Greetings,
This is the first chapter of a collaboration between Chris Willmore and
myself. We've been at work pretty hard on it, and would be interested in
any commentary you might have.
-AH and CW
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Prologue - Musk Empire, 647 C.E.
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Nature had prescribed gray uniformity for the day, and in all her
kingdom only the Musk had dared to disobey. Gray sky fused into a
horizon that was only tinged with blue; the mountains shed their usual
ruddy tone for that of quick-cooked flesh and the transparent pools
reflected the dolour faithfully on surfaces undisturbed by wind. Only
at one of the springs were there waves and ripples, and these, too,
were soon stilled. Several golden figures stood around it with bowed
heads. Beside them, one decked in white cloth and green dragon scales
stood fully upright.
Twice four monks had prostrated themselves a prudent distance
from the edge of the water and formed the petals of a blossom with
their robes. A heavy bronze column was the pistil, immersed in the
centre of the pool and carved with twin lotus flowers and arcane
knots. At the ninth place stood their Emperor, and at his side the
mechanism of the unnatural bloom's pollination - a tiny monkey, beady
eyes heavy-lidded in half-sleep.
The chants ended. For half a heartbeat all was silent except for
a slight lapping of water against the column. Then came a rustle of
cloth against scale armour. The Emperor had raised his right arm and
closed his eyes.
The column began to move. There was no rumble, no disturbance of
the pool, just a clean upwards movement of the pillar followed by a
perfectly geometric sideways displacement of the column from the
pool's centre to the soil just beyond the water's edge. It landed
with a muted thump and spilled not a drop beyond its own
circumference.
"Drugs," commanded the Emperor. One of the monks nodded, then
rose and fed a bundle of prepared herbal mash to the already-sedated
monkey before returning to his place in the blossom. The monkey
yawned a simian yawn, and her eyes closed completely.
"Begin."
Now it was the monks' turn to concentrate. They visualised
themselves collectively as a fierce spirit, crowned with skulls and
wearing human heads as ornaments about its neck; they were the
three-eyed, three-faced, many-armed conqueror of Death, yet of but one
mind. Once the monks had disappeared, once there was no doubt in its
mind that there were no individuals but only a mystic lotus, Fierce
Protector and the Mentor at the pool, then it did its teacher's
bidding.
"Take the sacrifice."
The limp, unconscious animal was clenched in an invisible grip
and raised high above the centre of the pool. Below, another had
risen to meet it. The pillar's ascenscion had freed a pale, naked
woman's body from beneath its weight to rise to the surface of the
waters. Neither moved, and only one of them breathed.
"Lower it. Carefully."
The monkey descended gently through the skin of the waters,
losing its form once it passed the barrier. An instant change, and
two identical human bodies now floated side by side, one of its own
accord and one by the action of a guardian spirit. One of the
submerged women still breathed.
But not for long.
With a mystic binding gesture, the Emperor of the Musk plucked a
three-edged dagger from his side and flung it at the monkey-made-
woman. The blade cut through the water as though it were not there -
it struck just below the breasts and kept its place, sending tendrils
of blood swirling through the pool.
He watched carefully. The curse-born human shell dissolved,
shrinking back into its original form, and making the half-hairy
semi-monkey scream beneath the water. Bubbles rose and burst in
silence.
"NOW!"
The chanting began anew, but fast this time, hurried, not as
before. The hastily-empowered Fierce Guardian scooped the monkey
from the spring and tossed it far onto dry land.
Again the Emperor watched, sensing the slow dyings of the animal
as it writhed and bled. He waited until the precise moment of the
creature's last heartbeat, then nodded. The monks responded to his
command and withdrew from the collective entity they'd summoned,
leaving its empty shell to serve as a source of power to another. A
spell of binding was performed to keep the mindless essence of the
Fierce Protector whole, and a second one to project it into the blood,
into the pool, and into the no-longer-corpse.
The monks bowed their heads to the ground and spread themselves
flat against the soft gray dirt. The mystic lotus bloomed; their
yellow robes wounded the surrounding gray and from the pool walked out
the human fruit, twice-born, unclad.
Water streamed down her glistening hair, and over her full
breasts, pooling in the clefts of her rounded thighs before spilling
down her long legs. A few droplets were caught in the long lashes
framing her beautiful eyes, and she blinked to shake them out.
The Emperor appraised his resurrected consort with more senses
than the mortal five, then nodded his approval.
She licked her blood-soaked hand and smiled.
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W A T E R F A L L S
by
Alan Harnum
and
Chris Willmore
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Based on characters and situations created by Rumiko Takahashi
and used without permission.
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Chapter 1 : Unfolding
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'...the lotus grows up from the darkness of the mud to the surface of
the water, opening its blossom only after it has raised itself beyond
the surface, and remaining unsullied from both earth and water.'
-Lama Anagarika Govinda, 'Tibetan Mysticism'
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The old woman bowed her head and flashed a toothless smile.
