Show Me The Way To Go Home.
A Ranma/The Navy Lark x-over.
Ladies and Gentlemen, we present The Navy Lark, with our three stars Commander Murray, Sub-Lieutenant Phillips, Chief Petty Officer Pertwee, and special guest Ryouga Hibiki.
They say that any armed service is like a family, and like every family has members who they will hide behind the sofa from and pretend they aren't in. In this case the family members in question are the crew of HMS Troutbridge, a frigate who existence is owed solely to the fact that its paperwork fell behind a filing cabinet in 1948 and wasn't found again until the office was renovated sixty years later to make it into a new senior staff's bar. Deciding to put the Troutbridge to good use their Lordships at Admiralty promptly put the biggest load of troublemakers they could find on it and packed them off on a goodwill tour, reasoning that whenever Troutbridge left harbour there was bound to be a sudden upswell of goodwill.
Ryouga Hibiki was not having a good day, not that this was in any way unusual for him. Ryouga seldom had good days; being cursed to turn into a small pig at the slightest splash of cold water tended to do that to a person. Today, however, it was the fact that he hadn't managed to activate his curse that was giving him trouble, and that was unusual. According to his GPS device there should be an abundance of cold water around; he was beginning, he considered, as he slashed his way through lush jungle foliage, to think this might not be Greenland at all. The area was certainly green enough, but he was wondering if polar bears were normally orange-black striped and had long tails.
Yes, Ryouga Hibiki was utterly lost, yet again. Not that this was unusual either, but along with the feeling of being lost there was also something prickling at his danger sense, as if he was being watched. And that was seriously getting on his nerves.
"Ranma, this all your fault!", he shouted to the world.
A few of those strange penguins burst into flight at the sudden noise. They had to be penguins, Ryouga decided, you got them in Greenland he told himself, never being one to give up on an idea once it had jammed itself into his brain. He checked his GPS again to make sure, yep, Greenland. If he had turned it over he would have seen the label reading "Trick your friends, send them anywhere with Boffo Pertwee's Joke GPS kit". All in all, it was rather unfortunate that he hadn't.
Ryouga pulled off one of his bandannas and wiped his brow with it, as he forged his way through the dense arctic jungle.
"Maybe there is something to this Global Warming stuff," he muttered to himself.
Eventually the jungle petered out, and he found himself standing on a cliff top overlooking a peaceful aquamarine sea. A peaceful aquamarine sea that contained an elderly naval vessel. An elderly naval vessel that was just about to ram itself into the cliff Ryouga was standing on. Yes, this was going to be a very bad day indeed.
"Do you know sir, I think that whale I spotted earlier might be lost," the rather foppish-looking blond officer reported to the commander of the vessel.
"Oh and why is that Mister Phillips?", the vessel captain's voice was laden with weariness as he responded.
"Well, according to the sealife section on my navigation charts, the Firth of Clyde is supposed to be a haven for small whales and seals, and I haven't seen another whale for simply ages. Nor any seals, or the Faslane dockyards come to that."
The older man gave a long-suffering sigh and rubbed the bridge of his nose before responding.
"Sub-lieutenant Phillips is it all possible that it isn't the whale that is lost, but us?"
"Can't be sir, I've been following my charts rigorously."
"Yeees," the commander had still to remove his hand from massaging the bridge of his nose, or to open his eyes. "Would you mind awfully just passing your "charts" back here for a bit."
"Certainly sir."
"Mister Phillips, do you think perhaps this isn't an official Royal Navy chart?" This time the voice was laden with sarcasm as well as weariness.
"Oh, it's got to be sir." The was a slight tone of hurt and petulance in Phillips' voice.
There was a long period of uncomfortable silence and the only sound was the rhythmic "clank-clank" of the decrepit engines on the equally decrepit ship.
"Really, since when then do Royal Navy charts have the title "The Observer's Big Book of Scotland"? Where on earth did you get this Mister Phillips?"
"Well, the Chief got it for me if you must know."
"Now we are getting somewhere. Chief…" The Commander turned to the third person on the bridge.
"Now I know what you are thinking Commander Murray, sir, but the original charts got sort of, well, mislaid you might say." The rather hurried explanation was given by a much older man with Chief Petty Officer insignia.
"Mislaid?" Commander Murray repeated. "That wouldn't happen to be mislaid as in stolen and sold on in shady night-time deal would it now Chief?" Murray's tone of voice made it quite clear this wasn't really a question, and CPO Pertwee squirmed a little as he considered how to answer the accusation.
"In your own time Chief."
"Oh do give him a minute, Commander," Phillips chimed in, "it isn't fair to spring a question like that on a chap."
Murray silenced him with a glare.
"Thank you very much Mister Phillips," the Chief said, "and no, I can say with a one hundred percent honest face that I did not steal those charts and flog them in any sort of shady night-time deal. Thankyou Commander Murray sir."
"I assume that means it was in daylight then."
"More sort of twilight," the chief said distractedly.
"Chief!"
"But Commander Murray, sir, what was the use of giving proper charts to Sub-Lieutenant Blond Bonce here. It isn't like he can read them."
"I say Chief, I take exception to that. In navigation school the lecturer said no ever got marks like I had before." Phillips protested hotly.
"Be that as it may Chief," Commander Murray ignored Phillips protesting, "You can't go around selling Royal Navy charts willy-nilly. How much did you get for them?"
"Tenner," Pertwee replied knowing the jig was up. "Donation to ship's benevolent fund as usual then Commander Murray sir?"
"Very well, as usual. I suppose that we should be lucky that is all you sold before we left dock."
"Yes well, we did leave a bit sharpish."
"Sir," Phillips protested, "aren't you going to put the Chief on a charge for insulting my map reading skills? It was jolly rude of him."
'Rude it might have been Mister Phillips, but to be put on a charge it has to be false as well.' Commander Murray replied flatly.
"Oh I say, well in that case I'm turning this ship around and going home. Chief, set half ahead starboard, full ahead port. And left hand down a bit Chief!"
