Chasing the Rainbow
Disclaimer: I do not own Ranma ½ or any related characters in any way, shape or form.
Author's Notes: Well, I'm pleased and more than a little surprised about how well folks took the revelations of the previous chapter. While we are most certainly not going for a harem matchup at the end (though the possibility does exist that we will do that as an "alternate ending" if folks would like that), I'm pretty sure that I can say that you'll enjoy the ending no matter whether you want Ranma/Shampoo, Ranma/Ukyo, or Ranma/Kodachi.
Daxel; we're actually going to use the "Tendo Dojo Christmas Party" OVA as our climax. But thanks to you, we've actually figured out what we're going to do for the Ryugenzawa adaptation, so thank you for that.
RockBane; well, technically, one could say that there is a Ranma somewhere in the "ARDverse" who is watching the events of this chapter and the previous one in the Eye of Zygyg. But… unless stated otherwise, all events that happen in this story are exactly what's happening. It gets too confusing otherwise.
Chapter 13: Showdown at Nekonron!
Growing up on the road does not give you a very conventional schooling. In fact, given how he had grown up, it was really remarkable that Ranma was as (relatively) honest and sociable as he was. In fact, the things he had most naturally picked up tended to not be very appropriate for polite society. Among these things was a profoundly profane vocabulary, which Ranma, still in female form, was currently sharing with Prince Kirin and his six retainers - it really would not have surprised them to see the wood blistering and the paint peeling off from the diatribe spewing from Ranma's spittle-flecked lips.
Prince Kirin remained resolute during the barrage; he was of noble blood and would not be robbed of his composure by a little foul language. Even if he had to admit that it was a rather remarkable amount of foul language. Monlon had quickly vanished shortly after the rant started. Bishamonten was frozen in horror at some of things being said, mainly about his ancestry and how certain animals contributed to his family tree. Wu, on the other hand, simply sat there; Kirin was glad that the large fighter could sometimes be as stupid as he acted. A glance revealed Ebiten taking notes, and while that was not unusual, the fact that he was seemingly encouraging his bride's venomous tirade and that the twins Daikokuse and Daihakusei were joining him, prompted the prince to finally act.
Besides, his ears were starting to hurt.
"Enough of this. Wu, Bishamonten, gag her and place her in a cabin." The two men leapt into action, Bishamonten considerably faster than Wu, and before long a sturdy gag was in place and the glaring girl was carried off by Wu, Bishamonten nursing a nasty-looking bite from putting on the gag as Kirin loomed over Ebiten's and the twin's notes.
"Dump them, now."
Nodding rapidly, the trio quickly tossed their notes overboard as their leader nodded.
"Remind Prince Kirin that we'll need to ensure that she's properly educated when we arrive at Nekonron."
Ebiten nodded, even as he and the twins vanished to amuse themselves.
Ranma struggled and writhed like a cut snake against her captors' grip, but to no avail; strong as she was, even in female form, there were limits to her strength. Between the sheer weight of the hulking Wu and the fact he had her arms gripped firmly behind her back, so much so that they felt on the verge of being pulled from their sockets, there was nothing Ranma could really do to free herself.
Bishamonten, quite clearly the brains of the group, led the duo and opened a small door, stepping back to allow Wu to unceremoniously toss her inside. "You should be down on your knees thanking your lucky stars for this good fortune, you ungrateful wench. Were it up to me, you would be severely disciplined for your misconduct. But that is in Prince Kirin's hands. Use this opportunity to repent for daring to act as you have before your future husband, and be prepared to conduct yourself with the proper decorum once you are granted freedom."
Bishamonten barely managed to slam the door shut before the livid girl crashed into him, Ranma audibly rebounding off of the toughened wood. "I fear the fates may have a dark jest planned for us by choosing such a woman as she to be the future queen." He muttered to himself, locking the door and turning to return to his post, Wu ambling along placidly behind him.
In her "prison", Ranma angrily waited until she was sure that Bishamonten and Wu had left, and no guards had been posted, before she viciously tore the gag from her face and threw a glare at the door that should have made it spontaneously combust. Praising herself mentally for thinking to hold back her strength once she realized she was outmatched, ensuring that they would underestimate her, she took a look at her quarters before setting to the task of escaping. Fairly spartan, but not devoid of comfort; a small writing desk in one corner, and a bed in another. Inquisitively, she wandered over to the sole porthole and looked out, seeing nothing but clouds below.
"Okay, not going to be going out that way." Ranma muttered. "There's gotta be some sort of lifeboat or something I can hijack, though..." So saying, she walked back over to the door. A straight-armed punch and it flew open, the lock torn out, and Ranma slipped away, heading in a direction that she hoped would lead her to the hold. There, she should be able to scavenge some canvas and rope to fashion a makeshift parachute, then it would just be a matter of making an exit, gliding to the ground, and going for hot water and back home, if not necessarily in that order.
