|\v/| Primal Chaos
|=_=| [rn][xo:fus][bw] A Ranma 1/2 / Beast Wars crossover fusion
'\_/' Part 10: Revelations.
---begin part 10---
Ranma turned his back and casually started to walk away from the
trap-filled field. One thing which he had to give his opponent, Mu
Tzu had to have been very busy to set everything up on his own over
one night. He was stupid and cowardly, perhaps, but also
industrious.
"Alright, Saotome," Mu Tzu announced as he burst out of his hide
and somersaulted through the air to land on the field. "You may
have beaten my obstacle course, but you still haven't defeated
me!" He landed with a heavy thud.
Ranma dodged the knives thrown at his back and turned to flash
an insolent grin at his opponent. He cracked his knuckles.
"Okay, you gave me a nice warm-up, now, let's _begin_ this fight."
"I'm going to _finish_ this fight, right now!" Mu Tzu boasted a
warning and adopted a crane stance. His robes billowed in the
morning breeze.
"What trick are you going to pull out of your sleeve now?" Ranma
demanded with a smirk. "Playing cards? Streamers? Pigeons?
Maybe a rabbit?"
The sunlight glinted off of Mu Tzu's glasses as he savoured the
moment. Ranma mightn't be showing signs of exertion, but the
ork-out was sure to have taken the edge off of his speed. "You've
mocked the power of hidden weapons for the last time. Now face my
new ultimate attack: the charge of the rhino!"
"Is that like the blow of the ostrich leg? The hawk's talon?"
Ranma demanded as he counted the moves off on his fingers, "or ...
maybe the blow of the chicken egg?"
"Beast mode!" Mu Tzu shouted and tore out of his robes.
"Oh crap," Ranma muttered as the massive beast charged across the
field. The 'charge of the rhino' wasn't a martial arts technique
at all.
"Tremble with fear, Soatome I will crush you like a ...!" Mu Tzu's
threat was ended when he smashed his head into a tree. Solid wood
shattered on impact, proving that Mu Tzu would be quite deadly, if
he could but hit his intended target.
"Get real, Mousse," Ranma smirked from atop of his opponent's
back. "You may be a walking tank, but you're still as blind as a
bat."
The rhino shook his head clear of the smashed timber then bucked
Ranma off of his back. Quite obviously he was no lumbering
behemoth but a charging juggernaut. Like Ranma, his father, and
Tatewaki, some of his martial arts skills carried over to his beast
mode, though he was clearly unable to use his hidden weapons
techniques.
On the other hand, his huge body and horns were all the weapons he
needed.
"Sooner or later, Saotome, I will trample you into the ground," Mu
Tzu snorted as he skid to a stop then turned. "You can run, but
you can't hide forever. I can smell your fear."
"Who's afraid of the big bad rhino?" Ranma paraphrased as he dodged
another charge. The trip to Spain to study martial arts bull
fighting hadn't been wasted. "But if you've been reformed, that
means that the Musk must be close." 'Damn, that Kuno must have
lead them here after all. But what are they playing at?'
The rhino ploughed the turf as he pirouetted then churned ground
for another charge. "How long do you think you can keep dodging
me, Saotome?" Mu Tzu demanded as Ranma dodged him once more.
Minor annoyances, like scattered boulders and logs, were knocked
out of his path like nine pins.
But the major annoyance remained elusively agile.
"Hey, I can keep this up all day," Ranma informed him with a mock
yawn, "but I've got better things to do with my time."
"And how are you going to stop me?" the rhino demanded. "I can
take any blow you dish out. There's nothing you can do to mee...."
Mu Tzu's voice trailed out as his feet started churning only air
when he dropped over the edge. He made a note that in future he
would not pick the top of a waterfall for his fights. 'This isn't
over, Saotome!' he vowed as the river bank rushed up to meet him.
He rolled and tumbled, and suddenly had a chance to discover how
well rhinos could swim.
