What Might Have Been Chapter Six: ...In for a Pound Disclaimer: This fanfiction is not written with the consent of Pioneer/AIC. I do NOT own the characters, with the exception of Kei. Please do not sue me. Comments, criticism, flames, and death threats may be sent to Platinum_Dragon@usinternet.com. !!WARNING!! This is NOT mainline Tenchi. It is an alternate universe, and the characters at times will be VERY ooc, compared to those in the series. Please remember that the versions in this story line had very different experiences. ***** "How far out from Headquarters are we, Mihoshi?" asked Kiyone, as she stepped onto the bridge. The blonde glanced at her over her shoulder. "Three hours still, but we're in communications range now. You said you wanted to know as soon as we were, right?" she replied. Kiyone nodded as she sat down and punched up her com-panel. Opening a channel, she cleared her throat. "Control, this is patrol ship Yagami, over." After a moment, a communications window opened up, and a young, brightly smiling communications officer appeared. Kiyone inwardly winced; she looked fresh out of Academy. "Yagami, this is Control. I am Shea, how may I assist you?" she asked. Kiyone almost ground her teeth. It wasn't fair. Even a nearly useless job as a communications officer was better than being assigned to the rear end of the universe. Instead, she forced her face to remain straight, and smiled slightly. "I am Detective First Class Kiyone Makibi. I would like you to please transfer my call over to the head of Special Criminal Retrieval," she replied. Shea winced. "I would, Detective, but-" Kiyone cut her off. "If she's in a meeting, tell her that it's urgent, and make sure you pass along my name, please," she said. "But-" she tried again. "Just place the call, please, I promise that I'll take care of the details," said Kiyone, scowling slightly. For a moment, Shea looked like she was about to try again, but then sighed, nodding. "It's on your head," she muttered; when Kiyone raised her eyebrow, she blushed bright red. "I'm sorry Detective Makibi, I... I'm connecting your call right now, have a very good day!" she finished in a rush, before a 'Please Stand By' message replaced her image and soft elevator music began to play. "Cushy little button pusher," muttered Kiyone. Mihoshi looked at her in curiosity. "What do you need with SCR, Kiyone?" she asked in curiosity. Kiyone grinned slightly. "Not Special Criminal Retrieval itself, but its section commander. You remember the teacher from our covert ops training, don't you?" Mihoshi nodded slowly. "She and I got to be friends during that particular bit of training, and we've kept that friendship up since then," she answered. At least, they had until she and Mihoshi had been shipped off to Nowheresville, she mentally added. Abruptly the music cut off, and Kiyone looked back up to the communication window. "Are you that off on station time Kiyone? It's the middle of the night here!" grumbled the red eyed woman that appeared on the screen. Had they been standing side by side, they would have been roughly the same height, though Kiyone was actually a little shorter. She had almost platinum-white hair, and a beautiful, if often too serious face. She was a bit older than Kiyone was, but you couldn't tell by looking at her. Kiyone grinned, wincing inwardly. So that was why Shea had been so reluctant to put the call through - Nagi's temper was rather... startling, at times. "Sorry about that Nagi. My partner and I are on our way back to the station. I have a lot to talk to you about - something you'll find really interesting. But I won't keep you awake telling you over the line - is there a place you and I could get together?" she asked, hoping that she'd understand. To her great relief, Nagi slowly nodded, frowning. "How far out are you?" she asked after a moment. Kiyone glanced at the distance indicator. "About... two hours and forty-five minutes, give or take," she replied. Nagi nodded. "Alright... Why don't you meet me down below an hour after you arrive and get your quarters assigned," she said finally. Kiyone smiled at her, as she nodded. "Thanks Nagi, I'll see you then," she said. Nagi nodded, and then closed the communication window. After making sure that the communications channel was closed on their end, Kiyone breathed a long sigh of relief. "Thank god she understood," she said, before glancing at Mihoshi, who was staring at her in confusion. "What was all that about?" she asked. Kiyone grinned. "Nagi used to be a bounty hunter, and a really good one, too. But, one of her leads turned out to be a trap. She got away, but her ship, which was a cabbit, took too much damage and died not long after. She'd made a couple of friends in High Command, and one of them offered her a special position; she decided to take it. She might