No Need for a Dragon/Slayer Half
(Ryu/Satsujinha'nin Nibunoichi Muyo)
By Alex Timiney, 12/08/2002 to 16/08/2002
curator@discordia.connectfree.co.uk
Revision 1.1 (16/08/2002)
(69chr wordwrapped MS-DOS format plain text version)
A Ranma 1/2 (Manga) / Dragon Half (sort of) / Tenchi Muyo (OAV) / Buffy
the Vampire Slayer crossover
Insert standard disclaimer here.
Additional Disclaimer -
Warning: May contain spoilers for Real Life.
Caution: Do not expose to direct sunlight.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
No Need for a Dragon/Slayer Half
Act One, Part One;
"Ranma's /other/ secrets"
"Stay away from the future,
Don't tell god your plans,
Its all deranged,
No control,
You've gotta have a scheme,
You've gotta have a plan,
In the world of today,
For tomorrows man,
I shall live my life, on bended knee,
If I can't control, my destiny
No control,
I can't beleive I've no control,
Its all deranged..."
"Ok, you, there's gotta be spring of drowned boy around here,
right?" Onna-Ranma demanded of Jusenkyo guide, holding the short
portly man up in the air by the collar of his green Mao suit, which
looked quite odd due to Ranma's smaller size. "Where is it?" she
continued with a stony voice when the guide fearfully nodded an
affirmation.
"Nanniichuan is there, sir." The guide wheezed out and pointed at a
spring in the middle distance. Before he could say 'Lavatory is a
ridiculous name, even for the Joketsuzoku tribe' he was sitting on
his rear end, watching the boy turned girl dash-leap into the
indicated pool. "AHH! NO SIR! Jusenkyo curse not work like that! And
that is wrong..."
SPLASH! You know how it is when people point at something amongst a
number of similar items a little ways away, don't you? What you think
is being pointed at is quite often not the target. Ranma, in his
foolish rush, had just made this same mistake.
"...spring. That is spring of drowned, how you say? Ah, Baby Red
Dragon." The guide sweat-dropped and hoped for the best. The spring
of drowned baby red dragon was a temperamental spring at best, and he
was unsure about how it would combine with the nyaniichuan - the
spring that Mr Customer's son had fallen in earlier. It didn't help
his nerves that the water seemed to boil for a short moment after the
boy/girl had become completely immersed in the magical water.
The doubly cursed Ranma bobbed up to the water's surface in a foetal
position, almost as if the youth element of the spring had caused him
to revert to the mindset of an unborn (or is that unhatched?) child.
Quickly though, the reborn Ranma straightened out and stood in the
deep pool.
Opening her eyes, she took stock of her new cursed form. The first
thing she noticed was that her already tattered gi seemed to be
burned on the inside. Her hair, now a bright burning red, had fallen
out from the seared ribbon that had been holding it back in a
ponytail at the base of her skull. Everything looked different, too -
colours seemed vague and indistinct, but she could see shapes clearer
and further than before. Dimly she heard the voice of the guide
rattle off his rhetoric through the haze of her shock.
"Very tragic tale of baby red dragon who drown there two thousand
three hundred year ago, very tragic tale," Ranma just shook her head
and tried to catalogue any physical changes. Her chest seemed...
well, it seemed bulkier, not her breasts, but her chest, as if there
were extra muscles spread across them.
"But you already fall in spring of drowned girl, so..." Awareness of
her new body spread across her as Ranma's mind processed the updated
nerve mappings. A slight weight above and behind her ears that had
not been present before accompanied the tingling of a new body part.
A hand snaked up to touch and probe the horns, even as other changes
became apparent.
"So curses combine... sometime in strange ways, but in your case they
combine in logical way." The guide continued as Ranma discovered what
those extra muscles were connected to, and also what had happened to
the base of his spine. She began to shake with fear - fear of
herself, fear of what was happening to her. What on earth was she!?
Only a week ago she had been an ordinary boy, of sorts, trained to
exceptional levels at the cost of a phobia and bad manners. But
now... now not only had she lost her manhood, had she lost her
humanity as well? What had /he/ become?
