Notes - Well it has been awhile since I put anything out on this story, just got to involved in my the other works. It advances things a little and sets the ground work for some up coming chapters. Reader comments on this have really made me alter it from what it was originally, a good number of people didn't like what I was doing with it. That kind of confused me really since I thought the original was pretty good and gave the plot a needed shot in the arm. I'm not sure what some of you will think of my changes, but I'm always willing to explain something if there are questions, just E-mail me.
My site is at - http://home.talkcity.com/BookmarkBlvd/crose9/
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Uncles!
Chapter 03
by Cory D. Rose
ertle2@msn.com
(c) 2001
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"Excellent!" Ranma said as he watched Rei.
They were again working on the techniques that Ranma had promised to teach her several days before. This time Rei had to admit that when she was breathing the way Ranma had taught her it seemed to be a lot easier to do now than when she had originally tried. She had used her Shinto training to center herself, and looked to the chi paths inside her as Ranma described them, and found that it was easy to focus her Ki into those paths. So Rei was sitting in the middle of the back yard with a faint red glow around her. It felt good too, better than anything she had done in a long time. She had worked very hard for this and accomplishing it meant she would soon be able to do other things as well. Even her grandfather was amazed at how quickly she had picked up the techniques and had told her how proud he was to see her growing strong by the day.
"Thanks Ranma, I can't believe how easy that was."
"Once you figure it out, its the easiest thing in the world. Now all you have to do is learn to harness the Ki and use it to enhance your body and your skills. That will take a little longer than a few lessons, but it will come to you eventually and when it does, you will be able to move faster than you thought possible, take hits that would kill normal fighters, and leap higher than a two or three story's in a single jump with no problems. The uses are almost limitless, it just takes an idea of what you want and practice." Ranma said, as excited about this as Rei was.
"What's next? Now that I have the aura down..."
"For now, I want you to spend the next several days building up your Ki and strengthening your control. Flare your aura while you are doing your fire readings, practice your martial arts, just relaxing, or while doing your homework. This little bit your using now is almost useless to you except as a night light, but with practice it can be built up and used as an attack or defense. Eventually I expect you to be able to add this power into your fire readings to make them clearer and more accurate."
"Cool!" Rei said, and thought about the Dragon Ball Z episodes she had seen, wondering if any of that was possible now that she could access her Ki on a higher level. Then she sighed and had to relax and let the aura go. Sweat was running down her face and covering her entire body. She realized that she felt really weak and nearly fell over, but Ranma knelt down and steadied her with his hand and grinned at her.
"You just used to much of your Ki. There is only so much available at the moment. That is why you need to build it up so that it can be used for longer periods of time, its like a muscle that you flex, the more you use it the easier it will become. You will need to eat a little more food than normal when you use you Ki up too. For some reason the body can use food and extra sleep to replace your excess Ki when you run low, you can't run out though, you'll pass out before that happens. When you start using it more and more you will find your appetite growing to insane amounts. I normally eat four to six times what others do in one sitting, but I practice my Ki exercises anywhere from six to twelve hours a day. I'll show you what I do once you get these basics down, in few weeks you should be ready to incorporate using Ki into your everyday chores and stuff."
Rei took a deep breath and grinned. "Didn't you want to talk to me about something the other day?"
"Hmmm? Oh yeah, I figured something out and I wanted you to know that I wasn't going to give away your secret."
"What secret?" Rei asked, slightly puzzled.
"That you're Sailor Mars."
This time Rei did fall over. "W-what...m-makes you say that?"
"That day at the ice cream shop, when you all ran out, I watched your fight with that demon. You have this magic field around you that was making it hard to see your face, but it did nothing to hide your aura and that was easy to identify once I had the idea of what to look for. I've been wanting to talk to you about your powers for days now."
Rei gaped at him and wondered what she was going to have to do about this, they couldn't have their identities known by just everyone.
"Like I said, I will keep it secret, but I wanted to say, from what I saw of that fight, you girls are very strong magically. Unfortunately, most of you don't know the first thing about fighting properly and need to be trained to use those super powerful magic attacks before you girls hurt someone."
"Hey, we practice all the time!" Rei snapped, then slapped her hand over her mouth.
"How much?"
"Every weekend."
"For how long?"
"Depends, but usually it is for about four hours." Though it is usually for less than that, Rei thought to herself as she finally sat up. Usagi was always trying to get out of it and using Makoto's food as an excuse. The others were always coming up with one excuse or another if they need or if they wanted to do something other than blow up large areas of land.
"You and your friends were there at the mall when me and Ryoga took on that thing, we were holding our own against it and slowly winning, though I had to admit that you girls did impress me. Me and Ryoga tend to put in at least six to thirteen hours of practice a day, we do this by making everything we do into training. Like walking on top of fences to perfect our balance or turning cooking into a weapons demonstration. Things like that."
"Ranma, we don't have time to do that kind of training."
"Maybe not, but with those Sailor abilities of yours I can teach all of you how to defend yourselves without harming those around you. All of you are very quick, strong, and tough. Those are traits that usually take years to develop, but your powers give you a short cut to doing advanced moves and I am willing to help you and the others out."
"I'll have to talk it over with the others and some of them will not like the fact that you know who they are."
"I only know you and possibly one of the others and I don't have a clue who the rest of them might be. I could make some guess though, based on what I know of you and your friends, but I won't do that."
"Okay, I believe you. Let's head inside and grab something to eat and we can talk this over some more."
"Sure."
Just as they were stepping into the shrine, Rei heard her communicator go off and turned to look at Ranma. She debated it for second, then shrugged. "Stay right there, I don't want the others so see you until I've had a chance to talk to them."
"Alright."
She tapped a button and looked into the little screen. "What's up?"
"Rei, we have another one of those little demons attacking the park, it's ripping up trees and beating up the people in the park." Sailor Jupiter said. Rei and Ranma heard her jumping about and fighting something while she was talking to them.
"How long has this been going on?"
"About ten minutes, we got here a little late to stop it from ripping up portions of the park."
"Which park?"
"The one near my apartment. Hurry up and get here, me and Venus are being overwhelmed." The communicator went dark and Rei turned to Ranma.
"I'll help you out, those things are dangerous and you will need as much help as you can get."
Rei glared at him, but was silently pleased with it as well. "Come on then, we need to make a three and a half mile run in a matter of minutes." Rei said as she pulled out her transformation pen.
"I run ten to thirty miles every day Rei, I can do it faster than an Olympic runner. No problem, just point the way." Ranma said and turned away when Rei's clothing suddenly disappeared and left her naked for a fraction of a second. He kept them closed until he could feel the aura of fire that surrounded her flare up and stabilize.
"What's wrong?"
"Must you strip naked to do that?" Ranma said with a smirk.
"Hentai!" Mars yelled and slapped him upside the head.
Ranma was knocked back into a wall, he was smirking. "What, you would have preferred it if I didn't notice you were naked for that little show?"
"W-what?" Mars gasped out, she started to blush.
"Come on let's go, where is that park?"
"T-that way..." Mars pointed, blushing a deep red.
They took off running and Ranma let Mars take the lead, he had no trouble keeping up with her if he strained a little. He could run fast, but even Rei was pushing his speed to the limit. He hoped they arrived soon or he was going to run out of Ki to use. The run took just over four minutes and they skidded to a halt just inside the park and looked around. There was a battle going on in the center of the park with smoke and fire rising above the tree line. They also noticed that enough time had passed that the park had been evacuated. That was a good thing in Ranma's book, usually he was forced to protect innocents while fighting against Ryoga in one of his berserker rages.
"Jupiter and Venus must be the only ones left to fight that thing." Mars commented as they moved forward.
"Then let's hurry."
"Sailor Mars!!"
Ranma and Mars turned to see Sailor Moon rush into the park, skid a few feet, trip over a break in the sidewalk and slam face first into the ground with a loud thump. Mars ran forward and helped her friend up, surprisingly there wasn't any signs of damage on her. "Are you alright?" Mars asked.
"Yeah, not the first time I did that. Hi Ranma." Moon said absently.
"Hi Usagi." Ranma said.
Moon blinked. "Huh?"
"You have got to be the only girl in all of Tokyo with that hairdo and an aura like that Usagi."
"Um...okay, keep it secret will you?" Moon asked sweetly.
"Sure thing, you keep some of my secrets so I can keep yours."
Mars face faulted. "How can you just stand there and just accept that? His knowing our secret identities places us in danger!"
"I trust him and he is famous, you know how honor bound he is." Moon said and dismissed the subject. She headed into the park heading for the battle ground. Mars and Ranma looked at each other and shrugged.
"You really don't have to worry."
"I know, it's just weird that's all."
They took off after Moon and were soon nearing the battle, the sounds of Jupiter and Venus fighting were still being heard, so Ranma breezed on ahead to see what was going on. Ranma was soon looking down from within the tree into small area of downed trees and large craters with smoke wafting out of them. It was one of those little guys again, easily recognizable in its plate armor, helmet, and gauntlets. Jupiter had seen better days, she looked like the thing was using her as a punching bag, a feeling he remembered all to well. Ranma could see that she was moving in such a way that her ribs were either broken or damaged. The blood running down her legs and arms from a series of minor cuts was also noticeable. They had to get them out of there, they were taking too much damage to be of use for much longer.
He turned and looked at Venus on the other side of Jupiter, she was staggering around. It seemed clear to Ranma that at some point in the last few minutes she had tossed out some kind of chain attack and wrapped it around the monster's arm, he briefly wondered how she made such an attack. To bad the thing was using it to toss the poor girl around like a lead weight on a rope. With a yank Venus was pulled off her feet and lifted into the air and used as a weapon to hit Jupiter, her scream of shock was enough to make even Ranma wince in pain as the two Scouts collided. Both girls went down in a pile of legs and arms, only some downed trees kept them from being sent clean out of the area.
A flash of blue caught Ranma's attention and he saw Mercury doing the same thing he was and waved at her as if nothing was wrong. She gaped at him as if he was mad. Ranma motioned over his shoulder to Moon and Mars and pointed Mercury out to them. He nearly fell over laughing as Moon waved just like he had, Mercury just glared back at them and pointing at Jupiter and Venus, as if trying to get us to act faster.
Ranma shrugged and nodded. He motioned for the for the others to get ready while he reached deep inside himself for the power he knew he would need to fight this thing. With a grin he launched out of the trees and landed beside the thing and kicked it away just as it was about to attack Jupiter again. The thing flew back and rolled to it's feet a few yards away, it giggled and grinned at him. With a flash of speed, Ranma flew forward in an attempt to catch the thing off guard. He made sure to keep the thing occupied as Moon and Mars dragged the injured Jupiter and Venus out of the area.
Remembering the last fight, he made some changes in how he fought it. Before, he had been trying to stop it without killing it and to stop it from hurting others. Discussion with Rei had led him to believe that these things were a deadly threat, one that the Scouts always tried to kill as quickly as they could. Focusing his Ki, Ranma brought his hands forward and fired off a large Möko Takabisha that hit dead center of the things chest and launched it across the clearing and through some trees. The good thing was he wasn't fighting it alone, it was just to strong and with the Scouts help they could all take it down. It was the perfect distraction to get it into a position the Scouts needed. Mars stepped out of the trees and fired off a blast of fire just as it was rising to it's feet and glaring at them for interfering with its mission. At the same time from two other sides, Moon did her giant pink heart and Mercury incased it in an ice blast. All three hit at once and exploded brilliantly, knocking Ranma off his feet. His senses picked up the still living mass inside the inferno and he brought both hands forward and launched a Double Möko Takabisha.
This secondary explosion went off and finally finished off the little pest, he couldn't comprehend the sphere power of something this small. It reminded him again of the old ghoul and the pervert, about twenty times more powerful and annoying. It was as if they were combined into one being of immense power. He stood up and stretched as the Scouts dragged themselves out from behind cover, Ranma noticed the Jupiter and Venus were still out of it and covered in wounds. Ranma was about to walk over and do a more intensive check of the girls, when his senses picked up the arrival of a large power source. He looked around just in time to see Hotaru or Sailor Saturn run into the area, she made her way right over to Jupiter and Venus and started to heal their wounds.
"How are they doing Saturn?"
"They should be just fine Ranma, our Scout powers make us heal up real fast. It's just that something like this takes a little longer to heal than others."
"Are you two going to be alright?" Ranma asked the two girls as they struggled to sit up.
They both blushed and nodded.
"Good, you two are very important to the team." Ranma said and patted them on the shoulder. He failed to see the little hearts that appeared in their eyes and the blushes that flared on their faces. Saturn just laughed and finished healing them.
"You two remember that he is engaged to all those girls right?" Saturn asked.
"...engaged..." Jupiter and Venus breathed out, their minds still in the gutter.
Then they blinked and groaned. "It isn't fair, how can he be so perfect and still be single?" Venus asked.
"I envy those other girls."
"There are things about him that make his life pretty bad, would either of you want to be kidnapped on a monthly basis or be challenged two or three times a day like he is?"
"Drat!" Jupiter snapped and stood up. "He looks even better than my last boyfriend too."
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"How's the ice cream?" Ranma-chan asked.
