Disclaimer

Macross is owned by or licensed to lots of people - Tatsunoko Studios, Harmony Gold, Studio Nue, Streamline Video...note that none of them are me.

The same can be said of Ranma 1/2 - Rumiko Takahashi, Kitty, Shonen Sunday Comics, Viz Video. Not me.

I didn't create any of them, and I certainly do not own them. Any use of them in this story is meant as nothing more than tribute. Please don't sue me.


Wednesday's Child

Twenty-Nine: The Need To Fight

March 7th, 2012

Ranma pulled on the center stick, and the YF-4 Lightning III prototype variable fighter brought its nose up until it was in a near-vertical climb. He firewalled the engines, then shifted the throttle to the left, past the afterburner detente, and up to stage five. The reaction mass flow control valves opened all the way, dumping water into the superheated exhaust of the FF-2001 fusion engines, and the big jet poured on yet more acceleration.

"Approaching atmospheric service ceiling."

"I can see that, Misa."

The atmospheric pressure was dropping off quickly; the fighter noted the fact, and switched over to pure rocket thrust. The loss of thrust was barely noticeable, but the rate at which he was now burning through reaction mass jumped sharply.

"Twenty seconds to engine cutoff."

The sky turned from dark purple to black, and Ranma grinned, despite the acceleration forces pulling the skin back from his face. The engines cut out, and Ranma checked his position on the INS and guidance computer.

"A little off, but not too shabby. I think there's still a flutter in the reaction mass flow valves; I was getting uneven thrust."

"We'll check that against the black box, but I think you're right."

"Starting turnover." He pushed the stick down. In microgravity with no atmosphere, the control surfaces were just inert chunks of metal; the flight computer noted this fact, and fired the vernier jets on the nose and tail of the Lightning. The YF-4 nosed down, until the curve of the Earth was visible just below the nose.

"Hey, Misa. If this thing can't handle re-entry, what do I do?"

"Jetisson the airplane."

"Great." He checked the nav comp, then touched a control. "Starting my burn in fifteen seconds."

"I have you on NAVSTAR...your re-entry angle looks good."

"Why, thank you, Colonel."

The engines kicked in again, for only twenty seconds, and the fighter began re-entry. "Burn on schedule, and we are on course. See you in a few hours."


"Low orbit turns out not to be a problem at all." Ranma tapped the report sitting in front of him. "We got a full print-out of the logs from the computer, and they match to six places with the projected numbers, once we allowed for the flutter in the number three fuel pump. However, I basically burned the fighter dry doin' it. Had to make an air-only landing. I don't think we can make geosynchronous orbit with any sort of realistic payload."

"But you could do it with external tanks?"

Ranma nodded. "Yes, Sir, but like I said, we'd need every station filled with extra gas to get up there. Leavin' the jet with nothing but the internal cannons."

Global nodded. "I understand that, Commander Saotome. Of course, if the need is merely to rendezvous with orbital support, such as a carrier, then this is acceptable."

"I don't want to try it until we do have a carrier up there," said Ranma. "I was a bit skittish about trying for low orbit without the extra gas."

"I thought you test pilots liked to live on the edge." Nabiki smirked.

"On the edge, yeah." Ranma snorted. "But I went twenty kilometers above the edge of that jet's envelope. Pilots die when they leave the envelope."

"What about the armaments?" Global flipped to another page of his own report. "I understand you underwent gunnery range testing last week."

"Main guns work nicely, but the recharge cycle could be brought down." Ranma scowled. "I ain't trained up fully on LASER operations, but it seems to me that the guns need too long to recharge."

"Point eight seconds is required to fully recharge the weapons," said McCain. He was the Stonewell-Bellcom representative. Ranma snorted.

"You can get awful dead in point eight seconds. You ever flown combat?"

"Well...no."

"I have. An' trust me, you don't wanna have to wait for nothin'."

"There is the GU-11 for backup—"

"The gun pod has an ammo limit," countered Ranma. "Plus, it doesn't have the penetration of the LASER cannons. That was a bright note," he said to Global. "Those guns can punch through two meters of armour, compared to sixty centimeters for the GU-11 rounds. But thermal blooming eats into their penetration over long periods of fire." He turned back to the representative. "The guns fire for a quarter second per pulse, correct?"

"Yes." The representative nodded. "Anything over that, and the thermal blooming attenuates the beam more drastically."