"Commander Murray sir?" CPO Pertwee glanced back from the wheel for confirmation.
"Might as well Chief, if Mister Phillips can find his way back to Portsmouth we can start again and maybe get somewhere."
"Very good sir."
Pertwee began signalling the engine room of the ancient craft and making the required manoeuvres. While he did that Phillips had picked up the book he had been using as a chart again and started giving it a disturbingly serious look, as the ship began to shift under their feet onto a new course with the sound of the waves slapping on the hull shifting in their rythym. Never let it be said that Sub-Lieutenant Phillips was particularly willing to let go of an idea once it got jammed in his head either.
"Mister Phillips,' the commander said, snatching the book out of his hands and flinging it out the window. 'This time use the compass."
"Oh, I couldn't possibly sir," Phillips said brightly.
"And why not?"
"Well, the Chief here had it removed for maintenance."
"Chief?"
"Yessir, donation to the ship's benevolent fund it is sir!"
Murray gave yet another long-suffering sigh.
"Use the GPS then."
"Begging your pardons, Commander, Mister Phillips sirs, can't use that either. We ain't got it installed yet." This time it was the Chief who sounded rather unnecessarily cheerful. "Someone and I shan't name no names, Commander Murray sir, ordered us to put to sea before the lads from shore detachment could get it all hooked up. Said it needed special cables for a museum piece like old Troutbridge here. Can't think why we needed to leave in such a hurry, sir".
This time it was Commander Murray's turn to look a little sheepish.
"Well, my mother-in-law was threatening to make a visit and..."
Fortunately, the bridge crew were spared the embarrassing saga that was Murray's marriage by the urgent "peee-whee" of the ship's intercom.
"Starboard lookout here, Able Seaman Goldstein chatting. I just thought you ought to know, it's been a good few minutes since Mister Phillips gave us "left hand down a bit" and you might want to consider changing course. There is a damn great cliff coming up sharpish and I'm off to put me tin hat on, tatty-bye". The intercom clicked off sharply.
All three men turned to stare out the window at the view they had been distracted from, the open horizon now replaced with a jungle topped cliff. Then Pertwee spoke for all of them.
"Everybody down!"
There was the all too familiar crunch of metal grounding itself.
Somewhere above the cliffs someone or something watched as the shockwave from impact of the ship sent the young man who had been blundering around its jungle all morning tumbling forward. It was mildly surprised to see the youth crash through the metal of the ship's roof, but the surprise was quickly replaced with glee as a plan formed. It was going home, it was going to see its mother again. There were preparations to be made.
On the bridge of the now stricken vessel the three men began picking themselves up. Students of naval history would have been amazed by some of the saltier terms being used by The Chief, but since swearing was generally recognised to mean alive, well, and intending harm, Cmdr. Murray wasn't too concerned. His navigation officer on the other hand was a cause for concern, and not just out of what might happen if The Chief got hold of him. He shook the unconscious young man as hard as he could, hoping for a response.
"Not now pater, bring the butler some rhubarb," Phillips mumbled.
"Chief, get the damn ship's doctor up here now!" Murray barked.
"Ow, I think might have dislocated something that isn't dislocatable; and I can't. We don't got one," Pertwee replied as he rubbed his shoulder.
"We left port without a doctor? There was one on the crew manifest, what happened to him?"
"He got a chitty from the shore doctor excusing him from going to see on account of seasickness. There was a memo sir."
"Ah, I see. Chief you don't happen to have any smelling salts on you by any chance then?"
Before the Chief was able to answer, there was a loud groan followed by a creaking and tearing of steel as something crashed through the ceiling. The Chief and Murray both turned around to see a young Japanese man levering himself out of the person-shaped hole he'd pressed into the deckplates. They took in the similarly person-shaped hole in the ceiling above them and decided not to press the point of his arrival.
Ryouga for his part took in the naval uniforms of his impromptu hosts and their Caucasian features and wondered how he'd managed to get from Greenland to America without having had to pass through Australia first.
"Er, hi there", he said in English while rubbing the back of his head nervously, "is this America?"
Judging by the way the man with the most stripes on his sleeves eye's narrowed, and his indignant spluttering this probably the wrong question. Okay the Japanese youth thought, Caucasian but hates America.
"Francais?"
This appeared to go over less well than the suggestion of American.
"British?"
The eye's remained narrow but the spluttering decreased. The older man drew breath to give some sort of reply. Fortunately Ryouga was spared CPO Pertwee's rant on international relations (and where he could shove them) by another groan from the still semi-conscious Sub Lieutenant Phillips.
"Ooh mater, pass the doughnut, the parson needs a dinghy."
"Oh damn," Cmdr Murray said ignoring their new visitor. "Chief, those smelling salts, quickly."
"I ain't got none sir, and I've had a look in the first aid box and all we've got there is half an elastoplast, and a copy of homeopathy monthly."
"Er, pardon me," Ryouga cut in, "but I think I have something to bring him around."
"Well, do it quickly then man."
Ryouga fumbled through his travelling pack until he found what he was looking for, a small bento box tied with pink ribbon, and then wrapped in chains secured with a huge padlock.
He could feel the accusing glare of the officer and the skeptical expression of the older man burning into the back of his neck as he knelt beside the younger officer. He tried to discount them, since obviously they weren't martial artists, their movements being completely wrong, but naval officers sometimes equalled guns and guns had a horrible way of evening the playing field between martial artists and non-martial artists. In this case Ryouga needn't have worried, no one at admiralty in London was prepared to authorise actual ammunition to the crew of HMS Troutbridge in any circumstances short of outright war, and perhaps not even then.
With the care of a man handling ten tonnes of incredibly unstable nitro-glycerine Ryouga undid the ribbon and chains and, hands only slightly shaking, transferred a small amount of a wobbly green substance onto a pair of chopsticks. For a moment it looked like the green substance was tensing itself to leap but, moving fast, Ryouga jammed it into Phillip's mouth. For a moment nothing happened, but just as both Murray and The Chief opened their mouths to make a smart-aleck sarcastic remark, Phillips shot straight up onto his feet at a speed that made it look like no intervening steps had been involved and bolted for the window.