"So sorry, dear."
"S'okay," Ranma muttered as she wrung her shirt out over the
pavement. "Happens all the time."
A stray sparrow caught the eye of the hag, making her forget all
about the victim of her walk-by splashing. She hummed something that
might have been music while walking after the bird, exuding an aura of
placidity only rivaled by a Zen monk tripping on the far side of bodhi
and loco weed.
Ranma muttered something deeply uncomplimentary (and deeply
accurate) about the elderly population as a whole, speculated on the
body-shrinking powers of prune juice and hurried around the corner
that Akane had already disappeared around. The wedding debacle had
made for a few days of tense -- well, tenser -- relations, and the two
of them had only now managed to settle down into an uneasy truce.
Uneasy meaning enough property damage to drive three more local
insurance companies bankrupt. The usual, as it were.
Akane was striding in the shadow of the canal fence as Ranma
caught up with her, bookbag swinging back and forth in one hand.
Ranma fumbled with the straps of her own bookbag as they walked in
silence, adjusting it so it wouldn't slip off her now much-narrower
shoulders.
"I think you'd learn after a while to be more careful around this
area," Akane said in a mildly huffy voice. "I mean, she gets you
almost every morning."
Here it comes, Ranma thought dully. "Ya think I don't try to
watch out for her? She's just-"
"Too fast for you?"
"Hey! It's not like that! I mean..." Ranma grunted in
frustration. "Why does every senior citizen in the country have it out
for me? All my biggest problems seem to be drawin' pensions these
days."
"Well, a lot of people our age don't like you either," Akane
said. "Ryouga, Mousse, Tarou..."
Ranma thrust her hands into her pockets and glared ahead at a
perfectly innocent lamp post. "Oh, that makes me feel a LOT better."
"I'm not _trying_ to make you feel better," Akane countered. "If
you want to sulk because of a little water, be my guest."
They continued in silence, Ranma stewing on the high road and
Akane walking primly along the low, until they reached the tall metal
gates of Furinkan high. Once inside, Akane left to join a group of
her friends and Ranma sauntered over to where Hiroshi and Daisuke
were leaning against a wall. "Mornin', fellas."
"Morning, Ranma," Daisuke greeted, raising a hand. "Got splashed
today, I see."
"Observant, aren't we?" Ranma muttered sarcastically. "And you
can both stop staring. It ain't like both of ya never seen breasts
before or somethin'."
"Well, not a pair like--" Hiroshi shut his mouth as Ranma gave
him a look promising painful death, or at least something involving
caltrops used in ways not approved of by the manufacturer.
Daisuke touched a finger to his chin and looked contemplative.
"How many days a week do you come to school as a girl, on average?"
Ranma snorted. "You think I keep a list, or what?"
"Well, make a guess," Hiroshi said.
"Why?" Ranma asked icily.
"Because we're bored and have a few minutes till the bell,"
Daisuke explained. "We're just wondering."
Sometimes Ranma wondered if the two of them had some sort of
mental link. "I dunno. I probably get nailed by that old bag with
the ladle at least once a week, and it seems to rain at least one
other time." She shrugged. "Maybe two, three times a week."
"Yeah, but is that school days?" Hiroshi asked. "We're not
concerned with the weekend here."
"School days are probably about that." Ranma nodded. "Two,
three times."
"So about half the time," Daisuke concluded.
Ranma nodded again. "Is there a point to this?"
"Knowledge is power." Hiroshi grinned.
Daisuke picked up his schoolbag from the ground and opened it,
sorting through it in search of something as he talked. "Hey, Ranma,
do you feel different when you're a girl? Do you get, I dunno,
different urges?"
"Urges?" Ranma blinked. "Hey! What the hell are you askin'
somethin' like that for?"
"Just wondering." Daisuke closed his bag, apparently not having
found what he wanted within. "Anyway, it's about time for class
anyway. Better start heading inside."
"Hey Ranma, one thing before we get inside."
Ranma looked over to Hiroshi. "What?"
"You know how your shirt's all wet?"
Turning her head to Daisuke, Ranma nodded. "Yeah."
"Your nipples are showing," Hiroshi said.
The bell rang in time with Ranma's anguished yell. Hiroshi's
anguished yell followed almost immediately.
* * * * *
His stomach was being torn apart, and in all honesty, he wasn't
sure if he could make it to the bathroom in time again. A flu bug,
perhaps, or something he'd eaten - though dear Akane hadn't cooked
anything in some time, and sweet Kasumi's food was always perfection
itself.
Or... Terrifying as the thought might be, was his age finally
catching up to him? Health and strength would be the last thing to
go, he knew that. His body was already shrunken and withered, but he
was as powerful now as he was in his youth: experience and skill
compensated him for the minor losses of power and speed over the last
few decades. Few in the world could stand against him, and he took
pride in that. Not as much pride as in his delicious collection of
lacy unmentionables, but pride all the same. Even as he lay in agony
on his futon, he was running his tiny hands up and down one recent
acquisition: a lace-trimmed, sable-black pair of crotchless panties
that he'd swiped from the laundry line of a house occupied by two
unmarried sisters in their mid-thirties. Underwear, he had
discovered, could reveal surprising things about people.