"But there's gonna be some blooming at a quarter second as well. Can you dial back the pulse length, to maybe point two or point one five seconds?"

McCain shrugged. "We can do that with a software patch, try it out tomorrow. But I'd expect to lose some penetration."

"Maybe at point blank range, but I'm guessing at medium range, it'll be nearly the same. An' until Raytheon produces a prototype for the new missile, all we can really do is tinker with the guns."


"Being a test pilot seems to agree with you."

Ranma sat down at the kitchen table. "Well, it beats hell out of flying recon." He and Misa had managed to patch things up, more or less, and their friendship was back on an even keel. It had helped that Nabiki had come through on the apartment for Minmay. The very next day, she'd been installed in her own place. Misa had tried to make amends with her by donating a couple of pieces of furniture for the apartment.

Luckily, Minmay was too damn nice to hold a grudge.

"Exedol has finished his genetic workup of the Zentraedi genome," said Misa. She was standing by the kitchen sink, looking out the window. "He wants us to sit in on the presentation and discussion in two hours."

"'Us' as in the U. N. Spacy, or 'us' as in you and I?"

Misa smirked. "'Us' as in you and I. And Commander Jenius, Commander Ichigyo and Milia. And he wants you in female form."

Luckily, Ranma had not been about to sip his tea. "Well, you can tell him to go to hell on that last one," he growled. "I ain't appearin' anywhere near Max in girl form. Bad enough that Milia'd be there; Max still hasn't given up entirely on her."

"Milia's a better martial artist now," said Misa with a bit of a grin. "Max might find that hitting on her could be...painful."

"She is gettin' good," allowed Ranma. "Probably better than you now."

"Gee, thanks." Misa's tone was dry.

Ranma shook his head. "I ain't gonna apologize for it; it's simply the truth. She's got nothin' to do every day besides train, an' she's been throwin' herself into it. You get maybe an hour a day nowadays, with all your other jobs you're doin', but she spends five hours a day in the dojo. Even I don't get that much time." Ranma frowned. "She might be better than me, before long."

"Who said that?" laughed Misa.

"Hey, ever since I started workin' for a livin', I ain't had time to keep up with the Art," objected Ranma. "So of course someone's gonna surpass me, right?" He shrugged. "At least there aren't many people I'd prefer to surpass me."

Misa bit her lip against the retort that sprang up. The last thing I need is to start another fight this soon. She walked over from the window, and sat down at the table across from him.

"Listen, Ranma...I really do need to apologize for what happened last week." She stared down at her hands. "I know that...well, we're not together any more, not really going to be together in the future—"

"Misa—"

"I know you want to stay friends, and I'm good with that," Misa hurried on. She didn't want him to confirm it, didn't want him to kill all hope, even though—"Because I value your friendship above any others', including Claudia's."

Ranma waited a few seconds, until convinced she'd said everything she meant to. "Misa, the war wasn't a great time for anyone, really. You and me were under a lot of stress, and we took it out on each other."

"That's for sure," muttered Misa.

"And I wondered, if we might not do better with less stress on us."

She looked up in surprise, and for the first time in almost two years, looked him right in the eye.

My God...he's lonely. As much as I am. And he's surrounded by friends—Nabiki, Claudia, even that twit Minmay—and he's still alone.

Just like he's always been.

"So if you maybe wanna start dating again—"

"No, Ranma." A part of her was screaming, What are you doing, you bloody idiot!, but she ignored it. "I admit, part of me is tempted, but the stress we're under now is just as real, and no less intense. It's just a different kind of stress."

"We've been getting along a hell of a lot better over the last year than—"

"You mean aside from last week's little incident?" She smiled. "I think we've been getting along better because we're trying to be friends, instead of trying to be lovers. Like you said, almost three years ago now. We knew when to break it off, early enough to keep our friendship intact."


"I'm sorry, Miss Ling, but I'm afraid that, while we'd absolutely love to have you here, we've got a commitment with Ricky Tang, and I don't want to leave him in the lurch." The manager looked rather downcast at having to admit it. "I mean, you dump someone, no matter who it is, or who you're bringing in, and people in this industry remember."

"I understand, Mr. Gerasimko." Minmay sighed. "I was hoping that maybe you'd have an opening."

"Call me Ilya," insisted the manager. "Ilya Valeriych."

"All right, Ilya Valeriych." Minmay smiled.

