I posted the first ten chapters of this at the end of May... then went
back to write some more. Now, in celebration of the completion of part
17, I'll go ahead and release the next batch... everybody who wrote,
thanks for the comments.

A short what-has-gone-before: Ryoga Hibiki, ex-wanderer and now pilot of
Unit 01, has just defeated (barely) the Falling Angel. As Gendo Hibiki
storms off into the wilderness for reasons unknown (although if you
can't guess...), his son attempts to come to grips with his new life,
roommates, and the upcoming marriage of Ranma and Akane.

If this didn't make any sense, go and read the back chapters at
http://members.tripod.com/~AvatarHR/pl.html, or from Godel's fic
archive.

So, without further ado...

---
Misato turned down the hallway. She was fairly familiar with Gendo,
angry... but she�d never seen him like that. Whatever had set him off
this time, it had made him so angry that he wasn�t paying attention.
She wouldn�t have believed it if she hadn�t seen it herself.

At least it hadn�t been her... not that he had anything to be angry
about. They�d beaten the Angel, and everything was still in one piece,
excepting all the stuff that had little Angel bits hit it. Ryoga had
been... quite thorough, hadn�t he? All for a good cause.

She reached the elevator and dialed for the hangars. It hadn�t been fun
getting the three Eva units back in place inside the hangar. The blast
right near the center had been pretty bad, and while none of the Eva
were damaged, they were left in a tangled heap inside the resulting
crater. It had taken two hours of shifting, cranes, and power cables
before they could be walked back home.

The doors opened... no, wrong floor. Ritsuko, still wearing her lab
coat,
stepped inside. "Take a look at these, Misato." She waved a stack of
paper. "The AT field readings are incredible! And whatever that thing
that Ryoga did was, look here..." She pointed to one spot on a chart.
"And here..." Another spot on the same chart. "His synch ratio spiked
over ninety percent."

"Amazing." Ryoga had trouble scoring over fifty-seven percent, in
practice. So long as he could perform when it was time, though, he�d do
a good job. "How are the pilots doing?"

"I haven�t been down to check on them, yet, but nobody mentioned
anything bad..."

The doors chimed as the elevator reached the hangar deck. Immediately,
a blue and white blur dashed through the doors, trailing an even bluer
and whiter blur. The two turned out to be Ryoga and Rei, both still in
their plug suits. Ryoga whirled around, throwing his pack up against
Misato, and stabbed at the "door close" button. "Oh, man, come on,
hurry up, damn it..."

"WAIT!" Asuka was running down the hall toward the elevator, also still
in her plug suit, and carrying... something, the door had closed too
much
for Misato to see what it was. It must have been heavy; Asuka was
running off-balance. The open door turned into a sliver... and jammed on

what looked like a piece of wood.

Ryoga slumped down to the floor of the elevator. "Oh, man..."

Sensing an object, the doors opened again, revealing an angry Asuka
carrying what looked to be a huge wooden mallet. "You..." Her face was
flushed and she was panting from the run. "You can�t get away that
easy, Ryoga. Now, do you mind explaining EXACTLY what took you so long
to get there?" She hefted the head of the mallet, preparing to swing.

Whoa... "Not in here you don�t, Asuka." Misato reached over and grabbed
the mallet�s handle. "Besides, you know perfectly well what took him so
long."

"But he <pant> could have <wheeze> run faster!"

Ryoga coughed. "Um... no, I was running all out."

Asuka�s face reddened even more. "You... you PIG!"

Misato thought that it something fairly mild, as far as insults went.
Ritsuko didn�t react much... but Rei cracked a smile, even showing
teeth,
and Ryoga flinched like he�d been hit. More than when he got hit.
"Don�t go there, Asuka." He reached for the handle of his umbrella...

"HEY! That goes for you too, Ryoga. Jeez, can�t you guys quit it? You
just fought the Angel, for goodness' sake." Misato couldn�t understand
why those two set each other off like that.

"Sorry, Misato." Ryoga slumped back against the rear wall of the
elevator. "Old habit."

"Well, lose it!"

Ritsuko rolled her eyes as she stepped off at her floor, leaving with
one of her patented "It�s YOUR problem so deal with it" looks.

Hmm... best way to defuse the situation... ah, that�s it. "Besides, now
we
have to find some place to go to dinner."

Asuka relaxed at that and dropped the mallet. "That�s right, you owe us
a steak dinner."

Yeah, but she hadn�t realized how much that would cost her. For all
that she was the Operations Manager and the highest ranking officer in
NERV, short of Hibiki or Futuyuski, her paycheck was downright puny.
"Um... actually, I had something else in mind." Ryoga looked up, turning

on his equivalent of puppy-dog eyes. "I read a restaurant review of
this one place, and I�d like to try it out. It�s better for this sort
of thing anyway, since it has some vegetarian dishes too."

Rei looked up from her corner of the elevator. "Thank you." She was
still grinning a bit.

"Hmpf. My bet is that she�s just too cheap to spring for steak, right
Ryoga?"

"Cut it out, Asuka."

Wait a minute. "Asuka, where�d you get that hammer?"

"Eh heh." She grew a sweatdrop. "I have no idea."

Life, Misato thought to herself, was getting truly weird.
---
Paradise Lost, part 11
Fan Fiction by Andy Kent
All characters copyright Gainax or Rumiko Takahashi
---
"I�ll take the front seat." Ryoga opened the door of Misato�s car and
tilted the seat forward, then stepped back to let the other two pilots
in.

Asuka started forward. "What makes you think that you have the right to
call shotgun after how you screwed up today?"

