The Underhill Journal

The commentary on this gets a bit annoying, but the kata itself is really good. Enjoy.

Just in case you are interested to know, I'm working on an "Interval" piece for the Rebel Empress series, set between parts 3 and 4. There will be more of these later, so watch out for them when they come!

At last, after rather a long delay, part four of my serial. This is in mostly unedited form, so please beware!
Enjoy!


Rebel Empress
Episode 4
Worlds Apart

It has been nearly six months since the end of Saphora's training on Enceladus. She has yet to return to the China-Japan war, because of the training of several Samurai on Mars that she was ordered to oversee. She has changed, radically, as a person, and seems even colder and harder than ever she was before. Her secret passion for vengeance against her father's killers is consuming her, filling the awful hole inside her that has been left by her separation from her lover, and the ache of separation from her Katana. She is finding it hard to hold herself to her fathers strict belief in the Buddha's teachings, and can feel herself turning to darkness.
Lee Chen is about to return to action as an Elite, after a string of failed trainees and a bleak time without Saphora. He knows he no longer wants to serve Eagle Empire, but with the kill chip installed inside him, he cannot see any other option if he is ever going to see Saphora again. The hope of seeing her is the only thing that keeps him going, although he too is in danger of falling to darkness.
When the Samurai training is finally over, Saphora returns to her family home to retrieve her beloved sword and speak with her brother....

The smell of the sea always brought memories back to Saphora, and today, with the Cherry trees in the courtyard in full bloom, it was like a spell. She gripped the handle of her sword reflexively, savouring the connection that she had missed for so long while trying to keep her mind on the present as she waited for her brother on the veranda. The tingling response that swam along her arm and up her spine was soothing, and brought to her mind a cherished memory of her father.
She had held the sword in awe as a child, from the very first time she saw him practice with it in the courtyard. The cherry trees that they fed with filtered sea water were in blossom then too. She had stood on the veranda, clutching a soft toy in one hand, and had seen him draw his sword to cut a falling cherry blossom in half. The sword had moved like a streak of silver lightning and her father had sheathed it again before the torn blossom had landed on the stone ground. She had clapped and laughed with joy to see it. He had glanced over his shoulder at her and smiled, then he had begun to perform a kata. She had found herself absorbed in the way her fathers sword had moved like a silver ribbon in the air, and in the way her father leaped, span and moved as if fighting with an imaginary attacker. At times his sword crackled and sparked, at other times it whined and sang and then it would fall silent, as he set himself for his next set of techniques. He had still been a young, healthy man then, before the injury that had forced him to retire young as a Samurai, and he had been the best swordsman of his time. Even though she had been very small, she had understood how great his skill was, and she had watched in absorbed silence until he was finished.
When he was done she had run up to him and thrown her small arms around his neck, demanding to see his sword close up, smiling and laughing he had shown it to her, explaining what each part was. That had been the moment that she had decided she would be like her father.
“Saphora?” her brothers whispered voice jerked her from the memory violently, leaving her feeling only the burning pain of grief and loss, the pain that she was finding it increasingly hard to fight with. For a second her sword blazed, warning her that she must now remember to keep her emotions in check. She closed her eyes, breathed deeply and then turned to face her brother.
“I'm sorry, Sakuro. I have much on my mind,” she told him simply, looking into eyes that were almost a mirror of her own.
Almost, but not quite. Sakuro was two years older than his sister, but smaller, and very slight of build. And in his eyes, there was an odd light that many people found very difficult to look into.
Although it had never been true, many people at the court of the Shogun maintained that it was because of Sakuro and his “madness” that Saphora had been sent to the service of the Shogun instead. Certainly it was true that Sakuro had a troubled mind at times, but he was not strictly mad. From a very early age it had been obvious that he would never be a Samurai, he had been too fascinated with machines, science and knowledge to be interested in swordplay.
While Saphora trained every living breathing hour of the day at becoming a Samurai, Sakuro buried his head in books and computers. He turned his bedroom into a workshop for the machines he designed. Their parents paid for renowned university professors to come and tutor him and he gained a medical degree without leaving home, not long before their father's death. Later he gained a degree in engineering, then another in Physics. Saphora had since lost track of his qualifications. In truth, Sakuro was a genius, but he was also a recluse and he had not left the family estate since childhood.
And that was the source of the odd light in his eyes, because he saw the world very differently from everyone else, and it was the reason that Saphora needed to speak with him now.
“Sakuro, I want to ask you something, but you must swear that you will not breathe a word of this to Mother. She must not know what I am about to ask for her own protection,” Saphora told her her brother now.
“Are you finally going to make a move against father's killers, Saphora?” her brother whispered.
“No, it is not time for that yet. It concerns the training I received on Enceladus,”
Sakuro seemed surprised by that, and he looked deeply into her eyes, reading her in the intense way he had always had. With a sudden, agonising, pang, Saphora was reminded of Chen's intensity. She had to look away, calming her mind desperately as her sword once again blazed in response to her darkened mental state.
“Did they rip your heart out on the Paradise Moon, sister?” Sakuro asked her, cutting frighteningly close to the mark.
“Perhaps, brother dearest. Much was done to me there,” she replied in a whisper of her own, “I have a chip in my mind that makes me a slave of Eagle Empire. That is what I need to speak to you about,”
“What kind of chip?” he asked, the volume of his voice rising suddenly as his interest was piqued.
“The Top Elite call it a Kill Chip. It is a remote Euthanasia device,”
There were two sides to her brother, the first was the fearful, quiet side that was often racked with guilt and anguish. The other side was entirely logical and rational, with no room for human emotion as he worked toward solving whatever problem was currently troubling him. The switch from one to the other was often abrupt and sometimes disturbing. In her own troubled state, Saphora was mildly alarmed by the way her brother changed, all concern for her fled before the puzzle she had presented him with and suddenly she was simply an object to be examined.
“I have a scanner in my room, I must have a look at this thing. I want to see what they've done to make it difficult to remove,”
“That's just what I want you to do, Sakuro. I want it out of my head,” but she didn't mention Chen, and her hope that her brother could save them both.
“If they've done their job properly, Saphora, I doubt we'll be able to take it out without killing you,” he told her, in a tone of voice that didn't give her any comfort at all.
“If anyone can do it, you can Sakuro, I know you can,” she replied, sounding more desperate than she wanted to. Sakuro didn't notice that, and simply smiled at her compliment and ushered her towards his room. She took one last glance over her shoulder at the Cherry Trees, and a gust of wind blew a shower of blossoms from them.

