Summoning The Beast: Chapter 3
"There won't be any permanent damage, and scarring should be minimal," the doctor said to the gathered Tendo and Saotome families, though Ranma was the sole member representing his clan. "I'm going to prescribe Mr. Saotome a standard course of antibiotics and some rather powerful pain medication, so he should be carefully supervised for the first few days while his systems acclimates to the pain killers." The hospital wide intercom system suddenly came to life, calling on the same doctor who had been speaking. "I'm afraid duty calls. At the checkout desk a nurse will provide you with a wheelchair for Mr. Saotome. Good day."
Everyone was still in varying degrees of shock over the attack on Genma. He hadn't lost all 'that' much blood, and he only needed one testicle to function as reproductive member of society, but the brutality was something unheard of in Nerima. Violent fiance beatings, battles fought nearly to the death, and all other manner of painful 'accidents' could occur, but no enemy had ever attempted anything close to castration. Ranma was having second thoughts about taking on a sword that could do something like that to his father, a man he mostly loathed but whom he admitted had more than enough skill to handle most ooponents, supernatural or mundane.
"Uncle Saotome would probably like to get home as soon as possible," Kasumi prompted firmly, setting the others into motion.
Genma was noticeably pale as the group entered his room, but he appeared none the worse for wear. A gallon sized tub of chocolate pudding sat on a tray before him and a television show, something of a cross between a sentai series and a cooking program, buzzed in the wall mounted set. Nodoka, her eyes red rimmed and her fists clenched, sat in a chair next to his bed.
An awkward silence hung in the air for but a few moments, before Ranma asked,"So, pop, how're they hanging?" He hadn't even thought about the question before asking it, and only after it'd came out of his outh did he realize just what he'd said. Ranma's eyes widened and he took in the stunned looks on all the faces around him.
Genma, suprisingly, flushed brightly and buried his head in the tup of pudding, his spoon becoming a blur of motion as it shovelled the dessert into the man's mouth at almost hypersonic speeds.
Eyes darting from one person to another, Ranma began to apologize, but instead said,"How does it feel to be a half man?" He chuckled once, caught himself, then slammed his hands down over his mouth and prayed to survive the next few minutes.
Nabiki, silent until now, snickered cruelly. It set of a chain reaction within the room. Genma, Soun, and Nodoka began to wail, all lamenting Genma's lost equipment. Nabiki went into a full blown laugh, and the remaining Tendo sisters looked over their family and friends in shocked disbelief. Akane even felt sorry for Genma, since she too had been humiliated by that damned sword. She felt immense gratitude that it had only disrobed her.
Ranma fled, confused his verbal slips and unable to really be upset at himself over them.
****
Roof top to roof top, Ranma vaulted, blanking his mind and expending all his efforts on pure speed. If someone had looked out their office window at the proper time, they would have seen a red and black blur bouncing from skyscraper to skyscraper, sometimes going almost into freefall, only to catch itself on a jutting transmission antenna or flag pole. Exhiliration, sheer freedom, this was what Ranma craved, not a life bound by chains of duty, both to his overbearing and eccentric parents, and to a wife he didn't care for, much less want to be around.
And now, as if his life wasn't complicated enough as it was, with all the fiances and rivals, the countless kidnappings and pervert attacks, Ranma had been charged with driving off or destroying an enemy he couldn't fight, and it was all because he'd played the hero, the knight protector who placed the safety of others above that of himself. Expected behavior, he'd thrown himself into the task, although he silently railed against those who would bridle him with yet another responsibility.
Far below, beyond Ranma's care or notice, a swirling cloud of fire and brimstone appeared in the middle of a busy intersection. A few moments more and Ranma would have been out of auditory range, but he wasn't, so he heard the screeching concussion of cars slamming into one another. A reverse somersault off of a realtively small thirty story building brought Ranma to a perch where he could observe the unusual accident. At first he assumed the cloud of fire to be a burning car, but that assumption rapidly changed as dozens of red-furred things began to leap from the eddying portal to Hell.
Small and red was about all Ranma could see from such a distance, but he knew something was up by the simple fact that animals don't jump out of a fireball without being on fire, and they most certainly didn't eat cars like these were beginning to do.
