**********
The Replacement
Chapter 05
By C. Rose
ertle2@msn.com
(c)2001
**********
Ranma spun and tried to sweep Usagi's feet, but she just hopped over his
foot with an impish grin. He continued the assault, moving a little faster than she was used to and used it to push her defenses for several minutes as they spared. They had been sparing in the morning for several days now and Ranma was amazed at Usagi's abilities, she seemed to excel at martial arts so long as he made it fun for her. The regular ways of teaching were out of the question, but if he gave her the right incentive or used the tickle attack technique she picked it faster than he could do at times. He wasn't sure, but he had a feeling that Soul Bond she had told him about was making this kind of quick increase in skill possible.
"That's great Usagi, but you need to keep your defenses up when your in the
air." Ranma said and twisted around into a high kick just as Usagi was
landing, he dropped his leg around her neck to hold her in place. He twisted
around at an almost impossible angle and tickled her ribs, she dropped to
the ground giggling loudly the instant he dropped her.
"What the heck kind of move was that?" Usagi demanded.
"The one that worked." Ranma smirked. "That's enough for today Usagi, your
slowing down and making mistakes. We need to work on your endurance more, maybe a weighted school bag or something."
"I don't think I'm ready for that yet." Usagi gasped out.
"Sure you are, you just need to find a way to ignore the training and you
will learn even faster than you are now. Stand up, lets run through that
kata that I taught you, we need to cool down."
Usagi groaned as she climbed back to her feet and glared at the black cat
giggling at her from the bushes nearby. Then got into position and started,
Usagi still couldn't believe how graceful Ranma was when he did this. She
felt like an awkward, uncoordinated animal compared to his flowing grace and
style. They spent ten minutes cooling down and Usagi was about to drop by
the time they stopped, but for once she didn't seem to mind. She staggered
over to her towel when they were done and smiled at Ranma in a teasing way.
"What?"
"My parents want to meet you today."
"Huh?"
"Grab your stuff, My mom and dad want to meet the boy who managed to break me of my lazy ways."
"You're kidding."
"Nope, they insisted actually, mom offered to cook you breakfast if you
came by."
Ranma's stomach growled it's opinion on the though of free food, he smiled
sheepishly and Usagi laughed at him. "That's a yes if you didn't notice."
"Oh, I did."
"Could I also use your shower while I'm there?"
"I was going to suggest it, I don't think you've had time to clean up with
more than lake water lately."
Ranma looked down in embarrassment. "Um...well..."
The blonde just giggled, grabbed his hand, and dragged him out of the park
that had been his home for the last few days. She was thankful that he had
managed to get some decent clothes, but where he developed a taste for silk
shirts and kung fu pants she had no idea. On anyone else it would look just
plain weird, but he wore them well, his rock hard muscles didn't hurt
either...um...blush.
Much to Usagi's pained muscles, Ranma had them sprint back to her house.
She was of the opinion he was really hungry and nearly tripped in shock at
the thought, then she burst into a fit giggles. Instead she went down,
twisted and rolled back to her feet without missing a step while still
laughing. She blushed when Ranma smiled at her and nodded in approval, she
almost went down again when a tingle went down her spine a few seconds
later. They soon reached Usagi's two story house and skidded to a halt in
front of the door, surprisingly, Usagi won that race.
"You got me on that one Usagi."
"Running is one of the things I excel at."
"Yeah, well...I'll beat you next time Meatball Head."
"Ohhhhh...you said you were going to stop calling me names."
"But it's so fun to tease you Odango."
"Better watch out, I can play at that game too, cross dresser."
"Hey now!"
Usagi stuck her tongue out. "Nmnmnmnmnm."
"Oh that's really dignified Meat Ball brain." Shingo said. He was leaning
out of the second story window, there was a weird grin on his face.
"Shingo don't you start this now!"
"Yeah right sis." Shingo said and turned from his window. "MOM, DAD, USAGI IS OUT ON THE FRONT STEP KISSING A BOY!!" Echoed though the house a few seconds later.
Usagi and Ranma sighed as the there was this sound of a braking lamp, a
couple of dishes and... "I'll kill him!!"
STOMP...STOMP...STOMP...STOMP...
"That's dad." Usagi sighed. "He's a little over protective of me."
"Now honey, it was probably just a little kiss, you don't need to pull the
shot gun out of the closet!" Yelled a female voice from inside.
"Your mom?" Ranma asked, beginning to sweat a little.
Usagi nodded and sighed, she was beginning to think they went through this
every time she even thought of bringing a boy by to meet them. "Yeah."
The front door to the house burst open and slammed against the side a house
so hard that it left cracks, Mr. Tsukino stepped out onto the front step and
glared evilly at Ranma. "If you ever kiss my daughter again I'll rip your
intestines out and use them to slingshot you across the city! Do you
understand?!" Kenji yelled as he formed a full fledged demon head attack
complete with flashing lights, smoke, and a long waggling tongue.
Ranma yelped and backed up until he was plastered against the wall around
the outside the house, he nodded frantically in acceptance of the threat.
"Yes Sir!" Ranma opened his eyes to look down the barrel of a very large
sawed-off double barreled shotgun, it gleamed in the morning sunlight.
Usagi ran over and grabbed the barrel of the gun pulling it from Ranma's
face just as Ms. Tsukino grabbed her husband by the collar and dragged him
back into the house muttering under her breath. Ranma slumped in relief as
the rather formidable looking weapon was finally removed from his shaking
hands and put away. Usagi's mother eventually stepped to the door and
invited him in so that they could all have breakfast together, his growling
stomach almost seemed to drag him into the house at the mere mention of free
food. Usagi giggled nervously as she followed him inside, just in time to
see Ranma stop, do an about-face and make his way back over to Usagi.
"Um...Usagi, I don't think it would be good idea for me to eat breakfast
with you this morning, I'd better get going." Ranma said quickly and headed
for the front door, but came to a dead stopped when Usagi grabbed his shirt
and dragged him back into the kitchen.
"Daddy! You stop this right now or I'll never talk to you again!" Usagi
yelled at her father.
"Please calm down Kenji, Usagi invited him over for breakfast so that we
could meet him. It's a whole lot better than the last boy she was going out
with since she kept him a secret for over two years." Mrs. Tsukino said as
she started setting out breakfast for the whole family.
Ranma enjoyed breakfast thoroughly, though he kept glancing over at Usagi's father whenever the guy picked up his knife and gave him the evil eye, Usagi's mother was an excellent cook and seemed to have prepared enough food to satisfy even his extensive needs. He and Usagi made a matched pair as they steamrolled their way through the giant breakfast, much to her parents disbelief they had thought their daughter's way of eating was somewhat unique. "We've never met anyone who could match our daughter bite for bite in a food eating contest." Mrs. Tsukino said.
Ranma finished chewing the last of his food, swallowed, and shrugged as if
doing so was an afterthought. "It's an eating technique that my father developed to help me improve my speed and accuracy while being able to put up a decent defense at the same time."
"The speed and accuracy I understand, but I don't see the defense
anywhere."
"Let me demonstrate and you'll understand better." Ranma said as he picked
up a second set of chopsticks and is off hand, got set, and his arms blurred
from sight as pieces of food vanished off every plate on the table in a
matter of seconds. Everyone at the table gaped at his sheer speed. "With
two or more people at the same table using the same technique, they need to
be able to defend against an attack such is that while still being able to
eat off their own plate."
"I see, please don't do that again." Mrs. Tsukino said politely.
"Sure."
"So son where are you currently staying?" Kenji asked.
Ranma shrugged, he had put a little bit of thought into this question when
he realized it would probably come up sooner or later. "Currently my only
home is my tent, I'm on a training trip to clear my head and improve my
skills."
"Training trip?"
"Martial Arts."
"We'll kind of martial arts do you practice?"
"My style is called Anything Goes Martial Arts, it's a conglomeration of
all the best moves of several dozen schools of martial arts. I may be
ranked as a black belt in over a dozen different schools across the world
and can be considered a grandmaster in at least four others, though I have
never taken the final tests to gain that rank."
Kenji paled. "Th-that's quite an accomplishment son, did your father teach
you how to fight in such a way?"
Ranma nodded. "I can't say too many good things about my father, but there
are few teachers in the world who could teach as well as my old man. For
anything else though he's a total moron and an idiot, outside of martial
arts he has totally disrupted and destroyed pretty much every chance I've
ever had of a decent life. That and several other reasons is why I'm on
this training trip, I need to find a way to get away from my fathers bad
influences."