"Pretty good." Hotaru said, she was enjoying herself more than she thought she would.
Her and her uncle Ranma had decided to go out to eat, but she hadn't expected the reactions of the other people to be quite so extreme. The had eaten dinner and been subject to the waitress being struck dumb at the mere sight of Ranma. Though Hotaru was surprised to note that Ranma didn't seem to understand the effect he had on the opposite sex. They had received a free meal when the waitress, nearly choking on her own drool, had dumped a plate of food in Ranma's lap. Hotaru had a feeling it had been deliberate from the look of anticipation on the girl's face as she produced a rag to clean him up.
From there it had gotten weird as girl after girl showed up at the table and asked him for an autograph. The autograph hounds were fine and quickly dealt with, but the ones that had pulled up their dresses and shoved their panties in his face had been a shock. Hotaru giggled to herself at the panicked look on his face as he bolted out of the restaurant. Living with Haruka and Michiru had given her a certain view on things and she had to admit that Ranma had this knack to attract very beautiful girls like flies to honey. Even the ones that threw themselves at him had been down right beautiful, if very obvious about their desires.
After that they had walked around for awhile and gotten mobbed by yet another pack of girls. The ear piercing screaming of forty girls was a new sound that Hotaru wasn't going to forget anytime soon. It was almost like she was in the middle of a crowd of girls lusting after the 'Three Lights' band that had been making the rounds lately. Then she had the funniest and scariest thing in the world happen, Ranma had picked her up in his strong arms and launched them into the sky. A thrill went through Hotaru as she recalled the shock she felt as Ranma once again surprised her with is abilities. She had thought she had seen all the amazing things he could do, but this one had been the best yet.
As a Scout she could run and jump like he could, but as normal human he could do things that were just super human. She wondered what would happen if Ranma were to ever receive Scout powers, they tended to amplify one's natural abilities as well as empower them with magical attacks. With Ranma the effect would be simply amazing, but even she knew that there was no way for him to get them so shrugged off the idea. That monster attack a few days ago had reminded her that even Ranma couldn't kill these things by himself. Sure he could hold his own, but in the end they needed all of them to take it down. Where these monsters were getting this power was beyond here, every enemy they faced seemed to get stronger and stronger too. What would the next one bring she wondered.
"Earth to Hotaru?" Ranma called.
The little girl blinked and looked up, gasped and jumped back in shock, knocking over her chair. Ranma was now a busty red head, she had spoon hanging off her nose, and had been less than an inch from Hotaru's face when she glanced up. Ranma just blinked and smirked as Hotaru fell down in shock, her eyes dancing with mischief.
"Ranma!" Hotaru yelled.
She blinked innocently as everyone in the ice cream shop took notice of them. "What's got you so spaced out that you are that unaware of your surroundings?" Ranma asked as Hotaru reseated herself, blushing, and made sure no one was watching them anymore before answering Ranma. She was also wondering when Ranma had turned female, they had come in here with him in his male form.
"Just thinking about what happened a couple days ago at the park."
"It was just a fight and we won, forget about it and move on."
"We have a meeting at the temple to discuss what happened. That reminds me, I was to bring you along to meet the others, the want to meet you."
"I don't know if that is a wise thing to do Hotaru..."
"Why?"
"I wouldn't mind knowing who they are, but what I don't know won't hurt your friends and I gave my word to you and Rei that I wouldn't do anything to reveal your identities." Ranma said quietly.
"Don't worry about it, there are others that have found out too and they have always kept the secret, I know you will too."
"Well..."
"Please?"
Ranma shrugged her shoulders. "Sure if it means that much to you, but keep the Outers away, I don't want to deal with them again."
"The Outers have been asked to leave you alone, though they have only seen you in this form. I heard them talking the other day and they never once mentioned your male aspect, so I figure so long as you stay out of their way as a girl you can work with them as a man."
"Whatever, I'm just tired of fighting useless battles and they came damned close to killing me a while back."
"Usagi took care of it though."
"Maybe, but I have a feeling I will be fighting those girls again. You told me they were willing to disobey Usagi if they thought it was necessary, they will find a way."
"Maybe, but don't worry about it now. I don't think they will attack you tonight."
"No, but I am over due for an attack by one of my other enemies."
"Really? Who is it this time? Toma, Kirin, Kuno, Ryu?"
Ranma smiled. "You certainly know a lot about my life, is all that information on those cards?"
"That and more, though they never said anything about the curses. We all thought the animals were just well trained or made up."
"At least Nabiki kept that secret."
"Yeah, I like knowing a secret no one else knows."
They finished off their ice cream and got up to leave several minutes later, Hotaru stopped them at the door and looked at Ranma seriously.
"What?"
"When are you going to take that spoon off your nose?"
"What, you don't like it?"
*********
He had a cure, he didn't turn into a pig anymore and Ryoga had been happy beyond belief and spent some time wandering around thinking of the times before Jusenkyo and the hell he had lived through because of it. He thought of all the times he had been forced to avoid things he loved to do, like swimming. Having to learn to avoid the water traps that were constantly making him turn into someone's dinner or ending up as some little girl's pet, that one gave him the creeps. Until he got his curse he had never know there were so many demonic little girls out there that were even worse than Azusa of the Golden Pair. A good number of them made that klepto look like an innocent little first year skater. Ryoga grinned and punched a tree as he was walking by, it exploded into splinters and collapsed around him. He barely noticed and his good mood just wouldn't go away, he was cured and Ranma wasn't. His revenge was nearly complete, Akane had dumped Ranma and Ryoga had a feeling he was the cause of that as well, he wondered what he would have to do to make it even better.
He had to have revenge against Ranma, they were Rival/Enemies and sometimes even allies when it came to saving one of the girls. There was no way they would ever be friends in his eyes, there had been to much pain and suffering for Ryoga to forgive Ranma. He would never do that, he would keep on tracking Ranma down and attempting to kill him as he had been doing for the last two years. Oh sure, he could say that most of what had caused him to go through hell was now gone, after all that curse had been a good part of it. Still Ryoga hadn't defeated Ranma yet and that would be one of his main goals from now on. For all of Ranma's strength he didn't have his power or strength, only tricks and speed to defeat him.
Then there was his other problem to think about, his family curse, the lack of direction sense. It wasn't as bad as it had once been, but he still had no clue where he was, just that it was a little easier to get from one place to another faster. Ryoga had passed the Tendo dojo at least once, but had decided that it wasn't time to deal with that part yet. So he had continued on and soon found himself in a jungle, again. He still couldn't find a the jungle on any map of Japan he had found either, he just knew that he tended to end up here every few weeks. Most of the village people knew him on sight and went out of their way to avoid him whenever he passed though. They had started to call him the 'Fanged Devil' at least that is what he thought they were saying. Their language was a little off and had a thick Japanese accent intermixed with a lot of clicking of the tongue and throat gargling sounds. He wondered if they were sick or something, then dismissed it as irrelevant since they liked to toss spears at him. It was good practice to catch, block, or dodge them as they flew in. Sometimes he even let them hit him, though it was a little odd to see them just bounce off his chest as it was a stone wall or something.
Ryoga stepped around a tree and looked up to see a skyscraper and blinked for a few seconds, where in the hell was he now. He looked around and wondered how he had come to be in a park in the middle of a city, was it set at the edge of the jungle or something? He shrugged, one of these days he would figure out why things like this kept happening to him. He adjusted his over large back and headed across the park when he spotted a yatai set up doing some brisk business. He got in line and soon had a large meal sitting in his stomach, the first food he'd had in the last several days. Pretty typical for him really, usually he couldn't find a store, let alone a kitchen to get any food. Buying it was a pain since he had very little money, but he didn't let that stop him to often.
He wandered around for several minutes taking in the sights, spotting several signs in Japanese was a good indicator that he was still in Japan. Then he remembered the time he wound up in Little Tokyo, Arkansas and figured it would be a good idea to figure out where he was exactly. He ended up in Russia and America far to often not comment on. Then as he was about to grab some random passerby and get them to tell him where he was, he heard some screams and spotted people running away from something a few blocks away. He headed in that direction, it took all his concentration to follow the sounds, and was soon witness to some of the weirdness that tended to plague Ranma on a daily basis, he hoped it wasn't catching though since he had felt sorry for Ranma on more than one occasion. Right in front of him was weird sight, a blue haired Sailor Scout was in a defensive stance facing off against a large Youma of some kind. It stood nearly 4 meters high and was make of muscle and fangs. It had to be one of the ugliest things Ryoga had ever seen and he had met a good number of ugly things in his travels.
"Mercury Aqua Rhapsody!" Mercury yelled and fired off a her attack, encasing the monster in a pillar of ice. There is quite for a second then the ice cracks and shatters as the thing flexes it's huge muscles. Mercury is forced to dive out of the way just to avoid being impaled by the ice shards.
Ryoga gaped for a second as a wave of super cold air washed over him from Mercury's attack, then dropped his pack and pulled out his umbrella. He took stock of the situation in a split second, then launched himself into the sky, twisted in mid air and landed in front of the girl as she was shaking her head. He growled and swung the super heavy umbrella and hit the thing across the jaw, the impact was like being hit by a train and sent the thing stumbling back several steps. "You will leave her alone!!"
"Who...?" Mercury gasped as she looked up.
"Ryoga Hibiki, we met the other day at the mall when we fought that little monster." Ryoga said without looking down.
"Ryoga...oh yeah, watch out, these things can shrug off damage from a normal human as if it didn't exist, so be careful."
"The one at the mall was a pain in the ass too."
Mercury stood up. "Let me take care of this, me and my friends have the magic needed to take them down."
"Are they on their way?"
"Yes, I called them must before it attacked."
Ryoga nodded, he didn't understand everything she had said, but figured she was saying he wasn't strong enough to kill one of these things. He would show her he had what it took to fight them, years of training had made him extremely strong. He turned and glared at the large monster as it was still shaking it's head from his attack. It took a lot of strength to shake off one of his attacks. His aura flared up around him and startled Mercury into stepping back, even repeated fights with Ranma hadn't conditioned her into ignoring these things yet. Ryoga brought his hands up and yelled out, his aura expanding outward a couple of feet and nearly blowing Mercury off her feet.
"Shishi Höködan!!"
"No don't..." Mercury said as her computer told her through her visor that it had completed its scans of the monster.
The green blast rose up into the sky as he used the most potent version, then concentrated and formed another blast just as it hit the monster and let loose with a blast out of his hands. The first blast just weakened the thing while the second blast slammed into it and the screaming began. The thing stumbled back and coughed up a bit of Youma blood and fell to it's knees, a hole blown clear though it's chest. Then Ryoga launched forward and brought his umbrella around like a baseball bat and catapulted it across the street and through a wall.
Mercury gaped.
Ryoga just grinned and stood there and waiting for the thing to get back up and just nodded as it did so. His Ki senses picked up a number of high powered Ki signatures coming into the area and looked around as the rest of the Scouts came running up. Ryoga just yells and throws his umbrella at the thing's damaged chest. It works, but Ryoga is always underestimating his strength and didn't take that into account. The umbrella struck the monster and the sheer weight and momentum of his umbrella just plowed the thing backwards through a wall with a massive crash, crushing some of the monsters other bones. Ryoga noticed that the other Scouts were beginning to show up, he smirked at Mercury.
"What was that, I defeated it easily."
"No, you just made it mad." Mercury said as she continued to scan the thing.
"It's not getting back up is it?"
"He seems to have taken care of it to me Mercury." Jupiter said.
"It's still alive." Mercury said.
"WHAT?!!"
"These things have been getting stronger and stronger lately and that last fight we had allowed me to get some better readings on these things. These things are changeing with every fight to better be able to take us down."
"Mercury we took it down easily enough." Moon said.
"Look what the next one did to Jupiter and Venus, it was even stronger and my scans of this one make it twice as strong as that one."
"Huh?" Ryoga said.
Ranma, now male, finally arrived with Hotaru and came up and stood beside Ryoga as everyone looked at the hole where the rubble was beginning to shift as the monster struggled to get up from under all that stone. Hotaru just stood in the background and made sure she would be able to transform before her Uncle Ryoga noticed. She did take the time to hug him though and smile at him, it made her giggle silently when he blushed and nearly fainted.
"Ryoga did you look at it with your Ki senses?" Ranma said.
"No, why should I?"
"I didn't do it at the last fight either, but if you look at it you should recognize the signature. I'm kind of ticked I didn't notice it before."
"What?" Ryoga growled and looked over and squinted his eyes. At first he didn't see a thing, then he sighed. "This is the same one we fought in the mall isn't it?"
"Yes, I'm almost positive that it is adapting itself to our abilities. Every time we take it down it grows stronger and stronger. Now it has adapted itself to your Ki attack and bulking itself up so that it can stand against our strength and speed."
The monster gives a heave and tosses a half ton piece of stone from the wall off itself and drags itself to its feet. Nearly all of the damage Ryoga had caused was gone and it seemed to have gained a few more inches in height and increased it's muscle mass, even it's fangs had grown longer and more evil looking as it crouched down and laughed at the one that had tried to take it down. Ryoga was impressed, even Ranma wouldn't have been able to stand up from being his umbrella like that, he would have dodged.
