Ranma ½ Baby Goliath and the Ugly Duckling

[shiki]

If Ranma kidnapped her, she wouldn't be so... comfortable and Ranma would be more guilty. More likely that Akuma was watching Ranma the whole time and took her for incentive.

At least that is what I got from it. I pretty much saw it the same way that Lost Star did.

 

[BukkakeNoJutsu]

This is great, man. I've missed your writing

 

[frostdragonz]

This is a excellent story so far. You are pulling off the crossover pretty well.

 

[lokinishizaki]

Ugh. Sorry I disappeared.

I got sick for a while and was too busy wasting away to do much more than sleep. Anyway, I'm feeling much better now. Here's the next chapter.

I feel like I've abused flashbacks in this one, but this is the way it came out. I don't think it's anything egregious, but some of you might disagree.

Once again, I appreciate any and all input, even if I don't always have the time to respond. I'd like you all to be aware that any modifications I make to the text will only be reflected on the version posted on FF.net. When I decide to post it of FF.net, of course.

Also, that post limit is really annoying. Maybe I should write shorter chapters?

[hr]

Chapter 2 - Sins of the father​

“Right there.”

Usagi followed the line drawn by Ranma's finger and found a small island in the middle of the rushing waters. Steady erosion had whittled it down to near nothing, aside from an anemic tree and a thin patch of grass.

She knew that he wanted them to be as isolated as possible–she'd already vetoed his first suggestion. She wasn't going to climb a mountain no matter how “traditional” –but this…

“Ranma,” she called out awkwardly. “How are we supposed to-?” Her throat closed up on her.

That kind, dumb boy looked at her with a brilliant smile and set about answering the question she didn’t have the courage to even ask. “How else? We'll swim there, of course! It'll be fun!”

“No,” she denied him. It was as she'd feared.

He blinked. “But–”

She shook her head. “No Ranma! I–I can't swim!”

Usagi didn’t enjoy lying, but she quickly consoled herself. After all, it was nothing egregious. If anything, it was a lie by omission. The words ‘in that river’ just went unsaid. She was used to swimming in backyard pools with plenty of floatation devices on hand and excessive adult supervision. Jumping straight to raging rivers seemed unreasonable.

Of course, she had no particular experience in judging which streams were slow enough to safely swim across, but if she had to guess, the whitewater forming at specific points in the river was a pretty strong indication that most bears would drown trying to make the trip across.

But even without that, the sound alone stirred her basest instincts. A low roar, endless and supreme. Avoid me or be swallowed, it screamed.

Somehow, Ranma heard that sound and thought ‘happy, happy fun time.’

“That's perfect,” he exclaimed. “I can teach you right now. It'll be my first official act as your master. It'll be easy!”

She stared at him, frozen in fear. He stared back with a huge grin on his face. Before she even realized it, he'd gently grabbed a hold of her shoulder, cutting off all hope of escape. “Go ahead, jump in!”

She hesitated, as any fish would when asked to walk on land. Her friend quickly noticed.

“What? Are you scared?” Ranma asked.

She nodded, frantically.

He grinned. “I can help you with that too!”

[hr]

“Why are you so mad?”

She wasn't really, but Ranma had always been the kind of person that could easily mistake the aftershocks of terror with anger.

Usagi bundled her hair into a fistful and squeezed, watching morosely as thin streams of water dribbled out of the gaps between her fingers. Her first lesson and she’d already failed. Like a slender doe in front of incoming headlights she lost all thought and flailed about beneath the surface pointlessly.

Ranma had shouted clear instructions and encouragement the whole time, but until he was literally inches from her face and carrying her out of the water, she hadn’t listened.

Supposedly, the lessons Ranma would impart would allow her to grasp a butterfly by the wings mid-flight without hurting it. …Maybe she wasn't cut out for this? Honestly, she felt like a boy aspiring to go to the Koshien when he couldn't even throw a baseball.

“Come on,” Ranma complained. “I built the raft, didn't I? That took hours! Why are you so mad?”

Building the raft took him 36 minutes. A third of that time was spent helping her spew water out of her lungs, Usagi knew. Another third was spent complaining about having to build it in the first place.

She wasn't mad. But maybe she was getting just a teensy bit irritated.

A stiff breeze harassed her, and she shivered violently. She wrapped her thick towel more tightly around herself and hoped that she wouldn't catch a cold.

Ranma sighed obnoxiously and rested his arms and chin on the raft's edge. He continued to paddle them towards the small, isolated island he'd picked out. The rest of their journey was completed in silence.

He gently pushed the raft onto the shore and walked out beside it, straight backed and with long strides, as though the river's current flowed his way rather than the opposite. He brought his hand up to his bundled hair and sent his long braid tumbling down, dry, unlike the rest of him. Cold river water dribbled down his compact muscles and blue swim trunks, and the river could have been a hot spring for all that he seemed to care. He pulled his huge pack off the front of the raft and settled down near the middle of the island.

He took a knee on the sparse grass and brought his hand up angled towards the ground, his fingers, wrist and forearm aligned until they resembled nothing less than a spear. Without faltering, he plunged his hand into the dirt, burying it up to his elbow as though the island were made of sponge cake and not tightly packed soil. With an audible exertion of effort, Ranma tore his arm from the ground, sending a huge pile of dirt flying into the air.

In short order, he finished digging his pit, filled it with dead wood and leaves and proceeded to rub two sticks together with such ludicrous speed that they produced thick black smoke and rained down embers into the pit. When the flammable material in the pit caught fire, Ranma dropped the smoking sticks into the hole and turned towards his pack. From its depths, he took out a small bottle, a plastic sack filled with herbs and a stone mortar and pestle set.

“Long, long ago, there were three brothers,” he began. “Their names, faces and histories were forgotten over countless years. What is remembered is this: after a lifetime of suffering, each brother realized the ultimate truth. Reality may define us, but it also holds us back. They opened their eyes and saw the shackles that held them down and naturally sought to break them.”

Ranma tore the plastic bag and poured the herbs into the bowl. “The youngest brother was neither smart, nor strong. Overcoming his limits was not something he could pursue wholeheartedly. In fact, nothing in the entire world managed to stir his heart, so he started imagining something that could.”

He picked up the pestle and diligently crushed the herbs. “Over time, he began to see it in his heart, in his mind and his dreams. He wrote books on it and produced great artwork. He started teaching many others, until they started seeing it as well, in their hearts, minds and dreams. After ten years of collective meditation, eighty-six men and women birthed the first god, and the youngest brother became the first priest.”

Despite herself, she lent an ear to his tale. The rushing river behind her made deciphering his words harder than it had to be, so she crawled to her feet and drifted towards Ranma, like was a whirlpool and she was its unfortunate victim.

He saw her approach and threw her a quick smile. “For a while there things were pretty great. It was a golden age, Usagi, the best the world had ever seen. But then the god was corrupted, and a pretty terrible dark age followed.”

She knelt down on the other side of the pit, facing him. The warmth of the flames warmed her, and she sighed in relief. “He became evil? How? And what was his name?”

Ranma smiled wryly. “Same way most things get sick, Usagi. It ate something it shouldn't have. As for its name, I have no idea. As it turns out, the first thing most new gods do is erase all evidence the old ones existed.

“Anyway, to combat the first god's evil, new priests gathered together and made a new god, who cast the first god down. All was good until he became corrupt too, and so on and so forth until–after a few thousand years of this nonsense–most of humanity decided that we were better off without the lot of them.”

“What happened?” She asked. “Did they go to war?”

Ranma snorted. “Of course not. We would have lost. Instead, the descendants of the middle and elder brothers banded together and built the well of souls. All the gods basically starved, along with most of the dragons, goblins, pixies, fairies, ghosts, etcetera… You know, the Pantheon was the greatest power in the world once? And now all the gods are dead and creating new ones is pretty much impossible as long as the well of souls exists.”

She blinked. “What?” She asked weakly. An intense chill fell upon her, like watching a horror movie in the dead of night and having all the lights go out.

“The middle brother… Wait, how did it go again?” Ranma scratched his jaw for a moment and finally shrugged. “Whatever. The gist of it is that he was pretty smart so he became the first wizard. Like his younger brother, he also taught a lot of people how to be wizards. Wizards are pretty powerful, so you’d think they’d have ruled the world at some point, but no. Here’s why.”

The boy pointed to the river surrounding them. “You see that river? Imagine that there's a spell that takes all the water flowing down, shapes it into a dragon and sends it flying towards your enemies. Pretty awesome, right? Now imagine that two wizards use that spell at the same time. What happens? There's only one river, so each spell comes out half as strong.”

“At the end of the day, wizards are secretive, selfish bastards,” Ranma spat out. “They don't teach anything to anyone and hoard all their power to themselves. The only thing they can't stand more than martial artists and gods are other wizards. That's why there's no wizard organization anywhere,” he claimed. He idly reached for the white porcelain bottle and popped the cork out.

“Those guys just can't get along. In fact, the creation of the well of souls was the only time ever that more than six wizards worked together to achieve anything. Unlike the priests, they haven't gotten weaker over the years but they haven't gotten any stronger either. As far as anyone knows, there are about ten thousand wizards and witches in the world. That's true now. It was true yesterday, a hundred years ago and three thousand years ago too.”

He shook his head in disgust and poured a clear amber liquid into the bowl.

“But enough about those losers. The oldest brother was the strongest of the three. He was also the fastest, bravest and most handsome! You've guessed it, he was a martial artist. The fundamental method that he passed down is the one you're here to learn today!” Ranma dipped his finger into the mixture and messily blended them together. “This technique is central to advanced martial arts. It's got about a thousand names, but personally, I like to call it Over-soul.”

Usagi blinked. “Like in Shaman King?”

He looked at her confusedly. “What?”

“Never mind.”

“…Normally, you have to spend a decade or so on self-reflection and actualization to grow your spirit before you can use the technique. Less if you spend most of your time around a master. Much less if your mother was spiritually strong herself. I've got good breeding, so I could use it by the time I learned to speak my name.”

