Episode 01
"GUESS WHO"S BACK!" Everyone in the classroom nearly fell out of their
seats, as the classroom door was slammed open, revealing a pair of red
eyes, and dark odangos some thought they would never see again. "Mei
Lin!" Sakura shouted back, waving at her friendly rival. For once, Mei
Lin smiled back. Back in China, she had missed that perky attitude, not
that she would admit it.
Li, of course, was shrinking back in his seat, hoping Mei Lin wouldn't
notice him. Tough luck for him, though, since he was quickly caught in
her amazon-like glomp. "And did MY fiancée miss me?"
"Uh, yeah. Welcome back." Li mumbled, thoroughly embarrassed. To his
relief, she disengaged, and sat at her old desk. Tomoyo, Sakura, and Li
tried several times to ask her why she had come back, but, "I'll
explain later," was all the answer they got.
Please stay tuned after these commercial breaks...
It was at lunch-time that they cornered her in a secluded spot past the
soccer field. In answer to their myriad questions, "Yes, I heard you
captured all the Clow Cards. Congratulations, by the way. Mother's
doing fine. She sends her love, Li. She's not quite back on her feet,
but Gramma sent me back for a reason. It's best if Keroberos were here.
Oh, Hi Kero!" Kero had been snoozing in Sakura's knapsack, quite
honestly hoping to avoid Sakura's snoopy brother at home.
"Yeah, I'm here. So what's up?" Mei Lin let out a small smile. Kero had
always amused her, somewhat. He certainly wasn't what you expect from a
guardian beast. "In a perfect example of synchronicity, someone from
this area stole the Saotome Cards."
Silence reigned for about five seconds, before Kero piped up, "Aaaah
man, of all the... and he got all of them?" Mei Lin nodded. "What are
the Saotome Cards? Are they like the Clow Cards?" Sakura asked. Kero
gave the five yen info, "Sort of. Four hundred years ago, not long
after he made his cards, Clow Reed met a young martial artist by the
name of Saotome Ranma. They were both prideful, and liked to show off.
When Reed started to brag about his magic cards, Ranma said he could do
better. He would have been right, except like Mei Lin here, he didn't
have any mystic heritage.
"Amazingly enough though, that didn't stop him. He managed to make his
own cards, ones that weren't powered by magic. Instead he created cards
that would channel his Chi, and take on a life of their own."
"Wow." Was about all Sakura could say, but that was because Mei Lin had
pulled something out of her shirt. It was crystal clear, with purple
and pink highlights. The picture on the front showed a beautiful purple
haired female, the other side a pink cat. "The Amazon.... The Feline?
Why does it have two sides?" Sakura asked.
Kero went into sage mentor mode. "Ranma Saotome was a creature of
duality. He had two forms, two personalities, his friends were his
enemies and vice-versa. Almost everything in his life had a counter-
balance, so he decided his cards would be no different. That, and all
of his cards were based on people he knew, and his martial arts
techniques. Now that I think about it, I thought you said the thief
made off with all of the cards? Where did you get this one?"
"The thief was tracked down to his home by a hunting party. A fight
broke out, and the thief tried to use the Mountain of a Thousand Fists
card. He accidentally tore off his own arm, and the resulting Chi
fallout woke up the rest of the cards, and they took off. This was the
only one that was left. Since I'm the only one with the experience and
the training, I was chosen to capture these cards."
Sakura got up, and put a hand on her friend's shoulder. Well, we'll
back you up all the way, Mei Lin!" Mei Lin smiled back. "Thanks,
Kinomoto." A devious smile graced her face. "But I'm going to be a
better Cardcaptor than you could ever hope to be!" They all had a good
laugh over Mei Lin's competitive nature.
Please stay tuned after these commercial breaks...
"I know it's around here. I can taste it." Mei Lin hissed. The usual
suspects were gathered on a rooftop. "I don't sense a thing." Li
complained. "Me neither." Sakura agreed with him. Keroberos had to
remind them, "Remember, The Saotome Cards don't run off of magic, but
off of life energy. Only a Chi adept could sense them when they're not
in action. And That reminds me, since when are you a Chi adept, Mei
Lin?"
"When the Hunting Party came back with the Amazon card, and it was
decided I would capture the cards, Gramma drilled the basics of Chi
sensing and channeling into me. I'm a little too specialized to be an
adept, but I have what it takes to get the job done." She pulled out
the Amazon/Feline card. "All right, I guess I'll have to get serious
about tracking it down." She flipped the crystalline card into the air,
and once it was in position, she caught it in an open-palm strike. That
hand had a blue aura about it, which graded into the purple spectrum,
along with her hair. The card split into five parts, the image of the
beautiful purple haired girl in the center, and the rest quadrisecting
Li, Sakura, Tomoyo, and Kero watched spellbound as Mei Lin stopped
being a cute Chinese girl, and grew into a young, ravishing, purple
haired woman. Her usual red and white dress, such as it was, barely
held her figure now. "Aiyaa! Mei Lin feel too, too much better now!"