His stomach gurgled, and he moaned as he forced himself to rise
to his feet. None of them had been in to visit him at all, to bring
him some nice soup, or offer to steal him a few new pretties for his
collection. Ungrateful worms all of them; he'd given them the
Anything-Goes School, refined until it was probably the most versatile
and deadly fighting art on earth, and what had they given him?
Nothing but pain and rejection. It brought a tear to his eye, and he
blew his nose on the crotchless panties and flung them away into one
of the piles that littered the room.
The old Master pushed open the door, half-closing his eyes
against the painful brightness of the hallway lights. With a grunt
and a liberating belch, Happosai staggered out of his dark, cramped
room to make the long trip to the cool, porcelain sanctitude of the
toilet.
* * * * *
Tarou leapt over another fallen log, not allowing nature's
incidentals to slow his progress. His pace was the wind's; he glided
over the forest's undergrowth and raced the breeze through the twists
and turns of the wooded maze. And he won.
He'd left behind the smoke and fire of the village he'd razed.
Even the screams of those he'd left homeless or worse were too slow to
catch up to him.
They'd tried to stop him. He'd come bursting down their only
avenue, and the silly fools had tossed insults at him for a few
knocked-down stalls or the demolition of an ancient wall or shrine.
Their curses were as those of wizened tortoises pawing filth at a
dragon with their clumsy paws. Unworthy as they were, he'd made time
for them and showed them the price of their disrespect. But there was
no daylight allotted to see if they had learned the lesson, once
finished.
He had to continue.
He had to run and reach... what?
His goal was unknown to him. He tried to think, tried to
remember, but the mayflies in his head buzzed protectively around the
carrion of his thoughts. For days now, that's what his higher mental
processes had been - an unapproachable pulpy corpse of decomposing
matter guarded over by a humming cloud of dark spots. Sometimes, he
was almost able to see them... little dark spots dancing before his
eyes, humming and circling his head...
Tarou didn't look forward to the maggots.
The illusory insects had been with him ever since he'd rammed his
head against a mountainside's stone carving in an effort to destroy
it. Were they a divine curse, then? A plague of madness thrown upon
him by a minor deity upset by the desecration of her image? The
buzzing kept him in a constant low-level fury, made cogitation
impossible and transferred command of his body to his legs, his feet,
and the adrenaline bath in which his tissues were now soaked.
Perhaps that WAS their purpose. Perhaps his lower limbs were
endowed with some retributory purpose to appease the goddess, one
which was to his mind unk...
The buzzing again. No time to think. Just run, leap, avoid
obstacles.
Keep moving.
And he did.
All this, for what? He'd shattered a statue with his head. He'd
had to. He couldn't help himself. How could he, when placed
face-to-face before that six-armed, fiery...
Under the branch. Over the rock. East, now, then north when you
reach the clearing.
Move.
The mayflies buzzed, and goaded him on.
* * * * *
"Ukyou wasn't in class again today."
Ranma looked down on Akane from his balancing atop the canal
fence. Classes had ended for the day, but he was still running
a few calculations in his head. "Yeah, I know."
"Don't you wonder where she is?"
Ranma considered this.
"Kinda," he admitted. If nothing else, he wanted to know where
her okonomiyaki were.
"Did you call the restaurant?"
"Nope."
Akane stopped walking and let out an exasperated sigh.
Ranma hopped off the fence and walked in front of her. "What? What'd
I do THIS time?"
"Your best friend hasn't been in school for nearly a whole week,
and you didn't even try to find out where she was?"
Ranma blinked. Best friend? "What'cha mean, best friend?
Ucchan?"
"Well, who else do you have to count as a friend?" Akane asked.
"Ryouga? Hiroshi and Daisuke? I mean, you've known Ukyou since you
were both little kids, and..." For some reason, Akane seemed to be
searching for something that wasn't there. "Well, I don't know.
Never mind."
"Best friend." Ranma scratched his head. "I dunno. I guess I
kinda drop by her place for some free grub once in a while, and she
kinda hangs around me, but I always kinda thought that was because of
the whole fiancee thing. She's a friend. I dunno if I'd call her my
breast one." Akane glared at him. "BEST one. BEST friend!"
"Don't bother, Ranma. I KNOW where your mind is."
Her fiance grinned.
"Sure explains why I don't think about YOU too often, then, huh?"
Akane hit him on the head with her bookbag and started walking
again. "Well, who would you call your best friend, then?"
"Do I have to have one, or something?" Ranma asked. "I mean, is
it some kinda requirement? Everybody's gotta have a best friend to be
a member of the human race?"