"Don't you think it's a little harsh on your father?" Mrs. Tsukino asked.
"Has Usagi's father here kidnapped or stole a couple hundred cats and put
them any pit, starved them for over a week, and then wrapped your daughter
in with various kinds of cat food and tossed her into the pit?"
"Of course not, that's completely and totally inhuman!"
"My father did that to me when I was six years old and he must have tossed
me into that pit twenty or thirty times. The whole point was to teach me a
martial arts technique called the Neko-ken, it worked to. It has also given
me a total fear of cats that's makes me go insane if I'm ever around a cat
for to long without being able to get away. My father is a great Martial arts teacher, but unfortunately he so good at it that he doesn't take into account his
student's fears and weaknesses."
"Ranma, you haven't mention this to me before!" Usagi yelled.
"The Neko-ken training gave me a number of special abilities, one of them
was the ability to sense when there is a cat around. It's more of a fear
reaction than anything else, but it allows me to know when there is a cat
anywhere within 100 feet of me."
"So what?" Shingo said.
"So, there's a cat in somewhere in this house on the second floor."
"Y-your right there is." Mrs. Tsukino said.
Ranma chuckled nervously. "So long as it stays up there I shouldn't have a
problem with it." Everyone in the room visibly relaxed.
"Usagi why don't you go upstairs and make sure Luna stays in your room."
"Sure mom." Usagi said and headed up stairs.
The instant Usagi was out of the room Kenji stood up and glared down at
Ranma, his aura seemed to be promising him a slow and painful death if he
ever hurt his daughter. He didn't help matters much that the man hissed
that very thing out between his clenched teeth while he grabbed Ranma by his
silk shirt and lifted and clean off the floor. Ranma nodded dumbly and
sighed in visible relief when he was dropped back into his chair. As soon
as the man finished threatening his life he quickly gathered up his
photographic equipment and went off to his job.
"Don't mind him, he is very overprotective of our daughter and has put on a
similar show for every boy that is ever shown even the slightest bit of interest in our daughter."
"I-it's very effective." Ranma gasped out.
"Oh no Daddy did it again!" Usagi moaned from the kitchen entrance.
"I'm afraid so." Mrs. Tsukino said and sipped some tea, totally
unconcerned.
"Mom, would it be okay for Ranma to borrow our bathroom to get cleaned up, he's been staying at that park for the last several days and hasn't had a
chance to get cleaned up lately."
"Of course dear, go ahead and show him where it is and I'll get the dishes
cleaned up." Mrs. Tsukino said as she stood up and winked at her daughter.
Usagi blushed a solid red as she dragged him to his feet and pulled him down
the hall to their furo. Ranma grabbed his large backpack and was thankful
that he had remembered to buy everything that he would need. About twenty
minutes later Ranma stepped out wearing a brand new set of clothing, a white
silk long sleeved shirt with a yen and yang symbol across the back, a pair
of black kung fu pants and white socks.
"My, my, my Usagi, he sure cleans up nice doesn't he?" Mrs. Tsukino
whispered to her daughter as he entered the living room. Usagi started to
blush again and nodded several times as her mother giggled at her.
"Thanks for the use of the furo Mrs. Tsukino."
"No need for thanks, we were happy to let you use it. So, are you going to
school with Usagi?"
"Right now not going to school at all, but eventually I'll probably have to
re-enroll so that I can keep my grades up and graduate. For now I need to
finish this training trip." Ranma said.
"How long are you going to be in the area?"
"Probably a couple of months, but quite possibly longer if things work out
for me."
"If you can be here that long I can help you get set up in Usagi's school
until you decide to leave."
"No thanks..."
"I insist." Mrs. Tsukino said with a glint in her eye.
Ranma sighed in defeat, he never could refuse a determined woman. "Okay,
Okay I'll go."
"Excellent, I'll call the school now and let them know you'll be attending
since the two of you will be heading there in a few minutes anyways."
Usagi, who still hadn't changed out of her workout clothes, screamed in
shock and ran upstairs to her room to change into her uniform. She'd been
so preoccupied with having Ranma in the house that she had completely
forgotten about school, again. So it was about 15 minutes later that Ranma
found himself running to Juuban High School with Usagi, he didn't mind all
that much since that meant that he would have time to spend with his newest
friend and student.
**********
School on the whole, for Ranma, was a waste of time and something he would
rather not be doing all that much of. He and Usagi walked through the front
gate and Ranma could have sworn that he felt the weird meter of the area
snap and fall of the wall, exploding into flames. He actually wondered if
Kuno was here to attack him already, but when he didn't show up Ranma actually got more nervous instead of less. Juuban was on the whole, a little smaller than Furinkan and the students seemed to be more sane than most of the others he had met. On the other hand the hairs on the back of his neck were
standing on end and he could feel about five hundred sets of eyes turn on
him. He looked around to see girl after girl giving him a once over, it made
him shiver.
Usagi on the other hand noticed something else, she was getting jealous and
hateful looks from all the girls. It made her stop and look around in confusion, then she sighed when she spotted Makoto and Minako heading her way. She waved timidly and smiled at them, they smiled at her and glared at Ranma. Usagi couldn't ever remember any of her friends actually being jealous like this over a boy, she looked at them in concern, but they ignored her.
"Hey pervert, stay away from Usagi!" Makoto yelled out.
"Yeah, she already has a boyfriend." Minako said.
"Huh..." Ranma started.
"Usagi already has Mamoru, stay away from her." Makoto said and pulled
Usagi away from him.
"Go back to where ever you came from pervert!" Minako yelled and kicked
Ranma in the shin. He didn't even seem to feel it, though Minako had to
stand on her foot carefully when she hurt her toe.
"What are you talking about?" Ranma managed to get out.
"After what you pulled at the shrine you don't have the right to say much."
Makoto said as she held Usagi behind her.
"Huh?"
"Get out of here!"
By this time most of the school had taken notice and were beginning to form
in a large circle around the yelling pair and one confused boy. The teachers, who were not quite used to the trouble that followed Ranma around, watched in mild interest and wondered if they were to interfere or not. The tall brunette was known for her fighting and the blonde was, well, blonde. The boy was a new student so they didn't know what to do with him just yet.
"If you don't leave Usagi alone I'll pound you Ranma!" Makoto yelled.
"What did I ever do..." Ranma started.
"Shut up and leave or else!" Minako yelled.
"Guys what are you doing, Ranma hasn't even had time to get to class yet.
Why are you doing this?" Usagi asked.
Makoto growled when Ranma didn't just leave and pushed Usagi into the crowd and launched herself forward, fists flying. Ranma just blinked and dodged on instinct, bobbing and weaving as it was just a normal thing to do, this
caused the crowd to watch in awe since Makoto was a very good fighter. Ranma kept it up for several seconds, this cute and confused look on his face, but eventually he made a decision.
"Cut it out Makoto I don't want to fight you like this."
"Shut up and fight!" Makoto yelled. She was more than impressed with
Ranma's skills, but she didn't care currently, she just needed to make him
pay.
"I did warn you." Ranma said calmly.
Makoto barely heard what he was saying, she was so focused on hitting him,
then she had to blink as Ranma seemed to waver like water and vanished from
sight. Then he was gone and she had to stop and look around in shock, what
the hell had he done. This was the thought of most of the crowd, until
Ranma appeared right in front of Usagi and smiled at her.
"Hiya cutie, what are you doing here?" Ranma drawled and winked.
Usagi gaped and blushed, unable to say anything.
Ranma turned serious. "Are you alright Usagi?"
"Y-yeah, do you know why are they doing this?"
"Got me, Rei was acting the same way the day I left the shrine. I didn't think to much of it at the time, just that she was pissed off. This is different though, I
haven't done anything to either of your friends to warrant this."
"That was when Rei tossed you out of the temple?"
"Yep...gotta go cutie, my dance card is full again." Ranma quipped and
blurred.
Minako came out of nowhere and tackled, or tried to tackle, Ranma. They
went down in a pile of legs, but Ranma had rolled back with a grin and
gently kicked the blonde off him. This was beginning to remind him of the
fights he had all the time at Furinkan, Ukyo, Shampoo, and Akane could
really have some knock down drag out fights when they put there minds to it.
Minako landed with a thump even as he was coming to his feet, unfortunately
Minako had landed ass end up, pink panties high and little Sailor Venus
picture plastered across her bum.