He looked at her oddly then. “I don't know how, but your aura's pretty intense, so all we have to do is draw it out. Now, if we do it the usual way, you'll probably still need between three months to two years of regular meditation, depending on how honest with yourself you are. Luckily for you, I don't have that kind of patience so I'll just do it for you.”

Ranma carefully examined the mixture in the bowl and nodded decisively. “Alright, we should be–” He looked at her and stopped. “Oh. Right,” he said, and belatedly added, “Take your shirt off.”

She stared at him blankly, like he'd asked her to leap from a ledge as a joke.

Only he wasn't kidding. “Uh… Usagi?” He motioned at her slightly damp, pale pink hooded sweater and the spaghetti strap shirt she wore underneath. “Your shirt?”

Her features tightened with obvious fear, and he grimaced. “Oi, don't look at me like that Usagi,” he insisted. “I've gotta paint this stuff on very specific spots on your body if it's going to have the best effect. As your master, it's my responsibility to do whatever it takes to make you stronger. Don't take me so lightly.”

The little blonde wrapped her arms around herself and resisted the urge to scream at him. “But I'm not wearing any underwear,” she complained. Indeed, while Ranma had bought her a half-dozen outfits within days of her abduction, he'd neglected to purchase a single brassiere. Thus, taking off her shirt would leave her completely naked from the waist up.

Ranma blinked. “So?” She glared at him such that he hastened to explain himself. “I mean…” Then, he glanced down at her chest and said with incredible insolence, “It's not like you've got much to hide, right?”

She stared at him hatefully and deeply regretted her earlier decision to capitulate.

[hr]

Usagi's head dipped slowly, her drowsiness pulling her towards sweet oblivion. She slipped lower and lower, until finally she sank beneath the surface and floated in peaceful, warm limbo.

A pebble bounced off her forehead. She flinched and thrashed about until she regained her bearings.

Ranma sat calmly across from her. His throwing hand settled back down.

“Grr…” She fixed her meanest stare onto the boy and growled with utmost frustration, but that bratty jerk easily ignored her. That he didn't even bother to look at her felt like being pierced with a dozen bitter arrows, one for each pebble he'd thrown her way.

Incensed, she grabbed a handful of the smooth stones and raised her hand to throw them right back in his face.

Ranma didn't move an inch. Under the camp fire's flickering light his furrowed brow and stiff jaw lent him a certain air of menace. Her fingers loosened and the rocks fell from her hand. She wasn't the type to cause others harm anyway, she reasoned, and settled back down.

She was lying to herself. The only reason she didn't throw those rocks was because she didn't live in a universe where she could throw something and have it actually hit Ranma Saotome. With a million attempts, she would get laughed at a million times.

Usagi imagined his braying laughter echoing in her ears. She pouted and drew her blanket tightly over her shoulders.

…Really, Ranma didn't look menacing so much as he just looked constipated. “Ranma, how long is this going to take?” She asked. “You said you'd make dinner, and I'm hungry.”

“You're always hungry,” the boy retorted without looking up. He pulled his foot into his lap and idly scratched the valley between his big toe and his long toe.

Usagi wrinkled her nose. “Don't forget to wash your hands before you cook anything.”

“If you're going to be so greedy and demanding all the time then you really should learn to cook for yourself. As a girl, aren't you embarrassed?”

Usagi flushed at the jibe. She opened her mouth to retort and Ranma waved her off. “Now be quiet, I'm thinking.” She closed her eyes and growled. Ranma looked up and frowned at her. “That's not being quiet,” he complained.

“Ranma,” she enunciated slowly. “You're too slow.”

He flinched. Like he'd been shot. He leaned forwards aggressively and denied her accusation. “I am not!”

She stared at him incredulously. “It doesn't take ten minutes to pick a card!”

Her powerful argument hit him like a Mack truck, and he lurched back. “Of course not,” he agreed, unable to deny such an obvious statement.

“Then come on, already!”

He tensed for a moment, and she knew he was trying to find a way out of this. Ultimately, he gritted out, “Fine. Hold them out.”

Usagi groaned and lowered her head. “Ranma, why can't you just—”

“Hold them out,” he repeated. “Failure to comply will result in your automatic and immediate loss!”

Usagi sighed in frustration, but she'd be damned if she forfeited this stupid game at this stage because of laziness.

Two bicycle brand, plastic playing cards were laid face down on the grass before her. She reached out of her blanket and picked them up. The eight of clubs and the queen of hearts stared back at her.

Sighing again, she shuffled the cards around repeatedly and stopped with the queen of hearts on the right over the eight of clubs. She held both cards in hand and held her hand out.

Ranma wasn't looking. She frowned. “Ran—” Their camp fire whooshed as the flame surged and her breath seeped out of her chest like a balloon the day after the party.

Ranma raised his head and glared at the cards in her hand, his hair billowing under a sudden draft. His blue eyes examined each card unwaveringly, then he looked up and stared her down. She couldn't match his intensity and looked away.

Finally, he reached out and picked out a card from her trembling hand. He flipped it around, and found the old maid staring back at him.

“Damn it!” He cursed.

Their camp fire dimmed back to normal, and Usagi took a deep breath. “That's cheating…” she mumbled, pouting.

Ranma wasn't listening, as he was busy shuffling his hand around. He placed both cards face down on the grass, and then his hands blurred out of sight. Colors blended together to the point where she could no longer distinguish the cards amongst all the movement.

Ten seconds passed, and she debated telling him that his efforts were complete overkill. Last time she tried, he'd continued for a whole minute, convinced that she'd been trying to fool him. She sighed.

A short time later, she found a pair of cards held out before her face. Ranma bore a fierce expression, like a man about to wrestle a 300 pound alligator. “Heh! I'd like to see you try and guess—”

Usagi reached out and picked out the left card. She flipped it. It was the eight of spades.

Ranma looked at her, completely stunned. A grin bloomed on her face.

She paired her cards and dropped them onto the pile together. “I win!” She crowed. A euphoric feeling overwhelmed her as this marathon game of Old Maid came to its merciful end, and she broke out in an uncontrolled giggle fit.

Ranma stared at the lonely queen of hearts and shook his head. “What the hell happened? Where did I go wrong?”

Still grinning, she looked at him hopefully. “Hey, hey Ranma, now that the game is over, why don't you get started on dinner?”

His head snapped up. Brows furrowed, eyes narrowed, he was the picture of unnecessary determination. “I want a rematch!”

Usagi pulled her blanket tighter around her. “No!” she cried.

Ranma scrambled towards her and planted his face about a foot away from hers. He looked at her with wide, inviting eyes. “Usagi! Come on,” he pleaded. “I was right there! Give me the chance to correct my mistakes. To avenge my loss. You have to give me a rematch.”

“I'm too hungry to play.”

Ranma frowned and leaned back. He crossed his arms. “You know, I don't get it. Why am I always the one that has to cook for you?”

She blinked. “I don't know how?”

“Once upon a time, you didn't know how to walk either,” he shot back. “You still aren't very good at it, but that doesn't stop you from doing just enough to get you to point B. How are you supposed to learn how to cook if you never even try? And another thing, the laundry—”

Usagi's eyes widened. This conversation was approaching dangerous territory! She had to pull out! “How are you supposed to attract a husband if you don't cook?” she blurted out.

Ranma blinked. “What?”

“You're the old maid,” she said. “Um… You have to prove that you'd be a good wife now. It's the punishment for losing the game.”

Ranma narrowed his eyes. “Oh, really?”

She nodded. Twice.

He snorted and stood up. “I'll remember that. I don't want to hear any complaints when I win.”

Usagi shivered at his tone of voice. Now, she had no choice. She to play every single game of Old Maid as if her life depended on it. Or, alternatively, never play the game again.

Ranma rummaged through his pack and pulled out a pot, a foldable steel grate, bottles of spices and hermetically sealed plastic bags filled with portions of rice and vegetables. He spent another minute with his head buried in his bag, searching for something.

“Hey, Usagi, what happened to the leftover—” He looked at her and she immediately turned her head away.

“You ate that? All of it?”

She took a glance at his expression, saw his naked shock and blushed like a nun in a translucent dress. “Sorry,” she muttered abashedly.

“When did you even– How did I not notice?”

Usagi smiled weakly. “You're a pretty deep sleeper, Ranma.”

Ranma slowly stood up, shook his head and trod off into the woods. “I can't believe this. I'm going to have to start sleeping with one eye open.”

She raised her head. “Eh? Where are you going?”

“There's a river pretty close by. I'm pretty sure I could catch a fish or a rabbit or something. I feel like eating meat and apparently we're out.”

She scrambled for something to say. “I-in the dark?”

“It's fine,” he assured her. “The moon's out.” With that, he leapt into the darkness and with the sound of rustling leaves, he disappeared.

Her hand hung in the air, having reached out for the boy reflexively. She slowly pulled it back.

“Dummy,” she muttered.

[hr]

Weight shifted. A branch groaned in protest. The heavy man it supported froze anxiously.

The sound jumped out towards the young Saotome, but fell beneath his notice. The young boy left his camp site at a run, and took to the trees once ensconced by the darkness. He passed by the man at lurid speeds, cutting across the forest canopy like a shinobi of legend, avoiding the hidden man by scant feet.

The man turned to follow Ranma's passage, and kept watch long after he was gone. Eventually, the man closed his eyes and passed a rugged hand over his bald head.

“What fresh hell is this?” Genma Saotome whispered.

Nervous energy tumbled through his body and with the ease of long practice, he held himself still, took a deep breath and thought over the matter. Gradually, his eyes turned towards the young blonde sitting alone by the camp fire.

His eyes narrowed. “Hmph…”

Resolute, he leapt off of the sturdy tree branch. His hefty body flew through branches and leaves and yet he brushed past them like the wind. Halfway through, he determined that his arc was short, so he bent into a roll. As he approached the ground, he straightened and extended his right leg.

His right foot touched the ground like a swan landing on a lake's surface.

