Author's Notes: Now that's a bit more like it! I am so glad that people aren't mad about the inclusion of Miriam into the ship's crew. In fact, you guys actually seem to like her, which is way more than I ever dared to hope!

For the curious, no, there's no canon artwork of her yet... I'd love to see her get fanart, just like Zoan Shampoo or any of the other crew, but I can't promise anything on that front. There is a pic that inspired her on a conceptual level, but... well, if the name "LurkerGG" means anything to you, you'll know why you shouldn't look up his "Izma's Sharktooth Necklace" pic anywhere that needs to fall under SFW guidelines. No, she's not the spitting image of Miriam, I took inspiration from the limb-fins from his much tamer "Haunted Suncarp Sun Lotion", as well as Cattleya from Queen's Blade, but that is the general outline I had of Miriam in my head when it comes to her blending of humanoid and shark physical traits.

I will confess I'm a little... surprised? Disappointed? That only King of Fans brought up Miriam's dad period, and nobody read anything into Ranma's little observation on Miriam's distinct anatomy... but I suppose that's the curse of the author.

I'm also glad folks like the informational "Ship's Log" entries. I'll definitely use those for other OC recruits in the future, but if there are other "meta" entries that would be helpful, such as an analysis of Shampoo's Devil Fruit, let me know and I'll try to get them worked together.

Doraemax: The technique Ranma used in the previous chapter was an imperfect, cobbled-together-on-the-fly version of the unnamed technique that Happosai uses to grow into a giant form in several stories in both manga and anime, most prominently the "Wrath of Happosai" arc and the manga-exclusive conclusion of the first Pantyhose Taro story. In both continuities, Genma is also able to use the trick, as seen in "Wrath of Happosai", but in the anime, Soun Tendo can also use it, as he, Genma and Happosai use it to battle a pair of giant monsters in the anime adaptation of the Scribble Panda story.

Chapter 16: Bye-Bye, P-Chan!

Lightning flashed and cracked across the rain-sodden sky as if a dozen storm kami were having a drunken disco. The wind howled like a banshee karaoke party, whipping the sea into a churning frenzy as the full fury of the elements turned themselves against the ship that so audaciously dared to claim their obedience. Half a dozen female forms, clothes plastered to their skins, defiantly battled on.

And down amongst their feet, ignored by all in the face of the storm, a tiny little black pig screamed porcine profanities to the uncaring heavens. As waves broke against the side of the ship, they spilled water across the deck, creating a churning, ankle high soup - which to Ryoga might as well have been shoulder-deep, thanks to the limitations of his cursed form. The boy-turned-pig paddled desperately as the heaving of the ship churned the water back and forth, dragging him around like a leaf caught in the tides. Feet pounded down around him as he tried to make his way back into the safety of the ship's cabins, but one particularly violent wave snatched him up and bodily dragged him the entire breadth of the ship to be sucked out the drainage holes.

"Ryoga's overboard!" Umok's voice boomed out, challenging with the crashing of the waves, but Ryoga couldn't really pay attention, being more focused on the inky black abyss attempting to suck him down to a horrible fate.

He thrashed all four legs desperately, fighting to stay afloat in the maelstrom when he only had tiny little trotters to keep himself afloat with. As he spiraled helplessly through the water, his heart stopped and his eyes bulged out of their sockets at the sight of an enormous shark's dorsal fin gliding purposefully towards him.

"No! Don't eat me! Eat Ranma, he deserves it!" Ryoga screamed at the top of his lungs. Driven by desperation, he turned and paddled for his life, swimming blindly in an attempt to outrun his inevitable fate...

Which was when something lashed around his legs and lower torso. Ryoga barely had time to scream before he was dragged underwater.

Below the waves, Ryoga found himself writhing in the clutches of a two-meter long, devil red squid. Its wickedly barbed tentacles dug painfully into Ryoga's hide, even with what remained of his Bakusai Tenketsu training hardening the Jusenkyo cursed trainer's skin, and it tried to wrestle the struggling pig towards its gnashing beak...

'No! No, it can't end like this! I haven't beaten Ranma! I haven't told Akane how I feel!' Ryoga mentally wailed.

Suddenly, three indescribable objects, like pillars of meat latched onto Ryoga out of the gloom, pinning him in a surprisingly soft pincer-grip. The startled pig found himself dragged backwards through the water, the squid sailing along for the ride... before their path brought them past an enormous, shark-like maw. The mouth gaped open, a tunnel of pale flesh lined with razored teeth, and the squid was sucked inside before the jaws snapped shut, leaving only the severed tentacles still mindlessly clutching onto Ryoga.

Through his panic, Ryoga realized he was being held by Miriam, the wotan now casually chewing on Ryoga's assailant before swallowing the squid in one massive gulp.

'...Talk about bigger fish...'

The thought came from nowhere, a random misfiring of neurons, but given the situation, Ryoga would have argued he was allowed to have the odd crazy thought. The wotan adjusted her grip, releasing Ryog from the forefingers and thumb-hold to wrapping him in her massive fist, then surged towards the surface, breaching in an explosion of spray and letting her distinctly non-amphibious crewmate get some much needed air from the safety of her now open and upheld palm.

"There you are... what were you doing, swimming away from me?" Miriam complained.

Ryoga pointedly ignored her, slightly exaggerating his desperate need to hack up saltwater and replace it with life-giving oxygen.

"Ah, whatever... problem is, red devil squids hunt in packs, so if you'll excuse me, I don't intend to let them nibble my clothes off again... go long, Umok!"

Ryoga stared at his newest crewmate in confusion, especially when she started shouting at the ship. Realization sank in just as she drew her arm back...

"No-no-no, there's gotta be a better - waaaaaagh!"

The wind whipped through his ears as he rocketed towards the ship like a living bullet. His eyes watered and his little legs flailed impotently as he screamed through the air.

"Somebody catch me-he-heeee!"

Just as it seemed he was going to sail clear past the ship and into the stormy water on the other side, a three-clawed hand of glowing azure mist snapped into being right in Ryoga's path. The boy-turned-pig plowed into it like a wall made of pillows, and found its vaporous digits wrapping around him in a deceptively solid embrace.

"Lucky for you that she decided to go for a swim, huh?" Umok drawled, gesturing with a cigar that remained miraculously alight despite the driving rain and lowering Ryoga back down towards the deck.

Ryoga was too exhausted to even try and flip the imp off with his trotters. He just slumped bonelessly in his magical salvation, and allowed himself to be deposited safely inside the ship's interior, where the water could no longer reach him.

After the storm passes...

"Cold water changes you, and hot water changes you back? Amazing..." Miriam breathed reverently.

"It ain't really that big a deal," Ranma grumbled, the old embarrassment rearing its ugly head. The fact the wotan was poking Ranma's breasts with her fingertip in fascination probably contributed to her less than stellar mood.

But her mood was nothing compared to Ryoga's, who tipped the boiling kettle over his head and returned to humanity almost literally steaming mad.

"Of course you'd say that! You lucky bastard - you don't even have a curse at all!" Ryoga bellowed.

"Ah, what do you know, bacon butt?" Ranma jeered.

"I know what it's like to be stepped on, kicked around, and beaten up, because a splash of cold water makes me helpless! I was almost squid-bait today because of this stupid curse!" the Eternally Lost Boy roared.

"By the way, thank you for bringing back these squid, Miriam; calamari will make a nice meal tonight," Ukyo commented from where she and Shampoo were busily fileting the dozens of two-meter-long cephalopods.

"Why aren't you listening to me?!" Ryoga screamed, face red with fury.

"Because there's nothing we can do! We couldn't fix these stupid Jusenkyo curses back on our world, so what are we going to do now? The only magic here are Devil Fruits and Umok, and it's not like Umok can do anything," Ranma flatly assessed.

Ryoga's fists clenched so tightly that his knuckles crackled like breaking walnuts, before he slumped with an anguished sob.

That was when Umok suddenly coughed pointedly.

"That statement... isn't entirely accurate," the imp hesitantly conceded.

He promptly shot up towards the roof, built to accommodate Miriam, as Ryoga lunged to try and grab him by the throat.

"Why do you people keep trying to do that?!" the imp roared in exasperation.

"Spill it! You can fix me?!" RYoga demanded.

"I... might have an answer to your particular problem, yes," Umok declared.

At this point, all eyes were upon him, and he took a moment to stretch, cracking his neck and lighting a fresh cigar before he began.

"I won't bore you with the technical details... I don't really expect you to follow them, anyway. But humor me and pretend you understand more than one word in five, okay?"

"Get on with it!" Ryoga barked.

Umok pointedly sucked on his cigar and exhaled a thick, nauseating cloud of acrid smoke in the Eternally Lost Boy's face. As Ryoga coughed indignantly, the imp continued.

"What you need to understand is that curses aren't all cut from the same cloth. There's differences in power. A permanent two-way triggerable transformation like Jusenkyo is a much nastier and more complex affair than a simple hex that causes you to suffer uncontrollable flatulence for a month, understand?"

"That is self-evident, yes," Kodachi snarkily retorted.

"The issue here is that I am not a specialist in healing, abjuration, or any field that prioritizes curse-breaking, so I don't have some of the more specialized spells that could be useful in this situation," Umok continued.

"You told me back in Loguetown that your magic is all about opening doors and things, right? Couldn't you just summon me some Nanniichuan water?" Ryoga interjected.

"Oh, sure. I just need to reach through the Blind Eternities to find a realm whose thaumic signature I barely recognize, and then narrow my link to a specific area I've never been to in my life, then track down the one specific spring which, again, I've never been to and so would have to identify by its arcane aura, which I'd have to remotely determine from the auras of every other spring in the valley!"

An awkward silence hung over the room before Miriam coughed nervously. "...I'm guessing that's even harder to do than it is to say?"

"It'd be simpler to just open the portal to your world and send you all there," Umok flatly retorted.

"I thought you said you could help - all you've done is say that you can't!" Ryoga snapped at him.

"No, I'm telling you my options are limited! I can still offer something... just not something you might actually want..."

"Wait, wait, how's that work? A cure's a cure, ain't it?" Ranma interjected.

"There are... degrees of curing one's ills. The long and short of it is that I can't remove Ryoga's curse... but, with the right ritual, I could tweak some of its aspects. Meaning... I can change what it is that you turn into when splashed with cold water..." Umok explained patiently.

"...How is that not a cure?! Just change it so I turn into a boy!" Ryoga bellowed, waving his arms in his exasperation.

"The problem is that I can't do that! Magic is tricky! The simple explanation is that I need an example of another Jusenkyo curse on hand to serve as my template - I can only change your curse to mirror the effects of another Jusenkyo curse! And unless one of these lovely ladies has been doing a very, very good job of keeping secrets from us, that means there's precisely one curse I can use!"

Umok jabbed his cigar in Ranma's direction for emphasis, bringing all eyes to the startled captain.

Ryoga looked poleaxed. "...What?"

"It's not perfect, I know! But as you've pointed out, Ranma's curse at least lets him remain human, with all the benefits that entails, however dubious. So that's your choice... stay a pig, or start learning how to put on your own bra. The decision is ultimately yours."

Silence fell on the room once more, all eyes going to Ryoga. He stood there quietly, head hung, visibly lost in thought. Finally, his hand slowly curled into a fist.

"...I'll do it."

"Ryoga, hey man, listen," Ranma began, putting a gentle hand on his (currently her) rival's shoulder.

"I said I'll do it!" Ryoga snarled, wrenching away from Ranma and snapping up his head to glare at the rest of the crew. "You all have no idea what it's like to turn into a defenseless little animal with just a splash of cold water! Anything would be better than this hell! And besides, if Ranma can handle it, I sure can, so Umok, make with the magic already!"

"Very well! ...But there's a problem," Umok added, the words causing all of the human residents of the room to collapse face-first onto the floor in shock.

"Oh, come on!" Ryoga complained.

"You've been feeding my power surprisingly well these last few encounters, but I am still very much drained! I can't just snap my fingers and make this happen - I need to resort to ritual magic! And that means I need reagents!" the imp defensively shot back.

