Subject: [FFML] [Fic] Ranma 2096, Episode 3 Special Edition: Girl Trouble
From: Chris Willmore <4cw6@qlink.queensu.ca>
Date: 3/15/1999, 7:15 PM
To: ffml@ffml.fanfic.com

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         R2096 WEB SITE: http://qlink.queensu.ca/~4cw6/2096a.htm
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    WARNING: Though not explicit, the below story contains some adult
                     situations.  I'd rate it PG-13.
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 A guide to the new characters and relevant side stories can be found at
                         the end of the episode.
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                                 PROLOGUE
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    I really SHOULD kick myself, but I think I sprained my knee going up
that last set of stairs.  Spending my evenings with Zannen is beginning to
cloud my mind.  Kim goes off on a hovercycle tour alone with Rat, and of
COURSE they decide to come back early, and of COURSE she needs the key to
the mansion for a night when both of his parents will be away...
    I didn't know Thompson had it in her.  And to be honest, I'm jealous. 
The bondage is as well set-up as any of my own, and with inferior
materials, at that.  She even remembered to leave a little slack on one of
the wrists - has she done this before? The slit boxers are a bit much, but
considering the state of the sheets...  If they weren't playing with
syrup, that's prodigious.  I can see why Kim felt she had to rush back for
a shower.
    Right.  THAT'S what I'm here for.  No more dilly-dallying.  A pity -
the view's wonderful.
    "Rat." Nothing. "RAT." Still asleep.  I poke his chest. Again. And
again.
    Is he... No. He's breathing, so that's all right.  He always WAS a
deep sleeper.  
    Well, there's more than one way to wake a man.
    Sure enough.  Just a few seconds and his eyes are not only open,
but bulging out, and he's trying desperately to tell me that he's NOT
enjoying my attentions.  And failing.  True, my tongue is rather in the
way of his speaking, but the rest of his body would have given him away in
a telling fashion, anyway.
    "I can explain! I... I... CHILDRA?!?!?"
    Well, THAT was fun.  Not quite moral, but fun.
    "CHILDRA?!?!?"
    "Rise and shine, lover-boy. Where's Ranma?"
    "Did you just..."
    "I had to get you up SOMEhow." And I DID get him up.  "Where's-"
    "You know about Ranma?!?!? How?"
    "There. is. no. time." I poke his nose with my index finger, once for
each word.  "The C-Ko's got your lover, which is bad enough, but if they
find Saotome..."
    Strong emotions can make the Dead visible to the living, and surely
among that group of fanatics there's one who fits the requirements.
    "What do you MEAN, my lover?!?" I smell the scent of scorched nylon.
    "KIM, Reiraku."
    "What on earth are you TALKING about?!? I don't HAVE a lover, I've
never had one, and if I did, it sure wouldn't be... be..."
    I'm teasing him now, running my finger from just below his chin to far
below his waist.  Blood trickles down his cheek, and he wipes it off with
his less-bound wrist.
    My, but Kim's a wild one.  Reiraku has more hickeys on him than a girl
caipira on the day after St. John's eve.
    I tug fast and hard, pulling the sheet out from below Rat.  He hisses. 
I know it stings; I've had it done to me before.  I take adjacent corners
of the bedsheet in my hands and hold it to the light where he can see it.
    "No lover, you say?"  Lots of 'aheheheh'ing.  There's no denying THIS
evidence.  "So," I set down the sheet and sit behind him, fingering his
bindings.  "Where's Ranma?"
    "Why do you want to know?"
    Brilliant in med school, dumb as a brick in the real world.
    "Weren't you LISTENING?!?  Kim's been captured by C-Ko!"
    "But I didn't sleep with her!  I was unconscious!"
    Wow.  She really IS good.
    "Right now, I don't care," I lie.  I might actually have to ask her to
share a few things with me, once this is all over.  "If the Church of
Kodachi finds out that Ranma is back..."
    "Wait. You're not saying that Ranma is... THAT Ranma?!?"
    "He is. And if they find him..." I let my sentence drop intentionally,
because nothing all that bad would happen to the Living. They want to
question Kim, and I can understand their eagerness, but they can't keep
her forever.  What worries me is that the fact they've taken her means
they know about Ranma, which means that at least one of their members must
have ghost sight.  If the C-Ko publicises Ranma's return - and they
will - Skeride will hear of it, and I can't allow her to hunt down THIS
spirit.  I won't fail my friend twice.
    "He was with Kim!"
    I blink.
    Oh my, oh my...  And here I thought I KNEW my neighbour.
    "You mean... he WATCHED?"
    I think the thermostat's set a bit too high.
    "No! He's with Kim.  He has to be.  Or at least, within a K of her."
    I run through everything I've learned about ghosts, hauntings and
possessions.  This doesn't fit.
    "Tell me why," I demand.
    And he does.  The story he tells is hard to believe, but I have to. 
It isn't unprecedented. After all, I was told about another girl and a
panda in similar circumstances, but those are things which I thought had
been left in the mythical past.  I never expected to meet with them in
modern Tokyo.
    A few minutes ago, I thought I was using scare tactics to hoodwink Rat
into helping me with a favour to a dear departed friend.  But now?  We'd
better hurry unless I want my number of dead acquaintances to increase.
    "Get dressed." I pull my machete out of its hyperdimensional pocket
and slice through Rat's bindings with more than a smidgen of regret.  I
feel like I'm shredding a painting - a naked boy bound properly to a
well-used bed can be a thing of beauty.  "We're going to fetch Kim."
    "Are you CRAZY?!?" He's rubbing his wrists, but hasn't covered himself
yet.  Awfully nice of him.
    I shake my head and pop my machete back out of sight and reality.
    "Not yet," I answer.  "But THEY are.  Their devil equivalent is 'Ranma
Satana', a girl who once shared a body with Ranma proper.  Get the
picture?"
    "You think they'd..." That and more, dear.  I nod.  "Why don't we
just call the police?"  He's moved to the closet and is pulling underwear
from one of the drawers.  At least it's the tight kind.
    "What would we tell them?  They'd lock us up for mental insufficiency. 
Look, Rat, I'm used to running solo rescue missions for EH, but for this
one I need YOUR help."
    "Why?"  He has a shirt on now, and is finishing the buttoning of his
trousers.
    Truth be known, I need him for cannon fodder and to use as a
distraction while I try to find Ranma and free Kim.  Of course, I can't
tell him that.
    "What?  You think I can face hundreds of those girls ALONE?"
    "Ah." He nods an understanding and puts on his socks and shoes.
    Never underestimate the male ego.  When I suggested that his joining
the party would make the fight even, he swallowed it hook, line and
sinker.
    "Besides," I add just in case he isn't fully convinced, "she's YOUR
lover.  Aren't you willing to play the Knight in Shining Armour and help a
maiden-" well, certainly not any MORE, "I mean, a LADY in distress?"
    "I did NOT-" I make a meaningful visual survey of the battle-scarred
bedroom.  "Well... aheheheh..." He cups a hand around the back of his
head.  "Maybe I did, at that..." Is that a sigh?  "But anyway," he says,
clearing his throat, "how'll we get to her?"
    "We'll go to C-Ko HQ by hovercycle."
    "And then?"
    "Leave that to me."
    "Oh, so you just HAPPEN to know how to break into their complex?"
    "I do."
    "And you found this out... how?"
    "I've been around. Let's stop wasting time, shall we?  Here's the key
    to 
the 'cycle.  I found it in Kim's jacket, just after her abduction."
    "You're letting me drive?"
    "I lost my license, and we can't risk getting stopped by the police. 
There's Cecils about.  Just try not to get lost."
    "I'll do my best."
    That's what worries me.
    "One more thing."
    "Yes?" He stops midway through putting on his jacket.
    "Do you know the way to the prefectoral graveyard?"

