Chaos Ensued

Hell broke loose in the pawn shop.

Burst of pink laser peppered goon, kaijin, and pawn show merchandise alike as half of those present rushed down Sweet Bear and the other half ran for the door.

Fuku and Sayuri took one look at each other before getting to work. Sayuri frantically stripped down to her blue and yellow bodysuit, unwilling to lose any more clothes tonight if she could help it. Fuku had already whipped out his wand and put up a shielding spell up around Sweet Bear.

The shield spell was already taking the brunt of a spray of acid from a kaijin, splaying off and dissolving a portrait of a wizard from days long past. It was melting the shield too, the spell shattering into pieces when Sweet Bear lunged in with her bear claws.

Fuku ran crowd control, his wand hurling statues, books, and crystal balls at anything that moved. Part of the store caught fire after a collection of potions smashed into the floor and spontaneously combusted.

The air was filling with smoke and debris and magic, and that was before a transformed Sayuri dove into the fray. Now he was stuck having to watch the back of a magical girl and a very pissed off werewolf.

It wasn’t that Fuku didn’t expect to get into a fight. It was just that he didn’t expect to get into one this big.

----

At the Other Side, Hanzo took a seat at the bar. Hideo took his own at the end of the bar, waiting to see who would take the first bite at him.

Hanzo flagged down the bartender, a towering blonde whose thick arms were wiping down one of the glasses with a stained rag. She looked up from her handiwork, nodding. “Hanzo.” Her voice was deep. “What’ll it be tonight?”

“Shirley Temple,” said Hanzo. “Need to stay on my feet tonight, Thrud. I’m on the clock.” He gestured to Hideo.

Thrud looked at the grump at the end of the bar, sliding a glass of water down to him. “The bounty?”

“Knock-on effect of the bigger problem.” Hanzo leaned in. “Jade Chrysanthemum took his kid. We’re on the war path trying to find her.”

Thrud nodded solemnly. “A noble quest. But I must protest using this bar as a staging ground for your war.”

Hanzo gave her a winning smile. “We’re not going to start anything.”

The two turned to look at Hideo again, who was now being harassed by half a dozen customers at the bar. One of them was gesturing wildly with a serrated knife. Hideo grabbed his wrist, plunged his knife into the bar, and flung him over the bar onto the floor – ducking under his flailing legs in the process.

Everything in the bar came to a screeching halt. Hideo stood up straight and laid down his marker. “Alright,” he shouted. As his belt appeared around his waist he continued, “I know you know who I am. I’m not leaving until someone tells me where my daughter is or everyone’s lying concussed on the floor.”

Several patrons immediately move towards the bar to close out their tabs, Thrud throwing Hanzo a dirty look. “In my defense,” Hanzo said, “we didn’t start it.”

Hanzo was already neck deep in other patrons who wanted that shot at a trillion yen. A flash of light inside that mob signaled to Hanzo that the Wolf Knight had come out, and it was time for him to back up his comrade in arms.

Hanzo reached his hands down to his hips, striking across the front in a ‘X’ pattern like Hideo would. A belt of steel wove itself across Hanzo, and between his hands appeared a purple and green buckle, with an image of a bird’s eye set inside.

Slowly, he raised the hands in front of him, rising further and further until they formed that ‘X’ above his head. With his mind at peace, Hanzo let the power loose once more as he said the magic word:

“HENSHIN!”

The ‘X’ was broken, Hanzo swinging his arms out to his side at the shoulder level – though the opposite side that Hideo would. The eye on his belt glowed, seeming to ‘blink’.

And then the belt chanted. [QUOTH THE RAVEN! NEVERMORE!]

A black glow flowed over Hanzo, dissipating once he was completely covered. The Raven Scout armor in real life was a bit bulkier and darker than the show made it look, but the feathery cape and raven’s head helmet were a spitting image.

Raven Scout kicked a few of the men off of Wolf Knight, the two rapidly throwing the remainder across the room or into the bar or into the fixtures hanging from the ceiling. Which only left two to stand against them.

Approaching Wolf Knight and Raven Scout were two men about their height, one with blonde hair and sunglasses while the other had cropped black hair.

The moment Wolf and Raven laid eyes on the two men, they knew the men were just like them. Experimented on, torn apart and put back together again by Jade Chrysanthemum. The difference was that Wolf and Raven escaped before they could be programmed into loyal foot soldiers.

“Surrender to the legacy of the Perfected Emperor,” said the blonde man. “And we’ll make your deaths quick.”

Raven Scout scoffed at the offer. “That’s it? Not even a fake offer to spare his daughter’s life?”

“Would you prefer that I insult your intelligence by promising she’ll live if you do?”

Wolf’s fist shook at his side. “Get on with it.”

It was an identical maneuver and magic word the men used, and the belts forming around their waists were the same as well.

It was the armor that formed around them when they finished transforming that stunned Wolf Knight. One was wearing green and black with an eagle’s head, and the other red and gray with a hippo’s.

Wolf recognized the two. Eagle Rook and Hippo Bishop.

It was how he recognized them that set him off. He’d seen them on posters in the Nise Kitai office, the stars of other shows the company made while pitching Miho and him the worst ideas ever. Come to think of it, Eagle was the protagonist in one of the shows Kumiko said her classmates enjoyed.

The implications were vast. Jade Chrysanthemum had taken a page from Miho and him, and made their own icons to commercialize. For all he knew, they ran Nise Kitai – and had been sandbagging every meeting he’d taken with shitty ideas that would ruin his good name or ensure he’d go to the poor house.

The magnitude of their conspiracy should have pissed him off. But as he charged in to deliver a fist to Eagle Rook’s jaw, only one question escaped his lips.

“WHERE THE FUCK DID YOU TAKE MY DAUGHTER?!”