INCIDENT AT THE ETOs
I was trying to write a Wandering Kasumi challenge story from the
point of view of the CSI series, but I can't do that. I don't watch
enough CSI to write a story using the background and characters.
Does anyone who is a fan of CSI want to write more chapters based on the incident written below or your own ideas?
INCIDENT AT THE ETOs
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Kasumi dropped the last thug with a delicate one finger tap to his
skull that rocked the man's head like she had connected with a
powerful punch causing his body to instantly go limp and collapse to
the floor. Catching the empty Mac 10 the man had been swinging at
her she crushed it into a useless mass of metal with her right hand
ignoring the weapon's long silencer as it poped off and droped
neatly onto a cushioned seat.
Finally satisfied the weapon would never fire again Kasumi pitched the
crumpled remains toward the unconscious leader of the group ignoring
the man's groan as the crumpled metal bounced on his stomach before
hitting the floor with a thunk.
Taking a moment she surveyed the destruction frowning in anger as she
clenched her left hand into a tight fist the lead and steel of the last
eight slugs she had caught popping and grinding as the pressure formed
them into a single mass.
Behind her two hearts beat wildly, but were reassuringly steady, in
front of her and to both sides was wreckage. It looked like every glass
surface or fixture below the ceiling was shattered, the furniture and
walls riddled with bullet holes. The salad bar and a few chairs
had completely collapsed the legs and other supports shot out by the
hail of 45 caliber bullets. She could hear the sound of water spraying
in the kitchen where one or more of the bullets had found a water line.
A particular loud moan near her feet pulled her attention downward
where it was side tracked by the state of her waitress uniform.
The nice blue blouse was little more than a tattered rag with dozens of
holes punched or torn in the material. Nearly five clips worth of dutch
loaded hollow point and steel jacketed slugs had transformed the week
old uniform into a badly used shop rag, her skirt was in slightly
better shape with only two or three holes and a large slice where the
jagged edge of a deflected bullet had cut the material from the waist
to just past her knees. She had been forced to use her body
to block most of the bullets from three of the thugs, while her
hands, arms and legs had been fully occupied with the job of deflecting
the fire from the other
two.
A second groan finally pulled her attention from the destroyed waitress
uniform down to the five crumpled bodies laying scattered haphazardly
across the floor, with one almost at her feet. Resisting the urge
to kick the leader through the front window Kasumi instead settled for
a glare at the badly bruised leader. The star bright glow of light
leaking from her eyes betraying her irritation both at the five
thugs laying unconscious before her and at herself for letting them do
so much damage.
She had been in back washing the worst of the days pots and pans, while
the Eto's ancient industrial dishwasher had noisily worked it's way
through a cleaning cycle on the rest. She hated that machine, it not
only rattled and roared in the normal audio spectrum it squealed in the
low ultrasonic bands and thumped in the high infrasonics. She had
been scrubbing the pots, while fantasizing about dropping the ancient
contraption into a active volcano or possibly the sun when the pot she
held had jumped from her soapy hands.
Like a complete idiot she had fished it back out of the large sink and
stared at the two holes with incomprehension until a second spray of
bullets had passed through the kitchen one bouncing off an ear. Only
then had she thought to scan with her X-ray vision and had reacted
barely in time to place herself between the cowering Eto's and their
would be murderers.
Kasumi's heart trembled as she thought how close they had come
to getting shot. She had saved the Eto's by the smallest of
margins literally flying in front of an already fired bullet. Had
the five not decided to have some fun terrifying their targets then
both Ginko and Yogoro would have been...
Cutting the thought off Kasumi silently berated herself for looking at
this universe as a vacation after the last two atomic wastelands she
had been in... Almost shivering at the memory of fighting on
post apocalyptic Earths she turned from the bruised unconscious thugs
and bowed deeply to the Eto's planning to apologize for her failure.
Instead as she rose from the bow Ginko peeking from behind Yogoro's
back had gasped out "She's been shot!" and sagged against her husband's
back and shoulders not quite fainting at the sight of Kasumi's savaged
uniform.
She allowed them a moment of worried inspection and watched as Yogoro's
eyes at first widened at the sight of the tattered remains of her
uniform and then narrowed as he noticed there was no armour under her
waitress uniform only undamaged skin. It took only a moment
before she could hear in the beat of his heart the realization
that the bullets had not been deflected or stopped by concealed armour,
but had bounced directly from her flesh.