be able to help get us into the Subspace Room, where Kain's locking mechanism is," she said. "What's down below?" "It's one of the bars in the civilian section of the station," answered Kiyone. "We used to go there now and then to talk." Slowly, Mihoshi nodded. Kiyone turned her attention back to her control panel, and reopened the channel. "Control, this is Yagami again, requesting temporary quarters and landing permission. We are currently inbound at..." Kei slowly picked herself up from where she'd landed, groaning. She heard somebody throwing up - either Achika or Ayeka, she thought, though she didn't want to dwell on it for too long. She was feeling rather nauseated herself. A hand touched her shoulder; she glanced over to see Tenchi, and gladly accepted his help in standing. Looking around, she saw Nobuyuki helping Achika up, and Sasami standing next to Ayeka, who was scrubbing the back of her hand across her mouth. Ryo-Ohki looked at little woozy, but miyaed at her softly. "Every... everybody here?" croaked Achika. "I think I may have left my stomach back in Aunt Washu's lab," said Tenchi. "It's probably safer there," countered Ayeka, as she unsteadily rose to her feet. Tenchi gave her a sympathetic grin. "That wasn't so bad... if it was supposed to be a blender, that is," said Sasami. They looked about themselves. Not far away Kei could see the house. It was different, smaller - of course. In this time, only Achika and her father lived there. "Come on," said Achika, "we need to move away from here before taking off, and before Dad or my younger self takes a look out the window and sees us all here." Once they'd all shaken off the after effects of being tossed through time, they started moving. Kei followed Tenchi and the others as Achika led them deeper into the woods. "Once we get into the air, will you be able to guide us to that planet?" "Yes; I checked Ryou-oh's data banks for the coordinates before we left; I have then written down," she replied. "It will not take us long to reach it, no more than a day and half, I would think." Achika nodded, as they continued through the forest. After almost an hour, she finally waved them to a stop. "We should be safe to take off from here," she said, before looking at Kei. Tenchi placed a hand on her shoulder. "Are you sure you're ready, Kei?" he asked. She grinned. "Only one way to find out," she told him, before looking at Ryo-Ohki. "Alright, go ahead and show us what you can do," she said. The cabbit jumped down from her shoulder, miyaing, and then gathered herself for a moment. Suddenly, she jumped straight up, soaring into the air. Once she was well above them, she flipped, and then abruptly began to change, at first becoming a crystal and then growing, shooting off great spears of black and gray. They all watched in amazement, until finally the now huge ship stopped growing, having fully formed. Kei was about to applaud, when suddenly she got a queasy feeling in her stomach and the world abruptly began to flicker. Once, twice, and then she was somehow inside a huge, crystalline room, with a dome that offered a clear view of the sky. There were about a dozen diamond-like crystals floating in the air, and a chair with three floating spheres before it. One was larger one and was between two smaller ones. One of the diamonds floated over, and Ryo-Ohki's face appeared on it. "Miya!" Kei grinned, as she walked over to the chair; the diamond floated with her. "Can you bring the others up too?" she asked; a moment later, Tenchi appeared, and then the rest of them, looking about themselves in surprise. "Great. Ok, so how do I get you moving?" she asked. A screen appeared, showing her sitting in the chair with her hands on the two smaller spheres. Kei sat down, and lightly touched the spheres, and Ryo-Ohki burst into motion, flying straight up. "This is so cool," she said, grinning. "You need to set a course for the Deltari system," said Ayeka, as she came over. Kei looked at her a little sheepishly. "Ah... how?" she asked. Ayeka blinked, and then laughed. "I forget, this is your first time, isn't it?" she said, smiling. "Simply say aloud, 'Set course for Deltari,' and Ryo-Ohki will do the rest," she explained. Kei did as she had been told, and abruptly several screens with star maps and charts appeared around them. The ship began to move toward a red marked star system, and next to it appeared a short message: ETA 25:32:27. The numbers began to count down. "A little more than a day, thanks to Ryo-Ohki's speed," said Achika, as she came up beside them. "Once we get there, we can infiltrate the planet itself and keep watch for Ryoko and Ayeka - their younger selves, that is." "While I was checking Ryou-oh's data banks, I pulled the proper security codes," said Ayeka. "With them, we can get onto the planet with no questions asked, and