Time Loops
Numbers in Nerima 6
Disclaimer: I own nothing, so, leave me alone!
Rubbing her eyes as she walked to the table, Dieci was understandably confused when she was yanked into one of the special rooms by Ranma, or at least one of his clones, since there were two others in the room with the one that pulled her into the room. "So, what's going on?" She asked as she looked around the room, more of a lab, now that she had more of a look to it.
"Well, we've spent a long time working on it, but I think you'll be pleased." One of the clones smiled as he looked at the brown-haired cyborg while gesturing to an item underneath a white towel. "Finally managed to get your cannon to work properly."
Another clone rolled his eyes at the giddy one. "What he means is that he finally managed to work the "Brianna Special" into this thing."
"Oh please! Like you don't like the Brianna Special!" The first one yelled back as he threw a wrench at the one who was bad-mouthing him.
"Knock it off before I knock you off." The second one yelled as he grabbed the wrench out of mid-air. "Better show Dieci what you did before I give her the BFG-9000 MKIII to use on you."
"YIPE!" The first one yelped and grabbed the sheet, pulling it free of the table. "Ta-da!"
"...A hand-gun?" Dieci was completely confused as she picked it up and studied it. "...What's with the scope?"
"Ah, based it on a version of Megatron that we met once." The one holding the sheet shrugged. "I will admit that Teana's "Cross Mirage" was also used as a basis of this model."
Dieci blinked a few times as the gun in her hand suddenly became two guns, one in each hand. "What the heck?"
"Like I said, stole the Cross Mirage design." Another shrug from the clone as the other one sighed and shook his head.
"The design was mostly used because it's easier to carry around than a gigantic freaking cannon all the time. Plus it's useful in a pinch."
"Oh..." Dieci blinked as the second gun disappeared. "What else can it do?"
"Ask for it to go to mode two."
"Mode... Two?" Dieci blinked as their was a whirring sound from the gun as the handle shifted outwards, the barrel increased in length before it shifted and gained a few pounds of mass as it became larger and filled her hands completely. "...A rifle?"
"Hand-cannon actually." Another clone pointed out to her. "Lighter than your normal cannon and packs enough of a punch that it can rattle someone's cage even with a shield up. Plus, it's more useful in case you need to move in a hurry or get caught in a fire fight with a crowd around you."
"My normal cannon? Is that... Mode three?" Dieci blinked as the small cannon became her normal-sized body-length cannon. "Wow..." She did like the fact it was quite a bit lighter than it had been before. The light blue coloring was very nice too.
"Go for the Overdrive mode!"
"Over...drive mode?" Dieci said slowly, before yelping as her cannon seemed to merge with her arm, though she could feel her fingers around some sort of trigger mechanism, as though it was a comfort to her. She blinked as her clothing seemed to glow and disappear, leaving her nude for an instant as clothes materialized around her chest and hips, followed by her arms and legs, boots that went up to her knees over the cloth on her legs. She blinked as her ears got covered by headphones and a visor went from one side of her face to the other, completely tinted green as various numerical data appeared. She could feel her shoulders getting covered and a short column extend backwards behind her, she then looked at her covered left arm, blinking as the cannon was a bit longer, there were four smaller guns lined up in a square pattern surrounded by circular binds as it gleamed in the light. "...whoa..." Dieci was rather stunned at that moment.
She was more stunned as she was surrounded by mirrors to see all sides of her body. Her outfit was a bright red, her upper chest was bare, though her breasts were covered, her abdomen and upper thighs were bare and as she looked at the mirror, she could see that the outer edges of her butt were visible to everyone looking. Her face warmed up a bit as she saw how... Exposed she was. "Um... This is revealing, isn't it?"
"Trust me, between the Gatling cannon and the missiles that's in your shoulder pads, no one's really going to be staring at your ass or chest." The snarky clone shrugged and rolled his eyes at the first one, who was grinning perversely. "Besides, this is still pretty modest, your butt's fine, I don't see why you're embarrassed by showing it off a bit."
"Um... Thank you." Dieci was still blushing pretty badly. Maybe she could modify this later? Still... "This is... Really cool."
"I suggest you take the time to get used to the various modes, otherwise you'll have trouble with them if you end up in any sort of combat." Dieci nodded as she moved around in the "overdrive mode" and found that she rather liked it, despite the awkward-looking Gatling cannon on her left arm.
"This... Could be fun." Dieci grinned slightly, getting a laugh from the giddy clone.
"Told you that the Brianna Special would do this to her."
"Yeah, yeah... Smart-ass." The other clone rolled his eyes at the attitude.
(-)
Nove looked at Dieci as she walked into the room. "What's up with you?"
Dieci has a faint blush on her face as she shrugged. "Um... Nothing much." That outfit had been very, very embarrassing to be in, she just hoped that she could at least add a few extra pieces of clothing to the armor of her overdrive form.
"So why are you moving funny?" Wendi asked curiously as she grabbed some food.
Dieci twitched and sat down at the table, ignoring the looks that her sisters were giving her. "Not going to talk about it." She muttered as she filled her plate. She didn't like the looks that she was getting and she really couldn't get them to stop looking at her. She was about to say something when an arrow embedded itself into the table in front of Ranma.
Soun's hair, as long as it was, suddenly poofed out in all directions, giving him the largest afro in the world. Interestingly enough, Cinque's hair suddenly stuck out at various angles as Ranma pulled the arrow out of the table and pulled the small letter that was stuck to the shaft. "Hmm... Looks like Ryoga's been training hard."
