trying to get a better look.

"Shit!" Ranma cursed, tentatively letting his hand move away from the
side of his face, below the three circular optics that were part and
parcel of the stealth suit's HUD. Between his fingers, Shampoo could see
dark skin, too brown to be Ranma's.

"This is Special Lieutenant Saotome," he said, obviously 'talking' to
Command. "I've lost suit containment. Ahh!" he hissed, in obvious pain.
"I don't think I've been exposed to anything, but I can't say for sure."

He quickly took the Medikit from Ukyou, and tucking it under his arm, he
jumped up, heading for the surface. Shampoo was on the verge of
following him, when it occurred to her to just ask Ukyou what the hell
had just happened.

"What...?" she started.

"A... a piece of metal. Melted metal. It fell on his face," the other
girl explained, turned, and made her own jump. Shampoo looked up at
Ukyou's retreating form, water rising to ankle depth, unsure what to say
or do. Ranma had been hurt plenty of times before, but this sounded bad.

Nearby, a handful of men cried as they were dragged out of their refuge.

-----

Just a few hours earlier:

The dirty blue pickup truck slowed to a stop, black tires slicing a
shallow trench in the dusty gravel and packed soil of the road. Its pit
stop was a lonely little repair shop and gas station in the middle of no
where, farmland and wilderness dominating the landscape for miles in
every direction. While it was located off of what passed for a main
road, the small station didn't seem likely to get much traffic, aside
from the locals.

The driver's side door opened first, and a light skinned Chinese man
wearing polished black army boots stepped out. Following his lead, the
other door also opened, and another light skinned man of the same
ethnicity, in appearance just a few years younger, exited the vehicle.
This one's dusty black work boots seemed scuffed and abused from years
of use. Both wore loose dark pants, and plain white shirts, with
matching caps shading their eyes.

"Good to get a bit of a stretch...!" The man from the passenger side of
the truck said, stretching his arms and craning his neck back and forth,
working the kinks out of it.

The only man with the clean boots grunted in agreement, walking towards
the small repair shop. His companion, meanwhile, started to inspect the
small and rather old fashioned petrol pump they'd parked near to.
Entering the un-air-conditioned shop with a chime of bells set up behind
the door, the driver headed immediately past the clerk to the back,
where a small selection of cooled beverages were on sale.

The clerk watched him like a hawk, while an obvious relative of the
store's owner also made sure the pump outside wasn't abused. It was
getting dark, and you never could tell, this far out in the middle of no
where, who would try and rob you. A small portable fan spun leisurely,
its pace matching the slow but steady trickle of time, paired to the
faint tick tock of an old clock.

The stranger placed his purchases on the counter: a six pack of beer,
four coca colas, a pack of cigarettes, a small bag of chips, and a local
paper. The clerk looked over the purchases, doing the math in his head,
and studying the man in front of him. His cap said "Zhong Fireworks." He
definitely didn't look like a sun beaten local hand.

"ID?" the clerk asked, patting the top of the six pack of beer.

The man opposite made a displeased face, but fished out his wallet
without verbal complaint. The driver's license identified him as a "Mr.
Zhong," from Xining. Still, it seemed legitimate enough. Truth be told,
the clerk had been more curious about it than concerned that his
customer was under age or anything like that. He named a price; the man
paid it, and slowly walked out the door.

'Fireworks?' he briefly wondered, noting the pickup truck out front with
several large boxes tied securely to the cargo bed. 'Must be for
Christmas, or the Western New year...'

Double counting the money, he promptly dismissed the whole affair.

The truck drove off, heading south.

-----

Ranma stared at himself in the mirror, fingers gently tracing the scar
that ran down his face from just behind his eye to nearly the curve of
his jaw. It didn't hurt much anymore, thanks to the medikit pain
killers, but the burn was pretty deep and pretty bad. He would heal,
quickly, but it was doubtful that there wouldn't be any residual
scarring. It was an ugly black mark on his face, and he wondered at that
thought what Akane would say when she saw it.

He smiled ruefully; she'd probably yell at him for being careless.

