Corinthian TCS.PRODUCTIONS.LTD Presents A Virtual Experience of Finite Proportions The First in a Series of Short Stories Based on the MegaHits "Otaku Rising" and "Otaku Rising II: Hentai Heroes": OTAKU RISING 2.1: "DECISIONS" Written by J. Daedalus Govoni CAST ==== (Of Many!) J. Daedalus Govoni.........................Corinthian Carley Paynting..................................Kali Thomas L. Carney.................................Wolf Mike Stewart...................................Marius Nicholas McNab...............................Zebediah S.A.M.I.A.M.......................................Sam Maxim-3...........................Jess/Jessie/Jessica Annapuna....................................Anna Puma Unipuma......................................Una Puma Sean Dunstan..................................Crowley and John Patrick O'Hanley as the Silver Falcon Visuals by BlindedMeWithScience I.G. Cybernetic parts "borrowed" from the Kirk Applied Sciences Building From a kinda original screenplay by J. Daedalus Govoni Role Models for Mr. Corinthian provided by Yakko, Wakko, and Dot Warner Original Score by Mercury Falling Tape Collections Costuming by Champion Sporting Goods and Autopalace. "Pururan" And The Patented BreastJiggle(tm) Brought to You From The Lovely Folks at GAINAX Productions, The Same Folks Who Gave Us "Gunbustier"! Caffeine provided by JOLT Cola, The Jolt Company, Inc. Does Anyone Actually Read These Credits? (If You Do, Drop Me a Note. -Cor) SEGA! "OTAKU RISING", the Original Story, and all subsequent sequels and related stories available by anonymous FTP to WPI.WPI.EDU, cd anime courtesy of Megazone@wpi.wpi.edu Typed on a WYSE85 with OneEyeClosed and TheOtherFoggedOver Spelling Checked by the Fantabulous DIGICOMSpellGuesser! Published by URIACC.URI.EDU Bitnet With Nothing Even CLOSE to Permission (c) 1993 by TCS.PRODUCTIONS.LTD All Rights Wronged, All Lefts Righted, All Pigs Fed and Ready to Fly, All Guilt Catagorically Denied. DISCLAIMER: All the events and persons portrayed herein are purely fictional, despite what THEY might try to tell you. :) Corinthian: Christ, you know what I usually say here... go back and reread the boxes from OR1 and OR2 if you forget. Basically, I write FanFiction because it's fun. Those to whom I owe gratitude know who they are... with the addition of John Greenwald (Mr. Mutant), our most loyal fan. And now, the story: Decisions_____________________________________________________________ "Man is only man at the surface. Remove his skin, dissect, and you immediately come to machinery." , -Paul Valery "Once in a while, you can get shown the light, In the strangest of places, if you look at it right." -Unknown ORBITAL BATTLE AND INFORMATION COMMAND PLATFORM _TALAMASCA_ <<> "You have to tell him, Sam," Kali said. The two women had been dis- cussing the subject for just over a week on and off between Kali's ses- sions. "I can't..." Sam said softly, dropping her eyes. Despite the fact that most of her "body" was located over 22,300 miles straight down and she was currently a fully interactive holographic representation of a very powerful computer mainframe, Kali thought of her as a real person. With very real feelings and emotions. Kali knew this was hard for her to discuss. "He'll find out eventually," Kali rationalized, "it's not like you can really keep a secret from him. You're practically a _part_ of him." "You're right, of course," Sam said, thrusting out her jaw and shaking her white-blonde, shoulder-length hair. "Um... would you come with me, Carley?" "Of course I will," Kali said, a tone of affection and understanding in her voice. "We women have to stick together." She moved to Sam and gave her a reassuring hug. "When is he due back?" "He's still in the Pacific with John...er...Silver Falcon," Sam an- swered. "I don't really know when he'll be here." "Well, we'll just have to tough it out until then," Kali decided. "In the meantime try and be your usual self. I mean, telling someone you love them is never easy." THE EAST CHINA SEA, 130 MILES SOUTHWEST OF KAGOSHIMA <<> The sun beat down on the deep, blue water, it's irridescence cascading off of the calmly rippled surface like countless reflective prisms. Sit- ting on the surface of the ocean like a huge insect was what could only very liberally be called a ship. Designed and built for large, under- water salvage operations, it was the cutting edge in recovery vehicles. from stem to stern she measured just over five hundred meters, and just over half that across. Surprisingly, the odd vessel only displaced just under 120,000 tons, due primarily to