Chapter 23: Ends and Means notes

This is the final section of the story, Part V: Salvation. Like Part
III, it's very short; just three chapters. Ch. 23 reveals Kazuya's true
motives, ch. 24 is the final battle, and ch. 25 the resolution.

It begins with the last Interlude: Elsewhen. I'm not sure if I always
planned to write Lee's disastrous TK1 match with Kazuya in, but it
is part of Namco's cannon and it fits very well. In TK1 characters
didn't have individualized stages, so I don't bother describing the
location of the "secret" match.

Kazuya is wearing his TK2 kick-button outfit here. I couldn't fit it
anywhere else in the story; his aristocrat's suit (which he
presumably keeps clean through the Dungeons & Dragons
prestidigitation spell) is his definitive outfit whenever you fight
him as a boss in TK2, and also throughout "Ashes".

Fight scene! Kazuya beats the crap out of Lee with one of his TK2
10-hit strings - the one ending in his unblockable spinning
uppercut. He finishes the fight with the tackle -> alternating
punches attack that every Tekken character has. This attack is so
savage-looking I later had Jin use it on Lei in "Phoenix Reborn".

"If you fail me, defy me, or seek to desert me, your life shall be
forfeit, in the slowest, most excruciating manner possible."

I'm deliberately making it clear that Lee never had many options.
He's a tragic figure, in some ways.

"The takeover was with a minimum of disturbance, except that the
old vice-president protested, resigned, and subsequently
disappeared."

Yes, Kazuya had this nameless previous vice-president killed. He
knew too much, and was too loyal to Heihachi.

"It's all right," Ganryu reassured, with a well-meaning smile. "What
else can your miraculous recovery be, but a sign of the gods' favor?
Everything will be fine. You'll see. Everything will be all right."

"It's all right" is very much a red flag in my stories, of course, but I
found this especially effective as a lead-in to what has become of
Ganryu and Lee in the present.

Since this chapter is all about Kazuya's ends and means, the
chapter title "Ends and Means" is from the old adage "The ends
justify the means", which is often used to suggest that horrible
things can acceptable if they contribute to a greater good. In
practice, it depends on the ends and on the means. Some means do
justify some ends; some means are so horrible that they can justify
no ends; and some ends are too ineffectual to be justified by drastic
means. Lei argues the latter two points with Kazuya.

The epigraph is from an excellent young adult high fantasy series,
"The Chronicles of Prydain". One book of this series was adapted
into Disney's "The Black Cauldron" animated movie. When one of
the coalition of lords resisting the enemy turns traitor, all the while
offering excuses, this is what is said about him. He eventually
reaches a bad end, by foolishly laying hands on "The Book of
Three" and getting immolated for his trouble.

Now for the resolution to ch. 22's cliffhanger, and the turning point
in Lee's allegiance. For all his crimes, and all his hatreds, when this
moment finally came... he couldn't personally murder Jun, any
more than he could watch her die. He had to save her life instead,
at the cost of his only friend's life and soul, which he can feel
trapped in Kazuya's death-web (though he doesn't say this aloud).

This turning point is loosely inspired by a critical juncture in
Steven Brust's "Cowboy Feng's Space Bar and Grille", when the
somewhat amoral musician Christian is about to shoot Libby and
couldn't; he has to shoot his friend Iverness instead. An immense
amount of "Ashes" was structured around reaching this point - the
entire Mori subplot to introduce Kuma, Lee's use of knives,
Ganryu's comatose state and being sent to the prisons, Liu Kang
crippling Lee so that he would be too weak to overpower Ganryu
without killing him. In retrospect it's surprising how naturally the
story seemed to flow to get here.

The unicorn hilt of Lee's knife protruded from Ganryu's right eye.
It had killed the former sumo wrestler with a single blow. In Liu
Kang's estimation, death had been close to instantaneous.

This is how Steven Brust's Vlad Taltos prefers to kill people... and
when forced to kill his friend, Lee would choose to do it as quickly
and painlessly as possible (and Ganryu was holding Jun at the time,
which made it difficult to stab him in the heart).

"I've never seen you cry before," she said, emotional uncertainty
clouding her voice.

I worry sometimes that my male characters cry too much during my
stories, so I wanted to establish that tears are a rarity for Lee.

The last vestige of fear left her, and with it, the hostile resentment
that had lingered within her for so long.

Although the climax of "Ashes" is about Lei's spiritual
transformation, and learning to let go of his self-hatred, Jun also
undergoes spiritual transformation. She, too, learns to let go of the
negative emotions tied to her own past troubles. Lee's
transformation also begins here... mostly. Like Lei and Jun, who
were struggling to change themselves long before "Ashes" begins,
Lee did start to work on controlling his bad temper and jealous
possessiveness, before Kazuya enslaved him and forced him to do
terrible things.

Lee's confession includes a reference to wildlife smuggling, since
that's what cannonically got Jun involved in TK2 to begin with. I
couldn't really do what happened Dr. Boskonovitch's daughter
justice here (I'm not sure it even crossed my mind at the time, and
Lee has thoroughly repressed it in any case). I was mildly surprised
when Lee told me that the Proving - giving people a chance to fight
for their lives rather than simply killing them - was his idea. I didn't
see that coming.

"Lee," Jun softly addressed. "You're on our side now, aren't you?"
         The silver-haired devil paused for a long time. "I... I have to
be. If I'm not, then I killed Gan-kun for nothing."

As much as Jun influenced Lee, it was Lee's bond with his friend
Ganryu that ultimately turned him. If Ganryu's mind hadn't been
burned out, Jun probably would have been able to persuade Ganryu
to join the good guys, and through him Lee. Probably.

Jun bit her lip, looked at the floor, then looked back to Lee. "There
must be something we can do."
         Lee stared off into space. At last, a hint of what might have
been a smile flickered across his lips.
         "There is."

I deliberately wrote this so that astute readers could guess what Lee
planned to do, without spelling it out.

The heart of ch. 23 is just two men talking to one another. I once
read that the creator of the "Fish Police" comic worried that his
pivotal issue #18 would be dull for just this reason, but it wasn't - it
was one of the best issues in the series. And because ch. 23 reveals
so much about Kazuya's motivations, even touching upon elements
of philosophy as well as real-world social problems, it was more
satisfying to write than any other chapter of "Ashes". It is because
of this chapter that I didn't arbitrarily end "Ashes" early; Kazuya
absolutely demanded the opportunity to share his point of view.

"Yet I did not invite you within my domain for the sake of a feud.
It is time for you to learn the full workings of my Plan. It is time
for you to join my cause."

The villain spilling his evil plans before the hero foils them is an
overused trope, to be sure. But I twist it around here, in that
Kazuya planned all along for Lei to join him, providing that he
could prove his worth.

"You show such ingratitude, even after all I have done for you."

This concept is borrowed from the movie "Labyrinth", and what
the Goblin King says to the heroine - everything she wished for,
starting with telling her baby brother "I wish the goblins would
come and take you away, right now," he has done.

