An Echoes in Time Side Story Series

Echoes of the Past - Story #2 - Prologue

Version 1.0 (9/28/01)

By AllWhacked

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http://www.geocities.com/allwhacked/

--- Disclaimer ---

The characters of Ranma 1/2 belong to Rumiko
Takakashi. The characters of Hokuto no Ken belong
to Buronson and Tetsuo Hara. The characters of
Ninja Scroll belong to Manga. The characters of
Highlander belong to Davis/Panzer Inc. The
characters of Wheel of Time belong to Robert
Jordan and TOR Publishing. All other characters
to appear are owned by their respective owners.
So in other words, I DO NOT own shit, so please
don't sue me because I have Zero money. Thank
You.

--- Warning!!! ---

Anyway this is an Alterverse/Continuation fanfic
with severe x-over tendencies.

--- Note to Reader ---

The events in this fic begin sometime before
Chapter 6 and 7 of Echoes in Time, but will later
branch back into the main story line.

"..." = spoken dialogue

'...' = thoughts

--- End Note to Reader, Start of Prologue ---


'Ohman!Ohman!Ohman!' thought a teenage boy as he
ran for his life; behind him chased a horde of
snarling goat-like creatures, the likes of which
he had never seen before. As he ran for dear
life, with fear as his only motivator, Tenchi
Masaki knew right then and there that if he
survived this and was somehow able to get back
home, he would never ever set foot back into
Washuu's lab.

'Oh shit!' he cursed as he rammed his head on a
low-lying branch. The moonlight was dim and the
forest canopy let in only a little light, but with
his--better than average--night vision, Tenchi
cursed himself for not seeing it sooner. As he
gathered himself off the ground, he brought a hand
up to his throbbing forehead. He felt a warm
wetness on his fingers and a slight stinging
sensation where he touched it.

"Gee, that was smart," he muttered. He would have
said something more like "ow!" or "god damn it,"
but from his mother he learned never to curse and
from his grandfather he learned that he should
never let pain bother him, instead he should
embrace it.

'Embrace this you fucking tree,' he thought as he
kicked at the offending foliage. The tree groaned
and then toppled down; Tenchi then heard the
painful moan of one of the goat-like creatures,
which soon brought him back to full awareness.
Shaking his head he got back up again; his head
still hurt, but he paid it no mind--after all any
student of Ranma Saotome was supposed to be made
of sterner stuff.

With the sound of his pursuers now getting closer,
Tenchi urged himself to go on and to run. 'Run
damn you!' His legs that were aching from earlier
exertion sprang to life while his burning lungs
continued to take in much needed oxygen. At that
moment, Tenchi was ever thankful for his father
and grandfather's arduous training regime.

'Thanks Gramps,' he thought as he spotted a
possible escape route. Above him shone the bright
moonlight; it was an opening in the canopy that
let in just enough light for him to see the tree
branches ahead. With a mighty leap, he was nearly
thirty feet up above the forest floor. Below him
he saw the confused looks of pursuers as they soon
passed over his previous position.

Some of the goat men began to sniff the air,
however a strong wind was in the air that helped
spread Tenchi's scent away from him. Ever
thankful for Mother Nature, Tenchi sat lifeless as
he watched his pursuers quickly give up interest
and return back the ways they came.

After a few minutes, Tenchi let out a long sigh.
'What the hell were those things?' his mind
demanded. He had never seen something so
grotesque; creatures that were bi-pedal and human-
like yet looked as if parts of other animals had
been sewn in where mouth or foot should have been.
They were mismatched creatures that made his skin
crawl.

He let out a cold shiver at the memory of the man
or thing that was obviously leading those beasts.
It was dressed all in black and its skin was pale
that shone with a sickly gleam. When the man in
black spotted Tenchi, the only thing that ran
through Tenchi's mind was the man's lack of eyes.
"He had no eyes," he muttered.

A gust of wind swoop across his sweat slick back
that left him feeling cold down to his toes.
Gripping himself to keep warm, he muttered out a
question.

"What the hell am I going to do?" he asked out
loud. He had no answer, knowing only that it was
due to his lack of caution and equal amount of
stupidity that resulted in this major mishap.

'Why didn't I listen to mom?' he wondered. 'I
should have stayed out of Washuu's lab like a
good-little boy.' Tenchi closed his eyes as he
remembered feeling extra adventurous that day-
-feeling ever grateful that Washuu had decided to
leave with his mother and father to go on some
intergalactic convention. With those three gone
and with most of the regular household gone to
pursue things in Nerima, Tenchi found it easy to
bypass Washuu's security and to take a peek at all
her neat gadgets.

"Neat my ass," he murmured. He got up and began
to leap from tree to tree, the added exertion
helped bring back some of the warmth he had lost
while remaining idle in the treetops. But, it was
only after a few minutes of tree hopping that a
thin gleam of sweat returned to his brow while his
body went into a mindless autopilot as he simply
jumped from limb to limb--heading in the opposite
direction that the goat-men had come from.

