|\v/| Primal Chaos
|=_=| [rn][xo:fus][bw] A Ranma 1/2 / Beast Wars crossover fusion
:\_/: Part 9: The power to surprise.
---begin part 9---
Kasumi, as usual, woke early to fix breakfast. She gave a friendly
wave to Genma, who was stretched out beside the glowing embers
after having kept watch during the night. The tiger's eyes
remained firmly closed, but his ear twitched in recognition. She
was sure he was quite alert even while taking a cat nap. It was
reassuring to have so powerful a martial artist and beast warrior
keep a watch over them at night.
Kasumi stoked the fire and started slicing vegetables into the
wok. As the sky began to lighten she walked over to Ranma's tent,
tapped on the flap then pulled it back after a slight pause - it
wasn't like she could catch him undressed (damn it).
"Ranma Dear," she called softly and nudged the slumbering form,
"would you like some breakfast before your match this morning?"
On hearing the magic word, the cheetah stirred and yawned.
"Oh!" Kasumi gasped and drew back, startled. The phrase, 'my,
what big teeth you have,' flashed through her mind. She hadn't
been quite so near to his beast form before. It was quite daunting
to be reminded, up close, that he turned into a hunting cat.
"Thanks, Kasumi," he rumbled, "I'm famished." He blinked the sleep
from his cat's eyes then peered at the girl. "Are you alright,
Kasumi?"
"J-just fine, Ranma," she replied as the cheetah padded passed her
and stretched in the brisk pre-dawn air.
---
Ryoga walked along the subway platform without really watching
where he was going. His thoughts were as dark as the tunnel was
getting.
Azusa was the first person to show him kindness in a long time.
She was awfully cute and sweet. She didn't care that he turned
into a rat.
That was the bad part. She really didn't care; in fact she
preferred keeping him as her pet mousy. She was plain nuts. He
was glad to have gotten away from her. Really!
Ryoga pounded his fist into a wall, dislodging clods of dirt and
rock. That was when he noticed that something was wrong.
"Who turned out the lights?" he yelled, listened to the echo for a
moment then transformed. The rat's eyes were a lot more sensitive
to light, which was handy if you spent a lot of time alone in the
dark.
The tunnel was simply dug out of the earth. There was no sign of
concrete walls nor tiled floors. Someone had moved the subway
station while he wasn't looking. He hated it when that happened.
Grumbling to himself, the rat turned around and scampered down the
tunnel in search of the way back. With only two directions from
which to choose he, of course, chose the other one.
Eventually he saw the light at the end of the tunnel. That was
when it hit him. 'It' being, of all things, a pig's hoof.
"Eeek!" a girl screamed cutely. "A rat! Kill it, Katsunishiki!"
The rat scurried for cover. Then he realised something important
and concluded, 'that pig is using martial arts! There's more here
than meets the eye.' "Ryoga Muskimise!"
The massive pig backed off as the giant rat transformed into an
armoured warrior, but then it adopted a sumo stance and advanced
to protect its mistress.
Ryoga snorted, "give it up, Musk. Why don't you fight me like a
man?"
The girl watched as her prize boar was beaten up horribly by the
guy in the rat suit. Her emotions were mixed. On one trotter, her
favourite sumo boar was receiving a savage thrashing but, on the
other hoof, her grandfather told her that she must marry a man
strong enough to beat her pig and this was the only one she'd
found.
Then again, she really didn't like rats! They were so dirty, not
like pigs. They were so cowardly, not like pigs. They were just
so very much not like pigs! How could she marry such a rat-like
man?
But he was so strong, like a pig. So handsome, like a pig. So
robust, like a pig. And he'd just knocked Katsunishiki out! He
was the perfect pig-like man she had to marry! Which was it to be?
Ryoga stood over the fallen boar and discovered that the girl was
staring at him with a confused expression and muttering to
herself. Ignoring her, Ryoga grabbed the pig by the snout and drew
back his fist to slap it awake; he wanted answers from the supposed
Musk warrior.
