Untamed Neko

Once again thanks to WarpWizard for doing a once over. His help is greatly appreciated.

For what they have done to Me, let them be scattered and hunted where once they

congregated and ruled, let them know weakness and fear where once they only knew

strength and fearlessness, and let their overweening pride be crushed.



- The curse of Bast



Ch2



Bast was ranting, it seemed that she had been doing little but rant for the last 3 millennia.

Normally one would be hesitant to draw Bast's ire, her name didn't translate to 'She Who

Scratches, Rends And Tears At Night' for nothing. In fact, if it weren't for her job as

personal hit man and primary hunter for Ra, then her rages would have gotten her into a

lot more trouble.



She was currently ranting at a select group of mortals, her children in fact. It was a little

known fact among the Egyptian pantheon that she had gone through a mortal fetish

phase. Exactly 5346 years ago she had a relationship with a group of mortals whose sole

purpose had been to provide material to help her conceive a crèche of children that

would, she hoped, achieve great things on the mortal plane. Great things that would

spread her fame across the land and gain her an almost unlimited supply of worshippers

and power.



It was a great plan, it was her plan and it was all going so well. Over the next millennia

her children established a priesthood in her honor and she began to gain popularity

through the often-miraculous abilities of her children - they had been born of god as well

as mortal after all.



That all ended however, when they forgot who it was who gave them life, who created

them – that they were supposed to obey her as dutiful children should. "What did they

do!" screeched Bast to an empty room, well caught up in her rant now. "They started

depicting me, ME as a common house cat, AND FOR WHAT?! MORTAL PROFIT

AND MORTAL POWER!!!"



As she watched the power and wealth of her children increase over the next millennia her

favor had decreased until she abandoned her children to their own fate and moved onto

other projects in disgust. "As if mortal wealth and power could ever compare to the favor

of any god, much less my own," she snorted in derision. So she had washed her hands of

them and watched them eventually lose everything that they had gained. Over the next 3

millennia she watched as the image of the cat had gone from being worshipped, as it had

been under her careful cultivation, to one that was hated and despised. She watched her

image, the cat, go from meaning viciousness, tenacity, and cunning but also being known

as a protector of warriors, women and children - to being known as an image of perfidy,

the ultimate representation of evil and bewitchment.



Her children went from being rich and powerful, almost being worshipped in their own

right on the mortal plane, to being hunted down and killed on principle over the course of

those 3 millennia. All this she watched, because the world went from thinking of her as

the desert cat she was, one that was ferocious in fury and strength, to thinking of her as

some- some- DOMESTICATED CAT!

"IT'S A DAMN INSULT!!" she roared.



"But…it's an insult that doesn't deserve the termination of my children," she thought,

"And with the way things are going, they will be beyond even my help after another few

generations. Well, I'll give them one last chance before I rip out their hearts and place

them at the feet of Ra as the failed experiments they'll have become." Suddenly she

smiled, the sudden change in mood would have put fear into the lesser and some of the

greater gods of her pantheon, "And all that is required is that a single female cub gets

lost." The maniacal laughter would have brought chills to the remaining greater gods, had

they heard it. After all, not many had the power, skill or inclination to cross Bast when

she was in one of her moods.



________________________________________________________________________



Tef mery-Bast had so wanted to see the above world. The world that she had heard so

much about but wasn't allowed to see. It was so frustrating, now that she was ten years

old - double digits - she was no longer a little girl in her book, and yet she was still

refused even the smallest glimpse of the world she craved to see. So she had snuck out,

not realizing how big everything was and just how hostile to her kind, now she was lost.

No, worse than that, she was SCARED and lost. It wasn't because she was lost that she

was scared. It was the mob that had been chasing her. At first she just ignored the strange

looks that she had received as she walked down the huge streets. Tef had even ignored it

when people stared to scamper away at the sight of her; she was too busy taking in this

strange new world that was all around her.



It wasn't until the mob had started gathering that she remembered her parents' warnings

and the reason why it was that she had not been allowed out. "They do not understand,

Tef and if you are ever caught they will hurt you," they had told her. That was inevitably

followed by the advice to run and hide if she was ever spotted. So that is what she had

done. Tef had run as fast and as hard as she could and she had become lost and scared,

more so when she couldn't find any place to hide from the mob that continued to dog her

trail.



Now, with her back to a brick wall, she realized she had just been cornered in a blind

alley. She expected her doom to come quickly after that, but the mob just crowded

around and started to build some construct of wood and rope that sent chills down her

spine. She had no idea where she was or where her parents were at the moment, but she

thought that maybe that was the least of her worries, as she stole another look at the

construct that was being assembled at the far end of the alley. She was trapped, but the

images that flashed through her mind of the mob tearing her apart had been averted, at

least until they finished what they were doing. As Tef shrunk back into a corner and

shivered, she hoped that whatever they were doing would took them a lot longer.