Screwed up? Hey, they�d won. "Well, there�s the fact that neither of
you are likely to survive if Misato takes this thing into the side of a
building... there�s no passenger seat airbag. On the other hand..."

She nodded, shivered, and stepped in the car. "I�d forgotten about
that."

"Post-traumatic stress syndrome. You tend to forget dangerous things."
Rei sat next to Asuka.

Misato stepped out of the elevator. "There it goes! Couldn�t find the
address to the place. Come on, Ryoga." She opened the driver�s door to
her car and got in.

The next ten minutes were quite possibly the most frightening of
Ryoga�s life, if you didn�t include the times when he was almost cooked
and eaten. She must have gone insane. No, there was an engine
malfunction and she didn�t have any brakes. Maybe there was a bomb in
the car and if she slowed down, everybody would have died? Ryoga didn�t
put much faith in that one.

"Hang on, everybody!" Misato gunned the accelerator as the little blue
car vaulted over a low hill... clearing a pothole that would have done
well as an anti-armor trench. "Man, but the restaurant had better be
better than the roads around here." She threw the emergency brake and
sent the car into a sideways skid, throwing Ryoga and Rei against their
windows... and stopped directly in front of... Ucchan�s. "Doesn�t say no

parking, so..." Misato got out of the car.

Wha? Huh? Okay, Ryoga, you�re stopped, it�s over, get out of the car
and go have some nice okonomiyaki... he tugged on the latch and opened
the door. Rei followed. Asuka clambered out behind her, looked around.
"Nice place. Does it serve food?"

Ryoga looked at Asuka. "How can you still be hungry?" Come to think of
it, Rei had a decidedly green tint to her tonight.

"Look, I earned this dinner and there�s no way that Misato�s going to
get out of it with a little stunt driving." She opened the door, walked
inside.

Misato crossed over from the street side of the car. "What was that?"

"<cough> Doesn�t matter. Let�s go." At least Misato had picked a good
place to eat. He opened the door and motioned for the other two to go
inside. Misato did... Rei didn�t.

"Go on, Rei, I�m holding the door."

She shook her head. "You�ll get lost if you don�t go in first."

Heck, she was probably right. Why was he holding the door for Rei
anyway? She probably wouldn�t understand chivalry either. "Whatever."
He stepped inside.

Immediately, he ducked his head and went for his umbrella. The first
volley of throwing spatulas went into the door frame. He managed to
deflect a second and third off of the open umbrella, risked a peek
around its edge. As if he�d been warned, he snapped the umbrella short
and used it to parry Ukyou�s much larger combat spatula. "HEY! What�s
that for?"

Ukyou grimaced. "As if you don�t know, Ryoga." She flipped the
oversized cooking instrument onto her back and vaulted over the
counter. "Don�t worry... I�m not THAT mad at you anymore... but you did
have that coming."

Rei peeked from around the corner. He turned to her, said, "THAT�S why
I should have come in last."

Misato hadn�t found her seat yet... in fact, she hadn�t found her
balance
yet, judging by the way she was reeling. "Uh, Ryoga, what was that all
about?"

"Don�t worry, old business. I told you about it already." He sat down
at one of the stools at the counter. "Well?"

Asuka plopped down next to him, said, "So I can hit you better" in
response to his look. Rei took the end stool, and Misato sat down on
his other side.

Ukyou peered at the four of them. "Celebration dinner?"

"Well, yes." Misato turned. "How did he know that?"

"I, uh, kind of told her about my new... job. We�ve known each other for

a while." Ryoga could almost see the gears turning in Misato�s head...
there, she�d figured it out. Hopefully, she�d be tactful, since he
really wanted food more than fighting.

"And let me guess, no meat right?" Rei nodded. Ukyou went on to Asuka.
"Well, you�re new. What do you have in mind?"

"Hm..." Asuka thought for a second. "What�s good?"

"EVERYTHING, so long as you order okonomiyaki." He tried smiling at
Ukyou.

"Ryoga, you jerk. Cut it out."

"Well, then I guess I�ll have the okonomiyaki. Double meat." Asuka
rolled her eyes at the ceiling and gave him a look. He had NO idea what
the look meant.

"Good then. I KNOW what you want, Ryoga, triple order with triple
everything. No telling where you store it all." She looked at Misato.
"I take it that you�re chaperoning this bunch?"

"Yeah, I�m Ryoga�s new guardian."

Not like anybody had asked him about it. "Don�t take her too seriously.
She�ll want a standard and beer." Wait a second. "No beer." Wait
another second. "Then again, what could it hurt?"

Asuka elbowed him... he thought. Might have been a tap. "You idiot!
She�s
driving."

"It�s not going to make any difference."

"What, so now I�m a lousy driver? And where do you get off ordering for
me? I�m the one paying for this."

"Actually..." Ukyou blushed, a bit. "I think Rei took care of it, last
time. She paid off your tab." She flipped Rei�s order onto a plate and
served it to her.

WOW. That had been a lot of okonomiyaki. "How much did you give her,
Rei?"

"Ten thousand." Rei took a bite.

"That�s a hell of a lot more than my tab, Ukyou."

Now she was really blushing. No... she was just mad. "Well, at least I
didn�t SHOOT her or anything!"

Misato coughed. "Hey, I thought you said that Rei shot a girl."

"Aagh!" Ukyou placed a hand on the haft of her large spatula. "What the
hell do you think I AM?"

"Ease off, Ukyou, she�s not from around here." Damn it, not this again.

"You mean..." Misato�s face distended from the effort of not laughing.
She didn�t succeed. In fact, she fell off her stool. "Sorry... <chuckle>

but you understand..." She was laughing so hard that she couldn�t talk.