"Wait!" the girl cried desperately as she threw her arms around
him. "You don't have to hurt my Katsunishiki any more! I'll
marry you!"
"What do you mean, you'll marry me?" Ryoga demanded in confusion.
"You are my ideal man," the girl lied then explained. "I am Unryu
Akari and my family has trained Sumo Pigs for generations."
"Then this is really a pig?" Ryoga demanded incredulously.
"Katsunishiki is the fourteenth champion of my Pig Sumo Dojo!"
Akari introduced proudly. "Before he died, my grandfather said
to me ...."
"Akari must be with a strong man," an old man interrupted with the
explanation, "I won't allow her to marry any man who can't beat
our champion sumo pig, Katsunishiki!"
"This is my grandfather," Akari pulled away from Ryoga and
introduced. "I tried to find a nice, intelligent, kind and gentle
man, but there was no one like that who could defeat Katsunishiki!"
"So in the end I decided that _anybody_ who could defeat
Katsunishiki would be okay," the old man concluded. "You're the
one for my Akari, alright!"
"I love you! I love you! I love you!" Akari repeated in an effort
to convince Ryoga; or perhaps herself.
'Why can't I ever meet a normal girl?' Ryoga wondered sourly as he
made his escape.
---
"What do you mean, Akane's gone again?" Soun demanded.
"When I went to get her up for breakfast after Ranma left, she
wasn't in her tent," a worried Kasumi explained patiently as she
picked the wok off the fire, " It doesn't look like she slept in it
at all!"
"I haven't seen her since she had Ranma walk her to the bushes last
night," Nabiki observed as she rubbed the sleep from her eyes.
"I saw her walk back towards the camp after trying to seduce
Ranma," Soun added.
"Well, she didn't make it ba... what!?" Kasumi noted and screamed
as the full shock of her father's announcement sank in. The wok
arced into the air and the contents went flying.
Genma hastily caught the tossed breakfast in a desperate display of
martial-arts-food-saving then plastered a silly grin across his
face. He knew that nature would take it's course; he just hadn't
expected Akane to be the one to make the first move!
"After she _what_!?" Nabiki demanded; suddenly she was very much
awake.
"That ... that's not like Akane," Kasumi exclaimed in bewilderment
as she pressed her palm to her cheek. "She's such a sweet girl."
'And I thought she'd be a late developer.'
"That's _so_ not like Akane," Nabiki agreed. "Damn, that shampoo
of Shampoo's really messed with her head."
"And now she's gone wandering off again!" Soun cried. "Now the
schools will never be united. Oh, my poor little girl!"
"Don't you worry, Tendo!" Genma exclaimed. "We'll find the girl
and then make Ranma do the decent thing and marry her."
"Now wait a minute!" Nabiki protested.
"Oh no," Kasumi exclaimed. "Ranma didn't ...do... anything, did
he?"
"He wouldn't!" Nabiki judged. 'Would he?'
---
"Construction engineering martial arts?" Ryoga asked as he munched
on a ham sandwich. He'd wandered into the construction yard after
escaping from the Unryu nuts and found the little man hammering
rivets into a steel girder with his finger.
"That's right," the friendly neighbourhood construction worker
agreed over his BLT. "There's a whole set of techniques that are a
lot safer to use than explosives or what not. Let's see, why don't
you show me how you would shatter that boulder?"
Ryoga snorted and struck the rock with his fist. It was too easy.
Even before getting steel fists, Ryoga could perform such a simple
feat.
"Not bad, but I said shatter, not break. I do it like this ...."
The little man tapped the rock with a finger, shattering the
boulder into tiny shards.
"How did you do that?" Ryoga demanded as he stared wide eyed. Even
with his metallic frame Ryoga wasn't that strong and the little man
hadn't exerted himself at all.
"It's simple," the worker said and titled back his safety first
helmet. "Everything has a breaking point. You just have to find
it. It is an old technique developed by quarry men in China."
