Brief A/N:
Frodo and Mary Sue live!…in the Poconos.
If you haven't, please reread chapter 8. There was a major rewrite.
This is a short transition chapter.
A Horse and His CabbitRaising Kaine
RanmaRanmaRanmaRanmaRanmaRanmaThe bomb was launched as Tsunami stepped out of Funaho's trunk. She had been weakened when forcibly separated from Sasami and would have perished had not Funaho been nearby. The tree sensed the incoming weapon and called on her own lighthawk wings to form a dome shield to protect her goddess and a large area around and below herself. The shield went opaque as the area outside went white in explosive violence.
As the weapon spent itself outside, Tsunami fell to her hands and knees, weeping. It was up to her sister and their friends to save her children, Jurai and herself. One of her second generation trees had been suborned by something evil and, like a spear in the gut, left her helpless, awaiting an end.
The three cabbit ships were accelerating down the wormhole, gaining on the wooden ship. Ranma was in the lead. Inside his environmental dome, his holographic image looked back at his mother, Washu and Nobuyuki.
"Ranma, what's your status?"
His image flickered a bit. "All of my systems are at peak efficiency thanks to the equalization Lin-chan and I went through. I'm set for several hundred years at maximum output. However my neutronium reserves need building up. Why is RyoOhki so small?" The image wavered and went out with a spark. Seconds later it returned. "Sorry about that. I just reestablished contact with LinOhki. We exchanged a hundred sixty petabytes of information and I had to assimilate it."
"Impressive Ranma. Can I have your permission to access your computer systems from my terminal? Mine are temporarily unavailable in this wormhole, but yours might be sufficient."
"Sure. Just a second…Lin-chan and Ryo-chan said that they will link all nonessential systems with me. Will that help?"
"Yeah, it just might put us over the top." The young looking genius brought up her keyboard and monitor and frantically danced her fingers across the board. The increase in activity in Ranma's subsystems increased to their theoretical maximum and one subsystem responded by increasing capacity and advancing his haleuristics far beyond Washu's original design specs. She had no idea where the logarithmic increase in computing power was coming from, but she damn well would use it. New sensor array crystals formed on Ranma's exterior surfaces and new weapon systems grew and mutated as evolution was speeded up a million-fold.
Soon Washu shouted, "Got it!"
Washu told Ranma, "Its an old enemy that I thought was gone forever. Apparently he was able to possess a minor noble of Jurai and subvert a second generation ship. Its name is Kaine and he must have been able to recover enough power to trap the royal family on earth in crystal prisons and tap their power. I don't know what we can do to defeat him and save them without killing them. If Sasami dies, Tsunami may never recover and the empire will be easy pickings for any two bit despot that comes along."
"Are they fully surrounded by these crystals?" asked Ranma.
"Yes, they're in a stasis pocket inside. Why?"
"Isn't that ship made of organics?"
"Its all made of wood, super dense wood, nevertheless."
"Well, Lin chan and I have about 100 grams of aetherium each and at least a ton of elerium…"
"So a kilo of elerium in a shape charge around a couple grams of aetherium and he will lose the ship and the body that he is using. The light hawk wings won't stop the anti-omega rays from doing their work. That's brilliant, though it won't set Kaine back much at this point. He has four members of the royal family as living batteries. That is the problem. By the time we beat him down they will be dead, drained of all their energy and he will still have his own restored native power."
Ranma said, "We need to figure a way to cut him off from them, to interrupt the drain, right? Surely the greatest scientific genius in the universe could figure something out."
"I'll be working on it."
"Hey Lin-chan, Ryo-chan come here."
Two more holo images appeared. "What have you got in mind Ranma?"
"You have the data. Any ideas on saving our friends?"
LinOhki spoke up, his hologram was definitely male now, "I have a hole shot that I was saving for us, but we could take them out of the fight completely." Mentally he told Ranma, 'This is something I don't want Washu or anyone else to know about, here's the data…' Washu could tell that data was streaming but the encryption was beyond her, for now.
"I see." Said Ranma. "You'll have to be close in to do that. Well Ryo-chan and I can distract him but you will probably only have one shot at this. Work with KhoLun to see if you can combine stealth techniques with her. MaoLin was just learning the basics when she merged with my former self and I believe that we can integrate human ki techniques into this war."
"Washu-chan, can you maintain the science station and keep looking for weaknesses to exploit? You may be our final hope for victory when it's all said and done."
Being stroked brought the young-old woman's aura up, "Sure thing! We'll show that criminal that he can't get away with this. After all, I'm the greatest scientific genius in this or any other universe. Buwahhahahahaha!" 'And I'll see what they are trying to hide from 'mother'. "Buwahhahahahaha!" The holograms both had digital sweatdrops at the second laugh.
Ranma then turned to his mother and Noboyuki, "Mom, Noboyuki-san, hopefully you will be okay in this coming battle to prevent a war. Please buckle into the seats there." A crystalline pod, open on the side facing the big screens and forward out the environmental dome, rose from the floor. "I hope that this will be enough to keep you safe no matter what happens to the rest of us."
"I have full faith and trust in you son. I plan on having lots of grandchildren to spoil. And, I want to be able to lavish motherly love on you, as well, for being all the son I could never have imagined and the daughter I never had." She whispered to Noboyuki, "I'm sure that my son, his friends and her family will save your loved ones."
The nervous man just strapped himself in and shuddered at the memories of his previous meeting with the monster that had cost him his wife at too young an age.
The cabbits were gaining on the second generation ship when they all passed the event horizon of the wormhole's exit. Revealed, was the Jurai home world with its butterfly rings of satellites, stations, and colonies. All cabbits went "Uh Oh!"
Ranma said, "You know what to do! Let's get them back and kick his ass!" LinOhki faded from sight and RyoOhki and Ranma spiraled away. Ranma played his opening gambit by firing hundreds of tiny missiles. Kaine's ship took apparent notice by extending three light hawk wings. At about that time the aetherium bomb detonated, after going around thirty degrees from the far side of the enemy. A wave of energy overtook the wooden ship and all space trees heard the keening of the disintegrating ship.
Where the Juraian ship had been, was a writhing black mass with a frowning white noh mask. "WHO DARES".
Ranma sent back, "I do, and I'm gonna kick your ass cause Ranma Saotome doesn't lose."
And the battle began.
12JAN2006