She exclaimed in a breathy, sensuous voice. poor Li soon found himself
the victim of an Amazon glomp. "After fight, Mei Lin and Airen go make
many strong Amazons together, yes?"
When Li had mentally translated what she was proposing, not to mention
that her suddenly present ampleness was poking him in the chest, he did
the logical thing. He had a nose-bleed and passed out. "Airen, what
wrong? No want to wait until after fight?"
Sakura, ever helpful, interrupted. "Mei Lin? I think you got him a
little too excited." Mei Lin looked between her fiancée, and her rival,
back again. "Ah, is so. Airen only male, after all. Should stay home
and cook dinner for wife and keep bed warm." Sakura and Tomoyo
exchanged nervous glances at Mei Lin's sudden ultra-sexist attitude.
"Now where is card? You! Frilly Wand-girl! Where is card? Tell truth
now!" More shared nervous glances between the girls, as Mei Lin was
glaring at them rather hard.
"Ah, could it be that large brass bell floating behind you?" Sakura
asked as she pointed over Mei Lin's shoulder at, yes, a large brass
bell, the kind cats like to play with. And yes, it was also floating in
the air, which made it an instant suspect. Mei Lin, with her increased
strength and reflexes, easily pounded the bell into the roof. "That,"
Kero started, "Was the Wedding Bell-slash-Ghost Cat Card. It's
relatively harmless." As if to mock him, the large bell flew upwards,
clonking Mei Lin upside her head and knocking her down. The bell let
loose a white mist, which coalesced into a six-foot tall, chubby white
cat with large golden eyes.
Said cat was presenting Sakura with a smaller version of the great bell
hanging from his neck. "Will you marry me?" It asked. "Well, uh I, uh,
hehehe, I-I'm flattered and all, but..." Whatever Sakura was going to
say was cut off by Mei Lin again slamming the Ghost Cat into the roof.
"Stupid Cat think he can sucker punch Mei Lin? You I kill!" Over the
course of five minutes, the Ghost Cat was given a severe beat-down.
Said Ghost Cat rather suddenly lost cohesion, and faded away, leaving
five pieces of a crystalline card, which automatically reassembled
itself into one glorious rectangle. Mei Lin reverted to her usual self.
The Amazon card reformed in her hand, while she picked up her new
Saotome Card. "Gotcha, ya little creep." She pocketed both cards, and
looked around at the carnage. Both Sakura and Tomoyo's hair was
standing on end. Li was still out with a massive nosebleed, and Kero
was rolling on the rooftop laughing his guts out.
Please stay tuned after these commercial breaks...
"So when you turn the power of the card on yourself, you have more
control over it, but it temporarily rewires your personality?" Sakura
asked, who else? Mei Lin. "Yes. The Amazon/Feline Card comes with alot
of physical power and skill, but it turns me into something of a
bubblehead. Sorry about the Frilly wand-girl crack. That just came with
the change." Sakura smiled reassuringly at Mei Lin. "That's all right.
Besides, it's not your fault Tomoyo likes to make those costumes for
me."
"I guess you're right. It's all that Pervert Camera girl's fault!" Mei
Lin readily agreed.
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Oh... nothing!"
Author's notes: I thunk this one up a long, long time back, and finally
made a cohesive story out of it. I wrote this first episode in one
evening, and intend to have CCS humor and good times, with bits of R1/2
zaniness intruding. Will we be seeing any Ranma characters?
Mmmmmaaaybe. Maybe not. I've thunk up all sorts of cards based on Ranma
1/2 characters and techniques, and I intend on making an episode or two
for each one. The Amazon/Feline card was based on Shampoo, one of
Ranma's fiancees, who was cursed to turn into a cat. The Wedding
Bell/Ghost Cat card was based on Mao Mo Lin, the Bakeneko (Japanese for
Ghost Cat), who appeared in two issues of Ranma 1/2. He was eternally
searching for a wife (Mainly because no girl in her right mind would
marry a ghost cat.) Poor sucker ran face first into Ranma-chan's
Nekoken. "She's meaner than an alley-cat!" The next time he popped up,
he tried to take Shampoo as his bride by permanently turning her into a
cat, unless she received a kiss from Ranma. Needless to say, she got
her kiss, though she was a cat at the time. I'd better stop before I
make the author's notes longer than the story.