MAGICAL GUARDIAN RANMA!

PREREADING AND EDITING ASSISTANCE BY:

Howard Melton,

Lord Talon,

Nevermore,

And some guy named Steve.

DISCLAIMER: 'Ranma ½' and all characters therein belong to Rumiko Takahashi, Shogagukan, Kitty, and Viz Video. This fanfict has been produced for my own enjoyment and to pass on without profit. Other characters that come into play in this fanfict may or may not be pulled from other sources (including other fanficts, RPGs, manga, anime, literature, or possibly even GASP American comic books!).

CHAPTER SIX:

R'hul kicked back and sucked on a bottle of ketchup as its impromptu Godzilla marathon continued into the next morning. From the first one done in a monochromatic medium of black, white, and grey, through to the colorful smash-fests of the current day, R'hull was enjoying every moment of them all. Alien and its sequil, Aliens, had been enlightening and amusing. Enlightening in that humans had thought of something capable of scaring it on first sight, but amusing from that point on as the terror of the ever diminishing human casts mounted. The Amityville Horror had been nice too.

R'hul supposed there was nothing keeping it from starting in on its lead minion's anime collection. Well, other than sheer amusement over the boy's impatience to watch the hentai selection he had acquired without his parent's knowledge. More giant monster movies it was then!

O O O

Akane rose with the sun, stretching her arms wide as she sat up and yawned. Blinking a few times, she shook her head and tried to make sense of her early morning thoughts.

"Weird dream," Akane giggled. "Me and Nabiki part of a Bishojo Senshi team of magical girls! And those costumes!" She giggled some more at the dream-like memories of the previous day. She was positive that if it hadn't been a dream she would have died from embarrassment walking around in front of her family wearing something that fit like it was painted on, let alone a complete stranger. It had felt so liberating though, that she almost wished that she could wear something like that in real life if she could feel that way while doing it. "Wait till I tell Nabiki!"

And then her eyes grew wide as she noticed the burn mark on her floor from where she remembered tossing an orange halter top the night before...

O O O

Nabiki slept on, quite comfortably snuggled in her bed, oblivious to the early morning world as it woke up around her. Ranma's sapphire token lay on her desk, where she had set it the night before...

O O O

Kasumi appreciated the help that the Saotomes where giving her this morning. Between the fire damage and the water run-off from what was once several impressive ice sculptures, the family room was a mess. Genma had moved the contents of the room out into the yard, where he was sorting them by level of recoverability. Ranma was inspecting the damage, noting which seemed to be caused by what, and apparently trying to come up with a way to reverse what his two new charges had accidentally done.

"I don't know, Pop," the largish blue furred kangaroo rat tilted his head to one side as he looked over the ruined television set. "I know, please don't ask me how I know, I just do. Anyway, I know that what Akane had managed to do was trigger the quick and dirty version of her transformation. Fast, damn hard to interupt, and completely destructive. It's meant for situations where she'd already be in combat or if she had been captured or restrained somehow. All of the elements have a transformation setting like that."

"So what seems to be the problem, Son?" Genma asked as he sorted some fire damaged decorations from the water damaged ones. "Just get Akane to use the other setting. Her transformation sequence should then be similar to those of Nabiki and Shampoo, only with fire instead of water or earth."

"Yeah, that would be the idea," Ranma agreed. "Unfortunately, I have no idea how she triggered that setting to begin with. I'll need to have the girls power up and down a few times and then try to compare notes or something."

"That would seem to make sense," Genma nodded. "I'd recommend getting them to pack several sets of old clothes that they don't wear anymore, and then finding some place secluded and just have them transform over and over again like a regular drill. Both ways, if they can figure it out. I take it from the three armed kimono that Nabiki doesn't have a complete handle on returning to normal yet?"

Ranma blushed at the memory of the two girls powering down for the first time. Akane's power had flickerd and then guttered out suddenly, leaving her not only topless, but completely naked. A fact that had surprised no one, really, other than Akane herself. And she hadn't noticed right away either, although seeing her sister's transformation error had prompted her to check.

Nabiki's own power seemed to drain away as her odd hair and eye coloration reverted to normal, with her costume dispersing as a fine mist. Moments later, her kimono had reformed out of this same mist, only with make-up stains and a third arm from what was presumably the section of Akane's attire that had gotten caught up in things. Even her bra had acquired an extra cup, which would probably have been uncomfortable had any of it actually appeared on Nabiki. Which it hadn't.

Instead, Nabiki's original attire reformed as a scattered pile of clothes in roughly the area she was in, give or take the radius of a ten foot dome centered on the now normal girl, leaving her naked as well.

Akane had aquired the most interesting full body flush, while Nabiki's left eye twitched for a few moments. Then both girls had decided to head for bed, Akane's hasty retreat contrasting sharply with Nabiki forced 'casual' pace as the elder sister attempted to retain some dignity as she returned to her own room.

A little later Nabiki had come back, dressed in green pajamas. Picking up the still dazed guardian beast, she brought him into the house and gave Ranma to his father...

O O O

Shan Pu made good time during the night. As she had guessed, her Earth Warrior form was revitalized nearly continuously while in contact with the ground, which meant that she could cover vast distances in a relatively short amount of time simply because she didn't have to pause for rest breaks. She could get tired by jogging or running, as the canter of those paces caused a person's entire body to leave the ground for brief moments, but a good brisk march had kept at least one part of her body in direct contact with the ground at all times.