Ranma's eyes narrowed as he watched the blind beast flounder.
Sometimes he hated being the hero, but he guessed that he needed
some answers.
---
"Do you expect us to believe that, Cologne?" Nabiki demanded
coldly as she, her sister and their father stood with Genma's tiger
mode between them and the little old woman. You can't grow up
beside a dojo without learning that martial artists improve with
age and, by that standard, the frail old woman must had 'improved'
considerably.
"And how do I know you haven't done something to Shan Pu?" Ke Lon
countered. She considered that Shan Pu could handle the only ones
able to challenge her physically: powerful beast warriors or not,
they were still only men. However, it was possible that the cat
girl was sneaky enough to eliminate the competition in other ways.
"How do we know that Shampoo isn't helping Mousse ambush Ranma
right now?" Nabiki returned as the though occurred to her. "We
have only your word, and his, that you aren't working together."
"In that case," Ke Lon countered with a snort of contempt, "how do
you know that there isn't an army of Joketsuzoku warriors hiding in
the woods around us?" She blithely returned to her campfire meal.
"Oh dear," Kasumi muttered as her eyes joined the others in darting
about nervously.
Except for Nabiki who just nodded thoughtfully. "You can't make
Ranma marry you grand-daughter by force, or by openly harming his
friends, but that doesn't mean you're innocent. Shampoo's scent
was there as well as signs of a struggle. They can't both have
been abducted; can they?"
Ke Lon's eyes narrowed. "Perhaps; if those two were fighting, for
some reason, someone could have attacked after one had been
defeated, or one of the girls could have stumbled upon the other
being taken captive. But who?"
"I think, we'd better pay a visit to the Kuno camp," Nabiki
suggested. "All of us." Her tone said 'I don't trust you but I
keep my enemies close'.
---
"Maximise, you moron!" Ranma yelled at the struggling rhino. "I
ain't coming in to save you like that."
The rhino suddenly stopped struggling, transformed into cyborg
mode, then Mu Tzu launched a lariat towards the bank. Of course,
the noose had been aimed at Ranma's head, but that could have
been a (yeah right) coincidence.
With the rope securely tied around a tree, instead, Mu Tzu reeled
his heavy form onto the bank; making landfall beside the trench
ploughed by the crash of his rhino form.
Without the robes to obscure the view, Ranma took a good look at
his opponents armoured body. He had been bulked up considerably,
though not quite enough to account for his beast mode's mass. Just
as Nabiki seemed to reduce when she transformed to her cat form, Mu
Tzu must somehow gain bulk. Something about it nagged at Ranma but
escaped his mind for the moment.
"So, what happened to our man-to-man fight?" Ranma demanded.
"Don't be a fool, Saotome," Mu Tzu sneered as he clambered to his
feet. "We both use any advantage we can get. You're not one to
hold back from using your opponent's weaknesses against them. Now
I hold the advantage!"
"So just where did you get this 'advantage'?" Ranma demanded
contemptuously.
"Do you think I'd tell you?" Mu Tzu sneered.
"Don't be as big a moron as Kuno," Ranma urged. "If Cologne's
heard of the Musk, surely you have too."
"The old bat's here?" Mu Tzu paled, then recovered as he remembered
his new powerful body. The image of Ke Lon trampled into the
ground entertained him briefly.
"Pay attention," Ranma urged, "do you think that the Musk will let
you keep their secret and live?"
Mu Tzu paused to consider. Had his pursuit of Shan Pu blinded him
to the consequences of the deal? Had his eagerness to destroy the
obstacle to his happiness doomed it? Could he have made a mistake?
It all came down to 'was Ranma right?' and, in that case, there
could be only one answer.
---
The tarantula stalked the forest floor.
Hikaru rather liked the form. He'd always been considered somewhat
creepily Gothic, when noticed at all, and liked the image somewhat;
this was only more of the same. Now people could not ignore him.
