The Great Trans-Syberian Adventure

[Tenchi Masaki]

Chapter 12
​

Tatyana asked Oscar to hold up the tray of beverages; she was thirsty and wanted tea. Oscar asked Tatyana, “Why don’t you want me to bring it to you?” Tatyana responded, “This is why Oscar.” Suddenly the cup of tea levitated off the tray and over to Tatyana. She gripped it with her hands and told Oscar, “Thank you, Oscar.” Kate and Hans were quite amazed by what they just saw and wanted to know how it was done.

Tatyana told them, “We are trained to do this if we are deemed worthy of it. We won’t go into details now, but Acme values knowledge very simply. Our ancestors in the organization were archivists and historians who wanted knowledge to protect it, not abuse it. Because of this, the Turtle and Crane Masters, the masters at a martial arts school who knew these abilities, decided to teach them so they could pass them on and not use them unless absolutely necessary. But the decision-making body chose Acme because of their Turtle philosophy, not the Cranes. This did not sit well with them as they wanted a more traditional group to teach and pass on their views. They felt if the masters that followed the Turtle philosophy got to choose a group, why couldn’t they do the same?

Unfortunately, this decision caused the Crane Masters to teach a thieves guild which would become VILE, and well, you can fill in the rest, I’m sure. After this, the school closed, and the Turtle and Crane Masters split into two different sects and went their separate ways. This created three groups that teach what we know; Acme, Vile, and Independents. The latter is made up of people who teach outside the rules of ACME or VILE and just learn the arts for the sake of the art. Whether they are turtles or crane is up to the individual. But their skill levels and quality of training vary by the master.”

Kylie interjected, “A few are really good, and most of the others suck.” Tatyana continued, “Yes Kylie they believe they are as good as they say they are and let their egos cloud their judgment and training. But you have to have the right state of mind whether under the Turtle or Crane philosophy in order to truly progress and master the art. If you don’t you can practice all day, every day and you will not get stronger. But that is also partly why they think they are so good. They hit a mental wall and that leads to them hitting a physical one as well. Then they think they’ve gotten as strong as they can get and no one can tell them otherwise.”

Kate began to understand at this point, Acme was humble information gatherers and guardians who were taught martial arts and given scrolls by the Turtle Masters. Acme learned the forms to protect the forms and mastered the skills only to show proof of concept. But when VILE came along, they started fighting and probably thought they were the only group to know these abilities. Once they clashed, they adapted to each other, and that caused history to play out the way it had. Kate asked Tatyana, “So, how did you deal with VILE when you first met them?” Tatyana answered simply, saying, “It was in Rome they had gone to steal things, but they were disrespected. They chose to be brazen as a result, and soldiers were sent to deal with them. Obviously, they could not stop them, but it so happened that members of Acme were there and sent word about what was happening.

Acme gave advice that was ignored and caused the weaknesses of the Roman Empire to be revealed to political enemies. Based on this, the aristocracy seeing the complete failure of government to stop VILE and Acme being the only group to defeat them, went about trying to imitate Acme’s honest approach over the centuries, which led to the creation of modern law. As you have heard, they sought to ignore whenever the rulings did not favor their nations.” Kate replied, “So it went full circle. Their refusal to follow the law caused even the trial by jury system to fail at the highest levels. Then they needed an organization to enforce rulings that no nation can ignore, namely, ACME Crimenet. And you can ensure geopolitical cooperation because, over the centuries, nations just got used to the idea and see ACME as a necessary part of the geopolitical system. They hardly protest or threaten to militarize if the ruling is not in their favor because that would be taboo.”

Kylie, happy Kate was quick to learn, added, “Exactly Kate, challenging ACME rulings is considered an extreme no-no and any nation that does finds themselves ostracized. Now Kate understood the basic framework; Acme ensures a stable legal system, nations erect treaties, trade deals, and other geopolitical issues using it, and therefore if a nation suddenly decides to ignore an Acme ruling, they lose all the access to the world stage financial or otherwise. Do you know all those treaties, trade deals, and the like? Those are backed by Acme rulings so the nations have an excuse to cancel these agreements if a nation doesn’t want to play along. As a result, the world has a stable legal system to use even though obviously there are people who take advantage of the system, such as….” Kate finished Kylies’s insinuation by saying, “The Golden Lords.”

Kate said, “And since this system is what it is any nation trying to expose it won’t be believed by the general public, while other nations would disavow any knowledge of this “Conspiracy theory.” So the only threats to the law and world for that matter are groups that exist outside the law for whatever reason. I’m strangely feeling a lot better now.” Tenchi saw Kate was very good at processing information and deducing plausible outcomes. That explained how she had managed to deal with the problems she encountered helping Hans.

Next came VILE proper, and Polly perked up slightly though it was probably more due to the hot cocoa with marshmallows she requested was ready. Kate and Hans wanted to know more about VILE anyway. Hans had heard stories of Acme and understood why they were highly regarded, but it was always strange how VILE continued to elude capture. Kate was, however, able to come to an idea about it. Kate asked what is Interpol really for? Tenchi made that short and straightforward, stating, “Interpol’s job is to generate warrants for criminals we capture. If a VILE agent is suspected, they send the case to us immediately. Ironically were supposed to be an alternative to us, but geopolitical intervention prevented them from doing what they were created to do.

They are the reason we enjoy this status the way we want it. We collar crooks, and they give us warrants whenever a political situation says they are not allowed to.” since they can’t pursue and arrest criminals globally, they had to call us. We filled in the gap created by the nations refusing to allow Interpol to police their countries. They became an intermediary between the world governments and us, and suddenly we were doing what they were created to do through Acme Detective Agency. Tenchi then went on to talk about VILE as their communicators started beeping. As Tenchi had stated, Interpol had issued an All points bulletin which was then forwarded through Acme. But as Tenchi, Kylie, and Tatyana were in the Siberian region already, they got the request to locate the Soyembika Tower.

They were instructed to find any clues to the whereabouts s of the tower and who took it. Chief Justice Magruder called in before she could get into her regular tough-as-nails routine. She found all three detectives were holding back laughter. She asked, “What is it do you find so funny about this egregious theft I wonder?” Tenchi responded by saying, “We were just wondering when you would let us enter the information about the criminal that’s all.” With the Chief’s blessing, they quickly entered information gleaned from the scene and witnesses. The data matched who they already suspected, Eartha Brute.

Needless to say, Interpol was quite impressed at the speed of solving this case. They issued a warrant for Eartha Brute’s arrest and wished the detectives Godspeed on their hunt. Chief Magruder told the detectives, “I don’t know how you actually managed to make up for your late rendezvous, but congratulations detectives, I salute you. Now go catch Eartha Brute just as fast.” The detectives thanked the Chief and ended the communication feed.

The next order of business was explaining how VILE was structured. Tenchi said, “Their guild is simple. It is divided into two groups, The House of Crane and the House of Vilan. The House of Crane has the Crime council and the master thieves who follow the way of the crane. The House of Vilan houses what the world knows as VILE proper, the thieves guild currently led by Carmen Sandiego. They stayed pretty consistent through the centuries as their job was simple, take things that don’t belong to you. Whether on land or at sea, they would establish networks to transport their stolen merchandise to safe locations for storage. They didn’t change their methodology until the twentieth century when technology started to make infiltration and theft harder.

But our approach to each other has stayed pretty consistent. We don’t fight unless circumstances force it to happen. VILE really doesn’t care in the end; even if sent to prison, they can just use their abilities to escape. Either using stealth techniques or, more bluntly, punching a hole in the wall. The witnesses who see any techniques or skills are told they have completely explainable causes by any professionals they talk to, whether they know of our abilities or not. Since our usage in the field is so rare, not even government officials who see the relationship Acme have understood what we can really do. They just hear our stories of us from over the years and feel whatever we did was completely explainable. Being officially on a case, the three detectives decided to call themselves Team TKT for short and noted the slight humor in their travel situation.
Polly was quick to chime in, saying, “Your Team TKT(ticket) and was on a train traveling through Siberia tee-hee! Oh, that explains the Carmen cartoons where Zack and Ivy always chase Carmen around, but no one starts shooting at each other! And on the game show, VILE takes huge buildings away by carrying them, and the Chief and everybody else acts like it’s normal! Then if they’re sent to jail, they always are free again to steal something in a later episode!” Tenchi responded, “Yes, Polly, everything happening in the cartoon happened in cases with Zack and Ivy. And the game show featured things VILE had stolen using either their energy training or technology.

The only reason the Soyumbika Tower, or other buildings and large structures for that matter, aren’t collapsing on themselves through their sheer weight is that Eartha put her energy into the building and “held” it together. If Carmen lifts a huge building off the ground using airships, she puts energy into it so it doesn’t fall apart. On that note, the weight of the things can be too much for an airship to lift away. Therefore she would use her energy to help raise the building or monument in question. That is why Carmen Sandiego is so famous in the public eye. Through the games and cartoons we released, as well as people who know she is a real person without realizing it feels wrong about the immense structures being stolen.

Scientists and engineers might see that and think, “What would it take to do that in real life?” and quickly realize it’s not possible according to the laws of physics and say, “It’s just a kids’ show.” But those who know it is happening in real life reach two conclusions: Either there is some unknown scientific method used, or VILE can ignore the laws of physics. Since they like their careers, they choose the first option publicly, regardless of their thoughts.” Polly replied back, saying, “That’s just dumb! If they were honest, they would know what VILE is really doing and be able to plan better. Grownups are so silly sometimes.”

Hans wholeheartedly agreed with Polly saying, “Exactly Ms. Tix, it is unfortunate but adults choose to believe half-truths instead of whole ones whenever it will benefit them. But in the end, it’s only buying them time and soon their lies or belief in them will catch up to them.” Kate joined in on those words of wisdom from Hans and said, “As it has now if the people in power would accept VILE for what they are everyone would develop security systems and defenses to stop this. But because believing someone can lift an entire building up and run off with it is too much for some people they cover it up or look the other way. Most people think Carmen Sandiego is not even a real person because of this. But because of the popularity the games, game shows, and cartoons had years ago; people would know her if they saw her at least.”

Tenchi added, “Yeah, that was why I pushed for it to happen though I didn’t think it would achieve this level of success. But because it did, if people see a woman in a red trench coat, they think Carmen Sandiego.” The conversation about all things illegal had brought everyone up to speed on the current situation. The hopes of vacation time were dashed, but the detectives were happy to pursue Eartha wherever she was running. Polly was delighted to be along for the case and messenger her friend Ann Tickwittee at Acme Academy while the grownups were finishing their talk and brunch. Tenchi realizing they had a crook to catch, finished by going over Acme, stating, “I guess that just leaves us; we have Acme Crimenet and Acme Detective Agency.

The former is where the master detectives handle cases brought in by various people worldwide. They have the justices who are responsible for most of the significant geopolitical rulings, though any full detective’s verdict is seen as final. And from the master detectives, also known as justices, the superior justices are chosen. The woman you saw us talking to is one of them, Chief Justice Magruder, and there is also Chief Justice Weller, to name two of them. There are several others, and they sit on our council in Crimenet. The Agency is an alliance of private detectives and spies from around the world who are good enough to deal with VILE. The Player is a person who selects detectives for cases that are brought to the Agency on Crimenet’s behalf.

It was a pretty loose structure before the Gardens, as everyone’s detective offices were scattered worldwide. But it’s still the same independent investigator idea though detectives can have an office at the Gardens if they want. That has brought us closer together, and now people think we are one single detective agency, but we are all still private investigators. The Gardens I had built provide spaces to work, train, and in times of emergencies rally points.” Now it was on to the business of tracking Eartha, which would not be that hard. A famous building being carried anywhere there were people would attract attention after all. And as reports of a moving building started to come in, Eddie was ready to send it straight into the Clockwork Train. However, Eddie was picking up new encrypted signals as they cycled the communication channels.

 

[Tenchi Masaki]

Chapter 13
​

Russia had agreed to verify all their communications and radio channels in situations like this. The reason was an ominous one. VILE was planning something in the area; their communications would be encrypted and unverified. So while Eddie didn’t know what they were saying, he knew VILE was up to no good. He radioed Tenchi saying, “Tenchi we got unverified radio communications highly suspected to be of VILE origin. I’m thinking a VILE airship is coming into the region.”

Tenchi and Kylie didn’t like where this was going. Still, they didn’t have enough information to go on concerning the air activity. Tenchi told Eddie, “Keep monitoring the situation and try to crack the encryption get Delores to help if you have to. Meanwhile, we’re going to focus on bringing in Eartha.” Eddie said he would do his best and shift the mainframes to breaking the encryption code. Team TKT headed straight for the area where the reports originated from, and spotting a moving tower was all too easy. Tenchi, Kylie, and Tatyana headed off Eartha and stood ahead of her path. They ordered her to drop the building and put her hands up.

Eartha wasn’t too happy about not getting away with the tower, but she was cornered with nowhere to go. Reluctantly she placed the building on the ground since Carmen would be none too happy if it were damaged in a fight. She looked squarely at the detectives and said in a threatening manner, “You want me to come and get me ACME twerps!” Of course, the Russian authorities came in and surrounded Eartha, and guns were drawn. She was ordered to put her hands up and surrender. Of course, these orders came in Russian, which Eartha wasn’t well versed in. She could barely handle English and preferred to use words that got to the point.

Naturally, she found it funny that they bought their guns would be effective, but this was a hastily assembled group of cops. Under normal conditions, cops with no guns would be sent under orders by their governments. That was an attempt to avoid conflicts with VILE thieves and escalate situations to physical exchanges. Since Carmen had taken over and restructured VILE, these standoffs had become more manageable. However, most of the authorities didn’t understand why completely. Still, those who did would not fully trust Carmen’s “rules,” so to speak. But it was better than nothing; they knew if the VILE thief in question resisted, there was nothing they could do.

The only VILE operatives that police could reliably arrest were the VILE henchmen. They either lacked the martial ability or were gadget-reliant members since they hadn’t trained enough. But the sudden situation caused the police to assemble as usual. Tenchi, Kylie, and Tatyana had to handle the situation with Eartha and the cops. And fortunately for all parties involved, it went as expected. Eartha was arrested by the detectives and immediately turned over to the Russian authorities.

Kate found that a little annoying after learning what she had, but it was necessary to maintain the legal balance of law and order. However, this did not make Zeddelin happy, and as he watched the arrest on live television, he asked himself, “Why couldn’t that Brute be faster!” Instead, she had decided to set a pace that enabled her to use the tower as a weight-lifting experience. Apparently, setting records was more important than getting away as fast as possible. When Eartha reached the police station, she got to have a phone call made to someone. That someone was Carmen Sandiego is why these calls were allowed in the first place, no matter what country they were arrested in.
Carmen was quite annoyed at the news and told Eartha to be on standby for extraction… whenever that would be. That meant Eartha would be standing in jail for the foreseeable future. But Eartha decided to use the extra time exercising to get stronger and do better next time. Carmen told her that Sachi Karin was still in the area and to be aware that her plans would not be stopped by ACME this time. Then the phone was hung up, and Eartha went to do time in the slammer. At the same time, Tatyana kept an eye on Sachi, hanging around the train with the other passengers waiting for an opportunity.

None of the detectives were fooled by her sweet-as-sugar personality though they did keep up appearances. Sachi Karin was always staring at people’s valuables, something she had been trained to do at VILE. ACME had been trained to spot those signs and be aware of them. While not suspecting someone outright, it caused them to look at other signs to piece a person’s actions altogether. And Sachi’s actions said she was a thief and proud of it. However, her thinking she could fool the very same people she stole from was a big mistake on her part. The detectives had decided to keep their enemy close and enjoy their trip, but now they had to be vigilant once more.

