This chapter took less time than I expected and more time than I had hoped. I wanted to get this done in October, but, well… wait… looks at calendar …it's still September? How the hell did I manage this in only a month and a half? Well, now that's a different story, altogether! (chorus: now that's a different story)

Convergence was fun! Didn't get to do everything that I wanted to do, but had a lot of fun with my cosplays. Had a little bit of a wig malfunction, so I went without, but still enjoyed the hell out of myself. Maybe next year I'll even go to the con costume contest. We'll see. But that's probably not what you're here for… no, you're here for the story.

IndiSpell will be back right after these commercial messages- I mean, delightful comments!
Luckystudios: Don't forget three rivals! Both good and bad news tends to come in threes where Ranma is concerned, though there often seems to be more of the latter, doesn't there?
Kingred222: Thanks for spotting the errors. And you're right, Ranma isn't actually tired after a spar like that. But he was putting it on a bit to sell the con on the falling daggers.
NightmareKnight1: My understanding of Cait in canon is that he isn't so much an R/C car as a nascent AI. Regardless, he's definitely capable of operating independently. In the original game, there's a point where Reeve is arrested by Heidegger and Scarlet, and Cait continues to function as a party member during this period of time. Wouldn't make much sense to hand a man you've imprisoned a remote control and say "Hey, continue furthering our interests, would you?", and handing the controls over to Heidegger or Scarlet would have been… uh… far less subtle. My version of Cait behaves much the same way. The specifics of this will come into play in a few later chapters.
Mr. Haziq: It's definitely not canon, but from this point forward I am treating established canon as a set of guidelines I can use to tell my story. It may not be exactly how it plays out in the original, but it's also definitely the kind of ten-moves-ahead chess play that someone like Rufus would put into action, given the opportunity. The first part of your question is one I'm not prepared to answer yet, but the answer to that has long since been decided, so stay tuned. The second question is mostly a yes; Ranma already has access to the basic elemental trio (plus one or two others), but last chapter's training only depicted the Ice because that's what she had equipped at the time.
Death of Snipers: I can't actually insert a .gif here of me laughing maniacally. Stupid text-based platform limitations. Kind of a shame. Regardless, you'll have to trust me on this one, you haven't seen anything yet. :D

I have no idea what the holidays are going to do to my writing. If I'm lucky, they'll do nothing but make me more productive… but I'm not counting on that. Amazingly, I've got some sizable chunks of the next three chapters already down, but I don't have them tied to each other yet. We'll have to wait and see, and hopefully I'll have more for you soon. For now, please enjoy!

Chapter Thirty Six

Learning Curves

[ ν ] - εγλ 0007, December 18

The ship was named Leviathan's Tail, and was almost but not quite as big as a house. It was a long-distance fishing trawler, rigged to be able to catch and store hundreds or even thousands of kilos of fish to bring straight to market. Normally, such a vessel would have a top speed normally associated with continental drift. However, the Leviathan's Tail had been refitted with a more refined hull, as well as an improved engine for higher speed. Captain Shiro claimed that it was so that the vessel could quickly move out to sea from shore when the fish were biting hard, or evade smaller stormfronts when needed. Ranma wasn't exactly well traveled, but he knew enough about what Shiro hadn't said about the ship to guess what the faster design was actually there for.

In the most polite terms possible, it had probably been pressed into service as a blockade runner during the Wutai War.

In more direct terms, it was a smuggling ship. Ranma had already spotted two hidden panels in the inner bulkheads, and was certain there were others he couldn't see so easily.

Captain Shiro and Tifa had managed to round up a half dozen of the sailors from the doomed traversal across the inner sea. Shiro's first mate, Isshin, had stayed behind to keep an eye out for any stragglers, with instructions to wait for the captain's return in a few weeks. The party had been given some simple instructions on how to help out, with the expectation that they would help when required.

Ranma, for his own part, wasn't all that used to boats. He'd only traveled by boat a handful of times, and he'd swam far more often. He didn't know how far Wutai was exactly, but Shiro had said 'four to six days, unless the weather screws us' and considering how fast the ship was able to go, Ranma was pretty sure he had never swam that far.

That being said, he was dealing with it better than Yuffie was.

The youngest member of their group, talking cats notwithstanding, had been visibly ill since they'd broken port. She said she'd taken something she called a Tranquilizer, and after about an hour and a half, she was able to stand upright two tries out of three. But whatever its beneficial effect, she still looked green around the gills to Ranma. He thought that a stiff breeze might knock her over at this rate. He didn't have time to let her recover, and she'd made it abundantly clear that she didn't want to fall behind in whatever they had planned because of her motion sickness.

As a result of that, all three of his students were above-decks only a few hours out from port, with Ranma standing in front of them. Aerith and Tifa were sitting on a long wooden box that was resting near mid-deck, and Yuffie was standing nearby. Well, maybe standing is a bit generous, Ranma thought as he looked over his students. In the case of Yuffie, currently bent double across the mid-deck railing, quite a bit over his students. "All right, last couple days, there's been a lot going on," he commented, running a hand across the back of his neck. "So, I'm gonna make sure all of you are gettin' the training you deserve from now until we reach Wutai." The martial artist watched as Aerith raised her hand. "Yes, Aerith?"

Aerith smiled, lowering her hand. "Can you teach us to fight SOLDIERs?"