Deed growled at that name, how dare that jerk chop her hair up like that? "Lemme at him! I need to hurt him!"
Tre sweat-dropped as she looked at her shorter, younger sister. "That was days ago, you can let it go, can't you?"
"So says someone who keeps trying and failing to master the Mach Impulse." Cinque replied calmly as she took a sip of her tea.
Turning and glaring at the shortest of her sisters, Tre nearly snarled at the silver-haired girl. "I'll get it one of these days!" It wasn't her fault, but she almost had it. She was able to not pass out or be laying face down after the technique ended last time at least. She still had a hard time moving afterwords though, so she really needed to work on it. But she was almost there, she could feel it.
Ranma shook his head and got up. "If you'll excuse me, I need to go have a talk with someone."
The others shrugged as he got up and left the room.
"...So Dieci." Sein asked after a few minutes.
"Hmm?" The brown-haired cyborg turned to her sister, wondering why she was suddenly grinning like that.
"Why WERE you walking funny when you came to the table?"
Dieci groaned and slumped, banging her head on the table. She had nearly forgotten just how much Sein liked to tease her and her other sisters.
(-)
"I was wondering when you'd show up." Ranma heard as he touched down in an abandoned warehouse. "Don't worry, I'm alone."
"I wouldn't worry even if you brought the entire Jusendo Valley with you." Ranma muttered as he looked at Cologne, who chuckled. "So, why not just send a letter in the mail like a normal person?"
"Bah! Mail service takes too long." The old woman waved her hand and smirked at him. "Anyway, I've been doing some training to an acquaintance of yours."
"Ryoga." He sighed when she nodded, that smirk of her was really beginning to get on his nerves. "What do you want?" He asked bruskly, his patience with the old crone running thin. "You and I both know that the training is only really good for toughening him up. Making the ground explode might cut up some of the girls a little bit, but they're born fighters." Okay, so maybe Sein and Uno weren't meant for straight-up combat, but that was fine.
"What makes you think that he wants to fight them?" She raised an eyebrow when he chuckled.
"Trust me, right now, Deed wants to hurt him for cutting her hair a few days ago." Cologne shook her head and laughed softly. "Anyway, we both know that it won't work on living flesh."
"Of course, the chi flows disrupt the technique as it is." Cologne shrugged at that. "However, you can't tell me that you wouldn't want to have some... Amusement." Just for a instant, the very air seemed to grow heavier, clammy and oily and just wrong somehow and for the first time in a very, very long time, the Joketsuzoku matriarch wondered if she had made too big a mistake. Then the felling was just gone, as if it had never existed. Seeing him raise an eyebrow, she smirked, though still a little jumpy from the odd experience. "Imagine if this "Deed" girl thought that one touch could kill her, hmm? It might keep her on her toes and make the fight interesting."
Ranma shook his head, even though he was chuckling. "Interesting, but I'm pretty sure that the rest of her sisters would try to get involved if they thought she was at serious risk."
The old woman chuckled at that. "Well, I need to get back, see if you can think of a way for this to happen, it might be fun."
Ranma shrugged, though he would admit, the reactions could be funny, but he just couldn't see the others not jumping in and interfering. "I'll see what I can do."
Jumping leisurely away, while unconsciously keeping an "eye" on Collogne's aura of course, Ranma tried to shook of what little hold it had gained on him. A focused mental blow latter, and the annoyance had settled back in its rightful place, the very bottom of his psyche, leaving behind mere phantom of felling. Anger, possessiveness and its always present and at time overwhelming hunger. Oh well, he had other things to think about, a quick trip in his own mind-scape to remind the useless piece of garbage what its place in the local food chain was and would be able to concentrate on the important matters, like how to get a one-on-one fight to actually happen. "Why do I feel like I'm forgetting something?"
(-)
"Soon, soon I shall have my revenge... And then..." A smirk appeared on his face as he looked at the water that was around him. "Shampoo will be all mine!" He stood up and took a dramatic pose. Which would have been impressive if he hadn't tripped over one of the buckets and went crashing into a dusty table in the corner of the dusty room. "My glasses." He muttered, before spotting something that was shiny. "There you are." He reached for the shiny thing. "Now then, I'll Quack!"
The newly minted duck just blinked a few times, wondering what just happened.
(-)
Deed blinked a few times as she looked at Ranma, then she looked at her other sisters, who were slightly confused, before she turned back to him. "Bakusei Tenketsu..?" She scratched her head, that was a weird name for a technique.
"Yep." He nodded to her as he and the girls were sitting around at the Tendo house-hold about twenty minutes after his meeting with Cologne, well, except for Uno, she was taking a day off and helping Kasumi with something in town. Genma and Soun were playing Go, or rather, were looking at the board, but paying more attention to his conversation with Deed. "I've seen the technique shatter roads, mountains, level forests and cause cave-ins, and all with a touch of a finger."
"The Breaking Point..." Genma spoke up, causing several of the girls to spin to him as he looked on gravely. "It's said that everyone and everything has one, a single touch to that point will destroy anything."
"Wait, are you saying that anyone could kill with a touch with this technique?" Tre suddenly shot up, her eyes wide as Deed paled at the thought.
When Genma nodded, Nove slammed her hands onto the table. "Hell no!" She pointed at Deed while frowning. "You aren't going to do something like that." She wasn't going to lose a sister over something so stupid, that was for sure.
