Street Fighter II

Chapter 6

Singapore

Ryu ran through the grassy field, completely soaked as the rain poured down on to him behind the sounds of the thunderstorm. He didn't know where he was running, relying on instinct to lead the way. Something was happening, and he wanted to find out what it was. He panted as he stumbled his way through the mud, the rain nearly blinding him.
What the hell is going on?
He found his answer, as the sky found his fears, and lit the sky with continuous lightning to reveal it to him. All his friends, including Ken, Chun Li, Guile, Guy, and so many others, were tied to wooden crosses, nails hammered into their hands, as they died from the pain that Jesus Christ himself had felt.
They were being Crucified.
All of them were dead, save one. Chun Li. She slowly lifted her head, and managed to use up her remaining strength in order to give a final smile to Ryu. Then she dropped her head as she took her last breath. Ryu's expression changed from one of concern to one of dawning horror. He grabbed at his chest, his body arching backward as sudden convulsions began. He looked as if he was being strangled.
He turned his head, and saw two familiar men standing nearby. One of them had his arm outstretched as if he was reaching out to him. The lightning confirmed his fears as to who they were.
One was definitely Bison, he saw the familiar uniform that Bison always wore. But he was supposed to be dead. The other one looked at Bison as if he was a superior. Ryu recognised him immediately. The one who killed his sensei.
Akuma.
It couldn't be them. It couldn't!
He saw Akuma blur towards him, and heard a cry of Akuma's familiar move, "SHUN GOKU SATSU!!" Ryu suddenly felt fourteen heavy blows to the most vital areas of his body,, but these were nothing compared to the finishing blow. An explosion of blood suddenly stained his once white gi crimson, as Ryu felt a punch to his heart. Akuma had not hit the chest where the heart was, but had actually punctured it. Ryu looked at Akuma's face as the evil demon grinned and started laughing. The laugh drowned out everything in the vicinity, filling Ryu's ears, overloading his numbered cortex, echoing, reverberating through his entire being as he.......
........sat up gasping, his body snapping into an upright position on the bed. He was alone in the darkened room. A small light shone from the moon outside. Clutching pathetically at his chest he fought to regain the breath the nightmare had stolen.
His body was intact: sternum, muscles, tendons and ligaments all in place and functional. There was no fist penetrating his chest into his heart. His eyes moved jekily in their sockets as he scanned the room. Nothing. No-one waiting in ambush as soon as he let down his guard. Only the silent night outside, which slowly lightened up as dawn was approaching. Ryu thought about falling asleep again.
No. I've slept enough.
Dawn was approaching towards the town. Ryu opened his window and looked out at the dawn. Occasionally, he'd have the nightmares again. Each one would be different, but they all involved two people, himself and Akuma. They had started about 6 months ago, and had never stopped since. Ryu often felt that he was going to have to learn how to sleep again.
Always Akuma used the Raging Demon, the Shun Goku Satsu (kill very quickly), on Ryu, and always had Ryu been powerless to stop it. It was the forbidden technique of the Shotokan. Akuma obtained it after killing his brother Gouken, who was Ryu's sensei. Ryu was the only one to see his sensei murdered at the hands of Akuma, as he was about visit him after being away for so long. When Akuma launched the killing blow, Gouken felt the full force of the blow. and fell to the floor. For the first time in his life, Ryu felt fear, and anger. As Akuma left, Ryu ran towards his fallen Sensei. Ryu always remembered Goukens last words to him.
"Ryu........do not be overcome by Akuma's evil intent. He sensed your presence, and he knows.....that I trained you. You and Ken were my finest students, and I have taught you all that you need to know.........You can be overcome, by Akuma's evil force......but I have faith that you will not succumb. Defeat Akuma, and avenge all that he has killed, with your skill, not your.......anger. Now.........go......."
Gouken died in Ryu's arms that day. Ryu buried him in front of the very dojo that Gouken trained him and Ken, tears in his eyes. Gouken had taken care of him ever since his parents died when he was 4 years old. Ryu was given by a friend of the family to Gouken, who knew Ryu's parents, as he grew up in the same village with them and had been friends with them. Gouken was like a father to Ryu, caring for him, feeding him, teaching him the ways of Shotokan Karate. When he met Ken at the age of 12, they were both treated with the same love and care.
Now that Gouken was dead, Ryu felt alone. Sure, he had friends, but his endless journeys had kept them at a distance. These days, Ryu wondered if he had chosen the right path as a wandering Street Fighter. He knew Gouken was watching over him, but the love was gone. Ken was a best friend, nothing more. Ryu wanted to feel what is was like to be loved again. Then he met Chun Li, a student of Si Gung (master) Gen, and Inspector Dohrai, her father, both of whom Gouken was aquainted with, in the annual Street Fighter Tournament. There was something about Chun Li that hit Ryu, a sadness hidden behind a serious face, and he found himself wanting to talk to her after their fight, which he won. They became friends immediately.
They talked about themselves immediately, talking about their past, their martial arts, other friends. Chun Li never told him about her father when he saw her defeat a Shadowloo agent to the point of almost killing him. When Ryu stopped her from doing so, she looked like an anger had swept across her whole form, while the Shadowloo agent lay unconscious. She chastised him from stopping her, and told her why she was acting like this. Chun Li told him everything about her father's death at the hands at Bison, continually sobbing as she told him.
