Chapter 15B - The Price of Freedom (Part Two)

    Director Sasaki waited, a little nervously, as he stood before the front 
entrance of the Arena.  He tugged absently at the collar of his dress 
uniform as he spotted the sleek white limousine finally enter through the 
main gate.  His chief aide, Lorelei Krieger, a buxom but trim blonde from 
Germany, had kept him informed of the Master's exact whereabouts at all 
times, ever since his private jet had arrived at Tokyo Airport.

    Lorelei nodded briskly to him once, her cool green eyes flashing like 
jade, and returned to her assigned place in line with the rest of the 
management staff.  Director Sasaki allowed himself the luxury of watching 
the purposeful stride of her long legs, and the graceful sway of her hips, 
encased by a rather scandalously short black skirt, as she walked back to 
her position in line.  He mentally scheduled himself for some relaxation 
time with her later this evening.

    After a face to face meeting with the Master, he was certain that he 
would need it.

    His eyes scanned the uniforms of the guards that had been selected to 
welcome the Master to the Imperial Arena.  They looked supremely 
capable, all of them former Imperial Special Forces.  Not a button was out 
of place, and there wasn't a loose thread on a jacket or a scuff mark on a 
boot to be seen.  These were his elite, and he nodded his approval to their 
commander, formerly Major Ryu Saeba of the Imperial Special Forces.

    Commander Saeba returned the nod curtly, before shifting his eyes back 
to rigid attention.  His back was ramrod straight, and he seemed to 
practically gleam in his spotless white dress uniform.  The Director 
counted Commander Saeba as his most loyal employee, and one of the 
most dangerous men that he had ever met.  His abilities at marksmanship 
were legendary.  If Commander Saeba couldn't hit it at five hundred meters 
with a pair of simple iron sights, then the target could not be hit by anyone.

    The man's only weakness was women.  Director Sasaki smiled as he 
recalled the circumstances leading up to Major Saeba's court martial and 
subsequent departure from the Imperial military.  It had been remarkably 
easy to arrange.  As long as the man's appetite for women was kept 
satisfied, he was a capable soldier.

   Commander Saeba had only been called upon to use his special abilities a 
handful of times since taking service in the Arena.  One of those times had 
been to put a frozen dart of neurotoxins into one Ranma Saotome.  The 
frozen darts dissolved instantly in the bloodstream and were obtained, 
through means that were best left unexplored, from an old acquaintance of 
his in the Security Directorate's Black Ops Division.  That Division was 
reportedly so secretive that no one else in the Security Directorate even 
knew anything of their affairs.

    Director Sasaki continued to fidget slightly while he stood at attention as 
the car carrying the Master and his entourage came to a halt in front of 
him.  Two of the Arena guards quickly snapped into position to open the 
car door that faced towards the front entrance of the main Arena building.  
There was silence for a span of time that was less than a minute.

    A figure dressed in a long, dark blue robe emerged from the car first, the 
hood of the robe concealing the face.  When the figure stood upright, 
Director Sasaki was startled to see that it was a young woman, a girl even.  
>From his position, Director Sasaki could see her clear blue eyes and a hint 
of Asian features.

    He prayed that Commander Saeba did not get a good look at her.  He 
always seemed to have a fascination for dangerous women, and this one 
gave every indication of being supremely capable.

    She scanned the area around the car with her eyes before nodding 
slightly to herself.  She spoke briefly with an unseen figure in the car and 
then moved aside.  Director Sasaki caught a glimpse of bright red hair 
concealed within the folds of her hood as she turned to face him.  Her ice 
blue eyes seemed to measure him briefly, and then dismissed him as being 
beneath further notice.  He felt a brief flush of anger cross his face at her 
expression of distaste.

    A second figure emerged from the car, and Director Sasaki immediately 
recognized this individual as the undisputed Master of Shadowlaw, 
Grigorii Rasputin.  He was a tall and powerfully built figure of a man, 
dressed in a Western-style gray business suit.  His hair was worn long and 
streamed back across his skull like a white waterfall.  A pair of mirrored 
sunglasses caught the sunlight as he exited the vehicle.

    When he stood up straight, he was easily the tallest man within sight.  
Director Sasaki felt an unconscious shiver pass through his body.  The 
Master smiled coldly in his direction, and one hand reached up to remove 
his sunglasses.  His eyes almost seemed to blaze when they were finally 
revealed.  Director Sasaki felt a second shiver pass through his body.

    The Master turned to the girl with him and spoke softly in Russian to 
her.  Director Sasaki could not hear more than a few words from where he 
was standing, not that he understood Russian anyway.  Fearing for his life 
if he had guessed wrong, Director Sasaki approached the pair and knelt 
bowing his head deeply, as a commoner would to an Emperor.

    "My Lord," said the Director, keeping his eyes on the ground.  "On 
behalf of my staff, I welcome you and your entourage to the Imperial 
Arena."  There was a silent pause as a single drop of sweat made its way to 
the tip of the Director's nose before falling soundlessly to the concrete.

    "It has been some time since I visited it last," rumbled a deep voice, a 
faint hint of amusement in it.  Director Sasaki let out the breath that he had 
been holding in.  "Perhaps taking a tour of the facilities would be in order."  
There was a long pause.  "You may rise."

    "Thank you, Master," said the Director obsequiously.  He rose back to 
his feet with as much dignity as he could muster, catching a glimpse of 
cold amusement on the girl's face.

    From up close, he could see that she was indeed a young girl, perhaps in 
her mid-teens or a little older.  Her features were exquisite, an 
incomparable beauty.  Her clear blue eyes reflected the slightest changes in 
her emotions.  At the moment, they were staring at him with displeasure.

    "I see that my great-granddaughter has captivated your attention, 
Director Sasaki," rumbled the Master's deep voice.  He raised his hand to 
gently grip the girl's chin.  She did not resist as he lifted her face upwards.  
"She has all her great-grandmother's beauty and more."  Pride resonated in 
his voice.

    "Might I have the honor of knowing the name of your very beautiful 
great-granddaughter, Master?" asked Director Sasaki in deeply respectful 
tones.  He found himself wondering if her body was as equally exquisite as 
her face beneath those concealing robes.  He suddenly suspected that 
Commander Saeba's attitudes were starting to rub off on him.

    "I am Sonya Rasputin, Sir," said the girl in clear tones.  The faint hint of 
a Russian accent was heard in her speech.  "I am not an object, to be 
spoken of so, by one such as you.  You will treat me with greater respect 
than that, or else suffer serious consequences."

    Sonya stilled herself when the Master placed a hand gently upon her 
shoulder.

    "I apologize for my great-granddaughter's rudeness, Director Sasaki," 
said the Master mildly.  "It has been a very long trip, and I fear that she is 
tired.  Perhaps we could skip the full tour and you could just show me the 
reason why I am here at this time."

