Timeline 4536
Chapter 1
Disclaimer: I don't own this stuff
There are many different parallel worlds where the same people live sometimes greatly different lives because they or the people around them have made different choices. For example in one world a young man named Ranma Saotome ends up becoming the ruler of a large part of China and in anther world he ends up dying from food poisoning. To those who deal with such thing on a regular basis, namely Sailor Pluto and the wizards of the Unseen University, call these different worlds "timelines."
This story takes place in the timeline called 4536 (hey, there are a lot of them). The main choice that makes this timeline different is that while out drinking after 'training' his son in the Neko Ken, Genma Saotome got an offer to train a girl named Makoto Kino, who's parents had died in a plane crash, in exchange for a large amount of money. The story takes place ten years after that event.
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Sailor V was chasing after a thief when two people about her age got in the way. "Let me by," she said
The brown haired girl's response was, "We can't, I'm afraid. That idiot might not be much, but…"
Before she could continue the white haired Moon Cat, Artemis, jumped down from the roof onto a near-by trash can. "Minako…"
"CCCCat," Ranma pressed up against the back wall of the alleyway looking absolutely terrified.
"Aw, hell," Makoto tried to chase Artemis away. Sailor V thought that she was trying to hurt Artemis and stopped her and then Artemis saw this and made the tactical error of jumping on Ranma's head to distract him so Minako doesn't have to fight two people at once. This causes Ranma to fall into the Nekoken and take off meowing with Artemis tangled up in his hair screaming bloody murder.
Four hours later …
Makoto and Minako climb to the top of Big Ben and find Ranma, curled up in a corner, and a rather dizzy Artemis.
"We finally caught up with them," said a rather out of breath Minako.
"Yes, finally, having those thugs chase us because they thought we were trying to spy on their meeting was a bit much. I take it that your cat is not normal," said Makoto, just as out of breath
Artemis had recovered enough at this point to say "Yes and I take it you and your friend aren't normal either. Who are you two and can you please tell me why I was dragged over half of London?" Artemis was feeling rather cranky, for some reason when he said this.
"I'm Makoto Kino and he's Ranma Soatome. Sorry about this; Ranma is rather scared of cats. Also sorry we had to interrupt your thief chasing, but if that idiot gets thrown in jail here I don't know what we will do," Said Makoto.
"Why he's a thief, he deserves to go to jail." Replied Minako
" 'Cause he's my guardian and Ranma's pop," said Makoto.
"You would be better off without him," proclaimed Minako
"What do you know anyway? You have a family to go home to, don't ya? All I have is Ranma and that idiot Genma," replied Makoto
Artemis took a good look at Makoto, could it be, "So what are you planning to do? You can't go on like this forever."
"Couple more years and me and Ranma won't be minors and we will have gotten mastership in Anything Goes, then we'll get jobs and maybe be able to pay back some of the people Genma stole from," said Makoto.
"I am glad to hear that because, you see, you are the reincarnation of the Princess of Jupiter."
Makoto looked at Artemis blinked and turned to Minako, "Are all talking cats this crazy?"
"What, yes, I mean no, I mean Artemis you can't be serious." Said Minako
"I am serious and I am not crazy," Artemis did one of those flip things and comes up with Jupiter's henshin wand. "If you don't believe me then take this wand and say Jupiter power, make up."
"You have got to be kidding me," said Makoto nevertheless picking up the stick.
"Just say it alright!"
"Alright, alright, Jupiter Power Make Up." As everyone here (hopeful) knows Makoto is Jupiter so the transformation worked fine.
Minako, having gotten over her surprise at who one of the other Senshi was, said, "This is great, now I have someone to work with."
After a moment Makoto, or should I say Sailor Jupiter, said in a tone that conveyed that she wasn't really sure about what she was saying, "Look this is nice and all, but Ranma can't stand cats and I am not going off without my brother, whatever we will be doing." She then detransformed and tried to hand the henshin wand back to Artemis.
Artemis refused to take it, "No, it is yours."
"So why's Ranma so afraid of cats anyway," asked Minako seeing the chance of having some one to fight beside go away as she also detransformed, after all it wouldn't be polite to stay transformed when her fellow Senshi wasn't.
