This story is a work of fanfiction. As such, it owes a great debt to the creators of the characters used herein: Rumiko Takahashi, Matt Bozon, Erin Bell Bozon and the creative teams of Kity Films and WayForward.
( 。◕ シーンブレイク ◕。)
Chapter 7
Wishsplosion Fallout
A pile of bodies was groaning, twitching, on the stone floor of a tiny dark room. The only light was coming from pre-dawn sky criss-crossed by the frame of a circular window. Violet sparks swarming in the air like a cloud of carrion flies weren't illuminating anything.
Nabiki was the first one to stir. She crawled on her shaky hands to the nearest wall to sit up leaning on it. Her feet were still touching the pile of bodies: this circular room was barely three meters in diameter.
"I suppose," the middle Tendou hissed, wincing each time a violet spark dove into her head, "this answers my unhealthy curiosity which I had no chance to satisfy: Could I lose my cool because of pain?" She rubbed her temples knocking her hat onto the back of her head.
"Nmnghh," Shantae groaned, draped awkwardly over one of two posts of a hammock-like bed. "Sleechadoo..."
The next one to come provisionally awake was Ranma, trying awkwardly to get from under entangled Ukyou, Xian Pu and Akane. He wasn't having success.
"Ow, it hurts so much," Akane breathed out trying unsuccessfully to disentangle herself from the other two fiancees. "Like nails hammered into my head."
"Mmph-mmph," Shantae moaned, twitching. Neither her hands nor feet were reaching the floor.
"The ah..answer, it, turns out, is a resounding no," Nabiki grit out, rising up on shaky legs even as it evidently caused a new pang of migraine. "Not even like this? I wond—" She hit a circular beam running along the ceiling and almost fell, hands grasping, blinded by pain. "Ng..Not even this...? It's always nice to know you'd stay aware through even most grievous harm. Isn't that hilarious." There was not a gram of humor in her voice. Stumbling like drunk she walked up to the window. She had to lean down to look outside, which made her freeze for a moment, blinded by screws twisting into her brain. "I can barely see, it's too dark." She slowly, carefully turned around to face Ranma lying on his back, his legs buried under the pile of fiancees. "My pupils are probably like tiny dots."
"Beware of the hole," he hissed in reply. "To the left of you."
Nabiki turned her uncooperative eyes there to see a circular hole in the floor she just barely avoided. There was a rope hanging into it from the darkness-enshrouded ceiling.
"So that's why there is no door," Nabiki commented as she hobbled towards the bed, stepping around the pile of girls and stepping over Ranma with difficulty. Reaching her goal she grabbed Shantae by her hand to begin tugging, wincing each time she exerted herself. Finally she managed to dislodge the half-Genie girl from the post — it was a good thing it was crowned with a big round ball. The dancer flopped onto the hammock with her belly, hanging across it precariously for a moment before toppling head-first onto the stone floor wit a dull thud. Her legs followed pushing Nabiki into the wall. The middle Tendou clonked her head against the ceiling beam again and barely managed to turn her fall into controlled sliding down the wall.
"Don't push yourself," Ranma advised. "Wait until it passes."
The violet sparks kept diving into the heads but there were noticeably less of them.
"I was curious," Nabiki replied sitting there, leaning against the wall with her eyes closed. "I just jumped at the occasion."
"What happened?" Akane asked plaintively, ceasing her struggles to avoid further pangs. "Where are we?"
"What happened...?" Nabiki replied acidly without opening her eyes. "We just gathered around an inexperienced, half-educated Genie doing her strongest mojo. What, I wounder, could have went wrong...? well, except throwing us all into a different reality or, say, into the Sengoku Jidai era...? How could it be? Everything was supposed to go without a hitch!"
"Big Sis Nabiki," Akane moaned. "Please... I beg you, explain it in simple words for the brain-addled. It hurts."
"Meh..." Nabiki let out an irritated breath, then explained, massaging her temples: "What is wrong with us? The learn-a-new-language-in-a-minute magic. Remember how pained Shantae was when she learned to speak Japanese? Endure it for fifteen minutes or so and the pain will pass. Where are we? Probably in deep shit. We got spirited away, Little Sis. There is sea outside, with small islands. I can't say more, my vision was blurry. Over our heads..." She lifted her head opening her eyes. "Are clotheslines with pantaloons and—" She fell silent abruptly. "Now I know we are in deep shit. Because beside pantaloons there are two pairs of suspiciously familiar red pants."
"So what?" Akane moaned in the voice of someone suffering. "Talk simple, all right...?"
"Where would you expect to find a clothesline with Shantae's spare pants?" Nabiki hinted in an exaggeratedly nice voice.
