The train is still rolling down the tracks, here's hoping nobody throws a penny on it before the final destination!

And before you ask if Ranma really is [BLANK] after reading this chapter; remember that I'm throwing a few twists in a relatively new 'trope' regarding his romantic entanglements. So if you feel like breaking out the pitchforks and torches, be patient and have faith...

Imperial Servant: Chapter 2
Blacklist

OOOOOO

Hinako-sensei swung her feet under her chair, bored out of her mind as she waited for lunch to end. Sitting in the teacher's lounge was so dull, and even the lollipop she was sucking on couldn't alleviate her desire to get back to class and teaching her eager students. She'd almost settled on going out to see what her charges were up to, when the sound of screaming came from outside.

The teacher was on her feet in an instant as her boredom vanished with a giddy squeal of "Delinquents!" Before she ran to the open window. Her eyes narrowed as she watched a male student sprint across the football field, her curiosity piqued as several other teachers offered their opinions on the boy's athletic ability.

Their conversations ceased when a girl holding a VERY mean-looking sword appeared at the edge of the field, from same direction the boy was running from, screaming and swearing violently. While there was a few dozen meters between her and the boy she was chasing, that didn't stop the brunette from swinging her weapon down into the astroturf, and Hinako's lollipop clattered to the floor as a small tornado of flame burst from the ground and tore it's way across the field, leaving a trench of charred earth and glass as it zeroed in on the object of the girl's fury. A lucky dive to the side prevented the boy from being immolated, though it was a very near miss judging by the smoke rising from the back of his shirt, while the girl continued her pursuit, obviously intent on finishing the job.

With a student in danger, it was easy for Hinako to recover from her shock and issue a warcry of, "I'll discipline you, you evil delinquent!" before hoisting her four-foot frame out the window and effortlessly dropping to the ground 2 stories below. Looking up, she caught sight of a mob of students headed by familiar sight of her 'favorite' delinquent chasing the girl and her attempted victim, and she ran towards them. As she watched, several girls she recognized as Ranma's fiancé and girlfriends dogpiled the howling brunette and restrained her, while Ranma himself snatched up the fear-stricken boy she now recognized as Hikaru Gosunkugi. While the threat of death had abated, that did not mean the students were without need of a stern talking to at the bare minimum, which became more apparent as she came closer and could make out what the outraged girl was saying.

"LET ME GO! I'M GONNA KILL HIM!" the brunette screeched as she kicked her feet, trying to pull herself out from under the three girls who had her pinned to the ground. "NOTHING THAT FUCKING STUPID SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO BREATHE! IF YOU DON'T LET ME GUT THAT ASS-SLAPPING MORON, HE'S GONNA DOOM THE HUMAN RACE!"

"Dabbler-san, calm down!" cried out the unusually shaken Akane Tendo, who was holding down the brunette's left arm in both hands.

"FUCK CALM! THAT IDIOT DIDN'T LEARN HOW TO BANISH DEMON'S BEFORE HE FUCKING SUMMONED ONE! WHAT IF HE'D SUMMONED NYARLATHOTEP!? WHAT IF HE'D AWAKENED AZATHOTH!? IF I HADN'T SHOWN UP, HE WOULD HAVE TRIED SUMMONING SOMEONE ELSE, AND THIS CITY WOULD BE A GODDAMN CRATER RIGHT NOW!"

"Saotome-san!" Hinako-sensei shouted as she approached, watching as 3 of the strongest girl's she knew struggled to pin down the pretty stranger, while a very old woman on a stick cautiously observed the too-large sword that was forming a blackened ash-print in the grass where it had fallen. Turning to see Ranma restraining a white-faced and terrified Hikaru Gosunkugi, the lolita-shapeshifter demanded, "What's going on here!?"

"Long story teach!" Ranma replied in a frustrated tone as he held onto the skinny and surprisingly wriggly boy. "You wouldn't believe me if I told you!"

"Really, Ranma!?" Akane snapped at her fiancee, while she still clung tightly to the flailing limb. "We're in Nerima, you baka! This is practically normal!"

"Yeah, which means she ain't gonna believe a word I say, tomboy!"

"WHAT WAS THAT, JERK!?"

"SILENCE!"

All sound immediately ceased as everyone winced from the powerful shout that had somehow come from an all-too-tiny pair of lungs. Huffing angrily, Hinako demanded, "Somebody tell me why this girl was attacking Gosunkugi-kun right now, or I will put everyone in detention!"

