Disclaimer- Now, finally, we have the first tentative crossing. Anyway, while insane, I am not quite so far gone as to claim ownership of either Ranma or Sailor Moon, or at least not and expect to be believed.
Warning- Spoilers. This is a given. Language. I don't really censor myself, I follow my characters. They may swear, they may not, I have no more say in the matter than you do. Also, as a warning, I got a lot of inspiration for this piece from Anne Bishop's Black Jewels trilogy, although it's not a crossover. I tried to mimic the feel and tone of Black Jewels in my own way, so beware. If you don't know what this means... Dark, sensual, violent. Topics that are often considered extremely inappropriate for dinner-table conversation will come up, and people will die. In most uncomfortable ways. If you can't take what you see, stop looking.
(Font specifics: If you've read any of my stuff, you probably know this by know.
"Hi," speech.
/Boo/ mental communication-ie. telepathy.
-This- is an interruption.
And this is either a thought, or signifies that whatever it is is stressed.)
Darklight: The YSDF
By Pale Wolf
Third Prologue
Time Hole: The Corruption of History
Ten Years Ago
Now was a junction point. A powerful witch was coming into her own, and another child was heading onto a path that would put him squarely against the Senshi. Sailor Pluto had to act. Nothing could interfere with the Silver Millenium's return. Nothing was more important than returning control of everything to the Serenity line.
Still, she didn't really want to kill the kid: he hadn't done anything wrong yet. 'If only there was some way to keep him in Genma's custody', had been her line of thought. Then she'd realized how close the coming encounter was. If Genma's initial, lethal, strike didn't miss, the witch would never have the chance to take him seriously. It had taken some planning, since, like any use of the Time Gate, the moment she disrupted the original path for any part of it, she wouldn't even be able to watch that part for quite some time.
Eventually, she'd realized all she needed to do was pull enough alchohol out of his system that he'd shoot straight.
And it was time to do it. She reached into the Gate with her power, red eyes hard...
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"BOY!!!" Genma roared, stomping up to the slowly stirring child. "Come with me, brat!" Seeing the fear in his son's eyes, he flushed, partially with booze, partially with anger. "You're becoming a girl already! Now I've got to work even harder to make you a man!" He reached for ranma's collar...
...then was blasted back as something hit him, straight in the sternum. A huge spider dropped from the treetops, standing protectively over his son.
Ranma looked up. "Yumiko!"
She kept all of her eyes of Genma. "I made a promise. I will never break a promise."
Genma shifted into a stance. "Get away from my son!"
Yumiko gave off a vicious, rattling growl. "Over a dead body. Yours." She crouched back, ready to lunge, mandibles swinging open.
No one even exhaled.
Genma moved first, snapping up one of his arms, shouting, "Kijin Raishuu Dan!"
Yumiko made her lunge, but didn't get far before the vacuum blade connected just to the left of her head, instantly shearing off her entire left side. She fell down in seven mismatched pieces, splashing fluids over Ranma, twitching violently.
Ranma shook his head, rushing to Yumiko's side. "No! You were gonna help me find Mom!"
She forced down the twitching, twisting her rearmost leg (right side, obviously), to contact the top of Ranma's head. "I'm... sorry... All I... can do... I welcome you into the Hourglass... Our coven sisters... will help... you..."
Striding up to Yumiko's head, Genma heard this, and chortled. "Nobody's taking the boy, monster. He's mine!" He slammed down a hammer fist onto her head, splitting it like an overripe watermelon. He snatched Ranma's collar in one hand, the pack in the other, ignoring the boy's yells.
"Lemme go! No! Leave me-!"
Genma cuffed him with the pack. "Shut up, boy! You sound even more girly than-!"
"Might I be of assistance?" a soft old man's voice quetied, cutting through Genma's yells.
Genma whirled around to face the bent, withered old man, raising his hands defensively, dropping the pack and the groggy boy. "You can leave. I'm having enough trouble with the boy."
The man extended his arms out to the side in a sign of harmlessness. "Disobedient children are a real problem, aren't they? You try to impart your wisdom to them and they just refuse to behave, refuse to learn."
Genma relaxed. "I know. I'm trying to make the boy a man, but he keeps on falling back, getting girly again, umm..."
"Regressing?" the man suggested.
"Ah! Right. Regressing." Genma had never heard the word before.
Ranma, regaining his coherency, rolled to get traction and darted away.
Genma caught him and dealt him a heavy blow that knocked him unconscious.
The man shook his head. "Sad, isn't it? I have a few things that might help you." He slipped off his own pack, opening the flap and searching inside.
Genma dropped Ranma. "How much?"
The old man waved him off. "I'd be happy to help a good man like yourself." He pointed at Yumiko's body. "I mean, look at that monster you killed. This world needs more people like you." While Genma preened, the man pulled out a bottle filled with a pearlescent, thick and viscous fluid. He held it up to Genma for inspection. "This will make him docile, until the antidote is applied."
Genma frowned. "But I'm trying to make him a man! He needs to be able to fight!"
The old man nodded consideringly, withdrawing the bottle. "Good point... What about..." Muttering to himself, he delved back into the bag, shuffling until he pulled out a thin glass vial filled with a clear, free-flowing liquid that had a carving, exceptionally pale wood in an odd design, tied to the cork by a cord. "This. It won't directly alter behaviour, but he will follow your orders, and yours alone."
Genma leaned in. "How does it work?"
