And the World was Full of Stars
(Ranma 1/2 and RIFTS (Phase world, specifically))
by Shea McIntee
Disclaimer: Neither series belongs to me... I'm just a mere otaku...
Note: There aren't very many Ranma/RIFTS fics out there... so here's one!
Prologue
Ranma spun and kicked in a completely improvised form, each move flowing smoothly into the next. A punch turned into a spinning back hand, and the recoil of the reflexive withdraw turned into a spinning horizontal elbow strike. A roundhouse kick was followed flawlessly by a spinnig reverse hook kick, which in turn gave way to a axe kick that flowed upwards above his head, and flashed downwards in an almost artistic display of lethality.
He stood on a small rectangular natural chimney as the sun rose in the east, continuing his display, while he waited for his father to get up. They had been traveling over the mountainous terrain of a small island north of Japan, searching for some legendary temple or 'holy place' or something. Pop was vague on that part. Ranma privately suspected that the old man didn't know himself.
He didn't mind his father most of the time, but sometimes he'd go off on some asinine little scheme, usually for food or the promise of 'secret martial arts techniques,' most of which were utterly ridiculous at the least, and dangerously painful or lethal at the worst. The idea of sparring with an oppnent with mock-knives was smart. Ranma could see the point of that. Even having your opponent using real knives made sense. But... CHAINSAWS??
That was pushing it. And that was only one time. Tying him to a large boulder and tossing him off a cliff into the sea to teach him some crazy ocean-something technique. The (shudder) neko-ken. Later, he even thought of the bright idea of trying something similar with large hungry rats. Luckily, Ranma had come across the worn and stained booklet while the idiot was taking a nap and had tossed it in the fire, or else he'd be scared of rats, too.
"Boy, where are you!" came his father's voice from the campsite. "We've got to get going!"
Ranma sighed as he trudged back. He didn't suppose his father would help carry anything today, either.
****
Ranma looked at the large cave entrance in front of him skeptically.
"You've got to be kidding! This is what we've been hiking for the past three days for? It's just a cave!"
Genma swelled up in indignation.
"Listen, boy; this isn't just any old cave! It's the location of a famous training ground!"
"Riiight. What's so special about a cave?"
"I'll show you!" With that, Genma grabbed Ranma by the back of his uniform and tossed him inside. The brochure said that the way to train the student was to throw them inside far enough so they fell down the hole. The process of surviving and coming back to the entrance, in spite of lack of food or water (there was none inside, and the journey took two and a half days at best), was supposed to toughen the body and the spirit.
He sat down and opened the pack to find something to eat. No sense in letting the food go to waste, was there?
****
Meanwhile, Ranma fell down a long steep passage, flailing his arms and trying to grab something to stop himself.
"Daaaaammmnn yoooouuu, Oooyyyaaajjjiii!!" he screamed as he fell through a hole in the passage and dropped into a endless darkness that seemed to almost suck the light inside it. There was a sudden actinic flash of light, and suddnely the space was completely empty.
**** years later ****
A figure stood upon a tall metal pole, limbs and body moving in a smooth dance. Much as he did five years before, Ranma welcomed the sun with a kata completely improvised. An arm shot out and gripped an imaginary oppnent, only to spin and turn the grab into a backfist. A leg flashed out in a lightning-fast kick, and he spun around to use the same leg in a flickering reverse kick. However similar to his performance before the temple this was, there were notable differences.
He was noticably more mature and more confident. Rather than the overconfident and naive fourteen-year-old he'd once been, he was taller, more worldly (in some ways, at least), and, although he still held that aura of confidence, it was tempered by the realization that there were indeed things far more powerful than him.
He flipped completely over, balancing on the pole with his hands as he performed an acrobatic split-kick, and then flexed his arms, tossing himself several feet in the air and off the pole, as he plummented down towards the ground.
Less than a body-length above the hard dirt, he spun himself back upright and took the impact with his legs, flexing and then rebounding, only to land again on the twenty-foot pole, already returning to the blurring routine from earlier.