"I can explain, sensei." Nabiki Tendo offered coolly as she approached the professor. Once she was at Hinako's side, the middle Tendo daughter gestured to the pinned brunette. "That's Dabbler. She's a demon."

"Hello." The girl offered in an irritated, yet polite tone with a small wave of her still-pinned hand.

"Gosunkugi summoned her," Nabiki pointed to the boy in question. "Because he wanted her to ruin Ranma's reputation," The middle Tendo smirked as she added, "Since he's such a lothario and a violent thug."

Ranma growled and tightened his grip on Hikaru's arms, prompting the reedy boy to give a sharp squeak of "Ite!"

"But Dabbler disagreed, and when she told Hikaru to send her back, he couldn't, because he never studied some kind of spell to keep her under control."

"It's not about control," the demon groused. "It's about goddamn safety! I swear to-"

"She is correct, Tendo Nabiki."

The mercenary queen blinked as she turned to look at Kuno, who explained in an even tone, "Dabbler-san is upset because while she is...far less odious than one would expect of demonkind, there are others who are exactly as we've been lead to believe regarding her species." Kuno narrowed his eyes at Gosunkugi, fixing the boy with a harsh, disapproving glare. "What Gosunkugi-san has done is the equivalent of a poisoner who did not create an antidote for a foul concoction he devised; thus putting himself and countless others at risk should he accidentally envenomate something which he did not intend to."

Nabiki's jaw was among the many that had dropped following Kuno's observation, while Hikaru blinked rapidly as understanding dawned, and Xuriel sighed in relief. "Finally! Somebody around here is talking sense!"

"Kuno-chan," Nabiki gaped at her classmate in shock. "How did you figure that out?!"

The swordsman cocked an eyebrow incredulously. "You're forgetting who my sister is, Tendo Nabiki."

Nabiki blinked. Then she closed her eyes and visibly grimaced, obviously struggling with herself before offering a simple, "You...you're right, Kuno-chan."

"...wow, how much did that hurt to say?"

"Too much." Nabiki admitted at Ranma's amused question.

Satisfied that the people surrounding her had gotten a clue, Xuriel grunted, "Now do you understand why I'm so pissed!?"

"Indeed we do, Dabbler-san." Kuno offered amicably. "But that does not excuse your attempt to slay the ignoramus, even if it is because you believe it is for our safety."

"Speaking of which, why are you so concerned with protecting us?" Cologne turned her gaze from the still smoking blade that Xuriel had dropped. "I'd think a demon would relish in the pain and terror of an unbound summoning."

The brunette fixed Cologne with an irate look. "You are really starting to piss me off with those generalizations, you racist witch! I'll have you know there's a LOT of different kinds of demons, and less than a quarter of them hate humans! I happen to like humans, or at least most of them!"

The matriarch narrowed her eyes at the slight, while Shampoo looked curiously at the girl whose back she was sitting on. "Demon-girl like people? Why?"

"I'm a succubus," Xuriel replied in a frustrated tone. "And liking people kind of comes with the territory, capisce?"

Shampoo wasn't the only one who was staring openly at the restrained girl now. Hinako, trying to get some semblance of order in this anarchic situation, stepped closer to the supposed demon and crouched down, cocking her head quizzically as she asked, "You're what kind of demon?"

"A succubus." Xuriel repeated in annoyance. "What, don't you people have those in Japan?" Turning her head towards Hinako-sensei, Xuriel considered the details of her lifestyle and the seemingly 11-year-old girl asking the question. With an apologetic smile, the demon decided not to scar an innocent girl for life and said gently, "Listen, sweetie? This is kind of a grown-up discussion, so could you go back to class?"

Hinako stood up immediately, incensed by the demon's words as well as the muffled snorts and giggles from the surrounding students. Stamping her feet in a way that only amplified her childlike appearance, she shouted, "I'm not a student! I'm a teacher here! Don't make me discipline you!"

Xuriel blinked and looked at Akane out of the corner of one eye. "Is she serious?"

"Yeah, Hinako-sensei is our homeroom teacher." Akane affirmed with a nod.

"Huh...some kind of child prodigy?"

"I'm 27!" Hinako shouted angrily, sounding more and more like a girl who'd just been denied a candy bar as she stomped her foot again.

