Jeffrey "OneShot" Wong	

Neon Genesis Evangelion/Ranma 1/2: The Angel the just won't die 2


  Ritsuko noticed someone familiar on her way home from a grueling day 
at Nerv Headquaters. She was jealous of Misato because she had gone home 
many many hours ago. While Misato had gone home close to five, Ritsuko 
had stay behind, not finishing until well past eleven.
  She was stopped at a red light, waiting for it to change, when she saw 
Ranma as he crossed the street. Unfortunately, he didn't quite make it 
as it turned green on him. Still, he took his time, not even bothered by 
the fact that several cars were honking at him, several drivers even 
sticking there heads out the window to curse at him.
  "Hold yer horses." Ranma shouted back. He was really hungry, having 
wandered the street for several hours already, and was starting to get 
irritated at not having found a job.
  "Get the fuck outta the road!!" a pissed of motorist shouted, flipping 
Ranma a guesture quite frequently used in a city called New York. He was 
a young man, showing off to his three friends whom happened to be in the 
car with him.
  Ranma, very annoyed at how rude people were nowadays, walked over to 
the motorist. Ritsuko watch all of this from the safety of her car, 
which happened to be locted directly behind the peeved off motorist. Her 
eyes widened as she saw him grip the front of the man car and pick it 
up, all four wheels leaving the ground. As he held the car, he walked 
over toward the red light, where everyone else was still stopped, 
watching in awe, and placed the car back down, perpendicular to the 
sidewalk.
  Ranma smiled a bit, and then crossed the street to the other side.
  Ritsuko turned her attention from Ranma and onto the car. She realized 
Ranma had put the car down so that it was stuck in the middle of the 
street, unable to move forward or back up to right itself due to the 
oncoming traffic one side and that sidewalk on the other. 
  After a short while, all the motorists realizing it was a green light, 
also realized they were all being blocked by that man's car and soon, 
everyone started honking their horn, swearing at him.
  A few minutes passed, the light having turned green and then red 
several times, the man finally righted himself, moving forward and 
backwards in tiny amounts. As the traffic finally managed to pick up, 
Ritsuko, compelled and shocked at seeing Ranma, pulled her car to the 
side and got out of her car. She ran down the sidewalk, catching up with 
Ranma after a short moment.
  "Ranma," she called out to him, stopping by his side, her breathing a 
bit heavy.
  Ranma looked at Ritsuko, "Eh? Do I know you? Have we met before?" He 
looked at her carefully, and after a moment, his eyes lit in 
recognition, "Oh, I know you. I saw you in that tiny room with Misato, 
ne?"
  Ritsuko nodded. This was the first time she had actually met him and 
talked. She had observed him through the one way mirror and had talked 
to him during that Angel attack via a communications line, but they had 
never truly met face to face.
  "I'm Ranma."
  "Yes. I know that. I'm Akagi Ritsuko."
  "How're ya doin'?" he said with a warm smile. "Whatcha doing around 
here?"
  Ritsuko's heart skipped a beat. She had never realized how handsome 
Ranma was. God, he was gorgeous. "I-I'm fine. I-I was on my way home 
from work,"
  Ranma seemed to be an easy person to talk to. He said, "You were at 
work until now? That's quite a bit of hours. You must be tired. Do you 
live around here?"
  She nodded, "Yeah, I've been at work for over forteen hours. And I'm 
beat. And yes, I live very close. My home is just around the corner."
  Ranma looked around, "Do ya walk home from work? You want me to walk 
you home?"
  "Um, er, I guess you could walk me home. I-I don't mind," she said. 
Jeez, she thought, what the hell am I doing? I don't even know this guy! 
Misato is the type of person to do this, no me! "Um, now that I think 
about it. There's no real need to. I mean, I live right around the 
corner."
  Ranma shrugged his shoulders, "All right," 
  And then he walked off.
  Ritsuko felt a bit sad that Ranma didn't even persist in walking her 
home.
 
  Asuka was looking out the window of her classroom during lunch break 
and caught sight of a very familiar and unwanted sight.
  "What the hell is he doing here?!" she gasped, noticing Ranma walking 
through the courtyard.
  Ranma looked around as he stood in the courtyard. He couldn't help be 
notice that every Japanese courtyard looked the same, and that every 
school looked the same. Luckily for him, there was only one school in 
the area. He closed his eyes and pictured Kuno rushing him, his bokken 
raised, ready to strike. God, how he missed the days. He would even let 
Kuno hit him several times, just for the fun of it. Of course, those 
attacks wouldn't hurt since Ranma had gotten much much stronger over the 
many years, but it was fun to imagine the look on Kuno's face as he 
realize he couldn't hurt Ranma.
  "God, what I would do to see that happen," Ranma said to himself, 
smiling happily. His little reverie was broken when someone called out 
to him from one of the second story windows.
  "Hey, oyaji, what the hell are you doing here?!" Asuka shouted with a 
wry grin. "Dontcha have some geriactric home you should be checking 
yourself into?"
   "Oyaji? What makes you call me an old man?" Ranma shouted back. Even 
though he technically an old man, he was just curious. 
  Asuka smiled evily, "Because I found out from Shinji that you're at 
the ancient age of, what, sixty. Man, that's old."
  Ranma smirked as he shouted back, "Ya have a nice sleep, little girl?"
  Her brows creased. She remembered hearing from Misato this morning 
that Ranma had touched one of her pressure points, knocking her out as 
it put her to a deep sleep.
  "My name's not, 'little girl'." Asuka shouted back, "It's Asuka. You 
think you can remember that or might your memory be slipping due to your 
old age?"
  Ranma continued to have his fun, "No, I don't think I'll forget that 
name.....unfortunately. But then again, who could forget a person with a 
winning personality like you?" he said sarcastically, a wry smile on his 
lips.
  Asuka was not going to lose this verbal battle, not after that 
humiliating one she had lost to when Ranma had struck one of her 
pressure points. 
  Shinji, curious as to who Asuka had been talking to, walked up to the 
window, immediately noticing Ranma.
  "R-Ranma, what are you doing here?" he asked.
  Ranma shouted back, "I'll answer you in a sec. You're on your lunch 
break, right? Well, I'm sick of tired of having to shout. I'll come up 
to yer classroom." 
  He then entered the school through the front doors.
  "Considering how old he is, he'll probably fall and break a leg on his 
way up here," Asuka commented wryly.
  
  Ranma entered the classroom, not really all that worried if there was 
a teacher present or not. If there was a teacher, he would simply make 
something up to explain his presence. Lukcily for him, there wasn't one.
  "Who are you?" Toji asked curiously. "Are you the a sub?"
  Ranma smirked, looking at Asuka with a wry grin and then said, "Yep. 
I'm the new sub. Class, please be seated,"
  "But there's still ten more minutes left before class ends," the class 
rep, Hikari, said.
  Ranma brushed the comment aside, "I know. That gives you an extra ten 
minutes more to learn what I'm gonna teach you,"
  "He's not the substitute. He's just an perverted old man!" Asuka 
shouted, pointing at Ranma. She didn't want him in the same room as her, 
much less acting like he was teaching the class. "He doesn't belong 
here."
  Ranma pretended to look at a list of names that was on the podium 
before him. He then said, "You must be Asuka. I've heard a lot about 
you, that you're a real nasty one."