"How are we going to stop these things if they can adapt to our attacks?" Venus asked.
"Is there any limit to what it can do?" Uranus asked as she stepped up beside Hotaru. The young girl decided it was time to transform and nodded to her adoptive parents, she just needed an excuse to leave.
"Hotaru, you get out of here, this is going to be a major fight in a few minutes." Ranma said, giving her a weird look.
"Beat it squirt." Ryoga said and gave her a little push. "I agree with Ranma for once, you need to be kept safe."
"Alright, but I want you two to be careful and let the Scouts deal with this. They have the magical power needed."
"Don't you worry about it." Ranma said and rolled his eyes. He was also watching Uranus and Neptune out of the corner of his eyes, wondering how long it would be before they attacked him or Ryoga.
Then they all heard chuckling and saw the monster rising to it's feet holding Ryoga's umbrella and grinning. It's teeth seemed to be glowing for some reason as it hefted the half ton umbrella. The Scouts all nodded and went into their usual half circle attack pattern and spread out to get into position. Ranma and Ryoga step forward and prepare to attack as well and unconsciously move like a well trained team.
The Monster giggled.
"Now!" Ranma yelled and shot forward in a blur, Ryoga right on his tail, they flared up their auras and fired. Blue and Green Ki swirled around each other and head right toward the monster's chest, but it just smirked and lifted it's hand and let the blasts hit it's hand. They exploded and shattered the concrete at the monster's feet. Ranma could already tell that it was unharmed as he flipped over the explosion. Ryoga rolled to the side and launched a half dozen bandanna's at it while he dodged out of the way.
The Scouts went into action as they circled around the thing, most were a little surprised at the sight of the thing. It actually looked like a male demon of some kind. Considering they were used to dealing with vaguely female looking demons it was a little weird to see. They had developed strategies over the months they had been fighting and knew what to do when an enemy knew how to field a monster stronger than them. Mercury went first, tossing down a layer of fog that overwhelmed the senses of the monster. As it stopped in confusion, Jupiter went next and fired off a massive electrical blast that fried the thing. Venus went next and used her chain to tie the thing up while Mars, in tandem, fired off a wave of fire down the chain that burned off most of the fog while burning the monster with the magical fire. It screamed and fell over and burned for several second before it seemed to pop and turn to dust and vanish.
"That's it?" Ryoga gasped.
"Your right, they are usually a little harder to kill than that." Ranma said.
Mercury looked at them and shrugged. "The next one will now be even stronger and immune to that attack as well as the Ki attacks."
"Well at least I didn't have to fire off anything this time." Moon said.
"You do realized that the next time we go up against it you will probably have to be the one that takes it down don't you?" Ranma said.
"Huh?"
Ranma rolled his eyes. "Mercury says that it is making itself immune to our attacks every time we hit it. You've only hit it once that I know of, so you can still hurt it...unless once is all it takes?"
"No, it seems it takes two or three times before it can adapt a counter, otherwise it would have had us in the park a few days ago." Mercury said.
"Crap..."
**********
Kakome stood and looked at her downed monster once again and frowned, she was beginning to understand how these girls had defeated all those other invaders. She stepped back and formed a ball of white energy in her hand and tossed it at the thing. The monster flared for a few seconds then lay there as its wounds healed and it's skin reformed. After about ten minutes it grunted and stood up, it looked fearful.
"You failed again."
It nodded.
"I give you permission to talk."
"Yes Master, it took the entire team to take me down this time, those two boys are wild cards and I am finding it hard to defend against them."
"What are they using?"
"It's not magic, I know that, some kind of life energy of some sort like you described, but they use more of it than a normal human should."
A white sphere appeared in Kakome's hand and she used it to watch the fight again, her face was unreadable and impassive. After several minutes she looked at the monster again and shrugged. "It seems I need to look into those boys a little more, I had thought I understood them, but they are unpredictable. I may have to change the plan. You are dismissed."
"Yes Master." The monster vanished in a puff of smoke.
Kakome walked back over to her throne and sat down in thought, she could care less about this planet, but she did understand what the Scouts were trying to do. Protect this planet from her and her minions as they had done before with the others. Could she be going about this the wrong way? She sat back and thought about her goals and wondered if a different approach would be needed with this planet. If it had only a couple of super strong protectors she would have been done with this planet and moving on to another one. Instead her computers were telling her that there were no less than 25 individuals on this little mud ball with the power to irritate or impede her advance in search of the Artifact she wanted.
That was a lot of protectors for one planet, what was here that required so many to keep it safe? On most other planets she had visited the average was anywhere from just one guardian to three if it was really important. Kakome blinked and sat forward, was there something special about this little spec of the universe that was important? She knew that several others had attacked this planet before, but had thought it was for the usual reasons like slaves and power. She tapped a button on her arm rest and waited as the floor opened and a computer console rose up for her use. As a scientist she had set this system up a long time ago to take care of the small things for her, an artificial intelligent computer system that ran her entire ship completely. It handled life support and anything else that was required for those living here to life comfortably.
"Advise me."
"Lilith is on line Master."
"I want you to scan this planet's history and anything else that would help me to understand why they have so many powerful beings here. Any normal planet has one to three protectors and are usually easy to overwhelm, this one has 25 or more and are almost completely unpredictable. Some are magical, but a good number of them are something completely different than what we usually deal with, I want you to find out why there are so many."
"Scanning planet more thoroughly will take some days, is this acceptable?"
"How many exactly?"
"Extrapolating....four days, seven hours, twenty four minutes to go through everything, another day to sift through it all and find what you are looking for."
"Then do it."
"Would you like some of the crew revived?"
The crew, she almost grinned. On some of the planets she had been to, the inhabitants were more useful than others and she had converted some of them to help her out. When they were done she had placed them in suspended animation and just forgot about them, she hadn't talked to any of them in nearly a hundred years or more. Her quest had been a very time consuming and had even spent a large part of the last century in suspended animation. She considered the request and decided that since her drone wasn't getting the job done, maybe one of them could, she would be able to study the situation a little more as well, this was getting interesting.
"Yes, wake up #347."
"Scanning...#347's chamber is being located and moved, she will be up and about in six hours."
"Excellent, show her the video's of our three fights with the Scouts and send her down to take them out if she can, or at the very least keep the occupied so that I can come up with better battle plans. Give her the equipment packet she used in the Solarian campaign."
"Yes Master."
Kakome grinned. She loved expandable personnel that were useful to the plans, no fuss and no muss ^^.
**********
"Ryoga!" Hotaru yelled and hugged the blushing boy.
"Hi Hotaru, how have you been?"
"Pretty good, though we have been having problems with those monsters lately."
"I'll help out with that, your family and it seems your always around when these things show up."
Hotaru blushed. "I'm not that bad!"
"Well I'm here so your safe now."
"Cool! With you and Ranma here we can protect everybody!"
"Don't count on that honor less coward, he'll end up hurting you eventually, just like he does all the girl's in his life." Ryoga snapped under his breath.
"What was that pig boy, I thought I heard you talking about honor." Ranma said mildly.
"You stay out of Hotaru's life you bastard, I will not let you hurt her like you have Akane!"
"She dumped me remember? Did your little piggy brain get damaged when you were hit on the head or something?"
"RANMA!!"
Ranma looked around as if looking for Ryoga's voice. "I seems to recall someone using their curse to go to bed with my fiancee. If you call that honorable Ryoga, I'll make sure you get your curse back."
"DIE YOU BASTARD, I'VE HAD ENOUGH YOUR MOUTH!!" Ryoga yelled and launched himself at Ranma.
"Ranma, Ryoga, cut it out!" Hotaru yelled. Behind her the rest of the Scouts, who had been following them to Rei's temple, backed off as both boys flared up. Rei grabbed Hotaru and dragged her off just as both boys started to punch each other.
Ryoga, since his umbrella was destroyed by the fight earlier used his fists and nearly took Ranma's head off. In a blind rage he didn't see Ranma duck and use his speed technique to punch him in the stomach several hundred times. Ryoga gagged and backed up several feet and just grinned as he dropped his backpack to the side. "Your going to die Ranma."
"Cut it out Ryoga, just back off and stop blaming me for all your problems will you?" Ranma snapped, he was so tired of this.
"Never, because of you I have seen hell and I will get my revenge even if it takes me the rest of my life."
"Your problems are your own fault Ryoga, you made the choice to go down that road in the first place."
"AGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!" Ryoga screamed and flared up even more before he jumped forward again. Ranma glared as he blocked and kicked to defend himself against Ryoga, but he was growing tired of this fight quicker than normal. He had fought a war with him and the others for the last couple of years. He recalled his last fight with Ryoga at the mall and his increased speed and power, where ever Ryoga had gotten the power increase it was enough to make him a lot more dangerous to deal with. Reaching deep within himself, Ranma tapped the power he had used against Saffron and let the Ki flow though him, turning his aura from blue to a sparkling gold and set his clothing to ruffling under the aura's power.
"I've had enough!!" Ranma yelled. The came together again, their fists slamming into each other's arms as they blocked. The ground at their feet shattered and rose up in the air, but Ryoga just growled, shifted his weight and punched. Ranma was shocked as Ryoga punched at him with more power than he ever had before, enough to actually kill him if they had been fighting at normal levels. Even then it went right through his defenses and slammed into his ribs, Ranma grunted as he felt two of them break. Where in the world had Ryoga gotten all this power from, was he holding back all this time?
"Aghh!" Ranma said and stumbled back holding his ribs.
"RANMA!" The girls yelled.
"Come on coward, it's time to receive your punishment and DIE!" Ryoga yelled.
"Not in this lifetime idiot." Ranma mumbled and lifted his hand. Ryoga stopped in place, seemingly frozen in place. The Scouts gasped and Ami had her computer out in an instant, scanning for anything out of the ordinary.
"Ranma what did you do him?" Usagi asked. All of the girl's could see Ryoga straining against something, his muscles bulging noticeably.
"I don't know, I just knew I could do this if I wanted to. I've just never had a reason to do it before or the monsters were to strong or fast to use it against them very effectively." Ranma turned back to Ryoga and considered his options. "I've had enough of you and everyone in Nerima Ryoga, your all totally insane. You jump to conclusions and attack me with barely any cause, just weird ideas that you make up in your head to justify your actions. I'm out of Nerima, I'm out of that stupidity and I wasn't nothing to do with it anymore. Go away and find Akari or Akane, Ryoga, and see if you can finally get a date or something because if you keep this up one of these days I will stop holding back just because I consider you a friend."
"I will never give up you honor less coward, I will destroy you and your life if it is the last thing I ever do!!" Ryoga hissed.
"Ranma, my computer is telling me that Ryoga is full of negative magic and power. He may be possessed in some way."
"If it's true it will explain his increase in power, but he's been like this since before I came to find Hotaru."
"Huh? I thought this happened to him while he was gone?" Hotaru said, a little scared of Ryoga.
"Nope, remember how I mentioned that he was stronger and faster during that fight at the mall? He's even faster now, at my level and that took me couple years of hard training to reach. He seems to have done it in two or three weeks and has had the last week or so to get even faster."
"Idiot, do you think I just wander around looking for you between fights or when you run away? I train and train up to twenty hours a day, I train at all dojo's I stumble across and always keep your punishment in mind. I have worked for this!" Ryoga snarled and stained again, this time Ranma wasn't able to hold him and broke free of whatever was holding him.
"No way, one doesn't improve that much in less than a month."
"Oh my god, look out!!" Ami screamed and tackled her friends just as a black lightning bolt fell out of the sky and hit Ryoga in the back. The boy screamed at the bolt didn't vanish, instead it continued for several seconds as it cooked him and blew Ranma and the girls away from Ryoga. Then the world exploded in flare of black energy, Ryoga's screaming could be heard, but Ranma had no idea what to do about it. He Just stayed down and prepared himself for whatever happened next, he had been in Nerima to long not to have learned caution.
He cracked his eyes open just in time to see the blackness vanish to reveal a smoking Ryoga, glowing with a greenish black aura, his eyes were a deep red. He takes a deep breath and starts to laugh as she stands up, black lightning arching around his body. "This is the day you die Ranma, I'm a hundred times more powerful now and even if you use all your strength your going to die by my hand."
"Ranma, whatever that stuff was it has taken over Ryoga just like a Youma or Daemon from a year or so back." Ami said as she and her friends transformed for the second time that day.
Ranma gulped and use his senses to see if she was right and had to hid his astonishment at what had happened to his friend. Ryoga had indeed become more powerful, he wasn't sure just how much, but it was far and above anything Saffron could have put out. The Lost Boy just laughed and vanished from sight, a second later he appears in front of Mercury and backhands her so hard she just drops to the ground in a spray of blood.
"Mercury!!" All the girl's scream in horror.
**********
She opened her eyes slowly and looked around weakly, there was an mask over her face supplying her with air. Looking around slowly she noticed that she was in a small round metal container filled with some kind of pinkish water. There was a barely heard beeping sound and the liquid started to flow out of the container, as soon as it was gone she reached up and removed her mask. A hatch opened up in front of her and she stepped out of the thing, naked as the day she was born. She was of medium height, had dark skin, and long blue hair that fell around her in damp waves.
