Guest Ki: Chapter 18
Roughing It
There were amazing advantages to being a girl, Barry reminded hereslf. Ice cream tasted better, the sense of touch was heightened and reaction time was superior. But the best reason was that Shampoo didn't molest Ranma-girl the way she did Ranma-boy. That was an important criterion, after all. The sooner they got back to civilization and their quest for Ranma the better! The longer they searched for Ukyo, the longer it would be before they could find a way to wake up or bring back Ranma and the longer it would be for Barry to return to his wife and son. Ranma lived his life in interesting times and Barry was sick of it.
He missed his wife terribly. Shampoo, presently scouting ahead, only sharpened his desire to return to her. The Amazon was, in Barry's present opinion, an obnoxiously over-sexed, exotic little brat aping what she believed to be womanly characteristics, a little girl playing dress-up with the wrong role model. It was with difficulty that he refrained enlightening her on this observation. But he was now a she and the violet-haired, violent girl had reduced her verbal seductions and innuendoes to a more tolerable level.
Akane, who followed behind Barry, was also a problem though for different reasons. When Ranma first met Akane, he had seen her fire and her enthusiasm for the Art in the sparring match they had when he first arrived. Ranma had been heart-broken at her rejection of him as a boy, and most of his actions since then had been attempts to get her to value him for himself. Had he been raised in a more normal atmosphere, he might have understood his feelings sooner. Only lately had Ranma and Akane begun to show one another how they really felt.
But Barry Barlowe, of the gaijin spirit from another dimension, had gotten in the way, and due to the Cat-Fist and unusual stresses, Ranma seemed to be missing from his own body. Akane was well aware of the circumstances, and while she provisionally trusted Ranma's Guest, his presence in her fiancé's place translated into a sullen withdrawal that gave her Amazon rival a free field, which Shampoo gleefully exploited. Barry was afraid Akane would talk herself out of Ranma. That would be a disaster for his host and the girl. He wasn't about to let that happen. Well, presently she wasn't about to let that happen.
"This way, airen!"
Whoops! Ukyo had taken a hard jog to the left this time. Shampoo waited for them to catch up and sped off again. As the better tracker, she cut the trails and they carried her pack, which was fair enough. At the last camp, they had been near a small pool in the forest and Shampoo had offered Barry a bar of soap she was carrying.
"Is waterproof soap. Let airen be man even if wet and keep Shampoo from turning cat so not make Ranma go Nekoken." She leaned against the redhead and rubbed the side of her breast against an available arm.
Barry jerked away. "You mean I've been jumpin' every time you got near cold water for nothing?" she screeched, vexed, glad for an excuse to bawl the little minx out. "Why didn't you tell me?"
"So sorry," she said, chipper, not sounding sorry at all. "Want soap?"
"I'll pass. You just make sure you use enough of that stuff that you don't go c-c-ca-cat!" Barry was quite pleased with her acting.
Shampoo had pouted and turned away, missing the curiosity in Barry's eyes. Ranma's memories of any cat were colored by his ailurophobia. Barry, not afraid of cats at all, was a little curious as to what Shampoo-cat really looked like. He suspected that Ranma's memories of a purple and white fanged monster were somewhat inaccurate.
This night rain threatened. They quickly set up the tent and got their equipment under cover. It was tight but the three had enough room to sleep packed elbow to elbow. Shampoo insisted, over Akane's objections, that she wanted Ranma in the middle and insinuated it was to protect her from 'pervert-girl'. They quickly built a fire and Shampoo cooked a hurried dinner. Barry suspected that Shampoo squirreled away some hot water for the evening's entertainment. As the rain began to fall, the three girls wedged themselves into their bedrolls.
The rain was very soothing but Barry could not sleep. Even without Shampoo's warm body pressing against her back, (Akane had jammed herself against her pack with her knees partly drawn up, keeping some distance) she avoided the dreams that had so often come. In the occasional flash of lightning, she saw that Akane could not sleep either. Her eyes were open but not focused on anything in particular and tracks of tears glistened in the uncertain light. She watched Akane become aware of her scrutiny and close her eyes, the only privacy she had in the tent's confines. Not much later, she became aware of a slow, steady shift in Shampoo's posture.
