Ranma Stole My Sweetroll.
By JSB and Weebee.
Disclaimer: We do not own Ranma ½ or Skyrim.
Hello, Weebee here. So yeah, this thing... It's been kicking around my and JSB's collective Google Drives for at least five years now. We've got a bunch of stupid little ideas like this that we put together while chatting, but this one's got a bit of internal structure to it, in a 'this is going to go terribly' sort of way. Enough that JSB suggested tossing it up as a one-shot, to see what happened. I personally don't mind breaking four months of inactivity. (I'm working on it, sorry.) So here we are.
Let us know how you think, and how relieved or angry you are that this probably won't ever go anywhere. Hope you at least enjoy the ride.
BEGIN.
Ranma rubbed at the top of her head, where a Ryoga's foot shaped lump was starting to form. "Did you have to step on me, P-chan?" she growled, trying to ignore the swaying of the wooden cart that the two were sitting in alongside several other tied up prisoners.
"I was going to fall in the river," Ryoga justified, before getting interrupted by an older man with a beard.
"So you stepped on the lady's head?" He asked, looking disapprovingly at the lost boy.
"Hey, it's not like that!" Ryoga objected.
"Would you shut up?" This statement came from a rather weaselly looking man who was sitting next to Ranma. "Who cares about a lump on her head when we're all going to have them cut off?"
"We're gunna be executed for crossing a bridge?" Ranma grimaced. "We aren't in Joketsu territory, are we?"
"Joke Cat Soup?" The old bearded guy asked, getting a slight nod from the gagged man next to him. "What is a 'Joke Cat'?"
"Eh... Nevermind." Ranma shrugged as best she could, the frankly flimsy bonds making the action somewhat difficult. Honestly, they were just going along with this more to find out where they were than actually being arrested.
"The Imperials aren't likely to show you any mercy all the same." The weasel-like man commented. "They've been going crazy trying to take care of you Stormcloaks. Arresting people just for being in the wrong place at the wrong time."
"Oh, well, what did you happen to be doing at the 'wrong time' then?" The blond Stormcloak questioned, in a not so subtle sarcastic tone.
"I... was borrowing a horse." The man replied nervously, pausing to lick his lips. "It doesn't matter what I was doing, I'm not with you rebels. I shouldn't be on this cart."
"Calm yourself. We're all in this together now." The older man said, obviously regretting his last retort. "Now where are you from? A man's last thoughts should be of home."
"I'm from Rorikstead," The grungy man said, beginning to shudder as he noticed the stone wall of the town approaching.
Seeing that the formerly panicking man didn't have anything else to say, the older one nodded to Ranma and Ryoga, who shared a look. Judging by the architecture, Ranma guessed that they weren't anywhere near Tokyo. "We're from Japan," she finally said, and she began to get a sinking feeling in her stomach as she saw looks of blank incomprehension on the others' faces. "Nippon?" she tried, hopefully, but the looks didn't change.
"Hey, it wasn't me this time!" Ryoga objected, raising his hands and inadvertently snapping the bonds holding them. Sheepishly, he tried to tie his bonds back together, only to end up just sitting on his hands.
"You always say it wasn't you," Ranma shot back, ignoring the two stormcloaks, and the thief, who were gaping at them. "It only ever happens when I'm traveling with you."
Ryoga was about to retort, when the cart came to a gradual stop, and the armored soldiers in the front hopped down to the ground. "Everyone, off the cart, form a line and wait to be called!"
Everyone followed the instruction, though Ryoga still seemed to be trying to pretend he was tied up, and ended up jumping rather than climbing over the side. No one seemed to notice, as the rest of the wagon's passengers, aside from Ranma, were staring at a chopping block across the courtyard.
"This isn't right! I shouldn't be here!" The dingy man was starting to get edgy again. "I'm not... I can't!" Abruptly, he broke for the nearest exit.
"He's a moron." Ranma stated, wanting to facepalm when the poor thief decided it was a good idea to taunt the soldiers, even as several of the ones on the walls began drawing back their bowstrings.
