Hello.  It's me, your friendly neighborhood fan-author again, venturing
forth once more into the dangerous world of multiple semi-derivative fan
fiction.  Between this and Hammer Time, I'm sure I'd never manage to pull
off anything else; I just can't bind myself to one anime universe's laws...

...and I'm not sufficiently creative to make up my own :)

This story is a sequel to Anime War Crisis, another excursion into the
Shogun Sabres Universe.  I never intended for there to be a sequel.  (Of
course, that's what they said about Undocumented Features, too.)  But after
several bouts of bouncing new ideas and hashing out concepts, and through
Chico-san's persistent badgering, I decided to make a few. :)

This one will take a different direction; whereas AWC opened up with a
bang-bang action motif, this will spend a little more time working with the
characters and playing with another crazy idea I got while on IRC.  (Special
thanks to Terianne and Asrial for inspiring this particular concept.  It's
so crazy, it just might work!)  I also didn't want to go into Recurring
Supervillain Mode just yet.

Maybe I'll be able to work an action scene or two into it, but it's mostly
going to be silly.  I just wanted to say that up front.

Remember, us fan authors LOOOOOOOOVE to hear comments on our stuff!
In other words:

           Mail comments to me or YOU'RE the next casualty! ;)

- Martin "Diggy-kun" Rose (mfrose@umcc.umich.edu)
  The New Supreme Controller of the Shogun Sabres Universe

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

                       Tales of the Shogun Sabres

                            TOO CUTE TO LIVE

                     Chapter 1:  Tastes Better Than...


   Dnab pulled another tape out of one of the VCRs he kept in his lab.
He rolled himself across the room with a quick thrust of his leg,
dragging his foot to stop as he reached the far side.  He grabbed a
label and a pen, scribbled the date on the label, and carefully stuck
the label to the edge of the tape.  With another roll, he whisked across
the lab again, and placed the tape in an ever-growing row of similarly-
marked videocassettes.
   He looked over his collection with a satisfied grin.  It had been
quite some time since the Anime War Crisis, and the Shogun Sabres hadn't
seen much real action since.  That was just as well; everyone,
especially Shogun himself, had been up to their eyeballs with
preparations for AX the whole time.  The con had gone off as a fantastic
event, and Shogun was already in the planning stages for the next one.
   Though the Crisis was a terrible tragedy, it hadn't turned out all
bad.  After all, it was during that time when Chun-Li had left her cat,
Miscreant, to be tended by Dnab.  He'd planted a micro-cam on the little
critter's oversized collar in hopes of catching her unawares.
   He'd succeeded beyond his wildest imaginings.  She hadn't the
slightest clue that she was being watched by more than mere cat's eyes,
and thanks to the Miracles of Modern Science, Jiro had captured every
single precious moment of her, and, not too infrequently, her and
Jyanken -- those were the best ones -- on videotape.
   He felt quite fortunate that she had no qualms about letting the cat
watch her do everything, and I do mean EVERYTHING, around the home.
   Anyone else would have thought he was building a library of some of
the worst-produced, most plotless porn video ever seen on the face of
the Earth.  To him, however, it was his life's ambition come true.
   Well, almost.  He still didn't get to make out with her himself.
   But, he told himself as he selected a tape for "review", this is the
next best thing to being there.  (Eat your heart out, AT&T.)

   On the outskirts of Mega-City, just about as far as you could get
from Shogun's manor without leaving the city limits, secluded in another
one of those ridiculously stereotypical deserted warehouses, another man
worked quietly with biochemicals and equations.
   "A little more ... a little more ... there."  With a quick twist, he
shut a valve that controlled the slow dripping of one of his compounds
into another.  The lab was filled with beakers, tubes and vials of the
various stages of his progress.  He kept this incremental "record" so
that he could back up any number of steps if something should prove to
be amiss.
   He waved the most current batch under his nose and took a quick
sniff.  Just as he'd predicted, it smelled almost exactly like the soft
drink Dr. Pepper, though not quite as strongly as the previous attempt.
That was a good sign; the last batch worked far too quickly.  He needed
some lag time between ingestion and effect.  But it still wanted a test
before he put his plan into operation.
   He poured some of the formula into a baby bottle, diluting it with
cold water.  Screwing the nippled cap on, he carried it with him as he
walked over to a very large cage.  He opened the door and was greeted by
the long arms of a chimpanzee.
   "Snack time, Goodall," the man said.  The chimp took the bottle from
him and proceeded to drain its contents, lying on her back and holding
the bottle with her legs.  It wasn't long before the bottle was empty
once more.
   The man pulled a chair over and sat backwards on it, leaning his arms
on the backrest and watching the chimp intently.  He knew that, if he
was right, the full process would actually take a couple days or so on
something the size of a chimp.  He just wanted to make sure there were
no immediately adverse effects.
   After all, if that were to happen, he could be traced.

   "Yo, Hammer!"
   Lieutenant PCHammer was startled by the voice behind him, but glad to
find any excuse to stop filling out YAFR (Yet Another Fraggin' Report).
"Well, about time you showed up.  How's it hangin'?"
   "I'm still recovering from AX.  It was quite a trip; you should have
been there."
   "Yeah, so I keep hearing.  Maybe next time I won't have an emergency
form-filling-out session to keep me tied to my desk."
   "Oh, cut with the excuses."  Radman sat opposite Hammer with a wicked
grin.  "We all know you just want more time to be alone with that cute
little babe of yours."
   PCHammer slumped his shoulders.  "She's not mine.  If anyone could be
said to own anyone here, I'd rather say I'm hers."
   Radman's grin only grew.  "Oh, so THAT's the type she is.  You're
hen-pecked already, and not even married yet."
   Hammer let his head drop to the desk with a thud.  "You'll never get
it, will you?"
   "I don't have to.  You're already getting it."
   He lifted his head to look at his taunting partner.  Now, he was
smiling.  "Actually, I'm not."
   Radman blanched.  "What?  But -- but she lives at your--"
   "Yeah, yeah, I know the story, I've heard it all before.  You just
have no idea what you're talking about."  PCHammer sat back in his
chair.  His eyes shone as he smiled, as if he were remembering a
wonderful dream.  "Have you ever been ... close to someone?"
   Rad sputtered.  "Well, uh, I've..."
   "Not just physically close.  I mean CLOSE.  So close you can..."  He
waved his hands, trying to conjure the words to describe it.  "...you
can FEEL what they feel.  So close that when they touch something, you
do, too.  Every sight, every sound, every thought, is not just hers ...
but yours.  And when you touch, her very soul touches yours, and it's
almost ... musical.  Everything she is floods through you, like a song,
and becomes part of what you are.  It's more beautiful than you'd
imagine anything to be."
   Radman blinked.  Hammer'd never been so poetic in his life.
   Hammer leaned forward, oblivious to his dumbfounded partner.  "That's
what my life is like, now.  She's not just someone I know.  She's ME,
and I'm her.  We couldn't turn away from each other if we tried."  He
smirked.  "I feel sorry for you, having to try to figure out what a
person's like just by talking to them, and pretending that the physical
things are enough..."
   Hammer returned to his report, cheered by the memory of how
meaningful a simple touch could be.  Radman wondered how to respond, but
had to get on with work of his own before he could think of anything.

   Pomru nodded at the pages approvingly.  "I didn't think I could say
this, Chun, but you've actually improved quite a bit from the last time
I've seen your work."
   Chun-Li beamed with pride.  The first issue of her comic was ready to
go to press, and she'd brought her finished pages to Pomru for a quick
look-over.  She was always open for suggestions, but compliments were
more than welcome.
   Pomru put the pages back down with a sigh.  "You're making me regret
being your friend."
   Chun looked at him confusedly.  "How so?"
   "If we weren't already friends, you would have come to me with this
idea first."
   She smiled apologetically.  "Well, I wouldn't want to think I was
just getting by on charity."  She posed with a grin, adding, "And my
girlish good looks, of course."
   "Of course."  Pomru stood as she gathered the paper back into her
portfolio.  "If that publisher you're with ever tells you to take a
hike, you think of me first, because NHS is definitely interested in
your stuff.  Got it?"
   She winked and blew him a kiss as she headed out of the office.
   Pomru watched her retreating form for as long as it was in sight.
Maybe we could make a manga about her, he mused for a moment.  He
chuckled at the thought.  Her life was too strange, even for comics.
Artist, fighter, Shogun Sabre, and gorgeous to boot -- that would
definitely stretch the outer limits of credibility.
   He looked out the window of his office.  Someone was putting up a
billboard across the street.  The text he could make out so far read,
"Take the Kawaii-Cola Challenge!"  There was also a super-deformed girl
next to a soda bottle.  Her dress and pose were obviously a parody of
the "Black Velvet" billboards, but the large eyes, small body and chubby
limbs gave it an overtly silly touch.
   'Kawaii-Cola'?!?  Boy, the marketers who made that up should be shot.
Talk about your tongue-twisters.  The picture's cute, though.

   Jiro spoke rapidly, almost too rapidly to follow.  Shogun had a hard
time trying to figure out just what the heck he was so excited about.
   "Wait, wait," he said, waving his hands in an attempt to calm down
his hyperventilating colleague.  "Could you start over, and say what
you're saying more slowly?"
   "Well, if we divide the middleman by the fish on the left side--"
   "Forget it.  When I couldn't understand you, you really had
something.  Kima, you try."
   Kimagure cleared his throat and pushed Jiro aside.  "What my spazzed
companion was trying to tell you is that we've found a way to get
output equivalent to our hardsuit powerplants from something about half
the size of what we currently use."
   Shogun nodded, glad that someone was able to wade through Jiro's
incessant jargon and techspeak.  "I see.  Do you have any working models
yet?"
   Jiro bumped his way back to Kima's position.  "Well, not exactly.  We
tried connecting a prototype with some standard hardsuit systems last
night, just to see what type of response we'd get."
   "And?"
   "And, well ... we should have the mech-lab back together in a couple
days or so."
   Shogun dropped his head into his hands.
   "That's part of what Jiro was rambling about before," Kima
interjected.  "We're still having some trouble regulating the output.
The thing goes up pretty spectacularly if we try to do something on the
level of, say, firing an arm-cannon."
   "We figure it should take us, oh, maybe a couple months to get this
little bug worked out."
   Shogun shook his head slowly.  Jiro had such a way with
understatement.  "Take your time, and try not to break too much more."
   Jiro grinned.  "Does that mean we can break as much as we want as
long as it's by accident?"  He and Kimagure enjoyed a good chuckle from
that one.
   Shogun just groaned in reply.

   Chun-Li walked happily through the mall, nearly skipping in her glee.
Her publishers had greeted her artwork with the same enthusiasm as Pomru
had earlier.  She was finally in the big time!  It was all she could do
to not giggle aloud.
   She'd already run into Chico-san and Nene Romanova, chatting with
Nene while Chico went to check the video shop.  After both had lost
their partners during the Crisis, they were made a team by Chief Gundam,
and seemed to be getting along quite well, both on- and off-duty.
Nene'd asked her about how the other Sabres were doing -- not so anyone
else could tell who she was talking about, of course -- and expressed
envy at Chun's loose "work schedule".
   The Crisis was a hard time for her, to be sure, but now that it was
all over, she missed the excitement.
   A crowd up ahead gained her attention, and she moved into it to
figure out what the excitement was about.  It was several minutes of
"excuse me"s later when she discovered the core of the crowd.
   "Step right up!  Take the Kawaii-Cola Challenge!  Is it better than
Dr. Pepper?  You be the judge!"
   The mention of her favorite soda garnered Chun-Li's curiosity in
record time.  She managed her way into the taste-test line.  Though her
patience normally wouldn't have lasted as long as it would take to get
to the head of the line, the promise of something that might taste
better than Dr. Pepper -- or even something that tasted just like it,
but didn't cost as much -- kept her going.
   She noticed the guy in front of her staring at her.  Annoyed, she
waved a hand in front of his face.  "Do you mind?" she grated.
   He blinked and shifted his gaze to meet hers.  "Oh, I'm sorry," he
lied.  "I was, uh ... admiring that cute blouse.  Yeah, that's it."
   "Sure you were."  Her sarcastic sneer let him know she wasn't
convinced, and she angrily folded her arms, depriving him of his view.
   He gave her an "I'm Hurt" look that had no effect whatsoever.  "Well,
if you're going to be mad, at least know who you're mad at.  I'm
Poofster."  He extended a hand to her.
   "I'm Chun-Li," she replied, accepting his hand and just about
crushing the life out of it.
   He grimaced and doubled over, groaning.  "Ow, ow, owowow, okay, okay,
I get the point!"
   "Good."  She released his hand, and he cradled it gently, turning to
face forward.  She heard him mumble something about "how could anything
that sexy be such a--"; she didn't quite catch the last word.  She
turned her head, and four guys behind her abruptly found something else
to look at.
   At long last, she was second in line.  She watched as Poofster took a
few gulps from each of two cans, both contained by can-holders that hid
their brand-names quite effectively.  After trying both, he pointed to
one, and the holders came off.  Sure enough, he'd chosen Kawaii-Cola.
He was handed a six-pack of the stuff and shooed away.  Chun noticed
that he held the pack with the hand she hadn't 'disciplined'.
   The man behind the booth waved her forward, and she complied,
stepping up to the counter.
   "Good afternoon, lovely miss!  Welcome to the Kawaii-Cola Challenge!
I'm Pai, creator of Kawaii-Cola.  I'm sure you know how the game is
played."
   Chun-Li nodded.  "I'll warn you right now, Dr. Pepper's my favorite.
You'll have to be pretty good to beat it."
   "Oh, I put a lot of work into this new product," Pai said with a
charismatic grin.  "I'm sure you'll notice."  He put the two covered
cans on the counter.
   Chun-Li apprehensively took a big sip from the can on her left.  She
swished it around on her tongue a bit, carefully considering its flavor.
It tasted like Dr. Pepper, to be sure.
   She then tried the can on her right.  It tasted like Dr. Pepper, too,
but a little sweeter, a little zingier ... actually, a little better
than the first one.  She re-tried the left can to make sure it wasn't
her imagination.  Sure enough, it wasn't.
   "Have you reached a verdict?"
   "Hmmm ... the can on the right."
   "Ah, let's see what you've chosen."  He released the can-holders, and
Chun-Li blinked in amazement at the can with the image of the cartoony
little girl on it.
   "I chose ... Kawaii-Cola?!"
   "Indeed you have!  And here's a six-pack sample as my way of saying
thanks."  He leaned forward with a hand beside his mouth, and she
inclined an ear to hear him whisper.  "Smile, this'll look great on the
commercials."
   Chun-Li snickered at the crass honesty.  "Thanks!  When'll this be
available at stores?  I haven't seen it around yet."
   "I'm still working on distribution.  Don't worry, it'll be the talk
of the town, very soon."
   "Okay, I'll be looking forward to it!  Bye!"  With the six-pack in
one hand and her partly-emptied test can in the other, she walked
briskly toward the exit; she'd spent more time in the mall than she'd
wanted to, but it was worth it.
   He smiled a slightly twisted smile as she bounded away.  Oh, I'll be
looking forward to it, too, he thought darkly.

   The Shogun Sabres met at Shogun's estate and gathered in the rec room
to watch a few Koko wa Greenwood videos.  It was, amazingly, the first
time Shogun had ever seen it; he'd always been too busy with organizing
anime fandom to actually watch the most recent stuff, and Kimagure had
to practically hog-tie him to get him away from his work tonight.
   Chun-Li was surprised to discover an impressive cache of Kawaii-Cola
in his refrigerator.  Dnab explained that he and Jiro had gone through
every taste-test booth in Mega-City -- there had been no fewer than a
dozen in various parts of the city -- and got a six-pack each, every
time.  Even when Jiro said he couldn't tell the difference.
   "The gal we saw said it'll be competitively priced," Jiro added.
   "In other words," Dnab expounded, "less than Dr. P."
   Chun just sipped at her can.  It did taste better than D.P.
   Kimagure was about to slip the first tape in when the doorbell rang.
   "Got it," Jiro called, jogging to the door.  He opened it with a
flourish and bowed to the newcomers, who had, over the past months,
become regular members of the group.  "Please, come right in."
   "Thank you," PCHammer and Terianne said in unison as they entered.
It was something they did quite often, a side effect of the joining of
their souls; Teri hadn't noticed it before the Crisis, because her late
partner, LordFranz, was mute, as per the tradition for Shinma hunter
soul-partners.  Hammer just thought it was funny to watch people's
reactions.
   "You're welcome welcome," Jiro grinned.  Following them to the rec
room, he called, "Okay, they're here!  You can start now!"  The three
entered and seated themselves.  Hammer and Teri took a large easy chair,
while Jiro dropped himself on the floor, closer to the screen.
   Dnab looked back at the duo.  PCHammer had managed to break Terianne
of her old kimono-for-every-occasion habit, though she still preferred
long sleeves and full-length skirts.  Right now, she was in a pretty
pink-and-white outfit, seated across Hammer's lap and looking quite
comfortable.  Dnab wished Chun-Li would get that comfortable with him
sometime.
   Chun stopped sipping her cola for a moment and gave Dnab a swat.  "In
your dreams, pervert."
   Being in prose can be such a pain, he grumped.
   Kimagure started the tape.  As the opening blank space and
distributor's screen rolled, he tossed cold cola cans to the room's
occupants.  Only Terianne abstained from the beverage; she doubted that
carbonation would agree with her unique tastes (B-positive).

   Pai returned to his research lab, smiling like the cat that ate the
canary.  Actually, he felt more like a fisherman than a cat at the
moment, for all of Mega-City had bitten for his Kawaii-Cola promotion.
   He whistled tunelessly.  Tomorrow, his product would be in every
store in town, priced even less than colas so generic that they had
nothing but simple white labels that said "COLA" on them.  He wouldn't
be pulling any great per-unit profit, by any means, but everyone in the
town that drank soda would be drinking it.
   Of course, profit wasn't his primary motive.
   Yet.
   He unlocked another door with his keycard, entering the testing area
of the lab, an area only he had access to.  The setup and security he
had here was much better than that old warehouse he'd been working in
before.  Here, he had coffee machines, telephones, electronic voice-
recognition access terminals -- all the comforts of modern technology.
   Of course, here, he also still had his first test subject.
   He smiled, opening the cage door.  "Well, Goodall.  You thirsty
tonight?"  He grabbed the same old bottle from a nearby counter-top,
filled with his uncarbonated, diluted Kawaii-Cola formula.  The chimp
gladly accepted it and set to work emptying it.
   Pai chuckled at the chimp's comical attempts to manipulate the bottle
with its shortened, chubby appendages.  She nearly swallowed the bottle
whole as her tiny mouth became a gaping maw when she opened it as wide
as she could.
   Oh, developing the formula had been quite an effort, to be sure.
Achieving just the right physical effect was only the beginning of the
process.  Making it taste like an improved Dr. Pepper took even longer.
And getting such a complex bioagent past the FDA without so much as a
blink was an exercise in biochemical stealth.
   But seeing an entire metropolis teeming with cute little munchkins,
super-deformed characters in real life, would make it all worthwhile.
To finally close that eternal gap between the Beautiful and the Unloved
... oh, what greater favor could a man do for his race?
   "My, Grandma, what big eyes you have," Pai said aloud, nearly
bowling himself over with wicked laughter.
   (He sometimes wondered why he behaved like a villain if he was doing
everyone such a great service.  He'd decided it was because villains
have more fun.)

   Dnab threw a blank tape into his Miscreant-recorder before heading
home for the night.

