Disclaimer; This fanfiction uses existing ideas, characters and or worlds, but is an independent work of art. I own nothing, hence the reason for publishing my writings here instead of in real books where I could make some money.
In the Diggers lab, a group of people were getting ready.
What they were getting ready for was the pursuit of the Djinni, Madrid, and the pilfered hurtbot, Prototype Alpha Seven, who had left for Yl'Dahjim.
Hanza was wearing an armour similar to what she had been wearing in Bain, only less advanced, and without an AI sphere hovering around her … replacing the random blast sources was the cannons Brianna had made and left behind … it was actually a good thing that the former curse had somewhat similar measurements as the former man, as it would have been more constricting than helpful otherwise.
Stryyp was in a new pair of pants, his former having gotten a couple of small nicks and splotches of oil and dust rubbed in, and though this wasn't of any major concern, he was royalty, and as such had to keep a certain image if it could be helped.
Seance was wearing the same as before, as his mage suit repaired itself. He was muttering the names of spells he might need for this mission, and making sure Ranma didn't catch him doing so, as the weredinictis had still not realised that he wasn't performing techniques, but spells.
Genn was wearing what she had earlier, but wore a visor in addition, which was the same type of device Penny had used during the visit to the Uhm Di Turrok, to spot devices and traps as well as supplying a map of the area. For her safety, one of the guns Brianna had left behind was provided. It wouldn't do much damage, but it would be better than nothing.
Gina was wearing another set of her mission clothes, marine in colour with the exception of the hat, utility belt and boots. And then there were the several pieces of equipment specifically designed for battle, such as shotgun-like weapons resting on her shoulders. Though she rarely brought weapons of her own, preferring to have Britanny or Brianna fight for her, she still had them, and these were special circumstances.
Penny cocked the gun-like crossbows she had brought in during their preparation, and placed in it bolts, preparing them for use.
Ranma, meanwhile, looked over his pants for any holes that would reveal more than he wanted, having reverted back to hybrid form shortly after the course of action had been decided.
Gina had already figured out how to open the portal to Yl'Dahjim, and was about to enter it alone.
"Wait a moment," interrupted Hanza, grabbing a hold of the scruff of Gina's top. "Where do you think you're going?"
"After Madrid!" Gina answered. "That b stole my robots! Then she used them against me!"
"Did you forget that she is now in her home realm?" questioned Hanza. "Chances are that we're walking into an ambush, plus, she might have gotten access to much more power than before, if what I understood is correct, and you are not trained as a soldier, warrior or fighter … let those with proper combat experience go in first, then come in later for support or something …"
Nodding reluctantly, Gina pressed the tablet in the proper place, and a black portal opened.
Ranma, Hanza, Stryyp and Seance entered, and suddenly found themselves in a desolate place.
Lightning flashed across the dark, murky brown sky, illuminating the fallen or ruined constructions visible from the small canyon they seemed to have landed in.
Thunder roared and bounced from wall to wall, prolonging the sound for several seconds.
Hanza silently directed the group through the canyon into view of a tower at the top of a set of long steps, on which stood Prototype Alpha Seven and someone who looked like Gina, only with purple hair that had curls at the temples.
" Madrid," Ranma hissed quietly, making sure that only his company heard him.
"They don't look like they know we're here yet," commented Seance. "I'll call in the others to let them know it's safe for them to-"
"LOOK OUT!"
The young mage was shaken from his concentration on telepathy by Hanza bowling him over, just in time to avoid the descending fist of Prototype Alpha Seven, who had dropped onto them from seemingly nowhere.
-KTHOOOM!-
The ground under Prototype Alpha Seven was now half a foot deeper, and rocks had been kicked up, forming a crater rim several feet wide.
"How on Jade?" Seance exclaimed, clearly startled at how quickly the robot was capable of moving. He quickly recovered from the shock, however. "Go after Madrid, I'll stall this thing!" he called to his companions, and channelled energy into his hands, bringing them towards the chest of the modified Hurtbot.
However, the robot was faster than the mage apprentice, and landed a solid punch to Seance's chin before whatever he was trying could be done.
Appearing at that time, were Gina, Penny and Genn, who saw the strike, and witnessed as Seance impacted against the rock wall.
"Seance!" cried Genn in dread.
"Run …" gasped the injured mage, barely audible over the sounds of thunder, and the small rocks still trickling down from the point of Seance's impact.
Ranma was about to engage the robot, when he realised something.