Yogoro stepped forward one hand involuntarily coming up in a barely
aborted attempt to finger the holes in her clothing and the
exposed skin as he made a closer examination of her body. Kasumi quitly
waited allowing the close visual examination fighting a blush as he
desperately searched for armour or some other reasonable
explanation for her undamaged body.
Finally gaining control he stepped back bumping into his
wife's shocked form before he hesitantly asked "How... Who...
WHAT... Kasumi?" With each word both Yogoro and Ginko
retreated stepping back in near perfect unison. The look on
Ginko's face had changed from shock to fear and the beat of her heart
made it clear she too had just realized that Kasumi wasn't wearing any
armour.
Kasumi smiled sadly at Yogoro and Ginko trying to think of a way to
calm them as their relief was again replaced with fear and the couple
continued to edged backwards. Kasumi had seen the fear before
both back home mostly among the North Koreans, Chinese and Russians and
in almost ever other universes she had been forced to visit. It was a
fear of the unknown a fear of what the Eto's had thought was a simple
teenage runaway, but was now revealed to be something almost
unimaginably different.
Her mind in overdrive whirling uselessly through dozens of
explanations discarding them all Kasumi unconsciously fell back
into her earliest training buying time by bowing once more as she tried
to frame an answer to Yogoro's question.
It wasn't so easy, in the past five months since taking pity on what
they thought was a runaway teenager dumpster diving for clothing she
had come to know the Eto's quite well. Her origins and very existence
and her just revealed capabilities were shattering a rock solid
foundation of belief reinforced by a lifetime in academic science and
over a decade of experience at successfully debunking countless magical
and supernatural claims.
Yogoro was a retired chemical engineer with doctorate in both Physics
and astronomy. He had taken an early retirement to be with his grand
children and pursue his own interest and lately had filled some of his
time performing a magic act followed by a debunking of his own tricks
in his wife's restaurant. His wife held BAs in Organic Chemistry and
Medical Biology, which she had abandoned to raise their twin sons and
then after the twins college graduations and subsequent marriages had
somehow ended up owning and running a small restaurant in Vegas.
In the last ten years both had become a famous or infamous
investigation team debunking bigfoot reports, alien abductions and
claimed supernatural abilities among the Cults, Con Artist, Mediums,
Mentalist and Spirit
Guides in Las Vegas's and every surrounding state.
Kasumi presence with them had been pure happenstance for all the irony
it embodied. She had been banished to this particular universe less
than a week and was wandering randomly enjoying the view of a
America not devastated by atomic weapons when she had been attracted to
the lights of Las Vegas and had a idea.
It hadn't taken her long to drop to 45,000 feet and spend a few minutes
using her telescopic and x-ray vision to locate enough lost coins to
assure herself of a win with the mechanical slot machines still found
in this universe's Casinos. Less than an hour later she had found
herself back at 45,000 feet and fuming in irritation at said Casino's.
She hadn't known this universe's America had a minimum gambling age of
twenty-one and hadn't realized her clothing marked her as a teen. She
had been intercepted in every Casino, "carded" and summarily removed
when she had been unable to provide proof of being over twenty-one.
Climbing back to altitude she had been looking to replace the teenage
style clothing unknowingly pulled out of a dumpster behind a college in
Hawaii. A second methodical search of Vegas had led her to the
dumpster behind the Eto's and ultimately to Yogoro's discovery of there
"runaway". Over the past few months she had grown slightly
tired of Yogoro's often repeated and overly humorous description of his
discovery of a dumpster sprouting wildly waving bare feet and legs
clad in last year's teen craze of faded and stone washed pink jeans.
That discovery had led to one bath, one meal of leftovers and a change
and several sets of clothing Ginko had put back for goodwill.
Kasumi had followed that up by volunteering to help the Eto's
wash dishes as they sent their three exhausted waitresses home.
In the next six weeks she had returned nightly a couple of hours before
closing and had eaten and washed dishes until the
noisy monstrosity that normally did it had been repaired.
That would have been it and she would have moved on, but somehow Ginko
had discovered her ability to cook traditional Japanese dishes and that
had led to her extending her nightly visits teaching both Ginko and her
cooks. Eventually she had ended up being the Eto's Restaurant's closing
waitress working the last two hours and doing general clean up after
the Eto had closed for the night.