    "Ranma Saotome is in the training area by now," said the Director.  
"Right this way."  He made a gesture with his arm.

    Sonya sniffed briefly and walked past him, her head held high.  The 
Master walked forward as well, remaining a single pace behind the girl.

    Director Sasaki blinked and scurried along behind them in an attempt to 
get in front of them.  He managed to get past them while still retaining a 
few shreds of his dignity.  His thoughts were dark when he contemplated 
the stunning redhead behind him.  

    *Cold-eyed bitch!* Director Sasaki thought fiercely.  *Shall I call you 
Princess Sonya, your highness?*

                    ******************************

    Behind the Director, Sonya Rasputin walked with a confident stride.  
She was mildly intrigued to see this boy who claimed to be a student of her 
family's secret school of martial arts.  Her right hand flexed and relaxed as 
she walked along, an unconscious nervous habit.  She could feel an 
eagerness in herself to finally meet this Ranma Saotome.  *I hope that he is 
more of a test of my abilities than the video indicated,* she thought with a 
smile.

    Her great-grandfather had shown her the tape of Ranma's fight with the 
Amazon, Shampoo.  He had displayed unmistakable signs of the Anything-
Goes School in his fighting style.  He was slow and hesitant in his moves 
at times, but there was no doubt in her mind that he had studied the style 
somewhere.  Perhaps he would tell her, after she had defeated him in 
single combat.  There was not a single doubt in her mind that she would.

    *Ranma Saotome will learn what it means to claim knowledge of the 
Anything-Goes School,* she thought with a smile, her right hand closing 
briefly into a fist.  *I am the rightful heir to the school, and he is but a
base 
pretender to its sacred teachings.  I intend to prove to him who the _true_ 
student of the Anything-Goes style is.*

    Sonya smiled sadly within the depths of her hood.  Since defeating her 
older brother Sergei a year earlier and being named heir to the Anything-
Goes School, Sonya had found a lack of challenging opponents for herself.  
For the longest time it had been Sergei.  They had trained together since 
they were young children, but in time she had grown more skilled than he 
was in the martial arts.

    Her smile fell into a sad frown.  On the day after her fifteenth birthday 
she had challenged Sergei for his position in the family.  Sergei had had no 
choice but to accept, as the first rule of the Rasputin's was that position in 
the family must be earned and maintained through strength, never assumed 
through mere order of birth.  It had been that way in her father's time, and 
in her father's father's time.  It had been so for almost a century.

    Her brother was stronger but slower of mind and body.  She had 
eventually worn him down and knocked him unconscious after a long 
battle.  Afterwards, his beaten body was carried from the main hall of their 
castle.  Sonya had not seen her brother again since that day and that had 
saddened her.  She missed her older brother.  They had been very close as 
children, but the rules of the family had to be maintained.  It was what kept 
her family strong and ensured their continuing position as rulers of a vast 
and powerful organization such as Shadowlaw.

    She was the fifth generation in the Rasputin lineage to uphold the 
knowledge of the Anything-Goes school, since her great-grandfather had 
claimed it.  He had ruthlessly maintained his position in the family and as 
the Master of Shadowlaw, by means of it.  Theirs was a small family, 
despite a century of time passing.  Her ancestral home in Russia had 
portraits of her forebears, going back to her great-great-grandfather, 
although he preferred her to simply call him great-grandfather.

    Sadly, there was only a handful of family that knew even the rudiments 
of the Anything-Goes Style.  Her great-grandfather insisted on approval for 
any training, and he also insisted on doing the teaching himself.  She had a 
few cousins who had been taught, but they had not progressed far beyond 
the middle levels of skill.  Two of her uncles and one of her aunts were 
trained in it, and they used it to maintain control of their own small 
portions of Shadowlaw.  All in all, barely ten people in all the world could 
claim to be practitioners of the Anything-Goes School of Martial Arts.

    Thus it was a great surprise to the Rasputin family when a boy, an 
Imperial Citizen no less, appeared as if from out of the blue to demonstrate 
that there was at least one more person with knowledge of it.  It was a 
puzzle that her great-grandfather had charged her to solve, and solve it she 
would.  It was her duty to her family, to their sacred traditions.

    So it was also in keeping with the traditions of her ancestors that she 
had challenged for rights to the heirship of the school, at her great-
grandfather's insistence.  He had seen how strong that she had grown to be, 
and he had devoted more and more of his time to her training.  She and 
Sergei had been trained under her great-grandfather's hand since before 
she could remember.  At some point though, she had begun to surpass 
Sergei's capabilities, so she had instigated the challenge when she was 
finally of an age to do so.

    When she had inquired about her brother's whereabouts afterwards, her 
great-grandfather had told her that Sergei was studying in Germany and 
would not be returning to the family's ancestral halls.  She had shut herself 
in her room and cried for a day and a night when she had learned that she 
was forbidden to see Sergei.  He had shown himself to be weak, and she 
had shown herself to be strong.

    "<Only the strong have a place among us, my little Sonya,>" her great-
grandfather had told her.  "<There are those who would see us destroyed, 
scattering to the winds that which has taken several generations to create.  
I know that you won't fail me, Sonya.  Now dry your tears, and become the 
warrior that I know is within you.>"

    With his words of encouragement still sounding in her ears, she had 
thrown herself back into her studies, training her body ruthlessly in an 
attempt to overcome her loneliness.  Her grandfather had very expressly 
forbidden her to inquire further about Sergei.  Due to her strong own sense 
of loyalty to the family, she did not.

    Sonya's already impressive skills had grown stronger.  Young warriors 
selected from the ranks of Shadowlaw were assigned to be her sparring 
partners.  None of them could seem to overcome her as she pushed herself 
into a higher and higher level of skill.  She had chosen to adopt her great-
grandmother's Amazon code, and so, despite offers from the few young 
men that she was in contact with, she lived a somewhat lonely existence as 
her skills continued to strengthen.

    Sonya's only true companion became her skill at martial arts.  She would 
practice for many hours each day, building up her body and honing her 
reflexes.  The remaining hours were spent in quiet meditation, seeking out 
the internal flame of her ki and gradually fanning it to greater levels.  Her 
great-grandfather encouraged her in this, and he was proud of her abilities.  
She was content, to a degree, with her solitude.

    Sonya had sworn an oath that she would continue to do so until she 
found a man who could equal her skill.  Her great-grandfather had 
promised her that he would search the world to find her an equal, but the 
young men that he had brought her so far had all proven to be insufficient 
in the end.  They seemed strong at first, and she had experienced a few 
temporary setbacks until she had had time to retrain to counter their skills.  
She would always emerge victorious in the end, her ability to adjust to the 
fighting style of an opponent was her edge against all other martial artists 
in her peer group.

