Next:

As she watched, the attacking reavers tore a bloody swath through the
marines without kinetic displacement rifles, shrieking angrily.

Why? The buggers are winning. :)

Swearing at the impulse that had lured her away from the relative safety
of the rest of the combat group, she gestured, narrow lines of force
winking into existence between a pair of trees on the reavers' path. The
first of the charging reavers passed through the lines, energy filaments
thinner than an atom, and collapsed into a messy pile of carapace and
ichor. The second began to phase, but not until it was too late, and the
third passed through them harmlessly.

Neat trick, though.

"Save it," Yosho's voice advised him, the man setting Ryouga down behind
the line of defenders. "There's too much battle left for you to throw
yourself away right now." The old man whooped a sudden bark of laughter,
and shook his head. "If I'm not allowed to die here, neither are you!"

Heh. True.

Collecting herself, she placed her hands before her, palms facing the
reaver, summoning a thin barrier of sparkling red light to ward it off.
She could just touch the bracelet on her wrist and call to Ranma for
help while her shield slowed the reaver.... But her hand made no move to
touch the bracelet, and the reaver strode through her barrier without
visible effort.

That's not goof.

"No," she whimpered, her traitorous body taking a slow step forward. "I
don't want to... why are you doing this?"

Tokimi: You owe me twenty dollars. I intend to collect. Now.

"Tokimi doesn't care about us," he said flatly. "She only cares about
getting her job done, and to her, the ends justify the means. She
doesn't want to hurt and destroy us. She only wants you to go home. To
go to her."

"Who is Tokimi? Ranma, I don't understand--"

"Do you suppose that she'd be willing to make the reavers go away if I
gave you to her?" he asked.

Heh. That's not a good sign. Wonder what brought this on.

Washuu blinked rapidly, not completely understanding what Ranma was
talking about. His hand passed into her field of vision, fingertips
carefully wiping tears from her face. The glow of green light from the
gem in his wrist sent a tremor of fear through her. "Stop this, Ranma!"
she insisted, still captive. "You're scaring me!"

"Yeah, well, I guess dealing with Tokimi constantly kinda scared me a
little bit, too," Ranma murmured. "I have some sympathy. How about I
send Tokimi a little token of my esteem for her, hmm?"

Washuu: You mean one of my Washuu blow up dolls?

Ranma: You can only wish.

Washuu nodded, not completely understanding the situation, and touched
the gem. Ranma winced at something from it, and said, "Norris, Pavel,
anyone with a radio -- tell everyone we're moving towards Jusenkyou. I
know we're in trouble in places, but trust me on this one. The reavers
will let up if we start running."

Oh? I wonder why.

"Lower ourselves to their level?" one asked, concern evident on his

features.

"Do not take that attitude!" Kiima yelled. "Saffron-sama fights at the
side of those below -- are you better than him?

Soldier: If it keep me alive, hell yeah.

Ducking his head, he darted off, followed shortly by the other messenger,
moving on to relay the word.

"Saffron-sama," Kiima said quietly, confident that none could hear her.
"Why are we doing this?"

Because otherwise it is death? I think she should understand that by now.

"There are those that govern me, and then, those that govern them,"
Saffron said evasively. "I wholly doubt that Tsunami-sama

Hmm. Awfully odd to hear him add that to her name.

"Looks like we lost about fifteen, all told,"

Nowhere near as many as I thought from the way you were describing things.

Pavel said apologetically.

"From the vanguard, Eric and Jim, from the northern flank, Jon,
Patterson, Smith... and more. That's half of your officers, sir."

Oh. I see. Casualities among the marines.

"Sir," Pavel said quietly. "With all due respect, I think she has a
point. Given the performance of our Marines, we're going to be more of a
liability than an aid here. We can barely keep up with the Amazon and
Musk warriors, our weapons are potential dangerous to both our allies
and ourselves... this is a fight that we should have stepped away from a
long time ago."