"Click" immediately recognizing the sound Kasumi blurred to all
watching as she spun to face the sound's source. An instant
before she had finished her turn there was a loud explosion and Kasumi
had just enough time to register the 357 magnum Revolver in the prone
leader's hand, a blossom of fire and smoke spreading from the barrel's
end partially hiding the gleeful look that filled her attackers face.
Her eyes suddenly crossed tracking the bullet's flight as she first
noticed the clearly visible shock wave and had followed that to the
dark blurred shape of the spinning bullet less than twelve inches from
her head.
Kasumi blinked and felt the sharp thump of the slug hitting just
above her nose catching in the depression just below her forehead. Her
head snapped back more by the sudden surprise of the shot than
the actual force of the bullet's impact.
Her head tilted sharply back Kasumi paused starring at the Eto's light
fixtures as her mind replayed the bullets flight and she suddenly
thought "I'm glad it missed my nose." A smile appeared on Kasumi's face
as she remembered a mortified Ranma-chan waking her up at 3 AM and
asking for help. It had taken thirty minutes, a screwdriver and a pair
of needle nose pliers to finally remove the small caliber bullet wedged
up Ranma's left nostril and it had taken nearly a month of
constant obscure public remarks before Ranma had finally given in and
she had gotten the full story of a black powder derringer "hidden" on
the outside of a belt buckle being suddenly pressed to her nose and
fired. The truly mortifying thing for Ranma about the entire incident
was that it had actually worked. The bullet hadn't actually hurt the
young superhero, but the cloud of burning black powder expelled along
with the 22 caliber slug directly into Ranma's nose had started a
sneezing fit that hadn't ended until the poor super hero was well above
30,000 feet. It had taken Ranma nearly fifteen minutes to return
and by that time the "nose" shooting mugger had staggered off cradling
an arm broken by the first explosive sneeze.
Tilting her head down Kasumi heard the thug's shout of "YES!"
mixing with the dying echoes of the gunshot. Looking at the man's
face Kasumi noted that he had shut his eyes in joy and she moved
instantly her right hand and arm becoming a blur snatching the
weapon from him.
His eyes flew open and Kasumi watched them widen as he stared at
her in almost frozen shock even she could barely hear his whispered "No!
I saw! Your
dead. I shot you! I shot you! Right between the eyes. " The last four
words were read from the silent movment of his lips as his eyes
seemed to catch on something and nearly cross as they focused on
the girl's eyes seeing something that called fourth a
sudden terror in the man's expression.
Kasumi hissed "Yessss!" and was surprised as something dislodged itself
from the top of her nose and a flattened shape suddenly fell away from
her face. She watched the thugs eyes and head turn as he tracked
the spent bullets movement to the floor, where it's flattened shape
bounced a couple of times and then slowly wobbled to a stop on the
hardwood surface.
The prone thug stared at the vibrating spent bullet giving no notice to
the double gasp or the soft sounds of the two Eto's collapsing behind
Kasumi. Instead he continued to stare at the flattened slug his body
unmoving until the toe of a small badly scuffed black shoe moved into
his line of sight and started tapping. Even then the now
trembling assassin refused to look up until a series of soft coughs
slowly almost against the man's will caused him to raise his eyes and
look Kasumi in the face his body freezing again as he locked eyes with
something that couldn't be human.
Kasumi held the Asian assassin's unblinking stare for several seconds
before she brought his 357 magnum revolver up into his line of sight.
On a whim Kasumi allowed her eyes to start to glow as she used her
thumb to pop the large revolver's cylinder out the wrong way the metal
giving a sharp ping as it broke. Emptying the bullets on the
floor she crushed the cylinder and the rest of the weapon in one quick
clenching of her right hand that was accompanied by the sharp sounds of
snapping metal. The man's eyes rolled up until only the whites showed
and he moaned fainting as all his sphincters released and his body
relaxed from it's rigid terror.
Kasumi quickly checked the Eto's and the other thugs and then vanished
for a moment in a high speed blur before returning with a large roll of
duck tape. Working quickly and in a near blur she used the entire roll
of tape to nearly mummify all five thugs constricting their movement
until their ability to breath was almost in doubt.
Turning to the Eto's Kasumi gently lifted Ginko and carried her to the
restaurant's back room placing her on the large old couch they and
their workers regularly used during breaks. Carefully arranging the
unconscious woman so she wouldn't fall over Kasumi stared sadly at the
woman her recent scare still evident on her features. After a moment
she shook her head and blurred from the room returning more slowly a
few seconds later easily carrying Yogoro's limp form.