He was sure to be unforgettable.
Besides, his new body was an improvement over the old model; in both
cyborg and beast modes. If a tarantula wasn't as strong, weight for
weight, as other spiders, it was still stronger than Gosunguki
Hikaru had been and there were other bonuses to being a hunting
spider.
Especially when hunting.
Yet, when he noticed which way his prey was fleeing, Hikaru came to
a halt. He was very pleased with his new body, but he didn't let
the power go to his head. He maximised and rushed back the way
he'd come as fast as his legs could carry him. He knew when he
would need help.
(Most of the time.)
---
"What? The fair and beauteous Akane has been kidnapped?" Tatewaki
repeated on learning the news. "What fiend would so dare?"
"Oh hO Ho hO!" Kodachi cheered. "With those dreadful girls out of
the way, nothing will stand between Darling Ranma and me!"
"Excuse me?" Nabiki bristled.
Tatewaki demanded thoughtfully, "perchance, Sister Dearest, did you
have anything to do with this villainous act?"
Indignantly, Kodachi protested, "dear Brother, how could you think
that I would do away with those horrid girls then hide the
evidence?"
Tatewaki apologised contritely, "forgive me, my Twisted Sister. Of
course you would flaunt your misdeeds to the world. You are quite
openly devious."
"That aside," Ke Lon considered, "I take it that you really have no
idea what happened to the girls? Then in all likelihood, Mu Tzu
has taken them hostage after the fact."
Tatewaki thrust his sword and shield into the air and proclaimed,
"that villain will taste the wrath of the mighty ..."
"...purple dinosaur?" Nabiki slipped in.
Tatewaki considered the name seriously for a moment before
responding, "I think not, my love."
---
"Cut it out, Mousse!" Ranma growled as he weaved through Mu Tzu's
punches. "This is getting tiresome."
"Curse you, Saotome. Why can't I hit you?"
"Grow a brain, Mousse," Ranma laughed. "You may be stronger now,
but I'm still faster. All the power of that bulked up body doesn't
do you any good against my speed. Without your hidden weapons, you
don't stand a chance!"
Mu Tzu growled ferally and roared, "my weapons are part of my
body!" With a snap of his wrists, he unlimbered a pair of mallet
shaped weapon launchers from ...somewhere... behind his back.
"Now more than ever!"
Ranma found himself suddenly on the defensive as Mu Tzu revealed
that he still retained his hidden weapons; both missiles and
grapples somehow stored in the barrels of those twin launchers.
Caught by surprise, Ranma's only salvation was that Mu Tzu hadn't
had time to fully practice with his new delivery system and was,
basically, just firing his weapons off at random. Yoyo bombs
emerged with equal likelihood as curare-tipped shiriken or a salvo
of poison-thorned roses.
Strangely enough, this was indistinguishable from his old and
well-practiced technique.
"Who's laughing now, Saotome!" Mu Tzu laughed as he fired off a
series of paper aeroplanes.
'Paper cuts,' Ranma thought with a hiss, 'are the worst.'
Especially when they sliced through die-cast metal as easily as
flesh.
---
A breathless Hikaru emerged from the scrub into the clearing beside
the top of the waterfall river and stood right on top of an
undetonated home-made landmine; but not for very long.
---
"Oh dear, they're still fighting," Kasumi observed at the sound of
the explosion.
"That's good, isn't it?" the cat asked. "At least we know Ranma
hasn't been ambushed."
"But why are they still fighting?" the tiger demanded. "It's well
after sunrise. Ranma should have finished it by now."
"Indeed," the 'raptor considered, "even my fight with Saotome
lasted but a fraction of the time. Can this Mousse be more
formidable than I? Nay! I refuse to believe it."
"The problem with Mu Tzu," Ke Lon laughed mirthlessly, "is not his
trick and traps, it's that he just won't give up. It's his most
annoying quality."
"You have a lot in common with him, Kuno," the cat smirked.