"Oh, let me guess; moonlight thrice-boiled at midnight and eyes of virgins and candles made from human fat," Ranma jeered.

"No, I need pomegranates and hallucinogenic mushrooms," Umok spat defensively.

"...What?" Ranma retorted incredulously, speaking for the crew as a whole.

"I can give you an hours-long lecture on the symbolic and metaphysical properties of those items and how they resonate with the ritual in question, or you can accept that as the case and move on to actually finding them," Umok defensively declared.

"...And where would we even find those things anyway?" Ukyo asked.

"I might know!" Miriam suddenly interjected. All eyes turned towards her, but she soldiered on. "I can't say if they'll have the right mushrooms -"

"I just need anything hallucinogenic; the stronger, the better," Umok interjected.

"-But the next island we're approaching is called Femille island. I've heard about it; it's a Summer Island, and it's known for its tropical fruits, including pomegranates!" Miriam continued, nodding in acknowledgement of Umok's words.

"Well, ain't that fortunate!" Ranma chuckled. "Dock there, do some shopping, and we should be done and dusted in no time! ...Well, unless there's something really crazy about the island that's going to be a problem...?"

"Uh... well, I've never been, but I've heard that Femille Island is an Amazon Island?" Miriam replied, shrugging helplessly.

"Amazon?" Shampoo asked, perking up at the familiar word.

"Islands with a matriarchal society of some kind... they're not hugely common, but they're far from unknown. They're called 'Amazon Islands' in honor of the most famous of their ilk, Amazon Lily, the home of Boa Hancock - the only woman to serve as a Warlord of the Sea! But... some of them can be a little funny about letting men from outside onto their island..." The wotan elaborated, shrugging once more.

"Good thing this crew can neatly sidestep any such issues, hmm?" Umok drawled, before puffing on his cigar.

Ranma nodded absently before turning his full attention back to Miriam. "How long until we reach this Femille Island?"

Miriam tapped her chin, visibly thinking it over. "Let's see... we've been sailing three days, so, assuming steady progress? About a week, I think."

One week later...

"Femille Island, dead ahead!" Umok's voice roared from his perch high in the crow's nest, echoing down into the bowels of the Stormbringer.

Ranma looked up from the game of checkers he was playing with Ukyo - having decided long ago that he wasn't ever going to play cards again unless he either fixed his poker face or he was truly desperate.

"Hm. Alright then... time to make ready," he mused, idly capturing one of Ukyo's pieces. Standing up, he cracked his neck before picking up a glass of water from the table and tipping it over his head. Now female, he walked out onto the deck, joining those already present and followed by those who had been waiting inside.

Even though it still was some ways off, even from here, Femille Island looked a lot like Ranma would have pictured when the phrase "tropical paradise" was used. Easily as big as Shay-Lot, it was dominated by a trio of rocky, bare-looking mountains, whose flanks were covered in thick jungle that ultimately gave way to sparkling white-sand beaches. Whilst much of its natural beauty had been tamed to form great orchards and farmyards, it was still largely wild and rugged looking. The port-town they were sailing towards wasn't the largest city they'd seen since arriving on this world - proportionally, it was probably only as large as Shay-Lot had been - but it was clean and prosperous-looking, with well-kept houses largely made of dried bamboo lattices and palm leaves, save for a few more permanent structures made of stone.

Within minutes, they were sailing into the town's docks, which were surprisingly small; a handful of caravels, and maybe two to three times as many small fishing boats. Evidently, Femille Island was not a very outward-looking community. Once the usual docking procedures were met, Ranma looked over his crew and grinned at them.

"Alright, ladies, it's shopping time! We know what Umok needs, but we also need to stock up on basic goods and supplies - they were generous to us on Shay-Lot, but we're still looking at bare larders and empty wardrobes, even with Miriam's help fishing and the 'donations' we took from those idiot Sonson Pirates..."

"What kind of stupid gimmick is 'every pirate must have a name ending in the word son', anyway?" Ukyo complained.

"Given how dumb some of the pirates we've seen have been, it's not really that surprising," Ryoga scoffed.

Pretending that neither had spoken, Ranma continued, "From what Miriam said, guys may not be too welcome on this island, so Ryoga and Umok, you two stay behind and guard the ship. The rest of us will go ashore."

"Uh... even me, Captain?" Miriam asked, with surprising meekness for such a towering figure.

"Are you gonna step on somebody?" Ranma dryly asked, one eyebrow raised speculatively.

"No!" the indignant wotan snapped back.

"Then you'll be fine. Come on, ladies," Ranma declared primly, gesturing imperiously for them to follow the boy-turned-girl even as he turned on his heel and began striding for the gangplank.

Nabiki giggled softly in amusement as she watched Ranma strut away. "For such a macho he-man, he certainly plays the role of the primadonna bitch well, doesn't he?"

"That is because my darling Ranma is a man of many facets," Kodachi declared, smiling dreamily even as she hurried to follow Ranma.

"As if Nabiki has any place calling somebody a primadonna bitch," Ukyo muttered to Shampoo, with the zoan stifling a giggle.

Miriam watched as the otherworldly pirates she had thrown her lot in tramped down the gangplank, observing their interactions with fascination. Then she loped after them, stepping over the gunwale and down onto the dock with all the ease of somebody surmounting a kneehigh fence.

The path from the docks to the marketplace was short and easily traversed, and in many respects, it wouldn't have passed notice for the Kamikaze Pirates. Only one thing really stood out: the abundance of women. Everywhere they looked, there were women, ranging from dignified old crones to little girls playing in the streets. Some wore fairly skimpy clothing, to the point that Miriam's own glorified bikini ensemble was practically the norm, whilst others draped themselves in flowing tunics and dresses that were clearly made to both preserve the bearer's modesty and to ward off the heat. The only visibly male people walking around were clearly sailors and merchants, and vastly outnumbered by the women.

"Wow... this place must feel just like home, eh, China Girl?" Ukyo quipped.

"Is so many womens here... where is mens? Shampoo tribe famous for strong womans, yes, but we still have many strong mens, too," the zoan replied absently, staring about in fascination.

The smell of the marketplace - a heady perfume of fruit and spices, baking bread, sizzling oil, frying meat and grilling seafood - washed over them as they entered it properly. Miriam tilted her head back and sniffed hungrily, licking her lips with a monstrous-looking elongated tongue.

"Mmm... that smells good... Captain, can we eat?"

"Shopping first, or at least the clothes first. Don't want to get blamed for smearing grease 'n' stuff on the fabric," Ranma replied absently.

The towering tiger sharkgirl's stomach growled in protest, but the wotan merely absently petted it even as she nodded her acquiescence. "Sure, that makes sense... so, where do we start looking?"

Ranma rubbed the back of her head sheepishly. "Ah... good question... any suggestions, girls?"

Shortly afterwards...

Ranma glanced at her surroundings, taking in the plethora of fancy dresses, ornaments and accessories, before heaving a long-suffering sigh and shaking her head.

"...Was this really the first place you had to go shopping? I thought we were after essentials to replace what got water-damaged when the Milka sank, not flights of fancy..."

"Oh, lighten up, Ranchan! It's nice to have some things just for the sake of it," Ukyo playfully scolded him from where she was examining a set of earrings.

"Not to mention that I seem to recall you having plenty of fun dressing up in the past, Ranma... why, if it wasn't for the fact you make an absolute idiot of yourself in your eagerness to chase every sniff of a cure that comes your way, I'd think you like dressing up in women's clothes!" Nabiki giggled. Then she held up her hands in silent apology as a bestial noise of fury ripped out of Ranma's throat, the transformed boy turning an incandescent glare her way.

Ignoring her captain's playing around, Kodachi wended her way through the dresses on offer, pausing occasionally to take a closer look at a particularly intriguing specimen. As she moved through the maze of designs, she spotted Miriam, hunkered in a corner, and curiosity prompted her to slip silently closer to her new crewmate. As she crept closer, she realized that the wotan was gingerly trailing her finger over a particular dress, a look of longing in her eyes.

"Found something that you like, Miriam?" Kodachi politely inquired, only to step back as Miriam visibly recoiled at her words, snatching her hand away from the dress as if it had burned her.

"I - what - I was-I wasn't doing anything!" Miriam defensively blustered.

"It seemed to me that you were admiring that dress," Kodachi calmly rebutted her, stepping forward to take a better look at the dress in question.

Miriam's cheeks went red. "S-So what if I was? You gonna tell me that I can't wear a dress?"

"Certainly not, dear. I think that dress would look lovely on you," Kodachi replied, after having taken a better look at both the wotan and the dress.

"Y-You do?" a confused Miriam replied, tilting her head. It was very clear that she hadn't expected Kodachi to say anything like that.

"Hmm... maybe not this color, though. I think it clashes with your skin tone. Ah, madame?" Kodachi waved gently, calling to the shop's attendant, who immediately came over to the Kuno heiress.

"Do you have this dress in red, or maybe black? And in a size... well.. her?" Kodachi gestured demurely to the towering immensity that was Miriam, who blushed again but gave a shy, hopeful grin.

At this, the attendant's smile turned brittle and her eyes went glassy, a bead of nervous sweat trickling down her face.

"Ah... well... let's see..."

Not long thereafter...

Miriam hugged the bundle to her ample chest reverently, as if afraid it would vanish if she lightened her grip. "I... Captain, I can't thank you enough..."

"Ah, don't mention it, Miriam. Everybody should have something nice... I'm just sorry we could only spare the money to buy you the one," Ranma replied, folding her arms behind her head as she walked along.

"Yes, Nabiki Tendo truly did an impressive job to haggle that storekeeper down as low as she did," Kodachi confessed.

Nabiki visibly puffed her chest out in pride, grinning triumphantly. "But of course! You didn't make me the quartermaster for nothing!"

"Shampoo thought we give you that job out of pity because you no can do physical work?" The ship's Zoan mused aloud, smirking at Nabiki's sour look.

"But, you really didn't have a dress like that before, Miriam? I thought your mom gave you a crateload of clothes before we left Shay-Lot?" A confused Ukyo interjected.

"Yeah, but it's all just practicals... mostly stuff for if we come to a Winter Island," Miriam replied defensively. "Giants don't usually bother too much with clothes..."

"But you're only half-giant," Nabiki pointed out, unable to resist the opening.

"And the other half of me is fishman. I spent most of my waking hours underwater... not a lot of calls for anything more than what modesty demands," Miriam dryly retorted.

"Anyway, now we've done that, let's go grab a bite to eat, and then we'll start hunting for Umok's requests. Shouldn't take us too long," Ranma interjected pointedly, hoping to head off an argument at the pass.

"Sounds good to me!" Miriam cheerfully announced, beaming with excitement at the news. Without even waiting for the rest of them, she spun on her heel and strode briskly off - not running, but with her legs, easily outpacing them and forcing them to scramble to catch up.

People parted around Miriam's waist like a human wave as she marched through the streets, following her nose in pursuit of satisfaction. She sniffed, and then grinned toothily, the shark-like fangs behind her otherwise plumply human lips adding a feral cast to her normally lovely features as she locked onto the delicious scent of grilled meats dripping with fat and laden with spices unfamiliar to the Shay-Lot palate. Tracing the scent to a streetcart under an awning, the wotan boldly thrust her head underneath the high-hung tent-structure.

The streetcart vendor looked ready to faint as the awning over her cart was lifted up and she glanced up into the face of a gigantic shark-woman, fangs glistening as an oversized tongue lapped up an errant rope of saliva.

"Excuse me," the she-hulk purred, "But how much for three dozen of those delicious-smelling spit-roasted pigeons of yours...?"

Shortly afterwards...

Miriam sucked on the bamboo skewer that had previously held spicy roasted pigeon, scraping off any lingering scraps of flesh and grease before using the point to pick her teeth clean. "Mmm, now that hit the spot! Nice light lunch to tide us over..."

"Shampoo must agree; was not great-grandmother's Peking Duck, but that one nice meal. Would visit again!" the cabbit zoan chimed in, daintily licking her fingers clean. "And she tell us where to find good fruit vendor, too!"