The robot was possibly as strong as him … possible as fast and smart as well … why hadn't Seance been killed by that one blow?
There was only one possible answer … the robot was holding back to below lethal levels, which was more than likely against orders.
Perhaps Gina's original programming was still in effect, and everyone there was considered friendly, thus not warranting lethal force, but Ranma doubted it … Madrid did not seem the type to overlook something like that while reprogramming the robots, especially after gaining Gina's intellect … something else must have happened to make the fully operational robot hold back.
"Is there a problem, Seven?" asked a stern voice that was a strange mix between Gina's and Madrid's. "That was a perfect kill opportunity, and you passed it up. Why did you choose to stun him instead? You've been acting strange, lately, Seven … but a diagnostic has to wait … kill Seance and the others, now!"
" Yes, mistress … " replied the robot in what could pass for reluctance.
"No!" screamed Genn, who rushed in and placed herself between Seance and Prototype Alpha Seven. "I won't let you!"
The robot paused before the two, and Ranma could see the flicker of something in its optical sensors.
"I'm waiting, Prototype Alpha Seven!" snarled the woman Ranma recognised as Madrid by her aura. "You have your instructions, now kill them!"
" I'm sorry, Mistress … " replied the robot. " But I cannot … will not kill. You may ask me anything else, but I will not kill. "
An echo of "What?" was heard from several surprised voices.
"Okay, Seven, that's it! It's diagnostic time!" growled Madrid and whipped out something that looked like a pocket calculator crossed with a small computer. "I'm patching into your logic processor and checking-"
"Nope," interrupted Ranma as he appeared beside the Gina look-alike. "I'll take that."
"NO!" Madrid cried. "Seve-"
"Ta ta tat," Ranma chastised and covered the Djinni's mouth with his hand. "Let's see … my, my … it looks like you've got a virus in the programming … explains why Prototype Alpha Seven isn't doing what he was told … "Pinocchio" … appropriate name for the virus, given what it apparently does …"
" Mistress! " cried the robot and made to approach the steps, only to have Penny, who had appeared along with Gina during the exchange, point half her choice of weaponry for this mission at him … Beta-tech crossbows so strong and heavy that they were mounted onto thin air by a force field of some sort, capable of aiming independently, as demonstrated by one crossbow aiming for Prototype Alpha Seven, and the other at Madrid, giving the robot a choice between staying in place or risking his Mistress getting killed before reaching her.
To add to that, Hanza had seen what Penny did, and copied her with the giant cannons mounted on her armour.
Stryyp's ancient artefacts, fused into his very being during a ceremony to save his people, glowed, showing where they were, and displaying his readiness.
" Interesting, " commented Prototype Alpha Seven. " Individually, only two of you can match me … however … "
"However is right!" crowed Penny. "Make one move, and the Traitorous B gets it!"
Growling in impotent rage, Madrid settled for glaring at Ranma, who crushed the "remote-control" for Prototype Alpha Seven to avoid Madrid regaining control over him in a manner the now sentient robot would not like.
"Now we wait for Gina to figure out what to do with you," stated Ranma, appearing calm on the outside, but being a barely contained raging inferno inside. These two had threatened one of his loved ones, even going as far as to impersonate her and turn her family against her … had it been up to him, the punishment would be swift in execution, long and suffering in duration, and serve as a reminder to everyone that one did not mess with Ranma or his loved ones.
However, Gina was the wronged party, so it was only fair that she decide.
"Let's first find out what is up there," Gina finally stated. Curiosity was evident in her expression.
"What about these two?" asked Ranma.
"They won't be a problem," said Stryyp. To further back up his statement, his artefacts flared with power.
In the Koki home, Ukyo was returning to the land of the conscious.
She was having a hard time accepting what she had learned before passing out, and immediately after waking, came to the conclusion that it had all been a bad dream. After all, there was no possible way that Ranma was the womanising pervert Akane had accused him of being so many times when she had not gotten any reasonable explanation for his absence.
The screams of an infant caused Ukyo to sit up from the bed she was on.
The reality of what she had hoped was a dream came rushing back, there would be no Ranma at her side, running Ucchan's Okonomiyaki or playing with their children after work while she cooked dinner or did other domestic chores.
"Tadaima!" called a familiar voice, chorused by a couple of female voices.
Ranma was home!
Ukyo tossed off the sheets that covered her to find and confront Ranma.
Opening the door, she rushed out and found the residents of the house converging on the hallway, where Ranma was returning his daughter to the bird-woman after having greeted the girl with a peck on the head.