the enormous opening in the center of the ship. From the air, the whole rig looked like a huge, oblong donut that had sprouted several dozen spikes that pointed upwards at odd angles. The many cranes and their supporting booms were busily moving about, raising and lowering various items into and out of the water. Corinthian stood silently, looking for all the world like a salvage man: faded "Auto Body Express, El Paso, Texas" denim workshirt with the sleeves rolled up over muscled arms, jeans bleached white by the salty air and the water, gouged and scarred steeltoe workboots. His auburn hair stirred slightly in the ocean air as he peered downwards into the briny depths of the largest ocean on Earth. "Anything new I should know about?" asked a voice from behind him. Cor didn't turn, he'd sensed the man's approach. After a moment more Cor straightened up to his full six-foot-five-inches and turned to face his partner for this expedition, John Patrick O'Hanley. O'Hanley waited for Cor's evaluation, his face reflected in Cor's mirrored, subdermal eye lenses. That had always freaked him out a little, O'Hanley admitted to himself. It looked as if he was wearing sunglasses without frames stuck to his face. He knew, however, that much more than solar protection lay inside these particular lenses. "No change," Cor said after a moment, looking at the slightly shorter man in front of him. "Still, that port-side forward engine compartment may cause a problem." When the monsterous battleship had been sunk on April 7th, 1945, by between nine and sixteen torpedoes and six bombs, her port-side forward engine room had exploded, sending tons of steel out in- to the sea and allowing her formidable bulkheads to be breached, sending her to the bottom. Fortunately, most of the hull was still together af- ter forty-three years. "The next bird's due overhead in about twelve minutes," O'Hanley in- formed him. They both knew that several governments were watching very carefully the planned salvage. Being this close to Japan and Okinawa was a risk they had to take to complete the job. So far the two of them had maintained very tight security on the whole expedition, but that would change in just under half an hour. "Let 'em look," Cor grunted. "It's not like they'll actually manage to learn anything useful." He moved his gaze across the vast expanse of deck behind them towards the bridge superstructure. Her registration proclaimed her to be the _Tecumsah_ out of Panama, with a crew of forty- eight. In fact, no shipyard had ever christened her or laid her keel, and the "crewmen" busily moving about her vast array of heavy salvage equipment were remote drones run by a series of holographic projectors arrayed about the deck that cast images over robotic constructs. Sam was multitasking them via a powerful STA located aft via one of the twelve slave satillites from TALAMASCA. Virtually all of the equipment, most of the superstructure and both of the two small submersibles on either side of the large opening in the center of the hull were mock-ups. Cor looked down into the water again. His HUD shifted through various magnifications and EM spectrums. His E.R.I.S. revealed most of the ship's hidden secrets to him. The actual human suffering of the 2,498 crewmembers lost on her when she was sunk remained sealed under millions of tons of water. But not for long. For a brief moment he was struck with a deep sense of loneliness, thoughts of Frosty lingering in the back of his mind. "Bird's clear," O'Hanley said, breaking Cor's mood. By "bird" he was refering to one of many recon satillites that had been shifted to witness their operation by various peoples. Cor looked back at him again, taking him in: six two...blue-grey eyes, light...sandy-brown hair...very well developed muscle tone...and an active metagene. O'Hanley was publicly known as the Silver Falcon amongst the tights-wearing-set. Having an ac- tual "superhero" as a partner was interesting. O'Hanley tended to be both altruistic and pessimistic at the same time. Cor knew from experi- ence that he had it in him to get the job done. "Good," Cor replied simply. "Terminate Program: Mindgame." As he spoke, large sections of the deck slid back and the various cranes and derricks either withdrew or vanished entirely. The crewmen lined up and marched into a door on the lower portion of the bridge superstructure. It was like watching dazed men being led to a gas chamber. Once inside, the individual holograms were shut off and the automatons shut down. Cor and SF followed them and entered another door. Climbing three flights of