Deed nodded, even though she was certain she could win, a lucky touch and she'd be dead? No, she'd rather not risk it over something that wasn't that important.
"Boy! Why don't you, woah!" Genma suddenly found himself weightless as he floated up when Ranma raised his hand up and raised an eyebrow at him.
"Look, Genma, if I fought anyone, it wouldn't be fair to them, since I would have to hold back so much that I might actually lose." With that, Ranma dropped Genma onto the floor next to the chair.
"Ommph! Yes, I can see that." Genma nodded as he stood up and tried to look wise, which was ruined as he rubbed his backside. "An ability to win a fight so easily should only be used if needed."
"Riiiiight." Ranma drawled out, knowing that if Genma had such an ability, he wouldn't stop to use it at every opportunity, of course, Genma probably was just saying that because he didn't want to get beaten up without having a chance to at least attempt to fight back. Suddenly Ranma shivered slightly. Jedi Master Genma was probably the most terrifying thought he could have ever thought up in a long time.
He vowed to make it a reality some day, just to prove to both Yoda and Anakin that there were some things worse than a drunk Palpatine in a Hutt slave girl outfit trying to convince everyone that he was a pretty girl.
"Anyway..." Ranma cleared his throat to get their attention. "The thing here is, Ryoga wants to test his new technique out, he's not really that bad a person, just stubborn, stupid and ornery, but he wouldn't want to kill any of you." Mostly because they were women and Ryoga really didn't know any of them. Ranma then shrugged as he thought about it. "Anyway, as for the technique itself, well, I've fought against someone with it before."
The cyborgs looked at him, interested in this information. "Oh?" Sein, who was laying across Dieci and Wendi's laps, blinked a few times. Some people might have thought it was odd that Sein was laying like that, but other than Cinque, who was the smallest, Sein was pretty light for her size. "How'd that turn out?"
Ranma shrugged at that. "Well, I can tell you that it really doesn't matter if someone can kill you with a touch, if you don't let that touch happen, you can't die, right?"
"I'll fight him." Everyone blinked as Tre stood up and scowled lightly. "He wanted to fight me originally anyway, so I'll give him a fight." She quickly left the room while most of the more combat-oriented cyborgs, and Genma, followed after her, promising to help her train her reflexes, just in case.
Sein, who had been deposited to the floor when Wendi and Dieci both got up, blinked at Ranma. "What's wrong?"
"...Nothing..." Ranma blinked as Sein suddenly sat in his lap and looped her arms around his neck. "Sein?"
She frowned at him slightly. "You've never acted like this before, what's wrong? Tre'll be alright, she's tough and fast, Ryoga'll never kill her with that..." She blinked as Ranma sighed again and shook his head. "Then what?"
"...Actually, can you keep a secret?" When she nodded, he leaned in close to her ear and whispered to her. "That technique's worthless in combat actually, it can't kill a person with a touch."
Sein blinked as he pulled back. "Then why not..." When Ranma explained the reasons why, Sein started giggling uncontrollably. "That... Hee hee... Is the funniest... Ha ha... Thing ever!" She laughed for a few more moments before pressing herself against Ranma and hugging him tightly. "Don't worry, I won't tell, but thanks, I was worried for Tre too." When Ranma hugged her back tightly, she blinked a few times, it felt like he was clinging desperately to her. "...Dad..?" Honestly, she had never thought of Ranma like that until that moment, but he seemed to need that at this time.
"Sorry, it's just... I'm worried that they'll hate me for manipulating them like this." He didn't let go of her, even as she shook her head.
"Nah, they won't hate you, they'll be upset, but a good prank is always worth it." Sein was sure that Tre wouldn't be happy, maybe Nove wouldn't either, but at the very least they'd forgive him, since she was sure that she or Wendi would probably do the same thing to them.
Ranma chuckled softly, oh, how he knew that. Still, it did make him feel a little better.
(-)
Looking at Genma with a frown, Tre wondered why he had brought her to a construction lot. When she asked, Genma had a weird smirk on his face that just felt wrong for some reason. "Well, there's a lot of debris for one, for two, no one will care if we destroy stuff." Maybe the construction companies, but they seemed to like it when stuff was destroyed for some odd reason. Genma smirked as he picked up a few rocks. "Plus, if that technique really can do what my boy says it can, you'll need to learn how to dodge... And I know that some of your sisters can attack at a distance..."
Wendi blinked a few times before speaking up as she caught onto the idea. "Wait, does this mean that we all are going to attack Tre?"
Genma's smirk was incredibly nasty at this point. "Yep. All she has to do is dodge. Shouldn't be too hard considering how fast she is." Genma flipped back and away from Tre. "So... Shall we begin... Oh, don't forget to DODGE!" He yelled as he threw a rock at Tre far faster than it had any right to go.
(-)
Meanwhile...
Nabiki blinked and looked around, the hair on the back of her neck was standing up. She had opted to actually go to school this day, mostly because she wanted something to do and people to talk to.
"Boss, you okay?" One of her classmates asked, before Nabiki blinked a few times and shuddered almost violently.
"Either Ranma's training someone that way again, or I'm being paranoid..." There was the chance that Genma was training someone in the "dodge" method, but that didn't seem likely.
(-)
A few hours later, Uno blinked as she saw Sette carrying Tre over her shoulder as she walked into the Tendo home. Her carrying Tre made sense at least, since Sette was the only one who was tall enough to carry Tre without dragging her on the floor. "What happened?" She was worried as Sette set Tre down, and there were bruises, burns, some shrapnel stuck in her skin as the rest of her sisters looked on pretty nervously.
