In the dark, a match can be a horrible thing.

The grating as the match is lit comes as a surprise.  With a
guttering sound, the light flares into being; it
is insufficient to dispel the darkness.  Instead, with a
barely audible hiss, it struggles to hold the darkness back
from a tiny little circle, its flickering existence only
sufficient to illuminate the hand which holds it, and the
sheaf of papers held above it.  And even when the dull
silence is broken by a women's sobs, still the hissing of
that struggle persists.

"Please."  The woman's voice is unsteady, hiccuping.  It is
the voice of a person well into adulthood, who has seen more
than her share of joy, and is now tasting new depths of
despair.

"So you'll do it?"  This voice is that of a man, nasal, dull
in tone.  It is the voice of a person to fear, because for him,
reality has passed into the irrelevant.

The sobs intensify, and as they rise, so too does the
match.  The crying breaks off in a sharp inhalation, and
then resume with even greater force.  "No, please!  That's
the culmination of my life's work!  You can't...."

"I can."  The interruption is delivered in the same
monotone.  "I will.  You know the only thing that will stop
me."

The crying resumes for long minutes, uninterrupted.  When
they trail off into ragged sniffles, the woman musters the
strength to speak again.  "You win.  I'll do it."

"It's on your desk."

There is a rustle, and the match moves away from the sheaf
of papers to hover above the neatly-ordered piles on the
drawing desk.  A new pair of hands is now seen, delicate and
graceful, with the signs of age only showing in finely lined
knuckles and the hints of spots.  Trembling, they press a
single piece of paper flat, and then reach for a stamp.
There is a long pause, and then the final thud as the
document is sealed.

The man's hand reappears, setting down the stack it has been
holding.  The passionate and reciprocated romancing of a
shifty-eyed schoolboy by a dog-eared half-demon is briefly
illuminated before the art is dropped and the notarized
declaration is quickly removed from the woman's reach.

The match, held high, reflects off the mirror-like glasses
of the man and reveals the woman, who is tenderly caressing
her masterpiece as quiet tears run down her face.  And then
she is lost to the darkness, as the man turns and heads to
the door.

The door is open, and the hall is dimly lit by starlight.
There is not enough light to ease the match's struggle, but
just enough to outline the doorway, and give the barest
hints as to the nature of the figure standing there.

"You've got it?"  This is a new voice, a rapid machine-gun
of a voice chattering the words like confident bullets.

The match-holder does not speak, but instead holds out the
tear-stained sheet.  As the man in the doorway reaches out
to take it, the dying light glints off his massive afro.
Impatiently, he gestures, and after a short pause, the match
is also passed over.

These are the last few breaths of the match's struggles, and
the darkness, seeing advantage, surges in.  But its last,
dying throes are just enough for us to read, stamped with
red seals, and written in bold, authoritative characters,
the prophetic words:

"I, Takahashi Rumiko, hereby give permission to Rikudo Koshi
to make this episode of Excel Saga into a Ranma 1/2
cross-over."

The afroed man's teeth gleam, and he whispers, "Excellent."
And then all noise is swallowed up as the match, with a
sigh, is extinguished.

And Nabeshin pronounces, "Shit.  I burnt my fingers."

                      ~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Across Honour

an Excel Saga / Ranma 1/2 Cross-over 
 by Bjorn Christianson (bjorn@etho.caltech.edu)

Ranma 1/2 is copyright Takahashi Rumiko.  Excel Saga is
copyright Rikudo Koshi and J.C. Staff.  This work is not
intended to infringe those rights, and is done without
knowledge or consent of the rights holders.

That wasn't Takahashi in the prologue, just an unauthorized
stunt double.  After all, everyone knows that Takahashi's
masterpiece is not a passionate romance between Ataru and
Inu-Yasha; it is a Akane/Sister Angela bondage special.

Comments and criticism can be sent to bjorn@etho.caltech.edu
and will be greatly appreciated.  You can find copies of all
my stories at http://www.its.caltech.edu/~bjorn/fanfic.