"Yup." Ryoga agreed, kicking at a stone on the ground with his right foot. It flew quite quickly, catching the running Nord in the back and sending him to the ground. The nearby guards looked at each other for a moment, and then shrugged before hauling the attempted escapee to his feet and dragging him back to the line.
"Nice shot!" Ranma said after whistling appreciatively.
"You, quiet down!" One guard, a woman, said as she walked down the line of prisoners, her arms crossed behind her back. "Now I expect the rest of you to behave, or you will get a punishment similar to what he's going to get."
One of the other men spoke up, "Aren't we already receiving said punishment?"
The guardswoman turned to him and smirked. "No, death is a light punishment comparatively. Now step forward, and state your name." The man did so, though neither Ranma nor Ryoga heard it. The former was busily scanning the castle walls, speculating on the best place to jump over them without getting shot full of arrows. Ryoga, for his part, was sort of wishing he hadn't thrown that rock.
"You, in the ugly bandanna!" Ryoga looked around to see who the guardswoman was talking to, before a look of understanding crossed his face, followed by one of annoyance. Obviously biting back a yell, he walked up to the woman, and the man with the clipboard standing next to her, and stood with his arms straight at his sides.
"Name?" The man asked, sounding almost bored.
"Ryoga Hibiki," Ryoga replied.
"Race and birthplace?" came next.
"Um, Japanese," Ryoga stated, before looking puzzled. "And Tomobiki, I think."
"Ryoga, Tomobiki is fictional," Ranma grumbled, rubbing her forehead.
"Okay, Um...Gensokyo."
"Let's just go with that," Ranma responded, shaking her head.
"Well, wherever he's from, he's not on the list," the male guard said. "I looked under every heading, including Argonian and Kajit to be sure."
The guardswoman frowned irritably, looking Ryoga up and down. After stopping dead for several seconds, she glared into his eyes. "How did you get loose from your bonds?"
The lost boy laughed nervously, playing with his bandanna. "Um, you might want to get stronger rope next time."
Nearby, the old bearded guy started chuckling. This obviously irritated the guardswoman, as she reached for a sword at her side, producing it with a menacing "Shwing" sound.
"Damn it, P-chan," the short redhead behind him grumbled, and abruptly, her bonds snapped as well. "Pissin' everyone off is my thing, not yours."
The bandanna clad boy turned to glare at his companion, ready to retort, when his opponent placed her blade at his throat. "I wouldn't move if I were you," she said, sounding somewhat nervous and looking between the two apparently escaping prisoners.
"You think we've figured out enough, Ranma? I'm tired of playing this game." The blade began pressing into Ryoga's throat, but he irritably pushed it away.
"Yeah, we've blown it now, I guess," the other martial artist responded, causing Ryoga to abruptly reach up, grab the sword's blade once again, and yank. He'd sort of been expecting its wielder to be as dumb as Kuno, holding onto it so he could flip her, but unfortunately she let it go, leaving him holding the weapon. Shrugging, he tossed it over his shoulder and walked towards his companion.
"Soldiers, kill them!" The guardswoman bellowed, her face taking on a rage filled expression usually only seen on a particularly riled up Kuno.
"To arms!" the rest of the nearby soldiers responded, drawing their weapons. While this was happening, one of the other prisoners began to walk towards the discarded imperial sword.
"Huh, it's the hentai horde all over again," Ranma muttered, cracking her knuckles, and jerking her head out of the way as an arrow flew through the space it had formerly occupied. "Well, that's different."
Ryoga was too busy to respond, as he'd decided on a good old fashioned shoulder charge into a group of soldiers, sending them flying. He continued by grabbing a pole out of the ground nearby, wishing for the umbrella that he'd been forced to leave, along with his pack, at the side of the river where they'd been captured.
Ranma had taken to running along the walls, knocking out the archers that had almost hit her in the head earlier. She abruptly came to a halt, her fist about a foot from a rather apprehensive archer's face, as a loud, unearthly screech echoed around the area.