Demons? Well, if they were demons, they were kinda wimpy looking to be demons, but Ranma didn't particularly care. A fight without neccessity, a challenge that he could choose to accept or ignore as he saw fit, that's what had just presented itself. No one appearred to be in any danger, as the demons happily munched away on the totalled remains of several vehicles while ignoring their fleeing passengers. A broad grin spread itself accross Ranma's face and he dived head first towards the demon infested street.
****
Elmo surveyed his horde as it fed. They weren't much, not as long as they were so soft and cuddly, but that would soon change. The combination of fear from their entrance and metal from their meal would reinforce their plush bodies and fuel their infernal powers. Already Elmo was seeing the changes in a few of his servitors. They no longer moved quiet as jerkily and one or two were even showing signs of an actual internal skeleton. Within his firey refuge, Elmo sensed an enormous presence nearing, mothing like that of his Lord and Master, but stronger than anything it'd ever felt on this plane.
From the sky fell a gowing figure, wreathed in blue flames that filled the air with the crackling of pent up energy and brought the smell of ozone to any near enough to see the figure, a teenage boy crash feet first into the pavement. The asphault crumpled under the force of the landing, a shallow but wide crater forming beneath the boy with fine cracks radiating outward over a dozen meters. Elmo watched, not quite in fear, as the boy stood, coming out of a one kneed kneeling position with frightening grace that set tiny streamers of blue flame spinning slowly into the air.
****
Ranma didn't see the tiny figure hidden within the flaming rupture in the fabric of space, but he did note the the fire had no visible source and didn't even touch the bubbling asphault beneath it. Up close, the litte red demons were actually pretty cute, Ranma mused, though the concept of a 'cute' demon had never occured to him. When they turned to hiss at him and bared row upon row of razor-like metal fangs, Ranma decided to handle the situation a bit more seriously.
"All right, ya little furballs, time to go back to Hell." Ranma stated menacingly. The cute little things hissed again, then began to giggle in unison, their tiny little frames shaking merrily. Only then did Ranma realize the true evil that these hellspawned monstrosities embodied. The sonic barrage introduced all kinds of cute and cuddly thoughts into his mind, even going so far as to want a little red-furred demon of his own to hold and snuggle up to whenever the urge took him.
Ranma shook his head and growled at the horde that by now surrounded him. The intensity of his battle aura subconsciously increased and small pebbles, shards of glass, and other debris in the desserted intersection began to slowly skid away from him, pushed away by the force of his will. Despite their numbers and cuteness, they were no match for Ranma, and he knew it as soon as one of them attacked, baring fangs that dripped motor oil and claws that still had pieces of upholstery stuck to them. It was slow and uncoordinated, and Ranma batted the suprisingly soft creature out of the air and into a nearby building where it hit the wall and exploded into a cloud of white fiber stuffing and a few bits of red fur.
Ranma only had a moment to contemplate the existance of stuffed demons before the slain demon's bretheren attempted to dog pile him. Those that didn't burst into flame upon nearing Ranma found themselves the target of almost lazy punches and kicks that tore them into chunks of useless wads of cloth and polyester. A few of them who had managed to ingest a significant amount of automobile and suprised Ranma when it took a whopping two hits to finish them.
****
Elmo saw red, well he always saw red, but this time he 'really' saw red. The boy who so callously destroyed his creations became a figure composed of varying shades of red and pink and the raging aura that surrounded him looked much smaller and less threatening as noting more than a distortion in the pink tinged air. With a cry of rage and hate, Elmo exploded from the flames, inadvertently closing the gateway behind him and cutting off his only escape route. He roared a squeaky kind of roar and called on his infernal power, so much so that by the time the boy saw him he was no longer a knee high child's play thing, but a fifteen foot high, spike covered horror from the pits of Hell. Smokey trails of dark energy flowed from his decimated likenesses like streamers of smoke and he gathered them lovingly into his taloned paws.
The human would pay, pay with its life and soul.
****
'That' sure as freaking Hell wasn't cute or cuddly. Ranma tilted his head back so he could get a better view of his newest victim. He didn't see or sense the sword that hovered around him protectively on the Astral Plane, not in its split form as two, more slender blades.
It kinda resembled the stuffed demons, sorta like how a salamander has the same basic shape as a crocodile. Ranma winced as it threw its head backed and roared, a sound that was just as squeaky as it had been when he'd first heard the sound that had drawn his attention. Ranma couldn't help himself, and chuckled a few times. Enormous monsters weren't supposed to sound like mice, it was some kind of unspoken rule, at least that's what Ranma's experience had led him to belive.
