Chapter 4:


As Storm trudged through the forest, she was well aware of the boy that followed. Why does he feel familiar to me? she wondered as she glanced towards him once more.


Sensing her gaze upon him, Ranma looked up, he muttered as he glanced in her direction, but before he could meet her gaze, she quickly faced forward once more with a frown.


Those eyes.and that voicethey have haunted my dreams since I awoke with no memories of my past. Is that why I asked him to follow me? Sighing, Storm picked up the pace as she remembered how the hunting party had found her.

**Flashback**


Yes child, what is it? Xanixi replied, swinging her long neck around to glance towards her adopted daughter.
I think I see some deer in the valley below. Can you land so that I may hunt? Storm said as she leaned forward to eye the ground below them.


Sighing, the scarlet dragon rolled her eyes and suggested, Why don't I fly bye the tallest trees so that you can use that new technique I taught you?


Storms turned her attention back towards her mother and replied excitedly, You mean I can do it while we're in the air?


Yes. It's the only way you will be able to perfect it..besides, you've gotten enough practice jumping from the tree branches back home, Xanixi replied, chuckling.

All right! Let's do it! Storm yelled as she pumped her fist into the air.


Nodding, Xanixi banked to the right before hovering for a few moments as she selected the target. Then, without warning, she folded her massive wings and dove at tremendous speeds towards the unforgiving ground. Thirty feet from hitting the ground, Storm strapped on her bow and arrows, tucked her feet beneath herself and then dove off her mothers back, accelerating at a frightening pace towards the trees. Just before impact, she contorted her body into a flip and landed catlike on the top most branch in a crouch while bracing herself with her hands between her wide spread knees.


Glancing upwards, Storm watched as her adoptive mother pulled herself out of her nosedive and into the air once more. Ginning like a Cheshire cat, Storm waved and shouted, Bye mother! Have a good hunt and I'll meet you back home! with those last words on her lips, Storm flipped off the branch and landed on the soft forest floor. Sniffing the air, Storm tried to determine the direction of her prey. Due to the magic on the warped healing spell, Storms ears and eyes were not the only thing that had changed.

There!" Storm turned towards the scent. "Over to the right is a faint scent of deermust be about two hours old. Good enough! Storm thought. Quickly, she broke into a light jog; carefully placing her feet on the forest floor so that not the slightest noise was heard. After two hours of travel, storm paused and glanced at her surroundings. On her left side, a stream that ran through two mountain peeks. On the right was a grassy clearing occupied by five grazing deer. Smiling, Storm crouched and began to stalk her prey. It took her a good twenty minutes to get close enough for her arrows to be effective. Eyes bright with the impending kill; Storm knocked an arrow, drew back the string and let it fly.


The arrow flew straight and true, producing a high pitched whistling sound that startled the deer enough to take flight. All escaped, but the one buck that storm had targeted. It fell to the ground, with a muffled thud. All right! I finally got my lunch storm eyed the large animal and muttered, and dinner too and not to mention tomorrow's meals as well. Storm sighed and muttered as she knelt by the animals side, pulled out her skinning knife and proceeded to prepare the animal to be eaten, I'm really getting tired of eating deer all the time, but like mother says, it will make me strong.


Finally finished, she grabbed several sticks and some dried grass and began to make a fire to cook the kill. Once the fire was good and ready, Storm cut off a chunk of meat, speared it with a sharpened stick and then set it over the blazing fire to cook. Storm yawned and let her thoughts drift while watching the clouds pass overhead. After ten minutes, the meat done, Storm removed it from the fire and ate it ravenously. Belly full, Storm leaned back against a boulder to rest. Slowly, her eyes grew heavy and in the dappled sunlight she felt warm and content enough to rest her eyes for a moment. Within the space of one heartbeat and the next, she fell asleep completely oblivious to the impending danger.

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Shan-Pu, Mou-sei, Cho-mei, Mu-ti, Su-Tan and Lu-fa had been searching the valley for over six hours and had found a few faint traces of where the Tendo girl could have disappeared. Just when they were about to give up and return to camp a large shadow flew overhead startling the hunting party and causing them to glance upwards. Eyes widening as large as oranges, Cho-mei gasped at the sight of a scarlet dragon hovering overhead and pointing she whispered, "Do you see that!"