"Training got a little out of hand." Sette said, looking upset as she looked at Tre. "Where's dad?"
"I'm... Not sure actually." Uno blinked as she thought about it, before blinking as Cinque and Otto did what they could to get shrapnel out of Tre's body. At least it wasn't big, just chunks of rock, some glass, and... "Cinque, is that your knife?"
"...I missed." She said softly as she pulled the knife out of Tre's leg. She was just thankful that she hadn't made it explode, otherwise Tre would be missing a leg at that moment.
"Where's Genma?" Uno wasn't surprised as the others just shrugged. She didn't care for him too much herself. Eventually, Wendi admitted that Genma had accidentally been in the way of a Ray Storm when Otto missed Tre. Considering that he had been breathing and still alive afterwords, they just decided to leave him there.
Still, Uno did wonder just where Ranma disappeared to.
(-)
Sein found herself on her hands and knees, panting hard. Looking up, she glowered at Ranma, even though there was no anger in her eyes. "You're... Insane..."
Ranma shrugged, honestly, he had been insane for the longest time, hearing that was nothing new to him. Still, at least their session had been productive. "Well?"
Sein shook her head and nearly passed out, before blinking as she was picked off the ground. "Huh?" She blinked at Ranma as he smiled at her softly.
"Come on, let's get you home then."
"Sorry." She muttered, sighing softly as he carried her home, the gentle rocking from his running actually caused her to close her eyes and rest her head on his chest, where she fell asleep.
Looking at her, Ranma smiled softly. Sein honestly had put in a lot of effort into what they had done. It wasn't her fault that she had worn out. Still, he wondered how long it would take her to actually get her Deep Diver skill to the point where she could phase through living matter, or at the very least, be able to use her skill without calling it out all the time.
For some odd reason, he got a weird mental image in his head at that moment.
*Mind-scape*
"Banzai!" Sein yelled as she grinned and jumped at Erio, who stared at her stupidly.
"GAH!" He crashed into the wall that sprouted up behind him, causing him to see stars while Sein got up, unharmed and pouted.
"Drat! I was hoping to phase through you that time."
*Mind-scape*
Ranma sweat-dropped and wondered where that came from. "That's something that Orihime would've thought up." Hell, he was certain that if Orihime took Sein's place for a loop with her phasing powers that she'd attempt to phase through Ichigo just to see what she could do with them.
(-)
The next thing Sein knew was a warm, wet, cloth-like substance rubbing her body down. "Huh?"
"You can go back to sleep." She heard Dieci's voice as she looked up at the naked brown-haired cyborg. "You were pretty worn out when Ranma brought you back in."
"Oh..." Sein muttered and snuggled her head against Dieci's naked lap. "Mmmm... Your lap's comfy."
Dieci didn't say anything as she quietly cleaned Sein's body of sweat and dirt. Though, she wasn't sure if she should be insulted or not about having Sein call her lap comfortable. Especially since Sein was nuzzling her head against Dieci's crotch. Oh well, at least it wasn't sexual in nature, since Sein was just trying to get more comfortable.
(-)
Soun looked at the board in front of him. He looked up at his opponent, who just smiled back at him pleasantly. Smiling, he looked back at the board. Who knew that the young-looking girl was so good at Go?
Sitting across from Soun, Cinque found that the game was a nice distraction from her guilt at accidentally hurting Tre, at least the wound had just been skin deep and not as serious as it appeared. Still, how the heck was Ryoga supposed to touch Tre with that attack? She honestly hadn't seen him do much of anything that was dangerous at all. 'Then again...' She thought to herself, rolling her shoulder. As big and harmless-looking as Genma was, his attacks hurt when he hit you with them, then again, maybe it was worse because he was in his panda form.
Both Cinque and Soun were surprised when two naked bodies suddenly came through the floor and crashed onto the table. "Ouch!" Dieci cried out, rubbing her butt in pain.
Soun stared the sight before him, Sein was sitting up and looking around for someone, like she was just attacked out of nowhere, and inadvertently giving him a complete and total free look of her complete and totally naked body. A small dribble of blood escaped from his nose as he looked at the cyborg. It got worse as she spun around, letting him see her backside completely. The weird thing was, if he discounted Sein's hair color, she looked almost like a younger version of his dear departed wife.
'Oh Kimiko, I'm sorry, but I've been single for so long and... Why does it feel like I'm about to die?' Soun thought to himself as he slowly turned around, gulping as he looked at the glowing blue eyes of Ranma. "Uh, now... You can't blame me... She appeared just in front of me and it would be rude to just look away."
"I could forgive that... If you would have at least tried to mention to Sein and Dieci that they weren't in the bath anymore..." Grabbing Soun by his shoulder, he dragged the older-looking man out of the room. "We need to... Have a talk."
"Kimiko, help me!" Soun bawled as he was dragged away.
Meanwhile, Dieci was blushing as she wrapped herself up in the towel that Uno offered her, she couldn't believe that she had been completely seen like that. Sein, on the other hand, just put her towel on quietly while looking for short-tempered tomboys and mallets trying to take either hers or Dieci's head off.
Nabiki wore a bewildered expression as she walked into the room. "Anyone know why my dad looked like... oh." She finished lamely as she saw Sein and Dieci in their state of dress, or undress as the case was. "I thought you were washing her?"
