They watched Ryoko in horror, both the red-eyed one and the grey-eyed one. And then, watching was all they could do. When the blur had settled to the ground, only one Ryoko was standing. And bleeding.
She turned towards Yosho, who had arrived during the earlier fighting. "Please ... can you ... . help me .... get back ... inside?" But before anyone could move, she collapsed, her head hitting the ground with a sickening thud.
"RYOKO!!" Washu screamed, running to her daughter. With one of them over each arm, she disappeared into the house.
"Tenchi! You and the others see about getting that fire out. Kagato, Zelgadis, Lina, come with me!" Yosho called out, following Rezo in a dead run after Washu.
The devices in her lab being passed without notice, Washu streaked through the air, all her thoughts upon getting her daughter to the extensive medical labs on the next of the three planetoids that made up her lab.
I'm sorry Ryoko ... I never should have insisted on the merge ... I'm sorry ... I'm sorry ... Please, just live long enough for me to be able to repair the damage I've done to you, I'll do anything that you want me to, even if it's my leaving you here on earth and never returning, just live ... You're my baby girl, please, just live ... You're all I have left ... I'm so sorry ...
Washu's thoughts raced each other in endless, despairing circles, time ticking by rapidly, her daughter's life dripping away in streaks of red-blue blood ... Feeling her daughter dying even as she raced into the lab that might be able to save Ryoko's life.
Hovering in mid-air, Washu gently slipped both women into one of the tubes that were standard to most cloning or stasis units. Quickly activateing the unit, which would suspend Ryoko's life until Washu could find a way to heal her, Washu soon had it set to almost complete stasis. Buying them time. And it was to this that the others arrived, Washu at her keyboard, dashing to check a readout from anther station, frantically comparing data from two different sets of information. And Ryoko, both of them, floating peacefully within the stasis unit.
"Hey, Professor, what's the diagnosis?" Kagato called out as he took a place at one of the three stations, the one monitoring the more violent of the two Ryoko. Washu blinked at him bemusedly, a rather confused look on her face. "Professer, what is the diagnosis on the physical status of the subject?"
"My daughter is not a 'subject', Kagato of Ich' Nerits." Washu snapped crabbily at him, her hands moving rapidly over the keyboard in front of her.
"Sending corralated data to your left A3 monitor, Washu." Yosho called out from his post, the third one that Washu had been trying to run by herself.
"Rezo, can you scan her or something and see what your magical abilities turn up?" Washu called out to him as he stood hesitantly by the door with Zelgadis and Lina, a worried frown creasing her forehead.
"I'll see what I can do." Moving quickly, he peered shortly into the stasis tube before closing his eyes. A flare of blue power, and of a red-orange beyond the blue told Rezo that Zelgadis and Lina had joined him in observing Ryoko. The life-energy of Ryoko's two bodies showed clearly, as did the fact that the energy flowed freely from body to body, with very little of the leakage that would signify open wounds.
"Interesting." Zelgadis's calmly cold voice cut like a knife across bare skin in the sudden silence. "Her life energy is being drained away by something ... and it's not because of being in two bodies."
"It's almost as if it's being drawn somewhere ... I can see some her energy being returned ... but it's been, changed somehow, something's been taken out of it." Lina murmurred, her eyes opening halfway, unfocused. "And the altered energy ... seems to be affecting her mind. Normally I'd only see something like this in ..."
"Astral travel." Zelgadis said firmly, opening his own eyes.
"Just what is 'Astral travel', and what does it have to do with my daughter?!"
"It means your daughter's soul is traveling the local astral plane ... perhaps the very area around the gate we came in." Rezo mused, his chin resting on his hand as he thought. He turned slowly towards Zel, a rather hesitant look on his face. "Will you, please, check the astral plane for her, Zelgadis?" Zelgadis stared silently at Rezo, his eyes even colder than before. "Please, Zel?" Washu asked, standing next to her keyboard.
" ...." Zel looked towards Washu, a rather neutral expression on his face. "Very well."
"Thank you."