Galaxy Police Cadet Scramble
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Chapter 4
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Ranma had incorrectly assumed that when they'd escaped from Galus' spaceship, they would be arriving at the Galaxy Police academy within hours. He assumed he'd be able to straighten out the misunderstanding and be back at the Tendo dojo in time for breakfast the next morning.
Such was not, in fact, the case. In the hours they'd spent in the slaver's brig, Galus and his subordinates had apparently been busy salvaging parts from Miz's ship to repair their own. Normally this wouldn't have been cause for concern save for one thing: While they had left the hyperspace engine intact, they'd not had the same courtesy regarding the hyperspace navigational computer.
Thus, the moment they'd performed a blind jump to escape from the pirates and gain the breathing room they needed to calculate a route to the Galaxy Police headquarters, they'd become irrevocably lost. While Miz could have navigated manually from where they'd been ambushed, the same could not be said given their current location.
The water-user had reluctantly told Ranma that she had no idea where in the galaxy they were. For all she knew, the Galaxy Police could be a few days of travel at regular speed or halfway across the galaxy. Worse yet, the EMP blast which had disabled the A.I. had also irrevocably fried their communications system. They had no way of calling for help.
Right now, their only hope was for Miz to repair the A.I. core enough so that it could reference the relative position of the stars around them to provide the older woman with a rough estimate of where they were. That would enable her to manually plot a hyperspace jump. It was that or jump randomly, a tactic Miz felt was at best reserved for a last resort without their navigational computer online.
"Would you please you pass me the magwrench?" Miz called from where she was buried elbow deep in one of the cockpit's control panels. Beside her, Ranma turned his blank stare from where she lay on the ground to the interior of her toolbox. When his gaze turned back to her, she sighed. "The one with the red handle."
Handing her the tool, he noted Miz's annoyed look.
"Look, you can't really help me. Would you perhaps check on Princess Fatora? I'm beginning to get worried about her. She should have woken up by now," Miz muttered, her gaze turning back to the underside of the console. She delicately lifted the magwrench inside to some component unseen to her pigtailed observer.
"Sure. It's not like I got anything better to do," Ranma muttered to himself, standing.
After checking the sleeping quarters and finding the princess still asleep, Ranma casually sniffed under his arm. Yep. Time for a shower. He entered the bathroom and found a spare set of the nanite clothing. After fiddling around with it a bit, he discovered how to change the size.
He stepped into the shower stall and turned the knob for hot water. He yelped as cold water blasted him mercilessly, switching his gender. Try as she might, nothing would increase the temperature of the water. With a shrug, the pigtailed girl quickly showered. Miz would be able to switch her back afterwards. After drying off, the redhead donned the clean clothing and left the bathroom.
"Hey Miz, what's the deal with this shower? Why isn't there any warm water?" Ranma demanded, annoyed.
"Sorry, Ranma... The EMP blast knocked a lot of systems off line," Miz said, not turning her head towards Ranma, focused on her work. "I guess it got the water heater as well. Frankly, we're lucky the engines were working when we boarded the ship."
"Oh. So, do you think I could get a splash of hot water?" Ranma asked, quietly.
"Sorry, I can't make warm water without my lamp, and it's in the bedroom. If you get it, I'll change you back," Miz offered, ratcheting her arm. Several pops from inside the console caused her to smile.
Ranma wordlessly entered the bedroom again, noting that the princess was now stirring. She knelt by the brunette, casually shaking her shoulder.
"Hey, you alright?" Ranma asked quietly, concerned. Whatever that trick she'd done with the lockout on Galus' ship had looked pretty draining... and the girl hadn't been in good shape to begin with.
Fatora's eyes slowly opened, then focused on the martial artist.
Then the girl grinned. Ranma felt something deep within his soul tremble at the sight: A small, plump herbivore under scrutiny by something with large jaws and a voracious appetite. Like a predator the girl lunged and Ranma found herself being kissed. Soft lips pressed against her own as the girl's light body tackled her to the floor.
