then it's someone else entirely. I just wish..."
He stopped and looked into the darkness of the room. Getting up into a crouched stance, he spoke softly, "Who are you? How did you get in here?"
A dark shadow moved slightly. "Saotome Ranma," it said. "There is no need for alarm. I came because you called."
"But... I didn't..."
"Yes, you did. Just now. I have answered your call."
"What do you want?" Ranma said, glancing around the rest of the room.
"The question is, what do YOU want?"
"Don't be stupid."
"I am quite serious. I can make a wish of yours reality, if you want. What would you like?"
"I'd like you to step forward where I can see you. Or else go back to wherever it is you came from."
"I have no time for games, Saotome. What is it you would like? Unlimited strength and mastery of the martial arts? Complete wisdom gained only by the monks of the high temples? All your rivals eliminated? Or maybe something more..." it trailed off. "Whatever it is, name it - it shall be yours," it said darkly.
"I... I would like... I would like this whole stupid fiancee business to finally be over and done with. I don't need any more fiancees. I have too many as it is. I wish that I was free of all these extra fiancees!"
"Excellent," it said, stepping forward, its purple robes swirling with the movement.
Ranma Elseworlds #5: Honor and Loyalty -
His death came slowly. It began late in the day as the red sun dropped behind the clouds. Again and again swordsmen were sent forth, their bodies littering the path to each side of him. Many still were set in the stony path ahead of him, however. Like waves crashing on a shore, they threw themselves at his blades, and with each wave he took another step closer to death. I was returning from a day at the stream far from the temple. As I approached the temple, the sound of gunfire rose up to meet me, and I knew fear. Not for myself. Not for one moment. But for my sensei. I dropped my catch and ran back to the temple, knowing exactly what I had feared was to come true:
they could not bring him down with sword, so they turned to the ancient weapons of powder and metal shot. Still he fought, bringing many more down with him. Finally there were too many for him. Finally, his journey to the shadows had reached its end, but his murderers did not know triumph, for as he died, they fled, fearful his spirit might rise and slay them.
They stole away into the night. They left behind their slain. And their honor. They fled before their bloody work had been finished. My sensei still breathed.
I picked my way through the broken and destroyed temple to his side. He reached up and held my jerkin collar. "They bore the mark of the Half-Moon,"
he said, softly. "If they are my enemy then they threaten our lord. My death would only serve our master's enemy, the shogun.
"You must foil their schemes whatever they may be... you must protect Lord Ranma... but your pathway is not to vengence... swear to me that you will not kill in my name... that you will not avenge me... you must think only of the safety of our lord... your loyalty is to him alone."
"I swear," I said as the tears streaked my sweat-stained face.
"There is a scroll I have sealed and hidden with the masamune blade...
take the scroll... to our lord..."
With those words, he slipped away to the realm of his ancestors, damning me to walk a dark road.
I stepped back from the funeral pyre and reflected for a moment. I alone mourned him. I alone whispered the prayers that sent him on to the shadow worlds. I thought of his dying words, and the promise I made. As I walked away from the ever-increasing blaze, I thought of all the things he had taught me.
And all of those he had not. All of the questions; each one swam just below the surface of my thoughts, like fish beneath rushing waters. I entered the secret practice room of the temple's grounds and walked down the stairs to the altar where the masamune blade was kept. My sensei was the warlord Genma's ninja. A spy. An assassin. A servant who kept our master's order by secret murder. He served and protected his lord from the blades of his enemies, but Genma grew ill and soon died. And the rule and title of the clan fell to Ranma, his son. He was five years old.
When he was but seven, his forces suffered disasterous defeat at the hands of a rival warlord - the Battle of Sekihara. That rival was Tatewaki Kunou, and he demanded the Emperor proclaim him shogun.
His reign was harsh. The daimyos were stripped of their lands and exiled.
Their peasants became landless and their samurai became ronin - masterless warriors. For many years only Ranma stood against him. Only the walls of Osaka Castle stood between Kunou and the iron rule of all of Japan. Only the walls...
and my sensei.