At least he didn't have any sort of infection. The auto-diagnosis
equipment in the kit had given him a clean bill of health, and he had
learned to trust in XCOM's scientific analysis. Washing his face
carefully, not wanting to trigger his girl-curse, Ranma felt silently
grateful for that too. Scars weren't that bad on a guy, but it
definitely wouldn't do any favors for his girl side's looks.

Drying off his face, also very carefully, with some paper towels he left
the washroom to check on things. The ship's flooding had been contained,
so the ship wouldn't sink until they were ready to blow the charges
Mousse had placed inside it. His own ki levels were low, very low, but
recovering. The ship was secure, though no one quite knew what to do
with the infected prisoners in the biolab. They'd probably just have to
shoot them.

Then there was a related issue: Intel had gotten word to them that,
based on info they gleaned from the hijacked computers on board, it was
highly likely that a large quantity of the prepared chemical weapon
developed on the ship had been smuggled off it. Apparently a small scout
or something around its size had landed on the ship, picked up at least
half the developed supply of the weapon, and taken off. UNETCO had
detected the scout during one leg of its flight, on radar, but it was
low to the ground and by the time an Interceptor was in the area it had
disappeared.

"Are you alright, Saotome-taichou?" Konatsu asked, catching up to him as
he walked. The ninja boy, Ranma knew, felt bad having to hold himself
back during the Sectopod fight. But it had been important that, no
matter what, at least one member of the two squads remained out of
danger and ready to complete the mission and destroy the ship. Besides,
Konatsu's skills weren't exactly geared towards fighting indestructible
killbots.

"Fine," Ranma replied, ignoring the slight numbness in his jaw, an after
effect of the pain dopers. He had his helmet off, which meant he was out
of contact with Command at the moment. "Anything new?"

"Hibiki-taichou is pressing Command for an interrogation of the
prisoners here, instead of bringing them back to base. He believes it
may save lives, if an attack is planned within the next twelve hours."

Ranma let out a suffering sigh. Interrogation? This mission was just
getting better and better. But the lost boy had a point. It would take a
while to get the Procyon scientists back to Seiran for a proper brain
picking. They could at least try and get some of the more important info
out of the bastards here, first.

"I can see why," Ranma said, as the two took a flight of stairs down,
heading to the engineering lab where the scientists were currently kept
under separate confinement in their rooms. All but two were present and
accounted for; the bodies of a man and woman had been found in an
emergency alcove shortly after the others had been captured. They had
been killed, obviously, but the find had meant no one had to worry about
two escapees getting off ship. It was a harsh, cold attitude to have
towards the dead, but Ranma just reminded himself of what they had done,
and what they planned to do.

Just because they were dead, killed, didn't make them innocent or
blameless.

"He is talking to Commander Yasuda right now," Konatsu elaborated. "He
believes I may be of some use in the work as well."

"Well, I'm sure you have some ninja-tricks or something, right?" Ranma
asked. "For getting people to spill their guts and stuff?"

"I do," the genius kunoichi admitted. "But... we are part of a United
Nations agency. Would such unsavory methods be allowed? Is not torture
prohibited by...?"

"Konatsu," Ranma interrupted. "This ain't no normal UN outfit, ok? We do
what we gotta do. If the order comes in, you follow it."

"Yes, sir. I just wanted to hear it from you, that's all," Konatsu's
meek tone belied the sort of things Ranma suspected he could do, if
ordered to extract information from an unwilling subject by any means
necessary. Of course, there was also the question of how often (if at
all) Konatsu had done this sort of thing before, back when he'd been an
active member of the tiny ninja community. It wasn't something he was
sure he wanted to know.

Ranma slipped his helmet back on.

"...well, Hibiki. I've considered your request, and given the
information Intel has here, it looks like your concern may be justified.
But I want Aliyev alive. The others, too, if possible. That includes the
Captain."

"And the Mind Probe?" Ryouga asked. Ranma wondered, at that moment, why
they hadn't set up a separate channel for this conversation, if Konatsu
could listen in. Quickly checking, he saw it was a secure channel, just
that Konatsu had been given security access.

