Ranma 1/2 was created by Rumiko Takahashi and its characters belong to her, and her alone. I'm just kinda borrowing them. The story below is for entertainment purposes only, and not to be used commercially. ...Obviously.

"Learning Curve"

Part X (v1.4)

by: J. Wagner

Very few men and women saw the first blow. Those who had blinked, or flinched, or looked away for just a heartbeat, missed it, the moment was so fleeting. And yet, if only a few saw it, fewer still, only two, felt it, and understood it. Those two stood there, Ryouga's arm extended, his fist nestled in Ranma's right palm, and supported by his left. Ranma had caught the blow. Slowly, Ryouga pulled his arm back, and Ranma let it go. The wind alone filled the silence of the moment until, as it had to be, it was broken by a word, from Hibiki Ryouga.

"Good."

And the two warriors exploded at each other. Ryouga opened up with a high kick that spun into a Muay Thai combination of blows, first high, then low, then broken, as Ranma moved in, his fists a blur. Ryouga moved with unnatural grace, avoiding or fielding the blows that could have hit home. Ranma was attacking without restraint, and maneuvering for a good solid hit, and the lost boy was not yet ready to accommodate him. The exchange ended in an attempted backhand from Ryouga, that Ranma ducked, and instantly switched to an attempted counter around Ryouga's legs. The sweep hit only impossibly hard bone, and Ryouga still stood, the momentum now his.

Ranma rolled back, kicked out, catching a bit of black hair, and onto his feet seamlessly. Ryouga received him with aplomb, pressing the attack with increasingly aggressive and savage blows. Ranma almost bent in half, avoiding a snap kick that would have punted a regular man's head into low earth orbit, and let his body flow into a new stance, crouching. Ryouga never hesitated, and jumped while reaching up, and letting lose a single bandanna. He landed, the bandanna still in hand, and flipped it around his fingers, like a switchblade, with practiced ease. One hand forward, to counter any attacks, he charged.

Ranma's upper body blurred, as Ryouga's hand and bladed bandanna took seemingly random turns trying to either pound his face in, or slice it to ribbons. The pigtailed martial artist, however, had more than enough experience with sharp objects, thanks to a certain longhaired, short sighted, male Amazon, to last a lifetime. There was a heartbeat's hesitation in the lost boy's attack, and Ranma moved in, grabbed his wrist, pivoted, and axe kicked the lost boy, hard, sending him flying ten feet back, before he righted himself and landed on his feet, one hand minus a bandanna.

Ranma smiled, and tossed the now limp piece of cloth to the ground.

The crowd cheered, but neither boy seemed to hear or acknowledge the noise.

"Nice to know this won't be too easy, Ranma. Nice to know you'll make me work a little to beat you," Ryouga spoke softly as he calmly walked to where his umbrella stood planted in the ground, and pulled it out like an Arthurian blade. He seemed to test it's weight, for only a second, before leaping at his opponent, the battle joined once again. Ryouga tucked the heavy weapon in, at first, and came in with an attempted elbow to the neck that Ranma avoided by less than an inch, having anticipated a strike with the umbrella. Ryouga recovered without breaking stride, and pressed forward, his ultra-heavy red umbrella now coming into play, and moving faster and faster with every strike, finally approaching an unspoken threshold.

"Kachuu Tenshi Amaguriken!" He roared, and the speed behind the strikes doubled. Ranma barely had time to think, as the blows came in by the hundred; an endless barrage of attacks powerful enough to make a jackhammer seem like a love tap. Behind the pigtailed one, the ground erupted into puffs of smashed earth and dirt from the air pressure that rapidly accumulated into a cloud that stretched over half the field. Then, suddenly, the barrage ended, and Ranma moved to attack, a second too late - the back of a fist, moving at terrible speed, came in from the side, and caught him across the jaw. Ranma tasted blood, and felt himself go airborne, flying over the ground for twenty feet before plowing into the earth for half that distance before he recovered, and flipped out and onto his feet.

Ryouga seemed momentarily stunned by his opponent's fast recovery, but he brought his forearm up just fast enough to block Ranma's flying kick, and respond with a lightning fast roundhouse that nearly connected. Ranma again took the offensive, with combinations of a half dozen slightly different martial styles, driving the lost boy steadily back. Ryouga had to give his opponent credit - Ranma was, again, as fast as he was, if not slightly faster, at this level. To compound that, Ranma had always been extremely skilled, and it looked like he may have had that advantage again, no doubt due to his training with Cologne and his father. Ryouga moved to counterattack, and Ranma shifted without hesitation into Akaido, throwing the lost boy off balance, and then into Tae Kwon Do, striking offensively with a series of kicks. Caught unprepared, Ryouga jumped back and up, before he could lose his footing further. Ranma tensed to pursue, but was forced to jump to the side as a one-ton umbrella spun through the air, nearly taking his face off completely.