"I was, but your sister thought I was doing something perverted..." Dieci complained and wished that she had brought her gun with her, at least then she could have defended herself better. She might have had super strength, but she wasn't much for hand-to-hand or close-range combat.
Nabiki rubbed her head. Honestly, she thought that Akane was pretty mellow in this loop for someone who wasn't in the know. Sighing, she just decided to ignore it. With any luck, Ranma wouldn't kill her for what she tried to do. Nabiki took five steps towards the kitchen before sighing and turning around. Who the hell was she kidding? Once Sein or Dieci complained about it, Ranma would likely blow a gasket and seriously maim her baby sister. Which was how she found herself coming face-to-face with Akane as she tore out of the bathroom with a serious look on her face. "What the hell?"
"Out of my way, Nabiki!" She yelled, trying to shove her older sister out of the way, only to blink as she couldn't get Nabiki to budge. Oh well, she'd move the instant that she knew why she was so upset. "Two of those girls were being perverted in the bathroom."
"...You do realize that Sein was likely to drown in the bath if she tried to clean herself off, right?" Nabiki raised an eyebrow at Akane. "And Dieci was just being a good sister and cleaning her off."
"Bu...Bu...But..." Akane couldn't believe this, Nabiki was taking their side?
"Besides, if those two say anything to Ranma, well... I'm pretty sure that you won't like the results."
Akane frowned and squeezed her mallet tightly. "That pervert, bringing in all these perverted girls into this house and doing things..." She gasped as she felt a stinging, burning sensation on her cheek. "...Nabiki?"
"Listen, and listen well, little sister..." Nabiki narrowed her eyes at the youngest Tendo. "Those girls mean a lot to Ranma, they're like his daughters, if you go and try to hurt them..." She trailed off, shaking her head. "Just let it go. If you see them doing something weird, just ask what's going on."
"Who are you and what did you do with my sister?" Akane pointed dramatically at Nabiki, who just sighed and held out her hand.
"600 yen." Seeing Akane face-fault was enough to make her smile. "Akane, let's just say that it's better for everyone if you keep your temper in check." She turned around and sighed. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I better make sure that daddy's still alive and try to diffuse the situation..." Or she could make it worse, she could go either way at that moment.
After telling Akane to go back and take a bath, Nabiki sighed as she walked towards the dojo, sometimes she wondered just why she was doing this. The mental image of her sister horribly bloody, beaten and mutilated came to her, answering her question. "...I hate you so much, Saotome." She muttered to herself as she caught Ranma walking out of the dojo. "I do hope that you didn't hurt daddy too much." When he shrugged, she sighed and grabbed his arm as he was about to leave. "Anyway, I need to tell you just why that happened."
"What?" Ranma said flatly after Nabiki explained everything to him. He was tempted to go to Akane and mallet her across town, then dismissed it, since Akane didn't have the conditioning to survive that. Honestly, he didn't want to do any killing in this loop if he could avoid it. Well, for some people. Others could just go straight to hell. He could probably give Hild a call and express deliver some of the people himself if he wanted to.
"Look, just... Don't go and..." She trailed off as there was a loud crashing sound, nothing unusual about that, but the helicopter sound that came afterwords wasn't something that was heard too often. "...Please don't tell me..."
Ranma rolled his eyes as he stepped outside, before blinking. There was Otto in the arms of a pink-haired catgirl. "Nuku? What's going on?"
"Huh?" The catgirl blinked and turned to look. "Oh, hey Ranma!" She grinned at him as she danced around the bullets that were being fired at her. "Seems that Emi-chan wanted to have some fun, but then I accidentally ran over someone who said that you were his dad," she gestured at Otto in her arms, "so I thought I'd bring him here to see if you were here and you were, but I'm honestly shocked, I thought that loops prevented people from having children since we'd all go insane if we had to watch our children grow up a little bit, then disappear and get born again and again and again and again and..."
"Nuku..." Ranma interrupted her, getting the excitable catgirl to stop saying anything. "I think Emi's going to get pretty upset at you if you don't pay more attention to her."
"Oh. Sorry." She put Otto down before jumping onto the wall of the compound, then up into the air, grabbing the tail of the helicopter and spinning around in mid air, causing the helicopter to spin and wobble through the air before crashing into the ground several blocks away. "Okay, Emi's done." She bounced back into the yard. "It's weird though, Otto looks like a boy but smells like a girl, what happened? Another mirror clone or something?"
"Actually, I'm a girl." Otto said as she stood up and dusted herself off. "Really, you grabbed my chest when you pulled me off of my bike, you should know my gender."
"Oh, sorry." Nuku rubbed the back of her head before blinking as her stomach growled. "Man! I forgot, it's almost time for dinner." Waving to Ranma and Otto, she jumped over the wall and ran fast enough to leave a giant dust cloud in her wake.
"Uh..." Otto blinked a few times as she looked at Ranma. "So, you know her?"
Ranma chuckled and nodded. "She lives on the other side of Nerima and stays there, normally. Her name's Nuku Nuku."
"Weird name." Otto muttered, getting a laugh from Nabiki.
"She used to be a cat."
"Eh?" Otto stared as Nabiki smirked at her.
"Yep. Then she got ran over, her brain put into an android body and she stayed that way for awhile, but then..." She trailed off, looking at Ranma, who shrugged.