Xuriel blinked again, but before she could speak up, Cologne's voice brought her attention back to the old woman, who was looking between her and her sword with an incredulous expression. "You expect us to believe that, when you were swinging around a weapon like this?"

Xuriel growled, thoroughly done dealing with the old woman's continual suspicion, especially when she'd only tried to kill a single person and it was totally justifiable in her eyes. "If I was any other type of demon, I wouldn't be pinned down by 3 teenagers, and I'd have turned everything within 6 square blocks into a slaughterhouse or a sea of molten glass! I got that sword cause I'm not made for hand-to-hand combat and I needed a personal defense weapon!"

Cologne slowly turned to eyeball the undoubtedly evil blade. "That's for defense?"

"Beats the crap out of a can of mace." Xuriel replied with a dark chuckle, before taking advantage of the old woman being distracted and reached up with her un-pinned, still glamoured-to-invisibility lower arms to pinch Akane and Ukyo's backsides as hard as she could. Both girl's leapt away with a shriek and a scream of "Who touched me!?" while Xuriel grabbed Shampoo and tossed her off her back. The Amazon squawked in surprise and shock as she landed on the grass while Xuriel got to her feet.

However, she didn't have a chance to do anything more than catch her balance when she saw the deceptively sharp point of Cologne's staff hovering between her eyes, and the old woman herself was standing in front of her, looking like an albino, pissed-to-hell-and-back Yoda.

"You try something like that again, demon." Cologne spat frostily. "And hell will seem like a vacation compared to what I'll do to you."

The surrounding students and members of the wrecking crew shivered at the absolutely frigid tone in the Amazon matriarch's voice. Privately hoping she never heard something like that again, Nabiki rubbed down the goosebumps that suddenly formed on her arm and asked dryly, "Is it bad that I'm suddenly more scared of her than I am of Dabbler-san?"

"No."

"Quack."

"Not really."

"Nay, Tendo Nabiki."

"Hiba-chan scary…"

"You ain't alone, Nabs."

Cologne's eye twitched as she resisted the temptation to really show the loudmouthed whelps around her how scary she could be, which was made easier as their statements ended up helping her intimidate the demon who she had dead-to-rights. Xuriel gulped audibly and slowly stood up, raising her hands in surrender while Colognes staff shifted to point directly at the base of the demon's throat. "I wasn't going to do anything." she said in a too-calm 'no I'm totally not scared shitless' voice. "I just wanted to get off the ground. It wasn't exactly comfortable, you know."

"I can imagine."

A bead of sweat ran down the back of Xuriel's neck. While the old woman was technically jabbing the narrow end of her pogo-stick towards her sternum rather than her neck due to the difference in height between her real body and the illusion, the demoness wasn't willing to find out if the old biddy could cause severe damage despite the fact that her target was sturdy bone rather than soft tissue. As she slowly extended one of her visible hands to the side, Xuriel gestured with one of her invisible hands and said carefully, "Alright, I'm not going to attack the kid again, and I'm gonna put my sword back."

Cologne narrowed her eyes, but made no move to stop her captive. Sighing in relief, Xuriel snapped her fingers (and secretly completed the sigil) which recalled her blade back into the pocket dimension she'd pulled it from. The mood noticeably eased at that, though Cologne didn't relax her guard for an instant. Much as the old woman grated her, Xuriel couldn't help but respect that even as she fixed Hikaru with a glare that made him whimper in fear. "Also, I'm gonna make sure something like this NEVER happens again by blacklisting this moron the first chance I get."

"B-Blacklist?!" Gosunkugi shrank back against Ranma, feeling rather like he was pressing into a steel girder as he whined, "What's that mean!?"

"You may have summoned me using my true name," Xuriel snarled angrily. "But that's only because I was curious how desperate someone had to be in order to summon a demon with such cheap freaking ritual components! Seriously, birthday candles and a pentagram in housepaint!? How the hell did you pull that off, anyway?!"

"Umm...the ritual said the sigil had to be written in blood, but it didn't say whose or how much…" the pale boy nervously offered as he held up a bandaged finger. "So I...improvised?"

One of the succubus' eyes twitched. "Sweet Jesus on a bicycle, no wonder I was felt like something was yanking at my neck when I went through the portal. I'm actually glad you're an absolute failure of a wizard right now, you know that?"

