Chapter 8: Confrontations
Disclaimer: I don't own anything.
XxXxXxXxXxXxX
Furinkan High School was a bit quieter these days. The morning fights had finally stopped; the teachers breathed a sigh of relief at the removal of a major distraction, and not having so many students late for homeroom. Not that Akane's admirers had lost hope. They had merely begun to see it might take more than defeating Akane alone to get a date with her.
Tatewaki Kuno held court in the schoolyard, insisting that Ranma Saotome had to be defeated if there were to be any chance of Akane becoming available. "He is a perceptive enemy. He knew well of your trap. Finding a way to strike at him through his weakness will not be an easy matter."
"It can still work!" Gosunkugi said. "We just need a better way to lure him to the cats..."
One of these others, a boy named Ichiro, agreed. "This time I write the note."
"I doubt any note will attract his attention," Kuno said. "The simplest plans are best. Leave them where he will have to go."
"He has gym class today," Gosunkugi said. "Will he go in the equipment room?"
"He will. I shall arrange it."
"It'll take more than that..." a new voice said from on top of the outside wall. Everyone looked up to see a long-haired boy in white Chinese silk robe standing there, hands hidden by his joined sleeves. His eyes were hidden by the glare of the morning sun off his thick glasses.
"You are late. If you seek the hand of Akane Tendo you should learn punctuality."
"I have no interest in this 'Akane Tendo'. I have my own reasons to kill Saotome." The boy jumped down from the wall. "In case you hadn't noticed, he is very good at avoiding trouble. He sees it coming - literally. It's his other form. It allows him to see the future."
"The future? Who are you, that you would know this?"
"Mu Tsu, Master of Chinese Hidden Weapons Style. He has stolen a great treasure of my village. I intend to get it back. Your plan will work, with my help..."
XxXxXxXxXxXxX
Ranma had been edgy all day. His cursed form couldn't get clear images of today. His nightly dreams had been skipping over the near future for more distant weeks. He now had a good idea where to find Sailors Uranus and Neptune, but no idea what the next hour held.
"Saotome!" the phys ed teacher called. "You're on storage duty."
Ranma gritted his teeth. The duty schedule had changed. Kuno would have the power to do that. It must be some gambit of his. Well, he needed to stop relying on his cursed form's power and get back to his Anything-Goes roots, dealing with surprises.
They had been playing basketball; Ramna gathered the balls with a bit of Anything-Goes flair, throwing one at another and creating a cascade like a table of scattered billiard balls: hit the right one in just the right way and they all end up coming to you. His father had won a few games like that, he recalled.
He racked the balls and wheeled them into the equipment room. The door closed behind him - Mousse was standing there with a pail of water. He reached over to open a locker - dozens of cats came pouring out. He moved in front of the door, cutting off Ranma's escape.
"Hello, Saotome," Mousse said, upending the pail on himself.
And so it began, Ranma fighting Mousse, losing his mind by inches with each blow.
XxXxXxXxXxXxX
Ranma-chan woke up in the school swimming pool. She was strangely dazed and exhausted. Something had happened... a blackout. What had she been doing? She tried to remember. Going into the equipment room after gym class to put basketballs away... and then... HE had been there.
She had fallen for it. Sometimes the simplest plans really were the best. Trapping him in a small room with a swarm of cats... and one really BIG cat. She cursed her stupidity. Of COURSE Kuno and the Akane Brigade were going to keep trying until they got it right. She just hoped he hadn't killed anyone while she was under.
Ranma changed back to male form in a restroom and made his way home. He quickly asked his father what had happened. Being in panda form, it took a while for him to sign the answers.
"Kissed Nabiki? Aw, no... I didn't..."
[YOU DID]
"Oh, man... did anyone see it?"
[EVERYONE]
"Great. I know what everyone is going to think about this..."
XxXxXxXxXxXxX
Ami's thoughts drifted on her way home. She was trying to relax and decompress before a heavy homework session after dinner. She had just got out of one cram school and was starting a new one next week. She didn't want to start slipping in the gap.
She was startled by someone falling from a rooftop to land right in front of her. The figure landed forcefully on the sidewalk in her path. She was even more surprised to see who it was. "Sailor Moon -?"
"That's me! You're Ami Mizuno? Pleased to meet you."
"Ummm... what do you want? Is there a monster around here?" Ami looked nervously around the street.
"Come with me. There's something you need to see."
A few minutes later they were in a back alley. A cat with a gold crescent on its forehead was there. "This is Luna," Sailor Moon said. "I believe we have something for you."
The cat leaped into the air, performing a somersault. An object appeared - a pen, Ami realized. "Take this, Ami. It's yours."
"That cat... talked..." Ami was beginning to wonder if she had fallen asleep at school and was dreaming right now. That wasn't like her, she'd never had problems staying awake in class before, and hadn't shown any signs of stress from studying hard before now. Well, if it was a dream, there was nothing to do but go along. She took the pen. "Now hold it up and say, "Mercury Planet Power, Make Up!" the cat said.