"aether" is either an archaic spelling of the word "ether", as in the
old "ether hypothesis" that science later debunked, or a word I
made up. It seemed as good a term as any for Kazuya to use when
describing the green sky-fire that immobilizes people and steals
their souls.

"And I have cured your-"
         "Not another word about that!" Lei snapped, flushing.

My last clue to Jin's origin, before the reveal at the end of ch. 25.

"Yet as the challenged party, mine is the privilege of choosing the
time and setting of our match, within reasonable parameters, of
course."

As the Angel later reveals, Kazuya could have delayed the
challenge up to seven days; but in the meantime, he can't harm Lei,
the one who has issued it. Not directly, and not by ordering any
minions to attack him. Lei still could have flung himself into
Kazuya's wall of force with disastrous results, though.

"You speak my language like a woman. You are parroting
something that you learned from Kazama, are you not?"

Women's speech in Japan tends to be more polite and formal than
men's speech. Since anyone studying Japanese is taught to be
polite, they end up speaking more like women. It's particularly
problematic for men who learn Japanese from their girlfriends, and
fanfic writers (me) who studied Japanese in college and didn't
realize all their male characters sounded female. Oh, well.

Kazuya putting up sorcerous blinders is mostly from the "our
heroes/villains aren't idiots" clause - in ch. 18, Kazuya said that he
knows the Shao Kahn is watching him, and sensed that his father
was watching him. So no, he's not going to talk about his plan to
betray the Shao Kahn without invoking some privacy.

But the other reason for this turn of events is that it gives an
opportunity to cut away to the Angel. The reveal that Kazuya is one
of her Chosen - the strongest, noblest, and purest of them,
originally destined to unite and lead them against the Apocalypse -
is entirely creative license. Kazuya does not appear in the Angel's
ending when she conjures images of TK2's player chars. I'm
drawing an immense amount of interpretation from one,
fascinating glimpse of Kazuya and the Angel in PSX TK2's
introductory cutscene... a moment that Namco never does explain. 

It's a shame the Angel isn't playable in TK6, because I would like
to see what she has to say to all the other Tekken characters.

The final purpose of this scene is to allow for a cutaway jump in
the Lei/Kazuya conversation, the better to keep it moving.

"I saw Jiao lose his soul to the Kahn's curse, and I saw his body
crumble to bones. Jiao was a Hong Kong policeman for twenty
years! He was a good cop! He was my friend! He was-"
         "On the take," Kazuya coolly finished.

I don't think I realized the significance of Jiao's early demise until I
was at this point, but it made the perfect example.

"Is that not the proper idiom?"

English is full of idioms that are a royal pain for non-native
speakers to learn. Kazuya's natural gift in languages is accelerated
by his telepathy, but still. Kazuya isn't fluent in Chinese any more
than Lei is fluent in Japanese, so they're both using English to get
around the language barrier.

Kazuya's eyes flashed, resolutely. "All I have done - all I have done
has been out of necessity!"

This is a lead-in to a point-by-point laundry list of Kazuya's
rationalizations. Lei is meticulous in part because he needs to learn
everything he can about Kazuya to figure out how to manipulate
him into a fight. But I also pounce on it as a device to reveal how
Kazuya sees his own actions.

"I am not as unfeeling as you may presume; yes, I am aware of the
torment they suffer, and I wish there were a way for the innocent to
serve me without pain."

I also wanted to work the answer to Lee's question in somewhere.
Kazuya despises Lee, and would not deign to spell this out to him,
but Kazuya has a significantly higher opinion of Lei.

"You let me kill Irvin so you could make a point?"

Kazuya deliberately sacrificed Irvin to make this point. It's partly
one of Kazuya's weaknesses that he doesn't recognize the true
value of his most staunchly loyal servant, and partly prompted by a
hidden corner of Kazuya's own mind that is actively working to
sabotage him.

"This world holds over five billion souls,"

This was the world population estimate at the time "Ashes" was
written. Now it's six billion going on seven. Scary stuff. And yet, it
seems that the most effective way to control population is to
improve people's lives; they have fewer children when they know
that their children will live.

"I took your soul," Kazuya quietly explained, "so that you would
understand the burden I willingly suffer, as part of my contract
with the Kahn."

This is a reveal that I didn't have much opportunity to set up -
Kazuya is too rigidly in control to let weakness show, most of the
time. The main clue is in ch. 16, when in the wake of one disaster
after another, Kazuya momentarily presses his forearm under his
ribs. Another, much more subtle hint ties into both this and a ch. 25
reveal.

"But now that you know what I endure, it is no longer needful for
you to feel the same pain. Join me, Wulong, and I shall return your
soul."

This could be inspired by a Straczynski comic book series, about a
man whose soul is taken by Satan and sent to wander in a parallel
world of abandoned things and people. When he finally confronts
Satan, he learns that all those who serve him have had their souls
returned.

"You can no longer pretend to be morally superior to myself,
because you have the blood of Kazama and Kang on your hands."

I also wanted to spell out just why Kazuya ordered Lei's curse to be
activated while sealed in a room with Liu Kang and Jun.

"Join me, and help me usher in the New Era!"
         "Uh-huh. Then what?"

The villain exhorting the hero to join him is a classic trope. Lei's
response is perhaps borrowed from "Death Becomes Her", a movie
about immortality - but when the immortals make their pitch to a
mortal man to join their ranks, "Join us and live forever!" he
replies with, "Then what?"

"Kazuya, almost no one is born evil. It's learned behavior, and
usually learned through misery"

I read a fantasy novel - "The Swordbearer"? not sure. One line in
that novel stood out in my mind: "What is evil, but pain, and
misery?" It would make for an awesome epigraph. But it never
quite fit as an epigraph for any my fanfic chapters, so eh.

"Have you studied enough of your own country's goddamn history
to learn how holy and noble its military saw itself during World
War II, even as it raped and burned Nanking?"

I had a Chinese friend, Bladerunner, who is very passionate about
Japan's inadequate admission of guilt for its WW II war crimes.
Since Lei is himself Chinese, it stands to reason that he would be
clearly aware of this historical injustice.

 "Like I said, you're not really solving the problems of crime, or
overpopulation. You're just setting yourself up to be a totalitarian
despot. But if we really are going to reach an enlightened New Era,
then humanity has to learn to solve its own problems."

Lei's rebuttal is my response to any villain, real or fictional, who
wants to make the world a better place by becoming its dictator.

"Here in your private funhouse, you have all the souls you've
enslaved helping you, but what if the Kahn wants to face you
elsewhere? Are you sure you're strong enough to win?"

I don't spell it out in part to keep this chapter from becoming too
talky, but Kazuya expected that once he amassed enough strong
souls and sufficiently honed his Power, he could take the strongest
of them on the go as needed. Whether the Power from the souls he
could take with him would be enough to defeat the Shao Kahn is
another issue entirely...

"If you beat me, I'll serve you to the end of my days."