Ryu felt sympathy towards her, after all, he had experienced what it was like to lose a father figure. Unexpectedly, Ryu told her about Akuma and Gouken's battle. He did not know why he told Chun Li, he had not even told Ken, who was told a few years later, when Ken actually faced Akuma himself, but managed to escape. He then promised Chun Li that he would help her avenge her father's death, if she was unable to do it, he would fight him and defeat him for her. For the first time in a long while, Chun Li actually looked happy. She embraced Ryu, and spent the rest of that day in his arms, both of them looking at the sun setting over the horizon.
Ryu felt a certain kind of bond had formed between him and Chun Li. Not just a bond of friendship, but one of mutual understanding. He never really knew what it was, maybe it was something else, something he hadn't really felt before until now.
Love?
He pushed the thought out, and reprimanded himself silently at thinking such a thing. He and Chun Li were just friends, nothing more. Weren't they?
There was something else to the dream. A new character had come into play, one that shouldn't have been in his dreams at all, until now.
M. Bison.
Bison was supposed to be dead. He had nothing to do with Shadowloo now, so why did Bison appear in his dream like that? Chun Li also seemed to be a prevailing figure in his dreams. She was always the one who would be still alive before Ryu was attacked by Akuma. Even Ken wasn't there, although he did feature sometimes.
Ryu stopped thinking about his dream, and thought about the day ahead. Today, he would board a boat to go to Hong Kong. He had not been there for a long time, even before he had faced Bison and won, and wanted to pay his respects to Si Gung Gen, the old ex-assassin who ran a Kung Fu dojo in the outskirts of the city. Chun Li was probably going to be too busy, but who knew what would happen?
After paying the Innkeeper, Ryu walked towards the docks, passing the market as he walked. It was full of merchants selling their wares, be it toys, fake Rolexes, or pirated video games. Ryu didn't want any of it, and the Merchants didn't even pester him. After all, what would a Japanese man wearing a white Karate Gi possibly want to do with fake watches? Ryu walked on by, noticing two young boys running up to him.
They spoke in broken English, "Excuse me, sir, but we lost ball in sea. We cannot swim, and so cannot get it back. Can you give money to us to buy new one? The merchant says he give for 10 singapore dollar. Please?"
Ryu could sense that these boys were telling the truth. He had plenty of money to travel to Hong Kong from his last few fights, and he had no real need for it anyway. He gave ten dollars to the children, and saw them ran up to the merchant. He was just turning towards the docks when he heard shouting fom behind. He turned round, and saw the merchant attacking the two children with a wooden club, shouting to them in his native toungue, Mandarin.
"I TOLD YOU, THE PRICE IS FIFTEEN DOLLARS!! IF YOU DON'T PAY FIFTEEN, THEN SCRAM!!"
Ryu knew that the man was nothing more than a greedy merchant, hardly worth fighting, but the hitting of children, just because he lied to them was inexcusable. He walked up to the merchant.
"Excuse me," Ryu spoke in slightly questionable Mandarin, "Please do not attack them. They are simply children who lost their ball, and want to buy a new one. I am willing to pay the remaining money, just do not harm them."
Ryu was taught Mandarin from Chun Li and Fei Long, who was also a childhood friend of Chun Li's. Fei had taught him the rudimentory basics, but Chun, who had been with Ryu for longer, taught Ryu the more advanced sayings. Even so, his speaking of the language was not as fluent as he would have liked. There were only three languages that Ryu could speak fluently, his native Japanese, English, taught to him by Ken, and bad English, also taught to him by Ken. Ryu also knew very basic Thai, but that was very poor.
The shopkeeper, though just simply ignored him, and proceeded to beat the child closest to him. He was just about to strike the child with the club again, when Ryu's hand held onto the end, and stopped him.
"I warn you, touch those children again, and you will regret it."
Enraged, the merchant drew a concealed flick knife, and thrust it at Ryu's midsection. Ryu immediately blocked the attack with a low block, then spun on one foot as he blocked, and kicked the merhant in the head with a right-legged forward roundhouse, connecting to the cheek. The Merchant staggered back, and swiped at Ryu's neck with the neck. Ryu ducked, and took full advantage of the merchants open defence.
"SHORYUKEN!"
The merchant flew back into his stall. some of his stock fell on top of him, as he lay with his legs sticking out of a mountain of cheap toys, unconscious. Ryu, looking at the destroyed stand, he noticed an inflatable ball at his feet. Picking it up, Ryu handed it to one of the children
"Here, I believe this is yours."
The children tried to give Ryu's money back, but he wouldn't accept it. "No, no, keep it. Take this as well." He pulled out fifty singapore dollars amd handed it to the children. "It's the least you deserve, after being attacked by that man."
The children took the money from Ryu, and smiled at him. They ran off to play with their new ball.
Ryu looked at the children for a few seconds, then walked back towards the docks. Managing to haggle a price to the dockworker (Ryu learnt from Fei Long that people around Thailand and Singapore loved to haggle) he boarded a boat bound for Hong Kong. Ryu stood on the deck, thinking about what may await him when he made it.