Ranma leapt aside as a bolt of black lightning issued forth from the monster's gaping maw, then dived behind an overturned and partially eaten car as the lightning was followed by a spray of acid. It wanted to play that game, did it? Well, Ranma could play just as good as any two-bit demon. He kicked into the air as another bolt of black lightning flew from the demon's mouth, this time igniting the car's fuel tank and causing a massive fireball to billow high into the air, almost enveloping Ranma. Even as the thick black smoke swallowed him, the light of his chi aura grew in intensity, causing the cloud of smoke to glowazure from within.
"Moko takabisha!!!" Ranma shouted, blasting away the obscuring smoke with his aura and taking aim on the stupidly staring demon below.
The lance of energy slammed into the demon, knocking it to the ground and pinning it there as the beam continued to hammer into it. Ranma, held aloft by the recoil of his attack, continued to pour power into the beam, watching in satisfaction as red fur and black spikes alike burned away under the unrelenting energy. Only when he sensed that his attack had burrowed through the demon and into the street beheath it did Ranma cut power to it. By now he was a block and a half away, propelled by the force his chi, and even from that distance he, he could see the demon stand, staggering as it did, and clutching at the gaping hole in its torso that dripped green and purple ichor as well as copious amounts of black energy that drifted away on an errant breeze.
Slightly winded by the effort of maintaining his moko takabisha for so long, Ranma ran down the street, unaware of the hundreds of people who stood as far back from the fight as possible while still being able to view it, and the pair of helicopters that circled over the scene in precise patterns as their mounted cameras captured the struggle for the viewers at home.
****
"It's all right, Genma old friend," Soun assured the man tearfully. "I've read all about it in those magazines outside. You can get a fake one that will look and feel just like the real thing, isn't that great?"
Genma shook his head mournfully and looked down at his numbed crotch. Ranma was right, he was a half man, no matter what the doctors or psychiatrists insisted. And all this time he'd made fun of his son about his curse. The heavily medicated man felt like the proverbial pile of shit. He'd lost a ball, but his son regularly lost his manhood. How did the boy handle it without going insane?
"Cheer up, Uncle Saotome," Nabiki volunteered helpfully. "If the prosthetics don't work out, you can always get a transplant. I hear that scientists are making discoveries almost daily in transferring pig organs to human patients." The statement had the desired effect, and Genma broke down crying once again.
"Hey, everyone, look!" Akane exclaimed. In her hand was the remote to the television and she was pointing at the set with an emphatically jabbing finger. "Is that Ranma?"
The picture on the screen was an overhead view of Ranma trading blows with a really big, really ugly monster. It had a large smoking whole in its chest and one of its arms had been torn off at the shoulder, but it showed no signs of slowing down. Ranma's shirt was ripped badly and hung in tatters from a single remaining tie. The lack of a shirt revealed a long bloody gash across Ranma's back, but he ignored it just as his opponent ignored its own, more serious wounds.
Kasumi shrieked as the monster lunged its remaining arm for Ranma, covering her face and looking away. She missed seeing Ranma dodge the attack, stomp on the exposed arm with a foot that blurred into invisibility, then finally leap up to catch the monster in one of its eyes with a knife hand jab that popped the orb like an overripe melon.
Akane gagged at the site, but couldn't peal her eyes away from the spectacle. The monster threw its head from side to side, squeaking pathetically as it tried to cover the ruined eye with an equally ruined arm. Since the view was momentarily zoomed in much closer to the monster so everyone could see its horrendous injuries, no one saw Ranma actually launch a moko takabisha, but they saw it connect, taking the monster in the knee and rapidly burning through armor plating, sinew, and bone, turning the limb into a charred off stump.
It collapsed to the asphault, unable to stay upright. The camera zoomed back out to get a better view of the fire and lightning scarred, cratered battle field. Ranma had his hands raised into the air and his head thrown back as he yelled a primal shout of victory over his enemy. Everyone watched, even Kasumi, as the monster began to unravel, turning into thick bands of black smoke that writhed like disembodied tentacles.
****
Ranma breathed deeply, savoring the smell of molten asphault and grilled demon. His whole body ached and the cut across his back throbbed painfully, but that didn't matter. He'd fought and won, fought a battle for the simple joy of fighting, the thrill of crushing ones enemy into nothing. He walked slowly to his dying foe, gritting his teeth and resisting the urge to limp as he further strained a pulled groin muscle.