Hikaru's vision blurred with tears as his words from earlier were thrown back in his face. "B-But Xuriel-san, why-"

"Summoner's don't use blood from living creatures, especially themselves, because then whatever they're summoning can possess them, you idiot!" Xuriel snapped. "If you'd used anymore than however many drops you managed to squeeze into that paint bucket, we would have been fused together, permanently!"

Nabiki looked between Gosunkugi and the irate succubus. "What, like, your mind in his body?"

"That would have been if I was astrally projecting." Xuriel side-eye'd the page cut brunette. "But using my true name meant I could manifest physically, which means we'd have fused physically and turned into conjoined not-twins, at best."

Nabiki gulped audibly, noting that even Cologne's cheeks had taken a green-tint at that little nugget of information.

"But that's not happening now, or ever again." Xuriel growled as she focused on Hikaru again. "Cause my bestie happens to be a secretary to one of the big guys downstairs, and once I tell her about this absolute fuster-cluck of a summoning, you aren't gonna be calling any-one, or any-thing, ever again!"

Cologne blinked, her staff dropping away from the demon's neck by a few millimeters. "That's what blacklisting means?"

"Oh yeah." Xuriel affirmed without taking her eyes off her summoner. "It won't matter if he makes an altar out of the stones of Atlantis, sacrifices an entire city with his bare-hands, AND uses their true name; this idiot will never summon another demon for as long as he lives! And we're gonna make sure you don't try calling on other things either!"

A strange sort of confused calm came over the assembled mass of people as they puzzled over the...rather odd punishment. "Not that I'm complainin'," Ranma intoned as his grip loosened around his captive. "But that sounds like a slap on the wrist."

"Depending on how dedicated Mr. Summoner is to his craft, it can be pretty damn hellish as all his knowledge has just gotten flushed down the drain." Xuriel replied dryly. "Getting blacklisted is one of the few times the boy's downstairs will do something that's for the 'greater-good', as opposed to dragging someone off and showing him how badly he screwed up with a pair of pliers and a blowtorch."

Hikaru flinched as that mental image played merry hell across the landscape of his mind, while Cologne finally withdrew her staff from it's threatening position, satisfied that the demoness wasn't going to enact more hostility, and confident that she could stop it in case she was wrong. "I wouldn't think you would care if he tried to call a servant from some other plane."

Xuriel looked askance at Cologne. "I wasn't exaggerating when I said he might have called upon the Old Ones if he screwed up badly enough. That's pretty much an instant game over for everyone. Or worse, he could catch the attention of a Sidhe."

"A...She? The old woman cocked an eyebrow, "I'm not sure how 'she' could be worse than an Old One."

Xuriel pursed her lips and studied the old woman for a moment. "Ever read Shakespeare, granny?"

Cologne nodded and said, "I have."

"Me too." Akane added.

"You know the play, A Mid-Summer Nights Dream?"

Cologne stiffened while Akane's brow furrowed, each of them getting the reference, but only the matriarch understanding the context as Akane asked, "A 'she' is a fairy? Why would a fairy be scary?"

"The original myths surrounding fairies are nothing like the stories told today, Tendo Akane." Cologne intoned as she held her staff in a cold, clammy grip. "Do you recall when Oberon used a love potion on his own wife, so she would bed the first animal she saw and he could use that to blackmail her into giving up a child servant to him?"

"Yes, I remember. And what does..." Akane's eyes widened the scene in question came to her mind, filtered through a less rose-colored, comedic lens and she swallowed heavily. "Wait, are you saying-"

"Compared to a real Sidhe, that's practically cuddly." Xuriel rubbed her arm and shuddered violently, her eyes a thousand miles away as a chill swept through the surrounding students. "While some demon's don't like people, we at least acknowledge them in some way or another. The Sidhe are uber-magical narcissistic sociopaths who can't care about anyone but themselves, and not even we would do the stuff that they consider pranks. Thankfully they're a little weaker on Earth than in their own realm, but I still wouldn't go near one without one of the big guys from downstairs and an archangel as back-up."

The fearful reaction and her caveat regarding the creature she was describing made Kuno look at her with surprise. "An angel would work alongside a demon?"

"If a Sidhe showed up?" Xuriel gave the swordsman a haunted look. "Hell yes."

