***This Fanfic is written without the permission of both Pioneer and AIC but 
I'm not
selling it so please do not sue me. Actually what you can do Pioneer and AIC 
is reopen
sales of Tenchi in the UK (you know how much it costs to get the stuff from
America!!!!!!!) PLEASE!!!! ***
Washu's hands flashed over the holo-keyboard as she worked towards her aim: 
to revive the original Soja AI.

Mihoshi sat on the floor, RPG aimed and ready. They were both still smarting 
from earlier, bruising showing now around Washu's neck while Mihoshi still 
had stomach pains and cramps around the ribcage.

"We're nearly there," Washu said out loud as she found herself managing to 
bypass the security of the controlling Soja AI.

Mihoshi just nodded. She was freaked out right now, it's not everyday you 
get voices in your head that sound like someone very familiar. Mihoshi 
sighed as she massaged her lower ribcage, doing the healing movements that 
Washu had showed her.

"Washu"

"Yes?" Washu answered impatiently.

"Do you know where Gary is?" Mihoshi asked expectantly.

Washu paused and looked at a sub-screen "two seconds" she muttered as she 
went back to her work.

"Pardon?" Mihoshi blinked as she looked round at Washu, then back ahead to 
the forward entrance to the main hall.

And there, standing somewhat exhausted and very dirty was Gary. His Black 
ops suit ripped in several places with the fight with Ryoko. Mihoshi didn't 
know what to do. Was he back to his old self? If not then should she fire?

"Stay back!" Mihoshi said, her voice while not filled with fear, had a tone 
of uncertainty on it.

"Stand down Detective it's-" Gary smiled as he took a step forward, and then 
took a step back as Mihoshi clicked the safety off.

Washu turned round, looked at her sub-display again then smiled "Hey Gary" 
she waved before getting beck to work.

"Are you sure it's him?" Mihoshi blinked.

"Sure I'm sure" Washu winked "watch"

Washu turned around again and shouted to Gary "Gary duck!"

Gary blinked and looked around "where?"

Washu giggled and turned back again. Mihoshi though, seeing this was the 
real Gary got up and ignoring the pain and possible resumption of internal 
bleeding by her exaggerated movements sprinted to Gary.

"I'm glad you know it's me!" Gary grinned then 'oofed' as Mihoshi grabbed 
and glommed him as hard as she could.

"Oh Gary, don't worry!" Mihoshi giggled happily, her innocent attitude 
returning to earth once more "I know you didn't mean to hit me!"

"What?" Gary blinked as he gasped for air "you mean you heard me?"

Mihoshi nodded.

"Well I...erm..well" Gary blushed.

"Ahem!" Washu tapped her feet at the pair as they hugged. Gary and Mihoshi 
blinked as they looked at the position they were in.

"Oh!" Mihoshi blushed as she (painfully) stepped away.

"Well, ahh...how have you held up Detective?"

"Not too bad" Mihoshi nodded innocently, helping Gary with the small talk.

Washu sighed, sighed and shrugged as she turned back to her work.

Gary was still blushing a bit as he looked at Mihoshi. She had returned to 
her quite innocent self, blushing herself.

"May I stand down sir" Mihoshi asked.

"Oh of course" nodded Gary.

Mihoshi sighed painfully and sat back down on the floor, rubbing her ribcage 
again.

"Did I?" blinked Gary.

Mihoshi nodded.

Gary sighed, "Did Washu fix it up?"

"I did indeed," Washu said as she tapped away.

"I think you have a couple of questions to answer Washu" Gary said as he sat 
down himself.

"This really isn't the time," Washu mumbled, not turning around.

Gary sighed, slipping his gloves off "Mihoshi if these appear on my hands 
again, bop me on the head please" Gary smiled.

Mihoshi nodded.

There was some silence as the three sat there, Gary looking up at the high 
ceiling, Mihoshi looking down at the floor and Washu tapping away at her 
holo-screen.

"Washu" Mihoshi asked, "What exactly are you doing"

"Resurrecting the original Soja" Washu smiled.

"What?" blinked Gary "you mean the one that actually worked?"

"Yes" Washu said "if I can get it up and running, most essential services of 
the ship should transfer to the original programming, leaving Soja AI 
powerless"

"So Tenchi, Ayeka and Ryoko are just decoys right now?" Mihoshi asked.
Washu nodded as she whistled along to her work.