"Between the two of you, she probably made a month's profit - I wouldn't have been surprised if she told you where to buy her sister," Nabiki grumbled, jingling her disappointingly light money pouch.

"Ah, come off it, Nabiki; what's a little cash more or less? You certainly weren't turning your nose up at it," Ranma chimed in, before spitting an errant bone off into an alley.

"I'm just glad she was willing to share the recipe - I'll try to recreate that on the Stormbringer," Ukyo chirped.

"Now, where was it that she said? Down the end of the block, two lefts, and then a right?" Kodachi wondered aloud.

Following the instructions, they soon found themselves standing before a wide pavilion, whose shade-clothes stretched over tables groaning under an array of tropical fruit, ranging from familiar specimens like bananas, pineapples, coconuts and dates to more exotic specimens that even Kodachi couldn't name.

The stallkeeper, a slender, androgynous figure under her veil and flowing dress, looked up as they approached. "Greetings! How may I assist you today?"

"We're looking for pomegranates; do you have any?" Ranma asked.

"Pomegranates?" The stallkeeper repeated, tilting her head to the side as she visibly thought it over. Then her eyes brightened. "Ah, yes, as it so happens, we do have one small crate of them available! It's not really the season, alas."

"That'll do us, then... how much?" Ranma cheerfully asked.

"One million beries," the stallkeeper replied.

Ranma froze mid-smile, her cheek twitching. "Ah... you should speak to my quartermaster. Oh, Nabiki...?"

The oldest of the world-displaced Kamikaze Pirates strutted forward, with a grin that even Miriam found unsettling.

"One million beries? Surely you jest. We'll pay you one hundred thousand for them."

"One hundred thousand? For what is likely the only crate of pomegranates on the entire island? Do you take me for a fool? Five hundred thousand!"

"You already told us this isn't really their season, we both know that those can't be in the best condition. Two hundred and fifty thousand, and not a berie more!"

The rest of her crew watched as Nabiki and the stallkeeper haggled in earnest, gazes shifting back and forth as if watching a tennis match.

"For somebody who grow up in Japan, she sure know how to strike deal like village witch," Shampoo muttered.

"Everybody's gotta have some kind of talent," Ukyo murmured back to her.

"Fine! You pirate! Three hundred thousand, and I will take no less!" The stallkeeper suddenly howled, making them all snap their attention back to her.

Nabiki grinned sharkishly. "I am a pirate, and pleasure doing business with you."

The stallkeeper sighed and shook her head, mumbling to herself as Nabiki counted out the beri notes. She visibly perked up as Nabiki placed an extra fifty thousand on the pile.

"Can you deliver this to our ship? We still have other things to do," Nabiki explained.

"Certainly can! And which ship is it?"

"The Stormbringer! Look for the ship with the horned fish-horse for a figurehead and storm of fists Jolly Roger," Ranma interjected.

"It shall be done, Captain," the stallkeeper replied calmly, bowing politely to them.

Their business done, the group walked away from the fruit seller.

"Well, that was anticlimactic," Ukyo commented.

"Even for us, not every encounter is going to become a life or death struggle," Kodachi playfully chided her.

"Shampoo not complaining. We just need find mushrooms now, then we just wait until Log Pose resets and we move on, right?"

"Yes, I believe it will take roughly a week before we can do that?" Kodachi mused, pulling her personal Log Pose from her pocket and tapping it inquisitively.

"Well, I wouldn't complain; a week spent camping out on a nice tropical paradise sounds like just the rest break the doctor ordered... after all, what could go wrong now?" Nabiki asked them all with a grin.

And that was when the sound of breaking wood, shouted curses and tearing fabric drifted their way from an alley just up ahead. Wordlessly, four feminine faces turned to Nabiki with matching expressions, leaving her pouting in frustration.

"Oh, come on!" She cried, especially when even Miriam started patiently shaking her head.

Ranma jogged off towards the noise, the rest of his crew following in the genderbending pirate captain's footsteps.

The alley was nothing special; just a disused tunnel between some permanent shops, a dark hole strewn with garbage. And currently occupied by seven teenage girls, six of whom were clearly ganging up on the seventh. The lone defender fought valiantly, twisting and turning with incredible speed and agility to dodge, parry, jump over or duck under the attacks of her half-dozen assailants, but her few retaliatory strikes either missed or just knocked one attacker away for a few moments, even as the other five redoubled their efforts.

It wasn't anything that none of them hadn't seen before... but it was something else entirely in the abilities on showcase. This was a fight that would have been impressive even back in Nerima; any one of these teens would have left the average Marine that Ranma had encountered so far in an unconscious heap on the ground.

But as one girl suddenly and viciously slammed what looked like an honest to goodness pair of shinai across the defender's face, sending her crashing to the ground, Ranma wasn't inclined to admire the fight.

The shinai-wielder spat contemptuously, brandishing her two bamboo training swords with obvious menace as she strode forward, her posse cracking their knuckles and cackling in anticipation. "How many times do we have to beat this lesson into you before it sticks? Oh well, you brought this on yourself!"

She raised her right shinai, clearly about to bring it crashing down on the stunned girl's skull...

And then there was Ranma, the bamboo rods slamming into her palm with a meaty smack as she crossed the intervening distance faster than the human eye could follow, weaving through the ring of bullies and interposing herself defensively in front of their victim. She started up at the apparent ringleader, a dusky-skinned, dark-eyed beauty with what Ranma would call "Okinawan" features, a shoulder-length mane of jet-black hair falling down her shoulders. Despite the height difference, Ranma sneered defiantly at the dual-wielding bully.

"Two things I can't stand are bullies and cowards. So of course I had to run into both today."

"Miserable outsider! This doesn't concern you!" the ringleader spat, trying in vain to yank her weapon back, but she might as well have been trying to push an anvil with her nose.

"Six on one? I think it does. How about we even up the odds, girls?" Ranma grinned wickedly, glancing over his shoulder.

"Waaah-hahahhahaha! I think that sounds like a lovely idea, captain darling!" Kodachi shrilled, brandishing her sword and cracking her whip in a single smooth gesture.

"Shampoo just itching to sharpen up her claws," purred the cabbit zoan, extending her nails to their full razor-sharp lengths and letting them glint menacingly in the sunlight.

Ukyo twirled her battle spatula in acrobatic loops around herself, the wide, well-polished blade shimmering as it caught the light. Miriam grinned toothily, unslinging her anchors from their positions on her back and clashing their steel shafts together, the crash of steel-on-steel echoing through the alleyway. And Nabiki hid behind Miriam's tail, putting the comforting bulk of the wotan between herself and the fray.

The sight of Ranma's crew, all armed and visibly spoiling for a fight, seemed to suck the confidence out of the bullies, who visibly paled and nervously stepped away from their still-prone victim, falling in behind their apparent leader as she backed away from Ranma, who finally let her shinai go.

"Y-You'll regret this! We're with the Crying Willow School!" the lead bully cried.

"You got five seconds to beat it, or I'll give you something to cry about!" Ranma spat back, holding up one hand and curling it into a fist to emphasize her choice of words.

"You'll be sorry!" The lead bully cried, but she was shouting it over her shoulder as she and her posse fled as fast as their legs could carry them.

"Tch! Buncha cowards," Ranma sneered, before finally turning to face the groaning victim they had left behind. "You alright there, miss?"

Moaning, the beaten girl spat blood off to the side, painting a splatter of crimson on the ground before wiping the excess off with the back of her wrist. That done, she sat up onto her knees and looked up to Ranma as she responded.

"Ugh...th-thank you, stranger. Not many would have stopped to help me..."

"That's our Ranma; never could pass by a damsel in distress," Nabiki quipped, stepping out from Miriam's shadow now that the danger was passed.

Ranma wasn't listening, largely due to having other things on his mind...

'Holy shit, she's cute!'

Almond-shaped, coal-black eyes stared up from a delicately featured face framed by stray locks of inky black hair that cascaded down to her shoulders, a bruise already blooming against moon-pale skin. Long, silky eyelashes fluttered as she stared up at Ranma, admiration written all over her lovely features.

'Okay, okay, keep it together, Ranma; remember you got three super hot and very jealous girls on your crew already!'

"What was all that about, anyway? They jealous of your looks or something?" Ranma asked. She did her best not to cringe as she felt the weight of her crewmates' collective gaze fall upon her, silently judging her.

'Kami damn you, tongue!'

The girl simply looked confused for a moment, before gingerly shaking her head. "No... my cousins and I have a... long running disagreement, shall we say?"

"Those were your cousins? Some family!" a disgusted Ukyo interjected.

"Why family fight like that?" an incredulous Shampoo demanded.

"Forgive me, but that's a private matter... still, I am eternally grateful for your assistance. They were feeling more aggressive than usual today. Is there anything I can do to repay you for your help?" the stranger asked.

"Well, you could tell us your name," Nabiki commented dryly.

Still sprawled in the dirt, the girl bowed her head humbly. "Forgive my manners. I am Harumi Tsukuyomi, of the Crying Willow School."

Ranma jabbed a thumb at herself, before pointing to each of her crew in turn. "I'm Ranma Saotome. That's Shampoo, Kodachi Kuno, Ukyo Kuonji, Nabiki Tendo..."

Even as Ranma was speaking, Miriam suddenly moved, lumbering forward and reaching down a massive hand to the smaller, supine Harumi.

Audibly amused, Ranma continued, smirking as she spoke. "And that big lug is Miriam Ransdottir. Don't worry, she doesn't bite..."

Harumi looked up at the wotan, and her eyes grew even wider, a faint hint of pink dusting her pale cheeks.

"O-oh my... thank you," she replied softly, extending her own hand and allowing Miriam to help her to her feet, teetering slightly and leaning against the wotan's supple, muscular thigh to catch her balance. Harumi seemed hypnotized by the towering non-human, silently drinking in every ample inch of her... of which admittedly there was quite a lot to admire!

"As for helping us, you really don't need to," Ranma added, drawing Harumi's attention back to the genderbending pirate.

"But surely there must be something I can do to assist!" she pleaded.

"Unless you know where we can buy some hallucinogenic mushrooms, not really," Ukyo declared bluntly.

The pale-skinned brunette tilted her head quizzically to the side. "Hallucinogenic mushrooms...? But... the sale of such items is prohibited on Femille Island..."

"Damnit! Really? You mean we'll have to wait until the next island?" Ranma outburst.

"Perhaps not even the next island, Captain darling; it all depends on the indigenous climate," Kodachi cautioned her.

"Forgive me, but I said that their sale is prohibited here, not that they are unavailable," Harumi gently interjected. "They grow quite profusely in the jungles beyond the city... and I happen to have spent most of my youth training in the wilderness. I would be honored to assist you in securing an ample supply of fungus."

"Well, how about that? In that case, sure, we'd be glad for the help!" Ranma chuckled.

"Then pray, follow me; one of the best spots for fungus is around Thunder Ridge, one of the island's few headwaters. It should only be about an hour's hike from here, maybe less," Harumi declared.

Nabiki went pale at the words 'hour's hike'. "Um... I'll just go back to the ship and make sure everything is okay there, be sure the deliveries arrived safely..."

"Oh, no you don't! You need the exercise, Nabiki - consider this part of your training!" Ranma barked.

Nabiki somehow managed to go even paler, hanging her head and audibly choking back a sob.

Roughly an hour later...

The path that Harumi had led them to had been little more than a glorified deer trail, initially; a sinuous, narrow route that wound its way tightly through the trees and over stones, an ankle-twisting, skin-scraping, face-swatting trial in endurance through rough terrain.

Whilst Ranma and Shampoo were both quite familiar with such nuisances, and even Ukyo had some experience in dealing with them, it turned out that they had a solution to this problem. And that solution's name was Miriam.

It wasn't that the wotan meant to break things. It's just that when four meters of shark-girl wants to go in a given direction, well, not much is going to stand in her way. Boulders toppled and trees were pushed aside as she lowered her head and stubbornly bulled her way through, stamping and crushing her way through the underbrush, flattening out a path that her smaller companions could easily tread through.