Placing him beside his wife's limp body Kasumi carefully arranged them
so that they were propping each other up and then dropped into a nearby
seat. She rested there only a moment when she suddenly snapped her
fingers and vanish in a blur returning a moment later with two glasses
of water. Sitting both glasses on a nearby table frowning at the
single bullet hole in it's surface before she turned and exited the
back door only to return seconds later her legs now dusty and muddy
from the knees down where she had kneeled and shut off the water.
Sitting down across from the the still unconscious Eto's
Kasumi absently brushed the mud and dirt from her legs with one
hand while she picked up the phone with the other and dialing the 911
this universe used for emergencies.
Finally hearing the police sirens in the distance Kasumi hung the phone
up in spite of the 911 operators orders. Standing to her feet Kasumi
glanced at the Eto's and smiled at the way the old couple had nestled
into each others arms in their sleep. Reaching
a decision Kasumi was half way to the restaurant's rear door
when she heard Yogoro softly ask "Will we see you again?" Turning
back to the couple Kasumi was surprised to see that Yogoro hadn't moved
only his heartbeat and eyes giving away the fact he was awake.
Thinking about his question for a moment Kasumi slowly shook her head
and spoke softly saying "Probably not, my time in this world was always
limited and soon I'll return home. I'll watch as long as I..." Glancing
at the room's far wall Kasumi focused through it and watched a pair of
police officers carefully make their way inside reacting to the damage
and wrapped bodies. Speaking while she watched the two officers Kasumi
said "The police are finally here they just entered the front and are
calling for backup."
Yogoro spoke again softly stating "You can see and hear them can't
you.right through the walls." Nodding her head in a silent yes Kasumi
turned rose a few inches into the air and was silently gliding toward
the door when she heard his final question quietly asking "What are
you?"
Yogoro watched in shocked silence feeling almost numb as what he had
thought was a teenage girl revealed yet another impossibility by rising
into the air and in complete silence glided slowly across the room.
Some how he worked up the nerve and asked one final question of the
being he had been so sure was a simple runaway. The being seemed to
ignore his question and was out the door and rising into the air when
she paused her body settling slightly before she spoke through a very
sad smile saying "A strange visitor from another world." A moment later
she was gone her body rising into the semidarkness of a Vegas
night.
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Additional Optional Facts to go with the short scene above.
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Remember Kasumi has been banished from her universe by the wizards
staff yet again, this is one of the later times where her body is
banished as well.
Up until 5 months ago when she appeared in this universe it was exactly like the standard CSI universe seen on TV.
Las Vegas, the CSI and the world have not really noticed that they have
a superhuman living among them. (A least two Tabloids have taken
notice of some of Kasumi's actions and published what they thought was
exaggerated version of the events.)
From Kasumi's point of view she has been in the CSI universe for 5
months and has worked at the Eto's restaurant for the past 4 months and
3 weeks.
In the past 5 months she has used her "ultra" abilities at least 137
times mostly very minor saves with both the police and reputable news
agencies discounting the more outlandish accounts. There were a few
exceptions told more as human interest stories as hallucinations or
over active imaginations such as a small child seeing a "White angel"
lift the car out of a river.
65 of the minor "ultra" saves that have not been noticed or attributed
to a superhuman have been in the larger general area of the Eto's
restaurant and deal directly with the actions of a Chinese Triad gang
that is trying to expand it's territory around a Casino they recently
purchased through several front companies.
Kasumi has unknowingly stymied the Triad's crime wave designed to
expand the gang's power and bring in more territory. She has been
using the neighborhood crime watch as a info source and has
accidentally made it appear that her employers were the people that
have been stopping them.
The Eto's are the current outspoken leaders of the neighborhood watch
and because of Kasumi's hidden superhuman actions they have been
specifically targeted to be made a example of in this particular
triad's traditional very violent way.
Kasumi's Rising Sun uniform is still intact in this banishment, but
Kasumi has whited out the Japanese symbols to keep from causing a
international incident.
The Eto's believe Kasumi is a teenage runaway and have given her a part
time job as a cleaner and dish washer and while Kasumi hasn't exactly
lied she has fostered their belief that she is a runaway roughly
15 to18 years that might vanish at any time.
One other fact which Kasumi doesn't know is that while the
restaurant was closed for sunday the day before the incident the
Eto's have finally given into their twin son's begging and
allowed professionals friends install a full security
system complete with several video camera's.
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howard melton
hmelton@ameriwave.net