[Ranma/SM/CCG][3rd Draft]
Hailstorm - Chapter 3
by Laqjr
Disclaimer
I do not own Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon or Ranma 1/2. Characters used without permission.
Acknowledgements
The original idea behind Who's Your Daddy and Hailstorm is courtesy of Rift120, from the Delphi Boards.
Sinking into the Depths
Ami walked slowly down Yamano Street, pondering the events of the last few
days. It seemed an epidemic spread across Tokyo nearly overnight, and most
people were sick in bed for their second or third day. Though Ami did have a few
of the symptoms of the quickly spreading sickness, she was not so unwell as to
be unable to attend school. However, the school closed early due to the
overwhelming number of absent staff, so she headed to the library to see if it
remained open.
The last few days were uncomfortable for Ami. Her mother still woke her up early
every day, and every day the woman would show her some new way to hold herself,
make an attack, or defend herself, and expect her to remember each stance or
movement by making her practice them all in different kata. This all forewent
the fact that Atsuko always left her some strange task or extra training regimen
to perform, and because of the last droid attack only four days ago and the
plague saturated city, her mother rarely came home before midnight anymore. Yet
despite this, if Ami did not perform the extra training prescribed by her
mother, Atsuko made her swim twice as many laps (or more), or assigned her some
other exercise likely designed solely to exhaust her.
Training under Atsuko was not for the weak in health.
Though Ami saw her mother every morning when the older woman woke her up for
training, Ami could not bring herself to dredge up the argument between them to
apologize for her behavior. The time just seemed inappropriate for meaningful
discussion.
The truth of the matter was Ami felt scared of her father. Before, the man had
no meaning in her life, being someone who she never knew, never met, and
probably never would see. Now, he knew her secret, which not only meant he knew
about her and where she lived, he also knew one of her deepest secrets, placing
her in his mercies. What if he told someone her secret? What if he used her
secret against her?
Really, it was an irrational fear, but years of not knowing her father and never
having thought of him left Ami with no idea of what to do now that he reentered
her life. Partially, anyway. He still hadn't shown up at the apartment, and Ami
so far only saw him at the youma battle, but she knew he'd be showing up more
often now that he fancied himself her protector. He made that obvious to her
when he shielded her from the droid's attacks at the cake shop. And he's
standing in that abandoned lot across the street, too, so-
Ami quickly hid behind the corner of the building next to the abandoned lot- the
next intersection read 35th Street- and carefully inched around the corner to
see what he was up to. A dirty and unkempt man, harried from days of travel,
stood before him, carrying a huge travel pack and holding an umbrella that went
out of style long ago, shouting some sort of challenge. Her father's clothes
appeared damp, but no open water sources were nearby.... What were they doing?
Ami stepped out from behind the building to find out more from them, decreasing
the displacement between them and herself.
The travel worn man shouted, "You can't hide anymore, Ranma! This is for
abandoning your fiancées!" He leaped high into the air and fell toward her
father's position, who jumped away before the man landed. A huge crater formed
under the man's feet when he landed.
Ranma? That was the name of her father, wasn't it? Just the sight of such an
impossible leap and an equally impossibly large impact crater stunned Ami to
immobility.
"Ryoga, you jerk! What're you trying to do? I thought you'd be happy to have me
out of the way!" Ranma growled as he wearily circled Ryoga, unknowingly blocking
Ami from Ryoga's line of sight.
Ryoga glared at Ranma while shouting, "It's all your fault, too! If you hadn't
left, I wouldn't be having these problems! I'm going to kill you, Ranma!"
Ryoga didn't immediately attack Ranma. He glared a minute longer, then said,
"Akane married a man named Shitori Sanji, did you know that? She never loved
you!"
Ryoga's announcement gave Ranma pause, allowing the stranger the time to charge
and attack her father. Ami watched as they fought swiftly at speeds she dared
not hope to achieve. Their movements were easy enough to follow, but Ami could
not possibly catalogue all the different attacks or blocks either party used. By
the time she identified a specific strike or block, both combatants had already
performed two or three more interactions.
Her father shouted something akin to "Roasted Chestnuts", then launched a high
speed volley of punches before jumping back and away from the other man, who he
had identified as Ryoga. Ami looked around Ranma at Ryoga, who took two or three
bandanas off of his head while glancing in her father's direction.
"This time, I'll get you, Ranma," he said. "There's no more running away now.
Let's finish this the way it started all those years ago."
"I've never run away from a fight, Ryoga, and I'm not gonna start now." Ranma
dug his heels into the ground and took up an unfamiliar stance. Ryoga frowned.
"You ready, P-chan? 'Cause this is really gonna hurt! There's no way you're
going to beat me!" Ranma shouted.