Ukyou crossed her arms over her chest and grumbled. "I can�t believe
you didn�t tell her I was a girl, Ryoga."

How was this HIS fault? "Uh... I did."

"Then how do you explain..." Ukyou gestured at the helpless Misato. "Is
she always like that?"

"Uh, just when she�s drink... yes." Ryoga watched Asuka dig into her
order... she liked it. She was eating it, anyway, and he was almost
certain that she would have said something if she hadn�t. He barely
tasted his own, as usual.

Misato grabbed her beer and drank. "HAA! Okay, I�m done laughing now.
Sorry about that."

"No harm done." Ukyou flipped the final dish off of her grill and in
front of Misato. "Go ahead, try it."

Misato bolted the okonomiyaki in less than ten seconds. "REALLY good."
Ryoga boggled. Not many people could eat like that... well, Ranma could.

So could Genma. Come to think of it, he could make a pretty good
headway himself. He risked a glance in the other direction, found that
Asuka had been paying full attention to her own meal. Rei... well, he
probably wouldn�t know if she had noticed anything in any case.

"So..." Misato finished off the beer. "You going to be okay?"

Ukyou turned, paused, and resumed cleaning her grill. Then turned
again. "Exactly what do you mean?"

"You know, you having to break up with your fianc�e." Eep. No. She
hadn�t. She didn�t. Ryoga started to reach back, stopped when he
realized that going for his umbrella would make a fight a certainty
now.

"And just HOW do YOU know about that?" Ukyou was speaking to Misato,
but looking straight at Ryoga. Not just a look. Like being stared at...
by Death itself. He could feel his head trying to explode under the
force of her gaze.

Misato... either she was too tired to notice, or just plain didn�t care,

or maybe Ukyou had put straight alcohol in that beer bottle. No other
explanations. "When Ryoga came home, he was really broke up about it.
Cried all night..." HEY! "Told me about it in the morning. He was
worried
about it, you know."

"Do you MIND not yelling that kind of thing all over, Misato?" She
looked genuinely surprised to see Ryoga lean toward her. He felt his
flatware splinter in his grip. "I mean, that�s like..."

"What you did to me, telling her?" He could never understand how a
woman could say something SO sweetly and still convey a death threat.
Had to be a female thing. Just another thing that kept Ukyou from
passing as full male.

"Don�t worry about it, he was just worried about you, that�s all. No
stories, no gossip, no nothing. Rather boring, really."

"Was he now?" Instantly, the malice was gone from Ukyou�s voice. Just
her ordinary life-is-good voice... "How sweet..."

Asuka snickered. "So, stayed up crying over her, did you? You big
baby."

Ryoga hung his head over his empty plate. Why did it seem that the
world was out to get him?

---

Gendo ran. It had been years since he�d had a good run, and while he�d
softened up a little, the reflexes were still there. Vague impressions
of woods passed by, green leaves, brown trunks, blue sky. Vague,
because he wasn�t looking at the scenery. He had no idea where he was
headed, not that it would have mattered anyway. Just run until you hit
something... and keep running...

Or until you get hungry. He considered the meager supplies he had
started with. The thought of eating one of those awful freeze-dried
meals didn�t appeal to him at all... besides, he was still angry.
Something to help him work off some aggression. Hunting. Yes. Hunting
would help clear his head.

He started to pay more attention to his surroundings, to the flight of
lesser creatures along his path. There. A deer noticed his crashing
passage through the undergrowth, stiffened, prepared to bolt. It would
do quite nicely. He shifted his dash to intercept the doe...

And heard somebody say, "NO! You idiot!" as he passed by. He didn�t
stop, whoever was there wouldn�t catch the deer. It looked up at him,
confused, with big brown eyes... Gaaaah. Gendo couldn�t STAND cute
things. Hands reached out to grasp it by the sides of its head, twisted
brutally. Good. He didn�t feel like running down a deer, as opposed to
eating one.

He whirled, teeth bared, as he heard the stranger approach through the
underbrush. Human. Gendo immediately settled out of his combat stance,
composing himself. DAMN it all. He didn�t particularly feel like
dealing with people yet. Although this one looked... odd. Fairly short,
with considerably more muscle. Black hair, framing a face that would
have been effeminate on somebody with a less impressive build. He wore
bracers, silk pants, some kind of Chinese footwear, and a vest. A
hellishly impressive vest, Gendo thought. It gleamed as the forest
light played over it, first blue, now green. Dragon scales. The bracers
shone the same way.

The man held out one hand, from which dangled a primitive sling. "That
deer was MY dinner. Go find your own."

"I think not." Gendo sat down next to the deer�s carcass, produced a
knife from his pack, and methodically began to flay the creature. "I
killed it, which makes it MY dinner."

"You are aware that I may have a problem with your logic." With the
word "problem", the stranger flexed muscles in his arms. Rather nicely
developed, if not bulky. He used to have arms like that...

"Boy..." Good, this was good. An anonymous person, completely outside
the
Plan... (which was shot to hell, now, what matter whether he was outside

the plan?) outside his knowledge anyway, and a perfect opportunity to
let off steam. Lots of steam. He pitched his voice into full contempt
mode and continued. "I have a long list of problems to consider right
now... and you, BOY, are not even on it."

Impressive, how he didn�t take the obvious bait. "Then I shall be
forced to amend your agenda." A discrepancy... the stranger was using
what apparently was a pair of women�s pantyhose to secure his
waistband. "Right now."