Ranma paled slightly at that. The question hung in the air for a moment. Three faces looked at him expectantly. He rallied himself, and cleared his throat. "I'm gonna be straight… from what I've seen, you three are not ready to take on a SOLDIER. That's not a knock against any of you," he continued, as he saw the sinking looks on their faces. "I think if the three of you worked together, you'd be able to take one down. But one-on-one, they're tough nuts to crack." He stood in thought for a moment. Well, they're not gonna learn how if you're just standin' in the way all the time, are they? he considered. I think Cloud said it right. If these three are my students, I need to make sure they know what they need to do to survive whatever's comin', and to be able to do it together. He smiled. "So let's change that."

The three expressions shifted from crestfallen to varying degrees of confusion and enthusiasm. Tifa raised her hand. "What do you have in mind, sensei?"

Kami, I hope they don't all keep raisin' their hands like that, Ranma thought. I might be their sensei, but I ain't no school teacher. "Captain Shiro said it'd be four to six days to get to Wutai," Ranma continued, gesturing broadly with one hand. "So that means we have at least four days to get each of us to be the best versions of ourselves that we can be. And I mean all of us. I'm gonna be tryin' something new too, and if I think any of you are ready for it, I'll show you what I've figured out. But first things first…"

Ranma turned around and pulled up a short, weighted table with a battery powered cooktop, and a dozen ordinary looking seashells from his pockets. "Grabbed these on the beach last night," he said, holding up the shells. He removed a pot of water from under the table, and gestured to Tifa and Aerith. "I know you two only had the one chance to try practicing the Kachuu Tenshin Amaguriken, and that was back in the forest outside Junon. I want you two to focus on that today, and I'm gonna sit down with Yuffie and teach her how to use her chi." He watched as Aerith raised her hand. Oh Kami, they're going to do it every time. He suppressed his slight exasperation at the formality of it, and faced Aerith directly. "What's up?"

Aerith lowered her hand and smiled. "Can you show it to us again, sensei?" she asked politely. "A lot happened over the last three days, and since we only got to see it once, I would like to make sure I remember it correctly."

Ranma nodded, and turned on the portable stovetop, dropping the seashells into the pot of water atop it. "I thought you might ask that. I don't want to get turned into a girl right now if I can help it, so I warmed this water up some already. The Amaguriken is, ultimately, about control, and precision. The goal is to be able to strike the same point, repeatedly, before your opponent can think about guarding against it. We're going to start with the control half, because the way the old…" he caught himself, shaking his head. "...the way I was taught at first, I couldn't hit the same place twice to save my life. It was just a wild, unfocused storm of punches. But I got better at it, eventually, and that's what I'm gonna teach you to do.

"What you wanna do is, think of that moment when you're using your chi to sense others," he continued, lifting two fingers to press against a point just above his temple, roughly in line with the third eye chakra. "When I feel it, it's like a… pressure, I guess, but I feel it up here, just behind my eyes. You might feel it in your gut or wherever, but think about that feeling. That's your chi, or a small part of it. And it's part of you."

Tifa and Aerith watched as Ranma slid into a horse stance, closing his eyes. "That feeling will come when you need it to, and if you work at it, then it'll do what you need it to do, but it's just like any other muscle, you gotta practice it." He took a deep breath, centering himself, remembering his earliest exercises, before it became second nature. "Think about that feeling moving into your arms, focusing near the joints. You're not trying to hit something as fast or as hard as you can; that'll come later. Right now, you're learning about controlling your chi. You need to focus your chi so that your arms can move out-" he snapped one arm straight out in a straight punch, and pulled it back in the blink of an eye, "-and back, as fast as possible, like a spring or a piston firing." Ranma threw out a small flurry of punches with one arm, almost a dozen strikes to the same exact point in midair, in the space of two seconds. "When you can do it, and do it as many times as you need to, we'll work on the precision half of it."

The water in the pot was steaming visibly at this point, but not quite to boiling. Ranma took a deep breath, and focused his chi into his arms the very way he had described to his students. There was a moment where nothing happened. And then suddenly Ranma's arms were a blur. The splashes of water in the pot showed to those watching that he was definitely connecting with the water, but the water barely moved from each impact. A dozen tiny splashes later, and Ranma held up his hands. The space between each finger was filled with one or two shells, his thumbs grasping the two largest ones against his palms.

Aerith stared at Ranma in awe. "...whoa…" she breathed. She'd seen it once before, but it was still impressive the second time. She watched as Ranma pocketed the shells, before emptying the pot of water and setting the portable cooktop away to the side. "That's amazing!"

Tifa was no less impressed by the feat, giving him one of her winning smiles. "Still can't believe we're learning things like this," she admitted, coming to her feet, "but I'm going to do my best."

Ranma nodded and gave the two of them a thumbs-up, circling around them to the far railing. "I'll be keeping my eyes on you both," he reiterated, before looping one arm around Yuffie's shoulder, "but I'm gonna try and get her caught up with a bit of a crash course."

"Hey, getcher hands offa me," Yuffie growled, pulling away.

Tifa and Aerith gave them a nod and set to work on their assigned practice, as Ranma guided Yuffie further to the bow of the ship, and out of easy earshot of the rest of the passengers. Yuffie turned to face Ranma as they came to a stop out of the way of the rest of the crew. "So what're ya gonna teach me?" she asked, slightly more excited now that she was getting to be the center of someone's attention.

In response, Ranma lifted his arms to about shoulder height, and vanished.

Yuffie blinked twice, and immediately reached out into the space where Ranma had been a moment earlier. There was nothing. "...doshitano…?" she muttered, clawing at random into the empty space around her. "...the fuck did ya go?"

Her answer came less than a second later when she felt a hand drop squarely onto her shoulder from directly behind. The sudden touch caused her to leap somewhat gracelessly forward, twisting in midair to see what had startled her, and landing on her butt a moment later.