    Sonya's oath to herself kept her living the life of a nun.  She had no real 
friends either, her great-grandfather considered them to be a needless 
distraction, a liability to a true warrior.  She had her martial arts, and that 
had to be sufficient for her.  As she had grown older, endless nights of 
loneliness without knowing the touch of a man's hand, except in combat, 
seemed to stretch before her.  Sonya continued her rigorous regimen of 
training, maintained her oath, and she felt herself to be slowly dying 
inside.

    Sonya's mother had become a pale ghost of a woman after Sergei's 
departure, her fragile beauty fading, and she had died a few months ago.  
She had gone to her deathbed convinced that her son was dead, a victim of 
the Master's madness.  Sonya shook her head sadly.  Her poor mother must 
have been the one to have gone mad.  Sonya would never believe that her 
great-grandfather would ever do such a thing.

    Sonya knew that Grigorii Rasputin could be a cold man, and sometimes 
cruel, but he was the patriarch of their clan.  She had been raised to believe 
in him as the prophet of a coming new age for the planet.  Such a man 
could not be held to the same levels of accountability as other mortals.  He 
would never harm family though, Sonya was certain of this.

    Sonya had held her mother's hand at the end and watched with sadness 
during those final moments.  When the last breath had faded from her 
mother, Sonya had allowed herself to cry one more time, purging herself of 
sorrow once more.  She had risen from her mother's deathbed feeling 
shattered inside; another who she had cared about had left her.  Love was a 
weakness, she had decided at that point, as she laid her mother's hand 
down and walked from the room with a new sense of purpose.

    Later that day, Sonya went to look at the portrait of her father once 
again, hung in the family gallery.  He had been a great man, a powerful 
martial artist.  He had died when she was only a baby, fighting against 
impossible odds, a victim of an assassination attempt against her 
grandfather.  He was said to have died quite heroically, taking down almost 
two dozen trained fighters before being overcome.  As she looked at the 
portrait, she closed her hand into a fist.

    *I will make you proud of me, father,* she silently vowed.

    Sonya carried her parents' portraits in a small gold locket that she wore 
around her neck.  It was a simple picture, just the two of them looking 
forward while holding hands.  However, on each of their faces was a smile 
that told anyone that gazed upon the portrait that the two people were 
deeply in love.  It was her most treasured possession.

    Since the death of her mother, her great-grandfather Grigorii and her 
great-grandmother Mei Lin were the only family that she had left.  She 
devoted herself to learning all that they would teach her.  Theirs was never 
a large family, only a few people in each generation to carry on the name 
and the teachings of the family school.

    From her grandmother, so far Sonya had learned only one of the many 
secret techniques of the Chinese Amazons, her great-grandmother's people, 
known as the Chestnut Fist.  She had used it in actual combat only once, to 
deal with a challenger for her hand named Artur Krauser, the only son of 
the Shadowlaw warlord Wolfgang Krauser.  Artur had not taken his loss 
well, and he had vowed to return and "teach her her place."

    Sonya had not been all that impressed with his words, as he had been 
carried, bruised and bleeding, from her family's halls at the time.  Artur's 
father, Wolfgang Krauser, was one of the most highly placed warlords of 
Shadowlaw, the head overseer for the entire European region of operations.  
He was a frightening man of immense pride.  Sonya was certain that he 
would train his heir to be able to challenge her, and he had made no secret 
of his desire to see his son ruling Shadowlaw at her side.

    Sonya had been grateful for the Chestnut Fist technique and had been 
very impressed with its effectiveness.  To be able to move at such blinding 
speed was a heady experience.  Her great-grandmother had so far refused 
to teach her anything further until she felt that Sonya was ready.

    From her great-grandfather, Sonya had begun to unlock the secrets of ki, 
the mysterious power that separated the legendary warriors from the rest.  
She could feel a vast well of power available within her, but she had only 
been able to tap into the most basic levels.  It was as if she was blocked in 
some way.

    "<Combat with a strong opponent is sometimes the only way to tap into 
higher levels of power, Sonya,>" her great-grandfather had once told her.  
"<Desperation can be a powerful motivator.>"

    Sonya smiled once more as she let her thoughts return to the present.  
She relaxed her hand open and pondered her future.  *I am coming for 
you, Ranma Saotome.  Your feeble skills won't be able to withstand me.  
You will tell me how you have stolen the secrets that rightfully belong to 
my family.*

                    ******************************

    Grigorii Rasputin strolled along a single pace behind his great-
granddaughter and pondered the mysteries of life that had led him to this 
point.  A faint smile crossed his face as he thought about the power that he 
now held within his hands.

    *Ahh... Happosai,* thought the Master solemnly.  *Sometimes I miss 
you, my old teacher.  If only I could show you what your legacy has 
wrought.  I can only imagine what the world might have been like if you 
had lived.  I hope that, wherever you are, you find the uses to which I have 
turned your knowledge acceptable.*

    Like many old men, the Master allowed himself a moment of reverie as 
he walked along.  His mind returned to events of the past, to the man that 
he had once been.  He had been such a lost soul, lacking direction, when 
that unknown power had first spoken to his mind in that Siberian prison 
camp.

    For many nights, he had only heard the voice in his dreams, as he 
huddled for warmth with the other "guests" of the Czar's kindness.  Other 
men had thought him mad, thrashing about in his sleep, but the dream had 
returned, again and again.  It was only a voice that spoke from a vast 
darkness, but its presence could not be denied.

    Eventually, he had heard it fully for the first time.

    "<Grigorii Rasputin,>" had spoken the voice in his native Russian.  It 
was neither a loud voice, nor a sharp voice, but a still, small voice.  Despite 
those qualities, it had penetrated to the core of his being, and he was 
convinced that he was hearing the voice of God.

    "<Grigorii Rasputin,>" the voice had spoken once more in those soft 
tones.  "<You must escape this place.  To stay here will mean your death, a 
meaningless death.  Heed my words, do what I say, and I shall make you 
great.  Kings and nations shall lie beneath your feet.  I offer you a place in 
history.>"

    "<Is that you, Lord?>" had asked a cold and frightened Grigorii in that 
place of dreams.  "<Is the time of my deliverance at hand?>"  He had spent 
his youth studying sacred texts in a monastery.  They had made mention of 
the voice of God granting a man visions in dreams.

    "<Know that I represent a power older than the very stars in the 
heavens, Grigorii Rasputin,>" had stated the voice.  "<There shall come a 
time when all old things are done away with, and a new heaven and a new 
earth shall be crafted from the ashes of the old.  Towards that day, 
preparations need be made.  I invite you to participate in this great 
undertaking.  There is a place for you, if you choose to follow me.>"

    "<I... I will follow you, oh Lord,>" had whispered a sleeping Rasputin.  
He had pulled his thin blankets more tightly around himself in his sleep 
and shivered from more than the cold outside.

