A/N: Props for those who guessed it. This is going to be the very first Ranma and Red vs. Blue crossover. By the way, in this universe all the events around the dragons' whisker never happened.
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Many people think that my fat lazy father is at fault for every little thing that happened to me on the training trip, from Jusenkyo to the Neko Ken, and they'd be right. Mostly. However, this was one problem that was purely my doing, and now I was about to pay the price.
"T-Tex?" I stuttered into the phone nervously. I could sense Nabiki watching me curiously but I didn't care, "How did you…how could you…?"
"I have my ways," she said mysteriously.
The conversation drifted off for a second, "What do you want?" I asked finally, already knowing the answer.
"You know exactly what I want. Four years ago on January 23rd. I'm here to call in my favor."
'Curse women and their long memories,' I thought to myself.
FLASHBACK:
"So you're what exactly?"
"I'm part of an experimental program designed to make humans stronger through D.N.A. alteration and cybernetic enhancement. However, this process is still in its early stages so we need test subjects. Your boy seems strong enough to handle it."
Genma thought briefly about it, "Well, it's a tempting offer but…"
"We're also offering a large sum of money…"
"SOLD! I mean…I accept."
That was the last I saw of my pops for two long years. To my knowledge, the person who "recruited me" was from the US. When my dad tried to steal me back, we had already hopped a plane to America. My pop tried to track the weekly checks that were being sent to him, but they were all false addresses. It was a good thing I had learned a slight bit of English to get by.
"ATTENTION!"
The loud booming voice woke Ranma up instantly. Jumping out of the bed, he prepared for anything. Taking a moment to assess his surroundings he realized he had no idea where he was. There were two rows of steel bed-frames with people around his age lying on them. He was the only one standing.
Searching for the voice, he saw a man, or at least he thought it was a man, clad in teal colored armor lightly patting a stun baton. Two men wearing the same type of armor, except a darker blue, we're also wielding the stun batons. Slowly the three went down the line of beds, shocking those that were still asleep, into wakefulness.
As the armor suited people passed his bunk, one turned to stare at him. Ranma stared back defiantly. A tinted visor covered the persons face. Without missing a beat, the armor suit moved past him to wake up the next person in line, ignoring him completely.
That was my first look at the Mark IV Spartan armor. It was imbedded with things called nano-technology that accelerated healing, boosted physical attributes, and protection from small arms fire while remaining light and flexible. I had heard that an earlier version called the Mark III had all those benefits doubled, but weighed about two tons as well.
"Two hundred push-ups, now!"
Groaning, the group of kids began their laborious task. Even when they had finished the workout continued with the instructor having them perform sit ups, squats, and various stretching exercises. By the end of a five mile jog, people were beginning to throw up but the instructor continued on as if he didn't see. If someone collapsed, the stun batons were brought out.
By the end, only Ranma was standing.
If it wasn't for the fact that Genma had gotten me into that mess, I would have thanked him for the training he had put me through. Day after day we repeated the same grueling routine, people slowly getting used to it, using me as a role model to get better.
"What do you mean you don't want to use a weapon?"
"I'm a martial artist sir," Said Ranma stressing the last word, "It's against my nature."
The man in the blue armor looked like he was about to deliver a reprimand when a new man entered the room, "its okay gents, let him be. The boy probably can't lift one anyway."
Ranma looked at the new person who had just entered the room only to see a suit of white armor.
"I suppose we can always use him as a meat shield then," continued the white armor, "If he's too scared of guns then let him die."
"I ain't afraid of nuthin," mumbled Ranma, eyes looking towards the floor.
"What was that?"
"I ain't afraid of nuthin," said Ranma a little louder.
"If you are afraid," continued the white armor as if he hadn't heard, "its okay to admit it." He spoke as if he was talking to a four year old.
"I said I ain't afraid of nuthin you deaf idiot!"
White armor didn't even look surprised by the outburst, "Then show me," he said tossing a standard issue pistol towards him.
Ranma took the pistol, his eyes murderous. Without taking his eyes off of the white armor Ranma pointed the pistol downrange and shot a round clean through the target's head.
Even though I never saw his face behind his visor, I could tell he was smiling. I was played for a fool and had my own pride used against me. My perfect eyesight and steady hands made me a near perfect shot.
Then, they gave us the injections. It wasn't really noticeable at first but the effects were there; simple little things like catching something thrown at you with only a seconds notice, or recovering your balance more quickly when you loose your footing. I wasn't awake when they gave the injections, otherwise I probably would have protested.
Over time we were given our armor. Some people got black, others got white. There didn't seem to be a system to it.
Then, they began the next stage of our training. Implanting AI's into our armor.