                      ~~~~~~~~~~~~~

This is not a room, but a great hall.  The darkness is
banished from the center, where the eye is drawn to an
imposing dais; instead, the shadows lurk and cling to the
walls, which ponderously rise up to meet the vaulting
ceiling.  It is a place of the sort where kings and emperors
address the cheering masses, but at this time, the
silver-haired lord serenely regards only a single,
dark-haired beauty.  Pushing his tiny wire-framed glasses up
with a delicate finger, he says, "Hyatt.  Where is Excel?"

The object of his attention comes to attention, carefully,
as if afraid her bones might break, and raises a hand in
salute.  "Miss Excel was going...."  The high, whispering
voice trails off as Hyatt's golden eyes roll back into her
head, and then she collapses, blood spilling freely from her
mouth over her pale skin and ornate purple uniform.

There is a short pause, which the author uses to change the
verb tense.  

No more than a litre of blood spilled out over the granite
floor before a blonde burst through the door and ran up to
the master of the hall, waving her hand madly above her
head.  "Hail Lord Il-Palazzo!  Excel has come to... oh,
sorry, Ha-chan, didn't see you lying dead there, just let me
get off you...."

"Excel."

"Yes, Lord Il-Palazzo?"

"You will explain to me why you were late." Pausing, he
adjusted the hang of his ornate robe.  "My intuition is that
your answer to that question will also answer why I am
sitting on a barstool."

Excel's green eyes looked at the floor shiftily, and
muttered, "Well, yesterday, you promoted Ha-chan to Director
of Forward Planning, made your throne the Director of
Security, and made me sub-janitor in charge of toilets."
She began to push her index fingers together.  "And of
course this was a good idea, because all your ideas are very
good!  But I wanted to make sure that the throne had not
lied on its resume, and that it was actually qualified for
the incredible honour of serving under you!"  Beaming
wildly, she thrust one fist into the air in an enthusiastic
salute.  "So I decided to see if it could deal with the
possibility of arson from one of the many enemies who oppose
you and your ideals!"  She crossed her arms over her chest,
shaking her head sadly.  "Unfortunately, it couldn't, and in
fact, made a bad situation worse by burning a very long
time, but I highly recommend making it into Director of Food
Operations, because the fire was the perfect temperature for
cooking sweet potatoes, not that I had any...."

Il-Palazzo tugged on the tasseled cord which had descended
from the ceiling during the continuing rant, and Excel was
sent plummeting into the pit that opened beneath her feet.
A distant splash was immediately followed, faintly, by,
"Snakes!  Why does it always have to be snakes!"

Lifting her head from the ground, Hyatt coughed once to
clear her mouth, and weakly asked, "Why did you call us here
today, Lord Il-Palazzo?"

Pulling his robes around him as he settled back onto the
barstool, Il-Palazzo intoned, "I have called you here for a
mission of utmost importance.  For in these times of despair
and degradation, when the world sinks deeper into sin and
villainy, it is all the more important that we, as members
of the Ideal Organization ACROSS, conquer and subjugate the
city.  It has come to my attention, however, that there is a
powerful man who arises to present a possible obstacle to
ACROSS and its goals."

Hanging from her fingers off the mouth of the pit, Excel
gasped, and threw herself out and to her feet.  "Someone
dares to defy you, Lord Il-Palazzo?"  She paused to wring
some of the worst of the water from her blue shorts and
massively-shouldered jacket.  "Tell me who, and I'll defeat
him!  I'll kill him!  I'll step on his dog, and cancel his
newspaper subscriptions, and put frogs in his mailbox, and
give him really bad pedicures, and..."

"Excel."

"Yes, Lord Il-Palazzo?"

"Be quiet."

"Yes, Lord Il-Palazzo!"

"This man is a martial artist, a very powerful one.  If he
acts to challenge ACROSS, he may very well thwart our
plans.  We must prevent this."