                       Tales of the Shogun Sabres

                            TOO CUTE TO LIVE

                  Chapter 2:  Nagging Little Problems


   "It is time, PCHammer."
   He glanced over at a wall clock, confirming Terianne's statement.
"You're right, as always.  Another day, another donut."  He rose from
his chair, taking his plate and flatware to the sink and running some
water onto them.  He'd wash them properly when he came home from work.
   Just because Terianne stayed at home most of the day didn't make her
"domesticated", by any stretch of the imagination.  Virtually all the
mundane chores of mortal life were quite unfamiliar to her; if her
initial reactions were any indication, PCHammer was certain that she'd
never so much as eaten before the first time he'd cooked for her.  In
all that, however, she never seemed aloof.  Indeed, it fascinated her,
and the more she saw and experienced, the more she wanted to learn.
   The thought made him smile.  She's been a Shinma hunter for over 130
years, and had probably existed for much longer ... yet she approached
his mortal style of life with the wonder of an eager child.
   He shut off the sink and walked to her, taking her hand as he always
did.  They sang to each other silently for a few moments.  Then he let
her hand drop and held her by the shoulders; she put her hands in his
hips.
   "Everything's still quiet on your end, I see."
   She nodded.  "The Shinma who live in this realm are yet in hiding.
The defeat of Kai has frightened them."  A small smile graced her lips.
"'Word gets around fast', as you might say.  When they are bold once
more, we shall resume the hunt."
   "Well, I'd hate to think you'd lose your edge."
   "I must remain wary.  All may be still, but my purpose is unchanged."
   He grinned at her and gave her shoulders a friendly squeeze.  "See
you tonight," they said to each other, and he bent down slightly to kiss
her forehead.  When his lips touched her, there was a short burst of
music within them.
   But when he stood and looked at her, his look held confusion.
   "Is something wrong?"
   "I..."  He blinked, then shrugged.  "No.  It's nothing.  My aim must
be a little off, is all."  He turned and left, trying to put the error
out of his mind.
   But the fact that he'd kissed her high on the bridge of her nose
nagged at him.  Bad aim is one thing, but for such a rehearsed move...
   It's nothing, he continued to tell himself.  Maybe he'd eventually
believe it.

   Chun-Li strode confidently into Shogun's exercise room.  She was
wearing her tight blue Chinese fighting tunic, the one in which she'd
gained her reputation in the world-wide underground tournament network
as "The Strongest Woman in the World".
   She remembered those days, though the momories weren't always
pleasant.  Her father had been killed by a notorious drug lord, and she
swore vengeance.  Once she'd heard that he was also the reigning
champion of a highly illegal open-style tournament, she'd trained
herself obsessively to have a crack at him.  She met and befriended
other fighters during those bittersweet days, many of whom also had an
axe to grind against the man.
   The days and nights came back to her as she continued to walk.  The
friends, the enemies, the struggle and the re-learning, the painful
defeats, the final victory ... it all seemed so long ago.  Immediately
after it had ended, she felt so eager to resume a "normal" life.  With
no family to speak of, she'd moved to America, and Mega-City.  With
nothing but her victory purse to call her own, she tried to live her
life as the beautiful young woman she was.
   She was able to turn her childly interest in art into what was
promising to be a fruitful career as an artist in the manga style.  She
even found new friends ... and something more.  It was, in almost every
way, just what she'd hoped for.
   But the years of toil and strife had made their indelible mark on
her.  She was a fighter, and would always be a fighter.
   A heavy bag hung from a suspended platform near one side of the room.
Though it looked like an ordinary sandbag, it actually contained no
small amount of high-tech sensing equipment.  It could measure each blow
struck against it for force, direction and effectiveness, tabulating its
output on a nearby flat-screen terminal, and comparing it to previous
results.
   Chun-Li logged into the exercise computer and faced off against the
bag.  She stood at a distance she knew far too well, drawing controlled
breaths.  Then, without warning, she struck.  Her fist landed against
the bag with a softened thump.
   She froze.
   She looked at her hand.  The blow felt ... wrong.
   She tried again.  Thump.
   Yes, it was definitely wrong.  Normally, her fist hit home just as it
reached the point of maximum velocity of her strike.  Now, she wasn't
making contact until the beginning of follow-through.
   She checked her distance.  It was right where she always stood, and
not a centimeter farther.
   She checked her stance.  Posture was fine, feet apart, arms akimbo,
spine straight, shoulders square.  Nothing should be wrong.  Was it all
her imagination?
   She glanced over to the terminal screen.  It confirmed what she'd
thought at first; her blows measured far below her normal effectiveness.
   Now angry at herself, she proceeded to assault the bag with a
berserker's fury, punching, kicking and shouting in her rage.  After a
full thirty seconds of this outburst, she stopped, her chest heaving as
she panted with fatigue.
   She did NOT feel better.  Not a single one of those hits felt right.
In fact, several of her quick jabs even stopped short of striking the
bag.  A look at the terminal screen verified her concerns; fighting
effectiveness was gauged at below 75% of her norm.
   She dropped heavily to her knees and stared at the floor, still
gasping for breath.
   What is wrong with me?

   Nene tapped away at the terminal keyboard on her desk.  Most everyone
else in the office, including Lieutenant PCHammer, had no great love of
the endless stream of reports and paperwork that they had to file.  For
Nene, however, it wasn't really a problem.  But that was because she'd
banged up her own little report-writing program that took care of nearly
all of the technical and formatting details for her.  Besides, compared
to being a meter maid, it was positively stimulating.
   Still, gathering the necessary information and materials for each one
took a bit of office legwork.  Nene felt fortunate that her new partner
was such a sucker.
   As if in response to her train of thought, there was a loud thump at
one side of her desk.  She looked, and saw a pair of hands around a tall
sheaf of old reports.
   "There they are, Nene," Chico-san said.  "Traffic altercations for
the past two months, chronologically ordered."
   Nene looked surprised.  "Chronological?  I said alphabetical!"
   Chico-san blanched.  "What?!  Oh, maaaaaan, not again..."  He hung
his head dejectedly, then glanced back at Nene, who was giving him a
silly grin.
   He took the top five reports off the stack and swatted her in the
back of the head as she broke into giggles.  "Don't do that to me, you
little Sadist!"
   She looked back at him, batting her eyes at him with a positively
angelic smile on her face.  "But that look you get on your face is just
sooooooo cute..." she almost sighed.
   Chico-san melted immediately under the warmth of her big, blue eyes.
He scratched at the back of his head, unable to respond.  He looked at
her again.  And she thinks the look on MY face is cute, he mused.  I'm
not sure, but she seems to have ... I don't know.  She almost looks like
she's gotten cuter since we first met.
   Satisfied that she'd buttered him up past the point of anger, she
returned to her report.  "Oh, Chico, could you get me a new toner
cartridge from the shelf?  You put it up higher than I can reach."
   Chico-san smiled.  "I was hoping I'd get to watch you try."
   Nene responded with a nasty smirk.  "Go get it, you pervert."
   Chico walked to the shelves as Nene's eyes followed him.  He reached
up to snatch one of the large boxes.
   His hand didn't even touch the base of the shelf they were on.
   "Huh?"  He reached up again.  He couldn't even brush the bottom of
that shelf.
   Nene stood up.  "I saw you put them there..."
   "Maybe some smart-aleck moved 'em higher.  I'll get a stepladder."
   Nene nodded, but knew he couldn't be right.  There were still two
shelves above where the boxes rested, just as they had been since she
watched him put them up there and complained about how high they were.
They were modular shelves, though, so some practical joker could have
jacked them up.  But not possibly that much farther -- all the shelves
were still just barely tall enough for their tallest item, and loaded
heavily, making such a stunt impractical at best.
   Nene thought for a moment, then opened a drawer in her desk.
Shuffling the contents around a bit, she soon produced a reeled tape
measure.
   Chico-san returned with the stepladder, and retrieved one of the
toner cartridge boxes from its suddenly-too-high perch.  "Here you go,
Nene.  Anything else?"
   "Yes," she said seriously, fixing her eyes on his.  She pushed him
against a wall and stretched out the tape measure with her hands.  "How
tall are you?"

   "Hey, Jiro."
   Jiro looked up from his CAD screen.  "Oh, hi, Dnab."
   Dnab strolled casually into Jiro's mech-shop, wearing the frustrating
smile that made the entire group wonder about his sanity.  They had yet
to correlate the times he wore it with the times he spent locked in his
private lab.  Actually determining the reason for his grin would have
likely resulted in a world of hurt for him, courtesy of an infuriated
Chun-Li.
   Today, however, he seemed a bit out of sorts, despite the silly grin.
Jiro noticed this.  "Hey, you okay?  You don't look so hot."
   Dnab slumped slightly, caught in his attempt to look like nothing was
wrong.  "Actually, no.  I've got some kind'a headache and stomachache,
and all my joints hurt."  He did an 'old codger' voice and walked with
an intentional hobble as he continued.  "My legs are old, my teeth are
grey..."
   Jiro dropped his head to his work table with a thud.  "Sorry I asked.
Any particular reason you're here?"
   "You mean besides the fact that everyone else is somewhere else doing
something else?  No, not really."
   Jiro's head shot off the table and he snapped his fingers brightly.
"Great!  C'mere, I need a hand testing this new suit powerplant."
   Dnab stopped at the mention of the device, taking a step back.  "Is
this the same one you blew up the mech lab with last week?"
   "Whassamatter, you chicken?"
   "Better a live chicken than a roast turkey.  Besides, shouldn't Kima
be helping you?"
   "Well, he would, but he's laid up right now.  He's having some kind
of painful feedback from his artificial hand."
   "I see."
   "Well, come on, then."
   For no sufficiently good reason, Dnab complied, following Jiro to a
steel-and-concrete reinforced area of the lab.  Jiro let him walk around
the new suit, which was currently standing free.
   Dnab considered it.  "What holds it up?"
   "It's a remote armor.  All control signals come from a special suit I
have in the observation room in the back."
   Dnab grinned.  "So even you don't trust it yet."
   Jiro shrugged.  "I didn't live this long being stupid."
   "Really."
   Jiro swatted at him, missing by several inches.  "Come on.  You'll be
doing manipulations while I watch the output signature."  They walked
into a room in the back.
   "Dark in here."
   "Well, duh."  Jiro flipped on the lights.  There were parts of a
lightweight armor on a table against the back wall of the room.  "Go put
that thing on while I set up."
   Dnab began mounting the suit on himself.  It was a well-rehearsed
process, though not performed very often anymore, since their primary
hardsuits had been built to perform most of the procedure automatically.
   Dnab put one arm of the suit on himself and frowned.  "Hey, what's
the deal?"
   Jiro didn't look up from his panel.  "What's what deal?"
   "I didn't think you made these suits in gorilla sizes."
   That got Jiro's attention.  "What's that supposed to mean?"
   "Look."  Dnab displayed his arm to his fellow Shogun Sabre, who
regarded the sight with confusion.
   The hindarm piece covered well past his elbow.
   "What the...?!  This suit should fit you fine!"  Jiro grabbed the
other armpiece and held it near Dnab's arm.  It was long, as well.  He
proceeded to fit it on himself, muttering, "I guess I'll have to do it
myself, then," until he noticed that it didn't fit HIS arm, either.
   "Stretching the suits again?"
   Jiro had a bad feeling.  "Let's get sized," he said, just about
jogging out of the back room with Dnab hot on his heels.
   In moments, they were in the room where their Sizer stood.  This was
a nifty little device that any tailor would have killed to get; it could
instantly analyze every measurement and dimension of whatever was placed
on its pad.
   Dnab stepped onto the platform as Jiro worked the controls.  A
glowing disc passed over him, from his feet to his head.  Once it was
above him, he jumped off and moved beside Jiro.
   Jiro, for his part, was ready by that time.  He had Dnab's sizing
profile already displayed on one side of the monitor in front of him.
The numbers from this new measurement came up on the other side just as
Dnab arrived.
   They gaped at the display.
   Jiro spoke first.  "What kind of diet are you on?"
   "I never diet if I can help it."
   "Well, whatever it is, you've managed to lose five inches."
   "Sure, but five inches of HEIGHT?!?"
   Jiro stood and walked toward the sizing pad.  "Do mine now."
   "Huh?  Oh, yeah."  Dnab set up a comparison display similar to the
one Jiro had just done for him.  After he'd been sized, Jiro joined him
in watching the results dumbfounded.
   This time, Dnab opened.  "I guess my diet's better than yours."
   Jiro nodded.  "That still doesn't explain why I'm four inches shorter
than I was."
   Dnab checked a few of the other numbers.  "Hey, there's something
odd."
   "More odd than suddenly getting shorter?"
   "You be the judge.  It says here that your head hasn't gotten any
smaller, and the facial area taken up by your eyes has increased by nine
percent."
   Jiro blinked.  "Well, you win."
   "Pay up."
   "I never promised money."
   Dnab snapped his fingers.  "Rats.  Well, maybe next time."
   Jiro gave him a silent gloat, then looked worriedly back at the
display.  "Still, this can't be a good thing.  Let's get the others down
here tonight and see if we're the only ones shrinking."
   Dnab brightened.  "Hey, cool.  I love the way Chunners dresses when
she's being measured."
   Jiro sighed.  "Forget I said anything."

   There was a quiet tapping at the door, followed by a head of red hair
poking in through one side.  "Chief?"
   Gundam stood from his desk.  "Ah, Sergeant Romanova.  Come in."
   "Thank you, sir."  Nene stepped into the office, closing the door
quietly behind her.
   Gundam walked around his desk.  "What can I do for you, Sergeant?"
   Nene seemed unsure of where to begin, but selected her words with
care as she spoke.  "Sir, I think something really peculiar is going on.
I'm not even sure if we can do anything about it."
   "What precisely do you mean, Sergeant?"
   "Well ... today, I was typing up a report, and had Chico-san playing
gofer for me.  I asked him to get one of the toner cartridges, because
I'd noticed that the printer was starting to get pretty pale with its
copy.  I'd have fetched it myself, but they were higher up than I could
reach.  As it turned out, he had to get a stepladder to bring one down."
   Gundam scratched at his head.  "That hardly seems cause for concern,
Sergeant."  He walked over to the window, considering the street below.
   "He put them up there himself, sir, and without any assistance.  I
saw it myself."
   Gundam turned toward her.  She had his attention.  "Go on."
   "I took the liberty of measuring his height after asking him what he
remembered it to be.  Either his memory is faulty, or he's lost at least
four inches of height."
   "So you think something has happened to him, and he's shrinking."
The Chief wondered what the quickest route to the insane asylum was.
   "If he is, sir, he's not alone.  I had him measure my height as well,
and I'm four-and-a-half inches shorter than my last measured height.
I've been measuring people around the office after asking them how tall
they are.  We seem to have an average stature loss of four inches."
   Gundam looked incredulously at her.  "That's pretty hard to believe."
   She held out her tape measure.  "If you'd like, sir, you can check my
height against my records.  You'll get the same results."
   He looked at her.  She was deadly serious.  "I don't suppose we have
any leads on what could be causing this."
   Nene shook her head.  "No, sir.  If it weren't for the shelf, I
wouldn't even have noticed."
   "Is it happening to everyone?"
   "No, sir.  Some people are just as tall as their records say they
should be.  And the ones losing height aren't all getting equally
shorter, or proportionately shorter; whatever it is affects some people
more than others.  Corporal Jakilpat is over six inches shorter, for
instance."
   That seems to make sense, he decided.  After all, no two people are
truly alike.  "Do you think this is just affecting our department?"
   "I doubt it, sir.  It's probably city-wide."
   Damn.  Gundam looked back out the window.
   Nene paused, uncertain how to proceed.  "Um ... now that we know
about this, sir..."
   "You want to know what we should do about it.  Am I right?"
   She was slightly taken aback by the anticipation of her question, but
realized he was already trying to determine its answer.  "Yes, sir."
She waited in silence as he brooded.
   He watched the people down on the street.  How many of them were
becoming shorter without even realizing it?  Does this ... whatever it
is pose any risk to the citizens?  How can we even think to warn them
about it, maybe even causing a panic, when we have no idea how to stop
it?
   As he watched, a young couple came into view.  The guy was a fairly
typical resident of Mega-City -- the IRC otaku type, glasses, dark hair,
the works -- while the woman with him bore a head of long, deep golden
hair.  They were walking, joined at the hip, and the girl kept looking
at her hand and smiling at the guy.
   Abruptly, the guy stumbled and fell to his knees, almost bringing the
girl down with him.  He clutched his arms around his stomach as he
curled into a ball on the ground.
   Gundam bolted away from the window and dashed out the door, barking
commands at the startled redhead behind him.  "Sergeant, get an
ambulance!  There's a sick man out there!"
   Nene looked out the window, confirming what Gundam told her.  She
grabbed the phone and dialed frantically.

   Gundam emerged from the ADP building running, with Chico-san right
behind him with a first-aid kit.  They crossed the street and pushed
away the crowd that had gathered around the fallen man.
   He was lying just as Gundam had seen him, with an anguished look on
his face.  The girl was beside herself as she kneeled with her hands on
him, shouting his name and shaking him.  While Chico-san cleared out
some room at the center of the gathering, Gundam tried to get the woman
away from her fallen boyfriend.
   "Please, Miss, let me--"
   "No!  I can't leave him!  KEIICHI!"
   "Look, I want to help, but I can't--!"
   "Let me handle this, Chief."  Nene pushed through the ring of
onlookers and came around past Gundam and Chico-san, putting a
reassuring hand on her shoulder.  She spoke gently to the distraught
blonde.  "Come on.  Let them help him.  Please?"
   The girl looked up at Nene, then at Gundam and Chico-san.  She stood
up hesitantly, stammering, "A-all right."  Nene tugged at her, and she
stepped back as Gundam set about examining the prone figure.
   "My name's Nene.  What's yours?"  She looked up at the woman as she
asked, noticing, for the first time, a small trianglular marking that
seemed to be planted in the middle of her forehead.
   "I'm ... Belldandy.  Keiichi and I are ... engaged ... to be
married."  She spoke between sobbing breaths, working to bring herself
under control, if only for the sake of civility.  She showed her hand to
Nene.
   "That's a lovely ring."
   Belldandy smiled weakly.  "Thanks.  I helped him pick it out."
   "So, what happened here?"
   She rubbed her arms and took a faltering breath.  "Well, we were just
walking down the street ... he only gave me the ring an hour ago.  We
had our arms around each other, and I noticed all of a sudden that his
arm is slowly sliding down my back.  It used to go over my shoulder-
blade, but now it was going below.  He was complaining about some
headache and stomach-ache, and how his joints all hurt.  Suddenly, he
screamed and fell over, clutching his stomach, and ... well, you came
then."
   Nene nodded, looking over at Keiichi.  He was lying flat on his back
now, but still had a pained look on his face.  His sleeves and trouser-
legs were all bunched up on his limbs; it was obvious that his clothes
didn't fit him anymore.  He looked like a chubby six-year-old playing
dress-up with his father's clothes, except that his head was rather
oversized.
   Nene gasped.  All things considered, he looked rather ... cute.
   Keiichi's eyes opened slightly as a siren cried out from down the
street.  He groaned as he tried to move his arm; his severely undersized
fingers wiggled slowly.  "Bell-chan..." he mumbled.
   She was down beside him in an instant.  "Keiichi!"
   His enormous eyes opened fully as he looked up at his fiancee.  His
voice croaked weakly.  "...Bell-chan ... what..."
   "Easy, son," Gundam said in his best paternal tone.  "You'll be at
the hospital soon.  They'll fix you up.  You just relax."
   The ambulance screeched to a halt, and two men emerged.  They opened
the back and pulled out a stretcher.
   Keiichi shivered slightly.  "...Bell-chan ... I ... I'm so cold..."
   Belldandy hugged him as best she could, taking his tiny hand.  "No!
Keiichi ... Don't leave me!  I love you!"
   "...and I ... love you ... Bell-chan ... alwayyssss..."
   "Keiichi!  I love you!  Keiichi!"
   His limp hand dropped from hers, and his eyes stared blankly.
   "KEIICHI!"  Belldandy shook him violently, as if to wake him up.
   His head fell loosely to one side.  Otherwise, he did not stir.
   "NNNOOOOOOOOO!"  Belldandy screamed with grief, throwing herself on
Keiichi's diminutive body and dampening his shirt with her tears of
farewell.
   Nene choked back her own sorrow as Belldandy wailed.  She wondered
how many others would have to go through this.