The girl didn't react. She stared at a scattered set of cards with an elaborate pout on her face. Combined with her impractical twintails with oxhorns hairdo, the effect was almost unbearably cute.

He crossed his arms and frowned angrily. “Oi, girl!”

The girl's head jerked up. She took one look at him and started screaming.

He stared at her silently, even as she scrambled back and got tangled up in her blanket, even as she struggled and tore herself free and crawled ineffectively away, even as she hit a tree trunk and wrapped her arms around it, gasping for breath.

“Are you done?”

She shook her head, took a deep breath and shouted. “Ranma!”

Her voice exploded out of her chest and immediately hit a wall of trees in every direction. The boy would not hear her, the man estimated. Still, there was no reason to dally. He quickly closed the distance between them and knelt before her. Startled, she squeaked and closed her eyes.

“Yes, let's talk about Ranma,” the man proposed.

She opened one watery blue eye. “What?”

The girl was adorable. The man frowned harshly. “Ranma, who are you to him?” He demanded.

She reached up and wiped her eyes with her thin wrist. “You know Ranma?”

“Answer the question, girl.”

The little blonde sniffed. “H-he's my friend.”

“That's all?” He asked. He had to make sure. “You don't have any fanciful notions of marrying him or anything, do you?”

“I–” She blinked repeatedly. “What?”

He didn’t know how to interpret that reaction. Regardless, he pushed forwards. “Give up on him, girl. Ranma is already taken. I won't allow you to interfere.”

The blonde stared at him in an odd way. “Are you with Fumiko?”

The man stiffened as a burst of agitation surged up his spine. “Who the hell is Fumiko?” Where were all these girls coming from?

A whispered threat floated through the trees, soft like silk sliding down a naked blade. Tormented as he was, it nearly slipped beneath his notice. Belatedly, his body snapped to full readiness. A master was making an attempt for his life.

Don't move prematurely, he told himself. Stay calm and assess the timing–

Genma threw himself down and just barely cleared the strike zone as a rock the size of his fist zipped by and slammed into a tree trunk. The impact tore the trunk to pieces and showered him with debris.

Genma snapped his eyes shut. Splinters bounced off his cheeks and closed eyelids. The girl's screams echoed in his ears.

He breathed in, and tensed in anticipation. He couldn't feel it at all, but there would have to be–

A rising shot hit him where his chin met his neck. Long and flat, such a cudgel could only be a foot. But the angle was too sharp. His attacker was shorter than he'd expected. Recognition sparked within him. He opened his mouth to call out to his son, but his tongue was heavy and unresponsive. Despite knowing the blow would come, the power took him by surprise. He'd taken a bit of damage.

He risked opening his eyes, and got a handful of sand blown into them for his trouble. Genma squeezed his eyes shut with a muffled curse. As expected, his assailant wasn't going to let him–

A sense of peril urged him back. He leapt back blindly. A verse of muffled strikes whispered against his skin. Despite himself, he felt his skin crawl.

His right leg buckled as he landed and sent him into a skid. His knee hit the ground like a rudder. He slammed his left hand against the grass and brought his right hand up as he quickly slowed to stop.

For a second, there was stillness. Genma knelt with his left hand pressed against the ground and his right held over his head. It had drifted there naturally, to help him keep his balance. It stayed there for another reason entirely.

Genma smiled. His assailant… his son was truly a prodigy. He recognized it, after all. That right hand was a guillotine.

He cleared his throat. “Have you finally recognized me, boy?” He said, roughly.

Ranma snorted. “What makes you think I could ever mistake that bald head?”

“Oh? So have you come to take my neck?”

“That depends. Are you done scaring Usagi?”

Genma cracked his eyes open. His beautiful son stood stalwart, clearly obstructing the path to his little friend.

“Is that so?”

“It is so. She isn't one of us, old man. I can't stop Leviathan from doing what he pleases, but that doesn't mean I have to let you mess with her. Back off.”

Genma frowned. “What is she doing here?”

“Same thing I'm doing here, pretty much.”

No more needed to be said. “Ah,” Genma muttered.

The delicate blonde gently tugged on his son's pants. “Um... Ranma? What's going on?”

“It's ok, Usagi. Everything's fine. He won't bother you anymore. He was just…” Ranma trailed off and turned to look at Genma. “Hey, why were you messing with Usagi anyway?”

Genma cleared his throat. “That's not important.” The boy gave him a skeptical look and crossed his arms, but such a weak-willed attack would never make Genma Saotome flinch. The hefty man climbed to his feet and felt a few twinges as he stretched his neck. Grimacing, he massaged the sore muscle. “Your assassin arts have gotten dangerous, boy.”

Ranma snorted. “It was a waste of time.” Genma gave him a curious look, and the boy frowned. “Assassins kill men. Powerful men, wise men, protected men, exceptional and ordinary men, all fall within the purview of the art of murder. But no matter how far I take it, those skills won't reach Akuma. One does not murder Leviathan. One slays him.”

“Akuma is just a man, Ranma,” Genma asserted, not for the first time.

“Maybe that was true once,” his son replied. “But how far is too far? How twisted is too twisted? When does sand become rock? When does rock become mountain? I draw the line father. I look at him and know that he has gone too far, that he has become too twisted. Akuma is no man. Any definition that includes him is one I reject!”

Genma scoffed. “Bah! When did you become so obstinate and gloomy, boy?”

The boy's frown grew more severe. “Leviathan's shadow covers everything. Beneath him, none can see the sun. And if I weren't obstinate I'd be a corpse.”

His eyebrow twitched. “Do you have to have an answer for everything?”

Ranma's expression softened just a bit. His lips curved to form the smallest smirk. “Yes.”

Genma huffed and crossed his arms. That was truly worrisome. The darkness in his son's heart had only grown since their last meeting. His greatest fear was that his son would become too twisted by this experience to re-enter society after Akuma was dealt with. Even an exchange with his own father only managed to improve his mood from grim to dour.

He needed to find a solution, quickly–

“Ranma?” The girl questioned.

His son turned to face the girl. “Yeah? What's up?”

The girl shyly turned to look at him. “You know that man?”

“Of course I do. He's my–” Ranma snapped his fingers. “Oh yeah! I never introduced you!”

The blonde pouted. “Mou, Ranma. Stop stalling. It's really annoying. Just tell me already.”

“Fine, fine.” With that, Ranma turned back.

Genma's eyebrows rose in surprise. His boy's face was clear. Like storm clouds disappearing without the slightest downpour.

Ranma clapped his hands. “Okay! Usagi, here stands a man of unparalleled senses. Both hefty and swift, he bears the fortitude and speed needed to withstand the greatest of blows and escape with both life and limb. At forty-one years of age and over three hundred pounds—”

“Oi!”

“The survivor of nine consecutive bouts with Akuma! His motto is ‘live to fight another day!’ The invincible cockroach—”

“Boy!”

“Genma Saotome!”

Silence fell upon them after that incredibly unflattering grand reveal. Ranma turned to look at his friend, awaiting her reaction. Her head was bent, and she mouthed Genma's name. She looked up and blinked at the boy a few times. “Is he your uncle?”

Genma scoffed, unimpressed. His son stared at her, stunned. “What? No. He's my dad.”

Her face slackened with shock. She sat up. “Wait… Akuma adopted you?”

Ranma opened his mouth, said nothing, and turned his head pensively. “Well, I guess you could call it that. But most people would consider it kidnapping.”

“Really?”

Ranma looked at her, surprised. “I never told you?”

Usagi shook her head quietly. “I thought he was your dad.”

The boy grimaced. “How could you think that? I don't look anything like him.”

Usagi surreptitiously looked at the boy's biological father. Genma huffed and crossed his arms. “Ranma looks a lot like Nodoka.”

The girl nodded, satisfied by the explanation, but Ranma turned to him with a questioning look on his face.

“Who's she?”

Genma felt his heart stutter. “Boy, have you forgotten your mother's name? Never let her hear such a thing. It would break her heart.”

His son's eyes widened. “I have a mother?”

Genma stared at Ranma. “Of course you have a mother, boy. How do you think you came into this world?” He frowned. “I don't have to explain the difference between boys and girls to you, do I?”

The boy shook his head wildly. “No, it's just–” He stopped with his tongue tied. “She's alive?” He whispered.

Genma sighed heavily. So many years wasted. “Yes, son. Your mother is alive and well.”

Ranma stared at the campfire, shaken. His little friend, all bundled up in a blanket, looked at him with misty eyes. She shifted, and Genma instantly intuited that she wanted to give his boy a hug.

He cleared his throat harshly. The two started and turned to face him. Genma casually crossed his arms, and hummed thoughtfully. “Tell me boy, what do you remember of that time seven years ago?”

[hr]

In the middle of the wilderness, a pheasant speared on a stick cooked slowly over an abandoned campfire. The succulent smell of searing meat spread out into the woods, tickling the nostrils of local wildlife and opportunists alike.

A heavyset man snuck into the clearing, his spectacled eyes fixed onto the prize. His stomach trembled silently, commanding him to appease it post-haste. He offered no resistance, no misgivings. This man had long since given in to his baser desires. He reached the campfire without incident and reached for the buried stick.

Above him, a shadowed man fell like the executioner’s blade. His calloused foot slammed into the center of the flames with the force of a howitzer shell. The campfire disintegrated instantly into a cloud of dirt and ash, plunging the small clearing into a silver edged gloom.

The wind picked up and viciously swept through the clearing. The dust cloud was torn apart in seconds.

Scattered splinters burned and scorched eagerly, licking at the killer’s naked feet. He straightened to his full height, scowling. Across the clearing, the thief squatted unharmed.

The two men swiftly assessed one another. One saw a scoundrel; the other a killer. The scoundrel’s white bandana fluttered in concert with the breeze’s ebbs and flows while the killer’s stark white hair fended it off with the strength of a hundred year old redwood.

The scoundrel adjusted his round glasses. “It takes a special kind of man to throw a killing strike without warning.”

The killer grunted and crossed his arms just below the thick prayer beads around his neck. “Why would any man warn the worm he finds writhing in his dinner?”