"At Shantae's... home..." Akane realized.
"Welcome," the half-Genie mumbled trying to move. Her words carried weird doubling overtones, inducing new pangs of headache.
"Well, we're all alive," Ranma declared with optimism. "And healthy, except the headache that should pass soon... Shantae, are you all right?"
"Weakness..." the dark-complexioned girl groaned. "Give me the purple vial. It's there, on the table..."
Wincing — was the pain receding already? — Nabiki reached for a round, low table that could've been called coffee table if it wasn't so ridiculously massive. She passed their host a round crystal vial with a thin neck, it was the only one among many vials and bottles on the table that looked remotely purple.
Shantae took it with her barely moving hands, pulled the stopper out with her teeth and uppended it into her mouth. Her eyes bulged. Then filled with tears. She was whimpering but stubbornly gulping the potion down. Finally she lowered the vial, sat straighter and replaced the stopper. And then she let out a shuddering breath of very real flame, singing the hammock net.
"Umm, are you sure you're all right?" Ranma grew worried.
"No, but now I can at least move," Shantae replied honestly, standing up with a groan. Then, looking at Akane, she gave a warning for her personally: "Remember the healing potion...? Well, don't even think of drinking this one unless you are a powerful mage. Not only it restores health, but also mana, over the top. I just drank three times more than you need to spring up from being almost dead..."
"Why so much?" Nabiki asked suspiciously. "What is wrong with you if even a triple doze haven't healed you fully?"
"I think I over-strained my Genie half," Shantae explained. "I'm unhurt and bursting with mana, but... Yeah, I think I won't be able to transform for a long while, and forget granting wishes. Well, at least we are at my place and not in the middle of the swamps where zombies are crawling from under every bump."
"Zombies?" Ukyou moaned from the fiancee pile. "Ran-cha, what trouble have I got into?"
"Don't you have them in your world?" Shantae was surprized. "I thought you simply don't let them into cities." She edged towards the window stepping over legs and bodies. "Yeah, here it is, Scuttle Town, right where it should be and looking whole. I'm definitely back home."
"It could have been not whole?" Ranma inquired warily.
"Well, if it was on fire it would've meant I had to run repel the invasion," Shantae explained in inappropriately airy tone. "And Mayor Scuttlebutt could've fired me again for chasing pirates away too late." She sighed. "Why does it always become apparent only after half the town is already in flames and monsters are running rampant?"
No one of the Nerimans had a reply to that.
"Half the comic books are missing," their host began taking stock of her inventory, glaring suspiciously at the only bookshelf, a massive, rough board. "My Silk Hair Creme is missing... Fell behind?" She peeked beyond the table. "No. And—" She bumped her head against a large dangling construct of many frames and nick-knaks hanging on threads, from sea shells to tinfoil stars. "And where is my lucky sprocket...? I remember it clearly as I hung it place of this sea shell here...! Was Rotty poking around my home again? I'll show her..."
The headache was receding, the dawn beyond the window was growing brighter. The Nerimans could now see that the ceiling in the room was cone-shaped, supported by many sloped beams resting on the thick ring beam, curving sharply into a dark depression in the center. Obviously they were in a tower with a cone-shaped roof that had a protrusion at the top.
"Do you live in a tower?" Ranma asked, curious.
"Yeah, it was a lighthouse long time ago," Shantae replied distractedly, looking around for anything else missing. Lifting her eyes towards the ceiling she frowned even more: "Two pairs...?" She pulled her red pants from her subspace pocket, the pair she hadn't chance to wear since washing as she still wore Ranma's black silk pants. "Now I have three pairs of hakama...? I'm completely stumped!"
"I would be quite grateful if some of the present company been so kind to stop lying on me," Xian Pu injected.
"Huh?" Ukyou shook off her stupor. "Let's get free... Err, just move your arm, I need—"
"That is my leg," Akane clarified. "Whoa... How did we end entangled into such a knot?"
Coordinating their effort, the three fiancees managed to untangle from each other.
"I'm much obliged," Xian Pu quiped. "I have no idea how would I fare without your expeditious help."
"Easy there, sugar," Ukyou snubbed her. "I ain't too fond of you too, you know."
"I am merely glad I can speak like a normal, civilized human being," the amazon bit back. "And be understood by everyone!"
"Of course!" Nabiki snapped her fingers. "You got a whole new language crammed into your head by magic! How is it called, by the way?"
"Oyghul... I think," Shantae replied. "I never thought of it, I thought of it as simply human speech."
"Hey, I'm still sitting on someone!" Ukyou exclaimed in alarm.