"She ended up getting a real flesh-and-blood catgirl body." Sighing, he shook his head at that. "Interestingly enough, she only has the cat ears and tail and she can make her finger and toe nails long and hard enough to be claws, other than that... She's pretty much human."
"Except when she goes into heat." Nabiki snarked at him.
"Right, except when she..." He trailed off and mock-glared at her as Nabiki stuck her tongue out at him. "I hate you."
"Feeling's mutual." Nabiki smirked as she headed towards the kitchen, she wanted that snack.
"Hey, dad..." When Ranma looked at her, Otto rubbed the back of her head. "My bike exploded... Um... Can I have a new one?"
Ranma rolled his eyes at her, honestly, she looked too dammed cute with that embarrassed expression on her face. "Fine, but I'll teach you how to make one this time, okay?" Otto nodded as the two went into the house.
Hours later, Genma finally found his way back to the dojo. He was rather beaten up and extremely hungry as he stumbled into the compound. "Growf?" He wasn't surprised to see everyone sitting at the table, well, Soun wasn't, which was odd, and Akane looked oddly subdued at the table while two, Sein and Dieci if Genma could remember correctly, looked at her with some light glares.
"Took you long enough." Nabiki chuckled, getting an angry growf from the panda as he sat down at the table.
I was out conscious and then I got wet, *Flip* what did you expect? The panda "signed" to her as it started to eat He blinked as Wendi stole the sign from him and started to inspect it.
"How the heck? You can only write on one side, how the..."
You learn quickly *Flip* when you need to *Flip* speak and have no human *Flip* vocal cords.
"...You're just messing with me, aren't you?" Wendi deadpanned, getting a shrug from the panda as it went back to eating.
"Just ignore him, Wendi. Everyone else does." Genma gave a sad sound as he looked at Ranma. There was something about his demeanor that kept the panda from actually challenging what he just said. What it was, he wasn't sure, though he suspected that it had something to do with why Dieci and Sein were upset.
(-)
A few days later...
Tre sighed as she looked at her sisters. "How long does it take for him to show up?" They were at the construction lot that she had been using as a training ground for the past few days.
"Depends on how long it takes them to correct his direction." Ranma chuckled as Deed tapped his shoulder. "Huh?" Looking to where she was pointing, he shook his head. "Well, there he is, I'm surprised."
"Why?" Sette was curious, she was rather enjoying the sparring matches that she had been getting with Tre in the past few days.
"Normally it takes Ryoga at least four hours to get somewhere, even with someone leading him, this time it only took about forty-five minutes." He shrugged at the disbelieving looks he was given. "Hey, I didn't give him the directional curse, regardless of what he thinks at times."
"I'm starting to believe everything you're telling us." Sette muttered before settling back to watch the fight. Honestly, she wondered just how much of a fight Ryoga could put up against Tre. Still, a part of her worried for her older sister, which got a sigh from the tall cyborg.
Cinque looked at Sette, concerned. "What's wrong?" When Sette was silent for awhile, Cinque shook the pink-haired girl's leg to get a response from her.
"...It was easier when I didn't feel anything." Sette murmured softly, blinking as she suddenly found herself sitting on Ranma's lap. "...Dad?" He was partly hugging her, one arm behind her back, the other across her body as she sat in his lap. She felt her face heat up, but it was rather nice.
It wasn't anything sexual, just a concerned parent holding their daughter. But Sette wasn't used to such close and comforting contact. It made her feel quite shy and embarrassed.
"Don't." He said softly as the rest of her sisters, except for Cinque, since she had been the one to ask, and Uno, since she was sitting right next to Ranma. "It might be true that not having emotions makes things easier, but all it does is make you feel empty inside."
Sette, her face still slightly red, looked at Ranma as his eyes seemed to dull and get unfocused. She wasn't the best at reading people's emotions, but something seemed wrong here. "Dad?"
He shook his head quickly and looked at her, smiling softly. "Sorry, but even if things would be simpler without emotions, you should never, ever wish to have none. It's better to feel some emotions and be alive, than move through life feeling nothing."
Ranma blinked as he felt a hand on his shoulder, turning to look, he saw Cinque's smiling softly at him. "What?"
Cinque shook her head, unable to really put into words how happy she was that Sette was feeling emotions and her younger sisters were all becoming more and more human, rather than just fighting machines. The only thing she hoped for was that her sisters didn't suddenly decide to be as crazy as Wendi or as silly as Sein. It was alright in small amounts, but if they all decided to be like Wendi or Sein, well, Cinque wasn't sure what she'd do at that.
(-)
Ryoga looked at Tre, his face heated up slightly, he just couldn't get that mental image of when he first saw her out of his head. Coughing to hopefully clear away the images of her long legs, toned body, the scent and her large breasts...
Tre sweat-dropped as Ryoga turned bright red and face-faulted to the ground. "...He does this often?"
"Shampoo think that Lost Boy is just moron." The purple-haired Amazon sighed as Ryoga jumped to his feet and yelled at her. "Just fight now!" She yelled at him and really, really wished that he wasn't such a complete idiot.
Contrary to what Shampoo thought, Ryoga wasn't a total moron, he just tended to be less educated than most, due to him not able to get to school all that much. Despite that, he was still relatively smart, capable of reading, writing and speaking in several languages due to his travels. It wasn't his fault that he was totally inept at finding his way out of a room with one door and no windows with the aid of maps, compasses and a GPS.
Those doors tended to be hard to find after all. And he swore to high heaven that they liked to move around on him. Really, was it so much to ask for a door to be in front of him at all times?
