Darkened Stars - Chapter 10

Darkened Stars - Chapter 10

Stardate 29361.1 - May 12, 2352 - 03:54:00

Looking out at the very traditional Japanese compound, Rain was fully willing to admit she kind of hated the owner on sheer principle. Because it was exactly the type of place she would want to live if she could, and now they had ruined that for her.

A careful survey of the location had led the Asari to learn her early act of destroying the Yamaguchi's building in central New Tokyo had generated the kicked ant-hill response she had been hoping for. 

Of course, in this case that weighed heavily towards her benefit, since it included shutting down and or hiding anything that used more power than a basic household appliance. Likely in an attempt to avoid drawing any further Klingon attention than this whole mess already had.

She took a moment to stretch as she finished the horrible tasting Klingon ration pack, before beginning her trek up the pathway to the front gate, where a pair of regular metal katana wielding meatshields stood guard, no doubt ready to die bravely in the case of an attack.

“Raine of House Palkar here for blood vengeance.” She announced as she waved her disruptor pistol back and forth in a somewhat jaunty manner. “So if you'll just send out your–”

Her barrier sparked, and two throwing knives fell to the ground from where they had impacted it, the guards giving twin looks of surprise that quickly morphed into annoyance as they pulled out their Katana's.

Rain's disruptor barked twice, a bolt of deadly green energy slamming into each of the two guard’s chests moments before they collapsed dead.

“You know.” She continued as she stepped past the two bodies and continued on into the compound. “If you'd have done what I was about to ask you could have gotten out of this alive.”

She was doing this in part for Jel'ang after all, so Rain had been hoping to leave at least a few survivors to spread the tale of just why this was happening. But if it came down to it she supposed she could just leave that part to Keiko, who was hopefully taking advantage of Rain's absence to use her ninja skills to escape and run away.

The slow pace she had set for herself had given the household defenders more than enough time to gather after the sound of her disruptor fire had reached. So the Asari was unsurprised to find a good dozen armed men and women lined up waiting for her in front of the large house's front door.

But of course, that had been Rain's plan.

Before any of them could take even a single step forward, in what would have no doubt been a rush that guaranteed over half of their number made it into range to run the Asari through, Rain flicked her wrist.

The resulting biotic effect threw the entire group a good sixty feet into the air, at which point like any mass tossed into the air their momentum ceased, before they plummeted back towards the ground and landed with the audible crack of multiple broken bones.

“I get it, you know.” She offered to any survivors as she walked up to the door and tried to open it, only to frown in annoyance upon finding it locked.

“The Klingons invaded your world and oppressed your people.” She continued as she set her disruptor to 'make own door’ and fired at the offending structure. “But you kind of had it coming, and could have learned from it and become better people. Instead, you went out of your way to kill a pair of women whose only real negative to you was being related to someone high up in the Alliance.”

With that she made her way through the blasted door and into the house, making sure to take care as she did since enclosed interiors played against her strengths a lot more than the open areas she had been fighting in so far.

It was an odd feeling making her way through a house that looked like it could have been a hundred years old when she had actually been born, but at least the rice paper walls made it easy to see when someone was about to try and stab her with one of those energy blades.

Diving through the walls on the opposite side of the hall she narrowly avoided the red energy blade that slashed through the space she otherwise would have been standing. Rolling to catch herself, she brought her disruptor and snapped off a shot at the samurai-esq armored form only to stare dumbly as the disruptor bolt failed to penetrate.

“Did you truly think–”

Rain threw out her hand before the man could finish whatever it was he was about to say, and the warp flashed to slam into the armored form.

He fell over with a clang, whatever supermaterial his armor was made of no barrier to the twisting gravity fields of her biotics.

“Kill first and then brag, motherfucker.” Rain muttered as she pushed herself back up to her feet and continued on with her search.

Empty room after empty room was all that greeted her however, and she was left with the unfortunate realization that either the Yamaguchi's head had locked himself away in a hidden panic room somewhere, or fled before she had even arrived.

“Fuck it.” She said to herself, as she made her way back to what she was pretty sure was the living room. 

“Hey assholes!” She yelled out. “You have two minutes to come out! Then I blow up the house!”

Given the lethargy she could already feel creeping up on her that would likely have her running on the caloric equivalent of empty, but the rage that had been emotionally driving her was rapidly running dry, and she wanted to get this done before it did.

The seconds ticked by without any response, and finally when it hit the two minute mark she let out a sigh.

“Boom it is.” She offered glibly as she began to push dark energy into her barrier.

She'd only really done this specific thing once when she'd been trying to see if she could figure out a way to supercharge her barrier, which was when she'd discovered that accidental Novas were apparently a thing.

Though unfortunately a thing that, like the supercharged warp she had used earlier, took way too long to build to be actually usable in combat circumstances, though she suspected that would likely change if she could ever get her hands on an actual biotic amp.

“Goodbye.” She offered to the empty room as the dark energy feeding her barrier hit its peak and exploded outwards in a shockwave of biotic blue energy.

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Stardate 29361.5 - May 12, 2352 - 07:24:00

Dragging herself back to the Palkar compound, Rain was almost unsurprised to find the large form of Jel'ang's father, General Palkar himself, standing over the carefully laid out bodies of his wife and daughter with a look of absolutely murderous rage on his face.

“So the shuVak lives.” He growled upon noticing Rain. “Given my wife and daughters fates, I had thought surely you had fallen before hand.”

Rain held back the sudden urge she had to drag a grime covered hand across her face and groan, because of course the only thing that had gotten back to the man had been his wife and daughters deaths.