Something warm seemed to soothe the base of her skull near the pigtail. His skull, rather. Shampoo had gotten some hot water. He saw Akane's eyes open and then close to slits as she watched the Amazon's strategy. Muscles jumped along her jaw. Barry read the distinct possibility of murder being committed. He doubted Shampoo actually expected to accomplish anything with this stunt aside from having a male Ranma to sleep beside. After all, they were all fully dressed; but he felt the need to act before Akane did.
With a sigh he shifted, letting an arm slip through the tent slit and out into the rain. Hair reddened, a human form shifted, shrank and Shampoo grimaced and sighed in frustration. She waited to see if Ranma woke up and after a significant period of time, reached out to shift the Ranma's arm away from the tent opening. Again warm water trickled past an ear and Barry felt the Jusenkyo curse release.
He pretended to come partly awake this time, muttering about a leak in the tent and turned, stretching, arching his back. Coincidentally, this sent both arms out the flap and turned the male profile decidedly (and disappointingly from Shampoo's viewpoint) into the familiar female outline of Ranma girl-type.
Shampoo flopped down in disgust as Barry turned her head towards Akane and winked. A sudden snort was the dark-haired girl's only break of control. Barry suspected that the rest of the night should be without incident. She was wrong.
Shampoo was on her knees suddenly. Above the loud pounding of the rain a different rumble could be heard. It was not an alarming sound to Barry. He had grown up in the gently rolling hills of the eastern U.S. and streams during rain like this, often roared like a fury as they carried away the run-off. Shampoo's tension was not immediately comprehensible to her. Akane's eyes came open and she silently listened to the sound, which was growing steadily louder.
"Airen! Must go! Now!" Shampoo suddenly said. She ducked out of the tent like a ghost. Alarmed, Barry grabbed Akane by the arm and yanked her out of the shelter.
"Avalanche!" they shouted, almost in unison.
Under their feet, they could feel the tremble of the mountain. Dodging a slide, especially one as big as this seemed, was not going to be easy in the dark. Barry switched to the ki-vision, which had served him so well at Himamashi's Bar. She reached out and latched onto Shampoo, not wishing to be separated while the path to safety was unclear.
Unfortunately to her ki-vision there was no path to safety. The organized ghostly images of ki emitted by the trees uphill was rapidly being replaced by a wall bright, loose energy as the avalanche chewed up the life it encountered. It looked like the entire mountain face was falling towards them. The small rise on which they pitched the tent was no barrier to this monster. It was however, an indication of a feature Barry might use to their advantage. Barry searched under the earth and found the rise was the result of a deeply anchored spur of rock jutting out of the mountain. Weighing as much as a small city, its peak should be a strong enough anchor for the refuge she contemplated. She gathered her companions, holding them close.
"I'm gonna try something new! Cross yer fingers!"
"How many fingers Shampoo have to cross?" Shampoo screamed back. She was frankly terrified. Dying this way was not a warrior's death; she would never be recalled to her family in the ancestral rites. She would probably end up as some yearning spirit molesting passers-by on the rare occasions anyone ventured to this mountainside. Wonderful! With all this water, her special soap wouldn't hold up either and she'd end up a female version of the ghost cat, Mao Mu Lin.
They could all see the moving line of destruction now, mud and rock smashing and pushing over trees that had stood for centuries. Akane watched Barry set herself and focus intently, her aura gleaming like phosphorous in the downpour. She watched as a plane of energy seemed to thrust up from within the little rise they stood upon and guessed it must be some form of the shield Ranma had devised as armor, anchored to the immovable rock far below. The dozen heartbeats before the slide reached them seemed an eternity. Akane clung tightly to the redhead's waist and wished over and over again that the real Ranma were there.
The front struck. A tearing groan escaped the redhead's throat as irresistible force met immovable object. Each rock, boulder and tree was keenly felt as it glanced aside or shattered against the ki-based obstruction. Akane and Shampoo stared across her back at the maelstrom that surged about them. Beneath their feet, wet earth was churned to a sucking torrent as turbulence turned the dirt to liquid mud.