    "<Excellent,>" had hissed the voice from the darkness.  "<Receive my 
touch, and I shall make you great among all other men.>"  A hand had 
appeared in the endless void of his dream world, pale white but 
shimmering with immense power.  It had touched Rasputin in the dream, 
and he had screamed back into wakefulness.

    He had awoken, while the rest of his fellow prisoners continued to 
slumber.  His thoughts were clear, and he felt reborn with new purpose.  
Something had been changed in a place deep inside himself.  The madness 
that had consumed his soul for so many years had been replaced with a 
clarity of his place in destiny.

    He was a man who had been touched by the hand of God.

    He had walked from that festering prison, killing three guards who had 
tried to stop him.  Their clothes had warmed him as he had slowly made 
his way south.  He had endured many hardships on that journey but had 
been cleansed of his few remaining doubts.  The voice had guided him 
across the border region between Russia and the consolidating strength of 
the Empire of Japan, into China.

    He had witnessed Happosai defending himself from a large mob outside 
a village to the north.  His skills were like nothing that Grigorii had ever 
seen before.  The voice had whispered to him at that time, the first time 
that it had done so when he was awake.

    "<Learn from that man,>" the voice had whispered.  "<Find him, and 
have him teach you all that he knows.  Become his disciple, and you shall 
be one step further along the path to greatness.>"

    The voice had led him to a bar outside Hong Kong.  There he had met 
Happosai, asleep in a pool of his own vomit.  It was not one of the best 
impressions that a man seeking a teacher could have found.  He had waited 
near the table where Happosai slept.

    When Happosai had finally awoke, Grigorii had spoken the honeyed 
words that the voice in his mind had told him to say.  It had taken less than 
an hour of appealing to the old man's vanity before Grigorii had become 
Happosai's apprentice and his training had begun.

    *Those were wondrous days,* thought Rasputin with a faint smile.  He 
had followed his perverted master, sampling the pleasures of the flesh 
across China.  With the coming of the new Japanese Imperial overlords, 
bars and women of easy virtue abounded to satisfy the needs of soldiers far 
from home.  He had stolen wine from a heavily guarded bar one week and 
liberated the silken undergarments from a high-class brothel the next.

    They had traveled across China like that for a couple of years.  Grigorii 
had embraced Happosai's teachings completely, learning that there was 
something in man that desired pleasures at any price.  It was a lesson that 
would serve him well when it came time for the formation of Shadowlaw.

    It had been during these years that he had met his future wife, during 
one of his times spent apart from Happosai.  The perverted master would 
disappear for weeks at a time every now and again.  He had followed 
Happosai past a tiny village, that the small man had taken a wide path of 
avoidance around, when the voice had told him to stop and enter the 
village.

    Grigorii Rasputin paid his first call upon the Joketsuzoku Amazons of 
China.  He would visit them several more times over the next few years.

    He was greeted curiously by the guards on the roadway.  Under Japanese 
Imperial rule, travelers had become more rare.  That he was white, and yet 
traveled in the guise of an itinerant martial artist, was even more of a 
subject for their comments.  They had allowed him to enter, and he had 
wisely not mentioned the name of Happosai.  He had learned the hard way 
over his years with the little man that his name was synonymous with a 
curse in some regions.

    He had entered the village during some sort of festival day.  A large 
table of food was prepared near one side.  Despite his hunger, Grigorii had 
ignored it for the voice had told him to watch the contest taking place.  He 
had learned some time ago that to fail to obey would bring him great pain.

    A pair of young women had been competing on a suspended log near the 
center of the village.  Both of them were quite lovely, but one of them was 
breathtaking.  She had stood tall and strong at the near end of the log, and 
Grigorii could admit to himself that he had gawked like a schoolboy.  The 
voice had sounded amused in the back of his mind as it had commented on 
her qualities, before suddenly going silent.

    The Matriarch Khu Lon had been watching the fight from the sidelines 
as Grigorii stopped next to her.  He had ignored the old woman to continue 
to gaze in wonder at the warrioress before him, but he had still felt her eyes 
upon him though.  The voice had gone strangely silent within him, its 
presence withdrawing from him, as he had been near her.

    Grigorii had asked the voice about it once, before it had chosen to leave 
him completely many decades ago, why that was so.  It would not reply, 
save only to say that Khu Lon was dangerous and that care should be taken 
in dealing with her.

    Despite years of spending time with women of purchasable charms, he 
had felt something more than simple lust when he had gazed upon the girl 
that would become his wife.  She had stolen his heart with a single look, 
and he had known that he must have her.  She had concluded the fight 
with a lightning quick move that had catapulted her opponent to the 
ground.

    She had descended from the log and approached him, her face flushed 
with victory.

    "<Challenge her to a fight,>" the voice had commanded him briefly, 
before withdrawing once more.  Khu Lon had suddenly looked at him with 
something akin to horror at the time.  She had made no move against him 
though.

    "<I challenge you,>" had said Rasputin simply, in passable Mandarin.  
He had pointed at the object of his desires, and she had raised one eyebrow 
and nodded.

    His time with Happosai had given him more skills than simply how to 
evade a bar bill.  Despite taking a few strong blows, he had managed to 
defeat the girl, after she had taken several hits from his fists, with a final, 
brutal kick, knocking her unconscious.  He had caught her before her body 
had fallen to the hard-packed ground.  The lithe musculature under her 
clothes had inflamed his desires for her.

    There had been a loud cheering from the crowd, and the girl had 
awoken quickly.  She had smiled at him, and his heart had leapt in his 
chest.  He had thanked the voice for leading him to the path that had 
brought him here.  The voice had chuckled in the back of his mind.

    "<Beloved husband,>" she had said.  He had kissed her with passion to 
equal that which he had fought her with.  She had returned the kiss with 
equal passion, as if he was the man that she had loved all of her life.  They 
had spent the next several days consummating the marriage, and he had 
learned that Chinese Amazons are insatiable in their carnal desires for 
their chosen husbands.  Luckily, he had been building up his endurance 
through rigorous training.

    When he had taken his bride from that village a few months later, the 
Matriarch Khu Lon had argued long and loudly with his wife.  She claimed 
to sense a darkness within him, despite the strength that he had shown.  
His wife loved him and had chosen to come with him, and her skills as 
Khu Lon's intended heir had proven quite useful to him over the years.

    Grigorii shook his head sadly at the memory of the old woman's look.  
She did not understand, he was a man chosen by destiny by the hand of 
God.  *Ahh Khu Lon... it will be good to see you once more.  I will show 
you that you were wrong about me, all those years ago.*

    The Master's musings were interrupted as the Director stopped before a 
door.