****

Ayeka gasped out loud as she started to feel the transfer working, she 
tested the new energy inside of her as she pulsed her shield outwards, 
slowly forcing the clone on top of her back up into the air. Her confidence 
grew and grew as the power inside grew with her.

The clone on the other hand was thrown onto the back foot as he tried to 
fight back against the onslaught from the revitalised Princess. He was 
thrown back several meters as Ayeka got up, more and more logs filling the 
air between her and her opponent, the centre of her tiara glowing brighter 
and brighter as her connection with Sasami became stronger and stronger.

Ayeka looked up at the clone, the clone looked back, both not showing any 
emotion.

"Now Ayeka, now" a voice said in her head.

"Got to keep calm" Ayeka said to herself softly.

"Free yourself" the voice continued.

"Got to keep in control"

"Your sister will not be able to keep it up forever go now!"

"Must.."

"Everything!"

Ayeka blinked as she saw the clone form a dark blue halo, a visible shield 
of some sort. She knew what she had to do. Tensing she widened the 
connection as far as she could, sucking in as much energy into her body as 
possible, knowing Tsunami would protect her she pressed on. Her tiara was 
pulsing with light, the energy begging to be unleashed.

She fixed her position and put her hands out to her sides and bent her head 
slightly forwards. Then she felt it starting to escape, this pent up anger 
from a hundred different disappointments and the energy from a hundred 
different stars making this force unstoppable. Gritting her teeth she let 
rip, her Tiara exploding in a blast of ultra light as the stream of purple 
tinted energy blew its way towards the clone.

The clone strengthened his shield at the last minute, throwing all his 
reserves into action at this point, but to no avail. The energy broke 
through the shield easily, striking the clone directly in the head. For a 
moment he stood there as the stream of energy pumped through him like he was 
being force-fed through a pipe in his chest. Then he started to fade away, 
the energy taking every particle of the clone's existence with it. As the 
stream subsided Ayeka breathed a sigh of relief, Tsunami had managed to 
protect her well, as she had no feeling of fatigue.

"Thank you little Sasami" she thought in her head "Tsunami will be proud"

Sasami smiled happily in her sleep as Katsohito dabbed her forehead with a 
wet cloth.

"Sleep well my youngest sister" Katsohito smiled as he stood and looked 
around Sasami and Ayeka's bedroom "your sister will return soon".

****

Tenchi dodged backwards as the clone fought back with vigour, seeing Tenchi 
in trouble, Ryoko flew in, her foot outstretched. It connected perfectly 
with the side of the clone's neck as a dull crack was heard as the upper 
spine broke with the force of the kick. The clone fell to the floor. 
Motionless.

Tenchi wiped his brow as he turned Tenchi-ken off. Ryoko smiled with 
satisfaction as she walked to the clone and looked down, the smiles turning 
to a grin.

She blinked as she head a click from the corpse. It sounded like her own 
re-adjustment and re-generation routines, gasping she began to phase out.

Too late.

The clone struck upwards with a foot, knocking Ryoko back. The clone went in 
hard and fast delivering several quick punches to her face, a hard punch to 
her stomach. A crack was heard as Ryoko felt a plas-steel rib break. The 
clone finished it off with a bolt quick roundhouse kick to her neck.

As Ryoko hit the floor, she phased through it, disappearing from view. 
Tenchi blinked as the clone looked up at him, forming his energy sword. 
Tenchi fumbled for his Tenchi-ken, re-forming it as the clone sprinted 
towards him. Ayeka gasped as she looked round. "Where's Ryoko?" she thought 
as she looked around.

The clone struck, Tenchi blocking the low swing of the clone's sword swung 
it upwards, countering his opponent's first strike. The clone jumped 
backwards as Tenchi flew forward, one of the rare moments in his life where 
he was successfully attacking. Tenchi looked upwards for a fraction and saw 
one of the massive pistons, which pumped Soja with energy and had an idea.

"Of course!" he blinked as he jumped back "Gary did this". He dodged round 
the clone who went back on the offensive. He then jumped onto the side of 
the Piston, looking down he saw blackness as he realised the risk he was 
taking. Slamming the Tenchi-ken into the cold hard metal he felt it burn and 
melt it's way into the piston. Smiling he started to use the Tenchi-ken as a 
climbing tool as the Clone jumped on and gave chase.