He protected his young lord from the assassins that the shogun sent with orders to kill Ranma. He was alone in his service, without the support and protection of a clan, and I was to be trained as his successor. A second generation of ninja to guard our lord from attack. One question was more troublesome than the others, though.
"Who is my father?" I asked, sitting before my sensei.
"You have never asked this before, young one," he replied.
"I beg to know. I want to know the names of my ancestors," I said.
"You do not ask the right question. Ask correctly and I will tell you."
"Do you..." I began.
"Do not be hasty," he interrupted. "Consider your wording. Consider what it is you really wish to know. It is not only your father you seek to know. It is yourself." He leaned over toward me, pointing a finger at my chest. "I shall answer your question when you word it properly. It is as much a part of your training as anything else I teach you."
As the months and years passed, training consumed my life. Every waking moment held a lesson for me - lessons of agility, endurance, patience, stamina,
all under his watchful eye. Still I had questions about my past.
"Honorable sensei," I began, again sitting before him. "I still have questions."
"I will answer them, should they prove worthy."
"Are you my father?"
"No. Though you would be a welcome daughter."
"Does my father still live?"
"That matters little. Your duty to him, the honor you bring his name,
would be a comfort to him alive or dead."
"And...?"
"I have said enough. Your ancestors are an old and illustrious clan. You honor them as they do you," he said as he stood up. He turned and walked up the stairs.
An enemy of the shogun, my sensei was often a target of reprisal. That fateful night, we sat alone outside meditating as the rain softly poured, lightly tapping on the temple roof. I was purging myself of empty thoughts when sensei's head suddenly twirled and looked out into the garden. "Rainfall on cloth," he whispered. We silently rose to ready ourselves. "Six men." Sensei drew his sword, and I unbuckled my chain.
The ninja attacked without warning. I leapt away from an overhead blow and made the man pay for his miss. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw sensei down one of the ninja with a quick thrust to the abdomen. Two more attacked me, but rolling under one of the men's attacks, I used him as a shield from his friend's katana. As his bowels spilled on the ground, I jumped over him,
kicking his compatriot in the throat.
In the blink of an eye, it was over. Sensei's blade dripped with blood and the rain that continued to fall. The night held no rest for us, and the dark held only danger.
Sensei tore away a ninja's robe to reveal a dark half-moon. The symbol of this clan was not known to me, as unknown as the name of the one they served, but he must have seen it before, just as he saw the storm to come, the clouds stirring dark and foreboding. For it was then that he sent me away to the stream. He said it was to lay in fish for the winter ahead. Now I know it was so I might escape the crimson rain that was to come.
I reached down and held the masamune blade to my chest. With a quick twist, the compartment opened in the hilt, and a small scroll fell out marked with sensei's symbol. Tying the sword to my pack, I dropped the torches to the floor, watching the flames rise up to meet the ceiling. The practice ground was compromised when our hidden temple was found. I could not leave it to bare any more secrets to our enemies.
As I walked away into the night, the fire of the temple burning brightly in the rainy night sky, I vowed to keep my promise to my sensei - to fulfill my giri... and to find the clan of the Half-Moon.
The snowy path was barely outlined against the cold, white mountains. I walked alone on the path, always watching over my shoulder at the landscape I had just left behind. My first duty was to travel to Osaka and warn the lord of the plot against him. My sensei's death was only the first step in a grand conspiracy, I was certain.
No wind in the air, I thought. No birdsongs. My hand found my katana in its sheath and cocked the hilt with my thumb. My head turned slowly around the frozen landscape, certain something was wrong.
Unsheathing my blade, I looked up to see four ninja drop from the trees above me. Diving quickly to my right, I rolled, avoiding the arrow that landed softly in the snow behind me. A hook and chain wrapped around my wrist, wresting my blade from my grasp, but instinct took over and my throwing knife was lodged in his shoulder before either of us could blink. Another attacked from my left, and I sidestepped, catching him easily in the back of the neck with an elbow. Immediately I regretted it, as it left me wide open for an attack from behind. I felt the force of the blow as it rocked me off my feet,
and instantly I rolled forward into a crouching stance facing my last opponent.