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       |  __  \  |  _  \   |   | | | |         | |  _  \    /\ \/   /
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       |_|. \__\ |_|. .|_|.|_|...\/..|_|.|_|.|_|.|_|. \|_|  \  
                                                    /\ \    /
       Created by Christopher Willmore.            /  \ \  /
                  <4cw6@qlink.queensu.ca>         /   /  \/
       Based on a story by Rumiko Takahashi and      /
       Developed by C. Michael Schumacher           /   /
                                                    \  /
       R2096 pages: http://qlink.queensu.ca/~4cw6/   \/(Logo:Armakuni)

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                         EPISODE 3: GIRL TROUBLE
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               For Vilja, Cassandra, and the Witches' Coven
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           "The love that follows us sometimes is our trouble"
		   
                           -William Shakespeare

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    I flutter from grave to grave asking my question, but my fellow
departed give me as much of an answer as the wind which I've been
questioning for years.  When I say the name, they turn away as if from one
insane, but I know they understand.  How can they not?  We know each
other's histories here, down to the smallest detail.  Our days we spend
in common lament and our nights in recollection of that which will never
be again; how can they not know who I've grieved for, who I died for and
who it is I must now find?
    "Where's Ranma?" I ask.
    "Who?" counters an owl.
    Smart-aleck.  If I were alive, I'd use its feathers for pillow
stuffing.
    But I'm not.
    I recognise a shade, not far off.  It's old Hiro, who spends his time
at the lake watching young lovers. 
    "Have you seen Ranma?" I ask, dashing up to him.  He looks at me for a
moment.  His eyes are searching for... what? knowledge? an expected
feeling? Whatever it is, they don't find it, and he moves on.
    "Why won't anyone answer me?" I ask him.  "What's going on?"
    Through waves of silent ghosts and markers I trail him.  It's quiet;
even the usually omnipresent sound of supernatural whining is absent
tonight.
    "Why won't anyone tell me about Ranma? Is there a problem? Is he...
he..."
    I can't say it.  He says it for me.
    "We face a problem greater than any of our individual misfortunes." 
Hiro stops and points at a crypt's half-open door.  "Look."
    I'm not sure what I'm supposed to see, but I phase past the door and
into the burial chamber.  Everything seems in place.  Urn.  Inscription.
    "Th... the Wanderer... shy gypsy, SAVE US! slyly, spryly, tryst... HA!
HA! tryst and twine until she... he... Dai. DAI.  DIIIIEEEEEHAHAHAHAHAHA!"
    Babbling phantom in convulsions.
    I know her, and that only makes it worse.  It's Minnako.  She isn't
looking well.  Her eyes are enlarged to twice human size, her jaw moves up
and down even when she doesn't speak and her body not so much shakes as
pulses with a stuttered rhythm.
    "He will come... but too LATE! too LATE to my crypt, now mine not his
he's not hereanymoreishenot ANYWHERE goooooooooooone.... Baibaibaibai HA!
HA! WAAAAAAAAAAANDEEEEEEEEREEEEEEEEEER!"
    Hiro melts through the wall and joins me.
    "What happened?" I ask.
    "The Assassin happened," he answers.  
    "Skeride? When?!?"
    "Tonight.  Not long ago."  Both of us keep our eyes on the spectral
girl as she continues her mutterings.
    "Who... who was it?" I have a fairly good idea, but I don't want to
know.  Not for sure.  The Death that Nutkin brings is final.  There are no
ghosts of ghosts.
    "Kimeko and Daisuke." As I feared.  That pair had been in love, and
Minnako here was well-known as Dai's rejected suitor.  "The two had
finally decided to try... well..." His pink glow and cough say enough.  A
crypt was an obvious choice for that, since it guaranteed privacy - the
wards embedded in its walls make exit from one difficult, and entry less
appealing.  "Mi'ko'd heard of the tryst, and was planning on walking in on
them." Hiro closed his eyes.  "Skeride walked in on them first.  Caught
them with their pants down."
    "She... she did it in the MIDDLE of..."  Hiro nodded.  This was bad. 
However vicious she may be, until now the Assassin always respected the
sanctity of those at prayer and the privacy of couples seeking intimate
solace.  This lowering of her respect for us considerably increased our
danger.
    "Minnako saw it all."
    "Deity..."  Her cries and shouts were now impossible to understand.  
    "It's worse for her, you know.  The Wanderer's rescued her twice, and
she expects him to do the same for everyone.  For the rest of us, he's
hope.  For her, he's... he WAS a certainty."
    "He's only ONE spirit!"
    "But he's all we have."
    "There are HUNDREDS of us.  Why can't WE do something about Nutk...
about the Assassin?"
    "Because she has weapons we cannot fight.  A touch of her blade, or
one of her bubbles, and we're gone.  And what can we attack her with? We
could try scaring her to death, I suppose..."  Minnako's been reduced to
sobbing now.  I try not to imagine what's going through her mind. I don't
know what I'd do in her place; unable to help while the one you loved
was...
    "RANMA!" The Heavens forgive me for forgetting about him these few
minutes.  If anything were to happen to him NOW...  The double death fills
me with guilty reassurance - Skeride strikes only once a night.  
    "Ranma's in trouble!" The crypt door slams fully open.  "Hi, Hiroshi!" 
Childra waves at him while running in.  She glances down.  "What's wrong
with Minnako?"  I start to explain, but she silences me.  "No time for
that.  The C-Ko has Ranma."
    "Is he..."
    "Yes, he's alive."
    "WHAT?!?!?"
    "And dead.  Dead and alive.  He's as lively as a stiff can be, but
we'd better get to him soon.  If we don't, the Church will make his
presence public, and that'll attract-"  Minnako looks up from her crying
and looks Jansen directly in the face.  "Oh, no. She didn't..."
    "Skeride," I mutter to myself.  Why can't she stick to her books and
her passions, and let us BE?
    "I'm so sorry..." Childra wrings her hands.
    "You don't have to apologise for your friend."  Hiroshi.  "We know her
actions are not yours.  You are a comfort and companion to the Dead, while
she's the self-appointed scourge of the Heavens."
    "She's not always like this..."
    "Only the living can afford to see her as anything but the Assassin."
    A weak smile from Childra, and then the verbal steamroller is back.
    "Rat's out front; he's waiting for us."  Hiro raises an eyebrow. 
Jansen ignores his silent question.
    "What does HE have to do with anything?" I ask.
    "I'll explain on the way.  Do you know your way around the C-Ko
complex?"
    "I think so..."
    "Good enough."
    And then we run, leaving Hiroshi behind to deal with Minnako's
shattered soul.  At times, we all must be a little selfish.
    
                                * * * * *

    Ranma examined the mural in front of him.  He had to admit that it was
quite a good likeness, though the situation was a bit far-fetched.
    The room he'd warped into was in was dimly-lit, simple and harrowing. 
The sole item of furniture was a chair in the middle of the room, the only
light came from a glowing disc at each corner, and every available inch of
space was painted.
    Three of the walls had pictures of Ranma's ex-fiances on them.  One
showed a giant Ukyou, dressed in black, demolishing a town with her
spatula while green flames rose up around her. The next depicted Shampoo
as an enchantress, calling down lighting from the dark clouds above her.
The one Ranma was currently admiring had Akane rushing towards the viewer
from the centre of a whirlpool, wooden mallet in mid-swing.
    And the others... well... he didn't want to think about them.  The
nicest of the three had an army of those 'Kodachettes' on it, all dressed
in their green leotards and wearing identical ticked-off expressions.
Looked like they were protecting some sort of building.  As for the floor
and ceiling... the kindest thing he could say was that at least now he
knew where the picture on the side of that skyscraper'd come from.  Above
him was the same pastel-shaded painting of Kodachi hugging an
ultra-bishounen version of himself.  The extra clouds and cherubim made it
clear it was meant to be a rendition of Heaven.  Below wasn't much better.
Amidst flames and dancing devils was an underendowed demonic version of
his female half in a pink leotard, complete with horns and a barbed tail.
At least Kim's unconscious body covered the worst of it.