    "We are here, Master," said the Director.  He opened the door that they 
were standing near.  Inside was a plush chamber with comfortable seating 
and refreshments available.  "This room overlooks the training area.  You 
will be able to observe Saotome unseen from here."

    "Excellent," said Rasputin.  "You may leave us now, Director.  I will 
call for you when I require anything more.  Do not keep me waiting when I 
do."

    Director Sasaki bowed several times as he backed out of the room, 
shutting the door with a sigh of relief.  *That went better than I expected,* 
he thought with another sigh.

                    ******************************

    Ranma suddenly paused in what he was doing.  Some sixth sense that he 
had never felt before suddenly told him that he was being observed by a 
powerful presence.  He looked around but could see nothing.  He noticed 
that Cologne and Shampoo were looking around the same way.  After a 
moment, the presence faded.

    Ranma's eyes met Shampoo's.  She seemed to be as puzzled by what had 
just happened as he was.  He looked over at Cologne, and the old woman 
was looking upwards at the mirrored windows of the gallery area.  Ranma 
had been told that there were rooms up there where the press and other 
interested parties might gather to observe the fighters during their training.

    "<Matriarch Khu Lon?>" asked Ranma.  "<What is it?>"  The old 
woman let out a breath that she had been holding in and shook her head.

    "<I... sense something,>" muttered the old woman softly.  "<A presence 
that I have not felt in a long time... a long time....>"  She suddenly seemed 
to come back to herself.  "<It is probably nothing.  You two should return 
to your training.>"

    Ranma nodded.  Shampoo looked at Cologne for a brief moment more, 
but a look from the old woman's eyes caused her to return to her place near 
Ranma as he went through another attempt at the Chestnut Fist technique.

   After three days of training in the technique, Ranma and Shampoo had 
managed to remain neck and neck in the race to increase the speed of their 
punches.  Ranma felt frustrated because, if he closed his eyes, he could 
visualize what it felt like to successfully perform the technique.  Shampoo 
felt frustrated because an outsider male was managing to match her speed 
for speed.  Her ego and her pride refused to admit that Ranma might be an 
equal, especially since he had refused to fight her until the day of the 
rematch.

    Shampoo had gone back to wearing short-sleeved outfits by necessity. 
One of her favorite blouses had been ruined two days earlier when the 
sleeve had caught fire.  She had managed to avoid burns when Running 
Deer hosed her down with a blast of chemicals from the fire extinguisher.  
Mina had laughed long and loud at her that day.  After that, Shampoo 
decided to only wear short-sleeved outfits during her training.

    Ranma soaked his hand in a bucket of cool water that he had taken to 
leaving in the corner during their practice sessions while Shampoo tried 
once more.  He had failed again, and he sighed as Shampoo managed to 
improve her lead over him by a single chestnut again.  She was so 
irritatingly smug at those times that he wanted to hit her.

    She still considered him to be some sort of weakling, and she had begun 
to make a game of taunting him, apparently trying to goad him into a fight.  
If it hadn't been for his uncertainty if he could take her at his present level 
of ability, he would have obliged her.  Not that he intended to hold back 
during their rapidly upcoming match.  He simply wanted to finish his 
training time before he tried again.

    "Ranma fall behind Shampoo again," said the Amazon as she bounced 
over to where he was sitting.  She had a smile on her face that grew 
broader as she noticed the frown on his face.  She then leaned down in 
front of him, and he got an eyeful of her ample chest when she did so.  
"Ranma want admit that Shampoo better now?  Man not able to learn 
Amazon technique.  Too slow."

    Ranma grumbled, deep in his throat, his attraction for the Amazon at 
war with his irritation with her assumption that men were the weaker sex.  
*I am not a weakling!  I am a genetically enhanced human, so there should 
be no reason why I cannot master this technique!*

    Ranma got up from his position and slowly approached the fire.  
Cologne watched him with interested eyes.  She was alternating her 
attention between the children in front of her, and the region where the 
sensation of a powerful evil watching had come from.

    Shampoo watched Ranma with a smug look on her face, convinced that 
she had finally surpassed Ranma's best efforts.  *Silly Citizen boy should 
learn that Amazon techniques are for Amazon warriors.  Ranma can't have 
any more speed left in him.*

                    ******************************

    "<He's attempting the Chestnut Fist?>" asked Sonya in Russian to her 
great-grandfather, surprise evident on her face.  "<But that's an advanced 
technique.  There's no way that he will ever be able to perform it.  He's too 
slow.>"

    "<Perhaps,>" acknowledged Rasputin.  He recalled the file that he had 
obtained on Ranma Saotome.  He was amazed that such a boy had 
managed to escape his notice up until now.  Ranma was a recipient of one 
of the several prototype genetic upgrade serums, similar to the one that had 
been given to Sonya, but Ranma had never received any physical training 
in his gifts.  His father had only spent time training Ranma's mind, and the 
boy was quite accomplished in many areas of learning.

    "<If he can perform the Chestnut Fist, then his skills will be perhaps 
great enough to challenge yours, my child,>" said the Master with a smile.

                    ******************************

    Ranma approached the fire.  It crackled merrily in front of him as if 
taunting him.  He balanced a bag of sweet chestnuts in one of his hands.  
He took in a deep breath and let it out, trying to calm himself.  *Total 
concentration, Ranma.  Don't let any distractions into your mind.*

    A brief image of Shampoo's naked body bouncing before his eyes in the 
bath popped into his thoughts.  He shook his head angrily to clear them.  
He wiped a small droplet of blood from beneath his nose.

    He emptied the full bag of chestnuts into the fire.  Behind him, Shampoo 
caught her breath.  *Hah! That will teach her to be so smug!  I'm a man, 
and I'm going to prove it!*

    He launched his hands into the fire, pouring every ounce of will that he 
could muster into increasing his speed.  His hands began to pull chestnuts 
from the fire as sweat ran down his face.  The heat of the flames was 
ignored as he focused on more and more speed.

    It wasn't enough.  He had failed again.

    "Ow!  Ow!  Ow!"  Ranma hastily pulled his hands from out of the 
flames.  He held them briefly as pain washed over his senses, then ran over 
to the bucket of cool water and soaked his hands to cool them, grateful that 
he hadn't burned himself badly.

    Cologne went over to the small pile of chestnuts that Ranma had pulled 
from the flames.  He had managed to pull about half of the bag out, 
actually a stunning accomplishment for as brief a time as he had trained.  
Shampoo had fallen behind again, but Cologne was amazed at the level to 
which each of them had pushed the other.

    Training Shampoo alone, it might have taken a month to get her up to 
being able to perform the technique.  Cologne had not seriously thought 
that she would be able to accomplish it in the week that she had been 
given, but the speed training would have been helpful to Shampoo.  With 
Ranma present, both so full of pride, they were reaching deeper into 
themselves to try and outdo each other.