"Sir, you now become Dragon Half... I am guide here many many years
and have read many entries in Jusenkyo guest book from before I guide
here, but you first to become half dragon without falling in spring
of drowned Dragon Half." The guide finished, a mix of emotions
crossing his face, the most predominant being awe and astonishment.
"Though not quite this strangest spring here..." he added quietly,
mostly to himself as he recalled the day that poor child was bathed
in the Niu Ho Man Maolen Niichuan.
Ryu-Ranma carefully stepped out of the spring, bobbing up and down
along her strides as if gravity had been cut in half. She felt as
light as a feather, and she wondered if the draconic influence had
made her much lighter or had dramatically improved her strength, or
more likely a little of both. But of greater import and interest was
the additional pair of limbs now protruding from her mid back.
Carefully she peered over her shoulder and saw the wrist and fingers
of a gleaming red wing half folded against a large tear in her gi
top. Twisting a little she could make out more of the membranous wing
and also a long red tail, as long as her legs, dropping out from
under the hem of her top, along with a large torn fold of fabric from
her leggings. Near the tip of the tail a pair of spines stuck out
sideways with membrane stretched between them and the tail proper,
making a neat tail 'fin'. At the moment the spines were relaxed, and
the fin was folded away.
"Crap... that's gonna take ages to sew up." She muttered with a sigh.
The guide had the decency to face fault (though years of training for
such an eventuality allowed him to avoid falling into a spring).
Experimentally, Ryu-Ranma tried out her new muscles. Her wings
snapped out, startling the recovering guide and spraying droplets of
water about the place. Her tail straightened out a little and the fin
opened up, revealing its shape to be like that of the ace of clubs.
She looked left and right, examining the details of her draconic body
parts. The wings were about five or six feet in span (it was a little
difficult to tell from her perspective, and it felt like she was
trying to guess how tall she was by staring at the ground) They were
constructed in the same fashion as a bat's, but with the membrane
narrowing to meet with her the small of her back, rather than
extending out to her legs, as it would with a bat. Five needle-like
fingers sprouted from each wing's 'wrist', hinging slightly at a
third and two thirds along each, and were tipped with short flexible
tendrils, once free from the membrane stretched across them. A thumb-
claw pointed out through the leading edge from the hand and also
helped the leading edge membrane keep it's aerofoil shape. Also,
unlike a bat, the muscled parts of the wings were covered with snake
like scales - soft and warm to the touch, but tougher and slightly
less flexible than skin. The tail was a similar story, with the tail
and spines covered in small, soft, shiny scales and the fin membrane
being made out of leather like skin. She also noticed that her human
skin now had a light metallic red sheen where it caught the light
from the misty skies. In some places, like her for arms, there was
the barest trace of scaly patterns imprinted into her skin, too, like
a subtle tattoo, only noticeable upon close inspection.
Tentatively, she gave her wings a light flap... and with one
effortless stroke blew herself off her feet and back into the spring.
Ranma flailed about ungracefully for a few moments (as one does when
one finds one's self unexpectedly in a pool of water) until she
realised the she was swinging her large wings about, too, and not
achieving anything but spraying water about... and making the guide
run to avoid being splashed! She relaxed and allowed herself to float
on her back in the chilly spring.
She giggled a little. Then accidentally belched out a flame, giggling
some more at this latest ability. The giggle turned into a laugh and
the laugh turned into cackle. Hidden amongst the waters of the
spring, though, the occasional tear spilled from Ryu-Ranma's eyes.
This last week had been very confusing for the boy turned girl turned
dragon half. Very confusing. And it was taking its emotional toll.
She needed some time alone to think things through, to think about
what she had gained... and what she had lost... and what she should
do.
The guide sweatdropped from where he had retreated to the edge of the
springs. He too decided that time alone was what Mr Customer's son
needed. He darted into his hut out of sight, even as the cackling
softened and degenerated into sobbing.