"Have you tried at Teddy's?" asked Ilya. "Arnorrson manages the entertainment there, and I can give him a call if you want."

"Thank you, but no." She'd already tried Teddy's.

"Well, leave my your com code," said Ilya. "If Ricky ever decides to move on, I promise you, you'll be the first I call."

Minmay handed over her card—the phones used in Macross City all had bar-code scanners, and the com code was printed on the back, both in human-readable and machine-readable forms. "Thanks, Ilya."

"And don't worry," said Ilya. "This town is growing by leaps and bounds. I'm sure you'll have work in no time. You're Ling Minmay, after all!"


Yeah, I'm Ling Minmay, now without an agent, she mused. I've been insulated from real work up till now, and I'm doing terribly!

Nabiki had managed to wrangle basic rations for her, in addition to the apartment, but if she couldn't find a job, she'd be unable to go anywhere from where she was. Her situation right now was a big, fat zero. If she could get a toehold in this city, anything at all...but a week of hunting had turned up nothing.

I helped win the damn war. I'm Ling Minmay! Don't these people know who I am?

She crushed down the thought. That sort of nonsense belonged back with her childhood...wherever she'd misplaced it. Sure, she'd helped win the war. But what, really, had she done in the last two years?

She looked up, and was surprised to find that her wanderings had led her back to Nabiki's door.

I could ask her for help...But Ranma always told me to count my fingers after shaking Nabiki's hand...

Well, things were getting pretty desperate. She stepped up, and thumbed the doorbell.

"Come!"

She opened the door, and stepped into the apartment. Nabiki was in the armchair, in the half of the main room that served as a living room. Seated across from her, on the sofa, was—

"Saotome-san!" Minmay bowed. "A pleasure to see you again."

"I'm sorry, Miss...do I know—Oh!" Nodoka's hand flew to her mouth. "Ling Minmay! What a pleasant surprise."

"Grab a piece of the couch, Minmay." Nabiki stood and wandered towards the kitchen. "Want a cup of tea?"

"Yes, thank you." She turned to look at Saotome. The older woman—her auburn hair showing a trace or two of grey, but she still looked young enough to be Ranma's sister, rather than his mother—was wearing an elegant kimono, rather than the business suit she'd worn last time Minmay had seen her. "I was worried that maybe you hadn't made it out of Yokohama before—"

"I was on a business trip," she said. "Okinawa. Since then, I've been trying to get here, to Macross City. I thought that if my son survived the war—and I was certain he had(emhe'd be here."

"He is," confirmed Minmay. "In fact, he helped me out just last week."

"Just like my son." The stars appeared again in Nodoka's eyes, and Minmay chuckled.

"Yeah, Saotome always has a soft spot for the damsel in distress," said Nabiki. She set a teacup in front of Minmay, then picked up the pot and poured it full. "So, Minmay. What brings you here?"

"Well...I kind of need more help," admitted Minmay. "The job market here isn't quite what I thought it would be, and without an agent—"

"No agents to be had in Macross City," said Nabiki. "We're still largely a military town, and there's only three private venues so far."

"And I've tried all three," said Minmay. "Plus, most other kinds of jobs—they aren't hiring wait staff, short order cooks, or even dishwashers! And outside of entertainment, the restaurant industry is all I know."

Nabiki nodded carefully. "Well, you know that the only sorts of jobs I could offer would be in the Intelligence Department of the Space Service. And U. N. Spacy—well, I think it wouldn't be a good match for you."

"I considered it, a couple of years back, during the war." Minmay bit her lip. "Ranma kind of told me I wouldn't fit in."

"Oh, he did?" Nabiki frowned. "Not like him to actively discourage someone...I hate to agree with Little Brother about anything, but I think he's right."

"What about our company?" asked Nodoka.

"Tennasaono doesn't really exist anymore," said Nabiki. "The three best girls were with me on the day of the Invasion, and they're all now part of the Service, just like me. The company office was flattened from orbit, and you spent the better part of two years out of contact...In fact, you're the first member of the company I've heard from aside from Chloe, Kirika or Yasmina."

"Perhaps I should start it up again," mused Nodoka. "Is there much need for security in this town?"

Nabiki snorted. "We're eighty percent Service here." She paused. "On the other hand, we could use more Johnny Legs—civilian security. And Global's talked about turning the police function over to the civilians as soon as they can get some people together."

