Chasing the Rainbow
Disclaimer: I do not own Ranma ½ or any related characters in any way, shape or form.
Author's Notes: It's been a long time since we updated, and for that I can only apologize; real life interfered in the parts of all three of us who work on this story.
Chapter 21: Possession Perils! An Oni in Nerima!
The Temple of the Monkey Monk was one of many small temples scattered around Nerima, and the greater Tokyo area in general. Unlike other locales like the Frog or Cat Temples, it was not abandoned, though it was still small enough that it had a single kannushi, or Shinto priest, in attendance. That priest fussily flittered back and forth at the gate to his shrine, anxiously awaiting the two men that he had summoned. His eyes momentarily widened with delight when he saw the two approaching figures before he composed himself once more. "Ah, gentlemen, there you are." He called out in his rather reedy, clanging voice.
Soun and Genma straightened up to look as professional as possible. It wasn't easy, they had just moments ago been arguing over how Ranma should have been at the Tendo Dojo when they got the call about this monster that needed battling, each blaming the other for his absence and thusly the fact they would need to do this all on their own, but they managed to look serious.
"Good day to you, sir. I understand that you have need of the Tendo Dojo's services in defeating a monster?" Soun asked politely; he always was better suited for the position of speaking to the clientele. This was hardly the first time that the Tendo Dojo had been called in to handle monsters. Guarding the bra of Yang Gui-Fei from the notorious Panty Thief of Nerima, battling giant monsters that emerged from cursed wall scrolls, defeating the marauding octopus pot, yes, all of these were tasks to which the Tendo Dojo had been called.
"It's less a matter of defeating a monster and more a matter of being prepared to defeat a monster." The priest replied politely.
"What's that supposed to mean?" Genma asked inquisitively.
"Saotome..." Soun growled softly. Why was it that time and time again, his supposed best friend ended up making himself - and by extension Soun and the Tendo Dojo - look like a complete and utter fool?
"There's not much time to lose; please, come with me into the temple itself." The priest proclaimed, leading the way. As they walked, he explained. "The sacred charge of this temple is a magical box, in which a legendary monk - who was also a monkey - sealed away a terrible oni that ravaged the land. However, time has taken its toll on the sacred ink, and the seal is losing its power. I must apply a new seal, or the oni will be free to devastate the land once more. That's why you gentlemen are here; to assist me should the sealing not go according to plan. If the oni escapes, I will need the two of you to help me catch it again before I put the fresh seal on the box."
As he told them this, he led them to a small altar, on which they saw the box that he was talking about. In appearance, it wasn't much, a simple wooden box with a slip on lid, an ofuda taping it shut. The ink that made up the kanji had grown extremely worn with age, to the point there was barely anything left. The box itself visibly shuddered, the odd arc of energy crackling across its surface.
Soun and Genma carefully moved away and got into ready stances while the priest began the necessary preparations for the new seal, carefully drawing the ink on the replacement ofuda even as the box rattled slightly in a menacing manner.
Finally, the priest completed his work and calmly approached the box. Genma felt a bead of sweat fall down his face; this was it, this was the moment of truth – whether they would have to fight the Oni or go home and call it an easy job. The priest came closer, closer and closer still and then began the final step of the sealing when a loud bang made them jerk… to see a window had somehow worked its way loose and was banging quite loudly.
Genma and Soun sighed in relief, and then paled when they heard a voice remark, "Hey a tissue! Thanks!" They whirled just in time to see Happosai yank the ofuda out of the priest's hands and blow his nose, breathing in relief, "Ah! You have no idea how annoying it is to have stuffed up nose."
The priest paled. "Oh dear, this is not going to be good."
The box rattled and shook like it was inside an invisible laundry dryer as the ink finally smoked and burned away, before, with an almighty explosion and clouds of smoke, the box shattered into millions of splinters. A form began to become visible as the smoke cleared and then, with a flourish the Oni revealed itself… a balloon-like creature wearing a tiger-stripe loincloth, a brief turn of its body revealed a pair of small horns. All in all, it would have been comical, but any sensible person knew better than to underestimate any demon... no matter how puny it looked. Unfortunately, Soun let his guard down at just the right moment that the demon sped towards him and vanished on impact with the yelping man.
Happosai took one look at his cowardly apprentice, two small, sharp, spiral-patterned horns now sticking out of his head, his eyes practically glowing with mischief, and then turned to the other two men in the room. Passing over the quivering form of Genma, he directed his attention to the one sensible looking person there; the priest. "Okay, what's the deal here?" He asked irritably.
"You have released the evil, body-snatching oni! It will feed upon the evil of its host to rejuvenate its power, whereupon it will be truly free to ravage and pillage once more!" The priest wailed.
"Oh, so you mean that dinky little thing wasn't the oni's real form? That's good, I'd hate to think that was supposed to be the monster... wait am I saying?" Genma suddenly yelped as the realization of the situation sank in.
Everyone ignored him. In part, this might have been because, while Genma was carrying on and Happosai was questioning the priest, the possessed Soun promptly hurled itself at Happosai with a horrifically warped battlecry. If Genma hadn't been so terrified at seeing his closest friend possessed and throwing his life away by attacking the most evil entity in all of Japan, he would have been deeply insulted for Soun's sake. What a waste of Soun's kiai talents!
