And, part II...
Please, I'd love some C&C, I wanna make this fic as good as I can...
Millennia Past
By Valandar the Red
The stars outside the luxurious starliner's portals
shone with the promise of the new Human Race. Two thousand
years after recovering from the greatest disaster to ever
befall mankind, they now traveled the stars, passing through
the Milky Way as the voyagers of old would traverse the
Atlantic.
Annwyn Taldea was one of these passengers, who now
found herself lost in thought. Her family had booked this
vacation to celebrate her parent's twentieth wedding
anniversary, and she took the first opportunity to sneak away
from them, and explore the ship on her own. Something had
always felt like it was missing from her life, and she was
bound to find out what it was.
As she turned a corner in a passageway, she nearly
bumped into a young man, about her own age. "Oops, sorry!"
she exclaimed.
"That's okay," said the young man - who was now standing
right next to her, not in front, steadying her. He was just
over six feet tall, with black hair pulled back into a braid,
and eyes so blue, she found herself... just... staring...
Annwyn shook her head, and took control of herself. "Um,
well, anyway, my name's... er... " As she trailed off, she
found herself thinking, 'Those eyes... wow... '
"Well?" asked the young man, snapping her out of the
spell.
"Oh, um, my name's Annwyn Taldea. Uh, heh heh, what's
your, um, name?"
The black haired man smiled, and Annwyn felt her heart
skip a beat. "Names... kinda tricky subject, huh? Well, I
guess you could call me Ran."
"No, um, family name?" asked Annwyn, a half smile
forming on her face.
A cloud passed across those sky blue eyes. "No. Not for
a long time." Soon, the cloud passed, and the smile returned.
"Hey, have you had lunch, yet? I hear the buffet on this ship
is incredible."
'Self-confidence, self-confidence', chanted the young
girl to herself. "So, um, Ran, is this a date you're asking
me on?"
This time, it was Ran's turn to get flustered a little.
"Um, well, I dunno. Let's see what happens."
Arm in arm, the young pair sauntered down the
passageway, intent on finding new paths within each other.
******************
"My god, when was the last time you ate?" asked Annwyn,
aghast at the stack of empty plates quickly piling up next to
her erstwhile companion.
He paused the action of 'food from plate to mouth'
barely long enough to answer. "Bwrekfsht, thsh mrning."
She blinked at that. "You mean you _always_ eat like
this?"
He shrugged, but didn't slow down. A passing waiter
started to try to cart the plates away, but a quick slap from
a blurred chopstick convinced him otherwise. "Hey, th'
platesh're way ta keep score!" he said, a couple noodles
hanging out of his mouth.
Annwyn decided to go ahead, and wait for him to finish
eating before trying to start any more conversation. It took
a little while, but he was eventually ready for a
conversation. So, she gestured towards the stack of plates.
"Twenty-three?"
"Hm, I'm not at my best today. I was trying to be
polite."
"Good god, I'd hate to see you when you're really
hungry," she joked. "Anyway, how can you eat so much?"
"Simple. I'm a martial artist," he answered.
"A what? You mean you make paintings of war, or
something like that?" The young woman was totally confused.
"No, no, no. Look, a long time ago, there weren't any
guns, cannons, tanks, or anything. People fought their wars
face to face, and hand to hand. Over time, the techniques
developed to fight that way were distilled, and condensed
into an art form that was intended to be used in self-
defense, and in the defense of others." He shrugged, and slid
his chair back from the table. "If we can find a gym or
something like that, I can show you."
She scratched her head. "If this was so long ago, then
how do you know about it?"
He scratched the back of his head. "Well, my family
practiced it for generation upon generation. Now, I'm the
last one left. C'mon, let's go find a place for me to show
you."
******************
The waiter watched the young couple leave, and reached
under his apron. The small device he extracted fit neatly
over his ear, and he began speaking into it. "Yes, it's time.
Begin the Jyhad." Placing the device back into his pocket, he
pulled out a small energy pistol, and thumbed the charging
switch. 'The Confederation will hear this message,' he
thought.
******************
It wasn't a gymnasium, but it was large enough for Ran's
purposes. It was actually a lifepod hangar, with enough space
between the lifepods for even some of the more acrobatic of
his techniques.
