Rating: Most audiences approved. Contains coarse language and violence.

Ranma 1/2 is copyrighted 1998 by Rumiko Takahashi/Shogakukan Inc. and anyone else who rightfully owns the copyrights. All-Purpose Cultural Cat Girl Nuku Nuku is copyrighted 1992 by Yuuzou Takada. This fanfic was written entirely for entertainment purposes and NOT for monetary benefit. Please don't sue me. Any similarities with other fanfics are purely coincidental unless stated otherwise.

This is my second attempt at a decent fanfic. This also happens to be my first attempt at prose. Be lenient.

Information is based on the author's experience of the two series, meaning a truckload of Ranma 1/2 but an OAV and a few fics of Nuku Nuku. Japanese will only be used when necessary, and NOT to show that this author can look up lots of words and phrases she does not understand in a Japanese-English dictionary, or show that she can write Japanese in English when others don't have a clue what any of it means.

Some parts of this fanfic were influenced by Terry Pratchett's Discworld novels. If you haven't read any of them, shame on you.

If you've just stumbled upon this, please read the previous chapter to understand anything in this one.

Kyusaku looked up sharply as he heard his computer beep at him. That only happened if the hidden cameras he installed at Mishima Heavy Industries picked up anything out of the ordinary. Dropping his next project, he rushed to the computer and pressed a few buttons. Sitting down, several screens popped up from the table and came to life, showing the inside of the TSI facility.

"Wonder what's happening?"

Kyusaku's question was abruptly answered as he stared at the one screen of a young person being trapped by one of the new HV-27s. On the other screens, masses of SNK-60s could be seen blocking corridors leading out of the complex. Kyusaku stared incredulously.

Kyusaku typed something, and the words RECORDING SCREEN 3 appeared on the central screen. He put his cigarette into an ashtray and grinned maniacally.

"Akiko probably thinks *I* sent the boy in! She's in for a lot of trouble, attacking a harmless kid!"

Kyusaku frowned as the situation finally dawned on him. Someone was about to get seriously hurt.

RANMA 1/2 and ALL-PURPOSE CULTURAL CAT-GIRL NUKU NUKU

PROJECT NK-RANMA

Written by Celeste Byrd

CHAPTER TWO: Lasers and Cannons and Explosives, Oh My!

"I wouldn't run if I were you," suggested Arisa through her microphone. All of the HV-27's weapons (Yes, all 35 of them) were trained on the young man's head. Much to her astonishment however, the boy wasn't cowering in fear, like a normal teenager in the face of enough weaponry for another World War. In fact, he had a mild air of surprise mixed with alarm and was poking at Arisa's bodysuit with interest. This got Arisa extremely angry. "Aren't you even gonna plead for mercy?" she asked.

"Why should I?" Ranma replied as he continued to inspect the battle mech.

Although she was protected with over thirteen inches of armour plating, Arisa felt very uncomfortable under the examination. Moreover, the boy examining her was pretty cute. Had they've been in different circumstances (and had he been a few years older) she might have asked him out. So she was very relieved when the rest of the troops filed in and Ranma turned to glance at them.

"Arisa, wait!"

Kyouko, sporting a similar mech, ran up to Arisa as Ranma watched on.

"The boss said to APPREHEND the intruder, not kill him!" she pleaded.

Arisa hadn't blown anything up since yesterday, so she was feeling rather stressed. Cute or not cute. "So what?!" she yelled. "I haven't been able to test POISON FOUR out yet, the android hasn't come around today, and nothing has threatened the corporation. What d'ya expect me to do?!"

"Arisa, just calm down. Arisa..." She turned her back on Kyouko, ignoring her. Arisa then concentrated on the intruder.

"Put your hands up in the air or I'll blast you into the next millennia!" he shouted at Ranma.

"Can I leave after that?" Ranma asked.

Now infuriated by Ranma's rather stupid question, Arisa opened fire. The SNK-60s followed suit. Ranma soon found himself dodging plasma, laser beams and artillery barrages. The room filled with the sounds of gunfire, the smells of charred metal, and the impressive sight of a single two metre by two metre area being bombarded with over a ton of ammunition.

When the smoke cleared, Ranma was no longer there. Arisa stopped firing, and looked around. Where did that boy disappear? Surely he'd have screamed if he'd been underneath the assault.

That was when several SNK-60s started firing at her head. Arisa frantically avoided the attacks while waving the HV's arms wildly.

"HEY! STOP FIRING NOW!" Arisa shouted out. Instantly, the SNK-60s stopped their antics. Arisa whirled on them.

"YOU STUPID PIECES OF TRASH! DO I 'LOOK' LIKE THE INTRUDER TO YOU?!" she yelled.

"No, but you sure do look like an idiot."