Well, once they became completely ineffectual, yes. Until this point they
did fairly well.

He shrugged then, and turned away, not waiting for Norris to respond.
Finally, Norris found his voice enough to ask, "What does he mean he
can't take a break?"

Washuu bit her lip, staring after Ranma as he strode away uncertainly.
"I'm not sure," she said quietly. "He knows... he knows something I'm
not allowed to remember yet."

Odd way for her to phrase that as well.

"We should sleep in shifts, I think," Cologne said after a moment of
thinking. "Is there anyone who wants to leave? Anyone who's hurt? Most
of the Marines will be leaving -- to the stars. We all will, soon, I

think."

Actually they probably could all bail out to Austrailia and meet the
spaceships there. The reavers might not make it there in time.

Ducking their heads meekly, they set their weapons on the ground, and
strode to the Marines, heads bowed. Cologne shook her head, studying the
eleven women who remained, and sighed. "So, it's come to this?" she
asked. "I can't persuade you to go, Kura-Wan? You're one of our finest
warriors. Jian-Di? You have a bright future, too."

"I will not abandon Pei-Lin," she insisted. "We swore at the festival six
springs ago, and tomorrow will be our seventh."

"Without Pei-Lin, we are incomplete," Jian-Di added. "So we stay."

Interesting way of looking at things.

Cologne nodded her understanding. "Eleven of my warriors remain with us.
Twenty are leaving. The rest...." She sighed, shaking her head. "We've
not lost so many in a single battle in decades.

Haven't exactly been in a battle like this ever before.

Ranma glanced over his shoulder at the girls he had once thought of as
'cheerleaders', and they all nodded firmly. "Okay," he said quietly.
"Washuu, what's else do we have?"

"Atsuko, Mousse, Ryouga, Ryu, Tsunami, myself, Yakumo, and Yosho, Ranma,"
she said apologetically. "Aside from yourself and Saffron and Herb, of
course. I don't know how long we have until we get attacked, though, so
I can't guess our hopes of lasting this out."

yeah. But after 15 chapters, it's time to wind things down.:)

"Yes, but that raises even more questions and problems, too. They can
phase-shift and slide through the lot of us -- destroy us all at will,

Not really. Phasing through things and solidifying in them doesn't ever seem
to be a tactic of theirs.

"How much time do we have before they start swarming over Australia?"
Cologne asked, frowning sharply.

"Well... hours? Given their reproductive rate, yes, in a few hours they
would overcome the beacon, and spread out -- but they can't move quickly
enough for that to be a worry," Washuu assessed.

Snorting, Ranma countered, "How long did it take them to get to the
orbital platform from Earth?"

Need a break there.

There was another moment of silence then, a large Galaxy Police craft
sinking towards them through the night sky, and silently teleporting
away the troops that had elected to leave. "Well," Ranma said quietly,
"that'll have to do, I guess. Keep them as confused as possible, for as
long as possible, then engage in a running battle

Could grab one of the spaceships. Keep touching down,and once the reavers
draw near, take off again. It's not like it would be stationary, like the
platform was.

"Who is to say?" Saffron asked, shaking his head. "I am not a master of
fate and destiny, I am merely a god.

Ranma: And not much of one if you can't handle a few thousand piddly
reavers.

Ranma stepped away from Saffron before splitting, his female half bearing
two long blades of blue energy, while the male drew his sword, both of
them looking down at the pools. The first of the attackers arrived,
flying up from the land below the cliff's edge, and landing atop the
level area above Jusenkyou.

Hmm. So the final fight of book one begins.

Saffron whirled to face the creature that had flown over his head, then
faltered, frowning. Where they had been expecting a reaver, there was
nothing more than a small piglet. It bounced against the hard turf, then
squealed balefully, and began to twitch, only taking a moment to
collapse on its side, breathing, but unblinking. "What the heck was
that?" Ryouga asked fearfully, approaching it curiously.

The effect Jusenkyou has on reavers.

