Galaxy 1001D presents:
The Witch of Washu
Tenchi Muyo and all related characters are © AIC/Pioneer. This story is written solely for entertainment and is not intended to make a profit in any way.
Dedicated to cyberimp6, whose numerous 'Wizard of Oz' references inspired this story.
Based on "Tenchi Muyo" created by Masaki Kajishima
And "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz" created by L. Frank Baum
Chapter One: Typhoon Season
"Hey guys, did you hear?" asked Tenchi Masaki, a mild mannered Japanese boy and the desire of his interstellar housemates. "We've got a typhoon heading this way!" He blinked as there was no response from the oddball alien girls who allegedly based their whole lives around hm. "Hey! Did you hear me?" the teenage Earthling repeated. "There's a typhoon on the way! It's a big one too! It might blow this house clear away!"
"Tenchi, you're overreacting," said Princess Ayeka, a teenage beauty from outer space who appeared completely human with the exception of having dark purple hair and blood red pupils in her eyes. "There's nothing to worry about, silly. You know that."
"Yeah," Ryoko chimed in. "Now shut up, will ya? We're trying to watch the movie!" Ryoko was an attractive woman with topaz yellow eyes, messy silvery cyan white hair and large flappy ears. She was also a notorious space pirate and an immature tomboy.
"Some… where… over the rainbow… way… up…high…" the preadolescent Princess Sasami sang as a black and white Judy Garland did the same from the family's television set. Ayeka's little sister had skyblue hair, bubblegum pink eyes, and freckles across the bridge of her nose.
"Mew-mew-mew-mew-mew," Ryo-ohki, furry toddler with large lop rabbit ears sang along too.
"Why… oh… why can't I…?" the blonde and blue-eyed Mihoshi continued, forming a chorus with the others and the television.
"You aren't taking this seriously!" Tenchi insisted. "Don't you guys have typhoons where you come from? Or hurricanes?"
"Pipe down, Tenchi!" Ryoko made a shooing motion with her arm. "I have to see if Dorothy's dog gets taken away!"
"I don't see what you're so worried about Tenchi," Ayeka shrugged noncommittally. "You know the force field that Washu built will protect us."
"That's what I've been trying to tell you!" Tenchi announced while trying to maintain his self-control. "Washu has shut down the force field! It was interfering with her latest experiment!"
"What?" Ayeka squeaked. "But that means we're exposed to the elements! Anything could happen to us!"
"That's right!" Tenchi nodded. "I need some help getting the storm shutters up in time! That typhoon should be right on top of us!"
"Wait a minute," Ryoko said. "Why don't you just ask Washu to put the field back up?"
"I can't get in there," Tenchi whined, "the door is locked! Come on girls, we've got to batten down the hatches!"
"Alright, I'll help," Ryoko sighed, "but as the daughter of the great Washu Hakubi, it is beneath me."
"What are you talking about?" Ayeka snarled. "I'm the first princess of Jurai! Since when have you done an honest day's work in your life? You're a common criminal!"
"Hey!" Ryoko protested. "There's nothing common about my being a criminal! I used to be the most feared pirate of the spaceways you know!"
"I don't see what is so romantic about an interstellar highwayman!" Ayeka sniffed. "You are just a common robber, nothing more!"
"Can't this wait?" Tenchi snapped. "The house is going to get blown away; there's no time for this now!"
"Just tell the witch to shut her hole!" Ryoko cried.
"How dare you call me a 'witch'!" Ayeka protested. "Where do you get off calling me a 'witch' anyhow?"
"I calls 'em like I sees 'em, witchy," Ryoko smirked.
"I don't believe you two!" Tenchi shouted. "What is wrong with you guys? Were you dropped on your heads when you were little or what?"
"It's your fault," Ryoko insisted childishly.
"Yes, it is your fault Tenchi," Ayeka scolded. "You are just like your grandfather, stringing us along and never making a choice about who you want to marry! Sometimes I think you don't have any heart at all!"
"Yeah, are all Juraian males so heartless?" Ryoko added.