easily take up positions to guard." Achika nodded. "Good," she said. Ayeka smiled slightly, and then turned to Tenchi. "Well then... I believe Washu was expecting me to show you how to activate Tenchi-ken..." Kiyone opened the door to the quarters that she and Mihoshi had been given, and stepped inside. Dropping her bags, she reached out and hit the light switch - and blinked in surprise as Nagi glanced up at her from a datapad. "How did you know where we'd be roomed?" she asked, as Mihoshi stepped in behind her. Nagi smirked dryly. "I'm head of Special Criminal Recovery, you don't think I have ways of finding things out? Barring that, you don't think I don't still have a few tricks up my sleeve from my... earlier career? I had the feeling that you wanted to talk sooner than later," she said. Kiyone nodded, and then looked at Mihoshi. "Why don't you get our stuff unpacked, while I talk with Nagi, ok?" she suggested. Mihoshi grinned, and nodded. "Sure Kiyone!" she said cheerfully, as she grabbed Kiyone's duffel. Kiyone smiled slightly, and then walked over to Nagi, pulling the black box out of her pocket. "I need to attach this to Kain's locking mechanism within four days, or he'll escape," she said simply. Nagi studied her for a moment, with one eyebrow raised, and then smirked again. "This should be an interesting story. I take it that you don't want to run this through Control?" she said, finally. Kiyone nodded in relief. "They'd pick this apart, and I doubt that they could put it back together again. For that matter, it would take a week just to cut through the red tape to see them," said Kiyone. Nagi nodded briefly. "Alright, I'll help, but first I want to know how you came to get that, and how you found out about Kain's impending escape," she said, gesturing to a chair, and taking one for herself. Kiyone smiled, and nodded. "It started when Mihoshi suggested we go to Earth for leave - don't give me that look, I know it's off limits. I'd like to see you refuse her when she's made up her mind," she said dryly. "When we landed, we were met by Dr. Washu." "You mean the mad scientist that was exiled in a prison crystal seven hundred years ago?" asked Nagi, surprise showing on her expression. Kiyone nodded gravely. "The same. She led us to a house, and asked us to wait there. Not long after, Princess Ayeka and Sasami arrived as well." Nagi gave her a startled, somewhat disbelieving look, but Kiyone didn't give her the chance to ask the obvious question. "Not long after that, the family that owns the house arrived, and that's when things started getting strange. They told us... what would have been an unbelievable, if not for the entire situation already being unbelievable. The gist of it was that, in an alternate timeline, Kain did escape, and went back in time. He killed a little girl. Here's the catch - that little girl's older self was also in the past, trying to stop him, and so when her younger self was killed, she didn't die - she was outside the timeline." Nagi nodded. "Let me guess," she said. "When she returned to her time, she created a paradox." Kiyone nodded again. "Right. It created this timeline, but the distortion is too great. It's ripping a hole in reality. The others went back to prevent her death, but the Kain in this timeline still has to be stopped - that's what Mihoshi and I are here to do. Washu said that she'd made this after studying the data from his escape in the other timeline, and that this would be able to stop him - if it's hooked up to his lock," she finished. Nagi frowned a moment, and then sighed, leaning back in her chair. "If I didn't know you, Kiyone, I'd say that you've cracked under the strain. Then again, I do know you, and I'm still tempted to say that. Problem is, nobody crazy could come up with a story as coherent as that." She paused, frowning thoughtfully. "Four days?" she asked. Kiyone nodded. "Hmm... Alright, you'll have to give me a day or two to do some leg work and scramble the message logs a little. Stay low; I'll leave a message for you saying where to meet." She stood, walking over to the door, and then paused. "Oh, and Kiyone? You might want to think about what else you'd like to do with your life, because if we get caught, Control won't be happy." Nagi slipped out of Kiyone and Mihoshi's quarters, making sure that nobody saw her as she did. It'd been nearly ten years since she'd lost Ken-Ohki, and left the life of bounty hunting. The problem was, as much of a part of her as it was, hunting just hadn't held any challenges for her anymore. Still, she'd never lost most of her habits. She'd been a hunter for too long... it was a part of her. When an old friend of hers had offered her a job as head of the Special Criminal Retrieval section, she'd just decided to take it. It allowed her much of the same freedom for a steady