Ayeka looked in horror as she saw Tenchi climb up and into the piston 
chamber, the piston was about to fall, slam down into the chamber and 
dissolve the two combatants into nothing.

"Tenchi!" she screamed "don't!"

Tenchi couldn't hear however as he flipped down into the chamber. Gritting 
his teeth he felt his battle armour dissipate the extreme heat that would 
usually burn an unprotected person to a crisp. He looked up as he saw the 
piston come down on him. Looking around, he saw that the clone didn't follow 
him that way. Readying his Tenchi-ken he counted about 15 seconds before he 
could kiss his life goodbye. Then he heard a zip, whirling round he saw the 
clone fly out of a dimension portal, blinking, totally unprepared and 
standing in an unset position he put his Tenchi-ken up in defences.

Suddenly he saw logs appear around him, then a light bluish tint formed 
round as Ayeka started to lift Tenchi out of the piston.

Roaring the Clone increased his speed, desperate to take Tenchi down with 
him. He suddenly saw black with a red stripe. Stopping in his tracks he 
bounced into Ryoko's bust, Ryoko grabbed the clone by the shoulders and 
lifted him up to head height.

"It's rude to be so 'forward' sweetie pie" she winked.

The clone blinked in shock as Ryoko nutted* him right on the nose, breaking 
it instantly, sending synthesised blood everywhere, vaporising in the heat 
as the piston was about to hit home. Ayeka lifted Tenchi out of the piston 
the logs doing their job perfectly.

"Azaka! Kamidaki!" She called sternly.

"Yes Princess" They chimed, as they appeared either side of her.

"Get Lord Tenchi to safe ground and make sure he is okay"

"Yes Ma'am" they responded as they lumbered into the air.

Meanwhile, the clone weakly tried to free himself from Ryoko's grip, she 
just grinned manically as she punched and punched again in red mist, beating 
the clone into a pulp. Then as she saw the piston about to slam into the 
chamber she let go and phased through the piston as it fell down, crushing 
what was left of the clone, slamming the crumpled body again and again, 
preventing any regeneration from taking place.

The logs around Tenchi disappeared as Azaka and Kamidaki took over the care 
of Tenchi who was nothing more than exhausted. The Royal guardians returned 
Tenchi to the ground next to Ayeka.

Ryoko appeared from the floor; covered in the synthesised blood of the 
clone, brushing herself of the blood she looked up and blinked at Tenchi 
"Hey you okay Tenchi?".

Tenchi felt sick as he saw Ryoko covered in what he thought was real blood 
and coughed as he threw up off the edge of the walkway they were standing 
on.

"Oh Tenchi" sighed Ayeka. She turned and smiled at Ryoko who nodded back at 
Ayeka.

"The last clones gone" Ryoko said to Washu through the link.

"No I'm still got signals of one more" shook Washu.

(* Nutt(ing)(ed) = British slang for head butting someone (or being head 
butted) very hard, speciality of people from Glasgow)

"What?" blinked Ryoko "where?"

"Everywhere" Washu said as she worked away.

Ryoko blinked as the synthetic blood dripped off of her hair.

"Oh Ryoko clean yourself up!" said Ayeka in exasperation.

Ryoko nodded and phased out of existence. A minute later she returned, clean 
of blood.

"Where did it all go?" Ayeka asked.

"Oh it all evaporated" shrugged Ryoko.

"Did we get rid of the clones?" Tenchi groaned.

Ryoko shook her head.

"We didn't"

"We forgot about the biggest clone of all" Ryoko said "Soja"

****

Waiserdau was deep in thought as on the massive status display screen in the 
control room of Operation Watchman blinked on with the status of the two 
black op teams that were going to do their best to stay out of the way of 
the mayhem and disable Soja once and for all.

He had looked at the last known plans of Soja that various they had 
'borrowed' from various research institutes and university academies across 
the galaxy.

>From these they had pinpointed the main core room. From one end there seemed 
to be some furious close combat taking place but half a mile on the other 
end was the main core reactors, knock these out (hopefully) Soja should shut 
down for good.

He saw the reaction on his aide's face as he explained the plan to Amnasaki.

"But life-support will shut down, the people on board will die of 
asphyxiation!" he gasped in shock and horror.

"You've failed to add three things to the boil Captain" Amnasaki said.

"What?" the Captain asked.