"Ah, of course!  Yes!"  Excel pumped her fist
enthusiastically in the air.  "So you want us to seek him
out, and challenge him to fair and honourable single combat,
and fight him, and lose, and go off and learn powerful
techniques in far-off, long-lost lands, and eat really good
Korean, the sort you can only get in Los Angeles, and then
return, stronger than ever, and...."

>From the ground, Hyatt coughed through her blood, "So we
should assassinate him, Lord Il-Palazzo?"

Excel screeched, and began frantically pawing at the air.

"Excel?"

"Yes, Lord Il-Palazzo?"

"What are you doing?"

"I'm trying desperately not to fall into the pit-trap, even
though it's futile, because you were right to open it up, as
you're right to do everything and I was very silly to say
such a silly thing but I REALLYREALLYdon'twanttofallandswimand
bebittenbyrabidsharkswithteflonteeth...."

"Excel?"

"Yes, Lord Il-Palazzo?"

"I didn't activate the pit trap."

"What?"

"You are not about to fall.  As you suggested, the plan is
that you shall challenge this martial artist to single
combat."

Excel nodded sagely.  "Yes, yes, of course.  We will
challenge him, and fight him, and defeat him, which will
crush his spirit and his hopes and his dreams," her eyes
took on a manic gleam, and hints of slaver dripped from her
fang-like incisors, "and then, to avenge his ruined honour,
he will train harder than ever and devote himself to one day
defeating ACROSS and all it stands for...." She ground to a
sudden stop, one finger pressed to her forehead in laboured
consideration.  "No, wait.  This is a stupid idea."

A gentle tug of the gloved hand opened another pit-trap.
Excel had time only to blink before she fell again,
shouting, "Never mind, Lord Il-Palazzo, I'll get right on
it, thank you for sending me out the fast way...."

                      *     *     *

Shampoo hovered over Cologne's shoulder.  "What is it,
Great-grandmother?"

"A bad omen, dear."  She perused the letter carefully for
the third time.  "A very bad omen."

"Tell Shampoo.  She tough amazon warrior, she can take it."

"No roles in this episode."

"Aiyah!"

                      *     *     *

With Hyatt close behind, Excel strutted down the street,
singing, "Gonna find a martial arrrrrrist!  Gonna kill a
martial arrrrrrrist!  Gonna crush his bones and pulp his
skull and step on his spleen all for the greater glory of
the hunky Lord Il-Palazzo and his Ideal Organization
AAAA-KUUUUU-ROOOOO-SUUUUU!"  She stopped skipping and
scratched her head.  "Hey, Ha-chan, how are we supposed to
find this guy, anyways?"

Hyatt tilted her head.  "Well, Lord Il-Palazzo said he was
in the Nerima district, which is in Tokyo."

"Yeah, but Nerima's kind of big.  Do we have his address?"

"Um...."

"The neighbourhood?"

"Um...."

"Nearby landmarks?"

"Um...."

"His name?"

"Um... I think Lord Il-Palazzo mentioned that, but I was
dead at the time."

Excel twitched.

                      *     *     *

Exhaustion sapped his muscles and blurred his mind, but
Ryoga paid it no heed.  Hunger gnawed at his insides,
bidding him remember the time four days past when he had
last eaten, but he had no money which which to get more
food.  None of it mattered, anyways.  Nothing mattered at
all, but the three shining stars of Ryoga's life: a cure for
his curse, revenge against Ranma, and the love of Akane.
The first was beyond him, at least at the moment.  But for
the last two....

He stepped around a puddle lying, unexplained, in the middle
of the street, and flexed the fingers of his right hand,
grinning savagely.  It had taken him time to find the
Master, time and hardships as he had fought his way through
the barren steppes, and then the steaming rain forest.
When, finally, he had fought his way free of the last raging
beast and found himself in downtown Kyoto, it had taken even
longer yet to persuade the Master to train him.  