paycheck, and she had the power to go out after a criminal herself anytime she got the urge. But more and more of late, she was starting to miss that life. The thrill of walking a razor's edge between life and death while squaring off against an interstellar criminal, of picking up the traces and tracking them down... She sighed softly, surprising herself. "Probably too damn old to do that now," she muttered. Old... she wasn't even forty! Maybe that was why she'd jumped on this so quickly. Because, as she'd told Kiyone, it was crazy. But it was also different. It was outside of what had become an almost painful rut for her. She scowled. "Great, now I'm having a bloody mid-life crisis," she growled. "Penny for your thoughts, Commander?" Nagi winced inwardly, as the newest transfer to her department fell in beside her. He was nearly as tall as she was - mentally, she tsked vexedly. His genes had been tailored to the optimal height and weight for an officer. Tall enough to reach most anything, and small enough to fit perfectly into all forms of gear. Of course, that wasn't all; he was stronger, faster, and more intelligent than any officer that wasn't grown from a test-tube. And last of the improvements was his cybernetic arm. It could directly interface with practically any computer, perform minor site-to-site teleportation, and fire hollow-point projectile bullets. She hadn't believed it, when she'd been briefed about that - actual bullets, rather than energy blasts, but she'd seen him on the practice range. The techs had said it was something about being easier to work in a projectile system than an energy blaster due to the power requirements. His 'official' name was Operative A, but most people called him by the name his developers had given him - Trakal. The officer of the future, and she absolutely loathed him. She hadn't had any training, unlike other Galaxy Police officers, but then, she'd hardly needed any. But she did know one thing that made Trakal completely dangerous to entrust such power to. He'd been grown in a lab, and not in a family. He didn't have the human qualities that might prevent him from killing an innocent just because they did the wrong thing at the wrong time. He'd been programmed, not raised. Of course, she couldn't tell him that or let it show; he'd been assigned to her both as an officer under her command and to learn some of that human judgement. She highly doubted that the later was possible. "Ruminating on my career," she replied, not-quite-curtly. He gave her a sideways glance; a calculating, too cool, almost nauseatingly flat glance. It was the kind of glance that, had she still been a bounty hunter, she would have shot first, shot later, and then shot some more for, and questions be damned. She knew that she could order him to go away and he would. He couldn't do anything else - he'd been programmed to be the perfect officer. Always obeying orders, always following the rules, and always, ALWAYS going unbendingly by the book. Abruptly, she felt her throat dry. If he caught wind of what Kiyone, Mihoshi, and she were planning... She kept her face carefully composed, answering his questions in the same, not-quite-curt tone. Suddenly though, something that he said caught her attention. "What was that?" she asked. He gave her that... inhumanly flat glance again. "I said, it seems that Princess Ayeka and Princess Sasami of Jurai have gone missing. The report came through a couple hours ago on the Jurai-Net. They found Sasami's ship, set to stand-by, drifting out near the Sol system. I've also been hearing rumors that the Science Academy picked up a temporal anomaly in that area not long ago," he said. Nagi let an eyebrow rise, as she tried to think of a way to steer the conversation away from that area, and berated herself for underestimating him once again. She wouldn't have thought that he'd pay attention to rumors and be able to connect them to something substantial. But of course - he'd been programmed to be the perfect detective, too. "The Science Academy?" she finally said dryly. "The last time I checked, if you handed them a box, they'd come up with nine reasons it was real, ten that it wasn't, and three that it wasn't actually a box. At the moment, they're probably trying to decide if their scanners were properly aligned." She smirked slightly. "By the time they figure up from down, Ayeka and Sasami will probably have returned, and told everybody that they were just on vacation. In any case, it's hardly our concern. Jurai military will be doing the search." He frowned slightly, but nodded after a moment. "As you say, Commander," he said. Nagi debated giving him another little push away from his earlier train of thought, but decided against it. A push might topple him, but it might also start him asking questions, and she couldn't afford