    Eventually, the girl opened her eyes.
    "Ungh..." she groaned, then shook her head and sat up.  "Where..." She
noticed Ranma.  "Ranma, where ARE we?"
    "Dunno.  Some girls took you from the shower, and I kinda just warped
here."
    Kim squinted as her eyes adjusted to the half-light.
    "I don't feel so good," she moaned.
    "I think they drugged ya. You've been out a while."
    "I'm feeling chills."
    "Then you might wanna get some clothes on."
    "CLOTHES?!?"
    Ranma's sudden embarrassed glow added considerably to the light in the
room, and Thompson was able to find and grab a leotard that had been left
for her.
    It was pink.
    "I've seen the ceiling before," she commented while putting it on.
Ranma nodded, his back to her.  "C-Ko has us."
    "'Fraid so."
    "I KNEW that switch at the restaurant was going to cost us."  She
sighed.  "Well, so much for my mid-terms...  Say, isn't that Shampoo?"
    "Yes," Ranma said softly.
    "How'd they know about her?"
    "I don't wanna talk about it."
    "Suit yourself.  Any ideas on how we're going to escape?"
    Part of the army of Kodachettes slid open, and three women stepped
through the open door.
    "You won't," said their leader.

                                * * * * *

	"Big wall," says Rat.
	He's right.  The C-Ko spared no expense in making their compound look
the part of an impregnable fortress.  Much like the ladies themselves.
But there's an easy way to get both of them to open.  You just have to
know what to slip into the slit, and which buttons to press...
	Green light and a beep.  They either haven't bothered to erase
Isabella's code, or they never realised I stole her card.
	The expression on Rat's face as the front door swings open is
precious, and the ghost's isn't far behind.
	"What was that?" asks Reiraku.
	"Membership card."
	"You... you were in... you were... wha..."
	I shrug and step inside.
	"I was young.  Coming?"
	
                                * * * * *

    "Not so much, Cassandra! Alana, be careful with that knot! Remember
who she...  There it is.  Her eyes are glossing over. Good."
    The drug was quick-acting.  In a few seconds Kim ceased to be bothered
by the ribbons with which they'd strapped her to the chair; the women in
front of her looked as insubstantial as Ranma, and all around them the
paintings were laughing.
    "What is your name?"  The one who asked the question wore a mask.  
    "Kimberley Anne Thompson," she answered.  Funny.  She'd never told
anyone her middle name before.  The birds were lovely, but they really
shouldn't pick on the poor weasels so.
    "Your TRUE name."
    "I... *aheheh* I told you! *BWAHAHA!* Kim. Thomp. Son. WHEE!"
    "Why have you returned?"
    Seagulls under rocks.
    "Well, we couldn't stay in China FOREVER... It's so nasty there, with
bats, and rats and shampooooooooOOOOOOOoooooooooOOOOOOOooooooo..."
    How silly those girls looked with alligators on their tummies.  Was
that a blimp? No. It was a hat. A derby hat.  Ah, well.
    "China? What does the return of Ranma-sama have to do with China?"
    "That's where he comes from.  Yup! Yup! Yup! Wheeeeeee!"  And speaking
of Ranma, there he was! Was he playing hide-and-seek? Maybe he was 'It',
and that's why he had his hand over his face like that...
    Thompson tried to pop one of the golden bubbles, but the ribbon around
her wrist stopped her.  She struggled a bit.
    Hey.
    That actually felt... good.
    Kim wriggled in her bonds, trying to set up as much friction as she
could.  The masked leader covered her face with her hand, just like Ranma.
Maybe SHE was 'It', now!  That's odd. No one seemed to have tagged her.
    "What is the nature of your relationship with Ranma Saotome?"
    "None! I'm single!" She grinned. "For now, anyway."
    Ooooooo.... Aaaaaaaa....
    Giggle.
    "Stop playing games. In what way are you and Ranma linked?"
    "Linked? Why didn't you say so before, dum-dum? We share my body!"
    "What?"
    "In and out, in and..."
    "Enough! This is going nowhere.  Alana! Cassandra! I'll take my
chances, but we might need your strength if this is only a demonic
duplicate.  Genevieve!"
    Another girl must have come in with water, because Kim soon found
herself splashed, out of the body and coherent.  Now Ranma was in the pink
leotard, strapped to the chair with large quantities of red ribbon and
giggling madly. 
    The switch sent three of the girls to their knees.  Only the masked
one managed to keep her composure, and poked Ranma twice with a white
instrument.  The boy's laughter died down and a green light flashed at
the top of the machine.
    "The genetics match," whispered the masked one.  "Genevieve!
Cassandra! Release the saviour!"
    While they did, with trembling hands, the leader knelt before him and
removed her mask.
    "Our apologies for doubting you, my liege, but this being the
century-day of your Ascension and having been warned of Satana's wiles,
we thought it prudent to wait for a genetic test before acknowledging
you."
    "S'okay," said a drowsy Ranma.
    "Genevieve! Cassandra! Alana! Ready the Sanctum!"
    Three nods, then the pitter-patter of slippered feet exiting a
smooth-floored room.
    All the ribbons were off now.  The leader took Ranma's hand in her own
and helped him up, offering herself more as a full-body frontal splint
than a crutch.  The Collective Bridegroom was too sleepy to care, and Kim
too disgusted to watch.
    "It will be a few minutes until the sedation wears off."
    "Wrrhrumptuf..."
    "I am Sakuin, first-ranked of your brides.  Allow me to be the first
to... to..."  
    Further words would have been wasted on one too drugged to understand.

    Sakuin's kiss drove the clouds from Ranma's mind.  She broke it off
only when both of them were short on air and she could no longer keep him
pressed against her.
    Ranma backed against the muraled walls as if trying to melt through
them.  His eyes were wide, his Adam's apple was moving up and down and
sweat trickled along the side of his face.
    The head of C-Ko smiled.
    "I am afraid there is but one way out, our love, but I guarantee that
you won't find it unpleasant.  If you will follow me?"
    
                                * * * * *
								
    Everything's exactly as I remember it inside the complex.
	Well, no, not really.  Everything I remember is exactly as it was, but
they've added a few wings and remodeled half the rooms.  The security
detail's also missing.  That must mean...
	"Childra?" asks the spirit hovering beside me.
	"Hrm?"
	"Where's Ranma?"
	"They'll have taken him to the main auditorium."
	"Huh?"  I've confused Rat with my conversation.  I'm not about to give 
him a Parapsych 101 cram session, so I pretend that I was talking to him.
	"I was saying that they'll have taken Ranma - and Kim - to the main
auditorium."
	"Do you know where it is?"
	"If memory serves..."
	We walk down two halls and come to an elaborately carved door.
	"Um... Childra?" asks Reiraku.
	"Yes?"
	"Why does the main auditorium look like a dungeon?"
								