Sachi enjoyed the scenery more than the thought of stealing things. It was lovely to look at all the sights as the Golden Eagle chugged onward. Though the one person she couldn’t stand In the slightest was Polly, her love of the law was annoying, and she didn’t mind getting a call from Carmen telling her to shove her sense of justice down her throat, but it didn’t matter anymore. Eartha was arrested, and all the passengers would be talking about was how ACME handled the situation so well. Sachi hated to see her side lose. Hearing about the adult thieves getting locked up all the time was too much to bear. She always thought the kids on ACME’s side must be smug about it. And she saw Polly as proof of that.

On the other hand, Polly witnessed law enforcement in action, and she loved every second of it. Tenchi was the coolest guy ever, Kylie was the coolest girl ever, and Tatyana wasn’t a communist. These are the things that mattered most to Polly, and she only hoped things would get better from here on out. The VILE henchmen had risked her trip in Siberia from being fun to homework-related, but Team TKT stopped it in its tracks. Polly decided sending news of their progress to her friend Ann Tickwittee couldn’t hurt. Eddie would encrypt it, and she could claim it was communications training if they said no. She went to Tenchi’s room and made her case when he returned from speaking with the other adults.

As she entered, however, Tenchi held up his hand and reminded her of what to do when one enters a room. Polly huffed and said, “May I come in?” After getting permission to enter, Polly asked if she could Communicate with her friend Ann Tickwittee at the Academy while they were in Siberia. Tenchi said it would be fine unless they said it wasn’t and don’t go anywhere with Sachi Karin alone. Polly asked why she didn’t like Sachi very much but thought that was normal given her overly sweet personality. Polly said, “She thinks we don’t notice how she overdoes the sweet act, it’s like she’s always trying to get candy from adults. It’s annoying.”

Which told Polly she was a member of VILE. She asked why they didn’t just arrest her, only to be told she hadn’t broken any laws other than stealing the converter they got back. Polly, still confused, replied, “I don’t get it she stole something that’s a crime so don’t you get arrested?” Tenchi responded, “The converter is a secret if we arrest her for stealing it we reveal not only that it is real but that we have it. Since the Golden Lords are in the area we are going to see how far they are willing to go. And if Sachi gets back to VILE it was worth the risk. Her theft was a public one not on the orders of VILE so Carmen won’t even care that she gave it to the Peaky Blinders.” Polly remarked, “Hey I forgot about them!” Tenchi added, “Well I almost did too they got outclassed awful quickly by bigger better criminals.”

Tenchi told Polly that several factions were converging on the Siberian tundra to find the converter. Polly laughed at how Tenchi spoke of them. They weren’t any match for the Golden Lords, but they were willing to try hard. Either because they thought it was real or to get in the way of their rival groups. All the detectives decided not to underestimate them, which proved to be quite wise as they were not about to let anyone ACME or otherwise get in their way. Many power players wanted to prove they were up to the challenge, and some had even got swept up in the adventurous fervor. Regardless, they knew when it came to each other; there would be no playing around.

 

[Tenchi Masaki]

Chapter 14
​

Some considered doing this search as a friendly rivalry, while others decided to win by any means necessary. This takes us to the office of one named Valmont. He wore a green suit with a black shirt hiding a very athletic tall build with flaxen blonde hair in a ponytail. And it is not something the enforcers wanted to be reminded of. They knew their boss was not one to trifle with and decided to be very cautious about their failure against Tenchi. As he gazed at them with his blue eyes, Ratso felt that maybe commenting on his nice tan would lighten the mood. But the look Valmont was giving made him change his mind very quickly. They knew Valmont wanted to know how they did immediately and decided they might as well tell him how it went in the best way possible.

Finn said, “Well boss you see we kinda ran into Tenchi who came out of nowhere and we decided to strategically withdraw and not risk the success of the mission.” Valmont then said, “And did you succeed?” Chow nervously stuttered out a response as best as he could, saying, “W-well s-since T-Tenchi was there w-we d-didn’t wanna clue him in on w-what we w-were up to s-so we let him think we -l-lost to throw him off the t-trail.” Valmont rose from behind his desk and slowly walked over to a bookcase. Then he calmly stated, “Three of my enforcers were bested by that… wandering merchant?” Seeing as this report wasn’t going as they had hoped, they attempted one final rally to plead their case for competency.

They claimed Tenchi ambushed them and attacked without warning, along with Russian police. Of course, Valmont was not fooled and had Hak Foo, a noticeably large muscular enforcer with long red hair and extreme love of kung fu movies, teach them some of his new moves; the hard way. Suddenly the snake dragon art piece hanging on the wall’s eyes glowed a bright red as it started to speak, and it, “While your Hak Foo is impressive perhaps he should be aided by… The Shadow Khan!” Suddenly the shadows all over the room came to life and were drawn towards the center of the room and took the forms of evil grey-skinned ninjas. Valmont was more than happy to send extra assistance, especially the demonic kind, since the sorry bunch standing before them made it clear they weren’t taking things seriously. Valmont replied to his scaly friend, saying, “As you wish, Shendu.”

While Valmont was busy getting his gang, the Dark Hand, in gear, so too was another Golden Lord named Koga Shuko, a theatrical man with oversized business suits to match his inflated ego. His bleach blonde hair on the top of his head and his eye-drawing Vanilla Ice-inspired hairstyle were enough to convince most people there was no reason with this man. He was preparing to receive good news but was hearing back from his minions about how things did not go as smoothly as they would have liked. Koga Shuko could care less about those details and happily leaned forward on his desk, asking for news about the converter. His two top enforcers, Huey and Lewis, twins of Chinese descent wearing green vests with white shirts underneath and green pants, braced themselves for what was to come. They told their leader there was nothing new learned from the initial reconnaissance mission with the Dark Hand.

Koga Shuko’s gleeful expression quickly turned to sour rage as he flew into a rant, screaming I just want total domination of one major American city! Is that too much to ask for? Is it? Is it? Huh!? This is not what I wanted to hear, gentlemen, so I’ll simply say this. He who does not adapt; shall perish. Now get outta here.” Koga Shuko wasn’t one to take things lightly and, as usual, decided that it would be easily attained if he wanted something. That’s what he paid his men for, so why couldn’t they succeed whenever he wanted.

On the other hand, his blonde personal assistant Linda Lash did at least try to smooth things over. She usually wore a skintight black outfit and carried her whip wherever she went. And she knew better than anyone that the sooner the boss was calmed down, the sooner the daily unethical grind could resume. Koga Shuko, however, had to call his partners in golden crime simply because he had to know they were suffering the same setbacks. The video screen lowered down from the ceiling, and the screen turned on. Pretending to be giving a friendly call Koga Shuko smiled wide at the two figures staring back at him.

One of them was Jean Carlo, a brunette-haired crime lord who dressed more like a corrupt businessman and made it a point to have a token cigar in his general location at all times. The other was the man known as White Tiger, a highly feared crime lord who dealt in the Golden Lords diamond division. The two had started as rivals but, over the years, gained mutual respect. Their only remaining point of contention was deciding whether cigars with gold or diamonds were the best to smoke. Jean Carlo swore by his custom-made cigars with flecks of gold, while White Tiger endorsed his bespoke cigars with small diamonds in them.

This may have been a little biased as they were heads of gold and diamond smuggling operations, respectively. But the fact remained they were happy to help each other out when needed. Valmont had started as a second-tier boss, but his strategy of “A hand in everything” paid off big time. His thugs would assist all the other bosses for a price, and thus he gained experience in all the major criminal activities the Golden Lords had to offer. His original responsibilities were training and providing enforcers for the criminal empire. But slowly, his division took on more underhand things until the Dark Hand was the most wealthy of the first-tier bosses.

All three bosses present knew this in the back of their minds, and Koga Shuko was working with Valmont and not them. He decided to use this to his advantage as he could pretend the Dark Hand was on track to finding the converter, but Jean Carlo and White Tiger were not. Valmont’s position was a matter of fact to them, not genuinely earned from the ground up. He simply took advantage of the situation and profited from it. All the bosses had no problem calling on his organization for support, but now Koga Shuko wanted to pretend that his partnership was exclusive. Though in his own right, he had risen quite highly himself, which only worsened his tantrums.

He boldly charged forward in the criminal and business worlds, and his sudden appearance and quick-to-action strategies surprised competitors. He then consolidated his grip on power and began to not care what was legal and what wasn’t. Why waste time setting up illegal science experiments in a secret location to avoid the police when you could just set it up in your corporate buildings’ basement levels. It was faster to see what was going on than traveling to and fro all the time. The three, therefore, were at parity with each other; however, Koga Shuko did have an obvious ace up his sleeve. He was the Shadow Boss who controlled all the gangs on the western side of America. When he went to prison for a previous series of crimes, he took the opportunity to recruit from inside. When he walked out and into his limo as the other two bosses had similarly done when they went to prison, he had increased his strength, unlike them.

As a result, Koga Shuko was happier to subtly get this point across as he made his case for securing the converter before the other two did. What would they do with it anyway? Make more gold and diamonds with it? Koga Shuko greeted his two competitors saying, “Gentlemen welcome to the Shuko show! We’re coming at you live on gang-net right now! My boys down in Bloody Town are jacked up and ready to go! It’s a shame you two couldn’t get to work with Valmont though my boys would love to have the extra company!” At this, the howling gangsters watching from a viewing room could be seen on camera cheering for Koga Shuko to succeed. Chants of Shuko started to echo through the crowd as they worked themselves into a frenzy.

Jean Carlo and White Tiger preferring more professional and well-dressed goon squads, were not exactly enamored with Koga Shuko’s low-brow gang army, as they called it. If there were a gangster scale to measure their preferences for hired help, Valmont would land square in the middle, not caring about looks, only results. While Jean Carlo and White Tiger were on the “clothes make the man” side of the scale. Wherever Koga Shuko had started, his sudden successful recruitment of street gangs landed him in cheap thug territory. Even though he had just as many three-piece suit-wearing hoods as the others, his street gangs outnumbered them by a wide margin. White Tiger, for one, saw where this was going. The gangs would hear their responses, and anything they didn’t want to hear would be mercilessly booed.

Jean Carlo decided to catch them off guard and stated, “It’s a wonder why you people work for Shuko. Gold smuggling is far more fun.” One of the more vocal members of the gangs responded to this, yelling, “No one knows who you are man your totally hollow! Shuko’s the one spreading the goods around, and if it wasn’t for him we’d all be vapor!” The gangs erupted in thunderous roars to this endorsement of Koga Shuko. And the two bosses had to admit blind loyalty was something they both respected and demanded.

Suddenly the camera feed switched to a silhouetted figure, and Shuko’s gangs started cheering wildly. This could only mean it was The Clock, and as he began to speak, usually with a microphone and in the third person, it was clear to all that he was there on behalf of Shamus McMahon. “Eventually the Clock would come back to Los Angeles! And for all the fans of the Clock, know that Shamus is well and soon expects to have the converter! If ya taste what the Clock is bakin’!” All present knew by now not to give the Clock ammunition for his ego even with the ridiculous one-liners as he had were spoken and focused on the message that was sent.

Koga Shuko, sporting his trademark shades, began speaking again, “Now boys we all know how this will turn out as the Dark Hand says Tenchi is over in Siberia. And unless you want to risk more of your high-class made men going to prison or the hospital maybe we can reach a deal.” The gangs erupted in anger over the mention of Tenchi. He made things uncool as Acme; butting in meant less money to go around and more gang members in jail. They had already tried to take him on once before, only to be beaten like the rest. But Koga Shuko had made a wise move against the other two. Their leader Shamus John McMahon knew of the converter and, if the stories were true, expected it to be delivered to him.

Now Jean Carlo and White Tiger had to play nice, as any mention of Tenchi was of the highest priority. He would be destroyed at all costs, as he had cost the GLC way too much money and respect. Therefore, the bosses knew where this was going and wanted to get it out of the way. They would then clarify to Koga Shuko that they would not back down from their critique of his methods. White Tiger said, “We would happily authorize the deployment of the 701’s to deal with Tenchi. He’s a thorn in all our sides and so my enforcers, sorrange a little series of unfortunate events to play out in Siberia, forcing Acme to go after the expendable members sent to be a distraction. While that’s happening the 701’s can take the detectives on directly.”

Jean Carlo backed up White Tiger, saying, “My boys will get the point across to those gumshoes and if they’re lucky there will be enough of them to make gold engravings reading “They tried; and they died!” Hahaha!” To this, the two took the customary puffs of their overpriced cigars. Somehow their class and professionalism had managed to steal the spotlight away from Koga Shuko, who was determined to get it back and fast. He then played his trump card, saying, “Oh, and by the way gentlemen I also have hired a former Acme detective to help us all out. He’ll be dealing with the other main target in the area and once that’s acquired the converter will be ours.” Knowing that barring an order from the leader, multiple bosses were needed to authorize any of the 700s. They were initially an elite special forces unit that was given a drug that increased their strength and gave a near-total resistance to pain. After one of them killed officers in a rage, they were ordered to be eliminated, but they escaped and ended up working for the Golden Lords.

Having a special force super soldier unit went a long way in gaining the Golden Lords’ respect among the secret corporations worldwide. They were initially clubs of nobles who missed the old days of monarchies and decided to start companies. These companies were not above the law, but their influence was powerful. Ironically they were the most outspoken in favor of ACME. Primarily due to the agency being seen as a matter of fact and traditional rules being ever-present. It was, therefore, bad form to try to change things, so to speak, and they would constantly request ACME detective to sign off on something as a way to preemptively avoid challenges to their plans by competitors. This pretty much caused ACME to be seen as the authorizing body for products or policies being implemented by the secret world that had arisen from these secret companies.

 

[Tenchi Masaki]

Chapter 15
​

When the Golden Lords discovered this world’s existence, they wanted in but were looked down on until the 701s were made members of their company. While the Golden Lords were still seen as mob bosses and regarded as such by the aristocrats, they were finally acknowledged. Three bosses were needed to dispatch a team of 700s as the Golden Lords had changed the process to produce different super soldier variants. Currently, their most advanced was the 705s, and unless sent to a boss to work for them already, they needed two other bosses to get more 700s if they felt it was needed. Jean Carlo and White Tiger had bad run-ins with Tenchi and immediately offered their approval. They knew he had beaten even the 700s before. They knew they needed all the muscle they could muster.

Koga Shuko was relying on Valmont to bring the enforcers down out of hatred for Tenchi, and as a result, Valmont would send more 700s than usual to assist. On top of that, Shendu was sending the shadow khan as well, so it appeared things weren’t looking too good for the detectives. But that’s where the iron and energy training would come in handy. Whenever ACME came across other-dimensional issues, using their abilities was an obvious choice. As the Shadow Khan were stronger and faster than ordinary people, ACME simply saw them as similar to super soldiers and bioweapons. Though anyone knew to deal with Shendu if they came across his forces, good or bad. The only exceptions were greedy people like Valmont, who figured the reward of money justified any alliances.

On the other hand, the Peaky Blinders were happy to be your typical baddies. They knew there were lines you shouldn’t cross, and though they were criminals, they valued family. It was mostly that reason that caused Steven to rebuild the Peaky Blinders gang. He wanted to relive their glory days which he had heard stories about when he was a child. Their crew slowly grew out of Birmingham until they became significant criminal players. Their leader Tommy Shelby, who he was nicknamed after even was elected to Parliament. This caused Steven to feel a life of crime worked then, so why not now? His family and friends, for better or worse, backed him up and started the gang again.

It was thrilling to commit crimes like shoplifting and jaywalking. They slowly worked their way up the criminal ladder to burglary and carjacking, respectably. Stealing the converter was the most significant thing they had done simply because they had someone else do the stealing for them. That being Sachi Karin, who stole it to gain more experience in the field mostly. Nevertheless, the Peaky Blinders had just had a massive ordeal in Mid Market, and they were lucky to escape mostly unscathed.

The three Shelbys,” Tommy,” the leader, Ben, the brains, and Margaret, the caring, never wanted to go through that again. One second they were in control; the next, gunfire erupted. Tommy was focused on using his connections to track down Tenchi; he had the promise to keep after all. They all figured it would go a lot better anyway; the ACME detectives seemed to be on top. All Tommy had to do was shoot Tenchi, and this would be over and done with; of course, they were pretty nerve-wracked about it. They had put people in the hospital but never outright killed anyone before. So they went over the revenge plan, which was pretty much; get Tenchi.