"I don�t take lightly to changes in my agenda." Which was why he was
out here now... DAMN Seele! They gave him the outline, things that might

happen, things that had to happen, things he was to have brought about
to fulfill the goal... and they were COMPLETELY wrong. He could have
dismissed his son�s age. He could have dismissed Eva 01�s victory over
the fifth Angel. But when they started coming... OUT OF ORDER... he felt

his teeth clench. "Who the hell am I kidding?" The stranger stepped
back, once, at the vehemence of Gendo�s words. The movement startled
Gendo out of his thoughts, and back to the present. "Look, it�s obvious
that you practice SOME sort of martial arts, and recently. Also, you�re
in much better physical condition than I am. If we get into some sort
of fight, you�ll win, and I�ll end up hurt somehow, which I really
can�t afford right now. So quit your posturing and do something useful,
like gathering some firewood!"

"Er..." The stranger scratched the back of his head. "Why would I...
HEY!
What in the world are you doing, telling ME what to do... you old
geezer!"

Well, that wasn�t exactly too imaginative. "Simple, BOY. There�s more
deer there than either of us can eat. And neither of us can carry it
around..." Well, not after he�d skinned it like that... Gendo allowed
himself a slight grin. "So we should both eat it. I can�t leave the
body to go get wood, so unless you like your venison raw, you�ll go get
some."

The boy thought about that for a second... and arrived at a conclusion.
"I believe that I shall, then..." he turned his back and started off.
"Hibiki."

"Hey! BOY! No need to run off, there�s plenty of wood around right
here." Now THAT was a surprise. Gendo hadn�t expected his wandering to
have become folk legend... nor did he expect the memory of his passing
to
have survived the Second Impact. "How did you know my name?"

"So, you ARE a Hibiki." The boy grinned. A smug grin. Gendo felt his
hackles rise, just looking at that grin. "Simple, geezer. There�s only
one reason that you couldn�t leave the deer, and that�s because you
wouldn�t be able to find your way back to it. That means that you have
the Hibiki sense of direction... and that you�d better have the meat
ready to cook when I finish." He turned, leaped, and disappeared into
the underbrush.

---

Pantyhose Tarou bit into a chunk of deer. It wasn�t cooked enough,
really, but still quite tasty. He leaned back, sitting against a fallen
log that had been a fair-sized tree a few minutes ago, and propped his
feet up on a handy stone. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see
the stranger working another few ribs free of the roasted animal.

Truly, an odd fellow. He was wearing a simple karate gi, and he moved
like he had some training, but those horn-rimmed glasses were NOT
suitable for a fight. And all of his moves seemed... hesitant. Somebody
who hadn�t used them for a long, long time. The headbands were silly,
they�d reminded him of Ryoga... which had prompted that comment. Meant
to
be a complete in-joke. But he�d understood the reference immediately...
which meant one of three things.

He couldn�t read minds, of course, or he wouldn�t still be eyeing Tarou
when he thought that he wasn�t being observed. He COULD be a genius and
have ascertained the value of the joke, immediately telling one of his
own. Yeah, right. That meant that he knew Hibiki... and probably WAS a
Hibiki. At least he had more of a clue than that moron Ryoga.

Oh, well, time to find out the truth. "Hey, old man!"

The Hibiki settled down beside the fire and proceeded to attack his own
dinner. With a full mouth, he barked, "What?"

"What are you doing out here, anyway?"

Hibiki looked up, at the clear night sky. "Forgetting some problems,
for a while. You?"

Well, Tarou thought, he HAD asked first... "Solving some, with luck."
Happosai was his problem. If he could find the old pervert, THIS time,
he could defeat him. Actually, the last few times, he had won those
too... but this time, he would FORCE Happosai to remove his curse.

"Huh." Hibiki continued to chew his meal. "Talk about it? Nothing
better to do."

"You kidding? I don�t even know you."

Hibiki grinned. "You guessed my name, didn�t you? Maybe you know me
better than you think."

Good point. "I�m here to defeat somebody. He�s the key to removing a
curse I have had all of my life, the only thing preventing me from
achieving happiness. If I can force him to revoke the curse, then I can
live a normal life again."

"Heh. Such a small problem. Must be nice."

"What? It�s not like YOUR problem is the end of the world."

Hibiki turned around, stared directly at Tarou. "Yes, that is exactly
my problem."

Well, maybe this Hibiki wasn�t more collected than Ryoga after all. "So
fix it."

"I�m trying." He settled down again. "But it�s not that easy. Some
people, they�ll try to stop me. And then there�s the Angels. We can
hold them off... probably. Slip up, and it�s the end of the game."

"Angels?" Not many people that Tarou could think of had problems with
angels. "You�re a Satanist, then?"

Hibiki laughed, blowing little bits of deer into the fire. "Heh. No,
we�re NOT. This has damned little to do with religion. Really, you
haven�t heard about the Angels?" For a second, Gendo wondered just how
far he�d traveled in the last few hours. Even with the news blackouts,
everybody in Japan must have heard of the Angels by now.

"No, but I�ve been out of touch for some time. So, what are they?"
Tarou took another bite out of his portion. "Winged seraphs bearing
swords of fire, maybe?"

"You really haven�t heard. Huge robots. There�s been a few attacks on
Tokyo-3, so far, but all of them have been repulsed."

Hmpf. "Well, of course they were. A huge robot is easier to hit than a
little one."

"BOY, if you�re headed to Tokyo-3, you�ll see Angels before you leave.
THEN you tell me that they�re easy to kill. So far, only three people
in the world have managed that."

"Jet pilots?"

"No, robot pilots."

It figured. To fight robots, use robots. "Whatever, old man. More
likely it�s just swamp gas, or something boiling out of Nerima. Things
get weird there, you know."

Hibiki leaned back, pulled a cigarette out of his pack and lit up.
"Yes, I know."