Ryouga was still in midair when they met, once again, in a flurry of blows and counterblows. On the ground, the umbrella kept spinning, like a saw blade, cutting through a swath of the field fence, before turning around and heading back to its master. The crowd roared, again, as the two martial artists landed, and continued fighting hand to hand. Ryouga's attention on his opponent never wavered, and as Ranma lunged, he caught the fist instead of blocking it, and initiated a grapple, as Ranma caught his own fist, easily. The two stood there for a moment, straining against the other, Ryouga using his superior strength and Ranma his superior position. The latter attacked first, with a high kick to the side of the head that the former intercepted with his right knee. Repositioning himself, Ranma was about to try again, when his danger sense went off - something was coming in from behind!

The umbrella.

"Kuso!" He tried to break the grapple, but Ryouga's grip was too strong.

The lost boy laughed. "One splattered Saotome, coming right up!"

Ranma's eyes narrowed, and he concentrated on his hearing. The umbrella was making a barely audible cutting noise, as its hilt plowed through the ground keeping it on course. His eyes met Ryouga's, and he could see that the lost boy was never going to let go. It would be impossible to try and move him, or even try and trick him forward by falling backwards. Ryouga had grounded himself, and it'd take a military cargo helicopter to move him even an inch. The sound was slightly louder now. The weapon was getting ever closer to its ultimate goal of slicing his back in half at the midriff. Summoning all his will power, Ranma waited until the last second, tucked his legs in, and with every bit of flexibility he could muster, pulled his legs up, past Ryouga's face, and over his own head, taking his abdomen along for the ride. Nearly folded in two, Ranma heard Ryouga's astonished gasp, and felt the powerful grip on his hand and wrist disappear.

Landing on his feet and straightening out, Ranma saw Ryouga, the umbrella now stopped and lying at his feet, a long red gash on the lost boy's shirt, across his chest. He looked infuriated, but Ranma was surprised he hadn't been cleaved in half by the impact. Ryouga's umbrella buzz saw trick was one of his most dangerous, but fortunately, also one of his most easily avoided. The lost boy had been unusually tricky, and ruthless, in using it like he just had. If he'd been a second too late coming up with that plan, Ranma didn't doubt that Ryouga would have just stood there and let something far worse than what he got happen to him.

"Should yon blow have not done more harm to the Wanderer, Nabiki Tendo?" Kuno clenched his bokken. He'd been able to follow most of the battle so far, and he knew that the wandering rogue's thrown umbrella, given that it sliced through steel link fence like paper, should have done more damage. His money, of course, was on the wanderer (he'd be damned if he ever put money on Ranma, regardless of his opponent), and though Tatewaki Kuno was generally not one to look a gift horse in the mouth, he was still curious.

"Ryouga-kun's wearing protection," Nabiki answered. Her voice was emotionless.

"Protection? ...As in armor? I see no armor."

"His clothes protect him from cutting attacks, Kuno-chan."

"Interesting." Kuno slowly realized something. "You didn't charge me for that information, you know."

Nabiki didn't answer right away.

"I know," she finally said, her mind elsewhere. That had been a killing attack. What was Ryouga doing? What the hell was he thinking?

Ranma took a step to the side, in a different stance, arms dropping forward in an almost wounded fashion. Ryouga took a step forward, quickly recovering from the blow he'd absorbed from his own weapon, when Ranma's body began to fade. For a moment, he looked wavy, in a way similar to looking at an object at the bottom of a pool. Ranma just stood there, calmly.

"Let's see what you've got, porkchop. Come on."

"Porkchop! Porkchop?" Ryouga snarled, his cool quickly fading in the face of rage and indignation. "Eat fist and DIE, Ranma!!"

He charged. Ranma's stance was pathetic, from a defensive or offensive viewpoint, which meant he was up to something. Ryouga scoffed to himself, and kept closing the distance. To those watching, he probably almost disappeared. He pulled back a hand, ready to deliver a quick tiger strike to Saotome's face and cave in his nose, leaving his face a tangled, bloody, unrecoverable mess, when his hand went right through Ranma without hitting anything.

"Nani?"

"Haku Dato Shin Shö!" Ranma's disembodied voice called out. Ryouga felt pressure on his back, up and down the sides of it, and skidded to a halt, his feet digging grooves in the ground. He turned, facing Ranma.

"Interesting little trick, Ranma."

Ranma was still in his lazy stance.

Ryouga started to laugh. "Interesting. But useless on me! Those blows were like falling cherry blossoms."

The lost boy snarled, and attacked again, his fists and knees blurring in a rapid series of attacks. Ranma barely seemed to move, as the blows passed right through him, and then, suddenly, Ryouga's forward momentum was lost, and he fell face first to the ground. As he rolled to the side, and back to his feet, Ryouga's eyes couldn't conceal his fury.

"How?"

"Shichü Rakuchi Sei," Ranma replied, calmly. "Of the Umisenken. Saotome School."

"What a waste of time." Ryouga smiled, slowly.

"Oh?"

"Yes. A total waste." He stood up, tall, and crossed his arms in front of him as he settled into a low crouch, his voice louder now, enough for everyone to hear. "Your little trick seems dependant on reigning in your Ki. What happens, then, I wonder, when it becomes a matter of life and death..."