Happosai easily dodged Soun's attack, his martial arts training letting him turn the possessed fighter's own momentum against him and sending him crashing onto the floor. "And just what do you think you're doing?" He asked, a warning tone in his voice.
"Evil, useless, stupid pervert! You're not fit to be grandmaster of the Anything Goes style!" Soun spat.
"... Happo Fire Burst!"
"Right." Happosai said, dusting some ashes off of his hands, turning to the flabberghasted priest. "So, how do we expel that monster from my worthless disciple?"
"...A solid blow to the head typically works wonders. But I think you just took it a bit overboard." The priest declared.
Happosai looked at him coolly, then turned to Genma. "Well, you two better get going after him, then! No telling what kind of trouble that thing could cause if you don't."
"Us?" The priest spluttered in protest. "But you were the one who-!" He found himself caught off in mid-tirade as Genma suddenly grabbed him by the shoulder and began dragging him away.
"Look, buddy, best to just get while the getting's good; he's worse than any damn oni!" Genma told the priest in a stage whisper. When Happosai's indignant "I heard that!" rang out, he vanished; the two of them were out in the street and trying to establish Soun's trajectory before the last echoes rang off the shrine's interior.
The old pervert gave an offended sniff, then adjusted his bag of panties on his shoulders before setting off home. After all, no matter what had gone on here, it had nothing to do with him, right?
Meanwhile, closer to the area in which the "Nerima Wrecking Crew" were established…
Ranma looked up as he heard the sound of something falling through the air in the kind of arc that signified it had come up a long way away and was now coming down as gravity demanded. Ranma wasn't an "A" student by any means, but that was more frequent disinterest and occasional distractions than stupidity. When he took an interest in his work, he could surprise his teachers – his science teacher was particularly impressed with how precisely Ranma could wax forth on the effects of gravity. Of course, some would argue that to be a result of Ranma having a rather considerable amount of practical experience with it on a regular basis.
Of course, knowing how it happened and knowing why it happened were two different things. And caring was another matter altogether, come to think of it. Of course, Ranma probably would have investigated anyway, that's the sort of person he was, when he found himself under a most unusual form of assault.
"Wahaha! Wallyhoo!"
Before Ranma could even think to say that was the stupidest battlecry he had ever heard of, or take in the goofy, balloon-like shape rising towards him, it hit him in the head.
If anyone had been watching, they would have witnessed the balloon-thing seem to simply… "phase" into Ranma's head, whereupon he looked pained and clutched his head, then returned to normal and looked around with a confused look on his face. After a moment he shrugged and continued on his way.
However, there was something different, something more sinister about the teenager as he whistled a tune on his way to Kodachi's place.
Some time later, Soun awoke with a pained groan. His body felt like one giant bruise, and once more he found his traumatized memories slipping back to his training under Happosai. The beatings, the starvation, the crimes for which he was left to take the fall... fiercely he shoved those memories back into the darkness where they belonged, took several deep breaths and concentrated, trying to focus his ki. While he had taken more than a few lumps since the Saotomes had first arrived in Nerima, it still paled to the beatings he had taken during his time as Happosai's disciple, and it had been many long, blessedly quiet years since then, so he was out of practice. Still, the pain seeped away and his bruises began to fade, allowing him to rise up from the crater he had made on the rooftop. His clothes were tattered and scorched, but serviceable; now, the only problem was getting down. Walking to the edge, Soun steeled himself and then jumped down, sinking into a crouch as he landed to absorb the impact with nothing but a rough jolt. Standing up, he smiled proudly; he still had it!
"Soun! Soun, there you are!" Genma called as he screeched to a halt near his friend, the exhausted form of the priest clinging to his broad shoulders. "And that impact jarred the oni loose, just like the priest said. But where'd it go?" He asked, eyes widening with realization and looking all around him.
"I... ah, um..." Soun mumbled, trying to recall if he knew anything at all about the oni's disappearance.
"You idiots!" The priest's furious voice rang out as it became quite clear that it had escaped them altogether.
"Okay Kodachi, see ya later!"
Kodachi waved at Ranma's departure with a stiff smile on her face. As the pigtailed teen vanished, so did the smile, replaced with a more suspicious grimace. When Ranma had arrived he had seemed… off, somehow. At first, she just thought she was imagining it – maybe a little lingering doubts from this whole strange situation, the changes in the former status quo. But as the time had passed, she knew she was right. Her beloved Ranma-sama had been unusually cavalier in their lesson. In fact, there had been one thing that cinched something wasn't right: he had fondled her. Deliberately, not hard enough to be distracting, but plenty enough to be noticeable. Kodachi wanted Ranma to think of her as attractive, certainly enough, but that had been just… shivers still went down her spine thinking about it, and when he'd done so, she'd leapt away from him. He'd backed down, said not a word and been his usual gentlemanly self. But, all through the lesson, she'd felt him watching her, like a predator studying prey, and she didn't like it. She didn't like it at all.
It was a gloomy pair that returned to the Tendo Dojo later that day. The priest refused to pay them until the Oni had been located and resealed and while technically that meant they were still on the job, it still counted as a failure in their eyes.
