Disclaimer: This is a work of fanfiction, I do not claim any rights to any of the characters or concepts created or owned by Viz Video or Rumiko Takahashi. This is just the work of one fan to the others. The only characters or concepts that I claim are the ones I created or introduced. That said, I bring you:
For Love and Money, the War of the Horse. A Y3 story.
Chapter 5: The finer points of aggressive negotiations.
Ranma walked with a confident swagger to his step, like he had seen the man who's jacket and cap he now wore had. All six of the raiders had paired off, but they were too focused on their little act to be truly aware of what had happened already. Ranma glanced at the pair by the truck, and narrowed his eyes. They were mostly in the open as they played some game of chance. They should have been on guard, watching to make sure that none of the villagers tried anything. Or if something went very, very wrong .
Of course, Ranma would only correct them in a very final and thorough manner.
Ranma mentally debated with himself for a moment whether he should take the risk of dealing with the guards at the truck now, or last. They were the ones most likely to attempt to rabbit if something went wrong, or to report the situation.
There was only one real answer, then.
Ranma hunched down and bent at the knees slightly to appear shorter. He started to walk towards the two in a relaxed manner. As long as they didn't see the back jacket, it should be fine, he thought to himself as he closed the distance.
The two guards looked up and greeted him in Mandarin as he closed the distance with them. One of them turned back to the game,but the other called out a challenge phrase. Ranma didn't know the reply, so he just kept walking at the same rate as the other guard looked up and back at Ranma. When that one started to reach for his gun, Ranma began to run towards them. He launched the knife in his hand with a quick motion to take the one that had started to ready his rifle through the right eye.
The one that had started to reach for his rifle instead rolled to the side to avoid the other knife that Ranma had thrown at him and cleared his own fighting knife. Ranma could read the decision process as it flickered through his opponent's mind. Did he try to run for it? Call for help? Or fight the unknown foe that had squared up against him.
With a soft curse in Russian, the bandit rose up and held his knife ready as he pulled a second one out. He settled into the stance of a practiced knife fighter without any of the showy antics one would expect from a bandit in the sticks.
Ranma smiled a rictus grin as the two slowly circled each other. Ranma kept to his usual relaxed stance with his empty hands loose and moving.
Ranma looked over his opponent and said in unaccented Russian. "If you surrender, I'd be willing to consider letting you live."
"You stupid little slant-eyed shithead, I'm going to slit your neck and shit down your throat." The Russian said as he stood up and pointed at Ranma.
Ranma shrugged as he took a half step forward and well into the other fighter's longer reach with that cold look in his eyes. The larger Russian took an involuntary step back then visibly steeled himself as he dropped back into his stance and Ranma continued to slowly walk towards him.
The bigger Russian took a tentative swipe at Ranma, but didn't fully commit to it. Ranma leaned out of the way with a smooth, subtle sway of his body as he continued to move steadily closer. With a snarl, the Russian moved to engage Ranma as he launched a series of fast, smooth slashes and stabs. Ranma weaved out of the way of the first couple, then he started to actively parry the strikes. He blocked his opponent again and again as he brushed aside the hand that held the knife, or by sliding his forearm along the forearm of the Russian.
The Russian bounced backwards, and started to launch into another series of attacks, as he started a combination of kicks and slashes. His face became more and more serious, while Ranma kept that cold, almost disinterested look in his eyes. It was a look that sent a shiver up and down the mercenary's spine. He had fought many battles and engagements, and stared down Death many times. This was the first time that Death had looked him back in the eye.
Ranma moved with smooth, practiced precision. For him, combat was an art form, an intricate dance that those involved had to carry to it's finale. Regardless of the outcome, mattered was the fight, the subtle dance of death that they had entered. He moved through the elaborate sequence that he had in his mind, as he improvised whenever his dance partner did something that didn't fit what he saw.
Still, Ranma knew that unless something unexpected happened, this dance could only end one way. The Russian was skilled, bigger and stronger than him, yes. And Ranma could gauge how much skill he had from their engagements. Still, compared to Konatsu and Tachi, he might as well have been standing still. And in a knife fight the tiny Black Geisha Amaya would be handing his liver on a plate, properly seasoned.
Who would have thought that something he truly loathed when he was younger, would be such a boon to people that he had come to truly care about. Ranma himself had made his peace with the gifts of Jusenkyo years ago, and accepted his other side as just as much an expression of who he was, and who he had become.
Ranma returned his full attention to the fight once more as their dance moved towards its conclusion. There were only a few possible steps now, because his opponent had let himself be led into a corner. Only a few moves left in this chess game as Ranma continued the circular, sliding motion of his forearms against the Russian's. Each cycle brought them closer to the crescendo of this performance, and they both knew it.
It all came down to this moment, this decision as Ranma's hand slid lightly over his opponents, and the twisting motion removed the knife from the Russian's grasp as easily as if he had handed it over himself. Even as Ranma shifted the block on the other hand, the Russian tried to disengage and go for the gun concealed at the small of his back.