stairs, they exited onto the bridge of the huge vessel. Cor looked out over the now completely bare deck. SF checked helm and nav control against the data that Cor had provided. The big battleship was directly below them. "Ready?" Cor asked him as he stepped over to the controls. "Ready as we'll ever be, I guess," SF replied. "Then let's give our friends in the trawler a show," Cor said, refer- ing to an unmarked ship ten miles away on the starbord side. It had been slowly circling for the last nine hours, pretending to fish. Cor pressed a series of buttons below a row of blinkies and part of the control panel halved and slid away, revealing a few dozen controls and monitors that no port authority had ever dreamed of seeing on a seagoing vessel. Cor de- pressed several buttons and waited. THE BRIDGE OF THE "TRAWLER" _KIMBERLY_ANNE_ "Sir!" exclaimed a frantic-looking observer as he burst in. The man he addressed, the "captain" of the vessel, turned to face him. "What is it now?" asked "John W. Smith", United States Central Intel- ligence Agency, mission commander and underwater salvage specialist. "Um... the _Tecumsah_ appears to be sinking, sir," the nervous young man said after a moments thought. "What do you mean 'appears to be sinking'?" Captain Smith asked. "Is she taking on water? Is she listing? Explain!" "She's not listing... just... sinking," the man replied. "It's almost as if she's purposely taking on ballast...or maybe hoisting something heavy? Also, half her superstructure just vanished." "Impossible," Smith retorted. "There's no way they could have gotten the _Yamato_ free of the sea bottom and prepped for raising in just two days! What are those bastards up to over there ...wait a second. Did you just say 'vanished'?" As he spoke he took a pair of high powered bi- noculars from a table-top and headed outside onto the catwalk around the wheelhouse. Focusing his eyes on the huge vessel on the horizon, he raised the glasses. His mouth dropped open. He closed it. It dropped open again. "I can't believe what I'm seeing," he said. "She's slipping under right in front of us!" It was true. The _Tecumsah_ was almost to her railings under water. After a few minutes more, the warm waters of the Pacific closed over her huge deck, the bridge housing remaining above for a few minutes more until the entire vessel vanished beneath the waves. "Dammit, get that fucking satillite link up _now_!" Smith bellowed in- to the bridge. "Washington'll _shit_ when they hear this one!" THE BRIDGE OF THE DSSV _TECUMSAH_ <<> "Cor, that was priceless!" SF said between fits of laughter. "I could swear I heard that bogus captain's jaw hit the deck when we 'sank'!" "You should have heard him cussing at the crew two hours ago when I gave him the middle finger," Cor giggled. As they spoke, a triad of ex- tremely powerful lasers bathed the sea bottom below, relaying depth and location information accurate to within millimeters to the DSSV's onboard mainframe which made minute adjustments in attitude and trim. Cor and SF were just along for the ride and to check out the scenery. Wolf had done it again. The ship performed perfectly so far, her gravitic drives doing the impossible for a 'standard' salvage ship. After about twenty minutes the huge vessel approached the target area and slowed. Cor double-checked the computer's figures on the exact con- figuration of the wreck site. SF watched the donut-hole in the ship's hull as she halted bare meters above the sea bottom, the remains of the _Yamato_ rising like a spectre of war's long past in the center of the _Tecumsah's_ hull. "Wow," was all SF could manage at first. "I've done some diving in the past, but _this_ is incredible." Cor joined him at the window. It was almost as if you could hear the mighty 18.1-inch main guns of the fallen lady firing upon some unseen enemy fleet. Keel laid November 4th, 1937 at the Kure N. shipyards, launched August 8th, 1940, completed De- cember 16th, 1941. She once the largest battleship to ever roam the high seas, and aside from her sister ship, none had challenged her majesty. Her once proud superstructure lay canted to port and she was buried to the railings in silt as thick as wet cement. After a moment, Cor broke the silence they shared with the fallen lady of war: "All stood together on the deck, For a charnel-dungeon fitter: All fixed on me their stony eyes, That in the Moon did glitter. "The pang, the curse, with which they died, Had never passed away: I could not draw my eyes from theirs, Nor turn them up to pray. "Coleridge?" SF asked when he had finished. "Ummm hmmm," Cor acknowledged. "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. 