Although I don't spell out the lie behind Lei's self-destructive
promise, Lei of course expects to either defeat Kazuya or die
trying.

And the chapter ends on a cliffhanger - but the resolution to it has
already been hinted at, even echoed in Lei's desperate wish that Liu
Kang and Jun might succeed where he has failed.
Chapter 24: The Greatest Power notes

This chapter is the climax of the story - both in the battle to save
the world from the Apocalypse, and in Lei's inner struggle with
himself. The title comes from Lei's own words to Kazuya when he
discovers the Power to break his curse.

The epigraph is unlike every other epigraph I've ever used, in that I
haven't read its source material. Perhaps I should. I just couldn't
find a better epigraph anywhere; I think I may have come across
this one in someone's Internet signature.

"The sensors are equipped with both sorcery and technology, and
the defenses are programmed to disintegrate intruders - or as a last
resort, to kill the sleepers. Not even a shape-shifter or a teleporter
could avoid setting off the traps. Kazuya made sure of that."

I wanted to make it crystal clear that only Lee's betrayal could have
freed the sleepers. Even if our heroes had known about them, they
couldn't have released them on their own. 

The technological side of the defenses was co-opted from the
syndicate's takeover of Ultratech - Kazuya's own scientists didn't
completely understand it, and were unable to process it into more
conventional weapons. Which is why Kazuya's troops don't have
disintegrator guns. Yeah. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

"Why is the computer speaking with my voice?" she asked, with a
shade of troubled concern.
         Lee turned partway toward her, though he hesitated to make
eye contact, and shrugged uncomfortably. "I missed you."

This was just something that felt completely in character for Lee.
Later on, it became a minor story point in "Phoenix Reborn", even
though I never did find the opportunity to set it up there, either.

"The New Era has dawned. Begin the Lazarus procedure for all
units, all at once."

Lazarus, of course, is the Biblical man whom Jesus Christ
resurrected.

"O brave new world, that has such people in it."

Lee's passcode is from the dystopian novel "Brave New World". I
had to study it in high school. It's a very depressing book, about a
world where people are made through "cookbook science",
"everybody belongs to everybody else" (including their sexuality),
and where the world ruler purports to serve "happiness".

I am told that the novel's quote is in turn taken from Shakespeare,
but Kazuya's New Era would have been a dystopia had it come to
pass anyway. "Phoenix Reborn" later reveals that Lee used another
dystopia passcode in the computer system, "He loved Big Brother"
from the novel "1984".

Foremost among the multitude, Lei recognized individuals from
the Iron Fist Tournament, inciting and leading the rest.

I don't name them, since that would be extraneous to the story, but
the Tekken 2 characters that Lei recognizes are Paul Phoenix
(doing his footsweep->elbow rush combo), Marshall Law (doing
his double flip kick), and King the First (doing his giant swing
throw).

In the center of the maelstrom, Liu Kang had transformed into a
dragon. The tremendous beast lumbered onto the battlefield, reared
on its mongoose legs, and spewed its fiery breath. Its flames
reduced scores of androids into heaps of molten slag, clearing a
path between the newly awakened mob and the Chosen Ones'
army.

In "Phoenix Reborn", I retroactively worked Hwoarang into the
battle of the Mishima syndicate, stating that dragon-Kang
incinerated him. This was the moment when it happened, although
dragon-Kang didn't notice the vampyre that charged headlong into
his fire. If Hwoarang hadn't gotten himself incinerated, then Baek
would have forced him to continue fighting and killing even after
the rest of the syndicate's forces surrendered.

Hwoarang's incineration did not cause him to be enslaved to Liu
Kang, because it wasn't "single" combat. Months later, Hwoarang
was able to escape the mass grave our heroes buried his skeleton
in. Hwoarang tried to find Liu Kang in hope of being defeated and
set free from his curse (and yes, Liu Kang would have had the
mercy/ruthlessness to kill him) but couldn't. By the time Hwoarang
got a solid lead, Liu Kang had, with the aid of the Outworld
Investigation Agency, literally left Earth to protect other worlds.

"HE HAS BETRAYED ME!"

This is straight-up taken from the climax of the original
"Dragonlance" novels - Raistlin of the Black Robes betrays
Takhisis the five-headed Dragon Queen, enabling our heroes to
restore the balance. She screams this when she realizes what he has
done. I haven't read the novels (maybe I should, one of these days)
but I did collect and read the comic book series. The comic series
is largely side-stories about peripheral characters to the dragon
war; this moment is recounted at one point.

I had Lee's betrayal, and Kazuya screaming this in response, in
mind from the very beginning. One could say it's foreshadowed in
ch. 1, when Lee fights back his unreasoning terror to confront his
brother.

Kazuya's jet black eyes changed color to blood-red.

Lei's eyes have been doing this off and on through the whole novel,
so I wanted to show off the same with Kazuya.

"I possess one last weapon to use against them. I possess you. Your
Power as a reagent shall infinitely amplify mine, and I shall
eradicate the invaders who infest my syndicate!"

Now I'm starting to abuse the trope where the villain spells out his
plans, paving the way for his own defeat...

Sharp crackles of indigo Ki laced Kazuya's left fist as he brought it
up, clenching it on level with his chin. "I shall obliterate all
resistance from your human persona, and your demonic persona is
innately subject to my will!"

...and now I'm *really* abusing this trope, complete with a gesture
from one of Namco's CGI scenes involving Kazuya... I think it's
the TK1 arcade intro animation. Jin does this too. So does
Heihachi in ch. 25.

The trope was invaluable to fall back on, because I dearly wanted
to clarify just how much is at stake - if Lei fails to resist the demon
within, or loses the battle to Kazuya, then the Chosen Ones and
most likely the Earth are doomed. At the same time, it really is a
tactical blunder for Kazuya to say it all out loud. I'll just suggest it's
the one tiny good piece of Kazuya working to undercut his own
plans, the piece that needed Lei to stop him and break his power,
and leave it at that.

Kazuya attacks Lei with his charging double uppercut, a move I
don't see players do much anymore, followed by his two-punch and
turning backfist string. The final hit is Kazuya's lunging gut punch,
which stuns on counterhit. Lei would have been better able to
block/dodge/counter if he hadn't been trapped  by the remnant of
the death-web.

Break for a look at the outside action - and the duel between Baek
and Seung Mina, a battle that I expressly wrote Seung Mina into
the story for. Baek is far too psychotic to simply surrender. Baek is
drastically outnumbered and never had a chance overall, yet I
deliberately wrote in how his sheer ferocity hampered the Chosen
Ones before Seung Mina made her challenge.

Seung Mina's weapon, the Tiger Fang, is from the Soul Blade game
& guide - she actually gets many different zanbatohs among the
series' games. It's not fair to have weapon vs. unarmed combat, so
the Centaurian sword and shield return in Baek's possession.

"You disgrace our ancestors, and bring shame to Land of Morning
Calm!"