As she snuck deeper and deeper into the bowels of the ship, Ranma thought he heard someone chuckling and immediately started creeping more slowly down the hallways until she was at the source of the chuckling...and frowned at seeing a familiar wrinkled form packing away panties, bras and other feminine articles into a familiar brown sack.
"Why am I not surprised?"
Happosai blinked and turned around, his face alight with joy. "Ranma-chan!" A quick kick floored the ancient grandmaster, leaving him to project a kicked-puppy look at the girl. "That was mean."
"Can it ya old lech." Ranma snarled as she glanced up and down the corridor, "What are you doing here anyway? Don't tell me you're the only one who came to save me?"
"Of course I came to save you! The moment I realized those wicked fools intended to carry off my heir, I naturally leapt aboard and hid myself until the time was right!" Happosai crowed, puffing out his chest. "And since you're so grateful to me..." He wheedled.
"Yeah, right. More like you were after that chesty Chinese broad who's always hovering at Kirin's back." Ranma scoffed.
Happosai's buggy eyes blinked rapidly. "Come to think of it, there was a scantily clad lovely on board this ship, wasn't there? And here I thought they were hauling all these pretties because they had good taste. Well, Ranma, you clearly have things handled here, so... have fun! I'm off to see the lady with the lute!" And with that he scurried away, blending into the darkness with the skill that, sadly, was his trademark.
"Good riddance, ya horny old goat. Who needs a bungling hormonal fool like you gumming up the works anyway?" Ranma complained.
"Hey, what are you doing down here? You're not supposed to be out your quarters!" Came a Chinese-accented voice.
"Crap!" Ranma shouted, then turned and fled. How was it possible that Happosai could screw things up for him even when he wasn't trying?
Meanwhile, Ranma's rescue party was having difficulties of their own.
"This is pointless." Mousse grumbled.
"Shut up and keep rowing." Shampoo snapped from where she was sitting at the prow of the boat with one of the spare oars; while, like all rowboats, it was only intended for two oars to be used at once, Shampoo and Ukyo were way too impatient to just let the spare oars sit in the bottom of the boat.
"He has a point, though." Ryoga mentioned. "How on earth are we going to catch them in this?"
"With courage and tenacity, that's how!" Kodachi immediately proclaimed. "If Ranma can swim from Japan to China and back, then we can surely row a boat there!"
The sounds of paddling faded, each of the other four members of the impromptu team staring at her in disbelief. As one, they chorused, "Ranma swam to China?"
At this surprise, Kodachi cocked her head quizzically. "Yes, he did. Why is that so surprising? Didn't you do the same?" She asked, pointing at Shampoo.
"Shampoo pay for plane ticket." The Chinese Amazon said.
"I worked my way across on a freight ship." Mousse added. "Ryoga probably walked to China." He then said.
At this, Ryoga narrowed his eyes and looked like he wanted to brain Mousse with the oar he was holding. "I'm not that bad, duck-boy. I stowed away on a cargo ship – easiest time I've had finding my way around in a while."
"Can we concentrate on the real issue here?" Ukyo complained. Turning gimlet-like eyes to Kodachi, she then continued, "How do you know that Ranma swam to China?"
The daughter of the Kuno clan merely shrugged her shoulders elegantly. "Simple. I paid Nabiki Tendo for all of the personal information she could provide me on my beloved."
"Why we no think of that?" Shampoo wondered.
"Because neither of us could afford that pocket-gouger's prices." Ukyo pointed out.
"Point." Shampoo conceded, even as she, her rival, and the two boys resumed rowing at their former impressive pace.
For a few moments, the boat was silent again, until Kodachi spotted something through the clouds that made her tense. "Mousse, do you have a grappling hook?" She demanded.
"What?"
"A grapnel, something that can be used to scale heights, anything!" She snapped.
Putting the oar back in his lap, Mousse fished around inside his left sleeve, finally finding one of the elaborate claws that were most suitable for such a purpose. "Here. It's a bit overboard for catching fish with, though."
"Chains, give me your chains." She then demanded.
"What's the deal?" Mousse complained; who did she think she was, demanding he divest himself of the materials that were so important to his fighting style? She gave no explanation, and Mousse instead found himself beset by the others in the boat… normally, he wouldn't have minded having Shampoo tearing at his clothes, but this was a bit much! After a brief, vicious melee, he was lying on the bottom of the boat as the quartet he was traveling with frantically affixed his various chains and ropes together into one super-long train, and Mousse could finally see (as well as that term could ever be applied to him) just what had them so upset. "You could have said that you'd seen the airship, you know." He grumbled, pushing himself upright.