1798. Somehow I think it's fitting." Cor pressed a larger button on the controls once their position was confirmed. THE BRIDGE OF THE "TRAWLER" _KIMBERLY_ANNE_ "Captain Smith! I'm reading a large magnetic flux from the target area!" exclaimed a crewman. "What the _hell_ are they doing down there?" Smith asked himself a- loud. THE DSSV _TECUMSAH_ What could best be described as a 'force field' of magnetism appeared in a large ellipsoid inside the opening in the hull of the _Tecumsah_, completely surrounding the _Yamato_ and a good portion of the wreckage strewn about the sea bottom. Most of the fragments that had been scat- tered about had been gathered during the previous day and placed within the area to be affected by the _Tecumsah_, including the four of her twelve Kanpon boilers that had exited her armored hull into the sea. "All light green," Cor said aloud. "70,572 tons, 862 feet 10 inches overall length. Commencing surfacing proceedures. Looks like a cake- walk, John." The huge DSSV rose slowly from the bottom, taking the huge battleship with it. "Um, do you think we should surface right where we submerged?" SF asked curiously. "Our friends on the trawler might question our vessel's unusual abilities and the ease with which we performed this salvage." "True, true," Cor said thoughtfully. As he did so, he looked at one of the metallurgy monitors. All of the _Yamato's_ wreckage was maintain- ing it's original position in the field as the sand and silt sifted away from it. The only exception seemed to be a few odd mineral samples that he could examine later. "Then let's Red-Oktober it for a while," Cor concluded, moving the throttles slowly forward so that they gained headway. He plotted a course that would take them well clear of both the "trawler" and any other ships in the area (there were a few). Cor looked at SF and smiled. The men on the "trawler" would be scratching their heads and searching for the _Tecumsah_ for weeks. _TALAMASCA_ "Show me that spectrographic display again, Lucien," Marius requested from the command chair. Anna stood behind him, slowly rubbing his slumped shoulders. Una was off somewhere doing who-knew-what. "Yes, sir," came the slightly British, disembodied voice. A trans- lucent holographic projections appeared in the air in front of Marius, depicting what appeared to be a large clump of iron ore. In actuality it was a rather large asteroid that was currently orbiting the Sun in the Asteroid Belt. "Polar rotation plus ninety degrees, speed 2," Marius said. The pro- jection obeyed, turning slowly to the left. What looked like bright spots on the image grew and faded with distance inside the representation of the stellar mass. "Hold. Magnification in section two, increase by four hundred percent." The image did so. "Hold. Lucien, can you give me a 2-D color image of that, my perspective?" "Certainly, sir, one moment." Marius stood and stretched his arms up over his head. He turned and stepped over to the "printer". The image ejected and he tore it off. Sitting back down absent-mindedly, he stared at the image for almost a minute before speaking again. "_This_ could be a problem." Una stepped through the irised doorway into the hanger bay of the huge orbiting battle station and looked around. She immediately noticed a set of new vehicles that hadn't been there before. Jessica looked over and waved, calling out to her. "We're over here!" Jessie shouted across the vast expanse of decking seperating them. She and Wolf were fine tuning the onboard systems of an upgraded model of the Kestrel interceptors. The overall hull design was sleeker than the first, and the various receptors and sensor arrays were gone off the nose. "How's it going?" Una called up to the cockpit where Wolf's hair could be seen bobbing around. "Did Marius send you to spy on us?" Wolf deadpanned. "He has absolut- ely _no_ patience, does he?" "Well, he _is_ curious about what you're up to down here," Una admit- ted. "That, and I was bored with looking at rocks." "He's still poking around with the sensors?" Wolf asked. "Ummm hmmm," Una acknowledged. "It's enough to drive a girl crazy!" She playfully tossed her long hair about her shoulders. Jessie gave Wolf an evil look. Wolf did a not-me-I'm-innocent-as-a-lamb in reply, then laughed out loud. "Girls! Girls! Let's not be like that!" "So what should I tell him?" Una asked, crossing her arms under her ample busom. Wolf stared shamelessly. Jess fumed. "Tell him that the new power design DC left us with works like a charm and that