Ranma could feel it, then. Ryouga was beginning to manifest his battle aura. The glow came, suddenly, brighter than before, and in tune to Ryouga's breathing. In seconds, the lost boy's body was trembling, as he fought to contain his aura, and build it to new levels of power. The heaviness came, then, and Ranma could feel it trying to push him to his knees - to make him supplicate himself before its master.

"What happens," Ryouga repeated, his voice low and dangerous. "When it becomes a matter of life and death... to RELEASE IT?!"

He reared back, arms splayed to his sides, as if in ecstasy, and drowning out the lost boy's voice, great waves of red and black Ki poured off his body in a terrible, overwhelming deluge. Those watching capable of feeling it recoiled, and at his feet, Ranma could see blades of grass catch fire and burn away into nothingness. Birds took flight, and dogs barked, for miles, as the living maelstrom around Ryouga blazed, almost uncontrolled, for what seemed like minutes, but was, in fact, only seconds. The weight on Ranma was greater now, the heavy Ki pushing him down. To the side, it seemed like their audience was far enough away to avoid its effects, but for Ranma, there was no choice.

He dropped out of the Umisenken.

Arms wide, Ranma closed his eyes, and felt the power within him rise up to the surface, and form at its boiling point. Ryouga watched, impassively, as blue wisps of Ki began to coalesce around his nemesis, seeping out of his skin and rising into the air. Ranma's mouth opened, wordlessly, and more of the cold blue and white Ki escaped to freedom. Finally, some unspoken barrier broke, and snapped, and yellow crackles of spiritual energy manifested amid the blue, sheathing Saotome Ranma in a chilling power unlike any Ryouga had ever felt. Unfortunately, the only effective counter to a battle aura attack was another one, and even a 'cold' battle aura wasn't compatible with the Umisenken.

"Well, then," Ryouga finally said. "Let's do this thing."

"Incredible." Mousse's eyes were wide, but still obscured by his thick glasses. He could see them fairly well, but more importantly, he could feel their power. He was well aware of his own ability to manifest Ki as a battle aura, and his best was still far short of the two titans out in the soccer field, staring each other down. To his side, he saw Shampoo and Cologne, both of which were watching things intently. Mousse blinked, then - was Cologne smiling?

"They're both monsters!" A boy, a freshman, took a step back. In the field, the two warriors clashed, and the sound was like the crack of thunder. Hiroshi spared a glance to his side, where Ukyou stood, watching the fight. A bit farther away, he could see Tendo Akane, who looked somewhat nervous. Truthfully, they both made him nervous - neither of them was really normal. In Akane, it was more exotic and exciting than truly dangerous or intimidating, but in Ukyou, with 'his' odd habits, and obvious power, it was more than a little disconcerting.

Ukyou scowled, as the two men clashed, exchanging blows in the middle of the field. Clumps of dirt and stone flew past, occasionally hitting the odd student, but generally going well overhead. She watched, arms crossed, as Ranma found and exploited an opening, his fists truly blurring, as hundreds of blows well exceeding mach speed pounded away at Ryouga's chest. The lost boy barely acknowledged the blows, and pressed on. The shockwaves were already tearing the ground beneath them to bits. They were moving more and more quickly, too. Already, she could see that some students were having a hard time even coming close to following the exchange between the two.

***

Three weeks prior.

"Ah!"

"Quit flinching, you big baby."

"I wouldn't be flinching if you weren't so clumsy!"

"Clumsy?" Ukyou growled.

"Geez! Sorry!" Mousse cringed, and Ukyou went back to bandaging his arm. With his other arm, he scratched the bridge of his nose. Another problem with his too-thick glasses, besides their liability in combat, and embarrassment in public, was that they always slipped out of place. He wasn't stupid, of course, he'd gotten a pair tighter on the nose, to try and prevent it, but they still slipped, and now, worse, irritated his nose.

"There!" Ukyou cut off a stray bit of gauze with a mini-spatula, and admired her work. Mousse's arm had gotten pretty badly scraped up in their last scrap... or to be exact, her last scrap, with Ranma. She'd bandaged it up pretty well, and cleaned up the wound, and while it wasn't up to the levels of Doctor Tofu, Tendo Kasumi or even Shampoo, who was surprisingly well versed in holistic medicine, it seemed all right. Still, it didn't hurt to make sure.

"What do ya think, sugar?" She prompted.

"It's a bit tight," Mousse answered, and then saw the look on her face. "But tight in a ...good way."

"Good." She smiled, and leaned back on the chair. Her hair was a mess, and idly, she undid the ponytail behind her, and let it cascade down her shoulders and back. It was a jumble anyway, right now. It'd be less of a hassle let down and long than bunched up into her normal boy-disguise haircut.

Mousse was silently thankful when she did. Ukyou in her boy-disguise look always made him feel a bit uncomfortable, though he couldn't quite pinpoint why. When she let her hair down, it made him feel much more at ease, though he was careful not to say anything. Ukyou was still very touchy when it came to her past, of which Mousse only knew a little. Kuonji Ukyou was reluctant to let her secrets out.