It was actually kind of pleasant. Then a probing hand found it's way into the pigtailed girl's pants and Ranma remembered she was a girl. The redhead yelled in surprise.
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"Gwaah! What the hell!?"
Miz's head smacked sharply against the edge of the console at the yell, and she quickly slid out from under her work, sitting up and rubbing her head. Hearing more commotion drift in from the bedroom, she rushed to the door and opened it.
Fatora lay straddled against Ranma's female form, pinning the girl to the deck. Helpless blue eyes looked up. "Miz, help!"
Miz laughed at the panic, quickly grabbing her lamp from on top of her bookshelf and channeling a bit of hot water onto Ranma. The change was immediate, and if she remembered correctly, would certainly resolve the problem the boy was having with Fatora.
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The change was subtle, and Fatora was at first too caught up in nibbling the beautiful redhead's ears and kissing her to notice. Then little things started to drift into her consciousness.
That lovely soft chest which had supported her own was now flat, more broad and decidedly unsoft. The feel of the lips beneath her own was different, less full. She opened her eyes and found they'd changed, the cheekbones shifting higher and the shape altering subtlely to become comprised of sharper planes. Black bangs had replaced red... In fact, only the eyes were the same.
And... Her hand was now full. The fact seemed incongruous with what she'd felt just a moment ago. She remained confused until a horrible thought occurred to her.
She squeezed.
Yep.
It was.
This time it was the Roshtarian Princess who screamed.
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"Unclean... My hand is unclean, now," Fatora moaned, having leaped away from Ranma with all the speed she'd possessed. Ranma shot her a glare, shifting his pants. She returned it with interest, growling, "You've sullied my purity!!"
"Who's sullied who!?" The pigtailed fighter demanded in response, standing. He crossed his arms. "I didn't do anything but get ambushed! You're the one to blame, here!"
"It's not MY fault!" The girl snapped, staring at her hand as if to scorch the skin from her bones. Volatile eyes turned slowly to meet Ranma's. "I thought you were a girl! Why would I want anything to do with a boy!?"
"What's wrong with guys?" Ranma muttered angrily, sitting down on his bed.
"You're all nasty, oafish, pigheaded... and you're just so gross! All muscles and bone, no softness to you whatsoever!" The girl turned her gaze to Miz and grinned. "Now that's what beauty looks like."
"Hey, men ain't ugly!" Ranma sputtered in protest, pointing a finger at her while Miz took a not-so-casual step away from easy grabbing range of the brunette.
"Oh yeah? Well if you like men so much, why did you kiss back? Even you'll admit that girls are better than boys!" The princess crowed.
"It's not even remotely the same thing," Ranma said with a deep scowl. "Guys like girls and girls like guys. That's just how it us!"
"Not for this girl," Fatora chuckled. She turned her attention to the purple-haired detective. "Speaking of which, why are you so shy, officer? I'd like to thank you personally for the rescue. Who knows what those awful men would have done to me..."
"Your thanks are enough," Miz coughed, taking another step back. She pointedly looked away from Ranma. "I should get back to work."
With that, she quickly exited the room, leaving Fatora to glare at Ranma. After a moment of returning the glare, Ranma decided that the best tactic for dealing with the excitable girl would be to fall back on the tried and true.
"You're just jealous," Ranma informed her with a smug grin.
"Excuse me?" Fatora retorted, crossing her arms. She seemed to flinch a moment later, carefully removing her "soiled" hand and holding it away from herself with a shudder. Her eyes narrowed at the young man. "Are you going to explain that?"
"Well, it's obvious why you like girls," Ranma told her, leaning back casually. "I mean, I'm a guy and I'm more feminine than you are. Compared to me, what man would want you? It's just a lack of options, I say."
"I'll have you know I've had hundreds of men come to my planet, begging for the chance to court me!" Fatora snapped, leaning forward. "How does that make you feel, smartass!?"