"You may feel a slight sting," said one of the technicians in a white lab coat, "Try not to move too much."
Ranma lay perfectly still as a wire was connected to his helmet. After a few seconds a huge jolt of electricity flowed through his brain, shocking his whole body. However, nothing came from his mouth which was now covered by a tinted visor.
"Download complete," said the technician, "How do you feel?"
"Fine," he said simply. It's not like they would have done anything if he told them he felt like shit.
"Your system should configure automatically," continued the technician, "Give it a couple days. And if you hear voices in you head, you're not going crazy."
It was also around this time that my group began to hold contests with each other. Fighting, shooting, combat based stuff mostly. It was supposed to be harmless and good for training, but the AI's had a different agenda. That was when I got indebted to Tex, January 23rd by her reckoning.
BOOM!
Ranma cursed as an explosion went off 10 feet in front of him. Emptying his clip into the smoke he ducked around a corner and reloaded.
"Harmless my ass," he said to himself.
Once again he had been challenged to an exhibition match. Being the best in his group, everyone (or rather all of the AI's) was trying to take the opportunity to knock him off his high horse. The matches had started out harmless at first, but then his opponents began sneaking live weapons into the arenas. It didn't make for an easy fight when all he was equipped with was flash grenades and an assault rifle with dulled bullets.
He was pretty sure his opponent was using AP rounds but he wasn't willing to risk his body to find out. Then he heard voices.
"Go around on the left, I'll pin him down here."
"He's hiding behind that rock."
Ranma cursed to himself again. Apparently he wasn't alone either. Taking a deep breath, Ranma jumped out from behind his cover, taking the guy flanking him by surprise. Putting on an extra burst of speed Ranma dodged the volley and grabbed the guy around the neck.
Just in time too, as a shower of bullets hit his human shield. Ranma returned fire, forcing the others to take cover. Thinking quickly Ranma took the gun from the now unconscious soldier and ran behind the dividing wall, trading fire with the remaining people.
"What the hell? Did they invite the whole group here?" Technically these were supposed to be fair matches but it had gotten to the point where it was beyond the ability of the stationed guards to control them.
Ranma was in a bad position too. The only effective weapon he had was the half emptied pistol he had stolen from the wounded soldier.
"Buenos dias cockbite."
Ranma looked up to see a familiar tinted visor and black armor. By the voice, he could tell that the person was Tex. And she was armed to kill. Switching her pistol to her left hand, she pulled a grenade out of her storage.
"Need some help?" Ranma nodded, as if it took all his willpower, "Pull it." She said offering him the grenade.
Hesitantly Ranma reached up and took the pin out of the grenade. Like lightning she chucked the frag over the barrier into the enemy nest. There was an explosion and then they went into action, disabling, knocking out, and injuring the people on the other team. When the smoke cleared 6 people lay on the ground.
It should be noted at this point that I had met Tex before. When they were assigning out codenames, Tex ended up with Nevada. For some reason I can't fathom, I got the codename Texas. I was 80 sure she hated my guts at that moment. However the fact remains that she saved my life. Right after the fight was over, she simply said, "you owe me one," and walked off.
Tex, while not as well versed as me in the combat arts, was a demon with a weapon. She had gotten almost as many challenges as me, and had stayed my close equal throughout the two years I spent there, even going as far as punching out a guys eye straight through his visor. She never actually challenged me directly, but we did compete from time to time.
Then, everything went to hell. You remember those AI's that they implanted with? They were supposed to make us stronger, faster, or in Tex's case, just plain meaner. The program worked fine for a while, but then the AI's started taking over their hosts' minds, causing most to go crazy. They tried deleting the AI but many resisted and escaped the facility, including Tex.
To this day I consider myself fortunate that my AI never activated.
Two days after the AI Omega had escaped with Tex, killing over half the guards, I made my escape as well. It's not like anyone was left to stop me. Unfortunately, when I got outside the facility, I had two major problems. I may have been able to pick up English during my training but I had no idea where I was or where I should go.
As for what I did, well, that's a completely different story.
END FLASHBACK
I cursed silently to myself as the memories came back to me, bombarding me with a past that I would have rather forgotten. Even Genma agreed that he had made a mistake in sending me there (and he was still trying to push the engagement).
"I can't talk on this phone Tex. The line is tapped."
Upstairs in her room, Nabiki cursed.
"That's okay," responded Tex, "I'm going to give you some coordinates. Get to them. I'll call you back." Tex read off a series of numbers which I quickly committed to memory. I knew Nabiki had probably copied them down too, but she wouldn't be able to find the location unless she knew military talk.
Slowly, I hung up the phone. Now it was time for the hard part.