A black rope of energy lashed at him, but it fizzled out of existance as it came in contact with his much diminished but still powerful battle aura. He wanted to look it in the eyes, eye, whatever, and let it know its death at his hands. Ranma never got quite close enough to do that, though, because the demon chose then to explode in a very messy and very destructive ball of black fire.
Ranma's eyes widened in suprise and shock, and he reflexively crossed his arms in front of his chest. He didn't even have time to hope to survive.
****
Kasumi wasn't the only person to shriek as Ranma was enveloped in the massive ball of supernatural fire that topped some of the nearby buildings in size. The helicopter that captured these images had to veer away hard, or be caught in the fire and the wicked thermals it would create. Nodoka and Kasumi sobbed at the apparent death of Ranma, while Soun and Genma lost consciousness, and Nabiki and Akane stared in open mouthed shock.
When the news chopper managed to get itself stable once again, and the cameras were able to refocus on the raging inferno that was liquifying the glass windows of nearby buildings, Nodoka, too, fainted. The fire burned unabated for several minutes, then, without warning, disappeared entirely. In its wake was a molten see of asphault and concrete, brightly glowing puddles that had once been automobiles, and slumping facades of business that flowed slowly towards the devastated street in sheets of intermingled glass and steel. And directly in the center of it all, on a small island of intact pavement, stood Ranma.
A few feet to his right and left floated a matched pair of swords, each one visibly gathering Ranma's battle aura and redirecting it into a hazy, glass-like barrier that had protected the martial artist from a certain and painful death.
****
Ranma recognized the sword he had up until then never seen, or swords in this case, though it wasn't hard to discern that they had somehow split into two blades. Suprised and happy to be alive as he was, he was even more stunned by the swords. Why had it/they saved him, especially after what it had done to others? He could feel his chi being gently drained, but didn't fight the effect, for he saw and understood the sword's purpose in doing so, as it formed his energies into a shield in a fashion he doubted he'd ever be able to duplicate.
The air within his little sanctuary was becoming thin and wouldn't support him much longer. He looked around, seeing that there would be no convenient jump points or spring boards to use. If he wanted to make it to safety, he would have to do it in a single bound. Taking several deep breaths, Ranma reached out for the swords, grasping one smooth bone hilt tightly in each hand and gathering as much of his energy as he could for the attempt. A moment later the shield died away and he was assualted by near scorching temperatures and fumes that would have seared his lungs if he had breathed them in.
He jumped, a single powerful lunge upward and outward that caused the muscles in his strained legs to scream. Ranma hadn't even reached the zenith of his attempt when he knew he would fall well short of the solid pavement. What a way to die, just when he had done something for himself and regained something he never knew he'd lost.
The tug was barely noticeable, and then Ranma was surrounded by silver mists that felt cool on his bruised skin and tingled soothingly across his battered body. The swords vibrated in his hands and he looked at them in something akin to awe, for here, in these silver mists, the swords were not swords at all, but glowing beams of light that merged seemlessly with his aura and intertwined irrevocably with his being. It was as if the swords, or whatever they truly were, were nothing but an extension of himself.
Ranma gulped as the implications of what that meant became clear, and the acts that they'd commmitted over the past few days returned to his mind with fresh clarity. And those thoughts were swept away as another tug came and Ranma found himself standing near the edge of the still bubbling asphault lake that had been the site of his recent battle. His wounds didn't pain him nearly so much as only moments before, and he could see scrapes and bruises on the back of his arms that looked as if they lad days to heal.
****
Author's Notes- Finally got another chapter out of this, and now I think I'm back to writing regularly again. Yay! Ranma's got his swords now, so what's he gonna do with them and how are people going to react to him now that they've seen him in action with and without the swords, especially Genma? Speaking of Genma, I may have been a little harsh on him, but throwing a child into a pit of starving cats strikes me as kinda harsh, too, ya know? Oh yeah, only having one nut isn't a bad thing, I knew a guy back in middle school who had to have one removed because of a really really unlucky basketball accident, and he never had any trouble with his lack of a matched set. I just can't see Genma, everyone's manly man *snicker* handling the situation all that well. C&C welcome at dark_phoneix@hotmail.com
"There won't be any permanent damage, and scarring should be minimal," the doctor said to the gathered Tendo and Saotome families, though Ranma was the sole member representing his clan. "I'm going to prescribe Mr. Saotome a standard course of antibiotics and some rather powerful pain medication, so he should be carefully supervised for the first few days while his systems acclimates to the pain killers." The hospital wide intercom system suddenly came to life, calling on the same doctor who had been speaking. "I'm afraid duty calls. At the checkout desk a nurse will provide you with a wheelchair for Mr. Saotome. Good day."