Determined to let him have an earful for not letting her know that he was alive, Ukyo stomped closer, only to get a face full of smoke as Ranma disappeared.
Staring in confusion, Ukyo couldn't really understand what had just happened.
One moment, Ranma was there in front of her, handing his child back to its mother, the next he disappeared in a cloud of smoke.
It couldn't have been an evasive manoeuvre, as he hadn't seen her, and she hadn't, in her opinion, made much noise.
"Okay, we're done with the Rings," interrupted Ranma's voice from the garden. "I'm sure I'll be back soon, so there's no reason for me to stay."
Ukyo rushed towards the voice, and got into view just in time to see Ranma disappear in another cloud of smoke that rapidly scattered to the winds and was no more.
What was going on here?
Erwin "Peewee" Talon was by no means an old boy … he was two or three years from entering his teens, actually, but that did not mean that the airlines had any reason to treat him as they had thus far!
The first thing that had gone wrong, was that his seat on the plane had been double-booked, meaning that someone else had bought his seat and gotten to it before him, which left him with the unappealing choice of sitting in Coach, or displeasing his mother, who had threatened to withhold his allowance and trust funds if he did not come along.
"It'll be a good character builder," she had told him. "A chance to see how privileged you truly are by mingling with the lesser fortunate on the economic ladder."
Why was it that every time a child was faced with a situation remotely similar to this, the parents would start spouting about character builders? What was next? "When I was your age, I held down five jobs, and had to walk ten miles to school every day, hip-deep in snow and with howling winds, then tend to my ill parents who had worked their fingers to the bone to feed and clothe me until they were not well enough to continue."
Erwin knew that both his parents had been brought up in wealth, and hadn't seen a day's work until they were in their mid twenties, due to studies and taking a year off to ponder their futures … if he ever got a kid, it would indeed suffer for all his parents had done to him … as all children seemed to do …
The second offence had been when the stewardess had placed a box of crayons on his fold-up trey, along with a colouring book and a juice box.
They had treated him as a five-year-old!
He complained to them, and they took him to the cockpit to see the pilots.
The Captain sat him on his knee and told him what some of the controls did, even if he was already perfectly aware of what everything did … he was a genius, after all, but his silent fuming was not understood for what it was.
Then he had been given a toy airplane and a "badge" that the Captain had pinned onto his sweater, incidentally stabbing him three times before getting it right, and sent him back to his seat.
If it was the last thing he did, he would get his revenge on the airline!
Now, if only the turbulence would stop … it was making him colour outside the lines …
Entering the sole remaining structure at the top of a steep and long set of stairs was, as Gina said it, a piece of cake. Even with its security locks active.
So it was that while Stryyp, Penny, Hanza, Genn and Seance kept guard with their prisoners, Ranma and Gina stood on a metal platform that had extended on its own from the opposite side of a gap. The yellow and black warning stripes on the end seemed a little too contemporary for having been something created by the Nomad Artificers, but Ranma held his suspicion to himself.
As soon as the two were on, the bridge-like platform started retracting, then soon after, it started raising itself like an elevator.
"Huh, there's an energy spike …" Gina noted as she looked at her instruments. "It's the walls!"
"Plasma is gathering in them," Ranma observed.
"They're screens …" Gina realised as an image appeared.
" Hold it steady, Alpha Nine, " a female voice called, and the face of an older Gina, with nearly white hair appeared, with a ball of metal floating beside her. " Brit and Brianna are never going to believe this … "
" Gina, this … this is incredible, " stated the orb.
" You bet it is, Subtracto! We're through! " continued Gina. "We threaded the "eye of the needle"!"
"Ranma, that's me!" Gina gasped.
Ranma nodded and studied the scene unfolding before them.
" Brit! Brianna! Get a load of this! " exclaimed the elder Gina. " Your big sis did it, guys! I found them! I found them on the other side of time! The masters of the previous existence! They're right in front of me now! The Nomad Artificers! "
"Jinkies!" Gina exclaimed, staring up at the view before them in awe. "Look at that! The planets! The machinery!"
For some reason, Ranma felt it would be wrong to speak … the sight of the planets, tamed stars and artificial moons was awesome … this race was truly great.
" Alpha Nine! " continued the enthused elder Gina in the recording. " Let me get you into the shot! You made this possible too! "
The focus of the recording moved, showing a green robot with what looked like a hat.
"I … I know him!" Gina gasped.