"Well cheer up Tendo, at least he promised to pay us in full if we manage to find the Oni."
Soun nodded miserably as he cracked his back, stiff from pain, as he walked. "Still, I can't believe I let my guard down like that."
Genma nodded sagely. "Don't blame yourself, everyone slips up once in a while. Come on, let's play some Shogi when we get back inside, that should make you feel better."
Soun smiled as they opened the door and he announced his return.
"Father!" Came one feminine voice, thick with outrage and tinged with hurt.
"Daddy!" Came a second feminine voice, blatantly upset and wanting comfort.
And in their wake, the forms of Natsume & Kurumi, on a fast approach square for Soun Tendo.
Soun blinked at the tones and suppressing the sigh at their insistence of him being their father, he asked, "What is it girls?"
"There's this horrible little troll invading the house!" Kurumi squalled.
"Who are you calling a horrible little troll?" Happosai asked indignantly as he bounded onto the scene.
"What else are you, you disgusting little thing?" Natsume jeered. "You barge into our father's house like you own the place, carrying a bag full of women's underwear, harass our sister and demand she feed you, then try to grope me! Father, are you just going to let him get away with this?"
"What's the deal here, Soun old boy? Since when do you have five daughters, and where have these two been up until now?" Happosai demanded, eyes burning holes into Soun.
Soun sighed; he might have guessed something like this would happen when Happosai finally poked his ugly head back into his house. But why did it have to be today? "They're adopted Master, they've just recently come into the family." He was sore, tired and he really, really did not want to put up with Happosai's antics right now.
"Adopted?" Kurumi asked, clearly hurt, tears shining in her eyes.
"Master?" Natsume asked, disgusted disbelief ringing in her tone.
Happosai turned to her with a mocking grin. "That's right, tootsie! I trained your father and taught him everything he knows - why, I am the Grandmaster and inventor of the Anything Goes School! So, if you really are Soun's apprentices, that makes you my disciples, too!"
Soun fought the urge to groan like a dying man and clap his hand over his eyes as his "new daughters" shrieked in outraged disbelief, Happosai's malevolent cackle ringing up to the uncaring sky above. What had he ever done to deserve this...?
Things did not clear up that night. Or the next morning, either.
"Alright! Which one of you stole my underwear?" Akane demanded early the next morning.
"Haven't we been through this before?" Nabiki grumbled sarcastically. "Ours are missing too."
"Why accuse us in the first place when that disgusting old lecher just showed up last night, anyway?" Kurumi asked, puzzled.
"But it's not me!" Happosai protested, startling them all. "Somebody's robbed me, too!" He looked on the verge of tears, which wasn't surprising to those who knew him; after all, had he not broken down weeping when that goodhearted Genji Heita had taken Happosai's warped lessons to heart and stolen Happosai's lingerie too? Had he not taken to his bed in horror after Ranma's living shadow had burnt his collection? None of them noticed Kasumi entering the room, nor the worried look on her face, until she spoke.
"Akane? Do you remember where the ladder was last put? I think we should clean the roof off before anyone else notices it."
"The roof?" Everyone repeated, confused, and then stampeded outside. To their horror, they saw a sign visible from the street had been assembled on the roof so that others could see it, a sign "written" with women's lingerie. "The underwear thief of Nerima lives here", that was what it said. Akane and Nabiki's face paled with the realization of what this could do to their standing in Nerima; Happosai's stupid little tenugi mask didn't actually conceal who he was, but nobody knew his name or where he lived. If they did realize the Tendos had been harboring him all along...
"Happosai! Fetch!" Akane barked, pointing at the underwear.
"Oh, like I really need to be told that!" The old pervert scoffed, moving at lightning speed up to the roof and making the underwear disappear as he leapt back and forth; obscuring the location of his favorite hiding spot took first priority, but that didn't mean he couldn't also take advantage of this.
Down on the ground, Akane realized something. "Hey! You give mine back to me, ya hear!"
Meanwhile, elsewhere in Nerima, Ukyo Kuonji was waking to a similarly unpleasant situation...
"WHAT THE HELL?" Ukyo stared in abject shock and horror. Someone had broken in and completely destroyed the grill/counter, the very lifeblood of her business, a blatant insult to her profession – indeed, her very life. She stared at the twisted, mangled metal until tears came to her eyes, wondering who could be so cruel to do this to her place.
After the tears came rage. Oh, she was going to find Ranma and when they found the bastard that did this, POW! Straight to Mars! Dashing upstairs, Ukyo grabbed her gear and headed out to find Ranma. Her insurance would take care of the damage; Ranma and her would take care of the culprit.
When she reached Ranma's camping site, though, she found herself stopping and staring. One thing she knew quite well about Ranma, because it was a trait she herself was inclined towards, was that Ranma believed very strongly in keeping his belongings and living space neatly arranged and clean. Even back when he had been living with the Tendos, Ukyo knew that nothing that he owned was ever removed from his backpack, which sat inside the guestroom cupboard and awaited him to grab it and be gone. This was the natural legacy of the warped sort of childhood he had lived under Genma, forever anticipating that he would to grab his pack and go. Ukyo had similar tendencies, a result of her nomadic lifestyle up until Nerima, but for some reason even she had found the way Ranma went about this to be rather sad. That was why the sight of Ranma's camp being not only empty, but reduced to a proverbial rat's nest of stuff, caused her to screech to a halt. She knew better, unlike most of the kids from Nerima, who saw Ranma's reluctance to partake in classroom cleaning if he thought he could get away with it (a result of Ranma having been brought up with strict independence – you took care of your own mess).