Ranma gave her a grin from where he was standing, a hair's breadth behind where she had been only a second ago. "Nice reaction time," he commented, stepping forward and offering her a hand up. As Yuffie pulled herself up to her feet again, dusting off her rear, Ranma continued, "You're a ninja. That means in a lot of ways you're a different kind of fighter to Tifa an' Aerith, so me teachin' you how ta go head-to-head with somethin' twice your size ain't gonna do you any favors. Instead," he concluded, stepping forward again and pressing his index finger directly to her forehead, "I'm gonna teach you some stuff from my world that's gonna put your ninjutsu on a whole new level."

Yuffie stared up at his finger, and then back at him. "How did you even do that?" she asked, reaching up to grab his wrist, tugging his hand away from her head.

Ranma smirked, and effortlessly pulled his hand free from her grip. "Simple," he answered, and raised his arms level with his shoulders once again. Yuffie darted forward as he vanished once again, her hand passing through what she thought should have been his chest, but turned out to be nothing but empty air. Yuffie waited a full second, then turned as fast as she could, pawing at the space immediately behind her. She struck nothing at all, overbalancing slightly, and turned in an awkward manner to keep her feet. "Come on, you… lyin' gaikokujin wannabe, I'm gonna get you…" She turned again, drawing one of her knives from a pocket somewhere in her arm guard, and thrust out with it at random.

The first thrust hit nothing. The second thrust was caught in a vise-like grip, which solidified into the hand of Ranma Saotome. He tugged at her fingers with his other hand, pulling the knife free by the handle, and moved his arms in a complicated pattern, the knife vanishing somewhere without a trace. "This is your first lesson, runt, and you ain't doin' too great."

Yuffie sneered. "You keep ghostin' around like that! The hell are you even s'posed ta be teachin' with all this?" In response, Ranma smiled, and raised his arms again. Before he vanished from sight, Yuffie snaked out her arm and grabbed his limp wrist, pulling him forward unexpectedly. "Not this time," she declared, her other hand thrusting forward in a sharp punch to the midsection.

Ranma's free hand came down in a quick clockwise slap, diverting the punch to one side. "You're askin' the wrong question," he answered calmly. Inwardly, he reeled briefly, but refused to let it show on his face. Damn, she's faster than I thought, he observed, taking a moment to wrench his other wrist free. "You oughta be askin' yourself, 'what can I learn from this?' 'Cuz I'm gonna make sure you learn it."

"Stop with the freakin' riddles, already!" Yuffie threw another punch, which Ranma effortlessly wheeled away from, spinning lightly around to the ninja's left side. By the time she turned her head to find him again, he had already disappeared again. She spun and flung one arm in a wild backhand, hoping to catch the vanishing act sneaking up on her again, but hit nothing. "Tell me what the hell you want from me!" she barked out, brandishing her shuriken in front of her.

"You need to learn two things from this," Ranma's voice called out, from very close by.

Yuffie spun again, thinking he was behind her once more, swiping at the air with the sharpened tips of the shuriken. The energetic slash resulted in an impact with nothing other than the wooden deck as she overbalanced herself again, one point digging a small divot into a deck board. Frustrated and angry, she slammed her hands against the deck before pushing herself up to her feet once more, tugging her weapon free from the deck boards.

Ranma's voice spoke again, from some indistinct location, but still sounded as if he could be within inches of Yuffie. "The first thing you need to learn is that you can't fake out chi," he said calmly, the voice seemingly everywhere and nowhere. "The lifestream will not be impressed by posturing. You can't bluff it, you can't intimidate it, and you can't persuade it. You're gonna have ta learn how to control it if ya wanna hide the way I do."

Ranma let the cloak fade, and peered down from the rigging he was almost leisurely hanging from, before dropping down to the deck directly in front of Yuffie, who took a step backwards in some obvious surprise. Yuffie stared at him, and realized that he could have easily knocked her senseless. Here, in the sparring match the previous day, back in Junon Forest, pretty much any time he'd got in it in his head to do it. And she'd never see it coming. She'd known he was strong… crazy strong, even, after taking out that monster on the beach, and she remembered Cloud telling him to keep some of his techniques off the table while on board that ship, which meant that there were even more things he could do that could wreck her. She only had one real chance against a power like that… and that was to learn how he did it, learn everything that she could about it, so she could do it too, or maybe develop a counter to it if she was lucky. But either way, it meant that she needed to learn this.

Yuffie hesitated for a moment longer, but finally let out a long sigh, shouldering her shuriken again. "Okay, okay, okay, fine, I'll… play it your way," she relented, standing up straight. She looked him straight in the eyes. "What's the second thing, anyway?"

Ranma met her gaze and held it for an uncomfortably long silence, the ocean sloshing all around them as the engine churned somewhere underneath. "It's your pride," he said finally, and Yuffie tilted her head in puzzlement. "I have my own pride. I still kinda hate this stupid curse of mine, but it's part of me. For over a year, I avoided nearly every responsibility I had at the drop of a hat if there was even a sliver of a chance I could get rid of it, because my pride was completely wrapped up in how I saw myself, and how I thought others saw me." Ranma stood still and silent for a moment, letting that sink in. Even now, seven months after Kuno crossed the line, admitting it is hard, he thought, crossing his arms in front of his chest. But if I can't accept that I was that person, it'll be a lot harder to make amends. "If I manage to free myself of it at this point, great. But I'm not gonna drag everyone I know on another life-threatening adventure because I'm too focused on my pride. I've gotten myself in more trouble than I could ever count because I didn't know when to let go of my pride. I have an ability that actually uses how much pride and confidence I have in myself as a fuel source. So when I tell you," he continued, his gaze intensifying as he unfolded his right arm, leveling one finger at the ninja's chest, "that I think you have too much pride for your own good, I want you to understand my full meaning."