Another difference this time was that, although the rising of the sun signaled the end of the dance, it's setting last night had heralded it's beginning. Yet over eight hours of highly intensive exercise had left him no more exausted than the one-hour workout of that long-ago day; another sign of his growth in those years.
The place was different. Instead of standing on a spire of rock in the mountains of Japan, he was perched on a much thinner metal pole in a barren and alien landscape. The sun he watched as it rose was larger and older than the star that greeted him that day half a decade ago.
So many things, experiences, people, and places separated him from that brash boy from long ago. He wasn't yet out of childhood by the mores of the culture of his birth, yet he had seen so much and done so much more than anyone who still lived in that culture.
He had arrived alone and completely unprepared in a strange city. For months, maybe a year, he had scrounged a living in a place where he recognized nothing and understood none of the languages spoken around him. He stole food when he could, or found it abandoned. He fought with many who were in similar straits over moldy crusts (or whatever was available-he learned early never to try to figure out what exactly he was eating), and learned to avoid the predators who roamed the shadows. His martial abilities gave him an edge, but in a world where magic and technology mixed and merged, his advantage was precarious at best. His day-to-day existance depended upon his using his wits, his skills, anything that he could muster to survive. He had seen many others in similar conditions, human or not, succumb to hunger, sickness, or violence. Some disappeared, victims of the deadly intelligent predators who cruised the alleys and shadows for prey. A rare few found a way out, using a combination of ruthless determination and sheer luck to excape, but he quickly learned to stifle any such dreams. Those who dream constantly become victims and corpses, unless they were careful about when and where they dreamt.
And then he had had a dream... one that was somehow different, and it led him out of the shadows. He had fallen asleep in his small 'home', which was merely a tiny storage space in a ruined building. To get in, one must be small enough to crawl through one of several small tunnels and know the exact way. That was another lesson he learned: like a fox, one must always have more than one exit. He had swiped a pack of field rations from a corpse that had been left to cool in an alley, and he quickly retreated to safety before any of the others could find it. Luckily, the rations were edible, and he had had a full meal for the first time in a long time.
But when he had gone to sleep, he had dreamed... he had seen a figure dressed as both he and he father had, in a white dogi tied with a simple belt. The figure seemed to shine, and he squinted, unable to see anything more than a vague outline. The figure had asked him what he wanted from life, and offered him a way out: become it's champion, it said, and he would be able to make what he could of his life, to make a difference defending those who couldn't defend themselves.
He had accepted, and then had drifted off in a deep slumber. He had woken up with the dream vivid in his mind, and somehow felt compelled to travel to a specific section of the city, and to find a person named Caryn at a particular hotel. Caryn had turned out to be an odd-looking lizard-like man, of a race known as the Seljuk, who soon became his teacher.
He had been chosen as a champion, a 'teyr veryn k'irrit' in his teacher's language, meaning, roughly, 'star's fury'. There were many names for those like him in many languages, but all of them meant the same thing.
A Cosmoknight. A chosen champion of an entity known merely as 'The Cosmic Forge.' The number of legends and stories concerning the Forge were immense, yet very little was actually known about it. It seemed to randomly interfere with various races and individuals, often in desperate circumstances, and usually for their survival. His mentor's race, the Seljuk, themselves had been saved by the Forge when it lended it's aid to their wizards and mages, who calmed the dangerously out-of-control energies of their planet and allowed them to thrive and grow into a large civilization. Perhaps the greatest impact it had on the Three Galaxies (and perhaps elsewhere) was in it's champions, beings of many races and altered and changed by the vast energies it wielded, who fought to protect the innocent and to preserve life.
Many of them died within a few years, perhaps a decade of their choosing. Many fell, corrupted, in one way or another, by the vast power that each could wield. Some eventually retired, tired and exausted by their service. A few continued, walking the balance between inaction and corruption. Many were suspicious of them; after all, anyone with that much power was dangerous, no matter how careful and circumspect they were in using it. Some had mentors, like he did, and some learned to harness their powers on their own. All of them followed the same code and worked towards the same ends, no matter what their race or culture once was.