"There is a typhoon!" Tenchi shouted. "It is coming this way and will level the place! If we can't get Washu's attention we should all hide in Mihoshi's shuttle in meantime! We should be safe in hyperspace, or wherever she keeps it!"
Another beautiful young woman with short green hair entered the room. "Hey everyone, have you been listening to the news?" she asked them. "There's a major typhoon heading this way!"
"Noike!" Mihoshi smiled. "So that's what continuity this is! This is Tenchi Muyo: Ryo-ohki! I did wonder!"
"Yeah, what a pain in the neck," Ryoko nodded. "I can never keep track. At least other franchises like Star Trek don't have multiple continuities."
Almost two and a half centuries in the future, a 21-year-old James T. Kirk sat in the captain's chair. "It may be a bummer that the planet Vulcan was destroyed, but at least I now hold the record for youngest starship captain in the history of Starfleet!" he exclaimed with his blue eyes flashing. "Sweet!"
"Get back into character!" Ayeka scolded in the present day. "Honestly Mihoshi, do you have a brain in that empty head at all?"
"I think so," Mihoshi squirmed on the couch uncomfortably. "Doesn't everybody? No wait, in this continuity I'm smarter! That was a close one!"
"Look, we've got to evacuate the building until the typhoon passes!" Tenchi insisted. "If we can't get to Mihoshi's shuttle why don't we go the cave Ryoko was trapped in for seven centuries?"
"We know what continuity it is, quit it," Ryoko snapped.
"Why don't we just contact Washu?" Noike suggested.
"Because the door is locked!" Ayeka exclaimed as she tried the door. "Azaka!" she shouted out the window. "Run the stock footage from Tenchi in Tokyo! You know, the episode where I'm trying to break open the door to Washu's lab!"
"Why doesn't Mihoshi open the door for us?" Noike asked. "No matter what precautions Washu takes she always manages to get in somehow."
"Oh great. Trust 'Mary Sue' over there to make the rest of us look stupid," Ryoko grumbled.
"You don't need very much help do you?" Noike scowled dangerously.
"You're askin' for it, girlie!" Ryoko snarled.
"That's it!" Tenchi cried. "Mihoshi! Quick! Let us into Washu's lab!"
"What?" the blonde looked up from the television, "but I'll miss the movie!"
"Look it's gone into color!" Sasami gushed. "I'll bet this movie was made the year Earth invented color movies! I wonder what year this was made?"
"Get your blonde behind off that couch!" Ryoko said as she lifted Mihoshi up by her neck.
"Hey!" Mihoshi whined. "Let go! All right! Sheesh! It's not like it's that hard to get in you know…"
Soon Tenchi, Ayeka, Ryoko, Noike, and Mihoshi were in Washu's laboratory, a fantastic interdimensional space hidden behind the door under the stairs.
"What are you guys doing here?" the redheaded genius asked testily. "I locked that door for a reason!"
"There's a typhoon heading this way!" Tenchi informed her.
"Oh yeah, that…" Washu blushed and looked away. "Well, I can't be sure, but I think I might have something to do with that…"
"You?" Mihoshi scratched her head. "How could that be?"
"I've been working on a new invention, the dimension tuner," Washu explained. "But when I ran a computer simulation on what would happen if I told you there was a 76.8% chance you idiots would abuse it for your own gain can cast us all into different worlds."
"Maybe you should start from the beginning," Noike suggested.
"Okay, the dimension tuner was meant to alter time/space and probability in order to create a new dimension based on a certain criteria."
"And what does that mean in Juraian?" Ayeka asked.
"It can create an alternate world either based on the user's conscious parameters or their subconscious desires," the little genius continued.
"Wait a second," Ryoko held up her hand. "Does this mean that you created a machine that could allow you to play God?"
"That's right," Washu nodded. "You could create a world based on the Twilight saga or your favorite segment of Juraian history for example. If you wanted that world could be populated by alternate versions of the rest of us who would take the appropriate roles in your dreamworld."
"Wait a second," Tenchi frowned. "Does this mean that you could create an entire universe? An alternate version of the world we know?"