“Listen to me, Commander Lee, the Security Board want you back out in the field, in spite of my best efforts to persuade them otherwise. I don't trust you, Commander, and I will take great joy in press the Kill Switch on you when it comes to it, but High Command don't respect my opinion enough. They think you are one of our best Elite and they want you dealing with this New Rebel Army that's started springing up all over Titan. If I hear that you have put even one foot out of line, I will make sure you pay dearly for it. Is it understood?” General Deuce was snarling in Chen's face again, leaving flecks of spittle on his cheeks and brow. He had to fight the urge to wipe them away with the back of his hand, knowing just how much it would aggravate the General.
“Understood General. Where am I to report to for briefing?”
“Titan Elite H.Q. You're being placed at the head of a 2nd Elite counter-terrorist team, reporting directly to General Hine. I will be monitoring your performance closely from here, waiting for you to screw up, and General Hine will also be keeping very close tabs on your methods Commander. Take this as your final warning – no more unnecessary heroics!” Chen watched the Generals face contorting and darkening as he barked, and felt hatred welling up inside him. He knew that if he could, he would take great pleasure in killing this man who had tormented him like this for years.
“Yes sir!” he barked back, straightening himself up and saluting. He still had more reasons to live than to die, so he forced himself to kowtow once more to the General.
“Dismissed Commander,” the General barked, turning his back on Chen and staring out of his office window. Chen stifled a smirk at the General's petulance – Deuce would see his reflection in the window - and left the office hurriedly before the General decided to add anything else. He felt a sense of relief that he would finally be leaving the School on Enceladus and getting back to action, but it was tinged with regret at leaving behind his memories of his time with Saphora. He had to stop his line of thought there though, because it always led to the bleak possibility that he would never see her again.
He made his way through the bustle of the School to his rooms, where it took him about ten minutes to pack up all his belongings. After another ten minutes there wasn't a visible sign that anyone had lived in the rooms for nearly a year, and then he left without looking back, heading straight for the Hangar and his Hawk.