Tommy said, “Tenchi’s days’re numbered, boys, and aw we’ ave ter do is find ’im!” Ben asked, “Didn’t ya already make that crystal at Mid Market? And I have to say wot our informants’re telling me aint encouragin’ China Plate. There’s glamour afoot.” To this, the Peaky Blinders took notice as they believed in the Glamour. “And since magic was bein’ reported ’round ACME and VILE and ter an extent there where even whispers of the bleedin’ Dark Hand usin’ dark magic as ‘eaven ‘ell. Maggie replied, “Glamour is as glamour does loves; you kna they say the McCready’s have got it in ACME, so it must be the Robin Hood kind, and VILE gots the Sorry and Sad glam. We don’t ‘ave any, so ya need ter be careful, Tommy.”

Tommy decided magic was probably at play, but they could still take them by surprise. They didn’t wave their hands and make the Robo dog disappear, so it couldn’t be that big of a deal. Tommy commented, “I recall them shootin’ the Cherry Hogg not usin’ a spell so they can’t be that powerful na can they? So I say we find em wherever they’re and we bloody ambush em! The Peaky Blinders will spread aahhht aw over Siberia and be in disguise. If we come across those ACMEs we’ll take Frank Bough our disguises and attack.”

The Peaky Blinders felt that was as good a plan as any. They would avoid the Golden Lords and VILE while being able to surprise attack Tenchi. They would get all the glory instead of the Golden Lords, and their reputations would increase considerably. After making general plans of action, they ran off to clothing stores to buy all kinds of clothes for their gang to use as disguises. While they were at it, Tommy decided it was time to have official uniforms too. He said, “Aligh lads were also garn ter up our outfits as ‘eaven and ‘ell! Those goldy boys’re wite Radio Rental if they fin’ they can sha Frank Bough their threads and not us!. So we’ll be gettin’ spiff duds ourselves!.”

While Tommy’s criminal approach was more follow than lead, his heart was in the right place, albeit illegal. Their primary strategy was a simple one; spread out over Siberia and wander around the various locations in and between towns along the Trans-Siberian route. If a Peaky Blinder came across Tenchi, they would ambush him. Their weapons of choice, given their meager budget, would mostly be knives and billy clubs. The call went out to all the Peaky’s across Europe to get to Siberia and track down Tenchi fast.

All the major players were assembled and acknowledged each other’s presence. Whether they had plans to work alongside each other or not, they would at least stay out of each other’s way. This unintentionally opened the door for a specific “Queen of Crime” to get what she wanted. She was heading into Yekaterinburg for her heist, and all eyes were on her. She landed and strode into view of her target, knowing it had to be a spectacular steal to bring true infamy to her name. All she needed was the right timing and Led ensured his crew was running by the second. All that was required was patience…

 

[Tenchi Masaki]

Chapter 16
​

The Golden Eagle was coming into the station at Yekaterinburg while the passengers were enjoying a delicious breakfast. After eating, the riders disembarked when the train came into Yekaterinburg station. Sachi Karin knew it was time to rendezvous with Carmen and headed off to meet her or her team deploying to steal the church. The detectives were on the lookout for suspicious characters from the various criminal factions and started making positive IDs. Kate had decided to use her notebook to take detailed notes on characters and organizations they encountered for reference. The information would further help her keep track of all the villains running about. Double Trouble was approaching their target as well and had dressed up as two famous hockey stars, Filip Savchenko and Mikhail Ustyantsev, to better infiltrate the area. The military merchandise was many, but they planned to bag it all, that being an actual bag.

Double wanted to impress Patty and put it in a bag as she did with the Library of Congress. Double said, “Yo Trouble this is gonna be so great! Once we put this museum stuff in this bag it’ll be like Patty lifting the Library of Congress! Okay, maybe not exactly like that but it’s a library we’re stealing a museum it’s almost the same thing.” What Double was saying was true; it wasn’t the same. Patty didn’t need a bag; she used her energy to separate the building along critical points and then took the sections of the building away. That was the one thing about Patty the Contessa hated most to admit; she was a prodigy. Double was ahead of his class, too, but compared to Patty, he was average.

Thieves who would witness heists pieced it all together. Eartha lifting a building by using her strength and putting her energy into it to hold it together was one thing. But outright levitation or molecular separation took a bit more skill. As such, any thief intermediate level or higher could see how gifted Patty was. For intermediate rank to be given in ACME, a student had to demonstrate using their energy as quickly as they used their body to move. VILE required similar but to a lesser degree, as only what was needed to steal was valued. Techniques were also handed out sparingly by selfish teachers. If you wanted techniques taught, you had to earn them through servitude or be very lucky.

This also helped ACME beat VILE most of the time in the long term. Because VILE was so guarded and wary of each other, they withheld knowledge instead of sharing it. While this was driven partly by the dark energy, they used, making them value selfishness and greed and not trust others fully. It was also common sense they were a thieves guild. After all, their organization attracted all kinds of power-mongering and violent types. While the Crime Council and especially Carmen made it clear there would be no violence towards one another, this was because they had the power to enforce their will. To keep order, skills and abilities were given out after a student was proven. Punishment was administered when they failed.

The techniques, however, were up to the teachers in question, leading to taking students down paths they weren’t compatible with. This was defended by instructors saying they should be good enough to deal with it and they will become more versatile by using what little they have. In real life, however, this paranoia resulted in many losses for VILE to ACME. ACME did not restrict techniques and therefore took longer to train students following their knowledge-first policy. VILE withheld skills that would increase the overall combat capability to enforce strict control out of fear of betrayal. However, this led to those who rose through this draconian system being reasonably feared. Their natural skill and tenacity caused them to become elite professional fighters.

ACME was countered by them in a fight since they had less to learn, so their abilities were temporarily “Better” in a sense. However, as training progressed, ACME students gained more skills and abilities. VILE was well aware of this and sought to avoid pitting under-classed fighters against ACME agents. They would therefore send A or B-ranked thieves who would generally have to contend with C-rank detectives. The B to A-ranked thief would lead the other thieves under his or her command on short or long-term heists. Especially if they were on Vic the Slick’s black market network to transport stolen goods, they needed him to make it happen. Led’s airships could only do so much for ferrying goods to safe vaults.

Of course, in the end, ACME won on the principles of trust and friendship. Master detective and Master thief encounters usually ended with the VILE thief on the floor. Only the true master fighters in VILE stood a chance of winning; knowing this, they became the enforcers of VILE’s will. VILE would be, as it always was, a thieves guild, and all endeavors would be directed toward that goal. Many thieves would naturally want to do other, more violent things with these abilities, but these were rejected outright. And as such VILE stayed true to its origins and away from more militant philosophies. The good thing, at least, was that they each held respect for the fights they had with each other.

And that was where Double drew the line. Once trained, they saw how good they were, as did their instructors. Double had stood out among his peers in VILE, and it was only natural to think ACME wouldn’t be a problem for them. Then as per the norm, their arrogance was their downfall. They had faced their class equivalents in ACME, but this class was different. They had heard of specific students that were sent to Japan and had been raised there and to be wary, as the adults put it. Of course, they ignored it as warnings only serve to make the young do the opposite. And thus, their class was made an example of, or in short, they became an inside embarrassment to the Crime Council.

The thieves charged forward after hearing about confident kids at ACME and, not fully understanding why decided to seek them out and challenge them to fights. This was under the guise of stealing as usual so as not to tip off the council. Wherever they individually met, they escalated things to violence. They thought they would have no trouble winning, but it was a complete loss every time. It made the focus fall onto these two specific classes as well. ACME for winning and VILE for being the token bad guys.

This caused expected bitter rivalries to be formed as the VILE thieves involved never got over these first encounters where they were humiliated. Especially the boys, whose egos were bruised, and they would have their revenge, or so they thought. While no direct action was expressly taken openly, the council made it clear there would be consequences. Their performance in the fights showed they were indeed advanced, and now that those in the know knew of their battles, VILE couldn’t afford to be seen as backing down. The council’s decision turned the incident to VILE’s advantage as they simply went with image over substance. VILE let people think they were more violent than they actually were usually.

Carmen saw it as a lesson learned while angry; they respected ACME now. They wouldn’t recklessly fight them again, with the exception being Double. While he had just met her, Patty was supposed to cheer for the winning team. Instead, she saw him get smacked around… by Tenchi. Then she ran over and called him by name! She… They knew each other already, and she had secretly followed them to try and get them back to VILE HQ. This was simply humiliating to Double.

Patty was Tenchi this, Tenchi that, how long has it been? Blah, blah, blah! Patty then tried to smooth things over, but that made things worse. She tried to explain that those ACMEs were getting special training because they had already experienced things and even trained with members of the golden generation. They were the previous generations’ best in ACME and VILE, and their rivalry culminated in a battle against the evil Oni. They joined together to fight against him and his army and emerged victoriously after a very epic battle.

Double wondered how this was going to make him feel better? He lost to Tenchi, who was then revealed to be a genius, among other things, and Patty didn’t even mention anything else about him. If she knew information about Tenchi, she should tell VILE, but no, she kept it to herself. Then she started talking about all the other people she said were better. In the end, though, the two who took it the worst were Double and Iori, known for being sadistic. Patty wouldn’t even speak to him after seeing footage of his rage against Rock Howard in their fight. Rock pulled off a final combo ending in his signature move sending Iori flying back and crashing into a car. At that point, Iori may as well have been a homicidal maniac in her eyes. And Double was the guy who just didn’t get it.

Double would usually pursue his vendetta against Tenchi but more calmly, but the end would be the same. Double was supposed to take the hint, as was every other VILE member. She thought how bad it would have made her look if she had worked with him on a job and that fight happened. But fortunately, she trusted her intuition and chose not to work with him. Until his true nature was revealed fighting Rock, he seemed normal and likable. But like most girls, Patty found a rage-filled guy with bloodlust in his eyes quite off-putting.

If you wanted to work with her, you had better respect the rules. Double, however, decided to see her attempt at calming the situation as her saying, “You really suck, and need to be better.” And from that point on, he became a more silent operative. In fact, to other thieves, he seemed to be a cold, calculating, no-nonsense guy. But to his brother and close friends, he was more talkative. He would show that Tenchi was overhyped and a loser too. The golden generation was just good because they were old, and one day he would be just as good, if not better, than all of them in ACME or VILE.

And so Double dragging his brother Trouble along, descended a spiraling path of “Stealing to impress” first Patty, then everyone in general, but especially Patty. This was more a matter of fact as she was the new girl when this all happened, and given the circumstances that played out, she became a focal point for attention. Since Patty got high marks from her instructors, her popularity grew in VILE from the top down. Other girls didn’t understand why all of a sudden it was Patty, Patty, Patty. While Patty, on the other hand, wasn’t trying to be teen queen, though she didn’t complain and made sure not to talk about her home in Gravity Falls. As Patty got more attention, she didn’t have time for idle chat with Double Trouble too many things to steal and people to meet.

Double drifted apart from the initial group they were in as a result, and when Carmen took a liking to her, it was too much to bear. Now Patty hung out with the boss; any free time Patty had leftover after talking with her friends went to Carmen almost all the time. This was because of sparring sessions, and Patty had become quite good at being Carmen’s punching bag. After assessing Patty’s level, she was cleared for full training, excelled, and was groomed for training with the masters. Double had grown accustomed to getting the job done, and he started to redeem himself in VILE’s eyes. Double Trouble would, however, push the limit of confrontations, and both sides were tired of it. Those who knew of the “Unasked for triangle” between Tenchi, Patty, and Double were even more put off.

Fortunately, Tenchi wasn’t interested in competing with Double, just throwing him in jail. This saved everyone a lot of unnecessary posturing and angered Double even more. “Who does Tenchi think he is!?”, He thought to himself, adding, “It doesn’t matter we have to steal these exhibits and get outta here. If I have to sign one more hockey autograph I’ll snap!” They immediately began cruising through the military exhibits, placed them all in the bag, and sped off in their car, the Double Dash.

 

[Tenchi Masaki]

Chapter 17
​

When the curator came out to see the commotion, he saw an empty museum yard. The police were called immediately after realizing what had happened, and they forwarded the case to ACME directly. They had already lost a tower, but Tenchi and Kylie had gotten it back now; there was a museum full of exhibits to return. Crime-net was on full alert at this point; a Siberian heist had already happened, there was another one, and a more extensive plan was suspected. Tenchi, Kylie, and Tatyana were given the case and told to investigate for signs of a larger plot by VILE.

Kylie responded, “We’re on the case and will report our findings as we verify intel.” Tenchi said, “We have multiple criminal factions searching for the converter and VILE is l,ikely pulling a string of thefts as well. In all, it should be mildly entertaining stopping them.” Kylie rolling her eyes at this, said, “Get over yourself super detective.” All jokes by them aside, they knew the sooner they hit the streets, the better. So off they went with Polly in tow to the crime scene. Interpol sent word over encrypted communications that a warrant would be issued pending necessary information given. So they immediately started tracking down witnesses and passersby.

Tatyana commented to Tenchi, “I love the Trans Siberian you get to see more of the real Russia than most Russians do. And we get to hunt clues as well!” Kate realized her notebook, which had served her well, was starting to run out of pages. Being a regular small handheld notebook you could buy at any grocery store, there wasn’t much writing it could take. She hoped to find a replacement somewhere, but the ones she had seen were no better. Kate would have to carry a bag full of them at the rate the information was adding up. She decided to ask her inquisitive company and got a Hobonichi Techo from Tenchi.

Kate’s eyes widening exclaimed, “Oh my god the notebook of legend!?” The Hobonichi Techo was renowned in the notebook world. Those who still used pen and paper revered these most sacred notebooks. Used to keep reminders, a daily log, or draw, it offered a year’s worth of pages to record information, draw people or places, and add accessories and clippings. It was more than a notebook; it was a Lifebook. Kylie wondered why in these moments, objects Tenchi gave emitted light while Polly enjoyed every moment like this she saw. Before leaving, Polly spoke with Hans about her friend Ann Tickwittee at Acme Academy. Hans, a fan of Acme since he was a child, told her there was an old Acme technology they could use. All they needed was the correct number, but Ann would have to “Send” herself from the academy.

Team TKT was on the case with Kate in tow, Hans and Oscar were perusing the city on the hunt for anything mammoth-related, and Polly was thinking about how best to make a “Good Student Award” list. They saw a lady speaking about her husband happily telling her work was canceled at the military museum today due to theft. Kylie asked her what she knew, and she said, “My husband said there were two of them dressed as hockey celebrities.” At a park, they saw a painter painting a picture showing two guys holding a bag and military vehicles and trains being sucked into it. He told them, “People there told me they loved celebrity gossip and drove away in a car with a license plate that said Double Dash.”

Next, they decided to speak to the person walking along the sidewalk toward them. He looked like he and his friend had something important to say. Tenchi greeted them and asked if they knew any information about the museum robbery. One of the men said, “Why yes, I do come to think of ,it they were bloody rude on their way out of that place! But we’re about to get way ruder with you mate!” Suddenly they removed their disguises and revealed they were members of the Peaky Blinders! They drew their weapons, knife, and billy club and charged Tenchi. Tenchi easily countered their attacks and incapacitated them quite quickly. After tying them up, the police were called in to take them away. Team TKT couldn’t waste time on low-level goons as they were on the clock, and warrants don’t last forever.

After several hours the detectives had enough information to narrow down their list of VILE suspects to Double Trouble. Team TKT entered all the necessary clues they had gathered to Interpol, and a warrant was issued for the arrest of Double Trouble. Interpol relayed well wishes and good luck on capturing the double delinquents. Team TKT raced to track down the twin terrors twice as fast as expected and boy, did it pay off. The Double Dash was trying to drive around any cars in the way, and they weren’t interested in which side of the road they were on. They were determined to at least reach the rendezvous point, unlike Eartha. They were close to the church, but Team TKT was gaining fast. The police had blocked all roads in and out of Yekaterinburg, but that didn’t matter since they were leaving south by “Air Zeddelin.”