"First thing he asked me when we met was if there were any cats around. It's supposed to be because of training in something called the Nekoken," said Makoto. "It's caused a lot of trouble."
"Oh," said Minako then turning to Artemis, "Don't you have some Moon Cat magic you can use to fix things?"
Artemis sweatdropped, "I have something that might work." Hen turned to Makoto, "Do I have your permission to do it, Makoto?"
"Why ask me?"
"Because I can't ask Ranma."
"Ok, then yeah, you can use it, but don't screw anything up." Makoto agreed to this only because she had a feeling or a dim memory from her past life, that Artemis could be trusted.
"Right then," Artemis stood before Ranma, the crescent moon on his head glowed and he dived into Ranma's subconscious and found himself in an area filled with mist, facing another cat. The other cat immediately attacked Artemis and he was forced to defend himself. As he jumped back to catch his breath and figure out what the hell was going on, the other cat shot claws out of his paws. There was no way to avoid all of them so Artemis braced for the attack pulling his magic around him in hopes that he would not get killed.
And the claws disintegrated against the shield the now human Artemis was holding. "I had forgotten that I could do this," thought Artemis as he drew his sword and sliced the cat in half.
Back in the real world, Minako and Makoto watched as Artemis' form blurs into a young human with white hair then back into a cat.
"Ok now what?" thought Artemis, "If this is Ranma's subconscious then I guess I should calm the mist down." As he did this some of the mist swirled around him and then the mist became as calm as a Buddhist monk meditating and Artemis 'woke up' back in the real world. "I think I was able to fix Ranma's fear of cats."
"You think?" said Makoto, "You mean you don't know."
"He did, Makoto, I can think of cats without getting scared now," said Ranma as he woke up.
"I guess I have to help with this Senshi thing now," said Makoto, "So what is it anyway?"
"3000 years ago there was a thriving civilization that was ruled by…," started Artemis
"Come on, they don't want to hear about that, Artemis. Basically we have to stop the Dark Agency from draining people's energy," said Minako.
"It is a martial artist's duty to protect the weak, so we would have helped, had to help, ya anyway," said Ranma and Makoto nodded.
"Ranma, I didn't mean you. You don't have magic and I doubt you could even hurt the members of the Dark Agency," said Artemis.
"Wanna bet?" Ranma concentrated and a small ball of chi formed between his hands, then anything in the room that wasn't nailed down lifted up off the floor and the ball of energy in Ranma's hands doubled in size and seemed to explode but nothing was hurt.
"How did you do that, Ranma?" yelled Artemis, all of his hair standing straight up.
"Don't know, something add itself to my chi," said Ranma, rather stunned, "Give me a little while to figure it out and then I'll be able to beat anything."
"Ranma, that something you just used was magic. It's very dangerous to use without proper training," Artemis stopped for a moment, "Have you ever had any indication that you had any gift for magic before?"
"Naw, we met this old man once that said Makoto had some, but he didn't say anything about me," said Ranma.
"Wish we hadn't had to leave in such a hurry. I would've liked to talk to him more," said Makoto, remembering the incident.
"Uh, Ranma I will have to check into a few things," Artemis said as something occurred to him, "I will talk to you more about this later. Just be careful."
Since it didn't look like Artemis was going to say any more about magic right now, Makoto asked, "So if you have this mission to defeat the Dark Agency then why are you chasing down thieves?"
"Um, I need the practice" Minako looked embarrassed as she said this.
"If ya need training then we can help."
Big Ben started ringing the hour and Minako realized that it was getting rather late. "Ah, my parents are going to kill me," and transformed and ran off.
Artemis sweatdropped and said, "Since tomorrow is Saturday, how about we meet up at the park on 10th street at 11am?"
"Fine, is she going to be in good enough shape to go out by then?" asked Ranma
"You mean Minako, why wouldn't she be?" asked Artemis.
"She was yelling about being killed and people always yell they are gonna kill us or Pop before trying to beat us up. If she's too hurt, we'll understand," replied Ranma
Artemis had to take a moment to recover from this statement, they think that is normal, he thought. "Don't worry. At worst her mom will yell at her. Now I must be going. I will see you tomorrow."