At any other time she would have been swamped with drooling men, but since she was alone, she just walked over to a nearby box and opened it to reveal some weird clothing. Pulling these out she sat them to the side and ran her fingers through her hair and shook her head a little as she walked across the room and tapped a spot on the wall to make a small door open. Inside was a simple shower and she made use of this to the pinkish gel off her body and prepare herself for the day. Keeping her thoughts to herself she wondered why she had been revived, but decided she would find out soon enough. After several minutes she stepped out, dried off, and got dressed in her uniform.
The uniform was the same as the one she had been using for all her life, first came her skin tight black body suit that functioned as a bit of light weight armor. Next was the dark blue coat that she wrapped around herself and tied off with a black sash. Then came the boots and gloves, both made out of a special temperature resistive material that looked a lot like a thick kind of black spandex of some sort that glistened in the room's light. Long, long ago she had been able to use her power to transform into this uniform at will, but Kakome had locked her into her powered up form and changed her in ways she still didn't understand. Over time she had become so used to being like she was that it barely bothered her anymore, power corrupts and all that.
She smirked as she pulled a tray out of the box, it contained all of her 'weapons', first was the sword harness and it's sheath, then the regular belt she wrapped around her waist just under her sash that held all her little goodies. The sword was a masterpiece of technological design, made from the finest materials of her home planet from so long ago and one of the few things to survive her master's coming.
"Good morning, Commander Hibera." Said Lilith.
"Hello Lilith, what is going on?"
"The mistress wants you to eliminate some super powered beings if you can or keep them occupied until she finds a way to take them out without to much fuss."
"How many are there?"
"Currently 25 for so, but only five or six you will be facing right off the bat."
"I see, I will need all the info you have on them if I am able to do anything."
"That is understood, please make your way over to the conference room and I will brief you on the guardians."
The room was a few decks away and took her about twenty minutes to reach, it was a lot longer than it should have taken, but she had just woken up from an extended suspended animation and it would take her some days to get back into order and a few weeks to get back into shape completely. It was unlikely she would not be given the time to do so, but she would have a few days to get everything in order. It was the only drawback to being frozen like she and the others were, it was impossible to keep in shape when your asleep. The chemical bath she had just gotten out of was enough to revitalize her body, but it needed some real exercise before she would be back to 70% or so, right now she was at about 40% and in dire need of food.
"Lilith, is there any food available?"
"Of course, it has been set up in the conference room."
"Perfect."
*****
Ryoga lowered his arm and smirked evilly at the girls, his aura burning around him and growing darker by the moment. His skin had paled as his body grew a few inches and seemed to expand with muscle mass. "Keep out of this fight Sailors, you are not my enemy here. You butted in last time at the mall, stay out of this man to man fight, it is a matter of honor."
"You hit Mercury!" Moon yelled.
"She is the smartest one among you and the only one of all of you that could have figured out how to stop me from tearing Ranma limb from limb. I will not allow that, I did not kill her either, just knocked her out."
"I won't let you get away with this!" Saturn snarled. Her uncle was possessed or something, just like Ranma had been saying, now it seemed to be to late to help him, she could feel the rage flowing from him in waves.
Ryoga ignored her as he turned back to Ranma. "I want this to be our final battle Ranma, I finally found a way to correct the difference in our power levels."
"This is neither the time or the place Ryoga."
"I have been trying to beat your for nearly six years now, I want to finish this battle and move on and I can't do that while you are still standing."
Ranma looked into Ryoga's eyes for a few seconds and sighed, there was a steel there that hadn't been there in their last few fights. He nodded. "So be it, this will be our final fight."
"Ranma don't do this, we have to help him!" Moon said as she stepped between both boys.
"I'm sorry Sailor Moon, but we have to do this to satisfy honor." Ranma said.
Ryoga snorted. "Honor, right, your the enemy of all women. You use them and discard them with contempt, you insult them and hurt them, you and your honor have hurt more people than just me, but I will be putting you in your grave today Ranma."
Ranma smiles at Usagi and pushes her to the side. "Don't worry about me, Ryoga has been blaming me for his problems for a long time now. He is only able to see me as the bane of his existence, his enemy that he blames all his problems on. This is no different than any of those other fights, except this time neither of will be holding back as we fight."
"But..." Moon started.
"Please stay out of this Sailor Moon."
"Ranma, let us help, please!" Saturn pleaded.
"NO! Stay out of this, it has been building for some time now."
"Are you ready yet Ranma?" Ryoga whined and smirked.
"Shut up pig boy!"
"That won't work anymore, I'm no longer cursed, remember?" Ryoga said snidely.
Ranma took up a stance as the girls backed off to watch and wondered if they were doing the right thing. They didn't like this one bit, Ryoga was radiating enough negative power to let all of them feel it. Even without Mercury's computer it was easily detectible, they had to help some how, but Ranma wouldn't let them. As they moved Mercury out of the way Ranma and Ryoga launched themselves at each other and were nearly knocked off their feet from the back lash of energy as the two boys slammed into each other. Ryoga was like a bull as he moved, loud and dangers, while Ranma was glowing like a blue star, his clothing rippling under the power of his own aura.
They traded blows back and forth for several seconds, moving so fast that they were barely seen blurs to most people. Ranma tested Ryoga's new strength by leading him into one of the many little traps he had used to take the Lost Boy down before. Ryoga wasn't reacting like he usually did, this was pure hate and anger fueling him now and Ranma wasn't sure how to handle that. He and Ryoga had been fighting each other for a long time now, to test out new moves, to perfect others, and even work off stress. This was different and Ranma didn't like it, he didn't want to hurt Ryoga, no matter what he said to others. He had always thought Ryoga felt the same way even when he was threatening to kill him and stuff.
"Quit holding back Ryoga, I want to see what you can do before I take you down." Ranma said evenly.
"There is now holding back in this fight Ranma, you will die, there is no other choice."
"You may have been cured, but you obviously didn't learn anything from being the pig did you?"
"I don't think you quite understand what has happened to me do you Ranma?" Ryoga said with evil humor in his voice and swung his arm out to back hand Ranma.
Ranma twisted and dodged as he turned a confused look on his rival. "Why do you say that?"
"That black lightning filled me with power and shattered the barriers in my head that kept me from doing certain things. Since they no longer exist I can now kill and destroy anything I like and you won't be able to stop me. It freed my mind, it gave me power beyond yours, and I embraced it with out hesitation just so I could kill you!!" Ryoga snarled.
Then did the unexpected, he seemed to waver and Ranma's punches became useless as the Lost Boy stepped into his defenses and started to pound on him at amazing speeds. Ranma couldn't believe it as he found himself on the defensive, something he rarely was with Ryoga. Each of his blows felt as if they were ten times as powerful as what he had been doing before, he could feel each one of them as they landed and knew he wouldn't last long against this kind of power. Then Ryoga went into a lightning fast crouch and came up underneath him like an avenging angel and hit him with an upper cut that sent Ranma flying.
"RANMA!!" The Scouts screamed. They had all saw the small spray of blood that accompanied the blow and glared at the Lost Boy, he wouldn't get away with even if he was just possessed by something.
Ryoga just started to laugh. "He is beaten, I took him down after all this time!"
Ranma came down about a block away, impacting against a wall and shattering it with his body. A nearby water pipe broke and sprayed him with cold water, turning him into his female half. The red head groaned as she assessed the damage and cursed herself for letting her guard down against the idiot, she hadn't taken a blow like that in a very long time. She slowly pulled herself out of the rubble of the wall and staggered around a little, as she watched laughing boy proclaiming his victory. Ranma had to admit that it was also the first time Ryoga had ever come this close to beating her.
Ignoring her pain, Ranma gathered a quick ball of Ki in her hands and fired it at Ryoga. The little blue missile streaked down the block, Ranma running after it, and hit the Lost Boy in the chest. Ryoga was caught by surprise and blown off his feet with a grunt of pain, but Ranma was already in the air as he started to sit up and landed knee first on his chest and blowing all the air out of his lungs and using his Amaguriken to punch him in the face several hundred times per second. Ranma hadn't used this attack against Ryoga in a while, but the last time he had it had worked as well as usual, but this time Ryoga didn't even seem to feel it.
The palm of his hand came out of nowhere and slammed into Ranma's chin and sent her flying back, but she just cart wheeled and slid to a stop. She spit out some blood from her split lip and grinned, she hadn't had a decent fight in a long time and Ryoga knew how to do it best. He was one of the few people that could stand up to her when she really let loose and this possession seemed to have made his endurance even higher, it was like hitting a steel wall or a dump truck. Ryoga slowly growled as he made his way to his feet, his aura glowing a black/green color as he moved.
"Is that baby slap all you can do now Ranma, your female body is even weaker than your male one. How do you expect me to beat you up if one of my hits could break you like a piece of glass?"
"..." Ranma narrowed her eyes and felt her anger boil.
"Your weak and pathetic now, your still cursed, weak, and still being affected by the transformation. Do you find boys good looking in that form Ranma, Kuno perhaps, me, how about your friends at school?"
"Ryoga, your pushing the wrong buttons if you think that will work."
"They seem to be working to me, but if they don't work, how about I kill two birds with one stone and have my way with Akane? I still want her you know and using her to manipulate you is so easy. Just imagine her reaction when I have my way with her and her sisters Ranma, you are to weak to stop me and my revenge against you would be finished."
"If you touch them Ryoga, I will kill you just like I did Saffron." Ranma growled out.
"Sorry Ranma, but I have been thinking about Saffron and I know that he isn't as strong as he could have been. You interrupted his transformation and he 'hatched' as a weakling compared to what he could have been. Cologne, Hopposai, me, you, and perhaps Shampoo could have taken him down. Cologne especially since she taught you the move that took him out, your a pathetic weakling compared to what I am now and I will make you suffer for all eternity."
Before Ranma could even say anything Ryoga was in his face using her as a punching bag, his speed twice what it was before. She gasped and wondered what the hell was going on again, this just didn't seem to be her day. A knee to the chin and a kick to her ass send her sprawling into the pavement, giving her a taste of asphalt. Then Ryoga was there grabbing the back of her head and lifting her up into the air, squeezing her skull just to the point of crushing it with his bare hands. Ranma had to bite her tongue to keep from screaming in pain, she wouldn't give the pig the satisfaction of hurting her.
"How does it feel to be outclassed Ranma? This is what you make me feel like every time you beat me up, every time you call me a name or insult those I care about. You are going to suffer before I kill you."
Ranma could have sworn she heard her skull cracking under the pressure of Ryoga's hand and she was just a bit surprise to find that she was about to be killed. She hadn't been sure that Ryoga could actually ever do it, but the negative energy that Mercury had mentioned must have really screwed Ryoga up. She grit her teeth and looked deep in her mind and body for a way to survive, deeper and deeper she went until she could touch her soul and saw something that she had never seen before. She sent a mental hand out to examine it and was surprised when it leapt up and seemed to swell and heave inside her.
Laughing insanely, Ryoga crowed and slammed Ranma's head into the ground and shattered the concrete in all directions. Lifting the limp body up he repeated the action several times and turning Ranma's face to a bloody pulp, laughing all the while at this victory. Behind him the Scouts watched in frozen horror as Ranma was killed and Sailor Moon was having problems convincing herself to stay out of the fight like Ranma had requested. She had doubts and that was bad, a friend was being killed right before her and she didn't know what she should do. She had made a promise, but this was getting out of hand and it was obvious to her that Ranma was about to die. She made the only decision she could and started to step forward...
"Stop..."
Sailor Moon spun around to look at Mercury as she opened her eyes. "Mercury?"
"D-don't go over there Moon, Ranma is planning something, I can feel it."
Mars, who was about to go and help Usagi nodded. "I can feel something too, but I don't know what it is."
"Ranma is about to die, we have to save her."
There is a ruffling of cloth and Tuxedo Mask appears right behind Sailor Moon and holds her. "Do not interfere in this Sailor Moon, Ranma and Ryoga have to settle this alone no matter what has happened to one or the other. They would not want you to interfere in their fight."
"...But Ryoga is possessed!"
"Then we will take him down after Ranma has failed. He is a man, even with his curse, and will push himself to the limits to win this fight. They both agreed to do so and this is the price, let them finish."
"I...I...can't..." Sailor Moon said and hung her head and called her scepter. "I have to save both of them and I won't let either of them die."
"Then wait until Ranma is unconscious." Tuxedo Mask said.
"...No, I will do this now..." Moon said and pushed him out of the way as the others watched.
The rest of the Scouts stood and nodded, following Sailor Moon's lead as she stepped around her boyfriend and looked at the fight. They were her friends, Hotaru's family, and she would not let either one of them die...
Then something happened and they all froze in shock, their eyes nearly popping out and their jaws hitting the ground. Ranma's blue aura has flared up as Ryoga tried to crush her head and she screamed, not in pain, but as a release. Blue light lit up the area until it turned white and blasted into them, blowing them off their feet. Ranma's scream increased in volume until it was loud enough to shatter glass and could be heard through out a good portion of the city. Then...
KKKKKKKAAAAAA-BBBBBBOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMM!!!!!