"Section Seven may no longer be relevant to this mission, Special
Lieutenant, but a Mind Probe can be very dangerous if used improperly."
Commander Yasuda was clearly a little apprehensive about allowing them
to use it for the interrogation. Ranma wasn't sure he blamed her. He'd
heard stories, after all... though he still hadn't read that damn
manual! Definitely by the next mission. Definitely.

"However, under these circumstances, I will allow it. But if Aliyev is
unable to answer questions when he gets back here because of brain
damage, I will be most displeased. Get to it, gentlemen. Yasuda out."

"Konatsu," Ryouga asked a few seconds after the Commander had left.
"Does Ranma have his helmet on yet?"

"I'm here," Ranma resisted adding a quip to his statement, tempering his
generally playful attitude with the knowledge of what they had to do. "I
heard the last half minute or so."

The lost one got straight to the point. "Ranma. I'd like to have Konatsu
handle the other two researchers while we take care of Aliyev and then
the Captain."

"You're actually going to use the Mind Probe?" Ranma asked, knowing what
it meant. It would still be torture. Probably as bad, if not worse, than
anything Konatsu was capable of.

"Of course," Ryouga's voice didn't display even a sliver of hesitation.
"I'll personally tear the information out of his mind. You took care of
that Sectopod, Ranma. Let me do this, at least."

Ranma contemplated telling Ryouga to let him handle it, but...

"Fine," Ranma acquiesced. His head wasn't totally clear at the moment
anyway, so that was as good an excuse as any to let the lost boy take
the job. The apprehension he felt about mentally raping another human
being for information was a fact he would keep to himself.

"Konatsu," he then said. "Do whatever you have to."

"I see..." the ninja boy replied softly. "How much time do I have?"

"An hour," Ryouga answered curtly.

"I will need a medikit, but I can do them both in the same room."
Konatsu continued. "Please have no one interrupt me."

"Done and done," Ranma promised him, laying a hand on the young
kunoichi's shoulder. "You're a good man, Konatsu."

His team mate only nodded ever so slightly, a silently menacing air to
him.

He and Konatsu soon parted ways, as Ranma switched partners to Ryouga
outside the room they had picked out to interrogate Aliyev in. The other
two men had been taken downstairs, to a small storage room ancillary to
the main engineering workshop. Aliyev, ironically enough, would remain
in his original room. Ryouga had pointed out that a setting like that
was already ideal - the Mind Probe was designed to automatically isolate
and take advantage of emotional imbalances and strong memories.

Barring that, there was always simple, straightforward pain.

Aliyev sat alone in his room, hands tied together in his lap. Seeing the
two soldiers enter the room, their helmets off, he appeared initially
shocked.

"You're children!" he exclaimed, his English more than passable.

Ranma closed the door behind them with an ominous thud.

"Doctor Iosef Aliyev," Ryouga began, pointing to the disk-like Mind
Probe strapped securely around his right arm. "Do you know what this
is?"

The scientist's eyes focused on the device, but he didn't reply.

"This is a Mind Probe. Technology captured from your alien friends. I'm
going to use it to find out the truth." Ryouga's scowl was deep enough
to bear his slightly over-large canines. "I've been on the receiving end
of this sort of thing, Doctor. It isn't pleasant."

"Keh!" The Russian laughed derisively. "Do you think you can intimidate
me, boy?"

"Answer our questions, and you'll be fine." Ranma, without meaning to or
planning on playing the part of 'good cop' none-the-less ended up doing
so.

"You'll tell us what we want either way," Ryouga added, walking closer
to the man.

Aliyev's eyes darted from one squad leader to the next, before he let
out a long, deep sigh and gave up. "Very well, gentlemen. I won't
resist."

"Good," Ranma spoke up, giving Ryouga a look that told him to back off,
if only for the moment. The other fighter did so, leaning against the
wall, waiting for the chance to pounce.

"What were you making here?" Ranma asked, starting simply.

"A bio weapon," Aliyev admitted. "Based on the ebola virus. You must
know I worked for the rodina, the Soviet Union, and that I was part of
their bioweapons program. I made a few tweaks so that it would survive
longer underwater, and..."

