Dead Or Alive Fanfiction X The King of Fighters

Maria

The room was silent, save for Helena's sobs and also Kokoro's comforting comments to Helena. They were all waiting eagerly, when suddenly Rig gave a shout.
"Look!" exclaimed Rig suddenly. "Her eyes! She's waking up!"
Helena quickly got up and leaned toward her mother.
"Mother!" cried Helena. "You're alive!"
Maria opened her eyes weakly. She looked pale, but definitely alive. She looked around and saw Helena.
"Helena?" said Maria weakly. "What happened? The last thing I remember was blocking a shot directly to you before everything went black! What happened? Did I survive the bullet?"
"No mother," said Helena, still crying. "You... didn't survive..."
"Then how am I still alive now?" asked Maria, confused. "Aren't I supposed to be dead."
"You were," said NiCO. "But we resurrected you with the help of science!"
"What is this place?" asked Maria. "Is it DOATEC?"
"No it's not," said NiCO. "This is MIST."
"MIST?" asked Maria, confused. "Helena, how long have I been like this?"
"For about two years," said Helena. "MIST took your remains and worked on resurrecting you. They have succeeded."
"Wait what happened to you, Helena?" asked Maria, examining Helena. "You look so pale."
"They had to use my blood to bring you back, mother," said Helena. "It's part of your process."
"And who is this?" asked Maria, looking at Kokoro. "You look familiar..."
"I am Kokoro," said Kokoro. "I'm... I'm Fame Douglas's second daughter, born to Miyako."
"Miyako?" asked Maria, surprised. "She had a daughter with Fame too?"
"Yes, mother," said Helena. "Kokoro is all I had after your death. But now..."
"How do you know my mother, Okaasan?" asked Kokoro. "She never told me anything about Helena, nor about my father..."
"She was my good friend," said Maria. "We met when I first came to Japan to see with Fame for something."
"Oh," said Kokoro. "Mother never said anything about this to me. In fact, she never even told me that I had a sister..."
"When I last met her, she said she didn't want to to be mixed with Fame's busy and problematic life," said Maria. "That's why she just wanted you to become a traditional geisha."
"But that's kinda unfair," said Kokoro. "She didn't tell me anything about my own life!"
"She only wanted to protect you, Kokoro," said Helena. "Just like how I wanted to..."
"Now that this experiment is complete, you may take her back to your home, Miss Helena," said NiCO suddenly. "She's fine now and only needs some rest."
"I don't understand you, NiCO," said Helena. "All I know is that you can't face reality. But, thanks for bringing my mother back to life."
"With science, nothing is impossible," said NiCO, holding up her hand with the right-hand rule. "Now, I have to resurrect my father."
Helena and Kokoro helped Maria out of the place and went back to their home, near the DOATEC building.
"Rig, come help me with the experiment," said NiCO. "I now know that it has a higher chance of succeeding. Come to that room over there."
"Are you sure this is a good idea?" asked Rig, following NiCO to that room. "What if I fail?"
"I'm positive that it won't," said NiCO. "You won't fail."
NiCO led him to a chamber, the same one that held Helena the day before. She stepped into it, and before the door closed, she turned to Rig to give him directions.
"I've written it all out as clearly as I can," said NiCO. "Whatever you do, don't turn the voltage up too high. If you do, then that would be the end of me, and you'd have to resurrect me as well or else my ghost will haunt you forever."
"I hope not," said Rig, walking towards the machine where she pointed. "But please don't haunt me..."
NiCO went into the chamber and pressed a button from the inside, causing the glass cylinder to close by itself. NiCO was slowly loosing consciousness, but she called to Rig to say something to him.
"Rig," said NiCO. "Thanks for helping me."
"Not that I have a choice..." said Rig. "You're forcing me, after all."
"You know, Rig," said NiCO. "I know that you're doing all of this willingly. I know that Hamilton gave you that immunity."
"What's an immunity?" asked Rig, pretending to not know. "And who's Hamilton? Is it the musical?"
"Rig, I know very well that you're lying," said NiCO. "It's so obvious that you're not being mind controlled. But don't worry, I'm not gonna tell anyone about this. Your secret is safe with me."
Rig said nothing but just looked away from the glass chamber.
"I don't have much time now," said NiCO, holding her temple. "My vision is blurring. Just in case you fail and I don't make it, I want to thank you for all your help."
And with that, she became completely unconscious and the machinery started holding her up.
"Well this is where my work starts, I guess," said Rig, and went over to the machine. There were a bunch of sticky notes stuck on the computer screen, and he started reading them one by one. It was detailed, but Rig had a hard time reading her handwriting.
"Phew her handwriting is worse than mine," said Rig, reading them. "It's a good thing it's clear enough to read..."
So he pressed some buttons and the screen displayed that the time taken for this experiment to finish is 24 hours.
"Looks like it's back home for me," thought Rig and walked out of the lab. "Time to get some sleep and also, tell the news to those ninjas and to the Armstrongs."
He took one last look at the unconscious NiCO in the chamber and left. He went straight to the Armstrongs' home, which is directly next to his and started telling them about what happened.
"You what?" asked Bass, shocked. "You helped her to resurrect her father?"
"And she knew the whole time that ya were not being mind-controlled?" asked Tina.
"Yes..." said Rig. "She knew, but she's keeping it a secret."
"But why?" asked Bass.
"Because she actually knew me before this," said Rig. "I couldn't recognise her because of her hair and also because she wears glasses now. She wasn't a good friend or anything, she only asked me for some crude oil sample when I was working at the oil rig, before DOATEC."
"And she still remembers ya?" asked Tina and Rig nodded. "Wow..."
"What did she wanna do with that crude oil sample?" asked Bass. "Did she use that to resurrect 'er father?"
"She said she wanted the skeletal formula of benzene or something," said Rig. "And crude oil is rich in benzene. She was only fourteen or fifteen at the time."
"Weird girl..." said Tina, shaking her head. "When I was around that age, all I did was train train train train to become a wrestler, thanks to daddy..."
"Hey, at least now yer're famous," said Bass. "Admit it, you're the world renown Tina Armstrong, daughter of pro wrestler Bass Armstrong! Singer, actor, supermodel and pro wrestler!"
"Yeah fine," said Tina. "So what's going on there in the lab?"
"I have no idea," said Rig. "The machine said 24 hours, so I just left. I'll go see what's going on tomorrow."
"Well you better," said Bass. "Like what she said. Her ghost will be hauntin' ya for the rest of yer life of you failed that experiment."