Hearing footsteps on the stairs, I quickly dodged into the dining room and hid under the table. Right on cue, Nabiki walked in, looking for me. Taking a glance around she must have determined that I wasn't there and left.
Not missing a beat I rolled out from under the table and ran up the stairs to the guest room. Grabbing my old backpack, I jumped out the window, over the surrounding wall, and onto the street outside.
"Going somewhere?"
I flinched and turned to face Genma.
"Pops?"
"It was them wasn't it?"
Sighing, I dropped by stance and leaned against the wall like he was doing, "How can you tell?"
"You're in soldier mode," he said as if talking about the weather, "The only time you're like that is when you're reminded of that place."
Was I really that easy to read?
"So what are you gonna do about it?"
"Me? Nothing whatsoever," he started laughing, "If you want to go off and get shot that's your problem, not mine."
WHACK!
I withdrew my fist from his face, "You're such a kind and loving father you know that?"
Picking himself up off the ground, Genma shook his head a bit, "I try my best son."
"If that was your best I'd hate to see the poor bastard that lived through your worst."
"The point is," said my dad ignoring my earlier comment, "You need to clean up the mess you made here before you go make another one."
"Well why don't I just pull out my handy dandy to-do list huh?" I pulled out a list from my pocket, "Number one, beat Happosai for the title of grandmaster. Number two, beat Cologne to get the amazons off my case. Number three, gracefully break off the other two engagements you hooked me up with without loosing honor and preferably without losing blood. Number four, get a cure to my curse. Number five, kill Tatewaki and Kodachi so they stop following me. Number six, destroy all of the photos Nabiki took of me and destroy all of her cameras. Finally, number seven, kill you and leave your body for the cats so you never haunt my steps again and recreate the situation for me." I crumpled up the piece of paper and threw it over my shoulder, "I might even do that last step first."
Genma had several sweatdrops on his head, "You know, on the other hand, why don't you just do what you need to do. I'll cover for you."
Picking up my discarded backpack I started walking off, "Its not like they're going to find me," turning around I looked one last time at my dad, "but thanks anyways old man."
I was about to start walking again when something made me stop, "You know? I just had a strange feeling that I'm never going to see this place again."
"And that's a bad thing?" asked Genma curiously.
"Oh I didn't mean weird bad."
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I got to the coordinates Tex sent me with two minutes to spare, a back alleyway with a rusty telephone booth. Softly I counted down the seconds until Tex was set to call. I had just hit two when the phone started ringing.
Going back into soldier mode, I picked up the receiver, "Okay, what is it?"
"Do you remember Omega from the training facility?"
"Yeah. He was the AI you were paired with."
"You may not have known this considering yours never activated," continued Tex, "But did you know that these computer programs could jump from person to person by using the radios?"
My heart skipped a beat. AI's that could jump from person to person? Everyone in the military had the same protocol armor and radio, so what was to stop a crazy AI from jumping into someone who was in charge of a nuclear missile silo? And considering Omega…
"Let me guess, Omega found out how to do this right?"
"Yep."
"And he wants to destroy the universe too I bet."
"You got it."
"And you want to kill him right?"
"Right."
"So what's stopping you?"
"A lot of things. Have you heard of the two new armies that have been fighting each other recently?"
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An hour later I hung up the phone. Grabbing the phonebook I looked between the S and T section and found the plane ticket hidden there. It was absolutely astounding how organized she was. She had left me a trail of objectives for me to follow so she could call in her favor at any time.
She had even known where I had hidden my armor.
I guess I should be pleased that she thought of me as important enough to keep tabs on, but it was incredibly annoying how unprepared I was for it. Story of my life huh?
I pocketed the ticket and extended my senses around me, searching for anything that would interfere with my mission. Finding none, I quickly went back to roof hopping. My destination was a good ten miles off so I had time to ponder the situation.
The major question I had on my mind was how did Tex find me? After I had gotten back from America with my dad we had traveled all over China and Japan, going into places that not even experienced explorers would go.
These questions kept repeating themselves in my mind, going nowhere until I sensed a familiar presence. Shampoo was on her bike, making deliveries as usual. However, there was something about this that seemed…off. Her eyes were searching for something and I could feel her ki prodding the area. I didn't need to be Einstein to know who she was looking for. Quickly I dampened my presence as much as I could and continued on, but Shampoo continued to follow me.
That's when I noticed two more familiar presences, Ryoga and Mousse had shown up as well. Doing some clever dodging now, I ducked into an alleyway I knew to be a dead end and went through a side door into an abandoned warehouse. Running towards the back exit, I barely had time to duck under cover as one of the factories walls exploded into a cloud of dust admitting Ryoga.
"Curse you Ranma! Where the hell are you?"