Ranma and most of the boys gaped at it for several seconds before most of
the girls screamed "Perverts!" and proceeded to beat the crap out of all the
staring boys, much to their shock and dismay. This was definitely beginning
to feel like home now, Ranma thought. The frothing girls converged on the
boys with screams of wrath, tossed them to the ground, and proceeded to
pound and kick them for several minutes just for good measure. Usagi, who
was one of the girls not pounding a boy, saw Makoto and Minako cackling as
they jumped in to pile and laid into the boys too.
Usagi noticed that she and Naru were the only ones who haven't jumped in,
though they watched the spectacle with interest. "That's different." Naru
said, blinking a little.
"No kidding, Ranma seems to be subject to these kinds of things." Usagi
said.
"Oh, why do you say that?"
"He actually managed to set off my dad's wrath this morning, got his
shotgun out and everything. Even managed to do that giant head thing of his
and you know how rare that is."
"What about that flaming skull thing?"
"Not yet, but I have a feeling that it's coming and soon."
Naru looked at Usagi curiously. "So is he your new boyfriend?"
"What?!"
"Well?"
"No, we are just friends." Usagi said, but blushed clear to her chest.
"Yeah right, what about that tall, dark, hunk you usually hang around with?"
"Mamoru? He decided he wanted to try living on his own, took off for
America the other day. Left this little note saying were through, again."
"Can I have him?"
Usagi glowered at the smirking Naru.
The crowd of peeved girl's finally stopped pounding the perverts and walked
inside the school in one mass pack just at the final bell rang. Usagi and
Naru stood there in shock, then paled as they were going to be late too and
dashed inside with twin screams of fear, leaving a large pile of groaning
boys in various stages of agony out in the front area of the school. A
closer look showed no sign of Ranma, though by that time no one would have
remembered him anyways.
Usagi and Naru were just pulling out their books when the door to their
class room opened and Mrs. Haruna came in followed by a female Ranma. She
was, surprisingly enough, wearing a girl's school uniform. She had her
bright red hair hanging loose and an irritated look in her eye a she looked
to the back of the class at Makoto and Minako, who gulped and tried to
shrink below their desks.
"Class, this is Ranko Saotome and will be staying with us for three or four
months while she is in Tokyo. She has recently been to China and America on
a training journey for Martial Arts. Please introduce yourself."
"Sure, I'm Ranko Saotome a Master of Anything Goes Martial Arts."
"Thank you Ranko, please take a seat over behind Ami Mizuno."
"Sure." Ranma said as Ami raised her hand and tried to hide a smirk.
Usagi on the other hand looked at Ranma. "What's with the change Ranko?"
"Had no choice, found my self in this outfit and form in the middle of the
fight and didn't have time to switch back." Ranma whispered.
The rest of the morning classes were actually interesting enough to keep
Ranma awake, though she got in trouble for not having any school materials
and had to borrow some. She smiled at the geek behind Naru and battered her
eyes at him until he fainted, then she stole his books, notes, and other
useful items. She had learned her lessons from Nabiki very well, those girl
lessons did come in handy every now and then.
"I can't believe you just did that?!" Usagi hissed.
"He doesn't need them, he was working on his trigonometry homework instead
of English."
"So what, you don't steal other people's stuff like that!"
"USAGI!!" Mrs. Haruna yelled and pointed to the hall.
Usagi blushed, stood up and walked out of class. Ranma on the other hand
was feeling pretty good, until he saw the teacher's look and followed Usagi
out. She wasn't sure what was more useless, Furinkan's water buckets or
Juuban's little signs. Ranma figured it wouldn't have been all that bad, but
Usagi was glaring at her in a very familiar way. "What?"
"This all your fault." Usagi snapped.
"You were the one yelling in class."
"You stole his books."
"I borrowed them, I was going to copy his notes and give them back
tomorrow."
"Yeah right."
Ranma shrugged and was about to say something, when the door to the
classroom banged open and the little geek walked out. He looked around,
spotted Ranma and grinned in a geeky way. He flashed forward and wrapped
himself around Ranma's body like a snake. "My Love!" There were these little
hearts floating around the guy's head that set Usagi to giggling at Ranma.
"Get off you little slime ball!" Ranma yelled as she tried to peel the
thing off, but it just gripped tighter.
"Now you done it Ranko!" Usagi said and started laughing.
"Lay off!"
Naru stalked out of the classroom, spotted her boyfriend and Ranma and
turned red. She stomped over to Ranma, slapped her, and peeled the love
struck Umino off. Then dragged him back into the class room to the sound of
laughter and hooting from the guys and the girls cheering Naru on. Ranma
just stood there in shock while Usagi just giggled and giggled at her as she
rolled on the floor trying to catch her breath.
Ranma just crossed her arms. "Humph!!"
"M-my L-love...." Usagi gasped out and giggled some more.
"Har har Usagi." Ranma grumbled.
Several minutes later they were allowed back in and Ranma spent the rest of
class blushing and trying to hide as all the girls glowered at her. Though
she did find it a little surprising that the geek hadn't taken his books
back, instead there was a note and a fake paper flower telling her to keep
this set since he had several anyway. Of course she tried to give them back,
but the love struck look on his geek face was just pathetic enough to make
her nervous and to make Naru even more jealous and angry. Ranma was happy as punch when the lunch bell finally rang, she jumped up and left the room
before anyone could say anything to her.
She had only intended to copy the geek's notes and return them, no matter
what it may have looked like. She had told Usagi so, and yet she had not
believed her, why? Ranma considered the whole day so far and to her it
seemed almost normal actually, a few girl's jumping to conclusions, her
being blamed for the dumbest stuff and suffering for it. Well she hadn't
suffered all that much yet, she wasn't in any pain anyway and that usually
meant being brained by Ukyo's giant spatula.
Then Ranma blinked, this wasn't Furinkan, it was a normal school and this
meant the actions of the students were more than a little odd. She looked
around the school grounds and noticed that she wasn't the only one being
glared at, everyone was glaring at everyone else like they were paranoid, it
was giving her the strangest feeling. Ranma stood up slowly and looked up at
the window to her homeroom, with a crouch she launched herself three stories
and through the window. Much to the shock of Mrs. Haruna who was yelling at
those students who had stayed in the classroom after the bell rang, that
feeling was getting worse. Ranma tried her best to ignore her and calmly
walked over to Ami and sat down beside her.
"Ami?"
"Yes Ranko?" Ami asked as she looked up.
"This whole school is acting weird, can you scan it for signs of those
things you told me about the other day?"
"Why should I do anything for you after you tried to steal Naru's boyfriend?" Ami asked pleasantly, though Ranma could see something else in her eyes.
"I had no idea the guy would freak like that, I just wanted his notes, not a b-boyfriend."
"I don't believe you." Ami glared at her...him? T-the PERVERT!!
She glared some more.
Ranma shrugged and scooted back a little bit, she threw her hands up in the air as Ami continued to stare at her, this was getting weird and she had
no idea what to do about it. She stood up and turned to go and look around
herself when that feeling hit her again. For a brief second it is worse than
the other times and she feels like she is swimming in the most rancid oil
like substance she has ever felt, it crawls over her skin and sends chill
down her back. A quick glance at Ami shows that she seems to have felt it
too and she sighs as she pulled out her little computer and covertly started
to type. After a few seconds she looks up at Ranma and nods at her to
confirm her suspicions.
"Whatever it is it's on the roof of this building." Ami says quietly.
"I'm heading up there."
"I'll call the others."
"I can handle it Ami." Ranma says arrogantly.
"Uh huh." Ami says and rolls her eyes. "I want to keep an eye on you."
Ranma growls and shrugs. "Whatever."
They get up and start to walk out of the class room, but the teacher stops
them. "Were are the two of you going?"
"Um..." Ranma starts sweating and looking nervous.
"We need to use the restroom sir, we'll be back in a few minutes." Ami says
quickly.
"Hurry up, we start up again in a few minutes."
"Yes sir!" They yell as they dash out of the room. They fail to see the
strange looks that the rest of the class is giving the both of them, and
even if they did they wouldn't have understood it. Though Minako and Usagi
would have, but they were still eating lunch.
"That was weird." Ranma says as they hit the stairs that head for the roof.
"All part of being a Scout, know how to make quick excuses to get out of class. It's the second rule."
"The second?"
"The first is don't give away your identity to anyone if you can help it."
"Right that I can understand. VULCAN KNIGHT SENSHI, MAKE UP!!"