-- 
  The High Diggy-Hoek of Chihuahua-Wala Land (Martin Rose) - mfrose@ais.org
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Truth is stranger than Fiction ---------------- Stupid is a boundless concept
The Limbaugh Institute for Advanced Conservative Studies:  Ann Arbor Division


                       Tales of the Shogun Sabres

                            TOO CUTE TO LIVE

                         Chapter 3:  Undertall


   "Good evening.  This is Mega-City Evening News; I'm LadyLove,
reporting.
   "In our top story, reports continue to pour in from across Mega-City
as the count of people either dead or in critical condition climbs well
into the hundreds, all suffering severe reactions to a mysterious
illness, known as 'S.D. Disease', that is actually shrinking the city's
residents.
   "AD Police Chief Gundam, at a press conference earlier today, said
that the disease is only having violent reactions on a small portion of
the population, while most will only notice their height has changed
when something brings it to their attention, such as reaching for a high
shelf or putting on an old suit of clothes.
   "The extreme cases give us our most telling glimpses of what the
future holds for Mega-City's residents.  Small bodies, short, chubby
limbs with tiny hands and feet, large heads, and enormous eyes are
becoming common sights as the number of advanced cases continues to
grow.
   "At Mega-City's leading medical research labs, doctors and scientists
are working around the clock in an attempt to isolate the cause of the
peculiar malady.  Until such a discovery is made, health officials say,
there is no chance for a cure.
   "Still, AD Police representatives reiterate that there is no real
cause for alarm.  There are no known preventive measures, and, with no
cure in sight, citizens are advised to just go about their lives, and
maybe invest in children's clothing.
   "Besides, the end result might be kind of cute."

   Pai snapped off the television.
   So, hundreds of people are dead.  So what?  I couldn't afford that
many test animals.  I can't be expected to account for everyone who
might have some sort of allergic reaction or something.
   The fact remains, the entire population of Mega-City is becoming
cuter by the day!  Soon, walking the streets will be like browsing in
the stuffed-animals section of a toy store!  Why, just think of the
reduction in violent crime as would-be muggers find their intended
victims too cute to assault!  I'll bet that even open warfare could be
stopped with such a healthy dose of cuteness!
   And even if these narrow-minded ingrates don't like it, there's
nothing they can do about it.  They have no cause, they have no cure!
All they have is cute, and plenty of it!
   Pai broke into another round of villainous laughter.
   I love my job, he thought.

   Sergeant Romanova put her hands on her hips and sighed.  "Some days,
it just doesn't pay to get out of bed," she groaned.
   She surveyed the scene of the traffic accident again.  Another 'SD
fender-bender', as they were being called.  The cause was all too easy
to determine; the driver of one vehicle has an unexpected, rapid
advancement in the disease, and is suddenly unable to reach the pedals,
or see over the dashboard, or work the gear-shift.
   The victim was one of the unlucky ones.  He hadn't had his seat belt
on, and his skull cracked open against the steering wheel when the car
behind him, driven by a pair of advanced SD cases who'd worked out an I-
steer-while-you-push-the-pedals deal, rear-ended him at high speed,
unable to compensate quickly enough for his loss of control.
   She looked at the dead man's license.  Name, Regius ... Mega-City
resident ... address, height (before SD'ed, of course), weight, eyes,
blah blah blah.  Just another ordinary Joe caught in whatever was
happening to the people of this town.
   Nene shook her head despondently.  As if it weren't bad enough that
SD disease was inherently fatal to some people, it was also killing so
many others through incidents like these.  What kind of unthinking
monster could do this to so many innocent lives?
   The tow trucks arrived on the scene, followed closely by the
ambulance.  Nene stood, keeping the crowd behind her.  When she turned
to face them, there was an audible "awwwww" -- she knew Chico-san kept
telling her how cute SD disease was making her, but this confirmation
made her blush a deep crimson nonetheless.
   She chanced a look at her reflection in a nearby window.  Her case of
SD was quite advanced, but it hadn't been as painful as it'd been for
many of her officemates.  She'd already had to requisition new uniforms
twice, and, judging how her half-length skirt was working its way down
to her ankles, would likely need to do so yet again.
   Even so, she couldn't help but smile when she saw herself.  She had
to admit, she was quite cute.
   But what a terrible price to pay...
   With the ambulance, tow trucks and wreckage now gone, Nene allowed
the crowd to disperse on its own.  She mounted her mini-scooter, started
its engine and buzzed back to ADP Headquarters to file her report.
These days, she was happier than ever with her automatic report-writer
program; her tiny hands were getting difficult to type with, and having
to sit on a phone book or two just to reach the desk wasn't much help.

   Three quick raps sounded against Chun-Li's door.
   She silently slipped the deadbolt off, then crept into a shadow
behind the door.  The peephole had been out of her reach ever since SD
had hit her with a vengeance a couple days ago.  It hurt quite a bit at
the time, bringing sharp pains to her normally nimble joints, but she'd
recovered from that and was trying to live normally.
   "Come in," she sang, already knowing who was behind the door.
   The door opened casually, and Jyanken walked in, surprised that there
was noone to greet him.  He looked all around, but managed to overlook
the spot directly behind him.
   "Okay, you let me in, now where are you?"
   "HYAAAA!"  Chun leaped into the air, affixing herself to the startled
Jyanken's back, doing her best to wrap her shortened limbs around him
and grabbing to hold what she could with her stubby fingers.  He whirled
around, bumping the door closed as he stumbled into the living room,
spinning past the coffee table and finally collapsing onto the sofa.
   "Jeez, you tryin' to give me a heart attack?"
   "Oh, you love it and you know it."  She slid herself around him so he
could see her grinning face, all the while keeping him pinned to the
cushions.
   His eyes widened as she came into view.  "Oh my God ... Chun..."
   "Yes?"  She batted her eyes innocently with a sweet little smile.
   "I ... I didn't know you were this far SD'ed."
   She sighed.  "Well, you haven't been by for a few days."
   "Yeah, I know.  Things have been pretty frantic down at ADP HQ.  All
the deaths, both of SD disease and SD-related incidents, have Chief
Gundam's nerves on edge.  I was lucky to get tonight off."
   She seated herself on his stomach, rubbing a hand on his chest.  "I
see it hasn't affected you very much at all.  You're still about as tall
as you were before AX."  She was smiling at him.
   He swallowed nervously, trying to stay calm.  "Uh ... yeah.  The docs
say that just like some people seem to have sudden reactions to the
disease, others have almost no reaction at all.  I'm not any shorter
than I was when I got back to Mega-City.  I'm supposed to go to a lab
tomorrow for tests, to see why it doesn't affect me."
   "Mmm-hmmm."  Chun-Li sighed her response, laying herself on him.  She
pulled herself up a bit and started to kiss him, rubbing his leg with
her bare foot.
   He responded eagerly at first, then caught himself.  He twisted his
lips free from her sweet seduction and mumbled, "No, Chun, please..."
   She refused to give up.  "Yes."  She put her lips to his ear.
   "No."
   "Yes."  Her hands and feet massaged him.  She still knew how to turn
him on.
   "No!"  He grabbed her by the shoulders and pushed her up.
   She looked at him, startled and slightly angry.  After a long
silence, she started to lower herself again, but he kept her at bay.
   "Chun, please!  I can't!"
   "What the hell is that supposed to mean?!  You found someone else?
I'll make you forget her!"  She tried again, with equal success (or,
more appropriately, a lack thereof).
   He shook her harshly.  "Chun!  Look at yourself!"
   She stopped and followed his words.  She bent her head down, and took
a long, hard look at what she found.
   Until now, she'd tried to ignore the fact that he was almost twice as
tall as she.  She'd pushed out of her mind that she had the body of a
chubby, overdeveloped six-year-old.  She'd worked to forget that she was
wearing one of her old polo-style shirts and had added a wide sash
around the waist, since it fit her like a half-skirted gown.
   Now, she looked and saw herself for what she was -- just not built
for what she wanted to do tonight, unless she planned a date with a
pedophile.
   She still tried to ignore it.  "So?"
   Jyanken shook his head.  Her refusal to accept the physical realities
of the situation was frustrating.  "Come off it, Chun-chan.  I can't do
this with you -- not with you like thi--"
   Chun-Li slapped him hard, blinking enraged tears from her eyes.
"DAMN you!  Don't talk to me like that!  No matter how I look, I'm NOT a
child!  I am a WOMAN!  I LOVE you, dammit!"
   Jyanken rubbed the sore spot on his face and chose his words
carefully.  "And I love you, Chun.  And that's why I can't let you hurt
yourself like that."  He put his hands on her waist.  "Haven't you
considered that ALL of you has been shrinking?"
   She sat in silence for a long moment, then dropped her head.  She
knew what he was talking about.  She had considered it.  And she knew he
was right.
   Damn it, he was right.
   "I'm sorry," she whimpered.  "I was just ... I knew you'd ... I only
wanted to..."
   He wiped a stray tear from her cheek.  "Yeah.  I know.  I feel the
same way."
   "You do?"
   He nodded.  "And I always will."
   She choked a happy sob.  "Thank you," she whispered.
   She fell onto him, kissing him harder than before.  This time, he
held her tight instead of pushing her away.

   PCHammer strode silently through the night, eyes darting to and fro,
watchful for activity.
   Terianne had left him a note, letting him know that she'd detected
the presence of a rogue Shinma in the downtown district of Mega-City.
She went out ahead to track it down, and he knew she would need him to
complete the binding process and return it to the Shinma realm.
   He looked at his squat, malformed hands.  The last time they'd done
this together, he was much more agile and could act in her defense.
Now, though, his short arms and legs made even basic household tasks a
chore.  He wondered if he would even be able to help her with the mystic
gestures, since his hands might not be able to achieve the correct
positions.
   He paused underneath a streetlamp.  Closing his eyes, he reached out
with his still-new Shinma sense, seeking out his soul-partner.  He
mentally picked through the undercurrent of noise from the many living
souls around him, trying to find one specific tune.
   There.  Her song is that way.  She sings with urgency.  She is not
alone.
   He opened his eyes.  Damn, the thing must have spotted her.  He
bounded forward, crossing the street at a run.  He jogged two blocks,
hooked left around a corner, and ducked into an office building whose
door was lying on the ground, broken in two and removed from its hinges.
He ran up one, two, three flights of stairs, down a hallway, hung a
quick right and entered a room that glowed with an unnatural
luminescence.
   He stopped, panting for breath as he surveyed the scene.  Apparently,
there'd been a slight miscalculation in the number of rogue Shinma.
   Terianne made no move to greet him, standing impassively at the
center of the room.  Four hulking, butt-ugly Shinma stood around her,
glowing with auras of unholy emerald.  They had been watching her
hungrily, reaching toward her, surrounding her with hair-like tendrils.
PCHammer's entry distracted them, and they regarded him with mocking
contempt.
   "Thhhe hhhunnnterr'sss ssssouullmmmaatte," one of them breathed.
   "Ssseeee hhhoww cuutte hhhee issss," another hissed.
   "Hhhee isss nnno thhreeatt tooo usss," the one closest to him added.
   PCHammer glared.  "No threat, am I?"  Acting on cop instinct, he drew
his gun and ran forward, only to be backhanded across the face.  His
weapon went flying as he sprawled across the room, landing hard against
the far wall.
   "Thhhat'ss wwhhatt Iii sssaiiddd," it confirmed.
   I'm going to have to learn to stop doing that, he groaned to himself.
   Terianne looked toward him.  In his heart, he could hear her singing
for help, but she gave no outward sign that anything could be wrong.
   He stood himself upright and spread his arms to his sides.  Terianne
began to follow suit, but the threads quickly tightened around her,
pinning her arms tight against her.  It was the first time he'd ever
seen a startled look on her face.  The four Shinma began a tug-of-war to
see who would have the privilege of destroying the lovely huntress.
   PCHammer narrowed his eyes with determination.  A burning aura formed
around him, and he levitated from the ground.  If he'd known what he was
doing, the realization would have probably broken his concentration.
His focus was his soul-partner, and, for her sake, he could not afford
to fail.
   Releasing a whimper as the breath was squeezed from her lungs by the
confining strands, Terianne closed her eyes.  The Shinma could bind her
body, and so prevent her from using her powers -- but they could not
contain her soul.
   Drifting forward, PCHammer gestured meticulously, forming mystic
script in the air from a language he never knew.  With a final flourish,
his right hand snapped forward, and a pole of glowing ruby shot forth.
It whirled around Terianne, severing the tendrils that held her and
sending the Shinma scattering backward, yowling in pain.
   The lifeless strings dissipated, and Terianne's eyes opened with a
burning anger as she spread her arms to match PCHammer's pose.  He
drifted behind her, and they hovered back to back.
   "Your resistance has only served to bring you suffering," they
stated.  "Return where you belong."  With that, the Shinma hunters
clapped their hands together.  Holes opened in the very fabric of
reality, one below each of the rogue Shinma.  The four clawed vainly at
empty air, screaming as they were pulled into their native realm.  The
openings closed up behind them, and the room was dark and silent.
   The hunters turned to face each other as Hammer lowered his arms,
dropping to the floor.  Once on his feet, his legs buckled under him and
he began to fall, but Teri caught him, lifting him up and cradling him
in her arms like an oversized child.  He sleepily cuddled against her
bosom, slowly regaining consciousness as she carried him out of the
building, into the light of the streetlamps.
   His face colored when he realized what he was cuddling.
   "Teri..."
   She smiled down at him, giggling lightly.  "You are awake."
   "Yeah.  Teri, I ... I'm sorry."
   "You apologize for rescuing me."
   "No, I apolog-- I mean, I'm sorry I messed up back there.  I should
have been there sooner, but I just can't move as quickly as I used to."
   "If that is your reasoning, I should be the one asking forgiveness.
I allowed the Shinma to discover me before you could assist me."
   "You had no control over that."
   "Exactly."
   PCHammer sighed.  She never let him get away with any guilt-tripping.
"Oh, Teri."
   She kissed him on the forehead as she lifted herself into the air,
carrying him home.  "Rest now, PCHammer."
   He offered no further argument.  As he let his head drop back onto
her and closed his eyes, she smiled down at him.  It was a frightening
thing that was happening to him.  But he looked so cute.
   One of his hands fell onto hers.  She held him tighter and sang him
to sleep.

   Jiro kept a careful watch on the new power unit's output levels.
   His work on the more compact generator had intensified, driven by the
realization that all of the Shogun Sabres were severely afflicted with
SD disease.  He'd tried designing new hardsuits to fit their shorter
stature, but the old power plant was just too big, and would throw them
off-balance during intensive maneuvers.  Without this new power source,
the Shogun Sabres could hang up their helmets right now.
   He worked hard, and, for the most part, he worked alone.  Kima had
needed to have his artificial hand completely removed for the time
being, due to the fact that it just didn't fit anymore.  He was still in
the hospital, too doped-up on pain killers to be of any help.
   Right now, though, Jiro wasn't alone.  He'd managed to pull Pomru
from his NHS Enterprises duties, and hauled Dnab out of the kitchen.
Dnab was in the "test suit", which had been reduced to a set of joint-
sensors to make it usable even if they shrank further.  Pomru was
working the regulator controls, a task Jiro would have taken himself if
his arms were long enough to reach them while he was working on the
modulators.
   "90% and stable."
   "Good.  Bring it up slowly.  Keep up with the acrobatics, Dnab."
   "Acrobatics, nothing.  I got an itch on my back!"
   "Good, at least you have incentive.  93%.  Keep it coming, Pom."
   "Roger-dodger."
   "95 ... still looking good."
   "Where?"
   "Where what?"
   "Where's Chunners?"
   "Not here.  Probably home, inking some pages for her next issue."
   "Well, you said 'still looking--'"
   "Jeez, you just don't stop, do you?  98 ... 99 ... 100."  Jiro rose
slowly to a standing position.  "Okay, Dnab.  Try the arm-cannon."
   Dnab pressed a couple switches on a panel beside him.  "Charging ...
halfway ... fluctuating at 78%, doesn't look good..."
   "I see it."  Jiro considered his display, then gave a slight twist to
a large dial near the bottom of his console.  "How's that?"
   "Up we go ... 100%.  Here goes nothing."  Dnab touched another switch
as Pomru and Jiro looked out the thick, blast-proof window.
   The armor-doll, standing with one arm aimed at a thick plate and the
other appearing to mime a hunt-and-peck typist, fired a blast from its
arm-cannon.  The bright beam leaped forward and impacted the target
plate, charring its surface and hurling it violently against the far
wall.
   "Cool.  Huhuhuh."
   "Ready to fire again."
   Jiro looked back at Dnab, surprised.  "Already?"
   "Yup."
   Pomru looked his displays over.  "He's right.  The current power
curve is even more stable than our usual hardsuit power plants.  We
could probably bump it up to 150% output with no problems."
   Jiro blinked.  "Wow.  Guess we got smaller and streamlined, too."
   "DON'T SAY THAT WORD!" his companions shouted.  Pomru hissed and
cringed as Dnab formed a cross with two nearby leg-pieces.
   "Whoops -- sorry."

   Kallen stopped at the door, straightening his lab coat and pushing an
undisciplined strand of hair off his forehead.  Taking a deep breath, he
pushed the door open and greeted his guests.
   "Good afternoon, gentlemen.  I'm glad you both could see this."
   "It's a pleasure, Dr. Kallen," AD Police Chief Gundam said, reaching
down and shaking the SD'ed scientist's hand firmly.  "This entire city's
future is at stake, and any step that could isolate this disease is more
than welcome."
   "Indeed," Scanner added, seeming to remain aloof, as always.  "This
malady has cost us much in productivity and injuries.  We are eager to
see a resolution."
   "Well," Kallen said, "I'll admit what we've found isn't much, but
it's more than we've had before.  Come this way, please."  He beckoned
them through the door, and they followed his lead.
   Gundam and Scanner looked around curiously as they walked through the
lab.  Several lab techs, many severely SD'ed and a few not SD'ed at all,
carried tubes, beakers and syringes from one lab instrument to another.
Gundam couldn't even begin to guess at the purposes of the devices they
were using.
   Kallen offered a nutshell explanation for the activity.  "We've been
performing every test we could think of on every kind of sample we could
get from our test volunteers -- blood, urine, saliva, stool, you name
it.  It was kind of you to offer paid leave to any ADP officers who
volunteered, Chief Gundam."
   "We're just doing our jobs, Doctor."
   "Nonetheless, your support is appreciated.  As is your ongoing
financial support, Mr. Scanner.  I'm sure you know how unprofitable such
community service will probably be."
   "The well-being of the community should always be a concern for any
businessman, Doctor.  You are ... quite welcome."
   "Um ... thanks."  Scanner's dispassionate tone continued to catch
Kallen off-guard as he stammered what passed for his reply.
   "Hey, Chief."
   The group stopped as Gundam turned to face the familiar voices off to
one side, addressing him from medical beds with IV tubes still in their
arms.  "Well, Sergeants Radman and Jyanken.  Feeling well?"
   "I'm a little under the weather," Radman smirked.
   "You're little, all right," Jyanken deadpanned, "and the weather
wouldn't have to be too high up."
   "Yeah, you just be glad I can't reach you from here, smart-ass."
   "You sure talk big for a little guy."
   "Okay, break it up, you two."  Gundam's smile let them know he was
glad they were in good spirits, even if their behavior left something to
be desired.  "Soon as they're done with you here, I want you back in
uniform.  Got it?"
   The pair snapped to attention, albeit horizontally.  "Yes, sir!"
   "Good."  He turned to face Kallen once more.  "Doctor, shall we?"
   "Of course."  The scientist led them past the endless parade of lab
coats and equipment to a stark conference room.  Once his guests were
seated and the noise of the laboratory was muffled by the closed door,
he spoke.
   "I'd like to once again thank you for your cooperation, Chief Gundam.
The addition of your people made our sample base large enough to be
certain that we weren't just seeing some kind of common variation.  We
can now say for certain what is happening inside the body of an SD-
inflicted person, such as myself."
   "Dwarfism is usually caused by some kind of gland imbalance, isn't
it?" Gundam offered.
   "Gland failure, actually.  The gland that regulates growth of the
body ceases functioning at an early age, so the person never grows up,
physically.  That was the first thing we checked, in fact."
   "And that wasn't it."
   "Correct.  Everything was in perfect working order.  It was the same
story in all glands and organs, in fact, unless the person we examined
had some other disorder."
   "So that rules out that possibility."
   "Only in the sense of something affecting the glands themselves.  The
actual problem, as we discovered, is outside of them, in the hormones
they produce."
   "Something is actually altering the way the glands work?"
   "Actually, no.  Here, let me pull down a chart."  Kallen stood and
pressed a button on a nearby wall, producing a diagram of the human
body.  He pulled a telescoping pointer from his coat.  "I feel lost if
I'm not pointing at something," he grinned.
   "Anyway, we discovered that the glands were producing perfectly
normal hormones when we sampled them at the source.  However, when we
took hormone samples from other points in the body of an SD'ed
individual, what we found was slightly different, slightly ... altered."
   "A bio-chemical agent," Scanner intoned.
   "Our hypothesis precisely, Mr. Scanner.  A new compound has worked
its way into the body system, bonds itself to the hormones, and produces
the physical effects we're all so familiar with."
   "Have you managed to isolate this bio-agent?" Gundam queried.
   "It hasn't been easy, to be honest.  In addition to being able to
replicate itself with in th body of its victim, the thing works fast,
and actually alters itself in the process of bonding.  We've only been
able to see its residue in a spectrographic analysis of blood, urine and
stool samples."
   "I see.  And why are some people not affected?  Are they immune?"
   Kallen collapsed his pointer and pressed another button, causing the
diagram to retreat to its hiding place.  "As far as we can tell, people
who aren't affected by SD simply haven't been exposed to it.  They show
no residues in their wastes, and have no altered hormones in their
system."
   Gundam sat forward again.  "That certainly restricts the means by
which the agent could be carried.  It can't be in the city water, or
spread through the air, or absorbed through the skin.  Most of my
department is SD'ed, and I still haven't caught it."
   "The, er, lab pool odds are favoring some kind of ingested substance.
Something SD'ed people have eaten, or drank."  Kallen seemed embarrassed
to admit that anyone would take bets on such a topic.  "We still don't
have any real evidence to back this up, of course, nor any means of
reversing the process."
   After a long silence, Gundam and Scanner stood.  "Thank you, Doctor,"
Scanner stated.  "You have been most helpful."
   "I'll second that," Gundam added.  "Congratulations, Doc."
   Kallen put a hand behind his head.  "Well, don't congratulate me
until we find a cure for this."
   There was a sudden, excited rap at the conference room door.  It flew
open, and a cute, blond lab girl entered.  "Dr. Kallen, Dr. Xa--"  She
looked apprehensively at the tall men staring at her.  "Oops.  I hope I
didn't interrupt anything."
   "No, Deedo, we'd just finished.  Gentlemen, this is Deedlit.  She's
one of our youngest lab techs."
   "How do you do, Miss Deedlit.  I'm Gundam, Chief of the ADP."  Gundam
offered his hand, which Deedlit enthusiastically accepted.
   "Wow, a real, live ADP commander!"  Her huge blue eyes sparkled.
"I'm honored!"  Suddenly, she gasped, remembering why she was there in
the first place.  "Dr. Kallen, come quick!"
   Kallen followed her as she dragged him by the arm.  "What is it,
Deedo?"
   "We've found a match!"
   "A match?  A match for what?"
   "For the residue!  We found the bio-agent residue in a cola can!"
   Scanner and Gundam looked at each other as Kallen rushed out of the
room, now easily as giddy as Deedlit.