I think "Land of Morning Calm" is the literal translation of
"Korea". Like many eastern cultures, great emphasis is put on
respect for one's ancestors there.

"DO NOT INTERFERE. THIS IS NO LONGER WAR; IT HAS
BECOME A MATTER OF HONOR." Not even Jax seemed
inclined to argue with the tremendous beast.

One final line to explain why Seung Mina and Baek duel alone in
the middle of a battlefield. Do not argue with dragons, for you are
crunchy and taste good with ketchup.

For all its setup, I keep this battle short because I'm not that good at
writing fight scenes, and I'm not even sure whether I owned Soul
Blade for the PSX at this time. Baek might be using some of
Sophitia's sword-and-shield moves. Seung Mina uses a Soul Blade
combo ending in a low kick and gets Baek with her trap-the-neck
throw (which looks kind of lethal to me, but hey, Baek's tough).
When Baek's madness makes him reckless, she impales him.

I looked up the Korean word for "Thank you" for the resolution.
But even that was so much hassle that if I were to do it all over
again... I wouldn't.

His shadow-hawk spread its wings and made one last, echoing cry,
as its black shape slowly dissolved into nothingness. Its eyes of red
fire dimmed to cinders, then winked out.

The shadow-hawk ends with its master, but I never did write in
what became of the Centaurian sword and shield. They were
definitely co-opted by our heroes, but did they end up in a museum,
or is someone out there wielding them as weapons of war - or of
justice?

"Kung Lao was correct about you. You truly are worthy of
induction within the Order of Light."

I also wanted closure on this point. "Woman must prove herself
worthy of equal membership among the men" is something of an
overused plot, or subplot, but only because it has roots in real life
history... and current events.

 "So? What's the worst that can happen?"
         "Do you recall what Wulong and Kazama did to the army that
invaded Sanctuary?"

I'm emphasizing exactly what's at stake one more time, before
going back to Lei and Kazuya.

         He accepts who he is, and aspires to what he can become.
         He renews his commitment to what is good, and his
determination to do what is right.
         He lets the hatred go.

At the time I wrote "Ashes", I thought ch. 23 was the part of the
novel most worth reading. But in retrospect, I changed my mind. I
now believe that Lei's inner battle with himself is the most
important part of "Ashes". If my readers remember nothing else of
the novel ten or twenty or fifty years later, I hope that they might
retain something from this. 

It can't come out of nowhere; almost the entire novel has been
building up to it, and all the voices speaking to Lei in his mind are
direct quotes of things people have said to him.

"Your curse has no hold on me,"

The general concept, but not the exact wording, is inspired by the
climax of the movie "Labyrinth" - where the heroine says to the
King of the Goblins (David Bowie), "You have no power over
me."

When Lei awakens, he takes Kazuya down with his unblockable
attack (the stance of Phoenix Illusion is a name directly from
Tekken 2's strategy guides). It's normally very slow and easy to
evade or counter, but Kazuya's shock makes him vulnerable.

The sorcerer rolled and crouched on one knee. 

In TK2, if you defeat Kazuya the game gives you a brief cutscene
of the Devil rising to battle you. I wrote it in. A still image of it is
on the "Links" page of my website.

Devil Kazuya screamed.
         As if in sympathy with the keening wail, all the rest of his
mirrors broke apart in one great shatterstorm. 

I'm setting up the climax of the Lei/Kazuya battle, by strewing
broken mirror-fragments everywhere. Flying broken glass shards
would normally be quite deadly, but both Kazuya and Lei are
tougher than the average mortal.

"Come on, Lee," Jun urged. "You've rested for long enough. We
have to join Liu Kang and the others on the battlefield."
         The silver-haired devil shook his head. "You go on."

I'm repeating the ch. 21/22 plot device within ch. 23 - covering the
same period of time from different points of view. Lei's battle with
Kazuya, Baek's duel with Seung Mina, and Lee's confrontation
with Catsclaw all take place at roughly the same time. The moment
where Lee shakes his head is the moment that Lei glimpsed in
Kazuya's mirrors.

"Well, if you must know, I'm waiting for a 'friend,' of sorts."

Even though Lee says it ironically, Catsclaw really was the closest
thing Lee had to a friend outside of Ganryu, whose mind was
destroyed, and Wang, whose disappointment in Lee (for staying
loyal to Kazuya) hurt far more than Lee dared to admit. Lee knew
that no apologies or expressions of remorse could ameliorate what
he has done, but he still wanted to offer his only other 'friend' the
one thing he could, before Kazuya's death-link claimed its toll - an
opportunity for revenge.

"I don't think I'm in any shape to give you much sport, though.
Sorry."
"You're not in chains; that's more of a chance than you gave Dark
Mane."

No, I'm not writing in another Lee/Catsclaw battle - the first one
was enough, there's already a Lei/Kazuya and Seung Mina/Baek
battle in this chapter, and even if Lee weren't severely weakened,
he no longer has any desire to harm Catsclaw. But most
importantly, this was a useful lead-in to...

"If I hadn't killed her, she might still be alive. She might have been
rescued, or fought her way free by now."

Kazuya ordered Shimada to take two weeks to kill Michelle. It's
been roughly two weeks. Lee knows that if he hadn't killed her, she
might have been rescued in this battle - at the very least, she might
have had the chance to die like a warrior, instead of being
slaughtered while helpless. It is part of the regret that continues to
drive Lee, long after his death.

"You're out for revenge, and you know it! Don't you have a degree
in criminal law? Doesn't the principle of a fair trial mean anything
to you?"

I threw in Catsclaw's legal expertise on a whim in ch. 12, but it was
useful to refer to here.

"It's just that you have no idea how wrong you are, Jun-chan. I'm
not going to be dragged in front of some Indian jury."

Lee says this knowing that either Kazuya himself or Kazuya's
death-link is going to kill him. What he doesn't realize is that
Michelle's soul is watching, and it is at this moment that she
decides he is damn well going to be dragged in front of a jury. She
did it herself, forcibly marching him to the Grey Lords for
judgment. 

Lee didn't resist her, but some of the syndicate's other newly freed
souls tried to interfere and take direct revenge on Lee. She
personally fought them back, protecting him. She ordered Lee's
soul to fight too; he was reluctant at first, but unwilling to let her
stand alone against the likes of Mori's and Shimada's souls.

It was Alex. Three infant reptiles clung tightly to her back and
neck. She rumbled a series of growling, clicking noises to the
sergeant. He bared his teeth at her; her jaws snapped open and shut
scarcely an inch from his nose.

I didn't have room for a lot of closure on Alex, but I wanted to at
least show that she'd found her children. She was also the most
effective way of defusing the Catsclaw/Lee conflict without getting
melodramatic, or cliche'd.

What Alex said to Catsclaw was, "Stop playing with the dead
thing, unless you're going to eat it." She sensed through animal
instinct that Lee was as good as dead. As the one person who can
speak her language fluently, Catsclaw had a duty to look after her
and her children - or perhaps to ensure that she doesn't snap and
murder any of our heroes.