Halfway up the stairs Ranma's arm bracers appear and flare with light and
fill the stair well. When it recedes she stops in mid step and groans in
shock at what she is wearing, Ami looks her over and giggles even as she
turns into Sailor Mercury and contacts the others. Ranma is still wearing
Vulcan's uniform, but is styled for her female body, in other words she is
in a blue jacket like her male form, but the resemblance ends there. The
jacket is form fitting and from the waist down is a dress like section that
hangs from her waist to her knees in front and back and is split up the
sides to show off her legs. She has knee high boots made of a black leather
and her usual mask, her flaming red hair is hanging halfway down her back.
The Blue jewel is still on her chest and pulsing brightly. Finally her
bracers are visible and glinting with a gold like sparkle in the over head lighting of the stairwell. It was enough to make Ranma want to throttle Vulcan if she could get her hands on him, the only thing holding her back was this wonderful feeling running through her body.
"Wow Vulcan, you look great." Mercury said. Why was it suddenly so hot in
here, is the monster affecting the environment? She whipped out her computer
again, but the readings are all negative. Weird.
"Why me?" Ranma muttered to herself. Even when she tried to stay out of
dresses, she seemed to always end up in the most revealing and sexy thing
available. Ranma sighed. She looked around and noticed that her mask was
giving her readings again, there was some kind of energy or mist in the air.
Flowing down the stairs from above and Ranma looked upwards to where the top
of the stairs seemed to be filled with the stuff. Her mask seemed to sense
her need and focused beyond the mist to show a sealed door with the mist
streaming through the edges of the door with malevolent need.
"The computer says our bad guy is up on the roof." Mercury says.
"My mask is telling me the same thing."
"What do you mean?"
Vulcan turns to look at Mercury. "This mask seems to be like your computer,
it reads the area and shows me some information, where the monster is, the
dark energy in the air and stuff. Even suggested some possible battle plans."
Mercury gaped.
"What, don't tell me you've got mask envy now?" Ranma asked with a playful
grin.
"Humph!"
"Oh yeah, Mask envy."
Mercury is about to respond when Ranma holds up her hand and looks around
quickly, then she growls and jumps up the last few stairs and kicks the door
off it's hinges, sending it flying across the roof to crash into the monster. Who screams in shock at the unexpected attack and crashes to the ground. Vulcan is through the opening before Mercury can blink, but she regroups and follows the girl out onto the roof just in time to see Vulcan land on the door and jump up and down on it a couple of times. What they see is about normal for these kinds of things, she brings computer up and scans the monster. It is vaguely female and seems to be made out of some kind of glass.
"Take that, and some more of the same!" Vulcan yells.
The monster tossed the door off her and Vulcan flips back and lands easily,
she smirks at the thing as she gets her first good look at it. "I see the
Sailors have showed up, oh well, I was expecting you like last week. I'm
Beaker and I will kill you today!" Beaker yelled hollowly.
"You don't look that tough to me." Vulcan grins and launches forward in a
blue blur and slams her palm into the things glass like chest. The glass
shatters around the blow and sends it flying back with a scream only to slam
into the chain link fence that ran around the edge of the roof. "Is that all
you got?" Vulcan yells as she walks forward cracking her knuckles as Mercury
stepped forward.
"Mercury Aqua Rhapsody!!" Mercury yells and fires of her icy blast and
freezes Beaker to the fence as she was struggling to stand back up.
Vulcan launches into the air and kicks the thing in the head, shattering
it's hair, the fence shatters under the force of the blow and it and the monster are suddenly launched off the roof. Ranma does a back flip and lands on the edge of the roof and looks down to see the thing slam into the ground below with a mighty crash. She smirked; this one was turning out to be pretty weak all things considered. She is about to write the thing off when it sits up and shakes
itself, Vulcan can see it's glass like body reforming as she watches. She
barely thinks as she brings her hand forward and yells. "Möko Takabisha!"
and sends a bright blue bolt of power into the thing. Unfortunately Ranma
hadn't had time to train in the use of her new powers, this made for an
interesting effect. What would have been a somewhat strong blast normally,
was far stronger in her Scout form. The blue bolt was almost as bright as
the sun and it fired out with the force of a cannon. Vulcan found herself
being pushed back as the force threw her the length of the roof with just
it's kick back, she landed with a grunt.
"Sailor Vulcan!!" Mercury cried out in shock at the power that had just
been released by her teammate.
Beaker was just turning to look up at her attackers, a sneer on her face
just at the bolt hit.
KA-BOOOOOOOOMMMMMMM!!!!!!!
The explosion, about twenty feet from the main walls of the school, shook
the school and rent the area into powder, shattering most of the windows in
the school and causing a concussive blast that knocked most to the nearby
bystanders off their feet, this included Jupiter and Venus who had just
arrived on the scene. Bits of dust and shattered glass rained down on the
school for several seconds, but it was like a rain of dust and caused little
to no damage to anyone. The Scouts were still glad that their Sailor forms
were more sturdy than their normal bodies.
"What the hell was that?!" Vulcan yelled from her back, her hands still
smoking and throbbing in pain.
"Vulcan, you could have killed someone!" Mercury yelled.
"It was just a normal blast, I fire them off all the time!"
"Your transformed state increases your abilities exponentially."
"Huh?"
"Your about ten to twenty times more powerful in this state, you could
easily hurt someone. Your Ki attacks are increased by the magic of your
transformation, it is how all of us are able to use it as weapons."
Vulcan groaned and tried to think of a way out of this mess, then grined as
her mask scans the entire school and surroundings areas. The damage is
mostly just broken glass and cracked walls, there are only about ten
students hurt and those are minor injuries compared to what could have
happened. The mask beeps and she takes a closer look as it focuses in on the
blast crater. She gasps as the mask tells her that the monster is still
active, as damaged as it was, there seemed to be enough left for it to
regenerate. "That stupid thing is still alive after all that!"
Ami pulls out her computer again and confirms Vulcan's statement. "What
else does your mask say?"
"Basically to keep blowing it up until it is dead." Vulcan snaps as she
staggers to her feet, she felt drained. Her energy reserves were completely
shot, she must have put everything she had into that blast, no wonder it had
been so strong. It was like Ryoga using his Perfect Shishi Höködan.
"Well you let me run some tests on that thing when this over?"
"What? Oh...sure, but later okay?"
Mercury nods and points to the ground where Sailor Moon, Jupiter, and Venus are examining the large crater. Vulcan is pleased to see that Venus and
Jupiter are back on their feet. She pulls out her communicator. "Sailor Moon?"
"What's up Mercury?"
"You need to blast that crater with one of your attacks, it's still
active."
"It's still alive, after being hit with something like that?!"
"Yes, now blast the center of the crater Sailor Moon."
"Starlight Honeymoon Therapy Kiss!!" Moon yells as few seconds later and
fires off her magic. It clears out the smoke and dust and leaves a broken
case of glass bottles at the bottom of the crater, Venus and Jupiter blast
the remains just to be sure.
"I still say that giant pink heart is just stupid." Vulcan mutters.
Mercury hits her up side the head. "So what, it works doesn't it?"
"It's a nine foot high giant pink heart Mercury."
"That it is."
Ranma watches silently as the dark mist seems to just rise into the sky and
vanish as if it had never existed before. She sighs in relief as she notices
that Mercury is no longer being affected by it either, down below the stuff
seems to take its nearly invisible claws out of all the students and
disappear. Ranma hopped it would make things better, but she knew her luck
and knew it would only delay the next weird thing that happened. Of course
if she had noticed this stuff a little sooner she would still be at the
temple instead of on the street. That didn't matter though, she had lived on
the road for over ten years, this was a lot easier to do than that. Now all
she had to do was learn to control her new strength, find a new place to
live, and figure out how she had shifted genders during the fight earlier.
She hadn't been hit with cold water and her clothing had shifted with the
change. That had never happened before and to figure it out she was going to
have to practice. She grinned, that was her favorite pastime anyway, though
now that she was going to school again she would have to be on high alert.
Nabiki would be able to find her now, easily. Hopefully she would have a
week or two before the crazies showed up to make her life a living hell
again. That would give her some time to make some plans, some thing she had
been putting off. Things were going to be very interesting in the upcoming
months, she could feel it.
Vulcan grinned evilly.
Mercury backed up a couple of steps as Vulcan started to glow then cackle
insanely.
**********
Notes - Okay, I had to rewrite compete sections of this chapter because I
absolutely hated what I had originally posted. The more I looked at it the
less I liked it, it wasn't fun enough or up to my usual standards. Hopefully
this version reads a little better and wasn't as gloomy as the other one.