I should have thought of it myself," Wolf said. "Also, have him or one of you lovely ladies send down some lunch." Wolf knew perfectly well that the station's organic servitors could perform the requested task in half the time, but he liked watching the Puma sisters move. "Okay, bye!" Una replied, turning and bouncing out of the hanger. "What??" Wolf said innocently as Jess burned holes in Una's back with her eyes. "You know what," she answered. THE BRIDGE OF THE DSSV _TECUMSAH_ "I can't believe how smoothly that went," SF said as the huge salvage ship broke through the waves two hundred miles due east of their point of submersion. Any ships observing them on the surface when they dove would be well outside of detection range now. As the ship settled easily to her waterline despite the added weight of a WWII-era battleship, Cor ad- justed the magnetic force bubble around the center of the ship to make the entire field air tight, then pumped out the water still inside. "That should do it," Cor said with a smile as the once mighty dread- naught hung suspended in the field earily without visible support. The image that came to Cor's mind was that of a fly trapped in amber, para- lized for eternity. This fly, however, would live again. He and SF had been toying with the idea of a floating salvage museum that would travel the world and be sponsered by the United Nations as a sort of goodwill gesture of the member nations. All vessels would be raised wrecks that were previously considered too far gone or too costly to salvage. The very image of warships from enemies of eras past in one fleet together made him smile. And they wouldn't limit it to warships. Cor's subdermal eye lenses glowed a slight pale blue as he pondered his ultimate goal. SF knew that look. Cor had set his sights on the "Crown Jewel" of salvage men everywhere, and the success so far of the _Yamato_ salvage made it all that more attainable. Cor smiled at the mental image of the most famous shipwreck of all times rising once more into the light of day. _Titanic_. FAST-ATTACK NUCLEAR SUBMARINE _USS_DALLAS_ "Captain," the sonar operator said into his comlink. "What is it, Jones-y?" came the reply of his commanding officer. "I'm reading a rather large surface disturbance about two miles north of our current position," Jones replied. "Let's take a look," said Captain Bart Mancuso as he leaned into the tight quarters taken up by the sensitive sonar equipment. Jones let him look at the printouts and screens for himself. "Anything before this?" "No, sir," Jones replied, "it's like it just dropped out of the sky. No sounds of hull-popping before it, no transients, and no surface noise indicating aircraft." "This might be the ghost that NSA just warned us about," Mancuso said, refering to the Growler message of two minutes ago. A large salvage vessel in the East China Sea had just vanished under to nose of observing craft. All hell had broken loose at Pearl. Someone's ass was going to be handed to them. "Keep monitoring it, Jones-y," Mancuso leaned back into the command center of the mast of his boat. "Periscope depth. I want to take a look around." THE LIPPITT COMPLEX, KINGSTON, RI <<> Crowley and Zebediah stood in the Communication's Center of the former headquarters of the Otaku Group and looked around. Crowley looked over the consoles while Zeb moved over to the chair so often occupied by Frosty before _Talamasca_ came online. Now the building was both redund- ent and limiting. "How soon can all of the sensative equipment be removed and the new configuration be instituted, Sam?" Crowley asked. "I have a list of things from the others that they want to take with them," Sam said as her holographic image appeared beside him. Crowley tried not to jump. That had always made him nervous. "Kali already had Lucien 'slide her quarters up and Marius was here a couple of days ago packing." "Good," Crowley said, "what about Wolf and Cor?" "Wolf lives out of a suitcase usually," Sam said with a smile. "Any hardware he needed was out at the hanger, anyway. He instructed me to 'slide up any ordanance and hardware from the UPSTruckFromHELL(tm) that we found. I'm assuming he wants everything." "And Cor?" Crowley prodded. Sam stood silent for a moment or two, which Zeb took note of. "Cor 'slid his personal lab up last week, as well as all of the Demo Room logs and programs. The only thing left is in the other room on this level." She nodded towards the vast computer center located at the other end of the corridor leading to the room they occupied. "Oh, that's right," Zeb said, "that's _you_. Ummmm... Say, why