"I must apologize, Miss Miriam, I forgot just how narrow this part of the trail is. It does open back up as we reach the ridge," Harumi declared, hanging her head in shame.

"Ah, don't sweat it, Harumi; this is a nice little workout!" Miriam assured her, reaching out and placing the flat of her hands against a pair of trees that had the audacity to grow too close together to let her pass between. Earth crackled and snapped, mixing with the woody groaning of roots tearing as she pushed with all her might, muscles rippling like waves in the ocean as the trees ripped up from their rootballs and went crashing to either side.

"Thank you, Miss Miriam, you're too kind!" Harumi chirped, watching the feat of strength with blatant fascination.

Ranma coughed deliberately behind them both. "So, anyway, Harumi, what's with this Crying Willow School stuff?"

"Ah, yes, my apologies, Captain Saotome. Femille Island was founded by a rare alliance of female warriors and martial arts societies from across the Grand Line. Legend even has it that there may be Kuja blood running in our peoples' veins, though this is unproven and of course all the great clans claim to be the true heirs to the Kuja. Over time, the different martial arts schools evolved to become alliances of clans, which in turn became the power blocs upon which Femille society is built. Our people are divided between the schools, which constantly struggle with each other for privilege, for power, for prestige."

"Sounds much like Shampoo's village. Clans rise and fall in large part due to strength of warriors. Is part of why Shampoo's marriage is so important," the Joketsuzoku zoan commented.

Ranma twitched at the reminder, but Shampoo seemed content to leave that little revelation to prick the genderbender's skin under its own merits. Pushing it aside, Ranma asked, "Is that connected to the dispute between you and your cousins?"

Harumi hesitated. "It... has its role to play, yes..."

The group continued on in silence after that... well, 'silence'. Then, over the sounds of Miriam bulldozing a pathway through the underbrush, another noise became audible. A strange susurrus that was growing louder and louder as they advanced, until it was making the leaves tremble around them.

Harumi beamed triumphantly and pointed to a massive craggy shape that almost completely blocked the trail. "That's it; Thunder Ridge is just beyond that boulder!"

Miriam grunted, bent her knees, and then powered forward, driving her shoulder into the obstruction in a picture perfect shoulder barge. Easily nine tons of granite rolled out of the way, bouncing and thundering off of unseen ledges in the distance. With it removed, Thunder Ridge now lay before them in all its glory.

Thunder Ridge was a waterfall, obviously feeding from an opening somewhere much higher up the steep cliff-face that they had climbed to. The result was a spectacularly tall curtain of roaring water that thundered in sheets down from its perch before crashing into a churning pool that became a raging river that swept away through the jungle. The endless roaring of the falls was obviously the source of the area's name, and the spray from the crashing water filled the air with a thick haze of moisture that glittered in the sunlight like a million tiny rainbows.

"As I promised; mushrooms and toadstools grow in this area all throughout the year, so if we're to find any of the hallucinogenic species, this is the best place to start," Harumi proudly declared, gesturing broadly at their surroundings.

"Nice job, Harumi! Alright, ladies, you heard her; fan out and start looking!" Ranma ordered, and at her words, the Kamikaze Pirates dispersed to begin investigating the darkest cracks and crannies they could find.

Miriam marched right up to the falls and experimentally probed inside. When her hand reached through the water and into hollow space, she stuck her head through the falls in turn, relishing the feeling of cool water flowing over her gills and running down her back. In the dark, dank cavern beyond, she found a great carpet of bulbous-headed mushrooms and she smiled proudly to herself even as she plucked up the biggest and stepped back into the light of day.

"Hey, look what I found! And there's a cave full of these things!" she cried, brandishing her prize triumphantly. In the light of day she could see it more clearly; whilst the basic shape of it with its thick stalk, bulbous foot and rounded pyramid cap had been visible in the darkness behind the waterfall, the sunlight revealed the sickly green hue of its foot, contrasting an equally sickly gray trunk and a mud-brown cap covered in big inky black spots.

"Nice going, Miriam!" Ranma cheerfully announced.

"Unfortunately, that's not one of the mind-altering species - it looks like a Common Mushu," Harumi interjected.

"Aw..." Miriam pouted momentarily, before perking up. "Hey, can you eat it?"

"Why, yes! Common Mushus are delicious," Harumi began.

"Then score one for me all the same!" Miriam cried, grinning with renewed happiness.

"No, wait, stop!" Harumi suddenly cried, but it was too late; with a single mighty nomf, the mushroom disappeared into the wotan's caverous maw and vanished down her ever-hungry gullet, shredded to pieces with the simplest flex of her fang-studded jaws.

Miriam's eyes suddenly went wide and she grimaced in disgust, sticking out her tongue. "Blech! I though you said that they were delicious! Ugh, that's one of the nastiest things I've ever eaten, and I once ate rotten seal guts for a dare!"

"That wasn't a Common Mushu! That was an Erlin's Jest! They're deadly poisonous!" Harumi wailed in dismay, bringing the rest of the Kamikaze Pirates clustering to the local's side in disarray.

"You say what?! Miriam, spit it out, now!" Shampoo ordered, snapping into her role as the ship's nurse.

"Relax, Shampoo! I'm not human! One little mushroom...won't... hurt..." Miriam trailed off, her usual blue skin turning a very deep shade of green, eyes watering and cheeks bulging as she swallowed repeatedly.

"Miriam? Miriam, are you alright?!" Ranma demanded nervously.

The wotan was visibly trembling now, tears running copiously down her cheeks before she opened her mouth... and belched so loudly that it momentarily drowned out the endless thunder of the falls behind her, a cloud of bilious black mist fountaining from between her fangs and spilling to the ground like a lazy fog, moss visibly blackening where the fumes touched and a smell of rotten fish hitting all of them with the subtlety of a brick to the face.

Miriam coughed thrice, then wiped the tears from her cheeks and gingerly smiled at them. "Whoo, that feels better! Told you it couldn't kill a giant!"

"You're sure that you feel okay?" Ranma demanded, eyes narrowed suspiciously.

Miriam nodded rapidly in response. "Sure! I feel fine... actually..." she giggled, then hiccuped lightly. "I feel wonderful! All floaty... like I'm out at sea... wheee!"

As her crewmates watched in disbelief, the wide-eyed, beaming wotan spread her arms and began to lumber to and fro in a drunken dance, twirling and spinning seemingly for the sheer thrill of it and giggling madly all the while. She even began to skip about, hopping clumsily across the ground and sending leaf-litter soaring upwards from the force of her impacts, whereupon she began trying to catch the dancing leaves from the air with her bare hands.

Sidling closer to the dumbfounded Harumi, Ranma nudged their guide in her shoulder. "I thought you said they weren't hallucinogenic?"

"No, I said Common Mushus aren't hallucinogenic; Erlin's Jest is quite a potent hallucinogen, if you don't die of the poison first," Harumi corrected him.

Suddenly, Miriam pounced on the two of them. Ranma leapt away, but Harumi was caught by surprise and the wotan snatched her aloft, wringing a startled shriek from the local guide.

"No! Miriam, don't!" Ranma cried out in horror, nightmarish visions flashing before the genderbending captain's mental eye.

"Pretty-pretty! You came back to me!" Miriam cheered like a little kid, beaming with joy and eyes screwed tightly shut as she gleefully rubbed her cheek against the smaller's girl's own startled face.

The tension went out of Ranma like a deflated water balloon. "O...kay... didn't see that coming..."

"Naughty, naughty, pretty-pretty! You shouldn't run from momma - I looked for you for ages! I thought one of the nasty big girls had taken you away from me!"

"Miss Miriam, please! Mmmph!" Harumi's protests were nipped in the bud as the wotan crushed the human girl to her massive chest, inadvertently smothering Harumi with her breasts.

"Oh, for a camera!" Nabiki giggled, shamelessly watching the interplay with naked glee.

"It's hardly Miriam's fault that she's stoned out of her mind," Ukyo chided her.

"I know, but it's still hilarious!" Nabiki countered, pointing to where the wotan was now stroking Harumi's hair with childish fascination.

"I myself am more concerned with how long this state of affairs is likely to last," Kodachi interjected.

"Huh... good point, Kodachi. Yo, Harumi!" Ranma yelled at the wotan's plaything, who was now fighting tooth and nail to keep the bigger shark-girl from removing her top. "How long do ya think Miriam's gonna be acting like this?"

"I'm hardly an expert on wotan biology!" Harumi snapped back, her usual smile taking on a very brittle aspect that, combined with her wide-open eyes, made her look rather manic. "But I think I recall that Erlin's Jest has a very short-lived high!"

Miriam suddenly stopped, cheeks going green as her stomach let out a very distressed-sounding growl.

"My tummy not feel right..." she moaned plaintively, her grip on Harumi slackening and allowing the smaller girl to slip free of her clutches, scampering to what she hoped was a safe distance. A wise decision, given the way Miriam's cheeks were bulging and her stomach gurgling like a witch's cauldron. Nobody was in the least bit surprised when another monstrous belch ripped its way out of the drugged shark-girl, who shook her head and then looked blearily down at them all.

"Wha...what happened?" she slurred, still looking quite literally green around the gills.

"Harumi not kidding," Shampoo observed in astonishment.

"In fairness, I have no idea how it would affect either a giant or a fishman, never mind a hybrid, Miss Shampoo," the local girl politely demured.

"Somebody wanna explain to me what happened?" an irked Miriam feebly demanded. Then her stomach burbled thunderously and she quivered in distress, cheeks bulging.

"Gggk! N-never mind!" she choked, scrambling over to the river on all fours before finally surrendering to her nausea and...

Well, let's just say it was quite spectacularly messy. And also alarmingly colorful.

Ranma did her best to choke back the disgust that the rest of the crew was so freely expressing, instead sauntering over to the puking wotan and casually leaking against her thigh.

"So, what have we learned?" the Kamikaze's captain conversationally commented.

Miriam simply retched again.

"I think we learned not to go around eating random mushrooms, what do you think, Miriam? I mean, it's only a lesson so obvious that even my ragtag bunch of misfits didn't need it spelled out for them," Ranma replied, sarcasm now coloring her words.

Miriam collapsed on her belly, head still dangling over the escarpment, and moaned piteously.

"Are we going to need to learn this lesson again?" Ranma asked her.

"...No, captain..." Miriam feebly responded.

"That's a good girl," Ranma declared, petting her in a gesture at once consoling and mocking. Then she realized exactly where she was petting the wotan, and she snatched her hand away as if she'd touched a hot stovetop. Pointedly stepping away from Miriam, she dusted off her hands before placing them on her hips.

"Alright ladies! Show's over; those mushrooms ain't gonna find themselves! Let's get looking!

As the Kamikazes resumed their search, Nabiki looked at the still-sickly shipwright and shook her head.

'Chaos really does follow us wherever we go, hm? I almost shudder to think what might be happening to Ryoga on his own...'

At that very moment...

"21!" Ryoga barked gleefully, flaring his cards.

"Son of a BLEEP! That's three times in a row!" Umok roared, tossing his cards at the table so hard they bounced, fluttering through the air like drifting petals.

"And to the victor, the spoils," Ryoga declared, reaching out to claim the pot - made up of small candies, for obvious reasons.

"How are you so good at this?" Umok demanded, watching as the sweets slid over the table to join Ryoga's massive pile.

"Oh, I spend most of my life roaming around. Cards were pretty much my only entertainment," Ryoga replied, shrugging casually.

"...Wanna make it five out of seven?" Umok finally replied.

Again, Ryoga shrugged. "Why not?"

"Okay, I'm dealing this time, though!"

Several hours later...

The buildings of the town - they never did bother to ask its name - loomed large around them as the Kamikaze Pirates marched back in from the jungle, returning triumphantly from their quest.

"We got quite a haul! Look at all this stuff!" Ranma cheerfully announced, gently shaking the bag full of assorted mushrooms and toadstools that she was carrying.

"It was my pleasure to assist... and I am sorry for what happened, Miss Miriam," Harumi meekly bowed to the wotan bringing up the rear.