"Show me how!" Ryoga demanded. 'With this technique, I'll be able
to get my revenge!'
---
A girl broke free of the rope binding her while her captors weren't
looking, then climbed out of the cave to make a break for it. As
she raced through the woods she realised that her former captors
would soon track her down and looked for a way to throw them off
her trail. However, when a way presented itself, she suddenly
realised that she'd forgotten how to swim.
It seemed that she'd forgotten a lot of things, but that one
suddenly seemed to be rather more important at that moment. She
began to thrash wildly; which was not a help at all. Then a
grappling hook wrapped around her arm as she went under and it
pulled the waterlogged girl out of the river.
"Akane!" the gigantic tarantula exclaimed as he scuttled to the
river bank. "Are you alright?"
She sputtered water, peered at the spider through dripping hair,
then brained it with a piece of flotsam; a rather waterlogged log.
"She'll be fine," Mu Tzu observed as he reeled his grappling hook
back into his sleeve. "Transform and take care of her while I deal
with Saotome."
"H...hi...karu, Ma...shki...mise!" the tarantula muttered from
under the log.
But, by the time Hikaru recovered, the girl had made her escape.
---
"I'm really not sure about this ...!" Ryoga stated his second
thoughts.
"Just extend your finger and concentrate on the point!" the
construction worked instructed him. "See the point; be the
point!"
"That's easy for you to say!" Suspended high over the construction
site, Ryoga whimpered and watched as the wrecking ball was pulled
back then released.
"Go Katsunishiki!" Akari yelled and the sumo pig dived in front of
the swinging wrecking ball. "I'll save you, lover!"
Ryoga's eyes widened as the ball hit the pig and kept on coming at
him; carrying the very large and heavy pig with it.
"Oh no!" Akari cried as she rushed over to the crash site.
"Lover! Katsunishiki! Are you all right? Speak to me!"
Ryoga briefly wondered if she was talking to him, or the pig, then
passed out.
---
The cheetah maximised in mid air and Ranma landed in the clearing
to look around warily. From what he'd seen of Mu Tzu, and been
told by Shan Pu, he expected the place to be riddled with traps.
There was plenty of places to conceal them in the riverside
foliage and boulder speckled ground.
"It took you long enough to get here, Saotome," Mu Tzu's voice
sneered from the vegetation. "I would have thought even a
womaniser like you would be more concerned about your girlfriend.
I won't let you treat Shan Pu so callously!"
"Get a grip, Mousse," Ranma advised the shrubbery as he searched
for Mu Tzu's location. "I ain't interested in Shampoo and Akane
spent the night safely in her tent."
Mu Tzu laughed. "I assure you, Saotome, your woman is quite
securely bound back at my camp. The only way you will see her
again is to face me in man to man combat."
Ranma snorted. "I don't know who you think you have, but Akane
is quite safe back at my camp. 'sides, I ain't the one hiding
here. Why don't you face me like a man?"
"What do you take me for, Saotome? I am a master of hidden
weapons and this field is my weapon!"
Ranma leaped aside as a sharpened log swung across the clearing
followed by a boulder from another direction then a series of
other roped objects from various directions at once. Ranma
flipped about the clearing, avoiding them with ease, until his
feet touched down on the concealed pit.
"Is that the best you can do?" Ranma's jeer stifled Mu Tzu's
triumphant laugh. He stood on two of the many sharpened spikes set
into the bottom of the pit. He flipped out of the pit and looked
about. The roped objects with which Mu Tzu had herded him into the
pit lay tangled around the clearing.
"Well then, it looks like I will just have to get serious!" Mu
Tzu's voice announced and the crossbows, with poison tipped
quarrels, and the catapult, with exploding shot, were triggered.
---
"Oh dear, it sounds as if Ranma's fight is serious, Mister
Saotome," Kasumi observed nervously at the sound of explosions. "I
do hope he'll be okay!"