"MERCURY PLANET POWER! MAKE UP!"
It happened fast, a flurry of light and ribbons and water and Gods knew what else. She stood there, now clad in an outfit like Sailor Moon's, blue-themed. "What on Earth?"
"They were right!" Sailor Moon said. "You ARE Sailor Mercury! C'mon, there's another one of us this way!"
Ami decided to stop questioning. If she woke up from this, she certainly wasn't telling anyone about it. She ran down the street after Sailor Moon.
XxXxXxXxXxXxX
Dinner was... tense. Kasumi's eyes drifted over to Nabiki, who looked like the cat that had swallowed the canary. Akane was looking angry, though whether at him, or at her latest failed cooking attempt he couldn't say. Her face seemed to be breaking out in a rash.
"Ahmmmm... Nabiki... I'm sorry."
"No need to apologize, Ranma. You ARE supposed to be choosing me, aren't you?"
"What? But... well..."
"You DO remember it, though?"
"That's the thing. When I'm like that... I have no idea what's going on."
"So... you'd have kissed anybody?" Nabiki laughed. "Don't give me that. You were acting on instinct. From the heart, you could say." She clasped her hands in front of her, looking up as if in romantic swoon. "Showing your true feelings!"
"But I don't -! I didn't -!"
Soun patted his shoulder. "No need to be modest. You'll make a great couple. I'm sure you'll do the right thing."
"It was just a KISS!"
"JUST a kiss? What are you, an American? Kisses still mean something on this side of the Pacific."
"Lucky thing he's NOT American," Akane muttered. "With them you're not safe even after you've had a few kids with them."
"It wasn't a real kiss! You're reading too much into this!"
"I'd say this is pretty real," Nabiki said, producing a photograph of the kiss.
"You had someone take a picture!"
"Gosunkugi had his camera. He was dirt cheap about selling the picture, too."
Ranma looked over the picture. It looked more like a cat's nuzzling than a human kiss to him. "How can you call this a real kiss?"
A line of spatulas embedded themselves in the wall in front of Ranma's face. "Ranma! I loved you! This is how you repay me?" Ukyo called from near the koi pond.
"Ucchan! Please! Ya gotta believe me! I-!"
"You said I was the one you were really going to marry! I was there! You could have kissed ME! Why HER?"
"I... uhhh..." Ranma had no answer for that.
"Well, FINE! If that's how it is! FLOUR BOMB!"
Ranma found he could not avoid taking his lumps.
XxXxXxXxXxXxX
"You look like you've had better days," Cologne said.
"Mousse," Ranma said. "He was the tiger?"
"It's not easy keeping a Siberian tiger contained. Especially when it isn't actually a dumb animal. Him being blind dosen't help as much as you'd think. He's on his way back to China."
"Better late than never, I guess." He looked embarrassed. "I kissed Nabiki while I was under. Ucchan blew up when she found out."
"Young people are so jealous. You'll just have to make your choice clear."
"That's another thing. I'm not too hot on choosing anyone."
"One thing the Lady has taught us in all her various hosts is you don't have to be enthusiastic about doing what leads to your best future. Your feelings can catch up later. The important thing is to do what you must when the time is right."
"At least with her power you always knew what that was. I know Ucchan will calm down in a few days. Better than SOME people in this town..."
The Senshi bounded toward them and landed on the rooftop of the Nekohanten. Jupiter looked around. "Where's Usagi?"
"If she's late, that's her loss," Ranma-chan said. "Let's get started on training." Together with Cologne they started to explain basic operations: reconnaissance, moving silently, blindsiding enemies, preparing attacks quickly.
"...You don't want to announce your presence to the enemy, especially if there's no one around to be inspired by a speech. The youma certainly aren't intimidated. It just wastes time and give them the initiative..."
"...You don't have enough power right now to go head-to-head with a general. We really don't have any means to kill them ourselves. We just keep them from getting what they want and their rivals will do the rest. The Dark Kingdom isn't the most stable political system..."
"...You have to understand that until this war is won you have nothing better to do with your lives than fight and train and prepare. If your families are making demands that reduce your effectiveness against the enemy, you should run away for the time being and live here."
That last one had them all sweatdropping. "That's a little extreme, isn't it?" Jupiter asked.
"Yes!" Mercury said. "What will our families think?"
"Let them think what they will," Cologne said. "It's the sort of sacrifice true warriors have made since the dawn of history. Even if they never find out what you have done, there will at least BE a world for them to live in."
"If this goes on long enough," Ranma said, "you really can't avoid going public. Your parents won't let you fight, and the Dark Kingdom will kill millions of people around the world, and the Japanese government will demand your parents allow you to fight. If they refuse, it will be a race between the Dark Kingdom's assassins and the American Special Forces out to kidnap you. You can fill in the rest."