The world exploded.
Only Usagi saw the flare of the Pluto symbol on Ranma's forehead.
**********
End Notes - Dont jump to conclusions just yet, this will be explained in a chapter or two. ^^;
My site is at - http://home.talkcity.com/BookmarkBlvd/crose9/
**********
Uncles!
Chapter 03
by Cory D. Rose
ertle2@msn.com
(c) 2001
**********
"Excellent!" Ranma said as he watched Rei.
They were again working on the techniques that Ranma had promised to teach her several days before. This time Rei had to admit that when she was breathing the way Ranma had taught her it seemed to be a lot easier to do now than when she had originally tried. She had used her Shinto training to center herself, and looked to the chi paths inside her as Ranma described them, and found that it was easy to focus her Ki into those paths. So Rei was sitting in the middle of the back yard with a faint red glow around her. It felt good too, better than anything she had done in a long time. She had worked very hard for this and accomplishing it meant she would soon be able to do other things as well. Even her grandfather was amazed at how quickly she had picked up the techniques and had told her how proud he was to see her growing strong by the day.
"Thanks Ranma, I can't believe how easy that was."
"Once you figure it out, its the easiest thing in the world. Now all you have to do is learn to harness the Ki and use it to enhance your body and your skills. That will take a little longer than a few lessons, but it will come to you eventually and when it does, you will be able to move faster than you thought possible, take hits that would kill normal fighters, and leap higher than a two or three story's in a single jump with no problems. The uses are almost limitless, it just takes an idea of what you want and practice." Ranma said, as excited about this as Rei was.
"What's next? Now that I have the aura down..."
"For now, I want you to spend the next several days building up your Ki and strengthening your control. Flare your aura while you are doing your fire readings, practice your martial arts, just relaxing, or while doing your homework. This little bit your using now is almost useless to you except as a night light, but with practice it can be built up and used as an attack or defense. Eventually I expect you to be able to add this power into your fire readings to make them clearer and more accurate."
"Cool!" Rei said, and thought about the Dragon Ball Z episodes she had seen, wondering if any of that was possible now that she could access her Ki on a higher level. Then she sighed and had to relax and let the aura go. Sweat was running down her face and covering her entire body. She realized that she felt really weak and nearly fell over, but Ranma knelt down and steadied her with his hand and grinned at her.
"You just used to much of your Ki. There is only so much available at the moment. That is why you need to build it up so that it can be used for longer periods of time, its like a muscle that you flex, the more you use it the easier it will become. You will need to eat a little more food than normal when you use you Ki up too. For some reason the body can use food and extra sleep to replace your excess Ki when you run low, you can't run out though, you'll pass out before that happens. When you start using it more and more you will find your appetite growing to insane amounts. I normally eat four to six times what others do in one sitting, but I practice my Ki exercises anywhere from six to twelve hours a day. I'll show you what I do once you get these basics down, in few weeks you should be ready to incorporate using Ki into your everyday chores and stuff."
Rei took a deep breath and grinned. "Didn't you want to talk to me about something the other day?"
"Hmmm? Oh yeah, I figured something out and I wanted you to know that I wasn't going to give away your secret."
"What secret?" Rei asked, slightly puzzled.
"That you're Sailor Mars."
This time Rei did fall over. "W-what...m-makes you say that?"
"That day at the ice cream shop, when you all ran out, I watched your fight with that demon. You have this magic field around you that was making it hard to see your face, but it did nothing to hide your aura and that was easy to identify once I had the idea of what to look for. I've been wanting to talk to you about your powers for days now."
Rei gaped at him and wondered what she was going to have to do about this, they couldn't have their identities known by just everyone.
"Like I said, I will keep it secret, but I wanted to say, from what I saw of that fight, you girls are very strong magically. Unfortunately, most of you don't know the first thing about fighting properly and need to be trained to use those super powerful magic attacks before you girls hurt someone."
"Hey, we practice all the time!" Rei snapped, then slapped her hand over her mouth.
"How much?"
"Every weekend."
"For how long?"
"Depends, but usually it is for about four hours." Though it is usually for less than that, Rei thought to herself as she finally sat up. Usagi was always trying to get out of it and using Makoto's food as an excuse. The others were always coming up with one excuse or another if they need or if they wanted to do something other than blow up large areas of land.
"You and your friends were there at the mall when me and Ryoga took on that thing, we were holding our own against it and slowly winning, though I had to admit that you girls did impress me. Me and Ryoga tend to put in at least six to thirteen hours of practice a day, we do this by making everything we do into training. Like walking on top of fences to perfect our balance or turning cooking into a weapons demonstration. Things like that."
"Ranma, we don't have time to do that kind of training."
"Maybe not, but with those Sailor abilities of yours I can teach all of you how to defend yourselves without harming those around you. All of you are very quick, strong, and tough. Those are traits that usually take years to develop, but your powers give you a short cut to doing advanced moves and I am willing to help you and the others out."
"I'll have to talk it over with the others and some of them will not like the fact that you know who they are."
"I only know you and possibly one of the others and I don't have a clue who the rest of them might be. I could make some guess though, based on what I know of you and your friends, but I won't do that."
"Okay, I believe you. Let's head inside and grab something to eat and we can talk this over some more."
"Sure."
Just as they were stepping into the shrine, Rei heard her communicator go off and turned to look at Ranma. She debated it for second, then shrugged. "Stay right there, I don't want the others so see you until I've had a chance to talk to them."
"Alright."
She tapped a button and looked into the little screen. "What's up?"
"Rei, we have another one of those little demons attacking the park, it's ripping up trees and beating up the people in the park." Sailor Jupiter said. Rei and Ranma heard her jumping about and fighting something while she was talking to them.
"How long has this been going on?"
"About ten minutes, we got here a little late to stop it from ripping up portions of the park."
"Which park?"
"The one near my apartment. Hurry up and get here, me and Venus are being overwhelmed." The communicator went dark and Rei turned to Ranma.
"I'll help you out, those things are dangerous and you will need as much help as you can get."
Rei glared at him, but was silently pleased with it as well. "Come on then, we need to make a three and a half mile run in a matter of minutes." Rei said as she pulled out her transformation pen.
"I run ten to thirty miles every day Rei, I can do it faster than an Olympic runner. No problem, just point the way." Ranma said and turned away when Rei's clothing suddenly disappeared and left her naked for a fraction of a second. He kept them closed until he could feel the aura of fire that surrounded her flare up and stabilize.
"What's wrong?"
"Must you strip naked to do that?" Ranma said with a smirk.
"Hentai!" Mars yelled and slapped him upside the head.
Ranma was knocked back into a wall, he was smirking. "What, you would have preferred it if I didn't notice you were naked for that little show?"
"W-what?" Mars gasped out, she started to blush.
"Come on let's go, where is that park?"
"T-that way..." Mars pointed, blushing a deep red.
They took off running and Ranma let Mars take the lead, he had no trouble keeping up with her if he strained a little. He could run fast, but even Rei was pushing his speed to the limit. He hoped they arrived soon or he was going to run out of Ki to use. The run took just over four minutes and they skidded to a halt just inside the park and looked around. There was a battle going on in the center of the park with smoke and fire rising above the tree line. They also noticed that enough time had passed that the park had been evacuated. That was a good thing in Ranma's book, usually he was forced to protect innocents while fighting against Ryoga in one of his berserker rages.
"Jupiter and Venus must be the only ones left to fight that thing." Mars commented as they moved forward.
"Then let's hurry."
"Sailor Mars!!"
Ranma and Mars turned to see Sailor Moon rush into the park, skid a few feet, trip over a break in the sidewalk and slam face first into the ground with a loud thump. Mars ran forward and helped her friend up, surprisingly there wasn't any signs of damage on her. "Are you alright?" Mars asked.
"Yeah, not the first time I did that. Hi Ranma." Moon said absently.
"Hi Usagi." Ranma said.
Moon blinked. "Huh?"
"You have got to be the only girl in all of Tokyo with that hairdo and an aura like that Usagi."
"Um...okay, keep it secret will you?" Moon asked sweetly.
"Sure thing, you keep some of my secrets so I can keep yours."
Mars face faulted. "How can you just stand there and just accept that? His knowing our secret identities places us in danger!"
"I trust him and he is famous, you know how honor bound he is." Moon said and dismissed the subject. She headed into the park heading for the battle ground. Mars and Ranma looked at each other and shrugged.
"You really don't have to worry."
"I know, it's just weird that's all."
They took off after Moon and were soon nearing the battle, the sounds of Jupiter and Venus fighting were still being heard, so Ranma breezed on ahead to see what was going on. Ranma was soon looking down from within the tree into small area of downed trees and large craters with smoke wafting out of them. It was one of those little guys again, easily recognizable in its plate armor, helmet, and gauntlets. Jupiter had seen better days, she looked like the thing was using her as a punching bag, a feeling he remembered all to well. Ranma could see that she was moving in such a way that her ribs were either broken or damaged. The blood running down her legs and arms from a series of minor cuts was also noticeable. They had to get them out of there, they were taking too much damage to be of use for much longer.
He turned and looked at Venus on the other side of Jupiter, she was staggering around. It seemed clear to Ranma that at some point in the last few minutes she had tossed out some kind of chain attack and wrapped it around the monster's arm, he briefly wondered how she made such an attack. To bad the thing was using it to toss the poor girl around like a lead weight on a rope. With a yank Venus was pulled off her feet and lifted into the air and used as a weapon to hit Jupiter, her scream of shock was enough to make even Ranma wince in pain as the two Scouts collided. Both girls went down in a pile of legs and arms, only some downed trees kept them from being sent clean out of the area.
A flash of blue caught Ranma's attention and he saw Mercury doing the same thing he was and waved at her as if nothing was wrong. She gaped at him as if he was mad. Ranma motioned over his shoulder to Moon and Mars and pointed Mercury out to them. He nearly fell over laughing as Moon waved just like he had, Mercury just glared back at them and pointing at Jupiter and Venus, as if trying to get us to act faster.
Ranma shrugged and nodded. He motioned for the for the others to get ready while he reached deep inside himself for the power he knew he would need to fight this thing. With a grin he launched out of the trees and landed beside the thing and kicked it away just as it was about to attack Jupiter again. The thing flew back and rolled to it's feet a few yards away, it giggled and grinned at him. With a flash of speed, Ranma flew forward in an attempt to catch the thing off guard. He made sure to keep the thing occupied as Moon and Mars dragged the injured Jupiter and Venus out of the area.
Remembering the last fight, he made some changes in how he fought it. Before, he had been trying to stop it without killing it and to stop it from hurting others. Discussion with Rei had led him to believe that these things were a deadly threat, one that the Scouts always tried to kill as quickly as they could. Focusing his Ki, Ranma brought his hands forward and fired off a large Möko Takabisha that hit dead center of the things chest and launched it across the clearing and through some trees. The good thing was he wasn't fighting it alone, it was just to strong and with the Scouts help they could all take it down. It was the perfect distraction to get it into a position the Scouts needed. Mars stepped out of the trees and fired off a blast of fire just as it was rising to it's feet and glaring at them for interfering with its mission. At the same time from two other sides, Moon did her giant pink heart and Mercury incased it in an ice blast. All three hit at once and exploded brilliantly, knocking Ranma off his feet. His senses picked up the still living mass inside the inferno and he brought both hands forward and launched a Double Möko Takabisha.
This secondary explosion went off and finally finished off the little pest, he couldn't comprehend the sphere power of something this small. It reminded him again of the old ghoul and the pervert, about twenty times more powerful and annoying. It was as if they were combined into one being of immense power. He stood up and stretched as the Scouts dragged themselves out from behind cover, Ranma noticed the Jupiter and Venus were still out of it and covered in wounds. Ranma was about to walk over and do a more intensive check of the girls, when his senses picked up the arrival of a large power source. He looked around just in time to see Hotaru or Sailor Saturn run into the area, she made her way right over to Jupiter and Venus and started to heal their wounds.
"How are they doing Saturn?"
"They should be just fine Ranma, our Scout powers make us heal up real fast. It's just that something like this takes a little longer to heal than others."
"Are you two going to be alright?" Ranma asked the two girls as they struggled to sit up.
They both blushed and nodded.
"Good, you two are very important to the team." Ranma said and patted them on the shoulder. He failed to see the little hearts that appeared in their eyes and the blushes that flared on their faces. Saturn just laughed and finished healing them.
"You two remember that he is engaged to all those girls right?" Saturn asked.
"...engaged..." Jupiter and Venus breathed out, their minds still in the gutter.
Then they blinked and groaned. "It isn't fair, how can he be so perfect and still be single?" Venus asked.
"I envy those other girls."
"There are things about him that make his life pretty bad, would either of you want to be kidnapped on a monthly basis or be challenged two or three times a day like he is?"
"Drat!" Jupiter snapped and stood up. "He looks even better than my last boyfriend too."
**********
"How's the ice cream?" Ranma-chan asked.
"Pretty good." Hotaru said, she was enjoying herself more than she thought she would.