Yuffie's gaze faltered, and she turned away. "So what, what's wrong with that?" she snapped.

"What's wrong with it is that to learn the techniques of the Umi-sen Ken," Ranma explained, pulling his finger away from pointing at Yuffie and aiming it at himself instead, "you have to be able to let go of strong emotions. That means no anger, no fear, and no pride. You have to be able to set yourself aside, even if it's for just long enough. And if you hold onto that pride too hard, then it ain't gonna work."

Yuffie huffed in irritation. "So, you're the only one who gets to use your pride?"

Ranma stared at her back. Was this what I was like, to Cologne? Kami-above, I'd want to smack me with a cane too. But he always suspected that the old crone had baited him into learning things her way. And maybe he could use that. "Fine," he said after another moment. "I'll make you a deal. You learn to control your pride enough to use the Umi-sen Ken by the time we make landfall in Wutai, and I swear on my honor as a martial artist, I'll teach you how to use that pride to fight, too." Then he turned his back to her, crossing his arms over his chest once more, a smirk adorning his face. "But I can tell, there's no way I'll have to pay off on that. You could train for a hundred years and you probably wouldn't get it."

Yuffie wheeled on him with a screech of indignation, grabbing him bodily by the shoulders and spinning him around to face her, jabbing one finger into his chest repeatedly. "What, you think I can't do it because I'm too immature or somethin'?" she demanded, advancing on him so much that the concept of personal space ceased to exist in that moment. "Fine, I'll prove you wrong! I'll show you jus' how mature I can be, and then you'll hafta teach me that crazy shit you're talkin' about! Just you wait!"

Ranma grinned, a wicked looking grin that curled up on one side. "Good." He took a calming breath and stared Yuffie down, the intensity of his gaze making her take a couple steps back. "Then let's get started."

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After an hour, Tifa was frustrated. She hadn't been able to make that feeling in her gut move one centimeter. "I'm going to get some lunch," she said to her fellow student. "Let Ranma know if he comes back?"

"Sure thing," Aerith responded, still deep in her meditation. Tifa got up from her seat next to the brunette, heading below deck.

She found Barret and Cloud sitting near the galley, preparing some dried vegetables for the next batch of food preparation, while Cait Sith stood on a table nearby, Red curled up beneath it. "Ach, lassie, wotcher doin'?" the feline asked, bouncing down from the tabletop to the bench as she approached.

Tifa smiled. "Ranma's trying to teach us some of the stuff he does," she explained, taking a small bowl and adding first some rice, then a generous helping of the fish they'd already caught that morning. She wasn't used to the Wutai maritime tradition of 'there's always food ready, help yourself and don't be shy about it' but she could understand the reasons behind it. On a ship with people going to and fro at all hours, having ready-made food regardless of your schedule could be a blessing from the goddess. "Still having trouble with the basics, though."

"Mister Badass knows his shit, don't he?" Barret commented, once again using the space between the barrels of his gun-arm to hold a vegetable in place while he peeled it. "Never thought when he showed up on our doorstep that he an' that girl would be as much trouble as they've been… but damn if they ain't also useful enough to make up for it."

Cloud nodded his head in agreement, taking a large knife to a strange yellow vegetable Tifa wasn't immediately familiar with. "He's a bit rough around the edges, still… but I think he's got a better idea now about how to fight alongside people, and trust them to have his back as much as he has theirs."

Tifa grinned at that, snagging a bit of the yellow vegetable, which had a consistency rather like a coarse potato. "Don't suppose you had anything to do with that?" she asked, taking a small bite of the tuber.

"I may have given him a bit of a lesson while we were still on the Grace of Ifrit," Cloud admitted, not breaking his stride with the tubers. He carved another into six roughly equal batons and began dicing them. "Ranma took it to heart, apparently. He learns fast."

"He has a good teacher." Tifa found the taste of the tuber to be sweeter than she expected, but it wasn't bad. "Two, actually, if you count Aerith teaching him how to use his materia. But you two should have seen him yesterday… I swear, Master Zangan would talk about some of the old masters and their lifestream techniques, but he never told me anything like what Ranma's doing."

"You did mention something about a new ability he discovered," Red's voice sounded from beneath the mess table. The battle-scarred wolf padded out and sat down on his haunches at the foot of the table. "Could you tell me more about what it is that he has learned?"

Tifa sat in thought for a moment, trying to think of the right words to explain it. "It was like… try to imagine if someone could cast Blizzard… or a mini-Blizzard, anyway… just by throwing a punch or a kick. It was like that." She explained further by punching the air twice, each time punctuating it with a somewhat juvenile 'ksshh' sound effect. "He says he's still trying to figure it all out, and he's going to teach us once he knows how it works… and once we're able to control our chi."

Cloud stared at her with a hint of disbelief, and Red's expression was thoughtful. "Man, ain't nothin' that boy does surprises me anymore," Barret said after a moment of shared silence, starting on peeling another of the sweet tubers. "Turns into a girl 'cuz of water, jumps like a damn Touch Me, stronger 'n a behemoth. An' now you're sayin' he can jus'... make materia do whatever the hell he wants 'cuz of outer space magic martial arts bullshit. Swear if he started growin' a second head, says somethin' like 'Oh, yeah, all us Japan folk get our second heads in at seventeen' or some shit like that, I'd just nod my head and get on wit' business."