The scoundrel quickly surveyed the entire clearing, frowning. “What exactly are you doing here? If this is really your camp, then where are your supplies? Or have you none? Someone like you… Who are you running from?”

In the wake of that accusation, the air thickened such that the wind sputtered and died. The trees trembled.

The scoundrel remained motionless as the forest screamed in creaks and groans. He kept his composure even as their cries rose in a crescendo, spiralling towards an uncertain climax.

Finally, a rupture. The crack pierced through the clearing from its ceiling. A thick branch plummeted with a cacophony of rustling leaves and breaking twigs, and slammed into the ground. The clearing settled into silence.

“I run from no one,” the killer insisted.

The scoundrel cleared his throat, his skin glistening with sweat. “I see.” He climbed to his feet, despite wobbly knees. “I’ve taken up enough of your time. I think I’ll take my leave,” he said, and turned away.

His third step flowed into a low somersault. The air parted above him.

His instincts screamed, demanding distance. He strained his ears, hoping to catch the sound of a master's feet gently brushing the blades of grass. He needn’t have bothered. The killer landed with an insistent stomp, demonstrating all the grace of a beached whale.

His back against the ground, the scoundrel used his four limbs to launch himself away at a low angle. As his momentum waned, he kicked off of the ground, deftly twisted his hips and landed on the tips of his right foot’s toes.

Thirty feet away, the killer knelt on torn soil facing the clearing wall. On his back, the kanji for heaven wavered like an ominous mirage.

The scoundrel raised his hand. “I don’t want to fight you.”

“Then this won’t be much of a fight.”

[hr]

A little stomach growled.

Little Ranma Saotome echoed it. “Be quiet,” he hissed at his own midsection. In clear defiance of his wishes, it gurgled back at him.

The child glared and raised his fist threateningly. “What? You think I’m afraid to punish you? I’ll punch you right out of my belly if it’ll shut you up! I’m the boss here! You think I need you? My kidney’s been looking to take your spot for years!”

His digestive system quieted.

The boy nodded resolutely. “Good,” he said threateningly then collapsed back onto his bedroll.

He listened to the crackling sound of their campfire burning to ash, to thousands of leaves rubbing against one another as they shifted along the wind, to his bedroll rubbing against the grass as he shifted incessantly.

But mostly, he listened to the sound of his father not coming back with dinner.

Ranma groaned and curled up into the fetal position. “I’m going to starve to death,” he muttered. “I wish dad was here…”

The camp fire cracked loudly, as if in agreement.

Ranma turned to it. “Right? I mean, he doesn’t need both of his legs, does he?”

The flames rose up noticeably higher.

Ranma nodded. “Yeah! He could get a prothet— a prostet… a fake leg! Or, or maybe I won’t have to take all of it off. Yeah, I could just take a small piece! It’ll grow back, right?” Ranma asked the camp fire.

The flames dimmed a bit.

Ranma’s shoulders slumped. “Yeah, you’re right. I couldn’t catch him anyway.”

Sighing, he lay back down and stared at the moon. It was exceptionally bright that night. Beautiful and mysterious, it floated all alone. Without peer.

“I wonder if he’s alright,” the boy murmured.

The moon shined brightly.

His eyes snapped wide open. He sat up and stared into the fire. “You don’t think he found a buffet and is so busy stuffing his face that he forgot about me, do you?”

The flames danced wildly.

Ranma scowled. “Damn it, old man,” he muttered. Without a moment’s hesitation, the boy shot to his feet and promptly ran into the darkness.

Minutes later, he jogged back into the clearing. With a scowl still on his face, he packed up their supplies, hid his and his father’s packs twenty feet up a tree and threw dirt onto their campfire until it was extinguished.

His tasks complete, he dusted his hands off. “Alright, old man. Here I come. You’d better have saved some for me.”

[hr]

The air parted with a shrill scream. An old tree’s thickest bough exploded as though hit by a bolt of lightning. The thick limb hit the ground with a thunderous crash.

A single strike split a boulder in half. Shrapnel flew and bounced off of the killer’s leathery skin harmlessly. His next strike split the earth, leaving a ditch large enough for a man to fall in.

The one that followed parted the waters of a river, granting the surrounding foliage a short lived shower.

He was more cyclone than man. His attack carved through everything in its path.

On the other side of the river, Genma Saotome adjusted his round eyeglasses, perfectly unharmed. “How far are you going to chase me?”

“You’re still alive. Impressive.” A toothy smile twisted the killer’s face.

Genma grimaced. “From your spirit, to your art, to your face… everything about you is ugly.”

The killer laughed, a deep sound that spoke of nothing but deadly promise. “Such a bold tongue. I will enjoy tearing it out!”

“Oh? So I’ve graduated from worm? Am I finally a man now, or maybe a dog?”

“No more than a rat.”

The two men eyed one another. The rushing sound of the river carried the conversation forward.

“Why are you here?” Genma asked.

“Your head. I want it,” replied the killer.

“You’re well versed in an assassin’s art. Who hired you?”

The killer’s lips tilted up. “I am not for sale.”

Genma examined the other man for a minute. He nodded slowly. “I believe that. There is nothing of stealth in you, nor one ounce of grace. You’re no assassin. You’re more of a butcher.”

“Stealth? Grace? Pah.” The killer spat on the grass. “What need is there to hide from prey? What need is there to spare the earth beneath my feet from the burden of my weight? Let prey struggle to escape! Let the earth bear the marks of my passage! You call me a butcher, but a butcher is only recognized as such by his peers. To livestock, he may as well be a god!”

Genma adjusted his glasses. “Is that so?”

The killer crossed his arms. “It is so, rat!”

“Well then, what would one such as you call yourself?”

“One such as me?” The killer snorted. “Is there such a thing? I stand alone. I am the strongest. I am Akuma.”

“I’ve never heard of you.”

Akuma’s eyes flashed with red light. “I see. Would you like to see my credentials?”

Akuma exhaled like a bull and settled into a defensive stance, his knees bent and ready to absorb forward impact. His thick, calloused hands gathered at his side, cradling empty space.

For a moment, they stared at one another. Genma’s brows burrowed in confusion. “What are you—” His tongue numbed suddenly, and the rest of his sentence was completely unintelligible. He pawed at his jaw, but felt something wrong with his hands. He brought them before his eyes.

They trembled softly, soaked in cold sweat.

The killer spoke one word.

“Messatsu—”

Akuma’s gi swelled and billowed. His thick, wooden prayer beads floated around his neck like gossamer threads.

On the lead bar to sponge spiritual scale, Genma Saotome was a brick. But as he stared into Akuma’s red eyes, his mind briefly achieved empathy.

Genma gasped for a breath that would not come and fell to a knee. He quickly closed himself off to spiritual pollution, but the damage was done. His body shook. His nerves were shot.

Whatever was on the other side of that river could not be called a man.

Embers glowed behind Akuma’s eyes. His rage was manifest, and stained the air with crimson. Thin clouds of red miasma flowed off of him and rose up into the darkness.

The space between his hands filled with a shining mass of churning lilac light. His thick hands shifted and swayed under the force, like the lid on top of a boiling pot.

Genma’s heart stopped at the sight. A compressed ki blast. He quickly estimated the energy contained within the attack as well as the strength Akuma would need to keep it contained and realized that that madman intended no such thing—

His round eyeglasses cracked.

“—Gou Hadou!”

Akuma thrust his hands forwards, and unleashed desolation.

[hr]

Blinding light disrupted Ranma as he rushed through the forest. He immediately tried to stop, but his feet failed to get much traction on the slick grass. He skid and slammed into a tree trunk. “Oof!”

His breath knocked out of him, the child slumped to the ground and leaned against the trunk, gasping for breath. “Ow…”

Idly rubbing his chest, Ranma turned his attention to what had distracted him in the first place. Down the cliff and off into the distance, a shaft of lilac light carved a path through the forest. The trees in the path of that light were toppled as fierce winds pushed the surrounding trees to and fro.

The first of the toppled trees slammed into the ground and the sound carried off into the entire valley. It was a signal. As hundreds of trees fell to their final resting place, hundreds of thousands of birds took off into the air, abandoning their nests to make their escape. Their wails pierced the sky.

Ranma slammed his small hands over his ears and screamed as though his voice could push back the cacophony. The sound was unlike anything he’d ever experienced. It was so loud he couldn’t hear himself think.

The birds passed overhead, obscuring the moonlight. With the moon hidden, the lilac glow dominated everything, seemingly staining everything in the world with its essence.

It was strange. It was terrifying.

It was absolutely amazing.

“Wow,” Ranma whispered, his eyes wide open.

Idly, he wondered where his father was.

[hr]

Akuma stood atop a fresh scar, a newborn wasteland. The earth cooked and steamed beneath the hardened soles of his feet. Fires burned wantonly. Scattered puddles boiled. Underground vapors mixed with wood smoke to form a truly toxic cocktail.

The life in this valley would lick its wounds for years to come, and perhaps it would never fully heal.

His lips tilted up. The scene was almost perfect. The only thing that could have made it better was that rat’s charred corpse on display.

“Such senseless destruction,” the rodent said, wearily.

The voice came from his left, but only empty space greeted him when he turned to look. He didn’t bother looking elsewhere. He trusted his senses.

His red eyes narrowed. “An invisibility technique? If you had only taken the opportunity to attack, perhaps I would have been impressed. Your arrogance will be your undoing.”

The thief’s disembodied voice responded with a snort. “I must thank you for the demonstration. Your might is as a mountain, Akuma. Its peak is the tallest I’ve seen yet, maybe even the tallest in the entire world. But a clever man doesn’t climb to the top when he finds such an obstacle in his path. He goes around.”

Akuma’s fists clenched. “Even with such a powerful technique, you would run?”

The volume of the disembodied voice lowered gradually. “I’m no assassin, butcher. I’m a petty thief. Once I’ve taken what I want, I make my escape. If my prize is destroyed, then there is no reason for me to stay.”