He was ignored, Ukyo presenting the newly furnished grapnel to Ryoga. "Don't you dare miss." She warned him.
"Just what kind of 90 pound weakling do you think I am?" The eternally lost boy asked scornfully. "…And I'm not going to aim in the wrong direction, either!" He snapped. Taking precise aim at the ship, he drew back his arm and sent the grapnel flying at it, so fast and furious it punched clean through the board he was aiming at and then anchored itself in the undamaged wood as it was yanked back, in the same manner of a hook spearing a fish.
"Quickly! Tie other end around our boat!" Shampoo shouted, hurrying to do just that.
Soon enough, the tangle of chains and ropes was binding the two vessels together, Shampoo tugging on it to test how strong it was. "Should hold us." She declared authoritatively. "So, what we waiting for? Let's go!"
"Hold on, let's think about this for a moment." Ryoga spoke up, flinching as three angry girls whirled on him.
"Just what is your problem?" Ukyo growled.
"Calm down, all of you. Look, if we just race up there, what happens if we lose? At best, we get captured like Ranma. At worst, they'll throw us overboard! The smart thing is to wait until they land, then jump them on the ground." Mousse stated sagely.
"You just no want us to save my Ranma!" Shampoo spat.
"That's right! Heaven only knows what unspeakable things they are inflicting upon my poor Ranma-darling." Kodachi cried, hands knotting together over her chest and few dramatic tears escaping her right eye.
Before anything more could be said, though, a sudden jolt ran through the rowboat; the airship of their enemies was rising, and easily hauling their own vessel aloft! Desperately the quintet leapt for the rope, even as the rowboat that they had been sitting in dropped out from underneath of them, gravity refusing to be denied. The rope twirled and spun around from the sudden motion, but fortunately the claw held fast in the wood.
"Well, guess we don't have a choice. Come on!" Ukyo stated, shimmying up the rope from her topmost position, the other members of the rescue party following in her wake. With an appropriately dramatic motion, they surged onto the deck of the airship once again… only to find it empty. "…Okay, Ranma must be inside, let's get going!" Ukyo declared.
"Since when are you the leader?" Kodachi huffed.
Old habits died hard. Particularly when you only started trying to get over them about an hour ago. A fight almost certainly would have broken out, had they not heard the commotion coming from beyond the door into the ship's interior.
"You come back here, young miss!"
"Fuck you! I ain't marrying no stuck up prince! Find someone who's desperate!"
"You cannot deny your destiny!"
"Watch me, asshole!"
The door literally flew into splinters as Ranma tore through it, triumphantly leaping through the cloud of wood shards. "Freedom!" She cried, then yelled in dismay as Ebiten's fishing line came zipping out of the gloom behind her and lassoed her legs, sending her falling face first onto the deck.
By this point, the rescue team had shaken off their shock. "Oh no you don't!" Shampoo bellowed, lunging forward with a dao that had seemed to materialize in her hand, slicing effortlessly through the fishing line binding her boyfriend (well, technically girlfriend at this moment – and if you had asked Shampoo about the semantics, she would have used a rather more intimate term) before dragging Ranma back into the protective crowd of her erstwhile allies.
Ranma shook his head and looked up at Shampoo with an expression that made her heart melt, having temporarily forgotten about the events of earlier that moment in light of the present conflict. "Man, am I glad to see you – all of you!" She added.
Shampoo preened herself at the compliment, but quickly found herself being forced to adopt a battle stance as the kidnappers swarmed out of the sundered door like a hive of angry bees.
"Wife, this is growing quite tiresome." Prince Kirin stated.
"I ain't yer wife!" Ranma snarled.
"That right, you want Ranma-honey so bad, you gotta go through us first!" Ukyo snapped.
"Prince Kirin will not sully his hands with the likes of you again." The Chinese warlord declared. "But nor shall Prince Kirin allow you to interfere in private matters. My vassals; attend to these interlopers."
"Sire!" The sextet cried, charging forward.
"Oh, I been waiting for this! Get 'em!" Ukyo hollered, the quintet of rescuers and the now-free Ranma letting out battlecries and charging to meet Kirin's underlings.
Mousse, naturally, went for Wu first; if he could defeat such a massive foe, then surely he could win Shampoo's respect and admiration! Besides, such a big body was easy for him to see, and coupled with his keen sense of hearing, the sounds such a goliath made meant there was no chance of his attacks missing. He may have surrendered most of his chains and ropes to the grapnel, but he still had plenty of weapons to use, hurling a dozen or more implements of pain at Wu's chest. To Mousse's utter disbelief, they all bounced harmlessly off of his enemy's leathery skin. With an empty-headed moaning noise, the tremendous member of the Seven Lucky Gods School swung his ever-present sack at the bewildered male Chinese Amazon, bodily slamming him across the deck.