The Replacement
Chapter 05
By C. Rose
ertle2@msn.com
(c)2001
**********
Ranma spun and tried to sweep Usagi's feet, but she just hopped over his
foot with an impish grin. He continued the assault, moving a little faster than she was used to and used it to push her defenses for several minutes as they spared. They had been sparing in the morning for several days now and Ranma was amazed at Usagi's abilities, she seemed to excel at martial arts so long as he made it fun for her. The regular ways of teaching were out of the question, but if he gave her the right incentive or used the tickle attack technique she picked it faster than he could do at times. He wasn't sure, but he had a feeling that Soul Bond she had told him about was making this kind of quick increase in skill possible.
"That's great Usagi, but you need to keep your defenses up when your in the
air." Ranma said and twisted around into a high kick just as Usagi was
landing, he dropped his leg around her neck to hold her in place. He twisted
around at an almost impossible angle and tickled her ribs, she dropped to
the ground giggling loudly the instant he dropped her.
"What the heck kind of move was that?" Usagi demanded.
"The one that worked." Ranma smirked. "That's enough for today Usagi, your
slowing down and making mistakes. We need to work on your endurance more, maybe a weighted school bag or something."
"I don't think I'm ready for that yet." Usagi gasped out.
"Sure you are, you just need to find a way to ignore the training and you
will learn even faster than you are now. Stand up, lets run through that
kata that I taught you, we need to cool down."
Usagi groaned as she climbed back to her feet and glared at the black cat
giggling at her from the bushes nearby. Then got into position and started,
Usagi still couldn't believe how graceful Ranma was when he did this. She
felt like an awkward, uncoordinated animal compared to his flowing grace and
style. They spent ten minutes cooling down and Usagi was about to drop by
the time they stopped, but for once she didn't seem to mind. She staggered
over to her towel when they were done and smiled at Ranma in a teasing way.
"What?"
"My parents want to meet you today."
"Huh?"
"Grab your stuff, My mom and dad want to meet the boy who managed to break me of my lazy ways."
"You're kidding."
"Nope, they insisted actually, mom offered to cook you breakfast if you
came by."
Ranma's stomach growled it's opinion on the though of free food, he smiled
sheepishly and Usagi laughed at him. "That's a yes if you didn't notice."
"Oh, I did."
"Could I also use your shower while I'm there?"
"I was going to suggest it, I don't think you've had time to clean up with
more than lake water lately."
Ranma looked down in embarrassment. "Um...well..."
The blonde just giggled, grabbed his hand, and dragged him out of the park
that had been his home for the last few days. She was thankful that he had
managed to get some decent clothes, but where he developed a taste for silk
shirts and kung fu pants she had no idea. On anyone else it would look just
plain weird, but he wore them well, his rock hard muscles didn't hurt
either...um...blush.
Much to Usagi's pained muscles, Ranma had them sprint back to her house.
She was of the opinion he was really hungry and nearly tripped in shock at
the thought, then she burst into a fit giggles. Instead she went down,
twisted and rolled back to her feet without missing a step while still
laughing. She blushed when Ranma smiled at her and nodded in approval, she
almost went down again when a tingle went down her spine a few seconds
later. They soon reached Usagi's two story house and skidded to a halt in
front of the door, surprisingly, Usagi won that race.
"You got me on that one Usagi."
"Running is one of the things I excel at."
"Yeah, well...I'll beat you next time Meatball Head."
"Ohhhhh...you said you were going to stop calling me names."
"But it's so fun to tease you Odango."
"Better watch out, I can play at that game too, cross dresser."
"Hey now!"
Usagi stuck her tongue out. "Nmnmnmnmnm."
"Oh that's really dignified Meat Ball brain." Shingo said. He was leaning
out of the second story window, there was a weird grin on his face.
"Shingo don't you start this now!"
"Yeah right sis." Shingo said and turned from his window. "MOM, DAD, USAGI IS OUT ON THE FRONT STEP KISSING A BOY!!" Echoed though the house a few seconds later.
Usagi and Ranma sighed as the there was this sound of a braking lamp, a
couple of dishes and... "I'll kill him!!"
STOMP...STOMP...STOMP...STOMP...
"That's dad." Usagi sighed. "He's a little over protective of me."
"Now honey, it was probably just a little kiss, you don't need to pull the
shot gun out of the closet!" Yelled a female voice from inside.
"Your mom?" Ranma asked, beginning to sweat a little.
Usagi nodded and sighed, she was beginning to think they went through this
every time she even thought of bringing a boy by to meet them. "Yeah."
The front door to the house burst open and slammed against the side a house
so hard that it left cracks, Mr. Tsukino stepped out onto the front step and
glared evilly at Ranma. "If you ever kiss my daughter again I'll rip your
intestines out and use them to slingshot you across the city! Do you
understand?!" Kenji yelled as he formed a full fledged demon head attack
complete with flashing lights, smoke, and a long waggling tongue.
Ranma yelped and backed up until he was plastered against the wall around
the outside the house, he nodded frantically in acceptance of the threat.
"Yes Sir!" Ranma opened his eyes to look down the barrel of a very large
sawed-off double barreled shotgun, it gleamed in the morning sunlight.
Usagi ran over and grabbed the barrel of the gun pulling it from Ranma's
face just as Ms. Tsukino grabbed her husband by the collar and dragged him
back into the house muttering under her breath. Ranma slumped in relief as
the rather formidable looking weapon was finally removed from his shaking
hands and put away. Usagi's mother eventually stepped to the door and
invited him in so that they could all have breakfast together, his growling
stomach almost seemed to drag him into the house at the mere mention of free
food. Usagi giggled nervously as she followed him inside, just in time to
see Ranma stop, do an about-face and make his way back over to Usagi.
"Um...Usagi, I don't think it would be good idea for me to eat breakfast
with you this morning, I'd better get going." Ranma said quickly and headed
for the front door, but came to a dead stopped when Usagi grabbed his shirt
and dragged him back into the kitchen.
"Daddy! You stop this right now or I'll never talk to you again!" Usagi
yelled at her father.
"Please calm down Kenji, Usagi invited him over for breakfast so that we
could meet him. It's a whole lot better than the last boy she was going out
with since she kept him a secret for over two years." Mrs. Tsukino said as
she started setting out breakfast for the whole family.
Ranma enjoyed breakfast thoroughly, though he kept glancing over at Usagi's father whenever the guy picked up his knife and gave him the evil eye, Usagi's mother was an excellent cook and seemed to have prepared enough food to satisfy even his extensive needs. He and Usagi made a matched pair as they steamrolled their way through the giant breakfast, much to her parents disbelief they had thought their daughter's way of eating was somewhat unique. "We've never met anyone who could match our daughter bite for bite in a food eating contest." Mrs. Tsukino said.
Ranma finished chewing the last of his food, swallowed, and shrugged as if
doing so was an afterthought. "It's an eating technique that my father developed to help me improve my speed and accuracy while being able to put up a decent defense at the same time."
"The speed and accuracy I understand, but I don't see the defense
anywhere."
"Let me demonstrate and you'll understand better." Ranma said as he picked
up a second set of chopsticks and is off hand, got set, and his arms blurred
from sight as pieces of food vanished off every plate on the table in a
matter of seconds. Everyone at the table gaped at his sheer speed. "With
two or more people at the same table using the same technique, they need to
be able to defend against an attack such is that while still being able to
eat off their own plate."
"I see, please don't do that again." Mrs. Tsukino said politely.
"Sure."
"So son where are you currently staying?" Kenji asked.
Ranma shrugged, he had put a little bit of thought into this question when
he realized it would probably come up sooner or later. "Currently my only
home is my tent, I'm on a training trip to clear my head and improve my
skills."
"Training trip?"
"Martial Arts."
"We'll kind of martial arts do you practice?"
"My style is called Anything Goes Martial Arts, it's a conglomeration of
all the best moves of several dozen schools of martial arts. I may be
ranked as a black belt in over a dozen different schools across the world
and can be considered a grandmaster in at least four others, though I have
never taken the final tests to gain that rank."
Kenji paled. "Th-that's quite an accomplishment son, did your father teach
you how to fight in such a way?"
Ranma nodded. "I can't say too many good things about my father, but there
are few teachers in the world who could teach as well as my old man. For
anything else though he's a total moron and an idiot, outside of martial
arts he has totally disrupted and destroyed pretty much every chance I've
ever had of a decent life. That and several other reasons is why I'm on
this training trip, I need to find a way to get away from my fathers bad
influences."