"Thanks," she suddenly said, out of the blue.

"Huh?" Mousse shook his head a bit, focusing on the conversation.

"Thanks," she said again, more slowly this time. "You really saved my skin back there."

"It wasn't a problem." He looked at his arm, and amended that. "Well, maybe a little one. But you'd have done the same for me."

"It's my fault. I... I shouldn't have gone off like that, and attacked him myself. I knew I didn't have a chance against him, but still..." She clenched a fist, pain evident on her features. "When I found out that he'd gotten Ryouga-kun lost, on purpose. And that smug smile on his face... I just lost control. I had to do something."

Mousse nodded, understanding. "I feel the same way when the bastard plays around with Shampoo. Taking food from her, then insulting her behind her back, with that Tendo girl. When I see her dote on him, it... it just makes me furious."

"You really love her, don't you?"

"I... I..." Mousse stopped, surprised by his hesitation. He did love Shampoo. He'd loved her ever since they were children, when no one else was interested in doing much with a male who wanted to fight, and train. They'd grown up together, but they'd never grown closer, together, in all that time.

"Yeah, I love her," he finally said, matter-of-factly.

"I think... I think I love Ryouga-kun," Ukyou ventured. Mousse quirked an eyebrow, and his heart jumped a beat. His composure, however, never changed, even to a trained eye. He had learned quite well to hide his emotions, when he wanted to. It was a very handy skill, considering his position at 'home.'

"Think?" He queried, calmly.

"I don't know. Maybe like a brother, I guess." She sighed. "Things are a lot more complicated than before, when it was just me and my revenge on the Saotomes. You won't believe this, but I think I loved Ranma, too."

"What?!" Mousse hissed, sibilant.

"It was a long time ago. We were kids." Ukyou didn't say any more, preferring instead to look up at the ceiling. "Anyway... on the topic of revenge, what are we going to do about Saotome?"

"We train. We get better!" Mousse reached into his left sleeve, and started twirling a small knife between his fingers. "It won't be easy, though."

"Not with the old ghoul training him all the time." Ukyou frowned, her features hardening. "I couldn't even touch him when we fought, and I was faster than I'd ever been before."

"You were fighting angry. Very angry," Mousse clarified.

"I was. But I always fight angry. I use it to my advantage," she repeated the same things Ryouga had told her, back when he'd given her training to face Ranma, when they first met almost a year ago. "Still, usually I come close to matching him sometimes. Now? Nothing. And when he started to attack, it was like no defense I could mount did anything."

"He hit harder, too." She felt a tender spot on her right arm carefully. "Either he's been holding back..."

"A possibility."

"Or he's getting much better, much more quickly than we anticipated. He'll be totally beyond us in a week, at a minimum."

The two were silent. Overhead, the large ceiling fan did its work, slowly spinning and softly humming. Ukyou's Bar and Grill was closed, given the hour, and the neighborhood, at least here, tended to be quiet at night. Tsubasa hadn't even shown up in days. It was a comfortable silence, though, Ukyou felt. They were both thinking along the same lines, and they both knew it.

"Would Cologne...?"

"No," Mousse replied with finality. "She's already devoting herself to Ranma. I know she wouldn't train me, and I don't think she'd spare her time for you, either, because you're an outsider."

"Ranma and Ryouga were outsiders."

"The only reason she trains Ranma is because he's... legally married to Shampoo, according to our laws. And she only trained Ryouga to try and get Ranma to join the tribe of his own free will. She has no such incentive to help us and she doesn't do anything unless it benefits her in some way."

"Damn." Ukyou started tapping on the grill, growing frustrated. "If Ryouga-kun were here...."

"But he isn't, so there's no point in moaning about it, is there?" Mousse caught her hard glare, but pressed on, a little repentant for snapping at her. "You know I'm right, Ukyou-san."

She sighed. "Yeah. ...I know. And *you* should know by now that you don't have to sound so formal with me. We're friends, after all."

"Ah..."

"You can call me... " She seemed to hesitate. "Uuchan. ... If you want."

"Uuchan?" Mousse nodded. "Ok. Uuchan it is, then."

"And I'll call you Mu-chan!"

"Uhh..." Mousse shook his finger. "How about you don't?"

"Fine, fine." She smiled, sweetly. "Mousse-honey?"

He laughed shyly. "That's a little, er, aaa... just Mousse is fine!"

"You're so uptight!" She punched him playfully on the shoulder. "Loosen up a little."

"Ok. Ok." He coughed, steering the conversation back to the previous topic. "Anyway, Happosai's an option."

The two instantly broke out into laugher. Ukyou snickered at the thought. "That'll be the day!"

"We could pay him for the lessons in underwear!"

"He'd be happy just to feel me up! I don't think he'd even ask for anything else!"

"Wait!" Mousse held up a finger at that, demanding attention. "He doesn't know you're not a guy."

"He..." She smiled, slowly. "He doesn't know I'm not a guy?"