Her and her uncle Ranma had decided to go out to eat, but she hadn't expected the reactions of the other people to be quite so extreme. The had eaten dinner and been subject to the waitress being struck dumb at the mere sight of Ranma. Though Hotaru was surprised to note that Ranma didn't seem to understand the effect he had on the opposite sex. They had received a free meal when the waitress, nearly choking on her own drool, had dumped a plate of food in Ranma's lap. Hotaru had a feeling it had been deliberate from the look of anticipation on the girl's face as she produced a rag to clean him up.
From there it had gotten weird as girl after girl showed up at the table and asked him for an autograph. The autograph hounds were fine and quickly dealt with, but the ones that had pulled up their dresses and shoved their panties in his face had been a shock. Hotaru giggled to herself at the panicked look on his face as he bolted out of the restaurant. Living with Haruka and Michiru had given her a certain view on things and she had to admit that Ranma had this knack to attract very beautiful girls like flies to honey. Even the ones that threw themselves at him had been down right beautiful, if very obvious about their desires.
After that they had walked around for awhile and gotten mobbed by yet another pack of girls. The ear piercing screaming of forty girls was a new sound that Hotaru wasn't going to forget anytime soon. It was almost like she was in the middle of a crowd of girls lusting after the 'Three Lights' band that had been making the rounds lately. Then she had the funniest and scariest thing in the world happen, Ranma had picked her up in his strong arms and launched them into the sky. A thrill went through Hotaru as she recalled the shock she felt as Ranma once again surprised her with is abilities. She had thought she had seen all the amazing things he could do, but this one had been the best yet.
As a Scout she could run and jump like he could, but as normal human he could do things that were just super human. She wondered what would happen if Ranma were to ever receive Scout powers, they tended to amplify one's natural abilities as well as empower them with magical attacks. With Ranma the effect would be simply amazing, but even she knew that there was no way for him to get them so shrugged off the idea. That monster attack a few days ago had reminded her that even Ranma couldn't kill these things by himself. Sure he could hold his own, but in the end they needed all of them to take it down. Where these monsters were getting this power was beyond here, every enemy they faced seemed to get stronger and stronger too. What would the next one bring she wondered.
"Earth to Hotaru?" Ranma called.
The little girl blinked and looked up, gasped and jumped back in shock, knocking over her chair. Ranma was now a busty red head, she had spoon hanging off her nose, and had been less than an inch from Hotaru's face when she glanced up. Ranma just blinked and smirked as Hotaru fell down in shock, her eyes dancing with mischief.
"Ranma!" Hotaru yelled.
She blinked innocently as everyone in the ice cream shop took notice of them. "What's got you so spaced out that you are that unaware of your surroundings?" Ranma asked as Hotaru reseated herself, blushing, and made sure no one was watching them anymore before answering Ranma. She was also wondering when Ranma had turned female, they had come in here with him in his male form.
"Just thinking about what happened a couple days ago at the park."
"It was just a fight and we won, forget about it and move on."
"We have a meeting at the temple to discuss what happened. That reminds me, I was to bring you along to meet the others, the want to meet you."
"I don't know if that is a wise thing to do Hotaru..."
"Why?"
"I wouldn't mind knowing who they are, but what I don't know won't hurt your friends and I gave my word to you and Rei that I wouldn't do anything to reveal your identities." Ranma said quietly.
"Don't worry about it, there are others that have found out too and they have always kept the secret, I know you will too."
"Well..."
"Please?"
Ranma shrugged her shoulders. "Sure if it means that much to you, but keep the Outers away, I don't want to deal with them again."
"The Outers have been asked to leave you alone, though they have only seen you in this form. I heard them talking the other day and they never once mentioned your male aspect, so I figure so long as you stay out of their way as a girl you can work with them as a man."
"Whatever, I'm just tired of fighting useless battles and they came damned close to killing me a while back."
"Usagi took care of it though."
"Maybe, but I have a feeling I will be fighting those girls again. You told me they were willing to disobey Usagi if they thought it was necessary, they will find a way."
"Maybe, but don't worry about it now. I don't think they will attack you tonight."
"No, but I am over due for an attack by one of my other enemies."
"Really? Who is it this time? Toma, Kirin, Kuno, Ryu?"
Ranma smiled. "You certainly know a lot about my life, is all that information on those cards?"
"That and more, though they never said anything about the curses. We all thought the animals were just well trained or made up."
"At least Nabiki kept that secret."
"Yeah, I like knowing a secret no one else knows."
They finished off their ice cream and got up to leave several minutes later, Hotaru stopped them at the door and looked at Ranma seriously.
"What?"
"When are you going to take that spoon off your nose?"
"What, you don't like it?"
*********
He had a cure, he didn't turn into a pig anymore and Ryoga had been happy beyond belief and spent some time wandering around thinking of the times before Jusenkyo and the hell he had lived through because of it. He thought of all the times he had been forced to avoid things he loved to do, like swimming. Having to learn to avoid the water traps that were constantly making him turn into someone's dinner or ending up as some little girl's pet, that one gave him the creeps. Until he got his curse he had never know there were so many demonic little girls out there that were even worse than Azusa of the Golden Pair. A good number of them made that klepto look like an innocent little first year skater. Ryoga grinned and punched a tree as he was walking by, it exploded into splinters and collapsed around him. He barely noticed and his good mood just wouldn't go away, he was cured and Ranma wasn't. His revenge was nearly complete, Akane had dumped Ranma and Ryoga had a feeling he was the cause of that as well, he wondered what he would have to do to make it even better.
He had to have revenge against Ranma, they were Rival/Enemies and sometimes even allies when it came to saving one of the girls. There was no way they would ever be friends in his eyes, there had been to much pain and suffering for Ryoga to forgive Ranma. He would never do that, he would keep on tracking Ranma down and attempting to kill him as he had been doing for the last two years. Oh sure, he could say that most of what had caused him to go through hell was now gone, after all that curse had been a good part of it. Still Ryoga hadn't defeated Ranma yet and that would be one of his main goals from now on. For all of Ranma's strength he didn't have his power or strength, only tricks and speed to defeat him.
Then there was his other problem to think about, his family curse, the lack of direction sense. It wasn't as bad as it had once been, but he still had no clue where he was, just that it was a little easier to get from one place to another faster. Ryoga had passed the Tendo dojo at least once, but had decided that it wasn't time to deal with that part yet. So he had continued on and soon found himself in a jungle, again. He still couldn't find a the jungle on any map of Japan he had found either, he just knew that he tended to end up here every few weeks. Most of the village people knew him on sight and went out of their way to avoid him whenever he passed though. They had started to call him the 'Fanged Devil' at least that is what he thought they were saying. Their language was a little off and had a thick Japanese accent intermixed with a lot of clicking of the tongue and throat gargling sounds. He wondered if they were sick or something, then dismissed it as irrelevant since they liked to toss spears at him. It was good practice to catch, block, or dodge them as they flew in. Sometimes he even let them hit him, though it was a little odd to see them just bounce off his chest as it was a stone wall or something.
Ryoga stepped around a tree and looked up to see a skyscraper and blinked for a few seconds, where in the hell was he now. He looked around and wondered how he had come to be in a park in the middle of a city, was it set at the edge of the jungle or something? He shrugged, one of these days he would figure out why things like this kept happening to him. He adjusted his over large back and headed across the park when he spotted a yatai set up doing some brisk business. He got in line and soon had a large meal sitting in his stomach, the first food he'd had in the last several days. Pretty typical for him really, usually he couldn't find a store, let alone a kitchen to get any food. Buying it was a pain since he had very little money, but he didn't let that stop him to often.
He wandered around for several minutes taking in the sights, spotting several signs in Japanese was a good indicator that he was still in Japan. Then he remembered the time he wound up in Little Tokyo, Arkansas and figured it would be a good idea to figure out where he was exactly. He ended up in Russia and America far to often not comment on. Then as he was about to grab some random passerby and get them to tell him where he was, he heard some screams and spotted people running away from something a few blocks away. He headed in that direction, it took all his concentration to follow the sounds, and was soon witness to some of the weirdness that tended to plague Ranma on a daily basis, he hoped it wasn't catching though since he had felt sorry for Ranma on more than one occasion. Right in front of him was weird sight, a blue haired Sailor Scout was in a defensive stance facing off against a large Youma of some kind. It stood nearly 4 meters high and was make of muscle and fangs. It had to be one of the ugliest things Ryoga had ever seen and he had met a good number of ugly things in his travels.
"Mercury Aqua Rhapsody!" Mercury yelled and fired off a her attack, encasing the monster in a pillar of ice. There is quite for a second then the ice cracks and shatters as the thing flexes it's huge muscles. Mercury is forced to dive out of the way just to avoid being impaled by the ice shards.
Ryoga gaped for a second as a wave of super cold air washed over him from Mercury's attack, then dropped his pack and pulled out his umbrella. He took stock of the situation in a split second, then launched himself into the sky, twisted in mid air and landed in front of the girl as she was shaking her head. He growled and swung the super heavy umbrella and hit the thing across the jaw, the impact was like being hit by a train and sent the thing stumbling back several steps. "You will leave her alone!!"
"Who...?" Mercury gasped as she looked up.
"Ryoga Hibiki, we met the other day at the mall when we fought that little monster." Ryoga said without looking down.
"Ryoga...oh yeah, watch out, these things can shrug off damage from a normal human as if it didn't exist, so be careful."
"The one at the mall was a pain in the ass too."
Mercury stood up. "Let me take care of this, me and my friends have the magic needed to take them down."
"Are they on their way?"
"Yes, I called them must before it attacked."
Ryoga nodded, he didn't understand everything she had said, but figured she was saying he wasn't strong enough to kill one of these things. He would show her he had what it took to fight them, years of training had made him extremely strong. He turned and glared at the large monster as it was still shaking it's head from his attack. It took a lot of strength to shake off one of his attacks. His aura flared up around him and startled Mercury into stepping back, even repeated fights with Ranma hadn't conditioned her into ignoring these things yet. Ryoga brought his hands up and yelled out, his aura expanding outward a couple of feet and nearly blowing Mercury off her feet.
"Shishi Höködan!!"
"No don't..." Mercury said as her computer told her through her visor that it had completed its scans of the monster.
The green blast rose up into the sky as he used the most potent version, then concentrated and formed another blast just as it hit the monster and let loose with a blast out of his hands. The first blast just weakened the thing while the second blast slammed into it and the screaming began. The thing stumbled back and coughed up a bit of Youma blood and fell to it's knees, a hole blown clear though it's chest. Then Ryoga launched forward and brought his umbrella around like a baseball bat and catapulted it across the street and through a wall.
Mercury gaped.
Ryoga just grinned and stood there and waiting for the thing to get back up and just nodded as it did so. His Ki senses picked up a number of high powered Ki signatures coming into the area and looked around as the rest of the Scouts came running up. Ryoga just yells and throws his umbrella at the thing's damaged chest. It works, but Ryoga is always underestimating his strength and didn't take that into account. The umbrella struck the monster and the sheer weight and momentum of his umbrella just plowed the thing backwards through a wall with a massive crash, crushing some of the monsters other bones. Ryoga noticed that the other Scouts were beginning to show up, he smirked at Mercury.
"What was that, I defeated it easily."
"No, you just made it mad." Mercury said as she continued to scan the thing.
"It's not getting back up is it?"
"He seems to have taken care of it to me Mercury." Jupiter said.
"It's still alive." Mercury said.
"WHAT?!!"
"These things have been getting stronger and stronger lately and that last fight we had allowed me to get some better readings on these things. These things are changeing with every fight to better be able to take us down."
"Mercury we took it down easily enough." Moon said.
"Look what the next one did to Jupiter and Venus, it was even stronger and my scans of this one make it twice as strong as that one."
"Huh?" Ryoga said.
Ranma, now male, finally arrived with Hotaru and came up and stood beside Ryoga as everyone looked at the hole where the rubble was beginning to shift as the monster struggled to get up from under all that stone. Hotaru just stood in the background and made sure she would be able to transform before her Uncle Ryoga noticed. She did take the time to hug him though and smile at him, it made her giggle silently when he blushed and nearly fainted.
"Ryoga did you look at it with your Ki senses?" Ranma said.
"No, why should I?"
"I didn't do it at the last fight either, but if you look at it you should recognize the signature. I'm kind of ticked I didn't notice it before."
"What?" Ryoga growled and looked over and squinted his eyes. At first he didn't see a thing, then he sighed. "This is the same one we fought in the mall isn't it?"
"Yes, I'm almost positive that it is adapting itself to our abilities. Every time we take it down it grows stronger and stronger. Now it has adapted itself to your Ki attack and bulking itself up so that it can stand against our strength and speed."
The monster gives a heave and tosses a half ton piece of stone from the wall off itself and drags itself to its feet. Nearly all of the damage Ryoga had caused was gone and it seemed to have gained a few more inches in height and increased it's muscle mass, even it's fangs had grown longer and more evil looking as it crouched down and laughed at the one that had tried to take it down. Ryoga was impressed, even Ranma wouldn't have been able to stand up from being his umbrella like that, he would have dodged.
"How are we going to stop these things if they can adapt to our attacks?" Venus asked.
"Is there any limit to what it can do?" Uranus asked as she stepped up beside Hotaru. The young girl decided it was time to transform and nodded to her adoptive parents, she just needed an excuse to leave.