"Okay, Annwyn, what I'm about to do is called a kata. It
is a pre-arranged sequence of techniques, designed to
practice both the techniques, themselves, and how they flow
into other methods." He stretched high, and dropped into a
stance. Soon, he launched himself high into the air,
exploding onto a display of skill nearly lost to the
star-faring culture that had grown out of the fall. Spinning
back kicks flowed into reverse turning kicks, which set the
stage for a spinning backfist. A sudden reversal of momentum,
and a dual tiger punch lashed through the air, followed by
dropping back into more complex combinations. Soon, Ran lost
himself in the kata, and flowed into a more complex kata.
Eventually, he had progresses into maneuvers unseen in
thousands of years.
The young lady stared in amazement. The acrobatic leaps,
thirty feet into the air, might have been explainable by
cybernetics, but nothing could explain the almost inhuman
grace with which he performed the kata. It was something no
artificial limb could capture, and something that seemed to
almost ooze out of every pore.
As he reached the climax of the kata, the starliner
lurched to one side, a sickening groan echoing throughout the
lifepod bay. "Ran, what was that?" squealed Annwyn. "Was it
an asteroid hit?"
The young man's face was deadly serious. "That was no
asteroid. I know what that feels like." His eyes snapped to
the bay entrance, and he snatched her up, diving behind one
of the pods.
"Wha..." She couldn't continue her question, as he
clamped one hand over her mouth.
"terrorists," he whispered. "no idea what they want.
They probably detonated a bomb, and will be coming for the
pods, so they can get away. we're nearly in-system, now, so
they'll have someplace to go."
She nodded, then her eyes widened, as she saw several
men, one dressed as a waiter, rush into the pod bay. The
waiter turned, closed the door, then fused it shut with a
precise laser burst. The men climbed into one of the pods,
and it launched itself down its tube. The pod quickly became
visible as a spiraling flare of light just outside the
porthole beside the tube.
"Koytsu!" exclaimed Ran. "With the door welded shut,
about a third of the passengers won't be able to escape!" He
let go of her, and dove at the door.
"Ran, no!" she yelled. "It's a blast door, nobody's
strong enough to rip it open like that! Only energy can tear
it open!"
"Yeah, right. Just lemme try! KIAI!" His fist impacted
with the door so hard that sparks flew, but all that his
efforts resulted in was a fist-shaped dent. This impressed
her enough, but what happened next surprised her. He stepped
back, and hurled his hands forward with another shout. A
brilliant burst of energy filled his hands, and lanced out at
the stubborn blast door, pulverizing it. Seconds later, a
rush of people came barreling in, racing for the pods.
Annwyn pushed through the panicked crowd, until she made
it to Ran's side. "Ran, my family!" She kept hold of him with
one arm, while frantically scanning the crowd. Seeing a
familiar face, she dragged her companion with her to
intercept. "Sis, where's Mom and Dad?"
The younger girl looked at Annwyn, tears in her eyes.
"They... they were in the explosion." Then she broke down in
tears, clutching her older sister.
Ran looked around, and saw one lifepod with room
remaining. Leaping over the crowd, he shoved the two girls
inside. "Get out of here, you two!" He reached in, and pushed
the ejection button, and slammed the pod's door shut.
"NO!" screamed Annwyn. "RAN!"
As the pod launched, no one noticed his hand clutched
tightly around one of the pod's maneuvering fins.
******************
The fourth planet of the system the starliner was
visiting was a wild one, still under quarantine by the
Confederation's Exploratory Committee. Wild creatures that
fell into no known classification dwelt there, with toxins
that changed the very genetic structure of the victims.
Unfortunately, this was the world that the lifepod holding
Annwyn and her sister came to rest on.
The impact wasn't gentle, and the younger girl was badly
hurt when she was thrown across the pod as her restraining
harness snapped. Annwyn forced the pod's hatch open, and
crawled outside. What she saw made her intensely happy, and
intensely confused.
There was Ran, apparently unconscious, holding on to one
of the pod's fins. He was badly burned, and much of his
clothing had burned away during re-entry, but he was still
alive. In fact, as she watched, the burns started to fade,
and he stirred. "Oh, ite." Seeing her, he opened his eyes
wider. "Daijobu?"
"Huh?" she asked, quite intelligently.
"Um, sorry. Old Japanese," he said. He looked down at
himself, and back at her, blushing under his burns. "Um,
could you please get me one of the jumpsuits from the pod?
Oh, and how's your sister?"
Annwyn ducked down, also blushing, and tossed one of the
suits out without looking. "She... she's hurt. I don't know
how bad."
A few minutes of rustling, and he popped his head over
the edge of the pod's door. "Let me see her. I picked up a
few things over the years." He dropped down next to her, and
began to pass his hands over the young girl.
