Ranma ½

I Saw a Light Shining and Thought of You.

A R1/2 and GGX/XX crossover. I own none of the characters, so do not try to get any money from me. I am truly sorry for the heavy flashback parts, I feel it is the only way to accomplish what I want from this. On to Chapter 3, and beyond.

Chapter 3: Pain is Modern Day Love.

Ryouga grumbled as he drew himself up from the ground and brushed himself off, he had been thinking of that day again. He was not sure what was so memorable about it but it seemed to be taking up a lot of his normal thinking. She was good looking sure, if in a tragic kind of way, and she was strong, but he had met other women that were strong also. There was just something about her that was different, something he could not put a finger on. Sighing he shook his head and continued to walk. He was not even sure where he was going anymore. Perhaps he was searching for a reason to his life, perhaps he was just looking for another place to rest his head. He just did not know anymore, everyone was gone, he was the only one left, well him and Shampoo. He seriously doubted that she would even remember him.

Thinking hard could take its toll on you, especially when it caused you to miss signs that you were headed towards a cliff. Ryouga yelled as he felt the ground give way beneath him and looked down to see a pool of water below him. This caused him to yell even more until he hit the surface and caused a huge splash to fly into the air. A few minutes later a small black pig with a yellow and black bandanna on and dragging a backpack appeared from the side of the pond and started to take a small stove and a pot from its backpack. It was difficult but he eventually set it up so that he could boil some water and change back to his human form. When the water finally boiled he tipped the water over on himself and with a shimmer he was back in his original form. Dressing in his spare clothes and hanging the wet clothes he had dragged from the pond along with the backpack, Ryouga decided to make some food. As he made the food his mind drifted back to that day long ago.

When she woke there was a lot of pain that accompanied her awareness, like the fact that it felt as if she had been thrown into a stone wall by a very strong opponent… Oh yeah, that had been dumb. Of course she had been drunk at the time, she still was drunk for that matter, so she was not surprised that she had done something like that. The question was the fact that she seemed to be in her own room, wrapped in bandages from wherever a person would get bandages in a place like this. She tried to get up but found that she was a little weak to do such a thing so she just lay back and grumbled.

"You're awake, huh?" It was his voice that spoke to her from the side, "Sorry about the hit, I got a little angry and that tends to happen."

The woman looked from him to the ceiling above her, "Yeah, can't say I didn't deserve it though."

Ryouga looked over at her in surprise, he was silent at the comment as he was not sure what it meant. It seemed as though she was referring to how she was acting earlier, at least at first, but now there seemed to be some deeper meaning in the way she said the words. With a sigh he turned away from her again and closed his eyes, why must things always be so difficult.

"What kind of pain does a person have to go through to be like that?" Ryouga asked in an offhanded manner, "I can tell you've had it rough just by looking at you."

"Well you're whole village has to be wiped out before you're eyes for starters," The woman said sadly, "Then you have to lose an eye and an arm before you swear vengeance on the man who did such a thing to you."

Ryouga nodded, "I see, I'm sorry for the painful memories, please get some rest."

"I'm still drunk you know," the woman said absently.

The man grunted once, "Yeah, I had some also, not bad stuff for forgetting painful memories."

"I know," the woman said, "Could you give me some more."

At this the man was caught, on one hand he was not sure that she should have some, on the other hand he did not want her to get angry in her current state, not like it would hurt that much anyways, right, "Alright, just as long as you promise to rest."

The woman took the cup with the drink in it and sipped at it for a bit as Ryouga poured himself some more, "So why are you drinking?"

The man looked up at the question and shrugged, "Well I just lost a person who was probably the only link to my past and a friend. I think I have a right to drink. By the way, what was you're name again?"

"Baiken," the woman said after a drink of alcohol, "It seems you've lost a lot also."

Ryouga took a deep drink and responded, "Well, a lot of people have lost a lot. Genocide is never pretty. I'm going outside so you can rest."

"Alright," The woman responded before she finished the drink quickly and closed her eyes.

"Good night, Baiken," Ryouga said as he walked outside.