"There you go, then." Nodoka smiled, then turned to Minmay. "How would you like to be a police officer?"

Minmay blinked.


"Thank you for coming, Commander Saotome." Global bowed to him, then turned and grasped Max's hand. "And you, Commander Jenius."

"Thank you, Sir."

"Commander Ichigyo is already present—" Hikaru was, at the moment, at the credenza in the back corner, preparing a cup of coffee. "—as is Assault Leader Fallyna."

"Misa's gone to get Nabs," said Ranma, "so I'm expectin' them to turn up any minute."

"Excellent. Archivist Exedol will be here shortly as well, and just so we have enough Zentraedi representation, he's bringing Specialists Warera Nantes, Konda Bromco, and Roli Dosel."

Ranma snickered. "The spies."

"Indeed." Global tugged at his mustache. "One thing, however, Commander. Archivist Exedol requested that you be present in your female form—"

Max laughed. "You got the Admiral roped into that con as well?"

Ranma bristled. "All right, I've officially had enough of that crap, Max. Sir, you got a cup of water here?"

"No need, Mister Saotome. Whatever reason that Exedol may have had, you enlisted as a male, and I'd just as soon have you here in that capacity."

"Gosh, Ranma. Looks like you dodged the bullet again." Max pulled his glasses off and polished the lenses. He set them back on his nose, and peered at Ranma. "Yep. Still look like a guy."

"Max—"

"Gentlemen, please. If you would take your seats?"

Ranma and Max walked to the far side of the V-shaped table, one glowering, the other chuckling.

"Master Saotome." Milia nodded to him as he sat.

"This ain't the dojo," said Ranma. "Ranks are appropriate here."

"Yes, Commander."

"How's the Diplomatic Corps?"

Milia had, at Ranma's suggestion, applied to the U. N. Spacy, but had been declined due to her Zentraedi heritage. However, Global was not one to waste talent, and had found other work for her. And from courtesy, always referred to her by her Zentraedi rank.

Milia sighed. "Do you know what the primary difference between the Zentraedi Armed Forces and your culture is?"

"What's that?"

"The Zentraedi never invented paperwork." She sighed. "Approximately thirty percent of the Zentraedi that I have contacted have requested recloning. However, I suspect that some of them were coerced by Humans."

Hikaru had been walking past just as she said this, his cup of coffee in hand. He paused, and said, "I have to say, I prefer seeing the Zentraedi micloned. There aren't nearly as many Humans left as there are Zentraedi, and your normal size gives you a significant advantage."

"Should be their say," said Ranma. "I wouldn't mind more Zentraedi being micloned, either, but that's just my prejudice speaking. If they don't want to be recloned, they shouldn't be. The procedure's risky."

"Well, I ain't gonna pressure any into the procedure, either," said Hikaru. "I just feel...safer...every time one gets resized."

"No doubt Hitler felt safer every time a Jew was sent to Auschwitz," offered Milia.

Hikaru blinked. "That's not the—" He broke off. "Okay, I guess it is the same. Sorry, Milia." He walked down to his seat, and set his coffee on the table. He pulled his chair out, flipped it around, and sat down, arms across the back.

Exedol entered, followed by the three spies. They took the left side of the table, almost filling it. Global sat at the head of the table, and glanced down the right side. "Assault Leader Fallyna. I believe that you are in Colonel Hayase's place."

"I apologize, Admiral. I was not aware that seating was assigned." She stood, bowed to Ranma, and walked around the table.

Ranma watched her sit down, then glanced down a bit, to see her name on the tag in front of her place. Then glanced at the seat next to his, with Misa's tag sitting on the blotter right next to his. He looked up, to meet Max's eyes on the other side of Misa's seat.

"I think she wants to be in Colonel Hayase's place," said Max.

Ranma scowled again, but luckily, the murmur of conversation in the room drowned out Max's quiet aside. Max grinned.

"You know, Max, you're lucky you're such an easygoing guy," said Ranma.

Max's grin widened.

The door opened again, and Nabiki and Misa walked in. Misa sat between Ranma and Max, and Nabiki sat on the other side of Max, at Global's right hand.

"And I believe that that is everybody," said Global. "Of course, Archivist Exedol, you do have a penchant for remembering someone we missed...?"

"Not today," chuckled Exedol. "However, I did request that Commander Saotome be in female form."