Shampoo, meanwhile, was completely oblivious to Mousse's fate, having gone after the furious Ebiten; even beyond the personal satisfaction of quite literally carving a piece out of the wretch who had physically abducted Ranma, there was the fact that she was certain he would be quite defenseless against her dao. The sooner she finished him off, the sooner she could go after the same target as Ranma.
Unfortunately for her, Ebiten evidently realized that his now-lineless fishing pole wasn't up to much against live steel being wielded by an angry Joketsuzoku, and ducked for cover behind the scantily clad lute-wielding Monlon. The older Chinese woman smirked at Shampoo, idly plucking the strings on her instrument even as Shampoo advanced on her.
"My, aren't we loyal? Are you certain it's not envy that drives you?" Monlon questioned softly.
Shampoo snorted in a rather unladylike fashion. "Please. Shampoo already have man much better than spoilt princeling could ever be. Shut up and take beating!"
That said, she lashed out, only to bite back a curse as Monlon zipped out of range of her strike. Twice, thrice more Shampoo lashed out, flowing elegantly into a well-practiced combo, but each time the lute-player dodged at the last moment. Swearing profusely in the back of her mind, Shampoo vowed that once this whole mess was over and done with, she would seek out her great-grandmother and demand that she be allowed to undertake greater training. She was supposed to be the champion of the Joketsuzoku in Nerima, not some second-stringer! Alas, though distracted for barely a moment, that was all the time Monlon required to slip through Shampoo's guard and lay her out cold by applying the base of her lute to the base of Shampoo's skull.
"Payback time, Bishamonten!" Ranma snarled, pressing her assault on the trident-wielding warrior. Knowing he would be punished if he dared to harm his master's chosen bride, Bishamonten was forced to hold back – and that would be his downfall. Easily deflecting and latching onto her opponent's polearm when Bishamonten tried to jab at Ranma with the butt of his trident, Ranma used the fact she had gotten Bishamonten off-guard in order to do something she normally never would have. It wasn't that she didn't know all-too-well how effective it was, it wasn't that Genma had trained her not to do so (in fact, he had been the first one to teach it to her), it was just that normally it would have hurt Ranma's pride way too much to do it.
This, however, was not a normal day and so Ranma felt no shame in delivering the strongest kick she could manage square into Bishamonten's family jewels. As his jaw dropped, his eyes bulged and his muscles slackened, Ranma took advantage of this to pry the trident from his hands, bring it painfully thrusting into his midriff, and then cracked him over the head with it when he doubled up. Placing a boot triumphantly on her downed foe's head, Ranma sent a blood-curdling grin at Kirin.
"Your turn now, Prince…" She jeered.
Kirin sighed, shifting into a defensive stance as he tried to talk sense into his bride, "Why do you keep fighting? Our union is fated to be, so why are you resisting me so?"
Ranma snarled like an animal and actually thrust out at her would-be husband with the sharp end of her liberated weapon. "Fated to be?" She declared, disbelief and spite dripping from the words. "How much damn clearer do I need to be that I'm! Not! INTERESTED!"
Kirin closed his eyes and shook his head, "Very well, it seems that your eyes will need to be opened to the truth by more physical means then." With that he shifted from a defensive stance to an offensive one and closed with Ranma.
'This clown is worse than Kuno!' Ranma thought viciously to herself. Drawing on all the speed gained by undergoing the Kachu Tenshin Amaguriken, then refined with the Parlay du Foie Gras, she stabbed out again and again with the trident, each time the sharp tines seeming to glance off of some invisible protective veil in front of her foe. '...Not least of which because he's competent!' She exasperatedly added, along with a few choice phrases that would have made a dockworker blush and her father wash her mouth out with soap.
"Your skills with a weapon do you credit my dear, but your perception is sadly below the level you would need to break past the skills I possess with a weapon in my hand." Kirin allowed himself a small smile; just a touch, he didn't want to completely throw her off the deep end after all.
"Why, you...!" Ranma hissed, drawing back yet again. '...Wait a fricking second, what weapon? All he has are those chop...sticks... Ah, now I get it, you smug snake...' She realized, sliding back and starting to circle her calmly confident foe. He had to be using those formal chopsticks of his to catch her trident each time she struck, then releasing it when she was withdrawing it. Had to be by the base of the blades as well, otherwise his implements of choice would soon be sliced apart. 'You got some skill... but I'm not the heir to the Saotome School for nothing!'
Plan springing into her head, Ranma made several feints with her trident... and then threw it at Kirin, racing after it and slipping onto one leg while simultaneously kicking with the other and punching with both arms. Kirin was promptly knocked flying, his ever-present bowl of rice and pickled vegetables soaring from his hand to shatter on the floor.