That elicited a chuckle out of most of the group, though Cloud remained stoic, the kitchen knife moving rhythmically through the vegetables. Red gestured with one paw, looking up at Tifa. "I would not be surprised if you all have forgotten, but do you remember that day on the swamp, before the passage through the mines?"

"Who could forget?" Cloud answered, reaching for another peeled tuber, as Cait's ears perked up. "The Zolom nearly killed us all."

Red shook his head softly. "I meant to indicate the events afterwards, once we had reached safety and camped for the night." He took a breath and for a moment, it seemed to Tifa that the wolf's tail-flame burned a bit brighter. "I asked Ranma to do something impossible with his materia… or at least something we thought to be impossible. And he was unable to do it. And now… he does something impossible with his materia… or at least something we think is impossible."

A thoughtful silence passed through the three humans in the room. "Ae don' follow ye, Red," Cait said, walking along the bench like a balance beam. "You know what the lad is doin' or somethin'?"

"For certain?" Red clarified, lifting one paw and shaking it back and forth in the air in front of him. "No, not at all. But my tribe had a long-lived oral tradition, and our history goes back many generations. The stories tell of things that the Cetra could do with the magical powers at their disposal. Things we would consider in this day and age to come under the heading of 'impossible'."

That managed to pull even Cloud away from his focus on the vegetables. "You still think that he might be… like Aerith, somehow?" he asked, his expression unreadable.

Red hesitated for a moment. "I honestly don't know," he answered finally. He lifted his head, his one yellow eye meeting Cloud's glowing green gaze. "Something Barret suggested has been weighing in my mind, and I now have to consider that he may have been onto something."

Barret turned at the mention of his name, and screwed up his brow in thought. "Wait, I said somethin'?" he asked, perplexed, setting down the peeling knife. After a moment's thought, he shook his head. "I'm guessin' it's back when we were all locked up in Midgar, but I don' remember what it was I said now."

Red's lips curled up, baring his teeth in a gentle canine smile. "There was a great deal occurring that night, to be sure. But before Cloud released us from our cells, you posited the idea that the Cetra were not rendered extinct, but merely hid themselves away somewhere."

The silence that passed between the group was almost palpable as the implications made themselves apparent. Tifa was the first to speak them aloud. "You think that the Cetra could have made their way to this… Earth place that Ranma is from?" she asked, tilting her head in thought.

Red's smile grew larger as he turned to answer the martial artist. "It is a possibility, at least," he explained, "though we have no way to test such a thing at the moment. We would need far more information, about the people of Ranma's world, and about the Cetra themselves. All we have now is our observations, my tribe's oral history, and a theory that ties them together. Any one of them, or all three, could be entirely wrong." He lowered his head slightly, still meeting Tifa's eyes, before looking at the dish before her on the table. "I don't suppose I could prevail on you to prepare me a meal as well?"

Tifa smiled. "Yeah, I'll fix you up something, Red," she answered, rising from her seat. That's a lot to think about, though. She left her own bowl on the table and stepped over to the galley bench to dish up a helping of fish.

Cait Sith scratched at his cheek with one mittened paw, looking between Tifa and Red. "So this Ranma is some kinda space alien… ye all tell me that tha lassie Aerith is some kinda Ancient outta legend…" He hopped back up to the table, moving his right paw in a broad, vague gesture across the galley. "Ye wouldna mind if Ae ask ye if any o' the rest o' ye have any… strangeness… about ye? Might as well get it all outta the way at once."

A chuckle seemed to pass between the three humans, and even Red gave a canine snicker of amusement. Cloud peeked out from the galley and met Cait's eyes. "We've all got our own stories, if that's what you're asking," he explained. "Our strangeness is what brought us together, what's keeping us united."

Cait wrinkled his nose in confusion. "...Ae canna say Ae unnerstand ye on tha'," he admitted, glancing between the others with some confusion.

Tifa set the bowl of fish down next to a large bowl of water in front of Red, and turned to Cait with a friendly look. "Well… you can't exactly eat with us at meal times… but…" she paused, glancing at Cloud and Barret in turn. "Maybe if we told you a little about ourselves during meals together, you'll understand more about why we're doing what we're doing."

Cait blinked slowly at each of them in sequence. "Ae suppose it couldna hurt ta hear about ye a bit," he answered, sitting down on the table as Tifa began to speak.

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…later…

"Arrrrgghh, this is so stupid! I hate sitting still like this!"

Ranma didn't even turn to look at Yuffie this time. It was the ninth such outburst in less than two hours. "Fine, go take a break, but be back here in twenty minutes."

"Yes, boss," Yuffie grumbled, but walked past Ranma and towards the steps leading below deck.

Ranma decided that he, too, needed a bit of a break from Yuffie's consistent pessimism and aggressive refusal to cooperate. As Yuffie's head disappeared below deck, Ranma pulled out a materia orb and slotted it into place in his new bracelet, an ornate but thick coil of polished metal. Taking a moment to adjust the materia bangle's fit, he considered what he was about to do. He didn't dare risk using a Fire materia aboard what was mostly a wooden ship, and he already knew what Blizzard could do with his newfound ability. Trying to punch healing magic into people seemed… counter-productive. His newest acquisition, the bangle notwithstanding, would have to wait until they made landfall for any kind of experimentation, because even more than the Fire magic, he had no intention of using that aboard a ship in the middle of the ocean.

Which left only Thunder.