"It wasn't your fault... I gotta reign in these damn shark instincts better," Miriam grumbled, kicking a stray rock aside in embarrassment.

"A lovely little excursion into the wilderness, and a quest completed without any fuss! Truly, this day couldn't get better," Kodachi sighed happily.

"There they are, Madame Masami! Those are the interlopers!"

The angry female voice from behind them made the group turn as one to stare at Kodachi, who had the courtesy to blush in embarrassment, before they shuffled around to face their accusers.

Harumi's tormentors had returned, but this time they had been joined by a grown woman, who they were almost cowering behind as she stared imperiously down her nose at the Kamikaze Pirates.

For the first time since they had met her, Harumi's perpetual smile broke, replaced by a look of absolute despair.

"M-Mother..." she moaned piteously, visibly trying to deny the reality of what was before them.

Ranma's eyes flickered between the two, mind racing as she analyzed the scene.

'She's Harumi's mom? Wow, talk about a family resemblance...'

Indeed, the two were practically the spitting image of each other, save for the fact that Masami Tsukyomi had been blessed with more... uh... 'feminine presence' than her unfortunate daughter. But more than that, whilst both were pale-skinned and dark-haired, Masami's beauty was a cold, frigid thing, devoid of the warmth her daughter expressed. She was a thing of icy perfection and chill presence, hard as stone and sharp as a razor, her aura almost a mirror to that of the katana and wakizashi that adorned her hip.

"Once more, you disgrace me, Harumi," Masami declared. She didn't shout, she didn't wail, she didn't scream. Her tone was level, her voice flat - no emotion, just pure fact.

Harumi visibly cringed, shrinking in on herself and turning her face, unable to meet her mother's eyes.

Indignation bristled up Ranma's spine, her eyes narrowing and her teeth gritting. Clenching her fist, she stepped deliberately into the older woman's line of sight. "Hey! Leave her alone! She didn't do anything!"

Not a flicker of emotion crossed the older woman's face as she ran her eyes over Ranma. "And you must be the insolent outsider who interfered with Harumi's punishment."

"Yer damn right I interfered! What kind of mom would be so casual about her daughter getting beaten up by six other girls?!" Ranma incredulously spat.

Finally, a flicker of emotion crossed Masami's features, her brows narrowing disdainfully at Ranma's words. "You are mistaken. I do not have a daughter..."

Even as she spoke, her hand moved to the hilt of her wakizashi, which she clicked free of its sheath with a deft motion of her thumb. Then she snatched the hilt and drew it forth in a perfect iaijutsu, her withdrawal so fast and strong that the blade's passage tore through the very air. It would have been quite an impressive display, had it not been for the fact that the blade of wind scythed clean past Ranma, ruffling the genderbent pirate captain's pigtail with its passage, and slammed into Harumi faster than even Ranma could react.

Ranma opened her mouth to scream at Masami for her callous act, only for the words to die stillborn in her throat as she took in the scene before her. Incredibly, Masami's attack hadn't so much as scratched Harumi's skin, even though it had reduced her top to shreds, leaving her clutching her bare chest as her former garment fluttered to the ground around her.

Check that... her bare male chest.

The Kamikaze Pirates collectively stared at their tour-guide, stunned into collective silence, before...

"She's a boy?!" Miriam blurted out.

"With those hips?" an incredulous Shampoo added.

"This is Tsubasa all over again..." a dumbfounded Ukyo noted.

"Okay, what's going on?!" Ranma demanded, head snapping from the mortified-looking Harumi, now clad in just a set of boxers, and the icily imperious Masami.

"As I was saying, I have no daughter... only a disobedient and disrespectful son", Masami replied, her words cool and collected, save for the obvious venom with which she noted her child's gender. As she spoke, she slowly slid her short sword back into its sheath.

Ranma glanced between them once more, then shook her head, forcibly recentering her thoughts. "Okay, so he dresses in women's clothes, that's no reason - "

"To be clear, dressing the way he does is one of the few traditions of our people that Harumi actually honors; all of the men on Femille Island are expected to dress in such a fashion," Masami interjected coolly.

"It's an entire island of Tsubasas?!" Ukyo blurted out, only to be ignored.

"What the hell could Harumi possibly be doing to justify those girls trying to beat the shit out of him?!" Ranma snarled, blasting through to the point with her usual bluntness.

"Harumi has been a disappointment from birth. It would have been little but a footnote in our family's roster, had there not been complications in the delivery... I cannot bear any more children..." Masami's hand gently rested itself on her stomach, a brief flicker of grief passing over her face.

"Still waiting on an answer here!" Ranma spat.

"O-On Femille Island, traditionally, only women may practice martial arts... men are forbidden, unless they are willing to forsake their clans and join the Mourning Wood School, the only style permitted to men of the island," Harumi softly elaborated from behind Ranma.

"And yet my son refuses to obey our traditions! Instead, he dares to dream that he may somehow claim the title of my heir, rather than passing it to one of his cousins! Despite all our efforts to dissuade him of this heresy, he continues to persist in this delusion!" Masami spat.

Silence fell over the street, Ranma staring at Masami without speaking. The Kamikazes and Masami's disciples suddenly shivered in unison as the temperature suddenly dropped like a stone. Faint wisps of ghostly black flame seemed to crawl across Ranma's skin, dancing across clenching knuckles and flickering in her eyes.

"...You're telling me that you not only allow your son to be beaten for trying to learn your family style, you encourage it?" Ranma asked coldly.

"I am the one who told them to dissuade him, by any means necessary," Masami replied callously.

Ranma's eye visibly twitched in a spasmodic jig, her teeth grinding together so hard they seemed on the verge of cracking. Then, without preamble, the captain of the Kamikaze Pirates glanced over her shoulder. "Hey, kid!"

"I'm sixteen years old," Harumi dryly corrected her.

Ignoring him, Ranma continued, "You wanna join my crew?"

"What?!" snapped Masami, eyes narrowed as she bit the word out in protest.

"Just what I said; you say the word, Harumi, and you can come away with us. You don't have to stay here any more," Ranma told the stunned crossdresser.

"I-! But! That is!" Harumi weakly replied, clearly caught off-guard by the offer.

"And what makes you think I'll let him go?" Masami demanded imperiously, drawing Ranma's gaze back to her.

Miriam trembled, rubbing her arms with her hands. "A-anyone else feel that?" she muttered, only to start as her breath visibly wafted from between her lips in the form of a plume of mist.

"I-is this a side-effect of the Soul of Ice?" Ukyo asked Shampoo, shivering - she'd come dressed for a tropical jungle, a sudden cold snap wasn't supposed to be on the horizon!

"Shampoo not know... but Shampoo think Ranma not happy," the Chinese Amazon replied, switching to her hybrid form for a bit more protection from the cold now radiating from her gendershifting boyfriend.

Ranma paid no attention to her crewmates, instead looking Masami directly in the eye. "I am Ranma Saotome, Captain of the Kamikaze Pirates and heir to the Saotome School of Anything Goes Martial Arts. I challenge you to a duel, Masami Tsukyomi of the Crying Willow School. If I win, Harumi comes with us as a member of our crew."

"And if you lose...?" Masami asked primly.

"Then you can do as you like," Ranma jeered back

A smirk curled Masami's lips. "Very well... some can only learn through pain... But I shan't stain my swords with your unworthy blood..."

She ceremoniously removed her twin swords, and passed them over to the girl who had been leading Harumi's assailants earlier, who received then reverently. Then, shockingly, Masami flung aside her top as well, standing before them all bare from the waist up.

Ranma narrowed her eyes at her opponent's actions. 'What's your game, lady? Some stupid island tradition? Trying to psyche me out? Whatever, it won't work - I ain't got no feminine modesty!'

The captain of the Kamikaze Pirates made a show of all but ripping off her own top and flinging it away. As she did, she conversationally noted, "Normally, I don't like fighting girls..."

Then she sneered, and her next words came out in a rasping, guttural growl so harsh that those listening clutched their own throats as their vocal chords twinged in sympathy.

"But I'm gonna enjoy hurting you..." Ranma snarled, raising her hands into fists primed to punch.

The two women size each other up for a moment, and Ranma permitted herself a self-satisfied smirk as she witnessed Masami's expression sour when her gaze swept across a particular aspect of Ranma's magically altered anatomy.

'Yeah, they're bigger than yours, ain't they? I may hate this stupid curse, but at least if I gotta turn into a girl, then I can turn into a hot one!'

That was the last irrelevant thought that Ranma had time for, however, as her opponent suddenly rocketed towards her, fist lashing out at Ranma's face. It was hardly an unfamiliar scenario; it called to mind countless sparring sessions (and impromptu rage ventings) with Akane Tendo. The key difference here being that whereas Akane Tendo very rarely was able to hit Ranma so long as he was actually paying some level of attention to her, Masami in contrast came at Ranma with such speed and precision that the genderbent Saotome heir genuinely had to exert herself in order to snap up a forearm and deflect the strike. Even more unusually, the instinctive counter-punch Ranma snapped at Masami was deflected just as easily.

The two warrior women blurred into motion, fists and feet scything back and forth, torsos whipping around like reeds in a drunken gale as they dodged, deflected and counter-attacked. The dance of violence lasted for seconds, a relative eternity, before they broke apart, mutually springing backwards out of arm's length.

"You're good... but try this! Kachu Tenshin Amaguriken!" Ranma barked, pushing his altered body to move as fast as it possibly could, fists flying faster than all but the best martial artists of Nerima could follow, a shower of strikes where hundreds of blows were launched in seconds...

And Masami met Ranma blow for blow, dodging and deflecting - and then counter-attacking so fiercely that Ranma found her own striking rhythm faltering in shock from the sheer novelty of it.

'Holy crap, she's as fast as me! Nobody's ever been able to keep up with me, not since I came to this world at least!'

A lightning-fast haymaker nearly clipped Ranma's jaw, snapping the genderbender back to reality. Muscles in her legs tensed and then released explosively, launching her out of range, buying her precious breathing room. Skittering across the pacing stones, Ranma's mind raced, fully engaged in fight/flight/analysis mode.

'She's fast, she's agile...makes sense, most girl fighters focus on that. But I ain't a real girl... let's try this!'

As Masami closed the gap and launched her fist at Ranma, the teenage martial artist punched right back. But this time, she didn't aim it for one of the older woman's vital spots - she aimed it for Masami's fist instead. With the precision honed through her Parlay du Foie Gras training, her knuckles slammed squarely into Masami's own, the bones colliding with an audible crack. The impact made Masami snap her arm back, her icy demeanor visibly breaking as a look of shock washed over her at Ranma's action.

Ranma just sneered back in response. 'Oh, you felt that, didn't you, lady? Pity for you pops always believed that you gotta be tough as well as fast!'

Ranma deliberately held back, baiting Masami into throwing the next punch, which the genderbending martial artist parried in the same knuckle-busting maneuver as before, then lashed out with her free hand to deliver a crunching blow to the older woman's ribs. The look on her face sent a warm feeling through Ranma's heart, and she pressed her advantage.

However, Masami proved she wasn't the head of her school for politics alone by recovering and evading Ranma's attacks, launching her own retaliatory strike. Once again, Ranma parried her punch with one of her own, but this time, Masami had braced herself for the pain and she retaliated faster than Ranma had expected, preventing Ranma from hitting with a follow up punch.

Stubbornly, the two martial artists slugged it out, knuckles slamming together as each managed the impossible feat of repeatedly punching the other's fist in mid-strike. The impact jarred Ranma's bones and rolled up from her wrists, but she barely even registered it; Genma Saotome's training methods had many things to discommend them, but one of their few shining points was that if you lived through them, you learned to suffer and walk it off. She wasn't Ryoga, but if you were planning on taking Ranma on in a battle of endurance... you had better be pretty damn confident in your ability to take a beating!

And Masami was losing her confidence in that department pretty quickly, if Ranma was any judge. The fact she was now openly snarling was a pretty big clue. As was the fact that in their next exchange of blows, she caught Ranma's wrists instead of trying to punch them aside, exerting all her strength to hold the smaller, younger martial artist at bay.