"This may not be such a bad idea after all. If nothing else, we can appeal to his rivalry with Cologne. She is training the heir of his school, after all." Mousse's eyes took on a dangerous glint. "And, of course, we can always stuff him in a bag and throw him in the river AFTER he teaches us all we need to know about defeating Saotome. Even picking up just a trick or two would be useful."

"Mousse." Ukyou smirked, and the two clasped hands. "It's a Plan!"

A little over a mile away, Shampoo winced, for the fifth time, as Ranma flew back wildly, skidding and carving a deep ditch in the ground with his shoulder. The pigtailed martial artist slowly got back to his feet, drew himself up, and walked forward. He had a determined, almost wild look in his eyes, as he approached the Matriarch of the Amazons. Cologne blinked, and Ranma charged, only to be thrown back again, this time spinning from a strike to the side of his neck.

Cologne scoffed at his prone body. "Get back up."

Ranma groaned, and almost sat up, before gasping and rolling his head back in exhaustion. Cologne growled, and slammed the blunt end of her staff into his midriff, causing him to snarl in pain and anger and curl into a fetal position, guarding the sensitive parts of his body. He'd gone through a dozen training sessions where Cologne beat on him mercilessly, and put him through all manner of tortures. Every day, when he left, she encouraged him to give up - to not come back.

And like an addict, every day he walked to the Nekohanten, and limped, or was carried, back to the Tendo Dojo. The only small consolation was the food that Cologne herself prepared for him before he headed out. The old woman turned, and faced her great granddaughter.

"Get the harness ready again..." The Matriarch began to say.

Shampoo was about to move from where she sat, cross-legged, when Ranma yelled something unintelligible, and forced himself to his knees. Cologne favored him with a glance. "What was that, boy?"

"No." He shook his head, eyes shut. "Not again."

"Look at you. You're afraid, aren't you? Hibiki wasn't afraid to face the rocks," Cologne lied and let her words drip contempt. Ryouga had feared the rocks to an extent, but sheer thickheaded tenaciousness had let him get over it. "But, then, he's always been tougher than you, hasn't he? Stronger, too. I hate wasting my time, boy. Get up, or give up."

Ranma's whole body trembled. "Damn... you, old woman."

Cologne said nothing.

"I... don't... give... up!" Impossibly, on battered legs, Ranma got back on his feet, and weakly raised his arms. "Not now! Not Ever!! I'll never give up! And I won't lose!"

"Impressive." Cologne hopped up and over to where Shampoo sat. "Great granddaughter."

"Yes, great grandmother," Shampoo answered, stood up, and picked up one of her bonbori. She was always the last test of the day - he had to fight her before the day's training was done. It was far from fair; Shampoo herself had hardly had more than a warm up over the day, when Ranma practiced avoiding her and leading her attacks along a line on the ground that, recently, had become a spiral.

Sighing, Shampoo looked Ranma over. He was favoring one side, the left, and limping badly, and though he was compensating for it by adjusting his stance, his disadvantage was impossible to overcome. Earlier in the day, he'd been pounded on by rocks, in the traditional Bakusai Tenketsu fashion, and while his regimen was much less impressive than the one she'd seen Ryouga undergo - due simply to the fact that Ranma simply wasn't as naturally tough as the wanderer, it was still impressive. Far more so than the minor version of the toughening technique she'd undergone back when she was a girl.

But Ranma hated it.

True enough, no one enjoyed the Bakusai Tenketsu training. A person would have to be a severe masochist to even feel indifferent to it. But Ranma hated it. He hated the feeling of helplessness, and he hated being tied up. Ryouga had growled and cursed, but he had never needed to be coerced or forced into the harness. Shampoo knew she'd wanted, at times, to give up, but she'd voluntarily done through with it. Ranma, however, squirmed and complained, and even tried to escape. Shampoo had never seen anything like it.

"Here Shampoo come!" She warned, and started to advance. Ranma tensed, and slipped past her first, exploratory strike. She pushed harder, and taking advantage of his preference for his left side, struck the right. He blocked, and barely stood, but didn't attempt to counterattack. He was always too beaten and tired by the end of the day to do anything but block and avoid her attacks.

Shampoo barely noticed the slowly inward spiral she and Ranma were making, the cool grass barely registering where they had stepped. Shampoo barely noticed it, but for Ranma, it was his guideline. Cologne had showed him the power of the Hiryü Shöten Ha, and that power was in the form of a spiral. Mastery was a matter of time... and practice.

Still, as they neared the center of the spiral, she felt that something was missing.

But what?

Darkness.

Ranma blinked and looked up. Shampoo stood over him, and slowly, she reached down. "Come on. Shampoo take you home."

Feeling the side of his face where he'd been hit, finally, Ranma sighed. Reaching out, he took her hand. Home was sounding pretty damn good.

***

"Ranma! DIE!"

Ryouga broke through the flurry of palm strikes, and faked a strike with his right elbow, only to bring up a hard knee and plant it deep in Ranma's gut. As the pigtailed boy doubled over, gasping, Ryouga smiled. Sensing weakness, like a shark, the lost boy elbowed down, into the base of his opponent's right shoulder blade, and high kicked, sending Ranma straight up like a bottle rocket. Looking up at his ascending foe, Ryouga's eyes narrowed and his hands brushed past his temple, drawing bandannas.