  "Hey, oyaji, why dontcha go back to the geriatric ward that you came 
from?! You don't belong here!" Asuka said with a wry smile. She planned 
on embarrassing him to death.
  Ranma looked at Asuka, pretending hurt, "Oyaji?" He then looked at the 
class, "Class, do you think I'm an old man? How old do I look to you?"
  "You look like you're in your early twenties, and you're very cute," a 
female classmate commented.
  Ranma smirked. He had forgotten how open the girls are nowadays. And 
of course, they would say that stuff since they actually thought he was 
a substitute and wanted to make him nervous. He also recalled what kind 
of questions he would be barraged with in a second.
  "Thank you, um," He faked looking at the paper, "Junko, that's very 
nice of you to say that,"
  "My name's Keiko." The girl said, blushing a bit, she jerked a thumb 
toward another girl, "She's Junko."
  "Oh, I'm sorry. I must've read the wrong name," Ranma responded 
glibly. When he noticed the girl giving him this starry eyed look, he 
got a bit nervous. 
   Hikari raised her hand and then stood up. She asked, "Sensei, do you 
have a girlfriend?"
  Toji, who was sitting rather casually in his chair, looked at Hikari 
curiously and asked "Why do you ask that? Ya interested in him?"
  Hikari blushed. How clueless could that boy actually be? She 
whispered, "Dontcha get it. I'm the class rep. It's a tradition that I 
ask, um, embarrassing question to a young male substitute whenever one 
shows up,"
  Toji shrugged his shoulders, "Oh. Okay," He went back to ignoring 
everything else.
  Ranma smiled. He might as well have some fun while he was still on 
this world, "No. I don't have a girlfriend, but I'm definitely looking 
for one," For a split second, he actually felt guilty. He was sixty 
goddamnit. He continued, "I'm looking for the right girl. Could you be 
her?"
  Hikari blushed beet red. This little joke was backfiring.
  Luckily for her, Asuka came to the rescue and said, "Nah, she wouldn't 
be the one right for you. She's human. She's much too good for you. You 
should look for people that belong to the same species as you,"
  Ranma smirked, and then changed the subject, "Anyway, I'm here to 
teach you about....um.... human development,"
  Toji seemed to perk up a bit. He raised his hand and asked, "As in 
Human Sexuality?"
  "Suzuhara....." Hikari said, giving Toji a scornful look. 
  "Um, er, not really," Ranma quickly said, "It's about....what it's 
capable of. Yeah, that's it."
  "What the hell are you up to, oyaji?" Asuka muttered.
  Ranma smirked and said, "Asuka. Go stand out in the hall. I will not 
have you interrupting my class without raising a hand."
  "Go to hell!" came the reply. Asuka gave Ranma a look that would 
probably kill a man. Unfortunately, Ranma wasn't at all perturbed.
  "All right. Everyone here gets a zero on the pop quiz I plan on giving 
at the end of today's lesson," Ranma said, grinning from ear to ear. 
God, this was fun.
  The class gave Asuka a odd look.
  "What the hell's wrong with all of you?! He's not even a substitute!" 
she said in contempt, "Why do you actually believe he's a damn 
substitute?!" 
  The class continued to stare at her.
  Ranma, figuring he should really put Asuka in a situation like that, 
said, "Class, forget that last one. She could stay. Ahem, now, if you 
don't mind, Asuka-chan. Please, be seat. Okay, now what I'm here to 
teach you is....what the hell was that.......human something?"
  "Human development, sensei" a girl  corrected him.
  "Yeah, that's it. thank you." Ranma said, not even embarrassed. 
"Anyway, I'm gonna demonstrate to you what ki is and how to use it. But 
first, I must say that ki is a power that can not be abused. You must 
swear to me that you would not use it for evil purposes. You must not 
use it to help those devil....um....Angel thingies."
  The class was silent. What was this subsitute babbling about? Why on 
earth would he make everyone swear?
  When Ranma noticed the moment of awkward silence, he said, "All right. 
That's good enough for me. Um," He pretended looking at the paper, 
"Shinji, can you please come here? I would like to to volunteer for a 
demonstration."
  "I-I c-can't"
  "C'mon," Ranma persisted.
  "H-hai," Shinji said meekly.
  "What the hell is he up to?" Asuka muttered, more to herself than 
anyone else. Toji heard though.
  "Will ya just shut up? This ki stuff sounds interesting," he 
commented.
  "You shut up you walking gorilla," Asuka snapped back
  Shinji walked up to the front desk. 
  Once Shinji was next to him, Ranma whispered, "Yo, Shinji, ya up to 
learning this stuff? I'll show you more on this after school. I know I 
said I'll swing by Misato's by evening, but have something else I wanna 
do later. Anyway, I'll be around the courtyard here after school. Can 
you meet me there?"
  "Is this why you're going all this pretend substititute stuff just to 
tell me?" he asked.
  Ranma nodded, "Yeah. Why not? I could be fun." 
  He then picked up a piece of chalk, and wrote 'Ki' in bold letters on 
the chalkboard. He said, "Ki. Everyone has it. It's what you would 
consider inner energy. Y'see, everything, living and non-living have 
this internal energy called ki. Now, what I'm here to teach you is how 
to harness this energy,"
  "Huh?" Toji, although interested, was lost.
  "It's all fake, you dolt!" Asuka said to Toji. "He's makin' this stuff 
up!"
  Ranma placed a hand on Shinji's shoulder and, all of a sudden, a blue 
aura formed around the two of them. The class, except for Rei, was 
shocked to see this. They continued to stare, mouth agape. Asuka watched 
uninterestedly. 
  Ranma said, "All right Shinji, walk over to the window and point yer 
hand toward the sky, palm open,"
  Shinji did as he was told.
  "Now, whenever you feel like it, release all your energy. Picture a 
fireball erupting from your hand," Ranma said.
  Shinji did as he was told, but was now expecting what would happened. 
A massive ki-blast erupted from his hands shooting up into the sky. The 
entire class was staring at Shinji, a shocked expression on all of their 
faces. Toji fell backwards and off his chair, caught totally by surprise 
at what he saw. Everyone else was deathly silent, still staring.
  "Wow, Shinji, have you ever done this before?" Ranma said with pretend 
surprise, "You sure caught on to this stuff real quick."
  "W-w-what the h-hell was that?!" Asuka said, very much shocked like 
the entire class. She had never seen something like that before. It was 
even more shocking to see that Shinji had actually played a part in 
this.
  Ranma looked at Shinji and smiled, "Don't tell her how to do it. Let 
her suffer, hee hee." He turned toward the class, "Well, class, that is 
what you would call ki in one of its many forms,"
  At that moment, the teacher chose that time to enter the classroom. 
When he caught sight of Ranma, he said, "Who the hell are you?"
  Ranma, caught up in the act of shocking everyone, forgot to stop his 
little charade and said, "I'm the new substitute. Why?"
  "Sub?" the teacher said, "For what? My, you're awefully young looking 
to be a teacher, albeit a substitute one,"
  "Human development," Ranma said as he regarded the teacher for a short 
moment. The teacher was short and stocky and was balding.
  "I'm sorry, but I think you have the wrong room. First of all, as you 
can see, I'm not sick. And second of all, if I were sick, you would be 
teaching history," the teacher said.