Ami stood still, clueless as to what they were talking about and hoping neither
had noticed her yet. Participating in high speed martial arts battles is very
hazardous to one's health, and Atsuko probably wouldn't be happy with her if she
started getting into fights that didn't involve her.
The bandanas in the other man's hands disappeared from her sight as the two men
engaged in another round of combat. Though both were very good and fought very
hard, Ami easily saw and readily understood that her father was steadily giving
ground and on the verge of letting down his defenses. Was he trying to lose?
The other man in the yellow and black clothes, Ryoga, landed a solid punch to
Ranma's gut, sending him flying to land around 15 meters in front of her. He
rolled up onto his knees and clutched his stomach, spitting out phlegm and some
blood. Ryoga picked up a nearby stone, about the size of her computer tower, and
threw it up in the air. When it fell back toward him, he casually swung at it
with one of the newly reappeared bandanas and cleaved it in two. The two halves
of the rock crumbled upon impact with the ground.
"This time, Ranma, there's no getting away," said Ryoga, casually spinning the
bandanas, then letting them loose with quick flicks of his wrist. The bandanas
flew straight toward her father, who had managed to roll away in time, but now
they were headed toward her....
"What.. are those?" voiced Ami, completely frozen by the gruesome thought of
extremely sharp bandanas cutting her into pieces. What would her mother think if
she came home decapitated? She'd never hear the end of it at school!
What am I thinking? I'll be dead. That was it. She was going to die, and not of
old age, or even from fighting youma, demons, or droids. Some stupid piece of
cloth would be her undoing, who would have thought?
"Ami!" She heard her father's voice distantly, and there was an impact, and
suddenly she lay staring up at the sky. The sun's brilliance burned her eyes in
its path of ascension. What had saved her?
She looked down to see her father above her, having tackled her away from the
strange headgear projectiles.
"Ami, are you alright?" Ranma let go of her and touched her shoulder softly.
Suddenly she was filled with anxiety at how close her father was. Who was this
man who had saved her life so easily? She backed away from his touch. "I'm okay
now," she said.
The man did not relax in the slightest at her pronouncement. He instead turned
away from her and looked at Ryoga, who stood dumbfounded. "Ryoga! You could have
hit her with those! I'm going to kill you!" he shouted before leaping at the
man. Ryoga picked up and opened his umbrella, blocking Ranma's strike, then
bounded over the wall behind him. Ranma followed closely behind.
"Wha.... What happened?" For a few moments, Ami could only stare at the debris
around her. Deciding that going home would be the best way to spend the rest of
her day, she stood up, picked up one of the yellow and black spotted bandanas
which lay embedded in the ground, then stalked toward her home.
*********************
When she arrived home, Ami immediately thought of turning back to go out. There,
on her doorstep, was someone she just could not deal with today. It was....
Minako, with Artemis on her shoulder and a large bag hanging from her arm.
"Minako, why are you here? I told you, I'm not sick!" Minako was the only other
girl on their team who didn't get sick from the bug floating around, so she had
taken it upon herself to go on a crusade to the home of each Senshi and make
sure they 'got well soon'. Minako had already visited Makoto and Rei, and
planned on stopping by her house before going on to Usagi's. Ami tried to
convince the girl she wasn't sick by any means, but Minako just couldn't take
the hint, no matter how blatantly obvious it was given.
"Come on, Ami! Can't I just stop by for a visit? Wow, you live in such a nice
apartment, it looks bigger than my house. Are you sure this is an apartment?"
Minako said. She looked around while waiting for Ami to unlock the door.
"Yes, Minako, this is just an apartment, even if it is big. Alright, come in.
The house is a mess, though, I haven't gotten around to cleaning up the rooms
yet." Ami unlocked the door and went inside.
"Oh, that's okay, Ami. Hey, I brought you something, in case you're not feeling
well. I know how you love sandwiches and, well, soup is supposed to be the best
thing to eat when you're sick, so I decided to combine them to make something
better." Minako peeked around one of the doorways to look into the living room.
"Wow, that's a big TV. I wish my TV was that big."
"You... what? You combined a sandwich and soup? Ah, um." Ami wasn't sure how to
continue, and didn't want to know how Minako had managed to put soup into a
cutlet sandwich. Such matters were very dangerous topics of discussion. She very
discreetly dumped the contents of the... sandwich... in the waste disposal.
"Oh! A 20 disk CD player. I brought some soothing music you might like, wait,
here, let me get it...." Minako dug into her bag while Artemis crawled toward
Ami.
"Be careful, Ami! Minako's on a rampage today. She already blew up Makoto's
favorite blender and Rei's stereo system.... Who knows what might go wrong now?"
Artemis said from below her.