Catsclaw doesn't forgive Lee here. He never completely forgives
Lee; in "Phoenix Reborn", when he learns from Lei that Lee has
possessed Bryan Fury, he wards Julia Chang's home against Lee.

But by "Phoenix Reborn", the passage of years has taught Catsclaw
to accept, if not necessarily forgive. When Julia stumbled across
his nightmarish memory of Michelle's death, she was put in shock
for weeks, and her grandmother banned Catsclaw from their home
for a time. Yet when Catsclaw had the opportunity to speak to Julia
again, he was careful to tell her the rest of the story - that Lee felt
remorse over what he did, and that this remorse drove him to
betray Kazuya, knowing that it would cost him his life. Michelle
did not die for nothing.

I didn't have room to write much of this into "Phoenix Reborn",
especially since Julia doesn't knowingly meet Lee until very late in
the novel. So there's only a couple sentences in ch. 28 referring to
Catsclaw's talk with Julia about Lee. Sometimes, important story
scenes exist only in the author's mind, and do not or cannot make
their way directly to the page.

In retrospect, I have to wonder if the Lee/Julia dynamic was
inspired by the Cecil/Rydia dynamic of Final Fantasy IV (Cecil
was tricked into killing Rydia's mother, and her whole village - out
of remorse for what he has done, he asks Rydia to let him protect
her). I didn't see FF4 played through to the end until after I finished
my fanfic novels, but I did play the beginning of it long ago.

And now for the big Lei/Kazuya fight scene. I wasn't sure what I
wanted to do with Lei's silver-bladed fighting knife; I finally
decided that it's not much use against Devil Kazuya's thick skin
anyway. Maybe Lei would have been better off with a colid iron
knife?

Lei tries his crescent kick, which is a slow attack in the game, and
Kazuya responds with his other ten-hit string (deliberately a
different ten-hit from the one he used on Lee in their TK1 battle).
Lei's body has been made tougher than Lee's through Kazuya's own
sorcery, so he's still able to fight after taking the punishment...
barely.

Lei regains the offensive, and an instant of breathing room, with a
sudden sliding attack. It's one of his TK2 moves, but players don't
get many opportunities to use it because it requires him to be on his
stomach with his head toward the enemy. His "Play Dead" move
leaves him on his back, being knocked down leaves him on his
back, and his other sliding kick combo (which he uses against the
Toshin in "Phoenix Reborn") leaves him on his stomach with his
feet toward the enemy. Lei can roll over when he's on the ground
(like he does here) but that takes time to set up.

Lei's battle cry during the sliding kick is a transliteration of his in-
game vocalization, of course.

Perhaps I could or should have set up Lei's ability to bait Kazuya
better. But it's already been established that Lei can manipulate
Kazuya to a degree; he persuaded Kazuya to accept his challenge to
single combat early, after all. Lei is also keenly familiar with
Kazuya's hatreds from the memories Kazuya has forced on him.
The strongest setup is when Kazuya snaps that he is nothing like
Heihachi, in ch. 10. So Kazuya makes the mistake of trying to nail
Lei with his flying laser attack a second time - a mistake that Lei
was expecting and has prepared for. 

The climax of the Lei/Kazuya battle is something I intended from
the beginning - something I always wanted to do after getting fried
by CPU Devil's laser way too many times. Take a shard from the
"mirrors" that seem to be enclosing the arena, and reflect his
unblockable on him! Maybe Lei should have brought a mirror with
him all along, or tried/planned to use his knife's blade to reflect the
laser, but oh well.

"No, the real reason you spared me was because you needed me.
You needed someone to stop you, defeat you, break your Power.
All this time, a part of you has been working toward your own
downfall."
         Lei exhaled his breath in a long, slow sigh. "You really are
like me. You really are the brother of my soul."

The idea that part of Kazuya was working to sabotage himself all
along may be borrowed from Marvel comic's Thanos, who is in
love with Death (she scorns him), and who unconsciously
sabotaged all his own evil plans. Although whether there is any
good in Thanos is questionable, at best.

When Lei says "You really are like me," he is referring especially
to this self-sabotage - in the past several years of Lei's life, his
alcoholism and self-hatred have derailed his own efforts to be a
policeman, or create the ultimate martial arts style. And he is now
finally aware that he has been sabotaging his own relationship with
Jun.

"Join us, Kazuya." Lei firmly clasped the sorcerer's unresponsive
hand. "It's not too late for you."

There's power in the number three. Kazuya is expressly called on
to turn back three times, by the three who care the most about him:
Lee in ch. 1, the Angel in ch. 18, and finally Lei. (Jun just pleaded
with him to stop the massacre of Sanctuary; she never knew him
that well). It's a device I later use with Heihachi, who is also
enjoined to turn back three times by the three who care most about
him: Wang, Lee, and Jin.

"New York City," he hissed, spitefully.

A lot of the MK3 arenas look like New York to me, although I
don't think the game ever expressly states that is where they are.
And some of the arenas appear to be in Outworld, too. But it was
as good a location for the Shao Kahn as any. Kazuya isn't very
specific, but the Chosen Ones' divinations would have been able to
zero in on the Kahn once they were in close enough proximity. Not
that it really matters, since Kazuya's defeat was itself a direct
challenge to the Kahn.

Lei's death-link to Kazuya was something I didn't set up as well as
I should have. Lei himself wasn't aware of it. Liu Kang was, and
assumed that Lei and Jun knew about it. I did know that I wanted
Lei to come back from near-death all along like a Phoenix, and set
up his ability to "play dead" in previous chapters.

I also knew all along that Kazuya would destroy himself - it's
simply the unyielding, vengeful  nature of his character - and I set
up his suicide by establishing that hanging on to enslaved souls
after defeat in single combat will cost a necromancer his life.

It wasn't until after I finished "Ashes" that I looked back at this part
and wondered, "Hm. Why didn't Lei just knock Kazuya out...?"
This was the genesis for a major part of "Phoenix Reborn", finally
resolved in ch. 21, which truly felt like a missing epilogue to
"Ashes".

Lee had changed, in the past six years. She could remember a time
when such an admission would have immediately thrown him into
a jealous rage; yet now, all he did was let his hand drop and close
his eyes.

Given how Lee was six years ago, in ch. 15's Interlude: Elsewhen,
it felt important to underscore that he has worked to change
himself - even though Kazuya's enslavement of him for the past
two years derailed that process.

"I'm not afraid. I'll never be afraid again."

Lee's last words to Jun were strongly impressed in my mind, and it
felt very important to stress that, like Lei, he'd won an internal war
against himself - but instead of learning not to let self-hatred
control him, Lee had to learn not to let his fear control him.

And for once, her cinnamon-brown eyes stared into him, not with
hatred, not with incensed accusation, but rather calm, quiet
neutrality.