The devilish duo laughed as they exited their car, and Trouble held the bag in his right hand. Team TKT led the perimeter of police around them, and Tenchi walked forward, looking at Double. Tenchi yelled, “ACME agent Tenchi, Put the bag down and surrender perp!” Double was instantly infuriated by not being called by his name and made it clear they would make this problematic. Double yelled back, “Hey ACME agent The name is Double, dork!” Tenchi responded, “Oh well excuse me Mr. Dork, I had no idea I was speaking to an important thug.” Sounds of laughter were heard from this witty counter by Tenchi, including Trouble doing his best to hold it in, and this put Double back in his usual position. He wanted to run over and beat Tenchi through the street, but the situation prevented that. So he relented and waited for the signal as VILE henchmen were on the roofs of certain surrounding buildings, which meant it was almost time for the big steal.

Eddie and Delores had been chatting up a storm since establishing the communications network, which might have led to a late breakfast. Though Eddie was no stranger to that usually, he was normally watching camera feeds and losing track of time. But he and Delores talked their way to a 10:14 am breakfast feast of Pop-Tarts. As they continued their likes and dislikes chat. Suddenly warning alarms started blaring as multiple thefts by VILE thieves flooded the airwaves. Everyone from ACME and Interpol was panicking as they watched the video feeds hacked by VILE and Carmen appear to all members of the UN security council. What instantly prioritized the situation was they were all coming from Siberia.

The world leaders then heard Carmen’s confident address to them as she appeared atop the Church of All Saints, saying, “For too long you have ignored me and chosen instead to pander to other criminal organizations. and now you shall pay; in blood. I just hope ACME can keep up with me this crime.” As Carmen spoke, Led Zeddelin’s airships were descending hoist cables from the clouds and were quickly attached to harness points installed by the VILE henchmen on the roof. Then the Command Ship Hinderburg commanded the airships to deploy to the rendezvous locations while the airship above the clouds started to lift the church off its foundation. Eddie called Team TKT immediately as this transpired, yelling, “ACME we have a problem! Multiple thefts are being reported across Siberia! And something really big is going down in Yekaterinburg, please respond immediately!”

Team TKT didn’t have to be told twice they were there already at the church and were seeing Carmen herself atop it. However, Carmen had not seen them as a large crowd gathered; the only VILE thieves who knew they were there were Double Trouble. They quickly tried to continue to make their escape on foot. Maybe they could join Carmen properly? No, she would not allow them to be given direct instruction on where to run. They wisely chose not to be foolish enough to interfere with her plan and tried to escape through the crowd.

The cops had been overwhelmed by the large crowd and couldn’t hold them back from wanting to see what was happening. Double Trouble tried to use this to their advantage, but Team TKT was slightly more level-headed. They immediately jumped on top of cars, pinpointed Double Trouble, which wasn’t too hard given their flashy clothes, and quickly ran over to them. This is what Double hoped for; now he had an excuse to fight Tenchi and would say he was protecting Carmen by buying time. Trouble tried to get away with the bag, but Tatyana blocked him. He wasn’t a match for Kylie and Tatyana, which he found out the hard way by being quickly taken down. Double could hardly notice as he was focused squarely on Tenchi.

He lunged at Tenchi, who tactically drew back, forcing Double to overextend himself. Double was off balance at this point, and if they weren’t surrounded by a mob, given his skill, they could recover quickly. Unfortunately, they were, and Tenchi was the one experienced in fighting In these tight situations involving lots of people. Double had to focus on defending against Tenchi and keeping people out of the way. Which didn’t go too well since he was off balance and couldn’t counter Tenchi, and had to keep evading him. Tenchi and Double fighting caught Carmen’s attention, and she watched Double do his best to ruin everything.

Tenchi was clearly in control from the get-go taking advantage of the environment and prior knowledge of Double’s way of fighting. She watched Tenchi, who she had to admit could simply end the fight with power strikes that Double couldn’t avoid; instead, he chose strategy. It was almost like watching chess between two chess players, one advanced and one clearly a master. When one grossly underestimated the other from the beginning move, it was over, and they didn’t know it yet. The master would draw out a game they had won already because chess is not about brute force but strategic intelligence. Having studied under Shibumi, Carmen learned to analyze and assess what wasn’t seen more than what was. And what Carmen was seeing was what she didn’t want to accept.

Tenchi was more like a grandmaster against Double and was clearly holding back. Knowing all about Double’s fighting capability, she knew he was at his limit. But maybe Tenchi didn’t know how good he was against Double simply because he always chose to hold himself back. Regardless of whether he knew or not, Carmen was upsettingly impressed and then remembered what Grandmaster Gen had told her. He said there was a grandchild of Lord Katsuhito, and he should not be underestimated. As they both were golden generation, Gen would be one of the voices who actually knew how good Katsuhito was and, therefore, his grandkid. Carmen saw why Gen told her about him and started thinking maybe he could be useful.

Double wasn’t backing down, and though he regained his position by shoving people in his way, it didn’t matter as Tatyana and Kylie rushed him from behind. They each grabbed an arm, and Tenchi said, “You are under arrest for the theft of the military museum exhibits. Try to come quietly this time.” Double was not about to do that at all. All he had to do was shake off the cops and free Trouble. He used his energy to shove both Kylie and Tatyana away and saw Carmen on the roof. She glared at him, and he immediately knew he was taking things too far. Double then went casually to a regular Russian cop and turned himself in a while, staring smugly at Tenchi.

The apparent idea was, “Anyone but you will arrest me,” but this once again came off as childish in the context of what was happening. If Double was trying to prove he didn’t care, he failed big time. Letting Acme arrest him as Trouble did would have been the better option. Carmen was distraught at this display of poor sportsmanship. Carmen did briefly wonder if it was people messing up around Tenchi that gave the illusion of him being better but decided that was assuming too much. She knew to let actions speak loudest of all and don’t fuss over minor details. Led was filming the entire display because when you have an opportunity to ruin competition, why not? As a result, all of VILE had been sent the footage, and the masters were not pleased, to say the least.

Tenchi, of course, wasn’t done; the arrest of Double Trouble was, at this point, something to get out of the way. Carmen Sandiego was on the roof above them, and they needed to go after her. Tenchi ran towards the building and fired a grappling hook to quickly get to the top Kylie and Tatyana were soon to follow him. Tenchi looked at Carmen and said, “What’s your game this time Carmen!?” Carmen smirked and replied, “My game is to watch others play Tenchi dear, kindlyindly excuse me, I have a church to steal.”

To this, VILE henchmen appeared and started moving toward Team TKT. The church was being lifted off the ground, and people wondered why ACME was not charging Carmen to arrest her. The answer, of course, was simple her energy was keeping the church from tearing from its roof. Even if they could take Carmen down, the church would fall back down to the ground and be destroyed. Carmen said jokingly as she grabbed a rope to lift her onto the airship above, “Look at the bright side detectives. At least I’ll be in church on Sunday.” Carmen was lifted up quickly to the airship, and the VILE henchmen closed in on Team TKT.

 

[Tenchi Masaki]

Chapter 18
​

Kylie remarked, “Are you kidding me? This is like a Saturday morning cartoon. These VILE goons can’t beat us, but we have to outsmart them anyway.” Tatyana, backing away, added, “Yes Kylie and you have a plan to outsmart them right!?” Kylie answered, “Outsmart them yes. A plan for that no.” As the Vile henchmen closed in, their leader said, “Times up detectives, prepare to be finished!” Kylie exclaimed, “That’s it! Up everybody!” Team TKT fired their grapple guns toward the clouds and hooked onto the airship above them. They quickly rose as the henchmen ran up to stop them. Now they were heading to the airship and prepared for battle.

On reaching it, they had to climb to the top using handy ACME Labs Sticky Gloves Mk.4. but that was the start of significant trouble to come; Carmen was on board, and so were many, many VILE henchmen. They weren’t just the gadget-reliant kind but the combat-trained ones as well. But Team TKT was willing to try, not knowing this was part of Carmen’s plan if annoying gumshoes decided to stick to your airship. As Carmen relaxed, the detectives made their presence known. Tenchi addressed a large group of them and said, “This is Acme agent Tenchi you’re all under arrest!”

This went about as well as expected, with all the henchmen charging toward the detectives. Instead of fighting, though, Team TKT used evasive maneuvers to keep them at bay which wasn’t easy. Occasional attacks would be thrown at the extra stubborn henchmen pursuing them, and after one hit, they were unconscious. Carmen, having refreshed herself in the snack bar and after checking herself over in the mirror, made her way to her getaway vehicle, a lovely red glider. Team TKT was gaining on her, and Tatyana ordered her to stop in the name of the law. Carmen said she would instead go in the name of crime and proceed to board her escape glider and launch.

Carmen did find it funny how it was always so easy to misdirect Acme while they were expectedly chasing her. The others would get away well; at least half of them, anyway. Acme, already being here in Siberia, had made things difficult. She was surprised Eartha was caught so fast; usually, it took a few days for Acme to run them down. They had to be here for something else already, but what, she wondered.

On the ground, a particular shady figure had been watching the whole situation. This person had managed to observe VILE and decided to wait for their leader to show herself. When she did, he simply watched and waited for his moment to strike. He saw the detectives grapple up to the airship, and if they were successful, she would have an escape plan. He would simply track her path and corner her. As he saw her glider exiting the airship, he simply sped over to cut her off…

Team TKT was standing where Carmen had been looking at the expanse below them, commenting on why this always happens. But the VILE henchmen had entered the room and were running toward them. They all jumped from the airship to avoid any further encounters and deployed their Smart Chute Mk.2 parachutes to float down safely. They knew where Carmen was headed in her glider, and they wouldn’t give up easily. Especially Tenchi, he told the both of them, yelling, “Fortune favors the bold so they say!” At this point, he deployed his hoverboard and planned on some extreme parkour skills to get to where Carmen was going faster. Kylie and Tatyana couldn’t believe he would try something so reckless, well, maybe Kylie did, but they were still upset. If Tenchi’s plan didn’t work, they would be separated and have to rendezvous.

But Tenchi was a little more focused on grinding the rooftops to catch up to Carmen’s location. She had just managed to exit the glider and hide when he arrived. Why was this detective so hard to shake? How did he catch up so fast? Carmen decided it didn’t matter too much as she walked away, making sure not to alert him to her presence. It was hide and seek at this point as Carmen used her energy to mask her presence as she weaved through the crowd of people. She was glad to see that Tenchi could keep up with her as he was doing the same thing. They were basically like radar “pinging” the surrounding area looking for each other and “jamming” their signals, so to speak, as they weaved through the crowd.

But unfortunately for Carmen, an old enemy was also there working for Koga Shuko. He had said he’d get her for the Golden Lords and get rid of her if they wanted. Koga Shuko made it clear to only do that if necessary. And so he walked up to Carmen from a vantage point he was hiding at and slowly approached her from behind. Carmen was busy making sure to keep Tenchi away, then suddenly, she heard a familiar voice.

“Well, well, if it isn’t Carmen Sandiego?” Carmen heard a voice she never wanted to hear again; Lee Jordan. Carmen tensed herself at the sound of his voice and wondered how she hadn’t noticed him. Was he using something to mask his presence? It couldn’t be. Nothing could block her senses; she was a master. Carmen had been spotted by VILE henchmen convening in the area and Tenchi as well, who saw Lee and decided to intervene before things got bad. With a sinister look, Lee approached Carmen, who quickly made it clear he should not take another step.

These actions only served to anger him; honestly, it was not hard for anyone to do that. His arrogance caused him to fail at his iron and energy training by making him think he was the best fighter of his era. But before that, he would claim to be the best detective in the world, which many found rather childish. So his fall from grace surprised no one who knew him. As he demanded more acknowledgment in ACME, whether verbally or through his actions in the field, he received less. This made him feel everyone was jealous, and he “left” ACME. But being private investigators, that wasn’t exactly accurate, which he took advantage of when Carmen reappeared on VILE’s side.

He decided going after Carmen would force everyone to say he was the best. He captured Carmen only because he did what ACME detectives would not strive to do; be violent, aggressive, and use brute force. He charged through Carmen’s henchmen and caught up to her faster than expected. Carmen was still getting a feel for ACME detectives chasing after her and seeing what they would do. So Lee was far more reckless and violent than she was used to, leading to her letting him arrest her to not endanger her gang or innocent people. But back then, he received the benefit of the doubt since he was an ACME detective. No one would have believed the levels he would fall to, but it was easy. In hindsight, Lee was very weak-minded, and being challenged is precisely what made him ignore restraint. He just wanted the challenge to be over with since it conflicted with his inflated ego.

Lee as a detective would have said the ends justify the means back then, and later as a criminal, that excuse turned into he would win any way he could after kidnapping a man he decided was Carmen’s father. She initially thought he could work for VILE to find a challenge worth his time, but it only worsened his attitude. He decided now he was the greatest thief in the world, and Carmen was too tame. Why sneak in with stealth when you could blow up the vault door and take all the money while laughing maniacally. They were like oil and water, dirty, polluted oil in Lee’s case. He loved to win using brute force, and anyone hurt in the crossfire was of no consequence to him. And so, understanding his nature, she excommunicated him from VILE.

But all he did was throw it back in her face saying he was better than she would ever be. He would use weapons as tools of subjugation, not extensions of the fighter. To the outside observer, they wouldn’t see a difference. If a person pulls a gun, it’s all the same to them. But to people more aware of things, the context is the most important. If an honorable person uses a weapon as an extension of themselves, it carries their patience and restraint. But if a dishonorable person uses a weapon to subjugate, it’s done out of fear and frustration of not wanting to find another more peaceful way. Lee had given up on a nonviolent approach simply because it took too long, and he was tired of people thinking they could mess with him. Carmen was his polar opposite in this, and that’s why he grew to hate her most of all.

Carmen was a crook with class and would never resort to cheap and petty means to win. And she certainly would not hurt people for fun. She knew when to throw in the towel; otherwise, VILE wouldn’t last too long against ACME. Carmen saw in Lee the same destructive things she saw in Maelstrom; in short, she found him disgusting. Lee Jordan could care less what Carmen thought; she was just a pair of legs in heels to him at this point. No one was better than he was at stealing, and he would not let her get away this time.

Of course, that was easier said than done as Lee proceeded to once again find out the hard way as he lunged at Carmen only to find her evading his grasp yet again. No matter how much he tried, Carmen was leagues faster than he was. After making him look quite the fool, Carmen had to continue her escape from Tenchi, who had caught up to the two of them. Lee said, “Back off gumshoe, this thief’s all mine!” Tenchi, not one to take orders from criminals, drew his gun, pointed it at Lee, and responded, “I am ACME agent Tenchi Masaki and you’re under arrest for multiple armed robberies and interfering with a police investigation.” Lee found this quite humorous and decided to inform the detective of who he was dealing with.

But Tenchi already knew Lee, and that’s why the gun was pulled immediately though Lee wouldn’t pass up an opportunity to run his mouth; Carmen was still the top priority. He was being paid a lot of money for her capture, and he had an ace up his sleeve. When Koga Shuko offered it to him, he said he didn’t need it to beat that bimbo. Koga Shuko understanding a fellow egomaniac, told him it was a precaution. This was all needed to placate Lee, who was now calling on Koga Shuko’s enforcers to buy more time. Lee assuming his normal level of bravado, said, “Are you kidding me!? I’m Lee Jordan the greatest thief in the world! And you’re officially uninvited to the hotel party!”

Tenchi and Carmen needed to lose Lee fast, and Tenchi had an idea to blend in. They both went to high-end clothing stores and dressed in formal evening attire. Tenchi was wearing a very fashionable black suit, and Carmen was just stunning in a formal red dress. She wore her trademark trench coat over it more loosely and minus her fedora, which she put in a pocket in the coat. It was almost funny how they both spontaneously thought to use formal disguises. They even ran to the same store as a result and were so busy prepping and strategizing their next moves they didn’t notice each other. They each made their way back outside and over to the more upper-class groups of people.