Ranma was hesitant to try this for a whole different set of reasons. The Blizzard magic had made him feel as if his blood ran cold, literally. He hadn't been injured by it, as far as he could tell. But what would electricity running through his body do to him? It was something he needed an answer to.

He took a deep breath, and settled into a basic fighting stance near the bow of the ship, exhaling slowly. Another breath, and he began channeling his chi and mana together through the Thunder materia. His skin prickled, the way he was used to feeling if he was ever outdoors during a big storm. He took a step forward and threw a left-right-left combination of punches in rapid succession.

An audible bzzzt sounded as three miniature bolts of electricity erupted from his fists, arcing through the air, and grounding into the seawater a few meters ahead of the ship.

Ranma stared at his hands in surprise, the sharp smell of ozone in the breeze immediately in front of him, dissipating almost at once. "Okay… that's pretty cool…" he admitted, cutting the flow of chi through his materia, "...except for that weird prickly feeling." He pulled the Thunder materia free from the bangle, and curled his hand around the red orb in his pocket thoughtfully. "That one's gonna have to wait until nightfall," he muttered to himself, letting go of the Summon and returning the Thunder materia to his other pocket. "My training can wait. Need to focus on the others for now."

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"Oh!"

Tifa's continued attempts were interrupted by the sudden, delighted sound coming from her fellow student's mouth. She turned and saw Aerith's left arm, darting out and back, at a speed that would make a bee jealous. The motions were wild and unfocused, the distance between the ends of two punches differing by so much as the length of her forearm, and the girl didn't have the faintest idea how to make a proper fist, but she definitely had the speed Ranma had demonstrated earlier that day.

Tifa smiled. "Nice work!" she congratulated the brunette, reaching out one hand.

Aerith didn't take it immediately, seeming to tense her body for a moment. "Sorry, didn't want to accidentally hit your hand," she explained, before reaching out her own hand in what looked like almost exaggerated slowness, accepting the handshake. "It's… a lot tougher than I thought it would be, though… it feels like I just switched gears in a car, so I'm still getting used to how it feels."

At that moment, Ranma approached from the bow of the ship. "How what feels?" he asked, standing in front of them as he had earlier. In response, Aerith demonstrated, her arm shooting out in the blink of an eye before returning to her side almost as fast. "Oh, you got it, good work!" he praised, giving a genuine smile.

Aerith took a deep breath, and as she exhaled, she felt a release of a tension she hadn't realized was there, had been there, for what must have been the last two or three hours. "...wow…" she breathed, taking a moment before letting go of Ranma's hand. "That… was something else."

Ranma grinned, standing up straight as Aerith's right arm slipped down to her side, her left coming around to rub at the muscles reflexively. "Your next task will be doing that at will, but you should get some food for now," he suggested. "A good meal after training like that will help ground you again."

Aerith hopped to her feet and gave her kindest smile. "I will, thank you sensei!" she answered, before practically bouncing down the stairs in delight.

Tifa's eyes followed the girl until she was out of sight, before looking up at Ranma. "I'm happy for her, I really am," she commented. "Just wish I could figure it out too."

Ranma looked over the talented martial artist, before cupping his chin in thought. Maybe she needs a different approach, he thought calmly. Maybe they all need different approaches. "I've got an idea." He stood up and moved to a clear section of the deck, motioning for Tifa to follow. "Practice on me."

Tifa tilted her head slightly. "You sure?" she asked, the concern plain in her voice. "You know how hard I hit."

Ranma shrugged. "This isn't about hitting hard, at least not to start," he reminded her, lifting his hands to shoulder height. He began circling Tifa, who started maneuvering herself as well. "You can make it hurt later. Right now… I want you to break my guard," he instructed. "With a jab."

Tifa grinned as she realized what he was doing. "...your funeral," she quipped in a slight singsong, throwing a one-two that Ranma caught without missing a beat.

"Good," Ranma said. "Again."

Tifa nodded, throwing a left followed by another one-two punch. All three smacked into Ranma's palms. On reflex, Tifa followed up with a right hook.

Ranma shoved one hand directly into the path of her wrist, intercepting the body blow before it could connect. "Nothing fancy, Tifa," Ranma warned, lifting his palms again. "Focus on your jabs. Back to basics." Two more rapid punches came at him, and he caught them both in his hands, the dull smack of fist against skin filling the air. She wasn't kidding, either, he noted in silence, catching another punch in his right hand. Even her basic strikes hit like a jackhammer. "Good," he said calmly, ignoring the sting in his hands, focusing a little of his own chi to reinforce his palms. "Keep it up. Focus on your breathing."

Tifa didn't respond out loud, but took a deep breath. They continued like that for another minute or so, and she fell into an easy rhythm. Breathe in. One-two. Breathe out. One-two. It felt good, even if some part of her was worried about the state of Ranma's hands by the end of it.

"Keep up your jabs," he said, "and close your eyes. Follow me with your chi sense."

Tifa did as she was told, her eyes shutting, leaving her in darkness. She punched again. One-two. Her attack hit nothing but empty air. The lack of impact startled her for a moment, but she refocused her senses and felt Ranma just to her right. She shifted her weight and turned in place, throwing another punch, caught by his hand. One-two, catch-catch. Breathe in. One-two, breathe out.

"Good. Focus on that feeling, the one telling you where I am. Where do you feel it?"

Tifa took a moment to realize she was expected to answer that. One-two, breathe in. "My stomach," she responded. One-two, breathe out. Ranma nodded his head in understanding, and somehow Tifa could tell that Ranma had done so.

"That's your chi, your own little lifestream," he explained, catching another punch. "What you're feeling is one little pool in your body where it sits, but it's not the only place. It's already moving through you like a river. Try to feel that too."