"...What have you done?" Kirin demanded, pushing himself slowly from the floor, free hand going to the bruise on his cheek, disbelief and outrage radiating from him like heat from a furnace.
"Aw, whatsa matter? Not used to getting yer ass kicked?" Ranma taunted. "You had me going at first, but then I realized how you could block - and how I could get around that. Yer quick with those chopsticks of yours, but you're too busy holding onto that stupid bowl to have both hands free. If you're busy blocking an attack from one direction, you can't block a separate attack!"
Kirin snarled, wiping away the blood from his lips before rising to his feet regally, before he smiled thinly, "Very good, but though you may have felled me once my dear, your efforts overall have been futile." His hand waved to indicate behind Ranma as he continued, "You have only to see the truth for yourself."
Heart sinking, Ranma turned automatically to see that Kirin was telling the truth. All three of the girls, and Ryoga and Mousse as well, had been knocked unconscious and dumped into a pile that Wu was now gathering up in his arms... and throwing over the bow.
"No!" Ranma called, trying to run to interject somehow, or at the very least to leap over the side and join them, but as she moved, Kirin did so as well. His long chopsticks thrust forward and jabbed with the accuracy of shiatsu needles into certain pressure points on her back, causing Ranma to collapse onto the deck unconscious even as her would-be rescuers were loosed to fall to the uncaring sea below.
"Now then, someone wake up Bishamonten, and then make sure my bride is properly secured in her room until we arrive."
Monlon spoke up then, "She'll just break the ropes my prince."
Kirin paused the stride back to his cabin and turned slightly.
"Then use chains."
Ordinarily, a fall from such a height probably would have been fatal. However, none of Ranma's rescuers could really be called "ordinary", and while the impact had stung like the business end of a moonshine-laden giant hornet, all of them were quite alive and resolutely swimming after the airship. This was made somewhat difficult by the fact the better portion of their numbers had assumed small, innocuous forms upon hitting the water, courtesy of Jusenkyo's black touch.
"Why does this little piglet seem so familiar?" Kodachi mused aloud, directing a rather baleful stare at the miniature black swine timidly clinging onto her shoulder.
"Because you just saw Ryoga turn into it? But, seriously, I've got a funny feeling I've seen him in that body before as well..." Ukyo mused, finding herself oddly grateful for her childhood of training at the beach; it meant she was quite a skilled swimmer, even if nobody seemed to acknowledge it besides Ranma. As she ploughed through the waves, Shampoo, currently sitting on her arch-rival's head in cat form (the irony was not lost on either girl, suddenly took a hard look into the gloom. She meowed loudly in an effort to get Ukyo's attention, then, when she was ignored, bit her on the ear.
"Ouch! What's up with you, ya crazy cat?" Ukyo yelped, sending Shampoo tumbling into the sea with a shake of her head. She would later admit to herself she was lucky that Shampoo didn't use her claws to anchor herself, but right now wasn't in any mood to care.
"I say, is that a ship?" Kodachi asked.
Ukyo looked up, which prompted an indignant Shampoo to awkwardly paddle over and climb her shoulders again, and then brightened. "It is! Hey! Over here! We need help!"
"Please! We need your assistance!" Kodachi cried out.
Both girls took heart when the ship came towards them. They weren't quite so pleased when they made it out to be a Chinese junk... with a rather familiar elephant sitting aboard it.
Dawn was always a beautiful thing in the valley kingdom of Nekonron, as rays of light streamed through the clouds that perpetually hid the small valley from prying eyes. Seconds later, an airship broke through the cloud line and sailed majestically through the valley, over the village and farms, towards a large palace overlooking the valley, built into the face of the highest peak, the stunning architectural wonder a carefully concealed jewel that completed the image of the airship and its occupants seemingly being thrown back in time as it drifted past a thick mountain forest en-route to a dock jutting out from the castle.
It was a visual marvel wasted on the occupants of the airship, and not simply because they had seen it numerous times in their journeys already.
It was a very tired and battered-looking septet of Seven Lucky Gods Martial Arts Masters who staggered out of the airship. Kirin had traded his normally ever-present chopsticks for a bag of ice, which he was holding on his head - as a headache relief, not because he had actually been physically assaulted. At least, compared to his faithful retainers. Bishamonten's trident was absent, and he was walking with a limp, dents clearly visible in many sensitive-looking spots on his armor. The twins had an array of lumps and scratches on their faces. Ebiten was black and blue all over. Even Wu looked haggard and stiff, carrying on his back an iron cage originally used for tiger hunts, in which a vindictively savage Ranma sat, eyes glowing banefully at all around her.