The pain clouded my vision, but I could still see his shape inching forward toward me. We slowly circled each other, eyes attentive to every detail about one another. Another pair of hands grabbed my shoulder from behind, throwing me to the ground. Another ninja, this one female, solidly planted her foot on my sternum, forcing all the wind out of my lungs. It was plain she did not wish me to rise. She too was clad in black but for her mask which revealed a pair of the most beautiful brown eyes I had ever seen.
"What are you doing on our road, little one?" she asked.
"I am on an errand for my Lord Ranma," I replied evenly.
"You show promise for a small one. You might have slipped our trap had your defense been more fatal. Is that by accident or design?"
"I've taken a vow. I will not kill unless ordered to do so by my Lord."
"A creature of the Saotome clan, as you said." She removed her foot from my chest, letting me breathe. "And who trained you, little one?" she asked.
"The ninja whose sign is the rising sun," I said.
"The rogue ninja. The one who is clanless. I know him." she said, surprising me. "And why is it not _he_ on this all-important errand?" she again inquired.
"He is dead. Slain by the enemies of the daimyo."
"What swordsman brought him down?"
"Not one. _Many._ Each bore the mark of the Half-Moon."
"Then you may use our road with my permission," she moved away, letting me rise to my feet. "We share an enemy. The swords of the Half-Moon are raised against us as well."
"But who are they? Who are they sworn to?" I asked.
"I know not, but they are enemies to all that live." The group began to walk away into the snowy forest. "We will meet again, little one. You will know me by my eyes."
I was left alone in the clearing as the snow began to fall a little more heavily on the ground.
As I neared Osaka Castle, I could hear the rumble of low thunder. There was a wood smoke and iron on the wind. The castle of my Lord was under siege.
I could see the banners of the shogunate flying. Dark conspiracy had turned to open campaign.
Tatewaki Kunou. The shogun. He would see Ranma crushed and his rule made absolute. The walls of Osaka were the final obstacle to this goal. The shogun needed only to drag them down to reign unopposed. However, the walls stood firm and my Lord remained defiant, but the shogun was patient and had many thousands in his army.
The encampment of the siege-layers was a city unto itself, a city with every man armed and ready for battle, prepared and willing to stop anyone attempting to leave the castle, but not a thought that anyone might wish to _enter_ the beleaguered Osaka.
By now, the threat of the Half-Moon was eclipsed by the army at my Lord's gates. Even so, I vowed to my sensei to protect the life of Lord Ranma, though my swordhand be just one more added to thousands. I quickly skirted the edge of the battleground, searching for a way in between the bodies that littered the earth. Finding a darkened path, I quickly made my way toward the base of the walls of the castle amidst a hail of arrows and spears that were not even directed at me, but rather at the archers on the walls themselves. I scaled the walls with ease - even the walls of Osaka Castle were no match for one trained such as I, but I knew that my presence would be noticed. My ascent of the castle wall was greeted by a spear at my throat. I slowly raised my right hand, which held the message given to me by my sensei. "I bring the Lord Ranma a message. He will recognize this seal," I spoke evenly. I feared that the guardsman would not heed my words and instead shove the spear into my neck, yet he withdrew and allowed me to climb over the wall.
I was taken into the castle's antechambers where Lord Ranma held court.
The chamber was sparse, with tatami mats for Lord Ranma and a female "guest" to his left and a large mat in the center of the room, around which sat the courtiers. Lord Ranma was dressed in a green and blue robe, with the imperial symbols adorning his robe. The girl next to him wore a simple red robe, her short brown hair pulled back in the traditional geisha style. She sat quietly at his side, her eyes averted to his presence, as were the rest of the courtiers in the room.
I was led to the center of the room while my accompanying guard handed my sensei's message to Lord Ranma with a curt bow. Lord Ranma dismissed the guards and left me to kneel in his presence.
"So, my ninja has been slain, and he has sent you in his stead?" Lord Ranma asked, reading the message.
"Hai, Lord Ranma," I respectfully replied. "I am to warn you of a plot against your life. My sensei fell to men who would threaten you and your clan."