“Coward!” Akuma roared.

The coward did not respond.

The hunt was over, Akuma realized. And for the first time in over fifty years, his blood lust was left wholly unsatisfied. This could not stand.

His fists trembled. His jaw clenched tightly. He took a single stomping step forward and stopped. Uncertainty struck him stronger than any blow he’d felt in the last decade. How could he possibly give chase? For such a large man, the thief moved like a butterfly in flight. And even if he’d left tracks to follow, how was he going to follow them in the middle of the night?

He ground his teeth together as what was perhaps the single greatest challenge to come his way in the past decade slipped through his fingers: a master martial artist with the body of a heavyweight boxer, the skill set of an assassin and the mindset of a thief. Such an interesting puzzle, and it had just passed him by.

The thief wouldn’t get away, he promised. No matter how long it took, he would find—

Akuma realized that he didn’t even know the man’s name.

His hopes died and his hatred surged. Something needed to die, quickly. His entire body burned like a furnace. His maw gaped open and white vapor trailed out. His eyes sought out his surroundings and noted the ecosystem that had escaped his little demonstration.

Senseless destruction, was it? By the time he was finished, this entire valley would be nothing more than—

“Excuse me, mister?” A boy stood next him, eying him inquisitively. “What happened here?”

Akuma stared back. The child was certainly young, though Akuma couldn’t make an educated estimate of the boy’s age. He walked barefoot, wore a dirty white gi with a green belt and sported a messy pigtail. His features looked to be of traditional Japanese descent, save for his blue eyes.

The child cocked his head. “Mister?”

Akuma raised a bushy white eyebrow. “Where did you come from, child?”

The boy blinked. “Eh? I walked from over there,” he said, and pointed towards somewhere off into the distance.

Akuma didn’t bother to look where. Dark thoughts coagulated and suddenly the boy’s origin didn’t matter anymore.

“Where is your father child?”

“I don’t know,” the boy admitted. “He went off looking for dinner hours ago. Did he pass through here? He’s got a gi like mine, only with a black belt, a bandana and round glasses. Oh, and he’s pretty big,” the boy described, spreading his arms as far as he could.

Akuma hummed. “What is your father’s name?”

“Genma Saotome,” the boy answered easily. “I’m Ranma.”

Akuma examined Ranma’s features thoughtfully. “You must take after your mother.”

The boy looked down. “Um, maybe? I don’t know.”

A cold wind passed through the valley, intensifying the flames.

Ranma shivered, and held onto his elbows.

“Child, if you would curse your fate, curse that you share your father’s blood.”

“Eh?” The boy looked up.

Akuma’s knife hand slammed into Ranma’s neck. The child’s body slammed into the ground and bounced off, flinging him into the air like a ragdoll. His remains hit the ground with a thump.

Akuma crossed his arms and chuckled under his breath. “Even thieves crave revenge, Genma Saotome,” Akuma said. “If you would avenge your son’s death, then come after me. This is a climb you will not avoid, thief.”

His work here was done. He left, his heavy footsteps leaving clear prints in the dirt. The wind flew past him, carrying a slight shuffling sound. He stopped walking.

“Ow…”

Akuma slowly craned his neck around to see Ranma climb onto his hands and knees. His face was covered in dirt and smeared with blood, but his eyes were opened wide.

Akuma did not speak, did not move, did not blink.

The child woozily shook his head. “That hurt. What was that for, you jerk?”

Akuma turned to face the Ranma fully. “How old are you, child?”

Ranma blinked, and promptly lost his frown. The boy proceeded to count on stubby fingers. “I’m six.”

“And how long have you been taught martial arts?”

Ranma tilted his head. “I dunno. Dad’s always been teaching me how to fight.” The boy grimaced and poked at his neck, wincing. “Ow… Were we sparring or something? I can’t…”

Akuma hummed. “Why do you fight, boy?”

Ranma wiped his face with his sleeve. “Dad says I have to inherit the schools—”

“I don’t want to know why your father is teaching you.” Akuma interrupted. “I asked ‘Why do you fight?’”

They stared at one another in silence.

“I don’t get it.”

Akuma glared at the boy. The boy scratched his nose, unconcerned.

“When will you stop fighting?”

Ranma shrugged. “I don’t know.”

The boy’s uncaring facial expression almost earned him a swift death. Akuma carefully unclenched his fists. “…A dream. Do you have one?”

Ranma squared up to Akuma and said, quite seriously, “I’m going to be the best that ever was.”

“Is that so?”

Ranma nodded. “I’m going to be so great, that everyone, everywhere, will know my name. There’ll be movies about me, and a line of action figures, so that other kids will have an easier time imagining how great it would be to be me. I’ll have my own theme song, and they’ll build a huge statue of me right outside the royal palace!”

Akuma burst out laughing.

Ranma growled and jumped to his feet. “Hey! What’s so funny? I will be the best, you’ll see!”

Akuma did not stop. His laughter swelled and deepened until his barrel of a chest jumped with each cackle.

Ranma tilted his head. “Um… Are you okay?”

“Such a noble goal, Ranma Saotome!” Akuma exclaimed. “All these years I’ve wasted looking for the perfect challenge… perhaps it’s time I try my hand at growing one.”

Akuma’s stare burned. “Come with me, boy.”

The boy hesitated. “I don’t think I’m supposed to, Mister. Dad always tells me when he’s leaving me to learn from other masters.”

Akuma shook his head. “Your father cannot help you today, Ranma Saotome. Now come, and I will lead you to greatness.”

Ranma took a few steps back. “I can find it myself, thanks.”

The killer’s grin grew wide. “Such spirit. You’ll be perfect, child.”

“Um, thanks but no thanks?”

“Stand still, child. Save yourself the pain resistance will bring.”

A rattled voice emerged from the darkness. “Ranma! Get some cover!”

The child brightened up. “Dad!”

Akuma didn’t take his eyes off of the boy. “Do you take me for a fool? Do you think I will simply let you run—”

The breeze whispered a warning that he did not heed. An instant later, a fist crashed into the back of his neck. The force propelled him forwards and threatened to tip him over, but he slammed his foot into the ground and rode the momentum to a stop.

Akuma flexed his shoulder muscles and cracked his neck. A thought occurred to him, and he laughed. “You chose your path well, thief. You would make a terrible assassin.” He straightened to his full height and stared into the empty space surrounding him. The small child watching him fell beneath his notice.

His blood simmered. His thick skin tightened as he bared his teeth. “You should have pressed the advantage!”

The demon known as Akuma raised his hands and—

 

[lokinishizaki]

“Stop, stop, stop!” Ranma yelled suddenly.

The abrupt interruption startled Usagi, and she flinched. Her sudden recoil dislodged her bowl of rice just slightly. She felt it slip, fumbled it, panicked, badly overcompensated and sent the bowl flying into the air, grains of rice spreading out like buckshot.

Ranma's hand reached out and hung in the air long enough for the half-full bowl to land in his palm, like a softball thrown to a five year old.

His father's hand snapped out successively. In short order, a tightly packed rice ball formed between his chopsticks. He moved to deposit the ball in his mouth.

“Hey,” Ranma complained. He held out Usagi's wooden bowl and jiggled it meaningfully. Genma snorted and dropped the rice into her bowl.

Ranma stared at his father and pushed the bowl into her hands. “Don't waste food, Usagi,” he admonished her with only half a mind.

Neither of the Saotomes looked in her direction but she burned with embarrassment anyway. “Um.” She nodded sharply, cursing her clumsiness all the while.

Ranma's father crossed his arms. “Are you done interrupting me, boy? I wasn't finished.”

Ranma leered at his father. “Are you serious? We know how that story ends. It ends with you getting your ass kicked and me getting to spend seven years getting crushed underneath Leviathan's absurd weight.”

Genma's brows furrowed like a man in a brand new suit, caught outside in a sudden downpour. “Boy…” The father drew the word out, clearly warning his son.

The son leapt to his feet and looked down on his father with an ugly scowl. “You mean to tell me that this all happened because you were too lazy to hunt your own food?”

Genma flipped to his feet, completely outraged. “How could you be so ungrateful, boy? Don't you know what I've had to go through for you? The sacrifices I've had to make? The hardships I've had to suffer through?”

The look on Ranma's face was one of complete incredulity, and Usagi knew that that had been the exact wrong thing to say. “You– you think I'm ungrateful? Oh, I'm grateful alright. Let me show you just how grateful I am!”

Ranma's leading punch smacked his father dead in the face, but Genma rolled with it and grasped his son by the shoulders. With a firm grip on the boy's shirt, he lifted Ranma over his head and slammed him down back first into the ground.

Ranma aimed to quickly get back to his feet, but he noticed his father's girth angling down towards him. “Eh? W–wait!”

“Let's see if you've been keeping up with your grappling, boy!” Genma exclaimed as he fell upon his son.

“G-gya! Get off me you fat walrus!”

“Every inch of me is muscle, you ingrate!”

Usagi blinked slowly as Ranma and his father rolled around in the dirt, shouting boisterously and deliberately hurting one another, both verbally and physically. It was odd. Even though he was losing badly and even though it looked painful, she got the feeling that Ranma was happier now than he'd been the entire time she'd known him.

He was fighting with the entirety of his heart, but it was different from when he'd fought Akuma or Takamura or those yakuza. It was light-hearted, almost like a game. Though it seemed excessively violent to her, it did remind her of her struggles with her little brother. And that thought was quickly followed by thoughts of the rest of her family.

“I wonder if they're okay,” she whispered. Maybe they could afford to make a call the next time they were in a city? Just so they would know not to worry…

“Usagi,” Ranma yelled as his father pressed a knee down on his back. “Help! He's too fat! I can't shake him off!”

“I'm too strong boy,” Genma corrected. “Say it properly!”

[hr]

He stayed with them until morning, just to make sure there weren't any shenanigans, but he hadn't planned on staying even this long.

“Eh? You're leaving?” The little blonde, Usagi, asked. The boy wasn't surprised, of course. He knew what to expect.