Monlon, however, was seemingly untouched by the physical injuries that had been inflicted upon her comrades; but that was not due to any particular kindness on Ranma's part. She had locked herself inside her room; paranoid about being assaulted by Happosai again, the old pervert having ambushed her after the failed rescue attempt. Even now her tired, wild eyes were twitching to every nook and cranny and every shadow as if daring the diminutive grandmaster lech to show himself.
"Greetings Prince Kirin, was your latest search for your bride successful?"
Kirin blinked tiredly as he registered the question of his governor, who maintained the kingdom during his searches, and nodded in response before focusing on what had to be done next.
"Xue Li, I want my bride placed in the best of the guest rooms and the preparations for the wedding to begin immediately, during which my bride is to be placed under heavy guard; no-one goes near her and they are to make sure she does not leave under any circumstance."
The man nodded; a strange request but one look at the murderous expression on the face of the caged girl silenced any further comment.
"It shall be as you command my Prince."
With a final nod, the battered party trudged into the palace, so weary and tired from the task of keeping Ranma under control that Prince Kirin neglected to give orders for guards to be posted at the gates. Not that the other masters of the School were in any real position to guard them, anyway. Oh well, it wasn't like anyone was going to reach them… right?
"We is here at last; this Seven Luck Mountain. Seven Lucky Gods School of Martial Arts in castle atop mountain, beyond the five Gates of Luck." Lychee declared, seated comfortably atop Jasmine's broad back.
"If you know way all this time, why you not come here earlier?" Shampoo asked.
The blonde Chinese girl shrugged. "I not know Scroll of Luck connected to them, that's why. Only find out when Prince Kirin take boy-disguised-as-girl instead." She narrowed her eyes at her countryman. "You swear you no take Prince Kirin?"
At this, Ukyo rolled her eyes. "Believe me, honey, I can speak for the three of us when I say that we ain't got the slightest interest in your prince. You just help us get Ranma back, like we agreed back on your boat, and you get your prince."
Still looking suspicious, Lychee nodded and the group carried on. Moments later, they came to the first of the Gates, practically a small fortress in its own right. And yet, nobody reacted to their appearance; even when Ryoga, grown tired of the wary way that the others were hanging back, arrogantly strode forward and blew through the gates with his Bakusai Tenketsu, no reaction was met. Never one to waste an opportune moment, the group hurried on through, expecting an ambush all the while. But the second Gate was also unmanned. And when the third proved to be the same, Mousse couldn't bear it any more.
"Geeze, are these guys that sure we're dead that they wouldn't even post guards?" He complained, irritation and humiliation evident in tone and body language.
Kodachi tossed her hair emphatically as she spoke up. "I would bet my darling Ranma has something to do with this. They must be too injured to assume their posts, having been pushed to their limits to contain him against his will."
"I never dreamed I'd say this, but I agree with you." Ukyo proclaimed.
"Shampoo same."
"If you girls can kindly focus for once?" Ryoga asked bitterly. "We've kind of got to save him right now."
Other than a few sharp looks, the triad of Ranma's fiancées listened to him and the group hurried on to the Castle of Seven Luck Mountain. No obstacles stood in their path… well, beyond a few servants, but they clearly weren't fighters. Or maybe the sight of a charging Asian elephant being spurred on by what looked like a blonde madwoman and an even crazier quintet at her heels simply made them chicken out. Who knew? It was this group that stormed into the ceremonial chamber where Kirin would wed his bride, screeching to a halt mere meters from the startled, outraged masters of the School of Seven Lucky Gods Martial Arts.
"How dare you intrude upon a sacred ceremony!" Kirin thundered.
"More of a mockery of a ceremony than anything." Kodachi declared, easily taking in the still-bruised and visibly battered state of their opponents.
"You're gonna call this mess off right now, or else!" Ukyo declared.
"Or else what?"
Mousse, taking the sarcasm of Ebiten as his cue, stepped forward and pulled open his robes to reveal an array of bombs. Lots of bombs. So many bombs that even his own allies backed away in shocked fear, though such an effort would have been as futile as "duck and cover" when faced with a real nuclear explosion. If one stray spark hit Mousse, he'd have gone off with enough force that he'd almost certainly take out the better part of the castle.
"…Uh, yeah, as I was saying." Ukyo managed to rally herself. "You can't seriously be intending to go through this with Ranma – if she's already done all that to you, how the hell do you expect to get her into the wedding bed and survive the experience?" She asked, pointing at Kirin's more prominent injuries for emphasis.
Kirin kept silent in the face of that. Truth be told, he'd kind of wondering that himself.
"Besides, this fool here is the girl you should be wedding." Kodachi declared.
"Who you call fool?" Lychee snapped.
"What nonsense is this?" Ebiten demanded.
"No is nonsense! Lychee is girl who own Scroll of Luck in first place, Lychee simply misplace it when Prince Kirin arrive! Ranma merely pick it up – you drag away before we explain things!" The blonde Chinese girl insisted.
