"It's alright." Yori whispered to Yoko, though he knew that he didn't sound all that convincing. He didn't know why PaxCorp had sent his sister back in time, and hoped that it wouldn't have to come down to fighting at all.
The demon android's wings fluttered so fast while descending that the gusts of wind could topple over an average man, but Yori's weighted feet acted like stabilizers, heavy with the same Paxton alloy that made up all of his sister's body. After landing, her entire body remained spanned outward, menacing. At the short distance she was now, it was easier to tell that she taller than Yori, with a height of approximately 7 and a half feet. Presumably, she could make herself even taller, in the rare case she was outmatched in terms of height. Yori remembered that she used height as a weapon, favoring an aggressive highlander
Jodan-gamae style of combat combined with claw reach and free-form joint maneuverability.
"Hello, brother~" Her voice was sing song and sweet, thought it was betrayed by her appearance and stance.
"My sister, it has been a long time." Yori responded mournfully. "Why now; why has he sent you?"
"I'm
hurt that you would think that I wouldn't want to see you on my accord, but when I learnt about what happened, I knew I could convince our father to be the one to bring you back."
"What do you mean?"
"You're the first person confirmed to travel across the fourth dimension, the very first time traveler!" she squealed.
"Ayako
("design-child"), I..."
"To think that you finally managed to best me at something~"
"I was
plucked from our time. None of it was by my accord."
"Oh?" Ayako sounded like she was pouting, though she couldn't express it, having metal tendril-looking things spewing from where a mouth should be. "Maybe that's why I found it difficult to navigate the eddies of the fourth dimensional plane from the unstable wormhole you left. You weren't wrong when you said it has been a long time. I calculated that it took me approximately 75.25 years for me to be here, with
you." The last word was seething in new scorn. "Now I see that you've come to disappoint me once again."
"It's a difficult habit to break, considering that you always had such high standards." Yori quipped.
Ayako robotic eyes rolled exactly like slot machine wheels. "You look strange, with those caveman clothes you have on. I miss seeing you dressed like a cop; it was at least cuter. You've already interacted with the locals, and you look like you haven't even aged a day. It doesn't surprise me that you'd get chummy already."
"I'm going to fix the damage I've caused by being here."
"I'm going to fix all this, not you. Although, not having a way to return to my time is really a monkey wrench in my original plan. You know your friend, the one you sent away before I landed? All that did was spare him a couple more minutes. You
know I have super parabolic senses. Every local you've come in contact with must be purged from the timeline."
She always bested him in a fight. Out of the thousands of sparring matches in virtual reality space, Ayako had dominated as the clear winner each time. While Yori had become well trained in Pax Style, Ayako had attained a higher level of it. As an android, it was said that she was incapable of making mistakes.
"What then?" Yori rebuked. "You don't know the mission we must complete to
actually save the timeline. You'll be stuck here, without purpose, not knowing the extent to which you have failed your own design."
"You're bluffing. You're not that important, but the butterfly effect is notorious for bringing out unexpected results. It's going to be a pain, but I can wait a thousand years in a secluded cave until I'm in the right time again."
"I might not be important, but
he is."
"Hmmm. I doubt it."
"He's the only one that can defeat the greater threat at hand."
Ayako's eyes glowed bright red. "You know it isn't wise to try and provoke me, brother, because I can defeat anything that a caveman can."
"It's the truth."
"Tell me what this greater threat is and I'll kill it also."
"I know you well, sister, which is why I won't. You won't kill the greater threat, because he'll seduce you just like our power hungry father has. You could follow Paxton's mission exactly, but that'd boring."
"You're right about some things, but I'm not one to be seduced." Ayako mused. "Your friend, though, is he really that good in a fight? This mission might be fun after all."
"I won't allow you to fight him. He doesn't know our ways in which we fight. It'd be stacked from the start."
"You only cripple yourself with your held concept of honor. I will fight him, and if he puts up a good enough fight, I might spare his life despite the risk to the timeline. Then, I'll find this 'greater threat' and see what fun I can squeeze out of it before I figure out how to get back to our time."
"Nice plan. Too bad it doesn't take into account that you're going to lose your fight against me."
Yori drew his sword in a split instant and held it in a ready stance. Ayoko raised her the back of his large claw hands to her 'mouth', shaking her head erratically, animating her robotic fit of simulated exaggerated laughter. "I don't feel like playing with you anymore, toy. I got bored at around the 1001st fight."
Ayako was in effect only spewing out a stream of thousands of numbers at an incredible rate perceived only as rapid gibberish, made manifest by super-powered radio wave transmitters that attacked the circuitry of Yori's body, but Yoko could feel with Yori that effect that this command was having on his body, even though Yoko wouldn't be able to understand why. All of his electronic components struggled to remain active against the codes meant to disable him directly. It was an extremely cheap tactic to hack into personal body systems, but highly effective.
"It looks like some of the code wasn't used, and you're still standing. Why is that, Yori?"
I have Yoko by my side. She gives me strength that you can't detect.
"Many of my working components had to be stripped from my body to keep me alive from another fight."
"So not only are you a toy, you're a
broken toy. Begone!"
Before Yori could respond, he was shot by an unknown blast shot from the end of one of Ayako's metal claws. He felt the same unknown sensation he felt during that unknown space between his world and this one. He presumed his body was still corrupted by time particle residue, and that the burst excited them to form a separate pocket of time around him, to suspend him just outside the prime material plane. He was stuck now, and could only helplessly watch as Ayako flew fast and made a beeline straight towards the Ieyoshi manor, for Jiro.