"As much as I hate replying to someone who can barely speak the language, I do agree with her." Tre shifted into a stance. "So, just shut up and fight."
Ryoga got into his own stance and blinked as Tre rushed at him and punched him in the gut, the sheer speed and strength behind that attack was nothing to sneeze at, but he had seen her move, at least briefly, he just hadn't expected her to go so fast like that. Still, such an attack, well, he was pretty sure that if he hadn't just taken the Bakusei Tenketsu training, he'd probably be out with that one attack right then and there.
On the side-lines, Cologne smirked as Ryoga went falling to the ground. "It's not over."
"What makes you say that?" Nove asked as she looked at the little woman before shuddering. For some odd reason, the look on her face gave her the feeling that the old woman knew something she didn't. "Tre's the best fighter of my sisters." Or at the very least; the fastest and strongest, but Cologne didn't need to know that. "He's out."
"You think so?" Cologne smirked as Ryoga got up with no problem, much to the shock of the cyborgs watching. This was going to be fun, and she wondered just how long it would take for Tre to get poked by Ryoga, before mentally chuckling and sitting back to enjoy the show.
"What the heck?" Wendi could only stare as Ryoga rushed forward towards Tre, who merely side-stepped, only to have to block and parry the exploding shrapnel caused by Ryoga's finger touching the ground. Thankfully the two were far enough away from the group that none of the rocks got to them.
"Holy crap! Dad was right!" Otto nearly jumped in to help but Sein grabbed her shoulder and shook her head. "But, Sein..."
"Don't worry. Tre's strong, right?" Sein smiled at Otto as the boyish girl nodded. "Just relax then and hope that he doesn't touch her."
Otto wasn't too sure, but after a few more misses by Ryoga, she relaxed, after all, if he kept missing, he'd just wear himself out with all those rocks pelting him. Not to mention that Tre looked like she was starting to enjoy how easy this was going to be.
When Ryoga missed again, Tre smirked and kicked him in the gut, lifting Ryoga off the ground and allowing her to punch him in the jaw and into a nearby steamroller. "Really, this is pretty easy." Tre rolled her eyes and turned to look at Cologne. "You were a tougher opponent."
Cologne started laughing and pointed her staff at Ryoga. Turning to look, Tre blinked a few times as Ryoga effortlessly got up. "What the hell?"
"Was that all?" Ryoga smirked at her. "I barely felt that. In fact, it kind of tickled."
"What kind of freak is he?" Wendi glomped Nove as she trembled slightly. Nove didn't even bother pushing the other redhead off of her that time, since she knew just how hard Tre could hit. Hell, even she couldn't take her older sister's attacks and shrug them off like that. What kind of training did this Bakusei Tenketsu entail anyway?
"To be able to take a punch like that..." Cinque trailed off, her face paling, not that anyone was looking at her, since she was sitting the furthest back. For some reason, the shortest cyborg was imagining Ryoga having to suffer from several dozen Excellion or Divine Busters at maximum power. Anything that could survive that had to be tough enough to take a single punch from Tre.
Oddly enough, Sette was imagining Ryoga having to listen to Kodachi and Deed laugh at him. She looked at her shorter sister, sitting just in front of her and Ranma and stared at the brunette oddly.
Deed suddenly got the urge to start laughing, and she wasn't sure why.
As Ryoga tried to poke her again, Tre grabbed his outstretched arm and spun around, getting his feet off of the ground as she spun around a couple of times before letting go and letting him crash into pile of steel beams. Looking around, she grabbed a piece of pipe and rushed at him, cracking the pipe across his ribs and sending him tumbling away from her. "...There's an analogy here somewhere, but I'm not sure what it is."
"Homerun?" Cologne spoke up, remembering how fun baseball was when she was younger. Hey, she was old and had seen a lot. Sports like Volleyball, Baseball and even Basketball were actually pretty popular back in her village. She was thankful that football, both versions, had never caught on in the village, that would have been messy.
"Hole in one?" Wendi shrugged and blinked when Nove looked at her weirdly. "I was bored that day."
"Strike?" Sette raised her hand and Ranma shrugged before adding his two cents to the conversation.
"Timber?"
"Gooooaaaallll!" Sein jumped up with her hands straight up in the air. "What? The Spanish guys were yelling that and getting their hands up in the air like this after making goals."
"What kind of weirdos do I have for family members again?" Tre wondered, before she found herself suddenly leaving the ground before getting slammed into the ground onto her back. Grimacing, she let go of the pipe and rolled away and onto her feet and stared at Ryoga as he looked at her with an amused look on his face. "...Are you sure you're human?"
Ryoga scratched his head, if he thought about it, it was a pretty good question. He couldn't even recall the last time he had seen his parents. Still, he was having fun with this fight, even if he was starting to hurt slightly from those attacks she was landing on him. "If that's all you've got, you should just give up."
"Too hell with this..." Tre grumbled, purple bladed wings appearing from her wrists and ankles. "Ride Impulse!"
Ryoga's eyes widened as she glowed purple and suddenly disappeared in a flash, no wait, there was a purple thing flying at him, the way his body jerked from it as it passed by was no illusion. Even before he recovered, he took another shot to the back, causing him to stumble forward, another hit to his side had him twisting to the side before a hit to the back of his head sent him stumbling forward. He spun on his heel and saw a purple blur heading right at him. Smirking, he waited until the last moment before sticking his finger out.