“I was out avenging their deaths.” Rain informed the man with as much energy as she could muster. “The Yamaguchi's holdings in the city are no more.”

She took a brief moment to just bask in the surprise on the middle aged Klingon’s face before continuing.

“And I can personally confirm the deaths of at least thirty of their warriors carried out in T'ahan and Jel'ang's names.”

“I suppose that is an adequate excuse for your absence upon my arrival.” General Palkar offered in a tone that sounded like it almost hurt to admit as the rage seemed to burn out of him.

“Not sure I got their leader.” Rain continued with a grimace, since she hadn't really wanted to risk sticking around to check after blowing up the house. “But lacking Klingon fortitude I've hit my limits and returned to pass out for the next day or so.”

The earlier fire seemed to spark back to live in General's eyes at that, and he dismissively waved her off towards the sleeping quarters.

“Then go! I will finish what you have begun.”

A slow understanding made its way into Rain's brain, and she gave the man a nod before shuffling past towards her bedroom. Only to pause dead at the sight of the still bound and gagged form of Keiko, who seemed to have given up trying to escape at some point and fallen asleep.

“Fuck it.” She muttered tiredly to herself as she shut the door to Jel'ang's room and continued on to her own. “If she's still here when I wake up I can deal with it then.”

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Stardate 29362.9 - May 12, 2352 - 19:42:00

Feeling stiff, sore, and just generally yucky all over, Rain pulled herself out of bed as the overfull feeling of her bladder told her staying any longer would risk compounding the amount of regret she was currently feeling by an entire order of magnitude.

She made her way out of the bathroom an hour later, feeling marginally more alive thanks to a combination of a hot shower, fresh underwear, and judicious use of a Klingon medical kit. Which was the point she remembered she may or may not still have a tied up Keiko in Jel’ang’s bedroom.

“Please have escaped, please have escaped, please have escaped.” She muttered to herself in a mantra as she cracked open the door.

“Fuck.” She cursed upon seeing the still bound, gagged, and very unhappy looking Keiko laid out exactly where she had been left the night before.

Opening the door the rest of the way, she walked into the room with the grim acceptance that she’d actually have to figure out some way to deal with the woman now. 

“Mngarh!” Keiko exclaimed upon seeing her.

Walking over to the now struggling woman, Rain carefully removed the gag, making sure to keep her digits well away from the Japanese woman’s mouth as she did.

“Bathroom!” Keiko whined.

A flush of clear embarrassment flashed over Rain’s face at the realization she’d left Keiko in that state for who knows how long, before a metaphorical lightbulb went off in her head at the realization that this could be the solution to her Keiko problem.

“All right.” Rain agreed with faux hesitance as she began removing the restraints. 

“Bathrooms in there.” She said, pointing to the small adjacent bathroom as she removed the last of the clasps. “Just remember I…”

Rain trailed off in what she was about to say as Keiko attempted to push herself off the bed and take a step, only for her legs to all but immediately collapse under her, sending the woman flopping to the floor in a boneless heap.

“Your entire body is one giant cramp from spending nearly an entire day in Klingon bondage gear, isn’t it?” Rain asked tiredly as the obvious answer for what just happened flashed through her mind.

For a moment silence interspaced by the sound of two people breathing was her only response.

“Yes.” Keiko finally admitted in a tone that all but radiated shame.

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Ten extraordinarily awkward minutes helping the other woman go to the bathroom later, the two of them were back in the bedroom as Rain tried to figure out just how she was going to rid herself of Keiko now that plan ‘let her escape from the bathroom window’ had fallen through.

Without killing her, because Rain hadn’t wanted to do that before, and really didn’t want to do that now that she’d seen the young woman naked. A feeling the Asari really didn’t want to look too deeply into given how many questionable emotions it left her with.

“So you gave up?” Keiko inquired, looking at Rain with an almost smug look on her face.

“You can only blow up so many buildings in a single night.” Rain returned in a deadpan tone as she gave the woman an annoyed stare.

“What?” She continued with an amused lilt in her voice as a surprised look flashed across Keiko’s face. “You didn’t think I was actually going to charge in with only a disruptor did you? I might work for Klingons, but that doesn’t mean I fight like one.”

“Who got away?” Keiko inquired as she pushed herself up with a pained wince from where Rain had dumped her back on the bed. 

“Possibly your boss.” Rain admitted with a shrug, not seeing any reason to hide it. “But General Palkar seemed rather excited about the idea of hunting him down, so if he did I don’t see him lasting the week.”

“What was the plan with this anyways?” She questioned, still confused about just what the Yamaguchi family had been hoping to accomplish. “Kill me to send a message to Jel’ang, stupid, but I can see the logic behind it. But all killing a Klingon General’s wife and daughter is going to get you is said General’s declaring a blood oath and hunting you down.”

“I was ordered to ambush you.” Keiko answered with a scowl. “It was not my place to know more than that.”

Rain supposed that was fair, after all, criminals didn’t usually explain their grand plans to their disposable mooks for the very reason that they wanted to be able to write them off without risk if it came down to it.

“Feels like it would have been a good idea to ask for a little more information nonetheless.” She pointed out to the Japanese woman. “That way you could have done some research into just what your boss was expecting you to fight.”

“It was not my place.” Keiko repeated after a moment. 

“Fuck it.” Rain finally muttered, deciding subtly could take a back window to the fact that she hadn’t eaten anything in eighteen hours. “I’m going to get something to eat.”

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Author’s Notes: Look ma! This Ninja girl followed me home! Can I keep her?