He had eventually parted ways with Caryn after perhaps eight months, and had wandered this part of the galaxy in exploration. He kept his nature as private as he could, relying instead on skills and abilities learned from others, instead of the cosmic energy that was his new nature. Many chose to live only a life as a knight, living (literally) in their armor, needing neither to eat nor sleep. However, many of those became easy targets for the many enemies a cosmoknight 'inherited', and others grew apart from other s, eventually succumbing to the dangerous practice of wielding their power without humanity.
A few more months after he had left his teacher, he had signed on and served as a grunt, and then an officer, on a corvette for the CAF. Three months ago, he had petitioned for a long leave, almost a semi-retirement, in order to find his home-dimension and to wrap up his affairs, say goodbye to his family, and such, before coming back. A week ago, the approval had come back down, and thus here he was on a world governed by the Promethians, giant humanoids who controlled formidable powers at least equal to his own. He had said goodbye to his friends on board, and had promised to return soon. This afternoon, he would be visiting someone who could find 'his' dimension and open a gate to it for him. He would take a month there, and then come back in time to rendezvous with the 'Brigand' when it stopped by in it's patrol in three months.
He halted his movement as the sun finished cresting the horizon, and jumped off the pole and walked towards the city that he had once been so eager to leave four years ago.
****
Author's Note: Okay, this is another odd idea I had after reading the Phase World sourcebook for RIFTS. I know I was vague about whatever adventures and companions he had on the 'Brigand'... but don't worry, they'll be involved. In addition, it's possible that I'll be writing sidestories that go more in-depth. The basic idea is that of Ranma as a Cosmoknight, coming back home for a final visit. Little does he know what his father has in store for him.... comments, criticisms, and flames welcomed at deus_ex_mach42@hotmail.com
PS: As in many of my fics, there will be a romantic involvement for Ranma. However, it ain't anyone from his home dimension... it'll probably be one of the other crew members of the 'Brigand', who'll probably take exception to all those engagements and such.
(Ranma 1/2 and RIFTS (Phase world, specifically))
by Shea McIntee
Disclaimer: Neither series belongs to me... I'm just a mere otaku...
Note: There aren't very many Ranma/RIFTS fics out there... so here's one!
Prologue
Ranma spun and kicked in a completely improvised form, each move flowing smoothly into the next. A punch turned into a spinning back hand, and the recoil of the reflexive withdraw turned into a spinning horizontal elbow strike. A roundhouse kick was followed flawlessly by a spinnig reverse hook kick, which in turn gave way to a axe kick that flowed upwards above his head, and flashed downwards in an almost artistic display of lethality.
He stood on a small rectangular natural chimney as the sun rose in the east, continuing his display, while he waited for his father to get up. They had been traveling over the mountainous terrain of a small island north of Japan, searching for some legendary temple or 'holy place' or something. Pop was vague on that part. Ranma privately suspected that the old man didn't know himself.
He didn't mind his father most of the time, but sometimes he'd go off on some asinine little scheme, usually for food or the promise of 'secret martial arts techniques,' most of which were utterly ridiculous at the least, and dangerously painful or lethal at the worst. The idea of sparring with an oppnent with mock-knives was smart. Ranma could see the point of that. Even having your opponent using real knives made sense. But... CHAINSAWS??
That was pushing it. And that was only one time. Tying him to a large boulder and tossing him off a cliff into the sea to teach him some crazy ocean-something technique. The (shudder) neko-ken. Later, he even thought of the bright idea of trying something similar with large hungry rats. Luckily, Ranma had come across the worn and stained booklet while the idiot was taking a nap and had tossed it in the fire, or else he'd be scared of rats, too.
"Boy, where are you!" came his father's voice from the campsite. "We've got to get going!"
Ranma sighed as he trudged back. He didn't suppose his father would help carry anything today, either.
****
Ranma looked at the large cave entrance in front of him skeptically.
"You've got to be kidding! This is what we've been hiking for the past three days for? It's just a cave!"