"You wicked creature!" Masami spat in Ranma's face.

"Says the child abuser!" Ranma jeered back, then drew back her head and slammed it into Masami's face for emphasis. The older woman's nose broke with a most satisfying crunch, and she staggered backwards in a mixture of shock and pain.

"Argh! You savage brute! What kind of woman are you?!" Masami howled in outrage, miraculously managing to deflect Ranma's follow up strikes even as the blood dripped down over her lips.

It went without saying, but Ranma's crew were watching this fight utterly spellbound. Beyond their own interest in martial arts, and any personal investment in Ranma's victory, the sheer knock-down, drag-out brutality on display was a far cry from the comparatively genteel battles of Nerima. As such, only Miriam, who had no idea how much of a shock Ranma's behavior was, glanced away...

Which was when she realized that Harumi's cousins had the unfavored son bound and gagged, and were bodily marching him away from the battle as fast as they could go!

"Hey! Where d'ya think you're going?!" the wotan bellowed at the top of her lungs, unslinging one of her anchors and launching it in an underarm throw straight at the fleeing women.

It broke the group into two smaller groups as they sprang away, the steely mass slamming into the hardpacked earth hard enough to form a crater its tines virtually disappeared into. Unfortunately, one group still maintained their death-grip on Harumi, and they promptly decided to switch from stealth to speed, hoisting their cousins over their heads.

"We have him! Come, auntie!" they cried, before sprinting off.

"Get back here!" Miriam yelled, already striding towards them... but, as she stooped to grab her weapon's shaft and yank it free, one of the girls flung a spherical object at her face. It bounced off of her nose and then exploded in a thick cloud of oily, green-black fumes that enveloped the wotan's head.

"Blech! Ach! Yuck! No fair! Ugh, this stuff burns - it stinks! Yach!" Miriam gagged furiously, trying to claw her way out of the mist, even as it seemed to cling to her face like a second skin.

The rest of the crew was faring no better, having all run into similar noxious smoke bombs. In the makeshift arena, Ranma bellowed in protest.

"What kind'a cheap stunt is this?!" The Kamikaze Pirate captain screeched.

"As if I would really allow an outsider to interfere in my family!" Masami spat, crimson flecks dancing in the air as she did so.

Ranma lunged for her, but the older woman snapped one of the same smoke bombs as her subordinates from her trousers and dashed it on the ground between them. Ranma found her headlong plunge sharply arrested as she was enveloped in the smell and taste of Akane's cooking; burned and spicy and sickly sweet all at once, a noxious aroma that clung to the tongue and oozed its way down the nose, leaving even Ranma gagging and spitting in disgust, unable to move.

When the smoke cleared, Masami was gone. Ranma howled and punched the street in rage, smashing a meter-deep crater into the hard-packed earth.

"Of all the dirty, rotten, low-down, sneaky, tricks! She doesn't even *want* him!" Ranma snarled furiously, battle aura visibly flickering around her shoulders.

"Is matter of pride. No matter she no want him, would look weak to just let him go away," Shampoo spat, rubbing at her tear-streaming eyes. It turned out one of the downsides of a Zoan-enhanced sense of smell was a particularly negative reaction to stink bombs. Who could have known?

"I'm sorry, captain Ranma, this is all my fault," Miriam sighed, hanging her head mournfully.

"No, no, we all fell for it," Ranma assured her, shaking her head at the wotan's attempt to shoulder the blame.

"Which means we all need to band together and rescue poor Harumi from the clutches of that dreadful woman and her band of little trollops," Kodachi sneered, snapping her whip for emphasis.

Ranma looked over at her, surprise visibly washing over the genderbender's face, confusion snuffing out the rage-fueled flames that had been glittering on her sweat-shined skin. That confusion quickly gave way to visible admiration, and Kodachi preened herself, basking in Ranma's approval like her namesake basked in gentle spring morning's light.

This, naturally, didn't go unnoticed by Kodachi's rivals, who immediately tried to thrust themselves into the spotlight.

"She's right! Nobody deserves to be treated like that! It's our duty to save poor Harumi from his mother!" Ukyo announced.

"Yes, is too-too cruel for poor Harumi!" Shampoo chorused.

'...Okay, maybe I have been misjudging you girls all this time...' Ranma mused to herself, ignoring the way Nabiki was rolling her eyes and Miriam was looking at her counterparts with admiration.

After a moment's thought, Ranma clapped her hands decisively. "Okay, here's what we're gonna do! Nabiki, you head back to the ship; you'll be safe with Ryoga. The rest of us will find this Crying Willow School and pay them a little visit... shouldn't be too hard to find them."

"A smart plan, Captain Saotome... just one little addendum," Nabiki noted.

"What's that?" the confused Ranma replied.

"Maybe put your shirt back on? Unless you like giving everyone a free peepshow, that is," Nabiki sweetly pointed out. She giggled as Ranma visibly blushed, then hastily snatched up her shirt and quickly wriggled back into it.

Soon afterwards...

Finding the Crying Willow School wasn't hard. Gossip had spread like wildfire, and almost as soon as Ranma and her crew went looking, strangers were pointing them in the direction of the school's clan-hold. They all knew there were doubtlessly political motivations at bay, but none of them really cared in the face of their righteous mission.

The stronghold looked eerily like a feudal Japanese manor, adapted to a more tropical climate. From a neutral perspective, it was quite beautiful, tucked away in the hill country, surrounded by weeping willow trees and literally built over a great river that flowed all the way down to the sea. However, the five sets of eyes currently studying it were completely indifferent to its beauty, and instead were sizing it up for strengths and weaknesses.

"Hmm... Miriam, can you breathe fresh water as well as salt, or is that a bull shark-girl thing?" Ranma asked, eyes fixed on the river.

"I can breathe fresh water just fine... but, you don't want me to smash through the gate?" The wotan asked bemusedly.

Ranma shook her head. "No; best thing is we hit them from multiple angles. Ukyo, Kodachi; you girls sneak in from the sides. Miriam, come at them through the water from upstream, if you can. Shampoo..."

"Shampoo will take direct approach. Big and loud and noisy; airen will sneak in too," the Chinese Amazon declared firmly.

"B-But I was going to come smashing in through the front door!" Ranma pouted.

"Airen tired! Burn up much energy fighting nasty cruel woman - what airen need do is avoid fights and regain strength," Shampoo scolded Ranma, going so far as to flick the genderbent boy on the nose with the tip of her finger.

Ranma flinched back, instinctually rather than from actual pain, and rubbed her nose, staring at Shampoo in surprise. 'Since when do you give me orders?' She wondered, but couldn't bring herself to voice them.

Instead, she did her best to try and recapture her authoritative stance and tone. "Alright then, ladies, let's move out! Our goal is to grab Harumi and get him out of there, but if you have to bust some heads along the way... feel free."

All five women (well, four and an honorary one) grinned at Ranma's words. They were not nice grins...

Minutes later...

Shampoo looked at the gates in front of her. They were impressive-looking things; nearly half again as tall as she was, and made from good, thick, solid hardwood. Studded with iron, they looked like they could hold off a small army successfully.

The Chinese Amazon lazily shifted into her hybrid form and rolled her neck, cracking the stiffness out of her joints. 'Let us see... by my calculations, we should have reached the appointed time. My beloved Ranma and the other members of our crew should be in position now, which leaves it up to me to begin the assault...'

Having limbered up, Shampoo shifted into a picture perfect Jin Ji Du Li, balancing on one leg and bending the knee of her other as high as she could raise it, arms outstretched like wings to aid her in balancing. Devil Fruit-augmented muscles coiled like springs, sinews throbbing with power as she concentrated her strength, before snapping her paw-like foot squarely into the gate.

Her blow struck with a sound like thunder, the concussion rolling through the willow forest and mingling with the crunching, splintering sound of wood tearing asunder. That single strike from the zoan warrior smashed the once-proud gates asunder, shattering the locks and bars holding them together and breaking the wood so they yawned open, barely hanging together from their now-warped hinges. They were still swinging under their own lingering momentum as Shampoo strutted through the wreckage and into the courtyard beyond.

The metallic notes of bells rang through the evening air as the fortress's guardians sounded the alarm. Shouts and cries of alarm and confidence echoed all around Shampoo as the students of the Crying Willow School swarmed to its defense like ants whose nest had been invaded. As they rushed towards her, Shampoo smirked darkly, unsheathing her dao from its hiding place and wielding it with one hand, extending the claws of her free hand to further menace her would-be assailants.

"That's it... you come to Shampoo..." she purred, menace dripping from each syllable like poisoned honey.

She let the first of the students get within several paces of her before she struck first, exploding into action. Faster than the untrained eye could follow, she was amongst them, her sword lashing out like a flickering tongue of gray fire. To give the Crying Willow credit, her opponents reacted admirably, working to flow away from her strikes or to parry her blows with deft slashes from their own blades. Their skills would have compared favorably to some of Shampoo's own Chinese Amazon sisters...

Unfortunately for them, those sisters would have been Ling-Ling and Lung-Lung, and Shampoo had been the champion of her tribe even before her Devil Fruit had augmented her body. As fast and agile as her foes were, she was faster and even more agile, striking so swiftly that they couldn't hope to evade her. Those who made the mistake of trying to parry her blows found the stark difference in strength making itself evident; each sweep of Shampoo's sword sent bodies flying through the air, many knocking their fellows back in crashes or tripping them up as they rolled across the ground.

Those who made the mistake of trying to flank the zoan found she was just as adept with her bare hands as she was with her sword. Literal claw-strikes sent streamers of crimson flying as Shampoo's talons ripped through silk and skin with equal ease. Others were hurled senseless to the ground by lightning-fast elbow jabs and backhands, or launched flying by powerful kicks.

'Alas, if only my beloved were here! He would see that I am truly worthy of his heart by virtue of my skills!' Shampoo mentally lamented, even as she continued to dance across the courtyard, a whirling dervish that left the foe unconscious and bleeding in her wake.

Meanwhile...

'Sounds like Shampoo's having fun,' Ukyo mused to herself, hiding in the densest part of a willow's foliage as young women streamed past her, waving their swords and shouting battle cries as they charged off to the courtyard.

'Look at 'em go! Reminds me of Furinkan when that old pervert would pull one of his panty runs... lucky for me I didn't wear 'em, so he pretty much never bothered me. Still cost me a few gym shorts, the dirty old lech...'

As the last of the defenders raced past, Ukyo dropped from concealment and sprinted across the ground in the opposite direction.

'Lemme see... if I'm right, the kitchen should be... this way!'

Guided by a mixture of instinct, vague memories of history class, her nose and pure luck, the Kamikaze Pirates' chef slid through the shadows, pausing only to smite the occasional stray household resident across the head with her battle spatula when the opportunity presented itself. Eventually, however, she made her way to a small sub-building at the north end of the estate, where she hid herself in the shadows once more to study her surroundings.

'Jackpot! I knew this place looked fancy enough to have an oidono! Now, if that's where they cook the food, then the actual stores would be... there!'

A blur in motion, Ukyo darted across the interval between her hiding space and the door. Fortunately, it wasn't locked, allowing her to slip inside and take stock of the accumulated goods. She grinned mischievously to herself and rubbed her hands in anticipation.

'Let's see how they like this!'

Minutes later, a figure emerged from the kitchen door, only to stop and stare in horror at the flames roaring out of the food stores, the bamboo and palm-construction now a blazing inferno.

"Fire! Fire!" she - or possibly he - screamed, grabbing a bell that had been carefully placed near the kitchen's entrance and ringing it with all her (or his) might. Servants boiled out of the kitchen like ants, crying and shouting, sprinting desperately for the nearby river with buckets, pots, tubs and pails in an attempt to get the blaze under control.

Ukyo watched the chaos from the shadows, grinning to herself. 'Man, I really feel like a ninja! Eat your heart out, Shampoo; that'll make it easy for us to find Harumi and get him out of here! Now... where would they keep him, anyway?'

Content that her distraction would keep a significant portion of the estate's occupants busy, Ukyo slunk away to search for Harumi.