								* * * * *

	Shampoo listened, to make sure everyone else had gone to sleep, then
locked the door to her new room and tossed herself onto the bed.  It was a
spring bed, rather than a mat.  That was one of the few changes that had
been made.  
	The Nekhohanten was almost as she remembered it, physically.  The menu
had changed, there'd been a new paint job, but that... that was all.
Still, it didn't FEEL as it once had, and the spiritual connection she'd
had with Mousse's sons was gone.
	They spoke, and she heard nothing.  They moved, they smiled, they
tried to console her and all she saw were faceless ghosts wandering halls
haunted by quenched possibilities.
	She had nothing, now.
	For a century she'd lived towards a goal.  She'd reached it, and was
unfulfilled.  Ranma didn't love her.  Ranma didn't know her.  She'd seen
that the instant he'd woken - his face was trying to hide what his eyes
could not, that he felt himself in the presence of a stranger.  Had she
changed all that much?  The restaurant was ageless, but with a mutable
soul.  She was its inverse, or so she felt; an unchanging spirit confined
within a restless frame.
	Nimbly, she slipped out of her nightgown, draping it carefully over a
chair, and stood in front of the full-length mirror.
	She had aged in a hundred years; that was certain.  Her skin had gone
from creamy white to a dull half-gray, and though she wouldn't admit it in
public, smoothness had given way to wrinkles, and here and there a few
white strands clashed with her otherwise sky-blue hair.
	It wasn't fair!  She'd done all she should...  Long ago she'd promised
to herself (and to Cologne!) that she'd have no airen but Ranma.  She had
kept that oath, defeating all challengers and devoting her entire life to
bringing his spirit back from that half- death in the Jusenkyo pool... And
now...
	She started to cry.  It just wasn't right. It wasn't!  Her heart
hadn't changed, or her soul, and she still was athletic and trim... But it
wasn't enough. Ranma's heart, soul and build were equally inviolate, but
he had the advantage of his teenaged body, and she the burden of a hundred
years of age and memory.
	Surely, her beloved would be snagged by some pubescent girl with a
firmer chest, or a solid voice in place of her own tremulous
vocalisations...  All her work, her dedication, and her waiting... All for
WHAT?
	Shampoo laughed. She laughed at herself, at the world, at having
thought that he'd stay with her just because she'd raised him from the
dead...  At best, he'd think of her as a grandmother.  A GRANDMOTHER!
Tears streamed down the Amazon's cheeks.
	It would be easier to bear if he now hated her. At least, she would
then think that he disliked her for herself, that there would never have
been any chance of their being together. Instead, he found he LIKED her,
as a friend - maybe even more... It was only physical considerations that
prevented them from...
	Time's arrow had struck her in the heart.
	Shampoo shook her head. She shouldn't think of things she could not
change.  Wasn't that what she'd told Ranma? It was best to make the most
of what she could, and not regret the lack of that which lay beyond her
grasp.
	She walked over to the telephone.  Thank goodness Blow Dryer had shown
her how to use the thing earlier that day... She'd never have been able to
figure it out on her own.  Not a single button or dial was to be seen on
the device.
	She picked up the 'set, and spoke the number which she'd memorized. A
short pause, then a beep.
	'Welcome to Tokyo Telecomm's automated answering service. The persons
you have called: "Kim Thompson and Childra Jansen" Are not available.
Please leave your name and number, along with a brief message, after the
tone. Thank-you for using Tokyo Telecomm." *beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep*
	Shampoo smashed the 'set against the ground, and collapsed sobbing
onto the floor.

                                * * * * *
								
	Ranma was wary of following the overpassionate leader, but was left
with little choice, given the number of exits.  The room they went into
was as brightly lit as the first one was dim, and he was blinded for a
moment as he walked into the bright light.
	"Darkness is a requisite for the preservation of the paintings,"
explained Sakuin.  "Your images are very dear to us, and those are among
the most faithful.  They were made soon after your d... they were made a
long time ago, and so need special care.  Our apologies for the discomfort
which the change in light has caused you."
	"'S'okay..." Ranma squinted a few times, then regained his vision.
The chamber he'd been led into looked like either a space station's
control center or a very advanced medical lab, with large computer
screens, keyboards and some devices he couldn't recognise lining the
walls.  A few institutional-looking chairs and a desk were the only
furniture, and they, like everything else, were cast in a clean, glowing
white.  He could see everyone's reflections perfectly on the floor tiles -
except for Kim's, of course.  "What're they doing?" He jerked a thumb at
two of the acolytes who'd sat down at the terminals and were typing away
furiously.
	"They're preparing your rebirthday present."
	"Oh, yeah? What is it?"
	"Something the Foundress very much wanted you to see."
	More typing.  Kim put her invisibility to use and watched over the
Kodachettes' shoulders.
	Nothing seemed to be happening.
	"Why's it takin' so long?" Ranma was getting edgy, and he didn't like
the way Sakuin kept staring at his hips.
	"There are certain things which we value more than even those
paintings, and over-riding the safeguards we've built over decades of
storage takes some time."
	"What is it?"
	"You won't have too much longer a wait."
	He sure hoped not, since he REALLY didn't like the way she was using
her index finger to twist his hair into a curl.  He glanced at Kim.  She
was a pale shade of green, and her eyes were wider than a human's could
ever be, making her look like a character out of some anime show.
	"All we need now is your access code, Mistress Sakuin."
	"Gosunkugi Bar-Ranma-Alpha-Sakuin-Tiptoe-Ranma-Alpha-Pot."
	After a final bout of keyboard clicking the far wall slid open and a
carpet of cold air unfolded to welcome Ranma to Kodachi's final gift.
	"She waits," said Sakuin.
	The acolytes were now standing at attention, as if expecting something
official to happen.  Ranma didn't know what.  All he saw was another dark
room, and a few speckles of light bouncing off something within it.
	He looked for Kim.  Her ghost sight should allow her to see things
pretty clearly.
	Ah. Okay. Not when she was looking away.
	"Er... Ah..."
	Sakuin bowed slightly and gestured with her hand in the direction of
the dimly-lit chamber.
	Ranma stepped into the room, the lights switching on before he had a
chance to reconsider his entrance.  This chamber too was white, and
dominated by a tall glass cylinder filled with a translucent yellow goo
and capped by a panelled metal base and top.
	There seemed to be something moving in the middle of it.  He pressed
his nose and palms to the edge of the container and peeked in.  Something
dimly peeked back at him through the murk - or would have, were it living.
	"AAAAARGH!"  Ranma tripped on his own foot while jumping back and
sprawled onto the floor.
	It couldn't be.  Noway. Nohow. Nuh-uh.
	He looked again. Innocent enough. It'd just been a trick of the light.
It WAS a lava lamp, see? Just a few bubbles going up, some nice blinking
lights, a click or two, and some old dead bag grabbing. his. grinning.
corpse.
	"AAAAARGH!" Now he looked like a poster-boy for Twister.
	"Mistress Kodachi wanted you to know that even in Death, she
would be faithful to you," said Sakuin.
	"I think I'm gonna be sick," mumbled Ranma. "Tell me that's not 
what I think it is..."
	"I've already been sick," said Kim. She was somewhere behind him. 
"The janitorial squad for this place is bloody lucky that ghosts can't
puke.  The passwords ALONE were enough to turn my stomach.  Hope you're
into ribbons and handcuffs, o 'Collective Bridegroom'..."
	"She has never left you," continued Sakuin.  "In fact..." She pressed
a button on a nearby wall.  A spotlight came to life behind the tank, its
limelight cutting through the murk and making the contents of the vessel
clearly visible.
	There was no denying it now.  Floating within the glass cylinder,
the naked, grinning corpse of an elderly black-haired woman tightly hugged
Ranma's own cadaver.
	"In fact..." concluded Sakuin, "YOU have never left HER." She smiled.
	"You STOLE my corpse?!?" asked Ranma, shocked.  He couldn't take his
eyes off of the body hovering in the straw-coloured glop, nor rid himself
of the impression that he was looking into a very badly-manufactured
mirror.
	"Not _I_, no..." answered Sakuin. "It was Mistress Kunou.  We couldn't
leave it to decompose, after all, now, could we? That would be an outrage
against yourself.  Be assured; it has been carefully preserved and revered
all these years..."
	"But... That other body... Is that? Is it?"
	"That _is_ Kodachi Kunou.  When she died, she asked her body be placed
in the preservation tank along with yours, that you could see her
faithfulness proved upon your return."
	"I... I see..." he gulped. "Well, now that I have seen how she is...
er... faithful... Could you please... Close it up again?"
	Sakuin smiled.
	"Certainly! I can see how it might be a little - disconcerting, shall
we say? - to see your own corpse.  Will you step out of the chamber,
please?" Ranma did so.  Sakuin waited for the lights to go off, then
snapped her fingers.  "Alana! Cassandra! The doors!" The pair nodded and
set back to work at the consoles. In a short while, the panels closed
together with a thud.  Ranma relaxed visibly.
	"Is there anything else that I have to do, or will you let me go?"
	"Obviously, I cannot hold you here against your will, any more than a
Tibetan monk would retain the Dalai Lama.  You are free to go.  However, I
must say that our acolytes will be _sorely_ disappointed when I tell them
you declined to meet them..."
	"Acolytes?"
	"Ranma! Let's get OUT OF HERE!"  Kim was tapping her foot with enough
force to send it through the floor.
	"Our headquarters house about seven hundred Acolytes of Kodachi...
The press has taken to calling them 'Kodachettes'...  They are all in
between the ages of sixteen and twenty-five, except for the senior
priestesses, like myself." She smiled. "Who are considerably more mature
and..." A grin.  "...experienced..." Ranma gulped. "They train in martial
gymnastics and other athletics for several hours a day, and are quite
physically fit...  And, of course, all of us worship you...  You're SURE
you want to leave NOW?" She put on her best puppy-dog eyes.
	"What happens if I say yes?"
	Sakuin snapped her fingers and half a dozen ladies whose tight black
leotards showed more muscles than should be tastefully seen on any woman
entered the room.  They were holding small silver devices in their hands.
	"If that were the case, we should have to have you anointed by the
Holy Loving Taser Troupe before your departure.  Through the auditorium."
	"Oh." Ranma paused to think.  That took a while.  Eventually, his
brain settled on what promised to be the least painful option.  "Well,
um...  I suppose I could stay for a LITTLE... Just to MEET them..."
	Sakuin smiled, dismissing the Holy Loving Taser Troupe with a second
snap of her fingers.
	"I shall assemble the acolytes. Genevieve, give the signal!"
	A few keystrokes from the Kodachette filled the room with the sound of
the 'Wedding Chorus' from 'Lohengrin'.
	"They will gather in the meeting hall shortly.  Come with me."  Sakuin
offered her arm, and Ranma took it in his.
	"I CAN'T BELIEVE YOU'RE DOING THIS! WHAT A... WHAT A... Geeze, pervert
is too mild a word for you!  I hope those whips leave welts."
	Ranma smiled.
	"Seven hundred of them, you say? Ages sixteen to twenty-five?"
	Sakuin nodded, and winked.
	"Right this way, Ranma-sama..."
	"..."  Kim followed.