Perhaps worse than the fact that his campsite was a mess was that there was no sign of him to be found, and for a brief moment, Ukyo entertained the idea that some idiot had tried messing the place up while Ranma was gone. She promptly dismissed the idea; Ranma may not have run around demanding acknowledgement like some martial artists did, but he wasn't a total unknown. Especially in Nerima. As Ukyo had learned when some thug had tried holding her up (to her mortification, he had been more afraid upon recognizing her as Ranma's fiancée then of her own considerable martial arts prowess), the local toughs and hoodlums in Nerima would sooner eat their own eyeballs then risk crossing Ranma.
When she took a closer look at the trash she began to feel more worried. There was a lot of junk, but two primary components in the mess were empty (and often broken) sake bottles… and women's underwear. Looking over this last piece of evidence, she shook her head and set off purposefully in the direction of the Kuno estate. It wasn't that she believed they were at fault… well, not entirely… but she knew Ranma had gone to teach Kodachi some martial arts lessons yesterday and so if anyone was likely to have an idea where Ranma might be, or what might be wrong with him, it was Kodachi.
Kodachi had been going through a kata when the doorbell rang. Quickly toweling off, she decided to answer the door personally and opened it to see a grimacing Ukyo on the front step. "Ah, Ukyo, what a surprise."
"More'n you know..." Ukyo growled darkly. "Have you seen Ranma-honey? I mean, since he came to give you that lesson yesterday?" She asked.
Kodachi shook her head as she stepped aside to allow Ukyo entry, "No, although I'm not sure that's a bad thing. He was acting very strange yesterday."
"You noticed...?" Ukyo asked, her heart sinking. "This doesn't look good." She declared.
Kodachi cocked her head curiously, "Noticed what? Just what is the matter?"
"It's just... I came downstairs this morning to find my place wrecked. It's like whoever did it knew exactly how to make me mad and was deliberately trying to do that. Then I went to Ranma-honey's to see if I could get him to help me track down the lowlife and make 'em pay. But when I got there, he was gone... and the place was a mess, too."
"And... so?" Kodachi asked, inquisitively quirking an eyebrow.
"You don't?" Ukyo began, then trailed off and shook his head. "Ranma-honey's a neat freak when it comes to his personal belongings. Leaving his living space a mess goes against everything he's learned after a childhood of always being on the move. For the place to look like that... it's not natural. There was even women's underwear and empty sake bottles lying in it!" She declared emphatically, as if this was the most convincing argument she had.
It was. Kodachi's eyes narrowed in thought as she remembered Ranma's strange behavior and compared it to what Ukyo told her, "I do believe that we need to speak to the Tendos, it may be possible that his father or that perverted abomination have finally done something irreversible to him."
Ukyo blinked quizzically. "Why do you suspect it was them and not the China doll?" She asked, sincerely curious. It wasn't that she believed Shampoo to be responsible herself... okay, she wasn't ruling that possibility out entirely... but why leap straight to the accusation of the enemies coiled within the viper's nest that was the Tendo Dojo?
...Oh great, now she was starting to sound like a Kuno!
Kodachi sent a flat glare at Ukyo. "As much as I would love to say that this is the work of that dog-eating savage, this doesn't fit her. No… sake and women's underwear? That would be the influence of that wrinkled abomination and his buffoon father finally coming to the surface, and that is where we will get our answers one way or another."
Ukyo nodded even as she turned, already racing off and heading for the Tendo Dojo. She had never forgiven Genma for his crimes against her, and while she didn't hate Happosai quite that much, she could still feel the fires of hate and rage burning whenever she thought of the Ultimate Weakness Moxibustion, where she had learned firsthand just what sort of person the old degenerate was. If they had done something to her Ranchan...!
Kodachi blinked. "Wait for me!" She quickly started sprinting after Ukyo as well.
When the two girls arrived at the Tendo Dojo, they paused atop the wall to witness a strange sight; Mousse and Nabiki trying to negotiate with a rather upset Soun Tendo and from the conversation it was clear that the topic of interest was why Nabiki was dating Mousse and why exactly Soun should really be making such a fuss over the situation. It was just bizarre enough that they didn't notice Shampoo sitting next to them with an amused look on her face.
"Shampoo not think she ever get tired of watching Mousse and Mercenary Girl argue with Fountain Man." The pair twitched before turning to see Shampoo watching before the Chinese girl turned to them. "So, what Spatula Girl and Ribbon Girl doing here?"
Kodachi recovered from the shock first. "The more important question is what you are doing here?" Shampoo shrugged.
"Shampoo decide to watch Mousse and Mercenary floor show." The Chinese Amazon replied levelly. "Now, why you here?"
"We think there's something wrong with Ranma. Let's just say there's been weird things going on." Ukyo said, not wanting to share all of the details with the girl who had been, and in a way still was, her bitterest rival.