How had her people come to this, she thought, if what she had been told was to be

believed, then her people was descended from the Goddess Bast - a goddess. As the

children of Bast they had ruled and almost been worshiped themselves as gods. Now they

were a hunted people, on the run from demon and humankind alike. Killed whenever they

were found, she had not believed it, but from what she could see of the mob she believed

it now; every word of it. Still, how could they have fallen so far, were they really

descended from a goddess, if so where was she now?



Tef decided to do what she had promised herself she would never do again now that she

was double digits and no longer a little girl: she whimpered and called for her mummy.

She cried and even tried yowling but that just caused the mob to get meaner, finally she

prayed that Bast really did love her as her name implied. Only that would get her out of

the mess she had gotten herself into. Tef mery-Bast prayed for a miracle.



She closed her eyes as the mob turned towards her with deadly intent, having finished

building what she now recognized as a platform and noose. 'I will not scream, I will not

be afraid,' Tef chanted to herself, not even aware that her bladder had emptied itself,

though she did wonder at the slight warmth she felt along the inside of her leg. When she

was grabbed and lifted into the air, despite her chanting and determination not to scream,

she screamed.

_______________________________________________________________________



Shampoo had wondered why her daily lessons of martial arts had suddenly increased in

intensity. She was, after all, only seven years old, and the next major stage in her training

under her great grandmother Cologne was not meant to start for another few years. Even

if she was to be the next matriarch her great-grandmother did not want to overwork her.

Shampoo didn't mind though, martial arts were her life and she wanted to be the best, a

goal that the extra training would ensure.



The answer to her question came when her mother failed to come and visit her like she

had promised. When asked, her great-grandmother explained all about the cat demon that

had taken up residence nearby, affecting local trade. It was explained that her mother had

bravely led an expedition of warriors to end the threat to the village and to expel or kill

the demon, providing security and stability to the area and once again proving the

superiority of the Amazon nation.



It was then calmly explained to the seven year old that while successful in driving out the

demon, the whole expedition had lost their lives. They would not be coming home.



A lot of her friends lost mothers that day, the day that the demon had insulted the tribe by

even questioning the might and superiority of the Amazon nation. It wasn't even worth

mentioning that he had slaughtered a number of their best warriors, they must have been

careless and walked into an ambush. Her increase in training was so that she could

avenge her family and tribal honor in blood - demon blood.



So she trained hard, harder than any other warrior in the village. Some thought her mad

with grief, but her grandmother knew that she was driven - being the best in her

generation was no longer enough, now she had to best that demon to once again prove

that Amazon warriors were the best in the world, bar none. So she learned cunning,

trickery and tactics from the oldest and wisest of the tribe and trained hard in the arts with

Cologne.



Finally, on her tenth birthday she was deemed ready to go out and start the hunt. She was

the youngest in her tribe's history that had been allowed to go outside on a hunt. Being

the strongest, smartest and most cunning ten year old the tribe had seen - outsmarting or

out fighting some of the more experienced warriors in the tribe - helped greatly in

persuading others that she was ready to leave on her own. A quick scry by her great

grandmother to narrow the search and some language lessons to ease the transition with

the outside world and she was off to make history.



So here she was in a dusty Israeli town, wandering the streets and hoping that something

would jump out at her. The reality surprised even her, a small demon just came walking

down the street. If it were wearing more concealing clothing she doubted even she would

have noticed, but that thin layer of fur and cat like ears were a dead give-away and the

eyes! Shampoo shuddered as she made eye contact, the eyes of a cat, the eyes of a

demon.



It was a small matter to raise a mob of these stupid, suspicious foreigners. Their suspicion

and distrust of her was soon outweighed by the stories she told of the cat demon, some

true, some exaggerated and some made-up, all to get the job done. It seemed that the cat

was viewed with fear and suspicion here as well - Shampoo had found in her journey that

the cat was almost universally hated. Her stories were believed and a mob had been quick

to form: for the safety of the community, this demon had to go. The war caused enough

problems without adding demons into the mix. Things are never that simple, though, and

once the mob had formed, Shampoo knew only it's or the demon's destruction would

disperse it.



She didn't mention that the demon could probably take out the whole mob of these

foolish people without even trying, she needed a distraction after all and these people

would do nicely. Shampoo couldn't even begin to believe her luck, it seemed that fate

was really on her side - all that was required was for to come to this dust bowl and the

demon had almost fallen right into her hands. So much the better, she'd avenge her tribe,

reclaim the title of greatest warriors for the Amazons and bring its head back as a trophy

for her family. Shampoo should have been a little bit suspicious at how things seemed to

fit into place but in her excitement she couldn't see past the fulfillment of her plans.