The space between the inner and outer walls was tight and claustrophobic and it was difficult to be still and keep quiet, but there was really no other option. If the Eagle Empires soldiers sweeping the room just on the other side of the wall suspected anything, then everything he had achieved so far would amount to nothing.
"I've found one," he heard someone say beyond the wall. His heart began to hammer in his chest. Who had been caught? Could they be relied on to keep quiet? "There's no ID chip to scan," the speaker added.
"You people just don't know what's good for you do you?" another voice barked, menace dripping from each word. "Give me your name and ID number now!"
He held his breath, fearing the worst, but the request was met with silence.
"Give me your name and ID number now!" came another bark, punctuated with the unmistakable sound of a fist being driven hard into the relatively soft flesh of someone's stomach. There was a gasp, but there was no reply. Whoever it was that was making the demands let out a roar, then there was a crash of furniture and a barely stifled scream. The beating of his heart went up a gear and he could feel sweat standing cold on his forehead.
"Ok bitch, I'm not playing. Name and number!" There was a wail of pain.
"Katya Tomaski, ID, KT18316TN,"
A wave of nausea rose up in him at the sound of her voice. Katya. Possibly the last person who he would want to have been caught. Would she tell them anything? He had always been so sure of his ability to trust her. Was she going to crack?
"Where is Niall McCreedy?" It was a venomous snarl, accompanied by a howl from Katya.
"That's enough, Sergeant Grieve, " A new voice said suddenly, a calm voice with the slightly clipped tones of a Titan-Chinese, "Take her to the medic team now,"
"Yes, Commander Lee,"
He felt panic flood his veins. He was caught for sure. There was no way that Commander Lee would fail to find him, no way that he could be quiet enough or blank his mind enough to avoid the Elite's senses picking up on his presence.
"Take the rest of the team on a second sweep of the basement. Turn it over completely," the Commander ordered now. He could hear a number of feet snap together in a salute, then they scurried from the room. Was the Commander alone in there now?
The next few moments went by agonizingly slowly. He knew the Commander hadn't left the room, but the silence in there was so complete that he could hear the footsteps of the soldiers as they descended the stairs to the basement. Then finally the Commander broke the silence.
"Before I ask you to come out, I want you to know that I'm not going to arrest you. You can choose not to believe me, but I am going to help you escape. If you want to believe me, then please come out and talk to me. Otherwise, stay behind the wall and I will walk out of here,"
Paranoia gripped him. What kind of game was the Commander playing?
"Niall, do you know how they stop the Elite forces from rebelling?" The Commander asked suddenly, surprising him, "I've got a kill chip in my head, just like the Security bots on Mars. If I step out of line, General Deuce on Enceladus will take great pleasure in pressing the switch on me,"
A strange feeling overcame him, a twinge of the empathy that had made him fight against the Corporation to begin with. He'd always assumed the Top Elite were what they were out of loyalty to the Corporation, not out of coercion. Before he could stop himself, he pushed open the concealed door he was hiding behind and stepped out into the room.
He'd seen pictures of Commander Lee Chen before, because he had been a popular figure with the media for quite a few years now, but he'd looked like an arrogant, self interested young man under those headlines proclaiming him to be a "Hero". The man he saw now somehow looked very different, even though his face was the same.
"Thank you, Niall," the Commander said quietly, smiling in an oddly sad way.
"What happened to you?" he said, meeting the Commanders eye and asking a question he had posed a hundred times to the people who followed him.