Both Ranma and the guard she'd just been about to knock out looked up, noticing a large, dark, irregular shape approaching. "That's one big bird," Ranma muttered, shading her eyes to try and get a better look at the thing. She was proven spectacularly wrong a moment later, as the creature in question abruptly started diving for the town, and its features became more visible, revealing a large, and homicidally angry looking, dragon.
The redhead immediately dove off the wall, landing on the roof of a house below and rolling down it to the ground. This proved to be a very good idea, as a gout of flame followed several seconds after, sending the flaming and screaming guard after her.
Ryoga wasn't quite as lucky, as the dragon continued randomly spraying fire across the ground, and a wagon next to him, apparently filled with something flammable, exploded violently. He flew through the air for several seconds before slamming into a stone wall. Shaking his head clear after a few seconds, he realized that no new fires had been started, although the ones that were already there seemed to have everyone quite occupied.
The dragon had apparently been content to simply bombard the village before flying off to terrorize someplace else, much to the relief of everyone who realized it. Several people were still frantically eyeing the skies, searching for the black shape of the dragon.
"Wow, that thing packs a punch." Ranma whistled in appreciation of how quickly the monster had managed to turn the place into flaming rubble. Now was probably the best time to get going while the getting was good. Everyone was too busy to keep track of them.
Quickly Ranma made her way to the previously ballistic missile known as Ryoga with plans to leave. "Okay, I think it's time for the Saotome secret technique:"
"How is the 'Crouch of the Wild Tiger' useful for our situation?" Ryoga questioned, dusting off his shoulders.
"No, not that one! The other one!" The redheaded girl yelled in exasperation. How could he forget the most secret of Saotome techniques!
"You could have just said 'Run Away'," Ryoga deadpanned.
Ranma's eyebrow twitched. "Just blow up a wall," she grumbled, obviously not wanting to talk about things anymore, especially since she'd heard someone yell 'death to the empire!' and the fighting had restarted without them.
Ryoga nodded, and walked back to the wall he'd already left a small indent in, poking it with one finger. After the dust cleared from the irregular hole his Bakusai Tenketsu created, the two hurriedly left.
HR.
"We're being followed." Ryoga remarked casually, as the two martial artists walked down a rough mountain path away from the town. Tall trees lined the sides of the path, along with a smattering of unfamiliar underbrush.
Ranma stopped, frowning. "Can you tell who?"
"No, but they're over there," Ryoga responded, pointing ahead of them and to the left. Ranma nodded, turning around and looking right to see several bushes rustling in a suspicious fashion.
"Yeah, I see him," she confirmed. "He probably knows, too. So should we knock 'im out or ask him to talk?"
"We could just ignore him," Ryoga offered. Ranma shrugged, and the two continued on for several more minutes, before the sound of running feet on the path behind them caused them to stop and turn again.
Running up the path towards them was one of the men who had been riding on the cart with them, the one who had formerly been gagged. "Children of Gensokyo!"
Ranma and Ryoga exchanged a glance, wondering what the man would want as well as why he was calling them that.
"I wish to speak with you." The man added, stopping several paces away from them.
Ranma shrugged, eliciting the same from Ryoga, and both turned to hear the guy out. "Yeah?"
The man blinked, taken aback by the unusual response before continuing. "I saw some hint of your skills earlier, which my army could greatly benefit from, and we share a common enemy. I offer to allow you into the ranks of the Stormcloaks, to drive off the Imperials who blight these lands."
"Stormcloaks?" Ranma repeated with her head tilted to one side. The term had come up several times previously, but no one had felt any need to explain it.
"Perhaps news has not reached so far as where you hail," The man noted the confusion and set about informing them. "The Empire has overtaken lands that rightly belong to the nords, and have outlawed our beliefs. We need every man we can get to expel them from Skyrim."
"So... wait," Ranma said, slowly. "You decided to walk up to two random guys and figured we'd join a war because we tried to escape an execution?"