Her next question had been bugging her since she had
seen him outside. "H-how did you survive?"
"Hm? Oh. I just grabbed on to the pod, and rode it
down." Now, his hands began glowing, brightly enough for her
to not only see, but even feel. Something deep within Annwyn
echoed with that glow, and she began opening and closing her
hands.
"But... but we were in deep space for forty minutes! And
we also went through re-entry! Nothing alive could survive
that!" she protested.
"Wrong. I think the words you're lookin' for are
'nothing mortal' could survive that. Obviously, I did, and
I'm alive." His hands stopped glowing, and the echo in
Annwyn's soul stopped, as well. "Well, she doesn't have any
broken bones. Mostly, it's a concussion, and some strained
back and neck muscles. Go ahead and climb out, I'll be
bringing her out in a second.
Mutely, she did as he asked, and he lightly hopped out
of the pod to the ground beside her very soon after.
"Alright, Annwyn, let's go. We have to find a cave or
something for shelter, especially for..."
"Kelly," she muttered.
"Yes, Kelly, here." He looked around, and pointed
uphill. "There seems to be some sort of animal trail, here,
so it might lead to either water, or a den, of some sort. Oh,
by the way, I hit the emergency beacon. There should be a
survey ship here in a week or so, even with the quarantine."
"Good. I'm still confused, and I'm tired, and I... I
think I'm still in shock, somewhat, over my parents, but at
least we'll be safe. I think."
They began trudging, and the alien foliage seemed to
almost close behind them.
******************
The trail they had chosen split four times, but they
eventually found an abandoned den of some sort, large enough
for them all. A freshwater stream ran nearby, and Ran
verified that certain fruits hanging near the cave were, in
fact, safe to eat. That night, they settled down, using piles
of leaves as blankets.
"Ran?" asked Annwyn.
"Yeah?"
"How did you survive all that?"
He rolled over, and settled deeper in his pile of
leaves. "Don't ask me that. It's too complex to explain right
now. Go ahead, and get some sleep. We've got to be well
rested, so we can take care of Kelly."
The young woman settled into her leaf bed, but couldn't
sleep. 'What is he?' she wondered. 'He can't be human. Not
with his strength, and grace, and those eyes... gotta stop
thinking about that. How did he survive? Deep space, re-
entry, either one should have killed him. And then there was
that energy blast, and the way his hands glowed when he was
checking to make sure Kelly was okay...' Her thoughts drifted
away from that subject, and into dreams, dreams of riding a
horse of Old Earth, as it rode through space and time until
the end of eternity, with a man with a black braid and blue
eyes beside her all the while.
The next morning, Ran left the cave, to go look for more
food, saying that the fruits would only fill them up, and not
give them any sort of nutrition. Annwyn nodded, and
rearranged the leaf blanket that protected her sister. The
younger girl was still unconscious, but had settled into a
relatively normal sleep.
"Oh, Kelly, what are we gonna do?" she said aloud. "I'm
glad Ran is here, so we'll survive, but what about Mom and
Dad? You told me they died, so what'll we do when we get back
home?"
"Y...you'll... survive..." came a shaky voice from the
mouth of the cave, from a form that quickly collapsed onto
the rough stone floor.
"Ran!" she screamed, rushing up to him. Beside him lay
the pile of fruit he had been gathering, and sweat was
rapidly pooling underneath his prone form. Frightened, she
rolled him over, and saw his face twisted in agony. "Oh, God,
Ran!" She dragged him over to his own leaf pile, and
frantically piled the leaves over him to try to break him out
of shock.
"N..no, don't... worry. Poison... will be alright
soon..." he muttered weakly.
Annwyn ignored him, and continued her ministrations.
Inside, her heart raced with terror, but she couldn't let it
show. Not for Kelly, and not for Ran.
******************
Just over a day later, Kelly finally woke up.
"S...sister?" she asked, weakly.
"Shhh, yes, it's me. No, lay back down, conserve your
strength," replied the older girl.
The younger girl glanced over at the writhing form near
her. "Wh-who's that?"
Annwyn spared Ran a worried glance. "That's the young
man who saved our lives. And the lives of a lot of people on
board the starliner."
Kelly frowned. "He don't look so good. Whass wrong?"
"I don't know." The young woman bit her lip. "He said
something about poison before I got him in the pile of
leaves, so I think he got bitten by something."
"Oh. I'm sorry." Kelly began to close her eyes again,
then half opened them. "Sis?"
"Yeah?"