Barry felt her shield slip on the hidden spur. Desperately she reshaped the shield in an attempt to reduce the force she had to withstand. When Akane's feet started to slip, she anchored the girl to the shield itself. Before she could do the same to Shampoo, the Amazon slipped and was torn away by a wildly rotating tree branch.
Barry was so deep in her concentration that she felt nothing except resolve. A hand snapped out as a ribbon of light arced after the vanished girl targeted on the ki of her life force. At the same time, the shield was released from the mountain's roots and modified yet again to skip and slide like a surfboard upon the surface of the debris-field. Barry had done this once before to escape Ryoga's ki-blast but had been unable to duplicate until now.
The ribbon found its target and snapped back. A limp, muddy cat hurtled to waiting arms. "Hold her, Akane!" Barry deposited the cat in the other girl's arms, and scooped them both into a cradle hold, curling her body around them, even as she molded the shield one last time. Within a ball of force, three intelligent beings were swept down the mountain in the tailing edges of the massive slide.
Near the mountain's upper reaches, an irritable Ukyo Kuonji harangued an equally irritated Ryoga Hibiki about the weather, their surroundings and his conduct. "Did you hear that?" she shouted. "It sounded like an explosion!" Ryoga was singularly unresponsive. If it didn't kill him or dump his tent, he was willing to sleep through almost anything. Earlier that day, Ukyo stumbled into his campsite after wandering lost for days. He found her singularly ungrateful for her rescue, though of course she wasn't 'out of the woods' yet.
"Gazzzz! Jus' a avalanche… Happens alla time in mountains." He mumbled. "Turn off the light an' go ta sleep."
"Avalanche?" she screeched, shocked. "You jackass! Wake up and do something!" She grabbed him by the shoulders and pounded him up and down on his bedroll. Shadows danced in the tent in response to her efforts.
"Come off it, Ukyo!" he complained sleepily. "What do you expect me to do? Go outside and ask it to stop so you can get your beauty sleep?"
"You can go out and see if we're in any danger of joining the downhill plunge, dammit!" she snarled.
Ryoga propped himself on an elbow and listened to the beating of the rain. He thought about Jusenkyo. "Nope! Not me!" He tucked back under his covers and pulled them over his head. "You want to check, you go. OhhhHOOOooo!" His jaws cracked with a mighty yawn.
Ukyo found beating on Ryoga with her bare hands, martial artist or not, was very unrewarding. "Jackass!" she muttered. The rumble died away. Now only the beating rain and the occasional crack of thunder disturbed the night.
The one person more lost than she was. Ukyo slumped dejectedly, leaving the lamp burning. She scratched her arm and winced at the rough sound her nails made on the cloth of Ryoga's spare clothes. She hated the feel of them against her skin. Ryoga had hesitantly loaned her some clothes to use while hers were washed by nature's laundry service. He had refused to budge from the tent however and she had been forced to dress outside, just ahead of the oncoming storm.
On top of that, she felt like a tent! She was a tall, slender girl, but Ryoga was a taller, broad-shouldered man. The clothes bagged everywhere. She hated to think what she looked like. Why couldn't he wear silk or cotton like Ranma did?
She itched more vigorously and threw herself back on the spare blanket. With a single move, she snapped the light off. "Damn Ryoga!" she muttered. "If we end up dying in the middle of the night, I'll kill him!"
"Watch it, Akane!" Small delicate hands reached out and steadied the taller girl as they advanced along the cliff's edge. A rock under her foot broke away from the trail they were using, making her sway perilously for a moment.
"You watch it!" she snapped, nettled. "I'm not made out of glass!" She moved forward more carefully though, testing the footing before trusting her weight. "That storm must have loosened more than just the mud slide last night."
"I don't want to do that again, I'll tell you!" The helping hand returned and brushed red hair from Barry's eyes. Using both hands, she checked the knot in the shirt looped around her back. Barry cringed self-consciously at the sight she must present to any observer. Still, it was necessary.
Hung in the folds of the silk material, Shampoo-cat swung gently against the girl's back. She had been unconscious when dragged back from the slide's grip the night before and had drifted in and out of consciousness ever since. Akane had tried explaining what they were up to but there was no guarantee the concussed cat had understood. Shampoo had been told that Ranma would be carrying her in a sling made out of the only fabric available, his shirt.