"Him, too?" snickered Max.

"I had wanted there to be even numbers of Human males and females."

Global shook his head. "Even when he is in female form, Commander Saotome is still male, and has a male's viewpoint."

"Oh." Exedol blinked. "Well, in that event, we might as well begin.

"Over the last three months, myself and three other scientists have been conducting a mapping of the Zentraedi genome, much as your people have done with the Human genome. Among other things, we intended to determine a means of procreation for the Zentraedi race."

"What's wrong with the old-fashioned way?" asked Hikaru.

"The 'old-fashioned way' for Humans, or Zentraedi?" asked Exedol. "I shall address both in order.

"It is little known among the Zentraedi that our people are fertile," he began. "There was no need to do anything to prevent conception, as our sexes were rigidly segragated, and taught to distrust each other. However, there are difficulties with normal child-bearing for Zentraedi. The first is that while we have weeded out most genetic defects, many conditions that cause complications only during sexual reproduction have not been bred out. No reason why they should be."

"Those are very few—" began Misa.

"Among Humans, yes, because evolution has deselected them. But the Zentraedi have not been exposed to one hundred thousand years of sexual reproduction." Exedol sighed. "Unfortunately, such conditions exist in thirty percent of female Zentraedi, and close to fifty percent of male. And there are over a hundred times as many such conditions among the Zentraedi."

"Ouch," muttered Max.

"Even were that not a factor," continued Exedol, "sexual reproduction would not be possible between two full-sized Zentraedi. The increased physical strain of carrying a full-sized fetus would most likely kill the host."

"The mother," corrected Global.

"I apologize," said Exedol. "It is just that the behaviour of a fetus, prior to birth, is remarkably like that of a parasite."

"For some years after birth, too," pointed out Nabiki. "Call it twenty years, sometimes more."

There were snickers from the Human side of the table, but the Zentraedi merely looked blank.

"There is also the issue of mistrust," said Milia. "Male Zentraedi have been working side by side with females, both Human and Zentraedi, for two years. Despite their instant obedience, they still do not trust females of either species. Sexual procreation, by definition, requires at least a small amount of trust between the two parties. And those few female Zentraedi trust nobody except themselves." She tilted her head. "Present company excluded."

"There is also the fact that thus far, only two thousand Zentraedi females have been catalogued." Exedol frowned. "There are no doubt more, but they are avoiding contact."

"So much for the Human way," said Ranma. "What about the Zentraedi way?" He frowned, remembering the brief he'd gotten from Nabiki so many years ago. "In vitro fertilization, artificial wombs, a creche, and then education, right?"

Exedol shook his head sadly. "Unfortunately, that turns out to be false."

"What do you mean?"

"When we started the mapping procedure, it became apparent that our data was skewed," said Exedol. "We ended up throwing out a week's work and starting again from scratch. And what we found was...disturbing.

"We are a race of clones."

"...Come again?" Ranma blinked. "If you're clones, why don't you all look alike?"

"You suffer under a common misapprehension," said Exedol. "The cloning procedure does not create a duplicate of the individual, but instead an artificial descendant. Family lines exist, as we were told, but each comes from a single donor, not a line of descent. We are grown in tanks to maturity—"

"That cannot be!" Milia looked shocked. "I remember the days in the creche, I remember education, selection for the Air Force—"

"All implanted memories, I am afraid," said Exedol. "I suspect that skills can only be implanted when backed by memories. Plus, such memories make the person easier to control. All the signs were there. Why is it that we gain close to fifteen thousand kilograms in only thirteen Earth years? How is it that we can be force-grown to maturity after primary education, then never again after that? For that matter, you have heard of individuals that never physically mature, or ones like myself—" He gestured to his skinny form. "—whose size is not suited for combat. How would this be possible, if we had such control over our bodies?

"No, I fear that defective individuals, like myself, are the result of imperfect control. We did not evolve as we are now, but were created. We were bred—no, designed—for war, and little else."

There was silence after that. Global finally broke it.

"So who created you?"

"There is no way of knowing," said Exedol. "Our histories speak of a race that we call the Protoculture. We know that they were humanoid, and that our Imperative was to defend them. It seems likely that they created us, but they have been extinct for five thousand of your years. It seems unlikely that we can ask them."

"What effect with this discovery have on your ability to reproduce in the Zentraedi fashion, Archivist?"