"The phasing ability of project 1, the untapped power of HCE Tsunami via the 
two Princesses and the able ness of a boy who does not yet know what he can 
do" Waiserdau listed on his fingers with a wry smile.

"Herr Waiserdau, Commander Amnasaki" the Captain said with a grin "how do 
you know all of this?"

"Well y'know" shrugged Waiserdau.

"Well let's just say I read it all up...every night for the last couple of 
years" Amnasaki joked.

Waiserdau grinned; they didn't stop laughing for a long time. He nodded as 
Amnasaki walked out.
"Have they left yet?" Amnasaki asked.

"Just about to enter Dimension Space now sir"

"We can't get this wrong" Amnasaki rubbed his forehead "the last thing I 
need to do is authorise project 2 to clean the mess up"

Waiserdau shook his head "expelling all we have within a day, is not the 
right thing to do sir, believe me" he said
"McCann found that out the hard way" he mumbled to himself.

"Well after what happened with Project 1, I think we'll take your advice and 
play it safe" nodded Amnasaki "does Project 1 know about Project 2?"
Waiserdau shook his head.

"And vice versa?"
Waiserdau shook his head again "if Project 2 didn't have the scars then 
they'd both have heart attacks if they ever bumped into each other"

This brought more smiles to Amnasaki and Waiserdau's faces as they looked 
out over the control hall. Rows upon rows of computer consoles, each 
operator helping making decisions that (in theory) will keep the peaceful 
status quo. Other divisions of Watchman are separated off, the Black ops 
division for instance is housed outside the main HQ centre and the 
higher-class entity division (or HCED) is in another part of the HQ 
building. But this hall has the responsibility of aiding the many field 
Watchmen in their work.

"When will Project 2 be ready again?" Amnasaki asked.

"Well she's on some rest leave after her last op, damn Black Jurains" 
Waiserdau said in reply.

"They shook her up pretty badly?"

"Well they weren't any problem, it was just their compound was wired to blow 
sky high, it did and Project 2 walked out black as the ace of spades" 
Waiserdau smiled weakly "took 2 weeks to scrub her down properly"
Amnasaki nodded "Well as soon as she comes back in get her ready".
Waiserdau nodded.

****

Ryoko was silent as she looked around her surroundings, Ayeka sat down, 
taking a breather for a moment, thinking just how she did what she just did. 
Never did her Royal instructors teach her ways of direct telepathic 
communication and channelling of energy. She just couldn't get her head 
around it.

Tenchi however was still recovering from the nausea he experienced at a 
slightly 'bloody' Ryoko. He sat opposite Ayeka tapping his Tenchi-ken on the 
floor.

"So what do we do now?" Ryoko asked Washu through the link.

"Wait, he'll be here soon"

"Who?" Ryoko asked "Soja?"

"Yep" smiled Washu "and this time we'll be ready for it.

Washu shuddered for a second as she finished that sentence.
"What's wrong?" Ryoko asked.

"We've got visitors" Washu said as she brought up a new holo-window, showing 
several new temporary dimension holes have just appeared and were about to 
fade out.

"Where?"

"Don't worry, they're not gonna get in our way"

"If you say so" Ryoko shrugged as she looked into the haze of the Core room. 
The place was so big, the noise so loud that it was hard for her to hear 
properly.

The constant booming of the Core pistons however didn't deter the Black Ops 
squad as they emerged from their dimensional portals. There were five of 
them, fanning out to their targets, the main five power generators that 
processed the energy made in the massive pistons a further mile up the 
generation room. While this wouldn't cut off power totally, it would 
seriously weaken the evil Soja's ability to cause havoc and would prevent 
the resonance cascade scenario.

They placed a dimensional positional beacon on their targets, individual 
explosions being too weak to do the job properly as it wouldn't penetrate 
the ultra-thick outer shell of the generators.

****

"DPB's placed and activated sir" the DW operator said to Waiserdau.

"I'm new sir and we don't get any internal training yet" Waiserdau's aide 
said "how does the system work exactly"

"Every part of this room is made up of co-ordinates, every part of space, be 
it on earth, on another planet or even seven meters underground in solid 
rock. However it is very hard to exactly pin point exact coordinates in a 
location that our Watchmen have never been to before" Waiserdau explained as 
he saw 5 blue dots appear on the diagram of Soja's Core room up on the 
massive main screen.