                       Tales of the Shogun Sabres

                            TOO CUTE TO LIVE

                 Chapter 4:  Short People Got No Reason


   Kallen and Gundam rushed after the energetic young Deedlit as she
scampered across the laboratory.  She was difficult to keep up with,
even with her tiny SD'ed legs.  Scanner followed at a relaxed pace.
   Deedlit reached the GC/MS station first.  "They're here, they're
here, show them, show them!" she shouted, bouncing up and down and
waving her arms, barely able to contain herself.
   The operator, a bearded man who would have been considered somewhat
short if he weren't among SD'ed folk, turned to her slowly.  "Deedo,
please!  It's not going to disappear if they take their time.  Calm
down!"
   Her spastic hopping abruptly ceased, and she assumed a penitent pose.
"Sorry."
   He patted her on the head.  "It's all right this time.  At least you
didn't break anything, like when you--"
   "Hey, you don't have to tell everyone my life story!"  Her face
flushed with anger and embarrassment.  Apparently, she was quite
familiar with the tale he was about to tell.
   "What's this about breaking things?"  Kallen couldn't resist the urge
to find out what other expressions he could cull from Deedlit's face.
   After an astonished stare, she offered him a nervous grin,
frantically waving off the question with her tiny hand.  "Nothing,
nothing, Dr. Kallen!  Really!"
   "Is that so."  He gave her a sidelong stare, then decided to move
along to the reason he'd followed her.  "And just how is it that you
came to be doing spectrographic analyses of soda pop?"
   "Um ... well..."  Deedlit looked at the ground and shuffled her feet.
   "Spill it, Deedo."
   She sighed as she began.  "I was running some errands in the lab, you
know, 'cause that's what I do here -- you know that, but I said that so
Chief Gunny would know -- well, ol' Vatshu here tells me to get him the
calibration solution for the GC/MS, and I do that, and he tells me to
put it in the measurement thingie, but I have the solution in one hand
and my Kawaii-Cola in the other, 'cause I just got one from the machine,
y'know, and, well..."  Her voice trailed off.
   "She dumped her cola in the machine," Vatshu impatiently completed.
   "It was an accident!" she whined defensively.  "I didn't even get to
drink any of it yet."
   Kallen crossed his arms with a smirk.  "I suppose you didn't notice
your error until you took a sip of the calibration solution."
   She looked at him, perplexed.  "How'd you know that?"
   "Lucky guess.  Oh, by the way, your eyes don't match."
   "Huh?  Whoops!"  Deedlit was immediately on her hands and knees,
searching the floor.  "There it is!  C'mere, you!"  She stood up,
holding a large, blue contact lens.  Where she got a colored contact
that size, Gundam couldn't even guess.  As she put it back in its place,
he noticed that her eyes were actually a rich, emerald green.
   "All set!"  Deedlit smiled happily, then made a face.  "Anyway, the
calibration stuff has no future on the market, lemme tellya.  Ick."
   Gundam regarded the can on the table.  The familiar image of the
happy little SD girl beamed at him.  He wondered why it was that the
author made them overlook such obvious clues.
   Kallen continued to regard the humiliated little Deedlit.  "So you're
saying that you accidentally dumped your soda into our multi-million
dollar precision measurement equipment?"
   "Well ... I guess so."
   "What was that?"
   She withered under his scrutinizing gaze.  "Yes, sir," she whimpered.
She waited quietly for him to bawl her out.
   She nearly had a heart attack when he hugged her, giggling with an
enormous grin.
   "Deedlit, I could KISS you!  In fact, I think I will!"  He did, and
she turned deep crimson in reply.
   Vatshu peered up from his seat at Gundam and Scanner, who watched the
antics silently.  "The scientific process," he said with a shrug.
   Kallen finally finished his little victory dance with the red-faced
blonde tech.  He cleared his throat, straightened his lab coat and made
another attempt to push his hair off his forehead.  "Vatshu, Deedlit, I
want the two of you to test other types of soda, starting with Dr.
Pepper.  I want a comprehensive analysis of Kawaii-Cola's chemical
makeup, and a comparison with other sodas, in twenty-four hours.  In
forty-eight hours I want to know what should be required to separate the
bio-agent from Kawaii-Cola.  The full resources of this laboratory are
at your disposal.  Understood?"
   "Yes, sir!" the duo said, saluting and making a dash for the vending
machines.  Nearby lab workers, having overheard the entire exchange,
began taking samples of Kawaii-Cola from cans scattered throughout the
lab.
   Kallen let his shoulders relax, then turned to face Scanner and
Gundam.  "Well, gentlemen, it appears we're doing better than I thought.
I'm glad you could see this."
   "Should I make a statement to the press, Doctor?" Gundam offered.
   "That would be very kind of you, Chief Gundam.  Remember that the
agent manufactures more of itself in the body, so not drinking the cola
won't reverse its effect."
   "I see.  Thanks for the clarification.  Good luck, Dr. Kallen."
   "And to you too, Chief.  I assume the police will be going after
Kawaii-Cola's creators to find out what they know about this."
   "You'd better believe it, Doc.  I'll have every flatfoot in the
country breathing down this guy's back before the day's out."  Gundam
strode briskly toward the exit, nearly tripping over Deedlit as she
burst back into the lab with an armload of soda cans.
   Scanner regarded Kallen coolly.  "Your people have done well, Dr.
Kallen.  Continue the research.  We shall await your next report."  He
turned and left, not visibly hurried at all.
   Kallen shivered as Scanner closed the door behind himself.  Yow, what
a creepy guy.  Oh well, he pays the bills.

   Pai looked out the window of his office, smiling at the cuddly little
people as they walked, scampered and rode past.  Yes, it was a grand
success.  There were some people who weren't affected, but that didn't
bother him at all.  They probably just weren't soda drinkers.
   Well, that would change soon.  Very soon.  He began laughing aloud as
he thought of how he was about to forever alter the world.  He took the
remote control in his hand and snapped the large television at the far
side of his room on, to watch the evening news.
   The anchorwoman was looking cuter by the day, as well.  He grinned as
her image came on the screen.  She still shuffled the cue-sheets before
her with the precision of a master.  Pai leaned back in his chair,
putting his feet up on his desk.
   "Good evening.  This is the Mega-City Evening News; I'm LadyLove,
reporting.
   "Tonight's top story: AD Police Chief Gundam, in an emergency press
release only minutes ago, announced that a medical laboratory affiliated
with Scanner Services has discovered the cause of SD disease."
   Pai's chair capsized with a loud thump, throwing him to the floor.
He scrambled to his knees, pulling his head onto his desk, to continue
watching the newscast.
   "Ready for this, folks?  It's Kawaii-Cola.  Yes, the most popular
soft drink in Mega-City has been the mysterious culprit behind the
bizarre super-deformation of the town's populace.  According to the
press release, the drink is actually a cleverly-disguised bio-chemical
agent that bonds with the body's hormones, producing the cute, yet
sometimes deadly effects we've all come to know so well.
   "The press release also emphasizes that once the bio-agent enters
your system, it actually manufactures more of itself.  So not drinking
Kawaii-Cola will not cure you of the disease, but if you've never had
any yet, now is no time to start.  Work is already underway on a
possible cure for SD, but Chief Gundam points out that, as this
connection was only discovered by pure luck, chances of stumbling upon a
cure are slim at best.
   "Pai, the creator of Kawaii-Cola and president of the Kawaii-Cola
Company, is currently wanted for questioning by the ADP."
   He snapped off the television.  So, they've chanced upon the unique
properties of Kawaii-Cola.  No matter.  In a few days, this entire
planet will be insufferably cute!
   His thoughts were interrupted by the sound of sirens and screaming
tires.  A glance out the window confirmed that the ADP had arrived in
force.  He should have several minutes as they worked their way up to
his office.
   Then he heard the footsteps in the hallway.  Many running feet, all
coming closer.  So, they'd thought to send a more stealthful force ahead
of the rest.  Remarkably clever for someone on a municipal payroll.
Perhaps this situation called for more drastic measures.
   He pushed down on the nameplate on his desk.

   Chico-san and Nene held their Alystyre Micro-Magnum ZZ's at the ready
as they scurried down the corridor, following Jyanken's lead along with
five other officers.  Jyanken, for his part, hefted a Smith Brothers
Not Quite An AK-47 But It'll Do In A Pinch semi-auto rifle in his arms
and jogged watchfully, careful not to leave his mostly-diminutive task
force behind.  Pai wasn't exactly on the "armed and dangerous" list, but
there was no sense in taking unnecessary chances.
   They rounded one final corner, entering the reception area for the
company president's office.  The receptionist's desk was vacant, as
she'd already gone home for the day, but the jacked-up chair behind it
readily told the officers that even Pai's employees were not exempt from
his demented society-wide experiment.
   Jyanken waved his arm to the left, and four of the officers ran into
positions against the wall, kneeling and aiming their weapons at the
heavy double-doors leading to the office itself.  Another wave to the
right, and the rest set themselves up similarly on the opposite side.
He held up an open hand, indicating that noone was to fire until they
were fired upon, and spoke to the door.
   "Mr. Pai, this is the Armored Defense Police!  We have a warrant for
your arrest!  Surrender quietly, or we'll take you by force!"
   A long, tense moment followed.
   No response.
   Jyanken walked forward, preparing to open the door with his right
foot.  He didn't notice the way the floor gave ever-so-slightly when he
stepped forward, nor did he see the four pictures on the side walls
sliding silently open to reveal large-calibre automatic rifles.
   What he did notice was the telephone cable that his feet caught on as
he strode toward the door, and only when it pulled on his ankles,
sending him sprawling gracelessly to the carpet.
   Of course, the sound of machine-gun fire whizzing past where his head
had been got his attention quite readily, too.
   "LOOK OUT!" he shouted from his face-down position in the middle of
the room, scrambling to his knees and trying to be heard over the
deafening roar of gunfire around him.
   Nene was already drawing a bead on one of the guns and firing at it,
hoping to dislodge it from its aiming mechanism.  Apparently, another of
them got the same idea as it turned toward her and blasted the weapon
from her grasp with a single, precise shot.  She screeched and grabbed
her bleeding hand, unaware that the gun she'd been aiming for was now
returning the favor.
   Chico-san saw it, though.  "NENE!"  He jumped at her and sent them
both tumbling to the floor.  Nene was treated to the peculiar popping
sound of air collapsing behind the bullet that bit through her flaming
red hair.  She didn't complain -- if she hadn't been moved, it would
have struck her right between the eyes.
   "RUN AWAY!" Jyanken shouted, scurrying toward the room's exit as fast
as his hands and knees would carry him.  The rest of his group eagerly
followed suit with hot lead dogging their heels.

   Pai chuckled at the sounds of chaos on the other side of his door.
Come after me, will they?  If they're lucky, they'll live to regret
their arrogance.
   He decided to skip the usual round of megalomaniacal laughter, and
moved a small statuette of the Kawaii-Cola girl across his desk.  One of
the side walls opened soundlessly; he entered the hidden corridor, and
it closed behind him with equal stealth.
   Those ingrates will never stop me.  They'll all be adorable whether
they think they'll like it or not!

   Gundam waited impatiently for the advance team to return from their
"surprise" assault.  He grumbled humorlessly.  If it didn't take so
damned long to get an arrest warrant in this town, they'd already have
this looney-toon in custody.  As it was, they had to race to get here
before the evening news came on, spilling the beans on their plan.
   Sometimes, the news people could be such a pain in th--
   The door in front of him burst open, releasing a small flood of ADP
officers.  Jyanken ran in the lead with a little red-haired girl in his
arms, her hands drenched in crimson.  "Get the medics!  Romanova took a
hit!"
   Gundam swore silently.  He was afraid this would happen.  Turning to
his side, he bellowed, "You heard the man!  Move!"  The ADP convoy was
instantly a swarm of activity.
   Jyanken put Nene on the ground, leaving her in the care of her
partner, Chico-san.  As they waited for the paramedics, he continued
forward, meeting Chief Gundam with a sharp salute at the edge of the
flock of parked police cars.
   Gundam returned it.  "No luck, Lieutenant?"
   Jyanken shook his head.  "Sorry, Chief.  He had a trap set up in his
receptionist's office.  We don't even know for sure whether he's in
there; we didn't see or hear from him."
   "So he's on to us."
   "We could send an ESWAT team in from the outside, or call in PCHammer
and the assault suits."
   Gundam snorted.  "No, we need to take this guy alive if we ever want
to get a cure.  Assault suits and ESWAT tactics tend to be a little too
heavy on the firepower for that.  Besides, we don't know what other
surprises this clown may have."  He took a step away from Jyanken as the
camera dollied up to him for a dramatic closing line.
   "I think it's time to call on some friends."

   The red telephone sang its brash, oscillating melody to whoever cared
to listen.  It snared Shogun's attention instantly.  He set the "away"
flag on his IRC session, scampered across the room, leaped onto the
chair, leaned over the desk and grabbed the receiver.  "Shogun Sabres."
   "Ah, good, you're there.  This is ADP Chief Gundam.  I'm calling from
a pay phone."
   Well, well, Chief Gundam.  There was a name Shogun hadn't heard in
nearly five minutes.  "Nice to hear from you, Chief.  You're calling to
take us up on our promise, I presume.  Any place in particular you'd
like to rendezvous?"
   "You presume correctly.  Come to the Kawaii-Cola Company offices as
soon as you can.  Any estimates on when you can be here?"
   "You're in luck, Chief.  Everyone's here.  We just finished a new set
of suits to fit our cute little bodies.  You'll see us in five minutes."
   "Excellent.  Thanks for the help."
   Shogun put the receiver back down and hurried to the nearby room.
Pomru, Dnab and Chun-Li were there, in various stages of hardsuit-dress,
under Jiro's watchful eye.
   "Look alive, people!"
   "What's cookin', Shogie?" Pomru quipped, pulling his helmet on.
   Shogun stepped into his suit, and it began fastening itself around
him.  "We'll be at the Kawaii-Cola corporate HQ in five minutes."
   Dnab looked at him, flexing a tiny gauntlet.  "Why?"
   "Because that's where Chief Gundam needs us."
   Chun-Li and Pomru jogged over to the flight-boosters, which latched
themselves to the backs of their hardsuits.  "I hope we can get some
free samples," Chun said.
   "I doubt that.  We're probably going after Pai, the company
president."
   Chun flipped her faceplate up to give Shogun a confused look.  He
didn't see it, though, because he was still suiting up.  "What, is
making a great soda a crime now?"
   "No, but making the bio-agent responsible for SD disease is."
   "WHAT?"  Everyone else stopped and looked at Shogun.
   "They announced it on the news just a few minutes ago.  Kawaii-Cola
is the carrier for SD disease."
   Dnab blinked.  "Well," he mumbled, "guess that explains why Jyanken
didn't get it."
   Pomru worriedly looked at Chun-Li.  Her face was starting to redden
with anger.  "HE ... did THIS--"  She held her little hands in front of
her.  "...to ME??"  She whirled and put her fist through the wall with a
roar.  "I'LL KILL THAT BASTARD!"
   "Chun!  Control yourself!"  Shogun strode forward, still an imposing,
authoritative figure, even in an SD hardsuit.
   Chun-Li faced Shogun, livid with rage, not about to back down.
"NOBODY SCREWS WITH ME LIKE THAT AND GETS AWAY WITH IT!  HE'S GOING TO
PAY FOR--"
   "If Pai dies, the secrets of SD disease die with him," Shogun
bellowed as levelly as he could.  "Including any chance of a cure!  Got
that?"
   She glared at him for a long, tense moment, then swallowed her pride.
"All right."  Her eyes told Shogun that she wasn't about to forgive the
man for meddling with her life, but he knew she could be taken at her
word.
   "Good.  We're outta here."  The flight-booster made its final links
to Shogun's back, and he led the Sabres out of the lab, to their Secret
Exit (tm).
   People on IRC chuckled as they read Shogun's notice:

       *** Shogun is away: saving the world (again)

   Gundam checked his watch.  Since calling for the Shogun Sabres, it'd
been ... four minutes, thirty seconds.
   The paramedics and ambulance had been and gone.  Sgt. Romanova was on
her way to the hospital.  She'd be okay; the shot had missed the bones
in her hand and passed clean through, so she just needed to rest and
wait for the wound to close.  It could have been worse -- much worse.
   He put his arm behind his back, much like his other one, and paced
slowly forward, scanning the cityscape around him.
   "Lighten up, Chief," Jyanken said casually, leaning on a squad car
behind him.  "It's not like it's your fault that we have to call in
outside help."
   "I have to agree," Chico-san added.  He was sitting up on the car's
hood, swinging his little feet nervously.  He'd wanted to accompany his
downed partner in the ambulance, but Gundam wanted all the remaining
members of the task force handy to answer any questions the Shogun
Sabres may have had.  "This fruitcake's obviously ready to declare war
on anyone who tries to stop him."
   "We can't very well start driving around in tanks," Jyanken chuckled.
   A smiling, wide-eyed brunette popped her head up from behind another
car.  "Did someone mention tanks?" she asked hopefully.
   "Yeah, Leona, but we're still not getting any."
   Corporal Ozaki pouted and returned to her duties.
   Gundam grunted.  "I still don't like the idea of having to call on
something I don't directly control."
   Chico-san shrugged.  "Well, there's a first time for everything."
   Gundam nodded.  This was the first time he'd actually taken Shogun up
on his offer, extended to him back at the end of the Anime War Crisis in
return for being struck from the "Wanted" list.  PCHammer was the ADP's
de facto Shogun Sabres liason, but he was back at HQ, complaining about
his paperwork, as usual.
   Abruptly, Gundam stopped pacing, his eyes fixed skyward.  He took
another glance at his watch.  Well, what do you know.
   They're right on time.