This left Barry to 'hang loose' while Shampoo hung behind. Ranma supposedly could ignore the cat's presence if she didn't move too much, or so Barry and Akane told her. Barry was beginning to worry about her health, although a ki-scan had not revealed any serious problem. She didn't necessarily have the skill to identify all problems, she admitted silently.
"I sure wish we could have found some of our stuff!" she whined.
"Hey," Akane chastised her. "You kept us alive! I can be satisfied with that." Her stomach growled. "Well, at least till dinner time, I think."
"I still miss breakfast," Barry commented. "And tell me again why it had to be my shirt? You at least got a bra for decency's sake."
Akane stopped and turned her head.
"You want my bra?" she said dangerously.
"Um… No, that's okay," Barry replied absently. "It wouldn't fit anyway."
The other girl had started on, but stopped at the last words. Her head snapped around and she silently mouthed a stream of uncomplimentary remarks, ending with 'I wish you would stop playing Ranma, you Barry-baka!'
Barry rolled her eyes hopelessly. She was beginning to forget how to be civil. But until this was over…
They finally got off the ridge and moved back onto the undamaged face of the mountain. They moved swiftly uphill under the dripping branches.
"Tell me again, why we are going up the mountain?"
"Ukyo was sorta headin' that way, Akane," answered Barry. She flinched as Shampoo moved, hoping she didn't act too excited when she came all the way awake. "Besides, when we reach the top we should be able to see that town in the next valley… if we're right about our location." Barry carried Shampoo because of the two of them she had the better balance. She didn't want Akane exhausting herself or getting caught off-balance if Shampoo started moving about. These trails were treacherous.
"At least the rain stopped," Akane said. She tried for a bright, encouraging tone and glared when Barry didn't match her enthusiasm. The sun was high now approaching noon, and periodically the redhead's stomach announced itself. It did so now and Akane's glare grew stormier. "How did… uh, either of you survive those ten years, if your stomachs announced you to every prospective dinner?"
Barry blinked and ransacked Ranma's memories.
"Most of what we ate wasn't in condition to run," he answered.
"Roadkill?" Akane asked, horrified and nauseated.
"No… Well, at least not usually. We, ah… stole other people's food."
"Oh, that's right. As a matter of fact, doesn't that explain about five or six fiancées besides Ukyo and Shampoo?"
"No need to get nasty about it," she grumbled. "Or do I need to remind you about Picolet Chardin?"
"Point to you," Akane admitted.
They fell silent again as they approached the lower reaches of the summit. The wind made conversation difficult anyway. It was not a big mountain but had features many larger peaks did not. They skirted the boundaries of the slide staying well back from the edge. They hit a region of dense underbrush and chose to push on through.
Barry was trying to ignore the fact that Shampoo, recovered, bored, and looking for a chance to get closer to Ranma, had chosen to poke her head out of the sling and lean it against her bare back. Akane, still leading the way, pointed out a break in the trees. Eager for easier going, they altered course and headed for the clearing.
Breaking through the trees, Akane stopped short and Barry could have sworn she had uttered a Kasumi-like "Oh, my!" She pushed alongside to see what had captured Akane's attention.
"Whoa!"
Ukyo woke suddenly, realizing the rain had stopped sometime during the night. She lay in her bedding listening to the wind. Blinking, she sat up and winced once again as the fabric of Ryoga's clothing abraded her skin. She glanced sourly at the huddle of blankets from which deep snoring sounds issued.
She crouched out of the tent and smiled briefly at the sun, already well above the neighboring peaks. Her smile froze as she found that the avalanche had started only twenty meters away, where a section of their ledge had broken away as part of a fifty-meter wide swath torn from the mountainside. That close! She shivered. The idea of being swept down the mountain, her remains never to be identified or even discovered out here…
She found she was scratching more irritably than ever. Was she allergic to something about Ryoga's clothes? She looked for the branch where she had hung her tattered but still serviceable clothes the night before. There was no chance they'd be dry but she was ready to endure that. Wasn't it just to the left of the tent as she looked at the entrance? Well, wasn'tit!