While the unfortunate sub-lieutenant was feeding the fishes, or possibly causing more ocean pollution than a dozen broken oil-pipes, Murray and Pertwee interrogated Ryouga on the contents of the bento.
"Well," Ryouga replied nervously as he wrestled with the padlock, "Akane said it was chocolate orange cake."
"Hmm, bad cook is she?" said Murray. "I know the feeling, my dear wife makes a date and walnut loaf you could use as housebricks".
Ryouga glared at him with a furious expression.
"How dare you insult Akane's cooking, it is the most delightful food in the world." Ryouga paused for a moment while a number of conflicted emotions played across his face. Denial and self-delusion are powerful things and while Ryouga would never speak ill of Akane's cooking himself, the basic honesty present in his psyche tried to break through and -in vain- face reality. For a moment nothing happened, even the insect sounds that haunted this lush tree-filled desolate arctic tundra seemed to cease. There was only the eerie rustle of leaves in the mangrove swamps (which Ryouga, and Phillips if he ever stopped throwing up, presumed must be filled with polar bears) to break the silence.
"I've just realised I don't know your names," Ryouga said somewhat stiffly.
Murray somewhat warily introduced himself and The Chief and pointed out the still sick Phillips. Ryouga nodded making a note of them.
"I'm Ryouga Hibiki, it is nice to meet you. Now," he bared his teeth displaying the fangs that were a trait of his family, "for the crime of insulting Akane's cooking, Murray, prepare to DIE!"
Ryouga prepared to leap at the three men and defend Akane's honour in his usual violent, but before he could the bento box, which had been bouncing around on the deck, burst open and the chocolate-orange cake attacked.
Ryouga valiantly managed to deflect the first five tentacles, but the sixth managed to get a grip around his head and pull itself onto his face. The teenaged martial artist suddenly found himself recreating a certain scene from Alien and flailed around the bridge trying to prise the murderous confectionery off.
While Ryouga was engaged fighting the ghastly gateaux, Phillips finally stopped throwing up and rejoined reality. Or as close as he ever got to it, at least.
"Oh, I say chaps what is going on? Who is he?" Phillips said; gesturing at Ryouga; who had by this time pinned the psychotic confectionary's centre mass down with his combat umbrella and was trying now to wrangle the tentacles.
"Welcome back Mister Phillips, your standout navigational techniques have once again produced their excellent results."
Phillips preened for a second, "Well, I do try."
"Yeah, very trying," The Chief remarked dryly, "but he means you've cocked it up again. We are aground in the unknown."
"Aaaargh, help me!" Ryouga stumbled back across the bridge, tripping a little as he encountered the impression he'd left in the deck on arrival. The cake had managed to morph two of its tentacles into little hammers and was pounding them into his skull. It probably wouldn't have made Ryouga feel any better to know that this was hurting the cake more than it was hurting him, his skull having become hardened by the various strengthening techniques over the years.
"Oh dear, erm, don't you think we should help?" Phillips asked as cake and martial artist stumbled back again. He grabbed his chart book and managed a half hearted swipe at the fighting pair as teenager and cake hurtled past; the cake having now oozed out from under Ryouga's umbrella and was now latched onto his face like the creature out of Alien.
"Which one?" Murray said, not making a move.
"I give the tentacles odds on chance of winning you know," The Chief put in, from below the chart table he was hiding under.
"Gaaarrrrgh!"
"Now don't be beastly, sir, Chief, we can't let a chap be attacked, by a...by a...a whatever."
'"A chocolate orange cake. Oh, all right Mister Phillips; Chief grab his legs. Mister Phillips try and hold him still and I'll peel the "whatever" off. Ready, go."
To the surprise of many that knew them the Troutbridge team managed to successfully tackle the stricken youth without tripping over each other in the process. With some difficulty Murray managed to get his fingertips under the edge of the sentient cake, and bracing his legs against Ryouga's chest, pulled. With a horrible sickening sucking sound the thing came loose. Not giving it a chance to react he hurled it out of the window as hard as he could. Somewhere in the jungle something shrieked and there was an explosion in the foliage.
"Thanks," Ryouga said gasping to get his breath back.
''Anytime, now are you still determined to kill me Mister Hibiki, or can we discuss this like rational human beings?"
The Chief muttered something that might have been "first time for everything", but Murray chose to ignore him.
"Uh, well," Ryouga rubbed the back of his neck nervously. "I guess I got a little carried away."
In the jungle there was a howl that cut off sharply and another explosion in the undergrowth.
"Yes, quite", now it was Murray's turn to look a little embarrassed. "For reasons that I'd rather not get into," he paused to glare at Pertwee and Phillips, "we appear to be somewhat geographically dislocated. You wouldn't happen to be able to give us our present locale?"
Ryouga's eyes glazed over and he stared at Pertwee and Phillips for a hint as to what Murray had meant.
"We're lost, where are we?" Pertwee supplied.
"Oh, that," the irony of the request completely failed to register on the always lost boy, "I'm pretty sure we're in Greenland."
The three naval officers looked out at the tropical jungle.
"I knew that is where we were, and you chaps just made fun of me." Phillip's said in a hurt tone.
Pertwee and Murray stared at Phillips then at the Ryouga.
"Mister Phillips, your father was never stationed at Japan was he?" CPO Pertwee asked sarcastically.
"Funny you should say that, he did a brief stint there once, but it was ages ago. About seventeen years really, why do you ask?"
Murray shared a meaningful look with the Chief.
"Oh, no reason."
Murray contemplated his situation. They were lost, and aground, which was pretty much par for the course. Really all he could do was wait for high-tide and then try to get the ship off the rocks, then pick a direction and keep going. It usually worked. He could see by the expression on the Chief's face that he was thinking the same.
He had just opened his mouth to give the required orders when a writhing column of tentacles surged through windows.
"It's counter-attacking!" the Chief yelled, "HELP!".