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The next day dawned clear and bright. At 11 Minako and Artemis walked to the park. Minako's arms were full of the books Artemis had found for Ranma. Shortly after they got there Ranma and Makoto came up, "So, here we are, so what's the lay down on the Dark Agency anyway?"
"There you two are. Ranma, I have some books on magic for you," said Artemis patting the books with one of his front paws.
"Training manuals?"
Watching a cat roll his eyes is interesting, "Yes Ranma training manuals. In regards to your question, Makoto, you already know what's in the books even if you can't remember it. Now, the Dark Agency is a group of 'beings' who are trying to steal human energy. I suspect they are minions of Beryl. If that is true then things could get bad."
"Before we worry about that you need a disguise and a code name Ranma," said Minako, "We can't let everyone know who you are."
Ranma was understandably leery about having this overenthusiastic girl play dress-up with him. "Why do you say that?"
"Come on, bro, if I have to wear something silly then so do you," said Makoto, trying not to laugh.
"The Senshi uniforms are not silly," exclaimed Minako
"Yes they are," replayed Ranma and Makoto at the same time. Everyone was silent for a moment then Artemis said, "Can we get back to the point here?"
"Right. So, I think we should have Ranma dress up in a tuxedo, cape and mask."
"Come on, that wouldn't work. The cape would be too easy for an enemy to grab onto," started Ranma.
"And the tux would be too confining."
"And do you know how long it would take to get into that getup?"
"Not to mention the cost," finished Makoto
"Fine if you are going to shoot my ideas out of the air," said Minako
"Come on, the mask is a good idea. It's just that the rest is hard for a martial artist to move in," said Makoto, "Maybe we should choose a code name for Ranma first?"
That wasn't actually what I meant thought Artemis, Ranma's next words surprised him though. "If I have to have a silly name then it's going to be Jupiter Knight." said Ranma.
"Ranma how did you know there was an Order of Knights for each Planet," asked Artemis.
"Didn't wait, you mean there was, I just made that up 'cause knights are warriors and Makoto is my sister," said Ranma
"Why do you call Makoto your sister anyway? You two aren't related as far as I can tell," asked Artemis
"Blood isn't everything. Makoto doesn't have any family and all I got is that idiot you saw earlier, and we have always been together, so why shouldn't we decide we're siblings?" Replied Ranma
"Ok, anyway the knights had the tasks of safeguarding the royal family, maintaining the stability of the realm and protecting the weak," said Artemis
"The protecting is in the martial artists code but Makoto don't need anyone to protect her and would hit me if I tried," said Ranma disregarding what Artemis said about maintaining the stability of the realm, because he wasn't quite sure what that meant, but he did correctly think it was not something he had to worry about.
"Damn right, I'm not a weakling who needs to be protected by a guy." said Makoto. In case you are wondering, Genma stopped saying that girls are weak several years ago because he got beat up by his two students whenever he said it.
"Ok, do you mind if Ranma becomes a knight of Jupiter, Makoto?" asked Artemis, feeling a headache coming on.
"Don't have any trouble with it, no one I'd rather have guard my back."
Suddenly there is a loud rumble. Is it from a thunderstorm? No it's from Ranma's stomach.
"Getting hungry, Ranma? I know a good place to eat," said Minako.
"Don't got any money, Pops spent the little we had on sake before we could get ahold of it. Why do you think he was stealing stuff last night?" replied Ranma.
"Don't worry I just got my allowance so I can pay for the meal." Minako was about to find out about wonders of the Saotome stomach.
After they were done eating Ranma mentioned that he hadn't felt so full since he had gone to Iteven middle school.
"Oh did they serve extra large lunches there?" asked Minako thinking half of my allowance gone.
"Naw, the lunch room was a mad house, everyone would fight over the food there. Me and Makoto had a couple of good friends there, names of Haruka and Ryouga. Now Haruka unlike us and Ryouga had lots of money, she sometimes would buy us food," said Ranma.
"Isn't Iteven an all-boys school?" asked Minako. She remembered the name because a boy she had thought was cute went there.
Makoto replied, "Ya, when you think about it, it's kinda funny, me and Haruka kept running into each other in odd places 'cause we were both trying to hide that we were girls."