Without warning, Ryouga began to spin the cloth, turning each bandanna into a deadly shuriken. Not sparing a moment longer than he had to, Ryouga began to let them fly, straight up, machine gun style. In the air, Ranma clenched his teeth, got himself under control, and opened his eyes. When he did, he almost wished he'd stayed ignorant. There was a virtual wave of bandannas heading towards the Saotome heir, and his momentum was keeping him from even trying to get out of their way. Slowly, he felt himself begin to decelerate, as he reached his apex, and Ranma splayed his arms wide, as if he could almost catch some air and fly. His mind raced for an escape, but there was none. The only way he could go was down, and right into Ryouga's bandannas. He'd be dissevered into diced bits of Saotome Ranma before he even hit the ground.

One choice.

No choice.

Ranma drew back his hand, concentrated his Ki, and tracked the web of bladed bandannas he was about to fall right into. He felt his hands clench around what he needed, but it was too small, and he was running out of time. Tears streaming down his face from the effort, even after all these weeks, Ranma rejected the small one, and drew more Ki into the technique, drawing a larger one, and then a larger one. Finally, he brought his hands forward, lit the bomb, and threw it with every ounce of strength left in him.

"Happo Dai Karin!!"

Ryouga shielded his eyes, as a massive explosion intercepted his bandanna swarm. The explosion was at least partially directed, and sent the deadly projectiles flying in every direction, though mainly back down. Ryouga dodged, to the side, as two of the bandannas came down, and imbedded themselves in the ground at his feet, coming too damn close to clipping him for his comfort. Distantly, he heard people running, and trying to get under cover. Looking back up, and concentrating on the descending Saotome, Ryouga growled deep in his throat.

The stupid bastard refused to just die.

Ryouga reached up, and drew more bandannas, quickly shooting them off at the rapidly falling Saotome. Ranma tucked, and barely avoided the first two, but the fifth and sixth cut him across his left arm, drawing blood. Cursing, Ranma dodged the next two, spun, and let his foot impact the surprised Hibiki Ryouga in the face like a runaway train. Ryouga twirled, gracefully, with the blow, and into a high kick that Ranma almost broke his back avoiding. They were both back on the ground now, and Ranma came up first, slamming another unannounced three-hundred blow strike at Ryouga's throat, sending the lost boy sprawling in midair, spitting blood.

Ranma moved in fast, hitting him before he could hit the ground. A hard elbow to the sternum, another hundred blow attack, with his knee, to the base of the spine, a double handed blow to the stomach, sending Ryouga down and into the ground with a thunderous crash as earth and stone gave way to flesh and bone. Ranma jumped, then, just as Ryouga's left index finger lightly touched the ground.

"Bakusai Tenketsu!"

Ranma turned, blocking or catching the bits of earth, depending on their size. A cloud of smoke and dust obscured Ryouga's position now, and Ranma knew better than to boldly rush into such a situation. He landed, on both feet, and waited for a cool wind to blow in and start to disperse the smoke screen. He blinked, as a bit of dust got into his eyes, and almost had his internal organs reduced to jelly. Ryouga was in front of him, suddenly, rage in his eyes, arms a blur.

"Kachuu Tenshi Amaguriken!" The lost boy yelled, and let loose. Ranma reacted instantly, with his own set of Amaguriken speed blows and counters, trying to force Ryouga out of the cycle and lose his rhythm. Ranma almost forgot, just then, that Ryouga used his version of the Chestnut Fist differently. While Ranma used his to maneuver for a good blow, or to concentrate hundreds of blows in the same place, Ryouga used his primarily for distraction. Which meant...

The kick hit Ranma's forearm, and despite Ranma's bracing, almost blew straight through his defenses and into his neck. At their feet, the power of the blow shook the ground, throwing pebbles into the air, and knocking more than one observing Furinkan High student off their feet. Ranma saw the momentary opening that his hasty block had given him, and took it for everything it was worth.

Both of Ranma's arms blurred.

"Kachuu Tenshi Amaguriken Revised! SUPER!!"

Ryouga writhed, as Ranma's fists plowed mercilessly into his kidneys and abdomen, hammering both sides at the same time, hundreds of times. Ryouga was helpless in the position he'd left himself in, and Ranma pushed past his normal limit, passing the five hundred mark, even as his arms cried and screamed into his brain, begging for a break. Ranma ignored them, and broke his previous limits to splinters, knowing full well he may never again get such a golden opportunity. Ryouga's steel-hard muscles were just now beginning to weaken, and Ranma hissed past the pain in his arms, but pure determination could only fight off fatigue for so long, and after just over a thousand blows, with each arm, Ranma had to stop. Ryouga stumbled back two feet, not totally in control of himself, his Ki flickering as he fought to stay conscious.

"NOW!" Ranma lunged, drawing out a patterned cloth wrapper. "Goshin Ryü Sei Fu!!"

Ryouga was still stumbling, when the cloth wrapped around his head, cutting off his supply of air. Ranma them jumped over Ryouga's head, tightening the noose. "Ri Giyo Hon Shin!"