  Ranma, finally realizing that this was actually a real teacher he was 
talking to, finally said, "Oops. Um, I must be in the wrong class. Sorry 
'bout that. I'll be on my way," 
  As he was about to head out, he quickly said to Shinji, "Like I said, 
I'll be at the courtyard after school," 
  He opened the door and was about to leave when one of the boys made a 
comment, "C'mon, show us more. That was so cool! I wanna know how you do 
that!"
  The teacher looked at Ranma curiously. He was wondering how this 
youngster had done to get these damn kids to actually be interested in 
learning something. What was there to human development that was so 
interesting to learn. Afterall, human development didn't dwell that much 
on human sexuality. That was another course all together.
  Ranma smiled weakly and apologetically as he said, "Sorry class. I 
didn't mean to teach that. Forget you learned it."
  But, before he left the class, he turned toward the teacher.
  "Can you do me a favor?" Ranma asked.
  "What is it?" the short man asked.
  Ranma pointed toward Asuka, smiling wrying directly at her.
  "That girl over there. She kept interrupting me while I was trying to 
teach. Can you please do me a favor and have her stand out in the 
hallway for a short while."
  The teacher nodded. "Okay, I'll do that,"
  As a teacher to another, the man would grant him that favor. 
  Ranma smirked one more time at Asuka before he left.

  Shinji stepped out of school and into the courtyard where he saw Ranma 
talking to a young female teacher. It seemed a few of the females 
noticed him waiting there and wanted to talk to him and get to know him. 
Only one of them had the courage.
  "Not too long. I only started here a very short while ago, about three 
months ago," the young teacher said.
  The teacher noticed Shinji walk up to them and turned her attention 
toward him, "Why hello, Shinji-kun. How are you doing?"
  Shinji said meekly, "I'm doing fine, sensei,"
  "Well, I guess I better get going now," the teacher said, "Perhaps 
I'll see you again,"
  Ranma smiled softly, "All right. Perhaps we might bump into each other 
again. Ja,"
  Shinji and Ranma stood together and watched the young teacher leave. 
Once she was out of earshot, Shinji said, "Do you know her?"
  Ranma shook his head, "No. I just met her today. She seems nice,"
  Shinji was silent for a moment. He wondered if he should tell Ranma 
that almost every guy in the school had a thing for her. He figured it 
was best to let him find out for himself. "Um, you wanted to see me 
after school, right? Well, I'm here,"
  "Yeah, and that's good." Ranma said, "Is there any place we could go 
that, well, no one could get hurt or would be bothering us?"
  Shinji thought about it for a moment, "Well, we could always goto the 
park. It's not too far from here. Also, you said you were going to stop 
by Misato-san's later today. What's with the change in plans?"
  "Well, I wanna go away for a little while, and I wanna leave tonight." 
He responded, "And it's better since there's daylight anyway,"
  "Um, all right,"
  Asuka and Rei emerged from the school.
  Ranma looked at Asuka, "Hello,"
  "Hmph!" Asuka said, turning a head toward Ranma. She didn't want to 
see him. Ever. She had made her day turn out to be one of the worst in 
history. Never had she been this angry at someone in her life.
  Ranma shrugged his shoulder and turned toward Rei, "Hello. We haven't 
really met each other. I'm Ranma Saotome,"
  "Rei Ayanami," came a soft reply.  She didn't even hold eye contact 
with Ranma.
  "Why are you here?" Asuka said, contempt in her voice.
  "I came here to teach you what you saw earlier. Ki." He responded. 
"Since ki seems to help out quite a bit when you fight against those 
aliens-"
  "Angels," Asuka said, "At least get the terminology right,"
  Ranma's brows creased for a short moment. He sighed, "All right, 
Asuka, Angels. Anyway, I'm here to teach you about ki so it could help 
you fight against those Angels."
  "Why?" Rei asked.
  "Well, I'm here to help out the best that I can. And I'm here to teach 
you before I leave," Ranma said.
  "Leave? Where?" Asuka said. Her eyes seemed to light up. She would 
love for Ranma to leave. Now would be a good time as any.
  Ranma said, "I wanna go back to where I came from. I'm leaving 
tonight."
  "Good," Asuka commented. "The sooner you leave, the better."
  He ignored her, "I'll teach you the basic fundamentals of how to use 
ki and harness it. The only problem is that it takes quite a while to be 
able to manipulate ki effectively. What you saw Shinji do, well, that 
was one of the examples of ki. I showed him some more examples last 
night at Misato's,"
  "You did? When?" Asuka asked. She didn't remember seeing Ranma showing 
Shinji.
  "After I put you to sleep," Ranma answered matter-of-factly. "Anyway, 
it's very easy to call forth ki, this inner energy, but it's very hard 
to use it effectively."
  "Why are you showing us how to use this?" Rei asked, "We are EVA 
pilots,"
  Ranma looked at her, a confused and embarrassed look on his face. "Oh 
shit. I forgot about that."
  "Idiot,"
  Ranma took a deep breath, still ignoring Asuka, and said, "Now that I 
think about it, there's no real way you could use ki from within those 
robots....um.....EVAs. Man, that kinda puts a damper on the 
effectiveness of what I'm gonna teach you,"
  "I still wanna learn it though," Shinji said.
  "That's because you're a wimp and need it," Asuka commented wryly. 
"It'll become your backbone,"
  Shinji looked down at the ground. She was right. That one moment last 
night and today when he had experienced the power of ki had brought his 
confidence level through the roof. Unfortunately, when Asuka noticed 
Shinji looking a bit happy that morning, and began teasing him, bringing 
his confidence back down.
  Ranma looked at Asuka. She looked back at him, defying him, her eyes 
showing the utmost contempt toward him. He shook his head in disgust at 
her and turned toward Shinji, "Well, Shinji, I'll be glad to teach you. 
You could use ki in anything, even in the real world, like healing 
yourself,"
  "Don't shake your head at me like that!" Asuka said.
  Ranma turned toward Asuka, "Shut up! Shut up! Shut up! What the hell's 
wrong with you?! Dontcha ever shut up? You keep yabberin' and yabberin'. 
Dontcha ever run outta things to say? Jeez,"
  "Why dontcha just leave? We don't need you here!" came Asuka's retort. 
"We were doing just fine without you,"
  Ranma pretended to pull out his hair, "Shut up! Shut up! What's with 
you always havin' the last word? Are you always like this? All stuck up 
and bitchy? I mean, I respect females and all, I respect 'em more than I 
do males, but you're really making me think otherwise,"
  Asuka opened her mouth to say, only to catch sight of Ranma extending 
a finger toward her.
  "If you don't shut up, I'm gonna push your pressure point again and 
put you to sleep." He said seriously. He waved a index at her 
threateningly, "You'll find yourself waking up somewhere very 
embarrassing, like a men's restroom or a men's bathhouse,"
  "Is that a threat?!" she said, her anger rising "How dare you threaten 
me?!" When she saw Ranma take a step toward her, she covered her 
breasts. "Stay away from me y-you pervert! I-I'll s-scream!!"
  Ranma shrugged his shoulders, "So?" He took in a deep breath, "I'm 
asking this nicely. Will you please be quiet? Cause you're making it 
very hard for me to be nice to you."
  Asuka's brows creased.
  "R-Ranma? What are you doing here?"
  Ranma turned around to face Misato.
  "M-Misato? What are you doing here?" Ranma asked.
  "I came here to pick the children up for work," she responded.
  "Work? They work? Aren't there child labor laws around here?"