"I'm sure, but why were you at an all-boys school in the first place?" Minako then surprised them and asked, "Did you know Yukihen?"
"Genma said it was training, who knows what he meant by that. Haruka said she was going because it would annoy her parents," said Makoto, "And why are you asking about Ranma's admirer?"
"Um, just because I happened to meet him once," Minako said. She didn't want to admit that she had a crush on a gay guy.
There was an awkward silence for a minute. Then Artemis decided to bring up a new subject. "I believe I have found out why Ranma suddenly developed a magic gift. Um, when I fixed Ranma's fear of cats I might have formed a bond between us and Ranma got some of my magic," said Artemis
"What does that mean, Artemis?" Ranma said.
"Um, basically it means that each person gets some of the other's power and they can commutate telepathically," explained Artemis
Ranma thought about this and asked, "Does that mean you got some of my chi?"
Artemis blinked when Ranma asked this, "What is Chi?"
Ranma replies, "Chi is life force. Ya use it to boost healing, reflexes, speed and strength. If ya are really good, like me and Makoto then you can show a visible battle aura and throw around balls of energy."
"Wow, you mean you can do stuff like they do in kung fu movies?" asked Minako.
Something in Minako's voice made Ranma ashamed of his bragging, "Actually haven't gotten the hand of chi attacks or projecting much of a battle aura yet. Wait a minute. If Artemis can use my chi then he'll need to be trained in Anything Goes. I'm going to ask Pops about permission to train. You gonna teach the basics to those two, Makoto." when Makoto nodded Ranma jumped up on the roof of a nearby building and roof hopped away.
"What was that about?" asked Minako
"You need mastership to teach martial arts. Only school me and Ranma know that teachs chi manipulation is Anything Goes," replied Makoto. "Now try to attack me."
"What, Why?" asked Minako
"I need to see what you need to work on," replied Makoto. So Minako threw a punch which Makoto easily blocked.
"Not bad. You remembered to keep your thumb on the outside of your fist and out of the way when you punch, but you need to get your whole body behind your punch. When you throw a punch you need to throw it from the shoulder and twist a bit at the hips to get some momentum." Makoto demonstrated then said, "Also make sure not to lock your elbow when you punch, that can hurt." As you might guess Minako was a bit overwhelmed with the amount of information on how to throw a simple punch. "So practice that against the tree over there, just worry about technique right now, power and speed will come later."
Then Makoto turned to Artemis "You need to change to human form now. I can't train a cat."
"What, why do I …and how do you know …?" started Artemis,
"You changed when healing Ranma. As for why you have to learn Martial Arts, you told Ranma why he needed to learn magic. Chi is just as dangerous, you know," replied Makoto.
"But you said you wouldn't be teaching any chi manipulation right now."
"No matter what school you practice you still have to learn the basics."
"I don't have any clothes." Now this was the real reason Artemis didn't want to change form.
This was more interesting than punching a tree, so Minako was listening in on this conversation and decided to pipe up now, "Hey I know a good place to get some clothes for Artemis." As I am sure you don't want to hear about the ensuing shopping trip, let us instead go see how Ranma is doing.
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As Ranma was returning from his 'discussion' with Genma, he could only shake his head at how his father only agreed to letting him teach under the threat of starting his own school. He suspected there was more to it then that. He was wondering why his Pop had mentioned teaching at his old friend, Soun's Dojo when he was brought out of his musings by Minako called out, "Hey Ranma, we got a mask and vest for you."
"Oh," Ranma looked rather unenthusiastic about that, "Weren't you supposed to be training?"
"We needed to get some clothes for Artemis. I found them then," explained Minako.
"Right, got permission to teach ya Anything Goes, so let's get started with a basic kata."
Since the point of the kata Ranma demonstrated was control and position, not speed, his 'students' were able to actually see what to do. But seeing is not the same thing, as doing Artemis soon found out. "Damn it, it is hard to stay balanced on two feet."
"Well, then your homework for tonight is to spend some time walking around in your human form."
"Right, Ranma, and yours is to read those books I gave you."
All in all it was an enjoyable afternoon for everyone, well some people at least.