Part of this is inspired by Tanya Huff's "The Last Wizard" - when
Crystal saves a wer mother and child from death, an elder woman
of the wer changes to view her with neutrality, rather than hatred
for being a wizard. More importantly, I wanted a resolution to the
subplot of Michelle's vengeful soul.

She touched him, and the jarring pain vanished, though he could
still feel remote echoes of the burning, grinding sorcery that
gradually rent asunder his life.

Show, don't tell. Rather than state Michelle's change in attitude
toward Lee, it worked better for her to reveal it by deliberately
sparing him pain (in a gesture Lee later re-enacted with Bryan in
"Phoenix Reborn" ch. 24). Michelle couldn't stop the death-link
from killing Lee, though, any more than Jun could have.

I really liked Lee. I didn't want to kill him. Or Kazuya. But tragedy
demands sacrifice, and the story is more powerful for it. Even more
important is that Devil Kazuya's character would do no less than
kill himself, and take Lee with him.

In the "Magic Knights Rayearth" anime, the character Eagle dies. It
is a powerful moment. In the original manga, his life is saved
through an arbitrary plot device bordering on Deus Ex Machina,
and the story is weaker for it. It's particularly galling given how
manga creators CLAMP often have horrible things happen to their
female characters, while their pretty boy male characters tend to get
off too easy most of then time. CLAMP's stories are generally well
written with beautiful art, but Eagle in Magic Knights Rayearth
was a particularly noticeable instance of how refraining from
killing a character can damage the power of a story.

Eagle did look a little bit like Lee, too. Another CLAMP character,
Yueh ("Moon") of the Clow, also looks a lot like Guardian Lee.
Perhaps there was some subconscious inspiration there.

 "I - I'm sorry I killed you, Michelle. I'm so sorry..."
         I know.

The chapter doesn't end on a cliffhanger, since the climax of the
novel has passed, but it was important for Lee to tell Michelle this;
he never once said it before. She knew it all along, though. He
torture of his mind was only partly out of the need for revenge; it
was also the only way she could fight for her friends, and for the
Earth, without a physical body.
Notes to Chapter 25: Phoenix Rising

If I were to do it all over again, I probably would have posted ch.
24 & 25 at the same time, as I did with "Phoenix Reborn" ch. 31 &
32, instead of separately. Chapter 25 is purely resolution.

The title is straightforward, yet in keeping with both the "miracle"
of Lei's survival, and the Earth being saved/resurrected. One minor
regret I had was that there were no actual phoenixes in either
"Ashes" or "Phoenix Reborn" - I always thought of them as cool.
There's simply no place for one in either story, but I did later enjoy
writing a (rather sardonic) Albaphoenix into "Become Her
Servant."

The epigraph is from an anthropomorphic color comic by Vicky
Wyman, about Phelia, an immortal Phoenix queen. When her
lover, a hawk, is murdered, she sacrifices herself by immolation
outside the appointed time, and the two of them are reborn as the
first two firebirds. It's a beautiful comic book; Wyman's entire
"Xanadu" series is a must-read for anyone who loves fantastic
beasts, anthropomorphic art, or good storytelling. I wish I could
find the final issues of her "Ever-Changing Palace" fanzine though.

"I should have been the one to kill Kazuya. It should have been I!"

Shang Tsung and Heihachi were largely a dialogue/exposition plot
device, but a little closure of them was necessary, so the final
chapter opens with that. And even though "Ashes" differs from
Namco's TK2/TK3 storyline (in which Heihachi defeats Kazuya,
dumps him in a volcano, and retakes the Mishima syndicate), I do
at least acknowledge my break with cannon here, however
obliquely.

"Well, if you wanted to be teleported there, why didn't you just say
so?"

In my continuity, Kazuya crushed Heihachi so thoroughly that
Heihachi never gathered the courage to confront him for a rematch.
Asking Shang Tsung for a teleport into the Chosen Ones' territory
never actually crossed Heihachi's mind; if it had, he might have
chosen differently... maybe.

In "Phoenix Reborn", Jin speaks of the regret tainting Heihachi's
life-force, on the rare occasions that he thinks of Kazuya. Heihachi
deeply regrets not being the one to fight and kill Kazuya, and
despises himself for his own lack of courage. Perhaps he
overcompensated in the other direction, bravely but foolishly
summoning the Toshin when he ultimately did not have the power
to defeat or control it.

"KOROSHITE-YARU!"

Literally "I WILL KILL YOU!" but I have since been told that this
is way too polite for Heihachi to yell; men usually shout
"KOROSE!" in anime and the like. Oh, well. After all these years, I
choose to let my fanfic stand as-is, questionable use of foreign
language and all.

I brought back the Lamp-eft as part of the full circle motif for this
chapter, but mostly because it's cool and seemed appropriate.

"Yes, we have won, but at great cost. Half our army lies slain, and I
know that you count many of the fallen among your friends. I am
sorry."

The half of the army slain was during the first all-out conflict -
when Lee woke the sleepers and Jax led a renewed call to arms, the
result was utterly one-sided, with no casualties among our
surviving heroes.

"Major Briggs and Lieutenant Blade are currently holding a
dialogue with them."

Long ago, I played (and loved) an RPG named Dragon Wars. I
named my characters Sonya Blade, Kano, Chaos (from Martial
Champions), and Prince Lace (from Dragon Spirit). In my Dragon
Wars game, Sonya was the one with the Bureaucracy skill, which
she used to negotiate peace with escaped slaves, among others. I
might have also been influenced by this when Sonya used
diplomacy (of sorts) to prevent a civil war in Sanctuary.

I don't like to just kill characters and forget about them, especially
a major character like Lee. And I don't like action movies that end
with everyone bubbly and smiling even though they've seen any
number of friends (or secondary villains who turned at the last
moment to help the heroes) die. So there is a passage about Jun's,
Wang's, and even Liu Kang's reaction to Lee's death.

"No," she denied, pulling away from Wang and rubbing her
red-rimmed eyes. "Lay him to rest in one of the mass graves."
         "Are you certain?"
         She nodded, sniffling. "Lee never cared about status or
ceremony. But he always... he always hated to be alone."

This simply felt like what the characters would do, in addition to
being a lead-in for Jun to learn about Lei's death-link.

Liu Kang is aware of Lei's death-link because he shared Lei's
memories (and felt the full extent of them, even more than what he
showed Jun in ch. 12). Liu Kang knows enough about sorcery to
identify the sensation of having one's life tied to another's. But Lei
himself didn't know until Kazuya told him. Liu Kang mistakenly
thought that Lei and Jun both knew, and that this was the true
reason why Jun didn't want Kazuya killed. Liu Kang was aware of
Lei's willingness to see Kazuya dead, but just chalked it up to Lei's
self-hatred and suicidal tendencies.

And now, for the second-to-final reveal of "Ashes" - Shang Tsung's
and Shao Kahn's true plan to conquer the Earth. Yes, it was
convoluted, but that is largely because the Shao Kahn enjoys
giving his enemies a "sporting chance" to put up an entertaining
struggle.