"That explains all the different continuities," Mihoshi shrugged. "Washu must have been experimenting with that gadget for some time now."
"Quit breaking the fourth wall," Noike hissed.
"So the long and short of it is that you found a way to play God," Ayeka nodded. "So what does that have to do with the typhoon?"
"Well, when I realized that you idiots would fight over it and send us travelling through time and space through multiple worlds I decided to dismantle it," Washu admitted. "Unfortunately, I chose to take it apart with a large sledge hammer and when I hit it a bunch of blinky lights started flashing on it. Then the typhoon appeared. It's probably a coincidence…"
"Washu!" gasped Ryoko. "Are you telling me you caused this disaster?"
"Hey, even if I did there's only a 38.6% chance the storm would hurl you into a world created by your own subconscious," the redhead assured her. "Most likely it will simply be an ordinary ship-sinking, city-devastating typhoon!"
"What!" Tenchi cried. "Call yourself a genius? What were you thinking?"
"Calm down," Washu said. "Your father and Reiko are on their honeymoon. Your grandfather's at the convention in Kyoto. The rest of us are perfectly safe in here. When the storm is over I'll just use my matter conversion technology to completely rebuild the Masaki Shrine the way it used to be. They'll never know the difference."
"I thought only Tenchi was capable of matter-conversion," Mihoshi muttered to herself. "Z was able to make lighthawk wings, but only Tenchi could convert matter to energy and back again."
"Only Tenchi could do that without technology," Washu corrected. "Geeze, Mihoshi, can you break the fourth wall any more?"
"I don't know," the blonde sucked on her finger. "Can I?"
"Never ask a blonde a trick question," Ryoko groaned.
"Washu, what about the horrific loss of life?" Ayeka asked her.
"Don't worry about it," Washu said. "According to my projections, the worst damage will be right here. We'll just wait it out, then I'll rebuild the whole valley. Just make sure everyone's here and nobody go outside, okay?"
"Okay," Tenchi nodded. "All right, you all heard her. Everybody here?"
"We're here," the girls chorused.
"Wait a second," Ayeka looked around. "Where are Sasami and Ryo-ohki?"
"You're right!" Ryoko glanced left and right. "I don't see them anywhere!"
Back in the family room a little girl with skyblue hair and a furry toddler watched the television. "We're off to see the wizard! The wonderful wizard of Oz!" they sang.
"Sasami!" Ayeka shouted as tears tricked out of her crimson eyes. "Where is Sasami? Where did she go?"
"I thought they were with us," Noike said.
"But they're not!" Tenchi finished. "They must still be in the house!"
"Don't worry," Mihoshi giggled. "All we have to do go back out and get them." She pushed some buttons on the door's control pad. Washu had set up a complicated space age lock on her door this time. Sparks flew out of the control pad and smoke billowed out. "Oh no!" Mihoshi wailed. "What did I do? What did I do?"
"You broke my lock you idiot!" Washu snarled. "We're trapped in here now!"
"And Sasami is trapped outside!" Ayeka gasped. She pounded on the door with her fists. "Sasami! Sasami! Open the door and come inside! Please! The typhoon is almost here! Sasami!"
"He is, he is, he is, he is, if ever a whiz there was!" Sasami and the furry Ryo-ohki sang as they danced in front of the television. "If ever a wonderful whiz there was, because-because! Because-because-because-because-because…! Because of the wonderful things he does! La-la-la-la-la-la!"
"Sasami!" Tenchi said as he dialed a telephone in Washu's lab. "Answer the phone! Answer the telephone please!"
"Who could be calling us, Ryo-ohki?" Sasami said as the telephone rang.
"Meow?" the golden eyed toddler scratched behind her large rabbit ear.
Sasami went into the hall and picked up the phone, only to look outside and see a terrible storm heading straight for the house!
"Eek!" she screamed.
Ryo-ohki yowled and transformed into a tiny creature that appeared to be a cross between a kitten and a baby rabbit.
"AAAAH!" Sasami screamed as the typhoon ripped the Masaki house right off its foundations!
Next: We're Not in Okayama Anymore