Sunset over the Metropolis of Titan. The distant light of the sun was dipping beneath the tips of the skyscrapers, slightly deepening the gloom that the city perpetually lived under. Saturn dominated the eastern horizon, a muddy circle that stained the evening sky, blotting out the stars. The City moon was so far from the heart of the Solar System that the glow of Sol barely touched it. Titan did not have the privilege of Enceladus's SimSun, so it's denizens lived in a world of artificial light and shadow. Chen stood on the balcony, leaning on the railing, staring outwards at the twinkling cityscape while his mind looked deeply inwards.
Too much had happened that day, and he found himself wallowing in the kind of confusion that often dogged him over his feelings for Saphora. Why had he helped Niall McCreedy?
His mind had been in a fog since he'd been given this assignment, he'd felt uncomfortable about taking it on simply because it wasn't the kind of thing he was usually sent to do. He was used to the clearcut issues of tackling the Mafia and other criminal tribes that dogged the lives of ordinary people on Titan and he'd managed to avoid being put in a situation where his loyalty to the Corporation was ever tested. Until now.
Saphora had made him realise that he had no particular loyalty to his employers, but of course, it was also Saphora who had made him realise just how much of a slave he was to his employers too. If anyone found out about what he had done today, he would be dead without question, but again, because of Saphora he had been courting this death for almost two years now. It was without question in his mind that the only thing that bound him to the Corporation now was the vain hope that he would see her again. His own death meant very little to him now.
Again, why had he let McCreedy go? In truth it was obvious. He couldn't help but sympathise with the rebel and his cause. He had come to realise the oppressive nature of the Corporation and come to understand the fact that to most ordinary people in the Solar System, the Corporation represented a greater evil than any of the criminals he'd based his career on chasing.
That didn't answer the deeper question, the one that was really giving him pause for thought though. Why had he told McCreedy everything? Why had he told him about the Kill Chip? Why had he told him about the Corporations collaboration with the Shogun of Japan? Why had he told him about Saphora?
As he racked up the number of offences he had committed in that one conversation in his head, his heart began to hammer. What kind of reckless fool was he? Didn't he want to see Saphora again? He was incomplete without her, how could he put his only source of hope at risk like that? He could almost hear General Deuce gloating now. He'd be claiming how he'd always known Lee Chen would go wrong from day one as he threw the switch. When would Saphora ever hear what had happened to him?
Damn the fact that he was little more than a glorified slave! Anger exploded out of him and he let out a roar as he threw his fist through the glass doors that led back into his apartment. The pane shattered, and Chen collapsed to his knees among the shards, blood dripping from his fist.
He closed his eyes, despair welling up inside him. All he wanted in life was to be with the woman he loved, why was everything so complicated?