    "<So how did Ranma do, Great-Grandmother?>" loudly asked Shampoo 
with a smirk on her face.  "<I guess he couldn't match my Amazon 
speed.>"

    "<Actually, my child, he managed to surpass you once more,>" said the 
elderly Amazon with a twinkle in her eye.  Shampoo blinked.

    Shampoo quickly counted the number of chestnuts that Ranma had 
pulled from the fire.  *He has gone up by _three_ chestnuts,* she thought 
with amazement.  That put him two ahead of her!

    Shampoo closed her hand into a fist, and powdered chestnuts began 
sifting down to the floor as she squeezed her fist tighter and tighter.  *I 
will _not_ be beaten by an outsider male in learning an _Amazon_ 
technique!*

    It was then that she noticed every man in sight seemed to be crossing 
their legs and was grimacing at the powder as it sifted through her fingers.  
She shook the remaining powder off of her hand and turned to Cologne.

    "Great-Grandmother!" Shampoo suddenly shouted.  "Shampoo try 
again!  Shampoo beat Ranma for sure this time!"

                    ******************************

    "<As I suspected,>" said Sonya with a smug tone.  "<He is too slow to 
perform the technique.  I have at least twice his speed.>"

    "<Do not be so quick to judge, my child,>" said the Master in gently 
chiding tones.  "<It took you three weeks to master the technique.  Ranma 
Saotome seems to be well on his way to mastering it in one.>"

    "<Impossible,>" snorted Sonya.  "<His martial arts potential would have 
to be beyond even mine for such a thing to occur.>"  Her tone of voice was 
one of frank disbelief at such a possibility.

    *There is more to this boy than I thought,* mused the Master.  *His 
capacity for learning is enormous.  Such a one would make a powerful ally 
to have at my side.  I must see him in actual combat.*

    The Master picked up the phone.  The operator had apparently pre-
connected it to the Director's office.  *A sensible notion,* he thought with 
an approving smile.

    "Director Sasaki?  I have a request to make of you.  It concerns Ranma 
Saotome...."

                    ******************************

    Kodachi paused in her training regimen.  She sank to the floor and filled 
her lungs with cleansing air as she rested.  She wiped her face with a small 
towel, and rubbed the sweat briskly from her thick hair with it.  Her arms 
and legs burned pleasantly as she recovered her strength.  Her endurance 
was still too low for her tastes, but it was improving.

    She had been spending every free hour training for several days now.  
Ranma was going to be free of the Arena in a few days, and she wanted to 
be ready to keep the likes of Akane Tendo from claiming him as her own.  
To do that though, she needed to have herself in peak fighting condition.  
The Tendo girl was a tough opponent, but she was stupid too, relying on 
her physical strength too much.

    Kodachi knew that she could outfight Akane eventually.  It would 
simply require Kodachi to dedicate herself to that goal.  The Kuno's were 
descended from mighty samurai stock, and Kodachi intended to embrace 
that tradition to strengthen herself. When she met Akane Tendo in combat 
the next time, it would be Kodachi Kuno who was left standing at the end 
of a fight.  Then Ranma would be hers to lay claim to.

    Kodachi sighed softly as she pictured Ranma.  He was both a 
magnificent fighter and a brilliant scholar, a true man among men.  
Kodachi had no doubts that he would win his way free of the Arena.  *He 
will trample that Amazon whore who dared to lay hands upon him.*  A 
smile crossed her lips as she pictured the loving homecoming that she 
would offer Ranma.

    Kodachi had talked with her mother and explained Ranma's sterling 
qualities to her.  Kodachi's mother had been surprised that her only 
daughter had taken such an interest in any man so strongly.  She had been 
adamant in expressing her feelings on the matter, and her mother had 
agreed to approach the matchmaker that was handling Ranma's case.  
Kodachi had overheard Nabiki mention the name once to her bully of a 
sister.

    Kodachi sighed once more, her mind awash with thoughts of love.  She 
had felt so lonely on this world, a stranger in a strange land.  Now she had 
found someone who understood what it was like for her, and she would 
fight to her dying breath to have him by her side.  She clenched a fist as 
her thoughts of love faded away, replaced by an iron determination to 
overcome any obstacle in her way.

    Kodachi blinked and stared at her hand in confusion as the Arena 
warrior Kodachi faded back into the depths of her mind.  *I have to 
maintain better control of myself,* she thought with a shiver.  *I am 
Kodachi Kuno.  I will be able to handle this.*

    The voices of Kodachi's other lives had begun to speak to her in her 
dreams more often lately, and sometimes elements of their personalities 
would emerge from within her while she was awake.  She feared that she 
might be going mad, but she had managed to achieve a form of balance.

    All of the individual selves within her had come to love Ranma.

    *As long as I have Ranma, then all will be well,* thought Kodachi with 
a loving smile.  She hugged herself and slowly rocked back and forth 
gently on the floor.  *Ranma will be my salvation, and his love will redeem 
me.*

    A small chorus of voices, each identical to her own, murmured 
agreement with the sentiment.

                    ******************************

    Akane set down her cup of tea.  She cleared her throat with a delicate 
sound as she gathered her thoughts, a loose fist held against her lips.  She 
turned to look at her father, who had set an unexpected document down on 
the table.  Nabiki was currently reading it and occasionally making 
humming sounds.

    "What did you say, Father?" asked Akane, a little angry at him.  "You 
engaged Nabiki to Ranma?"

    "Ranma's father signed the document himself," said Soun with a faint 
chuckle.  "All perfectly legal.  That's just a copy.  I already sent the 
original to the Hall of Records.  It was all Nabiki's idea though."  He 
beamed a smile at his middle daughter, who looked back at him with a 
frown.

    "Father, how could you?!" shrieked Akane as she leaped to her feet.  
"Ranma was going to be _mine_!  I had it all worked out!"  Her visions of 
yielding herself to a victorious Ranma, when he had managed to defeat 
her, had just gone up in smoke.

    "Daddy?" asked Nabiki, ignoring her sister's outburst, a note of 
puzzlement in her voice.  "Why are both my name _and_ Akane's on this 
agreement?"

    "What?" asked Soun, surprised.  He grabbed the document back from 
Nabiki.  Akane's name and Genma's initials were clearly printed on the 
contract.  He looked up to see both of his loving daughters looking at him 
with less than perfect love on their faces.

    "Honestly, Daddy," said Nabiki as she folded her arms across her chest.  
She frowned at her father.  "It was a foolproof scheme.  How could you 
mess it up like this?"

    *Life just isn't fair,* thought Akane with a harrumph as she plopped 
back down to a seated position.  She crossed her arms across her chest and 
frowned at her father, unintentionally mirroring Nabiki.