Outside the door was a window that seemed designed by a giant, a strange thing to have in a base that housed mercenaries. Ryouga walked up to it and looked outside to see that it was snowing even harder than it had been earlier that day. Days like this always made him long for the company of others, something about the snow made him more lonely than usual. He had no idea how long he stood and stared, drinking as he did so, but when he looked down at his empty cup he knew then that something was missing from his life. Friends and family were all gone and the life he once knew had ended with a single swipe of a blade. It had been years since he had seen any of them, or even paid respects, Ryouga ran a hand through his messed up hair. It had been so hard for him and the whole time he had been on his own.

"It always makes me feel lonely when I look at this kind of scene," Baiken's voice said suddenly from behind him, "Sorry for not doing as you said, I always was bad at that kind of thing."

Ryouga turned to her and shrugged, "No, it's alright, you probably feel the same way I do right now."

"How's that?" The woman asked.

"Lonely, needing someone to talk to, angry at yourself for the way everything has turned out," Ryouga looked like he wanted to go on but stopped, "Sorry."

Baiken took a big long gulp out of the bottle she was holding and wiped her mouth, "Yeah, that pretty much sums it up. I guess we're a pair of losers, huh?"

Ryouga chuckled, "Yeah, pretty pathetic."

The silence that went on between them after that was not uncomfortable, it was a silence that two people shared when all they wanted was one another's company. They looked at the snow falling for a long time, so intently that neither of them noticed the way they slowly crept closer. Then Ryouga felt the two of them bump and he snapped back to reality with an embarrassed blush crossing his face.

"Sorry, I didn't realize I was closing in on you," The man said as he backed off quickly with a little fear in his eyes.

Baiken seemed a little hurt by this, "You don't need to act like I'm going to kill you!"

"Well considering how you reacted earlier I think I have the right to be afraid of you," Ryouga retorted, "I don't know what kind of mood swings you go through when you're drunk out of you're mind."

The woman took another big drink out of her bottle, finishing it off, before she threw it at him, "Screw you buddy, normal people don't just burst into a person's room unannounced."

Ryouga looked at the shattered remains of the bottle, "Yeah, and normal people don't just start slicing away without thinking either!"

The two glared back and forth for a while before Baiken let out a growl and ran towards him. Ryouga took the unexpected attack head on and the two of them slid backwards into the woman's room. The man was about to yell at her about charging at him but he found his anger stopped when he saw the pain in her eyes. It seemed to be both a physical and emotional pain, and suddenly all of his anger disappeared. What replaced it was something closer to a frantic need to help the woman. There was also the fact that her wounds had not fully healed.

"Hey, you alright?" Ryouga asked, afraid to move and injure the woman more, "Stupid, don't hurt yourself again."

Baiken winced as she felt a stab of pain run through her side, "Shut up! What do you care? We just met and you try to treat me like some fragile little girl, just shut up already. I have taken care of myself for this long, I don't need you're help!"

By this time Ryouga had composed himself enough to be a little more calm than he had been, "Look, please calm down, I'm not trying to treat you like a frail little girl. I just want to make sure that your wounds don't get worse than they already are."

The woman tried to get up off him but another stab of pain assaulted her and she collapsed in the man's chest with a cry of pain, "Damn that hurt."

"I'm sorry," Ryouga said in the silence that followed, "I let my anger get the best of me and now you're hurt. That's why I'm worried about you, we have so few friends left I don't want to lose one from my own stupidity."

Baiken sighed, "I'd hit you for being an idiot but it hurts to move. I'm sorry for being so crazy."

The man grinned and put one arm over the woman, "I'm going to carefully get up and move you to you're bed now. You ready?"

The woman nodded but as she as he tried to move she let out a scream of pain and the two of them went back to their original position, "Sorry."

Ryouga sighed, "Okay, this is not good, hold on."

The man slowly slid over to the bed, making sure not to move the woman on top of him around to much. When he reached the bed he grabbed the mattress and pulled it onto the floor next to him. Once this was done he rolled onto his side and let the woman fall onto the mattress, eliciting a grunt of pain from her. That being done he grabbed a pillow and placed it under her head so that she did not have to move to get one herself.

"Just so you know, I'm not trying to treat you like a frail little girl right now," Ryouga said as he finished up, "I just want to make up for how I acted earlier. I'm going to go ahead and say goodbye right now because I probably won't be here in the morning."

"In that case I wish you a good journey," Baiken said.

Ryouga nodded, "Yeah, see you. Oh, and Baiken, just so you know, I was fighting you seriously back there. I want you to know that I think you're strong to have stood up to me that long."

The woman closed her eye, "Yeah, even if I was stupid drunk."