Carmen was immediately focused on by many of the men present, and they started forming a perimeter around this lovely lady. Tenchi came in more professionally and introduced himself to the greeter at the gala event. He told them he was of the Masaki family, which went a long way in the high-class world. Carmen would be using her family name as well, which had connections as well. This led to a formal reintroduction, to their surprise as Carmen tried her best not to look too uncomfortable with the sudden shock of seeing someone she thought she had lost along with Lee. Tenchi, on the other hand, was more at ease in this situation and approached Carmen and said, “Good evening my lady I am Masaki Tenchi of the Masaki family.” Tenchi then used a sleight of hand to produce a rose which he offered to Carmen. To the other men’s dismay, Carmen took the rose and walked off together.

A dance competition of sorts was being held more so the dancers could show off to each other more than anything else. Tenchi asked Carmen if she would like to dance, and beginning to understand his plan, she agreed. Tenchi asked the musicians to play a certain song for the Tango, and they began to feel each other out through dancing. To the people watching, they were two people dancing, but they were both also using their energy and testing each other’s reflexes. The constant countering and matching move for the move was causing them to appear to onlookers as if they were completely absorbed with each other. As Tenchi and Carmen had hoped, a large crowd gathered, and he couldn’t see what was happening on the other side. However, Carmen was enjoying herself as one would in a situation like this. (Chapter #20)

 

[Tenchi Masaki]

Chapter 19
​

While done on a strategic whim, It had made her the center of attention, and no one liked that better than she did. Lee, however, was getting more angered as things went on. Carmen was paying more attention to Tenchi, and they were so taken by the people’s applause that they stopped caring that he was looking for them. As the crowd dispersed, he walked up to them and demanded Carmen go with him. Tenchi told Lee to go away as he’d deal with him later. But Lee would have Carmen one way or another, and as Lee proceeded to throw a smoke bomb to grab Carmen in the confusion, she took the time to slip away from people as she saw Lee was becoming his more hostile self.

Having cleared the smoke, Tenchi saw the goons heading to a hotel and casually walked over, expecting token resistance from multiple thugs. Carmen hoped to get to the hotel’s roof to distance herself from Lee. But he wasn’t making it easy as the place was filled with enforcers, most of whom wore business suits. Lee wanted to grab Carmen quickly but knew he had an uninvited guest to greet. And so-called his number two over to make a more personal welcome for Tenchi. Kylie radioed Tenchi wanting to know his location. He told Kylie that he was pursuing Carmen in the area and to wait for an update. This was music to Kylie’s ears, as it meant returning to base and waiting for him to come back after he was done grandstanding.

The public areas outside were packed with people going to and fro as an airport was nearby. Tenchi approached closer to the hotel and was greeted by a very overly confident Lee and his number two. This man was known for his ability to vanish in a crowd and appear next to his opponent. As Tenchi walked on, Lee and Danzo came up behind him. Lee said with smug sarcasm, “Hoping to enter Hotel Carmen?” At this point, Tenchi turned around and saw the two smiling at him. Lee continued asking, “Did you enjoy your trip?” As he said this, Danzo vanished as people walked between them and reappeared next to Tenchi.

Not having time to waste with these idiots, Tenchi simply grabbed Danzo and punched him in a disciplinary fashion three times. Danzo was utterly dazed and collapsed, but before he could fall, Tenchi held him up, showing him to Lee, and sarcastically asked, “Is he with you?” Lee, not feeling so smug anymore, replied, “He was.” Tenchi then let Danzo go and -proceeded to disappear as a group of people passed between them. Lee beginning to realize how good Tenchi was, said to himself aloud, “Nice trick.” Lee then signaled all enforcers to be ready to attack as he ran inside the hotel. He managed to locate Carmen still on the first floor, making her way to the stairs. Lee shouted, “Oh no you don’t, red!”

As he chased after her, Tenchi entered the building and saw Lee and Carmen over near the stairs. Lee began attacking Carmen again, trying to grab her, but as before, he had no luck. He screamed in frustration, took out the device Koga Shuko gave him, and said, “Now you’ll learn to stay still!” The device was placed on his wrist and began to glow. Suddenly Carmen’s necklace released a discharge of energy and glowed a bright red. Carmen was stunned and fell to the floor, barely conscious, only to be picked up by Lee and thrown over his shoulder.

Tenchi was not happy to see this at all; he had gone from running down Carmen Sandiego; to trying to prevent a kidnapping of Carmen Sandiego. He ordered, “Kidnapping is a federal offense, Lee. Let her go, or else.” Lee laughed at hearing this and said, “I’ve got a better idea, gumshoe! Since this is a hotel owned and operated by the Golden Lords, how about I have them treat you to their 5-star hospitality!” Lee walked behind guards and up the stairs to make his getaway. All he had to do now was turn Carmen over to Lash, who was waiting on her delivery upstairs, sitting on a throne chair, her legs crossed.

The guards were blocking an entrance to the hotel that was for more illegal pursuits than the average guest would want. Tenchi was in no mood to play diplomat, as whenever the Golden Lords were around, he had learned to be more direct. So walking right up to the guards, he quickly fought his way past them and into the hotel’s private area. He quickly looked up and saw it ringed the floors all the way to the top. There was a receptionist to the left of him and more guards further in, and once they realized what was happening, they charged him. Tenchi started dispatching them one by one and hurried after Lee Jordan. Who had made his way to the top of the area for the illegal clientele they served.

As Tenchi fought his way up floor by floor, he had to deal with the guards as they managed to run to him and attempt to start fighting. But being regular goons, they were all being put down by Tenchi, who was on a mission at this point. Having entirely gone into his fight mode, any guard approaching him was no match. As Tenchi reached the top floor, he cleared out the last of the defenders and opened the door. He saw a restaurant filled with guests dining in the back and Lee Jordan standing there, minus Carmen and his new friends from the Golden Lords. There were three guys and a girl who were acting as gatekeepers.

Lee’s confidence had returned, and he smugly asked, “Looking for something?” They all started laughing at Tenchi as Lee threw Carmen’s fedora to the ground in front of Tenchi. When distracted by it, Lee charged forward and began hitting Tenchi and kicking him back onto the floor. The rest of Lee’s gang started clapping and cheering for Lee as he went back over to them. Tenchi quickly rose to his feet and walked forward, only to be rapidly challenged by Lee one-on-one. They began to fight, and Tenchi was clearly the superior fighter as Lee was countered at every move. Then after knocking Lee away, the rest of his gang came at him. Tenchi beat them one by one and gently disarmed the girl. Then Tenchi rushed over to finish off Lee and kicked his head through a glass window on the door to the rear. Lee was officially out cold, but Tenchi still had a thief to find.

Racing to the back area, he found it filled with the guards Lee had alerted. They slowly advanced toward him while Tenchi refused to yield to their numbers. They jokingly started pushing Tenchi around as they realized he wanted to save that girl in red who was brought to Lash in the next room over. Lash, meanwhile, sauntered over to Carmen, who was being held up by a 705 enforcer, and slapped Carmen across the face. She ripped Carmen’s necklace off and then pushed Carmen’s chin up with her rolled-up whip. Then looking Carmen in the eyes smiled and said, “Now who’s the boss?” A giant video screen was monitoring what was happening to Tenchi, and Carmen was forced to watch this Acme detective fighting to arrest her. At least that’s what she kept telling herself; he couldn’t possibly have decided to rescue her on a whim.

That only happened in fairytales, and she didn’t need his help to get out of this situation anyway. Of course, she knew he didn’t know that and decided maybe she didn’t have to throw a single punch after all. In all her time in the field as a thief, she never had to use her fighting abilities and decided she might have to slap someone at worst. But the Golden Lords had gotten lucky; what did Lee do to her that made her so weak? Was it an energy technique? It couldn’t be; Lee was too mentally weak for energy training. She confirmed that when he joined VILE, he had managed to get to beginner rank in iron body, but that was it, and his ego and delusion made sure he did not advance any further. Lash returned to her throne to watch the show and hoped that finally Tenchi would be destroyed then maybe her boss would give her a raise.

Tenchi was getting increasingly annoyed with the guards and finally had enough when one of them pulled a knife. He proceeded to raise his level of muscle strength to break some bones. This was still baby-level to those who learned iron body, but the guards could care less as their bones were being broken quite effortlessly when they got close. All the guards started charging toward Tenchi, and as they came in range, they were quickly put down one after the other until the entire floor was covered in guards screaming in pain. Tenchi ran over to the next room and, as he entered, saw Lash on the throne glaring at him and Carmen still recovering on a couch. Then from an entrance across the room, the 705 came in and coldly stared at Tenchi.

Tenchi yelled and unbelievably charged forward toward the towering opponent. The 705 let out a mighty roar as he charged like a wild bull toward Tenchi. Tenchi then unexpectedly leaped into the air, curled himself into a ball, and crashed into the 705’s face with both knees, knocking him back off his feet and to the floor. The 705 got up and started attacking Tenchi, who used strategy again to evade the 705 strikes while using leverage to keep knocking him down. Then Lash decided cheating was an excellent way to pass the time. She stood up and started whipping at Tenchi when he was focused on the 705. This led to the 705 grabbing Tenchi and throwing him into the hallway. Then Tenchi was thrown suddenly back into the room as Huey and Lewis entered smiling as behind them, three more 705s came into the room.

Carmen couldn’t believe what she saw, the complete and total disregard for fighting fair and how they reveled in it. Now the original 705 grabbed Tenchi and threw him up to a higher platform above the throne. Tenchi got up and was furious he already knew the Golden Lords ignored law enforcement orders. And proceeded to remind them why he was their number one target. He leaped onto the 705 and hit him hard enough to send him crashing to the floor. As Lash, Huey, and Lewis watched, he rolled forward onto his feet and began fighting the others. No matter how hard they tried, they couldn’t overpower Tenchi, and one by one, they fell until Lash, Huey, and Lewis decided now was a good time to escape. When Tenchi was done finishing the 705’s he ran after the three who had gone up to the roof where a helicopter was waiting.

Lash ran to the helicopter as Huey and Lewis jumped in and ordered the pilot to take off. Tenchi ran up and grabbed Lash’s hand and caught hold of the necklace Lash tried to pull away and yelled for him to let go. As the helicopter lifted off, the necklace broke, and the piece holding the central gem ended up with Tenchi as they made their getaway. The helicopter would go to the airport, where they would board a Shuko corporate jet to get back to America as fast as possible. Tenchi returned to the throne room, where Carmen was waiting patiently on the couch. Tenchi being the professional he is, informed Carmen, “I’m ACME agent Tenchi Masaki, and you’re under arrest.” Tenchi was still a little in the zone from all the fighting he had to do to get to her and was also concerned for Carmen’s well-being.

Carmen was admittedly thankful for all his hard work and replied, “Well Mr. Detective, you must want me bad, and that’s sweet. But there’s only one thing I want from you; my necklace.” Unfortunately for Carmen, Tenchi wasn’t as easily swayed as Lee and said back, “How about these lovely matching bracelets? You’ll find they have a chain attaching them, very stylish I’ve been told.” Carmen uncrossing her legs and rising, looked Tenchi directly in the eye and said, “It has sentimental value, and I want it back.” Having lost her favorite necklace only to have it in the hands of an ACME detective was putting her in a tough spot. She was not going to leave without it, and he seemed determined to arrest her, but Carmen would continue testing his morals nevertheless.

Tenchi tried to cuff Carmen’s outstretched hand, only for her to move it out of the way. They both heard a commotion in the next room, which meant more guards were coming toward them. Then they decided to escape, and apparently, Carmen decided they should split up, as when Tenchi looked back, she was gone. Tenchi couldn’t risk alerting even more people, so he chose to use his sword if needed and headed out of the room. Tenchi, as always, knew vents were a great way to escape annoying lackeys, and as he crawled through them, he zeroed in on Lee Jordan’s voice which had made a call to his employer Koga Shuko.

Koga Shuko was busy giving a video conference meeting thinking the Moon was his as he was soon to be the converter. His associates in business and crime were hearing him go on about buying Los Angeles. Koga Shuko said, “Soon I shall buy the great city of Los Angeles from the Californian government, and my gang shall rule supreme! Buy in now gentlemen and you can share in my real estate gains!” One of the more level-headed businessmen had heard enough of Shuko’s rambling delusion and said, “You called this meeting saying you wanted to talk business, and now you tell us to take up arms against America.” Koga Shuko responded, “No I said we should buy Los Angeles. The American government let California run wild and they have been hemorrhaging cash for years.” The businessman shot back, “Even if we combined our fortunes we cannot afford to buy the city.”

Koga Shuko then motioned for Lee to provide his proof. Lee walked over to a table and opened a briefcase revealing it was full of gold. All present and holographic attendees crowded around to see for themselves. While that was happening, a smiling Koga Shuko said, “We can easily afford to buy the city gentlemen and we will do it with gold dug from America itself.” The satisfied attendees signed on to Koga Shuko’s plan and either cut the holographic feed or left the room, leaving only Shuko and Lee. Koga Shuko then asked Lee if he had the converter, to which Lee said no, he had to deal with some detective named Tenchi, but the necklace was secured and given to Lash.

Koga Shuko holding back one of his tantrums, then quickly asked, “Do I look like I need to hear excuses?” Lee again replied, “No.” Then Koga Shuko made it crystal clear that Shamus McMahon knew full well of the converter and wanted it for himself. But Koga Shuko had decided to use it to copy gold for his plan. The only reason it would end up working as the legends described was that the Moon was added as the power source. Koga Shuko then said with a tone of fear in his voice, “You don’t seem to understand that if Shamus finds out we have used the converter for this plan he will have us butchered like cattle!” A look of fear-filled Lee’s eyes as he took in the full gravitas of the situation. And he made it clear they would get the converter in time to copy the gold and turn it over to Shamus.

 

[Tenchi Masaki]

Chapter 20
​

While they were distracted, Tenchi noticed a map of the location where they would meet. And he realized it must be what they used to cover their tracks. With a plan like this, not even Shuko would be stupid enough to use computers to hold the information. They could be spied on or hacked, so they had to use a paper trail so only trusted individuals would have records of the plan. Tenchi grabbed the map silently and continued through the vents. But suddenly, Shuko ended the transmission, and Lee was all alone. Tenchi used the opportunity to ambush Lee to find out more information.

When Lee checked the table and saw the missing map, he immediately suspected one of the attendees and yelled for the guards, only to be surprised by Tenchi, who held his sword to Lee’s chest. Tenchi took Lee’s gun, and as the guards rushed in, he made it clear Lee would be run through if they came any closer. Lee told them to do as instructed, and Tenchi ordered them out of the room. Then Tenchi threw Lee a sword, and they started thrusting and parrying, but yet again, Tenchi was not having any problems outfighting Lee. Suddenly Danzo ran into the room, sword in hand, and aggressively charged Tenchi, who parried his power slashes. That led to both attacking Tenchi and the two guards re-entering the room.

Tenchi blocked both of them and front-flipped over them both. He then ran to the balcony hall, where more guards were converging on the area. Tenchi jumped down to the lower floor, rolled over the top of a guard, and flipped onto the table where all the guards present came at him from all directions. Tenchi beat them off the table one by one before making his escape. Unknown to him, Carmen was watching again and had seen all she needed concerning his fighting ability. She had removed her signature red trench coat and stayed in a hotel room while waiting for Tenchi to deal with the guards for her.

That had taken longer than expected since Tenchi was eavesdropping on Koga Shuko’s latest evil scheme, but he got it done. Now she just had to confront him and take back what was hers, and since she didn’t have time to change out of her nightgown, she threw on her trench coat and quickly walked over to where he ran. Carmen decided that Tenchi must be a combat thrill seeker, and though ordinary people posed no threat to him, the unknown things that could happen always gave fighters like that a rush. So with Carmen’s reasons to discredit Patty’s opinion on Tenchi fading fast, Carmen felt maybe Tenchi was just a bully picking on weaker people in order to pretend to be an action hero.