that. "Anything else to report?" she asked mildly, before shoving his drone into a corner of her mind to process later. It was a trick she'd picked up while bounty hunting to use once she... convinced a suspect to talk. Instead, she focused on how she was going to smuggle herself, Kiyone and Mihoshi into the very core of the station. Preferably without anybody finding out, especially Trakal, also known as Operative- bloody-A! The entity paused in its travel, as, quite abruptly, it felt its targets - two of them, anyway - from somewhere behind it. But that couldn't be - it sensed them directly ahead, and had for quite some time. Straining, it could still feel only one of its third target, but the doubles confused it. He had not said anything about doubles, only set it to the trail of the three. "Go," He had said, "go and destroy these three, and let nothing stop you." It would, of course; it had been created only to kill those three; the one with the gold eyes, the one with the crimson eyes, and the one with the green eyes... That was its existence, and once it succeeded, it would return to nothing. But now it was confused, because it could feel its pray both ahead of and behind it. After a time, it sensed that the ones behind it were coming closer. It wasn't very intelligent - truth be told, it was barely smart enough to complete its mission, and it knew that - but, after thinking hard on that - they were coming closer - it decided they must be going to join the ones ahead of it. Yes, they must be going to join themselves, and then it could kill all four of them at once. Then, He would be happy, and it could fade away. Casting about, it found an asteroid, and melded with it, to wait until they passed. Then it would follow, and then it would kill. Yes. It would wait, and then it would kill. Then Kain would be happy. Tenchi found himself once again in that impossibly long corridor, with its mirror-polished marble floor, and the blood-stained walls. Only, this time, he sensed... something. A presence. It was almost tangible, but at the same time, it was wholly out of reach. There was... a wrongness to it, something that shouldn't be. It... pulsed. That was it, he realized suddenly. The entire corridor was pulsing in time with that wrongness. It was barely perceptible, but now that he'd noticed it, he was surprised he hadn't seen it before. Slowly, Tenchi began to walk down the corridor. He could only assume that it was the same as before, except for that wrongness that he could almost taste. Unbidden, his mind began to dwell on it. It was... vile, like meat left out in the sun for too long. That was the smell his mind put to it, but it was more than just that, it was... He paused, as his mind supplied the words. It was death, decay... It was the smell that pain would have, if it had a scent. It was suffering itself. Pain, suffering, and terror all rolled into one. He had a sudden urge to empty his stomach; the wrongness was getting stronger. Closer. Panicking suddenly, he ran. Where was the doorway, he should have - there! Twisting the knob quickly, he slipped through, and then let himself drop in relief, that wrongness cut off as he slammed the door shut. He gasped for breath. "Jumping at shadows," he grumbled after a moment, abruptly feeling like a fool. Gathering himself, he stood. The room was the same as before; made of crystal, with the statue of Ryoko in the center. Idly he wondered which mind had made it up, his, or his double's. Frowning for a moment, he looked at the statue. "Where is he, anyway?" Almost before the words were out his mouth, his ghost appeared. He seemed... thinner than before, even more misty. "You look like you've seen a ghost," he said, grinning dryly. Tenchi frowned, and wondered if his double knew just what he looked like to him. "There was something... wrong out there," he said, and his ghost sobered. "Something that reminded you of pain, of suffering? You're probably sensing Kain, or his miasma. He's got that sort of an effect on a person," he said. Tenchi nodded, if a little doubtfully. "Anyway, I have a message." "Who from?" he asked. His ghost frowned slightly. "Ryoko. She came a little out of her fever, and muttered over and over, 'Black flower," he said, before frowning again. "We're not sure what it means either, but Ayeka pointed out that her and Ryoko's first meeting-" "Was in a flower field!" said Tenchi, understanding. His ghost nodded. "There's something else. When Washu sent us back to stop Kain the first time, she sent along some special chips that replaced mom, dad, and grandpa's memories of the time that we were there with a 'normal' memory. After Ryoko came out and muttered that, Washu played a hunch and scanned her for signs of the same. They turned up positive. She can't reconstruct the original memory, but it's something to think about," he