"I don't know," Akane snapped. "Who cares? The point is, you
should have checked up on her, like we did last time. Maybe she's
sick again."
"Ain't you just a little mad about what happened at the wedding?"
The word 'wedding' invoked a silence comparable to that caused by
the mention of privatisation at a meeting of the Chinese economic
council. Ranma prayed that he hadn't actually said the word, but the
sudden, absolutely horizontal position of Akane's mouth made it clear
that he had.
"Well," Akane said after a few seconds in which the sound of a
hair dropping onto a feather mattress would have been audible, "it's
not like that sort of thing hasn't happened before to us, is it?"
"Well, yeah, but we never tried to get married neither, ya
know--"
"Why don't you just SHUT UP!"
To his surprise, Ranma did, as though the words he'd been meaning
to say were suddenly choked off in his throat. "Okay, okay, whatever.
Sorry."
Akane sighed. "It's okay. It's not ENTIRELY your fault. Let's
go visit Ukyou."
They cut through the market district on their way to the
restaurant. When they ducked into an alley, Ranma found himself
looking nervously overhead. He was filled with a dreadful certainty
that SOMEONE was going to throw their dishwater or worse out atop him
from a high window. Hiroshi and Daisuke had him spooked, blast it.
When they arrived at the Ucchan, the blinds were drawn, the door
was closed, and the restaurant sign was nowhere in sight. Akane
knocked, and the door was answered by a dejected Konatsu, looking
mournfully pretty in a black and silver kimono.
"Ranma-sama, Akane-sama," he said, dabbing at his eyes with a
lacy handkerchief. "I was waiting for you to come by." He sniffled,
then blew his nose. "I just did not think it would take you so very
long. Oh, woe and perdition."
Beyond Konatsu's shoulder, Ranma was able to see that the
interior of the restaurant was dimly lit, but spotlessly, almost
obsessively clean. Only a large urn at the end of the room still had
a light shining on it. Funny. He didn't remember seeing THAT before.
"What's wrong with Ucchan?"
Konatsu sniffled again, then tucked the handkerchief back into
the belt of his kimono. "Please, if you do not mind, come inside so
that we can discuss it."
Moving beyond mildly concerned into deeply, Ranma frowned and
followed Konatsu into the restaurant, Akane trailing in their wake.
The whole placed smell of disinfectant and lye, and the grill was
polished to a mirror sheen. Konatsu pulled out stools at the counter
and silently bade them sit.
"What happened, Konatsun-san?" asked Akane in a soft voice.
Konatsu's eyes were red from weeping, and up close Ranma was able
to see that his kimono was rumpled and hair frazzled.
"Oh, it's just terrible, Akane-sama." Konatsu folded his hands
primly on his lap and stared at them. "After what happened at the
wedding, Ukyou-sama was so depressed. She felt terrible about what
she'd done. Absolutely terrible."
Ranma gulped. What had Ukyou done?... it couldn't be...
"I tried to talk her out of it," Konatsu sniffled. "But she was
so determined... then I woke up one morning and she was... she was..."
The kunoichi noticed something in the increased light, and
gasped. Not pausing to answer his guest's questions, he dashed to the
floor under the table the urn was on.
Ranma squinted. What was he...
Oh.
Oh, no.
There was a bit of fine yellowish powder under the table, and
Konatsu was carefuly, almost obsessively involved in picking up every
grain and delicately placing it inside the illuminated urn.
"Ukyou..." whispered Ranma. Akane reached a similar conclusion
at the same time he did, but was beyond words. She shut her eyes and
let tears fall out through the edges of her closed lids.
Konatsu increased his movements to a frantic pace, but some of
the grains escaped him by falling into the cracks between the floor
panels. Bursting suddenly into tears, he stood and handed Ranma a
folded piece of paper from within his kimono. A lump in his throat,
Ranma unfolded the paper and scanned it, having to narrow his eyes in
the dim light.
Ranchan,
I'm sorry about what happened. I know you probably don't believe
me, and you probably don't really have any reason to. It was
stupid and reckless; the sort of thing Shampoo would have done.
Not me; I've done a lot of thinking these last few days, and I've
started to realize that I don't like the person I'm becoming
because of this whole engagement thing. I don't think you do
either.
So I'm going back home for a while. Maybe a week, maybe longer.
Visit my parents, see if they have any advice. This whole
situation is hurting everyone - me, Akane, maybe even you. Maybe
when I come back I'll know what to do. Maybe you will too.
Hope springs eternal, right?
-Ucchan
Ranma put the note down on the counter. Akane's face was pale as
she stared straight at him. Ranma licked his lips, and said, "She
went. Away. On vacation?"
Konatsu's handkerchief was now a sodden lump being wrung out in
his hands. "Yes..."
"You could have just told us," Akane said flatly. It was clear
that she desperately wanted to flatten the kunoichi, as well.
"I was too distraught," Konatsu replied, with another sniffle.