"Bu-kiii," P-chain let out a strangled oink.
"Oh, poor Ryo—" Ranma made scary eyes at her making Ukyou remember and shut herself up. "Are you all right there, sugar?" She carefully rolled off the piglet.
"P-suke?" Ranma asked carefully, trying to tell if there was intellect behind the pig eyes.
"Bu-kiiiii‼!" the enraged piglet leaped aiming to bite him in the arm.
"Yeah, I see that you are P-suke." Ranma said fending off his pounces.
"Ranma!" Akane berated habitually, without thinking. "Come here, P-chan..."
Oinking victoriously, the piglet jumped into her lap to lie there, being petted.
Ranma felt a dreadful suspicion but he couldn't voice it because, frustratingly, Shantae was convinced that P-chan was a separate youkai and not Ryouga's curse. He had to find a roundabout way to check. Noticing a jug on the low table he grabbed it, sniffed the contents, then asked Shantae for good measure: "It's water in here, right?"
"Yes, why?" she said, surprised.
Instead of replying, Ranma upended the jug over huis head.
The suspicion proved true.
"Shantae, where is the lamp?" girl Ranma asked severely, shaking water from her soaked red hair.
"It's in my—" The half-Genie girl gasped, paling. "It's not there... It's gone. And if the magic is back..."
"Then where is Happousai now?" Ranma finished.
"Maybe the wish haven't affected the lamp" Akane suggested with timid hope. "And it simply stayed back home?"
"But what sort of wish was it?" Nabiki raised a question as she took her fedora off spinning it on her index finger. "I, for one, clearly remember being dressed in sports shirt and shorts. While I have no memories of having an Indiana Jones costume in my wardrobe..." She grasped around her belt. "With even the whip included. Let's first figure out what went wrong."
Everyone finally paid attention to the fact the middle Tendou was dressed is light beige shirt with ith sleeves rolled up, dark trousers of rough fabric and heavy shoes. That's not counting the fedora.
"And you, Little Sis," Nabiki added, "were definitely not dressed in your gi."
"I really am!" the other girl exclaimed in surprise as she realized she was dressed in her yellowish-greenish off-white gi. "But it should be in the laundry now!" There were wooden sandals on her feet.
They all started checking themselves but there were no more outfit changes. Xian Pu was still in her waitress dress with apron. Ukyou was still in her working clothes of black tights and blue robe with its sleeves bunched up wit white ties. Ranma was holding her kung-fu slippers, several sizes too big for her girl form.
Other than that, they found a box a cabbage and Ukyou's battle spatula lying to the side at the wall.
"What sort of tricky sorcery it was," the `cute` fiancee wondered aloud, puzzled, as she grabbed her weapon slash tool. "I'm glad the spatula is with me, though." She shot a brief glance at Xian Pu who arrived unarmed. The latter noticed it and snorted self-confidently.
"Let's get this in order," Nabiki said putting the hat onto her head. "Shantae broke the curse and destroyed the pendant, right?"
Everyone nodded in agreement.
"She then tried pulling something else off, with so much oomph we all started sparkling. I clearly remember seeing Ukyou-kun through her spatula."
"There was also a girl's outline appearing in the air," Ranma added. "Wait, could it be that amazon whose soul—"
"But the Genies have no power over life and death, right?" Xian Pu asked with trepidation.
"Over souls," Shantae corrected. "You can't wish someone back to life because trying to return the soul with Genie magic is like scooping water with a butterfly net. But her soul was right there, at arm's reach... Well, I couldn't help myself."
"Yeah, the mojo was so mighty it dragged us along for the ride," Ranma agreed. "I just dont understand, why. I don't remember saying any wishes."
"Weeell..." the Genie girl interwove her fingers sheepishly. "I think I understand now how it works. My magic, it's Light and it fulfils a true wish coming from your heart... Well, so..."
"Oooh, what a magnificient trap!" Nabiki face-palmed dramatically. "You don't have to say anything more, it is clear as day. Me, I was craving for adventures in the depth of my heart. Little Sis wanted to fight side to side with you. Ranma wished to protect her. These two... It's obvious. One after another, it wasn't just one wish, they cascaded like dominoes."
"Looks like it," Ranma agreed. "But how did that affect the lamp?"
"Well... I also wished for that accursed lamp to be gone," Akane admited, shuffling from foot to foot sheepishly. "And that there wasn't all that pain it caused Shantae..."
The mentioned girl gasped. Then she dashed to the rope to slide down into the darkness of the lower floors. A few seconds later there was a snap and stone floor lit with dim reddish light became visible beyond the round hole, only about three meters below.