The man's red eyes glittered. "Make him drink the liquid. It will stay with him for his whole life. Now, give him an order normally, and he'll react as normally as he can. However, hold this," he flicked the carving attached to the vial, "and concentrate a little on what you want. He'll do it. Now, you should be aware, the stronger his mind gets, the more concentration you should put in. But he should never develop the power to be uncontrollable, even if he gets far stronger than you. And be careful. Concentrate too hard and you might fry his mind. That will make him totally useless to you. You like?"
Genma snatched the vial from the man's hand.
"Feel free to test it out. And it's not just orders. He'll believe anything you tell him like that. You see, what it does is put him in a hypersuggestible state, susceptible only to the right transmission frequency. The carving transmits the suggestions and-"
"I don't need all that," Genma cut in. This old geezer was seeming a bit girly himself (see note 1). He ducked down to Ranma, pried open the boy's mouth, tilted his head back, popped the vial's cork, and poured the liquid down Ranma's throat. He watched the boy's neck to make sure he swallowed, then stood up. "Wake up, boy." He frowned, idly kicking the unconscious child. "It's not working."
"The carving," the man suggested, packing up his supplies.
Genma sweatdropped. "I knew that! I was just testing you." He fumbled for the carving, holding it as gently as he could in his meaty hand. "What if I break it?"
"You won't," the man replied instantly.
"But what if I do?" Genma insisted.
The man shrugged. "If the signal is disrupted, you'll need to find me to fix it or make a new one, or have no control over little Ranma. So don't. But relax. It will take an attack stronger than what you killed that spider with just to scratch it."
Genma nodded and clamped his hand down on the carving. Sure enough, it didn't give. He turned to Ranma... Then whirled back around. "Wait a minute! How'd you know...?" But there was no one there. "How'd you know the boy's name?" he asked, even though nobody would answer. He shrugged, going back to Ranma. "May as well make sure it works." He made sure his grip was firm, then, "Wake up, boy!"
Ranma's eyes snapped open, staring sightlessly up as his mouth opened in a scream of pain.
"Shut up!"
Ranma instantly silenced, but the pain was still clear on his face.
Genma frowned. His son must be too weak. He toned down the power for the next order. "Stand up."
Glaring at him, Ranma stood.
"Lose that look, boy. I'm your father, and you enjoy everything we do."
Ranma's entire demeanor changed, smiling cheerfully at Genma.
Genma grinned. The boy wasn't acting manly, but that could be corrected later. At least now he was controllable. "You trust me completely. I always know best."
Ranma nodded.
"Speak, boy!"
"Okay Pops. What about?"
"Never mind. Get that pack and let's go back to the camp."
Ranma nodded. "Uh-huh!" He bounced over to the pack, hefting it up onto his small shoulders. He glanced at Yumiko's corpse, then suddenly began to shake, violently.
Genma growled. "Forget about that thing!"
Ranma slowly calmed.
"Forget about your friends. Forget about your pain. Forget about your mother. You will forget anyone except me as soon as you leave them. You will give me whatever I want and be happy about it. You will come with me, now!"
Ranma nodded and followed Genma out of the forest.
But nobody knew, under Ranma's hair, tattooed on his scalp, was a symbol of a black widow on a web.
Next: First Chapter! The YSDF finally forms. And Ranma struggles with daytime nightmares, conscious flashbacks to things he will not believe happened. The river of time is about to shed it's course and run onto the land.
Author's Notes (The stuff. So I don't have a cute remark. It's past midnight. Sue me.)
E-mail is miraclewolf at
(1)No. Genma is not being uncannily perceptive. He just associates manliness with stupidity, intellect with cowardice and 'girlyness'.
Hoo boy. Remember how the last chapter was pretty non-controversial? Well, now we've entered the shadow. Departure time? Who knows,but it isn't very soon. Hopefully I'll get some really nasty flames about this story, especially later chapters (It has not yet reached the darkest point).
The thing about the control? Now, I don't actually make theories about the source (that keeps me much more flexible) but in this case, I thought a few things. One, Ranma's abysmal memory. Two, Genma's behaviour. He keeps bellowing out orders, and it seems, to me anyway, that he's under the impression that Ranma's listening and obeying. From what we've seen of Ranma, that's bullshit, so what gave him that impression? (Canonically it's probably stupidity, but...) And why doesn't Ranma obey him in the canon, under this theory? Well... you'll have to find out.
Guessed who the 'salesman' is? Good.
Anyone wondering how a spider's talking, or for that matter existing without crunching under gravity... It's magical. No more than that will be revealed as now. But I imagine you can put things together. And what do you think about Yumiko's death? Did I manage to make you care?
Yes, Pluto thinks she's being humanitarian by putting a child back in Genma's 'care'. She's not perfect, and incorrect assumptions can cause untold trouble for her. I have a little dossier on this Pluto if anyone wants it, but I'm more hoping I did a good enough job without it. If anyone raises good questions, which I am expecting, I'll explain what I can, as privately as I can. But I'm hoping my writing's good enough to answer those questions in the story. The dossier, I have that sort of thing on most of the major chars. Including Genma. So I'm ready for questions and complaints about characterization.
About the Time Gate, the limitation I put on it, I thought that up simply to make it possible to win against the generally-foresight-capable Pluto. Basically, she knows how the timeline will act without interference, but butterfly effect and unexpected paths can tear her plans to shreds. That's just when I'm using this theory, though.
Oh, and I forgot to mention. I will respond personally to any review, by e-mail if possible, or in the same reviews page if I can't find e-mail, even if just to thank you for your review. Questions will get answered (in a teasing manner meant to minimize spoilers and heighten anticipation), and I'll clear up whatever people don't understand-unless it's not meant to be understood at this point. Anyway, feedback.