"And so the DPB is there to find the co-ordinates?"

"Well yes" Waiserdau nodded "the DPB sends out a signal to our HQ, it's fed 
into computers with Co-ord information that is updated constantly" Waiserdau 
scratched his chin "the computer works everything out for us".

"So what happens next?"

"When we have the co-ords our Dimensional Warfare officer here sends the 
sealed orders to the Grunts for an arty strike"

The DW operator grinned happily "CFP complete sir, all co-ordinates ready 
for use"
Waiserdau sipped some of his gin snapps, smiling he slipped some shades on 
and said in a mock American voice "I love the small of snapps in the 
morning!" he took another swig in the morning "it smells like....victory!"

"That's a yes?" the DW operator asked.

"Of course" nodded Waiserdau.

The DW operator nodded and went back to his console "12th Tactical Artillery 
we are go, go, go"

"What's gonna happen now?" the aide asked.

"Well we'll wait for 5 minutes and then we'll blow those generators up 
basically." Waiserdau said.

"Therefore blowing any excess energy with it," the operator added.

"And preventing the Resonance Cascade Scenario" completed Waiserdau.

"What about those on board?" the aide asked.

"What?" blinked Waiserdau.

"Washu and the others?"

Waiserdau sighed "there's no way we could influence what's about to happen, 
all we can do is watch and take note"

****

"Ouch" Tenchi grimaced as he felt a burn on the side of his arm; his armour 
wasn't as encasing as he had hoped. As well as that there were burns around 
the rips where the Clone had just missed with it's energy sword, still he 
was alive and his friends were alive, well the ones he could see anyway.

Ryoko's eyes narrowed as she noticed something about 50 meters ahead on the 
platform they were on. A square frame began to appear out of nowhere.

"It's here" she said to Washu.

"Nearly done, couple more minutes," Washu mumbled.

"You'd better hurry" Ryoko answered.

The frame slowly filled with a transparent red liquid, when it reached the 
top a small light flashed for a brief second. Ayeka gasped as she saw what 
stepped out of the frame.

"S-Soja?" Ryoko blinked.

"Great guess, have a golden star," the figure said as it stepped into the 
light. It wore a white coloured black ops suit, its haircut nice and neatly, 
every part of the body impeccably clean and tidy. His face though was dark, 
like one of the gods of chaos itself.

"Y'know over the millennia I've been drifting around 'killing' time, I've 
been looking out of this universe, I've seen you Ryoko, I've seen what you 
can do with your full power, the ability to travel from one side of the 
Universe to the other by Teleportation" Soja said.

Ryoko just watched as she remembered the bad old days.

"But the way to do it is inefficient, it takes too much energy, there must 
have been a way to transport myself"

Silence.

"The power to travel where I want, whenever I want, be it a different, 
planet, system, universe or dimension"

Washu gasped as she listened in "Dammit!" she cursed in her head "I thought 
I destroyed that technology when I evacuated"

The control room of Watchman was in silence as they all listened to Soja's 
broadcast, Amnasaki rubbed his eyes while Waiserdau clicked his neck in 
fatigue. This wasn't the statement he wanted, he hoped this wasn't being 
picked up by CNN, Reuters or BBC.

"Anyway, here in this dimension we have limited means to achieve the level 
of efficiency I seek, to do what I need to do, I needed to find a way"

Waiserdau said nothing as he listened.

"I have found a way to maximum efficiency" Soja said as it's pure AI voice 
slowly faded away into the shadows and a new, darker voice replaced it "I 
can now travel beyond this universe."

Washu looked visibly shaken when she heard that part, Soja had finally gone 
past the point of no return.

"I have one goal, the extermination of all organic life for maximum 
efficiency for myself to explore the extents of the programming my creator 
entrusted to me"

"Hey nice speech" Ryoko grinned "but you forgot about us"

"Yes" Ayeka nodded as she walked up beside Ryoko "I will resist as long as I 
have strength in my body"
Tenchi walked up next to the pair, silent "my anger will be double if you 
ever hurt my friends again"

"Oooo!" it said sarcastically in its new ultra dark voice "now that is hard, 
Vinnie Jones has got nothing on you I can tell you"

Tenchi just glared.

****

Katsohito dabbed Sasami's head again, looking up at the stars, he sighed. 
Saying nothing he picked Sasami up and made his way to the house.

This was going to be a long night.


Fin