"Haizan Tökai Tai!" Ranma planted his feet on Ryouga's lower back, and straightened out partly, as Ryouga's hands waved wildly, clawing like a madman's at the air. Ryouga finally seemed to give, and threw himself back, but Ranma held tight, and rolled with him, so when Ryouga came back to his feet, Ranma was still behind him, his grip on the choking tablecloth secure.

"Ryouga!" Ukyou tensed to interfere. The lost boy had been on the offensive the entire time until now. For as long as she'd known him, he'd seemed unstoppable. How was he now in the defensive?

Akane gasped.

In another section, Nabiki ground her teeth, "Ryouga-kun. He's killing you.... They're killing each other... Idiots, both of them..."

True enough, she had heard Ryouga talk enough of what he wanted to do to Ranma, and she knew the pigtailed boy had felt similarly - there was no love lost between them. But to actually see it, to actually see them at each other's throats. It hadn't really occurred to her that they would actually follow through.

"Hold, Tendo Nabiki." Kuno put his hand on her shoulder, gently - the gesture of a friend. "Watch. Things are not yet decided."

Ryouga's hands became fists, and bringing both forward, struck both back as one, slipping under Ranma's arms and into his vulnerable underarms. Ranma howled in pain, and lost his grip, as both martial artists fell forward. Ranma gone from his back, Ryouga reached up to the cloth on his face, and tore it off like it was no stronger than a paper bag. He turned, and attacked, fist first. Ranma blocked, and they began to dance a similar step, though only Akane, Shampoo and Cologne recognized it.

"Bakusai Tenketsu!!"

The desiccated soccer field shook from the explosions.

"Back up, everyone!" Mousse jumped off the wall, recognizing that things were only going to get more dangerous for those watching as time went on. "Come on, you guys! Get back!"

"But..." One of the students, and older boy, didn't seem to want to move. Mousse noticed that he had his arm around a girl's waist, and inferred that he probably didn't want to look bad in front of his girlfriend.

Too bad for him.

"It's for your own safety." Mousse let a hand leave his sleeve, and three razor sharp claws glinted off of a stray ray of sunlight. "Trust me on that."

The other students didn't hesitate. Most of them recognized Mousse anyway; from the times he'd helped deal with the Principal. Ukyou noticed what he was doing, and came to an identical conclusion. Ryouga wasn't hesitating to use his Bakusai Tenketsu, and while he'd kept the explosions small, he was almost certainly just saving his energy and biding his time before letting lose with a BIG one. Or something worse. Who knew? One kid had been cut on the leg by a stray bandanna, when there was that big midair explosion, and Ukyou wasn't keen on anyone getting closer to the fight than they had to. Waving her arms, she directed them to move back, closer to the School, where they could at least duck into for cover, if they needed it.

"AHH! Finally da Big Kahuna's got outta der!" A familiar voice came, and the Principal ran out of the building, a piece of duct tape still hanging from the side of his mouth.

"Him?" Ukyou growled. "The idiot escaped again! Who was on guard duty?"

"Umm... me." Daisuke, a boy with neat brown hair, spoke up. Ukyou suddenly noticed he sounded a little like a younger Soun, but chalked it up to coincidence.

"Why ain't you keikis in class, ya?" The Principal's attention was drawn by another thunderous explosion from the soccer field. "AAAHHHH!! Mah socca field! ..."

The Principal crumpled to the floor, and Mousse landed behind him, casually twirling a heavy looking mace in his right hand.

"Oops." He adjusted his glasses, and the mace slipped silently back into his sleeve. "Did I do that?"

"You're a lifesaver, Mousse." Ukyou kicked the Principal's body off into a corner. Out of sight, out of mind. ...Hopefully, anyway.

It probably only took a minute or two for everyone to get back to the cover of the school, but to Ukyou, it seemed like half an hour. People kept milling around, trying to get a better look, and generally being idiots. The freshman, especially, had never seen the first fight between Ranma and Ryouga, and even when the explosions began, many didn't want to move for cover. Luckily, Kuno rallied some of the older students, and got them moving. Just in time, too, as a massive blast totally engulfed what was left of the soccer field, and more than half of the baseball diamond. Next to her, Mousse gasped, and she saw, in what was almost like slow motion, the entire soccer field bubble and grow, before finally simply giving way.

Caught so close to the blast, the bleachers bent and shattered like twigs, and the supply shack was simply consumed. Further away, the locker room windows shattered, and the walls caved in, like a house of cards. Ukyou blinked, and concentrated instead on the rolling wave of smoke and debris headed their way.

"Shit," she cursed, and then yelled to the other students. "EVERYONE! GET DOWN! NOW!"

Ryouga hung in midair, his hair whipping around his face. Clumps of dirt, and bits of stone and concrete, some tiny, some as large as a beach ball, impacted his chest, arms, and legs, shattering on contact. Eyes like slits, to keep out the dust, he saw Ranma disappear into the firestorm of broken earth. His ears picked up, distantly, broken piping and fountains of water. Ryouga's grip on his umbrella tightened, and he was silently glad he'd gotten it back, just in case he did run afoul of any cold water. To his left and right, massive boulders hung suspended in the air, twirling in unseen and chaotic orbits.