The silence following that answer stretched on for quite awhile, and was eventually broken by Hikaru quietly murmuring, "I...don't feel so bad about being blacklisted anymore…"

Being reminded of the reason for their conversation taking a turn down a decidedly scary road brought Xuriel's attention back to her summoner, who grimaced at the stern glare she was giving him. "Good." She stated coldly. "Then you can focus on some kind of magic that's less likely to blow up in your face and take a lot of other people with you."

While still hurt by the disapproval in her voice, Hikaru lowered his eyes and gave a solemn, meek nod.

Xuriel, satisfied that her point had been made, turned around and addressed the crowd at large. "Okay people, anybody feel like giving me a hand? I've got a long way to go and I need about a dozen volunteers for a game of 'Who's in my mouth' so I can get enough juice to warp home. And yes," She smiled cheekily. "That pun was intentional."

It took a few seconds for that to sink in, but when it did, a nearly unanimous shriek of "NANI?!" rang out of the crowd as nearly every face flushed bright crimson. While most of the students seemed taken aback and embarrassed by the frankly crude phrase Xuriel had used, some of the boys looked like they were about to volunteer their services, though they immediately wilted when the girls around them fixed them with looks that were nothing short of acidic.

"Y-you want to what?!" Akane sputtered in disbelief, so shocked by the blatantly perverted statement that her usual response of 'smash' had been bypassed completely. "Wh-why would you do that?!"

"Because she is a succubus," Cologne replied with a narrow-eye'd look at Xuriel, ironically not giving a fuck about discussing sex in front of numerous teenagers including her great-granddaughter. "Which means she feeds off of the life energy of her human lovers."

"Oh dammit, are you people still spreading that story around?" Xuriel glared at the old woman. "It's tantric energy we feed off of, not life energy! Big difference!"

"Oh? How so?"

With a disgusted groan and a roll of her eyes, Xuriel pointed to Akane, Ukyo, and Shampoo. "These three like him," She then turned and pointed to Ranma, "Because I can sense their attraction to him, or their tantric energy. Love, lust, arousal, desire, or even schoolyard crushes are a the energy that succubus can feel, and draw power from."

The three girls blushed at that as a few whispers broke out among the crowd, while Nabiki smirked at her little sister and asked aloud, "Is that how you know Akane-chan is repressed, Xuriel-san?"

"Nabiki!"

Ignoring the bluenettes offended and embarrassed shout, Xuriel nodded. "Yeah, it's like there's some kind of dam holding back her desires, and that's really not healthy for her. On the plus side," The succubus smiled teasingly at Akane. "If she finally lets her hair down a little, every succubus in a hundred miles is gonna get a nice boost off of her."

Akane's eye twitched violently, her fingers digging into the wooden haft of her mallet while several girls giggled, including her sister and rivals. Cologne, still not buying what Xuriel was selling, fixed the succubus with a pointed look. "If you do not drain life energy, how did that story get started?"

"While Mr. Blacklist can get away with his creepy stuff nowadays," Xuriel thumbed over her shoulder at Gosunkugi, who shrank away from her with nervous look. "People burned demon summoners alive in the old days. The ones who managed to perform any rituals back then did it because they were careful and spent years if not decades making sure they got it right." Turning to Cologne, the brunette smiled widely. "You'd be surprised how many of those old summoners keeled over from heart failure before they got a past foreplay."

Cologne chuckled at that. "I don't believe I would, actually. So when the friends and family found the summoner's bodies and their demon lovers, they assumed the creature they summoned devoured their souls."

"Uh-huh." Xuriel pursed her lips in annoyance. "Which is another reason this whole thing ended up being a waste of my time." She cut her eyes back to Ranma and Hikaru, the latter of whom was looking shamefacedly away from the demon he'd called as she snapped, "Just curious, Mr. Wizard; did you think I'd end up killing the supposed lothario if I banged him too?"

Gosunkugi winced and lowered his eyes. "Umm...kinda?"

Xuriel snorted while Ranma looked ready to pound the voodoo wannabe into a paste. "Well, kudos on not telling me just to drag him off to a shady spot and screw his brains out, or you'd really be in trouble. Not that it would have worked anyway."

"Huh?" Hikaru looked at Xuriel, his head tilted quizzically. "Why not?"

"Sorry to tell you, skinny boy, but your plan was doomed to failure from the start." Xuriel explained as she gave Ranma a frustrated, sympathetic look. "Because Mr. Cheating Thug here is asexual."

-AN-

Dun.

Dun.

Duuuuuuuuunnnnnn.