* * *
"It's a DEMON!!! Yahhhh!!!" Ranma may not have known much Chinese,
but the meaning of this one mandarin phrase and it's variants,
including 'Run away!' and 'Kill it!' were becoming increasingly
obvious and were etched into his mind. Once again, the denizens of a
small village were... over reacting to her presence. Once again a
barrage of wash buckets and pitchforks and whatever else the
terrified villagers could find to throw caused the dragon girl to
make a hasty retreat. It wasn't so much a physical defeat - dodging
or deflecting the incoming missiles would be child's play, especially
with her improved speed and strength - it was more of a psychological
battering which made Ryu-Ranma back-pedal away in the face of such
unyielding and unforgiving fear.
A quick beat of wings and the routed martial artist took to the skies
to consolidate her position in the woods. She touched down clumsily
with a heavy thud (flying, and the muscles required to perform it,
were still rather new and untrained) by a gently bubbling stream in a
small clearing.
Sitting down by the waters edge, her arms pulling her slender legs to
her chest and her scaly red tail wrapped around her feet, she chucked
a pebble into the running water and sulked. Every now and then a tear
would disappear forever into the tinkling flow of fresh water.
Water... it was the cause of all this. The hunger, the fear and
hatred, the loneliness, the... the... loss of manhood and humanity...
It was all because of water! She hated the stuff! The very substance
that sustained all life on earth was her mortal enemy, and as sure as
she was a she, it was killing her by proxy, in one way or another.
Things wouldn't be so bad if she could find something to eat - she
hadn't eaten properly since defeating Shampoo. She had a terrible
craving for raw red meat, too, which she presumed was a part of her
new draconic heritage speaking to her, but the very idea repulsed her
on an intellectual level. Small animals could be grilled roughly with
her flame, but they didn't provide enough energy to cover the cost of
catching and cooking them. Larger animals were too big for her to
cook - she couldn't keep flaming for very long - but there wasn't
enough dry firewood about the places she had to hide to start a
proper fire. Not to mention that a fire would undoubtedly attract the
attention of the people now trying to hunt her down, after making so
many appearances in so many villages.
If only she could turn male again... but streams couldn't be heated,
pools at the bases of waterfalls were too big, and puddles were too
small. If only she could get her pack back, then she could use one of
her pans. But no, she had foolishly decided to leave her pack in the
care of her stupid panda father, thinking that he would think that
she had not gone far or for long if she'd left her pack behind. So
much for being smarter than she let on.
Come to think of it, where was her idiotic father? Surely she would
have run into him at some point over the last week? She'd been just
about everywhere within a fifty mile radius of Jusenkyo (just why was
she still hanging around there, anyway?), apart from the Amazon
village, and she'd not seen him once. Or her pack.
Her sorrow now transformed into anger, she gave out a little
frustrated sigh and chucked another pebble into the stream. It felt
like the world was set against her, and now there was this strange
sinking feeling in her gut. It was kind of familiar, but she couldn't
place it, so instead she put it down to the combination of depression
and hunger.
"You seem a little lost, young girl" a gravely voice intoned behind
her, "Is there anything I can do to help?"
Ranma jumped, and flinched at 'young girl'. She may not have been
paying much attention to the word, but this guy had kept his presence
completely concealed. She glanced over her shoulder to see who around
these parts would approach a 'demon' without simply attacking. And
who would speak such good Japanese? She got a glimpse of the man. He
was tall, about six and a bit foot, was wearing western style monk
robes and would have appeared to be a gaijin if not for the pale
blue-green flesh, upturned snout and stubby demonic horns (quite
different to her own creamy slender spirals). She looked back across
the flowing water... then double-taked. Blue-green skin? Upturned
snout? Demonic horns? She hopped to her feet, her strength carrying
her to the other side of the bubbling waters. She adopted a loose
defensive stance (which she'd modified to add in positions for wings
and tail, ready to fly away if necessary) and faced off with the...
the... demon? Or cursee?
"That just depends on who, or what you are," she spat out with ill
concealed bitterness.
"People who have known me have called me Getrith," the man answered,
still with that gravely voice, "and I am many things, though I am
most notably a moderately powerful mage. Now... I have told you who I
am, so perhaps you would return the courtesy?"
"Name's Saotome Ranma of the Saotome school of Anything Goes martial
arts." Ryu-Ranma replied in a somewhat more civil tone, "But what I
meant was... well, you 'aint human, are ya?"