To her surprise, Kodachi decided to elaborate. "Yesterday, Ranma made some distinctly ungentlemanly advances on my person while we were training – and with an attitude that ensured I would rather he had not made them. Miss Kuonji here believes he may be responsible for the destruction of her grill."
"Shampoo should have known; Spatula Girl and Ribbon Girl always head here first when there trouble with Ranma, you two be too-too predictable." The blue-haired girl smiled.
The two girls in question flushed in embarrassment; they did tend to do that a lot.
"So... why is Mousse here, anyway? And what's all the fuss about?" Ukyo asked, curious despite herself.
Shampoo shrugged. "Mercenary Girl find pictures of her in room along with note from Ranma saying he take them. Mercenary Girl gets upset and calls Mousse, Mousse comes over and then Tendo find out they dating and starts the waterworks. Best floorshow Shampoo get for a while."
She stood up on the wall and stretched slightly. "So now what we do?"
"You're certain that none of Ranma's strange behavior is due to those who happen to have a vested interest in him once more shunning our affections?" Kodachi asked.
"How come you aren't blaming us for whatever's wrong with Ranma, anyway?" Ukyo followed.
Shampoo gave them a flat stare. "Spatula Girl value business as much as you value Ranma, and Ribbon Girl not want Ranma acting like pervert brother. Shampoo not stupid." She then indicated Genma coming out to investigate the noise. "Shampoo think idiot father or old freak do the damage, much more likely."
"What the heck is going on out here Tendo?" Genma grumbled as he approached where his friend was currently leveling a tearful tirade at his daughter and that Chinese boy who worked at that Amazon restaurant.
"My daughter is dating a gaijin!"
Genma shook his head at his friend's outburst before noting the pictures on the ground and picked them up, before blinking and turning to Nabiki, "Who took these?"
Nabiki in turn simply answered, "Look on the back."
Genma flipped them over and blanched and looked at Nabiki who nodded in response. He then quickly turned to Soun. "Soun, I think we have a more important problem to deal with."
He showed Soun the back of the photos, prompting the man to choke for a moment.
"Ranma! B-but that's impossible!"
"Nothing is impossible with that oni on the loose!" Everyone inside turned and the girls on the wall blinked as a priest walked in. "Your eldest let me in. And it seems that we all now know who the newest host of the oni is, this Ranma."
That got the attention of Ranma's fiancées, who leapt down from the wall as one and rocketed towards the priest, halting only at the last moment. "What do you mean, oni?" They demanded in unison.
The priest held up his hands in a placating gesture, "A body-snatching oni, that these two idiots," a gesture at Genma and Soun, "were supposed to make sure didn't escape as I renewed a seal on its prison. But of course it escaped and evaded capture. I have been searching for it and now it seems that it has possessed this Ranma fellow and is enhancing his capacity for evil, aiming him towards those he despises the most."
Genma paled as he remembered the wide range of 'training' exercises he made the boy do as it clicked with what had happened that morning, "Oh dear."
To say that the girls were upset would be an understatement.
"Where is he?" Shampoo demanded, chúi materializing in her hand from thin air.
"What do you mean he's going after those he hates?" Ukyo asked indignantly. "He tore my shop apart, and he loves me!"
"No he doesn't!" Shampoo protested.
"Yes he does!"
"No he doesn't!"
"Yes he does!"
"Is this really the time?" Nabiki asked disdainfully.
"You shut up!" All three of Ranma's fiancées screamed as one, whirling on the shocked Nabiki, who leapt back and, almost instinctively, stepped closer to Mousse.
"Ahem. Regardless of the matter of his emotions, we need to find and subdue Ranma." The priest spoke up as if he hadn't just started an argument between three volatile teenage girls, "The longer that Oni is in him, the more damage he will cause." As an afterthought, he added. "Not to mention that oni only leave their hosts voluntarily after they drain them of their life energy."
Screams met this proclamation, right before Shampoo's fingers closed around the front of his ceremonial robe. "Where is he? You tell now!" She howled, shaking him like a maraca to emphasize her point.
"T-t-the-e-e-e O-o-o-ni-i-i-i o-o-only-y-y-y e-e-effects their emo-o-o-o-tions! His ha-a-a-abits will remain the sa-a-aame!" The priest looked like a bobblehead from all the shaking as Genma slapped a fist into his palm.
"Then all we need to do is find something or someone he encounters regularly! The Hibiki boy! He should be in the area by now; Ranma's probably gone to fight him! Let's go Tendo, we have a paycheck to acquire!"
"You?" The priest asked disdainfully, Shampoo having stopped shaking him in shock. "I wouldn't trust you two to chase a Bakezōri out of an old shoe shed!"
"Hey!"
Shampoo unceremoniously released him, whereupon the priest picked himself up and dusted himself off. "You two failed miserably when I hired you the previous day; why should I trust you would succeed now?"
"Honorable priest…" Natsume interjected, humbly bowing to him. "Please, allow the Tendo Dojo a chance to redeem itself. I, Natsume Tendo, heir to the Tendo Dojo, promise on my honor that we shall find and capture this malicious yokai."
The priest looked flattered despite himself, and made a show of coughing into his fist. "Very well, young lady. I shall allow you a chance to redeem your school's name."