"Hotaru, you get out of here, this is going to be a major fight in a few minutes." Ranma said, giving her a weird look.
"Beat it squirt." Ryoga said and gave her a little push. "I agree with Ranma for once, you need to be kept safe."
"Alright, but I want you two to be careful and let the Scouts deal with this. They have the magical power needed."
"Don't you worry about it." Ranma said and rolled his eyes. He was also watching Uranus and Neptune out of the corner of his eyes, wondering how long it would be before they attacked him or Ryoga.
Then they all heard chuckling and saw the monster rising to it's feet holding Ryoga's umbrella and grinning. It's teeth seemed to be glowing for some reason as it hefted the half ton umbrella. The Scouts all nodded and went into their usual half circle attack pattern and spread out to get into position. Ranma and Ryoga step forward and prepare to attack as well and unconsciously move like a well trained team.
The Monster giggled.
"Now!" Ranma yelled and shot forward in a blur, Ryoga right on his tail, they flared up their auras and fired. Blue and Green Ki swirled around each other and head right toward the monster's chest, but it just smirked and lifted it's hand and let the blasts hit it's hand. They exploded and shattered the concrete at the monster's feet. Ranma could already tell that it was unharmed as he flipped over the explosion. Ryoga rolled to the side and launched a half dozen bandanna's at it while he dodged out of the way.
The Scouts went into action as they circled around the thing, most were a little surprised at the sight of the thing. It actually looked like a male demon of some kind. Considering they were used to dealing with vaguely female looking demons it was a little weird to see. They had developed strategies over the months they had been fighting and knew what to do when an enemy knew how to field a monster stronger than them. Mercury went first, tossing down a layer of fog that overwhelmed the senses of the monster. As it stopped in confusion, Jupiter went next and fired off a massive electrical blast that fried the thing. Venus went next and used her chain to tie the thing up while Mars, in tandem, fired off a wave of fire down the chain that burned off most of the fog while burning the monster with the magical fire. It screamed and fell over and burned for several second before it seemed to pop and turn to dust and vanish.
"That's it?" Ryoga gasped.
"Your right, they are usually a little harder to kill than that." Ranma said.
Mercury looked at them and shrugged. "The next one will now be even stronger and immune to that attack as well as the Ki attacks."
"Well at least I didn't have to fire off anything this time." Moon said.
"You do realized that the next time we go up against it you will probably have to be the one that takes it down don't you?" Ranma said.
"Huh?"
Ranma rolled his eyes. "Mercury says that it is making itself immune to our attacks every time we hit it. You've only hit it once that I know of, so you can still hurt it...unless once is all it takes?"
"No, it seems it takes two or three times before it can adapt a counter, otherwise it would have had us in the park a few days ago." Mercury said.
"Crap..."
**********
Kakome stood and looked at her downed monster once again and frowned, she was beginning to understand how these girls had defeated all those other invaders. She stepped back and formed a ball of white energy in her hand and tossed it at the thing. The monster flared for a few seconds then lay there as its wounds healed and it's skin reformed. After about ten minutes it grunted and stood up, it looked fearful.
"You failed again."
It nodded.
"I give you permission to talk."
"Yes Master, it took the entire team to take me down this time, those two boys are wild cards and I am finding it hard to defend against them."
"What are they using?"
"It's not magic, I know that, some kind of life energy of some sort like you described, but they use more of it than a normal human should."
A white sphere appeared in Kakome's hand and she used it to watch the fight again, her face was unreadable and impassive. After several minutes she looked at the monster again and shrugged. "It seems I need to look into those boys a little more, I had thought I understood them, but they are unpredictable. I may have to change the plan. You are dismissed."
"Yes Master." The monster vanished in a puff of smoke.
Kakome walked back over to her throne and sat down in thought, she could care less about this planet, but she did understand what the Scouts were trying to do. Protect this planet from her and her minions as they had done before with the others. Could she be going about this the wrong way? She sat back and thought about her goals and wondered if a different approach would be needed with this planet. If it had only a couple of super strong protectors she would have been done with this planet and moving on to another one. Instead her computers were telling her that there were no less than 25 individuals on this little mud ball with the power to irritate or impede her advance in search of the Artifact she wanted.
That was a lot of protectors for one planet, what was here that required so many to keep it safe? On most other planets she had visited the average was anywhere from just one guardian to three if it was really important. Kakome blinked and sat forward, was there something special about this little spec of the universe that was important? She knew that several others had attacked this planet before, but had thought it was for the usual reasons like slaves and power. She tapped a button on her arm rest and waited as the floor opened and a computer console rose up for her use. As a scientist she had set this system up a long time ago to take care of the small things for her, an artificial intelligent computer system that ran her entire ship completely. It handled life support and anything else that was required for those living here to life comfortably.
"Advise me."
"Lilith is on line Master."
"I want you to scan this planet's history and anything else that would help me to understand why they have so many powerful beings here. Any normal planet has one to three protectors and are usually easy to overwhelm, this one has 25 or more and are almost completely unpredictable. Some are magical, but a good number of them are something completely different than what we usually deal with, I want you to find out why there are so many."
"Scanning planet more thoroughly will take some days, is this acceptable?"
"How many exactly?"
"Extrapolating....four days, seven hours, twenty four minutes to go through everything, another day to sift through it all and find what you are looking for."
"Then do it."
"Would you like some of the crew revived?"
The crew, she almost grinned. On some of the planets she had been to, the inhabitants were more useful than others and she had converted some of them to help her out. When they were done she had placed them in suspended animation and just forgot about them, she hadn't talked to any of them in nearly a hundred years or more. Her quest had been a very time consuming and had even spent a large part of the last century in suspended animation. She considered the request and decided that since her drone wasn't getting the job done, maybe one of them could, she would be able to study the situation a little more as well, this was getting interesting.
"Yes, wake up #347."
"Scanning...#347's chamber is being located and moved, she will be up and about in six hours."
"Excellent, show her the video's of our three fights with the Scouts and send her down to take them out if she can, or at the very least keep the occupied so that I can come up with better battle plans. Give her the equipment packet she used in the Solarian campaign."
"Yes Master."
Kakome grinned. She loved expandable personnel that were useful to the plans, no fuss and no muss ^^.
**********
"Ryoga!" Hotaru yelled and hugged the blushing boy.
"Hi Hotaru, how have you been?"
"Pretty good, though we have been having problems with those monsters lately."
"I'll help out with that, your family and it seems your always around when these things show up."
Hotaru blushed. "I'm not that bad!"
"Well I'm here so your safe now."
"Cool! With you and Ranma here we can protect everybody!"
"Don't count on that honor less coward, he'll end up hurting you eventually, just like he does all the girl's in his life." Ryoga snapped under his breath.
"What was that pig boy, I thought I heard you talking about honor." Ranma said mildly.
"You stay out of Hotaru's life you bastard, I will not let you hurt her like you have Akane!"
"She dumped me remember? Did your little piggy brain get damaged when you were hit on the head or something?"
"RANMA!!"
Ranma looked around as if looking for Ryoga's voice. "I seems to recall someone using their curse to go to bed with my fiancee. If you call that honorable Ryoga, I'll make sure you get your curse back."
"DIE YOU BASTARD, I'VE HAD ENOUGH YOUR MOUTH!!" Ryoga yelled and launched himself at Ranma.
"Ranma, Ryoga, cut it out!" Hotaru yelled. Behind her the rest of the Scouts, who had been following them to Rei's temple, backed off as both boys flared up. Rei grabbed Hotaru and dragged her off just as both boys started to punch each other.
Ryoga, since his umbrella was destroyed by the fight earlier used his fists and nearly took Ranma's head off. In a blind rage he didn't see Ranma duck and use his speed technique to punch him in the stomach several hundred times. Ryoga gagged and backed up several feet and just grinned as he dropped his backpack to the side. "Your going to die Ranma."
"Cut it out Ryoga, just back off and stop blaming me for all your problems will you?" Ranma snapped, he was so tired of this.
"Never, because of you I have seen hell and I will get my revenge even if it takes me the rest of my life."
"Your problems are your own fault Ryoga, you made the choice to go down that road in the first place."
"AGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!" Ryoga screamed and flared up even more before he jumped forward again. Ranma glared as he blocked and kicked to defend himself against Ryoga, but he was growing tired of this fight quicker than normal. He had fought a war with him and the others for the last couple of years. He recalled his last fight with Ryoga at the mall and his increased speed and power, where ever Ryoga had gotten the power increase it was enough to make him a lot more dangerous to deal with. Reaching deep within himself, Ranma tapped the power he had used against Saffron and let the Ki flow though him, turning his aura from blue to a sparkling gold and set his clothing to ruffling under the aura's power.
"I've had enough!!" Ranma yelled. The came together again, their fists slamming into each other's arms as they blocked. The ground at their feet shattered and rose up in the air, but Ryoga just growled, shifted his weight and punched. Ranma was shocked as Ryoga punched at him with more power than he ever had before, enough to actually kill him if they had been fighting at normal levels. Even then it went right through his defenses and slammed into his ribs, Ranma grunted as he felt two of them break. Where in the world had Ryoga gotten all this power from, was he holding back all this time?
"Aghh!" Ranma said and stumbled back holding his ribs.
"RANMA!" The girls yelled.
"Come on coward, it's time to receive your punishment and DIE!" Ryoga yelled.
"Not in this lifetime idiot." Ranma mumbled and lifted his hand. Ryoga stopped in place, seemingly frozen in place. The Scouts gasped and Ami had her computer out in an instant, scanning for anything out of the ordinary.
"Ranma what did you do him?" Usagi asked. All of the girl's could see Ryoga straining against something, his muscles bulging noticeably.
"I don't know, I just knew I could do this if I wanted to. I've just never had a reason to do it before or the monsters were to strong or fast to use it against them very effectively." Ranma turned back to Ryoga and considered his options. "I've had enough of you and everyone in Nerima Ryoga, your all totally insane. You jump to conclusions and attack me with barely any cause, just weird ideas that you make up in your head to justify your actions. I'm out of Nerima, I'm out of that stupidity and I wasn't nothing to do with it anymore. Go away and find Akari or Akane, Ryoga, and see if you can finally get a date or something because if you keep this up one of these days I will stop holding back just because I consider you a friend."
"I will never give up you honor less coward, I will destroy you and your life if it is the last thing I ever do!!" Ryoga hissed.
"Ranma, my computer is telling me that Ryoga is full of negative magic and power. He may be possessed in some way."
"If it's true it will explain his increase in power, but he's been like this since before I came to find Hotaru."
"Huh? I thought this happened to him while he was gone?" Hotaru said, a little scared of Ryoga.
"Nope, remember how I mentioned that he was stronger and faster during that fight at the mall? He's even faster now, at my level and that took me couple years of hard training to reach. He seems to have done it in two or three weeks and has had the last week or so to get even faster."
"Idiot, do you think I just wander around looking for you between fights or when you run away? I train and train up to twenty hours a day, I train at all dojo's I stumble across and always keep your punishment in mind. I have worked for this!" Ryoga snarled and stained again, this time Ranma wasn't able to hold him and broke free of whatever was holding him.
"No way, one doesn't improve that much in less than a month."
"Oh my god, look out!!" Ami screamed and tackled her friends just as a black lightning bolt fell out of the sky and hit Ryoga in the back. The boy screamed at the bolt didn't vanish, instead it continued for several seconds as it cooked him and blew Ranma and the girls away from Ryoga. Then the world exploded in flare of black energy, Ryoga's screaming could be heard, but Ranma had no idea what to do about it. He Just stayed down and prepared himself for whatever happened next, he had been in Nerima to long not to have learned caution.
He cracked his eyes open just in time to see the blackness vanish to reveal a smoking Ryoga, glowing with a greenish black aura, his eyes were a deep red. He takes a deep breath and starts to laugh as she stands up, black lightning arching around his body. "This is the day you die Ranma, I'm a hundred times more powerful now and even if you use all your strength your going to die by my hand."
"Ranma, whatever that stuff was it has taken over Ryoga just like a Youma or Daemon from a year or so back." Ami said as she and her friends transformed for the second time that day.
Ranma gulped and use his senses to see if she was right and had to hid his astonishment at what had happened to his friend. Ryoga had indeed become more powerful, he wasn't sure just how much, but it was far and above anything Saffron could have put out. The Lost Boy just laughed and vanished from sight, a second later he appears in front of Mercury and backhands her so hard she just drops to the ground in a spray of blood.
"Mercury!!" All the girl's scream in horror.
**********
She opened her eyes slowly and looked around weakly, there was an mask over her face supplying her with air. Looking around slowly she noticed that she was in a small round metal container filled with some kind of pinkish water. There was a barely heard beeping sound and the liquid started to flow out of the container, as soon as it was gone she reached up and removed her mask. A hatch opened up in front of her and she stepped out of the thing, naked as the day she was born. She was of medium height, had dark skin, and long blue hair that fell around her in damp waves.