It had been several hours, and the night gave way to the early morning light. Tenchi knew all he had to do was wisely hide in plain sight as the guards would naturally think he was trying to escape the building. Carmen followed him to where he was hiding and said, “Good morning, Tenchi.” Tenchi turned to see a familiar thief in a nightgown and, being taken aback by her beauty, responded, “Good morning, Carmen.” Tenchi was able to quickly figure out Carmen broke into one of the hotel rooms and relaxed while he was doing cop work. Carmen ordered, “Give it to me.” Tenchi blushing and confused, asked, “What?” Carmen answered, “That which you have stolen. It was my father’s; I want it back. Give it to me!”

Needless to say, this was a very rare side of Carmen that Tenchi was seeing. He thought the necklace must be precious to her; otherwise, she’d be long gone. Tenchi responded to Carmen’s demands with a simple smile, saying, “No.” Carmen then said, “We could always fight over it.” Tenchi, not ever having seen Carmen fight was not too concerned but at the same time knew she was most likely so good she didn’t need to usually. That led to a decision to spar with her.

Tenchi was making an expression that implied you didn’t know who you were dealing with, returned, “I don’t have time to give you the proper instruction.” Carmen chuckled while assuming a combat stance saying, “I have had the proper instruction since I was five.” Tenchi decided to take up her offer and, as usual, misread the situation concerning a female’s reasoning, especially in his case. Carmen had heard from Patty about Tenchi and witnessed his honorable nature and skills firsthand. And now she wanted to see how… good he was. So she started off by playfully saying, “I hope you know this is my first time Tenchi so be gentle okay?”

They started fighting, both knowing unarmed and swordplay would be okay. Tenchi was caught off guard by how good Carmen was but managed to gain the upper hand in the end. Carmen was feeling a lot better about how this had turned out as she ended up right in Tenchi’s face, but then Tenchi said, “Are you going to come quietly now?” Carmen replied, “Never! Though I may scream.” Tenchi then jokingly added, “That’s okay I’ve been known to have that effect.”

Before things could go further, Lee Danzo and some of the enforcers burst into the room and were quite surprised by what they saw. Tenchi ran out the other door and radioed for aerial assistance. Eddie got the message and launched a support missile from the airship. When it reached Tenchi’s location, it deployed a high-tech bike, and Tenchi hopped on and sped off. On the other hand, Carmen was the victim of Lee’s sudden fury as he, having been bested by Tenchi and Carmen multiple times in one day, wanted to know why she was in a private room with him in her nightie. Of course, every other guy there wanted to know the exact same thing as they had realized this was Carmen Sandiego, the world-famous Queen of Crime. Carmen, however, had no time for Lee and his thugs, so she said while pretending to be one of their villainous groups, “Well Lee it’s quite simple. He and I happened to meet here then I fought him and he drove off on his bike. He was quite good Lee, and very powerful.”

Koga Shuko came on a video screen to ask about the status of the search for the converter, only to see his secret idol, Carmen Sandiego. Koga Shuko had heard Carmen explain what happened and decided Tenchi needed to die for hanging out with Carmen. So he ordered a unit of enforcers to pursue Tenchi immediately. Tenchi was racing through the streets back to the train when he detected enforcers were coming up behind him. Tenchi proceeded to outdrive and fight them on the run, and as they were taken out one by one, the authorities, having been alerted, would arrest them. Kylie radioed into Tenchi, and she asked, “So did you catch Carmen Sandiego? I know the answer is no since you haven’t been nonstop bragging over the radio to us.”

Tenchi replied, “Well you see it’s complicated, first We went clothes shopping so we could go undercover at a gala ball dance to avoid Lee Jordan. Then we danced the tango and became the stars of the ball. Next Lee kidnapped Carmen and I had to rescue her, so I fought an army of enforcers from the first floor to the top of the secret black market area of the hotel. Then I beat Lee and his gang, ran into another room full of enforcers, beat them all, and then rushed into the throne room and fought four 705’s while dealing with Lash’s whip attacks. Then I chased Lash, Huey, and Lewis out to the roof and managed to get a piece of Carmens necklace before they escaped. Snuck around in the hotel vents where I heard an evil scheme by Koga Shuko. Went into a private room where Carmen followed me in, we said good morning to each other and started fighting. Then I made my getaway when Lee and his gang showed up again.”

Kylie responded to this summation, saying, “Tenchi, I hate you. Now when you and Carmen are done with your date be sure to get back home safe okay. Or maybe have an intentional accident on the way to spare you my wrath.” An understandably terrified Tenchi dreaded the idea of rejoining his friends, but the mission demanded it. After Kylie explained the situation to Tatyana, she was also quite upset with Tenchi, who had been playing “super-spy” without them. Polly asked while yawning if this meant she got to stay up since it was morning, only to hear a firm no in response. Since she had dozed off earlier, it wasn’t too bad that she had been out all night. They decided to return to the train to wait on Tenchi and scold him collectively with Kate, as they all decided a guy wouldn’t want three angry girls staring him down.

Led Zeddelin was handling the transportation of the stolen merchandise, or at least what they managed to hold onto. Kneemoi had the meteorite in her UFO, but Patty hadn’t stolen Glass Bay Beach as Carmen hadn’t reported in as planned. That got Patty very worried as Carmen always was like clockwork when it came to executing her schemes. That led to Patty seeing what was happening with the rest of the airship fleet. Unsurprisingly Dirk Rigible was going out of his way to be as helpful as possible by getting in LED’s way. He had his airships parked in front of Led’s to attempt to say they were more important, but it wasn’t working. It made Led’s ships look like they were being escorted by Dirk more than anything else. Dirk occasionally announced by loudspeakers that his ships were in command, but to anyone on the ground hearing, it sounded like he was speaking on behalf of the fleet under LED’s control.

Patty could care less about Dirk’s insecurities and took advantage of Carmen’s contingency plans. Dirk was on the scene to assist any thieves who needed sudden transport to anywhere in Siberia. Without disrupting Led’s timetable, VILE thieves had transport versatility when required. Now more than ever, Patty needed that versatility, and after straightforward acknowledgment and a smile, Dirk was ready to assist and paint her picture on all his airships. Dirk reveled in the idea of using Patty’s likeness to boost the morale of his crew, who, like him, had basic Zeddelin envy running through their ranks. But even VILE had copyright rules, and Patty had to sign off on the deal first. The aircrew readied a single-person vehicle for Ms. Larceny, who proceeded to speed off toward the surface to Yekaterinburg.

Polly, having hatched a plan to get Ann Tickwittee to Siberia, was going over the final details with Hans, who had told her he knew of a way to get her here through faxing. It was old technology, but ACME transported their detectives around via fax machine. Hans had one of the machines rumored to have been used in such a way and told Polly all Ann had to do was dial in the correct number on her end and fax herself through a machine. Ann, for her part, had been rummaging through closets filled with ACME’s old stuff and had finally found a fax machine.

Once she set it up using the 56k modem, she dialed the number she was given and vroom! The machine faxed her through the phone lines, into satellites, over to Mobile Command, and with the noticeably obsolete signal checking out, sent by Eddie to the Clockwork Train. The fax machine whirred and shook as Ann came out of the paper slot and into the train. Polly, happy the plan worked, exclaimed, “Yay, It worked now we get to hang out!” Ann, hugging Polly, responded, “Hi Polly it’s good to see you! What has everyone been up to? Did you get back the museum exhibits? And I can’t wait to help you guys stop VILE!”

Tenchi had returned to the Clockwork Train and endured the angry stare-down of certain members on it. He made it clear that Carmen would be caught eventually, but first, they had to stop the forces looking for the converter. Tenchi went on to say that given the situation, they shouldn’t lose focus on the mission goals. Tenchi then stared down and waited a bit to be sure his eyes weren’t playing tricks on him; then he asked why there were two little kids there. Polly and Ann, however, wanting to be in on the girl’s action, returned, “Is Carmen your girlfriend now? How are you supposed to give us proper mentoring when you’re running around with her, hmm?”

Tenchi, of course, told them to go to Polly’s room, leading Kylie to ask Tenchi, “So who’s better Patty or Carmen I wonder?” Tenchi reminded them as a familiar person approached the train door, “Patty is sneaky as a weasel with sticky fingers! And if she was here right now I’d tell her that I hate her, and she’s a horrible person!” Just then, there was a knock on the door, and upon opening it, Tenchi saw Patty. Patty was cute as a button, sweet as a kitten, with a sunny smile and twinkly eyes. He promptly narrowed his gaze and flatly told her, “Patty, I hate you and you’re a horrible person.” At this, he shut the door, turned around to everyone in the room, and said, “Told you so.” While Tenchi was a man of his word, Patty didn’t have time to waste. She had to return to her deployment point in case she got orders to steal the beach. Before leaving, she had changed into a headscarf, sunglasses, a brown trench coat, and gloves to disguise herself, similar to a celebrity trying to go incognito.

She knocked on the door again, and when Tenchi opened it, she said, “Are you kidding me!? Is this how you treat a friend after all this time!? Do you think I want to be seen here in this hovel!? I’m here for your help you know, you have got to go easy on Carmen we don’t know where she is and might be in trouble.” Having honored his word, Tenchi was more than happy to see Patty but was surprised she would ask him that. He told her, “Your kidding right? You know we’re going to arrest her for theft?” Patty, with a smile, said, “Oh that’s what all the ACME boys say, but I know you care about her safety so if she’s in trouble you won’t let harm come to her. I’m just worried since she hasn’t reported in after taking the church.”

Tatyana was quite upset and commented, “Your boss has no shame, Patty, that church was to commemorate the Romanov family and try to atone for their murders.” Patty sensing the negative vibes, shot back, “Oh please the Russian government did that you know the ones you serve? All Carmen did was take the church I’m pretty sure it’s still intact just being relocated. Plus there was that Anastasia girl who was rumored to have survived so relax okay?” Tatyana clenching her fist, said, “Do not tell me what to do okay? the Romanov family is none of your concern. I do not “serve” the Russian government and Anastasia’s survival status is classified to the world and people can believe what they want to on that issue.” Patty then asked, “Aren’t you rumored to be a descendant of hers?”

Kate wanted to know, among other things, why they weren’t arresting Patty, who had literally walked through the front door. Tenchi told her, “Well that’s easy when we arrest members of VILE they by law are turned over to the country we arrested them in. Once in jail, the country knows to drop the charges since VILE can escape whenever they want.” Plus, Tenchi thought to himself, as a member of the Northwest family, she was granted privileges few others receive. Whether they started companies or were board members, the families in the secret corporate world were considered above many laws but not all. Suppose you had titles of nobility or “papers”; you were granted these privileges through birth or officially being registered into this prestigious system through, most likely, marriage. Though marriage would not guarantee you got the papers, it held the highest chance of getting them.

Patty wanting to jump in on informing Kate, added, “That means if I steal something and Tenchi tracks me down and arrests me, I am turned over to the country I was arrested in. When that happens all charges are dropped and then I just escape when I want to. The nations know we aren’t going to waste time going to trial and it would be embarrassing if we didn’t show up and they had to say we got away all the time.” Patty was the type to not brag about her family status and had learned to be more humble from meeting Tenchi and Kylie years ago in Gravity Falls. Of course, in the beginning, when they first met, she was the type to brag and be snooty and spoiled to boot. She and Kylie became rivals and, over time, became friends. Patty was happy that Tenchi and Kylie were in ACME as she discovered they would be given access to the secret world when they became detectives. And later found out the Masaki family was also a part of this world.

 

[Tenchi Masaki]

Chapter 21
​

Kate understood the reasoning behind that decision as she jotted down information in her Hobonichi Techo notebook. Nations were unwilling to be seen as helpless in the face of the people who knew the iron body and respected their level of strength. They were saying without saying, “We can’t control you so we won’t insult you by trying.” To send law enforcement after them would say we refuse to accept you can do what you do, and it would be seen as a challenge. By not doing anything, it was saying we forfeit and will not fight you. The only temporary problems with this procedure were new people unused to the process or the occasional prideful sore loser types. They would decide not to care for personal reasons and send people after them, which led to many cops or soldiers visiting the hospital.

Patty then commented on the two jr. detectives saying, “Oh hi you two! You are totes adorbs and I so love your hair!” All non-ACME members on the Clockwork Train saw how Patty was so likable. And wondered if the guards in prison wouldn’t just let her go if she asked nicely. Kylie told Patty, “I’m sure Carmen will be okay Patty, and not just because Tenchi was out with her all night.” Patty was quite surprised and glad to hear this until at least she started to listen to the details of the encounter. Tenchi made it clear he was just doing his job under the circumstances. And with words leaving his mouth faster than his brain could think of them said to Patty, “I would do the same thing if it was you I was chasing.”

Patty blushed slightly at hearing this and replied, “Oh really? Well, I’m happy to hear that Tenchi, and I look forward to our “Date.” I just hope you aren’t too rough with me.” All the girls realized Tenchi had suffered enough for his Carmen rendezvous and decided to strategize how to best counter Koga Shuko’s plan to buy Los Angeles. Polly and Ann took notes on the strategic procedure as Team TKT went over the details of what they knew. Patty congratulated Tenchi and Kylie on arresting Double Trouble and bid them a glittery goodbye for now.

Tatyana noted Carmen’s clue about “Paying in blood,” saying, “We got a little off track and I guess Carmen must be upset about that. She planned this heist to get attention and now we have to deal with all these other criminals. I guess it can still be salvaged though, she meant that clue more for the general public than us.” The rest agreed that the church was called the Church of All Saints in Blood Resplendent, which was the “Payment” Carmen demanded. Kylie was wondering what the connection between the items in question was. Tenchi said, “Hmm, Soyembika Tower, Military hardware, a meteorite, and an Opera House.” They agreed; at first, they didn’t seem related, but they all started to piece together a fairytale tower protected by the military.

Kylie said, “So Carmen wants to be a singing fairytale princess with a divine right to rule guarded by an army… cute. Can we go arrest her now?” Tenchi responded, “That was her plan but now she is trying to get her necklace back.” Tenchi showed the group the piece of the necklace he got when he tried to take it from Lash. Kylie threw a pillow that hit him in the head and told him there would be no more showing off. Tenchi said that it was not a keepsake, but it was precious to Carmen, and he had to draw her out to find out what was really going on with Koga Shuko’s plan.

He radioed Eddie saying, “Eddie send word to ACME detective agency were going to need backup call Rock Howard and Zack Monaghan.” Eddie was on it fast, and the personnel found it rather impressive that Eddie and Delores could talk to each other while handling all transmissions they were receiving simultaneously. Eddie responded to Tenchi, saying, “I’m on it, sir! Rock will be there ETA 12 hours!” Team TKT would be calling in assistance to keep the larger forces of criminal factions at bay so they could go after the leaders in the region.

On the other hand, Carmen found out more than she wanted to after learning Koga Shuko was a fan. He was telling her everything to impress her. It wasn’t working, but she didn’t mind being given a tour. Afterward, she returned to resume her plan against the protests of Lee Jordan, who was told to focus on getting the converter and not complaining.

Carmen was set on getting her necklace back, and after learning about the converter plan from Shuko, she knew to be patient and to wait. Like clockwork, Tenchi requested a meeting, and the two went to a cozy little café for a diplomatic conference. Tenchi entered the café and was seated in a snug corner booth; he heard a lovely voice singing. That woman was Carmen, and when she was done, she was led over to where Tenchi was seated. She gazed at him and said, “Hello detective I fear I may need your help to return something precious that was stolen from me.” The nod to classic detective films was not lost on Tenchi, who replied, “Well doll I’m just the guy you for the job.” Carmen slid her leg up and down Tenchi’s under the table, saying, “I am so happy to hear you’ll help me, Mr. Detective.” Tenchi then finished saying, “Wow Zack must have been at a loss for words every time this happened to him.”