This genial proceeding was rather shattered when they realized Ukyo, Kodachi and Shampoo had all vanished and were heading off without them, forcing the priest and the two newest Tendo daughters to run to catch up.
Several minutes later, Ranma's fiancées were racing off in what they hoped was the most likely direction - given the smashed walls, twisted signs, broken windows and other debris they were passing, their doubts weren't very great. "So, why you come?" Shampoo asked, directing this at Natsume & Kurumi.
"Like you would have heard if you'd waited, we must avenge the honor of the Tendo Dojo. How dare that priest proclaim father to have no skills in the art!" Natsume fumed.
"I happen to be right here." The priest in question said. At least, he would have said if he had even the slightest chance to use his breath for something besides trying desperately to keep up with the punishing pace that the girls were setting. He promptly crashed into Ukyo's back as she screeched to a halt alongside her compatriots, and fell backwards onto the street, unable to really do much more then gasp for breath and feel relieved that they had finally stopped.
The reason for that stop was the considerably sized crater they had almost run into. In the epicenter of which was sprawled the unconscious form of…
"Ryoga!" Ukyo cried, skidding down to the bottom of the pit and dragging him up. She didn't particularly like the Eternally Lost Boy… in all honesty she thought he was kind of as close as you could get to being a Gosunkugi-like nerd while still being able to bench-press a truck… but that didn't mean she wanted to see him hurt. "What happened to you?" She asked, once she had laid him out on the unbroken concrete.
"I finally –wheeze!- put him in his –hack!- place, that's what happened." Came a voice that was trying to be cool, menacing and sinister, but kind of lost the effect due to the choking and the spluttering. The girls looked over the pit to see the form of Ranma Saotome striding towards them, a black look being firmly cast over the lit cigarette in his grip. Grimacing in disgust, he crushed it between his fingers and scattered it nonchalantly. "How old man Tendo can smoke that crap is beyond me…" He muttered to himself.
The girls weren't really paying attention to what he was saying; they were staring at the horns poking out of his head. Surprisingly tiny ones, given the circumstance.
"What did you do to him?" Ukyo asked in disbelief. She'd been told he was possessed, but she couldn't really imagine Ranma being so… cold, so ruthless and cruel.
"Y'know… what a lot of people seem to forget is that what I practice is Anything-Goes." Ranma proclaimed casually. "And Anything-Goes means that I fight fair only if I want to fight fair. Ryoga's always been a pain in the ass, so I figured it was time I showed him what fighting for real actually entailed…"
"Ranma…" Shampoo began, "You no is acting like own self. You is needing help."
"Help? Help? From a foreign slut, a crossdressing pervert with no self esteem, and an inbred brat with more teeth than brain cells?" The possessed heir to the Saotome School jeered.
"Ranma!" The three girls chorused, equally offended and wounded. To her own surprise, Ukyo felt herself blink back tears. That… that had hurt. To her surprise, Kurumi suddenly pushed herself forward of the group, righteous fury and determination visibly shimmering around her.
"How dare you say that sort of thing, oni possession or not!" She demanded.
"Oh, like you're in any position to lecture me on what's right and wrong." Ranma sneered. "Too weak to hack making it in the world without a family, so you decide to come along and steal somebody else's!"
Natsume's expression became as frigid as her element, offense and a cold rage writ large on her face. Kurumi, on the other hand, did not take things as calmly as her sibling...
"Who the hell do you think you are?"
Kurumi's ribbon whipped out like a lashing cobra and Ranma flipped to the side to avoid the blazing weapon as it sliced through the road. In that moment Kurumi leapt in and the battle was joined as the pair weaved and flipped around, Kurumi trying to burn Ranma to ash with her ribbon and Ranma trying to get close enough to land a punch.
Ukyo watched as Ranma simply smirked at Kurumi's efforts, occasionally wagging a finger or making a mocking gesture, but otherwise saying nothing. Funny, something about those steps he was making looked familiar... A spiral pattern?
"Oh shit. Run!" She shouted, turning and racing for cover.
"What the?" Shampoo blurted, then realized she was the only one still standing there besides the bewildered priest; even Natsume had started sprinting. The difference was that the cold ki master was running towards her sister, while Shampoo's fellow fiancées were taking cover. Grabbing the priest, Shampoo joined them in taking shelter in the nook of a convenient wall. "What going on?" She demanded.
"A couple a' months back, your great-grandmother taught Ranma this killer move that needs the opponent to be burning mad to use." Ukyo began.
Shampoo's eyes widened in shock and more than a trace of fear. "Not...?"
"Hiryu Shoten Ha!"
Usual enmity forgotten, the girls huddled together in a timorous press as deeply into the niche as they possibly could, the great explosion as the winds violently erupted into existence drowned out by the sounds of the havoc they wreaked. Brick walls – like those surrounding them – tore and crumbled under the hungry, sucking vacuum, the tearing winds and pressure differential shattering store windows and ripping out the contents into the uncaring sky. The noise was incredible, and though Ukyo had been present for the Hiryu Shoten Ha once before, that one had been in the middle of a school playing field, not right in the center of a crowded street. The two didn't compare.