"No, I'm not entirely human. Like you, I'm part demon, though I'm not
sure what ty..."
"I 'aint no demon!" Ranma barked out, tensing somewhat at the
accusation, and the other's admission to demonism.
"... not sure what type of demon you are." Getrith continued,
heedless.
"I told you, I 'aint no DEMON!" she shouted, reiterating her denial,
as if shouting it out would make the creature in front of her
understand better. Her stance grew tighter and shifted into an
offensive pose. The slightest trace of a fiery red aura sprung to
life about her hybrid body.
The mage remained calm and impassive at the outburst, though silently
he was impressed by the display. It was also informative: demons and
the undead tended not to be able manifest spiritual auras, even when
their blood was diluted with human blood. Usually a demon's aura was
magical in nature and completely unseen.
"Really? Then what are you?" he asked, letting a little humour enter
his stony voice, even though he knew now that the girl was almost
certainly telling the truth. Though there was something very familiar
about her that required investigation.
"I'm... I... uh..." she averted her gaze and looked at the ground to
one side. Her shoulders drooped (all four of them) and her stance
relaxed as memories of the nightmares in her recent life flashed
through her mind, "I fell in one too many springs at Jusenkyo and now
I'm cursed to turn into a half girl, half dragon... I used to be a
boy... but I can't get any hot water to turn back."
The demon resisted the urge to slap his forehead in exasperation at
not spotting the Jusenkyo curse earlier. After all, it was his field
of expertise, so to speak. Of course, this changed things a little,
but this boy-girl-dragon appeared to be much more interesting than
your average Jusenkyo victim. Very few were ever cursed twice, and
that little snippet of info had certainly tweaked his curiosity.
There was still something else about her that nagged on the edge of
Getrith's mind, though. There was power here, that much was certain.
Was it his martial arts training? Very few mortal humans had come
even close to having enough power to be detected like this, and
certainly none so young. Another mystery to be investigated.
"Well, I can certainly provide hot water, and I also know a little
about Jusenkyo," he said, subtly providing the cursed boy with bait,
"It may be of use to you."
Ranma perked up at the offer of hot water, and then grinned as his
brain picked up on the rest of the statement. Putting two and two
together, she asked hopefully, "You said you're a mage, right? So if
y'know somethin' about Jusenkyo, d'you think y'know enough to maybe
cure me?" Unconsciously, she'd shuffled forwards across the stream
and tensed her wings - not quite open, but ready for flight.
"It could be done, but..."
"GREAT! What are we waiting for? Lets go!" Ryu-Ranma hopped across
the remaining distance in one bound. She grabbed the demon's arm and
pulled him off in a random direction... for all of five seconds,
"Uh... where are we going?"
Getrith freed his hand from the girl's strong grip, and stepped out
of the grooves his heels had made in the dirt. He had been intending
the let her pull him around for the few moments it would take for her
to realise she didn't know where to go, but the sensation of her
flesh against his own... Well, the electric tingling that had spread
from his arm to the rest of his body, which caused his muscles to
lock in place simply out of shock, had not been the most pleasant of
experiences.
While examining his wrist for any sings of damage from the brief
jolt, he continued his interrupted warning.
"Before we continue, you should know that removal of a Jusenkyo curse
is not an easy thing to do before the it has run it's course."
Satisfied with his inspections, he returned his calm gaze to the
eager draconian, "The results, if any, may not be quite what you are
expecting. You must be committed, too. If this is not what you truly
want, the results could be disastrous." There's no easier way of
getting someone to do something than telling them that they
shouldn't. 'If she accepts this, she'll have a hook in her mouth.'
"Of course it's what I want!" the red head yelled, and meant it - it
was true after a fashion, "It's bad enough being a girl, but people
HATE me! What's the point in being a martial artist, or having all
this extra strength and speed, if the people I'm supposed to protect
are driving me away out of fear?" she ranted.
"In that case..." with a smile, the mage gestured along a hidden path
perpendicular to the one Ranma had initially taken, "Come this way."
Ranma began to move, but hesitated... this guy admitted to being a
demon! Did she really want to go with him? Actually, he has said he
was /part/ demon. Could someone who was part demon be a good guy?