"Steady there chief, use the fire-extinguisher to beat it off" Murray said kicking out at the invading tendrils.
"I don't think this is the cake," Ryouga said, nimbly back flipping out of the way. "This is some sort of vine. I can see leaves on them."
He pulled off several of his bandannas and sent them hurtling through the air like laser guided rockets. Several sections of severed vine fell to the floor. The main column recoiled and then another cluster of tendrils shot out towards him. He managed to sever a few more with another barrage of bandannas, but the main cluster had him now securely wrapped tightly and forced him to his knees.
Out of the corner of his eyes Ryouga could see the sailors were still fighting off their own attacking vines, although Phillips was wrapped up almost as tight as he was having been unable to locate a weapon in time. Murray had grabbed Ryouga's umbrella off the deck, and although surprised at the weight of it, was giving a good account of himself. The Chief was discharging blasts of ice-cold CO2 from the fire-extinguisher, with the tendrils that had attacked him withering away and blackening with each blast.
So, Ryouga thought, this is how it ends. Overpowered by a plant and out-fought by a pair of middle-aged sailors. It was a truly depressing though. The familiar weight of heavy ki began to trickly through his body. Never would he see Akane again. The trickle of heavy ki became a steady flow. Never get the chance to be free of his curse. The flow began to pulse. Never again get the chance to beat up Ranma. The pulsing, depressive ki reached its crescendo.
"The world is a cold and lonely place," he muttered.
Then with strength born out of true despair and desolation he managed to rip his arms free and the ki surged along them as he pointed them towards the central cluster of greenery just outside the window.
"SHI-SHI HOKODAN," he screamed as the sum of all his misery was delivered in one mighty blast.
There was a hideous squealing noise from the vines as the blasted plantlife reacted. Then the few vines that had survived yanked themselves backwards, up the cliff face and into the jungle. Unfortunately, those surviving vines included the ones wrapped around Mister Phillips and he was drawn away, yelling frantically, with them. Ryouga slumped down onto his knees, exhausted.
"What in Nelson's name was that?" Pertwee demanded. The fire-extinguisher dropped out of his shocked grasp and clattered loudly on the floor.
"Ki blast." There was no emotion in Ryouga's listless voice. "You just get an emotion and put all your life energy in it."
"And the trick with the hankerchiefs", Murray asked?
"Iron cloth technique, a secret of the Hibiki martial arts school."
"I see," Murray said gently. "Chief, quick word." He gestured over the head of the kneeling Ryouga indicating he'd like to speak to Pertwee in private. They both stepped to the far side of the bridge.
"Did you ever see anything like that before Chief?" He asked in a frantic, conspiratorial, whisper.
Pertwee glanced over at the kneeling boy, then at the window where the surging greenery had withdrawn and leant in closer to Murray.
"What, the vicious, violent, vine of doom or his throwing green fire from his hands?"
'Either?'
"Well, I 'ad 'eard rumours of suchlike. That them weird walking the earth mysterious types could do that. You 'ear a lot of them type of things when you've shipped out as many times as I 'ave." Pertwee said, waggling his hands in what he thought was a spooky fashion.
Murray nodded slowly.
"So did you hear about how to deal with them? And stop waving your hands like that, Chief, it looks like you are directing traffic," Murray paused, "and badly at that."
"Yes, you just pretend like it never 'appened and get on with things as normal. And never write nothing in the log." Pertwee nodded sagely at this last part.
'That's probably a good idea,' Ryouga said having clambered back to his feet and was now flexing his arm muscles as their ki flows returned to normal. "People never seem to believe it unless they see it for themselves".
There was a long moment of quiet as Pertwee and Murray struggled to find something to say. The silence was broken when the urgent whistle of the ship's intercom sounded again. Still a little stunned from everything that had occurred no one moved. Then it whistled for a second time.
Breaking out of his stupor Murray yanked the offending tube out of its holder.
"Bridge here".
'Ah, was wondering if you were going to pick up, starboard lookout here Able Seaman Goldstein chatting.'
"Goldstein, I think I am actually pleased to hear you." Murray said, the Welshman's peevish voice being a welcome return to normalcy.
"Oh, lovely that is. I phone up to check you're okay and I get an insult. I just thought you ought to know that shrubbery what pounced on us is absconding with Mister Phillips and he doesn't look happy about it. Now if you'll excuse me I've got to go help Seaman Johnson out. Those vines tried to drag him out of the galley, but he got stuck in the porthole. Tatty-bye."
The intercom shut off. Leaving Murray standing open mouthed,
"Did you hear that Chief?"
"Yes I did sir, old Fatso Johnson is stuck halfway out a porthole." The Chief gave a little chuckle, "I wonder if it is top half or bottom half?"
"No Chief, about Mister Phillips, that... That thing has him." Murray grabbed his cap off the deck where it had been knocked off after the fight and jammed it on his head. "Chief we have to do something."
"I quite agree sir. I quite agree, you just give the order". With two swift steps Pertwee was at the ship's wheel. "So, full a'stern both it is and we might make it off out of here before it brings 'im back."
Ryouga felt his mouth drop open at the man's words, and was gratified to see that Murray also look angry at the Chief's response. Ryouga grabbed to older man's wrist as he reached for the telegraph pillar to pass the order to the engine room.
"How can you even think about abandoning your comrade," Ryouga demanded.
"'Ere, let go." Pertwee tried to yank his hand free, but Ryouga's grip was firm and unyielding. "You've never sailed with him, with his directions we've been to Shanghai, Southport, Sydney Harbour, Shanghai again, Vladivostok, Singapore, and bleedin' Chicago in our search for Scotland!"
"So?"
'Chicago is on a landlocked lake!'
"You mean like Hawaii?" Ryouga's voice was honest confusion
Pertwee felt his shoulders sag, there was no way the Japanese youth could be serious. Yet one look at the honest, slightly confused expression on his face told him he actually was.
"Two of them," he muttered, "there is perishing two of them."
"Standfast Chief, and thank you Mr Hibiki," Murray said. "We are going to go and get him. We can't take the chance on whatever it is just bringing him back. Let the Chief go, please Mister Hibiki."