"Don't you think it's a little harsh on your father?" Mrs. Tsukino asked.
"Has Usagi's father here kidnapped or stole a couple hundred cats and put
them any pit, starved them for over a week, and then wrapped your daughter
in with various kinds of cat food and tossed her into the pit?"
"Of course not, that's completely and totally inhuman!"
"My father did that to me when I was six years old and he must have tossed
me into that pit twenty or thirty times. The whole point was to teach me a
martial arts technique called the Neko-ken, it worked to. It has also given
me a total fear of cats that's makes me go insane if I'm ever around a cat
for to long without being able to get away. My father is a great Martial arts teacher, but unfortunately he so good at it that he doesn't take into account his
student's fears and weaknesses."
"Ranma, you haven't mention this to me before!" Usagi yelled.
"The Neko-ken training gave me a number of special abilities, one of them
was the ability to sense when there is a cat around. It's more of a fear
reaction than anything else, but it allows me to know when there is a cat
anywhere within 100 feet of me."
"So what?" Shingo said.
"So, there's a cat in somewhere in this house on the second floor."
"Y-your right there is." Mrs. Tsukino said.
Ranma chuckled nervously. "So long as it stays up there I shouldn't have a
problem with it." Everyone in the room visibly relaxed.
"Usagi why don't you go upstairs and make sure Luna stays in your room."
"Sure mom." Usagi said and headed up stairs.
The instant Usagi was out of the room Kenji stood up and glared down at
Ranma, his aura seemed to be promising him a slow and painful death if he
ever hurt his daughter. He didn't help matters much that the man hissed
that very thing out between his clenched teeth while he grabbed Ranma by his
silk shirt and lifted and clean off the floor. Ranma nodded dumbly and
sighed in visible relief when he was dropped back into his chair. As soon
as the man finished threatening his life he quickly gathered up his
photographic equipment and went off to his job.
"Don't mind him, he is very overprotective of our daughter and has put on a
similar show for every boy that is ever shown even the slightest bit of interest in our daughter."
"I-it's very effective." Ranma gasped out.
"Oh no Daddy did it again!" Usagi moaned from the kitchen entrance.
"I'm afraid so." Mrs. Tsukino said and sipped some tea, totally
unconcerned.
"Mom, would it be okay for Ranma to borrow our bathroom to get cleaned up, he's been staying at that park for the last several days and hasn't had a
chance to get cleaned up lately."
"Of course dear, go ahead and show him where it is and I'll get the dishes
cleaned up." Mrs. Tsukino said as she stood up and winked at her daughter.
Usagi blushed a solid red as she dragged him to his feet and pulled him down
the hall to their furo. Ranma grabbed his large backpack and was thankful
that he had remembered to buy everything that he would need. About twenty
minutes later Ranma stepped out wearing a brand new set of clothing, a white
silk long sleeved shirt with a yen and yang symbol across the back, a pair
of black kung fu pants and white socks.
"My, my, my Usagi, he sure cleans up nice doesn't he?" Mrs. Tsukino
whispered to her daughter as he entered the living room. Usagi started to
blush again and nodded several times as her mother giggled at her.
"Thanks for the use of the furo Mrs. Tsukino."
"No need for thanks, we were happy to let you use it. So, are you going to
school with Usagi?"
"Right now not going to school at all, but eventually I'll probably have to
re-enroll so that I can keep my grades up and graduate. For now I need to
finish this training trip." Ranma said.
"How long are you going to be in the area?"
"Probably a couple of months, but quite possibly longer if things work out
for me."
"If you can be here that long I can help you get set up in Usagi's school
until you decide to leave."
"No thanks..."
"I insist." Mrs. Tsukino said with a glint in her eye.
Ranma sighed in defeat, he never could refuse a determined woman. "Okay,
Okay I'll go."
"Excellent, I'll call the school now and let them know you'll be attending
since the two of you will be heading there in a few minutes anyways."
Usagi, who still hadn't changed out of her workout clothes, screamed in
shock and ran upstairs to her room to change into her uniform. She'd been
so preoccupied with having Ranma in the house that she had completely
forgotten about school, again. So it was about 15 minutes later that Ranma
found himself running to Juuban High School with Usagi, he didn't mind all
that much since that meant that he would have time to spend with his newest
friend and student.
**********
School on the whole, for Ranma, was a waste of time and something he would
rather not be doing all that much of. He and Usagi walked through the front
gate and Ranma could have sworn that he felt the weird meter of the area
snap and fall of the wall, exploding into flames. He actually wondered if
Kuno was here to attack him already, but when he didn't show up Ranma actually got more nervous instead of less. Juuban was on the whole, a little smaller than Furinkan and the students seemed to be more sane than most of the others he had met. On the other hand the hairs on the back of his neck were
standing on end and he could feel about five hundred sets of eyes turn on
him. He looked around to see girl after girl giving him a once over, it made
him shiver.
Usagi on the other hand noticed something else, she was getting jealous and
hateful looks from all the girls. It made her stop and look around in confusion, then she sighed when she spotted Makoto and Minako heading her way. She waved timidly and smiled at them, they smiled at her and glared at Ranma. Usagi couldn't ever remember any of her friends actually being jealous like this over a boy, she looked at them in concern, but they ignored her.
"Hey pervert, stay away from Usagi!" Makoto yelled out.
"Yeah, she already has a boyfriend." Minako said.
"Huh..." Ranma started.
"Usagi already has Mamoru, stay away from her." Makoto said and pulled
Usagi away from him.
"Go back to where ever you came from pervert!" Minako yelled and kicked
Ranma in the shin. He didn't even seem to feel it, though Minako had to
stand on her foot carefully when she hurt her toe.
"What are you talking about?" Ranma managed to get out.
"After what you pulled at the shrine you don't have the right to say much."
Makoto said as she held Usagi behind her.
"Huh?"
"Get out of here!"
By this time most of the school had taken notice and were beginning to form
in a large circle around the yelling pair and one confused boy. The teachers, who were not quite used to the trouble that followed Ranma around, watched in mild interest and wondered if they were to interfere or not. The tall brunette was known for her fighting and the blonde was, well, blonde. The boy was a new student so they didn't know what to do with him just yet.
"If you don't leave Usagi alone I'll pound you Ranma!" Makoto yelled.
"What did I ever do..." Ranma started.
"Shut up and leave or else!" Minako yelled.
"Guys what are you doing, Ranma hasn't even had time to get to class yet.
Why are you doing this?" Usagi asked.
Makoto growled when Ranma didn't just leave and pushed Usagi into the crowd and launched herself forward, fists flying. Ranma just blinked and dodged on instinct, bobbing and weaving as it was just a normal thing to do, this
caused the crowd to watch in awe since Makoto was a very good fighter. Ranma kept it up for several seconds, this cute and confused look on his face, but eventually he made a decision.
"Cut it out Makoto I don't want to fight you like this."
"Shut up and fight!" Makoto yelled. She was more than impressed with
Ranma's skills, but she didn't care currently, she just needed to make him
pay.
"I did warn you." Ranma said calmly.
Makoto barely heard what he was saying, she was so focused on hitting him,
then she had to blink as Ranma seemed to waver like water and vanished from
sight. Then he was gone and she had to stop and look around in shock, what
the hell had he done. This was the thought of most of the crowd, until
Ranma appeared right in front of Usagi and smiled at her.
"Hiya cutie, what are you doing here?" Ranma drawled and winked.
Usagi gaped and blushed, unable to say anything.
Ranma turned serious. "Are you alright Usagi?"
"Y-yeah, do you know why are they doing this?"
"Got me, Rei was acting the same way the day I left the shrine. I didn't think to much of it at the time, just that she was pissed off. This is different though, I
haven't done anything to either of your friends to warrant this."
"That was when Rei tossed you out of the temple?"
"Yep...gotta go cutie, my dance card is full again." Ranma quipped and
blurred.
Minako came out of nowhere and tackled, or tried to tackle, Ranma. They
went down in a pile of legs, but Ranma had rolled back with a grin and
gently kicked the blonde off him. This was beginning to remind him of the
fights he had all the time at Furinkan, Ukyo, Shampoo, and Akane could
really have some knock down drag out fights when they put there minds to it.
Minako landed with a thump even as he was coming to his feet, unfortunately
Minako had landed ass end up, pink panties high and little Sailor Venus
picture plastered across her bum.