"As you can see," Lord Ranma said, "I have no need to look far from these walls to see many men with the same wish."
"That is so," I began, "but if I gained access to these walls, might not others?"
"And who are these assassins? Who employs them?" Lord Ranma looked impatiently at the girl sitting next to him.
"I know not, though they are surely an ally of the shogun. They bore the mark of the Half Moon."
"They are not known to me." Lord Ranma raised his hand. "You will be shown to a room. We will speak again in the morning."
His words were like bitter rain. I bowed with the rest of his court as he rose and gestured to the girl next to him. "Prepare my bedchambers, Akane, and see to it the minister receives my message." Daring a glance, I watched Lord Ranma wash his hands in a small bowl that the girl held for him. The girl then turned and looked at me, and for the first time I saw her beautiful brown eyes,
reminding me of the words of another: "You will know me by my eyes."
Osaka Castle offered little comfort these days. I ate dry rice and the merest sip of stale water. Tired from a long and arduous journey, I drifted to sleep to the muffled roar of the shogun's cannons, a sleep that carried me from one illusion to another.
I dreamed I was in a field of golden light, walking amongst the sunlit skies. As I walked, though, a shadow approached, a shadow caused by the moon eclipsing the sun. The shadow's length stretched over the field, causing them to wither and die from lack of sunlight and warmth. I watched as the fields turned from gold to brown and the smell of death permeated my dream. The shadow moved slowly in an arc, causing decay wherever its shadow stretched. I walked around the ever-increasing shadow, watching in wonder, marvelling at its increasing distance.
The shadow then stopped and began to slowly fill outward, again stretching toward the place I stood. I began to step back and was caught - the shadow itself had completely surrounded me, leaving me nowhere to escape. I was trapped, and somehow I knew - it knew, as it began to close in.
The illusions then drifted away - chased away by a foot scrape on stone.
I unsheathed my katana blade and listened carefully again, wary of all that surrounded me.
The ninjas dropped from the ceiling itself, swarming like the vermin they are, each attacking quickly, each meaning to strike a killing blow. I wondered,
briefly, if they had been here all along, then tuned out those thoughts to focus on my vow to my sensei and to the life of Lord Ranma. Hurriedly, I dispatched the first two, though in a manner that my sensei would've sent me to the mountains as punishment for sloppiness. I then raced through the door, hearing the ninja's deadly stars embed themselves into the door frame, ripping through the paper walls, blindly trying to find their mark.
As I raced toward the end of the hall, I thought again, if they were here all this time, and in this number, then why did they wait to attack? Was it _my_ arrival that signaled this assault? And how did I stand in the way of their plans? Catching one poor ninja by surprise, I used him as a shield as I climbed out the window onto the roof. Glancing over my shoulder, I watched him fall to the ground, his body riddled with arrows and throwing stars. I began climbing the outer wall of the tower, wondering for the first time who the true target of this cabal really was. What danger did _I_ pose? How could _I_ stand in the way of the shogun? Who _gained_ by my death? My mind whirled, my thoughts lost in a maelstrom. The ninjas slowly creeped up the sides of the tower, and I readied myself for a last stance on the tower roof.
There was no easy way between my vow to my sensei and the horror my world had become. Only a narrow path lay before me, and each turn brought me closer to the shadowed land.
I whipped out my own hook and chain, grasping the leg of the fourth ninja,
sweeping him and three of his comrades off the roof. Three more took their places, and I steadied myself for a battle I knew I could not win. Each came forward, each with his own thrust, parry, or attack, and each fell to my blade,
just as my sensei had taught. I did not know who it was I fought for anymore.
Did I fight for my Lord Ranma? For my sensei? For my own life? My vow to my sensei and my duty to my Lord warred within me. My honor rested on the outcome.
An answer came in the form of lightning swords and flashing brown eyes. The female ninja attacked from the rear of the group, felling ninjas as she darted in and out of the fight. I remembered my dream, but dreams mean nothing in a world of dreams. She fought her way to my side, slicing open several men's chests as she did so. "I hope I am welcome," she said breathlessly.