Tre's eyes widened, dammit, she had been to eager, too hasty and now she was going to pay the price as his finger touched her right in the chest above her breasts. The shock knocked her out of Ride Impulse and caused her to crash into Ryoga, the two bouncing on the ground for a couple of feet before they slid to a stop. She could only blink at him stupidly as he stared up at her, continuing to poke her in the chest, her breasts pressing against his body as she straddled him, the two of them wondered what the hell just happened.
The two looked at the spectators, their faces still stuck in that same stupid look.
Cologne started chuckling, she couldn't help it, it was always so funny to see people's faces when they learned that a technique didn't do what they thought it could do. She often wondered why people didn't do more research into new techniques. Oh well, it did provide extreme amusement for her.
"What the heck?" Nove turned to Cologne as the old woman was starting to laugh more at everyone's confusion. "What's going on? I thought that was lethal."
"What? You mean this little Bakusei Tenketsu?" Cologne poked Nove in the forehead, getting a surprised look from the redhead and her hair standing on end. "You honestly think I'd teach him a lethal Amazon technique when he's not even a member of our tribe?"
"So... How can it make rocks explode if it can't do the same to people?" Cinque was glad that Tre didn't blow up, but still, she wondered why someone would develop such a technique for battle if it was useless on people.
Cologne laughed at the small girl's question. "That's the whole point of the technique. You see, it was designed years ago by construction workers in order to clear away large boulders, since we didn't have modern technology back then. The toughening up part was a nice bonus, especially since that's useful in conflicts, unarmed or not."
Tre suddenly shot up and glared at Ranma. "You said that you saw the technique make forests explode."
"I think the actual words were "I've seen the technique shatter roads, mountains, level forests and cause cave-ins," nowhere in there did I say anything about it killing someone."
Tre twitched, held her finger up as she looked at him, before sighing and realizing that he did have a point. "You could have said something."
Ranma shrugged at her. "Actually, I was kind of curious to see how you would handle it."
Ryoga stood up and rubbed the back of his head. "So... That's it then?"
"Would either of you had fought if you knew that the technique was worthless as an attack?" Cologne chuckled as they shook their heads. "Besides, no one got hurt, it was a fun fight to watch, and I got to have fun at you young kids' expense!" She laughed as she bounded away, Shampoo following her with a wave.
Sette looked at Ranma, she was a little disappointed that Ryoga didn't get what was coming to him, but she wanted to know something. "Hey, dad..?" She asked as she got off of his lap and the two walked to Tre, who was looking rather pissed off.
"Hmm?" Ranma looked at the other girls as they started to clear out of the lot, well, except Uno and Cinque. He mentally laughed as he heard Sein admit to the others that she knew it was a useless fighting technique, only to get yelled at by Nove and Deed.
"Are all fighting techniques in this world based on something else?"
"More or less. Some are designed for food, some are designed for drinks, others designed for construction, and some are designed for thievery." He grabbed Tre's hand as she tried to punch him in the face.
"Why didn't you tell me?" She snapped as the tall cyborg glared at him.
"Other than wanting to see how you'd react if you thought someone could kill you with a touch, I have no excuse." When Tre growled at him, he sighed. "Look, Tre, I'll admit, I'm a bastard at times," he poked her in the chest, right between her breasts, causing her to fall on her ass as he let go of her hand, "but I've also trained a lot of people over the course of these loops, and if I hold your hand the entire way as you learn, you won't be able to think for yourself." Sighing, Ranma turned around and started to walk away. "And that would be the worst thing for you and your sisters, being unable to think for yourself."
Tre looked at Uno, who shook her head as she walked up to her sister. "What happened?"
"I think, that in all these loops, that he's made a lot of mistakes, hurt a lot of people and did stupid things, so sometimes the situations he finds himself in with us brings back painful memories."
Tre sighed, she wasn't really mad at him, she was just in a state of shock and she needed to do something to get rid of the shock. "We should go home before something happens to make things worse, huh?" The others nodded and started to walk back to the dojo.
"Hey, Cinque..."
"Hmm?" The smallest cyborg looked up at her taller, but much younger, sister. "What is it, Sette?"
"We should do something nice for dad." The girl sighed and slumped when Cinque asked her what she had in mind. "I'll... Get back to you on that."
Cinque nodded, but was smiling inside. Even if this world was weird and crazy, it was making her sisters develop and open up. A little bit of trickery more than made up for it, at least in her opinion.
If nothing else, then Cinque was grateful for that at least.
Notes:
Dieci's "overdrive mode" is based, partly, on Heavyarms from Gundam Wing. And, yes, the shoulder pads do carry missiles.
And, apparently laughter can toughen you up. At least as long as it's Naga, Kodachi or Lutecia's laughter.
And an Omake for the road.
Omake:
Ranma stared, wide-eyed as he looked at the raw path of destruction. "...Kasumi... What did you feed her?" Seriously, he knew that the Numbers were capable of mass destruction, but not like this...
"...A glazed bear claw." Kasumi could only say as she looked between the pastry on the plate in front of her and the ping-ponging girl of destruction.
"She only had one bite?" Ranma protested as he looked at the path of destruction. "...Okay, new rule, no feeding Cinque that much sugar ever again."
"WHEE!" Cinque let out a high pitched giggle and laugh as she ran through another wall, making it crash and explode as she did that.
"On the other hand, I wonder what Signum or Reinforce Ein would be like if I doped them up on caffeine and sugar." Ranma muttered to himself.