"It nullifies them completely," said Exedol. "You see, we do not have the means to perform the cloning—neither the hardware, nor the donor genetic information. Our recloning chambers could probably be reworked to do the trick, but there is no Zentraedi with sufficient knowledge to do so, and unfortunately, your own biosciences are not up to the task, either."

"So the Human way is out, and the Zentraedi way is out," said Ranma. "Is there any way that we can help?"

"I was just getting to that, Commander Saotome." Exedol touched a control on the table, and a hologram sprang to life. "Here, you see the Zentraedi genetic makeup." It was in the form of a double-helix, the DNA graphic most familiar to the viewers—and remarkably similar to the DNA molecule itself. "And here is the Human genetic makeup." A second graphic sprang into existence.

Misa blinked. "I've seen those before. My father—"

"Indeed. This information was prepared by Admiral Hayase Takeshi." Exedol smirked. "He did his best to wipe us out, and in doing so, accidentally gave us the key to survival."

The two codes merged, like cancelling like, and leaving only two markers untouched.

"As you can see, the genetic makeup of our two species is practically identical. These two markers control only cosmetic differences—eye, hair and skin colour. They also carry some of the genetic disorders of which I spoke earlier."

Nabiki nodded. "I see now how we could help."

"Indeed. Our two species—though it might be more appropriate to refer to us as two breeds—are cross-fertile." Exedol beamed. "We can reproduce with you."

"Not unless you buy me a drink first," said Nabiki dryly. "This should be impossible, you know."

"How do you mean?"

"There are millions of species on this planet," said Nabiki. "Do you know how many of them Humans are cross-fertile with? None. Zero. So the odds of another species from another planet being cross-fertile with humans are astronomical. Pardon the pun."

"It is possible that we have a common ancestor," said Exedol. "Perhaps the Protoculture colonized this planet."

"Fossil records don't support that," pointed out Nabiki. "But the Mayan Island Incident does seem to indicate that the Protoculture came here once before."

"Roy was on that mission," mused Ranma.

"I know," said Misa.

"The genetic similarity helps explain some other things that have been bothering me," continued Exedol. "That we share a similar form is not such a puzzle—Humanoid seems to be a common evolutionary pattern. But we are alike in societal matters as well. For example, both—species? Breeds? What is the best word here?"

"Races?" suggested Global.

"That will have to serve, I suppose. Both races are social creatures, preferring company over solitude. Both are status-conscious. Where ours is solely a military hierarchy, Humans impose an order of precedence over any and every function. Even in the most informal settings, one person tends to become the leader."

"True enough," said Nabiki. "If you've ever been to a cocktail party, and seen a guest steal the floor from underneath the hostess—"

"Exactly," said Exedol. "Further, both races seem to have a penchant for violence. Both seem to enjoy conflict."

"Whoa, back up," said Hikaru. "I don't agree there. Sure, Humans have a pretty violent history, but I can't say that most people enjoy war. I know that I don't."

"Have you ever seen an anti-war movie, Commander?" Misa tilted her head. "Full Metal Jacket, for example, or Apocalypse Now are great examples."

"Not to mention, all the books, poetry and what-not that glorify war," added Nabiki. "All those lines about the honour of battle and the warrior's way. Even if someone's acting purely on the defensive, we remember them as savage fighters. The English airmen of the Battle of Britain, for example."

"I can't help noticing, Exedol, that you said violence and conflict," said Ranma. "Not war. And I agree with you one hundred percent."

Exedol beamed. Max and Hikaru scowled.

"After all," continued Ranma. "Almost one hundred percent of Human activity centers around conflict. All our sports are stylized battle. Our most popular and enduring board games are wargames—Chess, for example."

"All your video games are combat-oriented," added Milia.

"What about romance?" asked Max.

Nabiki laughed. "You never saw Ranma's teenage years, or you wouldn't bring that up at all."

Misa nodded. "In the end, it's about species survival. It's about stomping out other species, tribed, whatever, so that yours can continue."

"I think that the only difference there, Exedol, is that Humans have learned to channel our combative nature to some extent." Ranma leaned back. "Only somewhat, mind you. But we've learned to turn our violence to good ends."

"True," said Exedol. "By channeling it into competitiveness, which can be quite constructive. Unlike ourselves, who were never given that option. We were designed as weapons, first and foremost, with everything else being secondary."