Shan-Pu and the rest of the group glanced upwards to see what their companion was so scared about and saw the shape of a dragon outlined by sunlight. Shan-Pu was the first to reply in mandarin, "Yes, I see it but what is it doing outside the valley?"

"Maybe the game has finally run out or the pass might have been blocked by a rock slide so that the deer can't pass through," Su-Tan suggested while keeping a wary eye on the beast.

Squinting from the harsh glare of the sun, Mu-Ti spotted an odd shape on the dragons' back and nudged Mou-sei in the ribs, "Hey! There's something on its back!"

"I can't see it...what are you talking about?" Lu-Fa replied while shading her eyes with her forearm. When the dragon moved, she was able to make out what it was and exclaimed, "It's a girl! What is a girl doing riding on the red ancients back!"

"I don't know....but I'm going to find out!" Shan-Pu exclaimed, watching as the girl dove off of the dragon's back, somersaulted in mid air and then land like a cat in the trees.

"Come on, lets follow her!" Mou-sei whispered, rising from her crouching position on the forest floor. Glancing over her shoulder she suggested, "Besides, this girl might be the one we're looking for!"

"Hnn, You might be right," Su-Tan replied as she adjusted her quiver of arrows on her back and then began following her long time friend. Shan-Pu and the rest of the girls followed close behind, each curious to see who this girl was. All knew that no human lived in the valley, so the girl might be the prey that they were looking for.

The Amazon hunting party watched their prey from a distance and were amazed at the catlike grace in which the girl stalked the deer; waiting for the girl to let down her guard just enough for them to get close enough to identify her. Their time came when the girl, tired from the hunt, fell asleep next to the fire after a full meal of venison. Stalking closer, Shan-Pu crept upon the unsuspecting girl until she was two yards away, from this distance she could make out her features, Shan-Pu gasped in shocked surprise, "It's the Tendo girl...It must be!" she thought taking a step closer.

That single step was enough to alert her prey, the girl jumped up, glancing around wildly and sniffing the air. Catching the scent of the Amazons, her head snapped around in Shan-Pu's direction while her golden pupil-less eyes speared the purple hared Amazon in a penetrating gaze unlike anything the hunter had seen before. A bit unnerved by her gaze, she gasped, taking a step back in shock, Shan-Pu's eyes widened as she met the girl's unnerving stare, she began to doubt herself, "Am I wrong?....is she really, Akane?...NO!." Shan-Pu shook her head in denial, narrowing her eyes, she glared at the girl in front of her as her thought ran rampant, "..It's her....it just has to be because I won't fail!" Quickly, shaking off her surprise as her determination and anticipation of completing the hunt overruled what her eyes told her, Shan-Pu yelled, "It's her! Don't just stand there...GET HER!"

Storms eyes widened in fear when she heard the human's yell, feeling like an animal cornered, Storm shrieked loudly; the pitch of the sound allowed it to travel for miles around, alerting her mother while at the same time incapacitating the humans for a brief time.

"Ahhh!" Shan-Pu yelled while lifting both hands to cover her ears, the noise was so great that it drove her and the rest of the hunting party to their knees in pain.

Glancing once at the gutted and skinned deer, Storm sighed as she thought of what a waste this hunt had turned out to be."I must leave it or they'll surely catch me." Turning, she grabbed her bow and arrows and bolted into the forest.


"What the hell was that!" Cho-mei exclaimed as she climbed to her feet, wincing as the world seemingly spun around her. Apparently that noise had the ability to knock out one's sense of balance while causing immense pain at the same time.

"I don't know...but one thing I do know," Su-Tan replied while rubbing her ears. "I think we shouldn't give her a chance to do that again."

"I say it was the Tendo girl," Shan-Pu stated firmly while wincing from the pain. She now had a massive headache that was caused by the shrieking from that strange looking girl. "Let's follow her and bring her to great-grandmother so she can determine who this strange girl really is!"

"All right!," the Amazons yelled, all anticipating an easy capture, they gave chase. Ducking and dodging fallen logs and tree branches, they finally caught up and strove to keep the elusive girl in their sights.