    Soun just stared at the piece of paper in his hands.  He had forgotten to 
mention it for several days due to an increase in his workload at the office.  
Now it was entirely too late.  Genma had a copy, and the Hall of Records 
had the original contract.  It would be dishonorable to try and back out of it 
now.

    "Looks like you and I are going to be together for longer than I thought, 
little sister," said Nabiki with a loud note of distaste in her voice.  She got 
up from the dinner table with a sigh and went to her room.  Her well 
thought out plans for her future had just taken an unexpected detour.

    Akane went out into the back yard to start breaking things, her roars of 
anger frightening the animals in the neighborhood.

    Soun lit up a cigarette.  He inhaled deeply on his cigarette and blew a 
long puff of smoke at the ceiling.  *This is going to be a difficult time for 
me.*

    The sounds of smashing wood sounded loudly from the back, 
accompanied by yells from Akane.

    *Yes,* thought Soun, taking another deep inhalation from his cigarette 
and nodding at the ceiling.  *A difficult time.*

                    ******************************

    Running Deer tightened her grip on the neck of her opponent, and the 
roar of the crowds grew louder.  Her opponent's massive elbow slammed 
into her side once in an attempt to loosen her grip.  She grunted once at the 
pain but did not let up.  Instead, she bore down harder, but it wasn't 
appearing to make any difference.  She grabbed her right wrist with her 
other hand in an attempt to strengthen her hold.  *Fall down, you stupid 
ox!* she thought fiercely.

    For a second time, a powerful elbow strike impacted just below her ribs.  
A louder grunt of pain escaped her lips.  Running Deer could feel her arm 
weakening, the strain on it was immense.  She wrapped her long legs as far 
as they could reach around her opponent's massive chest and began to 
squeeze tightly with her thighs.  That action got a few appreciative whistles 
from the crowds.

    Her opponent was one of Tarou's cronies, a semi-intelligent mass of 
muscle named Wonton.  He was said to have washed up on the shores of 
Japan during a storm, but his appearance gave a person the impression that 
he was a cast-off creation of JuGen.  Wonton never spoke, just made 
animal-like sounds.  He was also slavishly devoted to Tarou, like a faithful 
attack dog.

    Apparently realizing that his blows were having insufficient effect, 
Wonton tried again to pry Running Deer's arm loose from around his 
throat.  Both of his hands reached up to get a grip on the arm strangling 
him.  His vision was beginning to blur.  He wasn't able to get a good hold 
on Running Deer's arm, and his time was running out.

                    ******************************

    Ranma cheered for Running Deer from the waiting area.  He tried not to 
think about what would be happening after Running Deer and Wonton's 
fight was concluded.  Then it would be Ranma's turn to fight in the Arena, 
and his opponent would be Ryuu Kumon.  It had been announced to him 
during lunch break.

    The higher ups had chosen to place him into the rotation for a single 
fight.  When they had asked for volunteers, Ryuu had been the first to 
volunteer for the fight.  Ranma glanced down the row of seated fighters to 
meet Ryuu's eyes staring at him with a strange, almost hungry, look.  The 
sheer intensity of the gaze was very disturbing, so Ranma turned his 
attention back to the fight.

                    ******************************

    Ryuu shifted his eyes back to the fight.  He could admit to himself that 
he felt a certain thrill at seeing the Apache girl in action, so long as it 
wasn't directed at himself.  While his face remained impassive, in his mind 
he cheered Running Deer on.  Wonton had been one of those involved in 
giving him such a warm welcome to the Arena, at Tarou's direction.  The 
lumbering hulk had held his arms while Tarou administered the beating.

    Personally, Ryuu believed that Running Deer would win.  He had to 
admit to himself that she had the all of the necessary ability to overcome 
the lummox.  It was a girl of rare ability that was able to fight him to a 
standstill after all.  His gaze locked on to her graceful body in motion, 
finding pleasure in the sight.  *She will win,* he thought confidently.

                    ******************************

    Mina was seated next to Ryuu.  She had two matches scheduled tonight, 
and she was impatient to begin.  She was wearing one of her sexiest 
fighting outfits, a dark blue silk leotard top, with tigers embroidered in 
golden thread, that scooped down low across her bustline and hugged her 
figure tightly.  She also wore a pleated skirt in black that reached down to 
barely midthigh.  A pair of calf-high boots, in glossy black, completed the 
outfit.

    Mina let her hand casually brush against Ryuu's leg again as she shifted 
her position, but the Citizen boy did not even appear to acknowledge her 
presence.  She noticed that Ryuu's eyes were on Running Deer in a rapt 
gaze, and a cold anger filled Mina at his inattention to her.  *I don't know 
what he can possibly see in that barbarian cow,* she thought with a mental 
huff.  *She doesn't even have half of my beauty.*   Her thoughts burned 
darkly.

    Mina turned her attention to Ranma, down near the opposite end of the 
bench.  She narrowed her eyes with displeasure to see that Shampoo was 
watching Ranma almost as much as she was watching the fight.  Mina 
snorted softly as she thought about all of the time that the Amazon had 
managed to spend with Ranma over the past several days.  Both Ranma 
and Ryuu had been staked out as property by the two girls that Mina 
despised the most, and nobody was admitting it.  Mina continued to watch 
Ranma.

    Mina thought briefly about the mutual training that Ranma and 
Shampoo were undergoing together.  The pair had developed a fierce 
competition over who would be the first to master the silly technique that 
they were learning that several other fighters had noticed.  Ranma's initial 
interest that he had shown Mina had faded quickly.  His attentions were 
focused on his training, but he would look at Shampoo now and again in a 
way that Mina found annoying.

    What was worse was that Shampoo would occasionally watch Ranma 
with a similar look on her face, despite her protests about how "weak" 
Ranma was.  For a time, Mina had dared hope that Shampoo had 
genuinely taken a dislike to Ranma, but she could tell that it was an act.  
For all of their competition with each other, there was some sort of subtle 
chemistry at work.

    *Both of them would probably vehemently deny it,* thought Mina 
angrily.

    Mina frowned deeply in Ranma's direction.  He had forced his way into 
her heart, and he had no clue that he had done so.  Her thoughts filled with 
jealous anger.  She curled both of her hands into fists.

    *Damn you, Ranma Saotome!  Damn you to hell!*

                    ******************************

    Running Deer's choke hold didn't appear to be working very well.  She 
couldn't seem to squeeze tightly enough through the mass of muscles on 
Wonton's neck to cut off the blood supply to his brain.  She felt his muscles 
bunch up underneath her and realized too late that she had underestimated 
his cunning.

    Wonton's body drove back into the Plexiglas, crushing Running Deer 
between his bulk and the unyielding wall.  She felt her breath driven from 
her body as her hold began to weaken.  Stubbornly she tried to maintain it 
as Wonton drove his body back into the wall a second time.  Black spots 
appeared across her vision as her lungs forgot how to breathe and her hold 
loosened.