"And... the urn... so who's..."
Konatsu blinked. "Urn?" He followed Ranma's gaze with his eyes.
"That's where we keep the sand in case of fire! If Ukyou comes back
and finds out that I tipped it over... I *tried* to clean it up, but I
missed some of it, and... and..."
Ranma blinked and looked around the restaurant. "She left you
food, right?"
* * * * *
Up ahead, another structure. Many structures, actually... Walls,
spires, slanting roofs and noise - pounding, sawing, banging and...
buzzing, of course the buzzing. Closer now. Men in yellow robes and
shaved heads. The gate was open in the walls that bounded the
monastery's buildings. There was commotion, a procession. A feast?
The feet of large statues could be seen within; they were being
ferried through the narrow streets. The noises resolved into the
sounds of construction, and associated themselves with sights. More
monks ahead, beyond the monastery's bounds, setting up racks and
shelves, painting signs, and...
Tarou strained his ears. If only the damned buzzing would
stop... then he'd be able to think. Hell, he'd be able to sleep...
he couldn't remember the last time he'd slept.
Those LOOKED like monks, but that didn't seem like chanting.
And... wasn't that a microphone?
o/~ To be in love, must be the sweetest feeling that a girl can
feel o/~
It WAS a microphone. And the sounds coming out of it were
horrendous; they were notes designed to drive the fiercest Naga back
into its hole and send the Death-conqueror running for the hills.
What arcane ritual was this? Tarou had heard that the monks were
often employed in driving away evil spirits, but he'd always believed
the ceremonies would be less noxious to the living. Incense, prayers,
maybe a little animal sacrifice, not... this.
o/~ To live a dream with somebody you care about like no one
else o/~
Instinct advised a half-circle pivot followed by a retreat, but
was denied by the everpresent buzz and the mayflies burrowing down
into his brain, tiny sharp jaws severing synapses and neural pathways
as they went. He walked forward as through through a sea of noxious
sludge; the sound was almost tangible - it hindered his movement and
battered his head with shockwaves of audible corruption. The monks
paid him no attention, even when he was close enough to smell their
butter-tea breath. They were, it seemed, too busy listening to the
singing to even notice him.
He grabbed the throat of the monk making the noise and squeezed.
Hard.
The sounds stopped. The microphone fell from the monk's hand,
and bounced once on the rough soil outside the walls of the compound.
Those who had been busy with the assembly of wooden structures
dropped their tools and formed a circle around Tarou and his victim,
pointing and chattering, as did a monk further away who had been
pushing a wheelbarrow full of... women's shoes?!? Where did monks
find women's shoes?
"What are you *doing*?" growled Tarou. His prey's throat was by
now considerably narrower than normal, and at the rate of exerted
pressure would vanish almost entirely in less than a minute.
"Ka... ka..."
"Yes?"
Kurukulla, maybe? Perhaps they'd been summoning that terrible and
fierce guardian deity. That would explain the unnatural force and
effectiveness of the ritu... Tarou's mental mayflies dissolved his
train of thought, and it was just as well, for the monk finished the
word he'd started.
"Karaoke," he sputtered.
Tarou dropped him.
"Karaoke..." he whispered to himself, shaking his head. "And
women's shoes..."
He looked at the half-painted signs that dotted the area
surrounding him.
All read "Shoe store".
A sweep of his arm sent half the monks flying and gave him an
exit from the circle of curious robed flesh. Tarou walked through it
to one of the signs.
"Shoe store." No doubt about it. The characters were painted
carefully, as if the artist were unfamiliar with them but wanted to
get them ju...
The swarm in Tarou's head buzzed into full activity, destroying
every vestige of his concentration and ringing his crown with a circle
of pain. He banged his head against the nearest placard in an effort
to cast out the flies, but all he achieved was a prompt tackling by
the monks who saw their object of worship desecrated and damaged. The
mayflies were too deep, they were laying their eggs inside his brain,
and the buzzing _wouldn't stop_.
They held him down quite effectively, but failed to pin his right
hand. He had just enough freedom left to unscrew the top of his hip
canteen, and-
Monks fell like oversized cherry blossoms from the sky with the
first exertions of Tarou's cursed form. When they fell, their joined
robes formed a very efficient carpet to protect the monster's tender
hooves from the rough Chinese soil. The crunch of their bones as he
stepped on them was most satisfying, and the moans-
Were not of pain. The monk whose back he was currently treading
on was typical:
"Oh, we are doubly blessed ... AURGGHHH... that two divine
visitors have deigned to put on mortal form, to remain bound to the
karmic wheel and... AIEEEE... help us in our seeking of
enlightenment... URKKK... teach us the incorrectness of... OOOH... our
ways..."
Tarou paused before stepping on another backbone. Then he
stepped off of the groaning tangle of monks and settled down on his
haunches to hold up two massive fingers and make a questioning grunt.