Everyone was still in varying degrees of shock over the attack on Genma. He hadn't lost all 'that' much blood, and he only needed one testicle to function as reproductive member of society, but the brutality was something unheard of in Nerima. Violent fiance beatings, battles fought nearly to the death, and all other manner of painful 'accidents' could occur, but no enemy had ever attempted anything close to castration. Ranma was having second thoughts about taking on a sword that could do something like that to his father, a man he mostly loathed but whom he admitted had more than enough skill to handle most ooponents, supernatural or mundane.
"Uncle Saotome would probably like to get home as soon as possible," Kasumi prompted firmly, setting the others into motion.
Genma was noticeably pale as the group entered his room, but he appeared none the worse for wear. A gallon sized tub of chocolate pudding sat on a tray before him and a television show, something of a cross between a sentai series and a cooking program, buzzed in the wall mounted set. Nodoka, her eyes red rimmed and her fists clenched, sat in a chair next to his bed.
An awkward silence hung in the air for but a few moments, before Ranma asked,"So, pop, how're they hanging?" He hadn't even thought about the question before asking it, and only after it'd came out of his outh did he realize just what he'd said. Ranma's eyes widened and he took in the stunned looks on all the faces around him.
Genma, suprisingly, flushed brightly and buried his head in the tup of pudding, his spoon becoming a blur of motion as it shovelled the dessert into the man's mouth at almost hypersonic speeds.
Eyes darting from one person to another, Ranma began to apologize, but instead said,"How does it feel to be a half man?" He chuckled once, caught himself, then slammed his hands down over his mouth and prayed to survive the next few minutes.
Nabiki, silent until now, snickered cruelly. It set of a chain reaction within the room. Genma, Soun, and Nodoka began to wail, all lamenting Genma's lost equipment. Nabiki went into a full blown laugh, and the remaining Tendo sisters looked over their family and friends in shocked disbelief. Akane even felt sorry for Genma, since she too had been humiliated by that damned sword. She felt immense gratitude that it had only disrobed her.
Ranma fled, confused his verbal slips and unable to really be upset at himself over them.
****
Roof top to roof top, Ranma vaulted, blanking his mind and expending all his efforts on pure speed. If someone had looked out their office window at the proper time, they would have seen a red and black blur bouncing from skyscraper to skyscraper, sometimes going almost into freefall, only to catch itself on a jutting transmission antenna or flag pole. Exhiliration, sheer freedom, this was what Ranma craved, not a life bound by chains of duty, both to his overbearing and eccentric parents, and to a wife he didn't care for, much less want to be around.
And now, as if his life wasn't complicated enough as it was, with all the fiances and rivals, the countless kidnappings and pervert attacks, Ranma had been charged with driving off or destroying an enemy he couldn't fight, and it was all because he'd played the hero, the knight protector who placed the safety of others above that of himself. Expected behavior, he'd thrown himself into the task, although he silently railed against those who would bridle him with yet another responsibility.
Far below, beyond Ranma's care or notice, a swirling cloud of fire and brimstone appeared in the middle of a busy intersection. A few moments more and Ranma would have been out of auditory range, but he wasn't, so he heard the screeching concussion of cars slamming into one another. A reverse somersault off of a realtively small thirty story building brought Ranma to a perch where he could observe the unusual accident. At first he assumed the cloud of fire to be a burning car, but that assumption rapidly changed as dozens of red-furred things began to leap from the eddying portal to Hell.
Small and red was about all Ranma could see from such a distance, but he knew something was up by the simple fact that animals don't jump out of a fireball without being on fire, and they most certainly didn't eat cars like these were beginning to do.