They could indeed. They threw themselves into training with renewed fervor.
Ranma led them in some katas and sparring practice. They eventually agreed on a suitably out-of-the-way place in the mountains where they could practice using their powers in team tactical exercises.
As they headed back to their homes Cologne huddled with Ranma-chan. "You were too easy on Sailor Moon when you mentioned she had to be a Warrior-Princess. You should have pressed her. She needs to understand the sacrifices to be made, as these other Senshi now do."
"What do you want to do? Kidnap her? That always ends badly for us."
Cologne sighed. "DOES she learn? Before the final battle?"
"Some. Not up to martial artist standards, but the therapy will help. Mostly she needs confidence."
"Well, as to the Tendos. How soon can they learn about your power?"
"Actually, there's a good opportunity after Shampoo gets back..."
XxXxXxXxXxXxX
Ranma-chan was in a corridor of crystal. The floor was tiled in onyx; the walls and ceiling surfaces looked to be ordinary quartz. Beneath the surface, however ... She walked up to a wall and looked closely into it. Translucent backing material, but with some strange effect in it... some patterns here, lights there. A word swam up out of the depths of her mind: computronium. Warm to the touch; the heat of untold zillions of calculations per second.
These walls had more than ears. They had brains.
She walked through corridors, rooms, galleries, chambers, atria, up several flights of stairs, into a spire. At the top she emerged into a greenhouse garden. The outer walls were sheer transparent crystal - not quartz, these, she knew; solid diamond, cheaper in this age than glass. *And what age is that?* she wondered.
The view outside the windows showed the plan of the building: a complex arranged as a five-pointed star, angular towers close in to the central spire. Between the arms, well-tended gardens. *A palace,* she realized.
The city beyond seemed mundane, architecture much like the Tokyo she knew. Looking at the mountains and coastline around the area she knew it WAS Tokyo: over here, the bay was much the same; over there, Mount Fuji in its rightful place.
*What happened to all the buildings?* she wondered. *Shinjuku? The Imperial Palace?* Realization: This WAS the Imperial Palace - a new palace for a new age. The lord of this place was not lord of Japan, but King of the World.
She made her way down to ground level. The central chamber was filled with courtiers in a mad variety of costumes. At the far end of the chamber, a raised dais with side-by-side thrones guraded by four figures. On the thrones sat the King and Queen, he in gray tuxedo, she in butterfly-winged gown. She recognized them all on that dais, royals and bodyguards. She worked with them, trained with them, fought alongside...
XxXxXxXxXxXxX
Ranma-chan woke up. This dream felt somehow different from previous ones. Tokyo wouldn't have looked like that in the past; this had to be the future. But with the area so radically changed... how far? Centuries, had to be. What could it mean?
As she drifted off to sleep again, she thought she knew: Hope. Hope of what they might do if they won.
XxXxXxXxXxXxX
AN: I'm trying to blend the Ranma manga with SM anime. I've worked out a rough week by week timeline for Ranma and assuming about one week per SM episode, and matching them up; next chapter is Episode 9.
Three's a tradition in Ranma fanfic of Ranma being raised by other fathers, who almost cannot help but do a better job than Genma of making him a functional human being. Some things I'd like to try sometime, if they haven't been done already:
Final Fantasy 8 crossover - when Ranma is six years old, he and his father meet Yojimbo (FF summoned monster, not seen in FF8 but in later games); they fight (Genma always willing to test his strength) and he uses the X-Zone attack, banishing them to another dimension. They end up in the FF8 world, in a battle zone, get separated, SeeD's find Ranma and take him in. Raised in one of the Gardens (not necessarily Balamb), years before the FF8 characters are brought in from Edea's care. At age 16, he takes his graduation mission as an Unarmed Combat Specialist. During the mission he runs into his father, a mercenary with the opposing forces, who has acquired a crystal capable of transporting them back to Earth. However, he dosen't know about GF's.
They land at Jusenkyo, continue their fight, get the usual curses. Ranma finds the dimensional transport had de-junctioned his GF, leaving him weak; he submits to his father, realizing he cannot win just now. On the way out of China, he finds Ramuh in a cave; the GF junctions with Ranma voluntarily. He draws magic at occasional spawn points on the way to the Tendos.
Ryoga would have a Titan GF, enhancing STR and VIT. Ranma's junctions would enchance AGI and SPI. Cologne would come with Leviathan. No other early series characters would have GF's, and most of the main series storylines are not affected by Ranma's power level.
Lost in the Myst - Ranma at age 10, Genma visits an obscure book dealer and picks up the training manual with the Nekoken, and the linking book to Myst.
Ranma separated from Genma, raised by Atrus. Eventually reunited with Genma, usual curses, arrive at Tendo household. Ranma more able to adapt to non-martial arts lifestyle, goes looking for materials to make his own linking books to various helpful worlds...