Either way, he didn't look like much and she reckoned she could take
him, even without the benefits of the draconic blood in her veins.
Besides, though she may be damned if she did go with him, she was
certainly damned if she didn't. It was worth the risk.
The red draconian had stopped only for a fraction of a second to make
her decision before continuing along the path... making sure the mage
was in front of her.
The narrow trail led a meandering course through the thick
undergrowth of the woods. After several minutes of walking in
silence, the two part humans came to a large rocky bluff, some twenty
feet tall, and stretching off in either direction beyond Ranma's
enhanced field of vision. The path entered the sheltered clearing at
its base, and then disappeared.
The demon mage didn't even slow down as he walked up to the natural
wall and, just as it seemed that he would do himself an injury on the
jagged rocks, disappeared, as surely as the path had. Ranma halted
and blink-blinked. After a moment or two, Getrith's head poked
through the rock face.
"Come along now," said the disembodied head, with that characteristic
gravely voice.
"Bu... but... cliff..." Ryu-Ranma sputtered out.
"Don't mind that - it's just an illusion." The head retracted and
disappeared.
Ranma collected her faculties together and realised that, not only
had she seen so much weird stuff of late that an illusory wall was
nothing, but the guy had introduced himself as a mage, so it was not
surprising that he was capable of such a thing. With that in mind she
stepped, hesitantly at first, through the non-existent section of
cliff. What greeted the dragon girl on the other side would not have
been out of place in a Tolkein-esque fantasy. Not that Ranma knew
what a Tolkein-esque fantasy was...
The demon's home, or possibly his work place, was a large cave, some
thirty feet across, fifty feet deep and half as tall as the cliff it
was in. A hanging tapestry of some sort, perhaps concealing a
sleeping area, sectioned off the rear of the cavern. The odd rickety
old chair and stool dotted the place.
The walls, though concave and irregular, were plastered with shelves
of all shapes and sizes, some of them fitted and others adapted from
natural ledges. The smaller and higher shelves contained arrays of
dusty, heavily bound books, which looked to be as old as time. The
larger, lower, natural ledges, which were more like tabletops, had
upon them a staggering array of vials, bottles, glass corkscrew tubes
and other such alchemic paraphernalia. The smells and sights of
bubbling potions and sparkling concoctions would have put the best of
mad scientists and budding Frankensteins to shame.
The floor had been worn smooth and flat by who knew how many years
worth of footsteps. Near the entrance, a round section of floor,
three or four foot across, was raised out of the ground, as if it
were made from a much harder stone and had resisted the gentle wear
of pattering feet. An embellished, five-pointed geometric pattern had
been engraved into this apparently natural dais. It was a pentagram,
though Ranma did not recognise it as such, nor its purpose.
Standing just within the threshold, Ranma took in the sights and
sounds of this hidden space. Silently she was impressed, though she
tried hard not to let it show. Here was a wizard's lair, if ever she
saw one.
"Would you like some tea, or a bite to eat, before we begin?" Getrith
asked the halted girl, from where he was fussing over a set of
apparatus.
Ranma nodded enthusiastically before considering what the tea might
contain after being brewed in a place like this. Never the less, she
heartily ate the food she was provided with, and drank down the
normal tasting tea. Meanwhile, the mage began to look through his
library of ancient books, occasionally taking one out and inspecting
it, before placing on a pile.
"So, how'd you come to know what you know about Jusenkyo, anyhow?"
Ranma asked, still eating, trying to make light conversation to ease
the small discomfort she felt in this unfamiliar situation.
Getrith paused, as if to consider his answer, "My ancestors created
it as part of a wish by a powerful martial artist. As it happened, he
was the first to die there and have his form imprinted upon a
spring." He rattled off, casually, and then went back to his
activities.
"Jusenkyo was created by demons? Well that explains a lot."
The mage didn't respond to that, continuing to browse books and
collect various pouches of god-knows-what, and leaving Ranma to eat
in silence.
Once the demon had collected all the tools he required and the dragon
half had filled her cavernous stomach, Getrith asked Ranma to stand
in the centre of the pentagram.
"You sure you know what yer doing?" Ranma asked as she stepped into
the engraving.