"Indeed?" the 'raptor asked in sincere puzzlement. "In what way?"
"Well, for one thing, Dear Brother," the black widow reported from
the branches, "it seems that you are both Beast Warriors."
"Oh my!" Ke Lon exclaimed as they approached the river. That was
certainly unexpected. "This is bad."
"When did that happen?" Kasumi demanded. "He was unmistakably
human the last time we saw him." A blush rose to her cheeks at the
memory.
---
The beast modes of Lin Ma and Min Ta stood watch as a third member
of their party fussed with the sarcophagus. The device was ancient
and battered, but still functioned. Usually. Mostly.
The device reported, "converrsion of pproteann fforrm compp...."
The Musk operator slammed the device with a fist and cursed.
This was the critical moment where it would be revealed whether
a new Beast Warrior would emerge or if the result was nonviable.
So far the signs were not encouraging.
The lid of the sarcophagus burst open and a metallised, female
form made a brief appearance before transforming. The beast bolted
for the entrance to the cave.
The winged wolf dashed after it. On two legs, four legs or in the
air, Lin Ma prided himself on being the fastest alive. Comments
made by Saotome's enemies about his speed had pricked his
competitive urges. He looked forward to putting Saotome's reputed
speed to the test and putting him in his place. But at that
moment, catching the newly reformatted beast would suffice.
Jaws clamped around the fleeing prey's throat and almost instantly
released it.
Hands reached down and intercepted the disoriented beast. "Well
now," the captor observed, ignoring the flaming battle aura,
"that's an interesting development, my pet. Quite unexpected, I
assure you, but useful, yes? Yes! Now, stop it. Calm down.
Muskimise."
Obediently, the blaze died down and the beast expanded into a
female cyborg; with blankly staring eyes.
"Excellent. The conditioning process holds. Prepare the next
one .... Lin Ma!"
"Not again?" the wolf whined as it turned to see a pile of snapped
chains.
---end part 10---
|=_=| [rn][xo:fus][bw] A Ranma 1/2 / Beast Wars crossover fusion
'\_/' Part 10: Revelations.
---begin part 10---
Ranma turned his back and casually started to walk away from the
trap-filled field. One thing which he had to give his opponent, Mu
Tzu had to have been very busy to set everything up on his own over
one night. He was stupid and cowardly, perhaps, but also
industrious.
"Alright, Saotome," Mu Tzu announced as he burst out of his hide
and somersaulted through the air to land on the field. "You may
have beaten my obstacle course, but you still haven't defeated
me!" He landed with a heavy thud.
Ranma dodged the knives thrown at his back and turned to flash
an insolent grin at his opponent. He cracked his knuckles.
"Okay, you gave me a nice warm-up, now, let's _begin_ this fight."
"I'm going to _finish_ this fight, right now!" Mu Tzu boasted a
warning and adopted a crane stance. His robes billowed in the
morning breeze.
"What trick are you going to pull out of your sleeve now?" Ranma
demanded with a smirk. "Playing cards? Streamers? Pigeons?
Maybe a rabbit?"
The sunlight glinted off of Mu Tzu's glasses as he savoured the
moment. Ranma mightn't be showing signs of exertion, but the
ork-out was sure to have taken the edge off of his speed. "You've
mocked the power of hidden weapons for the last time. Now face my
new ultimate attack: the charge of the rhino!"
"Is that like the blow of the ostrich leg? The hawk's talon?"
Ranma demanded as he counted the moves off on his fingers, "or ...
maybe the blow of the chicken egg?"
"Beast mode!" Mu Tzu shouted and tore out of his robes.
"Oh crap," Ranma muttered as the massive beast charged across the
field. The 'charge of the rhino' wasn't a martial arts technique
at all.
"Tremble with fear, Soatome I will crush you like a ...!" Mu Tzu's
threat was ended when he smashed his head into a tree. Solid wood
shattered on impact, proving that Mu Tzu would be quite deadly, if
he could but hit his intended target.