When the winds died away, the possessed Ranma stood in the middle of torn pavement and gutted shops, giving off a surprisingly evil laugh. There was no sign of Natsume or Kurumi, though Ukyo was sure they'd simply been sent flying off out of range by the whirlwind. They'd be okay… she hoped. "If we don't figure out how to stop him, and quick, there's not going to be any town left to save from him." She muttered.
"That easy. Step aside; let real warrior handle this." Shampoo crowed, pushing past her indignant rivals and striding towards their oni-ridden future husband.
"Oh, the little girl wants to play with the big boys, eh? I'm gonna send you crying home to momma… oh wait! I can't do that, cause yer momma's dead!" Ranma laughed.
Shampoo froze, and even Ukyo and Kodachi found themselves flinching in sympathy; possessed or not, that was a cruel thing to do! "That hurt, airen." Shampoo declared, and to the amazement of the other fiancées, her tone almost sounded conversational.
"So?" Ranma jeered. "What are you gonna do about it, when you're such a weakling?"
Shampoo chuckled and began cracking her knuckles – a tic, not that the others realized it, "borrowed" from her currently enthralled groom. "Shampoo was weakling… not anymore."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Ranma asked, looking put out as he said this.
Shampoo gave him a wicked grin. "Simple. You not know this, evil oni, but my Ranma recently help Shampoo make great breakthrough in Shampoo training! Now Shampoo show you the fruits of Shampoo's labor!" With that triumphant shout, arms twisting in the traditional manner, Shampoo's aura exploded into life around her, a vibrant display of shifting reds, yellows, oranges and violets.
"Is everyone but me getting secret training with Ranma?" Ukyo complained. Then blinked as she saw something strange about Shampoo's aura… well, besides its sheer size. "I've never seen an aura that color before…" She murmured.
Shampoo paid no attention to the reactions of her rivals; too busy turning her mental eye inward to achieve her goals. The trick with mastering hot ki was that it was counter-intuitive. Ordinarily, she was exhorted to calm her mind, push away her emotions and achieve a mental stillness that would let her spiritual energies flow strongly. With hot ki, she strove to embrace her emotions, stoking them to a fever pitch. Let the storm rage and grow until it transcends chaos to become order in its own right; find the eye of the hurricane and steer from there! Dramatically she raised her hands as her aura suddenly vanished as she drew its power inward, flexing her fingers as sparks flew between them, then shaping them into a cup as small orbs of blood-red flame suddenly exploded into life, one in either palm.
"Kasha Happa-Ken!" She cried, hurling first one sphere at her target, and then the next, both narrowly dodged, both exploding when they hit something with far more ferocity then any of Happosai's little Happo Fire-Bursts ever had.
"You have got to be fucking kidding me!"
Ukyo looked at Kodachi in surprise; she had no idea the rich girl even knew language like that! Kodachi blushed fiercely, looking more embarrassed then Ukyo thought she had ever felt in the past. Still, she tried to clear the air, unsure why she felt such solidarity for one of her rivals. "I don't know when our life turned into a shonen anime, either." She insisted.
The street looked like the result of a tornado before; now it looked like a live war zone. Shampoo's fireballs began starting blazes across the ruined street, even as Ranma flipped, ducked and span to avoid the burning projectiles.
"Heheh, not bad, that's a neat little trick you got there. But I've got tricks of my own too you know!" Shampoo ignored the taunt but then noticed that the heat was starting to build up around him, pulling away from the environment as his own aura grew colder and colder. Realizing he did indeed have something up his sleeve, the Chinese girl pressed her assault.
"Here you go, have some heat of your own!"
The air and flames shifted, Shampoo's eyes widened before she rolled out of the way of a horizontal vortex of flame and super-heated air. The house behind her was not so lucky as wood, brick and metal vaporized in a massive explosion.
"Hah, how do you like them apples?" Ranma crowed as Shampoo took cover again.
"...How did that happen?" Ukyo asked, dumbstruck, when she and Kodachi poked their heads out from behind cover. "The Hiryu Shoten Ha needs a spiraling motion to mix the air - Shampoo didn't give him a chance to move into the spiral!"
"Didn't you feel his own aura get colder before now?" Kodachi asked. "Or see the way he was moving his arm in a spiral?"
"...You mean he's just figured out a way to create a horizontal spiral to draw in all of the hot ki that Shampoo's producing and shoot it right back at her? ...Clever."
"Should you really be admiring the guy who's trying to kill you?" The priest asked incredulously.
"Kill them?" Ranma asked, looking wounded. "I would never do that! ...After all, torture's so much more fun!" He cackled, then burst into a full on fit of mad laughter.
"Shampoo will pull you out of Ranma's body and beat you until you begging to go back to Diyu!" Shampoo spat, livid.
Just as Ranma was about to respond, a sound echoed through the street and all activity stopped as the sound echoed again. Kodachi blinked. "That sounds like an engine." Ukyo and Shampoo glanced at the girl and then their heads joined Ranma's in whipping around as something screeched into view at one end of the street and as the cloud of dust dissipated, the group stared.