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Artemis was walking along the streets of London in his human form. He had decided spend some time in human form. He looked up and saw that he was in front of a music store called Camelot Music. "There's something odd emanating from this store." Artemis stood there for a moment, "Might as well, go in."
Camelot Music was a normal enough looking music store. It had the cashiers up front, racks of CDs organized by type of music, and a little nook with some headsets so that customers could hear a track or two of a CD to make sure they wanted to buy it or rather to convince them should buy it. When Artemis stepped into the store his eyes were drawn to that nook with the headsets, actually they were drawn to the people around the headphone that you could listen to the new band, The Dark Twins, on. The minute a person put on the headphones they started to look listless and then they grabbed one of the CDs and bought it.
Now you can guess that Artemis found this rather odd, to say the least, and he decided to try putting on the headphones to see what was going on. The minute he put on the headphones he felt this big blast of negative energy and he staggered back.
"Ya ok?"
"Yes, I'm fine," Artemis opened his eyes; the store clerk was standing in front of him looking worried "Are you alright, sir?"
"I'm fine; I think there is something wrong with that machine. It gave me a bit of a shock," said Artemis
"I'll call someone to look at it."
"Good." As Artemis left the store he thought wait a minute, I know I just heard Ranma. "Ranma".
"Yah"
"Where are you right now?"
"I'm in the room Pops rented. I'm doing the meditation practice the book you gave me called finding your center."
"Well I'm standing outside of Camelot Music right now"
"Aw hell is this some kind of teleawhhatis thing isn't it?"
"Telepathic and yes it seems to be. I think I may have discovered what the Dark Agency's next move is. Get Makoto and get over to Minako's, we've some planning to do."
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When they we're all gathered together Artemis told about the Dark Twins CD's having draining and control magic in them. The response to Artemis's statement were something like this
"Yep with a name like that they have to be working for the Dark Agency."
"Come on, they wouldn't be that stupid? Really, couldn't they think of anything less obvious to call themselves?"
"We should look into it, even if it isn't true. We'll get to see one of the hottest new bands around." As you can guess this last statement was said by Minako.
"How are we surpposed to find out if they are doing stuff anyway?" asked Makoto.
"They have a concert next weekend." Does it surprise anyone that Minako would know this?
"That means we'll have to do lots of training this week," said Ranma.
That weekend, Minako looked at the sign displaying ticket prices, "Um, problem, guys. I don't have enough money for tickets."
"We'll just have to find anther way in." Makoto looked up at the roof then at Minako, "better see if the back door is open first."
"If it isn't now, it will be soon." Genma felt that lock picking had been essential to creating the Umi-sen-ken so he taught Ranma how to do it.
"Are you crazy, what if we get caught?" said Minako her voice raising several levels.
"We won't get caught unless you give us away with your yelling, besides do you have a better idea," said Makoto as she pulled her around the corner away from the crowd.
"Um, I could disguise myself as a army commando and force my way in," said Minako realizing how ridiculous that was as she said it.
Rrright, I'll go look for the back door," said Ranma and left. A few minutes later he came back and said, "The back door is open and there is no one around, so lets go." Sneaking into the concert hall turned out to be much easier than Minako expected.
Once they got inside Minako was looking at all the Dark Twins merchandise for sale around the concert hall when she ran into a redheaded young man around her age.
"Oh, excuse me," he said then misinterpreting Minako's love-struck look, "Are you alright?"
Minako thinks he's cute and nice said, "I'm fine. My name is Minako Aino. What's yours?"
"Tomas Drake, I'm sorry for running into you."
"No it was my…" Minako started when a voice boomed behind them, "Pray save the romancing of girls until after our work is done, good Tomas."
"Yes'm Puck." Then Tomas turned back to Minako, "Maybe I will see later."
As Tomas left Makoto walked over. "Who was that guy? His chi is focused oddly."
"I don't know, but he's cute isn't he?" replied Minako
"Not half as cute as my old sempai," said Makoto
AN: I just want o say to things here. One, some people in this story are going to act a bit differently then in cannon. This is because they have had some different influences growing up. Two Ranma doesn't have his curse yet, but he will be getting it. Thanks go to Wargiver and others at Fukufics