"Yes, gentle bodhisattva," one monk said, tears in his eyes as he
looked at Tarou. "We were visited only a few days earlier by another
of your divine kind. It is almost too much for our humble order to
believe."
Tarou mooed inquisitively again, and made a gesture for the monk
to continue. He answered in typical monk fashion, speaking of rays of
light, transcendence, Nirvana and lotus thrones, but especially of a
fierce dakini who had appeared herself to them in the guise of a shy,
beautiful girl of sign Virgo and blood type A. She had revealed that
the surest path to enlightenment was through karaoke and shoe-shopping
and anyone who didn't agree with that would be fried right then and
there by her six-armed conqueror aspect just like she'd fried the
banquet hall when one of the monks had expressed doubts about her
divine nature. Her name, she had said, was 'Ru-Je', and she'd told
them that she would return, just before leaving towards the west. She
had also granted them the kindness of taking a very large amount of
tribute from them, most of it in small, easily-transported valuables.
Tarou didn't need to hear more, and indeed couldn't. The buzzing
in his head was overpowering even external sounds, and his legs were
tensing for a jump of their own accord. The monster's bellow was a
mix of pain and triumph, as his wings flapped and he propelled himself
to the west.
* * * * *
He felt better. Wonder of wonders, praise God and Buddha, he
felt _better_. There had been no need for a trip to the bathroom for
hours now, and his poor stomach seemed to have actually settled down.
For the last few days he'd lain abed, while his uncaring, ungrateful
students and their disrespectful children neglected him in his
illness; though it wounded his heart terribly, he had long ago
resigned himself to the fact that they had no respect for age or
wisdom. And after all he'd done for them. No respect; no respect at
all.
The dank, cramped room, which before had felt warm and cozy, was
now as confining as a cage. He needed - desperately needed - to get
out and roam the night, to seek the lacy treasures through the
darkness of the streets. The hunt, as it were, was the only thing
that made him feel alive any longer. The only thing, likely, that was
_keeping_ him alive; too long away from women or their unmentionables,
and he grew weak and helpless as a child. Certainly, he enjoyed the
collecting and groping aspects, but no one seemed to take any sympathy
with the fact that it was also a matter of survival for him. Again he
felt the raw fear, the terrifying idea that his body might finally be
breaking down. He picked up a silky garter, and ran his hands up and
down the crimson length of it until the bad thoughts went away. No
sign of any sickness any longer; he felt fresh, young, vital.
Into the night, then. He slid the window of his room open and
hopped out, landing easily on the balls of his feet two stories below.
The sun was down and the moon was out, a sickly green that wrenched at
the eye. Happosai leapt to balance on one corner of the peak-roofed
walls that surrounded the Tendo house and dojo, scenting the air like
any predator does.
That way. Drifting on the night air, the scent of freshly-
washed undergarments came, with just the briefest aftertaste of female
flesh. Happosai inhaled, breathed it in, and bounded off over the
roofs of the houses. Without even pausing, he passed by lines hung
with brassieres and panties, and ignored girdles and garter belts
draped over the bars of balconies as he raced with an absolute purpose
through night-time Nerima. A hound on the chase, he pursued the prey
with vigour; never had he sensed a cache like this, a treasure trove
of such delectable darlings as he had never imagined could exist. The
nightscape rushed by; houses and canal nearby, skyscrapers
rising against the shadowy horizon. Gods, he had not felt like this
since his youth!
He dropped from the roof of a garden shed to the street, leapt
atop the canal fence, and sprang over to the other side. Off into the
night his laughter rang; how could he ever have been ill, that now he
could feel like this?
Somewhere in the back of his mind, something screamed desperate
warnings, and was cut off. A pleasant, numbing buzz, like a great
cloud of insects or the hummings of turbines, fell over him. Scenery
emerged from the night, and passed back into the night, and the moon
hung over all like a face that stared down upon him, malevolent and
pale.
In time, he came to a pleasant little house, white-painted and
red-roofed, surrounded by low walls. A tiny garden bloomed with
delicate flowers beneath the shadowed windows, and the slim trees
looked like dancers to his eye, enticing him in the darkness.
Happosai passed beneath the gateway into the house, panting, with his
withered heart thudding in his chest like a bass drum. Vaguely, he
noted that there were no laundry lines hung with silky darlings, and
for a moment lucidity threatened.
Many silky darlings many treasures for you only come
Buzzing. A voice made from the sounds of cicadas and crickets,
from the gathering of flies round middens...
come to me
With careful steps, Happosai walked around the side of the house,
to the back yard where a tall cherry tree spread bare branches at the
sky. A blue tarpaulin flapped loosely in the wind, one corner pulled
away from beneath the rock meant to hold it down. Almost desperate
now with the need to find the enormous cache of precious, beautiful
treasures that he knew was here, he ripped it aside to expose the
splinter-ridden double doors of a cellar entrance. Though the hinges
were rusty, the doors opened without a sound, and a dim flight of
narrow, steep steps were revealed beyond. Now his pace was slow,
languidly slow, as if he moved in time with the steady buzzing in his
head. There were many, many treasures and he had to get down to them
_right now_ but his damnable body wouldn't obey. His feet seemed to
fear coming to rest open the steps with their flaking blue paint, and
his hands itched to close the cellar doors. But now he was
descending, buzzing growing stronger even as his resistance
disappeared.