"Get real, Mousse," Ranma smirked from atop of his opponent's
back. "You may be a walking tank, but you're still as blind as a
bat."
The rhino shook his head clear of the smashed timber then bucked
Ranma off of his back. Quite obviously he was no lumbering
behemoth but a charging juggernaut. Like Ranma, his father, and
Tatewaki, some of his martial arts skills carried over to his beast
mode, though he was clearly unable to use his hidden weapons
techniques.
On the other hand, his huge body and horns were all the weapons he
needed.
"Sooner or later, Saotome, I will trample you into the ground," Mu
Tzu snorted as he skid to a stop then turned. "You can run, but
you can't hide forever. I can smell your fear."
"Who's afraid of the big bad rhino?" Ranma paraphrased as he dodged
another charge. The trip to Spain to study martial arts bull
fighting hadn't been wasted. "But if you've been reformed, that
means that the Musk must be close." 'Damn, that Kuno must have
lead them here after all. But what are they playing at?'
The rhino ploughed the turf as he pirouetted then churned ground
for another charge. "How long do you think you can keep dodging
me, Saotome?" Mu Tzu demanded as Ranma dodged him once more.
Minor annoyances, like scattered boulders and logs, were knocked
out of his path like nine pins.
But the major annoyance remained elusively agile.
"Hey, I can keep this up all day," Ranma informed him with a mock
yawn, "but I've got better things to do with my time."
"And how are you going to stop me?" the rhino demanded. "I can
take any blow you dish out. There's nothing you can do to mee...."
Mu Tzu's voice trailed out as his feet started churning only air
when he dropped over the edge. He made a note that in future he
would not pick the top of a waterfall for his fights. 'This isn't
over, Saotome!' he vowed as the river bank rushed up to meet him.
He rolled and tumbled, and suddenly had a chance to discover how
well rhinos could swim.
Ranma's eyes narrowed as he watched the blind beast flounder.
Sometimes he hated being the hero, but he guessed that he needed
some answers.
---
"Do you expect us to believe that, Cologne?" Nabiki demanded
coldly as she, her sister and their father stood with Genma's tiger
mode between them and the little old woman. You can't grow up
beside a dojo without learning that martial artists improve with
age and, by that standard, the frail old woman must had 'improved'
considerably.
"And how do I know you haven't done something to Shan Pu?" Ke Lon
countered. She considered that Shan Pu could handle the only ones
able to challenge her physically: powerful beast warriors or not,
they were still only men. However, it was possible that the cat
girl was sneaky enough to eliminate the competition in other ways.
"How do we know that Shampoo isn't helping Mousse ambush Ranma
right now?" Nabiki returned as the though occurred to her. "We
have only your word, and his, that you aren't working together."
"In that case," Ke Lon countered with a snort of contempt, "how do
you know that there isn't an army of Joketsuzoku warriors hiding in
the woods around us?" She blithely returned to her campfire meal.
"Oh dear," Kasumi muttered as her eyes joined the others in darting
about nervously.
Except for Nabiki who just nodded thoughtfully. "You can't make
Ranma marry you grand-daughter by force, or by openly harming his
friends, but that doesn't mean you're innocent. Shampoo's scent
was there as well as signs of a struggle. They can't both have
been abducted; can they?"
Ke Lon's eyes narrowed. "Perhaps; if those two were fighting, for
some reason, someone could have attacked after one had been
defeated, or one of the girls could have stumbled upon the other
being taken captive. But who?"
"I think, we'd better pay a visit to the Kuno camp," Nabiki
suggested. "All of us." Her tone said 'I don't trust you but I
keep my enemies close'.
---
"Maximise, you moron!" Ranma yelled at the struggling rhino. "I
ain't coming in to save you like that."