                                * * * * *
								
	All right, so maybe my memory WAS a bit rusty, but it'd been years
since I'd last roamed these halls, and the auditorium hadn't been in
much use, in those days.  Now, if we had to find Isabella's room, I
could do that in my sleep.  I often had, in fact, and morning would
surprise me with the knowledge that there are far higher degrees of
sleepwalking than is generally believed.
	"You're walking too slowly and we don't have time," the ghost reminds
me. 
	"Give me a minute.  This looks familiar.  That's the kitchen, there's
the exercise room, and THAT," I turn towards Rat with a deliberately
theatrical expression, "is the-"

	Shocking Rat is not as easy when the boy is nowhere to be seen.

	I open my mouth to comment on the situation, but am stopped by the
sound of stampeding women.  Zannen's nephew will have to wait.
				 
                                * * * * *
								
	By the end of the twentieth century, a millennium of Chinese 
male-preferential breeding had led to a matrimonial crisis:  the nation's
surplus males exceeded the total female population of Taiwan, and dowries
for Asian women skyrocketed.  With hundreds of thousands of Chinese men
facing the prospect of a lonely future and no succession, the marriage of
an attractive or talented daughter became a transaction that would often
leave her parents independently wealthy.
	Enterprising, genetics-savvy 21st century Japan was quick to take
advantage of this:  families soon found that a little zygote-tweaking for
two X-chromosomes and beauty would more than pay for its cost,
child-maintenance included, once the foetus reached nubility.  The Global
Saviour's 'Empire of Light' drew a noticeable percentage of its financial
strength from the export of brides to China, through both taxes on the
obscenely large wedding payments and fees paid by the parents to the
notoriously government-linked Onocorp genetics company.  Indeed, the Kunou
Foundation publicly endorsed the practice, subsidising the marketing
(by Kurenai Industries' advertising branch) of Oncorp's 'mail-order
daughter' scheme as a  public education measure.
	Old habits die hard.  Though the Chinese population imbalance had been
eliminated by the 2060s, genetic selection and enhancement of children
remained a necessary status symbol for social climbers well into the
2080s, and a beautiful daughter was held to be more prestigious than a
son.  The damage had been done by the time the suppliers came to terms the
decrease in demand; a whole generation of factory-guaranteed knockouts
found themselves facing spinsterhood or marriage far outside their age
group.  Some were able to come to terms with this, either by finding
companionship in other women or adjusting to relationships with babes and
the elderly.  The media reflected this, changing the mainstream male model
from the dashing twenty-five year-old to the distinguished forty-year-old
and innocent 16-year-old.
	Of course, there were those for whom either of these choices was
unsatisfactory, or who couldn't find a partner no matter how hard they
tried: there simply weren't enough men.
	It was to these that the Church of Kodachi appealed, with its promise
of a mythical 'Collective Bridegroom' that would return from the Heavens
to satisfy all their needs.  It wasn't, at first sight, a very impressive
solution:  their deliverer was biologically underage, and they'd have to
share... but what they WOULD share, if the Church propaganda was to be
believed, would be mythical: specially-commissioned lurid illustrations
beckoned with their captions: 'A hundred men in one!' 'Virility
unbounded!'.  It wasn't everyone's piece of cake, but 'C-Ko', to use the
common Reuters abbreviation, managed to gain the loyalties of seven
hundred stunning, sexually frustrated females.  These were the proud, the
few, the severely repressed - and so when they heard the strains of
Wagner's Wedding Chorale letting them know their Saviour had arrived,
they didn't just run - they swarmed.
	Bombs, bouquets and things that were both were dropped and allowed to
explode.  Ribbons and handcuffs disappeared from lockers in a flurry of
maniacal wrist-tossing, and the Kodachettes kept tabs on each other to
ensure that no single one of them would use the advantage that nudity
would confer.
	They flowed into the main auditorium like maggots into a
newly-presented carcass, writhing under, through and over each other until
one green quasi-worm was scarcely distinguishable from the other.
	Once the inflow had settled into a small-scale harmonic undulation
about centre stage, Sakuin stepped onto the main platform.
	"Girls!" said the High Priestess into a microphone, "The day
we have long waited for has arrived at last! May I present...  RANMA
SAOTOME!"
	Their Deliverer stepped onstage.
	"Hi," he said, and waved to the crowd.
	A quarter of those present fainted.