  Misato and Shinji burst out laughing. Asuka snickered at Ranma's 
ignorance. Rei smirked.
  Misato shook her head, "No. Not as in workin' in some kind of 
sweatshop or anything. I have to bring them to Nerv Headquarters for 
some synchro tests. Just some testing, that's all."
  "Oh," Ranma said, "But, um, could that wait till later? I mean, I was 
about to teach Shinji some more about ki,"
  "I thought you were going to stop by my apartment later tonight,"
  Ranma nodded, "Well, yeah, I was. But I kinda wanna get back to my own 
world, so I wanted to leave tonight,"
  "Your world, you mentioned about that earlier," Misato said, changing 
the subject, "What's it like?"
  Ranma looked around, "Well, judging from what I see around me, my 
world is more technologically advanced, at least, it used to be until 
the downfall of Genom. But otherwise, it's pretty much the same. But 
that's aside from the point, I was kinda hopin' to teachin' Shinji now."
  "Um, no can do," Misato said, shaking her head, "We have to do the 
synchronization tests. We have to make it a top priority. We need to 
constantly keep in check of how well the children could synchornize with 
the EVA units," She wondered if she should be saying all this stuff to 
Ranma. It didn't really matter because he was the key to everything, the 
key to finally ridding this world of Angels once and for all.
  Ranma sighed, "But, I wanna leave tonight. All right, when are these 
tests finished?"
  "In two hours,"
  "All right, how about I come with you there and I'll teach Shinji 
there. That way, we could save the time it takes for him to get from 
there and to your apartment,"
  Misato wondered what she should do at that moment. "Wait a minute. I 
just thought of something. You can come along with us. While there, you 
can show us, as in Ritsuko and I, how this works. Perhaps we could 
develop some kind of weapon to generate that kinda energy,"
  Ranma scratched the back of his head, "Um, I don't really think that 
would work. I mean, ki, it's an internal thing. Can you recreate that?"
  Misato smiled, "We can recreate a lotta things. Even if it doesn't 
work, it's best give it a try. It's better to have tried and failed than 
to go on wondering if it ever have worked."
  Ranma shrugged his shoulders, "All right, I'm game. But, after that, I 
leave. There's a village I plan on visiting. If I'm lucky, there's gonna 
be a special item there that'll get me back home,"
  "And what would you do if it isn't there?" Misato asked, "Or worse, 
what happens if it doesn't get you home like you expected?"
  Ranma thought about it for a moment before answering, "Well, there's 
actually two items. There's that box I came to this world in. And then 
there's a special mirror. So, I have two chances of getting back. If 
not, well, I'll hafta find a way. It shouldn't be too hard. I mean, I've 
seen some strange things happen, and that isn't all that farfetched. 
Heck, I even went back in time once, but that's aside from the point,"
  "Y-you went back i-in time?" Misato asked. She couldn't comprehend the 
possibility of it. She imagined would could have happened, how the world 
would be different, the Second Impact had been prevented. The 
possibilites were endless.
  "Yeah, I went back in time," Ranma said matter-or-factly, "I met one 
of my finacees' great grandmother. I also met my father's grandmaster 
when he was young. It was some really freaky stuff."
  "Finacees?  As in plural of finacee?" Misato said.
  "Yeah, at the time, I had....one, two, three, four finacees, five if 
you count that Tea Ceremony girl," he said.
  "F-five fiancees?" Misato said, a bit dubious. "What, were you 
stringing four other girls along?"
  Ranma shook his head, "Nope. All five girls were my fiancees against 
my will. Ahem, but that's aside from the point, Misato. We're straying 
way off the subject. Anyway, I'll come with you to this Nerv 
Headquarters. I'll demonstrate for you guys in hopes of you being able 
to recreate ki. That way, you can battle these Angel thingies without my 
help. All right?"
  Misato nodded, "All right"
  Asuka, who was listening to all this, was a bit stunned at hearing all 
this. "Um, is a-all that true?"
  "Huh? What do you mean?" 
  "About all the things you've been through,"
  Ranma nodded, "Yeah, and much much more."
  "Like what?" Shinji asked, also curious. Rei looked a bit interested 
also, although she didn't show it much.
  Together, everyone headed for Nerv Headquarters.
  "Well, I used to be cursed to immortality," Ranma said, "That's why I 
look so you. I've travelled back in time, became engaged to more girls 
against my will than I can remember, fought with ghosts and dragons, 
seen giant lizards, battled these machines called boomers, and a lot 
more,"
  Shinji was more interested in what Ranma had said first, "Cursed to 
immortality?"
  "Yes, I used to be cursed. I'm no longer cursed anymore," Ranma said, 
"Actually, I wasn't immortal. I mean, I could die, but not through 
natural means...at least, it was virtually impossible. You see, there 
was a cursed for I changed into when splashed with cold water, and while 
in that cursed form, I aged backwards toward the original age of when I 
was first cursed, age fifteen. When I get splashed with hot water, I 
reverted back to my original form, but, I would be reverted back to a 
younger age. Let's just say my curse led me into a heap of trouble and 
was pretty much the cause of all my troubles."
  "T-that's crazy," Misato commented.
  "Look, perhaps we'll talk about this some other day," he said, pausing 
for a brief moment, "I don't really like talkin'about my past all that 
much. I've had some pretty bad memories of it,"
  "As in what?" Rei asked, silent most of the time until now.
  "Well, if you really wanna know, when I was young, I lost everything," 
Ranma said in a sad tone, "I mean everything. I lost my family, my 
friends, everything that I cared for. The town I lived in was destroyed 
completely. From what I remember, only three people outta hundreds of 
thousands survived. A girl named Lisa, my nemisis Ryoga, and myself. 
That's all."
  "T-that's h-horrible," Shinji said. He realized Ranma must had gone 
through a lot of pain and suffering.
  Ranma shrugged his shoulders, almost fighting back his feelings, "But 
you don't really hafta worry about that. That happened a long logn time 
ago. I can't change the past at least, I've never tried. I wouldn't try 
anyway because I would probably end up screwing everything up. Anyway, 
I've learned to go on with my life,"
  There was a moment of silence. 
  Asuka, even though she hated him, even felt sorry for Ranma.
 
  Ranma walked through the corridors. 
  "Great! Just great! I pull a Ryoga and get lost. Where the hell am I?" 
he muttered to himself, looking around, unable to discern any 
differences in all those plain looking walls. Everything looked the 
same. There was nothing for him to use a reference to see if he was 
walking around in a circle or not. Why the hell did he walk off while 
waiting for those synchronization test to finish?
  "Well, I'm a guy, and I ain't gonna ask for direction," Ranma 
commented. He continued to walk around, accidentally bumping into a 
pretty girl this short brown hair.
  "Hello," Maya said, "Are you looking for someone?" When he noticed 
Ranma's civilian clothes, she asked, "Um, do you belong here? Do you 
have the proper authorization?"
  Ranma shrugged his shoulders, "Authorizations? Probably not. I'm just 
walking around, um, exploring the joint."
  Maya regarded the young man for a moment. She couldn't help but feel 
her heart racing a bit. He sure was good-looking. "Well, without the 
proper authorization, you don't belong here. I'll escort you out,"
  "What kinda authorization do I need?" Ranma asked. "Wait. I think I do 
have authorization. Misato invited me. I'm here to help Nerv out,"
  "Help out?" Maya asked, "How?"