The rhino suddenly stopped struggling, transformed into cyborg
mode, then Mu Tzu launched a lariat towards the bank. Of course,
the noose had been aimed at Ranma's head, but that could have
been a (yeah right) coincidence.
With the rope securely tied around a tree, instead, Mu Tzu reeled
his heavy form onto the bank; making landfall beside the trench
ploughed by the crash of his rhino form.
Without the robes to obscure the view, Ranma took a good look at
his opponents armoured body. He had been bulked up considerably,
though not quite enough to account for his beast mode's mass. Just
as Nabiki seemed to reduce when she transformed to her cat form, Mu
Tzu must somehow gain bulk. Something about it nagged at Ranma but
escaped his mind for the moment.
"So, what happened to our man-to-man fight?" Ranma demanded.
"Don't be a fool, Saotome," Mu Tzu sneered as he clambered to his
feet. "We both use any advantage we can get. You're not one to
hold back from using your opponent's weaknesses against them. Now
I hold the advantage!"
"So just where did you get this 'advantage'?" Ranma demanded
contemptuously.
"Do you think I'd tell you?" Mu Tzu sneered.
"Don't be as big a moron as Kuno," Ranma urged. "If Cologne's
heard of the Musk, surely you have too."
"The old bat's here?" Mu Tzu paled, then recovered as he remembered
his new powerful body. The image of Ke Lon trampled into the
ground entertained him briefly.
"Pay attention," Ranma urged, "do you think that the Musk will let
you keep their secret and live?"
Mu Tzu paused to consider. Had his pursuit of Shan Pu blinded him
to the consequences of the deal? Had his eagerness to destroy the
obstacle to his happiness doomed it? Could he have made a mistake?
It all came down to 'was Ranma right?' and, in that case, there
could be only one answer.
---
The tarantula stalked the forest floor.
Hikaru rather liked the form. He'd always been considered somewhat
creepily Gothic, when noticed at all, and liked the image somewhat;
this was only more of the same. Now people could not ignore him.
He was sure to be unforgettable.
Besides, his new body was an improvement over the old model; in both
cyborg and beast modes. If a tarantula wasn't as strong, weight for
weight, as other spiders, it was still stronger than Gosunguki
Hikaru had been and there were other bonuses to being a hunting
spider.
Especially when hunting.
Yet, when he noticed which way his prey was fleeing, Hikaru came to
a halt. He was very pleased with his new body, but he didn't let
the power go to his head. He maximised and rushed back the way
he'd come as fast as his legs could carry him. He knew when he
would need help.
(Most of the time.)
---
"What? The fair and beauteous Akane has been kidnapped?" Tatewaki
repeated on learning the news. "What fiend would so dare?"
"Oh hO Ho hO!" Kodachi cheered. "With those dreadful girls out of
the way, nothing will stand between Darling Ranma and me!"
"Excuse me?" Nabiki bristled.
Tatewaki demanded thoughtfully, "perchance, Sister Dearest, did you
have anything to do with this villainous act?"
Indignantly, Kodachi protested, "dear Brother, how could you think
that I would do away with those horrid girls then hide the
evidence?"
Tatewaki apologised contritely, "forgive me, my Twisted Sister. Of
course you would flaunt your misdeeds to the world. You are quite
openly devious."
"That aside," Ke Lon considered, "I take it that you really have no
idea what happened to the girls? Then in all likelihood, Mu Tzu
has taken them hostage after the fact."
Tatewaki thrust his sword and shield into the air and proclaimed,
"that villain will taste the wrath of the mighty ..."
"...purple dinosaur?" Nabiki slipped in.
Tatewaki considered the name seriously for a moment before
responding, "I think not, my love."
---
"Cut it out, Mousse!" Ranma growled as he weaved through Mu Tzu's
punches. "This is getting tiresome."
"Curse you, Saotome. Why can't I hit you?"