Carmen couldn’t help laughing, though she did her best to hold it in. The reality of the situation was relatively simple, which was why they could be so informal about it. The Moon of Moldavia was a power source for the converter; without it, the converter could not make endless copies. The Moon was in Tenchi’s possession, and Carmen needed the whole necklace for sentimental reasons. Capt Tristan would be informed of the situation, and they would be able to set up a trap. Since they knew the Golden Lords wanted the converter, they would give it to them.

Carmen was willing to enjoy the atmosphere with Tenchi as she noticed he liked these settings. But since Koga Shuko was the only one who knew it needed a power source to work correctly, they would simply let him think everything would go according to his plan. Tenchi then decided to let Carmen understand what he knew about her past so as not to have annoying villain expository reveals and trust issues come up later. Tenchi fearing a girl wanting to start talking about likes and dislikes decided it was now or never and began. Tenchi started to speak, but Carmen was one step ahead and covered his mouth with her hand saying, “So ,what’s your favorite musical?” Tenchi countered this new battle of words by replying, “Well Ms. Larson, or should I say Buffy? I would have to say, Sweeney Todd.”

Carmen’s eyes shot wide as she never thought she’d be called that by someone outside her circle of friends. Only they knew that was her pet name. She excitedly squeaked, “What did Patty tell you!?” Tenchi answered, “I learned by actually reading up on you in the archives. Well, what little there is anyway. I think Suhara also mentioned something about you having a nickname and then I stumbled on it.” Carmen told Tenchi not to use that name unless “permitted,” as that was the rule of her and her friends. Carmen then said in a soft voice, “I guess you want to be my friend then?”

Tenchi continuing to resist Carmen’s charms, said, “I just feel I should put you in witness protection at this point, the Golden Lords don’t let grudges go. They’re way too petty.” Carmen decided to inform Tenchi she wasn’t about to sit this out in a safe house, only for Tenchi to say she was too powerful to waste her time on such a simple matter. Carmen realized Tenchi was being a gentleman about things and was dancing around the Lee Jordan issue. Carmen reassured Tenchi that Lee Jordan was not a problem, but Tenchi responded, “I thought at first he bypassed your passive shield but then I remembered that clown doesn’t know energy techniques.” Carmen, happy to know and agree Lee was lame, said, “That’s true I’m not sure what he did to me but it wasn’t him doing it. He used something and I… let’s not talk about that okay. I would have been fine I am master level in both iron body and energy. Though I am honor-bound to thank you for “saving” me.”

Carmen kissed Tenchi on the cheek as a token gesture though Tenchi enjoyed it nonetheless. The house band noted the interaction between the two and started playing songs more fitting of their apparent relationship. But it was one of the ways a boy and girl who studied iron bodies and energy could test their strength without looking weird. They had developed ways that mirrored everyday interactions at close range but, in reality, were testing muscle strength and energy defense. Either had to resist the level of force being sent and send equal or greater force back. So in simple terms, they were learning each other’s level of controlling their power which was the most important thing to know.

The higher ranks were granted to practitioners who showed greater control and precision, especially with energy training. Lee was only a “beginner” rank, and while this granted immense strength and power, it was nothing compared to a “master” rank. “Intermediate” and “Advanced” separated beginners from masters in both iron and energy training. And ACME and VILE had tests to see if a student was ready to progress to the next level. The most famous was ACMEs since, as expected, VILEs had to do with stealing-based techniques. To advance to intermediate rank in ACME, you had to pass two tests; one required using your energy like you use your body, and the other required you to be placed with legs crossed in a metal box. The box would be locked, and you had to direct your energy to all four specific metal joints with springs at a higher melting point and melt them only. If you did not, the box walls at a lower melting point would be melted instead, and you would fail.

Most students chose to do this test first since it made them look cooler, then they would immediately start the second test. They would stand in the center of stone blocks, bricks, and clay pots and use their energy to either break or lift objects without touching them physically. Doing so adequately proved they could use their power to lift and move things as if they were using their hands. Their teacher and others who chose to be present would use their energy to “see” what was happening instead of their eyes. Advanced rank was simply a more precision-based test involving things such as threading needles and weaving to show a higher level of control. Master-level was extremely difficult to achieve, and ACME had two tests, one for boys and another for girls, but neither was forgiving.

The boy selected for mastery would enter a room where other masters and guests, usually their students, were seated together on one side. The boy would have to stand on a table and fight any master who came to challenge him. The student could not be knocked off the table, or he would fail, and this was far more difficult than it first appeared. The masters would hold back as the test was about demonstrating master-level skill, not using brute force and winning. The student would have to control their power so they didn’t break the tabletop made of simple wood. Therefore only a student that had mastered their power could pass this test.

The girls were given the Echo Dance, which was a far more formal affair. The girl would dress in a traditional eastern kimono dress and stand in the center of the room. Students would surround the girl with square-shaped stands with poles out of the center. Atop the pole was a circular drum that was placed on its side. A male master would sit cross-legged on the floor outside the ring of drums, and a bowl of dried beans would be placed on a table in front of him. He would take a bean from the bowl of beans and flick them using his energy at the drums. The bean would bounce off the drum and fall to the floor. As the game progressed, the master would have the bean hit one, two, three, drums, and so on.

The girl would have to use her energy to control the sleeves of her robe as she danced to strike the drums in the order they were struck. She had to be careful not to hit them too hard, or the drums would fall out over. The student had to send energy throughout her body as she moved at the master level while gracefully striking the drums. It was a spectacle, to be sure, but the one trying to pass understood the level of skill required to even be chosen. Most girls would be more than happy just to be the center of attention. And the room’s second floor would be filled with girl students admiring the one chosen to be considered for promotion.

After passing their test, the boy and girl would do a traditional voluntary demonstration at the ACME building in San Francisco. This would demonstrate to those who studied iron bodies the level they had advanced to. It could be any kata form of any martial arts style, but it was usually Tai Chi that was demonstrated. The issue was muscle control and what happened when the iron body was attained. Students would develop new muscles that would be highly “stiff” in a sense and would have to constantly train to use their muscles so they could move like they used to before. The muscles would be durable as iron hence the iron body name. Further training would advance them to the intermediate level, where they would be on their own training-wise. Students who showed dedication would progress to an advanced level, and masters, whether their original master or others, would train them to attempt to reach the master level.

So in the grand scheme of things, beginners were babies compared to masters. And the two masters sitting at the table could better understand things going forward. Tenchi and Carmen knew as masters; they were too powerful for regular people to hurt physically. The only people who could even begin to be a threat were intermediate-level fighters using melee weapons forged using energy. These weapons were capable of cutting or stabbing an advanced or master-level fighter. The user of these weapons could also stream their energy through the weapon if they knew how. Not that it mattered, though; the strength, defense, and speed were so great that they might as well be moving in slow motion.

Other weapons or tools powered by energy could be more effective, but such methods were frowned on in the fighting community. Skill, unarmed or armed, not outside forces, was preferred in winning battles. People like Lee Jordan could care less about honor and fell into most of the students trained in the independent category. The “masters” of independent schools, whether on their own or through the dojo, would prepare students based on what they knew and felt like teaching someone. The end result was sporadic and random, which gave the illusion of actual progress. Teachers would claim their way was “the way” and prove it by fighting others in challenges training was based on who was winning fights, not the art itself.

They regarded ACME as an example of what not to do, primarily because of their pacifist, impartial nature and jealousy. Obviously, headstrong fighters would want to promote themselves and see all of ACME’s rules as restrictive and pointless. The main sticking point was ACME’s “Official Rank” system, which demanded more than the traditional ranking system. This was because the purpose was learning the knowledge to demonstrate it as a “proof of concept.” Non-ACME students would criticize ACME for making things harder and think they were elitists. The last straw was ACME saying their method didn’t replace the traditional system, and they still regarded the basic requirements as all that was needed.

This made non-ACME students feel ACME was condescending as the rank level was what was needed to request testing to reach the “Official” level. But any conflict between ACME detectives and independents resulted in quick losses as ACME had mastered multiple skills and abilities compared to their competition. Their only rivals were VILE, as they had also been given complete knowledge of the martial arts. The exception on the independent training side was masters training students properly, making them capable of sparring with ACME students. But skill was respected by all fighters regardless of who trained who.

 

[Tenchi Masaki]

Chapter 22
​

Carmen wanted to know how Tenchi attained master rank as it was more than skill needed, but also experience. Tenchi said when the Golden Lords deployed the 701s to take out rival drug lords in Asia, he came across them when his friend Rock Howard was put on the case. Tenchi ended up taking on the whole unit, and after defeating them, the masters saw no reason not to give Tenchi the master test. The skills shown by Tenchi, in this case, demonstrated combative, strategic, and support-based skills at the master level. While the 701’s were super-soldiers, they still were no match for an iron body practitioner. It wasn’t that Tenchi beat them in combat; it was how he did it that caught the master’s attention.

Tenchi told Carmen that he demonstrated patience, humility, and professionalism because he did it from the shadows and did not take credit openly for the combative and strategic defeat of Unit 701. Of course, all the jr detectives did was watch the fight scenes, but the rank of master was expected as he was one of the classes trained by the golden generation on ACME’s side. This was a factor in his training; anyone being trained by the greatest number of enlightened ones in centuries was expected to do well. Whether fair or not, the several other students in Tenchi’s class trained hard to be detectives and started excelling in all areas they were taught. Mainly because they didn’t have a choice due to their enemies trying to destroy their parents and the organizations they worked for. So they were sent to be raised in Japan, where Tenchi lives, and they have been the best of friends ever since. Carmen then realized what she had suspected all along on ACME’s side. The ACME members of the golden generation wouldn’t hesitate to train students deemed worthy. While VILE members wouldn’t teach anyone unless it was earned by showing strength and power.

Carmen, however, believed in the Crane ideology and wasn’t thinking of changing the training method. She just wished VILE thieves showed as much dedication in their fight training. Carmen then told Tenchi her rise to master was under Grandmaster Shibumi, and she got a lot of her wisdom imparted to her from Grandmaster Gen. Gen was held in high regard among ACME and VILE as he knew “The Way of The Assassinating Fist” a challenging form to learn let alone master as he had. Tenchi was also a fan of his when he was younger and would remark that he looked like he came right out of a Kung fu movie. But no one would want to fight him if they could avoid it. Their time at the café coming to an end; Tenchi and Carmen decided they should find out more information about the converter. But that would take them out of Siberia and back into Europe.

Time was not on their side, it seemed, but if they had to go back to Europe, that is where they would go. Suddenly Tenchi remembered Polly had faxed without permission earlier, and now Ann Tickwittee was on the Clockwork Train. Tenchi decided to tell Carmen about it saying, “I think there might be a way to travel fast if we had the numbers to do it. For reasons I don’t want to think too much about Hans Voralberg has an ACME fax machine which was used to bring a Jr detective here.” Carmen, interested, replied, “Oh I have some numbers still but not with me right now. We would have to go to… where it all began.”

Carmen began acting more excitedly and expected Tenchi to lead the conversation, something he wasn’t good at with girls. Tenchi started to blather about facts and figures as his glasses brought up files on the technology. Carmen played hard to get and said, “I couldn’t possibly give you the number though it’s far too dear to me.” Tenchi wondered what she meant by that and asked don’t we need that number to go “where it all began.” Carmen responded, “Oh you’re twisting my arm darling! I don’t know how long I can resist your interrogation!” Tenchi said, “Carmen what’s the number for the fax?” Carmen getting what she wanted, said, “Well okay you push too hard darling but I accept.”

Carmen acknowledged that he was ACME and she was VILE, and if the council questioned their temporary partnership, she could say she resisted at first but was coerced. This would not fool the council, but that was the point. Carmen didn’t care, and she loved to force verbal confrontations. So if you accused her of something, she would make you imply she was at fault, just to then say it’s your problem and not to blame others for not solving your problems. Tenchi was happy to have this “diplomacy” past him, and the two left the café to go to the Clockwork Train.

On arriving, Tenchi went inside and turned the fax machine on; he then radioed Delores saying the network of devices had to be powered by Home 01. Eddie would simply allow the calls through on Mobile Command as they left and, at a later point and time, came back into Siberia. Rock Howard and Zack Monaghan would be joining them shortly in Siberia and could handle any problems while they were gone. Kylie and Tatyana were quite surprised to see Carmen Sandiego, and when they heard the plan were even more shocked. Kylie said, “Why do you have to go with her?” Tenchi simply stated they wanted this over with as soon as possible and would be back shortly.

Tatyana sent in a request for a SOUL contract which was approved by Crimenet unusually fast, leading Kylie to quip, “They want Carmen to approve of the contract to have more bargaining power later with other VILE thieves who are witness to crimes. Pretty sad but expected.” Tatyana made it clear she would be arrested on a later date and not be shown leniency for her assistance. Carmen felt this was mainly about the stolen church and understood her feelings, given her alleged heritage. Not that Carmen cared about an individual’s feelings concerning the stolen property. Polly and Ann couldn’t help but take the opportunity to ask endless questions while Kate drew Carmen’s likeness in her notebook.

Polly asked, “Why do you keep breaking American laws? Did you really steal all the beans from Lima? And can I arrest you when I become a detective?” While Ann asked, “Do you feel bad when you steal things like the Sphinx or the Coliseum?” Carmen found them adorable and was more than happy to be interviewed. When the machine was linked to Home 01, it could take Tenchi and Carmen to any fax machine still connected to ACME’s old fax net. Carmen apologized to everyone for her plan being disrupted by outside forces and reassured everyone present that they would resume upon her return to Siberia.

Tenchi entered the number, and the two were pulled into the machine and sent to a machine east of the Suez to Tel Aviv-Yafo in Israel. Tenchi and Carmen made their way to a place very special to Carmen; Chez Acidophilus. It was a yogurt bar started by Dazzle Annie Nonker, a female with brunette hair with a rumored tattoo. She was disinherited by shoelace king Baron von Nonker when she ran off with a tennis pro. With only 3,000,000 to her name saved from her allowance and her Bugatti limousine, she started the toughest yogurt bar east of Suez: Chez Acidophilus.

This unexpectedly became the headquarters of VILE when a young Carmen Sandiego, fresh out of ACME, entered with her new best friend, Merey La Roc. She was a female with brunette hair and traveled around the world with a mobile health spa for the extremely wealthy. But it was actually a cover for her criminal activities. She enjoys the good life, especially when it’s paid for with other people’s money. She is a professional mountain climber, loves spicy foods, and her car of choice is a limousine where she can plot her next job. Carmen, furious at what she felt was the bureaucratic incompetence of ACME, couldn’t wait to get started planning and scheming criminal activities. Dazzle would hear these crimes being excitedly discussed by the two every day and joined in giving suggestions. The three were inseparable from then on unless sent to prison, of course.

Dazzle and Merey saw a familiar face enter… with a not-so-familiar guy and decided to play 20 questions. Dazzle asked Tenchi, “What’s the password?” Tenchi replied, “Buffy.” Carmen hit him on the shoulder as the two founding members of VILE giggled. The patrons in the bar were a rough bunch that traded in fermented barley juice for fermented milk. They decided they didn’t see the difference, plus new regulars were encouraged to transition by drinking the yogurt from beer steins. Merey asked Carmen, “Tell us who he is already Buffy he’s cute! Are you two dating? You know what she does for a living right?” Tenchi and Carmen nervously denied any dating going on, knowing any attempts to explain their prior meetings would be seen as just that.

Carmen told them, “He’s a guy I need to help get my necklace back. It was taken by a woman named Lash and now it’s in the hands of Koga Shuko.” Upon hearing this, Dazzle and Merey hug Carmen and decide Tenchi must be pretty good if Carmen relies on him. Tenchi told the two that they needed to get to Europe fast and research the Moon of Moldavia in order to stop Koga Shuko’s plan. Carmen said her address book with the fax numbers was left here, so all they had to do was just use it to dial themselves wherever they needed to go while they would love to get the address book and get out; obviously, three girls were more concerned with talking about what happened and when Lee Jordan was brought up Tenchi knew he wasn’t going anywhere soon. But Tenchi took the opportunity to analyze the bar more closely.