It was a miniature hot-rod, with Tsubasa at the wheel and Azusa standing triumphantly atop the bonnet. The ice-skater didn't say a word but instead tapped her foot and with a screech of rubber the mini-rod screamed down the street towards the still stunned and somewhat incredulous Ranma. Suddenly, just as Ranma was about to simply lash out at the pair, Azusa whipped out a hammer and slammed the weapon into the martial artist's gut, staggering him as the mini-rod screamed past and skidded to a halt behind the gasping teen.
Another tap of the foot and with a loud, flourishing horn call the mini-rod screamed forward again. Ranma turned only to see another hammer fill his vision.
There was silence for several long moments as Ranma teetered over and then crashed unconscious onto the pavement. And then, as one, from out of nowhere... "What the hell just happened?" The girls demanded.
Azusa idly tossed her head. "You weren't able to stop him, so we thought we'd try and help out."
"...Why were you even here in the first place?" Ukyo asked; this had just come out nowhere.
"We were looking for Ranma before we saw him beating the snot out of Ryoga - we were going to ask if he'd mind being the best man at our wedding." Tsubasa piped up.
"...You what?" Ukyo replied.
"Yahahaha! Foolish mortals!"
Everyone leapt in shock as smoke poured from the unconscious Ranma's body, materializing into the shape of... a big pink balloon-sort of shape with spindly little limbs. "Now, you shall all perish!"
"We supposed to be scared of something like you?" Shampoo jeered.
"Wahahahahaha! Fools, the energies that I have consumed have restored my powers nearly to their original state. More than enough to crush you all!" The Oni swelled up and exploded into smoke once more, coalescing into a larger, more sinister shape that quickly took on form and color to reveal the oni's true form. The last smoke wisps cleared to display a massive red beast, sharp yellow teeth gleaming in the sunlight while huge cat-like eyes regarded the group with evil humor.
As the other stared at the monstrosity, they missed Azusa and Tsubasa picking up Ranma and quietly motoring away before the Oni roared and floated to the ground, "Now then, prepare to be crushed!"
Ukyo swallowed nervously, and then turned to the priest... "I don't suppose you brought any sealing sutras with you?" She asked, then her face fell as she realised the priest was long-gone, a speck on the distance. "Oh, great, now what are we going to do?"
"I suppose it is time that I revealed some of the Kuno family traditions." Kodachi sighed, stepping ahead of her two rivals. "Sword!" She cried imperiously. Shampoo looked with some misgivings at the outstretched hand, then pro-offered Kodachi one of her dao. The weight of it promptly pulled the Japanese heiress flat on her face, and she spat out dirt before glaring at weapon and owner alike. "I said 'sword', not 'ploughshare'!"
"That only sword Shampoo have." The Chinese girl told her flatly.
"Then we are doomed! Nobody could wield such a brutish weapon!" Kodachi wailed.
Snorting in a most indelicate fashion, Shampoo promptly grabbed the dao back. "You just tell Shampoo how to cut; Shampoo handle this for you."
Any comments either of the girls may have made where cut off when the oni suddenly roared and lunged at them, forcing them to flip away as it smashed a crater where they had been standing. For something that looked an awful lot like a bloated red slug with a lantern-eyed skull at its front end and ridiculously tiny little limbs, it sure packed a punch!
With such teamwork that one would hardly believe the three of them were actually bitter rivals, Ukyo and Kodachi strove to distract the oni, which shrugged off their strongest blows with impunity and bellowed its fury. As they did this, Kodachi shouted the necessary strikes needed, and Shampoo's powerful muscles turned her dao into a bloody calligraphy brush, etching a powerful charm directly into the oni's flesh and bone. Realizing what was going on too late, onis not being known for their intelligence, the yokai was unable to do anything but scream in dismay as the final brutal strike was made, completing the last character and sending brilliant blue-white flames ripping hungrily through its flesh. The stink of sulfur and boiling blood in the air, its flesh burned from the bone into the finest ash, bones crumbling into powder even as a wind sprang from nowhere, transforming into a vortex that sucked the oni-dust into oblivion, leaving behind not a trace of its mortal corpse.
The three girls stood on the ruined street, panting with exertion, before Shampoo spoke up and broke the silence. "It gone?"
"That was the most powerful charm I knew; it's dead." Kodachi insisted. "However, I would advise that we move on with all due haste."
"...Why?" Shampoo & Ukyo demanded in unison, then cast sour looks at each other.
"Because I would rather not be here when the JSDF arrives, if only because they are likely to blame this mess on us." She smiled triumphantly as both the Osakan and the Chinese flinched, now able to make out the sounds of approaching troops. After all, one could hardly expect to see tornados and explosions erupting in the middle of town, in the very precinct where their headquarters were stationed, without them being sent to investigate.
As one, the three girls took off running; they would all rather not explain their role in this devastation.
(And so we come to the end of this chapter. I hope we handled it in a way that you all enjoyed. Speaking of enjoyment, this story as a whole is approaching its end; there remains but the Togenkyo, Ryugenzawa and perhaps the Vengeful Doll stories to adapt (I'm currently unsure if we can make the VD valid given this story's set up) before we close on the grand finale, the adaptation of the Tendo Dojo Christmas Party OAV. There's still chapters in between of course, but it won't be long now. We want to thank you all for staying with us this far, and hope you'll remain to see us through to the end.)