"The boy will be fine," the tiger, on which she was riding,
reassured her. "It's your sister we should be worried about."
"This is about where I last saw my little girl," Soun decided from
beside them. The cat leaped off of his shoulder and sniffed
around.
"It looks like there was a fight over here," the tiger observed and
strode towards the area. "I'm afraid she didn't just wander off
this time."
Predicably, Soun began bawling.
"Oh no!" Kasumi exclaimed and clutched the tiger's fur. "Are you
sure, Mister Saotome?"
"It was Shampoo," the cat hissed angrily as she caught scent of the
Joketsu warrior's perfume.
"Then we must find the amazon women!" Soun stopped crying to
declare fiercely, suddenly wearing his samurai armor and
brandishing his weapons.
---
Several blowgun darts peppered Ranma's armor as he dodged a volley
of fiery arrows and bounced off the last of the burning rocks in
mid air. He wasn't quite as swift in cyborg mode as he would have
been as a cheetah but he was armoured and, after years of martial
arts training, weaving through the barrage was almost a walk in the
park.
"Okay, Mousse, now you're starting to annoy me," Ranma declared
as he flicked a barbed dart off of the bracer welded onto his
forearm. "Come out of the bushes or I'll come in and hunt you
down."
"Go ahead, Saotome," Mu Tzu taunted. "Show me what an animal you
are!"
Ranma's eyes narrowed as he considered the riverside foliage.
There would be lots of places to conceal traps within that growth.
The smart thing would be to ignore Mu Tzu's taunts, but Ranma
wasn't like that.
He just wasn't the type to turn down a challenge!
Still, he flipped back his blonde pony-tail and considered, "this
is supposed to be a man-to-man fight, Mousse. Do you think I'd
give you the satisfaction of forcing me into beast mode to find
you?"
---
"Oh! Mister Saotome!" a startled girl exclaimed and began to
explain, "I was just ...!" when she noticed that that tiger
emerging from the shadows wasn't the one she expected. It wasn't
just colour; the wings were a dead give away.
Then hands wrapped around her from behind and squeezed. A voice
announced, "I've caught her Min Tu! And I can feel her br-breasts!
S-s-soft!"
"You pervert!" the girl growled and reached for the silvery metal
arms holding her.
"You lucky dog, Lin Ma," the winged tiger announced as he
transformed, then Min Tu winced as he watched Lin Ma discover a
whole world of hurt. He backed away as the girl turned on him. He
was a Beast Warrior of unparalleled strength, but dealing with
angry and half-dressed girls was not something he was used to.
---
Ranma leapt from tree to tree, apparently barely avoiding the bear
traps, pits nooses and trip wires set into ground or the garrottes
and nets strung between branches as he searched for his hidden
adversary. If there was one thing he could say about the master of
hidden weapons, it was that he was industrious in setting traps.
But eventually Ranma found ... the radio wedged into a hollow tree.
"Really, Saotome, did you think that it would be that easy to defeat
me?" Mu Tzu's voice taunted.
Ranma fumed, then smirked. "I guess this means that I won. I'll
just tell Shampoo that you forfeited the match."
"Wh-what are you talking about?" Mu Tzu demanded.
"You heard me," Ranma stated flatly, crossed his arms behind his
head and started to leave. "I wonder what she'll think when she
hears that you didn't even show up for the challenge?"
"You can't just walk away from this, Saotome!"
"Why not?" Ranma asked and made a pretence of looking around.
"'Hey, Shampoo, I showed up, waited but didn't see Mousse
anywhere. I guess he was too chicken to face me.'"
"Why you ...? So you're just going to abandon your girlfriend?" Mu
Tzu demanded incredulously.
"Check your prescription, Mousse. Akane is safe and sound back at
our camp. There's no way she can be in two places at once. She
ain't my girlfriend anyway."
---
"Shan Pu?" Ke Lon exclaimed innocently. "I haven't seen her since
last night. I assumed she was still out on her date with the
groom."