   "Kawaii-Cola building ho!" Dnab called out as the building bearing
the familiar SD mascot came into view.
   "About time," Chun-Li grated.  Shogun reminded himself that he would
have to keep a close watch on her.  If left alone with Pai for even a
moment, she would definitely liberate his head from his neck without a
second thought.
   Pomru's attention was drawn to the small congregation of flashing
lights at the building's entrance.  "Looks like they already tried to
reel 'im in, boss."
   "I figured as much," Shogun replied.  "That's probably why Gundam
called for us in the first place -- Pai managed to elude them."
   "That's an understatement," Dnab noted, looking in a slightly
different direction.  "There's an ambulance that looks like it's going
from the K-C building to the hospital."
   "I see," Shogun muttered, spotting the red-and-white van screaming
hurriedly through midtown traffic.  "So much for any hope of a milk run.
This guy's dangerous."
   "So am I," Chun-Li snarled.  The edge in her voice told even Dnab not
to try any smart-alecky follow-up lines.
   Save for the roar of their booster jets, the Shogun Sabres flew the
remaining distance in silence.

   The four pair of armored boots touched down with a satisfying clack
of polymer-titanium on concrete.  The whine of the booster turbines
diminished to a hum, then to silence.  With practiced ease, the four
little techno-knights removed the flight boosters that dwarfed them in
size, setting them on the ground and moving to stand in a diamond
formation, facing the group of ADP officers standing patiently nearby.
   Gundam stepped forward.  "Good afternoon, Shogun Sabres."
   "They've been better," grumbled Chun-Li.  A small image window opened
in her field of view; in it, Shogun gave her a reprimanding look.
   "I'm afraid I have to agree with you," Gundam sighed.  "This hasn't
been one of our shining days.  If we could have been here just five
minutes sooner, you most likely wouldn't be here."
   Shogun nodded.  "I assume the target is Pai, sir."
   "That's correct.  A group of officers tried to take his office by
surprise, but were driven back by a booby-trap in his reception area.
Everyone in that strike force is here behind me, save Sergeant
Romanova, who was injured."
   "Aww, rats," Dnab groaned.  "I wanted to see Sergeant Romanova again.
She's so cute.  Ow!"  Chun-Li gave him a powered swat to the back of his
helmet.
   "Can you point out the location of Pai's office from the outside?"
Shogun queried.
   Jyanken responded.  "It should be directly above the main entrance,
fourth floor."  He pointed needlessly toward the appropriate windows.
   "Thank you.  Chief, send your troops back to the room.  We'll enter
from this side and disarm whatever traps may be set."  He turned to
Jyanken and the rest of the strike group.  "Stay outside of the
reception area until we give you an all-clear.  Understood?"
   "Understood."  Jyanken turned, grabbed his rifle, and jogged back
into the building, his team following close behind.
   "Great."  Shogun took a step forward, striking a pose.  As one, the
Sabres tensed behind him, preparing to spring into the sky at his
perpetually mispronounced command.
   He took a deep breath.  "Shogun Sabres -- SanGUU!"

                       Tales of the Shogun Sabres

                            TOO CUTE TO LIVE

                         Chapter 5:  Booby Trap


   The elevator gave off a soft electronic chime as the thick steel
doors parted.  Pai had wanted one that made no sound at all, but no such
thing could be found for any price, so he had to settle for one that
beeped.  At least it was better than one with a loud bell on it.
   He strode briskly out of the lift, confidently yet nervously entering
his ultra-secret, sub-sub-sub-basement workshop, one hundred fifty feet
underneath the Kawaii-Cola building.  Construction of this addition had
been under his personal supervision and with the use of as little
manpower as possible.  If the secrecy of such a place concerns you,
let's just say that none of the workers will be telling anyone about
this particular underground hacienda; after all, any self-respecting mad
scientist has to have some deadly secrets.
   Pai looked around with distaste.  He hadn't counted on the
possibility of activating "Operation Small World" so soon; in fact, he'd
hoped to have at least another two months to get everything set up.  As
it was, none of the necessary equipment was even plugged in, let alone
hooked up and tested, and some of it still needed to be designed.
   To be honest, it was a mess.  Panels and cables were lying
everywhere, nothing where it belonged.  Drums of his concentrated SD
formula were in one corner, still waiting for a proper transport and
distribution system to be constructed.
   Pai sighed.  He'd wanted a nice, organized mad-scientist's workshop
to work in.  Now, he'd just have to make do with a lab that looked more
like the hacker's desk from _Jurassic Park_.
   He walked over to the only clean, connected panel and flipped a
large, green switch.  The words SECURITY ARMED winked on, and the
monitor above them came to life, displaying views of his office and
reception area.
   At least he would still have something to watch while he got set up.
In fact, something interesting was coming into view now.

   Their maneuvering thrusters emitting flaming tongues of brilliant
blue, the Shogun Sabres quickly covered the distance to the office
window pointed out to them only moments ago.  Shogun assumed a fair
distance from the mostly-reflective pane, and his companions fell into
formation beside him.
   "Okay, folks," he said quietly.  "It's showtime.  Chun, if you would
be so kind?"
   "Gladly," she growled.  She charged forward, thrusters flaring, eager
to beat the living hell out of anything dumb enough to oppose her.  The
window would do nicely, for a starter.
   A small communications window opened in Shogun's view, and Pomru's
image addressed him privately.  "It's booby-trapped, most likely."
   "I know that, and you know that," Shogun replied.  "But she needs
something to knock some sense back into her, or at least to vent some of
that anger she's been carrying."  The comm window closed.
   Chun-Li flew toward the window, fists first, Superman style.  Nothing
could hold her, nothing could stop her; she was invincible.
   Or so she liked to think.
   She was a foot away from the mirrored surface when her fists struck
something that refused to give way.  Her elbows buckled, flexing as her
hands were forced back, allowing her to slam face-first against the
unseen barrier.
   "Ow!  What the--?"  She pushed herself away from it, whatever it was.
She felt it with her gauntleted hand, tapping it, pushing against it,
looking for a soft spot.  Finding none, she battered at it with her
armored fists.  It sparked when she struck it, but did not give way.
   Her ire rising to the occasion, Chun-Li drew her beam-saber with a
snarl.  A mere hilt when attached to her hardsuit, it instantly flared
to life when activated by the power couplings in her gauntlet.
   "Let's see you shrug THIS off!" she shouted, rearing back to stab
through the invisible obstruction, completely oblivious to the cry of
"No, WAIT!" from behind her.  She swung the sword forward, slicing at
the force-field before her, not really considering how the conflicting
energy fields could affect her.
   Her entire body stiffened and spasmed as she screamed in pain, barely
aware of the crackling electricity shooting up at her through her arms,
unable to pull herself away.  After ten seconds of living hell, her
armor's on-board computer declared it had had enough, shutting her
powered systems down.
   Her beam-saber died out, no longer able to draw on the armor's life-
giving power to sustain itself.  The energy feedback died out as well,
and Chun-Li's body relaxed, her hardsuit smoldering slightly from the
backlash but otherwise undamaged.
   Her thrusters shut off as well, and she dropped to the ground like a
stone.  The sudden shock of impact with the sidewalk re-started her
heart, which had gone into arrest only seconds before.  Her friends were
around her in a moment, with Dnab cradling her head in his lap, trying
to shake her back to health.
   "Chun-chan!  CHUN-CHAN!  Say something!"  Her opened her faceplate
and removed one of his gauntlets.  He sighed with relief when he felt
under her nose.  She was still breathing.
   He continued more quietly.  "Chun-chaaaaan... Chun-chaaaaaan..." he
sang quietly.  After a couple minutes, her lips moved slightly, and he
bent over her to listen to her tender words.
   "Don't call me that, you ass," she hissed.
   He lifted his head and looked at Shogun and Pomru, slammming her
faceplate shut.  "She's fine."
   "And I'm Kenichi Sonoda," Pomru replied flatly.  "We'll have to take
her back to HQ and have Jiro look after her while we finish this up."
   Chun-Li stirred, trying to slowly wriggle out of Dnab's grasp.  "Nnnn
... no," she groaned.  "Can't let ... that bastard..."
   "You'll never make it like this," Shogun said gently to her, pushing
her back down with a hand to her shoulder.  "Revenge isn't enough to
keep anyone going.  You need to rest."
   "No."  Her voice was still weak, but adamant.  "I have to ... can't
give up.  Never give up."  She pushed herself into a sitting position.
"Help me stand."
   Dnab and Shogun lifted her gently to her feet.  "You're pushing
yourself," Shogun chided.
   He could almost see a tired smile through her helmet.  "Don't I
always?"  She took a stiff step forward, stumbling slightly.  She
managed to recover and remain upright, but her normally fluid, almost
artistic movements were now jerky and graceless.
   Pomru nodded.  "Yes, and it's going to be the death of you one of
these days."
   Chun turned to face Shogun once more.  She trembled slightly from the
effort of merely standing.  "Shogun..."
   "I know," he said resignedly, putting up his hands.  "This is
something you have to do.  I won't try to stop you, though I really
should."
   "Thanks."  She tried to strike a pose and directed a quaking arm
toward the high window.  "Now, let's get that creep."  Her hardsuit
power grid reactivated, and her thrusters blazed brightly once more,
lifting her until she was about a foot below the window.  The other
three Shogun Sabres followed suit.
   Dnab spoke first.  "So, the physical approach doesn't work."
   "We haven't exhausted our options just yet," Shogun stated.  "Ready
to try a different method, Chun?"
   She nodded, aiming her right arm at the window, steadying it with her
left.  "Should have tried this first," she muttered as the cannon
charged.
   Shogun held up an open palm, and Chun refrained from firing for the
moment.  "Pomru, can you get a reading on the status of that field?"
   "Just a sec."  Pomru consulted his sensory array.  In his armor, he
carried some of the most sophisticated sensing equipment in the world,
utilizing technologies that would have turned any scientist or military
leader green with envy.  "Okay, I've got a bead on it.  Yowza."
   "Yowza?"
   "That's one hell of a force shield.  I don't think an arm-cannon can
crack it."
   "Well, keep an eye on it and see how it reacts."  Shogun gave him a
moment to prepare.  "Ready?"
   "Good to go."
   "Okay, Chun ... hit it."
   At Shogun's word, Chun-Li's hand spat a piercing yellow bolt of
concentrated plasma.  It thundered forward, seemingly unstoppable, until
it flattened and dissipated against the invisible barrier.  The area of
the shield where the bolt struck sizzled loudly, rippling with a fierce
violet lightning-storm for several seconds before once again quieting to
its former state.
   Dnab let out a low whistle.  "Cool fireworks."
   Shogun nodded.  "And none too stable-looking, either.  How's it look
to you, Pom?"
   "Very impressive.  Our old hardsuits wouldn't have been able to get
such a top-notch reaction from the shield, I can say that much.  But a
single blast won't do it."
   "How about two or more in a row?" Chun queried, looking for
alternatives.
   "Or a couple close together?" Dnab proffered.
   Pomru shook his head.  "The lightning effect was the field
compensating for the momentary weakness caused by the energy overload.
It appears quite capable of spreading the shockwave evenly, so no small,
stable opening could be forced.  To punch through, I'd say we need all
our cannons at max output in one spot."
   Shogun locked his elbow and turned to face the window, already
charging for the shot.  "Let's do it."  He was immediately joined by the
rest of the group, lining up around him, all equally distant from the
point he'd chosen as his target.  "Charged and ready."
   "Locked and loaded," Dnab responded.
   "R-ready to rock," Chun-Li confirmed, still a bit shaky.
   "Istanbul not Constantinople," Pomru added.
   All eyes turned slowly toward Pomru.
   "Okay, okay, I'm ready, too," he whined.
   Shogun nodded.  "Good.  On my mark, people..."  He paused for effect,
taking a deep breath.  "...FIRE!"
   Four searing bolts burst forth from four armored hands.  Four searing
bolts smashed against the offending force-barrier, all at once.  The
formerly unseen obstacle rippled and wobbled violently in shades of
violet and blue.
   Abruptly, the rippling effect gave way to an exploding shower of
bright sparkles and an intense pulse.   The unexpected blast threw the
Shogun Sabres backward, knocked the closest patrol cars back a foot or
two, flattened and scattered the ADP assault team who had found
themselves unable to enter through the shield, and pulverized every
window in the Kawaii-Cola building.
   Shogun, Dnab and Pomru used their boosters to keep from flying into
the building across the street.  So did Chun-Li, but not as quickly as
the other three.
   Pomru considered their handiwork.  "We may have overdone it just a
scoche."
   Dnab shrugged.  "Hey, the force-shield wasn't OUR idea."
   "But we can't ignore the fact that it happened," Shogun chided.  "We
don't work for the 3WA, you know."
   Chun-Li rejoined the group.  "So you're saying that it IS our fault?"
   Shogun considered that statement for a moment before replying.  "No.
Let's move in."  Dropping the subject entirely, the Shogun Sabres flew
into the office of Kawaii-Cola's president.

   Pai grumbled as the four armored figures touched down on the plush
crimson carpet of his former headquarters.  Their weapons had proven
most formidable in defeating his force-shield.
   What's this?  One of their members stumbled upon landing, dropping to
his little hands and knees.  Oh, yes, that was the one who foolishly
tried to cut into the barrier with an energy blade.  He must have
injured himself quite badly; he's showing signs of severe physical
trauma.
   Pai smiled.  Perhaps this one could be used ot bargain with the
others.  He's certainly in no condition to put up a hard struggle, and
Pai still needed quite a bit of time.  Not the two months he'd need to
do it properly, of course, but he had the parts and equipment to rig up
something to put his formula into the atmosphere and spread it,
literally, to the four winds.
   He also wouldn't have time to cut the formula, reducing its rate of
effectiveness.  Many more would surely suffer and die as the SD effect
("disease" is such an ugly word) took their bodies rapidly from full
size to munchkin size, sometimes in less than a minute, judging by the
most severe cases documented in the medical journals.  Well, that was on
their heads, now; they'd forced his hand.
  Pai turned his head, looking back at a small vial on one of the
tables.  It was an antidote he'd prepared, just in case the SD effect
turned out to have a severe reaction on himself.  After all, he couldn't
let the entire world go cutesy-wootsey and miss out on it just because
he was dead.  It was his plan, and he had to be there.
   He flipped on the inner office security, tapped through the severity
levels until "I KILL YOU DEAD" was displayed, set a capture option on
the injured techno-knight, and returned to his current project.

   "You should go back, Chun.  You'll be more of a hindrance in this
condition."
   Chun-Li growled at Shogun's quiet reprimand.  "I'd rather be dead
than let that dickweed get away with this.  Help me up."  Against his
better judgement, Shogun did so.  Just watching her try to walk, he
could tell she was in serious pain.
   Dnab looked around, making sure to keep Chun-Li within his sight at
all times.  "Okay, so we're in.  Now what?"
   "Pomru, try ultra-sonar.  If he's not here, he may have some secret
passage through a wall or something."  Shogun began a careful search of
the desk, reaching to open the topmost drawer.
   "Uh-oh."
   Shogun stopped at Pomru's apprehensive voice.  "'Uh-oh' what?"
   "We're being watched."
   Dnab whirled, checking behind himself.  "From where?"
   "Everywhere.  Cameras all over the place.  No fewer than ... oh,
thirty, I'd say."
   Chun tried to pose.  "I hope they get my good side."
   Dnab grinned.  "That's the shot from the neck to the thighs, right?"
WHAP.  "Ow."
   "Pervert."
   "Cool it, kiddies.  Any other surprises, Pom?"
   "Aside from the ridiculously large number of weapons mounted in the
walls, floor and ceiling, and the elevator behind that wall over there,
no, not really."
   Shogun swallowed nervously.  "How about switches?  Any way we can
turn it all off?"
   Pomru switched to another viewing mode and scanned the floor,
following hidden traces up to Pai's desktop.  "Oh, all roads lead to
this desk.  Of course, I have no idea what the nature of the various
devices are -- the little girl statuette, the nameplate, the paper clip
holder, the tape dispenser, that memo pad--"
   "I get the picture," Shogun said, waving Pomru's list away with his
hand.  "Chun, try that top drawer, okay?"
   "Okay, Boss."  Chun-Li stumbled over to the desk and dropped into the
plush chair.  She sighed and slumped back into it -- it felt so good to
relax.  She didn't notice Shogun, Dnab and Pomru slowly backing away
from her as she pulled on the desk's top drawer.
   With a loud BLAM, the drawer leaped out, striking Chun directly in
her armored belly and hurling her, chair and all, out the window.
   "You sure that was a good idea?" Pomru inquired as he watched her
metal-laden form plummet to the ground.
   Shogun shrugged.  "I had to do something to get her out, before she
got herself killed.  She'll be mad for a while, but it'll pass."
   "Yeah, so will we," Dnab mumbled.  Shogun and Pomru turned to see a
multitude of panels sliding open all around the room, each one revealing
something large, mean and ready to blow them to teeny little bits.
   Shogun decided not to wait for them to make the first move.  "Shogun
Sabres -- SanGUU!"

   The chair fell out from underneath her, landing and splintering with
a muffled crunch.  She tumbled through the air, yelling curses at her
partners as loudly as she could manage until something much softer than
the ground intercepted her.
   "You STUpid ASSholes!  I can't beLIEVE you'd TRICK me like that!
Next time I see you, I'll RIP your FU--"  Chun-Li's next expletive froze
in her throat as she looked up at what, or rather, who had kept her
seperate from the concrete.
   "Hi, hon," Jyanken whispered.  He smiled at the little armored bundle
in his arms, trying not to laugh outright at her display of temper.
   "J... Jyanken..."  Chun-Li flushed a deep crimson under her helmet.
She'd always tried to keep her poorly-controlled temper under wraps
whenever he was around; she didn't want him seeing her when she was mad.
He seemed to be taking it pretty well at the moment, though.
   "They gave you the boot, huh?"
   Chun nodded with an affirmative grunt.  "And just because I was
nearly roasted alive trying to take down the force-barrier.  They always
treat me like such a kid."  She clambered out of his grip and hopped to
the ground, shrieking and falling on her face as her legs failed her yet
again.  "Shit, that stings!"
   Jyanken bent over her, rolling her onto her back.  "I can see why
they kicked you out.  Just-- come on, Chun, lie still!  You can barely
move!"
   She kept trying to sit up against his efforts to hold her down.  "No,
no, I gotta stop that bastard Pai!  Let me -- holy shit!"  She abruptly
froze, her gaze fixed upward.
   Jyanken looked up, still holding her to the ground, to determine what
had startled her.  It wasn't too hard to figure out; the window she'd
been ejected from was presently spewing a fireworks display that the
city would do well to hire for the next Fourth of July.  And that was
only what wasn't making contact inside the room itself.  The smoke and
debris coming out of the window told him there was a lot more from where
that had come.
   Swallowing her pain and whispering a quick "sorry, lover", Chun-Li
activated her thrusters, launching herself out from under Jyanken's
strong hands and flipping him onto the cement.
   "Ow ... dammit, get back here!"  Jyanken quickly picked himself up
off the ground, but there was no way he could catch the rapidly
ascending little imp.  "You need a doctor!"
   "No can do, Jyank!  My partners need me!"
   "Yeah, they need you ALIVE!  Stay out of there!"
   Heedless of his words, Chun-Li rocketed up toward the battle scene.
As she passed the level below it, however, a thick metal cable leaped
out from the building, coiling itself around her.
   "What the--!"  The startled Shogun Sabre barely had time to react
verbally before she suddenly found herself wrapped in a tightening steel
coccoon, pinning her arms against her sides and forcing her ankles
together.  A surge of electricity coursed over her, shutting her armor
down and relieving her of her consciousness with a squeaking whimper.
   Jyanken could only stand in gaping shock as Chun-Li was effortlessly
pulled inside.