"You're lying..." Ryouga hissed.

"And, of course, some modifications so it would change the victim's
physiology. Affecting the renal system, and..."

Ranma turned to Ryouga; he was shaking his head.

"I want the truth, Doctor," Ranma said to the captive scientist. "If the
Mind Probe says you're lying, then it means you are."

"I assure you, young man, I am not lying," Iosef insisted. "If you like,
I can spell out in detail how we mutated the virus sample, and where we
obtained it."

Ranma seemed about to open his mouth and ask again, when he shook his
head sadly and walked back to the door. It was a long couple steps,
drawing the moment out and leaving Aliyev alone in his half of the room
with India Squad's Special Lieutenant.

"See?" Ryouga asked his old rival as he pushed off the wall, before
facing Aliyev. "I knew it would come to this."

He briefly closed his eyes.

"Switching Mind Probe from passive to active... " The lost one opened
his eyes and stared at the Doctor. "Doctor Aliyev. What were you
making?"

"I told you, I..." Iosef gasped, and lost his breath. Briefly biting his
lip, he closed his eyes. Ranma, watching from next to the door, wondered
what he was doing.

"Reciting lyrics? Math equations? Nursery rhymes?" Ryouga asked, looming
closer to the man. "It won't work. What were you making in your lab?"

Aliyev grunted, shaking his head.

"I see... chemical names. I almost have it..." Ryouga paused. "He's
clearing his mind. He knows about the Mind Probe, and he's clearing his
mind."

"I don't know..." Aliyev began, but never finished.

"You know!" Ryouga struck him, a hard backhand to the face that split
the man's upper lip open. Blood hit the wall behind the bed. Ryouga
twitched - his expression turning triumphant.

"They call it Venom. The weapon is... a refined version of Chryssalid
toxin," Ryouga announced, as if experiencing a revelation. "It's
airborne. Even... even a tiny amount entering the lungs is fatal. There
is no antidote. No cure. No way to inoculate a victim. The aliens gave
them eggs, and they used... they infected people with them. Made baby
Chryssalids to harvest the first few grams of the toxin. Six people...
I... I can see their face as he infected them!"

Ranma sneered in disgust.

But Aliyev just smiled, cradling his bloody mouth. "And how many people
have you two killed today, hmmm?"

"Who were they, you bastard?" Ranma asked, stepping angrily towards the
vile researcher and ignoring his question about their own morality.
Aliyev's face straightened; his smile fading.

"Who the hell were they?" Ranma repeated, louder.

Ryouga's eyes narrowed, and through the alien circuitry of the Mind
Probe, his mental energy assailed the scientist's brain. The questions
prompted answers, even unspoken ones, deep within Iosef's consciousness.
The Mind Probe found those newly appearing images and thoughts, zeroed
in on them like a guided missile, and tore them free. He grimaced in
discomfort.

"Just some Filipino trash we picked up," he spat out, a headache growing
in the back of his brain. "They were the most useless sort of person -
the kind who can contribute more to the world in death than in life."

"You...!" Ryouga seemed on the verge of punching the man's head clean
off. Ranma, to his own distaste, found himself restraining his comrade
in arms.

"Command wants him alive," Ranma reminded him.

Ryouga took a deep breath, and nodded slowly.

Aliyev chuckled at the display. "Young people are so emotional now-a-
days..."

"Doctor," Ranma said and turned back to the matter at hand. "We know
you've managed to smuggle some of your Venom off the ship. Where is it?
Who has it?"

The sadistic scientist's face was impassive as he answered, "Dick and
Laura Cheney."

Ryouga roughly pushed Ranma aside, staring the man right in the face.

"Where was it taken?" he repeated. "You know the answer. Where?!"

Aliyev looked away, resisting, clearing his thoughts.

Reaching down to the man's right hand, Ryouga straightened out his index
finger, and in a single move grasped the tip of it and pulled up. The
fingernail popped out with a sick sound that reminded Ranma of Kasumi
tearing pieces out of a head of lettuce. Aliyev screamed, and slammed
the back of his head against the wall.