The cellar was larger than the house above would have indicated,
low-ceilinged and dank, with the windows boarded-up and nailed shut.
Thick water pipes scabrous with rust stretched from floor to ceiling,
seemingly at random, far too many for a small house like this. From
their moist surface, an occasional droplet of water would bead and
fall to the floor. A muggy dampness filled the basement that reminded
him of some of the jungles he'd been to; vaguely, he remembered that
there were a lot of tribes in those places where the women didn't even
_wear_ brassieres. Candles were everywhere, upon the scarred wooden
table in the centre or resting in alcoves on the wall beside
many-armed statues with terrifyingly fierce faces. Overlaying the
metallic smell of rusting pipes and the aged dusty scent was a mildly
cloying incense. Oddest of all, a great iron prayer wheel, colourful
paints long-gone so that only the rusted shape of it remained,
stretched from floor to ceiling near the stairs.
After a moment's hesitation, he reached out and pushed it with
enough force to make it turn a quarter rotation. The prayer wheel
screamed like a dying thing, and flakes of red rust showered down on
him like rain. Any god that would answer a prayer that sounded like
that, Happosai decided, was a god whose attentions he did not desire
to attract.
Buzzing. What a sound, what a terrible numbing sound... he was
forgetting something, but he couldn't remember what...
The treasures. He'd nearly forgotten the treasures. Where were
they? Frantically, he looked around the basement, but saw no sign;
there was one corner, though, where the light of the candles did not
reach. There; it could only be there.
Where he got there, though, and looked into the dim shadows,
there were no treasures, only a square pit whose walls were slick with
green mould, a pit that stretched down to a depth he couldn't begin
to guess at. Up from it came a cold chill that ached in his bones; in
the ceiling above the pit, two water pipes led into an apparatus of
spouts and gears and ratchets and burnished brass whose function he
could not begin to guess at.
And he realized then that there were no treasures here, no silky
darlings, that there never had been, and then he heard a shuffling
movement in the darkness behind him. He turned, buzzing, everywhere
buzzing, and looked into a pair of eyes large and soft-toned like
triple-D blue satin bra cups. The dark pupils were like erect nipples
showing through the cloth. Happosai stared, mesmerized, stricken with
lust and terror, and in a single tortuous moment realized just how
lost he was.
A voice. The voice he'd been hearing in his mind, but speaking
clearly and in the real world, now. It didn't sound like buzzing at
all; it was beautiful.
"Rather small for my Champion," it said, "but I grow weak and you
will do."
And then he heard no more.
* * * * *
Cologne was perched upon her stool behind the counter of the
Nekohanten, the drawer of the cash-register open in front of her while
her small hands darted with unnatural speed and agility as she sorted
the day's take onto the counter. A solitary light from above
illumined her as she worked; the main dining area was dark, with
chairs laid atop the tables and floor swept. On the floor above,
Mousse and Shampoo would already be asleep. Or at least they should
be; they had another day of work tomorrow. As soon as this last task
was done, Cologne would go to her rest herself, but her old bones
didn't need the sleep two growing teenagers did.
How she had hoped this would be over by now... It should have
ended months ago, but it seemed that all of them were bound to Ranma,
as surely as the monks said human beings were bound to the sufferings
of this world by their desires. Perhaps there was some truth in that;
all of them were stuck here because of one sort of desire or another:
Shampoo because of her feelings for Ranma, Mousse because of his
feelings for Shampoo... and her? Why was she here?
Boredom, maybe. The insanity that went on here was certainly
more interesting than the generally sedentary life of training and
teaching she'd practiced back home. There was also the future of her
family line to consider. It did not matter to her one way or the
other who Shampoo married, as long as she ended up producing strong
heirs to the family. Her happiness with the match was certainly a
consideration, but it was not the only factor. Frankly, there were
times when she genuinely contemplated giving Mousse some advice on
where he was always going wrong; the idiot did truly love her
great-granddaughter, and if he wasn't as strong as Ranma, he was
strong enough. Whether or not Shampoo would ever display any interest
in him was another matter... though, from experience, Cologne knew
that there were some men you loved right away, and some you grew to
love in time. So it goes.