Ryouga glared at Pertwee, but released his wrist. Pertwee in turn decided to ignore Ryouga and pretend like nothing had happened.
"Are you sure, sir?" Pertwee asked.
"Very sure Chief, apart from anything else I signed for a ship with a hundred and forty men, and I don't want my pay docked if I only bring back a hundred and thirty nine. Mister Hibiki would you care to join the Chief and myself as rescue party?"
Ryouga shot another the Chief another dirty look, then, cracking his knuckles, turned to face Murray.
"It'd be my pleasure. I'll teach whoever is out there to mess with Ryouga Hibiki, hahahahahahHAH!"
Somewhere in the jungle, something shivered.
Meanwhile in The Tendo Dojo, Nerima
"Hey Akane," Ranma said, "you seen Ryouga around lately?"
Akane paused in the middle of the kata she was performing and turned to face her fiance, "No Ranma, I haven't, why do you need him anyway?" A suspicious expression formed on her face and she crossed her arms in anger. "You better not be planning on picking on him again, you know how fragile he can be."
Ranma screwed up his eyes as he tried to picture Ryouga as "fragile"; the guy who could smash tunnels out of solid rock with his fists and had been known to rip telegraph poles out of the ground by accident, and tried to square that with "fragile". That line of thought was cut short when he noticed that Akane had moved on from folded arms to also tapping her foot.
"Eh-heh, nah it's nothing like that," he waved his arms frantically in defence, "Although I do have a new technique I've been working on that he could help me with..."
"Oh, and I can't help you with that?"
This was, Ranma belatedly recognised, one of those times he was going to get in trouble no matter what he said. Pausing for a moment's regret that with sheer amount of those times meaning he really should recognise them in advance, he opened his mouth to try and find an explanation that would make his most temperamental fiancée the least angry. And was saved by Akane herself.
"Come to think of it I haven't seen P-Chan in a while either".
Out of the frying pan and into the fire thought Ranma. Knowing his luck this would be the time Akane managed to figure out her beloved pet pig was his rival's cursed form. Having no objection in principle to Akane figuring that out, but strong objections to her specifically finding out when Ryouga wasn't around to take the punishment for the deception. What he objected to even more was that he, Ranma, was around to take the punishment for helping cover up that deception. Oh well, he thought, this wouldn't hurt nearly as much as Akane figuring it out.
"He's probably still hiding from that piece of toxic sludge you called a chocolate cake. That thing attacked people..." Yep, thought Ranma, subject changed and here comes the...
"DIE RANMA!" Akane yelled, whipping out her ki-mallet and bringing it down on his head, driving him into the floorboards. "How dare you complain about my cooking when you know Ryouga took some away in a gift-box, he knows how to appreciate it!"
Ranma was just about to wonder how his day could get worse when a giant panda charged through the dojo doors, threw a bucket of cold water over him activating his curse, which meant the black-haired boy became a red-haired girl, and slammed a hand-written sign over her head and ran off. Well, thought Ranma, that answered that question. She blearily focused on the panda-sign which read "you're on your own girl, just go with it". Akane meanwhile picked up the bucket and was examing the label on it.
"Ranma, what does "Acme Thirty Day Curse Locking Liquid" mean?"
Before Ranma could muster the strength to get angry she heard the sound of a conversation drifting through the hole in the doors left by the panda.
"Oh Soun it is so good of you to let me stay here for the next month while my house is redecorated".
"It's our pleasure Nodoka, you may stay here as long as you need". Soun's voice was rather louder than strictly necessary, as people trying to warn someone in another room's voices tended to be.
"Thank you, is my manly son around?" Nodoka winced a little at the volume of his reply, the Tendo family did have a tendency to be so very loud when she visited.
"No, I'm afraid not he is out training so that he will be manly enough to ensure he doesn't need to commit seppuku for that oath you hold him too. Ranko is out in the dojo with Akane though," Soun said.
"Oh good, I met a nice German boy that would be the perfect fiancé for her, I hope you don't mind that I've invited him to dinner".
Ranma groaned and cradled her head. At least she knew wherever Ryouga was he couldn't be having a worse time.
"SHOOT IT, SHOOT IT!" Ryouga screamed as one of the orange and black-striped polar bears tried to fit his head in its mouth.
"With what," Murray replied, "we don't have any guns!" He looked around frantically for a rock to at least hurl.
"What sort of soldier doesn't carry guns," Ryouga fired back, trying to find a grip on the tiger's head where he could bring his strength to bear on it. The problem was that he needed both hands to keep the animal's powerful jaws from clamping down on his head, and that somewhat limited his options until he could brace his legs on something.
"We're not soldiers," came Pertwee's voice from up a tree. Pertwee had scrambled up one with the speed of a grandmaster in martial arts cowarding; if Ryouga hadn't been so busy literally saving his own neck then he'd have strongly considered asking the man if he knew a certain Genma Saotome at all. "We," Pertwee said, "are sailors."
"Well what kind of sailor doesn't carry a gun, then," Ryouga snapped back at him?
Pertwee didn't bother to reply to that, but did manage to contribute to the struggle by throwing his shoes straight at the tiger perched on Ryouga's backpack's head. This didn't really achieve much in the way of a distraction, but the momentary flicker of attention as the beast glared at the older man in a way that promised that it was willing to add well aged flesh to its menu was enough that it allowed Ryouga to shift his hands just enough to flip the creature forward.
Now the tiger was facing him directly instead of being perched on his backpack. This, all things considered, was not actually an improvement, Ryouga realised. The beast's jaws were still wrapped just slightly over a tooth's length from his head, but now its forelimbs could rest on his shoulders and its powerful hindlegs could push against the ground. This definitely was not an improvement at all.
The beast extended its claws and prepared to bring its full animal might to bear. Suddenly it found itself pushing against thin air.