It had been the largest Bakusai Tenketsu Dan he'd yet unleashed.

Ryouga's eyes found a suitable landing spot, on a spinning boulder, and he touched down for only a quarter second, before jumping up, and off another boulder, getting high with each jump. As he reached the apex of the explosion, with the debris finally starting to fall back to earth, he saw Ranma, standing on another falling boulder. He looked ragged, beaten and worn down to the bone. But he was far from broken or defeated.

"You filthy thief!" Ryouga jumped, umbrella held high and ready to destroy the cause of his pain, "DDDIIIEEEE!!!"

Ranma smirked, and settled once again in to the Umisenken stance. Ryouga cursed, loudly, as his umbrella hit the boulder, passing right through the image-Ranma. Too late, he realized he'd put so much energy into the Bakusai Tenketsu Dan that his battle aura had slipped, and weakened, allowing Ranma to go back into the form fo the Silent Thief. The umbrella cracked the old rock in half, an instant before it splintered entirely, and gave out beneath Ryouga's feet. The image-Ranma looked down at him as he fell, its eyes glittering. The lost boy fell, helplessly, into the pit where the soccer field had once been, swearing vengeance, the boulders and stone from before closing in on him, blocking out the sky and the sun.

Cologne felt the tremor, through her staff, a millisecond before the second explosion rocked Nerima. In all her years, she had never felt so much Ki so perfectly, or perhaps, desperately, siphoned into a Bakusai Tenketsu before. The small earthquake, however, was only a side effect, as the ground shattered for hundreds of feet, like a demi-god's jigsaw puzzle. She calmly motioned to her great granddaughter.

"Move," Was all she said, before Cologne took to the air, the wall beneath her splintering.

"Ayia! What...?" Shampoo's voice was drowned out, as every Breaking Point within three hundred feet of the soccer field burned with Ki, and activated. The world disappeared in a cloud of ash and dust, and all noise was as nothing compared to the deafening roar of hundreds of tons of rock and asphalt and concrete tearing itself to bits at the whim of one man. The rising cloud was visible for miles over the Nerima skyline.

Inside Furinkan, students huddled together, as pieces of rock and stone battered in broken windows, and pounded the walls and roof of the school. Outside, right to the left of the main doors, a massive slab of rock, ages old, crashed down, flattening one of the statues of the Principal. Mousse smiled, at that, and looked down at the pineapple-loving maniac he'd dragged in just moments before. He was still out cold, thank goodness. It took more than a minute for the last of the rubble to settle and fall, though the blanket of dust still shifted and refused to release its grasp on the battlefield.

Ranma coughed, his spit brown with ash and dirt, and slowly moved the hunk of rock off his legs. He'd been buried in the second blast, despite his best efforts to escape. He'd had to scramble and scrape as soon as he'd lost sight of the sky, and only now was he finally able to get a brief look at the outside. Reaching up, he let his fingers feel for a good surface to get a grip on so he could pull himself out. Then, something found him. Ranma felt a powerful pressure enclose his hand, and effortlessly pull him out of the rubble.

"Damn." Ranma gulped, blinking bits of dirt out of his eyes.

"I was about to say the same thing, Saotome." Ryouga didn't smile. Around him, the world looked like a wasteland. Nothing lived. There seemed to be only broken rock and swirls of ash and dust. The only sound, besides the beating of Ranma's own brain, to his ears was the loud wail of police cars and ambulances. Ryouga's brows creased, and he seemed to consider his options. He had his enemy, by the wrist and hand, straight-armed, and off his feet.

"Tired already, Ranma?" He still didn't smile, instead preferring to drive his words home with a hammer fist to the stomach. "Well?"

Ranma looked up, and seemed to see something in the distance, behind Ryouga. "What the hell is that!?"

"Eh?" Ryouga looked over his shoulder. "What...?"

Ryouga never finished his sentence.

"Röga Shühai Tai!" Ranma kicked free of Ryouga. Silently, he was thankful he'd taken the time to study the Saotome School of Underhanded Trick Techniques. They seemed pretty stupid, but this one had probably saved his life. Slowly, Ryouga turned, sporting a rather unseemly bruise on his jaw, where Ranma had sucker kicked him about two hundred times.

"Ranma." He was virtually shaking with rage. "I'm going to break even your tiniest bones!!"

"Yeah?" Ranma felt his confidence rise, and with it, a second wind. His Ki was rapidly rising; again, despite the beating his body had taken.

"Yeah!" Ryouga nodded, his face a thing of fury, and his canines in proud display. His own battle aura blazed, again, enveloping him, and cutting off any effective use of the Umisenken. There were still techniques of the Silent Thief that Ranma could use, but none that would do much good in a situation like this. Ryouga attacked, his anger only somewhat clouding his technique and style. Ranma received him, and the two dueled anew, amid the wreckage and the rubble outside Furinkan High.