Now, though, he thought, idly hopping over a careening car as
he crossed the intersection, he had mastered the Five
Swallows Fighting And/Or Mating Over Two White Oaks And An
Elm With Dutch Elm Disease Fist.  He caught a glimpse of his
madly-grinning reflection in the display window of an
electronics shop, and could not help but laugh.  Now, Ranma
would pay.

He sobered quickly.  Ryoga had to find Ranma, first.
Feeling no less a fool for the many times he'd done this
before, he bobbed a bow to a passing couple of
strangely-dressed girls.  "Um, excuse me.  Could you tell me
the way to Furinkan High?"

When he straightened, he was met by their blank stares, and
couldn't help but flush in embarrassment.  The dark-haired
girl lifted a hand to her cheek in lady-like confusion, and
asked, "Furinkan?"

"Furinkan. In Nerima?"  They continued to look at him, and
his blush deepened.  "Um, aheh, could you tell me where I
am?"

The blonde one shook off her confusion and thrust a finger
trembling with emotion underneath Ryoga's nose.  "I will
tell you where you are!  You are in F Prefecture, in F City,
in F Neighbourhood, on F Street, in front of the...."  She
peered uncertainly at the sign beside them.  "G Building?"

A gust of wind blew tumbleweed down the street, bouncing
along until it fell down an open manhole, from which screams
of agony ensued.

"Anyways, most importantly, you are in the future domain of
the Ideal Organization ACROSS!  We will conquer it and
subjugate it and stamp out all the filth and depravity and
dirty bits and convenience stores that close at eight P.M.!
Here is a brochure that outlines our domination plans and
schedule, as well as current hiring opportunities, but
please don't read it because it's top secret!"

Ryoga stared at the glossy eight-page leaflet that she had
pressed into his hands, and felt the dark depression creep
upon him.

"Um, Miss Excel...."

F City?  He'd never even heard of it before.  Was it even in
Japan? Convulsively, his fist clenched on the pamphlet,
crushing the high-quality paper.

"Yes, Ha-chan?"

It might take him weeks to find Nerima at this rate.  Weeks,
while Ranma trained, and teased and hurt Akane.  Weeks,
while the advantages of his new training were diminished.

"He mentioned Nerima, Miss Excel."

"Damn you," he snarled quietly, and then his voice rose to a
roar.  "Ranma!  Damn you, this is all your fault!"  He
snapped his fist in a sweeping roundhouse, which sheared
through a nearby lightpost.  When someone tapped his
shoulder, he whipped around and snarled.  "What?"

It was the blonde.  "Hey, did you say you wanted to go to
Nerima?"

He blinked.  Beside him, the streetlamp slowly toppled and
crushed a parked Honda.  "Yes?"

She grinned broadly.  "And you're a martial artist?"

His chest puffed out slightly.  "Yes."  A tire, bouncing
away from the wreck, fell down the manhole.  Another
piercing scream was chased out by a muffled explosion.

"Do you live in Nerima?"

Ryoga was beginning to get confused.  "Um, no.  My sworn
enemy does."  He blushed, and pushed his fingers together.
"And there's this, um, girl, you see...."  A motorcycle
skidded out trying to avoid the flaming hulk in the road,
and slid down the open manhole.  Dull squishing noises, like
watermelons being run through printing presses, echoed up,
along with a sodden, resounding "clank".

The grin on the blonde's face was threatening to eat her
ears, and she nodded enthusiastically at her friend before
draping a companionable arm around Ryoga's shoulder.  "And
this enemy... Ranma? He's a martial artist?  Powerful one?
Strong?  Confident?  Kind of sexy?  Definite protagonist or
antagonist material?"

Ryoga snorted.  "He thinks so, at least.  Um, why are you
asking?"

"Oh, no reason," the girl sing-songed in a innocent voice,
and pointed behind him.  "Hey, look!  A semi-plausible
distraction like a water main exploding to disorient you
while I knock you out and tie you up to take you as a
prisoner and interrogate you later!"