Saphora surveyed the battlefield from the screen in her Hawk. Her 2nd Elite Samurai were pressing hard on the positions of the Chinese Zen Pilots where they were trying to give back up to the Infantry. The Cavalry were making mincemeat out of those infantry under cover from the Samurai in their Swifts. The battle would soon be hers, but it wasn't in her heart to care. She felt very little any more, except for the gaping wound in her heart that Lee Chen had left.
She flicked off the screen and pulled up the message Sakuro had sent her earlier. It was terse and cryptic, which was his usual style at the best of times. It simply said "Breakthrough, Sister dearest, try and get home soon,". She had mulled it over several times already, and, in spite of the brief flush of excitement she had felt when she had first read it, had decided on the balance of things that it would have to wait. He hadn't demanded her immediate return from China, so he couldn't have made that much of a breakthrough. Even so, it did make her wonder what he had managed to do.
"Lady Saphora! We need some backup! Some of the Zen Pilots have broken free and we are coming under heavy fire from them! Repeat, We need backup!"
Saphora sighed and leaned back into her seat. She really hadn't wanted to get involved this time, because it was when she flew in battle that she most missed having Chen beside her. Nothing that she had ever experienced was like flying with him into battle.
"Alright, let's go and help them out," she told her ship. She felt a wave of excitement from the Hawk and the engines roared into life. The ship leaped skyward and Saphora flicked her screen back on, using it to pinpoint the rogue Zen pilots. She spotted them quickly.
"Okay, let's go get them,"
The Hawk threw itself upwards full of a sense of joy. It had been a long time since Saphora had fought in battle with it, and she knew it missed the wild twists and turns of full melee. It reached it's peak and began to drop on the positions of the Zen Pilots. Saphora let her senses extend into her ship, becoming one with it. Together they dropped into a tight, corkskrew, and she gripped the gun controls tightly. In her mind, Chen flew like a ghost towards the earth with her, their flightpaths back to back, twisting together so closely that if she closed her eyes she could see his face just above her own. She had to hold the pain this made her feel deep inside, because she couldn't let her Hawk feel it any more than she could let her Kitana feel it.
She began firing as soon as she had one of the Zen pilots in her sights, but he span away as soon as she touched his wing with her fire. She followed him, her Hawk still spinning in the air as the other Zen Pilots moved to follow her. He twisted away from her, with the effortlessness of thought, but she followed him, her mind as melded to her ship as his body was. Another spray of fire from her guns and the Zen ship in front of her tumbled from the air, wings too torn to continue flight.
She pulled up sharply, turning her ship now towards her pursuers, and spitting rockets at them. They swerved and dodged, leaving themselves open to her cannon fire even as they desperately worked to avoid the rockets. She was almost disgusted at how easily they seemed to fall from the air under her cannon fire. The Zen pilots were second only to the 1st Elite in piloting skill, but to her the gap seemed so vast that there was practically no contest at all.
The battle was soon over and her forces claimed victory over the Chinese once again. The southern provinces of China would soon all be under Japanese control, although Saphora knew that would simply focus the Chinese effort to expel her troops from their land and it would yet be a long time before she would be able to push northwards.
She was in the process of debriefing her 2nd Elite Samurai when a message came through from the Shoguns's office. Reluctantly she left the debriefing room to take it. It took all of her effort to quell her hatred before the hologramatic representation of her master.
"Lady Saphora, congratulations on yet another decisive victory!" He exclaimed jubilantly by way of greeting when the connection to Tokyo went live.
"All for your greater glory, my Lord," she told him, wishing him death in her heart. Her sword whined in frustration at her side, echoing her inner feelings perfectly. She was glad he was not actually in the room with her.
"Unfortunately, I am going to have to pull you and your Samurai away from the war for the moment. The Corporation are calling in a favour," he told her without preamble. She clenched her teeth and tried to ignore the scream of rage uttered by her sword. She could feel it's echo in her heart, but she could not give vent to it.
"Where are they sending us, master?" she asked, her voice completely without emotion.
"Back to Mars, unfortunately. There is some kind of prisoner uprising taking place there,"
"Your will is my command," she replied, cutting the comlink before he could say anything else. She knew she could easily blame it on Chinese interference in the networks.
Back to Mars. Back to that dusty hell hole that she had only escaped a year ago. Back to that place that reminded her of the grief she felt at losing Chen.
It was only when her Hawk screamed at her she realised she had put her fist straight through the screen in front of her.

"Commander Lee? General Hines is on Channel 3 for you,"
Chen looked up from the pool of blood and glass he had been contemplating at the sound of the intercom blaring with that message. Reluctantly he dragged himself to his feet, ignoring the pain of the pieces of broken glass that embedded themselves into the soles of his feet as he walked over them. He hit channel three on the Com Station.
"Commander Lee here, you wanted to speak to me General?"
"Yes Commander. I have an urgent order through from Cent Com. There is an uprising on Mars that they need your team to investigate. They need to establish links to Niall McCreedy and his rebels,"
Chen's heart sank. He knew what that meant. He would have to fabricate evidence of links if none existed, and he really didn't want to be involved in that.
"Word is that you will have to work with your old pupil though, the Japanese General. What was she called again?"
For a second Chen thought he had misheard what General Hines had said. His brain seemed to go into paralysis while his heart and stomach did backflips.
"General Hachi?" he said, trying to sound like he couldn't quite remember.
"That's it, Saphora Hachi. I hear she is quite a brilliant tactician. Should be an easy job for you Commander,"
"I'm on it, General. We'll be shipping out within the hour,"

This is the final form of my sai kata.



My stances are off a little bit still and my head keeps dipping to my shoulder which is something to work on, but on the whole I'm quite pleased with it. The footage was taken at the Giant's Footstep, which is a pond on the High Carsphairn road out of my village. It's a really nice place.

I've been working on this for a competition. I'm still only practicing and I'll freely admit it doesn't look that great, but it's getting there.
Feel free to comment.