   "Pom!  Your six!"
   At Dnab's warning, Pomru whirled and fired.  The laser cannon that
had unexpectedly emerged behind him, much like the three dozen other
weapons of various varieties they'd already dealt with, exploded in a
shower of sparks and twisted metal.
   Their current strategy for staying alive amounted to little more than
fire-fighting -- blast anything that pops up before it blasts you.  This
had managed to keep them busy for the past two-and-a-half minutes
straight, and fatigue was beginning to take its toll on the three of
them.  Their shiny new hardsuits had seen better days as well, as the
colorful, well-polished suits of electronic armor now looked like they'd
lost a demolition derby in the Valley of the Door-Ding Gnomes.
   Shogun put his fist through a recoilless rifle while kicking a
particle-beam automatic off-balance.  "Pom!  How much longer do we have
to keep this up?" he shouted over the din.
   "Hard to say!" Pomru replied, rolling under three guns' worth of
machine gun fire.  "There may only be twenty or so left!"
   "'Only'?!?" Dnab choked, nearly missing his target.
   Pomru ended his roll with a flying tackle, completely dislodging the
laser cannon in his path.  Its base sputtered and fizzled; seeing his
chance, Pomru put his hand on the power output feed, connecting it to
his beam-saber coupling.  Opening a small panel on the connected
forearm, he set the beam-saber power system to its highest available
output level and gritted his teeth, raising his still-free hand to
shield his faceplate.
   After a moment's pause, every energy-based weapon in the room
detonated from a power overload, and the conventional guns, cannons and
launchers spun out of control, firing wildly before breaking from their
bases.
   The room was very still for a long minute before Dnab and Shogun rose
to their feet.
   Dnab looked around the room with a low whistle.  "Well, that does it
for that."
   "Pomru?  Hey, Pom!"  Shogun began digging around in the wreckage for
their unspeaking comrade.  Dnab soon joined him, and they scoured the
room for several minutes, finding nothing.
   Dnab leaned back to stretch his limbs.  "Garrr, he must'a completely
wiped his power pack.  I can't even get a tracer signal."  He put his
hands to his head, twisting it left, then right, then back -- and
stopped.
   He tapped Shogun on the shoulder.
   "Not now, Dnab!  I'm looking for Pom!"
   "You're looking the wrong way."
   "Hm?"  Shogun regarded Dnab curiously, then followed his gaze upward.
And that's where he found Pomru, embedded in the ceiling.
   Pomru growled at his companions.  "What do I look like, a chandelier?
Get me down!"

   Dnab and Shogun touched down before the gathered ADP and gently set
their powerless companion on the ground.
   Gundam stepped forward, flanked closely by Jyanken and Chico-san.
"This doesn't look like good news."
   "It isn't, sir."  Shogun stood and addressed the ADP chief as Dnab
removed parts of Pomru's armor.  "We were able to disarm the office's
defenses, but as you may have surmised, it was a desperate move.  I'm
afraid there's not much left of the room itself."
   Gundam nodded.  "I see.  And Pai?"
   "Nowhere in sight.  My fallen colleague found an elevator behind a
hidden panel in one of the walls, so my guess is he's somewhere far out
of reach."
   Gundam let his breath hiss through his nose.  Today was just one bad
thing after another.
   "If you don't mind, sir, the four of us should really return to our
base for repairs before pressing forward."
   Gundam turned, nodding.  "Yes, I understand.  Go ahead.  I'll get
some people busy clearing out that office."
   "Thank you."  Shogun looked around as Gundam walked back to the ADP's
impromptu parking lot.  "Anyone see where our fourth member got to?"
   "I'm afraid she tried to go back in," Jyanken offered.
   Dnab looked up from his work on Pomru, getting him ready to hook up
to a flight booster.  "She did?"
   Shogun shook his head.  "We didn't see her."
   "Like I said, she tried to get back in.  Something snared her before
she got to your floor, and pulled her into the building."  Jyanken
paused as the implications sank in.  "He's got her, hasn't he?"
   Dnab stomped a foot.  "I wanted to get her!"
   Shogun remained silent, then turned on his heel and strode toward
where the boosters were waiting, and proceeded to hook himself up.  Dnab
and Pomru, already linked to their flight-packs, launched themselves
into the air.
   Jyanken was incredulous.  "So you're just giving up on her?"
   "No."  Shogun's voice could easily have frozen Hell.  "But if we go
in like this, we'll end up no better than her.  We're going to get some
heavy artillery.
   "We'll be back."
   The final connection completed, Shogun rocketed into the late
afternoon sky, arcing gracefully away from the all-but-demolished
Kawaii-Cola Company headquarters.  The unmoving K-C mascot continued to
smile sweetly at him as he flew.

                       Tales of the Shogun Sabres

                            TOO CUTE TO LIVE

                   Chapter 6:  I Have a Little Dream


   Chun-Li stood unclothed in a vast, empty space.  She stood tall and
proud, lean and lithe, as she remembered herself before SD disease
claimed her.  She practiced a few quick fighting moves, smiling at her
strength and agility.
   There were no walls in this place, but she somehow felt confined by
it.  A wind whipped over her with a frigid caress and she shivered,
rubbing her hands on her arms.
   She was surrounded by ten steamer trunks, which she had opened in
hopes of finding some clues to the nature of this place.  The first case
she'd opened contained everything she knew and remembered -- images from
her past and present, cold data and raw emotion.  She was rather
disappointed to find that all these things still left the trunk nearly
empty.
   Strangely, the other nine boxes were filled to overflowing with plush
Totoro dolls.
   Somewhere in the first trunk was something about a similar scene in a
book by Douglas Adams, but she didn't bother to see whether it was from
the Hitchhiker's Guide trilogy or the Dirk Gently series.  It really
didn't seem important, anyway; the obvious implication was that the
author was trying to convey that she was not actually conscious.  So
long as Dnab was nowhere around to see her, she decided, that was fine.
   A voice echoed through the voidspace, snatching her attention away
from her peculiar surroundings.  It reached her as a garbled jumble of
overlapped syllables.  Someone out there, out in the 'real' world, was
trying to talk to her.
   She shuffled through the first trunk again.  After an eternal moment
of searching, she found her most recent memories, the only clues to her
situation; trying to rejoin her friends in battle, she was captured and
neutralized.  The painful instant of her last conscious thought once
again became real to her, and she screamed as she allowed it to
overwhelm her mind, clouding her reason and blurring her vision.
   A wave of darkness enveloped her...

   Chun-Li let out a long, low groan as she began to stir, lifting her
head with a concerted effort.
   "Wake up, little cherub," Pai sang quietly, standing close by and
watching her intently.  Getting this little warrior's armor off had been
quite a task; apparently, it was designed to perform such chores with
minimal assistance from the wearer.  He was astounded at the complexity
and sophistication of the powered suit.  Its designer must have been
quite a scientist in his own right.
   His greatest surprise, though, had been discovering that his captive
was female, and quite lovely.  Even among SD'ed folk, she was a rare
beauty, with long, dark hair and positively adorable features.  Her
chubby little body was remarkably well developed and toned, as well.  He
waited patiently to see what she looked like when her eyes were open.
   She blinked her eyes a few times once her head was nearly upright.
She gasped with a start as she noticed a three things at once.
   Firstly, her hardsuit was gone.  She was wearing only the tight
bodysuit that she usually wore underneath it, a sort of high-tech black
Spandex job with pink diagonal stripes in several places for an
attractive accent.  Her hair, which she normally tied up into a pair of
buns atop her head while in her armor, was now flowing freely down her
back.
   Secondly, there was something around her wrists.  Some type of snug-
fitting, cold metal bracelets.  She lifted an arm into her view, and
heard a jingling sound.  Chains.  She began to turn her head to see what
she'd been latched to, but stopped when the third thing came to her
attention.
   She wasn't alone.
   She curled her knees tighter against herself in her sitting position
on the floor.   Backpedalling up against the wall behind her and looking
fearfully up at her definitely not SD'ed captor, she hoped the old
"innocent waif" routine could help charm her way out of her predicament.
Even as she batted her eyes, however, her mind nagged at her.  There was
something familiar about him -- where had she seen him before?
   "So, you've been enjoying my Kawaii-Cola, I see."
   Her ruse immediately fell flat as her eyes narrowed, teeth and fists
clenching simultaneously.  "You," she hissed contemptuously.
   Pai smiled.  "Me."
   "You BASTARD!"  Chun-Li leaped from the floor, launching herself at
the grinning scientist, ready to beat him to within an inch of his
poorly-conceived life.  Unfortunately, she was still several inches away
from doing so when she reached the end of the chains on her limbs, and
stopped in mid-air with a frustrated roar.  She dropped helplessly to
the ground, landing flat on her back.
   Pai held his infuriating smile.  "You're so cute when you're angry."
   "I'll give you 'cute', you asshole," she growled in reply.  She was
quickly back on her feet, pulling at the limits of her chain-leashes
like the hound dog in a Foghorn Leghorn cartoon.
   As she struggled uselessly, her arms pinned behind her by the taut
chains, Pai picked her up gingerly by the waist, gave her a warm hug and
a kiss on the cheek, and set her back down with a pat on the head.  By
this time, her face was red with fury and her rage was beyond mere
words.
   "I can see you're just going to be loads of fun," he snickered,
walking away from her toward a nearby control panel.  "I'm sorry I
couldn't set you up with a proper dungeon, but your visit was so sudden
-- I just had no time to prepare.  Still, you're going to hurt yourself
if you keep this up."
   He pulled a switch on the panel, and Chun-Li was abruptly pulled
backward.  She hit the wall hard and briefly saw stars; when her vision
cleared, she was being held spread-eagled against the wall, over a foot
off the ground.  She tried to move her arms, but they were bound tight.
   Pai shrugged.  "You know, this could have been so much more
comfortable for you if you'd just been a good little girl."
   "You won't get away with this," Chun spat, already regretting the
cliches she was using.  "The Shogun Sabres will stop you!"
   "Oh, you mean your friends?  They left a few minutes ago."
   "They'll be back."
   "I'm sure they will.  But are they willing to sacrifice you to get to
me?"
   She simmered silently as Pai chuckled, returning to work in her full
view.

   "We've found it, sir!"
   Corporal Jakilpat's statement startled Chief Gundam a bit, and he
turned from the opening where there once was a window to reply.
   "Excellent, Corporal.  Show it to me."
   "This way, sir."  Jakilpat and Gundam moved carefully through the
demolished office of Kawaii-Cola's president, carefully sidestepping
still-smoldering gun placements, shards of thick glass, splintered wood
and large metal fragments.  The corporal was having a much harder time
of it, with his stubby little legs; his case of SD disease was the most
severe in the department.  Gundam paused briefly as his eyes passed over
the broken remains of a small statuette of the company mascot.
   They eventually reached a wall panel that had been pried back by an
ADP powersuit.  Behind it was a short, carpeted hallway, bending off
toward the inside of the buiding.  Gundam stepped inside, and as his
eyes adjusted to the relative darkness of the unlit corridor, he was
greeted only by the starkest of decor -- bleach-white walls, terminating
at what could only be an elevator's entrance.
   Of course, there was an important omission.  The elevator had no call
button.
   "Very good, Corporal," Gundam said.
   "Thank you, sir," came Jakilpat's crisp reply.  "Should we go in?"
   Gundam shook his head, then indicated the rubble around them.  "This
room was only the beginning, Corporal.  Whatever Pai has in store for us
would cut us to ribbons.  We'll wait for the Shogun Sabres to return."
   "Yes, sir!"  Jakilpat saluted and scampered away, leaving Gundam
alone with his thoughts.

   "Okay, stop it right there, pal!"
   A large moving van with the words "Live Crab" painted in dull red on
its sides halted on its way into the ADP-blockaded area, as per the
young officer's command.
   Corporal Lum-chan walked from in front of the van over to the
driver's window, pushing her long, green hair back behind her shoulders.
Looking up into it as it slid down, she mentally prepared a short
diatribe on civil obedience, the urgency of the situation, and how
little the driver should know about what was happening inside the
Kawaii-Cola offices.  If the creep tried to give her trouble, of course,
she was easily capable of beating him off, if she had to.
   However, when the driver regarded her from inside a suit of hi-tech
body armor, the best she could manage was, "Uhhhhhh..."
   "Hey, Officer Cutie," Dnab opened, leaning slightly out the window.
"We're the Shogun Sabres.  Aren't you thrilled?"
   Shogun pushed his overly-fresh comrade aside.  "I beleive Chief
Gundam is expecting us, Officer.  Do you know where he is right now?"
   "Ah, h-he went up to the p-president's office, t-to oversee th-the
investigation," Lum-chan stammered, still somewhat bewildered.
   "Oh, good.  Thank you, Officer."  Shogun pushed himself back into the
passenger's seat.
   "Mata ne, Kawaiiko-chan!" Dnab called, waving as the van lurched
forward.
   Lum-chan just stared after the van as it drove up to the building's
entrance, blinking vacantly.  The guys back at the station would NEVER
believe this.
   "Um ... bye-bye," she finally managed.

   Gundam's attention was drawn by the sound of incredibly heavy
footsteps in the hall outside the reception area.  This little entry-way
to the office was not quite so devastated as the office itself.  Still,
it was littered with the wrecked remains of Pai's defense systems.
Gundam wondered just what level of power the Shogun Sabres had at their
disposal to cause such a wide-spread system overload.
   As if to answer his question, a massive yellow powersuit leisurely
rounded the corner and entered the room.
   The word "leisurely" is not used here just to fill adverb space.
This suit actually looked relaxed as it walked.  This stood in
particular contrast to the ADP armors Gundam was used to, which all
seemed to be having a severe case of constipation when they were just
being guided around.
   Two much smaller hardsuited figures appeared behind the whopping
great yellow monster.  "Hello again, Gundam."
   Gundam's composure returned.  "Hello again, Shogun Sabres.  I'm glad
to see you so soon."  Gundam paused, tilting his head.  "I'm curious --
is the person in that large suit SD'ed?"
   "Yeah, and it's a real bitch drivin' this thing when you're shorter'n
Billy Barty, lemme tellya," Jiro offered from inside the suit.
   "I take it the ADP suits haven't been adapted for SD'ed people?"
Shogun guessed.
   Gundam nodded.  "We don't have enough room in the budget for it.  A
pity, too -- most of our best suit operators have been SD'ed.  This way,
please."  With that, Gundam led the Sabres to the elevator Pomru had
discovered earlier.  The hallway leading to it proved just barely wide
enough to accomodate Jiro's suit.
   After considering the closed doors for a minute, Shogun turned and
addressed the ADP chief once more.
   "Gundam, though we can appreciate your desire to protect your people
as much as possible, our team is a bit undermanned at the moment.  We
also have no illusions about this area being an easy run.  I'd like to
ask you to have some of your people come in immediately behind us, to
keep an eye on our backs, and to make sure nothing slips out behind us."
   Gundam considered this for a moment, then turned to one side and
called out, "Jyanken!"
   The lieutenant was at his side in an instant.  "Sir!"
   "Lieutenant, is your early strike team still present and ready?"
   "Yes, sir, with the exception of Sergeant Romanova."
   "Good."  Gundam faced Shogun once again.  He wasn't sure whether or
not he'd regret what he was about to do.  "Lieutenant, I want you to
take your team in following the Shogun Sabres.  For the duration of this
mission, you will be taking orders from their group leader.  Keep me
posted on your progress at your convenience.  Understood?"
   Jyanken saluted smartly, smiling.  "Yes, sir!"  He quickly gathered
his team near the hallway's entrance, all of them still armed.  He and
Chico-san exchanged a glance of mutual vengefulness.
   This gesture didn't escape Chief Gundam's watchful eye.  "Stay
professional, you two," he chided.  "No Punisher tactics.  We want that
man alive."
   Caught by surprise, they nodded to him with a weak "Yes, sir."
Gundam glared at the heartlessness of the reply, but let it go at that.
   Shogun pointed to the elevator door.  "Open says me," he commanded.
   "You got it," Jiro replied.  His monster suit reached forward and
easily removed the thick metal gate, mechanical fingers digging into the
steel surface and crumpling it like so much rice paper.  Jiro excused
himself to deposit the door's remains outside of the hallway.
   Dnab approached the vacant doorway cautiously and peered down the
long, dark shaft.  It may as well have been bottomless for all he could
see.  "Watch that first step, folks," he said half-jokingly.
   Shogun stood silently at the precipice for only a moment before
leaping into the man-made chasm.  He allowed himself to freefall for a
few seconds, then activated his hardsuit thrusters.  He slowed to a
controlled descent, the intense blue flames from his back and feet
lending a ghostly illumination to the narrow space around him.  He noted
with dispassionate interest that the shaft's walls were lined with sheet
metal, and not too heavily reinforced.
   Dnab and Jiro looked at each other and shrugged.  Dnab hopped down,
following Shogun's lead, and was soon catching up with his fellow Shogun
Sabre.  Jiro moved similarly, and followed at a discreet distance --
when they all reached the bottom of the shaft, Shogun and Dnab would
need a little time to get out of the way of Jiro's massive mech.  While
the hallway may have been tight for his huge armor, the elevator shaft
was downright claustrophobic, and he held the machine's hands out to
keep his distance from the walls.
   Jyanken and his team found a service ladder just below the ledge
where the door once had been.  Switching on handlamps, they climbed down
after the Shogun Sabres as quickly as they could manage.

   Chun-Li twitched her shoulder as much as she could, attempting to
relax the knotted muscle that had developed in her upper back.  She was
slowly developing cramps and sprains in every muscle and joint of her
body, mostly due to the fact that she was being stretched out by her
wrists and ankles.  She grimaced at the discomfort, then closed her eyes
and took controlled breaths, trying to use her martial arts training to
relax herself.
   Several minutes passed, but she found herself unable to achieve inner
peace.  Every time she seemed about to find the proper state, her SD'ed
condition popped into her mind, and she got angry all over again.  She
gave her head a frustrated toss and decided to give it one more try.
   "Awww, is our grumpy little warrior uncomfy?"
   Chun gritted her teeth at Pai's singsong taunt.  "If you must know,
I've felt better," she grumbled, flashing him a pair of angry eyes.
   Pai stood up from his crouched position.  "Well, I can fix that."  He
walked back over to the control panel and turned a knob.  Chun
immediately felt the pulling at her limbs relax.  Her feet touched the
ground and immediately sent a thousand pin-pricks up her spine as she
sucked in a startled breath through her teeth.  Her chains jingled,
drooping onto the floor with new-found slack.
   She began to take a step forward, but her stiff legs weren't up to
the task; she dropped to her hands and knees with a yelp, her oversized
head nearly throwing her off what little balance remained.
   Damn it! she hissed to herself.  I feel so useless!  I don't want him
seeing me like this!
   She lifted her head, shooting streams of pure ice at Pai.  "Thanks,"
she grated.
   He shook a finger at his little guest.  "Now you be a good little
girl, or Uncle Pai will have to string you up again and play some Barney
videos for you.  Okay?"
   Chun swallowed a five-minute tirade of the most obnoxious expletives
she could summon, replacing them, for the sake of diplomacy, sanity, and
a little freedom of movement, with a mumbled "Whatever".
   Pai turned to go back to his work as Chun-Li rose unsteadily to her
feet.  She steadied herself as best she could, going through what warm-
up exercises she was able to perform while chained to a wall and
swearing a thousand silent oaths against her captor.
   Her routine was soon interrupted by a light hum and a flashing red
panel.