  "Well, I after these synchro testings, I'm supposed to teach Shinji 
how to manipulate ki," Ranma said.
  "Well, the tests ended ten minutes ago. I was just coming from the 
testing labs," she said. "Misato and the others are still there. Um, are 
you Ranma?"
  Ranma nodded, "Yep,"
  So this is Ranma, Maya said. She remembered Misato walking up to her 
and asking her if she had seen a man named Ranma. When Maya had asked 
who Ranma was, Misato had told her he was a very good looking man with 
black hair that was in a pig-tail.
  "Please, come with me," Maya said as she walked down the corridor. 
  Ranma followed her blindly.
  When Ranma entered the room, he saw Misato, Shinji, Asuka, Rei, and 
Ritsuko.
  "Oh, hello, Ritsuko," Ranma said with a smile. Misato turned and 
looked at the blond haired girl, a odd look on her face.
  "You two know each other?" Misato asked Ritsuko.
  Ritsuko, whose heart was beating rapidly all of a sudden, replied, 
"We, um, bumped into each other last night."
  Misato gave Ritsuko a wry smile, "Oh, really..."
  Ranma, totally oblivious to the staring between the girls, turned 
toward Shinji, "All right, Shinji, when do ya wanna get started?"
  Misato turned away from Ritsuko and said, "Um, weren't you going to 
give us some demonstration? I mean, after that talk earlier, I thought 
you were going to show everyone while Ritusko and I observe."
  Ranma nodded, "Yeah, I plan on doing that, but, I figured since I'm 
going to be observed, I might as well teach Shinji also. You know, kill 
two birds with one stone,"
  Ritsuko shook her head, taking on a professional tone, "It's better if 
we just observe you by yourself."
  "Huh? How come?"
  "Well, our computers won't have to observe two people at once," 
Ritsuko said, "It'll be better to concentrate just one you,"
  Ranma looked at Shinji, "Is that all right with you?"
  Shinji nodded.
  Ranma then turned toward Ritsuko, "All right, I guess I could give a 
demonstration. I would like to leave then,"
  "Leave? For where?" Ritsuko asked.
  Ranma sighed, "Don't worry about it. It's just that I plan on leaving 
after this. Anyway, let's get started."

   Ranma took in a deep breath as he looked around the observation 
chamber. He was somewhere in Nerv Headquarters, within a heavily 
reinforced room that had been specifically build to contain an Angel in 
case one had ever been captured. The room was massive. It was virtually 
the size of a football field in every direction. In the middle of the 
room was a cylinder several feet think, about as tall at Ranma.
  "What do ya want me to do?" he called out.
  "Do whatever you want," Misato's voice entered. She and everyone else 
were in a tiny observation booth on the extreme end of the room, 
seperated by ten feet of reinforced glass. Shinji watched intently as 
did Ritsuko and Misato. Rei watched stoically while Asuka, too, watched, 
but pretending not to be all that interested.
  "Like what?" he asked.
  "Anything," Misato said into the microphone, "We just want to observe 
your powerlevels and attempt to recreate it if possible. We need more 
studies on it. That's all. I know, throw those fireball thingies of 
yours,"
  Ranma shrugged his shoulders, "All right," and then shot a tiny ki-
blast toward the cylinder, utterly destroying it, it melting into a 
puddle of melted steel. 
  "Goddamnit!!" Ritsuko said, looking at the sudden numbers that popped 
up on the screen. "How the hell did he do that?! That cylinder is made 
of the same materials as the progressive knives!" She looked at the 
screen and her eyes creased, "Wow, the powerlevels are through the roof. 
The computers can't seem to get a real good reading, but all the energy 
seems to be emanating from within him,"
  Misato nodded, "Yes, that's what he mentioned to me, but exact how is 
what I'm curious about finding out,"
  Asuka humphed. She wasn't impressed at all. He was still an asshole. 
She would be able to wipe the floor with him if she was piloting Unit-
02.
  Shinji's eyes popped out. God, how he wished he knew how to do 
something like that. With power like that, who needed EVA's.
  Ranam watched as the floor below the cylinder opened up and the melted 
ooze disappearing below it. After a short moment. Another cylinder 
started to rise from the opening, the floor closing below it. 
  "Don't worry about the cylinders," Ritsuko said. "We have quite a few 
of those. Please, go on with your, um, testings. We'll continue to 
monitor and observe you,"
  "All right. What else would you like me to do?" 
  "Anything you like," Misato said, "You're free to experiment with 
whatever you like. We're just here to monitor and observe you, that's 
all. We're very interested in finding out exactly how you manage to 
generate and harness all that energy,"
  "It's all from within,"
  "I know," came Misato rather exasperated voice, "But we don't exactly 
know how it come from, as you say it, 'from within'. Just continue on. 
We're here to watch. Oh, I know, use one of you strongest blasts. I'd 
like to know exactly how strong you are. I assume that last blast wasn't 
your strongest,"
  Ranma nodded, "No. It wasn't at all my strongest. As to my strongest 
blast, that would be my seppukku blast, and, well, frankly, no thank 
you. Let's just say this room is too small. Also, as you can tell by 
what I call it, I would most likely die if I tried it......even though I 
survived it throwing it three times already. Once when I was young, 
another when showing my friend Ryoga, and a third when I tried to stop 
this supercomputer from sefl-destructing,"
  "Hmph, perhaps he should try it. Perhaps we'll get lucky and he'll 
succeed in killing himself," Asuka muttered to herself, even though it 
was loud enough for everyone in the tiny observation room to hear.
  Misato said, "All right. All right. Don't show us your 'seppukku 
blast'. Show us anything,"
  "Okay," he said as he conentrated his ki. "I'll try something I've 
never done before," Although there was no nothing wrong with his old 
one, he felt it was about time he developed some new techniques. And now 
was probably the best time. Sure, he wished Cologne was there to help 
him develope some new moves, but since she had died many many years ago 
in the 'Nerima Massacre', he would have to learn new techniques on his 
own.
  He closed his eyes and concentrated his ki, his arua blazing. He 
wondered what kind of technique he should learn. Realizing that he had 
two forms of projectiles and one form of physical attack, he figured it 
was best to develope yet another physical attack.
  "Yeah, that's what I'll try and perfect," Ranma said confidently to 
himself, making a fist with one hand. "Some kinda super attack. Since my 
Kashuu TenshinAmaguriken deals with speed, I guess it's best to develop 
one that deal with shear power,"
  Not wanting really knowing the extend of his powers, Ranma 
concentrated a fraction of his ki toward his right hand. Slowly, the 
blue aura surrounding his body started to subside as this red aura 
started to grow surrounding his clenched hand.
  "Cool!" Ranma commented, looking at his hand. 
  "What are you doing, Ranma?" Ritsuko's voice entered the vast room.
  "I dunno, I'm improvising." Came the reply. "Cool, right? Anyway, I'm 
trying to develop some new move, that's all."
  With his hand still glowing red, Ranma walked to the cylinder. He 
wondered if he should shoot this ki from his fist or just punch away. 
Choosing to to the latter, Ranma cocked his hand backward and bent his 
knees, going into a low crouch, a perfect uppercutting postion. 
  He then brought his fist upward and stuck the cylinder. 
  The moment his fist hit the cylinder, this massive explosion erupted, 
enveloping Ranma in this perfect sphere of pure energy. 