The Shao Kahn's description is straight out of the MK games, as is
Sindel's.

I have heard rumors that Saibot's true allegiance may be to another,
even more mysterious being, but I have no proof to offer,
especially in light of his unblemished loyalty to the Shao Kahn.

I think MK4 may have appeared in the arcades by the time "Ashes"
was completed. It never had any direct effect on "Ashes" (and takes
place well after "Ashes" ends anyway), but this is a sidelong
reference to Shinnok, Noob Saibot's "other master".

An hour ago, the necromantic wards about their territory would
have prevented me from approaching them at all, but that was
before Kazuya's defeat spelled out a challenge to the Kahn's Power.

Just a little bit of extra emphasis that Raiden (or anyone else)
couldn't have just teleported in and delivered the challenge to the
Shao Kahn directly before Kazuya's defeat.

"You were never after Kazama's soul. You wanted the soul of
Kazuya Mishima."

Did you guess the second-to-last reveal? Lee Chaolan did; he knew
that Kazuya had mortgaged his soul to the Shao Kahn, and that the
Shao Kahn was after a soul of pure and noble intent. Lee strongly
suspected that simply murdering Kazuya would doom the Earth,
and he was right. He almost did so anyway, at the close of ch. 15,
but the part of him that loved Kazuya as a brother stopped him.

In a text-only online PVP MORPG/roguelike called "Carrion
Fields", there was an utterly evil god that devoted itself to Purity,
among other things. (I never played this RPG, but a friend of mine
did). This may have been my first introduction to the concept that
purity is not always good, and can sometimes be directly
descriptive of evil.

I later make a callback to this whole revelation in "Phoenix
Reborn" ch. 21; however, it would have been too wordy and
excessive to rehash Raiden's entire speech. So Guardian Lee
recounts a simplified version to Lei - "It is through no actions of
yours that Kazuya's demise did not bring the prophesied disaster."

I definitely enjoyed writing in the Angel's last appearance. As she
later states in "Phoenix Reborn", her extended presence upon the
Earth would risk its end, but she can and will enforce the Divine
Sanctions to the letter. Since the Shao Kahn and the Angel are both
supernatural forces that transcend mortal limits, I didn't feel as
though I could write a fight scene that would do them justice
(Angel's TK2 movelist is the same as Devil's anyway) so the Angel
just uses her ground laser while Raiden gets the heck out of the
way.

"I came as soon as I heard about Lei," the soldier explained,
tugging nervously on the cuffs of his uniform. "For what it's worth,
I don't wanna believe it either..."

Since Sparky was also a friend of Lei's, it was only fitting that he
be present here. Catsclaw is not, since he doesn't get to know Lei
until after the battle for the Mishima syndicate. After attending to
Alex and her children, Catsclaw learned that Lee Chaolan had died
from Kazuya's death-link. He personally inspected Lee's body, just
to be sure. Catsclaw oversaw Lee's burial, along with many of the
others in the mass grave Lee was sent to.

"Wulong fought and perished bravely for our cause. We shall not
leave his mortal remains to rot in some nameless pocket
dimension."

Although Liu Kang is something of a jackass during the course of
"Ashes", he is still a good guy, and I wanted there to be a reminder
of that in the final chapter.

The work was difficult, and taxing. It would have been impossible
if Kazuya were still alive to contest my efforts. 

In "Phoenix Reborn", Guardian Lee has the same issue with the
portal after Jin seals it - fortunately, Jin hadn't quite fully
reconstructed Kazuya's sealing spell at the time.

"Rigor mortis should also have set in by now, not to mention
dependent lividity, as has happened to Kazuya. I don't understand.
Clinically speaking, he's dead-"

Rigor mortis (the stiffening of a dead body) and dependent lividity
(the blood pooling in the veins, discoloring the body) are all too
often ignored in TV or writing, so I felt that they should be at least
mentioned. "Clinical death" literally refers to the heart being
stopped; it's technically possible for someone to be "clinically
dead" and resuscitated by having their heart restarted before their
brain dies from lack of oxygen.

I once saw this used as a cheap trick/plot device in a fantasy novel
about modern-day King Arthur, where the novel literally says he
died, but the next chapter reveals it was just his heart stopping
briefly. I try not to be quite that cheap.

"I did mention it to you once. Is it my fault you've never seen Lei
play dead before?"

The hero (or other beloved character) seeming to be "dead", only to
come back, is a trope commonly seen in children's animated
movies. Gurgi in "The Black Cauldron" movie adaptation, the
Beast in "Beauty and the Beast", and Diego in "Ice Age" ("It's a
cartoon!" the animators say in the commentary) all come to mind.

Yes, it's a bit cheesey, but it's also in keeping with Lei's and the
story's Phoenix motif. Well, I try to justify it, even set it up, and
"Play Dead" really is one of Lei's TK2 moves, y'know. The
advanced bodily meditation simulating death isn't much more far-
fetched than sorcery or were-dragons, is it?

Sadly, Lee did not know this type of extremely advanced
meditation - very few people are able to master it. Kung Lao isn't at
Lei's level of skill, and Jin wasn't able to assimilate the technique
either, even though Lei tried to teach him.

I was never able to spell out that Lee couldn't have been saved
through stasis or cryogenic suspension, not until "Phoenix Reborn"
when Lee explicitly states it. A death-link is capable of
distinguishing and disregarding external attempts to deceive it;
only Lei's internal attempt had a prayer of working.

And after all this, there must necessarily be closure on the fate of
the Earth. The MK3 Tournament itself could have been a novel,
but not the novel I wanted to write, any more than I wanted to write
a novel of MK2. So MK3's outcome is simply summarized.

King Jerrod, Queen Sindel's murdered husband, is from MK3
cannon. That Jade is Kitana's twin sister is creative license from
"The Blood On My Hands", and contradicts her story in later MK
games (also her appearance in the MK2 movie).

Sindel winning the MK3 tournament flatly contradicts MK cannon,
which calls Liu Kang the three-time MK champion. Not sure I'd
heard that at the time I wrote this, and I wouldn't have cared even if
I had. I liked the idea of Sindel kicking ass, even though there's no
room in the novel to write in her fight with the Shao Kahn.

In Kung Lao's MK3 ending, he dies. He also dies in Liu Kang's
MK3 ending, as I remember. So I wrote in his death. I didn't want
to kill him, but good people die in wars. It didn't seem right for the
Chosen Ones to be completely unscathed, and Lao didn't die for
nothing. I later dwell on his sacrifice for a moment in "Phoenix
Reborn" ch. 3, when Lei comes across a statue of Kung Lao that
Liu Kang had raised.

Kung Lao's bloodline lives on in Liu Kang - they are both distant
descendants of the Great Kung Lao. Did Liu Kang ever strike up a
relationship with Kitana? Or anyone else? Did he have any
children to carry on the family line? Possibly, but I leave that for
my readers to ponder.