                                * * * * *

	Lust delayed becomes a tangible force; a stale-smelling sticky fog
that surrounds its source and reminds the passer-by of laundry to be done,
and unswept floors.  The assembled Kodachettes fairly reeked of the
miasma; their eyes were focused on their leotarded Saviour, and their
hands and unmentionables kept back only by the steel-stiff spiritual
shield of Sakuin.  She was speaking - her sermon was indeed the excuse for
the delay in Ranma's release - but her followers, for once, did not
listen.  Neither did they notice that the Bridegroom seemed to be talking
with someone backstage; it was enough that his lips moved, and that their
imaginations could place those strips of flesh upon their own.  A few of
those present developed a jock itch, and the rest spoiled their makeup
with drool streaks.  All were clenching and unclenching their fists to
work off the less intimate part of the accumulating tension.
	"Even NOW, in our moment of triumph over the unbelievers, we are not
free of the evil Ranma Satana.  She has found an avatar, and has caused
our beloved to believe that he must FLEE our presence, rather than embrace
it. We must..."  A beep froze Sakuin's hands.  Her face melted into
blandness from her impassioned declamation while she pulled a comm-card
from her bosom.  Sakuin glanced at it, then frowned and put the card away.
"The Chief Executor," she explained.  Her other occupation.  "Miranda,
you're in charge."  A bow to Ranma.  "Our apologies, Deliverer, but my
worldly duties call."
	Not a single green chest heaved for breath until the door had closed
behind her.  Then the shield was gone.  Sakuin inspired respect and fear;
it would have been unthinkable to, say, mob the stage and leap upon the
Collective Bridegroom in a desperate attempt to be among the first to
grope him while SHE was present, but now... now was a different matter,
entirely.
	Miranda fiddled with a nearby control panel.  "Computer, locate
Gosunkugi Sakuin."
	"GOSUNKUGI SAKUIN HAS LEFT THE BUILDING."
	Ranma had an eighth of a moment's warning while the acolytes flashed
the rules of the upcoming game to each other with their eyes.  
	Then the mountain of flesh sealed itself over him.  He was calamine
for their full-body seven-year itch, and the hundreds of girls and ladies
present thought nothing of tunneling through piles of fellow worshippers
to rub as much of his demidivinity against themselves as possible.  Any
escape attempt was futile.  The instant Ranma raised a portion of himself
above the surface of the sea of green, some bag of unused oestrogen would
spot it, squeal, and toss herself upon his newly-exposed gift of arm, leg,
chest or rear.  It took him minutes to learn to do the sensible thing and
enjoy the rides while ignoring the bruises.  Then again, his stoic
acceptance of the situation might also have been shock, a theory lent
credence to by his cold-sweat-bathed expressionless face and splayed
fingers.  Whatever the reason, his obeisance paid off; he was allowed to
keep his head above flesh level and have it kissed by only one girl at a
time: a round-robin had been informally established for fairer
distribution of his limited lip-space.
	It was all working quite nicely, with no party receiving either too
much pleasure or too much pain, until the main doors swung open.
	"What are you doing with Kim's body?!?!?"
	The chamber was already suffused with a quasitropical steam from the
acolytes' rubbing and writhing.  Fueled by righteous indignation, Rat's
anger-based hyperfever raised the ambient temperature to a few degrees
above the comfort level.  The Kodachettes paused their wriggling for a
moment, decided they were more interested in reaching for Ranma than
puzzling out the intruder, and returned to the business they'd been
trained for.
	"I said, WHAT ARE YOU DOING WITH KIM'S BODY?!?!?"
	If Reiraku expected a reply, the ensuing noises were rather
disappointing.  Alana gasped.  Cassandra moaned.  Miranda cackled, and
Ranma was reduced to nervous grunting.
	Off in the spirit plane, invisible to the Kodachettes' eyes, Kim had
exhausted her supply of Japanese expletives and had turned to her American
lexicon of abuse for reinforcements.  Until Rat's arrival, her words
hadn't done much.  Now her verbal fire was seemingly transferred from her
mouth to his skin: Reiraku was glowing.  Oddly enough, he didn't seem to
notice it.
	"RAAAAAAAAAAAANMA!  TAKING ADVANTAGE OF A *BORROWED* BODY TO SATISFY
YOUR FOUL NEEDS!  HOW *DARE* YOU?!?"  The room was suddenly filled with an
almost blinding flickering light, a candleflame grotesquely magnified.
This grabbed the Kodachettes' attentions, for they preferred the dark, and
so they turned to find the source of the disturbance to their play.  It
was Rat, who was running towards them coated in lapping tongues of white
energy.
	"Don't worry, Kim!  I'll protect yo-"
	*KRAKABOOM*
	The biological capacitor that Reiraku had become released all of its
energy in a massive blast that sent him flying into the centre of the
mound of women.  Cushioning layers of breast and thigh protected him from
the falling shrapnel, but that proved to be a small blessing.  Once the
smoke cleared, he saw that half the room had been reduced to rubble.  The
C-Kos he had landed on glared at him, and of the rest those that weren't
tending to their wounds were charging at him, weapons raised.
	"Aheheheheh..."

								* * * * *
                 
	I'd had to stay hidden until the last of the girls had run by, but by
then the sound of their feet had given me a rather precise fix on the
auditorium.  It's no wonder I hadn't found it; it'd been shifted to one of
the newer wings.
	The explosion finished pinpointing the room for us.
	
	"Ranma..." said the ghost, hovering beside me as I ran. "You said he
was alive..."
	"Half-alive."
	"Do you think that blast could have-"
	
	I turned a corner and noticed green blurred motion peeking through a
crack in the door at the hall's end.

	"We're about to find out."

								* * * * *

    My other watch, the one set to Citadel time, told me that there were
only twenty seconds left until the agreed hour.  She wouldn't be late.
Not for this. 
    As I'd predicted, the instant the seconds counter displayed '00' she
appeared in a flash of crimson flame, startling the animals around us into
a symphony of 'baaaa's.
    My 'sister' tsk'd.
    "Why the sheep, Skeride?  I can understand it from a Hikaru, but I
expected more from myself."
    Seeing Sicarii is always odd.  It makes me think I'm looking into a
fairground mirror, or that it's already Halloween and I'm touching up my
makeup in the bathroom.
    I never DID understand why she got those tattoos around her eyes.  The
short black hair looks nice on her, I'll give her that.  I'd try it
myself, if I weren't scared of the time it'd take to grow it back to the
length I have it at now - but those black diamonds...
    "The sheep aren't mine.  They're mowing the grass."  She'd probably
strangle me if she knew I had my own 'Fleecy' back at the Citadel corral.
It was a present from #426 a few birthdays back.  "The Deep Forest
Preserve is the only place for K's without security cams everywhere.  I
had to bring you into a meadow section, because I didn't want your
teleport flame setting something on fire."
    "I still don't see why we don't just meet at the Cafe."
    Yes, she even pronounced the capital.
    "I don't feel comfortable there.  You know that."
    "You didn't seem to mind the loungeful of Reirakus last time we
visited.  Which brings us to the main item of business.  Did it work?"
    I admitted that my night HAD been more pleasant than usual.  Sicarii
smiled.
    "I knew that would do it.  The problem with you, Ske-chan darling, is
that you're too MEEK.  If you see something you want, TAKE it!  If you
don't, someone else will, and in cases like this that can be tragic.
Now..."  She stepped back and put her hands on her hips.  "Teach it to
me."
    "Not yet."
    "What do you mean, 'not yet'?" She was sputtering.  "Our deal was-"
    "-that I would teach you the Soul Trap Bubble the day I held Rat
safely in my arms."
    "From the look of your hair and the state of your bodysuit, I'd guess
that tonight qualifies."
    I remember crossing my fingers and hoping that my loophole was large
enough.  I needed... I NEED her help.
    "He's bewitched.  The American girl's cast a shapeshifting spell on
him, and I can't break it.  I've set protective wards, but I still
wouldn't call that safe."
    My other did a lot of grunting, but agreed.
    "You never told me the girl knew magic."
    "I didn't know."
    "What's her name?"
    "Thompson.  Kim Thompson."  
    Sicarii thought for a moment, then frowned and shook her head.  "She
has no equivalent in my reality.  What must I do?"
    Even before I started listing my conditions, she'd taken her iron
dagger from its holster and begun tracing the needed blood lines on her
right palm.
    "Find out more about Thompson," I said,, "and keep tabs on Rat.  Make
sure no harm comes to him, natural or otherwise.  Once he's free from
enchantment and physical harm and we're together, once he's... he's..." I
faltered.  I couldn't think of any gaps I'd left open, but it still didn't
seem airtight.
    "I know you want to be thorough in your contract, sister dear, but
'safely in your arms' covers everything you've said, and more."  She must
have seen the colour creep up my cheeks, because she added, "Well...
You're right.  Not your arms.  How about THIS for our renewed agreement?
You will teach me the soul trap bubble the day Reiraku is firmly and
safely established as your paramour."
    That sounded right.
    I took my own dagger from its place at my hip and drew the contractual
sigils on my hand.  I keep my blade sharp, so it didn't hurt.  Much.
    We were about to seal the contract, when I thought of something.
    "'Safe' refers to both the relationship AND the person?"
    "Of course.  Now, shake."  My hand went forward and then back again.
"What is it THIS time?"
    "NO killing." That'd be the easiest way for her to keep her side of
the deal, after all.  "Kim's my rival, but... well... we're also sorta
friends."
    "You take all the fun out of things."
    This time I took her hand in mine, and we bound ourselves to the
agreement.  At this point I always expect fire and brimstone, but I had to
settle for a weak green flash that signified the consummation of the deal.
    "Always a pleasure doing business with myself."  Sicarii wiped her
hand on her bodysuit.  "When then, shall we meet again? In thunder,
lightning or in rain?"
    My 'sister' has lately acquired an annoying habit of quoting from
Shakespeare at the most inopportune moments.
    I named a date and time.  She agreed with a nod and began walking
towards the treeline.
    "Where are you going?" I called to her.  "If you 'port in the jungle
region, you'll set fire to the place!"
    "Oh, I'm not going back just YET.  I have to do a little sightseeing."
    I didn't like that one bit, but how could I stop her?
    "Just..."  My frustration expressed itself as a faint purple glow
around my body.  It isn't that unpleasant, really.  Cheaper than sun
glasses and twice as effective.  Automatically tinted, too.  "Just don't
go on any hunts while you're here, Sicarii.  This is MY city, in MY
reality, and *I'M* the Killer of the Dead here.  Not you."
    "But of course."
    She smiled and walked away.  I'm still here, looking alternately at my
blood-stained hand and the spot where she disappeared into the foliage.
    I bend down and stroke one of the sheep; the feel of its wool
against my hand soothes me as I meditate.
    I am Sicarii, and she is me.
    So why don't I trust her?
    