Cologne finished sorting the profits into the cash box and closed
it tight. With a slap of her hand, she closed the cash-register's
drawer, then hopped off the stool and headed into the storage room at
the back. She'd keep the box in the safe in the corner until she made
a bank run. The safe clicked as she dialed in the combination, and
then swung open. Her eye caught on the books on the bottom shelf; all
of them were family heirlooms, protected from dust and moisture in the
airtight safe. On impulse, she pulled out the two-century-old
leather-bound copy of the I-Ching. She'd never really given much
stock the divination abilities of the hexagrams, but the phrasing of
them could occasionally make her consider a problem in a new way.
Coins from the cash box in hand to cast the changes, she sat down and
crossed her legs with the book open in front of her. She scratched
her cheek absently. What should she ask? It was important to fix the
question in one's mind before proceeding.
All right, then. Perhaps 'what should I do?' was a little too
general, but it wasn't as though she was taking this with the utmost
seriousness. One by one, she cast the changes; the coins danced and
clinked on the floor. Eight, nine, eight, nine, seven, seven.
Cologne read the changes, licked her index finger, and turned to
the correct page. Sung - Conflict. The judgement?
Conflict. You are sincere
And are being obstructed.
A cautious halt halfway brings good fortune.
Going through to the end brings misfortune.
It furthers one to see the great woman.
It does not further one to cross the great water.
Interesting, Cologne thought... and what else? The general
image?
Heaven and water go their opposite ways:
The image of Conflict.
Thus in all her transactions the superior woman
Carefully considers the beginning.
And the lines... what of the lines?
Nine in the second place means:
One cannot engage in conflict;
One returns home, gives way.
The people of her town,
Three hundred households,
Remain free of guilt.
Nine in the fourth place means:
One cannot engage in conflict.
One turns back and submits to fate,
Changes one's attitude,
And finds peace in perseverance.
Good fortune.
Well, then. She changed the moving lines - the two unbroken
nines that could be broken to obtain a related hexagram - to their
opposites, and found the page with that reading. Kuan -
Contemplation. The judgement read:
Contemplation. The ablution has been made,
But not yet the offering.
Full of trust, they look up to her.
Worthless superstisious nonsense, Cologne thought sourly. Then
she picked up the coins again, and began to cast another set of
changes.
* * * * *
Herb cast the book onto the floor, his mouth twisted into a
grimace in an effort to contain his clenched teeth.
Fairy tales. That's all the history of his Empire was, now --
stories of a golden time followed by a quick decline and the current
poverty and desolation. Once they had been feard and respected. Even
Songzen Gambo left them alone, and once the Tibetan Empire converted
to monasticism and was in need of protection, who did they turn to as
the equals of the Mongols? The Musk. They had refused, of course.
The barren plateau could offer little in return for their defence but
an alternate spirituality, and they already had their own gods.
That's what had held this Empire together: the divine spark setting
the populace on fire and leading them both in battle and in peacetime
planning.
And then the gods left. Marpa Kon died at the hands of the exile
Wu Lin; the Warrior was destroyed by the Creatress he had forged, in
the ultimate betrayal. That's when the downward spiral began. The
Empire was repulsed and demoralized. Papers surviving from that age
hinted with their harsh and desperate language at just how much of the
collective psyche was destroyed, and faith in the ancestral beliefs
shattered. Rather than create and train another pair of spirit
leaders the Musk accepted the teachings of Atisha. Weak, unworldly
Atisha, whose goal was the negation and deterioration of all that
Herb's predecessors had worked for.
He'd done well. In just a few centuries the Musk went from being
one of the greatest powers in the world to being all but forgotten,
their last stronghold -- HIS last stronghold -- a small citadel with
only a handful of followers within it and insufficient population for
an army.
And the Empire had never again trusted a woman.
Rain streamed in from a nearby window, covering the book's cover
with drop marks. Herb bent over to pick it up. Even a book this
painful deserved to be carefully preserved. He smoothed the pages
that had creased in its fall, and stopped at one near the middle: on
it was a likeness of the last Musk Empress.
The rain fell harder, and Herb's female form did something that
he would never allow himself when male.
She ran her hand over the picture, and cried.
* * * * *
The boy had fought back. For a second. But HE was the master,
and even though the Woman had trained him he still knew more; he had
the accumulated knowledge of oh so heavy to drag through this dirt the
scratch go rasp shirt yellow
He took a bandanna from his prey's forehead and used it to wipe
the sweat off his own brow. And then he blinked. There was another
bandanna in its place. He took off more and more and OH if only these
were his silky treasures instead of sweaty but argh! the... the...
the...
Drag. Boy. Home.
Heavy.
He hit a curb, and the lost boy's head hit it harder. Skull
didn't crack.
Didn't... cra-
So heavy. Drag. Scratch. Rasp. And so long to go. Could do any
attack, any explosion and defeat anyone, but manual labour? Not him.
Not the master of-
Rain! Rain!
And now...
A pig?
A pig. How nice. Much lighter. Must drag. No; carry.
Carry the pig, so small, so little buzzing rain falling pitterpatter.
Where?
Home. Not to his home. Did he have one?
No.
To HER home.
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END CHAPTER ONE
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