Ami started at seeing the white cat. "Oh, I forgot all about you, Artemis," Ami
said. "Cats aren't allowed in the apartment complex, neither are any other pets.
And my mother doesn't like cats, either." A crash resounded as Minako's disks
spilled all over the floor.
"I'll get them," the blond girl shouted, and Ami rolled her eyes as she watched
Minako crawl around the floor picking up the various optical disk media.
"Minako, Ami says cats aren't allowed in the apartment," Artemis started as he
walked toward his ward.
"What? Oh. Well, then I guess we'd better go, huh?" Minako appeared to be
embarrassed as she looked up from grabbing the last of her CDs. "Sorry Ami, I'm
such a klutz some time. Um. I'll just come back later and check on you then,
okay?" She stood up and, after stuffing all her CDs in the bag, picked Artemis
up and placed him on her shoulder again.
"That won't be necessary!" Ami hastily said. "I mean, um, my mom's a doctor, so
she takes care of me. I don't get sick often, anyway."
Minako laughed. "Yeah, I know what you mean. Well, call me if you need anything.
I'm going to Usagi's house, then."
Ami walked her to the front door.
"Well, bye Ami. See you later, then," said Minako.
"Bye Minako. See you in school," replied Ami.
*********************
Ami gratefully closed her Geometry book and took a deep breath. She'd managed to
complete chapter 12, with the theorems regarding angles whose rays formed
tangents with a circle.... Granted, the assignment had been in chapter 3,
dealing with centroids and medians of a triangle, but the coursework simply was
not accelerated enough for her, and Ami liked to work at her own pace. Maybe
next week she would borrow a few books on prospective geometry and begin on that
until the class caught up with her. Certainly that would be much more
entertaining than completing the math book and sitting in class with nothing to
do.
Two hours had passed since Minako left the apartment. Supposedly, the girl was
to come back for another visit to check on her, but Ami planned to be asleep by
that time. She just lay her head on the pillow when her communicator beeped at
her. Picking it up and pressing the button for audio, she heard Minako say, "Hey
guys, Esmeraude's got Chibi-Usa at the pharmacy in Juban General hospital! I've
got this one covered, though. Don't worry about a thing!"
Ami immediately got out of bed and left for the hospital.
*********************
"Mercury Bubbles Blast!" she shouted, creating a fog in the dimly lit pharmacy
of Juban General Hospital. Hopefully, the hospital wouldn't be too damaged by
their battle, and her mother wouldn't find out they were here.
"Everyone, you shouldn't have come here, you should all be in bed," Venus said
matter-of-factly.
"Venus," began SailorMoon, "thank you for fighting alone and protecting
Chibi-Usa."
"Don't worry, you're not in danger anymore now that we're all here," Ami said to
Chibi-Usagi.
Esmeraude, impatient with the fog, shouted, "Droid! Attack them now!" She
disappeared in the slowly dispersing mist.
"Mars Fire Surround!" Mars shouted, blasting the droid to impede it. SailorMoon
didn't look to well, and staggered a moment before Tuxedo Mask caught her.
"SailorMoon, don't get sick now! I want you to get well soon," Tuxedo Mask said
in what Ami supposed was an encouraging speech.
SailorMoon stood up from Mask's arms, struck a small pose, then shouted, "Moon
Princess Halatation!" She extinguished the droid, and another dark crystal shard
shattered.
"Rrr, you're really getting on my nerves! I'll get you all later, I must be
going to do other things. You won't win next time, Senshi! O-hohohohoho!"
Esmeraude disappeared.
Mercury sighed, then looked past where SailorMoon and Tuxedo Mask were making
out. There, in the doorway, was her mother. Atsuko nodded to her, an indicator
that the woman approved, well, something anyway. She quickly disappeared around
the corner.
"If you guys don't mind, I'm going home now, I don't feel well," said SailorMoon
from within Mamoru's embrace.
Ami could not have agreed with her more.
*********************
Author's Notes:
For those of you who are wondering, the identity of Ami's biological mother will
not be revealed/confirmed until either
a) the Senshi go to Crystal Tokyo, or
b) about halfway through SailorMoon S (I'm not telling where).
Most likely it's gonna be choice (b). As an effect, the real mother won't be
revealed in Hailstorm, as BSSM-S will be covered in a separate story, but she
may or may not be mentioned or seen in Hailstorm.
On another note, yes, I know I'm mixing Japanese and English names liberally,
and I know I'm using 'Tuxedo Mask' while also using 'Mamoru' and 'SailorMoon'. I
just think it sounds better than 'Tuxedo Kamen'. And I don't feel like looking
up, copying, and pasting a long string of Japanese Romaji every time one of the
Senshi attack, so I'm using the English names for their attacks. This likely
will not change in the future.
C&C welcome at laqjr_200@hotmail.com