"I'm going," Ranma said in a no-nonsense tone as she slid down after their host. "Hey, what's wrong? Why are you shaking...? Is that thing dangerous...?"
After that Ukyou and Xian Pu scrambled to follow her, jostling each other, Ukyou's spatula clanging loudly against the edge.
"Big Sis Nabiki—" Akane began.
"Just go," she waved her concern aside. "I had enough practice climbing ropes during P.E."
Every girl in turn arrived in haste only to see Shantae staring at a large, ostrich-sized sky-blue egg with red polka dots. And everyone who arrived before staring at her in puzzlement. The half-Genie girl was looking at the egg with so much horror it felt like she was staring at her own death.
Nabiki was the last one to slide down carefully. She took stock of her surroundings. It was a tiny kitchen, not much larger in diameter than the room above, lit by a kerosene lantern hanging from the ceiling. The walls were lined with cupboards and dressers with a few mugs, plates and other utensils on them. There was a construct of a huge cauldron and smaller woks hanging from the ceiling, swaying after someone of the fiances bumped their head against it. There was a huge brass bell the size of human head hanging above the round-topped door. Opposite the door there was a rounded oven built of rough stones, its massive iron smoke-pipe zig-zagging into the back wall. The egg was on the oven, nested in several blankets bunched up around it.
A million dollar question: what was so scary about this egg? A monster could hatch? Unlikely, it looked more like Shantae was caring for the egg, placing it atop the oven that should have kept warmth since— Nabiki walked rapidly up to the oven and touched its side. It was barely but warm. Which meant...
"We landed in your past, haven't we?" the middle Tendou stated. "A bad moment...? What should we be ready for?"
The rest of the Nerima Wrecking Crew stared at her, realization dawning why their host was so afraid. It wasn't the egg she feared!
"It's..." Shantae shook her stupor off. "It's a disaster! Today at noon Uncle will uncover the lamp's existence by mistake!"
"But the sun isn't even up!" Ranma retorted. "We can warn him!"
"And the Pirate Master haven't awakened yet," Shantae added, her voice trembling.
"That bad?" Ranma asked worriedly, not yet aware of the scale of the scimitar of Damocles hanging over their heads.
"Last time all it took was my magic turned dark and scattered across the world. This time around... If Happousai had been scattered... He will rise from his grave much sooner!"
"All right, let's go over this again from the begginning," Nabiki butted in, wary of the conversation degenerating into a self-sustaining squabble. "Who is that master and why is he so fearsome?"
"It's... He's... When..." Shantae, it seems, was at loss of words to convey how deep they were.
"Start from who sent him to that grave," Nabiki suggested.
Shantae stopped trying to describe indescribable and sighed. "When I was... very little, I guess, all Genies gathered together to seal that monster. Because no one else could beat him. They had to sacrifice their bodily shells and pass away into the Genie realm. It wouldn't work otherwise, he is that dreadfully mighty. Since then there are no more Genies in the Sequin Land. Well, except me..."
"How much is dreadfully?" Ranma asked her warily, mindful of beasts out there, like the recently encountered Orochi, you could only run away from, baiting them away from your comrades. You are lucky if there is an artifact around for dealing with that particular beast.
"Dreadfully is when your skin crawls from one look at his true form," Shantae explained grimly. "When the top of his hat is higher than the Sultana's palace even as he leaned down to better squash you. When sky turns pitch black from horizon to horizon at his approach and the land is swarmed with strong monsters. And you are standing before him knowing that you are the only one who can harm him because he is invincible against anything but the Light magic of the Genies. And you can only do it close and personal, with your hair."
Xian Pu was going to say something but Nabiki forestalled her "Wait, you speak like you fought him before! Is that why you were so intimidated?"
"We got very, very lucky that time with Ammo Baron's Palace Disruptor Cannon," Shantae said. "Twitch and Vinegar were hitting the enemy straight in the eye. That could not harm him, but I had time to climb up across bones and correct his face while he was blinking it out."
"Across bones?" Ukyou asked, puzzled.
"Palace Disruptor Cannon?" Akane asked incomprehendingly.
"But what—" Ranma tried to ask.
"All right, not everyone at once!" Nabiki interrupted them, gradually growing irritated because she had to take the role or the only sane woman instead of taunting them artfully from behind Ranma's wide back.