---end part 9---
|=_=| [rn][xo:fus][bw] A Ranma 1/2 / Beast Wars crossover fusion
:\_/: Part 9: The power to surprise.
---begin part 9---
Kasumi, as usual, woke early to fix breakfast. She gave a friendly
wave to Genma, who was stretched out beside the glowing embers
after having kept watch during the night. The tiger's eyes
remained firmly closed, but his ear twitched in recognition. She
was sure he was quite alert even while taking a cat nap. It was
reassuring to have so powerful a martial artist and beast warrior
keep a watch over them at night.
Kasumi stoked the fire and started slicing vegetables into the
wok. As the sky began to lighten she walked over to Ranma's tent,
tapped on the flap then pulled it back after a slight pause - it
wasn't like she could catch him undressed (damn it).
"Ranma Dear," she called softly and nudged the slumbering form,
"would you like some breakfast before your match this morning?"
On hearing the magic word, the cheetah stirred and yawned.
"Oh!" Kasumi gasped and drew back, startled. The phrase, 'my,
what big teeth you have,' flashed through her mind. She hadn't
been quite so near to his beast form before. It was quite daunting
to be reminded, up close, that he turned into a hunting cat.
"Thanks, Kasumi," he rumbled, "I'm famished." He blinked the sleep
from his cat's eyes then peered at the girl. "Are you alright,
Kasumi?"
"J-just fine, Ranma," she replied as the cheetah padded passed her
and stretched in the brisk pre-dawn air.
---
Ryoga walked along the subway platform without really watching
where he was going. His thoughts were as dark as the tunnel was
getting.
Azusa was the first person to show him kindness in a long time.
She was awfully cute and sweet. She didn't care that he turned
into a rat.
That was the bad part. She really didn't care; in fact she
preferred keeping him as her pet mousy. She was plain nuts. He
was glad to have gotten away from her. Really!
Ryoga pounded his fist into a wall, dislodging clods of dirt and
rock. That was when he noticed that something was wrong.
"Who turned out the lights?" he yelled, listened to the echo for a
moment then transformed. The rat's eyes were a lot more sensitive
to light, which was handy if you spent a lot of time alone in the
dark.
The tunnel was simply dug out of the earth. There was no sign of
concrete walls nor tiled floors. Someone had moved the subway
station while he wasn't looking. He hated it when that happened.
Grumbling to himself, the rat turned around and scampered down the
tunnel in search of the way back. With only two directions from
which to choose he, of course, chose the other one.
Eventually he saw the light at the end of the tunnel. That was
when it hit him. 'It' being, of all things, a pig's hoof.
"Eeek!" a girl screamed cutely. "A rat! Kill it, Katsunishiki!"
The rat scurried for cover. Then he realised something important
and concluded, 'that pig is using martial arts! There's more here
than meets the eye.' "Ryoga Muskimise!"
The massive pig backed off as the giant rat transformed into an
armoured warrior, but then it adopted a sumo stance and advanced
to protect its mistress.
Ryoga snorted, "give it up, Musk. Why don't you fight me like a
man?"
The girl watched as her prize boar was beaten up horribly by the
guy in the rat suit. Her emotions were mixed. On one trotter, her
favourite sumo boar was receiving a savage thrashing but, on the
other hoof, her grandfather told her that she must marry a man
strong enough to beat her pig and this was the only one she'd
found.
Then again, she really didn't like rats! They were so dirty, not
like pigs. They were so cowardly, not like pigs. They were just
so very much not like pigs! How could she marry such a rat-like
man?
But he was so strong, like a pig. So handsome, like a pig. So
robust, like a pig. And he'd just knocked Katsunishiki out! He
was the perfect pig-like man she had to marry! Which was it to be?
Ryoga stood over the fallen boar and discovered that the girl was
staring at him with a confused expression and muttering to
herself. Ignoring her, Ryoga grabbed the pig by the snout and drew
back his fist to slap it awake; he wanted answers from the supposed
Musk warrior.