is the mainframe still down here?" "I told Cor that Kali and I would handle it," Sam said curtly as she looked away quickly. "It should be taken care of by tomorrow afternoon at the latest. I've already reconfigured the lower levels to your de- signs." "Wow. That fast?" Crowley said, "I didn't know you had that much control over the physical aspect of the Complex." Zeb smiled knowingly, balancing a pencil on his upraised index finger. DSSV _TECUMSAH_ "I've got a surface contact bearing 189 two nautical miles off our starbord, Cor," SF said, noting the blip on the scopes. "Looks like we've got company," Cor said. "That'll be the _Dallas_, I believe. Engage: Mindgame 2." In the blink of an eye, the surface of the deck re-configuring and changing it's aspects. Large panels slid o- pen and the cranes and derricks reemerged, the holograms accompanying them. The "crew" drones exited the bridge superstructure and moved to the opening in the deck which now housed the _Yamato_. Images of cables and supports holding the ship in place appeared, as well as several small vehicles in the water next to the ancient hull. Several "men" crawled about on _Yamato's_ deck as well. "Just in time," SF said as the program engaged. "They just made eye contact with us through their periscope." "I imagine it was the sound of us surfacing that attracted them," Cor said. "Maybe they'll believe it was something else..." At Cor's command the mighty "engines" of the _Tecumsah_ churned the water around the stern of the ship briefly and were again silent. _USS_DALLAS_ "Captain, same sound as before," Jones said, "slight aspect change, but otherwise identical." "Thanks, Jones-y," Mancuso said as he looked through his periscope at the distant "ship". It was an odd one, that was for sure. But nothing overly unusual about her struck him other than her configuration. Busy crew. His eye was drawn to the grimy, grey shape looming a third of her length forward of the bridge. "I don't believe it..." "Sir?" a nearby officer inquired. "They must have some incredibly efficent equipment on board," Mancuso mused, "and an incredibly wealthy backer." "Captain! She's started her engines again, this time maintaining speed," Jones informed him. "Bearing and speed?" "Heading due east... screws turning for... "Jones trailed off. "Speed?" Mancuso asked again. "I'm unfamiliar with her design, but she seems to be turning screws for close to 25 knots." "Hmmmmm," Mancuso hmmmmm-ed. "Definitely a wealthy backer." DSSV _TECUMSAH_ "She's maintaining course," SF informed Cor. "No movements to inter- cept." "Good... they bought it," Cor said with an evil grin. "Plot course for 'Frisco, Mister O'Hanley. We've got a boat to restore." "Aye aye, Captain Corinthian," SF laughed. _TALAMASCA_ <<> "You're sure about this, Sam?" Kali asked as they set up what looked like a large coffin in one of _Talamasca's_ equivalents of the Demo Room. "Yes, I am," Sam answered from beside her. Her image looked both ex- pectant and forlorn. She really wasn't sure about this, but it seemed like the wisest solution to her current situation. A stark white console rose from the floor directly in front of the pair. Rows of colored but- tons appeared just below the surface, their light cascading around them, giving the whole thing a surreal glow. "I just hope he's not too upset," Sam said. "I know him," Kali said, "he won't be. Trust me." She gave Sam a light kiss on the cheek for luck and stepped back. Sam had wanted it this way. Sam touched a series of lights on the panel of the Howard Foundation 'Tank controls and the coffin shape glowed faintly. The entire room flickered as the lighting changed to compensate for the red-shift. Sam turned towards Kali and flickered, a small tear rolling down her cheek before she vanished. AT THAT EXACT MOMENT, 22,302 MILES STRAIGHT DOWN The huge mainframe computer hulking in one side of the CompCent of the Lippitt Complex changed it's aspect slightly. The large, crystal sphere centered in it flashed a rainbow of colors briefly and then dimmed, it's internal fire almost extinguished. Only routine maintenance programs and climate controls remained within it's huge storage space now... And also a "blank" template for an artificial intelligence program. DSSV _TECUMSAH_ Cor pressed both hands to his temples suddenly and a look of distant pain crossed his face as a slight gasp left his lips. "What is it?" SF asked him as he stepped over to his side. "I'm not sure," Cor said. "It feels like a part of me just vanished out of my head." "What??" SF asked incredulously. "I know you've got a lot of