Ryoga finished the "wh" in "what" before a massive geyser
exploded out through the manhole, soaking the street.

Dripping wet, the dark-haired girl clasped her hands in
front of her chest.  "That was very clever, Miss Excel."

"Hah!"  She proudly put her hands on her hips.  "The old
'semi-plausible distraction like a water main exploding to
disorient them while I knock them out and tie them up to take
them as a prisoner and interrogate them later' trick never
fails."  Peering about, she added, "Except that he seems to have
vanished, so I never got to the 'knock them out and tie them
up to take them as a prisoner and interrogate them later'
part.  Well, not that it matters anyway!"

"Oh, look, Miss Excel.  A cute little pig...."

P-chan, still stunned by the sudden change, could do nothing
as a hand reached out to snag his collar.  "Yeah, he is
cute, isn't he, Ha-chan?"  The blonde looked at him
thoughtfully, and then snuggled him into her arms.  "You
know, Ha-chan, I think we should keep him."

P-chan bwee'd a little hmmph, and then relaxed.  They seemed
to be going to Nerima anyways, and there were worse ways to
travel than cradled in the arms of a girl.

"Sure, Menchi would like the company.  Besides, you can
never go wrong with *two* emergency food supplies, and I
like pork better than dog anyways!"

                      *     *     *

In the gloomy, echoing headquarters of ACROSS, Il-Palazzo
ascends his dais.  He stops to consider the stool that
represents the seat of honour, his robes swirling to rest
around him, and then reaches to retrieve a cell phone from
an inner pocket.  Unfolding it, he presses a single button,
and raises the phone to his ear.  There is a pause, and then
he speaks, in a calm, level voice.

"Hello. Ikea Shop-by-Phone?  I would like to order a
throne."

There is a soft muttering on the other end.

"Yes, that would be fine."

Another murmur, and Il-Palazzo's eyes harden.  Rising to his
feet, he takes the phone away from his ear to glare at it,
and then brings it back, and in a cold voice, states, "My
address is a secret."

There is another pause.  The author realizes that the
episode is again in the present tense, and changes it back.

Il-Palazzo sat down on the barstool.  "Yes, I'll hold."

                      *     *     *

"It's amazing how fast we got to Nerima, isn't it, Miss
Excel?"

"Yes, Ha-chan.  What a wonderful country we live in, where
we have public transportation available to us that is so
efficient that it is easily mistaken for a plot
contrivance!"  Excel lifted the piglet high in the air with
both hands and smiled gently at it.  "Of course, Gyoza,
it'll be even more wonderful when all has been ground under
the heel of Lord Il-Palazzo!"  She ignored the pig's frantic
struggles.  "So we need to find this Ranma person quickly
and defeat him."  She peered around, one hand shading her
eyes.  "Well, this is Furinkan High.  Boy, there's a lot of
people here.  How to find this Ranma?  Maybe we should build
a dojo right here, and develop a reputation for brutally
crushing challengers," she posed, starry-eyed, snuggling
Gyoza under her chin, "or be kidnapped as a bride by
megalomaniacal chopstick-wielding villains," she wrapped
herself in a deep, heavy cloak, "or offer to teach an
amazing martial art based on using pressure points to make
people's heads explode," she threw away the cloak and hefted
a round crystal in which was trapped three stars, "or set
out on a quest to collect the other six...."

Hyatt stepped into the school's courtyard and bowed to the
nearest passing student.  "Excuse me, sir, but could you
tell me where I could find Ranma?"

"Ah, fair flower," the boy said mournfully.  He turned to
face her, hakama swirling, and bokken coming to rest on his
shoulder. "Why should such a sweet damsel such as yourself
be seeking out the miscreant knave Saotome?  I see!  You
must be yet another maiden that he has enslaved with his
dark magics and bound to his will!  Fear not, for I am Kuno
Tatewaki, Blue Thunder of Furinkan High, and a peerless
warrior!  I shall war for your freedom, even though my heart
is bound up in another, and verily, my mighty wooden shaft
shall strike with...."