Cmdr. Murray, having realised he was contributing even less to the defence of his new companion than CPO Pertwee was, had rushed in to try and distract the big cat. He hadn't really thought that he could achieve much, but having seen that even the flicker of attention created by Pertwee's shoe throwing antics had let the young man move the creature, he'd had the bright idea of splashing it square in the eyes with his water canteen. A plan that would have worked if a freak gust of wind had not blown the water square into Ryouga's face instead; causing him to vanish.
The tiger's weight fell on the pile of clothes and kit where Ryouga had been standing. It prodded at the pile curiously, then turned its attention to its one remaining target.
''Here, Commander Murray, sir,' Pertwee yelled, 'up this tree quick!'
Murray tensed, and so did the tiger. Then the leaves to the side of the track exploded in fury and hate; Akane's cake had returned. With a vengeance! The infuriated sentient baked goods latched onto the tiger's face, striking at it with its hammer shaped front limbs until the tiger fled down the path and into the jungle trying to shake its attacker loose.
"Well," said Pertwee in an egregiously casual voice, "there is something you don't see every day. I wonder where he's gone?"
While Pertwee searched for his shoes, Murray was poking at the pile of kit and clothing left behind when Ryouga had vanished. "You know," he said, "I think there is something moving in here".
"Probably an unexploded mars bar," Pertwee said darkly; while fiddling with his shoelaces. "You sure you want to go prodding and poking sire?".
"No, there is definitely something moving here."
As if to prove him right, and with an indignant sounding "bwee!" of irritation, a small black piglet was extricating itself from the pile. It looked around a couple of times for the attacking tiger, and then, seeing the coast was all clear, it clambered onto the abandoned backpack, extricated a small spirit stove, lit it, and to the ever increasing astonishment of the two naval officers, balanced a portable kettle on it.
Fascinated by what was happening, the two men just stared while the kettle came to the boil. Their curiosity interrupted only by the sound of Pertwee surreptitiously searching his pockets for a couple of teabags in prospect of a cuppa of some sort. As soon as it did the piglet gave it what looked like all the world to be a short karate chop, sending it spinning through the air and emptying the boiling load all over itself.
There was a small boomf of displaced air as the piglet suddenly morphed into a very naked Ryouga Hibiki. A naked and angry, Ryouga.
"Gah," he said grabbing hold of Murray's collar, "why did you have to go and do that!? Wasn't it enough that it was eating me, you had to go and make a pork dinner out of me too!" Ryouga shifted his stance, one hand on Murray's collar and the other clenching in the air in dramatic anguish, "a martial artist should at least be given a chance to die as himself, and not as a cursed pig!"
"And a Naval h'officer ought to be able to go to his with an uncrumpled uniform," Pertwee cut in, "so why don't you put Mister Murray down and go put your drawers back on and you can explain what just happened 'ere".
Ryouga glanced down and eeped a little as his brain caught up with his naked condition. There was another boomf of imploding air as he moved so quickly he was just a flesh coloured blur, grabbing his pack as dashed behind the tree that Pertwee had taken shelter in.
"Thank you, Chief," Cmdr Murray said, scrambling up from the ground where Ryouga had dropped him.
"Don't thank me yet, sir," Pertwee said while still patting his pockets, "I ain't got a single teabag on me, sir. Getting to be a dangerously dry day, sir."
Murray just glared at him, and then continued with his previous chain of thought, "I do think that explanations, while very much needed," he said, calling back over his shoulder to Ryouga's tree, as he made a show of straightening his uniform and brushing it down, "must wait. Those vines already have enough of a headstart on us and we don't want to lose the trail completely. Goodness only knows what horrible fate Sub-Lieutenant Phillips might be suffering already at their hands."
Phillips' legs dangled high in the air, wrapped tight in the coils of the vines. They'd dragged him back through the jungle, and now he hung in some half-darkened cave; the only light an ominous glowing red which came from another chamber, accompanied only by a horrible glooping noise.
"Oh-ho-oh", a sinister laugh peeled, "so my pretty is finally awake."
A figure moved in the darkness, female, and seemingly also suspended in vines. This figure was able to control the vines which suspended her and, from the way the vines suspending Sub-Lieutenant Phillips started stroking his face, able to control all the greenery in the cavern.
"Er, hello?" Phillips said. "I say, I'm jolly grateful to be called pretty but I think I'd like to go home now. It's been a rather long day."
"Oh-ho-ho", the figure laughed again, "I am so very glad, because home is where you are going to take me." She moved closer, almost gliding through the air, until Phillips could almost kiss her. Her breath was sweet and floral against his face. Phillips swallowed nervously, his Adam's apple bobbing noticeably.
"So," he paused, and half-nervously half-bewildered, replied; "you want to split a cab?"
There was an awkward pause, the silence broken only by the burbling sound from the other chamber. The ominous glow rippled in time with the noise, and the female figure screwed up her face in irritation. That, at least, was something Phillips understood. He was very familiar with the expression on female impatience, if he had been a Nerima Martial Artist then he would have been bracing for the hammer blow and short ride to LEO. Fortunately for him, the female figure merely puffed in irritation, blowing a lock of her green hair up out of her eyes. If he hadn't been lashed up in vines then Phillips would probably have thought her rather fetching.
"Yes," she said almost biting back her words, "split a cab indeed. Or should I say, a battleship." She paused for a moment. "Oh-ho-ho," she laughed again almost as an afterthought, and started gliding backwards.
Sadly, what ought to have been a dramatic line for her to end the conversation on was undercut by the undeniable fact that she was talking with a total twit.
"Oh, you have a battleship," said Phillips brightly. "That is jolly good. We've only got a rusty old frigate. Can we hitch a ride with you then? My friends will be here soon, I expect. They usually do show up pretty soon after any kidnapping. I say, I don't even know your name to introduce you to them." His voice trailed off as he saw the expression of irritation had moved to exasperation, with a side order of teeth grinding.
"I have no name," she hissed through her clenched jaw, "and as for your friends; I'm counting on it. For you, my dear little boy, I have plans before they arrive. You will serve me!"
