Lady Ide Shika Defies Destiny and Genetics


The paladins stopped in there advance as the door opened and an figure walked into the huge room. They watched the figure enter into the light to reveal the armored figure of the former daimyo advancing towards them. The light glinted off her black kotes and sodes as foot steps clicked on the metal floor. Her hara-ate held the weather-beaten black tunic tight, preventing it from doing much more than rustling. Her great helm was lacking, revealing her very feminine and very unwielding pale face. She stopped her slow advance about ten feet out from the door.

"None of you demons passes me alive," she promised calmly, arms hanging loosely at her sides. She was painfully aware of the fact that she was unarmed, but more for the reminder that she had allowed the blades to be destroyed than for any disadvantage it put her at. One of the paladins laughed at her, and the others joined in shortly thereafter.

"You don't have the Baxter gene fool," one of them laughed. "This is the moment of your destiny, the insurmountable warrior of darkness defeated by the cooperation of the light. The Moratani were designed to fail, again and again. Now will be no different." Shika snarled, they were harping on that "genetic engineering" nonsense again.

"You have no respect for the soul," she told them with a hint of anger and sadness creeping into the ice of her glare. Two of the ten paladins approached cautiously, and she could feel them smirking behind the helmets. She stood with her legs shoulder width apart and brought her hands together as she gave a slight bow to her opponents as a group.

"The soul is in the blood," one of them said.

"Come with me to the razor's edge," Shika invited them, she dropped the sode shoulder guards first, then moved to the kotes.

"Arrogant to the end, perfect to the Maker's design."

"We'll choose our fate with another dance." There was a click as another piece of armor hit the ground.

"This will be glorious."

"Striding the river red." She obviously turned her full attention them as the last armor hit the ground, leaving her free and unprotected, at least so it seemed. The paladins could not see the black, form fitting armor that they had found in this place of ancient secrets.

One of the paladins launched a spear at her as the two that had been approaching charged with shields leading. The spear passed them easily, and stopped, caught Shika's grip as it passed her dodging form. A quick motion stick the butt of the spear against the wall just in time for one of the blinding charging paladins to drive into it. The wooden shield that he had replaced his original with couldn't hold against the enchanted metal and the paladin impaled himself with a cry of shock.

The second charger found his target on the otherside of his dead comrade suddenly, and halted as she calmly took the fallen warrior's green-metaled blade from his cooling hand. He looked back long enough to see that his comrades were moving to his aid, no longer full of mirth. By the time he turned back to face Shika, the emerald sabre was ripping through his abdomen, and a dark haired Moratani was taking his sword.

Shika walked towards the charging paladins testing the comparative balances of her two new weapons. Three paladins broke forward and rushed in to attack her at once. Shika's upper body folded back as her foot kicked up. The long spear that had been trying to skewer her was diverted to her left as a sabre skimmed over her falling body. The blocking sabre then flashed upward taking a third of spearman's head. As she twisted her fall into a backroll, the man who's throat she had crushed with that kick dropped, dying painfully as he tried to breathe past a crushed throat. Her third attacker seemed to have merely frozen after making that one sabre slash, now, as Shika's second weapon was withdrawn from her chest, it was obvious what had happened.

Shika herself rolled back into a stand as the remaining five paladins moved to surround her, without moving in. They glanced past her and she smiled. She was still between them and the door, and they knew it. Plus they had just seen her take out three people in what amounted to two motions and half a second.

"Don't just charge blindly in!" somebody shouted belatedly. "She'll just use the confus..ack" The paladins blinked in shock as one of the stolen sabres whirled through the air, and drove through the speaker's helmet. The remaining four paladins moved to meet the now charging Shika.

Shika lost her second sabre in the first attacker, not having the time to retrieve it. She didn't know much about the latest kill, except that if the paladin hadn't been a woman before, they were a lot closer to that now. Seeing that she was now unarmed gave the paladins a little courage as the final three reached her. The first she directed past her, snapping the thing's neck as she did, without taking her eyes off of the next two.

Having a body between them and her only slowed them down a little, they tried to bowl their dead comrade into her and use him as a shield. Shika's eyes narrowed at the perceived insult to their companion. She drew a dagger from her latest kill's body and shifted her stance to let the ninth paladin proceed past her with the body. A well placed knife throw insured he wouldn't be returning to the fight.

Shika was turning to face her last opponent, when something stabbed through her "kevlar" jacket. There was a clatter as a helmet hit the ground, and through the pain she could almost hear the gloating smile.

"I told you we would..." the piece of cartillage driven through his brain, interrupted him. Shika dropped to her knees as he fell back away, painfully taking the sword from her side as well. Then again, Shika's own sudden motion had done more to bring her pain than that. The former daimyo dropped to her knees gripping the wound. It was much worse than it had started as, even her slaugh blood and chi control would not let her survive that indefinitely.

"And I told you none of you would pass me alive," she answered the corpse cooly. She examined the blood on her hands, and then she settled to focus her being on survival and healing. If she was lucky, her efforts would keep her alive long enough for the Fallen Morrama to find and give her a more certain healing. She struck on odd image, apparently meditating serenly among all the dead warriors.


Original@Fan.Fic