Tifa hesitated for a moment, her hands held ready, her weight shifting carefully from one foot to the other, but otherwise she was still. She looked inwards, trying to use that newfound sense of hers to… sense… herself. She saw the paths of energy within herself, pooling and winding like so many rivers. It was incredible to her, to realize so much was inside her. She'd barely scratched the surface. "...I… I feel it," she said finally, taking another breath.

Ranma smiled, his own senses extended, watching the chi cascading off of Tifa in waves as she began to understand what was inside her. "It's a part of you," he continued, "as much as your muscles, your bones, or anything else. And just like the rest of your body, that energy will go where you want it to." He focused a stronger surge of chi into his hands, doing his best to reinforce them from further damage. "And I want you to think about that energy coming together, and moving into one of your arms, settling into the muscles, strengthening them, making them able to move faster. And when you're ready, go ahead and throw that punch."

Tifa could feel it, the energy swirling inside her, just as he described it. And she felt that energy moving, not according to what Ranma was saying, but according to how she wanted it to move. It was… so simple this way. How had this ever given her so much difficulty? But Ranma had patiently turned her perceptions on their head somehow, and the end result was this. Unfathomable energy at her fingertips. A new level of martial arts for her to uncover and hone and explore. She smiled, squared her stance, and felt the energy slide into place like a lock and key. And she threw a punch.

Even with his extra preparation, the punch moved fast enough that it slipped straight past her sensei's guard. Ranma took it square on the jaw. He blinked twice, took one awkward looking step forward, and crumpled like a sack of laundry.

"Oh shit," Tifa breathed, letting go of her chi and rushing forward. She quickly crouched down, cradling his head gently in one arm to make it easier to check his vitals.

Which is where Aerith and Yuffie found them a few seconds later.

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A few hours earlier…

Rufus Shinra was sitting in a large command tent that had been set up just outside Rocket Town. The impromptu command post was busy organizing elements of the upcoming operation to capture Ranma Saotome. The local land had been surveyed, the terrain evaluated for advantages, and the initial evacuations had been made. Rufus was reviewing the day's results, when he became aware of a disturbance outside, punctuated by the sudden entry of one of the company lieutenants.

"What is going on out there, lieutenant?" Rufus asked in a distracted tone.

The lieutenant hesitated for a moment before clearing his throat. "It's one of the townsfolk, sir," he began. "He's quite upset."

Rufus sighed and stood up from the desk, exiting the tent. One of the occupants was indeed being vocal in his refusal to cooperate with the evacuation. "You and the rest of Shinra just fuckin' keep on taking and taking!" the man declared, shoving against the three troopers who were currently. "You already took every damn design I made! Now you want my goddamn house too! What's next, the clothes off our fuckin' backs?"

The man's shouting was drawing a substantial crowd of other villagers and mechanics from those in the middle of being displaced. The small line of troopers had superiority for the moment, but it likely would not last if the crowd continued to build.

Rufus stared at the man for a moment. A tall man with short grizzled stubble across his face and neck. Short, slicked blond hair combed into straight vertical spikes. Grease and motor oil staining his hands and arms and his denim coveralls. "Cid Highwind!" he called out, recognizing him. He gestured to the troopers restraining him. "You three, let him go immediately."

The troopers looked completely caught off guard by this, but not nearly as much as Cid himself was. As the guards disentangled themselves from the older man, Cid nearly fell over from the unexpected lack of struggle. "You must be Rupert's boy, right?" Cid asked.

A slight twitch of irritation appeared at Rufus' eyebrow at the direct comparison to his father. "I am the president, Rufus Shinra, yes," he answered calmly.

"Well that's great!" Cid declared with a grin. "Maybe you can tell me an' my mechanics an' the rest of these fellas what the hell is goin' on here?"

Rufus smiled a somewhat disarming smile, approaching the renowned pilot. "It's very simple, actually." He reached out one hand, and received a handshake in response. "A dangerous group of terrorists will be headed this way soon. We are laying a trap for them, and intend to capture and imprison them. This is the only settlement between here and the mountains, so they'll have to come this way."

Cid held onto Rufus' hand a bit longer than strictly necessary. "And that means you have to turn all of us out on our fuckin' ears?"

The grip on Rufus' hand slowly increased. Rufus didn't flinch, didn't twitch a muscle in response. "You know what?" he said finally, matching Cid's force of grip. "You're absolutely right. Attention citizens of Rocket Town!" he shouted, pulling away from Cid's surprised handshake. "Your town representative, Cid Highwind, and I have reached an accord. Not all of you will need to be relocated for this operation."

A chorus of relieved voices met this revelation. Rufus raised his hands placatingly, and smiled a particularly sharp smile. "To that effect… the following people will be permitted to return to their homes. Ahem…" He made a big show of pulling a sheet of paper from his pocket. "Cid Highwind." The silence after this drew out like a knife. "That is all. The very next question or complaint about this operation will result in the plaintiff's home being burned to the ground. The complaint after that will result in that rocket-" he continued, pointing to the rocket towering over the edge of town "-being toppled to the ground. Now, please, continue."

That took the wind out of the discontented crowd in a hurry. Several of the villagers glared angrily in the direction of Cid, before stomping away. Cid turned and looked at Rufus, aghast. "The hell is wrong with you?" he demanded. "Saying something like that, they're gonna-"

"-Gonna think that you are only out for yourself," Rufus finished for him, sharing a particularly wicked grin. He gestured to the troopers, who resumed their duties overseeing the evacuation and pushing the villagers back into line. "So now… their anger will be directed at you."