Once he settled into a nice rhythm, he pondered
back to Washuu's lab. 'Oh god, I hope Washuu
installed some video cameras.' The thought
occurred to him once he realized that no one would
know where he had gone. 'They'd probably search
the whole world or galaxy for me, but I just had
to play with that stupid Stargate-thing of hers.'
The image of a large circular contraption with
hieroglyphics carved into its edifice came to
mind.

He had heard that it had belonged to his Grandpa
Ranma and was originally used as a gateway between
planets. It was a device left behind by aliens
who came to enslave the human race over eight
thousand years ago. However, once Washu had
rediscovered the device amongst Grandpa Ranma's
junk, she had then proliferated it and with some
tinkering on her part, made it into some sort of
dimensional gateway.

The device still worked as it originally had-
-linking itself to other stargates scattered
across the galaxy--however, with some
modifications the device would scan the various
dimensions and anchor itself to another temporal
or dimensional gateway. At that moment, the image
of large-monolithic columns of smoothly carved
stone came to mind as Tenchi remembered himself
being surrounded by these stones when he first
came to this world.

He thought nothing much of it at the time--he was
too busy dealing with the horde of goat-men who
were pouring out of a silvery-mirror like gateway
some distance away. But now in hindsight, he
realized that those stones that were scattered
around him must have been the anchor point for
Washuu's stargate.

"Well shit," he voiced. "I can't go back there.
Not with those fucking goat-men blocking my
access. What I need to find is some food and
shelter. Hopefully, I can just wait those guys
out and I can go back and maybe figure out how to
return back home."

As Tenchi continued to jump through the trees, he
came across a dirt-paved road. A thought suddenly
came to mind. 'Roads usually lead to
civilization.' A sense of hope returned to him as
he descended from the trees and began his trek.
As he looked from left to right, he realized he
had no clue in which direction to go.

But only after a brief moment, he headed left-
-heading that simply because he was left-handed.
In his mind he hoped to god that he had made the
right decision because although he might have had
great skill in the art, the thought of fighting
goat-men barehanded made his skin crawl. With the
wind behind his back, Tenchi clutched himself
tightly as he walked east; a dull throbbing pain
now surfaced in the afterglow rush of his exertion
and fear-induced adrenaline high.

+++++

The wooden wheels creaked in rhythm as two men
walked alongside a cart being pulled by an old-
shaggy mare. One of the men was obviously older;
he had a small amount of girth and carried with
him a wooden quarterstaff. On the other side of
the cart, walked a younger man--still more a boy
than a man yet.

In his hand was clutched a bow, with an arrow
already at the string. The young man had a dark
reddish head of hair, and he stood a good six
inches taller than the older man. As the two men
walked along the road in silence, with only the
whistling of the wind to keep them company, the
older man, named Tam Al'Thor brought a hand up to
signal for his son, Rand to stop.

Seeing that his father made him stop, he puzzled
at what it could be. He took a look back and saw a
dark rider on horseback. Rand immediately tensed
at the sight and briefly blinked his eyes to make
sure that the morning dawn wasn't playing tricks
on him. When he opened them, the rider was gone;
there was no sign that he was even there.

Turning back around to the sound of his father's
voice, Rand caught sight of a lone figure walking
up the road. From the distance, Rand could barely
make out that the stranger heading towards them
was a young man, who like himself, was more boy
than man. As the stranger closed the distance,
Rand and Thom let out a simultaneous gasp as they
caught sight of the strangers appearance.

There was blood everywhere. The boy's face was
covered in red, a wound from his temple showed
where the source had come from and from the
darkness of the wound it was quite obvious that it
was only at most a few hours old. Immediately,
Tam ordered Rand to head up towards the stranger
to see if he needed help.

Rand lost no time in doing so as the two men
bridged the gap. As they got closer, they made
out more details about the stranger. For
starters, they noticed the man had facial features
not native to people of the Two Rivers; there was
also the fact that the man's hair was dark blue
and was tied long in the back that further
supported the opinion that this man was an obvious
outsider.

As Rand's eyes roamed across the stranger, he
noticed his odd sense of dress. He noted that the
clothes were finely stitched and were obviously
made by a fine tailor, however he failed to
recognize any familiarity in the man's fashion.
The shoes looked sturdy but were obviously not
made of leather. The pants looked sturdy as well,
though the multitude of pockets along the pant leg
made both Rand and Tam puzzle over why someone
would need so many. Finally, they noticed the dark
blue vest that lay over a black undershirt; he
could easily see the vest keeping the man warm,
though without any sleeves he could imagine that
the man must have been freezing.

Rushing up to the stranger they began to question
him, however they only received gibberish in
response.

"Rand," called out his father. "I think the boy
has lost too much blood and has gone delusional.
I think we should place him on the back of the
cart and take him to the Wisdom immediately."

Rand nodded and the two men approached the
stranger. After a little struggle and some brief
coaxing, they got the boy to agree. Though the
boy's words were alien to their ears, the look of
comprehension on his face made it seem that
perhaps he wasn't as delusional from lack of blood
as they had previously thought.

With the stranger resting under a spare blanket in
the back of their wagon, the three of them made
there way towards Emond's Fields with haste in
their step.

To be continued...

--- End of Prologue ---

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