Hong Kong

Chun Li entered her two-bedroom apartment. Another end to another long day working for Interpol. Placing the keys onto the hall table, Chun Li entered the lounge area, and sat down onto the sofa, thinking about yesterday's events. For single-handedly arresting 6 Shadowloo gang-members, she was entitled to a few days leave, starting the day after tomorrow. She just had to finish her report.
What she was going to do with it was anyone's, even her own, guess. She decided to visit Uncle Gen, as he prefered being called. She had long forgiven him for being a professional assassin, but due to her work, had never found the time to visit. When the whole Shadowloo thing was over, she thought about resigning and helping Uncle Gen with his dojo, or at the least, making her own dojo.
She knew Gen was currently teaching two twin brothers, his grandsons, Yun and Yang, as well as other students. By far, Yun and Yang were the best out of them all, but they were still only kids. They may have a small amount of arrogance, but they knew they still didn't have the experience of a skilled Kung Fu master. Chun Li realised that she would like to see how their fighting techniques had fared.
Despite all these decisions she still wasn't satisfied. She was lonely. She lived all by herself on a two bedroom apartment, without anyone living with her. She partly blamed it on her work, but she mostly blamed it on the fact that she hadn't yet found anyone to share her life with. She only ever had two boyfriends in her life, one was some guy she had met in school, which ended disastrously. The other was Fei Long, her long time childhood friend, who trained with her in the Kung Fu dojo her father and Uncle Gen had owned. That didn't last long either.
She was now 26, and she still hadn't found anyone. Well, Maybe I'm not ready for it yet, although....Ryu...
For some reason, she thought about Ryu. He was actually someone whom she felt close to. They had been friends ever since her first ever Street Fighter tournament, and had remained friends ever since. But she felt that their friendship had increased in magnitude when he promised her that he'd help her defeat Bison, her father's killer. She hadn't seen him ever since Ryu actually did kill Bison, and was feeling somewhat worried about him.
Why the hell would I be worried about him, if he can defeat Bison, he can take care of himself no problem. Face it Chun, you really miss him don't you?
She had to agree to this comment. She really did miss him. Maybe it was the way he helped others unintentionally, but to the best of his ability, she didn't know. What she DID know, was Ryu was a wandering fighter from Japan, who comes and goes wherever his path leads him. She wished for him to come, but it was unlikely. The chances of him coming here were remote.
Guess I'll just have to retire to the shower now, there's nothing else to do, and no-one else to care for.
She headed for the shower room, unaware that her wish would soon come true.

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