Ranma and most of the boys gaped at it for several seconds before most of
the girls screamed "Perverts!" and proceeded to beat the crap out of all the
staring boys, much to their shock and dismay. This was definitely beginning
to feel like home now, Ranma thought. The frothing girls converged on the
boys with screams of wrath, tossed them to the ground, and proceeded to
pound and kick them for several minutes just for good measure. Usagi, who
was one of the girls not pounding a boy, saw Makoto and Minako cackling as
they jumped in to pile and laid into the boys too.
Usagi noticed that she and Naru were the only ones who haven't jumped in,
though they watched the spectacle with interest. "That's different." Naru
said, blinking a little.
"No kidding, Ranma seems to be subject to these kinds of things." Usagi
said.
"Oh, why do you say that?"
"He actually managed to set off my dad's wrath this morning, got his
shotgun out and everything. Even managed to do that giant head thing of his
and you know how rare that is."
"What about that flaming skull thing?"
"Not yet, but I have a feeling that it's coming and soon."
Naru looked at Usagi curiously. "So is he your new boyfriend?"
"What?!"
"Well?"
"No, we are just friends." Usagi said, but blushed clear to her chest.
"Yeah right, what about that tall, dark, hunk you usually hang around with?"
"Mamoru? He decided he wanted to try living on his own, took off for
America the other day. Left this little note saying were through, again."
"Can I have him?"
Usagi glowered at the smirking Naru.
The crowd of peeved girl's finally stopped pounding the perverts and walked
inside the school in one mass pack just at the final bell rang. Usagi and
Naru stood there in shock, then paled as they were going to be late too and
dashed inside with twin screams of fear, leaving a large pile of groaning
boys in various stages of agony out in the front area of the school. A
closer look showed no sign of Ranma, though by that time no one would have
remembered him anyways.
Usagi and Naru were just pulling out their books when the door to their
class room opened and Mrs. Haruna came in followed by a female Ranma. She
was, surprisingly enough, wearing a girl's school uniform. She had her
bright red hair hanging loose and an irritated look in her eye a she looked
to the back of the class at Makoto and Minako, who gulped and tried to
shrink below their desks.
"Class, this is Ranko Saotome and will be staying with us for three or four
months while she is in Tokyo. She has recently been to China and America on
a training journey for Martial Arts. Please introduce yourself."
"Sure, I'm Ranko Saotome a Master of Anything Goes Martial Arts."
"Thank you Ranko, please take a seat over behind Ami Mizuno."
"Sure." Ranma said as Ami raised her hand and tried to hide a smirk.
Usagi on the other hand looked at Ranma. "What's with the change Ranko?"
"Had no choice, found my self in this outfit and form in the middle of the
fight and didn't have time to switch back." Ranma whispered.
The rest of the morning classes were actually interesting enough to keep
Ranma awake, though she got in trouble for not having any school materials
and had to borrow some. She smiled at the geek behind Naru and battered her
eyes at him until he fainted, then she stole his books, notes, and other
useful items. She had learned her lessons from Nabiki very well, those girl
lessons did come in handy every now and then.
"I can't believe you just did that?!" Usagi hissed.
"He doesn't need them, he was working on his trigonometry homework instead
of English."
"So what, you don't steal other people's stuff like that!"
"USAGI!!" Mrs. Haruna yelled and pointed to the hall.
Usagi blushed, stood up and walked out of class. Ranma on the other hand
was feeling pretty good, until he saw the teacher's look and followed Usagi
out. She wasn't sure what was more useless, Furinkan's water buckets or
Juuban's little signs. Ranma figured it wouldn't have been all that bad, but
Usagi was glaring at her in a very familiar way. "What?"
"This all your fault." Usagi snapped.
"You were the one yelling in class."
"You stole his books."
"I borrowed them, I was going to copy his notes and give them back
tomorrow."
"Yeah right."
Ranma shrugged and was about to say something, when the door to the
classroom banged open and the little geek walked out. He looked around,
spotted Ranma and grinned in a geeky way. He flashed forward and wrapped
himself around Ranma's body like a snake. "My Love!" There were these little
hearts floating around the guy's head that set Usagi to giggling at Ranma.
"Get off you little slime ball!" Ranma yelled as she tried to peel the
thing off, but it just gripped tighter.
"Now you done it Ranko!" Usagi said and started laughing.
"Lay off!"
Naru stalked out of the classroom, spotted her boyfriend and Ranma and
turned red. She stomped over to Ranma, slapped her, and peeled the love
struck Umino off. Then dragged him back into the class room to the sound of
laughter and hooting from the guys and the girls cheering Naru on. Ranma
just stood there in shock while Usagi just giggled and giggled at her as she
rolled on the floor trying to catch her breath.
Ranma just crossed her arms. "Humph!!"
"M-my L-love...." Usagi gasped out and giggled some more.
"Har har Usagi." Ranma grumbled.
Several minutes later they were allowed back in and Ranma spent the rest of
class blushing and trying to hide as all the girls glowered at her. Though
she did find it a little surprising that the geek hadn't taken his books
back, instead there was a note and a fake paper flower telling her to keep
this set since he had several anyway. Of course she tried to give them back,
but the love struck look on his geek face was just pathetic enough to make
her nervous and to make Naru even more jealous and angry. Ranma was happy as punch when the lunch bell finally rang, she jumped up and left the room
before anyone could say anything to her.
She had only intended to copy the geek's notes and return them, no matter
what it may have looked like. She had told Usagi so, and yet she had not
believed her, why? Ranma considered the whole day so far and to her it
seemed almost normal actually, a few girl's jumping to conclusions, her
being blamed for the dumbest stuff and suffering for it. Well she hadn't
suffered all that much yet, she wasn't in any pain anyway and that usually
meant being brained by Ukyo's giant spatula.
Then Ranma blinked, this wasn't Furinkan, it was a normal school and this
meant the actions of the students were more than a little odd. She looked
around the school grounds and noticed that she wasn't the only one being
glared at, everyone was glaring at everyone else like they were paranoid, it
was giving her the strangest feeling. Ranma stood up slowly and looked up at
the window to her homeroom, with a crouch she launched herself three stories
and through the window. Much to the shock of Mrs. Haruna who was yelling at
those students who had stayed in the classroom after the bell rang, that
feeling was getting worse. Ranma tried her best to ignore her and calmly
walked over to Ami and sat down beside her.
"Ami?"
"Yes Ranko?" Ami asked as she looked up.
"This whole school is acting weird, can you scan it for signs of those
things you told me about the other day?"
"Why should I do anything for you after you tried to steal Naru's boyfriend?" Ami asked pleasantly, though Ranma could see something else in her eyes.
"I had no idea the guy would freak like that, I just wanted his notes, not a b-boyfriend."
"I don't believe you." Ami glared at her...him? T-the PERVERT!!
She glared some more.
Ranma shrugged and scooted back a little bit, she threw her hands up in the air as Ami continued to stare at her, this was getting weird and she had
no idea what to do about it. She stood up and turned to go and look around
herself when that feeling hit her again. For a brief second it is worse than
the other times and she feels like she is swimming in the most rancid oil
like substance she has ever felt, it crawls over her skin and sends chill
down her back. A quick glance at Ami shows that she seems to have felt it
too and she sighs as she pulled out her little computer and covertly started
to type. After a few seconds she looks up at Ranma and nods at her to
confirm her suspicions.
"Whatever it is it's on the roof of this building." Ami says quietly.
"I'm heading up there."
"I'll call the others."
"I can handle it Ami." Ranma says arrogantly.
"Uh huh." Ami says and rolls her eyes. "I want to keep an eye on you."
Ranma growls and shrugs. "Whatever."
They get up and start to walk out of the class room, but the teacher stops
them. "Were are the two of you going?"
"Um..." Ranma starts sweating and looking nervous.
"We need to use the restroom sir, we'll be back in a few minutes." Ami says
quickly.
"Hurry up, we start up again in a few minutes."
"Yes sir!" They yell as they dash out of the room. They fail to see the
strange looks that the rest of the class is giving the both of them, and
even if they did they wouldn't have understood it. Though Minako and Usagi
would have, but they were still eating lunch.
"That was weird." Ranma says as they hit the stairs that head for the roof.
"All part of being a Scout, know how to make quick excuses to get out of class. It's the second rule."
"The second?"
"The first is don't give away your identity to anyone if you can help it."
"Right that I can understand. VULCAN KNIGHT SENSHI, MAKE UP!!"