  "Holy shit!!!" Misato shouted, looking out the window, caught sight of 
the blast as it engulfed Ranma, and quickly began to expand as an 
extreme rate in every direction. "I-it's coming straight toward us!!!!"  
  She turned around and dove for cover, lunging right into Rei and 
knocking her out of the way as the glass exploded, spraying to room with 
shranel. Lukily for its occupants, almost everyone had resonded quick 
enough to dive down toward the ground and take cover, not of the glass 
hitting them. 
  After a moment, when the smoke from the fire dissipitated, everyone 
slowly got to their feet. Misato was the first one to peer out the now 
glassless window. Her eyes widened as she saw the entire massive room 
covered in a black soot from the energy that had struck its walls. Lying 
in the middle of this huge crater that had been crated in the middle of 
the room was Ranma, totally unmoving.
  "R-Ranma!!!"

  Ranma was hurt.
  Misato was by his bedside.
 "Ugh, what.....happened?" he asked, looking around.
  Misato was silent for several moments before she answered. It looked 
like there had been a lot on her mind, "Y-you were hurt,"
  "H-how....long was I....out?"  
  "A long long time," Misato said with a slightly wavering voice. "We 
didn't know if you were going to wake up or not,"
  "How long?"
  "About a month,"
  "M-month?!" Ranma was shocked to hear how long he had been out.
  "Yes, three Angels have attacked while you were out. We managed to 
stop them, albeit barely," Misato said.
  Ranma shrugged his shoulder a bit, "Oh well, I guess my wanting to 
leave after the demonstrationg fell through," He smiled a bit as Misato 
chuckled.
  "Um, I was worried you weren't going to wake up," she said after a 
short moment.
  Ranma slowly sat upright. Every muscle in his body seemed to scream 
out in pain. He tried to smile, "How flattering, you were worried about 
me,"
  Misato blushed a bit. Even though he was badly hurt, he still managed 
to act like a jerk. "For your information, I was worried that you 
wouldn't wake up. That way, we wouldn't be able to learn about these 
power you possess,"
  Ranma smiled, albeit slightly, "I'm hurt that you would say something 
like that."
  Misato felt extremely guilty for saying something like that. She was 
about to apologize when all of a sudden, he burst out launghing, unable 
to hold himself back. He stopped laughing as surges of pain racked his 
body.
  "Serves you right," she scowled.
  Ranma took in a deep breath. Jeez, why was he still here? Instead of 
being in a hospital recooperating, he should be somewhere in China 
looking for the damn nanban mirror. But then again, he was never the 
type of person to walk away when another needed his help. It wasn't in 
his nature to be selfish. Arrogant, yes. Selfish, not really.
  All of a sudden, Asuka and Shinji and Rei entered the room.
  "Really, I don't see why we have to visit him!" Asuka said to Shinji, 
"I mean, he was the idiot who got himself hurt. He's the idiot, not us. 
We're not obligated to come and visit. Besides, why would I wanna visit 
some jerk like him anyway?" It was the same thing she constantly 
complained about everytime she came here. When she noticed that Ranma 
was actually awake and looking at her, she stopped talking. She was 
positive he had heard what she had said about him.
  Ranma's brow creased a bit but then relaxed, "You came to visit me, 
Asuka?"
  Asuka responed, "Yeah, but, for your information, I came because I had 
to, not because I wanted to."
  "How are you?" Shinji asked. "When did you wake up?"
  Ranma shrugged his shoulders a bit, "I'm all right I guess. I've been 
better. I woke up only a few minutes ago." He then turned toward Asuka, 
"Hey, Asuka, I betcha I know why you came."
  "Fine, I'll humor you. Why?"
  "To take advantage of me," Ranma said with a smirk. "Since I was in a 
coma, like Misato here have told me, you would take advantage of me 
because you know I would be unable to fight back and push you away,"
  Asuka blushed beet red. "I-I d-did not!!!"
  Ranma imitated Asuka, "Y-you d-did n-not? T-then w-why a-are y-you s-
studdering l-like t-that?"
  "Shut up!!!" she shouted in frustration.
  "I betcha you had trouble sleeping at night, knowing that I was here." 
he said, "Did you actually sleep at home, or by my bedside, waiting for 
me to wake up. But then again, since you're a perverted little girl, I 
betcha you slip into my bed since I was unconscious and wouldn't know to 
difference,"
  "You're an asshole!!!!!"
  "So?"
  "Argh!!!" she shouted in frustration. She walked over to the vase full 
of roses, pulled out the roses, and tried to splash Ranma with the water 
inside.
  Ranma, smiling, said, "Asuka, in case you're wondering, those are fake 
flowers. That's why there's no water in it. I figured you're were bright 
enough to realize that."
  Asuka gritted her teeth. He was making a total fool of her. "I wish 
you never came outta that coma. We would have all been better off!!!" 
Wanting to get away from such an asshole like Ranma, Asuka stormed out 
of the room, vowing that she would never come back, no matter what her 
superiors tell her.
  Ranma gazed at the door Asuka left through and said sarcastically, 
"What's with her?" 
  "Perhaps it was because you were treating her unkindly," Rei commented 
stoically.
  He looked at Rei for a moment and smiled, "Well, if she treated me 
nicely, without insulting me....." He left the rest off, letting the 
group finish the sentence for him.
  Misato, finally unable to contain herself, burst out laughing. "God, 
ha ha, that was funny. It's always amusing watching you two butt heads 
with each other!" 
  Shinji was the only one to change the subject. As he put the fake 
"What happened? I remember seeing you hit that cylinder with that 
glowing hand and all of a sudden, I was diving for cover,"
  Ranma said weakky, "I dunno. I was tryin' to develop a new technique. 
I guess it backfired. It was way too strong for me,"
  Ritsuko entered the room. When she noticed Ranma look up at her, she 
became extremely self aware of herself. She looked at him and said, "Um, 
h-how do you feel?"
  "All right, I guess," Ranma said. 
  A silent moment ensued.
  Ranma, not wanting to stay in the bed anymore, got up and out, "I 
ain't staying here anymore."
  As soon as he stepped off his bed, the bedsheets fell to his feet. He 
looked down and noticed he was stark naked. He looked up at Misato, and 
then at Ritsuko. It didn't worry him. They were all adults, surely, 
Misato and Ritsuko had seen a naked man. Having Shinji in there didn't 
matter because Shinji was also a guy. But when Ranma's eyes rested on 
the young blue haired girl, he panicked. "Oh shit!" 
  He quickly scurried back under the bedsheets.
  "Sorry you had to see that," Ranma apologized. "I forgot you were in 
here," He hoped he didn't scar the little girl for life. At her age, she 
should be seeing the world, not a naked man.
  "It doesn't bother me," Rei said stoically. She wasn't even blushing. 
Ritsuko and Misato, on the other hand, were both blushing beet red. For 
some reason, both of them would be having trouble sleeping tonight and 
probably many nights to come.
  Ranma, realizing that Rei was actually telling the truth, shrugged his 
shoulders. Figuring he was in luck to be in the presence of people 
unbothered by his sense of modesty, Ranma got back up, tying the 
bedsheet around his waist, his upperbody exposed for everyone to see. 
  "Um, why am I naked?" Ranma asked to no one in particular.
  "Well, it's so you don't go running off like ya did that other time," 
Misato said. "You remember, you busted out of the room, stormed into the 
room we were in, and then just up and left us,"
  "Oh. I guess that could work," he said. He walked out of the room, 
bedsheets dragging on the ground. Outside in the corridor, several 
nurses stopped dead in their track at the sight of a half naked Ranma. 