Curiously I watched as the lost boy took out an electronic device and stared at it intently. Then I watched shocked as he looked straight towards my hiding spot.
Thinking quickly I employed the umisenken and snuck out the hole he had just made. Everything made sense now; I was stupid not to have seen it before. Everyone who was constantly finding me, never getting a moments peace, and always being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
However, if my theory was correct, that was all about to change.
Taking a slight half-mile detour, I ducked into a clothes store and grabbed a couple pairs of clothes that looked like they would fit and hurried into the dressing room. Once I was there I got completely undressed and changed into my new clothes. Not exactly the most color coordinated but they would do.
Bunching up my old clothes in my hands, I drew in my energy and incinerated them with a focused ball of ki. A loud discharge of electricity confirmed my suspicions; I had been bugged, numerous times by the sound of it. I only wore about three different sets of clothes so it wouldn't have been that hard either.
As an afterthought, I also checked my backpack. Removing all of the stuff carefully, I inspected all the objects that I had carried with me for years. My family tanto, a very old photograph of my family, the engagement ring that was promised to Akane, another picture with the whole NWC at the beach, and all the weights I carried around in my backpack.
Strange how 17 whole years of my life could fit into this bag.
Beginning to put the objects back in now, I froze as I noticed a bulge in the bottom of my sack. Cautiously I reached down and felt it. My eyes widened as I recognized the familiar shape. Reaching into the hidden pouch, I pulled out my old 45, with some special modifications.
"What the…I thought I left this at Foundation."
Turning the gun over in my hands I noticed a tiny message scrawled on the side of the gun. It read, "Try not to loose this," and Tex's real name was scrawled at the bottom.
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Nabiki blinked and rubbed her eyes to make sure she wasn't seeing things. All of the tracers that she had placed on Ranma had suddenly disappeared. And if he had caught on to the tracers…oh shit.
Ryoga growled and flicked the side of his tracer expectantly hoping that the blip known as Ranma would reaper. If it didn't though…
"Damn you Nabiki! I paid nearly 40,000 yen for this!"
Similar stories were happening all of Nerima.
Shampoo growled and shook her tracker, "Stupid mercenary girl cheat Shampoo!"
"Mine eyes doth deceive me," said Kuno, "But mine nemeses has vanished!"
"Konatsu! We're going to pay a visit to our Tendo friend."
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I felt incredibly out of place as I walked through the high security bank. Everyone there was dressed formally and here I was wearing a blue t-shirt and a pair of jeans, the first two items I had grabbed off the clothes rack.
"Can I help you sir?"
I turned around and faced one of the black ties wandering around the bank, "Yeah, I'd like to access my storage vault please."
In response the suited man produced a fingerprint reader. I placed my thumb on it and after a few seconds there was a beep of recognition, "Right this way sir."
I was lead through a series of hallways and dropped off at my vault. Imputing my 10 digit combination, I looked upon my armor for the first time in nearly 3 years.
From what Tex had told me, I was unofficially recruited into a place called the Blue Army, being trained to fight against another army called the Red Army. Very creative names I know. However, despite this, my armor wasn't the traditional rookie blue but actually a shade of green. To this day I don't know why.
Undoing my pigtail, I produced a pair of scissors that I had borrowed from the clothes store. Using the visor of my armor as an impromptu mirror, I carefully cut some of my hair so my head would fit into the helmet. The first thing they did at basic was shave our heads so we could readily slip on gas masks and helmets like the one I was about to put on.
Piece by piece I started placing the pieces of heavy metal on my body, letting the once familiar weight settle on my shoulders once again. While the weight may have slowed me down a bit, I was going against firearms and this was the best protection available.
Finally, I set the helmet on my head and activated my visor, bringing up the HUD showing how much energy the shields had left. Even though my armor had been abandoned for nearly two years the shields around them were still working adequately.
Reaching into my vault I grabbed my standard issue battle rifle and attached it to my back. Reaching into my bag I grabbed the modified pistol Tex had planted with a tracking device. Two minutes later and I had transformed into soldier Ranma. Tossing my backpack into the safe I slammed it close, a bit too hard in fact. I had forgotten the strength modifiers my suit provided.
Now the two-million dollar question was how I was going to get out without…
"Is everything okay in here si…" the guard's sentence cut off abruptly as he noticed me standing in the room. Slowly his eyes traveled down my suit until he saw the pistol in my hand.
"SOUND THE ALARM! THERE'S A BANK ROBBER IN HERE!" Faster than my eye could track he sped out of the vault. Mere seconds later a loud blaring alarm sounded throughout the bank.
I almost felt like shooting the guy.
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A/N: I hope it was worth the wait.