"Yes," was the unemotional response, "First I must cast a srcying
spell to determine to specific nature of your particular curse," this
was the only part he was interested in, of course, and it would tell
much more than the details of a curse, "then I can craft a seal which
will lock you in your original form."
"Right..." that explanation had gone right over her head, apart from
'will lock you in your original form', which was all she wanted to
hear, "Do I have to be in my cursed form for this? 'Cos I'd kinda
like to change back."
"You must remain in your cursed form." Again he spoke in an
unemotional, 'as a matter of fact' tone of voice. Reaching into one
of the pouches, he grabbed a fistful of dull powder. Uttering a few
syllables that were gibberish to Ranma, he blew the dust from his
palm onto the platform. The grains glittered purple before settling
on the pentagram, whose lines pulsed with white light for a moment,
then returned to stony dullness.
Ranma suddenly felt like he was standing in a vat of treacle.
Movement became difficult and breathing became laboured. Standing
became easier, though (if that were possible with her improved
strength and great fitness) as the initial stages of the spell
supported her super light, hybrid body.
'Damn...' she thought nervously, 'He's really got me at his mercy
now. I wasn't expecting this... I guess this is where I find out if
he's for real, or not.'
As the ritual progressed, the world became hazy, coherent thought
became next to impossible, and the passage of time lost its meaning.
Untold minutes of chanting, casting and other magical acts, which
defied Ranma's ability to describe, rolled by. Caught in the spell's
thrall, it felt like seconds and weeks, all at the same time.
After a short moment of eternities, the tone of the ritual changed.
The demon mage had completed the spell and was now commanding it to
reveal what he desired to know.
All at once, the memories of her entire life, plus snippets from
lives not her own, flashed through the enchanted girl's senses. The
memories were not just recalled, but relived from a thousand
viewpoints and a thousand different senses, all of which granted the
sensation of realness beyond reality. Although the recorded thoughts
were exposed simultaneously, the linearity of her mind's eye forced
the resurrected memories into a chaotic chain of linked ideas...
...A small, red, winged reptile fell from the sky. The poor creature
had barely escaped after a pack of humans bearing sharp, shiny,
pointy things had slain its mother and siblings. But the flight had
taken its toll, and what little energy the creature had left over
from its hatching had been used up. Too tired to catch a meal, or
even scavenge for some half rotten carcass, the little dragon glided
towards the only open space it could see. A space peppered with small
round pools and upright shafts of bamboo...
...He was starving. He couldn't remember the last time he'd had so
much as a pot of instant ramen. Its not as if there wasn't enough
food for the both of them, but until he improved, until he was no
longer the weak girl that his father admonished him for being, until
he could /defeat his father/, he would always have his fair share
stolen away from under his nose...
...The cats were also starving. The string of fish sausages he was
wrapped up in would make a tasty meal for the ravenous felines. But
there wasn't enough to feed all those many pairs of feral, glowing
eyes. And while they fought each other over possession of such fishy
goodness, /somebody/ was going to get in the way...
...She was always getting in the way, or so the older villagers said.
Running around where she wasn't wanted, trampling crops and scaring
farm animals, or bumping into women as they carried their daily
shopping home from the small market. They never paid any attention to
her, except to tell her to buzz off. Even her parents seemed to
ignore her, and her brothers and sisters gave her nothing but grief.
It was obvious she wasn't wanted, so that's why she had decided to go
for a little walk, with no intention of returning. Collecting
together whatever supplies she could think to gather, and that little
multipurpose knife that her great grand mother had given her, before
she passed away, she had calmly walked out of the hamlet that had
been her home for all eleven years of her life.
Now she was staring out across Jusenkyo. It was a place she had heard
much about, but rarely had been told anything new. Really, all she
knew about the place was that it was a martial training ground, it
had many, many springs, it was horribly cursed, and that it was
STRICTLY forbidden to come here. And that's exactly why she had
decided to come here. But the journey had been long and tiring. She
really needed to have a drink, and something to eat. Well, there was
plenty of spring water to drink, cook with, or bath in. She'd collect
some later, after building a fire...