Glancing over her shoulder, Storm whispered, "They're after mebut why?....I must talk to mother. But, first I have to loose them in the forest." With those last words on her lips, Storm put on an extra burst of speed and took off, leaving the hunting party far behind and giving her enough time to disappear through the secret rock wall entrance to the valley. She was running so fast that she never expected to run in to into that boy.

**End Flashback**

Storm was broken out of her musings by the loud voice on her traveling companion, "Hey! I asked you where we're going!"

Wincing at the sound, she rubbed her sensitive ears and replied, "I'm going to talk to mother....you can follow me if you want. Glaring at him from over her shoulder she growled, " Just don't talk so loud....IT HURTS MY EARS!"

Jerking backwards at her sudden change in attitude, Ranma raised his arms in front of his chest in a gesture of surrender and replied, "Hey, I'm sorry. It's just....I've been trying to get your attention for the past twenty minutes and you were in la-la land.

"Sorry. I was just remembering how those Amazons had found me and were chasing me," Storm replied, turning around once more and heading deeper into the forest. "We should be coming upon my home soon."

"AMAZONS! THOSE WERE AMAZONS THAT WERE CHASING YOU!" Ranma screamed, his rage was so great that it broke the bounds of his control. Turning around, he started back towards the entrance of the valley, glancing over his shoulder, "I'm going back there and make them tell me where Akane is!"

He didn't get too far before he was knocked back on his ass by a powerful shove to his shoulder. "You will do no such thing! That was no ordinary group of girls!" his traveling companion yelled at him, hands fisted on her hips. Glancing upwards, Ranma could see how much this girl resembled his, Akane in her anger. So, he silently watched her while she continued to barrette him, "That was an Amazon hunting party who _I_ might add, were armed to the teeth with weapons that could kill in over two thousand ways. Besides, you're a man and if they find a man on their lands, they'll drag you back to their village bound and gagged!"

Something deep within the pigtailed boy's conscience told him that what he was seeking stood directly in front of him but that was so deeply buried and locked away that he totally ignored it. "No! I have to make them pay for what they've done! I will follow them!" Ranma screamed as he stood up, glaring at Storm.

Seeing that the boy was not going to listen to her, Storm decided to strike up a deal with him. "Fine! But on one condition...."

Curious, Ranma tilted his head and asked cautiously, "What is it?"

"You must defeat me first.....but I must warn you that I have been trained by a master versed in an forbidden art that is so old that it has been forgotten. If you fall, then you have lost." Raising one eyebrow inquiringly, Storm asked, "Do you agree?"

"Fine. Lets get this over with!" Ranma replied as he got into a defensive position meant to fool even the most experienced fighters and waited......and waited....and waited. When no attack occurred, he glanced towards his opponent and growled, "Well? Attack me!"


"As you wish," Storm replied while a glint of something appeared in her eyes; giving a hint that something was forthcoming, taking a deep breath, Storm let loose a subsonic screech meant to attack the nerve center of any animal and bring them down quickly.

One moment Ranma was standing and then the next thing he knew, his knees gave way and he was on the ground. Jaws gaping in shock, he yelled, "What the hell happened!"

"I used my disabling technique on you. It is designed to use sound to bring down your enemy," Storm replied as she extended a hand to help him up. "Here, take my hand since you will be a bit shaky as you try to stand. The sound effects the nerve center in your brain and causes a specific point to short circuit, thus causing you to fall."

"Wow! You have got to teach me to do that!" Ranma replied, completely excited at the thought of learning a new technique.

"Once we reach the clearing and rest. I will consult with my mother. Besides, there will be a lot of food to eat once we reach my home."

" That's good. I've been walking all day," Ranma replied with a renewed spring in his step.

Pushing aside the underbrush, Storm stepped into a clearing, turning around she warned, "Don't be alarmed when you see my mother. She can be a bit....scary when you first see her."

"Heh, Why would I be afraid of an old woma...." Ranma broke off when he spotted something big sitting in the middle of the clearing. Gasping in shock when he finally recognized what his eyes were seeing. Ranma gulped and whispered, "Is that a dragon?"

Smiling at her companions reaction, Storm replied, "Hnnn. That's my mother...." she was interrupted by Ranma's exclamation of surprise.

"Holy shit!" Ranma cursed, completely shocked at the site that stood before him.

"...............who also just happens to be a dragon," Storm finished, wryly.

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