"Ryoga!" she bellowed ducking into the tent. "Ry-O-Ga! My clothes are gone! Where are my clothes?" She grabbed him as she had the night before, slamming him up and down on the ground.
"Gzzzzz! G'way! Ba-Hyaaaahhwnnn, (smack!) night… Gahzzzzz!"
"Jackass!"
She exited the tent hissing her displeasure and began a detailed search of the area immediately around the tent. She was careful to keep this landmark in plain view. The search was meticulous, detailed, exhaustive... and futile. Along the way, she got rid of the pants. She decided Ryoga's tunic was long enough, barely, for decency's sake. At least her legs wouldn't itch! Her hands and knees were getting muddy. She used the trousers as a pad between herself and the soaked earth when she searched under the bushes. She was far too irritated to consider that skin was easier to clean than cloth.
Grumpily, she finally gave up. Her clothing must have blown away in this infernal wind. They better get to civilization soon, or she'd be ready to kill the first person that looked cross-eyed at her. Which meant Ryoga was in serious trouble. As she came around the front of the shelter, she found that individual nursing a small fire and beginning to boil water, probably for coffee or tea.
"So! Are you awake or just faking it?" she sniped stalking up. "How can you stand to wear this stuff!" she exclaimed whipping the soggy trousers at him. "It's like wearing knitted breadcrumbs!"
Ryoga jerked away surprised, but not fast enough. The cloth slurped around his head like a hungry octopus and the lost-boy did a disappearing act.
"Ahhh, Ryoga!" Ukyo jerked back as her fellow camper seemed to dissolve. She cautiously approached the pile of clothing. "Oh my god, oh my god…"
The clothing moved. She flinched away with a curse. All this time and she hadn't known Ryoga had a Jusenkyo curse. It was the only explanation she could think of. She returned and carefully pushed aside the clothing. A very irritated black pot-bellied pig glared up from the depths of Ryoga's clothes, a familiar bandanna adorning its neck.
"You're kidding!" she exclaimed involuntarily. "Ryoga, why didn't you tell me you were P-chan?"
"Wrooee roo!" the pig sighed. It looked over at the hot water with longing. Ukyo now saw that there were several pop-top thermoses lined up. They would be perfect to keep water warm for extended periods, simple enough for a small, intelligent animal to open if necessary. Thoughtfully, she tested the heating water. If Ranma was any guide, it was just hot enough for the change.
Seconds later, Ryoga snatched at some of his clothing and covered himself. "Can I have some privacy?" he asked, tight-lipped.
"How much privacy did Akane have?" she asked saccharin-sweetly.
"It… It wasn't like that!" he stammered. "I never looked at her when s-she was…"
"Bare naked?" Ukyo suggested. "You pervert!" she snarled, grabbing him by the throat, "You even slept in her bed!" She shook him violently and Ryoga had to choose between his life and his modesty. He held onto the clothing covering his privates and made choking sounds.
"I wish I had my spatula," she continued her verbal and physical abuse, "I'd give you such a beating…!"
"U… (Gaak!) …kyo! If you… (erk!) …went to Akane's… (glah!) …house you'd find… (wheeze!) …P-Chan wait… (urk!) …ing there!"
She stopped shaking him and let up a little on his throat. "How did you manage that little trick?"
Ryoga sighed. The cat was definitely out of the bag here, so he might as well explain. He chose not to tell her about Barry, though. He had no idea what she would think of Ranma carting around some gaijin wherever he went. He told her everything else including his dangerous and embarrassing near-visit to the veterinarian's office.
She released him and moved to a sitting position, her knees tucked up into the extra space Ryoga's tunic provided. As he finished his story, she stared at him, beginning to snicker. She still hadn't permitted him the opportunity to get dressed so he clutched his shirt to himself, protectively. He hoped her slight show of humorous appreciation might mean he could do so now.
"Heh-heh, heh! Can I get dressed now?"
"Go right ahead," she replied looking him in the eye.
He swallowed and reddened. "C'mon, Ukyo! They've forgiven me!"
"That's nice," she said, not budging. "Ranma and Akane are way too forgiving for their own good! I'm a harder case, thank you!"