One of them accidentally dropped her syringe.
  Ranma walked up to on of them, "Um, excuse me. I would like to know 
where my clothes are,"
  "Ranma! Get back in here!" Misato shouted from Ranma's hospital room. 
It looked like she was scared to actually follow after Ranma into the 
open where everyone was.
  Asuka, who had been at the end of the hallway, sitting sulkily in a 
chair, looked up and saw Ranma talking to a nurse. "What the?"
  "Yeah, Asuka, I'm naked underneath these," Ranma said, a bit 
exasperated. He turned toward the nurse, "Well, where are my clothes?"
  The nurse, her eyes glassy, pointed numbly toward a cubby behind a 
counter. Ranma walked over to it and took out his clothes. He looked 
around for a restroom. Finding one, he walked over to it and went in it. 
  After a short moment, he emerged, fully dressed.
  He gave Asuka a wry smile, "Um, Asuka, you can close your mouth now,"
  Asuka closed her mouth, embarrassed to death when she realized she had 
just been caught staring at Ranma.
  Ranma walked over to the room everyone was in an looked in, "Um, well 
guys, this is where I say goodbye,"
  "G-goodbye? What the hell are you talking about?" Misato said.
  "I'm gonna leave," Ranma said, "What else? I mean, I already 
demonstrated for you. Dontcha have the info ya need to do it?"
  Ritsuko shook her head, "No. Not at all. After that demonstration, we 
only found out how little we know about recreating this ki thing you've 
been telling us about,"
  At that moment, Misato's pager went off. 
  "Shit!" she said, "Shit! Shit! Shit!"
  Ranma looked at Misato curiously. It was kind of funny how some so 
beautiful could swear so unlady-like, "What's wrong?" he asked.
  Misato, ignoring Ranma, turned toward the children, "Guys, get ready! 
Another Angel's on its way! We've gotta prepare!" She turned toward 
Ranma "Ranma, I don't wanna beg, but we need your help. It's no wonder 
we managed to defeat that Angel with damaged EVAs, but our EVAs are 
still not fully prepared. Please, stay and help out...."
  Ranma nodded, not even having to think "Sure. Of course I'll stay and 
help"
  
  Ranma was standing on the highest bulding in all of Tokyo 3. From his 
vantage point, it looked like he could see all the way to the ends of 
the world in every direction. He was wearing a headset, which were 
earphones with a tiny communicator extending from forward in front of 
his mouth.
  "What do I do, just wait here?" Ranma said.
  He heard Misato's voice, "Just wait there. The Angel's expected to 
arrive in a minute or so. Be prepared."
  "All right," he replied back. He looked around and saw three EVAs 
standing within the city limits. He knew the Angel was going to land by 
the city outskirts, the EVAs waiting patiently to ambush it. There, he 
saw this huge sphere of white light hovering in midair a hundred or so 
feet above a lone mountain top.
  "Is that it?" Ranma said, "Is that light over there how the Angel's 
gonna arrive?"
  "We don't really know." Misato said, "Every Angel's a different in 
many ways. Each one is very unique in how they look and fight, and also, 
how they arrive."
  All of a sudden, the white sphere shattered outward in every 
direction, leaving behind what seemed like an Angel.
  Ranma squinted his eyes and looked at the Angel, 
  "No way!!!"

  Ryoga looked down and noticed he was well above the terra firma. His 
face faulted as he realized gravity was bound to take place. When it 
did, he screamed.
  "Shit!!!!" he shouted, flailing his arms as if he was trying to flap 
them fast enough to fly. As he fell downward at a blinding speed, Ryoga 
realized something, "Wait a minute, what do I have to be worried about? 
I can easily land on my feet," 
  He remembered able to land skillfully and safely from heights well 
beyond this one. He remembered jumping from a cliff a mile high and 
landing perfectly fine, not even disturbing the ground upon where he 
landed, when he and Ranma and Akane finally went back to Japan many 
years after the downfall of Genom.
  As the winds ripped by him as he rocketed toward the ground, Ryoga 
realized he was supposed to be holding something. 
  "Oh shit, where's the mirror?!?" he looked around. He remembered he 
had been holding a mirror a second ago. He spotted the mirror falling 
toward the ground several yards away from him, the ground rushing toward 
him at a extreme rate.
  Knowing that he needed that mirror to get back, Ryoga angled his body 
straight toward the mirror, hoping he would be able to reach it in time. 
  Unfortunately, he was too late. The second his hands barely touched 
the mirror, he collided right into the ground. The shear impact of him 
hitting the ground was so powerful that a small crater was created. 
Although Ryoga would be only slightly bruised from the impact, he 
realized it was too late as the mirror, slipping through his fingers and 
hitting the ground, shattered.
  Ryoga stared at the now broken mirror, its remnants scattered about.
  It took several long minutes before he realized what had just 
happened.
  His aura flared as he looked up at the sky.
  "Shit!!!!!"
  
  Ranma shielded his eyes as he saw a massive column of light and energy 
shoot straight up toward the sky.
  "Holy shit! What the hell is that?!?!?" she heard Misato's voice. "Our 
power scales are going through the roof!!!! Shit!!! One of the scanners 
just exploded!!!"
  Ranma winced as a pain shot through his temple. He should have turned 
the volume down.
  He said, "Don't worry. It's nothing much to worry about."
  "Not much?! What's going on out there?! Out scanners are blowing up 
one right after another!" came Misato's panic-stricken voice, "Maya, get 
the fire extinquisher! Anyway, Ranma, what's going on out there, we 
can't see anything on the viewscreen,"
  "Don't worry 'bout it," Ranma said, "It's only Ryoga,"
  "Ryoga?" he heard Shinji voice. He and the others had a constant 
communications line open so everyone could talk to and hear one another.
  "He's my.....enemy," Ranma said, almost smirking.
  "Your enemy?!" everyone said in unison.
  Ranma ignored the barrage of questions. Wanting to have his fun, he 
shot a massive ki blast right at the mountain Ryoga had landed on, his 
aim precise. What better way to get Ryoga's attention than to hit him 
upside the head with a ki-blast.
  A good portion of the mountain was engulfed in a massive explosion. 
When it subsided, the top part of the mountain was simply gone, like a 
knife that had been cut right through it, removing a portion of it.
  Ranma's eyes nearly bulged out of his sockets. He had no idea one of 
his ki-blasts could do something like that. He wasn't even trying. He 
knew his ki-blasts were strong, but not that strong. 
  "Hm, perhaps having throw a few of 'em over the days made me 
stronger," was all Ranma could come up with as he spoke to himself. For 
a moment, he felt a bit worried that he could have hurt Ryoga. But his 
guilt disappeared as he saw an equally massive ki-blast shot from the 
subsiding explosion, rocketing straight toward the building Ranma was 
on.
  "That's gonna hurt," Ranma commented, his eyes widening.
  Knowing that he didn't have enough time to simply jump out of the way, 
Ranma brought both hands forward and crossed it in front of himself and 
absorbed the full force of the ki-blast. The entire top half of the 
building was consumed in the explosion that ensued, Ranma caught in the 
blast.
    When the blast subsided, Ranma was somewhat bruised, his clothes 
singed. He looked around at what remained of the building and then 
snickered.