...The fire burned with a mindless rage in the cold of the desert
night. Through the twisting, flickering flames of the bonfire, a
figure could be seen. It was a girl, maybe sixteen or seventeen. She
was covered from head to toe with coloured paints, or perhaps mud.
Her stance, though it appeared feral, was accomplished and reeked of
strength. Her eyes shined with a wild spirit...
That last memory puzzled Ranma somewhat. Who on earth was that girl?
And why the heck was she seeing the memory from her point of view?
Somehow she felt that she should know, that she /did/ know, but was
unable to pin the thought down.
The origins of the other memories that were not her own were fairly
obvious: they were of the girl and baby dragon who had drowned at
Jusenkyo so long ago, shortly before succumbing to the springs.
Absently, she decided that the guide had not been making things up
when he had said that the stories behind the springs were tragic. No
wonder it was called the valley of sorrow, and it had nothing to do
with the people who fell in the imprinted pools.
Getrith knew exactly who the wild girl was, and what it meant. That
particular memory's presence scared him as much as it confused him.
After all, the legend went 'In every generation, a chosen one is
born'. The chosen one was always female, but Ranma had been born a
boy! And he still was a boy, with the application of a little hot
water. How could he have inherited a mantle destined only for
womankind?
Still, the memories gushed forth, revealing (in no particular order)
Ranma's entire life, interspersed with the adopted experiences of an
orphaned dragon, a lonely village girl and another girl, who had the
strength and skill to battle demons... and win.
The visions were not really providing the mage with the answers he
required, though. Actually, there seemed to be more and more
questions popping up. Normally Jusenkyo had an excellent reason for
the choice of curse it would guide its visitors into acquiring. The
usual reasoning was 'poetic justice'. The curse was meant to change a
person for the better, if the victim was a good enough person to make
the most of things. Often the form of the curse also highlighted some
deficiency in the victim's personality or outlook. Also, Jusenkyo
never allowed a 'cursee' to be cured, unless he or she did change for
the better and could only find peace without the curse, or a truly
powerful being intervened - the magic of Jusenkyo was so strong that
perhaps only the 'Powers That Be' could do so, however.
Ranma's curse though... well, for a start, Jusenkyo had actually
allowed him to return in an attempt to find a cure! That was strange
enough in its self. That he would then have his curse multiplied was
almost impossible to understand.
The reasons for his drowning in the Nyaniichuan were becoming fairly
obvious, as memories of his chauvinistic father's upbringing were
revealed. A more harsh curse would probably have befallen him were he
not such a good person at heart... but that just made the second
cursing that much harder to understand.
Being brought up to believe that girls were weak and useless, and
being called a girl as an insult on so many occasions, was what made
the first curse so apt. Not only had he become something he had been
taught to look down upon, but he was also genuinely weaker, in a
literal sense. The second cursing had taken that particular element
away, making the learnt negative aspects of femininity iconic only.
It had largely been replaced by the inability to be accepted by other
humans. But why? Ranma was a /good person/. Why had Jusenkyo punished
him like that? Could it have something to do with the Slayer?
Getrith mulled over the mysteries of the unfortunate curse victim and
developed a plan of action. Though he was mostly human, and was
generally kind hearted towards full-blooded humans, his allegiance
was to demon kind. The power he had detected in this hapless dragon
girl was not from one single source - it was partly from Ranma's
training as a martial artist (something which surprised the mage no
end, considering the skill levels required for that much power) and
it was also partly from her dormant abilities granted for a calling
yet to be realised. As a demon (or part thereof), it was his duty to
make sure that that hidden potential was never released. He knew that
he was not powerful enough to seal the whole curse, or the sleeping
threat within, but his humanity prevented him from outright murder. A
couple of years without a Dragon Half ripping through the world's
demon population would do to fulfil his obligation wouldn't it?
The last few memories flickered through the magic's gaze. The very
last memory was of the painted girl with fire in her eyes... the
first Slayer.
TBC
I was going to put more into this chapter, but I felt that this was a good
place to finish off.
Lyrics are from /No Control/ by David Bowie
C&C welcome, (but be gentle - my ego breaks easily)
Send it to curator@discordia.connectfree.co.uk
Or the FFML, if it's particularily interesting C&C.
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