"China... China... somewhere in China..." Ryouga gasped, and pointed at
one of the bed pillows. "Ranma!"

"Right!" the pigtailed young man quickly grabbed one of the foam cored
pillows and propped it against the back of Aliyev's head, keeping him
from knocking himself unconscious.

"Where are they, Aliyev!?" Ryouga snarled. "Targets? Testing? Where?
Where?!"

Iosef spat into the air, and Ryouga reached for his hand again, this
time seizing his right middle finger. The scientist's breath came in
ragged gasps, but when he spoke, it was more obfuscation.

"Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars!"

With another disgusting snap, Ryouga removed a second fingernail and put
pressure on the exposed flesh.

"Tell me!" he roared.

Aliyev heaved in pain, his words coming out as little more than a
gurgle.

"South!" Ryouga exclaimed. "South? A big city in the south! Something
important! Ships! Lots of ships! S... S... Singapore?"

The Special Lieutenant took an instinctive step away from the alien
sympathizer... no: terrorist. He was a terrorist of the worst order. For
his part, Ranma couldn't believe it either.

"Singapore?" he asked, having trouble wrapping his mind around it.

"The main target is Singapore!" Ryouga shook his head, stunned.
"Millions of people...!"

"Why?" Ranma asked, voice low. Then he whirled on Aliyev, shaking him by
the front of his shirt. "Why?!"

The terrorist slowly composed himself and licked his split lip.

"Names," he replied. "And we'll get them, too. Because if we don't, Hong
Kong, Shanghai, Tokyo, San Francisco... we'll show the great cities of
those who fund you the meaning of fear."

"Names?" Ranma asked, not totally understanding.

"Our names," Ryouga clarified, "And the names of our families. There was
something else, too. Another smaller test target, to make sure they got
the delivery system right."

Ranma was about to demand an answer from Aliyev, but the man just
shrugged.

"I don't know where they plan to test it," he admitted, seeming to tell
the truth for the first time. "Some shit-hole village in the middle of
nowhere, probably. It hardly matters."

"How the hell can you call yourself a human being?" Ranma asked without
thinking, anger and outrage getting the better of him.

"How can you?" Aliyev asked snidely. "The aliens, the Visitors, have
guided humanity for millennia. They're our protectors. Our protectors!
Without them, we wouldn't even be here! We owe them everything, and what
do we do? We take people like you..." he turned his eyes on Ryouga with
a look of pure hate. "And you. And we turn on the creatures that
nurtured us and gave us sentience."

"If God exists..." Aliyev jumped off the bed and walked up to the lost
boy, sneering. "People like you would try to kill him!"

Ranma just grabbed the deranged scientist by his right arm and tossed
him back onto his bed. Ryouga's expression was a dangerous mix of
confusion and anger, as he tried to assemble some sort of response. He
never did; Ranma motioned with his head, and the two backed off towards
the door.

"This is what we were told to find," he reminded India Squad's officer.
"Singapore... and another target in China. Probably rural."

"More than that," Ryouga shifted out of a confrontational mode, a degree
of calm returning as the seriousness of the situation became impossible
to ignore. "There's a stockpile somewhere. They want to be able to
launch separate attacks."

"I don't suppose you got any more names of contacts?"

Ryouga shook his head. "Just the three pseudonyms Konatsu found out
about."

"Ok. You'd better inform Command. We'll let them plan the next move, and
then blow this ship." Ranma looked over his shoulder. "I'll be out in a
second."

Ryouga ran a hand through his hair, tension slowly leaving his body. He
and Ranma exchanged looks of agreement, and a second later he left the
room. The pigtailed one remained, and he watched as Aliyev sucked on his
two fingers, now missing fingernails.

"Doctor Aliyev," he began, slowly, making sure the man heard and
understood him. "No matter what they did for us in the past, there's no
excusing what they're doing in the present. There's no excusing what
you've done, either, Doctor, which is why I want to make sure you know
what's going to happen next. What we did back there was just the tip of
the iceberg. You think this was an interrogation? The real one hasn't
even started yet!"