"Wait!" the girl cried desperately as she threw her arms around
him. "You don't have to hurt my Katsunishiki any more! I'll
marry you!"
"What do you mean, you'll marry me?" Ryoga demanded in confusion.
"You are my ideal man," the girl lied then explained. "I am Unryu
Akari and my family has trained Sumo Pigs for generations."
"Then this is really a pig?" Ryoga demanded incredulously.
"Katsunishiki is the fourteenth champion of my Pig Sumo Dojo!"
Akari introduced proudly. "Before he died, my grandfather said
to me ...."
"Akari must be with a strong man," an old man interrupted with the
explanation, "I won't allow her to marry any man who can't beat
our champion sumo pig, Katsunishiki!"
"This is my grandfather," Akari pulled away from Ryoga and
introduced. "I tried to find a nice, intelligent, kind and gentle
man, but there was no one like that who could defeat Katsunishiki!"
"So in the end I decided that _anybody_ who could defeat
Katsunishiki would be okay," the old man concluded. "You're the
one for my Akari, alright!"
"I love you! I love you! I love you!" Akari repeated in an effort
to convince Ryoga; or perhaps herself.
'Why can't I ever meet a normal girl?' Ryoga wondered sourly as he
made his escape.
---
"What do you mean, Akane's gone again?" Soun demanded.
"When I went to get her up for breakfast after Ranma left, she
wasn't in her tent," a worried Kasumi explained patiently as she
picked the wok off the fire, " It doesn't look like she slept in it
at all!"
"I haven't seen her since she had Ranma walk her to the bushes last
night," Nabiki observed as she rubbed the sleep from her eyes.
"I saw her walk back towards the camp after trying to seduce
Ranma," Soun added.
"Well, she didn't make it ba... what!?" Kasumi noted and screamed
as the full shock of her father's announcement sank in. The wok
arced into the air and the contents went flying.
Genma hastily caught the tossed breakfast in a desperate display of
martial-arts-food-saving then plastered a silly grin across his
face. He knew that nature would take it's course; he just hadn't
expected Akane to be the one to make the first move!
"After she _what_!?" Nabiki demanded; suddenly she was very much
awake.
"That ... that's not like Akane," Kasumi exclaimed in bewilderment
as she pressed her palm to her cheek. "She's such a sweet girl."
'And I thought she'd be a late developer.'
"That's _so_ not like Akane," Nabiki agreed. "Damn, that shampoo
of Shampoo's really messed with her head."
"And now she's gone wandering off again!" Soun cried. "Now the
schools will never be united. Oh, my poor little girl!"
"Don't you worry, Tendo!" Genma exclaimed. "We'll find the girl
and then make Ranma do the decent thing and marry her."
"Now wait a minute!" Nabiki protested.
"Oh no," Kasumi exclaimed. "Ranma didn't ...do... anything, did
he?"
"He wouldn't!" Nabiki judged. 'Would he?'
---
"Construction engineering martial arts?" Ryoga asked as he munched
on a ham sandwich. He'd wandered into the construction yard after
escaping from the Unryu nuts and found the little man hammering
rivets into a steel girder with his finger.
"That's right," the friendly neighbourhood construction worker
agreed over his BLT. "There's a whole set of techniques that are a
lot safer to use than explosives or what not. Let's see, why don't
you show me how you would shatter that boulder?"
Ryoga snorted and struck the rock with his fist. It was too easy.
Even before getting steel fists, Ryoga could perform such a simple
feat.
"Not bad, but I said shatter, not break. I do it like this ...."
The little man tapped the rock with a finger, shattering the
boulder into tiny shards.
"How did you do that?" Ryoga demanded as he stared wide eyed. Even
with his metallic frame Ryoga wasn't that strong and the little man
hadn't exerted himself at all.
"It's simple," the worker said and titled back his safety first
helmet. "Everything has a breaking point. You just have to find
it. It is an old technique developed by quarry men in China."