told him. Tenchi nodded again. "Aunt sent some along with us, to use on Ayeka and Ryoko after we finish," he confirmed. His ghost nodded. "I'll pass that along," he told him. Tenchi nodded, and then paused. "Can I ask you something?" His ghost shrugged. "I can't promise I'll be able to answer, but go ahead," he said. Tenchi frowned, nodding. "How do you do it? Live in... for lack of a better expression, exciting times?" he asked. For a wonder, his ghost laughed. "'May you live in exciting times!'" he quoted. "To tell you the honest truth, I don't know. Like I said on the message, when Kiyone first arrived, she asked how we'd all ended up together. Mihoshi said, 'Well, all I can say is that things just kinda developed this way.' It's pretty true. Things just develop, and all that I can do is hang on and hope that I don't slip." "That about covers what I'm doing now," sighed Tenchi. "Holding on with my fingernails. Do you draw?" he asked abruptly. His double blinked. "Not very often. Every once in awhile I'll try my hand, but I'm not really very good," he said. Tenchi grinned just slightly. "You might be surprised," he said dryly. "Right now, I feel like I've been given a half-done image and been asked to finish it through somebody else's hands and eyes," he said, frowning down at his own hands. His ghost nodded slightly. "I think that I understand," he said, and then nodded toward the statue. "Ryoko tried to teach me something once, but it took me awhile to understand it was a lesson. You see, Washu built a machine that let you build your own perfect world. The girls accidentally overloaded it and we started shifting through the worlds that they'd programmed." He grinned. "In one, we took the places of the characters in the Demon of Rashomon; in another, we all went to high school together." His ghost paused, his eyes seeming far off. "Ryoko's world was... sort of like Bonnie and Clyde, except that she and I were the gangsters, and we never got caught. We robbed from one side of the US to the other. That was Ryoko's idea - I didn't have much choice but to go along. But in between the robberies, while we were out on the road, driving... It's kind of humbling to admit it, but before then I'd never really seen her.. I'm not sure how to describe it. Her... real self. Not just her wildness -Ryoko, instead of The Space Pirate, so to speak." He shook his head. "Maybe it was just that before then, with all the other girls around, she was afraid to let it come out, or maybe I just didn't want to see it before then. But I think I started to realize that she wasn't there just because she wanted to make my life difficult. Anyway, we finally did get back home, to the real world... At the cost of Ryoko giving up hers." He shook his head ruefully. "When Washu appeared, she explained that, while she had been able to delete the rest of the worlds manually, since Ryoko had been the first to use the machine, she had to renounce it before Washu could delete it. I was actually surprised when Ryoko didn't want to leave, but not for the right reason. I thought - then - that she was just being selfish, and... I hurt her quite a bit when I said as much. It never even occurred to me that she wanted to stay because she believed I was enjoying it as much as she was. She caught me completely off guard when she asked me if I wasn't having fun too. I couldn't answer her... because the answer frightened me a little. I had been, and it had been seeing Ryoko, instead of The Space Pirate that I'd been enjoying." He paused, and shook his head again. "She disappeared when I didn't answer, shouting that she'd never renounce her world. She was gone for hours... I honestly was surprised when she came back, and again, it was for the wrong reason. She just appeared, and said, 'Let's go.' It took me a moment to understand she meant home, instead of going on." Slowly, his ghost moved over to the statue, looking at it sadly. "Ryoko never did tell me what happened while she was gone, or what changed her mind. But she did promise that one day, she'd take me on a real journey. That was when we really started getting closer." Frowning, he looked back at Tenchi. "I said she tried to teach me a lesson, but she wound up teaching me two over that journey. The first was to find some way to enjoy what ever comes. The second was the more important. Sometimes, somebody you thought you understood, you didn't understand at all." He looked up at the statue again, and abruptly his voice hardened; Tenchi blinked in surprise. It was strange, to hear his own voice like that. It sounded... wrong. "She's been there every single time I needed her, but I've let her down time and time again," he said bitterly. "I always manage to worry about her last, but she still keeps coming back; she never gives up on me. This time, I won't let her down."