The man smiled and nodded, "Goodbye, I hope we meet again on better terms. Even with what happened I still consider you my friend."

He heard the woman speak as he left the room, "Friend, I like the sound of that word."

Ryouga smiled and walked out of the room and grabbed his backpack and bedroll that was still laying in its place on the ground. He looked back at the wall where he had thrown her and shook his head. That woman was something else, she was strong that was for sure, but she was not so muscular as to be manly. She was sexy in fact, something Ryouga had trouble comprehending in his current state. He was sure all he needed was some distance to get those thoughts out of his head.

At least he had been at the time he had thought that distance would get some of those thoughts out of his head. What he learned later was that no matter how much distance he put between that place and him it never got better. In fact it was getting even worse than it had been. The more he wandered the more his thoughts drifted until he starting thinking about her. It was starting to invade his personal life and because of that he had started to wonder if these thoughts would invade his normal life. Not that he had the need to talk to anyone beyond finding what he needed to survive, at least that is how it had been lately.

Still, he had to find a way to stop this line of thinking before he went insane, Ryouga was starting to believe that he was falling in love. This was entirely possible but highly improbable. For him it had always been revenge that drove him down his path, always revenge and nothing else. Now it seemed that something was conspiring against that path. The man stopped and looked around and with a shake of his head walked in a random direction. Of course he ended up stepping in a sink hole and falling flat on his face in the mud. He rolled over and lay on his back, having taken off his backpack to make it easier to get up, and as he did he noticed that the trees in the forest he entered were barely broken by the sky. Where it was broken was a brilliant blue that seemed to be trying to eat away at the shadow that the trees caused. Ryouga shook his head and curled himself into a ball, bringing his hands above his head, the momentum making it easy for him to spring back onto his feet. It was something he had not tried in a while and so he was not surprised when he stumbled forward.

He was not even surprised when he tripped again, over the same sinkhole no less, what did surprise him was the sudden hill he was falling over. His instincts kicked in and he reached to grab his pack with the bedroll strapped to it as he slid down the steep hill. To be honest, it was more of an uncontrolled roll, a few inches of controlled sliding, then more uncontrolled rolling. To make it worse he was getting beat from all directions with rock and branches, and the occasional tree trunk. It was a good thirty seconds before he came to a rest at the bottom of the hill against a huge rock that refused to give way to his body. In fact it was pressing quiet painfully against his ribs.

Ryouga's body was laying chest down in the dirt, his head was turned to the side so that his face looked at the rock that he was laying against. In his right hand was the pack and in the left hand was a fistful of branches and dirt from trying to grab a hold of whatever he could to stop himself. None of the grabbing had done him any good. He opened his left hand slowly and let the dirt fall from his hand before he pushed himself up from the ground and sat against the rock in the lotus position, bringing his bag to the left side of him and setting it down, he used his hands to frantically brush the dirt from his head before he shook it back and forth to get the leftover off. Finally he sat back against the rock and idly listened to his surroundings to get a bearing on where he was. From where he sat everything looked the same, the sounds of animals came from farther to his left, indicating that would lead him deeper into the woods. He glanced at a tree and saw the direction of moss growing on it, it was nature's personal compass.

Then he heard the sound of high velocity running water indicating a water fall, from the current elevation he was at and the amount of sound he heard from it he was sure that it was a smaller waterfall and he was at the base of it, maybe a quarter of a mile in the direction his back was now facing. Ryouga dug into his backpack and took out a canteen in order to inspect his water supply and found it running a little low. Far away from critical but he did not know the area right now so it would not hurt to find the fall and get some fresh water. Getting up slowly with a few grunts of pain, Ryouga picked up his backpack and slung it on his back before heading in the direction of the fall.

It was not a hard trek, when he was focused on something he could usually find it easily, it was when he became unfocused that he would lose his way. Indeed it was about the distance he had estimated, and it was a small one so he would find it easy to get some good water. The fall ended in a small lake where the current was diluted before it continued down a small river, almost a stream. The lake was clear and peaceful, so the man collected his water and sat down at the edge to drink the water. There was no harm in drinking here since he could keep refilling his bottle, so Ryouga made sure he had plenty of water in his body before filling the canteen one last time and getting on his way. At least he tried to get on his way, as he stood he noticed a strange presence coming from the lake, slightly familiar but he did not know from where.