"Show me how!" Ryoga demanded. 'With this technique, I'll be able
to get my revenge!'
---
A girl broke free of the rope binding her while her captors weren't
looking, then climbed out of the cave to make a break for it. As
she raced through the woods she realised that her former captors
would soon track her down and looked for a way to throw them off
her trail. However, when a way presented itself, she suddenly
realised that she'd forgotten how to swim.
It seemed that she'd forgotten a lot of things, but that one
suddenly seemed to be rather more important at that moment. She
began to thrash wildly; which was not a help at all. Then a
grappling hook wrapped around her arm as she went under and it
pulled the waterlogged girl out of the river.
"Akane!" the gigantic tarantula exclaimed as he scuttled to the
river bank. "Are you alright?"
She sputtered water, peered at the spider through dripping hair,
then brained it with a piece of flotsam; a rather waterlogged log.
"She'll be fine," Mu Tzu observed as he reeled his grappling hook
back into his sleeve. "Transform and take care of her while I deal
with Saotome."
"H...hi...karu, Ma...shki...mise!" the tarantula muttered from
under the log.
But, by the time Hikaru recovered, the girl had made her escape.
---
"I'm really not sure about this ...!" Ryoga stated his second
thoughts.
"Just extend your finger and concentrate on the point!" the
construction worked instructed him. "See the point; be the
point!"
"That's easy for you to say!" Suspended high over the construction
site, Ryoga whimpered and watched as the wrecking ball was pulled
back then released.
"Go Katsunishiki!" Akari yelled and the sumo pig dived in front of
the swinging wrecking ball. "I'll save you, lover!"
Ryoga's eyes widened as the ball hit the pig and kept on coming at
him; carrying the very large and heavy pig with it.
"Oh no!" Akari cried as she rushed over to the crash site.
"Lover! Katsunishiki! Are you all right? Speak to me!"
Ryoga briefly wondered if she was talking to him, or the pig, then
passed out.
---
The cheetah maximised in mid air and Ranma landed in the clearing
to look around warily. From what he'd seen of Mu Tzu, and been
told by Shan Pu, he expected the place to be riddled with traps.
There was plenty of places to conceal them in the riverside
foliage and boulder speckled ground.
"It took you long enough to get here, Saotome," Mu Tzu's voice
sneered from the vegetation. "I would have thought even a
womaniser like you would be more concerned about your girlfriend.
I won't let you treat Shan Pu so callously!"
"Get a grip, Mousse," Ranma advised the shrubbery as he searched
for Mu Tzu's location. "I ain't interested in Shampoo and Akane
spent the night safely in her tent."
Mu Tzu laughed. "I assure you, Saotome, your woman is quite
securely bound back at my camp. The only way you will see her
again is to face me in man to man combat."
Ranma snorted. "I don't know who you think you have, but Akane
is quite safe back at my camp. 'sides, I ain't the one hiding
here. Why don't you face me like a man?"
"What do you take me for, Saotome? I am a master of hidden
weapons and this field is my weapon!"
Ranma leaped aside as a sharpened log swung across the clearing
followed by a boulder from another direction then a series of
other roped objects from various directions at once. Ranma
flipped about the clearing, avoiding them with ease, until his
feet touched down on the concealed pit.
"Is that the best you can do?" Ranma's jeer stifled Mu Tzu's
triumphant laugh. He stood on two of the many sharpened spikes set
into the bottom of the pit. He flipped out of the pit and looked
about. The roped objects with which Mu Tzu had herded him into the
pit lay tangled around the clearing.
"Well then, it looks like I will just have to get serious!" Mu
Tzu's voice announced and the crossbows, with poison tipped
quarrels, and the catapult, with exploding shot, were triggered.
---
"Oh dear, it sounds as if Ranma's fight is serious, Mister
Saotome," Kasumi observed nervously at the sound of explosions. "I
do hope he'll be okay!"