Arisa checked the HV's visuals surrounding her and came up with nothing. How did that boy run away so easily? Kyouko was missing too, but that didn't bother Arisa all that much.

"Yo, up here."

Arisa changed the visuals to look directly at her own mech. Ranma was perched on the hardsuit's head, an expression of boredom plain on his face.

"Is this ALL you guys can do?" he asked.

Arisa tried to club Ranma off, but he had already jumped down and assumed a ready stance.

"Your move," he taunted.

Truly enraged, Arisa threw everything she had at the egotistical boy. Missiles flew out of hidden flanks. Blazing white plasma shot out of the cannons. Chain-guns started to overheat from firing 60 rounds a second. Laser and electrical fire erupted from the SNK-60s. But alas, Ranma continually weaved in and out of the assault. Stray bursts of artillery stuck inactive prototypes on the racks, effectively destroying them. Those not catching on fire disintegrated from the intense heat in the complex.

Ranma bounced around to avoid all the mecha that started to explode into flames. This sent him into a small alcove in the damaged wall. Arisa saw this as a great time to get him. She took aim and fired her 210mm M86A45 howitzer. Any ordinary person would have simply been reduced to a pile of ash, but of course, Ranma is no ordinary man. He simply bounced out and sideways, letting the 210mm-shell fly past his face. Where Ranma stepped he left a small trail of destruction. Many of the SNK-60s overheated and burst into flame. However good Ranma was at evasion, there were simply too many mechs in the immediate area. Ranma felt something behind him, and was too late to dodge. Streams of laser fire ripped through his shoulder and his side. Fortunately, the heat of the beams was hot enough to clot the blood before his silken Chinese shirt got even bloodier. Ranma dropped his usual comical expression as he winced in pain. As he rubbed his shoulder, something in the back of his mind stirred. In his condition, Ranma didn't notice.

"Oy, looks like I have to get serious!"

However serious Ranma wanted to be, his adversaries were a hell of a lot more of it. As Ranma jumped back into the fight, three SNKs closed in around him. Ranma decked two of them and was rounding on the third when it picked him up by the shirt and tossed him away. This would have been fine for the martial arts master, who practised bracing for falls every single day. But there was only one small TINY problem about this; the SNK was still gripping his clothing.

"Kasumi? Kasumi?"

Kasumi turned around and smiled at her younger sister. "What is it, Akane?" she asked tenderly.

Akane looked guilty for a moment. "Have you seen Ranma?"

Kasumi thought about it. "No, I haven't seen him ever since he went out the window today. He isn't hurt, is he?"

Akane looked even guiltier. "No, I don't think so, but I haven't seen him around since..."

"He might be with Ukyou or Shampoo right now." Perhaps Kasumi shouldn't have worded it like that.

All thoughts of guilt vanished as Akane grew angrier and angrier at the thought of Ranma out with either of his fiancees. "GRR! I bet he's kissing Shampoo right now! Or maybe he's at a restaurant with Ukyou and laughing at me! Or he's probably kissing both AND laughing at me! Or maybe he's even..."

Kasumi watched Akane ball her fists and walk away, her translucent blue battle aura barely kept in check. The wall beside her flared up and then caught fire.

"Oh my," she thought.

"Hey, that was my favourite shirt!"

Ranma slowly got up and rubbed his head as every single mecha in the room trained their weapons on him. He checked himself over and gasped. Kneeling down, he picked up slivers of his Chinese shirt and gripped them in his hands. Staring at the tatters of red silk, Ranma suddenly felt his control slipping away...

Ranma felt in a daze, and before he knew what was happening, he had smashed up another twenty-four SNKs. Severed parts went flying in all directions. Almost everything caught on fire. Ranma could feel five or more mecha closing on him once again. He had managed to pummel most of them into oblivion when a laser shot out of nowhere and cut into his thigh, causing him to scream in pain. Ranma tried to regain control again, but whatever had taken over his mind was resisting hard. Trying to ignore the pain in his leg, Ranma rose and stared at the ones who ruined the shirt his mother gave to him. His thoughts told him these machines were not very nice, and played unfairly.

Not NICE? PLAYED unfairly?

"What the?" he thought.

Ranma is very slow when it came to understanding anything. In fact, normally he'd been the sixth person to admit it. But coupled with his ego, and fuelled by his stubborness...

Ranma ran out of the scenario and decked the editor, knocking him out cold and preventing his intervention for the next few chapters. There was a cheer from the author, who decided then to eat a fish cake and take a short nap. When she woke up, she put on her glasses, turned on the horrible computation device from Hell, laughed a bone-chilling maniacal laugh, and started typing.

This may be true, but even RANMA could figure out something was wrong inside the recesses of his head. He couldn't put a finger on it, mostly because of the dire need of pain killers but MAINLY because you can't stick your finger into your skull in the conventional way without serious repercussions.