That's why, when Genma held his hand out, he quickly received a leather-bound book. He ignored the girl's curious look and quickly skimmed through the pages, nodding absently.

He stopped, and flipped through the rest of the book carefully. He frowned. The last quarter of the book was blank. “Ranma.”

The boy threw out excuses like uppercuts. “Look, I've been busy, okay? What with Usagi and everything–and it's not like it's easy to find the time with Akuma anyway–ow!”

Genma dropped his hand, scowling. “I will not have my boy grow up a dunce. Complete your exercises boy.”

Ranma rubbed the back of his head and stared at the floor. “Fine.”

Usagi stared at them confusedly and Genma decided to explain, if only to get that adorable expression off of her face. “Under the circumstances, Ranma can't go to school like other children his age, but if I let him get too far back then he won't be able to rejoin his peers when I finally take care of this problem. So, being the caring father that I am, I kindly prepare a one of a kind hand-written volume filled with part of the information he needs to at least keep up with other kids. Speaking of…”

Ranma sighed as Genma reached into his backpack's side pouch and pulled out another leather-bound tome. “This should hold you over for the next year. If we don't meet within the next fifteen months, I'll leave the next one in the usual place.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Ranma muttered as he grabbed both books and walked to his pack.

“If the information you need to complete the exercise isn't in the book, then I'm expecting you to find it elsewhere. I don't care if you have to sneak into a school and steal some teacher's books. 'I don't know' isn't an answer.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know already!”

“I hope you do, boy.” Genma shook his head. “Do you know where he went?”

Ranma snorted. “No more than I ever do. Might be near Okinawa. Might not.”

That was it then. It was time to go, but…

The girl. He had to do something. As it stood, the situation was extremely dangerous. She stumbled around the camp in pink pyjamas with a dopey look on her face and quietly nagged his boy for breakfast. It was adorable. It made him sick to his stomach.

He hadn't wanted to do this so soon, but he had little choice. “Ranma. I've got something for you.”

The boy looked up, with a curious look on his face. “What is it?”

Genma sat, cross legged and motioned for his son to come closer. The boy did so with excruciating slowness, but Genma did not rise to the bait, nor did he look away from his son.

When Ranma was within arm’s length, Genma nodded and said, “Kneel.”

The boy fell down to one knee, and his father frowned. “Properly boy,” he instructed.

Ranma fell into the traditional seiza with a small grimace.

Genma cleared his throat. “You fought Master Takamura.”

“I did.”

“You made a lot of noise, boy. You've never dared to fight a Master in public before,” Genma commented.

Ranma winced. “I know. But I didn't have the time to do the usual.”

Genma scowled and his son looked away. “Boy, how many times do I have to tell you to leave Akuma to me?”

“Just once, if you'd speak with your fists,” Ranma retorted.

“You'll eat those words soon enough.”

“I look forward to it.”

Genma matched his son's challenging eyes and nodded to himself. Yes, he was suitable. More so than he had ever imagined. His mind clear of doubt, he reached deep into his pack, pulled out Ranma's prize and presented it with both hands.

“Here, son. You've earned it.”

Ranma's eyes widened. He looked up at him, speechless. Genma nodded encouragingly and carefully memorized the look on his son's face. Ranma swallowed a surge of emotion and gingerly reached out and grasped the bundled black cloth out of his father's hands.

“I, Master Genma Saotome, hereby welcome Master Ranma Saotome, second generation master of the Saotome school of Anything Goes martial arts.” He smiled kindly. “I'm proud of you, son.”

Ranma carefully unfolded the black belt and marvelled at its golden trim. A finger gently traced the length of the ceremonial garment. Ranma shook his head in disbelief.

“I can't believe it,” he whispered. He looked up at his father and asked, “W-what do I do now?”

Genma smiled. “You do what every other Master does, son. You take a student,” he declared. And when the boy's head shot up in surprise, Genma nodded meaningfully towards his little friend.

“Eh?” The two children exclaimed in sync. Genma frowned harshly at the display of coordination. Yes, this was indeed the correct path.

Genma cleared his throat relaxed his expression. “Yes. It's perfect. The girl is trapped here with you, but she can't keep up with your pace. You won't be able to protect her forever, and carrying her dead weight will eventually tire even you. It's best that you teach her so that she can one day learn to protect herself.”

The girl's hand shot up, drawing at attention to herself. “Um... But–”

“Don't complain, girl,” he interrupted. “You're getting prime instruction free of charge. For someone who wasn't born to the heritage, getting personal attention from a Master is impossible. Be thankful.”

The girl slowly lowered her hand, chastised. Genma turned back to his son, but the boy had his eyes on the girl.

“Hey. It's not that bad, is it? Don't you want to learn how to be awesome?”

“Yes... But–” Her voice lowered to a whisper, as she revealed a secret shame. “I don't think I'll be any good.”

“Nonsense!” Ranma declared. “Talent doesn't have anything to do with this!”

The little blonde looked up hopefully. “You really think so? You think I can achieve great things with nothing but sweat, tears and bloody-minded effort? Like in–”

“No,” Ranma interrupted. “Sorry, I meant to say ‘your’ talent doesn't have anything to do with this. With me as your teacher, how could you possibly fail?”

The girl pouted cutely, but his son continued to needle her, undaunted. It was only a matter of time until the girl's resolve crumbled and she bit the bullet, and then Genma's plan will be complete.

By and large, martial arts training was difficult and often cruel. A pampered city girl wouldn't last more than minutes. Before the month ends, either the girl will grow to resent the boy or the boy will lose respect for the girl.

So, Genma smiled, secure in the knowledge that he'd prevented any potential tomfoolery.

Yes. He'd lost many dreams over the years, but his son's arranged marriage with one of Tendo Soun's daughters was one he held close to his heart. The sister schools of Anything Goes will be united.

No matter what.

[hr]

His fingers trailed a line between her shoulder blades, spreading thick paste along the way. She shivered and arched her back, but he followed her movements perfectly, and completed the motion without fault.

“This is something I learned how to do in India,” he commented as he dipped his fingers into the bowl and gathered more salve on the tip of his fingers. “The guru that showed it to me said it would reveal the deepest corners of my heart, but as it turns out, I'd already been there. The guy wasn't a martial artist, so he couldn't have known. Still, even though it was pretty much a waste of time, I did learn a pretty convenient short-cut out of the deal. Turn around,” he told her.

After an obvious moment of hesitation, she obeyed. Ranma took one look at her and rolled his eyes. “Just drop your hands. I told you you've got nothing to hide.”

Usagi felt a full body flush surge from her stomach all the way up to her blonde roots. “Shut up, Ranma! That was the deal!” she hissed. She pressed her hands tightly against her flat chest, like fleshy bra cups, and desperately clung to her modesty.

“Fine, fine.”

She bit her lip as he drew three progressively smaller circles on her body, one around her belly button, another just above her heart, and the last and smallest on her forehead. Then, he picked up a stick and stuck it into the camp fire. He manoeuvred the wood left and right, and pulled it back, balancing a single red ember on the tip.

“Alright, for this next part, I'm going to have to zone out a bit,” Ranma explained. He dropped the red ember into the bowl, grasped the bowl with both hands and held it out towards her. “Take your time, Usagi. When you're ready, breathe in as much of the smoke as you can and hold it. I'll see you on the other side,” he said, and closed his eyes.

A minute passed. She called out to him. “Um… Ranma?” He didn't answer. However, the mixture in the bowl began to bubble and spew green vapor. Her skin crawled and she leaned back.

It was ten minutes before her mind settled enough to take his instructions seriously. Another twenty passed before she gathered her nerves.

Thirty-five minutes after Ranma stopped moving, Usagi leaned into the rising cloud and took a deep breath.

 

[Deathwings]

Do you have any ideas how hard it is to comment on your fics ?! There's literally NOTHING to complain about! And even if I ask myself "what did I like most?" my only answer is "EVERYTHING"!

So in conclusion, this hit all of the right notes, please continue being an awesome author, thank you.

 

[PCHeintz72]

Do you have any ideas how hard it is to comment on your fics ?! There's literally NOTHING to complain about! And even if I ask myself "what did I like most?" my only answer is "EVERYTHING"!

So in conclusion, this hit all of the right notes, please continue being an awesome author, thank you.

I second this...

The part about the stomache reminded me of Tsukikage Ran.

The part on Ranma telling the tale of the three brothers reminded me of both the galaxy Cauldren in Sailor moon and Slayers of all things.

Maybe a bit of the upcoming Star Trek fan film Axanar as well (the 21 minute prequel trailer is astounding, I look forward to the movie).

 

[Lost Star]

Spectacular! Like it quite a lot. Thank you for writing.

 

[cyberswordsmen]

Holy crap this is great. I haven't seen a ranma fic this good in a long time.

 

[shiki]

The young colt and cute bunny portions are pure gold. Those two are just too cute.

 

[Fellow Sufferer]

Flashbacks within flashbacks... Feels like I'm watching Noir all over again.

Other than that, can't find any faults so far. Going to re-read it. First impression is 'very good' and 'want more'. Interaction between Ranma and Genma is pure gold, reminds me of the sadly discontinued 'Seven Village Stomp' by Xylix, to name the most recent, but there is the undercurrent of deeper feelings as well.

 

[Lord Raa]

We need to flashback further.

/silliness.

Still not sure that it needs to be Usagi Tsukino rather than a brand new character, but I'm enjoying this one.

 

[daniel_gudman]

Oh, Genma. Trying so hard to be a good dad, but so bad at it.

I like that Ranma interrupted the Flashback; it made it clear that Genma was telling Usagi a story, rather than just having an unsolicited reminisce to show the audience backstory.

I feel like Usagi is a really good fit for the position you're using her in; as a clumsy kid she's a good contrast to the superhuman abilities of pretty much everybody else that shows up, and her "natural goodness/ friendliness" will save Ranma from falling to the same nihilistic darkness that Akuma breathes. That is to say, as a Magical Girl, she's someone who saves Dark Magical Girls from their depression, even if Ranma would strenuously object to that comparison.