Kirin retained his silence, at a lack of words. The prospect of being allowed to just wash his hands clean of this whole affair was tempting, but how could he get out of this without besmirching his reputation? As a noble, his dignity was one of the things of greatest personal value, and being seen to rescind a decision or change his mind could be quite undignified indeed. If only something could help him out.
It was then that causality proved just what a sick and twisted sense of humor it has, as Ranma, clad in an all but translucent undergown and lingerie, came rushing into the room, skidding to a halt as she realized it was occupied and by whom.
Kirin began massaging the bridge of his nose with two fingers. "My lady… this is growing quite tiresome."
"You can say that again – hey, Ranma! Catch!" Mousse shouted, slipping a steaming kettle from… somewhere beneath all of those bombs… and hurling it at Ranma… Who, rather than catching it, looked stunned and horrified, mere heartbeats before a sword came whirling through the air boomerang-style to cut the kettle in half and drenching her in hot water.
The resultant cloud of steam hid the change, but it couldn't disguise the sound of feminine squeals become masculine bellows, nor the tearing of cloth. When it cleared, a very irate Ranma glared at his Chinese self-proclaimed rival.
"Do you have any idea of how much that stings?" He thundered, trying to use his arms to cover himself better than the torn cloth draped over his now-too-large frame could.
While Ryoga turned aside in disgust, Lychee hid her face with a squeak, and Ranma's female rescuers tried not to make it too blatant that they were ogling Ranma, the Nekronians recoiled in shock, Kirin most of all. "What's going on here!" He screamed.
"Ever heard of 'Jusenkyo', asshole?" Ranma jeered.
"If you were really a man all along, why didn't you ever say so?" Kirin immediately howled in disgust, going through the usual shock so quickly it didn't even register on his face.
"Lemme think… because this is frigging embarrassing? Because I had no way of knowing you wouldn't simply slit my throat and toss me off the side of your airship? Because I never had a chance to think about it? …Maybe because I thought you'd accept that I wanted nothing from you except maybe your blood on my hands and let me go, what with how I kept trying to beat the shit out of you and escape?" Ranma thundered back, voice rising in volume as he spoke until he roared like an animal with the final sentence. Heaving in great draughts of air to calm himself, he spoke in a more conversational tone. "So, can I go now?"
"Get out! Out! OUT! I never want to see you or any of your crazy friends again!" Kirin bellowed.
"Two conditions first." Ranma stated, to the shock of the other Nerimites.
"What are you thinking of, Ranma?" Ryoga yelled.
"Yeah, let's get while the getting's good, Ranma-honey." Ukyo agreed.
"You made a real mess out of my day, so now you're gonna pay me back." Ranma declared, ignoring his "friends".
"Just what do you want?" Kirin gritted. This was more than he had wanted.
"I want to borrow that airship of yours to get us back to Japan… after I use it to go to Jusenkyo."
"Jusenkyo!" The other cursed teens in the room chorused in delighted surprise. Now that they thought about it, if they were in China – and particularly if they grabbed that airship – they could get cured in a single stroke! Finally, they would be rid of these obnoxious forms!
"Out of the question!" Kirin snapped. "What makes you think I would loan my private vessel to you?"
"…Shampoo?"
"Yes, airen?"
"What would happen if you told your village about how Prince Kirin made an idiot out of himself trying to marry another guy?" Ranma teased, without the faintest hint of playfulness in his tone.
"Would laugh selves sick, then put in newspaper – all villages in Byankalas know within day or so." Shampoo answered immediately.
"…You wouldn't." Kirin stage-whispered in dread after finally managing to get his voice to work again, aghast expressions on the face of his fellows.
"Try me." Ranma stated flatly.
"Alright, I will have some of my servants prepare the vessel. What is your other demand?" Kirin growled.
"I want my clothes back!" Ranma snapped, pointing a finger at Kirin like an avenging angel.
The room shook as everyone else, even Jasmine, promptly fell flat on their faces.
"…What?" Ranma asked, irritated.
About half an hour later, the teens from Nerima were aboard the airship, which was drifting off through the skies, laughing over their victory… admittedly, it wasn't much of a victory, but they were taking whatever they could get.
"Man, that was a pain in the ass to go through with, but it looks like we're finally going to be cured at last!" Ranma cheered.
"Yeah, I can't believe I'm actually saying this, but thanks, Ranma." Ryoga grinned, as he had been doing since they had first set foot aboard the airship.
"It be too-too good to be able to go swimming again!" Shampoo enthused. Then, she latched onto Ranma's side and nuzzled herself against him. "Also mean that Ranma no more have to run because Shampoo get wet."
"Get your hands off of him, you Chinese flirt!" Kodachi demanded angrily. Then she stopped and blinked. "Say, why does this seem familiar…?"