Perhaps he had thought he could shoot Ranma and survive this fight. Or maybe he had hoped the shot would bring the others running to see what had gone wrong.
That is not what would happen, though. This was a foreseen possibility. One that Ranma had expected and planned for. Ranma shifted his sliding block on the Russian's hand that still held his knife as he applied a wrist lock and stepped in as he pulled the larger mercenary slightly off balance. He snaked his now empty hand in behind the larger fighter as the discarded knife thunked into the ground. He grabbed hold of the hand that now held the pistol. The Russian had a moment to react, his face paled as Ranma twisted and blocked his larger opponent's leg and applied leverage as he threw the Russian in a flowing throw.
Ranma maintained his grip on the arm he had a lock on and felt the shoulder he had applied pressure on come apart. As the Russian stiffened, Ranma continued the movement as he rose for a moment before he dropped his knee over the neck of his fallen foe. As the neck snapped under his knee, Ranma moved to stand and looked over the situation before he quickly dragged the two bodies and dumped them under the truck.
Ranma moved quickly and quietly towards where he had seen the last two moving. He would need to last pair alive if he wanted answers. That didn't mean he had to hold back, just as long as they lived.
It was amazing what you could live through, after all.
As he moved closer, he could hear the pair as they looted and pillaged. Yes, the classic plagues of bandits and mercenaries. Looting, pillaging and raping. They seemed rather dedicated to sticking to the act. If it was even an act by now.
Ranma crept up on the pair of them, and tracked the movements of the two as they ransacked the chieftain's house. The best loot would be there, as far as they were concerned. Much quicker than going house to house to take everything.
He could hear them as they talked back and different rooms, and how they laughed about what their companions were up to. Ranma felt the bike ride up in his throat even as his eyes grew colder, harder.
As his wife would put it, this situation would surely call for some very.. Aggressive negotiations. He would make them an offer they could not refuse, and make sure that they were aware that only one candidate for the interview would be accepted.
The other would face immediate termination.
Ranma slipped into the building as quiet as a ghost, the noise the two were making easily covering any possible sounds. After a moment's consideration, Ranma made his way towards the one that was farther away of the two. If there was any noise, or more strangely silence, the other one was likely to investigate and move away from the door.
Ranma slipped a garrote from it's pocket as he entered the room that he had chosen. He shadowed the smaller Chinese man as he moved noisily about the room for a short span of time and waited for his target to reach for an object before he slipped the wire around his neck from behind and lifted him from the ground. His target struggled as Ranma kept the pressure up, before he dropped the unconscious man unceremoniously into a corner. Ranma pulled a set of zip ties out, and quickly trussed him up as he heard a shout of inquiry from the other mercenary.
Ranma faded into the shadows behind the door and waited quietly. When the last mercenary walked in, Ranma could sense the other man as he tensed and started to reach for his gun.
That was the moment that Ranma moved, as he stepped behind the mercenary and knocked him out with a couple of quick strikes. Ranma looked over the two and nodded with a grim look on his face.
Next came the unpleasant part.
The two men woke up with a start as buckets of cold water were thrown into their faces. A few facts became evident quickly. First, they were both naked, and tied into a chair with zip ties. Second, that each foot was in some sort of container filled with water. They both looked to the man who stood before them and dropped the second bucket on the floor. Not a word was spoken for a moment as Ranma calmly reached back and grabbed a pair of heavy leather work gloves and pulled them on silently. At the appraising look that Ranma gave them, a cold chill ran up and down their spines.
Ranma stepped around the corner for a moment, then came back with a pair of metal rods that each trailed a wire around the corner. He calmly tapped them together and the smell of ozone and the crack of the spark that leapt from one to the other seemed to fill the room.
"Now, how about we have a little talk? I guess you could call this the lightning round. First one willing to tell me what I need to know gets out of the chair. The other one, well… I guess we are cooking long pig tonight." Ranma said with a cold gleam in his eyes.
A bit of time later, Ranma walked out of the room with a grim look on his face. He had carried out his promise to the two mercenaries. One of them gave him the answers he needed, and the other he left with the rods in the water. The one who had decided to talk would be left to the villagers, because Ranma had never promised he would be freed.
What he had been told confirmed some of what he had already surmised, but created other questions. The Amazon and the big guy were the ones who called the shots, but they were working under the orders of others. The Amazon was called Bo Bi Pyn, and the man was named Parsley. They had bought and paid for the mercenaries with a combination of cash and precious gems, and had shown up about the time that Qiang Pu would have started her escape to Japan.
None of them had been to the village, but they knew of it. It sounded like not even their figure head had been there yet. So, he was going to need to talk to Parsley and Bo Bi Pyn to find out what they knew before he made a run on the village.
Not that he had ever intended to let them walk away, of course.