   Shogun's feet touched down on the ceiling of the elevator car with a
resounding, hollow thump.  Dnab did likewise, cutting off his retro-
thrust at the last possible moment.  Shogun cursed his tiny legs, which
prevented him from properly absorbing the impact of the fall.
   "So much for stealth," he grumbled.
   Dnab looked up.  "Uh ... stealth is the least of our concerns right
now, dude."
   Shogun followed his gaze, then quickly bent down and pried one of the
elevator's ceiling panels off.  He jumped down through it and rolled out
into the main corridor, followed closely by Dnab.  They both sat up just
in time to see Jiro's mammoth armor flatten the entire elevator car with
a loud squealing crunch.
   "Whoops."  Jiro sounded a bit embarrassed.  "Sorry."
   "That's okay," Shogun said in a voice that plainly told him it really
wasn't, "we weren't really expecting to be able to sneak up on him,
anyway."
   "Yeah, he probably knew we were coming before we touched bottom."
Dnab got to his feet, and Shogun did likewise, as Jiro stepped out of
the shaft.
   Jiro looked around at the chaotic jumble of metal, wire, plastic and
Pyrex that sprawled around the fluorescent-lit room.  "Hey, Dnab ...
this place reminds me of your lab."
   "Funny," Dnab deadpanned, "I was about to say the same thing to you."
   Shogun picked up an empty flask, holding it up to the light.  It
shone with a pristine clarity, and through it he could see the almost
antiseptic walls and ceiling above and in front of him -- a stark
contrast to the unkempt floorspace at his feet.
   Jiro considered the possible paths for the three of them to take.
Each of the other three walls in the room had a door on it.  He wished
there was another hardsuit with the sensory capabilities of Pomru's, but
knew that was something they should have thought about earlier.  "So,
what do we do now?"
   Shogun set the flask down on a small makeshift table of metal plating
and unused CRTs.  "We wait for the others to catch up.  Then we move.
Lieutenant Jyanken shouldn't be too much longer."

   Chun-Li's eyes widened at the mention of Jyanken's name, but she kept
silent.  Pai had already demonstrated his willingness to use human lives
as pawns in his twisted little game, and she didn't want him to get any
ideas about who would make a good hostage.
   Pai sat back and considered the surveillance screen unhappily.  It
was careless of him to not have any exits besides the elevator shaft and
the ventilation system.  The vents were too narrow for him to navigate,
though, as per his design.  Still, he didn't want his little guest to
think he was painted into a corner, so he turned to her and smiled.
   "Well, your chummy-wummies have arrived, little darling.  And all
dressed up for the occasion, too.  That big yellow one looks especially
nice."
   "Nice and deadly," she grinned, tossing her hair defiantly.  "You're
in for it now.  Better let me loose and give yourself up, and save us
all a lot of grief."
   "Grief?"  He looked at her with amazement.  "Why, I never did this to
cause anyone grief.  I did this to bring happiness!"
   "Happiness?!"  Chun-Li blinked incredulously.  The author must have
been getting desperate, doing a motivational exposition at this point in
the story.
   "Of course!  Once everyone is cute and cuddly like you, everyone will
be happy!  No more ugliness, no more unrest, no more crime, no more wars
... why, I should get a Nobel prize!"  Pai broke into maniacal laughter.
   Chun stared at him, slack-jawed.  She wondered how soon they could
get this guy committed to a nuthouse.
   Pai's laughter subsided.  "But, since so many people can't see that I
must be right, and are working so hard to stop me," he said in an almost
bemused voice, "well, I'll just have to show them I'm right!"
   She narrowed her eyes at him.  "And just how do you intend to do
that, from this little basement lab?"
   He raised a finger at her with an 'a-ha' gesture.  "I was just
getting to that," he said, walking over to a table and returning with a
cone-shaped object that was significantly bigger than her head.  "Do you
know what this is, by any chance?"
   She looked at it, suddenly stunned with realization.  "That's a
missile nosecone!"
   "My, looks AND brains," he said admiringly.  "Yes, my dear, you're
right!  This little warhead is filled with my superdeforming formula,
and will explosively release it as a gas into the atmosphere.  Once this
gets into the Jet Stream, it'll spread over the entire globe in a week's
time!  And everyone will be ... KAWAII!"  He started laughing again.
   Chun shook her head in disbelief.  "You're insane!  Thousands, maybe
millions of people will die!  Who knows how many others will suffer from
the loss of mobility!  Don't you understand?  Haven't you ever heard
that 'beauty is in the eye of the beholder'?"  Wow, I'm so deep all of a
sudden, she noticed.
   He stopped laughing for a moment, regarding her with a chuckle.
"That, pretty one, is easy for YOU to say.  But no matter.  Soon, my
missile will be ready to launch."  He rubbed his chin, looking down at
her and speaking thoughtfully.  "And I think I know how to guarantee its
safe departure, too."
   Chun-Li shivered under his intense stare.  Oh, please, don't let me
be right about what he's planning, she whimpered silently.
   Pai returned to his work once more, flipping the security system mode
to "NOT ENOUGH LEFT TO FILL A DIXIE CUP" as an afterthought.

                       Tales of the Shogun Sabres

                            TOO CUTE TO LIVE

                       Chapter 7:  Out to Launch


   Shogun bellowed an inventive curse as he dove into a stack of
equipment near his feet.  He quickly followed Dnab's lead, stacking the
parts around him to build a makeshift barricade, suitable for hiding
behind.  Jiro implemented the same idea in a different way, holding a
large plate of metal in each on his mech's hands and using them to block
the consistently-aimed incoming fire.
   Amazingly enough, this barrage was easier to avoid than when they
were fighting in the Kawaii-Cola president's office, since all the
emplacements in this room were on one wall instead of scattered all
about.  The forward wall just opened up a couple dozen little doors, and
recessed guns started shooting at them.
   Jiro yawned.  "This is boring.  His automated defenses don't have
enough variety in their aim."
   "I hate to agree, but he's right," Dnab added.  "This is way too
easy."
   Shogun kept a close watch over his shoulder.  "I know.  Stay sharp."
   Jiro looked at the ceiling.  "Wait ... do you hear that?"
   Dnab tried to listen over the noise of gunfire.  "Hear what?"
   "It sounds like ... hissing?"
   Shogun made a quick guess at what Jiro'd detected.  "Shit!  Close
your vents!"  The three of them quickly made their hardsuits air-tight,
and Shogun breathed a sigh of partial relief.  Their hardsuits' oxygen
regeneration systems couldn't sustain them for more than fifteen
minutes, but at least they'd found this gas trap before the ADP squad
had arrived.
   Shogun took another thick plate and stood up, holding it in front of
him.  The incoming fire bounced off of it, noisy but ineffectual.  "We
can't wait for them any longer.  Jiro, take the door on the right.
Dnab, take the one on the left.  I'll take the one in front."
   "You got it, boss."  Dnab and Jiro moved to comply with Shogun's
command.
   Shogun himself backed into the elevator shaft opening, switching his
transmitter to the police frequency.  "Blue Boy One, this is Top Sabre.
Do you read me?"
   After a moment's silence, Jyanken's voice crackled in his helmet's
earphones.  "Top Sabre, this is Blue Boy One.  I get a lot'a noise from
your end."
   "We've got plenty of noise to spread around, Blue Boy.  Right now I'm
holding off bullets with a makeshift shield -- with any luck, they'll
run out of ammo before you get here.  There's also some kind of gas
being fed into this room."  Shogun looked toward the door he'd be
investigating; the gas formed a light, greyish mist that clung to the
floor up to his chest.  "The gas looks to be heavier than air, so you
should be safe if you stay up in the shaft.  If you have gas masks with
you, I'd recommend using them.  The three of us have split up -- try to
stay near this first room until we find other exits to cover."
   "Roger, Top Sabre.  Good luck."
   "Thanks.  Top Sabre out."  Keeping the plate in front of him, Shogun
walked to the forward door and left the room.

   Jiro's enormous yellow powered armor stomped through a long, straight
corridior.  It was pretty much like the room they'd first entered, with
drab wall paint, shallow, stiff carpet and fluorescent lighting.  Two
differences that came immediately to mind were the lack of clutter on
the floor and the dimness of the illumination -- only about one-fifth of
the hallway's lights were on.
   Jiro continued guiding his suit forward.  This hallway was more his
size, with a good six feet of clearance above and to either side as he
strode down its center.   His mech's long shadow shrank behind him,
became a sharp-cornered blob underneath him, then raced before him,
stretching until it dissipated under the next light.  Shrink, stretch.
Shrink, stretch.
   Choom!  A sudden booming noise, not too unlike a deadened clap of
thunder, rang through the corridor.
   Jiro stopped directly underneath one of the lights.  He hadn't done
anything to cause such a noise, he assured himself.  Acting on a
cautious hunch, he punched up a rear view on his display.
   He couldn't see any lights behind himself.  The light that reflected
off his polished hardsuit, however, showed him that there was now a wall
between where he was and where the previous light had been.
   "Oh, shit," he breathed, taking a jogging step forward.
   Choom!  The thunder struck again.
   "Double shit."  Jiro stopped.  The lights stretching down the hallway
before him abruptly vanished, cut off by another wall that fell from the
ceiling, blocking his path.
   Taking another two steps forward, Jiro put his mech's giant hands
against the new wall, rubbing it and knocking on it to determine its
makeup.  Sounds like concrete.  Doesn't sound hollow, so it must be
pretty thick.  Could be reinforced.
   Jiro prepared a laser cutting torch to make a nice, big hole through
it.  It'd take some time to get through a wall this thick, but nothing
seemed to be rushing him.
   Except for that rumbling, scraping sound he just heard starting.
   "Key-ripes," Jiro muttered.  "Not the shrinking-room cliche."  He
looked to either side.  Either he was developing an acute case of
claustrophobia, or it was indeed the shrinking-room cliche.
   This definitely changed his plans.  The walls were closing on him too
rapidly to allow him to cut through the barrier, and he was in no mood
to play Hercules, holding them apart himself.  After all, if he got held
up keeping the walls apart, he'd never get a piece of that creep, Pai.
   He rushed over to one of the advancing side walls, checking it in
much the same way he'd checked the one ahead.  Same story.  Damn.  Not a
whole lot of time left.
   He pounded his foot on the floor.  That part was probably thicker
than either wall, he judged.  He threw his head back, staring at the
ceiling, hoping for inspiration.
   The ceiling...
   Holding his arms in to keep them from scraping the advancing walls,
he took two sprinting steps, then booster-leaped directly at the light
fixture.  It flashed when he struck it, then went out in a brief shower
of sparks as he continued through it.  There was barely enough room
above for his mech to hide -- his gamble paid off.  The walls met below
him with a dull thud.
   I wonder if Victor Kiam would be interested in a shave THIS close, he
mused.
   He activated his external lamps to see if there was anywhere for him
to go.  The combination ventilation/power line shaft he saw before him
was tall enough for him to walk upright without his suit, but a tight
crawl space for his massive armor.
   "Right.  Like I'll be any help without the suit."
   Jiro crawled in the direction he'd been walking only a minute ago,
shuffling his mech's limbs as quickly as he could manage.  It was slow
progress, but it was progress.  He wished he'd opted to add the crawl-
dash wheels when he designed the suit.

   Dnab hopped over the beam of the trip-laser, easily evading its
detection, as he had with the previous five.  He'd found himself in a
series of rooms apparently used for storage during construction.  The
lighting wasn't quite as bright as in the first room, and the floor had
a fine layer of sawdust.  It was that very sawdust that allowed him to
see the trip-lasers' beams.
   "Boy, if all the so-called defense systems are this brain-dead, I
should be snugglin' up with Chunners before Beavis 'n' Butt-head comes
on.  That'd be cool.  Huh-huh-huh."
   Dnab raised one leg so that the sole of his boot pointed in front of
him, and fired a quick burst from his boot-thruster.  The resulting
cloud of tiny wood particles wafted in front of him, revealing the beam
of yet another trip-laser.  He stepped up to it and lazily cleared it
with a quick hop, completely failing to notice the second trip-laser
mounted at the level his head reached in mid-leap.
   "Here he comes, here comes Speed Race-HERF!" he sang, cut off in mid-
discord by a section of wall leaping out and slamming forcefully into
him.  His forward momentum carried him out of its continuing path,
bouncing him off the opposite wall and leaving him dazed and sprawled on
the floor.  That wasn't much fun, but was preferable to being crushed
into gelatin.
   "Ow.  Guess he's a music critic."  Dnab picked himself up off the
floor.  He made a few useless motions to brush himself off, succeeding
only in getting some sawdust on his armored gauntlets.  Giving up on
that effort, he walked toward the next doorway, where he knew another
trip-laser would be waiting.
   He kicked up another cloud of dust, making the beam plainly visible.
He prepared to hop over it, then reconsidered.  Instead, he lifted his
foot and gave off another blast from his boot-thruster; the cloud grew
denser and taller, revealing the second, higher-mounted beam.
   "Well, well.  Tricky little weasel."  Dnab vaulted between the two
beams, landing on his hands and rolling forward.  His roll took him
through the doorway after that one, unfortunately, and he inadvertantly
tripped the next beam in line.  Only a quick burst of thrust threw him
out of the way of a plummeting chunk of ceiling.
   Once that started, of course, he couldn't stop himself in time for
the next one.  He soon found himself running a gauntlet of hostile
concrete at high speed, kicking up a massive wake of sawdust and
narrowly evading a messy death at regular intervals.  A couple of the
rapidly-rising floorpieces actually threw him off his feet, flipping him
over backwards, but he kept going.
   He hoped he was going in the right direction.  If he wasn't, he had
no way of changing that.  He chanced a look behind himself to see if the
shifting barricades left him enough room to get back, if he was ever
able to do so.
   Because he wasn't looking where he was going, of course, the next
doorway in line wasn't aligned with the one he'd just gone through.  He
messily smashed through the wall, making an SD-Dnab-shaped hole and
coming to rest flat on his face on the other side.
   "My mother told me there'd be days like this," he muttered, too dazed
to realize that he'd found a way around the trip-sensors.

   Shogun bolted to the left as the searing particle-beam cut hungrily
through the space he'd occupied only moments before.  He lashed out with
his railgun, finally striking home after three misses.  The deadly
hovering attack drone lost large chunks of vital circuitry and dropped
to the ground, joining its two friends in silence.
   Shogun accepted the moment's respite gratefully, leaning against one
of the heavy steel walls and taking deep, heaving breaths.  If this is
any indication of what Dnab and Jiro are up against, he thought
ruefully, Chun-Li may very well have to rescue herself.
   Which probably won't happen, since we haven't heard from her since
she was taken captive three chapters ago.
   With his breathing finally under control, Shogun stood himself
upright and walked toward the doorway to the next room.  He flattened
himself against the adjacent wall and carefully peered around the
corner, using one of Dnab's more useful inventions, a tiny camera
mounted on the back of his hand.
   All clear, or so it seemed.
   Not convinced that "no visible threat" was equivalent to "no threat",
Shogun slipped around the corner and into the room as quickly and
quietly as he could, sticking close to the wall.  He crept around the
edge of the room, keeping a close eye on anything his sensors might pick
up on that he'd otherwise miss.
   Of course, the sensors weren't perfect.  The external motion sensor,
for instance, failed to register the fact that the light fixture was
lowering ever-so-slowly from the ceiling, as it was compensating for
Shogun's hurried but careful movement around the room's perimeter.  The
lack of light above said fixture also did a good job of concealing the
weapons turret that was currently centering him in its sights.
   In fact, the only thing that saved Shogun's life was the turret's
minor miscalculation on the strength of his armor.  Its first round of
25 rapid shots bounced off his chestplate, pushing him hard against the
wall, startling him rather severely and alerting him to its presence.
   Shouting an unintelligible curse on Pai's lineage, Shogun dove to one
side as the turret switched over to a more potent armor-piercing
ammunition supply.  Satisfied with its new selection, it made a renewed
effort to track Shogun's movements and get a clean shot at him, but his
incessant darting made that quite difficult.
   Shogun wasn't really enjoying this, either.  As the turret's
countless near-misses perforated the steel walls in a trail behind him,
he swore up a blue streak that would have made Chun-Li beam with pride.
Both the door he had entered through and the one he was heading toward
had closed up tight, and both were lined with steel.  If he stopped to
deal with either one, or to take aim at the ceiling turret, he would
certainly have several new holes added to his anatomy.  As it was, he
had one arm pointed in the turret's general direction, firing wildly as
he ran.
   The room light went out in a quick flash of sparks.  Shogun switched
on his external lights without breaking stride, launching himself
skyward and rebounding high off the wall to reverse the direction of his
circuit of the room.  He was surprised when a good deal of the shots
fired during that time flew harmlessly below him.
   "I have you now, young Sleepwalker," Shogun grinned.  Reaching
another wall, Shogun kicked against it, firing a quick burst of thrust
to keep himself upright as he flew to the center of the room.  The line
of incoming punctures came closer, but he had time to stop and aim.
   "Goodnight, dickweed."  Shogun pointed his arm at the offending
ceiling ornament and fired his arm-cannon.  It was immediately reduced
to smoldering slag, which stopped its firing quite effectively.  Soon
thereafter, it barely contained an explosion within itself -- Shogun
guessed that some of its ammo had been detonated by his shot.
   He walked over to a wall, leaning on it and catching his breath
again.  After a few minutes of relaxation, he went to the next door,
ripped it open, and stepped carefully through its portal, hoping he
wouldn't have a repeat of the room he'd just left.

   A well-lit chamber waited patiently for a long time, alone and empty.
An occasional sound would sneak into it, an unwelcome intrusion through
the thick double-doors, labelled "Genius At Work -- KEEP OUT" in large,
unfriendly letters, mounted in the center of one of its four walls.
   Save for those occasional noises -- machines whirring, scraping, and,
just for variety, a megalomaniacal laugh -- the room lived out its life
in lonely silence, with noone to keep it company.
   Just as the room was finished contemplating suicide for the seventh
time, something happened to break the monotony.
   Another noise.
   It was a different noise than any of the others.  This was a sort of
hissing, crackling noise, and it wasn't muffled by anything.  If the
room had had eyes, it could have determined its origin easily, as a
blackened, smoldering line began to char itself through the wall to the
right of the one occupied by the "Genius At Work" door.
   The line slowly stretched itself up off the floor, then bent itself
after a time, proceeding horizontally.  It then started downward,
reaching back toward and eventually touching the floor once more.  The
end result was the rough outline of a rectangle, taller than it was
wide, charcoal black against the bright white wall.
   The entire rectangle began to lean forward, and then fell over
completely, flattening on the shallow carpeting of the floor with a
muffled FUMP.  An SD'ed figure in dusty armor stepped out of the
darkened opening and into the light of the room, making yet another
futile attempt to brush itself off with its gauntleted hands.
   "Jeez, my suit's all dirty," Dnab complained quietly.  "I'll never
impress Chunners looking like this."  Looking around, he finally noticed
the room's main door.  "Well, well.  I have arrived.  I suppose I should
wait for the others--"
   Another sound caught his attention.  He held himself as still as
possible as he listened to it, working to identify it.
   Scrraaape, clunk.
   Scrraaape, clunk.
   Scrraaape, clunk.
   It was the sound of metal dragging against metal.  It was advancing
across the ceiling from some area above it.  Dnab didn't know who or
what could be causing it, but decided it might not be friendly and
charged his arm-cannon in preparation.
   The shuffling came to a halt near, or possibly at, one of the
recessed light fixtures.  The fluorescent box appeared to shift ever so
slightly.  Dnab directed his palm at the offending device, ready to give
it a piece of his mind.
   With a brief ZAP, the fluorescent tubes bent, then buckled, along
with the white plastic housing that contained them.  The whole
contraption darkened and dropped to the ground.
   It was soon followed by a huge yellow hardsuit which leaped down and,
with a quick burst of thrust, landed heavily on its enormous armored
feet, easily crushing the fixture's remains.
   Dnab relaxed his arm, allowing his cannon to discharge peaceably into
his hardsuit's power grid.  "Jiro!  How's tricks?"
   "Tricky," Jiro replied, flexing his suit's limbs.  "Crimoney, but
it's cramped up there.  I could barely move."
   "Well, you beat the boss here."
   "Springsteen?  When did we hire him on?"
   "No, no, the OTHER boss."
   "Sylia Stingray isn't even IN this story."
   "No!"
   "Lupin?"
   Dnab threw up his hands.  "Forget it."
   "Whatever."  Jiro looked around.  "So, Shogun isn't here yet?"
   Dnab groaned and pounded his head against the wall, and nearly missed
the sudden activity over his commlink.
   "Blue Boy One to Sabres, come in, over."
   Jiro responded, since he didn't have to try to scrape drywall,
plaster and chipped paint off his helmet.  "Blue Boy One, this is Big
Sabre.  You're comin' in strong."
   "I read you, Big S.  We just got to the bottom, and it looks all
clear, except for the holes in the walls."
   "Good deal.  I'm at Bad Boy's front door here with Sabre H."
   "Moving in soon?"
   "We're still waiting for Top Sabre to show.  When he's here, we'll
crack this clam and it'll be all over."
   "Great!  Wish I could be there."
   Dnab cut in, grinning a lecherous grin.  "Don't worry, Bee-Bee One.
I'll give Sabre Mommy all your love, and then some."
   "You do and I'll rip your tonsils out!"
   "You'll have to wait for her to hand you the corpse, man," Jiro
chuckled.  He could hear Jyanken laughing at the other end of the
connection.
   Dnab lifted his faceplate and stuck his tongue out at his partner.
   "Good luck, dudes.  We'll wait for your next call.  Blue Boy out."
   "Thanks.  Big Sabre out."
   Abruptly, the door on the wall opposite the large double-doors
crashed open.  A hardsuited figure leaped through the opening, rolled
across the floor, and halted in a kneeling position, pointing his primed
and ready arm-cannon at the two surprised Shogun Sabres.
   A few seconds later, Shogun realized he wasn't aiming at hostiles.
   "Well, speak of the devil," Dnab said.
   "Hey, boss.  We were just talking about you."
   Shogun relaxed his combat posture.  "Really?  Anything you can
repeat?"
   Jiro and Dnab looked at each other, then turned back to Shogun,
shaking their heads.
   "Should've known."  Shogun finally noticed the huge doors.  "So, this
must be the place."
   Jiro nodded.  "And now that we're all here..."
   Dnab smacked a fist into his palm.  "Time to make the donuts."
   "Jiro, if you would."
   "You got it, boss."  The monstrous yellow mech stepped up to the
double doors, wedged its fingers between them, and easily threw them
wide open.