Shan Pu's pack, which had been ready to go for several weeks now, was easily ten times as massive as she could have previously carried. Perhaps unsurprisingly, most of the additional weight was comprised of various stones. Nice, simple, and direct, being able to attack at range with flying rocks was quite fun, and presumably useful for staying out of reach of those demons that she'd rather not touch.

For a moment she reflected on the strange war garb she wore in her role as a Warrior of Earth, as well as the other changes inherent with her powered up state. The costume itself was colored in earth tones, with some turquoise highlights. Sturdy boots and gloves were reinforced with, of all things, jade and granite, and were surprisingly comfortable despite their clunky and rigid appearance. The pants were short, ending halfway down her thighs, and the shirt was also a sleeveless, abbreviated affair that left her midriff bare. Both articles had raised trim and decorative designs that looked and felt like immovable stone but moved and flexed as easily as the rest of the material it was a part of, which differed from body paint only in that she could remove it like normal clothes. Granted, it would turn to sand when it left contact with her, but she just took that as more proof of its magical nature. Shan Pu's skin was currently a deep nut tan and her hair and eyes had both become a rich deep brown that most in the village likened to chocolate and one jealous warrior had called mud.

Once.

No one in the village had felt particularly inclined to make that mistake within the range of Shan Pu's hearing again, although some took Genma's theft of his son's token shortly thereafter as a sign that Shan Pu had lost the favored Champion position.

Utter nonsense. Shan Pu would show them all by finding Ranma and then leading whatever team of outsider women to victory over the coming demon invasion! The strength of the Earth Warrior was not to be taken lightly!

Emphasizing her thoughts, Shampoo hammered a tree with her fist as she marched briskly past it, only to be surprised at the loud crack and then crashing of the tree as it fell over and nearly landed on her!

Checking her bearings, the young Nichieju determined that the sapphire token that contained her errant guardian beast was still far to the east, towards the rising sun...

O O O

"So, where are we going again?" Nabiki asked her younger sister, who had taken the lead once they left the house. Both girls were dressed, as instructed by Ranma, in old clothes and were bringing along a few sets of replacements in small back packs, along with a bento Kasumi had prepared for each of them, and some extra money if they ran late and wanted to get something to eat on the way home. Ranma rode on Nabiki's shoulders in much the same way she had seen the neighbor's cat, Hinakyo, do with his owners from time to time.

Funny how Ranma had stiffened up like that when she had commented on that fact. But then she supposed that he would be uncomfortable arround cats now that he was a kangaroo rat, however large and blue he may be.

"There's a gravel storage lot on the edge of Nerima that Public Works uses." Akane explained. "There shouldn't be anyone there on a sunday, and there isn't much we could do to hurt gravel, is there?"

"That seems reasonable," Ranma agreed. Nabiki nodded as well.

The two sisters continued walking, occasionally being greeted by someone that knew one or both of them. Most passersby assumed that the fuzzy blue creature on the one girls shoulder was either a toy or an exotic pet, while the rest didn't seem to know what to make of Ranma and thus either stared at him or ignored him completely.

"So, Ranma," Nabiki asked after they had walked a considerable distance, glad that she had decided to exercise to keep her figure. "Tell us about Shampoo. You said that she was able to draw Earth powers from your token?"

"There's really not all that much to say," Ranma said. "She kept me in my token most of the time, so I didn't get to see her practice her powers other than on a few occasions."

"When can we expect to meet her?" Akane asked curiously, wondering what the only other team member so far was like.

"At the rate she's coming, I'd say in a few weeks at most," the blue furred kangaroo rat responded. "She's been powered up since yesterday evening and seems to be recharging herself by staying in contact with the ground."

"So we can recharge ourselves with our elements?" Nabiki asked. "That's good to know."

"Somewhat," Ranma nodded. "I think there are limits, but I'm not sure what they are yet."

The girls thought about this and other things for a while.

O O O

R'hul decided to take a break from the monster movie marathon and was currently examining itself in the bathroom mirror, pondering how best to disguise itself. It's build was already mostly male, although R'hul was actually genderless. It wasn't even very important, merely being an advanced scout picked from its creche to poke around and get things started on this end. If it failed, another would be sent in its place easily enough.

Sighing, R'hul decided that it had better show some initiative and actually do something for the cause if it wanted to be advanced to the next level. Its minions had been spreading their tag, so perhaps it was time to send one along to activate one. Preferably one of the ones farther away from its current domicile.

With the impulse sent to a random minion, R'hul turned its attention fully towards properly transforming itself...

O O O

Genma approached the door with no small amount of trepedition in his heart, but his resolve remained strong and he knocked without hesitation. Hearing movement inside, Genma reminded himself that he was doing this for his son. For his family. To make up for the mistakes of his past. No matter the cost to himself, so long as his son was spared further injustice.

He had to do this for Ranma's sake. For his son, he'd have the courage to face the greatest of dangers. And he would brave them alone, bearing the full weight of responsibility so as to spare his son.

The door opened, revealing a woman with chestnut hair and familiar blue eyes.

"Genma?" Nodoka asked. "Is that you?"

"No-chan," Genma began, "I have much to tell you..."

END CHAPTER SIX

OMAKE THEATER PRESENTS: Sucks to be R'hul

R'hul couldn't take it anymore!

It had to end! Where was the controller? How could he turn it off?

This travesty just could not go on any longer!

As R'hul slowly decended into quivering madness, its chief minion came in with some more ketchup for his Master and wondered why R'hul was watching My Neighbor Totoro...