Chapter 1, first half
Written by me, translated by Moe Moe Remilikana Scarlet
It is the year 2556
In over 500 years, a lot has changed.
Unfortunately it has to be said that the developments were not positive ones.
In the year 2026 it became known that China had been spying on the USA for several decades, to gain advantages in an imminent war. The USA tried to avoid a possible conflict, but China denied all negotiations.
Like that, the Third World War began, and it would claim more victims then all the wars before it.
At first it was only the USA against China, but the both opponents dragged more and more countries into the war, so that soon almost all industialized nations were involved in this useless confrontation. The size of the battles, and the amount of victims, grew bigger and bigger.
Finally the USA reached a point at which, thanks to some mistakes in the Chinese strategy, they were close to forcing the war to an end. But almost completely out of despair, to keep the war going, Washington D.C. was blown up. However the nations didn't accept that and ended the war blasting the governmental office in Peking on Septembre 19th, 2031. China was forced to sign a truce and the war finally came to an end.
The terrible results: Because of the frequent use nuclear weapons live on the surface became almost impossible, so that a safe secured survival was only possible in shelters. Many people died from the radiation during or after the war or mutated.
Now humanity, or that which was left of it, had to live in the shelters for over 200 years, until, in the year 2253, a team of scientists discovered a new element, which was able to absorb and neutalize radiation.Three years later they additionally became capable of reproducing the element without limits to get rid of the remaining radiation even faster.
Depending on the shelter-communities the nation-domes were build all over the globe between the years 2282 and 2307. A live outside of the domes had become unimaginable for the people, sicne they had spent all their lives in closed rooms. Also, the trust in the absorption-element wasn't too high, which didn't help the situation.
In the year 2381 a historian discovered the cause for the Third World War: the uncontrollability of emotions. All important actions that had led to the war were related to envy, fear, anger, despair. That wasn't the only thing causing the war, of course, but all other possible reasons for the war had been eliminated in the reconstruction. At this point mankind couldn't risk another war breaking out.
It was almost a miracle that at that time it was discovered that the element, which absorbed radiation, could, in high doses, make humans emotionless. It wasn't long before it was decided to use the element to neutralize this last possible danger.
The Emperor, that was only elected for representative purposes, called out to the people to give up their emotions for the sake of peace, which caused a lot of commotion. But most people decided to do so voluntarily, so that in the year 2394 a law was passed that only allowed trustyworthy soldiers and the Emperor himself to possess emotions, because in their eyes emotions were something that had to be strictly controlled to be able to live with them. Everyone else would be a potential threat to peace and could provoke a war at any time. Everyone that stood against this regulation was branded a Maverick, hunted by the soldiers and, depending on the situation, either subjected to the procedure or executd immediately.
Now it is the 14th of June 2556, one week before the 250-year-celebration of the construction of nation-dome CX-29
And it shall begin...
The celebration was a only few days away, but CX-29 seemed like it was on every other day.
Bare, bright white blockhouses stood tightly packed next to and behind each other, while not a single human was to be found on the streets. If one didn't know better, one could think that this was in fact a ghost town. Shining, bare, soulless white.
And even though it would be very unsusual to spot any other color here, there was an unconscious young man, wearing a red top, on the ground, like a drop of blood on a clean sheet of paper.
How he had come here, where he had come from, or that he was lying on this road, was known to noone at this point. But he should have been noticed easily, whether it be because of the red top that was decorated with rivets, the dark-blue trouers with suspenders, the red boots or the wild brown hair. The only thing missing was a "Notice me!"-sign, and even a blind person couldn't have missed him.
Slowly he awoke and held his right hand to his forehead, still slightly dizzy. "Am I snowblind, or why is everything looking so bright here?"
Within a moment he realized that he hadn't awoken at the same place that he had fallen asleep at. While he stood up, he thought: "It's looking even more dreary here than in my mind!"
"Stop!"
He jumped in surprise, turned around and saw a group of soldiers pointing their weapons at him. They would almost have been unnoticable, because their armor and helmets were of the same color as everything here: white.
Their supposed leader said: "Who would have thought that there is still a Maverick here. I believed we exterminated the last one of them three years ago..."
"HEY!" the young man called out. "I don't know where I am, nor who you are and especially not what you want with me. But if you want to fight..."
He drew his swords and aimed them at the leader. While one was glowing red, the coldness of ice was emanating from the other one.
"...then try it."
The leader appeared confident. "Well then. The first attack is yours."
The young man stormed forward, ready to impale the leader on his swords.
"SONIC THRU-"
There was only a hair's breadth of air between his swords and his enemies armor, when suddenly he was held by an invisible force, his swords slid from his hands and he barely managed to stay standing.
A bit surprised the leader said: "I'm impressed you can still stand despite the Anti-Combat-Code. It's a pity that you're a Maverick, else I would leave you alive!" He aimed his weapon at the young man's head, ready to fire, when...
"HOLD IT!"
Confused he looked up. A man in a white coat, with pointy brown hair, a sword at his side and dull eyes stood behind the boy.
"Sergeant Double X!"
Without reacting to it, he answered.
"Deactivate it."
"Err, what?"
"The Antic-Combat-Code. I want you to deactivate it."
"That's irresponsible! He can still stand despite the Anti-Combat-Code!"
"Exactly, that's why."
After a short pause, the leader quietly answered.
"Do you want to... fight him?"
Double X nodded. "Finally you got it."
About ten seconds later the boy got back to his feet, grabbed his swords, jumped behind Double X and held the swords to his throat.
But he didn't seem impressed. "You can't kill me. I just saved your life."
Slowly his grip relaxed, he took the swords away and sheathed them.
"By the way, what's your name?"
It confused him, after all he had just threatened to kill him, since he seemed too unpredictable, but he still answered him, without looking into his eyes.
"Lloyd, Lloyd Irving."
Double X sighed.
"An unthinkable name nowadays..."
He went a few steps away from Lloyd and the group and put his right hand onto his sword's handle.
"Draw your swords."
Lloyd only reacted slowly. "What do you want?"
"Draw. I want to fight you and see for myself whether you are really that good, since you could resist the ACC."
Lloyd hesitatingly unsheathed his swords, but soon he seemed full of fighting spirit.
Then Double X asked him: "Would you please grant me the first attack?"
Lloyd answered him: "Alright. But only this one time."
Double X drew his sword, which appeared to consist only of the hilt.
"Huh? Are you kidding me?"
"LOAD!"
Within a few seconds a blade manifested from the hilt, which slightly glowed green, was about two metres in length and resembled a katana. It wasn't decorated excessively, but swords like this one weren's created to be regarded as works of art.
Slowly he brought his sword into position, ready to attack Lloyd.
"Soldiers, if you don't want to be hurt, get away from the boy..."
After they had hesitatingly retreated about ten steps from Lloyd, Double X stormed towards him, jumped about ten metres into the air and shouted: "FALLING THORN!" The he threw his sword towards Lloyd.
He only barely managed to dodge the blade. While Double X landed on the ground again, Lloyd glanced at the sword, which was almost completely stuck in the ground.
Double X pulled his sword from the ground and said:
"... I'm impressed."
Lloyd responded, slightly surprised: "Why that?"
"Never has anyone managd to avoid my Falling Thorn. Well, there have only been five people who had a chance to see this technique anyway."
"Does that mean, that..."
Double X nodded.
"Exactly. You are the first one to survive this attack."
A shiver went down Lloyd's spine while Double X sheathed his sword again.
"Now it's your turn. Aim at me and attack."
Lloyd ran towards Double X, but after half the distance he dropped his swords before he fell to the ground himself.
Double X looked at his body without any expression.