Genma swelled up in indignation.
"Listen, boy; this isn't just any old cave! It's the location of a famous training ground!"
"Riiight. What's so special about a cave?"
"I'll show you!" With that, Genma grabbed Ranma by the back of his uniform and tossed him inside. The brochure said that the way to train the student was to throw them inside far enough so they fell down the hole. The process of surviving and coming back to the entrance, in spite of lack of food or water (there was none inside, and the journey took two and a half days at best), was supposed to toughen the body and the spirit.
He sat down and opened the pack to find something to eat. No sense in letting the food go to waste, was there?
****
Meanwhile, Ranma fell down a long steep passage, flailing his arms and trying to grab something to stop himself.
"Daaaaammmnn yoooouuu, Oooyyyaaajjjiii!!" he screamed as he fell through a hole in the passage and dropped into a endless darkness that seemed to almost suck the light inside it. There was a sudden actinic flash of light, and suddnely the space was completely empty.
**** years later ****
A figure stood upon a tall metal pole, limbs and body moving in a smooth dance. Much as he did five years before, Ranma welcomed the sun with a kata completely improvised. An arm shot out and gripped an imaginary oppnent, only to spin and turn the grab into a backfist. A leg flashed out in a lightning-fast kick, and he spun around to use the same leg in a flickering reverse kick. However similar to his performance before the temple this was, there were notable differences.
He was noticably more mature and more confident. Rather than the overconfident and naive fourteen-year-old he'd once been, he was taller, more worldly (in some ways, at least), and, although he still held that aura of confidence, it was tempered by the realization that there were indeed things far more powerful than him.
He flipped completely over, balancing on the pole with his hands as he performed an acrobatic split-kick, and then flexed his arms, tossing himself several feet in the air and off the pole, as he plummented down towards the ground.
Less than a body-length above the hard dirt, he spun himself back upright and took the impact with his legs, flexing and then rebounding, only to land again on the twenty-foot pole, already returning to the blurring routine from earlier.
Another difference this time was that, although the rising of the sun signaled the end of the dance, it's setting last night had heralded it's beginning. Yet over eight hours of highly intensive exercise had left him no more exausted than the one-hour workout of that long-ago day; another sign of his growth in those years.
The place was different. Instead of standing on a spire of rock in the mountains of Japan, he was perched on a much thinner metal pole in a barren and alien landscape. The sun he watched as it rose was larger and older than the star that greeted him that day half a decade ago.
So many things, experiences, people, and places separated him from that brash boy from long ago. He wasn't yet out of childhood by the mores of the culture of his birth, yet he had seen so much and done so much more than anyone who still lived in that culture.
He had arrived alone and completely unprepared in a strange city. For months, maybe a year, he had scrounged a living in a place where he recognized nothing and understood none of the languages spoken around him. He stole food when he could, or found it abandoned. He fought with many who were in similar straits over moldy crusts (or whatever was available-he learned early never to try to figure out what exactly he was eating), and learned to avoid the predators who roamed the shadows. His martial abilities gave him an edge, but in a world where magic and technology mixed and merged, his advantage was precarious at best. His day-to-day existance depended upon his using his wits, his skills, anything that he could muster to survive. He had seen many others in similar conditions, human or not, succumb to hunger, sickness, or violence. Some disappeared, victims of the deadly intelligent predators who cruised the alleys and shadows for prey. A rare few found a way out, using a combination of ruthless determination and sheer luck to excape, but he quickly learned to stifle any such dreams. Those who dream constantly become victims and corpses, unless they were careful about when and where they dreamt.
And then he had had a dream... one that was somehow different, and it led him out of the shadows. He had fallen asleep in his small 'home', which was merely a tiny storage space in a ruined building. To get in, one must be small enough to crawl through one of several small tunnels and know the exact way. That was another lesson he learned: like a fox, one must always have more than one exit. He had swiped a pack of field rations from a corpse that had been left to cool in an alley, and he quickly retreated to safety before any of the others could find it. Luckily, the rations were edible, and he had had a full meal for the first time in a long time.