"Sorry for whichever poor bastard doesn't have the smarts to run away after meeting you," Ranma replied quickly, chuckling at the enraged look on her face. "So is the doomed man finally gonna be chosen by drawing a short straw or is it whoever's too slow to outrun your guards?"
"Just what are you implying?" Fatora demanded, taking a step closer.
"Imply nothing, I'll tell you flat out!" Ranma snapped, sitting forward. Their faces were inches away from one another and the way the Roshtarian princess' eyes were twitching was too perfect. She'd just need one more nudge. "You couldn't catch a man with a cage and instructions! That's why you have to stick with women... and you're not even successful at getting them!"
"Die!" Fatora growled, launching herself at Ranma once more. There was no lust in her eyes this time, though they still shone with a predatory gleam.
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Miz hummed to herself as she worked on the A.I. A twist here, replacing a crystal module there, all that she needed to do to get the poor thing back online again. She ignored the sounds of struggle from her sleeping quarters with ease, content to let Ranma deal with the irate girl instead of having to deal with the girl's obvious lust herself.
She'd just fixed internal communications when she noticed the lack of a commotion. The sudden silence was unnerving enough the Miz slid out from the console a moment to glance speculatively at the door separating the bridge from the bedroom. She was in no way opposed to leaving the two of them to sort out their problems... especially when it meant lessening her own. However, she was essentially responsible for them both and if anything bad happened, the responsibility fell to her.
"Oh please! If I bothered to date you, you'd never look back!" Ranma's voice was mostly muffled by the doorway, but perfectly understandable.
"I wouldn't enjoy a date with you even if you had a Y chromosome!" Fatora's return snarl was a little harder to understand, but understand it Miz did. Rather than strain her ears, the purple-haired lady opened a link between the bridge and the sleeping quarters.
"Put your money where you mouth is, then!" Her pigtailed cadet's retort was officially making her sorry she could hear the conversation. She felt the beginnings of a headache forming. One part of her wanted to storm in and remind the boy that he was dealing with royalty. The other part, the part that liked having a career with a future, wanted nothing to do with getting involved with this mess.
"Fine! After you fail to show me a good time, you have to swear to be my servant!" Fatora's voice managed to sound triumphant and angry at the same time, something the detective felt was rather impressive.
"Fine! When you admit you've been wrong about men this entire time and find out just what you've been missing, you get to be MY servant!" The pigtailed headache sounded insufferably smug.
"Deal!"
Rather than listen to anything more, Miz thumbed the internal communications offline. Then she realized she wouldn't really have to use the bathroom for a while and would rather prefer not to have to deal with either of the petty teenagers in the next room, and so engaged the lock.
Two hours later, her A.I. Makoto was up and running and she'd plotted a course to the Galaxy Police academy. Nothing, not the largest pirate fleet, nor Lady Seto herself, could stop her from delivering the pair into hands other than her own.
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Appendix:
Roshtarian Political Marriages: Regardless of their feelings on the matter, Roshtarian nobility are expected to produce at least one heir to the throne if they are within the direct line of succession. Though they need not limit their liaisons to their political spouse, they are expected to become intimately involved with them. In the past, drastic actions have been taken to ensure the birth of an heir when it seemed the natural flow of events would cause the end of the Roshtarian royal line.
Author's Notes:
Go ahead and say "Fatora retorted" out loud three times. I dare you. Oh, and Makoto won't be showing up, obviously. I felt bad about cutting him out entirely, so he gets a cameo as Miz's A.I. Sorry to any of his fans, but I had to hijack SOMEONE'S harem.
If anyone thinks Ranma's reaction to Fatora's sexuality is out of character, I'll refer you to his reaction to Tsubasa. He isn't the most politically correct individual when it comes to gender and sexuality.
I didn't even realize the fun I could have with Fatora and Ranma until I started writing this chapter. Then... Then I couldn't help myself. Expect Fatora to stay around for a while. She's just too much fun to write... though she'll be difficult. Nobody challenges her the way Ranma would. I'm essentially going to have to start making assumptions and bridging gaps.
-Gaming Ikari