---

"Come back soon, now!" Ukyou waved at the retreating group. Ryoga could
really pick people to fall in with, she thought. Rei was strange
enough. Asuka, though, she was interesting. No WAY she was only
fourteen, despite her size. She certainly acted older. Bossed around
Ryoga like it was her profession, not that the spineless wimp would
mind. For a world-saving robot pilot, Ryoga was... well, he was Ryoga.

And Misato had been, different, she thought. Laughs easily, talks
loudly and too much, drinks entirely too much. And there was something
familiar about her, like Ukyou should know her already. She dismissed
that thought from her mind.

At least she wasn�t that mad at Ryoga, now. It felt better, somehow,
now that she knew that he was suffering as badly as she was over what
he had done. She couldn�t even blame him anymore... he was what he was,
after all. She shouldn�t try to judge him by ordinary standards...

Well, she wasn�t THAT angry with him. He still, single-handedly, had
ruined her life in a single day. It was infuriating... beating up on him

would be utterly ineffective. Making him feel bad would be useless, he
already felt bad about it. Persecution wouldn�t work, because he was
never around for it. She briefly toyed with the idea of divulging a
certain secret to Akane as vengeance, then dismissed it as too drastic.

Damn. She couldn�t stay angry, no matter how much effort she put into
it. She just felt sorry for him. Yeah, that�s it, it was pity that she
felt, not anger. She turned to help some other customers.

---

Ryoga waved to Misato and Asuka. He hoped they�d be okay, driving home
without him or Rei, and considering how much alcohol Misato had
consumed. He didn�t feel like going home quite yet, although it was
late. First, he wanted to stop by the dojo.

Rei had already started, and he had to hurry to catch up. Well, not
really hurry, she wasn�t THAT fast, but she was moving a lot faster
than she had been when they�d first met. (Come to think of it, she
couldn�t move at all when they�d first met.) The occasional lesson in
Anything Goes Martial Arts must be paying off.

---

Ranma sat, and reflected on how good life was. He hadn�t been fighting
Akane lately... she�d mellowed out a LOT since he�d asked her to marry
him. It helped that he tried to watch his mouth, maybe. If he�d known
how good it would be, he would have asked sooner... he hadn�t really
been
fighting too much of ANYBODY lately. Ukyou was avoiding him, which
wasn�t great but probably for the best right now. In turn, he was
avoiding Shampoo and her great-grandmother. The longer that he could
keep the wedding secret from those two, the better it would be. Since
he wasn�t around Shampoo, Mousse didn�t bug him about her. Even Kuno
seemed to be a little less quick to use that bokken. And, of course,
Ryoga was too busy running around in his Eva to cause any problems.

Ranma looked beside him, at Akane... who was currently leaning against
him and thinking thoughts that probably ran along the same lines. He
moved his arm around her, sort of a half-hug, and she returned the
gesture without looking up. Yes, life WAS good.

Two figures sprang over the outer wall and headed for the porch. Of
course. If life was good, something had to come and louse things up. It
was pretty dark... but he could still make out the large pack on one of
them.

Akane shifted. "Hey, isn�t that Ryoga?"

"Yeah. Probably whatshername, Rei, too." He raised his voice. "Hey,
Ryoga, isn�t it kind of late for you to be running around?"

"Well, yeah, but we were in the neighborhood..." Which meant any one of
a
dozen things, with Ryoga. Probably got lost. "and thought we�d stop
by."

Rei moved out of the shadows and sat down at the other end of the
porch. A second later, Ryoga dropped his pack a few feet away and used
it as a stool.

"Hi, guys." Akane sat up, which was all right but not perfect, he
thought. "Good job on the Angel today."

"Killing Angels is a pilot�s job." Rei looked at the two of them. Ranma
had NO idea what she had meant by that, and it sure didn�t show on that
face. He wished that HE could get away without blinking like that.

Ryoga scratched the back of his head and laughed. "Uh... thanks."

"That was cool, how you blew it up at the end. I didn�t know that the
bakusai tenketsu worked on Angels, Ryoga." Ranma chuckled, remembering
how he hadn�t known that it didn�t work on people, once.

"Um... I didn�t know either." He laughed to himself as Ranma grew a
small
sweatdrop. Akane, too. "It just sort of hit me."

Akane spoke first, while Ranma was busy groaning at the awful pun. "You
even buzzed... that�s what they call it, right? Buzzed the dojo. I�d
like
to see the robot, up close."

Uh oh... normally, anything that Akane said to Ryoga along those lines
would cause him to blush furiously and stammer incoherently. Now,
though, he was just staring. At Ranma. "I... did what?"

She kept talking. "You know, jumped right over the roof. There�s a big
footprint over by Ucchan�s restaurant. Caused a wreck, this afternoon.
We were watching you from the roof..." She trailed off as Ryoga�s fists
clenched.

Rei stared off into the night. "That WAS a footprint, then..."

"Um, Akane..." Ranma nudged her with his elbow, then whispered, "I don�t

think that you should have told him that..."

Ryoga stared at the ground in front of him, and stared at his right
fist, which now glowed with a greenish aura. "Ranma... I told you to
take
care of her, make sure that she was all right, didn�t I?"

Hm... think fast, defuse the situation. "Yeah, I did, she was, no
problem."

Ryoga�s face popped up. Twin pits of green fire gazed at Ranma as he
shouted, "Then WHY were you SIGHTSEEING on top of the ROOF instead of
someplace SAFE?!" He eased forward in his crouch. "Damn you Ranma!" On
the last word, he sprang forward.

Ranma felt time slow as Ryoga launched. First, get Akane out of the
way... no, no good, there wasn�t enough time, he�d have to hit her to
move her that fast, wouldn�t work... he lunged forward himself, trying
to
redirect his momentum away from the dojo�s porch.