"The boy will be fine," the tiger, on which she was riding,
reassured her. "It's your sister we should be worried about."
"This is about where I last saw my little girl," Soun decided from
beside them. The cat leaped off of his shoulder and sniffed
around.
"It looks like there was a fight over here," the tiger observed and
strode towards the area. "I'm afraid she didn't just wander off
this time."
Predicably, Soun began bawling.
"Oh no!" Kasumi exclaimed and clutched the tiger's fur. "Are you
sure, Mister Saotome?"
"It was Shampoo," the cat hissed angrily as she caught scent of the
Joketsu warrior's perfume.
"Then we must find the amazon women!" Soun stopped crying to
declare fiercely, suddenly wearing his samurai armor and
brandishing his weapons.
---
Several blowgun darts peppered Ranma's armor as he dodged a volley
of fiery arrows and bounced off the last of the burning rocks in
mid air. He wasn't quite as swift in cyborg mode as he would have
been as a cheetah but he was armoured and, after years of martial
arts training, weaving through the barrage was almost a walk in the
park.
"Okay, Mousse, now you're starting to annoy me," Ranma declared
as he flicked a barbed dart off of the bracer welded onto his
forearm. "Come out of the bushes or I'll come in and hunt you
down."
"Go ahead, Saotome," Mu Tzu taunted. "Show me what an animal you
are!"
Ranma's eyes narrowed as he considered the riverside foliage.
There would be lots of places to conceal traps within that growth.
The smart thing would be to ignore Mu Tzu's taunts, but Ranma
wasn't like that.
He just wasn't the type to turn down a challenge!
Still, he flipped back his blonde pony-tail and considered, "this
is supposed to be a man-to-man fight, Mousse. Do you think I'd
give you the satisfaction of forcing me into beast mode to find
you?"
---
"Oh! Mister Saotome!" a startled girl exclaimed and began to
explain, "I was just ...!" when she noticed that that tiger
emerging from the shadows wasn't the one she expected. It wasn't
just colour; the wings were a dead give away.
Then hands wrapped around her from behind and squeezed. A voice
announced, "I've caught her Min Tu! And I can feel her br-breasts!
S-s-soft!"
"You pervert!" the girl growled and reached for the silvery metal
arms holding her.
"You lucky dog, Lin Ma," the winged tiger announced as he
transformed, then Min Tu winced as he watched Lin Ma discover a
whole world of hurt. He backed away as the girl turned on him. He
was a Beast Warrior of unparalleled strength, but dealing with
angry and half-dressed girls was not something he was used to.
---
Ranma leapt from tree to tree, apparently barely avoiding the bear
traps, pits nooses and trip wires set into ground or the garrottes
and nets strung between branches as he searched for his hidden
adversary. If there was one thing he could say about the master of
hidden weapons, it was that he was industrious in setting traps.
But eventually Ranma found ... the radio wedged into a hollow tree.
"Really, Saotome, did you think that it would be that easy to defeat
me?" Mu Tzu's voice taunted.
Ranma fumed, then smirked. "I guess this means that I won. I'll
just tell Shampoo that you forfeited the match."
"Wh-what are you talking about?" Mu Tzu demanded.
"You heard me," Ranma stated flatly, crossed his arms behind his
head and started to leave. "I wonder what she'll think when she
hears that you didn't even show up for the challenge?"
"You can't just walk away from this, Saotome!"
"Why not?" Ranma asked and made a pretence of looking around.
"'Hey, Shampoo, I showed up, waited but didn't see Mousse
anywhere. I guess he was too chicken to face me.'"
"Why you ...? So you're just going to abandon your girlfriend?" Mu
Tzu demanded incredulously.
"Check your prescription, Mousse. Akane is safe and sound back at
our camp. There's no way she can be in two places at once. She
ain't my girlfriend anyway."
---
"Shan Pu?" Ke Lon exclaimed innocently. "I haven't seen her since
last night. I assumed she was still out on her date with the
groom."
---end part 9---