Demons? Well, if they were demons, they were kinda wimpy looking to be demons, but Ranma didn't particularly care. A fight without neccessity, a challenge that he could choose to accept or ignore as he saw fit, that's what had just presented itself. No one appearred to be in any danger, as the demons happily munched away on the totalled remains of several vehicles while ignoring their fleeing passengers. A broad grin spread itself accross Ranma's face and he dived head first towards the demon infested street.
****
Elmo surveyed his horde as it fed. They weren't much, not as long as they were so soft and cuddly, but that would soon change. The combination of fear from their entrance and metal from their meal would reinforce their plush bodies and fuel their infernal powers. Already Elmo was seeing the changes in a few of his servitors. They no longer moved quiet as jerkily and one or two were even showing signs of an actual internal skeleton. Within his firey refuge, Elmo sensed an enormous presence nearing, mothing like that of his Lord and Master, but stronger than anything it'd ever felt on this plane.
From the sky fell a gowing figure, wreathed in blue flames that filled the air with the crackling of pent up energy and brought the smell of ozone to any near enough to see the figure, a teenage boy crash feet first into the pavement. The asphault crumpled under the force of the landing, a shallow but wide crater forming beneath the boy with fine cracks radiating outward over a dozen meters. Elmo watched, not quite in fear, as the boy stood, coming out of a one kneed kneeling position with frightening grace that set tiny streamers of blue flame spinning slowly into the air.
****
Ranma didn't see the tiny figure hidden within the flaming rupture in the fabric of space, but he did note the the fire had no visible source and didn't even touch the bubbling asphault beneath it. Up close, the litte red demons were actually pretty cute, Ranma mused, though the concept of a 'cute' demon had never occured to him. When they turned to hiss at him and bared row upon row of razor-like metal fangs, Ranma decided to handle the situation a bit more seriously.
"All right, ya little furballs, time to go back to Hell." Ranma stated menacingly. The cute little things hissed again, then began to giggle in unison, their tiny little frames shaking merrily. Only then did Ranma realize the true evil that these hellspawned monstrosities embodied. The sonic barrage introduced all kinds of cute and cuddly thoughts into his mind, even going so far as to want a little red-furred demon of his own to hold and snuggle up to whenever the urge took him.
Ranma shook his head and growled at the horde that by now surrounded him. The intensity of his battle aura subconsciously increased and small pebbles, shards of glass, and other debris in the desserted intersection began to slowly skid away from him, pushed away by the force of his will. Despite their numbers and cuteness, they were no match for Ranma, and he knew it as soon as one of them attacked, baring fangs that dripped motor oil and claws that still had pieces of upholstery stuck to them. It was slow and uncoordinated, and Ranma batted the suprisingly soft creature out of the air and into a nearby building where it hit the wall and exploded into a cloud of white fiber stuffing and a few bits of red fur.
Ranma only had a moment to contemplate the existance of stuffed demons before the slain demon's bretheren attempted to dog pile him. Those that didn't burst into flame upon nearing Ranma found themselves the target of almost lazy punches and kicks that tore them into chunks of useless wads of cloth and polyester. A few of them who had managed to ingest a significant amount of automobile and suprised Ranma when it took a whopping two hits to finish them.
****
Elmo saw red, well he always saw red, but this time he 'really' saw red. The boy who so callously destroyed his creations became a figure composed of varying shades of red and pink and the raging aura that surrounded him looked much smaller and less threatening as noting more than a distortion in the pink tinged air. With a cry of rage and hate, Elmo exploded from the flames, inadvertently closing the gateway behind him and cutting off his only escape route. He roared a squeaky kind of roar and called on his infernal power, so much so that by the time the boy saw him he was no longer a knee high child's play thing, but a fifteen foot high, spike covered horror from the pits of Hell. Smokey trails of dark energy flowed from his decimated likenesses like streamers of smoke and he gathered them lovingly into his taloned paws.
The human would pay, pay with its life and soul.
****
'That' sure as freaking Hell wasn't cute or cuddly. Ranma tilted his head back so he could get a better view of his newest victim. He didn't see or sense the sword that hovered around him protectively on the Astral Plane, not in its split form as two, more slender blades.
It kinda resembled the stuffed demons, sorta like how a salamander has the same basic shape as a crocodile. Ranma winced as it threw its head backed and roared, a sound that was just as squeaky as it had been when he'd first heard the sound that had drawn his attention. Ranma couldn't help himself, and chuckled a few times. Enormous monsters weren't supposed to sound like mice, it was some kind of unspoken rule, at least that's what Ranma's experience had led him to belive.