At any other time she would have been swamped with drooling men, but since she was alone, she just walked over to a nearby box and opened it to reveal some weird clothing. Pulling these out she sat them to the side and ran her fingers through her hair and shook her head a little as she walked across the room and tapped a spot on the wall to make a small door open. Inside was a simple shower and she made use of this to the pinkish gel off her body and prepare herself for the day. Keeping her thoughts to herself she wondered why she had been revived, but decided she would find out soon enough. After several minutes she stepped out, dried off, and got dressed in her uniform.
The uniform was the same as the one she had been using for all her life, first came her skin tight black body suit that functioned as a bit of light weight armor. Next was the dark blue coat that she wrapped around herself and tied off with a black sash. Then came the boots and gloves, both made out of a special temperature resistive material that looked a lot like a thick kind of black spandex of some sort that glistened in the room's light. Long, long ago she had been able to use her power to transform into this uniform at will, but Kakome had locked her into her powered up form and changed her in ways she still didn't understand. Over time she had become so used to being like she was that it barely bothered her anymore, power corrupts and all that.
She smirked as she pulled a tray out of the box, it contained all of her 'weapons', first was the sword harness and it's sheath, then the regular belt she wrapped around her waist just under her sash that held all her little goodies. The sword was a masterpiece of technological design, made from the finest materials of her home planet from so long ago and one of the few things to survive her master's coming.
"Good morning, Commander Hibera." Said Lilith.
"Hello Lilith, what is going on?"
"The mistress wants you to eliminate some super powered beings if you can or keep them occupied until she finds a way to take them out without to much fuss."
"How many are there?"
"Currently 25 for so, but only five or six you will be facing right off the bat."
"I see, I will need all the info you have on them if I am able to do anything."
"That is understood, please make your way over to the conference room and I will brief you on the guardians."
The room was a few decks away and took her about twenty minutes to reach, it was a lot longer than it should have taken, but she had just woken up from an extended suspended animation and it would take her some days to get back into order and a few weeks to get back into shape completely. It was unlikely she would not be given the time to do so, but she would have a few days to get everything in order. It was the only drawback to being frozen like she and the others were, it was impossible to keep in shape when your asleep. The chemical bath she had just gotten out of was enough to revitalize her body, but it needed some real exercise before she would be back to 70% or so, right now she was at about 40% and in dire need of food.
"Lilith, is there any food available?"
"Of course, it has been set up in the conference room."
"Perfect."
*****
Ryoga lowered his arm and smirked evilly at the girls, his aura burning around him and growing darker by the moment. His skin had paled as his body grew a few inches and seemed to expand with muscle mass. "Keep out of this fight Sailors, you are not my enemy here. You butted in last time at the mall, stay out of this man to man fight, it is a matter of honor."
"You hit Mercury!" Moon yelled.
"She is the smartest one among you and the only one of all of you that could have figured out how to stop me from tearing Ranma limb from limb. I will not allow that, I did not kill her either, just knocked her out."
"I won't let you get away with this!" Saturn snarled. Her uncle was possessed or something, just like Ranma had been saying, now it seemed to be to late to help him, she could feel the rage flowing from him in waves.
Ryoga ignored her as he turned back to Ranma. "I want this to be our final battle Ranma, I finally found a way to correct the difference in our power levels."
"This is neither the time or the place Ryoga."
"I have been trying to beat your for nearly six years now, I want to finish this battle and move on and I can't do that while you are still standing."
Ranma looked into Ryoga's eyes for a few seconds and sighed, there was a steel there that hadn't been there in their last few fights. He nodded. "So be it, this will be our final fight."
"Ranma don't do this, we have to help him!" Moon said as she stepped between both boys.
"I'm sorry Sailor Moon, but we have to do this to satisfy honor." Ranma said.
Ryoga snorted. "Honor, right, your the enemy of all women. You use them and discard them with contempt, you insult them and hurt them, you and your honor have hurt more people than just me, but I will be putting you in your grave today Ranma."
Ranma smiles at Usagi and pushes her to the side. "Don't worry about me, Ryoga has been blaming me for his problems for a long time now. He is only able to see me as the bane of his existence, his enemy that he blames all his problems on. This is no different than any of those other fights, except this time neither of will be holding back as we fight."
"But..." Moon started.
"Please stay out of this Sailor Moon."
"Ranma, let us help, please!" Saturn pleaded.
"NO! Stay out of this, it has been building for some time now."
"Are you ready yet Ranma?" Ryoga whined and smirked.
"Shut up pig boy!"
"That won't work anymore, I'm no longer cursed, remember?" Ryoga said snidely.
Ranma took up a stance as the girls backed off to watch and wondered if they were doing the right thing. They didn't like this one bit, Ryoga was radiating enough negative power to let all of them feel it. Even without Mercury's computer it was easily detectible, they had to help some how, but Ranma wouldn't let them. As they moved Mercury out of the way Ranma and Ryoga launched themselves at each other and were nearly knocked off their feet from the back lash of energy as the two boys slammed into each other. Ryoga was like a bull as he moved, loud and dangers, while Ranma was glowing like a blue star, his clothing rippling under the power of his own aura.
They traded blows back and forth for several seconds, moving so fast that they were barely seen blurs to most people. Ranma tested Ryoga's new strength by leading him into one of the many little traps he had used to take the Lost Boy down before. Ryoga wasn't reacting like he usually did, this was pure hate and anger fueling him now and Ranma wasn't sure how to handle that. He and Ryoga had been fighting each other for a long time now, to test out new moves, to perfect others, and even work off stress. This was different and Ranma didn't like it, he didn't want to hurt Ryoga, no matter what he said to others. He had always thought Ryoga felt the same way even when he was threatening to kill him and stuff.
"Quit holding back Ryoga, I want to see what you can do before I take you down." Ranma said evenly.
"There is now holding back in this fight Ranma, you will die, there is no other choice."
"You may have been cured, but you obviously didn't learn anything from being the pig did you?"
"I don't think you quite understand what has happened to me do you Ranma?" Ryoga said with evil humor in his voice and swung his arm out to back hand Ranma.
Ranma twisted and dodged as he turned a confused look on his rival. "Why do you say that?"
"That black lightning filled me with power and shattered the barriers in my head that kept me from doing certain things. Since they no longer exist I can now kill and destroy anything I like and you won't be able to stop me. It freed my mind, it gave me power beyond yours, and I embraced it with out hesitation just so I could kill you!!" Ryoga snarled.
Then did the unexpected, he seemed to waver and Ranma's punches became useless as the Lost Boy stepped into his defenses and started to pound on him at amazing speeds. Ranma couldn't believe it as he found himself on the defensive, something he rarely was with Ryoga. Each of his blows felt as if they were ten times as powerful as what he had been doing before, he could feel each one of them as they landed and knew he wouldn't last long against this kind of power. Then Ryoga went into a lightning fast crouch and came up underneath him like an avenging angel and hit him with an upper cut that sent Ranma flying.
"RANMA!!" The Scouts screamed. They had all saw the small spray of blood that accompanied the blow and glared at the Lost Boy, he wouldn't get away with even if he was just possessed by something.
Ryoga just started to laugh. "He is beaten, I took him down after all this time!"
Ranma came down about a block away, impacting against a wall and shattering it with his body. A nearby water pipe broke and sprayed him with cold water, turning him into his female half. The red head groaned as she assessed the damage and cursed herself for letting her guard down against the idiot, she hadn't taken a blow like that in a very long time. She slowly pulled herself out of the rubble of the wall and staggered around a little, as she watched laughing boy proclaiming his victory. Ranma had to admit that it was also the first time Ryoga had ever come this close to beating her.
Ignoring her pain, Ranma gathered a quick ball of Ki in her hands and fired it at Ryoga. The little blue missile streaked down the block, Ranma running after it, and hit the Lost Boy in the chest. Ryoga was caught by surprise and blown off his feet with a grunt of pain, but Ranma was already in the air as he started to sit up and landed knee first on his chest and blowing all the air out of his lungs and using his Amaguriken to punch him in the face several hundred times per second. Ranma hadn't used this attack against Ryoga in a while, but the last time he had it had worked as well as usual, but this time Ryoga didn't even seem to feel it.
The palm of his hand came out of nowhere and slammed into Ranma's chin and sent her flying back, but she just cart wheeled and slid to a stop. She spit out some blood from her split lip and grinned, she hadn't had a decent fight in a long time and Ryoga knew how to do it best. He was one of the few people that could stand up to her when she really let loose and this possession seemed to have made his endurance even higher, it was like hitting a steel wall or a dump truck. Ryoga slowly growled as he made his way to his feet, his aura glowing a black/green color as he moved.
"Is that baby slap all you can do now Ranma, your female body is even weaker than your male one. How do you expect me to beat you up if one of my hits could break you like a piece of glass?"
"..." Ranma narrowed her eyes and felt her anger boil.
"Your weak and pathetic now, your still cursed, weak, and still being affected by the transformation. Do you find boys good looking in that form Ranma, Kuno perhaps, me, how about your friends at school?"
"Ryoga, your pushing the wrong buttons if you think that will work."
"They seem to be working to me, but if they don't work, how about I kill two birds with one stone and have my way with Akane? I still want her you know and using her to manipulate you is so easy. Just imagine her reaction when I have my way with her and her sisters Ranma, you are to weak to stop me and my revenge against you would be finished."
"If you touch them Ryoga, I will kill you just like I did Saffron." Ranma growled out.
"Sorry Ranma, but I have been thinking about Saffron and I know that he isn't as strong as he could have been. You interrupted his transformation and he 'hatched' as a weakling compared to what he could have been. Cologne, Hopposai, me, you, and perhaps Shampoo could have taken him down. Cologne especially since she taught you the move that took him out, your a pathetic weakling compared to what I am now and I will make you suffer for all eternity."
Before Ranma could even say anything Ryoga was in his face using her as a punching bag, his speed twice what it was before. She gasped and wondered what the hell was going on again, this just didn't seem to be her day. A knee to the chin and a kick to her ass send her sprawling into the pavement, giving her a taste of asphalt. Then Ryoga was there grabbing the back of her head and lifting her up into the air, squeezing her skull just to the point of crushing it with his bare hands. Ranma had to bite her tongue to keep from screaming in pain, she wouldn't give the pig the satisfaction of hurting her.
"How does it feel to be outclassed Ranma? This is what you make me feel like every time you beat me up, every time you call me a name or insult those I care about. You are going to suffer before I kill you."
Ranma could have sworn she heard her skull cracking under the pressure of Ryoga's hand and she was just a bit surprise to find that she was about to be killed. She hadn't been sure that Ryoga could actually ever do it, but the negative energy that Mercury had mentioned must have really screwed Ryoga up. She grit her teeth and looked deep in her mind and body for a way to survive, deeper and deeper she went until she could touch her soul and saw something that she had never seen before. She sent a mental hand out to examine it and was surprised when it leapt up and seemed to swell and heave inside her.
Laughing insanely, Ryoga crowed and slammed Ranma's head into the ground and shattered the concrete in all directions. Lifting the limp body up he repeated the action several times and turning Ranma's face to a bloody pulp, laughing all the while at this victory. Behind him the Scouts watched in frozen horror as Ranma was killed and Sailor Moon was having problems convincing herself to stay out of the fight like Ranma had requested. She had doubts and that was bad, a friend was being killed right before her and she didn't know what she should do. She had made a promise, but this was getting out of hand and it was obvious to her that Ranma was about to die. She made the only decision she could and started to step forward...
"Stop..."
Sailor Moon spun around to look at Mercury as she opened her eyes. "Mercury?"
"D-don't go over there Moon, Ranma is planning something, I can feel it."
Mars, who was about to go and help Usagi nodded. "I can feel something too, but I don't know what it is."
"Ranma is about to die, we have to save her."
There is a ruffling of cloth and Tuxedo Mask appears right behind Sailor Moon and holds her. "Do not interfere in this Sailor Moon, Ranma and Ryoga have to settle this alone no matter what has happened to one or the other. They would not want you to interfere in their fight."
"...But Ryoga is possessed!"
"Then we will take him down after Ranma has failed. He is a man, even with his curse, and will push himself to the limits to win this fight. They both agreed to do so and this is the price, let them finish."
"I...I...can't..." Sailor Moon said and hung her head and called her scepter. "I have to save both of them and I won't let either of them die."
"Then wait until Ranma is unconscious." Tuxedo Mask said.
"...No, I will do this now..." Moon said and pushed him out of the way as the others watched.
The rest of the Scouts stood and nodded, following Sailor Moon's lead as she stepped around her boyfriend and looked at the fight. They were her friends, Hotaru's family, and she would not let either one of them die...
Then something happened and they all froze in shock, their eyes nearly popping out and their jaws hitting the ground. Ranma's blue aura has flared up as Ryoga tried to crush her head and she screamed, not in pain, but as a release. Blue light lit up the area until it turned white and blasted into them, blowing them off their feet. Ranma's scream increased in volume until it was loud enough to shatter glass and could be heard through out a good portion of the city. Then...
KKKKKKKAAAAAA-BBBBBBOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMM!!!!!
The world exploded.
Only Usagi saw the flare of the Pluto symbol on Ranma's forehead.
**********
End Notes - Dont jump to conclusions just yet, this will be explained in a chapter or two. ^^;