But in the METAPHORICAL sense, Ranma couldn't put a finger on it because his thoughts suddenly vanished, leaving nothing but furious rage. If Arisa looked into Ranma eyes at that moment, she would have noticed a fire burning in his eyes with an almost... feline quality.

Ranma was tired of playing. It wasn't fun anymore, because they didn't do anything but shoot lots of stuff at him. In fact, he was getting throughly bored.

When a cat gets bored, it tries to entertain itself. Usually at the expense of others.

With a feline yowl, Ranma charged through the masses of robots. As they raised their arms to fire, Ranma shred the extended joints, tore them out of their sockets and bashed them on their owners' head. Sparks flew as he leapt from robot to robot, tearing off limbs and beating others senseless. Arisa watched slack-jawed as Ranma waded through the mass of mecha, snapping the battle mecha like twigs. Arisa aimed her massive weapon at the berserked boy, ready to take him down. Ranma noticed the cannon too late as it blew him off his feet and into a concrete wall, creating a small crater. Arisa was about to crack a smile when Ranma slowly got out and knelt on his knees, hissing.

"WHAT?! IMPOSSIBLE!" Arisa yelled.

Growling, Ranma rushed up to the HV-27 and clawed at the suit, ripping it to shreds. Some of the sharp jagged streamers tore through his skin, but Ranma was too angry to care. He leapt back into the large pile of broken parts. When he was at the centre of the destruction, Ranma spinned a few times on his good leg before raising his bloodied fist into the air.

"HHIIRRYYUUUU SSHHOOUUTTEENN HHAA!"

The chi in Ranma's body suddenly cooled as the dragon flew out of his extended hand. It rose high and punched a hole in the ceiling, expanding all the time. The now tremendously powerful twister raged uncontrollably, absorbing all the heat generated by the destruction Ranma had caused earlier. Twelve square kilometres of the leading edge in technology suddenly became twelve square kilometres of violent storm. Too much pressure caused the tempest to subside, only to have the entire complex explode in a blast of pale blue energy.

Kyusaku watched the six-minute tape for the tenth time, up until the point his cameras were destroyed by heavy winds. He put down the bag of popcorn and clapped heartily. Nothing like a good fight at MHI to lighten the spirits! He lit another cigarette and contemplated his newly acquired information.

"That kid's got some serious power... he's almost as good as my greatest creation, Nuku Nuku..."

Kyusaku paused. Project NK-1124, the technical term of the cat-girl, he considered his best project to date. Based on his research about eight years ago, the principles behind it were to connect a cat's brain into an MHI prototype android, and have it exist as the machine's CPU. A cyborg, of sorts. It took him several months to develop the concept, and about four years to perfect the technology. Kyusaku had hidden the information from his wife, afraid she would use it to turn military droids into cybernetic mercenaries. But for him to have perfected the technology, he'd have to have used it, and often.

And he had. Project NK-1078.

Kyusaku jerked out of his reverie. Come to think about it, that boy in the video reminded him of it. He wasn't sure why. Perhaps it was the willingness to survive? Project NK-1078 was full of bugs, and Kyusaku constantly had to rewrite his designs. The brain he used was on the verge of deterioration, but it endured long enough for Kyusaku to finally get the project complete. Its final serial number was NKR-1078. Certain that he had seen the boy from somewhere, Kyusaku cycled back the recording until the boy's face could be seen. He peered at it closely before shaking his head.

"Not clear enough, huh." The picture was too fuzzy for him to make out any proper details.

Kyusaku magnifyed the image, fixed the contrast and filtered out the background noise. When the image was clear enough did he try again. It was an image of a rather handsome young man with dark brown eyes and ebony black hair. Kyusaku gasped and the cigarette hanging from his mouth dropped to the ground, extinguishing as it hit the floor. He could recognize that youth anywhere!

"I don't believe it! After all these years... Nuku Nuku!"

Nuku Nuku came bounding into the room. "Yes, Papa-san?" she asked.

Kyusaku pointed to the image of the boy's face. "I want you to go to Mama-san's work and get this boy out of there!"

"Okay, Papa-san!"

Kyusaku turned to the screen again and shook his head, the forgotten memories flooding back.

"All this time. Genma, after all this time..."

Oy! A tad too serious at places, I should think. Oh well, I hope not to repeat anything like this one again. Too taxing on the brain. Too many school projects are due soon so the third chapter will take some time to write. Oh well...

Send in your thoughts to [nshampoo .com] and I'll try and reply as soon as possible.

Special thanks to Richard Lawson, for his suggestions and information on the Nuku Nuku characters. Special thanks should also be extended to Wade Tritschler, for proofing and supporting my writing style.

Time to go back to the infernal abyss again. And I was doing so well, too...