Phillips struggled in his vines valiantly, but he was held fast. The female figure made one sharp gesture and the vines yanked him through the air and into the glowing maw of the other cave. He saw lava…
On an entirely different part of the planet, while Nodoka was having an early evening meal in Japan and negotiating a month long vacation at the Tendo residence while her own house was repainted; she wanted it to look nice for when her beloved husband and manly son returned, all the while arranging for "Ranko" to start an engagement to a young German Olympic Archery competitor; in England the board of the Admiralty were having a meeting.
Through marbled halls and rooms walled with oak taken from ships that had fought at Trafalgar; past busts and portraits of the great sailors of the past, down checker tiled passages, and under the great picture of Nelson himself; the voices of the current great and the good of British high seas echoed.
"… And I said "that is as maybe young man, but you've still got your car on my wife's foot"."
"The thing is that we're overdrawn on the scones and jam budgets already."
"The thin, the thin, the thing-a ring-diddly-ding, the t-thin…"
"I know nobody listens to an old man like me, but I'll have hanged them for this. The glass isn't half empty or half full, it is all the way empty and I want to know what you are going to do about it!?"
"Oh, shall I pass the port old bean?"
"Better make it the starboard too".
"I say can we get on? I do have rather a lot to do. There are these theft reports."
"The thing-a-ling- thing is I found these ch-char-char-charter, charter, charter, charter, CHART! These charts for sale in the high street."
"I say shall we put cream cheese on it?"
"What, my wife's foot?"
"Now this glass is empty again, I don't know how it keeps happening."
"Look, about these theft reports.."
"No, old boy, not your wife's foot. The scone budget, shall we try and get cream cheese on it when we get it approved."
"Will somebody PLEASE look at these theft reports!"
And so on and so on the hubbub bubbed. Eventually there was a great clearing of throat, as the current chair of committees, Admiral Ffont-Bittocks, lost patience with waiting for the meeting to come to order on its own.
"Right, that is it you chaps," he intoned in the bluff tones of a man who long ago lost interest in giving a damn about other people's opinions.
This did not have the effect he intended, as the hubbub continued to hub and bub around him. Words like "cream cheese", "empty again", and the rapid fire stuttering as Commodore Weatherly rattled towards the end of a sentence, utterly failed to cease. Ffont-Bittocks' patience, never exactly being overly long in the first place, reached its end and he slammed his hand down on the table (causing an interesting ripple effect in the ancient oak that would have impressed any elder in the tribe of Chinese Amazons) and bellowed:
"BELT UP, or I'll lock up the gin," he finished in a more normal voice.
Silence unrolled in the boardroom.
"Yes," he said, "I thought that would get your attention. Never fails. Right," he said leaning back in his chair, "first things first. Povey, where are Troutbridge and me son in law on that goodwill tour. Me wife has been wanting to go a holiday and she says she isn't going until he comes back and can carry her bags."
Commodore Povey, who had been the voice trying to raise the issue of theft reports and was now caught flat footed by the change of topic, sputtered a little before managing a weak and feeble, "Oh terribly well sir, they've just been to Sri Lanka. Lots of goodwill now they've shipped off to Port Arthur. Last I heard anyway."
"Now I know you all think I'm a feeble old man and have no right to be here at all," broke in the creaky voice which had been demanding to know why his glass kept getting emptied, "but I happen to think you are WRONG, you know, and I want to know where this Sri Lanka place is, never heard of it."
There was a pause as everybody tried to fit their head around that. And a chink of glass on glass as the gin decanter was decanted into the speaker's glass.
"I think, Vice Admiral Prout," the voice who had been going on about scones and cream cheese, "that Povey means Ceylon. That is the new-fangled name for it. Least it was when pater joined up."
"Oh," Prout said while knocking back his glass of gin in one go, "I thought Ceylon was the new fangled name. Dutch East Indies, isn't it."
There was another stare from all those present.
"Forty five years of navy rum," Ffont-Bittocks said to the world at large, "gives you a liver you could soul and heel army boots with; and the brain functions of the boot, to boot. Carry on Povey," Ffont-Bittocks gestured towards him as Prout returned his focus to the decanters.
"Yes, sorry sir. Last we heard Troutbridge was steaming towards Port Arthur, according to the damage receipts and salvage requests we keep getting in anyway. Making good time too, at least if we take the word of that fishing fleet whose crews the Americans rescued." Povey paused as his ears caught up with the sound of his own voice, winced, and then made an attempt to strike out to sanity, "Must we keep them in the Service, sir? Really?".
"Absolutely Povey," Ffont-Bittocks said firmly, "young Phillips father is the First Sea Lord and was the one who was supposed to file the paperwork on the Troutbridge back when he was a Sub-Lieutenant himself. Got to find something for it, and young Phillips, t'do. Can't have First Sea Lords admitting to mistakes, what."
Ffont-Bittocks may have been a somewhat tactless man and certainly not the most easygoing officer in the senior service, but he was not a man who was deliberately cruel and as he looked at Povey's deflated expression he softened a little.
"Look, Povey, just go ask the bright boys at GCHQ to have one of those spy satellites check on them. See if you can arrange a pilot vessel to meet them and take them to old Arthur once you find them. As long as they don't manage to crash into China and start a real international incident we'll be fine."
As Povey shoved back his chair to leave, there was a great cracking and tinkling sound which echoed around the board room.
"Oh, I say. My cup just broke in half."
"Odd, so did mine".
"I know you all think I'm just a silly old man, but so did my glass. I'll have to drink straight from the bottle instead",
Povey froze. Then panicked; he may have been the (somewhat selfstyled) sensible voice in the conversation, but he was still a sailor at heart and had a sailor's superstitions carved deep in his soul.
"An omen, that is what it is. I just know it, it is them. Somehow they've done it!"
As the meeting degenerated into various arguing at cross purposes on the best way to calm Povey down, outside the boardroom Povey's aide, Wren Chasen, stopped listening at the keyhole, sighed, and went to place a call to GCHQ for them to start looking for Troutbridge somewhere on the Chinese coast.