  "Ranma!!! Are you there?!?" he heard Misato's voice, startling him. He 
was surprised that the headset was still functioning after such a blast. 
"What was that massive surge of energy was saw hit the building you were 
on?!"
  He replied, "Yeah, I'm fine. Don't worry, it was just Ryoga's ki-
blast." He brushed of some debris left behind from the damaged building.
  "Don't worry, it's just Ryoga,"
  
  "What're you doin' here?" Ranma asked Ryoga.
  He and Ryoga and others were both standing on the top of the mountain 
Ranma had almost blown up. Ranma and Asuka and Misato had been 
helicoptered in. Asuka, Rei, and Shinji were still in their EVA's, 
standing a short ways down the mountain.
  Ryoga looked at Ranma, an obvious look of contempt in his eyes. It was 
obvious Ryoga didn't appreciate having a ki-blast hit him in his back. 
"I oughta kill you right here for what you did to me earlier!" he said, 
his fangs showing. One of his hands was slowly starting to glow as he 
subconsiously building up his ki into another projectile, most likely 
intended for Ranma.
  Ranma smirked, "Keep your pants on. How else was I supposed to get 
your attention? Huh? Also, what the hell brings you here?"
  Ryoga calmed down a bit, "Well, as much as I hate to, I came here to 
bring you back home,"
  Ranma's eyes lit up, "R-really? You're kidding me, right?"
  "Hmph," Ryoga spat, "I wish I was. For all I care about you could stay 
here, where ever here is, and die. I came here to bring you back because 
Akane asked me to. Don't you dare think I would bring you back because I 
wanted to. I'm bringing ya back because I care so much about Akane that 
I would do anything for her, even bring you back with me, as much as I 
hate you,"
  Ranma smirked, "That's good to hear. It wouldn't feel right that you 
would actually worry about me. After all, we're enemies,"
  "Of course we are!"
  "So....how did you get here?" Ranma asked, not at all bothered by this 
slight aura glowing around Ryoga. Misato and Ritsuko, on the other hand, 
were deathly silent. They were almost scared to move. This Ryoga guy 
sure looked very very angry and probably on the edge of going ballistic 
on Ranma.
  Ryoga waved a hand toward what remained of the mirror that had broken 
earlier. "I used the nanban mirror to get here. Unfortunately, as you 
can see, that's what remains of it...."
  "What?!" Ranma said, his eyes widening, "B-b-but it's in pieces, h-how 
are we gonna get back?"
  Ryoga, realizing something, sneered and bared his fangs and said, "It 
was in good condition until after I get hit in the back by someone's ki-
blast!" He wanted a good reason to beat Ranma up. Of course, hating him 
was good enough reason to blindly hurt him, but this seemed more 
reasonable.
  What Ranma said and did was totally unexpected on Ryoga's part.
  "Well then, it's all your fault! If you were half the man you were, 
you would've blocked that blast and not let the thing get destoryed!" 
Ranma said evily, bringing a foot forward and kicking Ryoga right in the 
chest. Ryoga wa sent flying backwards bodily, slamming into Unit-01's 
chest, the force of the impact nearly knocking the EVA off its feet. He 
slid off the EVA's chest and fell to the ground below.
  Shinji had struggle with the controls to keep Unit-01 afoot. "What 
the?"
  Ryoga got up to his feet, glowing red with rage.
  "Die!!!!!!"
  Ryoga lept up into the air, up toward Unit-01's chest, propelling of 
it and triangle jumping back up to the top of the mountain. The force of 
Ryoga propelling off the EVA's chest cause it to fall backwards, slowly 
sliding down the mountain while on its back.
  "Shit!!!" Shinji shouted, trying his best to get his EVA to get back 
up onto its feet, much to no avail. He continued to slide down until he 
came to a halt at the foot of the mountains.
  Ryoga landed back on the top of the mountain, several feet from Ranma. 
With his aura flaring, Ryoga charged Ranma.
  Ranma, unperterbed, held out a quick had "Stop!"
  Ryoga came to skidding halt. "What?!"
  Ranma jerked a finger over his shoulder toward Misato and Ritsuko. 
They were both staring at Ryoga. "I don't suggest us fighting because 
one wrong move, like a simple ki-blast, would get them both killed,"
  "Fine, I won't use one of those!" Ryoga spat. He then cocked his arm 
back and puched Ranma with such great force that it sent him sprawling 
backwards down the mountain side.
  "W-w-what's wrong with these guys?" Misato muttered, still staring.
  Ryoga seemed to calm down a bit, glad to have hit Ranma back for what 
he had done to him a second ago. He looked over at Misato and Ritsuko 
and noticed them staring.
  Blushing a little bit since he felt like he was under the scrutiny of 
those two girls Ryoga said, "Um, I-I'm Ryoga. Ryoga Hibiki."
  "And I'm shocked," Misato commented. She snapped out of her staring 
when she saw Ranma climbing back up onto the flat plateau they were on.
  "Hey, Ryoga," Ranma said, "So, how do you expect we get back?"
  Ryoga turned his attention toward Ranma and said, "I dunno. The only 
way back that I know of was through the use of that mirror....which was 
destoryed."
  Ranma smiled weakly but then realized something, "Hey, how did you 
manage to get here? I mean, where didja get the mirror? Didn't it break 
or something?"
  "Well, it turns out that all you could still use it, even if it was 
broken" Ryoga responded. "Akane and I were in a museum when we saw the 
mirror. The mirror was one of the things actually recovered somewhat 
intact after the 'Nerima Massacre'. And, well, we stole it, and I used 
it to get here,"
  "Then perhaps we could use it to get back," Ranma said, a bit 
optimistic.
  Ryoga spat back, "Look at it! It's destroyed! How do you expect us to 
put it back together? I betcha we won't be able to find half of its 
remains! And it's all your fault!"
  Ranma took a cautious step back, "Now now, Ryoga. Um, it was an 
accident. I didn't know."
  "Hmph," Ryoga said, acting forgiving, "Well, what's done is done. 
There's no way we could salvage it so we might as well try and come up 
with something to getting back home. Akane's gonna get worried,"
  Ranma said, "Well, we're not in hot water, not yet. We could always 
visit the amazon village in China and borrow the nanban mirror from 
there,"
  Ritsuko looked at Ranma, "China?"
  "Yeah," Ranma replied, "Why?"
  "Um, I'd hate to bring this up, but, ever since the polar ice caps 
melted due to the Second Impact, China, at least most of it is now 
underwater," Ritsuko said.
  "What?!" Ranma and Ryoga said in unison.
  Ritsuko nodded, "Yeah. Didn't you know that?"
  "No!" Ranma said, his eyes widening. "W-why didn'tja tell me sooner?!"
  "Um, Ranma, if I recall correctly, when I asked where you were headed 
to," Misato began, "You said not to worry about it and changed the 
subject. Didn't you do the same when Ritsuko here asked you the same 
question, too?"
  Ranma grabbed a handful of hair, "Shit! What the hell are we gonna 
do?!" For the first time since he arrived, Ranma seemed to be a bit 
stressed out. It looked like several gray hairs was going to burst form 
his scalp at any moment.
  "Oh no, w-we're s-stuck here!!"






-OneShot
Jeffrey Keith Wong
Author of Ranma's girls, 
The least one can do, and
the 'just won't die' series.
http://www.li.net/~jeffwong/index.htm
Site usually updated daily