"As you said, we share these enemies," I replied evenly, my back to hers.
"There are many things you do not know..." she trailed off, and then there was no time for her to say more. The swords of the Half Moon redoubled their efforts, each attacking with a fury that seemed to be more overwhelming with each small victory we gained.
Then, a sound came from above us, a whistle that filled the sky. All held their blades and listened. The female ninja and I jumped from the roof just in time to watch it explode in a magnificent fireball. Osaka Castle was once again the anvil for the shogun's hammer; the cannons spoke - a night attack. We fell several feet before landing on another roof of the tower. The ninja that survived the blast followed us down, and just as quickly kept falling, as our swords met them halfway. "Go to your Lord!" she said, cutting down another ninja as she did so. "Go to Ranma!"
"And abandon you?" I asked increduously.
"Your answers lie with him. He alone holds the truth!" She wasted no time in slashing a third ninja, then pushed me off the roof. As I fell, I saw her shadow darken, then disappear in the cloud of haze and dust. Then I landed on the roof of the castle itself, breaking through and landing on the floor of one of the bedrooms. Several guards' bodies littered the room, and the walls and bed were hacked to pieces. I looked up once more futilely, knowing I would never know her reasons for her actions. I would only know that we had the clan of the Half Moon as a common enemy, and one other enemy did we have in common,
an enemy I was to learn of before the light of dawn.
Kunou was about to claim his prize; all the islands of Japan would be his.
Though they fought to the last, the samurai and ashigaru of my Lord Ranma were doomed. The cannonade ripped at towers, and miners dug beneath the walls and brought them to ruin. Osaka bled from a hundred wounds - an age was ending, and a new one was begun: the age of the shogunate.
My Lord was the last of the daimyos, and I the last of his subjects. The others had taken their own lives, as my Lord was preparing to do when I came upon him. "Lord Ranma...?" I said softly.
"You... you would come to torment me in my darkest hour?" he spat. The flames began to engulf the walls that surrounded else, framing my Lord in an unearthly glow as the firelight danced upon his features menacingly.
"My Lord?" I asked. "I do not understand."
My Lord rose with his blade, slowly unsheathing it as he talked. "Did your precious sensei betray my trust? Did he tell you the _name_ of your ancestors?
Did he tell you that your father's name was Kuonji and that you were born in the last year of my father's life? Did he tell you that you and I were meant to be _married_?" He swung high, aiming for my head. I ducked under his swing and automatically freed my own sword from its sheath. He rushed forward, attacking me again, and I jumped back, away from his outstretched arms. He came at me again, and this time I backflipped out of range.
"I knew you would be a threat to me one day," he went on, this time aiming at my shoulder. I parried easily and watched his eyes as the sweat from his forehead began to bead heavily. "Mother would not _allow_ you to be killed,
though, and then Kunou moved openly against me. He might have found you and used you against me; he might have split the clan with you as a wedge."
We broke away and circled each other slowly. "But the ninja protected you,
didn't he? He ignored my order to slay you _himself_." Another thrust. Another parry. "Even when I sent the men of the Half Moon, he sheltered you. Then he sent you here to DESTROY me!" He swung again, this time low. I jumped over his blade, landing in a ready stance. "His letter begged me to reconsider, to allow your birthright, to allow you to rule by my side as my wife. He feigned compassion, but I know the truth!" He raised his sword over his head. I stepped back instinctively. "He was DISLOYAL! He broke his vow to SERVE me! He BETRAYED me!" he screamed.
"NO!" I yelled as my blade found its way home in his heart.
All my questions answered, and each answer spawned more. My life has been a waking dream, a phantom existence. I broke my word. I betrayed my honor. I avenged my sensei when I swore that I would not. I did not protect my Lord from his greatest threat - myself. My heart was at war, loyalty to one of my masters over the other, and I was shamed before them both. I kneeled down on the tatami mat, my knife unsheathed and pointed at my stomach. Only one path lay before me now... and as my blood and bowels and life spilled upon the ground, I found that path - the narrowest path of all.
-fin.