   Pai whirled at the sound of bending metal, just in time to see his
final line of defense tossed aside effortlessly.  "So, the Shogun Sabres
have come for their little friend!"
   Chun-Li beamed with renewed hope.  "Guys!  I knew you wouldn't let me
down!"
   The Shogun Sabres, however, had nothing to say.  They could only
stand in stunned amazement, taking in what they could of the scene.
   Pai himself was standing in front of a large panel covered with
buttons, switches, levers and dials, none of which were labeled.
Typical mad-scientist mentality, Jiro noted; without documentation, only
the designer knows how to run it.
   Well behind Pai, standing upright in a square-shaped shaft, was a
rather short rocket.  It was short as rockets go, anyway; actually, it
was easily three times as tall as Jiro's hardsuit.  Steam hissed and
rose around its base, indicating its readiness to launch.
   The final, and most important detail by far, was on the rocket
itself.  About at the midpoint of its height, held fast by thick ropes
and small foot platforms, was Chun-Li, who looked increasingly worried
as the Sabres stood in mute indecision.
   Pai laughed derisively at his armored adversaries.  "So, the mighty
Shogun Sabres cannot decide whether to 'save' the world from my plan, or
allow their friend to continue living!  Well, you're too late to stop me
anyway!"  With a triumphant flick of his wrist, the scientist threw one
final lever, and the rocket's platform began to rise.
   "Um ... guys?"  Chun looked positively skittish.
   "Blue Boy One to Sabres!  What's going on down there?!"
   Shogun blinked at the sound in his headphones, then responded
frantically.  "Blue Boy!  What do you see?"
   "The base of the elevator shaft just opened up!  Something big is
coming out of it!"
   "Guys?!"
   "Jyanken, get your people out of that room, NOW!  When that missile
fires, it'll roast you alive!"
   "Can't you stop it?"
   "No!  The bastard's lashed Chun onto it!"
   "WHAT?!"
   "GUYS!  DO SOMETHING!"
   "Jyanken, I can't chat!  Just MOVE IT!  Top Sabre out!"  Breaking his
connection, Shogun struck a pose, pointing at Pai.  "Your evil will not
prevail, madman!  Shogun Sabres, SanGUU!"
   Pai laughed hysterically and dodged the Sabres as they pounced on the
control panel, demolishing it.  "You fools!  It's out of your hands,
now!  Even I couldn't stop the launch!"
   Chun-Li was no longer visible; she'd been lifted past the ceiling of
the lab.
   "Soon, all the world will be cute and loveable!  But YOU," he
shouted, grabbing an odd-looking weapon and pointing it at them, "won't
be worrying about it!"
   The sound of two gunshots escaped Pai's notice -- but not Jiro's.  He
discreetly opened a channel to the police band, just in case.
   "Because you've rushed me so much, I'm not precisely sure what this
new formula I developed will do.  But I do know that it'll completely
change your outlook on life!"  Pai squeezed a button on the gun's side,
and a clear liquid sprayed out of it.
   "VENTS!" Shogun shouted, not bothering to notice that they were being
assaulted by a high-tech squirtgun.  The Sabres were instantly air- and
water-tight, rendering the formula ineffectual.
   As if that weren't enough, Shogun and Dnab were also airborne, easily
bounding out of the spray's path.  Jiro stomped forward, grabbing the
weapon from Pai's grasp before he could react.  His grip squeezed a bit
too tight on it, though, and Pai found himself instantly drenched in his
own handiwork.
   "Gagk!  Pfft!"  Pai tried to spit some of it out of his mouth.  "No!
No, not me!  This can't be--GLAAARRRGH!!"  The scientist doubled over,
dropping to his knees and clutching his skull, his open lab coat draping
around him like a cloak.
   Dnab and Shogun were distracted by a sudden rumble from the shaft.
Shogun quickly opened his police-band transmitter.  "Blue Boy!  You all
right?"
   "We're fine, Shogun!"
   Dnab nearly jumped.  That wasn't Jyanken's voice!  It sounded like
... "CHUN?!"
   "Yup!  It's me, Sabre Mommy!  Jyank shot the ropes away and pulled me
off the rocket as I was going past him."
   "Best news I've heard all day," Shogun breathed, quickly switching to
the Sabres' frequency and boosting his signal power as far as he could.
"Pomru!  Respond!"
   The reply came amid a heavy humming and crackling.  "I hear you,
Shogun -- but just barely!"
   "Pom, a missile is launching from the hidden elevator shaft!  Catch
it and disable its warhead before it goes off!"
   "I'm on it!"
   With nothing else to do, the Shogun Sabres turned their attention to
the writhing, tortured form of the scientist before them, wondering what
they could possibly expect from the backfire of his latest invention.
Already, he appeared to be diminishing in size, and the pitch of his
voice seemed somewhat higher.

   With a loud WHUMP, the roof of the "Live Crab" truck in the Kawaii-
Cola parking lot opened abruptly, startling everyone.  Corporal Lum-chan
whirled just in time to see a billowing cloud of smoke spew out of the
truck, which, in turn, disgorged a small armored figure with an
oversized-looking flight pack attached to its back.
   At about the same time, a slender missile burst through the roof of
the Kawaii-Cola building, racing into the sky.  The flying Shogun Sabre
found himself starting off slightly behind, playing a desperate game of
catch-up.  He applied every bit of thrust he could summon, even adding
his armor's boosters to the brilliant flame behind him, but he could
only gain slowly.
   All eyes followed him skyward.  Lum-chan puled out her binoculars,
rapidly bringing the chase into focus.  Without really thinking, she
muttered a play-by-play.  "He's gaining ... gaining ... almost there ...
   "Yes!  He's at the tail!  Still gaining ... oh, no!  He's losing
ground! ... Wait! ... he's shut off his thrust -- he's climbing the
missile by hand! ... climbing ... halfway up ... oh, please hurry! ...
he's at the nose cone -- looks like he's working on it ... aaaand ...
KYAAA!!"
   A sudden, brilliant flash filled her view, and Lum-chan pulled her
eyes away from the binoculars, wiping them in an effort to dispel the
stars dancing in her vision.  "The missile blew!" she explained aloud,
resulting in disheartened muttering from the people around her.
   Blinking rapidly, she quickly determined that her eyes were working
correctly again, and she scanned the expanding cloud of smoke.  "I don't
see him ... is he all right?  Did he -- Wait!  Something's coming down
... it's ... it's HIM!  And he has the nose cone!  HE DID IT!"
   Lum-chan dropped the binoculars from her eyes, bouncing happily,
clapping, laughing and cheering at the top of her lungs.  All the
assembled ADP and bystanders followed suit.  Pomru flew a slow circle
around the crowd, waving and displaying the harmless nosecone, his
trophy of triumph.

   The Shogun Sabres were heroes this day.

                       Tales of the Shogun Sabres

                            TOO CUTE TO LIVE

                          Chapter 8 [Epilogue]


   Pomru finished his last slow lap around the crowd of cheering ADP
officers and civilians, landing gently in the former office of the
Kawaii-Cola president, which now bore a striking resemblance to Beirut
in miniature.  He was greeted by more cheers, and the broad, infrequent
smile of ADP Chief Gundam.
   "I suppose keeping you behind was your leader's idea," Gundam guessed
aloud.
   Pomru nodded.  "That's right.  Just an extra precaution in case Pai
tried to fly the coop.  It's a good thing this is our top-of-the-line
flight-booster, though ... we sure weren't expecting to have to catch an
ICBM.  It was a lot closer than I'd've liked."
   "But you did finish it in time.  That's what counts."
   "Maybe so, but it's nice when you're not trying to chew your nails
off under this armor."
   Gundam chuckled.  "It was an edge-of-your-seat chase from down here,
too.  I'm definitely going to put in some good words for you folks with
the press corps."
   Pomru smiled, though Gundam couldn't see it.  "It's good to know
we've gained your trust, Chief."  Gundam bent over, and they shook
hands.
   Pomru looked around as the ADP chief stood himself upright once more.
"I guess the rest of the gang hasn't returned from down below yet.  Hope
nothing unexpected happened."
   Gundam's reply was interrupted by the sound of rockets from the once-
secret elevator shaft.  Soon, two SD-sized hardsuits emerged from the
brief, unlit corridor and into the demolished office.
   "Hey, boss!"  Pomru waved to Shogun and Dnab, displaying the nosecone
he'd retrieved from Pai's missile.
   Shogun nodded.  "Good work, Pom.  I knew we could count on you."
   Gundam turned to face the Shogun Sabre leader.  "Your mission down
below was a success, I take it."
   Dnab rocked on his heels.  "Well, it was an adventure, that's for
sure."
   Shogun ignored his irreverent partner.  "We did what we could, Chief.
Here, I'd like to turn this over to you."  He held out his hand,
revealing a small, stoppered vial filled with a clear fluid.  "We found
this near where we intercepted the mad scientist.  We think it may be an
antidote for the SD condition."
   Gundam blinked, accepting the vial from Shogun's hand.  "You aren't
sure?  You were unable to capture Pai?"
   Shogun sighed.  "Well, yes and no.  I'm not sure you're going to
believe--"  Shogun paused, recognizing the sound of Jiro's thrusters
approaching in the shaft.  "Oh, good.  I think you'd better see this for
yourself, Chief."
   All eyes went to the entry-way of the elevator's corridor.  The sound
of thrusters died out, and Jiro's huge, yellow armor stepped out into
the light, providing Gundam with the surprise of his life.
   The monstrous suit's arms held what was definitely a non-SD'ed human,
albeit a smaller-than-average one, wearing an oversized white lab coat.
The figure was barefoot, with thick, short, dark hair.  A frail, quaking
hand held fast to the main body of the armor as a pair of innocent,
shimmering eyes turned to face the crowd.
   Gundam just stared quizzically at this unfamiliar girl, unsure what
to make of her, until she spoke.
   "Wh-- ... why you all stare at Pai?" her tiny voice begged.
   Jiro set her on her dainty feet as Gundam's jaw made a small crater
in the floor.  She walked gingerly, curiously over to the ADP chief,
meeting his astonished gaze directly, without so much as a twinge of
guile or deceit.
   "Pai not know you.  Who you?" she asked.  Gundam couldn't help but
notice how ... cute she was.  And much younger than she -- sorry, he --
was supposed to be.
   Gundam looked at her incredulously, but answered anyway.  "I am
Gundam, Special Operations Chief of the Armored Defense Police."
   Pai blinked at his long title, then smiled.  "Hello, Gundam," she
said brightly.  "I Pai.  Good to meet you."
   Gundam looked over at Shogun.  "Is this really--?"
   Shogun nodded.  "When we confronted him, he tried to use some new
formula of his on us.  He ended up getting it on himself, and it turned
him into ... her.  For all we can tell, she's a completely blank slate
-- she has no knowledge of her former life to this point.  She's
definitely no scientist."
   Dnab just stood with his arms crossed, grinning a lecherous grin that
was completely unseen under his helmet.  "Scientist, schmientist ... all
I want to know is what she looks like under that loose outfit."
   Pai looked innocently back at Dnab.  "You no like these?  Okay."
Much to everyone's surprise (especially Dnab's, who'd never though such
a straightforward approach would work on anyone), Pai shed her lab coat
and began to pull at her shirt.  "How I get this off?" she muttered as
she pulled on the buttons, popping one of them completely off.
   Gundam stopped her as Shogun shot a reprimanding look at Dnab over
the video comm-link.  Returning his attention to the ADP chief, Shogun
continued.  "As you can see, she definitely can't be released without a
guardian.  She's a bit grown to turn over to an orphanage..."
   "...and too dynamic for a nursing home, yes," Gundam completed.
"Well, I'll see what I can do.  This leaves us without anyone to press
charges against, but I suppose it's just as well."
   "Just as well for some of us," Dnab muttered over a private channel.
"Chun looked like she was ready to spit nails."
   Shogun once again ignored him.  "At any rate, there's a spare
elevator car that's still in working condition, so Jyanken's team should
be up soon.  Our last member is retrieving her armor -- when she gets
here, if you don't need us anymore..."
   Gundam waved his hand.  "Feel free to leave whenever you're ready.
You've done more for us today than we can ever think to compensate for.
I'll hand this vial off to the lab folks at Scanner Services, to see
what they can make of it."
   Shogun nodded.  "Until we meet again, Chief."  He walked to the open
wall that was once a window and jumped out, followed by his four
companions.  Firing thrusters to control their descent, they landed
gently in the "Live Crab" truck, which closed up over them.
   Pai ran toward the window, waving to them.  "Bye-bye!"

   Gundam sat quietly in his office, looking out the window at the
people walking by.  Businesspeople, working folks, couples ... most
SD'ed, some not.
   Three days ago, he'd turned the vial retrieved by the Shogun Sabres
over to Kallen.  Its arrival was greeted with great enthusiasm,
particularly by his little blonde lab assistant.  He chuckled as her
antics replayed in his mind -- Kallen just about blew his stack at her
when she looked like she was going to drop it.
   A pair of people strolled slowly past his view, leaning heavily on
each other ... very much in love.  The girl was smiling at a small,
sparkling spot on her hand.  Gundam's heart fell as the memory of
another couple prodded at him.  There was nothing they could do to save
Keiichi, and nothing they could say to comfort Belldandy.
   I sure hope they hurry with that cure, Gundam thought.
   Checking his watch, he noticed that it was time for the news.  He
returned to his desk, grabbed his remote control, and flipped on the
television on the other side of his office.  After several seconds of
flying computer-generated logos, the scene settled onto a familiar face.
   "Good evening.  This is the Mega-City Evening News; I'm LadyLove,
reporting.
   "It's been three days since the raid on the Kawaii-Cola offices,
hailed by AD Police Chief Gundam as a shining example of the civil
responsibility of the Shogun Sabres, turned up a small vial containing
what was believed to be a possible cure for SD disease.  A commercial
laboratory associated with Scanner Services today announced doubly good
news.
   "First, the formula in that vial is, indeed, a cure for the super-
deformed condition.  Unfortunately, only a small amount of the formula
was actually recovered -- apparently, it was all of the cure ever made
by the disease's creator, Pai.
   "Second, and most importantly, the Scanner lab says they have
successfully reproduced the cure, and have begun mass-producing it as an
over-the-counter medication.  You can expect to see it on drugstore
shelves in two days."
   Gundam turned down the volume, breathing a sigh of relief.  There was
other news, of course, such as the dropping dollar-ye exchange rate, and
the alarming increase of IRC users in the recent past, but he finally
knew things were going right.
   There was a rap at his door.  "Come in," he answered.
   The door opened, and the still-SD'ed form of Kallen entered his
office, wearing a pin-striped two-piece suit.
   Gundam rose to his feet immediately.  "Ah, good afternoon, Doctor!  I
just saw the news -- congratulations."  He walked around his desk as he
spoke, extending his hand.
   Kallen accepted the hand, shaking it to the best of his ability.
"Thank you, Chief.  But I can't really take all the credit -- I think
most of the thanks should go to the person brave enough to test our
first attempt at reproducing the cure."
   "And who might that be?" Gundam inquired, slightly curious.
   Kallen just smiled and waved a hand around the corner, and his
'guinea pig' walked into the room.
   Gundam watched the entering form in polite silence.  ('Polite', that
is, when compared to a cacaphony of howling and wolf-whistles.)  He
recognized little Deedlit immediately, of course.  Somehow, though,
'little' didn't seem to be the right word to describe the cheery,
youthful lady before him now.
   Her long, blond hair settled gently behind her as she turned to face
the ADP chief, smiling warmly with sparkling emerald eyes.  Her hands
were clasped demurely before her as she spoke quietly.  "Hello again,
Chief Gundam."
   "Uh ... hello, Deedlit.  I see you've discovered that your eyes are
fine the way they are."
   Deedlit smiled sheepishly, blushing slightly at Gundam's compliment.
"Thank you.  Actually, I was going to order replacements, but if that's
what you really think, I'll think about forgetting colored contacts."
   Kallen smiled at Gundam.  "To be honest, her eyes seem a bit bigger
now than they were before she was SD'ed.  I think it's a residual
effect; this is part of why I'm looking into controlled application of
SD'ing as a form of passive plastic surgery."
   Gundam nodded as Deedlit batted her eyes.  "Well done, Doctor.  This
city owes you a debt of gratitude."
   "Just doing my job, Chief, as you do yours."
   Gundam chuckled.  "Well put."

   Three quick raps sounded against Chun-Li's door.
   She silently slipped the deadbolt off, then crept into a shadow
behind the door.  "Come in," she sang, already knowing who was on the
other side.
   The door opened casually, and Jyanken walked in, surprised that there
was no one to greet him.  He looked all around, but managed to overlook
the spot directly behind him.
   He froze with a start.  "Here comes that deja-vu feeling..."
   "HYAAAA!"  Chun leaped into the air, affixing herself to the startled
Jyanken's back, quickly wrapping herself around his body.  He whirled in
a daze, bumping the door closed as he stumbled into the living room,
spinning past the coffee table and finally collapsing onto the sofa.
   "Jeez, you tryin' to give me a heart attack?"
   "Oh, you love it and you know it."  She slid herself around him so he
could see her grinning face, all the while keeping him pinned to the
cushions.
   His eyes widened as she came into view, and a broad smile played on
his lips.  "Oh my God ... Chun..."
   "Yes?"  She batted her eyes innocently with a sweet little smile.
   "You're ... not SD'ed anymore!"
   "Oh, how sweet of you to notice!"  She giggled cutely, bouncing
happily on top of him.
   He regarded her carefully, looking her over.  Her lithe figure had
returned, and when he looked into her eyes, the only word that came to
mind to describe them was "hungry".
   Good thing I have a late shift tomorrow, he said to himself.
   "Are you sure the cure was complete?" he asked carefully.
   Chun got up, crouched beside him, slipped her arms under him, and
easily lifted him from the sofa.  "We'll just have to find out, won't
we, lover?"  Any response he may have had was squelched by a passionate
kiss as she carried him into the bedroom.

   Dnab reached for a large bowl of popcorn and put a tape in the VCR,
never once letting his eyes off the screen as he grinned from ear to
ear.  He could tell by the tone of her voice -- this one would
definitely be a keeper.
   He made sure his backup VCR was also ready to go, in case they went
into overtime.


                                 E N D


Well, that's gonna be it for a little while.  Remember, you IRC mavens -- if
you don't want to see your head explode in the next Anime War Crisis
installment, say nice things to the author! :)
-- 
  The High Diggy-Hoek of Chihuahua-Wala Land  (or Martin Rose, if you must)
--------------------------- mfrose@umcc.umich.edu ---------------------------
Truth is stranger than Fiction ---------------- Stupid is a boundless concept
The Limbaugh Institute for Advanced Conservative Studies:  Ann Arbor Division