The man looked confused. "Well, you have clearly chosen a side in this campaign already..."
"We kept our heads from being chopped off, that's all," Ranma responded. "If I went to war with everybody that tried to chop my head off, hmm... I think I'd be at war with most of the people I know right now, including Ryoga here."
"I thought we were always at war?" Ryoga stated, tapping his chin.
Ranma just rolled her eyes, while the formerly gagged man looked rather confused. "Are you implying that the fight to free the Nords is similar to some friendly squabble?" His confusion had suddenly changed to anger, as he believed he'd figured out what was being said.
"Your war is insignificant compared to my burning need for revenge!" Ryoga said, getting angry himself.
"Um, Ryoga? I thought we were past this? You know, after the wedding..." Ranma responded.
"Shut up, Ranma!" Ryoga bellowed. "This guy's not going to trivialize my suffering!"
The man still seemed offended, and was ignoring the two martial artists' little spat. "You do not refer to Ulfrik Stormcloak as 'that guy'," he snapped, not entirely sure about the phrasing but understanding that it was dismissive.
"Who?" Ryoga asked.
The man before them stopped dead, his teeth clenching and a muscle twitching in his cheek. "Fus..." The two martial artists looked on, curiously. "Ro Dah!"
The circular mass of light blue energy hammered into Ryoga's chest, sending him flailing backwards, and straight into a large, sturdy looking tree. The trunk cracked ominously for several seconds, before the entire mass tipped forward, obscuring the lost boy from view.
Ranma blinked several times. "You probably shouldn't have done that," she observed, right after the tree came down.
"Silence, woman!" Ulfrik commanded. "I just slew your husband with only my voice. I highly doubt I will be regretting it."
"Oh, really?" Ranma said, her eyes narrowing to slits, as a blue light began to appear around her body. "First, you're wrong, on both accounts. And second, you really shouldn't have said that."
Ulfrik wasn't intimidated. Definitely not. It wasn't as though this ridiculously short, round faced girl could... That was about the time when Ranma's fist connected with his jaw, lifting him off of the ground and sending him several feet back. He briefly hit the ground on his feet, before collapsing forward and laying face down in the dirt.
"What? It's over already?" Ryoga complained, making his way back to the path. "I wanted a shot at him."
"Well, what do we do with him now?" Ranma asked, gesturing to the unconscious man, currently bleeding out of his mouth onto the ground.
"We? I didn't break his jaw. You should deal with it!" Ryoga claimed, not really wanting to clean up a mess he didn't make.
"If I didn't do it, you would have!"
"Well, maybe, but..." Ryoga trailed off, and then frowned. "I think the problem's solved."
Turning to follow the lost boy's gaze, Ranma saw a group of men moving down the trail towards them, holding weapons covered in blood. "Why does this always happen?" She muttered, before grabbing Ryoga by the elbow. "Let's go."
"Hey, let go!" The bandanna clad youth responded, "I can run perfectly well on my own!"
"Oh no you don't! Now is not the time for you to be getting lost!" The pigtailed girl exclaimed, keeping a tight grip on Ryoga's arm as she pulled him farther down the path. "Besides, I think I saw smoke from down there and I wanna get some hot water."
Though they likely wouldn't have caught up to them, regardless, the men didn't bother pursuing the two martial artists any further, stopping when they reached the unconscious form of their leader. Two soldiers lifted the man up to their shoulders and they left the area as quickly as possible, carrying him as gently as they could..
HR.
At a hunting camp that was set by the river, a grizzled Nord looked up from skinning a freshly caught deer as the sound of a loud, alien shriek cut the air. Near the silhouette of the Throat of the World, which loomed over the valley, he could barely make out a small black speck making its way erratically northward, a column of oily black smoke drifting up from nearby. Against his better judgement, the man quickly finished cleaning his kill, securing his sturdy iron axe to his belt and heading for the smoke.
He had a bad feeling about this.
END?