The concussion from the impact rang in Ranma�s ears as the two hit each
other. One chance to get them both away... he grabbed Ryoga, by one
shoulder and the waist, and jumped. It wouldn�t be pretty, neither of
them would land on their feet, but it�d clear the wall and get the two
away from Akane.

Too late, he realized his mistake... grappling with Ryoga, even if he
wasn�t frenzied with worry, was suicide. But Ryoga wasn�t latching on
for a crushing hug, but instead had grabbed Ranma by the shirt and one
leg... and he was jumping too... in the same direction.

The two pushed off in midair, landing just outside of the dojo. Ranma
whirled on Ryoga, shouted, "What do you think you�re doing, you idiot?
You could�ve hurt somebody!"

Ryoga stood up, pointed at Ranma. "I told you to keep her safe, dammit!
How can I keep everybody safe if YOU keep doing STUPID things like
that?"

Well, enough was enough. "Sounds to ME like you�re just looking for an
excuse in case YOU can�t hack it! I�m getting tired of this, Ryoga! I
mean, I put up with a lot from you, I know how you feel about her, and
then you turn around and do THIS!"

"It�s not my fault that you don�t know how to take care of her! I won�t
stand for it any longer." Ryoga took a step forward, clenching that
fist.

"That�s IT! Damn it, we end this here and now. No more rematches...
Ryoga, you�re a threat to Akane. You know it, you admitted it, that�s
why you gave up. But THAT wasn�t enough!" Ranma felt himself seething.
"If I win this, I want you OUT of our lives. Never come here again, you
got that! NEVER!"

"Fair enough..." Ryoga clenched his jaw. "But then, you have to promise
me that if I win, you�ll both leave, for good. It�s the only way I can
protect her, since YOU certainly don�t seem too worried about it!"

"Fine with me!" Ranma started circling, looking for an opening.
Finally! A way to get Ryoga out of his life, for good. The two leapt
toward each other...

---

Rei looked at Akane. They could both hear something being shouted in
the street, but it was too far off to make out the words. She was
puzzled... didn�t Ryoga like Akane? If so, why did he want Ranma to take

better care of her? "Um... why did they do that?"

Akane was gripping the lip of the porch with one hand. "Because," she
said, in a voice to match her own, "they�re both convinced that I�m
made of porcelain or something. I�m going to have to talk to Ranma when
he gets back." Rei thought that "beat to a living pulp" would have been
said in a kinder tone than "talk".

"So why don�t you stop them?"

Akane turned, suddenly noticing that Rei was sitting beside her. "You
know... they�re both men. It�s kind of useless to talk when they�re like

this."

Rei nodded... but she DIDN�T know. What did being a man have to do with
not listening or acting stupid? She asked the same question.

"You mean that you don�t know?" Rei shook her head, slightly. "Well...
basically, if somebody�s not listening or doing something stupid, it�s
a safe bet that they�re a man." Akane frowned. "Those stupid jerks. I
swear, if I could go ONE WEEK without having somebody get in a fight
with or over me... Hey, you want some dinner?"

"Um..." Rei thought for a second. "Did you cook it?"

"No..." Akane�s face hardened. "What should that matter?"

"Ryoga keeps saying that your cooking is bad." Well, he didn�t mention
Akane by name, but who else could he have meant by "worse than Misato"
there?

"He did, did he?" Akane was suddenly weighing a large mallet in her
grasp, and in another instant it was gone. Rei was SURE that she hadn�t
blinked.

---

Misato opened the door to her apartment, and went inside, followed by
Asuka. The latter was still walking unsteadily. "You know, I should be
doing that... you didn�t drink anything tonight."

Asuka staggered into the kitchen, rummaged around, and then emerged
into the living room with a six-pack of beer. "I... I can�t believe it.
Your driving..."

"WHAT about my driving?"

Asuka sank down on the overstuffed couch. "It was good. Perfect,
almost. How many did you have tonight, six? Eight?"

"Seven, good guess." Well, of course alcohol had its effects on her
driving, just like everybody else... She did a double take. "What do you

mean, good?"

"Just what I said. You stayed in your lane. You used the turn signal.
You stopped for EVERY stop sign. You weren�t even speeding." Asuka
popped the tab on one beer and tossed the remainder to Misato. "It was
frightening! We should get you drunk more often."

Misato opened her own beer. "I�m not even drunk yet." It was true, she
could barely feel the buzz from the liquor she�d had with dinner. "Turn
on the television, will you?"

"Sure." Asuka fished around between the cushions, eventually producing
a remote control. She pointed it toward the TV, thumbed it on, then
started methodically flipping channels. Commercial. Commercial.
Commercial. Talk show. Commercial. News bulletin. Commercial.

"Go back one, Asuka."

Erg... Asuka had been trying to avoid the news, since she was never in
it
and she�d be damned if anybody else got the pleasure of her watching
them. She flipped back...

"...And we now have footage of the vicious battle that is heading
through
town... Is the chopper... All right, folks, what you�re now seeing is
the
destruction caused by a pair of unknown assailants..."

The screen showed a section of city street. Several holes had been
blown into or gouged from the pavement... cars had been overturned like
toys in the street... there, that corner lingerie store had been
completely demolished by some kind of explosion. The dent in the side
of that semi looked suspiciously familiar... she heard the news anchor
ask the chopper crew if they could get any closer to the action.

At the range of the shot, she couldn�t make anything out... there. Two
people, both moving like they were on fire, dodging around each other...

one of them attacked, the other moved, and a section of sidewalk
disintegrated into rubble. The other twisted and lashed out, missing
his target but pulverizing a small car. Both of them jumped, at least
four stories high, and away from the camera.