wetware in that skull of yours, but how does part of it 'vanish'?" "That's what I intend to find out," Cor said as he straigtened up slightly and his STELLARIS armor tooled up around him. With a slight sa- lute to SF he said, "Lucien, bodyslide by one," and was gone. _TALAMASCA_ <<> Cor appeared in his private lab and immediately red-shifted, turning wildly around him searching with full-spectrum. Nothing out of the ordi- nary. < Sam, what have you got? > [ ... ] < Sam? > [ ... ] < SAM?!? > Cor shifted back into normal time and headed for the door, keeping his full armor up. This could be bad. As the door opened, Cor came face to face with Anna, almost knocking her down. "Cor!" she exclaimed as she recovered her balance. "Don't scare me like that!" "Sorry, Anna," Cor said. "What's going on? Are we under attack?" "No, I don't think so, why?" Anna replied. "Don't you think we'd let you know if we were?" "Hmmm... maybe it has something to do with her moving the mainframe up here from Lippitt..." Cor thought aloud. "Lucien." "Yes, sir?" came the disembodied voice. "What's the current status of Sam's mainframe?" Cor asked. "I'm not sure, sir. Sam and Kali mentioned working on it earlier." "Maybe they just did a reboot so they could 'slide it," Cor mused a- loud. "Where is Kali now?" "DemoRoom-3, Deck 4, sir," Lucien replied. "Thank you," Cor said, and headed off that way, leaving a puzzled Anna standing alone in the hallway. "Kali," Lucien said softly. "Yes, Lucien?" "You asked to be informed if and when Corinthian arrived on board this facility," Lucien replied. "Damn! He's too soon," Kali cursed. "Try and stall him for two mi- nutes, real time." Both she and the entire room were still red-shifted in the "Long Second" effect. Unknown to Cor, Sam had duplicated the technology from his armor for this purpose. She knew that speed would be an important factor. "What do you mean, 'sealed to non-essential personnel'?" Cor demanded to know of Lucien as he stood outside the door to DemoRoom-3. "Exactly that, sir," came the calm response. "By who's authority?!?" Cor blustered, his eye-lenses glowing a dan- gerous shade of red. "_Answer_me_!" "Why, Sam's, of course," Lucien said simply. "???" The door to DemoRoom-3 irised open and Cor stormed in, casting his powerful gaze about furiously, probing every inch of the room. He opened his mouth to demand an explaination for the extended downtime of Sam's mainframe when he stopped dead in his tracks. Sam and Kali stood looking at him, both with their arms folded across their chests. Cor's expression slowly changed from one of blind fury and confusion to one of awe and genuine surprise. As he hung for what seemed an interminable amount of time, Sam knew that she was being bathed with a spectrum of nonvisible light. She held her breath and waited. Kali watched Cor very carefully, ready to throw up her shields at the slightest hint of an attack. "..." Cor ...-ed as he looked at Sam, taking in every inch of her. At first he couldn't figure out what she was doing here with her mainframe unresponsive to his inquiries, but realization slowly dawned on him. Her image was softer than a hologram and not as sharp, but had a more 'real' feel to it just the same. Infrared showed body temperature of 98.8 with normal spectral distribution. Body mass positive. She was alive. In her mind's eye, Kali saw an image she didn't like, but was all too familiar with: "Sam!" Kali cried out, outstretching her hands. Sam turned away from Cor and tried to run across to her, but was stopped halfway between the two of them. "Oh no you don't," Cor said as he himself raised his hand towards the running figure of Sam. Kali was surprised when she felt a powerful TK force grip Sam and start to pull her back towards Cor. She gritted her teeth and it soon became a tug-of-war between the two of their mental a- bilities. Beads of sweat broke out on Kali's forehead from the strain. Bits of debris started to whirl around the room as if caught in a sudden vortex. The very fabric of the room itself seemed to momentarily waver before the onslaught. "Let her go," Kali begged through gritted teeth, the pain of the ef- fort starting to show. Her abilities had increased greatly over the past few months, but the shock and horror of what was unfolding in front of her, coupled with the surprise attack by Cor, put her under an enor- mous strain. Fatigue started to overcome her and Sam started to creep, minutely at first, then faster, across the room towards the grinning Cor. "For God's sake, Cor, she loves you!" Kali cried in desperation. "'He' had nothing to do