Murray and Pertwee slogged along the jungle trail, their progress slowed only by having to grab onto Ryouga and keep him on the track and not wandering off into the jungle. Coming to a fork in the trail, they paused and took stock of the signs. Specifically, the wooden sign which on which was painted "This way to the rescue. Shortcut to secret base!" and was carved into the shape of a pointing finger.
"You know," said Murray in a tone of voice which he hoped indicated he was pondering some deeper truth, "I get the feeling we might be being steered along somewhat."
"Yessir," said Pertwee, "but Pertwee don't like who is doing the steering, especially when Sub-lieutenant Blond Bonce is involved. Nor greenery neither," Pertwee continued, narrowing his eyes and glaring at what appeared to be a vine tendril hastily dragging a tin of white paint off into the surrounding shrubbery. "You can call old Chief Petty Officer Pertwee, Chief Petty Officer Suspicious if you like, but I don't like it." Pertwee crossed his arms in an obstinate pose. "Sir," he added almost as an afterthought.
Ryouga, who had been eyeing the surrounding jungle in case any more tropical polar bears attacked, shot Pertwee a look. "Hah, I'd rather call you Chief Petty Officer Coward. It is obvious what we have to do. Whoever is leaving these signs clearly is seeking a duel to test your strength. I deal with it all the time. Aren't you going to rise to the challenge," Ryouga said while crossing his arms defiantly!
Pertwee, a man who knew the meaning of shame only from the dictionary, reacted to Ryouga demanding he rise to a challenge to a fight with the demand that, he Pertwee, immediately be given a transfer to the submarine service and sink away. Things would probably have deteriorated from there, with Ryouga seeking action and Pertwee demonstrating that Genma Saotome wasn't the only man in the world with a black belt in cowardly fleeing, if Cmdr Murray hadn't intervened with a question about Ryouga's experience.
"I say, young man, what do you mean you deal with this sort of thing all the time? Is this a regular occurrence?"
Ryouga stopped glowering at Pertwee for the moment, and just shrugged. "The life of a martial artist is fraught with peril. You have to test yourself against each other to keep at your best." He paused, glancing sideways at Pertwee, "That is unless you are a total coward."
"Hah, CPO Cowardly Custard reporting for duty and wanting to go 'ome; right now, too."
"Stand fast, Chief," Murray cut in to defuse things again. "I did rather mean about the mobile greenery. I must admit, that is a new one for us."
"You ain't 'alf kidding, neither," Pertwee said. ''Falling satellites, weather machines, robotic killer whales, secret Forbodian agents with ray guns, the Loch Ness Monster, and mermaids tangled in fishing nets, yes. Attack of the herbaceous borders, not so much. It is a new one for Chiefy, and Chiefy don't like it."
Ryouga elected to ignore Pertwee, although the bit about the Loch Ness Monster rang a faint bell; perhaps it had been while he was in Morocco. "Ranma mentioned something about it, one of that playboy's fiancees likes playing with plants. How he can play around with FOUR fiancees, and break darling Akane's heart like that is disgusting. If he isn't playing with Kodachi and her pets, he is scamming free food from poor Ukyou, and then the way he allows Shampoo to fawn over him. Why, I ought to…" Ryouga pounded his fist into his palm. "He has no shame!"
Murray, as a man who knew an hours long rant approaching when he saw one, decided not to pursue that subject, but instead pursue the possibility of it being a challenge of some sort for Ryouga that he and his crew had somehow gotten entangled with. He gently put his hand on Ryouga's shoulder, to steer him back to reality.
"Perhaps we should follow your signs then?' Without looking around, Murray also reached out and grabbed Pertwee's collar; feeling the older man jerk to a stop as his fleeing was brought to a quick stop. 'I said stand fast, Chief."
There was a faint tapping sound from behind the trio. As they turned around to look, they saw the vine tap the sign with a still dripping paint brush and also tap at an outsized pocket watch it had somehow conjured up.
"And we should do so quickly," Murray continued, "since our "host" appears to be rather impatient."
"Right," said Ryouga, snapping back to reality, "lets go!" And with that he grabbed Murray's hand and charged head long down the opposite fork pointed at, dragging the two sailors with him.
If it had a face or palm, then the vine would have face palmed. Instead it mere slunk back into the undergrowth with a vague sense of bemusement.
The landscape fairly flew past as Murray and Pertwee were dragged helter-skelter behind Ryouga as he pelted down a path which only he could really see. Jungle became desert, became a town square selling pretzels, became a series of cliff, and became jungle again albeit with more of a bamboo theme, all in short order, until finally the trio tumbled over a cliff onto the banks of a pool ridden swampy valley. As the two older men clambered to their feet and got their breath back, Ryouga took stock of his destination, his nose a mere centimetre away from a pool with a bamboo pole sticking out of its centre, shot upright, and then back pedalled so fast into the cliff face he just fallen down that he left almost a person shaped alcove in it. His hands cramped in terror so hard that cracks spread across the rock's surface.
"Ju—Ju—Ju…," he stuttered.
Meanwhile Murray and Pertwee had regained their feet, brushed themselves off, and were half heartedly poking at some bushes and grass on the banks in a vain attempt to work out where they were now. Pertwe, who had picked up on Ryouga's sudden gibbering in apparent terror, was surreptitiously edging back up the bank while trying to decide if a jibe about who the coward was now was a wise decision at this point; probably not, he decided, given that Ryouga was creating cracks in a granite rock.
Murray on the other hand had wandered closer to the pool edges and was gently prodding at them with edge of his shoe. Deciding on the futility of that, Murray pivoted around and decide to confer with his erstwhile compatriots on what to do next. Ryouga winced, creating ever more cracks in the cliff, as well as now digging a noticeable trough in the ground under his heals, when Murray slipped slightly on a patch of mud; almost anticipating a sudden splash and an awkward, not to mention unforgiveable stain on his honour cursing someone else as Ranma had cursed Ryouga, transformation in Jusenkyo's waters. Thankfully, Murray was only off balance for a moment and had a seaman's instincts in regaining balance on a moving surface.