"This is incredible, folks... we repeat, if you are currently along
highway 158, move away from the area... you do NOT want to be caught in
this. So far, it doesn�t look like anybody has been hurt... but the
property damage must be in the billions of yen already..."

A greenish beam lanced out from one of the figures, leaving a smoking
trail across what had once been a bookstore. The other figure gestured,
and fired a yellow beam... it missed, and headed for the camera�s POV.
The sound of the commentator was drowned out by the thunder of the
blast...

"We�ve been hit! Some kind of energy beam... it�s not bad, but the pilot

tells me that we�re going to have to land the chopper..."

Misato spit out a mouthful of beer. "That... that was..."

"An Angel!" Asuka turned off the set and headed for the door. "What
else could have done that?"

Misato�s face went pale, and she grabbed her jacket off of the floor.
"I don�t want to know..."

---

Ryoga landed, looked around for a second. No obvious threats besides
Ranma. He dimly remembered taking out a SWAT truck, a mile back... and
he�d seen Ranma hit that helicopter, not straight on but it went down
anyway... wait. He was in the blast crater formed by the Angel�s attack
yesterday. How appropriate.

Ranma stopped, grinned at Ryoga. "You won�t win, you know. Besides,
either way, win or lose, you�re not going to see her again, right? You
lose both ways... Well, one way."

Ryoga felt himself snarling. "There�s one other way... I can make her
safe from us both." He attacked, and Ranma countered... no, DIDN�T
counter, only evading the attack. Ryoga continued... "You... have...
to... die...
here!" Why wasn�t he attacking back... it was really annoying.

Wait... NO. Too late, Ryoga remembered why Ranma wasn�t attacking,
noticed the spiral that their dance had sketched in the slag of the
crater. Ranma smiled triumphantly, seeing the defeat that must show on
Ryoga�s face, and punched, straight up, twisting his wrist. "HIRYU
SHOTEN HA!"

NO... Ryoga had lost... and he�d never see Akane again, not that it
would
matter because this idiot Ranma would never protect her right, and
she�d get hurt, even killed... as he felt the first tugging of the
impending cyclone, he felt himself calling... "SHISHI HOKODAN!"

Ryoga felt himself being flung aside, impacting into the twisted
remains of a steel girder. Stunned, he watched the huge ball of heavy
ki plummet from the sky... Ranma hadn�t stood a chance of evading it,
not
in the middle of his own special attack. The crackling ball of energy
struck... and exploded, sending Ranma flying across the crater.

He heard another rumbling, this time of tortured metal, as a pipe gave
way...

Water main. In the second before Ryoga was drenched, he briefly
wondered to himself WHY the world seemed to always be against him...

---

Misato arrived on the scene twenty minutes after the last attack. She
had seen it over the horizon, but a quick call to NERV had Hyuuga
assuring her that the Magi detected neither a blue pattern nor an AT
field. She immediately turned and went to see what had happened.

Asuka lurched out of the car. Whatever comment she had about Misato�s
driving was lost on her ears, as she immediately ran toward the
perimeter of the blast crater.

A policeman stopped her at the barricade. "Sorry, ma�am, but nobody�s
allowed past here." She looked around. Twenty police vehicles had been
disabled, blown glass windshields, flattened tires, even a couple
overturned.

She reached into her jacket, produced her NERV identification card.
"I�m allowed through. What the hell happened here?"

The officer�s eyes widened at the sight of her badge, and again at the
sight of her. He coughed, turning to the wreckage. "Some kind of
explosion, ma�am. That green thing from the sky hit some kind of wind,
and it just went straight to hell... Nobody�s dead, but there�s quite a
few of us that were cut up a bit. Good thing it happened here."

"Yeah..." Misato trudged up toward the lip of the crater, intending to
see the damage. "Did you see who did it?"

"Um... no, ma�am, although Akira says that he saw a little girl running
away afterwards... redhead, red shirt, although it�s my opinion that
he�s
been reading too many comics, ma�am. Nobody could have lived through
that. He even says that she had a little pig with her."

"Did you say a redhead?" Misato surveyed the damage. It was like the
Angel�s explosion, all over again. Well, no real harm done here, since
you couldn�t destroy the same thing twice... at the bottom, she could
see
the shine of the first layer of armor over the Geofront. That must have
been one HELL of a blast to dig that deep.

"Yes, ma�am." The officer looked uneasy. "Um... was this..." he waved
his
hand at the crater, then at the mangled police vehicles. "did it have
anything to do with what happened this morning?"

"No... no, I hope not." She wasn�t seeing anything important here, that
was for sure. That redhead, again. Something was important about her.
"Thank you, officer." Misato started walking back to her car.

---

Rei saw Ranma, as a girl, walk up to the door of the dojo. She was
carrying Ryoga... unless there were more pig-cursed people around. That
was something to think about... no, it was Ryoga, the pig had on his
headbands. She pushed the door open.

Ranma staggered across, like not all of her bones were working right.
She looked up, seemed to register Rei�s presence. "Uh... Kasumi... I�m
gonna go take a bath. Can you bring Ryoga�s pack up for me?" Rei
nodded, too surprised over his words to object. Ranma then continued to
drag himself inside, heading for the second floor of the house.

Well... might as well do it. Rei walked outside and grabbed onto one
strap of the pack... no, she was too tired to lift it that far. She
freed
the umbrella from the pack and hefted the latter. He could come get his
OWN
umbrella, she thought, as she headed toward the dojo. Gendo hadn�t told
her to stay awake waiting for him.