Everything was going to plan; the mob had formed and had cornered the thing in an alley.

It had been a surprised when it had run though, why would it run? It probably had the

power to level the entire town by now, if it had been able to defeat 15 premier amazons

three years ago. It didn't bother her though, in fact it made things easier. If it didn't

struggle then its death would come the sooner for it.



Her preferred method of dealing with obstacles was the sword but these foolish people

had actually wasted time building some sort of hanging device. Shampoo shrugged, she

could not afford to attack it directly due to its power level, a level that it was hiding quite

well - she couldn't even detect it - but so long as it died and she recovered the head she

didn't care how it happened. She wished they would get on with it though, who knew

what tricks it had up it's sleeve. The sun seemed to be falling. She just shrugged - the

mob sure was taking its time.



Shampoo scowled as the prey whimpered and begged for its life, even going so far as to

call for its mommy, it didn't even have the decency to die like a warrior. Finally, she saw

that the mob had finished it's construction and had turned to deal with the demon, who by

now had started secreting some fluids (such a powerful being as Shampoo knew this

demon to be would not wet itself in fear). She almost smiled in anticipation, her long

awaited vengeance had almost come. This moment would be the culmination of three

years of hard work and training in Amazon Wu Shu, strategy and cunning.



It was then that Shampoo picked up a powerful chi source emanating from a nearby

rooftop. How she could have possibly missed it, when it almost dwarfed her own, she

didn't know. Before she could close in to investigate, it moved. It jumped down to the

alley to snatch up the demon and fled the township, almost vanishing in the process -

only intense concentration on her behalf allowed her to track it. Shampoo quickly moved

to follow before she lost it altogether.



Whoever it was had moved so fast that she had been unable to clearly make out more

than basic size and shape and the small amount of information she had been able to pick

up from it's aura. It was a human male judging by its aura - quite different from the

demons - and young, if size was any indicator. Still, it was an obstacle and as her great

grandmother used to say, "Obstacles are meant for killing and loose ends are meant for

tying".



________________________________________________________________________



Ranma was frustrated; it had been three years since China. Three years and he had still

not managed to master the catfist. That was not to say that he had not made progress, he

had. Not only had his senses - both physical and danger - become much more sensitive,

but his speed, flexibility and chi reserves had increased greatly as a result of what he had

managed to master. Still, from what her remembered of what the Neko-ken was capable

of, that was only the tip of the iceberg.



He couldn't understand it, he had managed to learn whole schools in less than a tenth that

time - not including the time taken to integrate it into his own martial style. Three

years… Ranma shook his head. What he really needed was some time to focus solely on

the Neko-ken, but was it worth the time taken from learning about different styles?



It was a tough decision to make, he still had five years to go and he was well on his way

to mastering his father's style. He had even managed to integrate a number of moves from

various styles originating from all over China, Russia and more recently the Middle East.

On the one hand he had reached the stage where he was confident that he had gained

enough control over the Neko-ken such that he would not again regress into the feral

state. On the other hand, the Neko-ken had proved a real boon when it had came to

learning and merging other styles with his own. What to do?

What he needed was a sign. Ranma shook his head, not that he believed in the existence

of a God after some of the things he had seen and experienced on his training trip thus

far.



Ranma looked around the dusty township that he had been staying in for the last few

months. It had been terrific training, not only had he trained in the local art of Krav

Maga, but he had also been in the middle of a war zone - literally. Krav Maga had been

developed for these very conditions and it gave a real edge to his own style. Facing

shrapnel bombs, terrorists and local militia on a daily basis had been a real trial, but one

that he had relished. It was an eye opener to see how well a martial artist could stand up

to the tactics and technology of modern warfare, but it had also been a big blow to his

ego. One could hardly be the best if someone with no combat experience could take you

down with a well-placed gunshot or proximity bomb.



The experience had sharpened his already exceptional skills, and also as a necessity

caused Ranma to create a couple of very useful stealth and evasion techniques. His speed

and reaction time had also increased drastically, he would not be living today if he had

not. Ranma had lost count of the number of close shaves he had had. When he combined

his new and increased skills with his chi blanketing technique there wasn't much that

could catch Ranma unawares by the end of his training in Israel. Knowing a threat was

coming didn't really help him deal with it sometimes, though. Which was precisely why

he had developed his own stealth and evasion techniques, his father's were fine, but the

satisfaction he got from developing his own was immense, and you never could have

enough evasion and stealth techniques when it came to hiding. Then there was the

problem of his father's techniques being so draining on his chi reserves. They just weren't

effective when used in concert with his chi blanket, and that was too useful to let up.