That being said, since Ranma explicitly brought supernatural powers into the story, you should address the Moon Kingdom at some point, even if it's just as unsubstantiated legends, hinting that Usagi will become "Sailor Moon" after the whole "Story of Ranma and Akuma" completes. Maaaybe Sailor V gets a cameo from when she was solo operating in London or whatever. That might be giving the plot of "Sailor Moon" more narrative weight than you want to, though.

 

[Lost Star]

The vision quest seems like a good point to introduce the SM angle. You mentioned at the beginning that you hit a dead end? What got you stuck?

 

[BukkakeNoJutsu]

This is wonderful. I'm glad to see this updated. My favorite ranma story in a while

 

[lokinishizaki]

Well, when I first posted this, progress had definitely stalled. If I had to give a name to the obstacle I encountered, I'd have to say it was my own shortcomings as a writer. Since I don't have any alpha or beta readers, besides the good people of this forum, I was basically bouncing ideas off of myself. After a while, this got problematic. My instincts as a reader interfered with my instincts as a writer.

At the time, I had about 35k words written out, and I had written them in chronological order. Only, when I read them in that order, I just kept having this nagging sensation that it was all wrong. I tried rewriting the scenes, but that really didn't accomplish anything. It was a really frustrating time.

Anyway, now that I've gotten some feedback, I feel much more confident about the direction I'm taking this story. I've reworked some scenes and cut out others entirely. Please be patient with me, I'm still learning to be concise.

About Sailor Moon's plot… well, let's have that discussion after the next chapter or two.

As for right now, my biggest issue is Ryoga's character arc. I know where I want him to end up, but I'm having some trouble deciding when and how to introduce him. It shouldn't affect the next chapter, but I need to decide sooner rather than later.

 

[Lost Star]

Well, I can't say when it would be best to introduce him at the moment, but I'd simply find yourself with a good slow point. It sounds like you're going to be putting a fair bit of emphasis on it, so maybe when Usagi's stuck at a lesson? I'd consider him at a higher level than her, but lower level than Ranma, and it would make a good sort of 'example' of someone in their age bracket for her.

 

[PCHeintz72]

As for right now, my biggest issue is Ryoga's character arc. I know where I want him to end up, but I'm having some trouble deciding when and how to introduce him. It shouldn't affect the next chapter, but I need to decide sooner rather than later.

A simple way to consider it from, since I do not know your plot thoughts... would be to go with the standard motis operandai for how and when Ryoga shows... it is when it is most inconvienent for Ranma, or most potential for Ryoga misunderstanding the scene.

 

[Lost Star]

Oh, if you want more feedback too, you can head towards the spacebattles forums. They have a small Ranma fan Community too.

 

[Dumbledork]

Absolutely brilliant.

 

[daniel_gudman]

As for right now, my biggest issue is Ryoga's character arc. I know where I want him to end up, but I'm having some trouble deciding when and how to introduce him. It shouldn't affect the next chapter, but I need to decide sooner rather than later.

It's obvious that Ranma is going to bring up Ryouga's dad like the instant he recognizes the other kid's name, which gives you pretty much two options:
1) Ranma just straight-up forgot his name,
or
2) Ryoga just misses Ranma a bunch of times, and instead hangs out with Usagi and gives her some tips, and maybe hears a bunch about Ranma second-hand. Something like that?

Also, Ryoga's going to suicidally throw himself at Akuma first chance he gets, so maybe you should consider that angle. Like, Ranma runs interference and beats Ryoga up so the other kid won't throw his life away, but that would make it a deathly serious grudge match from Ryoga's perspective, which might be too dark.

 

[Stormfury]

I love everything about your writing.

 

[lokinishizaki]

Thanks for all the input everyone. I think I've got an idea on how I'm going to handle it now.

Anyway, I mentioned when I posted the last chapter that the character count limit on forum posts was annoying me, so I'm going to start posting scenes when they're done instead of my usual 10k chapters.

About the scene itself, it was surprisingly hard to write. I don't know if I got the atmosphere right, so I'd appreciate your feedback.

[hr]

Chapter 3 - Fever dream​

Part one​

The clean notes of a piano rang through Usagi's ears. The arrangement of notes evoked a certain vivacity and her heart was tugged and pulled to the cadence. She tilted her head and listened intently as the subtle strings of a violin joined as accompaniment. Her heart pounded and soared, until it felt like it would simply burst out of her breast.

The surge of emotion hoisted her to her feet and sent her adrift. Moored on the table she'd abandoned was a friend she couldn't recognize. The young girl raised a hand wrapped in a long blue glove and spoke in a garbled voice. Her face was buried in shadows such that her only recognizable feature was her neat bluish hair.

It was creepy, but Usagi smiled and waived goodbye regardless. Her friend at the table buried her shadowed face in her silk gloves and seemed especially exasperated, which was remarkable when you considered that she lacked an actual face.

Usagi giggled airily and twirled away. Her high heels clacked against the patterned ceramic floor as she traversed the room, passing little table isles inhabited with more shadowed faces of varying shapes and sizes, all dressed in incredible finery. Each turned to face her as she passed through, but she paid them little mind, their attention sliding off of her like like water off a swan's back. She daintily lifted her pearly white gown's skirt and sped off before one of her chaperones noticed her absence.

She emerged from the table archipelago into the open sea and found a few dozen paired vessels meandering around to the tune of the music. Above them, huge crystal chandeliers hung from the ballroom ceiling and diffused light onto the dance floor in truly mesmerizing fashion. It was all so beautiful, and she wanted nothing more than to join them. Only, as a few minutes passed, she realized that she didn't–and wouldn't–have a partner. A yawning misery encroached upon her then, and her smile slipped off of her face.

It was always like this, she remembered. Why had she thought that this time would be any different?

“Serenity.”

Usagi frowned. The name wasn't hers, and yet she looked up anyway, certain that she was being addressed.

It was a young man, tall, dark and handsome, and clad in a fancy tuxedo. Unlike everyone else in the ballroom, his face was clear of shadows but in their place was a white domino mask.

Though she couldn't see his eyes, she felt them linger on the silver tiara she wore on her forehead. He presented a gloved hand and asked, “May I have have this dance?”

Her heart pounded out of control. She moistened her dry lips and reached out nervously. A gentle smile appeared on his lips and he carefully took hold of her trembling hand before pulling her towards the middle of the ballroom floor as if she were a skittish mare just one loud noise away from being spooked.

Between one step and the next, he closed the distance between them and seamlessly led her into a slow waltz. She followed him as best she could, as the steps she'd learned from her tutors and practiced with her friends finally saw real use. The rush of it all filled her from her toes on up, and she excitedly stepped into the progression–too early she realized too late. She tensed up and the step meant for a gazelle was performed by a hippopotamus instead. Before she could ruin the dance even further, her partner placed his hand on her hip and swiftly drew her into his pace, smoothing over her mistake like a master artisan armed with fine sandpaper.

Her face heated up and she felt clumsy and stupid even as she stared into his white mask, enchanted. The young man was so elegant that he nearly seemed to sparkle before her eyes. He wasn't as graceful as Ranma, of course, but her young friend also lacked any sort of–

Usagi gasped and jerked to a stop. What was she doing?

Her dance partner looked at her, clearly concerned. “Serenity? What's wrong?”

“That's not my name,” she blurted out, and suddenly the white gown she wore so comfortably, the heels she walked in so easily, the stares she ignored so thoughtlessly, it all began to wear on her. Even the dance she interrupted felt wrong now. She didn't know how to dance like that. When did she learn to dance like that?

“Is this a dream?” She asked her dance partner.

The older boy placed both hands on her shoulders and spoke to her, but a commotion over by the entryway pulled her attention away from him. Eight bulky men in tuxedos congregated around the closed double doors.

A moment after she realized that they were guards, the doors they surrounded exploded open. One door broke apart and took down three of the guards with its debris, while the other slammed into the wall with a loud bang before tearing its hinges out of the wall and falling flat against the floor.

Usagi's shriek joined with others to form a chorus of terror. Her dance partner immediately moved to protect her. “Serenity! Stay behind me!” He shouted into the sudden silence. Everyone in the room turned to face the gaping entryway, anticipating an assault by some sort of terrifying monster.

“Ah! There you are.”

Usagi blinked and her fear disappeared like a grain of salt in a boiling teapot. She leaned around her dance partner's shoulder just in time to see young master Ranma Saotome waltz into the room, completely unconcerned with the threatening men surrounding him.

Like her, he wore different clothes than he'd worn on that tiny island. Unlike her, his outfit didn't fit the motif of this place at all. His black gi was decorated with a beautiful white tiger and tied around his waist was the belt his father had given him, but the ceremonial look of his clothes contrasted pretty heavily with the gowns and tuxedos worn by the ball's attendees.

The remaining five guards loomed over the boy and yelled unintelligible threats with distorted voices. Ranma looked up into a shadowed face with a chilling blank stare and picked some crud out of his ear with his index finger.

“Hey. Get out of my way, ya bums.” With perfect timing, he flicked a wad of earwax at the closest guard. The disgusting wad disappeared within the guard's shadowed face, and the guardian jerked back as if slapped.

A moment of incredulous stillness passed in silence. Usagi cringed, anticipating the upcoming violence.

The provoked guard stepped in and reached to grasp Ranma's shoulder, only to find his wrist ensnared in the young master's grip. Ranma then pulled the guard off of his feet and brutally back-handed him across the face. With an absolutely atrocious sound–like a goat falling off a cliff and hitting the ground at terminal velocity–the guard's head exploded, and his headless body evaporated into black vapour.

A different sort of stillness fell upon the room then.

Ranma glared at the other guards, sweeping his head from left to right. “We've no time to waste on phantoms. Stay out of our way, shadow-folk, or share his fate.”

The surviving guards fell upon him immediately and without hesitation, and Usagi closed her eyes. A stomach-turning soundtrack began and ended. She opened her eyes to see nothing but wisps of dissipating shadow clinging to Ranma.