"Ukyo! Um… If you go in my tent, you'll find something of yours that I found while I was wandering around."
"Really?" Ukyo was suspicious. "Why didn't you tell me about this before?"
"I forgot! Okay?"
"What is this something of mine you 'found'?"
"You have to go and see it." Ryoga's eyes narrowed and he smiled. He was pretty sure Ukyo would take the bait, and he could get his pants on in seconds. "It's under my umbrella."
With a sigh, Ukyo rose to her feet and walked slowly over to the tent. She knew exactly what his strategy was. Deciding she couldn't sit there all day and torture Ryoga if they were to stand any chance of getting anywhere, she mentally bowed to the inevitable and ducked into the tent. She heard a strangled exclamation from the lost boy and looked back over her shoulder.
"Ukyo, yourclothesarebyyourbed!" he said in a muffled voice. She noticed he was turned half away and one hand had gone up to hold his nose. Scowling she took note of herself and realized she had managed to moon her host as she ducked into the tent. She roughly jerked her hem down, face flaming. Then she interpreted what he had said.
"My… my clothes? Are in the tent?
"Yeah!" came his muffled voice. "When the rain stopped, the wind was getting worse; I figured you'd want them. They're on your side of the tent."
"You jackass! Do you know how long I spent looking for those?" she screeched. "You jackass!" She dove into the tent.
Ryoga dove for his pants. Ukyo could drive anyone nuts! Ranma called her 'cute', but then Ranma put up with being put into low-earth-orbit by Akane. He struggled to his feet, yanking the trousers up and fastening them. 'Well,' he amended, 'her butt is cute!'
Ukyo patted over the dim interior on her side of the tent before she realized she had covered her clothes with the blanket when she got up that morning. She shivered as she felt how clammy they were. Putting off changing for a moment, she located Ryoga's umbrella. She might as well find out what he had been hinting at.
"Damn it, Ryoga! What do you do to this thing to get it so heavy!" She didn't expect an answer and continued to lug the weapon aside. Beneath, she saw a gleam of metal. She realized what it was the moment her hand touched it. Like an old friend, the huge spatula seemed to slide out from under Ryoga's equipment and into her arms.
"My… (Sniff!) …spatula! (Sob!)"
She erupted out of the tent, spatula in one hand. Ryoga was caught totally off guard. Ukyo, unarmed, was one thing. With her spatula, she could do serious damage if she landed a blow. He dropped the shirt he was preparing to don and tried to both get out of the way and to block any blow she might launch. It was only after the fact that he realized she wasn't trying to hit him.
"Oh, thank you, thank you, THANK YOU, Ryoga!"
She caught him around the neck like she'd been practicing the Amazon glomp all her life. The weight of the spatula set them off balance and Ryoga had to close his arms around her while he stabilized them both. He was still completely unprepared for the extremely enthusiastic kiss she froze him in his tracks with. Of course, it was at that precise instant Akane pushed through the brush at the edge of the clearing.
Ukyo heard the "Oh, my!" and realized they had observers. Her eyes snapped over to verify, cheeks flaming as she realized what this might look like. Awareness of the breeze along the bare flesh of her legs, thighs and hips, and the tickle along the skin clear up to the small of her back, confirmed that it must look much worse than what it really was.
Her eyes registered a muddy, bedraggled Akane Tendo, eyes huge and hands over her mouth, followed by a topless girl-type Ranma, eyes also huge, with a familiar looking cat poking her head over the redhead's shoulder, its eyes like saucers. She unlocked her arms from around Ryoga's neck and tried to push away. She might as well have been in the grip of a statue. She pushed harder, to no avail. With her struggles, the tunic was rising even higher.
"Ummm…" she offered in a choked, embarrassed voice, "It's… It's not… It's not what it looks like?"
"Uh-huh. And you can explain everything," returned the wide-eyed Ranma dryly. To Barry, it looked like a late good morning kiss between two passionate lovers just leaving their nest. He even recalled a few similar ones with Gwen.
"Yeah, that's right," she replied weakly, trying to pull the hem of the tunic down where Ryoga's locked hands held it.
"What is it then?" whispered Akane from behind her hands.
"Mrrauw?" Shampoo seconded from beside Ranma's head.