Halfway up the stairs Ranma's arm bracers appear and flare with light and
fill the stair well. When it recedes she stops in mid step and groans in
shock at what she is wearing, Ami looks her over and giggles even as she
turns into Sailor Mercury and contacts the others. Ranma is still wearing
Vulcan's uniform, but is styled for her female body, in other words she is
in a blue jacket like her male form, but the resemblance ends there. The
jacket is form fitting and from the waist down is a dress like section that
hangs from her waist to her knees in front and back and is split up the
sides to show off her legs. She has knee high boots made of a black leather
and her usual mask, her flaming red hair is hanging halfway down her back.
The Blue jewel is still on her chest and pulsing brightly. Finally her
bracers are visible and glinting with a gold like sparkle in the over head lighting of the stairwell. It was enough to make Ranma want to throttle Vulcan if she could get her hands on him, the only thing holding her back was this wonderful feeling running through her body.
"Wow Vulcan, you look great." Mercury said. Why was it suddenly so hot in
here, is the monster affecting the environment? She whipped out her computer
again, but the readings are all negative. Weird.
"Why me?" Ranma muttered to herself. Even when she tried to stay out of
dresses, she seemed to always end up in the most revealing and sexy thing
available. Ranma sighed. She looked around and noticed that her mask was
giving her readings again, there was some kind of energy or mist in the air.
Flowing down the stairs from above and Ranma looked upwards to where the top
of the stairs seemed to be filled with the stuff. Her mask seemed to sense
her need and focused beyond the mist to show a sealed door with the mist
streaming through the edges of the door with malevolent need.
"The computer says our bad guy is up on the roof." Mercury says.
"My mask is telling me the same thing."
"What do you mean?"
Vulcan turns to look at Mercury. "This mask seems to be like your computer,
it reads the area and shows me some information, where the monster is, the
dark energy in the air and stuff. Even suggested some possible battle plans."
Mercury gaped.
"What, don't tell me you've got mask envy now?" Ranma asked with a playful
grin.
"Humph!"
"Oh yeah, Mask envy."
Mercury is about to respond when Ranma holds up her hand and looks around
quickly, then she growls and jumps up the last few stairs and kicks the door
off it's hinges, sending it flying across the roof to crash into the monster. Who screams in shock at the unexpected attack and crashes to the ground. Vulcan is through the opening before Mercury can blink, but she regroups and follows the girl out onto the roof just in time to see Vulcan land on the door and jump up and down on it a couple of times. What they see is about normal for these kinds of things, she brings computer up and scans the monster. It is vaguely female and seems to be made out of some kind of glass.
"Take that, and some more of the same!" Vulcan yells.
The monster tossed the door off her and Vulcan flips back and lands easily,
she smirks at the thing as she gets her first good look at it. "I see the
Sailors have showed up, oh well, I was expecting you like last week. I'm
Beaker and I will kill you today!" Beaker yelled hollowly.
"You don't look that tough to me." Vulcan grins and launches forward in a
blue blur and slams her palm into the things glass like chest. The glass
shatters around the blow and sends it flying back with a scream only to slam
into the chain link fence that ran around the edge of the roof. "Is that all
you got?" Vulcan yells as she walks forward cracking her knuckles as Mercury
stepped forward.
"Mercury Aqua Rhapsody!!" Mercury yells and fires of her icy blast and
freezes Beaker to the fence as she was struggling to stand back up.
Vulcan launches into the air and kicks the thing in the head, shattering
it's hair, the fence shatters under the force of the blow and it and the monster are suddenly launched off the roof. Ranma does a back flip and lands on the edge of the roof and looks down to see the thing slam into the ground below with a mighty crash. She smirked; this one was turning out to be pretty weak all things considered. She is about to write the thing off when it sits up and shakes
itself, Vulcan can see it's glass like body reforming as she watches. She
barely thinks as she brings her hand forward and yells. "Möko Takabisha!"
and sends a bright blue bolt of power into the thing. Unfortunately Ranma
hadn't had time to train in the use of her new powers, this made for an
interesting effect. What would have been a somewhat strong blast normally,
was far stronger in her Scout form. The blue bolt was almost as bright as
the sun and it fired out with the force of a cannon. Vulcan found herself
being pushed back as the force threw her the length of the roof with just
it's kick back, she landed with a grunt.
"Sailor Vulcan!!" Mercury cried out in shock at the power that had just
been released by her teammate.
Beaker was just turning to look up at her attackers, a sneer on her face
just at the bolt hit.
KA-BOOOOOOOOMMMMMMM!!!!!!!
The explosion, about twenty feet from the main walls of the school, shook
the school and rent the area into powder, shattering most of the windows in
the school and causing a concussive blast that knocked most to the nearby
bystanders off their feet, this included Jupiter and Venus who had just
arrived on the scene. Bits of dust and shattered glass rained down on the
school for several seconds, but it was like a rain of dust and caused little
to no damage to anyone. The Scouts were still glad that their Sailor forms
were more sturdy than their normal bodies.
"What the hell was that?!" Vulcan yelled from her back, her hands still
smoking and throbbing in pain.
"Vulcan, you could have killed someone!" Mercury yelled.
"It was just a normal blast, I fire them off all the time!"
"Your transformed state increases your abilities exponentially."
"Huh?"
"Your about ten to twenty times more powerful in this state, you could
easily hurt someone. Your Ki attacks are increased by the magic of your
transformation, it is how all of us are able to use it as weapons."
Vulcan groaned and tried to think of a way out of this mess, then grined as
her mask scans the entire school and surroundings areas. The damage is
mostly just broken glass and cracked walls, there are only about ten
students hurt and those are minor injuries compared to what could have
happened. The mask beeps and she takes a closer look as it focuses in on the
blast crater. She gasps as the mask tells her that the monster is still
active, as damaged as it was, there seemed to be enough left for it to
regenerate. "That stupid thing is still alive after all that!"
Ami pulls out her computer again and confirms Vulcan's statement. "What
else does your mask say?"
"Basically to keep blowing it up until it is dead." Vulcan snaps as she
staggers to her feet, she felt drained. Her energy reserves were completely
shot, she must have put everything she had into that blast, no wonder it had
been so strong. It was like Ryoga using his Perfect Shishi Höködan.
"Well you let me run some tests on that thing when this over?"
"What? Oh...sure, but later okay?"
Mercury nods and points to the ground where Sailor Moon, Jupiter, and Venus are examining the large crater. Vulcan is pleased to see that Venus and
Jupiter are back on their feet. She pulls out her communicator. "Sailor Moon?"
"What's up Mercury?"
"You need to blast that crater with one of your attacks, it's still
active."
"It's still alive, after being hit with something like that?!"
"Yes, now blast the center of the crater Sailor Moon."
"Starlight Honeymoon Therapy Kiss!!" Moon yells as few seconds later and
fires off her magic. It clears out the smoke and dust and leaves a broken
case of glass bottles at the bottom of the crater, Venus and Jupiter blast
the remains just to be sure.
"I still say that giant pink heart is just stupid." Vulcan mutters.
Mercury hits her up side the head. "So what, it works doesn't it?"
"It's a nine foot high giant pink heart Mercury."
"That it is."
Ranma watches silently as the dark mist seems to just rise into the sky and
vanish as if it had never existed before. She sighs in relief as she notices
that Mercury is no longer being affected by it either, down below the stuff
seems to take its nearly invisible claws out of all the students and
disappear. Ranma hopped it would make things better, but she knew her luck
and knew it would only delay the next weird thing that happened. Of course
if she had noticed this stuff a little sooner she would still be at the
temple instead of on the street. That didn't matter though, she had lived on
the road for over ten years, this was a lot easier to do than that. Now all
she had to do was learn to control her new strength, find a new place to
live, and figure out how she had shifted genders during the fight earlier.
She hadn't been hit with cold water and her clothing had shifted with the
change. That had never happened before and to figure it out she was going to
have to practice. She grinned, that was her favorite pastime anyway, though
now that she was going to school again she would have to be on high alert.
Nabiki would be able to find her now, easily. Hopefully she would have a
week or two before the crazies showed up to make her life a living hell
again. That would give her some time to make some plans, some thing she had
been putting off. Things were going to be very interesting in the upcoming
months, she could feel it.
Vulcan grinned evilly.
Mercury backed up a couple of steps as Vulcan started to glow then cackle
insanely.
**********
Notes - Okay, I had to rewrite compete sections of this chapter because I
absolutely hated what I had originally posted. The more I looked at it the
less I liked it, it wasn't fun enough or up to my usual standards. Hopefully
this version reads a little better and wasn't as gloomy as the other one.