But when he had gone to sleep, he had dreamed... he had seen a figure dressed as both he and he father had, in a white dogi tied with a simple belt. The figure seemed to shine, and he squinted, unable to see anything more than a vague outline. The figure had asked him what he wanted from life, and offered him a way out: become it's champion, it said, and he would be able to make what he could of his life, to make a difference defending those who couldn't defend themselves.
He had accepted, and then had drifted off in a deep slumber. He had woken up with the dream vivid in his mind, and somehow felt compelled to travel to a specific section of the city, and to find a person named Caryn at a particular hotel. Caryn had turned out to be an odd-looking lizard-like man, of a race known as the Seljuk, who soon became his teacher.
He had been chosen as a champion, a 'teyr veryn k'irrit' in his teacher's language, meaning, roughly, 'star's fury'. There were many names for those like him in many languages, but all of them meant the same thing.
A Cosmoknight. A chosen champion of an entity known merely as 'The Cosmic Forge.' The number of legends and stories concerning the Forge were immense, yet very little was actually known about it. It seemed to randomly interfere with various races and individuals, often in desperate circumstances, and usually for their survival. His mentor's race, the Seljuk, themselves had been saved by the Forge when it lended it's aid to their wizards and mages, who calmed the dangerously out-of-control energies of their planet and allowed them to thrive and grow into a large civilization. Perhaps the greatest impact it had on the Three Galaxies (and perhaps elsewhere) was in it's champions, beings of many races and altered and changed by the vast energies it wielded, who fought to protect the innocent and to preserve life.
Many of them died within a few years, perhaps a decade of their choosing. Many fell, corrupted, in one way or another, by the vast power that each could wield. Some eventually retired, tired and exausted by their service. A few continued, walking the balance between inaction and corruption. Many were suspicious of them; after all, anyone with that much power was dangerous, no matter how careful and circumspect they were in using it. Some had mentors, like he did, and some learned to harness their powers on their own. All of them followed the same code and worked towards the same ends, no matter what their race or culture once was.
He had eventually parted ways with Caryn after perhaps eight months, and had wandered this part of the galaxy in exploration. He kept his nature as private as he could, relying instead on skills and abilities learned from others, instead of the cosmic energy that was his new nature. Many chose to live only a life as a knight, living (literally) in their armor, needing neither to eat nor sleep. However, many of those became easy targets for the many enemies a cosmoknight 'inherited', and others grew apart from other s, eventually succumbing to the dangerous practice of wielding their power without humanity.
A few more months after he had left his teacher, he had signed on and served as a grunt, and then an officer, on a corvette for the CAF. Three months ago, he had petitioned for a long leave, almost a semi-retirement, in order to find his home-dimension and to wrap up his affairs, say goodbye to his family, and such, before coming back. A week ago, the approval had come back down, and thus here he was on a world governed by the Promethians, giant humanoids who controlled formidable powers at least equal to his own. He had said goodbye to his friends on board, and had promised to return soon. This afternoon, he would be visiting someone who could find 'his' dimension and open a gate to it for him. He would take a month there, and then come back in time to rendezvous with the 'Brigand' when it stopped by in it's patrol in three months.
He halted his movement as the sun finished cresting the horizon, and jumped off the pole and walked towards the city that he had once been so eager to leave four years ago.
****
Author's Note: Okay, this is another odd idea I had after reading the Phase World sourcebook for RIFTS. I know I was vague about whatever adventures and companions he had on the 'Brigand'... but don't worry, they'll be involved. In addition, it's possible that I'll be writing sidestories that go more in-depth. The basic idea is that of Ranma as a Cosmoknight, coming back home for a final visit. Little does he know what his father has in store for him.... comments, criticisms, and flames welcomed at deus_ex_mach42@hotmail.com
PS: As in many of my fics, there will be a romantic involvement for Ranma. However, it ain't anyone from his home dimension... it'll probably be one of the other crew members of the 'Brigand', who'll probably take exception to all those engagements and such.