Ranma leapt aside as a bolt of black lightning issued forth from the monster's gaping maw, then dived behind an overturned and partially eaten car as the lightning was followed by a spray of acid. It wanted to play that game, did it? Well, Ranma could play just as good as any two-bit demon. He kicked into the air as another bolt of black lightning flew from the demon's mouth, this time igniting the car's fuel tank and causing a massive fireball to billow high into the air, almost enveloping Ranma. Even as the thick black smoke swallowed him, the light of his chi aura grew in intensity, causing the cloud of smoke to glowazure from within.
"Moko takabisha!!!" Ranma shouted, blasting away the obscuring smoke with his aura and taking aim on the stupidly staring demon below.
The lance of energy slammed into the demon, knocking it to the ground and pinning it there as the beam continued to hammer into it. Ranma, held aloft by the recoil of his attack, continued to pour power into the beam, watching in satisfaction as red fur and black spikes alike burned away under the unrelenting energy. Only when he sensed that his attack had burrowed through the demon and into the street beheath it did Ranma cut power to it. By now he was a block and a half away, propelled by the force his chi, and even from that distance he, he could see the demon stand, staggering as it did, and clutching at the gaping hole in its torso that dripped green and purple ichor as well as copious amounts of black energy that drifted away on an errant breeze.
Slightly winded by the effort of maintaining his moko takabisha for so long, Ranma ran down the street, unaware of the hundreds of people who stood as far back from the fight as possible while still being able to view it, and the pair of helicopters that circled over the scene in precise patterns as their mounted cameras captured the struggle for the viewers at home.
****
"It's all right, Genma old friend," Soun assured the man tearfully. "I've read all about it in those magazines outside. You can get a fake one that will look and feel just like the real thing, isn't that great?"
Genma shook his head mournfully and looked down at his numbed crotch. Ranma was right, he was a half man, no matter what the doctors or psychiatrists insisted. And all this time he'd made fun of his son about his curse. The heavily medicated man felt like the proverbial pile of shit. He'd lost a ball, but his son regularly lost his manhood. How did the boy handle it without going insane?
"Cheer up, Uncle Saotome," Nabiki volunteered helpfully. "If the prosthetics don't work out, you can always get a transplant. I hear that scientists are making discoveries almost daily in transferring pig organs to human patients." The statement had the desired effect, and Genma broke down crying once again.
"Hey, everyone, look!" Akane exclaimed. In her hand was the remote to the television and she was pointing at the set with an emphatically jabbing finger. "Is that Ranma?"
The picture on the screen was an overhead view of Ranma trading blows with a really big, really ugly monster. It had a large smoking whole in its chest and one of its arms had been torn off at the shoulder, but it showed no signs of slowing down. Ranma's shirt was ripped badly and hung in tatters from a single remaining tie. The lack of a shirt revealed a long bloody gash across Ranma's back, but he ignored it just as his opponent ignored its own, more serious wounds.
Kasumi shrieked as the monster lunged its remaining arm for Ranma, covering her face and looking away. She missed seeing Ranma dodge the attack, stomp on the exposed arm with a foot that blurred into invisibility, then finally leap up to catch the monster in one of its eyes with a knife hand jab that popped the orb like an overripe melon.
Akane gagged at the site, but couldn't peal her eyes away from the spectacle. The monster threw its head from side to side, squeaking pathetically as it tried to cover the ruined eye with an equally ruined arm. Since the view was momentarily zoomed in much closer to the monster so everyone could see its horrendous injuries, no one saw Ranma actually launch a moko takabisha, but they saw it connect, taking the monster in the knee and rapidly burning through armor plating, sinew, and bone, turning the limb into a charred off stump.
It collapsed to the asphault, unable to stay upright. The camera zoomed back out to get a better view of the fire and lightning scarred, cratered battle field. Ranma had his hands raised into the air and his head thrown back as he yelled a primal shout of victory over his enemy. Everyone watched, even Kasumi, as the monster began to unravel, turning into thick bands of black smoke that writhed like disembodied tentacles.
****
Ranma breathed deeply, savoring the smell of molten asphault and grilled demon. His whole body ached and the cut across his back throbbed painfully, but that didn't matter. He'd fought and won, fought a battle for the simple joy of fighting, the thrill of crushing ones enemy into nothing. He walked slowly to his dying foe, gritting his teeth and resisting the urge to limp as he further strained a pulled groin muscle.