He looked down at his fist and scowled. “Like lambs to the slaughter,” he spat out. “Not a lick of sense in any of them.” The young master scoffed and took a single step. The crowd shifted in response, and a dozen aristocrats emerged, clearly preparing to oppose his advance. Her dance partner in particular tensed readily and raised his arms defensively.

Ranma took one look at this new wave of resistance and rolled his eyes. “Oi, Usagi!” He called, and she startled, along with everyone else in the room. “Not that beating your subconscious into submission is particularly difficult,” he drawled. “But I really don't want to do all the work here!”

Usagi blinked in absolute surprise. Somehow, the idea that she was to be more than a bystander in this place felt unnatural. “Eh? What do you want me to do?”

“I dunno, this is your head, isn't it? Tell 'em to go away,” he suggested.

The entire room turned to face her, their shadowed faces silently awaiting her instruction, and she balked at the idea.

Ranma noticed, and crossed his arms. “What? You don't want to?”

Usagi shook her head quietly, and felt torn. Even if Ranma became angry with her for refusing to help, she felt as though she could brave that anger in this case. Somehow, she had the feeling that ordering these people around was something she absolutely should not do.

Ranma looked her in the eyes and sighed exaggeratedly, and tension that she hadn't even acknowledged slipped off of her shoulders. He shrugged nonchalantly, as if to say: 'What can you do?' “How 'bout you just come with me then? Would that be okay?”

Usagi searched her feelings and found that suggestion acceptable, so she nodded cautiously.

Ranma held his hand out in invitation. “Well, come on then.”

She just stared at the boy indecisively. Ranma raised an eyebrow after a long moment of inaction. “Can't come to me either, huh?” He remarked, smiling wryly. “I'm really going to have to do everything, aren't I?”

Her utter unhelpfulness shamed her just a bit and she turned away from him. “Sorry,” she mumbled.

“If I take your hand, will you fight against me?”

She shook her head immediately. “No.”

She couldn't even imagine it. Fighting Ranma? An incredible dread pooled in her stomach and she suppressed a shudder. The second generation Master laughed to himself and shook his head. “Alright then. Guess I'll have to kidnap myself a princess.”

Her dance partner bristled and stepped forwards threateningly. “You think I'll let you?”

Ranma blinked and tilted his head as he stared at the older boy. “Oh, hey. This guy has a face.” He blinked again. “And a voice. Huh.”

The way Ranma eyed her dance partner up and down froze her blood, and she blurted out. “Ranma, don't hurt him!”

Her friend's eyes widened. “Wha–are you serious?” Seeing that she was, he pointed at the young man. “Aren't you going to tell him not to hurt me?”

Usagi turned to the young man, aiming to do just that. But her dance partner performed a sharp about-face and looked her in the eyes, and she found herself tongue-tied. The tall boy took hold of her hands and cradled them gently. “Serenity,” he called her. “The assailant seems to be aiming for you. We'll protect you with our lives, but you must promise me that you'll stay out of harm's way.”

His masked face stared down at her earnestly, and despite herself she nodded. “Okay.”

“Hey, thanks for the help, Usagi.” Ranma said sarcastically. She flushed red in embarrassment as her masked dance partner and several of the partygoers shuffled around to surround her young friend. “You got anymore requests? Maybe I should tie my hands around my back? Y'know, just to make it fair?”

He wasn't being serious, she knew, but she didn't let that stop her from taking him up on his offer. “Ranma! Please try not to hurt anyone else!” She pleaded. Though their faces were shadowed or masked, each of the men and women angling to oppose Ranma felt distinctly familiar. The thought of seeing them suffer the same fate as the guards made her chest tighten up painfully.

Ranma turned to her with a blank look on his face and she cringed. “I'm sorry,” she cried. “I know I'm not helping, but I–I…”

Her friend's expression softened, and he sighed. “It's alright, Usagi,” he forgave her, idly scratching the back his head. “It's my fault. I forgot where we were for a minute. Don't worry, I'll tread softly from now on. I promise.”

With that said, Ranma grabbed his long braid and threw it over his shoulder, where its momentum allowed it to coil around his neck. As it entered its third and final rotation, Ranma spun into it, avoiding a bolt of shadow by mere inches. The black missile traversed the length of the ballroom in a split-second and exploded upon impact with the far-side wall with an earth-shattering roar.

Usagi screamed and covered her ears as more black bolts shot out from the hands of a young woman in a beautiful ruby dress. Her arms buckled as each missile shot forth from her fingertips, her long black hair whipping about wildly in the backlash of each shot.

Ranma sprinted towards the side of the room, ducked under a blast and flowed into an easy forward roll. Coming out of it, he deftly chained a series of flips and stutter steps and closed the distance to the nearest table, its inhabitants fleeing seconds before he reached it.

The red clad young woman primed her arms for the next salvo just as Ranma flipped over the table. She fired, and the black bolt made it a few feet out of her outstretched fingertips before it collided with a food-stained porcelain plate zipping in the opposite direction. The subsequent explosion flattened the girl and several other partygoers before shoving Usagi off of her feet.

She landed on her elbows and knees, scraping her sensitive skin on the newly formed cracks in the tile. The sharp pain pulled a gasp out of her, and she inadvertently inhaled a mouthful of dust. Immediately, wet coughs broke out of her chest and the wracking spasms bent her over.

The urge passed and she looked up, but her baby blue eyes nearly burst with moisture, distorting her vision. She reached up and wiped the tears from her right eye with the back of her hand.

A white handkerchief gently wiped the tears from her left. Seeing as how she hadn't remotely expected that to happen, she flinched back and found Ranma kneeling before her with the embroidered handkerchief in his outstretched hand. She blinked and stared at him in shock.

He grinned at her stunned expression. “See? Didn't even touch anyone.”

Indeed, when she looked behind him she found four sets of partygoers bundled in twos and threes with mysterious white cord. Possibly table cloths, if the newly bare tables were any indication. The other shadow-folk that had stepped forward to oppose Ranma were still indisposed by inadvertently finding themselves within that red girl's blast radius, including the red girl herself. So, by all appearances, he'd kept his word and easily managed to cross a field of land mines on his tip-toes.

But none of that mattered in the slightest in the face of this development, so she cut to the core of the issue. “Where did you get that,” she blurted out.

Usagi Tsukino knew Ranma Saotome. She hadn't known him long, but he was an outspoken boy and she was incredibly empathetic girl. It didn't take more than an hour for her to understand what he was like. Without a doubt, Ranma Saotome wasn't the sort of boy that carried around handkerchiefs.

Usagi tried to imagine why he would have one and just… blanked. Complete white-out.

“I pulled it off that masked guy. You know, that tall skinny guy that was with you. He didn't look like he was going to need it,” her friend admitted.

“…Why?” Her eyes narrowed and she carefully observed the boy's features. Was this really her friend? The real Ranma Saotome was the kind of boy that would intentionally lose any handkerchiefs handed to him, perhaps even destroying them before scattering its pieces into the wind. The person before her looked like him, but in this place that really didn't mean as much as it should have.

The maybe impostor grinned ruefully and gently wiped her face with his stolen handkerchief. “I haven't been as gentle as I could have been. This place is weird, Usagi. It's a lot more defined and structured than I was expecting and I just–” He made meaningless gestures with his free hand. “Well, this would all be so much easier if you would just come with me, but you can't, right? Because I'm your enemy.”

Imposter or not, the look on his face when he admitted that wasn't one she could allow. “No, Ranma, you've helped me so much! I wouldn't even be alive if it wasn't for you!”

He smiled at that, but it was a bitter thing. “Don't be silly Usagi. Of course you'd be alive. You'd be with your family.”

“Ranma…” This isn't your fault, she didn't say. He looked at her with hard eyes, non-verbally asserting that she was wrong. She changed the subject. “That's why you stole his handkerchief?”

He nodded. “If you can't come with me as I am, then that's my fault.” He looked around the cracked and battered ballroom and shook his head. “Anything Goes. I'm a Master now, Usagi. I'm supposed to tailor my response to the situation, like a Swiss Army knife, but I've been walking around like the only thing I've got is a hammer.” He shook his head. “I'm acting like Akuma. That's just–” His face twisted with disgust, but he quickly got a hold of himself and relaxed. He climbed to his feet and uncoiled his braid from around his neck. “Anyway, I've got to fit the part at least a little bit, right? It can't hurt to try.”

Looming over her like Saigo Takamori's statue, he held out his right hand. “Milady, will you allow me to escort you?”

His smile was inviting and warm, and before she knew it her hand was in his and he was helping her to her feet and brushing gray dust from her gown and hair.

Usagi stared at his pristine clothes with awe. How could she, an innocent bystander, be dirtier than an actual participant, the actual target even? Sometimes, the little things slapped her in the face and reopened her eyes to the surrealism of Ranma Saotome.

Once he was satisfied, Ranma nodded and led her by the hand towards the gaping hole that used to be the entryway. Their route brought them past several unconscious or restrained attendees. Those capable of it followed their progression through the room in silence.

They closed in on her masked dancing partner, restrained back to back with a young blonde wearing a distinctive red ribbon. Ranma held out the dirtied handkerchief and dropped it in the young man's lap. “Thanks for the loan,” he said with dubious sincerity.

The young man didn't even look his way, his stylized mask pinned on her. “Serenity. Don't go with him,” he pleaded.

Usagi shook her head slightly. “That's not my name,” she told him again.

A dozen strides later they were gone.

 

[NuitTombee]

Only noticed one error, was too busy reading to look for others.

It was creepy, but Usagi smiled and waived goodbye regardless.

waived -> waved

 

[shioran toushin]

why does that fill my head with images of Marial Arts Usagi WTFPWNing the early Sailor Moon Enemies like a walk in the park with a lot of grace all the while denying being called Serenity (yeah, i was her, she died, now I am Usagi) and telling Mamoru that if he wants to beleve in the 'destined romance' then he should start doing something about it, because past life romance is just that, the Past.