He saw a room where an X-ray scan showed a wooden table and went inside; he was followed by grinning girls who told him that table was where they worked on their first plans. Now it would be used again to go over the details of how to deal with Koga Shuko, Lee Jordan, and Valmont. They set up the map and photos of relevant persons while Tenchi and Carmen talked about what had happened up to this point. Dazzle and Merey were not too happy that the guys in VILE failed miserably to protect their boss once unexpected things started to happen. They did, however, like that Tenchi had chosen to be competent. However, that was more due to circumstances than his decision to outright defend Carmen.

They were jealous of the dancing and spontaneous fancy dress-up parts of the story and wished they could have been there. But Carmen chose her thieves based on their skill sets, not friend status. Carmen had to admit this had caused unexpected problems, as had Dazzle and Merey been there, things would have gone entirely to plan. All of the issues caused by Koga Shuko and Valmont would have been dealt with while staying on schedule as Carmen had initially planned. Now the gangsters would pay, but first, they had to discover more about the converter and the Moon of Moldavia.

Carmen, Merey, and Dazzle dimmed the lights since that made things more dramatic, and they began laying out the gathered information on the table and pinning it with tacks. All the factions were organized adequately into their appropriate threat levels, with the Peaky Blinders expectedly coming dead last behind random street thugs that might be encountered and occasional punks looking for a fight. Tenchi’s experience dealing with the Golden Lords went a long way as he recounted their major encounters. Once they had a handle on how all the information fit together, they devised plans to counter their hapless foes. Paramount was letting Koga Shuko get the converter to attempt to carry out his plan and make sure Lee Jordan was adequately taken care of.

Merey, reminiscing on that issue, looked at Tenchi and said, “Carmen let Lee catch her to keep me and Dazzle safe we weren’t able to fight him then and she didn’t want us to be hurt by that creep.” Tenchi said his experience with Lee was concise. He was only aware of him after reappearing to try and catch Carmen along with Zack and Ivy, and then he joined VILE. Carmen interjected, saying, “That was a mistake he was better off in a gutter as far as she was concerned.” Even Tenchi could clearly see how upset Carmen was concerning him as he was the classic violent type of guy that girls despise. Of course, Tenchi said his assessment of Double was that he was capable of being better than he was but was focused on other things… and people.

Carmen decided to inform the two of Tenchi’s opinion of Patty, and Tenchi did his best to change the subject as often as he could. The girls were interested to know how he felt about Patty joining VILE instead of ACME and how cute they would look together. Double was crossed off her list but did Tenchi know that? They knew enough about Patty to know the basics of people she would want to be around. Tenchi seemed more interested in commenting on how he would beat Double on cases as if he was a golden enforcer. The girls decided, said enough of Tenchi’s assessment of him, they saw he didn’t lump criminals together and instead strategically organized them into like groups based on his knowledge of them.

When the planning was done, the yogurt flowed freely to all in the bar as a yogurt party was started. Yogurts from across the globe were unveiled for all to try, for a price, and after their yogurt-fueled singing and dancing, the bar waved farewell to the two hoping they could save the world in a timely fashion. Merey and Dazzle would provide support where needed, as they had been picked up on Carmen’s side. She had noted Tenchi was bringing in more detectives to Siberia, so why not more thieves as well? Carmen was an astute dungeon master to the end and was already thinking up her next plan after the Siberian operation was over.

 

[Tenchi Masaki]

Chapter 23
​

The first stop was Moldova, and upon arriving, Carmen heard the familiar info dump of an ACME detective. Tenchi spouted, “Formerly known as Bessarabia, this region was an integral part of the Romanian principality of Moldavia until 1812. Then it was ceded to Russia by its suzerain, the sultan of the Ottoman Empire. Bessarabia remained a province of the Russian Empire until after World War 1 when it became a part of Greater Romania. But then it reverted to Russian control in 1940–41 and again after World War 2 when it was joined to a strip of formerly Ukrainian territory, the Moldavian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic, on the left bank of the Dniester River (Moldovan: Nistru) to form the Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic. Upon the collapse of the Soviet Union in August 1991, this republic declared its independence and took the name Moldova. It became a member of the United Nations in 1992!”

Carmen was silent for a moment, then said, “Must you do that?... Suhara did that… Don’t do that.” The random small child Tenchi was talking to thanked him for the expository information on Moldova and skipped off. Tenchi said the education of the youth was very important, only for Carmen to threaten to call him “Son of Suhara” if he didn’t stop. Plus, they agreed the origins of the Moon of Moldavia shouldn’t be too complicated, and researching it should be over quite fast. Upon approaching the Moldavian archives, they were directed to the Ministry of Affairs and chose to access the files through Tenchi’s glasses.

That quickly turned into a nightmare as they met the Curator. They saw he was online and in person at his desk simultaneously and decided to approach him directly as Tenchi’s glasses were flooded with information from him about non-specific things in Moldavia. Tenchi and Carmen came up to the desk and saw his name plaque said Vitale Dascalu while unintentionally looking like out-of-place tourists and chose to first ask the Curator about the Moon of Moldavia. Too bad for them; the Curator was only interested in dumping random information about Moldavia on anyone that came in. He didn’t see too many people given the location and services rendered, that being archival information, and the random questions about tourist-related things had warped his originally pure-minded goal of giving helpful information.

He started based on letters, not even letting them finish a sentence cutting them off to suggest what he thought they wanted based on the “R” letter he heard. He stuttered out, “Ah, Let me guess! Roma, Roman, Romania!?” Carmen asked if he spoke Romanian? His eyes narrowed as he said, “I speak “Our language” madam.” Tenchi’s glasses back under his control brought up files concerning Moldavian politics, and he saw that they spoke a dialect of Romanian that they said was their distinct language mainly for patriotic reasons. Carmen politely told Tenchi he was just trying to guess what we wanted, probably because so many tourists accidentally ended up here and asked pointless questions. Tenchi thought to himself Polly Tix would be proud of this guy.

Relieved these two understood his daily misery, he broke character and claimed, “I’m sorry my customer service skills are a tad aggressive today.” Carmen took the necklace from Tenchi and showed it to the Curator, saying, “That’s okay, can tell us about the Moon of Moldavia please?” The Curator suddenly shot up straight, eyes open wide. He never thought he would hear that name, let alone see even a piece of the necklace now, to my office! Once in the Curator’s office stuffed with stacks of papers and books, Tenchi and Carmen have seated in comfy chairs; the first red flag. The Curator adjusted his glasses, pushed a special button under his desk, and said, “Well once upon a time….” Tenchi and Carmen realized this was going to take a while.

As the Curator told the story of the necklace’s origins, archival staff Efim Baciu and his assistants; Angelica, Boian, and Cristian, the Eder siblings, started pouring into the room. Their arms are loaded with books, charts, and scrolls about the subject. The lights dimmed, and Tenchi and Carmen were told in very detailed and dramatic shadow puppet fashion that the Moon of Moldavia wasn’t actually Moldavian but Bessarabian originally. But the region was a part of the ancient Kingdom of Dacia and thus… was Transylvanian in origin, which was now a part of modern Romania.

The Curator said, “You see, kids, the Dacians were members of an alliance that engaged Roman troops in 112, 109, and 75 BCE. Their society had split into the aristocracy and the proletariat. A gemologist artisan from the proletariat named Zalmoxis Zamfir was renowned for his craftsmanship and claimed he had inherited his skill from an older man named Pythagoras Fieraru, who took him in and taught him everything he knew. That man said there was more to learn from the scrolls, but he was too old to master and improve the art and hoped his apprentice would discover what the ancient scrolls taught and further the art of gemology. And that’s precisely what he did! He learned to cut gemstones with a precision unmatched to this day and became a great physician who inspired Plato himself! But he claimed that the ancients who wrote down this knowledge were even more skilled.

The sound effects produced by the Eder siblings were high production quality, and the shadow puppets had a life of their own. They were joined by more archive staff with actual puppets to further contrast the story being told. The director responsible for this was so happy with the production playing out as planned a tear fell from his cheek. The Curator continued, “We think he was just being modest about his skill level, as we have seen examples from those ancient times and his are equal to or better than anything from then. Some theories even say that Zalmoxis Zamfir hailed from the tribe of Getae and either was a divine being or at the least lived before Pythagoras; if you want to believe that sort of thing. He amassed great wealth and returned to his homeland where he is rumored to have built an underground chamber. A mystical cult formed from those who believed in his divinity and when he returned to them years later they believed what he had told them about living forever.”

Carmen was taken aback by this though being her professional self, she didn’t let it show outwardly too much. She didn’t think her necklace was so important, and she and Tenchi drank the copious amounts of tea and coffee on offer. They both knew they had to find the hidden chamber of Zalmoxis if it even existed. But there lay the solution; they could simply scan the areas where it was reputed to be in Moldova and Romania. However, the Curator wasn’t finished, and the outstanding shadow puppet show continued. The Curator delving into the story, said, “Well, this brings us to the real reason you two are here, I assume… the converters. They were made by loyal followers of Zalmoxis based on what they understood of his teachings.

But it took a long time for them to understand the complex science involved. But they persevered and began to make copies of the machines Zalmoxis had made by hand, modeled after music boxes, and used a gem cut by Zalmoxis himself to power them. But sadly, over time, the ignorance of people prevailed. Not understanding the converters, they took the gemstones and cut them to be fitted into jewelry. And then the last two, which were made by Zalmoxis and kept by his loyal followers, were lost. One had the gem shattered, and its pieces compose the rest of your necklace, Ms. Sandiego, with the final gem being the one in your hand. The last working converter needs to be fully operational; otherwise, like the others that have stopped working already, only one copy can be made of something. Hah! I bet you two thought Dracula would be mentioned at some point, didn’t you?” The Curator pointed at them as he said that last unexpected line. And both Tenchi and Carmen had to while showing signs of slight embarrassment, admit they did.

Tenchi was amazed at Zalmoxis’s craftsmanship as a model he designed was still working after thousands of years. But more important was he got to go relic hunting. Tenchi and Carmen thanked the Curator, who was an unexpected source of information and high production office presentation, and headed out to find the Tomb of Zalmoxis. Their search wouldn’t be complex as they faxed themselves to Bucharest, Romania, and began scanning from the ground and the air. While they were walking along the path, they were approached by a man who suddenly removed his disguise and declared, “I’ve got ya now Tenchi! Your bloody days of defyin’ the Peaky Blinders are over mate!” As usual, the goon was quickly knocked out as Tenchi and Carmen, hardly noticing him, continued along until they came across a beautiful grassy field with a uniform space underground.

This was why the scan was set to zero in on large uniform structures; it would have to be manmade. However, the scan Tenchi zeroed in on wasn’t because it was a uniform structure; it was that the scan was being blocked. Tenchi yelled, “Aha! Now that’s what I’m looking for!” Aerial scans confirmed the initial suspicions as it was a sizeable cavernous structure sprawling downward. Now they just needed to figure out how to get inside. Carmen said things like that were her specialty and decided if the design was laid out the way it showed, the entrance should be a tunnel or rising column acting as a sort of elevator down to the room. The two looked for any trigger mechanism to open a door and came across a large flat rock.

As they stepped onto it, they examined the surface for clues and found a slot-shaped hole. The glasses analyzed the spot and concluded it was hand-carved, leading to a possible way in if they figured out how it opened the door. Suddenly they heard a lot of “baaa,” which was the telltale sign sheep were coming. A shepherd was leading his flock saw the two standing where they shouldn’t be, and approached them. Dalil Zugravescu said, “This stone is sacred to those who follow Zalmoxis state your business strangers.” Tenchi going into cop mode, said, “Stand aside civilian this is official police business.” Carmen stopping him for a more indirect approach, said, “We have to get inside the tomb in ortowhat the converters were made for.”

The shepherd then told them to go to the Doina Farmhouse and play the proper notes. Realizing they did not have the converter, they thought that would be a problem. But the shepherd said any appropriate musical instrument would do and to position the children correctly and follow their signals. When they went over to the farmhouse, they met the shepherd’s family and saw the children each wearing a specific color of clothes, and on the back of their jackets were two letters. Tenchi saw that they were musical notes and, going into his routine, summoned his guitar Djinn. Djinn was enjoying the idea of not being dragged into an unnecessary detective adventure, but his excellent mood ended when a robot loaded him into a hypersonic missile transport. The missile was targeted to fly over Tenchi’s location in Romania and drop Djinn off; needless to say, he wasn’t pleased about it.

Upon the capsule holding him parachuting down and opening, Djinn yelled, “You bloody moron! Why have you called me to the middle of Romania!? I’m preparing to hear a very crummy excuse from you in advance, so let’s get this over with.” Tenchi explained he needed a musical instrument to play a note sequence to solve a puzzle. Djinn said he could have used anything to do that but chose to call him to the other side of the planet. Tenchi countered by stating that he didn’t know what to expect and might as well be prepared. Djinn decided that Tenchi was wise to consider him for the job at hand and agreed to help.

Carmen wanted to know why the guitar was talking but decided to ask it later as the children lined up in do, re, mi, fa, so, la, and ti order. There were ten of them in all Alexander, Alexandra, Bogdi, Bogda, Daria, Darius, Emil, Emilia, Gabriel, and Gabriela. Carmen was at a loss of where to even begin; the children gathered ’round Carmen in a circle. She decided to say, “They stuck us with the kids, I’ll take half to VILE okay?” Tenchi focused on the clues left behind and started to say, “E… A… D… Aha! Their names start with the letters for musical notes; E, A, D, G, B, and E. So all I have to do is play them in order.” Carmen beginning to understand, said, “Oh so “Doina” means song, and my name means song. That’s why they like me so much huh? Well, I prefer the connection to the Roman goddess Carmenta myself.” Tenchi replied, “Sadly that doesn’t surprise me.”

From left to right of the room, Tenchi and Carmen arranged the kids in the proper order onto foot-high colored stone pedestals spaced sporadically in a room. The house floor had been expertly built around the pedestals, making it look like they were a part of the home’s design. As they placed the kids, the shirts they were wearing as part of their outfits reacted to the proper pedestal, causing them both to temporarily glow. Tenchi then saw that the pedestals were marking note spaces on sheet music if looking at them from above. Aside from some of the kids excitedly hopping every so often, the setup was complete.

As they jumped as they had been trained to do, Tenchi played the notes on Djinn. The kids were excited to see a talking guitar and asked it questions as they went through the jumping motions. Djinn happily answered their questions while Tenchi played the notes perfectly until the song was over. After that, The shepherd’s wife, Polina, directed them to look outside. They could now see flat circular stones had appeared at specific points across the field. The shepherd told them they had to get the sheep to stand on each of the stones by herding one to it.

Tenchi and Carmen suddenly found themselves running across the field, slightly bent over, arms outstretched, chasing sheep. They decided not to mention this to the others when they returned. As they successfully got a sheep to run onto the stones, the outer edge of them glowed, and a ring of energy rose up to corral the sheep. They would have had more time to marvel at that, but they were caught in sheep fever. Tenchi felt this was like a mini-game from his favorite adventure franchise and would sometimes say, “Sheepy! Here sheepy, sheepy, sheepy!” To try and get more into the rhythm of what they were doing. Of course, Djinn cared more than he would admit about Tenchi and would prefer he not act like an idiot in front of people. But the Shepherds family loved the show they were watching, and the kids were cheering them on.

The shepherd then gazed at Carmens Moon of Moldavia and said, “Anyone possessing a gem of Zalmoxis shall pass to be tested. But know should you fail or be found unworthy, death will come to you if that death will come to you. Oh, so just like Thor and his hammer while Carmen smacked him on the shoulder. The shepherd thought to himself, “God, I hate kids.” he lifted his staff into the air and slammed it perfectly into the slot. The ground started to move as a stairway was revealed leading to the chamber.