                                * * * * *

	Rat's future was one of bondage and pots.  He woke from a knockout
blow only to find himself wrapped in a ribbon cocoon and hanging
upside-down from a structurally unsound rafter above what looked
suspiciously like a tubful of boiling mud.  It looked like mud; the colour
was right, and it bubbled and slurped thickly... but it smelled too good
to be dirt.  Almost like scented soap.  He felt like reaching out and
dipping his finger in it, but even if his arms weren't bound tightly to
his sides, the handcuffs would have made that impossible.  Besides, the
rafter was bending at a noticeable, steady pace, and it would be
altogether too soon that he would find himself in intimate contact with
the effervescent glop.
	It dawned on him that this would not be pleasant.
	"HEEEEEEEEEEELP!" he shouted.  "HEEEEEEEEEEELP!"  Screaming forced him
to raise his head and glimpse the activity surrounding him.  Kim was in
the back and looked concerned, but was impotent in her ghostly form.
Ranma was arguing with the leader of the group, but nothing seemed to come
from it.  And around him, several hundred leotarded girls were dancing in
a rather titillating fashion.
	A blood drop fell from his nose and fizzled into black solidity upon
the surface of the mud.
	"HEEEEEEEEEEELP!  HEEEEEEEEEEELP!  HEEEE- Huh?"
	Reiraku wriggled to face the cause of a loud crash, bringing himself
an inch nearer to the killer complexion booster.
	The main door, weakened from the earlier explosion, had been knocked
off its hinges.  Childra didn't wait for the dust clouds to clear to walk
into the main chamber.
	"Childra! Childra! Here! HEEEEEEEEEELP! HEEEEEEEEEELP!"
	Her entrance had startled most of the Kodachettes into defensive
crouches, but they now rushed at her, fleet-footed and snarling.  That
proved to be a mistake.
	"I'm flattered that you still remember me."  Jansen raised a finger
and her assailants went flying.  An invisible juggernaut fled from her
hand and knocked everything from its path on its course through the
chamber.  Girls and women turned into human tenpins, pairs of skulls
became impromptu castanets and Ranma's jaw dropped with an audible click
while he watched the spectacle.
	Kim's ghost, though silent, had its chin below its neckline.
	"You didn't tell me your friend was telly... telluh... that she could
move stuff with her mind," whispered Ranma.
	Miranda was the last to fall.  The unseen force slammed her against
the tub of boiling mud, knocking it over and severing its feeder tube.
	"She... can't," answered Kim.
	Injured women tried to roll out of the way of the sizzling mudslide
and screamed when their efforts landed them in the growing puddle of
scalding water being fed by the disconnected intake pipe.
	"Then... what did all of THAT?"
	Childra summoned her machete and used it to slice the ribbon holding
Rat to the roof.  He landed with a glop-muffled thud.
	"Ranma?  I think you'd better change back.  NOW."
	Ranma didn't react.  He continued looking at the bodies, the ruined
room and the new arrival.
	"DO IT!"
	"What? You wanna make sure Bat-boy's all right, or somethin'?"
	"Ranma, will you LISTEN to me? Change, NOW!"
	"Okay! I-"
	"GO!"
	He went.  He leapt off the stage and stepped over a few unconscious
acolytes on his way to the warm puddle.  Lying down in it didn't hurt, but
the soul transfer did.
	"AIEEEEEEEEEEEE! Hot! Hot! Hot! Hot! Hot!"  Kim screamed enough for
the both of them.  Besides, he was tongue-tied by what his spirit eyes
beheld.
	He saw a girl.
	A familiar girl, with dark close-cropped hair, who wore a dress in
pastel shades of yellow and blue. She held a wooden mallet in her right
hand, and her eyes watered as she looked up at him.
	"Ranma?" asked Akane.
	
--------------------------------------------------------------------------

                         "Now that I've seen her
                          There's no way to hide
                          She is not some fling
                              From long ago
                          Now that I've seen her
                           I know why she lied
              And I think it was better when I didn't know."

                   -Richard Maltby, Jr. & Alab Boublil

	
==========================================================================
                                 EPILOGUE
==========================================================================