    A shrug of Wonton's massive shoulders suddenly tossed Running Deer 
away like a rag doll.  Her body slammed back into the Plexiglas wall and 
bounced off.  She landed on her feet and fell to her knees for a moment, 
shaking her head to clear the grogginess.

    Wonton locked his eyes on her, smiled briefly, and raised his face 
upwards to howl.  The crowd went wild with excitement.  He began 
lumbering towards her, moving faster than a man his size should be able 
to.  He aimed a fist strike at the kneeling Running Deer, which she saw 
coming at the last possible moment.

    Running Deer seemed to disappear from where she had been kneeling.  
Wonton's fist slammed into the floor of the Arena, denting the steel into an 
approximation of his knuckles.  He quickly looked up to see Running Deer 
in the middle of an acrobatic leap that carried her over his head.  Her foot 
lashed out at him once in mid-air, catching him in the forehead.  Wonton 
barely felt the blow, but was slightly knocked off balance.

    Running Deer landed gracefully, planted one foot firmly, and spun her 
body around as hard as she could.  Her spin kick put the full power of her 
hips behind it as it drove into Wonton's side.  Not letting up for an instant, 
she dropped her kicking foot to the ground, and pivoted her other foot 
around for a similar powerful strike from the other side.

    Wonton felt a rib in his right side snap under the impact of the blow.  He 
howled his pain to the ceiling, even as his hand struck out.  Running Deer 
barely had time to register the motion of his fist before his backhanded 
strike caught her across the face.  She cried out in pain.  Her cheek took 
the worst of the blow, the bone cracking, as a cut opened up.  Blood 
sprayed away from her face, and her body slammed down to the floor of the 
Arena.  She rolled away from Wonton as he tried to smash her into the 
floor, her speed was the only hope for escape.

    Wonton paused in his attack, breathing heavily.  The little female had 
hurt him, and he didn't like pain.  He leaped his body into the air as a brief 
hush fell over the crowd.  Running Deer gazed upwards as a large shadow 
blocked out a portion of the overhead lights.  She leaped to the side in 
desperation as the mass of muscle and bone came down in the spot where 
she had been kneeling only a moment before.

                    ******************************

    Ranma was on his feet, about to leap into the Arena to assist Running 
Deer when a hand fell on his arm.  He glanced over to see Shampoo 
gripping his arm, a look of sympathy on her face.  She slowly shook her 
head.

    "Ranma no interfere in Running Deer's fight," said Shampoo softly.  "It 
matter of honor and pride for her to win fight by self."

    "But she's hurt," protested Ranma.  "A girl shouldn't have to go up 
against something like that.  It's not right."

    "That is life in Arena," said Shampoo firmly.  "Honor and pride in fight 
all we have left.  Ranma no interfere, okay?"  She let go of his arm and sat 
down again.

    Ranma reluctantly sat down again.  He gazed up at the cheering faces of 
his fellow Citizens and he suddenly didn't like what he saw.  The crowd 
wanted to see blood, and it didn't matter from who.  *This spectacle is a 
perversion of true martial arts.  This is just... wrong.*

                    ******************************

    Running Deer lashed out at Wonton with another kick while he 
recovered from his miss.  Her foot caught him under the jaw, and his head 
snapped back from the desperate force of her blow.  He was far from 
incapacitated from that, and she was a fraction of a second too slow in 
retracting her foot.  His hand managed to get a hold of her ankle in a bone-
crushing grip.

    "Let go!" she shouted at the man-beast.  She leaped with her other foot 
in an attempt to kick him once more.  His head moved aside, and her foot 
missed.  It left her horribly off balance, and the crowd cheered at her 
desperation.

    Wonton lifted Running Deer clear of the floor and slammed her down, 
flat on her back.  Pain flooded through her body.  Wonton slammed her 
down on the steel floor a second time, and Running Deer suddenly seemed 
to feel her body as if from a great distance.  She went limp in his hands, 
and her thoughts went numb.

    Wonton felt Running Deer stop struggling and reached a hand down to 
grab her by one arm.  The crowd was going wild with bloodlust.  Holding 
her by one arm and one leg, he raised her limp body into the air and smiled 
as the volume of cheers from the crowd increased.

    Running Deer's eyes moved behind her eyelids and one hand slowly 
closed into a fist.  Her thoughts were far away from the Arena, adrift in the 
past.

                    ******************************

    "Hit her again, Dawn Mist!" shouted one girl from out of the group that 
surrounded her.  Running Deer blinked back tears as the bigger girl hit her 
in the stomach once more before letting her drop to the ground.  Running 
Deer collapsed, holding her arms against her stomach, as her fellow 
students continued to loudly encourage the girl bullying her.

    It was another day of school on the reservation, another day of hell.

    It was also the day that a scared little girl's life changed forever.

    She was eight years old and a half-breed Japanese.  Her mother was 
dead, and she did not even know her father's name.  She lived with her 
grandmother on the reservation.  The Buddhist monks ran a small school 
for the children, in combination with the few remaining Spanish 
missionaries.  

    A new teacher was coming to the school today.  Running Deer had 
heard that her name was Taniko Genkotsu, and that she was a woman who 
could fight.  The rumor was that Taniko was looking for students to pass 
on her skills, and so she was traveling the region seeking out pupils.

    There was a sudden commotion in the crowd of children around her.  
Running Deer looked up through tear-filled eyes to see a Japanese woman 
frowning at the children around her.  She was not dressed in robes like the 
other teachers, but in pale yellow silk pants and a loose white tunic, belted 
at the waist.  She wore a pair of soft leather boots on her feet.  

    She stepped closer to Running Deer, and spoke the words that would be 
the end of her old life of fear.

    "Hello, little girl," said the woman with a gentle smile on her face.  She 
held out her hand.  "My name is Taniko.  Would you like to learn how to 
defend yourself from bullies?"

    Running Deer's memories blurred forward through years of hard 
training under her new teacher.  She proved to be an exceptional student of 
the martial arts, and she discovered a passion for it.

    There was one lesson that Taniko had told her, again and again.

    "Never give up, Running Deer.  When they knock you down, get back 
up.  Always remember that.... Get... Back... Up!"

                    ******************************

    Running Deer's eyes snapped open.  Her body was still held in the air by 
Wonton, only a few brief moments had passed.  To the few people able to 
see such a thing, a soft blue light enveloped her body as her thoughts 
crystallized into clarity.  Her hands clenched into fists.

                    ******************************

    The Master watched with mild surprise on his face as Running Deer's ki 
aura manifested.

    *Interesting,* he mused.  *Such unexpected power in that one.  I 
wonder what other amusing surprises that the warriors in this Arena hold 
for me?  I imagine that most would jump at the chance to work for 
Shadowlaw in exchange for freedom from here.*