Galvanized, the troop began to move, Kiima's forces lingering overhead
for a moment longer, as a few more victims of the pools began to land
atop the cliffs. A duck, a cat, a dog.... Eventually, of course one of
them would hit one of the pools of drowned human, and then....

It would die too, persuamble.

"Testing us," Yakumo replied tersely. "I can... I can feel them in my
head. They're waiting for us to panic, and break for it, because they
think they're leading us into a trap."

That is a bad thing.

Washuu winced at that, and shook her head. "Now, don't be foolish, Ranma
-- once we get to the valley, we can evacuate, and be done with all this
nonsense."

Heh. We all know it's not going to be that easy.

"Hardly," he spat. "A Juraian ship is coming for you. I remember my
promise. I have to protect Hotaru, and that means that I'm going to make
sure that she's gone before what has to be done comes about. Saffron...
Saffron and I will see it through to the end."

Hmm. I doubt if it will be that simple.

"My men may flee, Ranma, but to me, you are a brother in arms.

brother-in-arms

 I will not

abandon you," Herb stated proudly. "This matter has escalated swiftly
beyond what I truly understand, but I remain steadfast, and trust you."

"Trust is good," Ranma said, clapping a hand across Herb's back. The
prince of the Musk stiffened at Ranma's touch, then collapsed to the
ground, eyes wide and shining with betrayal

Thought as much.

"That would be nice," Ranma said quietly. "But there's not much time
left. I can feel them coming back -- quickly, too."

Yosho nodded again, and turned to Setsuna. "Meiou, you should leave, too.
Your plans will come to naught if you remain."

Hmm. I thought her plans were crapped out anyway.

"This ring should act as a kind of amplifier," Ranma explained. "Now that

everyone else is gone, it's going to tell every reaver on the planet
right where you are, and it'll send them all in a straight line for this
spot."

"Ranma?" Washuu asked nervously. "I'm acting as bait to buy everyone time
to escape?"

"No," he said, shaking his head. "The crystals have your pattern, and
will tell it to the reavers. Now you leave." With that, he teleported
again, setting Washuu down on a chair aboard Ran-oh-ki, and Tsunami
nearby as well. "Now do you get it?" he asked, smiling.

Hmm. He could have told them that before rather than drawing and over
dramatizing everything.

"Ranma!" she exclaimed, as he vanished, leaving the robes in her hands.
"What... Ranma! You have to come back!"

Well, he can teleport.

"Yeah," Ranma choked out, trying to resist the heady rush of raw energy
through him. "Need... more cold...."

Just like the dream, mostly.

The power began to unfold before him, expanding, sweeping across the
reavers with blinding speed -- speed greater than they could manage to
dodge. All he had to do was teleport back... and leave Saffron alone to
sleep.

But it was so far to the ship, and he was so tired... so very tired....

Hmm. Methinks he'll make it anyway.

***

Slowly rising away from the planet, Yohito allowed himself a sigh; they
were clear of whatever madness was going on below. Saryu-oh shuddered
once, the local subspace energy growing too thin to sustain the ship.
"What the hell," he breathed, as the ship's rise began to slow. "We're
going to smash into the planet," he gasped, eyes widening. "Something's
taking all of the energy from local subspace--"

Oops.

The Silence Glaive, a tool of death, was meant to be wielded by the
living, and when the lifeforce of its wielder was exhausted it vanished,
reforming in the hands of the proper bearer.

Hmm. I didn't think just any one could wield it in that way. Interesting.

Nuku's eyes were bright with tears, but she shook her head,

Yep. Sadly, she's been through this before.

 > Below, the entire planet was slowly consumed with a seemingly endless

tide of ice, spreading from Ranma's resting place outwards.

Hmm. We'll see in the epilogue if this is so. Still think there's a chance
he got out, but if not, he died the heroe's death Couldn't find any real
grammar errors. Will have to move on to the epilogue now

D.B. Sommer





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