That pulled Cid up short as well. "What about the rocket? My men and I have been working to get it back to flight-ready! We could go to space in less than three months!" Rufus shook his head dismissively and turned towards the tent again. Cid growled and lunged forward, grabbing Rufus by the shoulder. "Hey, this is Gaia's future we're talking about!"

As Cid pulled on Rufus' shoulder, spinning him around, Rufus reached beneath his jacket and pulled out his Shortbarrel, wedging the twin barrels just beneath Cid's chin, bringing the older man to a complete stop. "You forget, Cid, that it's only because of Shinra's funding, resources, and interest that you and your designs ever left the ground in the first place." Cid did not even dare to breathe for a moment, as Rufus continued his speech. "If we capture our target, we may have access to a previously unknown method of interplanetary travel. That rocket you're so proud of could be rendered obsolete twice over in a matter of days. And if they… or you…" he concluded, removing the tip of the Shortbarrel from Cid's chin and pointing it instead at the man's chest, "argue with me further, they, or you, will lose everything, followed by everyone losing everything else. So I recommend that you, too, keep your damn mouth shut." He took a few steps away from the dumbfounded pilot and waved to one of the troopers. "Lieutenant, make sure Mr. Highwind is safely escorted back to his home, and see to it that he is not disturbed by any of the other villagers, for any reason."

The lieutenant snapped off a salute and locked one hand around Cid's arm, leaving him away in stunned silence. As Rufus returned to his tent, he felt a buzzing come from his coat pocket. He tucked the shotgun back under his coat, pulling the PHS free from the pocket with his other hand. There was a text-only message from the recently appointed Director of Covert Intelligence.

'I need you to approve a transfer,' it read.

Attached to the message was a small profile of a SOLDIER. Rufus recognized the name, and they had met in Junon a few days ago. He hadn't seemed very special to Rufus. He started typing out a response to the request. 'Why not send this through official channels? Through Heidegger.' And sent it.

The response was so rapid that Rufus could practically taste the disdain dripping from the missive. 'I don't trust Heidegger,' the response read, before it continued. 'I think he's planning something.'

And you're not? Rufus thought with a knowing smirk. 'Why this SOLDIER? There are stronger ones, with better records.'

Rufus hit Send, and was somewhat surprised to have to wait for the answer. That surprise was nothing compared to what he felt when he did get the response several minutes later. 'Don't want 'stronger',' it read, the quotes drawing attention to the words on his screen. 'Need someone with a brain. Most of the smart ones don't join SOLDIER, they get recruited elsewhere. This one is an exception.'

That thought stuck in Rufus' head for a moment. Is he saying that all SOLDIERs are stupid? The newly minted President was fully aware that there were problems, ones he had been aware of since before his banishment at the will of his father, and which he now intended to correct. But the idea of an entire division of Shinra's armed forces, staffed by the dullards of both the bureaucracy and the military? Was such a thing even possible?

On the other hand, that would certainly explain Heidegger, he thought wryly. The man wouldn't know nuance if it bit him in the ass. He began typing again, and then stopped, double checking the profile. Something stood out to him. Nearly fifteen years in SOLDIER at this point, but he had stagnated in 2nd Class since the middle of the Wutai War. Normally, someone of his tenure alone would have been promoted to 1st Class years ago, to say nothing of his record, which taken as a whole was exemplary. 'Anything else special about this one?' he typed out. 'He's been at the same rank for a while now.'

The response was faster than Rufus expected. 'You noticed that too.' Rufus smiled. Sometimes it was nice to have his limited faith in others rewarded. 'I want to find out for myself.'

Rufus took a minute to fill out the details, then sent it back to the Director. 'Transfer approved,' he sent with it. 'Keep me updated.'

What does fate have in store for Cid and the other people of Rocket Town? How does Rufus plan to use Ranma to travel to another world? And who is this mysterious transfer student- er, SOLDIER? The answers to these questions and more… are still being written, though I've got them in my notes somewhere, so there is that.

Researching the kind of boat to put here was actually a little difficult. I could have just handwaved it to be whatever kind of boat I needed to. After all, I'm a writer, and that roughly equates to 'god' in the scope of the little world I've created here, but sometimes I just get a burr up my butt and decide to make things as theoretically realistic as possible.

Fortunately one of my friends is something of a maritime expert. Having a group of friends with an impressive cross-section of science and general geekdom is a real help when it comes to odd bits of research. Anyway… my friend was able to help me pick out an appropriate item in the real world to use as a parallel. If you're so inclined, look up the NOAA science vessel Oregon II. A former fishing trawler refitted as a maritime research vessel, has capacity for 19 crew and a dozen scientists, and assuming nothing goes sideways, can be out at sea for about a month before needing to refuel and restock food. When I described its speed as being 'continental drift' I was only barely exaggerating. The Oregon II has a top speed of 11 knots, or 12.5mph/20kph. I could probably keep pace with it on a bicycle. For the purposes of the story, a mako-powered engine has a little more get-up-and-go to it, and can move even a barge like this at decent speeds if the hull is up to it.

Language lessons…

Doshitano - Broadly, an expression of disbelief.

Gaikokujin - colloquially, foreign barbarian. The more contemporary term would be gaijin, which translates to 'foreigner' or 'outsider'. Gaijin is actually a slang contraction of gaikokujin, which eventually became more commonplace than the original phrasing. Language is fun like that.

Hope you like it! Feedback and comments welcome. And hey, maybe the next chapter will come quickly. Depends on how things go. Wish me luck!