---

Ranma held his head in one hand as he leaned on the side of the tub. He
hurt EVERYWHERE. That had quite possibly been the MOST stupid thing he
had ever done. At least he was still alive, though. Had to count for
something... he winced at the pain in his ribs. It didn�t count for too
much. He looked over at Ryoga, asked, "So? Who won?"

Ryoga, as a pig, leapt into the bath and changed. His human head, now
wrapped with bandanas, broke the surface of the water. "Owww..." He fell

back against the side. "I didn�t." He looked at Ranma, made an attempt
at grinning. "Did you?"

"Hell yeah. Get out of my house, pig."

"Right. Make me." They both started laughing, weakly, and punctuated by
more than a few wheezes. "Promise me that we�ll never do that again,
okay?"

"Fine by me. Besides, when did I ever attack YOU?"

"Jusenkyo, remember?"

Well, Ryoga did have a point. "You still sore about that? I mean, at
least as a cute pig you don�t have to fend off Kuno."

Ryoga chuckled, then winced. "At least in the Eva, it stops hurting
when you turn it off."

"Hurts to pilot Eva?"

"Hell yes. Worse than this, when the Eva gets hurt... but somebody has
to
do it, and I guess I�m it."

Ranma swallowed, said, "Look, man, I�m sorry I didn�t keep Akane away
from that. She could have been hurt."

"Don�t worry about it..." Huh? "If... you can fight like that... I�m not
sure
that you have anything to worry about."

"Heh. Truce?"

"Truce. Oh..." Ryoga snapped his fingers. "Been meaning to tell you...
you�re supposed to get a ring for Akane. Engagement ring."

Ranma smacked his head with his palm, setting off an entirely new level
of pain. Of course! He had completely forgotten about that. "Uh... I
don�t know anything about rings..."

"Neither do I. Just go get her something... she�ll appreciate it... you
lout."

"Hey, I thought that we had a truce."

Ryoga grinned through bruised lips. "I reserve the right to insult
you."

"Whatever, P-chan." They both started laughing again, only to stop as
they both winced in pain.

The door to the bath opened, revealing Rei, carrying Ryoga�s pack. As
the two dove under the bath water, she dropped the pack and asked, "Is
this all right?"

Ranma risked a peek. Well, at least she wasn�t trying to join him like
Shampoo would. "Um... do you mind?" She wasn�t smiling... well, maybe. A

little.

"Mind what?"

Ryoga�s head surfaced. "MIND GETTING OUT OF THE BATHROOM?"

"Oh... OK." She turned around and closed the door.

"Huh." Ranma turned to look at Ryoga. He was really turning red. "How
do you put up with her?"

"I don�t know, man. At least I don�t get lost anymore..."

"Well... look, I�ll walk you home with her, then. I don�t think she
could
carry you without splashing you."

"Better tell Akane... she might get jealous."

Oh, man, he hadn�t even thought about that. "That�s sick."

"Yeah."

---

Akane waited by the porch. A few minutes ago, Ranma had left with Ryoga
and Rei, to "make sure they got home all right." Honestly. As if
anything would make trouble with Ryoga. Besides, Ranma couldn�t fool
her, he had really gotten hurt earlier. So had Ryoga, she thought.
Stupid jerks. As if she couldn�t take care of herself.

She pricked her ears up as she heard somebody moving into the garden.
Must be Ranma... no. Way too noisy, and not his kind of noisy. The
figure
stopped, set down a pack, sat on the pack. The gesture was so utterly
familiar... but this man was taller, thinner, OLDER than Ryoga. He held
his head in his hands... and cried out to the sky.

"WHERE THE HELL AM I NOW?"

She stood up, flipped on the switch for the porch light. In the glare,
she couldn�t make anything out too clearly... whoever it was wore a gi,
sandals, a belt. He looked at her, his glasses glinting in the light,
as she asked, "What are you doing here?" Unexpected visitors were NEVER
good news, she thought.

"Um..." He made as if to scratch the back of his head, slapped at a fly
on his shoulder instead. "I... just wandered by. Saw the light on. May I

come in?"

"S-sure." Akane stepped back as the stranger stepped inside. She saw
his short hair, beard, tinted glasses... saw his headbands. The
conclusion was obvious. "H-hibiki...san?"

He stared at her, shocked. "Why does everybody know who I am?" he asked
the air behind her shoulder. He then proceeded to sit down at the
table. "Yes, my name is Hibiki. How did you know that, girl?"

"Um..." She sat down herself. "The headbands. They�re just like Ryoga�s
headbands."

"Ah... I see. You know my son." SON? Ryoga hadn�t ever mentioned a
father
before, to her... Ranma had said something, about him having run off or
something... "Where are we?"

Well, if it was really Ryoga�s father, at least he was consistent with
what she knew of the family. "Nerima. In Tokyo-3?" His eyes tightened
at the first statement. "Japan?"

"I know full well where Nerima is, child..." He stood up, started
walking
for the door. "Thank you. I can find my way from here. You are...?"

"Akane Tendo," she responded, without thinking.

"Thank you, Tendo-chan. I will leave now." He faded into the darkness
outside the door... she heard him pick up his pack, but didn�t hear him
climbing the wall.

Now THAT was weird. She�d have to tell Ranma... once he got back.
Stupid...
making her wait up for him.

---

End of part 11

Questions, comments, flames go to akent@pdq.net

And that's that! Thanks for reading, everybody... part 12 will be posted
tomorrow night, or if you just can't wait, it is also at
http://members.tripod.com/~AvatarHR/pl.html.

Andy Kent
--
"He'd been an angel once. He hadn't meant to Fall.
He'd just hung around with the wrong people."
Crowley, Good Omens