Ranma sighed. Despite his best efforts he still had not managed to increase and maintain

his Ki blanket any further than a few hundred meters in any direction, and even that took

insane amounts of food to fuel. Still, it was growing and he supposed he had to be

satisfied with that.



He would miss this place. As a parting gesture before Ranma left in search of further

training, he flared his aura as much as he could, in order to get one more feel of the

rhythm of the place he had called home for the last several months, firmly fixing his last

impressions of this place in his mind.



'Wait a minute,' he thought, 'What's going on?' He could feel the mob that had formed on

the other end of the town and it didn't feel right. In fact if what his chi was telling him

was correct - and he wasn't about to start doubting it now - someone was about to die.

The feel of the mob's combined chi against his own made him quickly withdraw his aura.



'That was just disgusting,' he shuddered, trying to get that horrid feeling out of his mind

as he made his way closer to the mob. The last time he had felt something like that was

when a local gang had thought to have some fun with some lost kid. Unluckily for them

he was hungry - waste not, want not.

It had been then that he had decided that they were both predators in society, and

therefore it would not violate his code of protecting innocents. It was the opposite case -

by cleaning up the streets, he was in fact protecting future victims. He was, however,

very careful about choosing his prey, even those that attacked him, for he was very aware

that he had started upon a path that could very easily lead into a very dark garden indeed.

'I prefer the taste of beef anyway,' saying that, he had never eaten so well in his life after

that.

There were three main deterrents from traveling too far down that path: the first was the

memory of his father, who would be horrified at the thought of his son becoming some

kind of despot. The second was that he wasn't fooling himself when he told himself that

he lacked the power and experience to be a real threat to some of the greater powers out

there - he was only 10, Neko-ken training or no. Finally, well, the thought of becoming a

despot really held no appeal to Ranma.



Ranma was jarred out of his current line of thinking by the sight that confronted him once

he reached the mob. It was immediately apparent what they planned to do: it was a

lynching. Now sometimes there are reasons behind lynching and other public executions;

he had seen the work of enough mass murderers and rapists to firmly agree with capital

punishment. In his opinion, those that were against it had never been a victim of, or seen

first hand, the results to said victims of those crimes. However, no reason was good

enough to execute a young child.



It was all he could do not to explode in anger; still, he restrained himself and studied the

mob, searching for the trigger. Something had set this mob off; he doubted it had been

spontaneous. Then he found it: a martial artist, of all people was slowly walking through

the crowd, discretely escalating tensions against the child. 'A MARTIAL ARTIST!' he

thought in anger. They were meant to protect people who could not protect themselves,

the child quivering in the corner of the alley she had been trapped in certainly applied.

When it became necessary to take a life they did it themselves, they did NOT stir up a

mob to do it themselves.



When the mob started to move towards the girl, Ranma acted. His aura flashing in anger

and disgust - he had never seen actions so disgraceful in a martial artist - he jumped down

from the rooftop he was standing on, grabbed the child and jumped away. He was

planning on leaving anyway, Neko-ken training sounded good about now. He did not

want to be around people right now, much less martial artists. Ranma felt so ashamed at

their actions that he growled, not even realizing that the child in his arms was screaming.









A/N: - I have depicted Bast as she was originally depicted in Kemetic Religion. Bast

wasn't depicted with the domesticated cat imagery that has now become synonymous

with Her until 1000 BCE, about 2000 years after the beginning of her worship. She was

the raging hitman of Ra, who tore out the enemies' hearts and lay them at the pharaohs'

or Ra's feet. Pakhet (lit. "She Who Scratches", "She Who Rends"). http://www.per-

bast.org/bast/ was used as my resource on Bast. Interesting stuff on the mystical history

of cats: http://www.sniksnak.com/lore.html

- "Tef mery-Bast", Egyptian for, "Tef whom Bast loves". Tef was taken from "Tefnut",

meaning tomorrow. There is a legend behind the name, if anyone is interested.



- No one alive saw Ranma when he was in his Neko state, so no one would actually know

what he looks like initially. Dead men tell no tales. As for Shampoo, I don't know

anything about child psychology, but I would think that if a child who had just lost their

mother (a traumatic enough experience for such a young child) was taken away and

trained in the killing arts and constantly drilled with tales of revenge and killing, then

their morality would be slightly warped.

- Coming, a show down between Shampoo and Ranma - the first of many. Tef mery-Bast

is an original character and not an SI.