"Grow a brain, Mousse," Ranma laughed. "You may be stronger now,
but I'm still faster. All the power of that bulked up body doesn't
do you any good against my speed. Without your hidden weapons, you
don't stand a chance!"
Mu Tzu growled ferally and roared, "my weapons are part of my
body!" With a snap of his wrists, he unlimbered a pair of mallet
shaped weapon launchers from ...somewhere... behind his back.
"Now more than ever!"
Ranma found himself suddenly on the defensive as Mu Tzu revealed
that he still retained his hidden weapons; both missiles and
grapples somehow stored in the barrels of those twin launchers.
Caught by surprise, Ranma's only salvation was that Mu Tzu hadn't
had time to fully practice with his new delivery system and was,
basically, just firing his weapons off at random. Yoyo bombs
emerged with equal likelihood as curare-tipped shiriken or a salvo
of poison-thorned roses.
Strangely enough, this was indistinguishable from his old and
well-practiced technique.
"Who's laughing now, Saotome!" Mu Tzu laughed as he fired off a
series of paper aeroplanes.
'Paper cuts,' Ranma thought with a hiss, 'are the worst.'
Especially when they sliced through die-cast metal as easily as
flesh.
---
A breathless Hikaru emerged from the scrub into the clearing beside
the top of the waterfall river and stood right on top of an
undetonated home-made landmine; but not for very long.
---
"Oh dear, they're still fighting," Kasumi observed at the sound of
the explosion.
"That's good, isn't it?" the cat asked. "At least we know Ranma
hasn't been ambushed."
"But why are they still fighting?" the tiger demanded. "It's well
after sunrise. Ranma should have finished it by now."
"Indeed," the 'raptor considered, "even my fight with Saotome
lasted but a fraction of the time. Can this Mousse be more
formidable than I? Nay! I refuse to believe it."
"The problem with Mu Tzu," Ke Lon laughed mirthlessly, "is not his
trick and traps, it's that he just won't give up. It's his most
annoying quality."
"You have a lot in common with him, Kuno," the cat smirked.
"Indeed?" the 'raptor asked in sincere puzzlement. "In what way?"
"Well, for one thing, Dear Brother," the black widow reported from
the branches, "it seems that you are both Beast Warriors."
"Oh my!" Ke Lon exclaimed as they approached the river. That was
certainly unexpected. "This is bad."
"When did that happen?" Kasumi demanded. "He was unmistakably
human the last time we saw him." A blush rose to her cheeks at the
memory.
---
The beast modes of Lin Ma and Min Ta stood watch as a third member
of their party fussed with the sarcophagus. The device was ancient
and battered, but still functioned. Usually. Mostly.
The device reported, "converrsion of pproteann fforrm compp...."
The Musk operator slammed the device with a fist and cursed.
This was the critical moment where it would be revealed whether
a new Beast Warrior would emerge or if the result was nonviable.
So far the signs were not encouraging.
The lid of the sarcophagus burst open and a metallised, female
form made a brief appearance before transforming. The beast bolted
for the entrance to the cave.
The winged wolf dashed after it. On two legs, four legs or in the
air, Lin Ma prided himself on being the fastest alive. Comments
made by Saotome's enemies about his speed had pricked his
competitive urges. He looked forward to putting Saotome's reputed
speed to the test and putting him in his place. But at that
moment, catching the newly reformatted beast would suffice.
Jaws clamped around the fleeing prey's throat and almost instantly
released it.
Hands reached down and intercepted the disoriented beast. "Well
now," the captor observed, ignoring the flaming battle aura,
"that's an interesting development, my pet. Quite unexpected, I
assure you, but useful, yes? Yes! Now, stop it. Calm down.
Muskimise."
Obediently, the blaze died down and the beast expanded into a
female cyborg; with blankly staring eyes.
"Excellent. The conditioning process holds. Prepare the next
one .... Lin Ma!"
"Not again?" the wolf whined as it turned to see a pile of snapped
chains.
---end part 10---