And across the estate...

Steel clashed on steel as two women dueled, one pale as the moon and the other dark as night, equally matched in speed, grace and skill. Kodachi feinted deftly to the left, only to find her blade intercepted when she reversed coursed to make her true attack.

"You're quite formidable, dear!" she acknowledged, parrying a stab aimed at her heart before using her gymnastics training to duck under a retaliatory slash that would have taken her head off had she not bent around it like a reed in the wind.

Her foe, the dark-skinned girl who had been tormenting Harumi, puffed with exertion, but attempted to put on a confident sneer.

"B-but of course! I am Kiyoko Tsukuyomi, and I am one of the heir-candidates for the Crying Willow School!" she bragged. Then leapt back as Kodachi attempted to cut her down whilst she boasted.

"And for that role, you would happily let your own family suffer? Be their tormentor? Hardly behavior worthy of such a title!" the aristocrat turned pirate scolded her, snapping up her blade to deflect a stab.

Consternation flashed across the self-named Kiyoko's face, though whether it was guilt or frustration at her inability to triumph over her opponent was anyone's guess. "If he would just learn to behave like a proper boy, none of this would happen!"

"Tis a poor excuse, and you know it. I am Kodachi Kuno, the Black Rose, and though my brother and I have our disagreements, never would I treat him as you do!" Kodachi passionately proclaimed.

It should be noted that had Ranma been present, he would have been a bit skeptical of that assertion, having had a front-row seat to some of the Kuno siblings' 'family squabbles'. But a certain level of hypocrisy was one of Kodachi's failings and besides, it wasn't as if Kiyoko needed to know that, now was it?

Kioyoko responded to Kodachi's claims with an enraged kiai and renewed fervor, their swords clashing so hard and furious that sparks flew from the impact. Duck and dodge, strike and parry and counterstrike, the two were a blur of motion that whirled across the floor in a deadly dance, the wind pressure from their strikes starting to gouge rents in the very walls and ceilings.

'Hmph! A worthy opponent she is, but I do not have time to play with such riffraff - my darling expects more of me! It is time to end this...'

At their next clash of blades, Kodachi sprang back, her free hand thrusting into her pocket and withdrawing a single black rose bud, which she threw at Kiyoko. Sneering, the dusky brunette effortlessly cut the curled bundle of petals in half as it soared through the air towards her... causing it to detonate in a thick cloud of dark silver mist that enveloped the startled swordswoman's face. She coughed and choked, but couldn't even muster a single word before the toxin took effect and she collapsed to the floor like a puppet whose strings had been cut.

Kodachi gave the vapors a moment to disperse, then prodded Kiyoko's head with her foot. Receiving nothing but a faint snore in return, the Kuno heiress smirked triumphantly.

'I simply must restock my supply of paralysis powder and sleep dust... hmm... perhaps Umok may be of some assistance in expanding my arsenal? Problems for later; for now, I have other wicked girls to dispatch!'

And with that, she sprinted off in a random direction, cackling in glee.

Whilst this was going on...

'...The problem with freshwater isn't the taste of it in yer gills... it's how little elbow room there is!' Miriam sourly observed. Whilst it had been easy to circle the Crying Willow estate and enter the river that fed the fortress with fresh water, the simple arithmetic was that Miriam was a pretty big girl and not many rivers on islands were really scaled to her size. So she was less swimming towards her destination and more crawling through the mud like an oversized eel.

Naturally, the builders of the fortress had realized there were certain obvious weakspots in constructing walls across an active river, and had done their best to compensate. A lattice-work of thick iron bars crisscrossed the entirety of where the river passed under the fortress' back wall, sturdy enough to keep out the average person.

But Miriam was far from 'average'. Contemptuously thrusting the fingers of one hand into the gaps between the bars, she made a raking motion and tore it free of the wall's foundations along its length. As soon as the bars settled into the mud of the river bottom, she was slithering over them, cramming herself into the just-barely big enough gap, twisting and turning to fit her head and shoulders through, followed by the rest of her.

As the dwarf wotan slunk along the riverbed, she glanced up through the water at the surface, spotting that she had emerged near a building that was on fire... and a bucket-chain of would-be extinguishers, who were staring down at her with open-mouthed shock.

'Crap. So much for sneaking. Ah well.'

Miriam surged to her feet in a mighty eruption of spray, sending waves of water washing over the banks of the river. Even as sheets of liquid cascaded down her hulking frame, she reached out and plucked the nearest human from the banks with the ease of somebody snatching a ripe fruit from the tree.

"Where is Harumi Tsukuyomi?! Tell me!" She demanded, holding her captive on eye level and glaring at... her? Him? Whoever! As fiercely as she could manage.

Her captive squeaked and stammered, shaking like a leaf, their eyes fixated very firmly on Miriam's lips... or, to be more accurate, the rows of razor-sharp teeth currently on display there. Finally, unable to muster words, they just pointed.

Miriam's head snapped in the direction they indicated and she unceremoniously dropped her captive to a splashy landing in the mud. Even as they plummeted, she was already on the move, striding briskly out of the river and across the courtyard, unslinging her anchors in anticipation of a brawl.

'Screw this stealthy thing - smash and grab it is!'

Some guards naturally spotted Miriam as she marched across the courtyard, and the bravest of them even dared to race off to face her. But most thought twice of confronting the twenty foot tall sharkgirl, and those who didn't typically changed their minds when her anchors came flying at their heads, smashing through whatever happened to be in their path.

As one particularly foolhardy soul hopped around like a demented grasshopper to evade Miriam's scything blows, the wotan grinned a feral grin before kicking out, catching the surprised defender and punting her clean across the estate.

'It's nice not being the smallest one in the brawl for a change!'

The wotan permitted herself a giggle as she closed in on the building that had been pointed out to her. Stooping, she peered in through the barred window and, sure enough, there was Harumi. Still clad in nothing but his boxers, fresh bruises blooming on his face, he was curled up fetal-style against the wall of what seemed to be a repurposed storeroom of some kind. Despite his injuries, he was still smiling sadly, and softly singing to himself under his breath.

'...By all the devils of the sea, just how used to this kind of treatment is he?!' Miriam wondered for a moment. Then she shook her head and rapped her knuckles against the window bars.

"Harumi! Hey, get up, we're here to save you!"

"Muh-Miss Miriam!?" Harumi gasped, twisting around to face her through the window, surprise and wonder written all over his face... underneath the blackened eyes, bruised cheeks and swollen lips.

It was a sight that made Miriam's teeth itch. "Did your mother do that to you?" she demanded.

"N-No, mother didn't touch me," Harumi replied, clearly struggling to accept that this was happening. But he couldn't look the wotan in the eye as he said it.

"Uh huh, right... anyway, stand back, cuz this wall's coming down!" Miriam ordered him. She watched as he scrambled to press himself against the far wall, before driving the sharpened flukes of her anchors into the wall separating them. Once both were firmly anchored into the wood, she tightened her grip on their shafts and heaved with all her might.

With an earsplitting cacophony of splintering wood, the entire wall was ripped away from its foundations before slamming into the ground with an all-mighty crash, breaking into pieces at Miriam's feet. The wotan jerked her anchors free of the wreckage, even as Harumi stepped out into the open sky, moving as lightly as a leaf across the broken wood and staring up at the wotan with awe on his face.

"You really came for me?" he asked.

"Of course we did! Nobody deserves to be treated like that! Besides, the captain already decided to invite you onto the ship, so that makes you one of us!" Miriam declared proudly.

"I... I don't deserve..." Harumi started, eyes visibly growing damp with unshed tears even as he continued to smile a brittle smile.

"Belay that! Now, you got anything you want to take before we go? Because we will *not* be coming back once we leave!" Miriam barked.

"Um... my room is over that way... all my worldly possessions should be no problem for a big strong lady like you to carry," Harumi replied, pointing as he spoke.

"You better believe it," Miriam bragged, flexing her biceps for emphasis. "C'mon, let's get your stuff and get out of here!"

As the mismatched pair set off across the courtyard, a stray thought flashed through Miriam's mind...

'I wonder what the captain's doing?'

Speaking of Ranma...

'So... one thing that seems consistent between this world and home... nobody ever thinks to look up.'

Even as the Crying Willow School's fortress had erupted into chaos, Ranma had snuck inside the main portion of the manor, where he boy-turned-girl was evading notice through the simple procedure of skittering upside down across the internal roof like the world's biggest spider.

Contrary to what some at Furinkan High had speculated, Ranma had never actually read any issues of the gaijin doujin "Spider-Man". He probably would have taken the wallcrawling web-slinger's gymnastic feats as a personal challenge if he had done.

Still, having the ability to get around unnoticed didn't mean that Ranma had any idea where she was going. Right now, she was just scuttling around as quickly as she could, looking for any sign of Harumi.

"Sister, this has been a disaster!" A female voice rang out from a chamber just ahead of Ranma's current position.

'Hello, what's this?' Interest piqued, Ranma scurried in the direction of the voice. She found herself in an official-looking room, occupied by three women; Masami, and two women of similar age who she didn't recognize. One was the spitting image of the Okinawan-looking girl who had been leading Harumi's tormentors - her mother, if Ranma was any judge. The other woman was an exotic-looking beauty with slightly darker skin offset by flowing crimson locks.

"Cease your complaints, Azami - I have only done what was necessary," Masami replied, cool and level as she did.

"Necessary?" The Okinawan woman, evidently Azami, spluttered incredulously. "Embarrassing us by having your prospective heirs beat your son senseless in an alley was bad enough, but to duel a visiting martial artist and then go back on your oath?! What were you thinking, sister?!"

"Especially since dumping little Harumi on that pirate's crew would have been a perfect way to get him off of the island and out of your hair," the dark-skinned redhead commented throatily.

"I don't have to explain myself to you, Azami, or to you, Chisuzu!" Masami snapped at them, her cool demeanor cracking like a mirror that had just been punched.

"Considering we are under attack by that same pirate crew you baited, I'd say that explanations are the least of what you owe us!" Azami spat in response. The redhead, evidently Chisuzu, simply giggled in amusement, clearly not taking the squabble between her siblings with any seriousness.

'What she owes me is a proper fight... but I can't have one now. I hate to say this, but she's one of the toughest fighters I've gone up against since coming to this world, and I'm guessing you two aren't slouches, either. No, much as I hate to say it, I can't afford to pick fights with you,' Ranma sourly observed.

"My ladies! My ladies, terrible news!" came a new voice. The three women (and their unseen observer) turned their heads as a young girl came bursting into the room, panting hugely.

"What is going on, Haya?" Masami demanded.

"It's just total chaos, my lady Masami! Our warriors are being cut down in droves by the zoan attacking the front gate, and those who aren't are being picked off by two other pirates who have been sneaking all over the estate! To make things worse, some kind of giant fishwoman broke in through the river grate and has freed Harumi -"

A sudden mighty crash made all of them wince, and even Ranma nearly fell off of the roof as the vibrations rippled through the wood he was clinging to.

"Tits of the sea devil, what was that?!" Chisuzu blurted out.

As if in answer, a voice rang out like thunder, Miriam shouting at the top of her lungs and broadcasting her words to the whole estate.

"Girls, I got Harumi! Let's get out of here!"

'...I gotta admit, I underestimated those girls,' Ranma confessed to herself. She was about to sneak away the same way that she had entered when something caught her eye... The swords that Masami Tsukuyomi had been carrying so proudly when they had first crossed paths had been placed on a small pedestal, which the three matriarchs of the Crying Willow School were currently ignoring as they shouted at each other about what to do next.

Call it a sense of ironic justice, call it a love of mischief, call it just proof that Ranma really was Genma Saotomes son (even if he might sometimes look like Genma's daughter). Whatever the reason, Ranma clung to the roof with her toes and dropped down, snatching up the swords and tucking them into her shirt before bending back upwards to cling to the roof once more. With all four limbs now free again, Ranma could scramble across the roof, becoming a veritable blur as she made her way for the door...