    "She thinks herself the game warden of this reality's Undead."  I take
a large gulp of Oolong to clear the bile from my throat.  "SHE forbade ME
to hunt on her ground.  ME! I, who have scoured more alternities than
she'll ever see! But I might as well please my sister..."  By the way my
tablemate arches her eyebrow, I can tell she has the wrong idea - her mind
is a non-stop gutter party.  I play along and follow with an ambiguous
statement.  "I can bear a small submission for a greater gain.  It's not
souls that draw me here."
    "Don't rub it in." Oh, that's right... Poor Licky doesn't HAVE one. 
Is she mad at me, or just plain mad? I love it when I have to make up.
    "Oh?" She doesn't see my hand move under the tabletop.  "But you
like it so much when I DO..."  I slip my fingers through the slit in the
side of her dress and scratch her leg as hard as I can with my shorn
nails.  I hoped for a reaction, and am disappointed. "My 'sister' is in
love."
    Our pupils meet. Parleys between us are always multi-tiered; our
tongues say one thing, our eyes another, and both are perfectly
understood.  Until it all degenerates into a tumble in which oculi and
linguae play the same role as the remainder of our bodies.
    "Who with?"  I'm careful in reaching for my blade, but not careful
enough.  Autolyca notices the dip in my right shoulder and grabs my
hands, holding both wrists in one firm grip and raising them above my
head.  My cufflinks are touching.  I could teleport back to the Citadel,
but she knows I won't.  It's shearing week.
    "Project R," I hiss.  My attempts to wriggle out of her grip meet with
all the success of a wasp struggling against a Venus fly-trap.  I missed
her knees with my below-table kicks, and now my feet are pinned to the
floor by her own.  "She's fallen for your brother."
    "Brothers and sisters I have none, and yet this man is my father's
son..."  Another one of her quotations.  This one I don't recognise.
    "Shakespeare?" I can hear the clack of her tongue-stud against her
teeth as she moves in for her reward.  My body tells me with a thrill that
letting her take it would not be in the least unpleasant, but that would
involve giving in, and it just won't do.  I'm always on top.
    "Mother Goose.  Reiraku is no brother of mine."
    "That's a relief," I mutter, stalling for time.
    She pauses.  It worked.
    "Hrm?"
    "If he WERE, this would be... perverse."
    "When you put it that way, I'm tempted to hack into the genealogical
files and make him my official sibling."  She's right.  I'll have to thank
sis later for making our contests more exciting.  Her tongue is almost at
my neck now, and her moist breath warms part of my skin and leaves the
area around it feeling colder than before.  More shivers.  I slip into a
submissive posture, relaxing every muscle, closing my eyes, slowing my
breathing and tilting my head back to expose my neck.  Funnily enough,
that's also the perfect state for focusing one's ki.
    The bait works beautifully.  The slight time Licky spends smiling at
her triumph is all that I need to cast the spell.  The suctioning 'O' of
her lips never gets to my skin; I intercept it with a burst of ruby fire
that surrounds me as thoroughly and snugly as the bodysuit I wear.
Autolyca should have known better.  On several of our trysts I've used the
flaming aura AS my outfit.  She'll need to buy lip balm tomorrow.
    The unexpected pain loosens her grip, and I take the opportunity to
disengage myself and flip the table onto her.  Tea cups and a pot shatter
behind me.  Only Autolyca's upper chest and head protrude from beneath the
table, on which I kneel to ensure her immobility.
    "I need you, Licky."  I brush the tangled mane of hair from her neck
and put my dagger at her throat.
    "For what?" Her mad green eyes move everywhere, analysing the
situation.
    "She'll teach me her technique if I deliver the Rat to her as a love
slave."  My knife traces faint lines on her face.  Not so deep as to scar,
but enough to bring a few drops of blood to the surface.  She likes blood.
So do I.  "I WANT that ki attack, luv."
    "Then you must have it - and it MAY prove interesting.  Mind control-"
    "Is allowed.  I made sure of that."  The edge of the table stops me
from bringing my blade any further down.  I content myself with carving
arcane symbols onto the fingernails on the hand which Licky's managed to
slide free, but all too soon the manicure is done.
    We are at an impasse.
    "Neither of us can go further," she agrees.
    "Then yield."
    "I will not."  A troublesome grin.  "Not to someone as forgetful as
yourself."  I yawn deliberately and theatrically, then coat a finger with
her blood.
    "What have I forgotten?" I ask, raising it to my lips.
    Too late, I see her long nails make contact with the wooden table.
    "The Breaking Point Victory."
    A shower of splinters.
    A release.
    And then our bloody, laugh-filled revels truly begin.

==========================================================================
                              END GIRL TROUBLE
==========================================================================

I can't think of much to say, so this time the author's notes wil be
short and sweet.

First off:  Alan Harnum is to blame for the Holy Loving Taser Troupe.
Many thanks to him and the others who patiently provided input on the 
scenes as I sent them out, particularly Skywise, Cassandra (yep; the 
Kodachette's named after her - then again, 'Alana' is named after Alan
Harnum), Lara Bartram and the rest of the R2096 pre-read team.  The
Witches' Coven is a group of young ladies who've offered entertaining
commentary on the series in the past, and one of the lines in the Prologue
is borrowed from them.

Gratuitous references? Heck, yes.  See if you can spot the allusions to
'The Seventh Guest' and 'Fairy Princess Ren'.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------
                    CHARACTERS INTRODUCED THIS EPISODE
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
            (I'm being deliberately opaque to avoid spoilers.)

AKANE - What happened to Akane after Ranma's death is told in the
side-story 'Zannen'.  Suffice to say, she's now one of the most
emotionally stable ghosts in Nerima's Prefectoral Graveyard.  She and
Childra (who has ghost-sight) have been good friends (best friends?) for
years.

Sub-page:  http://qlink.queensu.ca/~4cw6/akane.htm

MINNAKO - This ghost has been saved from a second death at least twice by
'The Wanderer', champion of the undead.  As Hiro (a background ghost)
pointed out in the episode, this led her to think she'd ALWAYS be rescued.
Not so this time.  Her first appearance is in the side story 'The
Wanderer'.  (She was originally meant to be a one-shot 'everyghost'
character, hence the odd spelling of her name: "Everygirl" (roughly)).

GOSUNKUGI SAKUIN - Chief Executress for Onocorp and the Kunou Foundation
(the two organizations are nearly one and the same, though the public
don't know it).  Disappointed - to put it mildly - in earlier romances,
she was drawn to the Church of Kodachi's promise of a celestial perfect
bridegroom who would satisfy her every need.  Her government contacts made
her a valuable asset to C-Ko, and she rose quickly through the ranks.  She
now co-heads the Church when her duties allow her time.

Sub-page: http://qlink.queensu.ca/~4cw6/sakuin.htm

GOSUNKUGI SKERIDE - (a.k.a. 'Nutkin', 'Squirrel Girl', since her name
comes from the Latin for 'Squirrel').  Sakuin's niece, and Rat's cousin.
She studies Physics and archaeological anthropology at the University of
Tokyo, and is hoping to do graduate work in Exploratory History.  Skeride
is part of the 'Gosunkugi Collective', an association made up of many,
many versions of Hikaru Gosunkugi (and a few relatives) from across the
multiverse.  (See RpM's side-story 'Gosunkugi: Generations' for details).
The Collective has its home base in another reality, to which she more or
less frequently travels.  Nutkin's had a rather severe private grudge
against all ghosts ever since the murder of her double by spirits.  (This
double was a sweeter-tempered version of herself from another reality, and
fellow member of the Collective - see the side-story 'Skeridextremes' for
details.)  She now hunts ghosts nightly, eliminating them with either a
mystical Tibetan dagger or a specialised ki attack.  Skeride's ghost sight
is perfect: while Childra sees ghosts as transparent, Nutkin can't tell
the living from the dead without touching them.  This has led to a few odd
situations... For instance, Skeride has befriended Akane, not knowing that
she's not alive.  She has a crush on her cousin Reiraku.

Sub-page: http://qlink.queensu.ca/~4cw6/skeride.htm

GOSUNKUGI SICARII - Another alternate Skeride from a different reality,
and a member of the Collective; this one's hatred of ghosts verges on
psychosis.  Her name was originally 'Skeride' as well; the Collective kept
track of them by numbers (Sicarii was Skeride III).  She changed her own
name to a variant on the Latin word 'Sicarium', or 'Assassin' during the
story 'Skeridextremes'.  She began frequenting the R2096 reality to visit
her sister, but now spends her time mostly with Autolyca (see below).

Sub-page: http://qlink.queensu.ca/~4cw6/sicarii.htm

AUTOLYCA - Sicarii's lover, and an employee of the Kunou Foundation.

Sub-page: http://qlink.queensu.ca/~4cw6/autolyca.htm

--------------------------------------------------------------------------


__________________________________________________________________________
Christopher Willmore  http://www.geocities.com/Paris/Bistro/2653/index.htm    
"I shall manage.  I shall be happy.  I shall be beating Jocelyn." 
       - Iris Murdoch     | R2096: http://qlink.queensu.ca/~4cw6/2096a.htm