with it," Cor replied. "I made her. _I_ am her 'God'." As Cor spoke a rift appeared in his armor from just under his neck to just above his crotch. A strange, whitish liquid started to leak from the rend. Kali screamed as Cor threw back his arms in one last mental tug. As Sam started to hurl across the room towards Cor's outstretched arms, the front of his armor split open vertically, revealing a large, gaping maw filled with jagged teeth. The entire effect made the front of his armor look like an enormous Venus fly trap. A long black tongue snaked out the orifice and wrapped itself around Sam's waist. Sam screamed as the tongue tightened and hauled her towards the huge opening... Reality reaserted itself with an almost audible slap across Kali's left cheek, and she was back in DemoRoom-3 with Sam and Cor. "Sam, why?" Cor whispered. He hesitantly took a single step towards her. "I..." Sam stopped, breaking eye contact with him. She looked down at her shoes, a nice pair of crystal blue leather pumps that were the exact color of both the two piece skirt-suit she wore and that of her eyes. "Can't you see it, Jon?" Kali asked. "Have you really been that blind for all this time?" "What...you...she...really??" Cor asked, dumbfounded. All traces of anger were washed away by the rising flood of emotions he let pour over him. "Jon, I..." Sam looked up at him again, her eyes moist with tears. "I love you." Cor was struck harder than any fist had ever hit him in his entire life. It was as if all the air had been simultaneously been sucked out of his lungs and yet they were about to explode. He was faced with one of the hardest decisions he'd been forced to make, and it had already been made for him by a person of his own "creation". What choice was there but to admit the truth? "I love you too, Sam," Cor said as he stepped towards her with more conviction, his armor seemingly melting away from his body, leaving just him in his workshirt, jeans, and boots. How could he _not_ love her? She had taken an enormous risk for him, and had given up almost every- thing that made her unique for something as ephemeral as love. "I love you," Cor said again as he enfolded her in his arms, pressing her head against his shoulder as all three of them began to weep. How could he not? "Will you hold me sacred? Will you hold me tight? Can you colorize my life? I'm so sick of black and white!" "I Would Do Anything for Love (But I Won't Do That)" -Meatloaf, Bat Out of Hell II END. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- AUTHOR'S NOTE AND SOUNDTRACK LIST: -------- ---- --- ---------- ----- Well. Hopefully that wasn't too confusing (or obvious... I hope). I deci- ded that the partially answered question about Sam and Cor that I left in the ending of OR2: "HENTAI HEROES" should be answered, but it really didn't have a place in OR3. (There's WAY too much other _big_ stuff go- ing on in OR3! <--Shameless plug!!) It was important to me that this chapter in Cor's life stand out a- lone like this, but deciding to actually _write_ it this way was _very_ hard for me. I feel that much of an affinity for the characters. I had to justify it to myself, as well at to you, the reader. Personally, I like the way it worked out. (Though I'll never be _completely_ happy with it. The author is always his harshest critic.) Don't worry, we're not leaving the _Yamato_ hanging. You'll see it again. No , NOT as the _Argo_! That would be too cruel to the fans! Again, I hope you enjoyed this story. J. Daedalus Govoni aka The Corinthian February 2, 1993 Kingston, Rhode Island ------------------------------------------------------------------------- THE SOUNDTRACK (Available on Mercury Falling Records (c)1993) What a Fool I Am Lou Bonnevie Fathoms Below Disney's "Little Mermaid" SDTRK Octopus's Garden The Beatles Changes David Bowie Follow Your Dream (C-ko's Theme) Valerie Stevenson Look Up (The Sky is Falling) Lancer I Would Do Anything for Love Meatloaf "OTAKU RISING 2.1: DECISIONS" (c)1993 by TCS.PRODUCTIONS.LTD ---------- +--------------------+ | | | | | | | | | +------------------------------+ | The Corinthian | +-----------+---, | "Would someone please stop | | J. Daedalus Govoni | | ANVIL!! | _/ | that man from shouting | | Email: | \---------/-' | 'dragon'?" **anvil drop** | | jgov1447 @ | _)_______(___ | *THUD!* "Thank you." | | uriacc.uri.edu | |_____________| | -Yakko Warner | +--------------------+-------------------+------------------------------+ | Official keeper of the Animaniacs MEGA Lyrics File !! | +-----------------------------------------------------------------------+