"Y'need ta get some sleep. Y'look like hell." With that,
the girl fell back asleep.
Annwyn dug herself into her pile of leaves, her eyes
never leaving Ran's recumbent form. "Yeah, right. Like I can,
right now."
******************
Once again, dreams assaulted Annwyn. This time, however,
she was with Ran in a chamber with a cool, flagstone floor.
He was still racked by the spasms that tormented him in the
waking world, but she was dressed in a fashion she didn't
recognize. It was a yellow tunic of some kind, that folded
one side over the other, with a black sash tied on her waist
as a belt. Her feet were bare, and her legs were covered by
yellow pants that ended just above her ankles. Ran, himself,
was wearing a soft, slightly shiny red shirt, tied in the
front by several wooden pegs, black pants, and black
slippers.
As she glanced around the chamber, she saw an entrance.
She started to stand, when a soft glow filled the archway of
that entrance. From the glow, an ephemeral, almost human
shape flowed forth, towards the center of the chamber.
"Wh...who are you?" she asked.
The form turned to face her. "That question doesn't
matter anymore. If you mean, 'who were you', then that would
have meaning." It then settled down, as if kneeling, beside
the prone from of Ran.
"Alright," she growled, "who were you?"
"Ah." It sighed. "I once was a god. A member of the
Celestial Bureaucracy of a nation called China."
"A god. Riiiight..." she began. A burst of brilliant
light interrupted her, however, and she realized the light
had come from where the eyes of the form would be.
"I was a god. Do not doubt, or you may condemn him
forever." The form reached down, and placed a diaphanous hand
on Ran's brow. "I was a trickster, one who had gone too far.
Shang Ti, King of the Celestial Bureaucracy, condemned me to
eternal pain, with a further condition that I should grant a
single wish of any who came to me.
"At the time, and for fifteen hundred years after, the
one who rests before me had a curse. It is unnecessary to
explain the curse, but it was the greatest source of anguish
in his life. When he found my cave, and heard my tale, he
chose not to remove his curse."
"Why?" interrupted Annwyn.
"He chose, instead, to take upon himself my immortality.
In so doing, he cursed himself further, but allowed me to
die, and finally escape the punishment of Shang Ti. I had
learned my lesson, after all."
"Oh? How is immortality a curse?" she asked.
"Imagine outliving your husband. Now, imagine outliving
your son. And his son. And his sons. Imagine outliving your
entire race, eventually. That is the curse of a mortal
granted immortality." The form stood and faced her. "In
addition, he had your love, and he would be condemned to
outlive you my generations."
"Me? But I only met him a couple o' days ago!" she
protested.
The form laughed, a gentle laugh. "I do not refer to
Annwyn Taldea, but to an old incarnation, one whose garments
you wear right now. I refer to Tendo Akane."
At the mention of the name, memories started to slowly
filter in to her mind. Shoving them aside for now, she asked,
"Well, if he's immortal, why can't he just shrug off that
poison, the way he did re-entry and explosive decompression?"
"Alas, the poison is no normal toxin. It changes his
very genetic structure into a form incapable of supporting
life. He finds his immortal life force trapping his essence
forever within a form incapable of sustaining that life,
trapping him in an agony as great as my own was."
Annwyn remembered an incident where Ranma had threatened
to kill a skater named... Sanzenin?... for kissing him in his
cursed form. She then remembered the incident with Saffron,
where he had called out to her very soul, returning her to
life with his love, a love the continued to deny for three
more months. And she remembered him returning from his last
attempt to cure his curse, and folding his arms around her...
then the memory of that last, horrible fraction of a
second...
"Tell me how to take his immortality from him!" she
demanded.
"Ah. You have solved the riddle. Simply take his hand,
and open your eyes." The form turned away from them, and
drifted back to the archway. "Someday, Tendo Akane. Someday."
******************
Just less than a week later, a Confederation Exploratory
vessel set down less than a quarter mile from their little
cave. Kelly was much better, though considerably sore, and
Annwyn, herself, had come to terms with what had happened. As
they passed a low mound of freshly turned earth, she
whispered, "Don't worry, Ranma. You waited three thousand
years for me. Now, it's my turn to wait."
Author's Notes:
Unfortunately, I do not really intend on writing a third piece.
That would ruin the ending mood...
=====
- Valandar the Red of the Empty Tankard
Captain of the Guard of the Barony of the Far Woods
Empire of the Iron Mountains
and Ruler of the Spammish Main
http://Valandar.tripod.com/Hello.html
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