"We're going to take you to a deep, dark hole in the Earth somewhere,
and when you get there, Doctor..." Ranma scowled, and turned away,
placing his hand on the handle of the door. "May that God you mentioned
have mercy on your soul."

Stepping out and closing the door behind him, Ranma never saw the look
of panic appear on Doctor Iosef Aliyev's face.

-----

When the charges detonated, there was no great explosion; no Hollywood
fireball. There was just a distant rumble, heard by none. In the
darkness of the night, the Procyon shuddered and silently slipped under
the waves, taking over forty lives with it into the deep. In time, the
wreck would be found, and some scraps of knowledge gleaned from the
wreckage.

But not by human hands.

-----

The blue pickup truck slowed to a stop, leaving a trail of flattened
grass in its wake. Inside, one of the two men, the one in the passenger
side, checked a hand held GPS device. Double checking with the map
unfolded on his lap, he turned to the driver.

"We're here," he said, hand patting the map. "Right on target."

The silent driver nodded, and the duo exited the vehicle.

It was still dark, but walking close to the edge of the sheer cliff
they'd driven along, following a dusty road barely wide enough to
support a car, they were treated to a bird's eye view. Below and just in
the distance, set against a backdrop of pristine mountains, pinpricks of
reflected light could be seen, as if from a multitude of small ponds.
Further along the road, but still down in the valley and to the north, a
few scattered lights betrayed the location of a small village.

"Smell that crisp mountain air!" the man with the GPS declared, taking
in a deep, almost exaggerated, breath. "Aaahhh! Nothing like it in the
world!"

The other man didn't reply, but he did take a deep breath of his own.

"Well..." the nature lover prompted, facing his companion. "Shall we?"

"Let's," the other man agreed. Together, they started unloading the back
of their pickup truck. A crowbar helped open the crates marked "Zhong
Fireworks Company" revealing first a metal scaffold, and then a small
number of electronics. One of the men ducked into the back of the truck,
behind the front passenger side seat, and came back with a laptop in one
hand, and a coca cola in the other.

The faint light of a burning cigarette in the silent man's mouth
disappeared under the glow of a lantern and a pair of flash lights. With
practiced ease, they worked, setting up the scaffold, and then removing
the fireworks. The rockets were large - very large, and sophisticated.
The silent man snuffed out his cigarette, flicking it into the middle of
the road, as he worked on putting it all together.

In the last box sat an unmarked metal crate, heavily reinforced.

The more talkative of the two men finally reached down and removed it.
Using a bronze key, he unlocked the top, sliding the two halves apart.
Strapped down securely inside were two canisters, side by side. Each was
a dull grey bearing a single red stripe.

As one discarded coca cola can turned to three, joined by as many beers,
the fireworks scaffold took final form... as did the pair of rockets
mounted on top of it. A small white scrap of cloth flapped in the wind
nearby. It was almost time. Gently, the 'firecrackers' had their cargo
loaded aboard. The grey cases, when twisted, lit up with small yellow
lights.

Finally, the work was done.

Taking a long drag from his cigarette, the silent man, "Mr Zhong,"
checked his wrist watch. It was a nice night, and they'd been able to do
their work undisturbed. The maps and the GPS allowed them to set up in
just the right place, and they'd set the timers just like they'd been
told. Everything was exactly as it should be. Flicking the spent cig out
and over the edge of the cliff, he turned his back to the distant
village. They didn't have to hit it exactly; they only had to get it
close.

"Three, two, one," the other, more talkative, man exclaimed. "Fire!"

The first mini-missile took off with a roar and a squeal, heading north.
The light from its engine was clear enough against the dark sky and
countryside, but after a trip of several seconds, it disappeared.
Swiveling the scaffold slightly, they fired again, this second missile
flying a similar distance before fading into the night.

"Not much of a bang, huh?" The chatty fellow remarked, walking casually
over to the edge. A few loose rocks tumbled down the sheer sides,
splashing into water down below.

The silent man stood nearby, lighting another cig.

"Give it an hour or two," he said, cupping the light of his burning
cancer stick. "Then we'll see some fireworks."

Far below, another Tragedy was brewing in Jyusenkyou.
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