Making the Shao Kahn Entropy personified was creative license -
and as a side effect, it doesn't make sense for him to be "killed",
since one cannot "kill" the heat-death of the Universe. So he is
simply declared to be "banished to the ends of Time", and Shang
Tsung with him. I wasn't terribly interested in these villains
anymore anyway; both had become too shallow and two-
dimensional, especially when compared to Kazuya. I later enjoyed
writing Heihachi as a similarly complex villain.

As for myself, the Angel has reinstated my godhood.

This is from Raiden's MK3 ending and general MK cannon, of
course.

This was the first time I wrote I story with an epilogue. "Ashes"
had so many characters that, after wrapping up how the Apocalypse
ended, I wanted to spare a few words about each of the survivors.

Jax and Sonya forming the Outworld Investigation Agency is
directly from their MK3 endings. It's logical enough that Sparky,
Catsclaw, and Paco would join them (Sparky and Catsclaw are
lucky enough to survive in my fanfic when they died in the Malibu
MK comics, and Paco is especially lucky given that he was a
redshirt to begin with).

Kabal becoming a vigilante is from his MK3 ending. Kabal
bringing Kano to justice is creative license, and the cost of Kano's
trial is made up (but inspired by our excessively wasteful justice
system).

Stryker's depressing ending is written in, but with a dash of
creative license I give him a slightly happier conclusion by sending
him to work for the OIA (which seems only reasonable, all things
considered).

At the close of "Ashes", I knew Boskonovitch was trying to get
some of the Toshin's blood in TK3 for his daughter. That takes
place at a much later time, so I simply end "Ashes" with
Boskonovitch being unable to revive her, even with Sub-Zero's
help.

I always liked Scorpion's MK2 ending, where he becomes the
Guardian of the younger Sub-Zero. That ending was rendered non-
cannon, but I use it anyway - it is Scorpion (among other friends)
who helps Sub-Zero survive Sektor's wrath. The "cybernetic friend
with a human soul" is a reference to Smoke, whom Sektor's
converted Lin Kuei got ahold of at the end of "The Coming of
Winter". "Human Smoke" is an MK3 secret character though, so
perhaps Sub-Zero was able to restore him. Sub-Zero's work for the
OIA is creative license.

Nightwolf's MK3 ending was so generic I can't remember it. In my
novels, he's elected leader of Sanctuary, but by the time of
"Phoenix Reborn" Nightwolf has retired from politics and his
whereabouts are unknown. Thunderbolt has succeeded him as
Sanctuary's elected leader; he received Lei for a brief
teleconference when Lei tried to request Nightwolf's aid in
teaching Jin about projectile wards.

Later MK games had an interesting story about Nightwolf going on
a mission to the Netherrealm and having to taint his soul with evil
in the process. But that's a fanfic for someone else to imagine or
write.

I more or less write T. Hawk's SF2 ending into the story, with a
reference to M. Bison being brought down. Hawk had aid from
Guile, Cammy, Ryu, Chun-Li etc. against M. Bison, of course.

The Virtua Fighter series is notorious for not having in-game
endings, although it did have a storyline and even a halfway decent
anime TV series. Wolf doesn't figure prominently in the storyline
and has only a minor role in the anime, but he is a good guy, and
naturally he ends up embroiled in the noble fight against the evil
machinations of Judgement Six.

Namco's video game cannon never explicitly states what happened
to Michelle's mother, although Namco's Michelle is very much
alive in TK3 (and presumably later games as well, although she
doesn't personally show up in Julia's endings from TK4 onward).
The (non-cannon) Tekken anime states that Michelle's parents and
village were destroyed. Meh. Since Michelle died in my story, I at
least resolve the fate of her kidnapped mother here. The offhanded
comment proved invaluable in "Phoenix Reborn", when I needed
Julia Chang as a major character (and therefore a parent to raise
her) even though Michelle had passed on.

Liu Kang's, Seung Mina's, and Wang's epilogues simply felt right,
at the time. It wasn't until I began work on "Phoenix Reborn" that I
realized having Wang and Seung Mina living at the Temple of
Light fit so well with Ling Xiaoyu living there too. Xiaoyu living at
the temple with Wang and Seung Mina was purely creative license;
Namco's cannon says next to nothing about Xiaoyu's family outside
of listing Wang as a distant relative.

I wanted to give a little final closure on Alex and her tribe, and also
leave the door open for some of Reptile's race to still be around...
some on other worlds, and a few survivors in Edenia (perhaps
Shang Tsung was lying when he said none of them escaped his
massacre). Queen Sindel and Princess Kitana, and Princess Jade
are keeping quiet about Edenia's saurian population to protect
them.

And Heihachi has a paragraph setting him up as a future villain...
which I knew he would be, even if I wasn't committed to writing a
sequel at the time I finished "Ashes".

Since "Ashes" is a love story, its final scene is of the two lovebirds
Lei and Jun. Even when two people are in love, it's important for
them to take time to get to know one another before rushing
headlong into marriage - and Lei needed some time to get used to
being on the wagon - so this final scene is set six months after the
end of the Apocalypse.

So it ends with Lei's proposal of marriage, and one last reveal -
how Jin's existence would be possible, in a story where Jun and
Kazuya were never intimate. It's a reveal I didn't start working into
the story until about a third of the way in, because that's when TK3
came out and I learned about Jin... but it did set the stage nicely for
"Phoenix Reborn".

And since Jun never adopts Lei's last name in any of the Tekken
games... well, it made for a good closer, I thought.

I didn't completely realize that "Ashes" would lead to a much
grander project... though I had ideas for "Phoenix Reborn" shortly
afterward (and started work on it before TK3 was out for home
systems), "Phoenix Reborn" was originally supposed to be much
shorter. The 13-chapter outline expanded to 32 chapters before it
was all done, as characters like Shingo Yabuki became utterly
integral to the story and demanded their own subplots.

The problem with fanfic writing is that although the characters are
"mine" in that I hear them and bring them to life, they also aren't
"mine" in that the companies that own them can do the most
twisted things with them... and in that I can't legally profit off
them, of course. So I'm retired from fanfic writing now; I won't say
I'll never write any more fanfic, but my days of writing massive
novels about video game characters are done.

I've entertained ideas of writing an original novel. Well, original
enough to be published, given that I steal all my ideas anyway. But
life is short, and there are so many video games to play, not to
mention paying work to do, so perhaps not.

Either way, though, I hope I was able to entertain you with "Ashes"
and "Phoenix Reborn"... and if you skimmed through these self-
indulgent notes, I hope you found something useful in them. At the
very least, you might have learned that Steven Brust's Vlad Taltos
series is excellent; you could probably learn more about the craft of
writing just from reading them once than you could from studying
my ramblings twenty times over.

One final piece of advice - if you really do want to write, whether
for a career or pleasure, then just go do it. The best way to get
better is to keep practicing, and if you're stuck for ideas, the best
way to get them is to go out and live a little, while paying attention
to the world around you. It works wonders.

Good luck and happiness to you all.

Victar

12/28/2010