The elder Gina held out a box with a familiar creature within. Gina had described them to Ranma when she came back from the exploration on Jade, though she didn't tell him much else about what she had found.
" I think she'll get a kick out of them, " she said, confusing Ranma as to the context this had with the previous images. " They're always doing nice things for you … and for each other if you have more than one … They're called Pau. I got Tiffany the whole set! "
The whole thing set Ranma at unease … there was something spooky about this place, and he felt like he was being watched. But no matter where he looked, he saw nothing but light and shadow hitting objects, and no real presence was felt apart from his own or Gina's.
"We've reached the top, Ranma," interrupted Gina, snapping Ranma from his search. "Are you okay?"
"Fine," Ranma assured her. "Just a little preoccupied."
" Gina … " a distorted Alpha Nine called, his image appearing on the screen that was the walls. He seemed badly damaged for some reason. " This is Alpha Nine … I hope you can hear me … we ran into trouble along the way – but … we made it through … We passed through the "eye" … Mission Accomplished.
" However, there is more to add to my report …
" During our passage … after the … difficulty … we encountered an anomaly. While crossing through the end of time to the beginning of time, something … attached itself to every complex device and mechanism within Prototype M14 H.A.D 7h.
" The side effects are inexplicable. The Life Support system began … "growing" … plants … grass … water … life …
" And the Pau toys, the ones placed in my care … they move and interact independently. They play on the hull of the ship … like children on soft grass … they … live … "
Images of Pau frolicking on grass by a stream appeared on the screen in place of the beaten-up face o Alpha Nine.
Some of them had wings like dragonflies, and zoomed above the others in playful laughter.
One or two had their eyes on their stomachs instead of their heads, and possessed horn-like protrusions on the head instead.
And some had two extra forelegs that they used for support while using the upper set to paw flowers or tickle the other Pau.
They all looked so innocent and happy, and made Ranma long for his daughter, even though one of his clones had recently held her for a moment and the memory of it had filtered back to him. It wasn't the same as holding her himself.
" The Hydro-Carbon Nanomachines that formed their infrastructure have transformed, " continued the image of Alpha Nine, not paying any heed to Ranma's musings. " Into living cells … and even I have changed … the anomaly has stripped my memory banks bare, as a virus might … but I still function … just like a wooden puppet with its strings cut … yet still moves …
" Gina … I will wait for you … as your last instructions to me requested … I will wait to give my final report to you … until then, Gina … until then … " the voice and image of Alpha Nine faded away.
"Does this mean what I have a sneaky suspicion of?" asked Ranma, surprise setting in.
"If it is that the Djinni were originally Pau, then yes," an equally surprised Gina replied.
"That explains why they can't use their powers on themselves …"
"They were made to do nice things for others …" said Gina, finishing his train of thought.
"What do we do with Madrid?" Ranma asked, checking the giant room once more for observers, but finding none.
"I have just the idea for her …" Gina grinned maliciously, making Ranma cringe in short-lived sympathy for the Djinni. "You might want to start considering how to break it to your team of scientists that colonising the moon will be out of the question, though …" she added as an afterthought.
Wincing at the though of that meeting, Ranma followed Gina back to the elevator. Maybe he could convince Gina to let them at least turn the moon into a prison colony … at least then his scientist wouldn't feel as let down …
Author's Notes; I think I deviated a great deal from the Comics drawn by Fred Perry in this chapter, at least the part about the capture of Madrid and Prototype Alpha Seven … if you have a different opinion, please inform me, but do so in a polite manner.
I have noticed that the plot is getting increasingly difficult to think up, so I'll probably try to find a way to put the story to bed, so to speak. These difficulties are partly to blame for the lateness of this chapter … another part is that since the last chapter, my brother had his Confirmation, and as his godfather, I was obligated to attend the ceremony and some preparation, not to mention preparing for the celebration afterwards. Then there was the National Holiday. Then my Uncle had his 60th birthday, and as he isn't entirely well, in mind not body, the whole family was there to celebrate, along with friends of his with either a similar condition or people he'd met and befriended some other time. Then there has been this Ranma/Naruto crossover I had, inspired by the story "Cherry Blossom" by Largo, which I could not keep myself from tinkering with on The Fanfiction Forum, mulling over the idea with others … as soon as the next few chapters are finished, I'll post it here as well, but it will be in the Naruto section. The final obstacle in churning out this chapter, was the preparation for the "500 hit" marker on my profile at DeviantART, an occasion for which I felt I had to draw something.
I apologise again for the delay and the likely disappointing chapter length.