"A-Anybody else hungry?" Ranma quickly interjected, hoping to change the subject before they remembered what had happened early that morning and resumed his "interrogation".
"You ask for food, sirs?" Came a voice, and the sextet of teens turned as a diminutive servant in form-obscuring clothes came trundling in with a heavily laden food trolley. The teens hadn't eaten all day, and it had been a very long day at that, and so they eagerly set to dishing out the food for themselves.
"Rice and pickled vegetables?" Mousse asked.
"Sorry, sirs, but that's all there is." The servant apologized. "I go now and help the others steer the ship."
None of the teens were paying him any attention, being too fixated on their food; plain it was, but it was better than nothing.
"Man, what is with these guys and pickled vegetables?" Ranma asked.
"Yeah, I still can't believe that scroll Happosai stole in the first place was basically just a vegetable pickling recipe." Ryoga grunted with his mouth full.
"Next time we see that vile degenerate, I suggest we make him pay for causing all of this." Kodachi said between dainty mouthfuls.
"Shampoo just hope we not see him again for long, long time."
"Amen to that, sister."
"Shampoo not your sister!"
"Do you think Lychee will make Kirin agree to marry her?" Mousse asked Kodachi conversationally.
"Who knows?" The younger Kuno asked.
"More to the point, who cares?" Ryoga added.
"You've got no romance in your soul, pigboy." Mousse retorted.
"Since when is stalking a girl for thirteen years romantic?" Ryoga jeered.
Ranma watched his rivals quarrel and shook his head, then yawned loudly. Strange, he didn't recall feeling so tired before… his mind grasped then on something else that had been tickling him.
"You guys…" He began, his eyelids starting to feel exceptionally heavy. "Does this taste a little odd to you?" He managed to slur out, then felt himself collapsing bonelessly onto the floor, unable to muster the energy to fight it off or even care all that much. Darkness claimed him…
…And then he woke up, sun glinting harshly into his eyes and making him screw up his face and drag himself across the floor away from it.
"Finally, you're awake. I was starting to think that Grandfather might have overdosed you."
Ranma blinked, stared at the speaker, and then blinked again. Finally, he spoke. "When did you get here, Kasumi?"
"You and your little friends arrived sometime last night. It's almost noon now – you've been asleep for ages." The eldest Tendo girl informed him. Ranma looked past her, and saw that Ryoga, Mousse, Kodachi, Shampoo and Ukyo were all either awake or waking up.
"How did we get here?" Mousse asked.
"That would be my doing." Came a proud voice, the martial artists turning and hackles rising in unison as Happosai bounded into the room. "I was looking for the pretty Monlon back at Seven Luck Mountain, when I saw Ranma escaping from those handmaidens. How could I pass up so beautiful a sight as Ranma's girl form in see-through undies? I had to follow her. And then I heard your wicked plans… how could I just sit back and let you murder a beauty like Ranma's girl form? I had to stop you, for your own good."
Outside, Soun and Genma were hard at work clearing away the debris of the airship; Happosai had managed to intimidate the Nekonronian servants into turning it towards Nerima, but they had grabbed parachutes and abandoned ship soon after, and landing it was quite impossible for one old pervert. They stopped in their labors as a wordless cry of utter fury echoed from inside the house, barely a heartbeat before something small came rocketing through the walls, plunged clear through the wreck and went out the other side.
"Justice comes to all, in the end." Genma declared sagely.
"Well said, Saotome; well said."
Back inside the Tendo house, Ranma sank to his knees in despair. "It's not fair! Why does it never work like I had planned?"
"Speaking of plans, airen…" Shampoo mentioned.
"…I think it's time we had a little talk about what plans you had that required sneaking around behind our backs, Ranma-honey…" Ukyo added.
"I must concur, Ranma-darling…" Kodachi finished.
Ranma looked up at the three girls closing in on him, and tried to swallow the lump in his throat.
Okay, let's be honest: how many of you figured I was going to have the cast get cured here? Well, surprising as it may be, there is a method to my madness. I may consider curing the curse to be a fitting "reward" for Ranma and company, but that does not make me ignorant of the fact it should actually mean something. It should either be the ultimate climax of a story, or serve to mark the story as taking a very different path to the canon "wacky hijinks with no ultimate meaning". This was just… too early, for me. It felt wrong to let Ranma and company be cured now, even though it's quite likely I will have Ranma at least cured. Either during the Togenkyo incident or at the Christmas Party, I'm honestly not sure yet.
As Daxel pointed out in his last review, there are at least 14 more chapters to come. We hope that you continue to enjoy them and that when it comes, the climax will be worthy of the trip it took.
And yes, the next chapter will show you exactly what Ranma and the girls are going to say to each other.