"It was when Ammo Baron decided yet again to take over the world," Shantae explained. "I have no idea why the thought his conquest had to start with demolishing the Sultana's palace, he just did. Got the mayor addicted to chocolate, over the town and rebuilt Scuttle Town into Ammo Town. Made the retirement center into an artillery fort, the vile villain. Then he stuck a terrificaly long range supercannon on top of the tallest tower that could have leveled the palace in one shot. Thankfully, he didn't hit the palace, because he contracted Techno Baron to make one very important thingie for it. But Techno Baron subcontracted it to Bolo... Yeah, that's Bolo for you. He made it so upside down and inside out that instead of the palace the cannon hit Techno Baron himself who was taking a stroll near his lair on the Frostbite Island. Scarily long range!"
"How large is the palace?" Xian Pu asked. "Just for the scale."
Shantae fell silent for a minute, thinking.
"About fifteen times higher than my lighthouse. And much thicker."
"And you brought such a monster down?" Ranma was impressed. "With your hair?"
"Well, it's like picking at a watermelon with a tea spoon," the half-Genie found an analogy. "With enough determination and patience you'd finish eating it. The watermelon isn't trying to squash you like a bug, though..."
"If there's even a tiny chance," Ukyou declared, "we should try offing such enemy before he crawls out!"
"Even better would be preventing him from awakening altogether," Xian Pu added. "Also, shouldn't we continue this conversation outside? It's dark and stuffy in here and we are crowding like conspirators around a lone candle."
"Yeah, right!" Shantae made for the door but stopped so abruptly she had to wave her arms for balance. "No! I won't leave it this time!" She returned to the egg to begin fiddling with towels, making an underslung harness for carrying it.
"What are you doing?" Ranma asked.
"Well, I promised to sit it," Shantae explained like it was obvious. She finally managed to nest the egg snugly on her belly.
"Going to play a pregnant bird?" Xian Pu couldn't help herself.
"Yes...! No...! Idea...! Hold it." She stuck the egg into Ranma's hands, jumped up and climbed the rope upstairs.
"What's with her?" Akane grew worried.
"Soon we will know." The redhead shrugged. "Cluck-cluck." She stuck the egg under her undershirt and crossed her arms over it with exaggerated self-importance. "Cluck."
Involuntary smiles banished the atmosphere of a gloomy, barely illuminated crypt. This was just kitchen, if utterly primeval one in Nabiki's opinion.
Shantae clambered down with a bunch of several more towels and the ornate bed cover. Raising furious activity she wrapped her head in a weirdly elongated turban hiding her hair completely. Then she took the egg back, added more towels, wrapped the bed cover around herself and became quite unrecognizable.
"An excellent disguise of a pregnant woman in a shawl," Nabiki approved, one brow lifted. "But why? Is there a reason for it, or just for the fun of it?"
"I was hinking," Shantae explained as she tucked a tassel torn from the pillow roll under her turban so that it looked like a lock of chestnut hair. "What if Risky had already infiltrated the town in disguise? All her "ho-ho-ho, men, charge!" is really an act for the public. In truth she can make plans so cunning you can't help feeling awed. She could very well have already stolen the lamp yesterday, then planted it for Uncle to reveal it instead whatever he was going to, just to steal it again, making a racket in front of large crowd of witnesses..."
"Revealed?" Akane was puzzled. "How does that work?"
"Well, when there is a Relic Hunter Expo they crack some fossil open in front of public revealing the rarity inside," Shantae explained heading for the door. "He will have cracked today something he thought was the most recent relic he obtained but turned out to be the lamp. Then Risky Boots crashed through the ceiling right on cue! And snatched the lamp!" Hefting a massive bar aside she flung the door open letting in the fresh sea air and the pink glow of dawn. "I lock the door against the mermaids. If you forget to, they can barge in at night and break all your tableware!"
The five displaced girls and one not quite piglet made their first step under the sky of this new world. The lighthouse — its roof turned to be covered in scarlet tiles — was standing atop a grassy rock together with a couple palm trees. There waves rolling some ten meters below were of modest size, not oceanic. The surrounding sea was picturesque with many protruding rocks and islets. Some distance ahead there was rocky shore of the mainland covered in jungle, steep grassy rolling hills towering in the distance. The town was stretching to the left, its houses and towers the color of terracotta interrupted in places with sheer cliffs overgrown with weeds. Further to the left, white sails of fishing boats could be seen. The ubiquitous palm trees, the onion-shaped tower tops and fancy window shapes were giving it somewhat Arabian air.
"I suspect the climate here is like Okinawa," Ukyou concluded. "If not hotter."
"Let's go!" Shantae called them as she headed to a hanging bridge connecting this rock with a neighboring one. She then strolled across rotten planks without a care in the world, hopping merrily over yawning gaps.
"Aaand, the adventure begins," Nabiki stated with all the enthusiasm of a dead cactus.