A black rope of energy lashed at him, but it fizzled out of existance as it came in contact with his much diminished but still powerful battle aura. He wanted to look it in the eyes, eye, whatever, and let it know its death at his hands. Ranma never got quite close enough to do that, though, because the demon chose then to explode in a very messy and very destructive ball of black fire.
Ranma's eyes widened in suprise and shock, and he reflexively crossed his arms in front of his chest. He didn't even have time to hope to survive.
****
Kasumi wasn't the only person to shriek as Ranma was enveloped in the massive ball of supernatural fire that topped some of the nearby buildings in size. The helicopter that captured these images had to veer away hard, or be caught in the fire and the wicked thermals it would create. Nodoka and Kasumi sobbed at the apparent death of Ranma, while Soun and Genma lost consciousness, and Nabiki and Akane stared in open mouthed shock.
When the news chopper managed to get itself stable once again, and the cameras were able to refocus on the raging inferno that was liquifying the glass windows of nearby buildings, Nodoka, too, fainted. The fire burned unabated for several minutes, then, without warning, disappeared entirely. In its wake was a molten see of asphault and concrete, brightly glowing puddles that had once been automobiles, and slumping facades of business that flowed slowly towards the devastated street in sheets of intermingled glass and steel. And directly in the center of it all, on a small island of intact pavement, stood Ranma.
A few feet to his right and left floated a matched pair of swords, each one visibly gathering Ranma's battle aura and redirecting it into a hazy, glass-like barrier that had protected the martial artist from a certain and painful death.
****
Ranma recognized the sword he had up until then never seen, or swords in this case, though it wasn't hard to discern that they had somehow split into two blades. Suprised and happy to be alive as he was, he was even more stunned by the swords. Why had it/they saved him, especially after what it had done to others? He could feel his chi being gently drained, but didn't fight the effect, for he saw and understood the sword's purpose in doing so, as it formed his energies into a shield in a fashion he doubted he'd ever be able to duplicate.
The air within his little sanctuary was becoming thin and wouldn't support him much longer. He looked around, seeing that there would be no convenient jump points or spring boards to use. If he wanted to make it to safety, he would have to do it in a single bound. Taking several deep breaths, Ranma reached out for the swords, grasping one smooth bone hilt tightly in each hand and gathering as much of his energy as he could for the attempt. A moment later the shield died away and he was assualted by near scorching temperatures and fumes that would have seared his lungs if he had breathed them in.
He jumped, a single powerful lunge upward and outward that caused the muscles in his strained legs to scream. Ranma hadn't even reached the zenith of his attempt when he knew he would fall well short of the solid pavement. What a way to die, just when he had done something for himself and regained something he never knew he'd lost.
The tug was barely noticeable, and then Ranma was surrounded by silver mists that felt cool on his bruised skin and tingled soothingly across his battered body. The swords vibrated in his hands and he looked at them in something akin to awe, for here, in these silver mists, the swords were not swords at all, but glowing beams of light that merged seemlessly with his aura and intertwined irrevocably with his being. It was as if the swords, or whatever they truly were, were nothing but an extension of himself.
Ranma gulped as the implications of what that meant became clear, and the acts that they'd commmitted over the past few days returned to his mind with fresh clarity. And those thoughts were swept away as another tug came and Ranma found himself standing near the edge of the still bubbling asphault lake that had been the site of his recent battle. His wounds didn't pain him nearly so much as only moments before, and he could see scrapes and bruises on the back of his arms that looked as if they lad days to heal.
****
Author's Notes- Finally got another chapter out of this, and now I think I'm back to writing regularly again. Yay! Ranma's got his swords now, so what's he gonna do with them and how are people going to react to him now that they've seen him in action with and without the swords, especially Genma? Speaking of Genma, I may have been a little harsh on him, but throwing a child into a pit of starving cats strikes me as kinda harsh, too, ya know? Oh yeah, only having one nut isn't a bad thing, I knew a guy back in middle school who had to have one removed because of a really really unlucky basketball accident, and he never had any trouble with his lack of a matched set. I just can't see Genma, everyone's manly man *snicker* handling the situation all that well. C&C welcome at dark_phoneix@hotmail.com