Just before she could reach it, however, her finely tuned danger senses screamed the alarm and she sprang down from her perch on the ceiling just before a blade of wind slashed across the spot where she had been clinging.

"You! Miserable wretch, why do you torment me?!" Masami bellowed in an imperious fury, hand still uplifted from having been used to shape the razor-sharp wind that had so nearly struck Ranma.

'She can do those wind blades bare-handed?! Crap, she *is* good...'

Even as the thought flashed across her head, and Masami's sisters silently took up positions flanking the school matriarch, Ranma defiantly sneered at them, snatching up her precious swords by their hilts and brandishing them at the trio.

"Call me an agent of justice!" Ranma proclaimed, ignoring the horrified squawk that the sight of her wielding the family blades elicited. "Normally, I'd enjoy a proper fight with you... but I have places to go and things to do, so you leave me no choice! Saotome School of Anything Goes Final Attack!"

The older women's eyes went wide, then narrowed defiantly as they slipped into defensive stances, ready to dodge, deflect or block depending on Ranma's next move.

"Ready!" Ranma barked, snapping up the blades of her stolen swords into a perfect pre-attack pose. Her foes didn't even flinch, calm and ready for the attack.

"Set!" Ranma hunched down, knees bent and spine coiled, compressing her muscles and building up power in anticipation of an explosive release. Masami stared defiantly into Ranma's eyes, even as her sisters glanced quickly between the two.

"...Run Away!" Ranma screamed at the top of her lungs, before launching herself backwards out the door, taking off so explosively that the tailwinds from her departure whipped the dresses of Masami and her sisters around like a sudden gale.

The corridors were a blur in Ranma's eyes, the outraged shrieks of rage (and one burst of hysterical laughter) mere faint echoes in her ears as she pelted to her freedom. The very first window she saw became her literal window to freedom; Ranma launched herself through it in a picture-perfect dive, smashing through the glass without even blinking and rolling as she hit the ground before springing roofward.

A few mighty hops and she had reached the broken front gates, where her crewmates were gathered, surrounded by dozens of unconscious women.

"Captain/Ranchan/Airen/Darling!" a quartet of excited voices cried out as Ranma came dropping from the roof to land before them.

"Save it! Run!" Ranma ordered, not even slowing down as she wove through her own crew and shot forward. She was almost a mile away before she managed to reign in her Genma-taught instincts and look over her shoulder, but fortunately all four girls were bringing up the rear - as was Harumi, who had changed into a new dress and was easily keeping pace with the others.

Back at the ship...

Harumi stood at the bow of the Stormbringer, watching as the port dwindled in the distance as the ship retreated to the comparative safety of the open waters around the island of Femille. He sighed softly, then turned around to face his new crew, smiling gently at them. "I truly don't know how to thank you enough, Captain Saotome."

"Eh, it was nothing, Harumi. We couldn't just turn a blind eye," Ranma assured him.

"Only you, Ranma, could turn a simple shopping trip into a brawl," Ryoga scoffed from behind the genderbender.

"Oh, shut up, bacon-breath! We got your precious reagents, we'll get to you shortly," Ranma jeered at him.

"Regardless, I wish to repay the debt I owe you. I am not certain how I can assist, but you can be assured I will work hard as a member of the crew," Harumi interjected, bowing formally to his new captain.

"Wait, you mean you actually want to stay with us? I just thought we'd give you a ride to the next island..." A startled Ranma confessed.

"Though I will admit my departure was not... how I would have liked it to go, the truth is that I have been dreaming of going to sea for several years now. I have simply been unable to find a crew who were willing to accept me... or who did not demand a price in passage that I was unwilling to pay."

As he said this, Harumi's smile momentarily flickered, and he gingerly touched his bruised but still attractive face. The rest of the teens looked at him in confusion, before expressions of horror collectively formed as understanding dawned.

Ranma shuddered in revulsion. "Yeah, you can be damn sure we won't be expecting anything like that! Sick perverts..."

"If it helps, Captain, I am quick, agile, good with heights and a dab hand with a needle and thread if I do say so myself," Harumi observed.

"So you're our sail-monkey. Works for me," Nabiki quipped.

"We'll discuss that later. Right now, I think these belong to you," Ranma declared, stopping the stink-eye she was giving Nabiki to instead pass Harumi the swords she had pilfered from his mother earlier.

Harumi's eyes went wide as possible and he nearly dropped the blades in shock, frantically fumbling to catch them. "Th-these are! How?! My mother!" he spluttered, too amazed to articulate his words.

"I figured you deserved them far more than she did. Besides, can't expect you to learn how to master your style without all the tools, right?" Ranma brightly chirped, grinning at Harumi's antics.

Tears actually began to slide down Harumi's cheeks at Ranma's words, but he was beaming with joy, hugging the blades to his chest. "I promise, I won't let you down, my lady!"

Ryoga promptly burst out laughing. "Ranma? A lady? That's a good one, kid!"

Harumi looked from the hysterical first mate to the glowering captain, confusion writ on his face. "I'm sorry? I don't understand what I did wrong...?"

"It ain't your fault, Harumi. Now that you're on the crew, it's time we talked about a little something called Jusenkyo..."

One brief explanation...

"Fascinating... I had heard the legends of Devil Fruits, but never of magic like this," Harumi noted, marveling at Ranma's bare and now-male chest, steam still wafting from his skin.

"Let's just say we came a very long way from the Grand Line and leave it at that," Ranma replied, accepting the offer of a towel from Shampoo and starting to towel himself off.

"Still, it's amazing... and you intend to change your curse to match the captain's?" Harumi asked, turning quizzically to Ryoga.

"As soon as Umok is ready to perform his spell, yeah. How much longer is it going to be, anyway?" Ryoga complained, glaring at the imp hovering near the table.

"As a matter of fact, the ointment and elixir are now complete. We can begin the ritual whenever you wish," Umok casually declared.

"Well, what are we waiting for?! Let's go!" Ryoga demanded, clenching his fist and shaking it in anticipation.

"Very well... strip down to your underwear and wait for me, I will be back momentarily with the reagents," Umok stated. Even as Ryoga's eyes bulged and the terminally shy boy went beet red, the imp turned and floated away to his own little cul-de-sac.

He returned minutes later, bearing a small cauldron full of what looked like water with an iridescent shimmer on its surface, and a bowl full of a sickly pink ooze. By this point, Ryoga was still blushing from head to toe, but had stripped down as instructed. The imp handed the cauldron to Ranma, and then took out a brush, with which he began to paint strange, eldritch-looking sigils on Ryoga's body with the pink slime. Ryoga visibly shivered from having the cold goop smeared on his skin, but stoically bore it as Umok painted him, creating an intricate tapestry of designs from his cheeks down to his toes.

Once the slime had been used up, Umok passed the bowl and brush to Harumi, who simply happened to be closest to hand, before taking the cauldron back from Ranma. He floated in front of Ryoga, just above head-height, only to pause.

"You are absolutely certain of your decision? Once this rite is complete, it cannot be undone! I won't be able to change your curse back, not without access to Jusenkyo itself!" the imp warned him.

"Just get on with it! There's nothing you can say that would possibly make turning into a girl worse than turning into a pig," Ryoga sneered impatiently.

"Be it on your own head, then!" Umok declared, before lifting the cauldron up and dumping the contents over Ryoga's head.

As it touched Ryoga's skin, the elixir lit up bright as the sun, enveloping Ryoga in a shimmering sheet of colors. It was so bright it was blinding, forcing the Kamikaze Pirates new and old to look away until it died as suddenly as it had been birthed.

Collectively, his crew looked back to Ryoga again, and their jaws nearly hit the floor.

"...Well? Did it work?" Ryoga asked, uncertainty finally creeping into his words.

"...Oh, yeah, it worked!" Ranma blurted out, unable to stop staring.

Instead of the normal little black pig, standing in front of them was a girl... and what a girl!

If any of those present had been a member of the Anime Club at Furinkan High, they might have described the new Ryoga as "a fusion of the Amazon and Busty Big Sister archetypes", or perhaps as "Sakura Hibiki, from Dumbell Nan-Kilo Moteru". Not having that background, they were instead left to analyze the near-naked form of Ryoga's new female body element by element.

The first thing to stand out was the height; whilst Ranma's female form was drastically shorter than his real one, and in fact it was generally accepted that she was close to if not the tiniest girl on the ship, the female Ryoga didn't seem to have lost an inch with the gender shift. In fact, Ryoga might have actually been taller as a girl! Which led to immediately obvious facet #2...

Not content with towering over the "veteran" genderbender, the newly female Ryoga quite clearly usurped the position of "bustiest girl on the ship" from where Ranma and Shampoo had contested it by a clear margin. Well, bustiest human girl - they were all sensible enough to admit that trying to compete with the half-giantess Miriam in that department was a fool's game. As for the rest of him-her...

Ryoga had always been a muscular individual; the rugged lifestyle he lived and the brute force-focused style he practiced encouraged a naturally stockier and heavier frame than Ranma's more lithe and slenderly toned one. But whereas Ranma's muscles vanished entirely in female form, this female Ryoga still retained something of her original build; not enough to detract from her obvious femininity, but enough that even without trying, her limbs were lined with visible strength, whilst a sixpack stretched across the flat expanse of her stomach. Long, slender limbs, wide hips and clear, creamy skin added to the picture of strong but attractive womanhood.

And then there was his-her face. They all could see the resemblance to the real Ryoga; much like Ranma's male and female forms had a strangely familial resemblance, so too do Ryoga's. But there was simply one inescapable conclusion to be drawn... this new girl-type Ryoga was a babe.

"You know you're gonna be beating the guys off with a club, right?" Ranma blurted out, unsettled by the realization that Ryoga actually looked attractive in this new body.

Ryoga simply snorted disdainfully. "I'm not looking forward to guys staring at me, but I'll take that over being a pig any day. Do you know how many things tried to eat me before we wound up on this crazy ocean?! I've been attacked by wild dogs, bears, wildcats, hawks, snakes, campers, bandits, and even one very large and very cranky salamander! Having to adjust to having breasts is going to be heaven on earth in comparison!"

"Speaking of breasts, no problems with your own pair then, Mr. Terminally Shy?" Ukyo dryly asked, a hint of jealousy in her tone as she stared at Ryoga's new 'assets'.

Ryoga blinked, tilting her head and giving a quizzical look at the Kamikaze chef, then finally looked down at her chest. She let out a sudden incoherent gurgle before her nose erupted in a spray of blood, gore splashing over her delicate skin before she collapsed to the floor in a dead faint.

Ranma sighed and shook his head. "Well, baby steps, I suppose..."

He ignored the way a smug Nabiki was badgering the other girls to pay their bets and the confused expressions on Harumi and Miriam's faces.

'I bet no other captain on this sea has a crew as crazy as this...'

Chapter End & Closing Notes

Bet you weren't expecting this! As always, reviews are my lifesblood, and we have a TVTropes page desperate for love... in fact, if any tropers think Miriam fits either the Amazonian Beauty or Big Beautiful Woman tropes, it'd be handy to have somebody add her to those pages.

Now, changing Ryoga's curse is probably going to be one of the most controversial things about this fic, but it was considered very carefully. Let's face it, P-chan is a pretty one-note gag, and without Akane, it falls even flatter. Now, Ryoga turning into a girl is a pretty simple gag too, but it's still deeper than P-chan. Plus, I had to consider things from Ryoga's perspective as the writer: realistically, what would Ryoga choose to do? Stay a pig and try to overcome the downsides by training, which even in One Piece is still going to leave P-chan as a major weakness? Gamble that he might find a Zoan Devil Fruit that is at least as useful as Shampoo's, when he has no way of identifying what a given Devil Fruit does and it's literally a no-take-backsies? Or exploit the fact he has an honest-to-gods helpful magic user to hand and try to cheat his way to humanity? Let's be honest; Ryoga would definitely prefer to jump in Nanniichuan, but he would still consider Nyanniichuan an acceptable stop-gap.

Anyway, I hope that this doesn't turn you off this fic and you'll give poor little "Yoiko" a chance to prove herself in the upcoming chapters - see you all there!