Hyatt wandered back.  "Miss Excel," she whispered, "he says
he is a martial artist too."

Chewing on her lip, Excel stared at him.  "Two martial
artists in Nerima?"  She closed her eyes and ground her
knuckles into her temples.  "Tricky, tricky, very tricky.
How do make sure we fight the right one?  Lord Il-Palazzo
will be very unhappy if we defeat the wrong one, and I don't
want him to be unhappy with him, I want him to smile at me
and praise me and promote me and rip off all my clothes with
a feather duster and throw me over an over-sized marshmallow
and.... I know!  Hey, you!"  She pointed at Kuno.  "Go fight
Ranma!"

Without skipping a beat, Kuno thrust his bokken skywards and
switched rants.  "Indeed!  I, Kuno Tatewaki, Defender of the
Fairer Sex, sally forth!  The sorcerer Saotome has seen his
last English class!"

Hyatt and Excel stood, watching him run off with his bokken
held high overhead.  "That was very easy, Miss Excel."

Excel crossed her arms and nodded decisively.  "Indeed.  He
has excellent taste to be swayed so easily by my feminine
charms."  She broke into a sprint.  "C'mon, Ha-chan!  He'll
lead us right to Ranma, and then we can fight the winner,
because that will be the incredibly powerful martial artist
Lord Il-Palazzo told us to deal with!"

Her only answer was a spray of wetness across her back.
When she looked back, she stumbled to a stop, slumped, and
then slapped Gyoza against her forehead.  "Ooops," she
muttered.  "I forgot that Ha-chan dies when she tries to run."

When she finally rounded the school, Hyatt slung over one
shoulder and Gyoza tucked into the other elbow, there was a
ring of slightly-bored onlookers, and no sign of Kuno.
"Excuse me," she said, lashing out with her feet at the
crowd, "beautiful delicate girl coming through!  Get out of
the way or you'll be cleaning toilets in the new regime!"

Once she'd reached the front row, she could see that the
inside of the ring was occupied by a young, handsome
pig-tailed boy dressed in Chinese clothes, rather than the
uniform, and a short-haired girl.  Watching the boy warily,
Excel set the pig down on the ground.  "You stay here,
Gyoza," she whispered.  

P-chan blinked at her, and then started to scamper for
safety.  No sooner had he gotten his trotters under him then
he was crushed to the turf by a heavy, if soft, weight.

"Keep an eye on Ha-chan," Excel added, before dusting off
her hands and stepping away from the corpse-pinned pig.

                      *     *     *

Ranma was mildly irritated.  Being attacked by Kuno was not
new, getting boring, and not particularly challenging.
Moreover, the new accusation of having "enslaved the
porcelain doll" was new, and Ranma had no clue as to
what it meant, other than it probably represented yet
another headache.

Ranma was mildly pleased.  He had used the sack he'd been
carrying to belt Kuno into the sky, and then thrown it like
a sling to land another hit on the mid-air kendoka.
Conservatively, he guessed that he'd been able to double his
usual distance.

Ranma was mildly worried.  The sack, he just remembered, had
been carrying Akane's homework.

And so Ranma was mildly grateful when the strangely-dressed
blonde girl stepped forth.  "Excuse me, have you seen a tall
talkative guy wearing a hakama?"

"Yeah."  Ranma smirked and crossed his arms behind his
head.  "I beat him up."  He grunted when Akane planted a
short sharp jab in his ribs.

The girl pointed at him.  "Are you Ranma?"

"Yeah.  What's it to you?"

Looking impressed, the girl said, "You know, you speak
Japanese really well for a Chinese guy."

"What?" Ranma sputtered.  "I'm Japanese!"

"What?" the girl echoed.  "But you're wearing Chinese
clothes!"

"So?"

"So why are you wearing Chinese clothes if you're not
Chinese?"

"What, I gotta be a Chinese to wear Chinese clothes?  What
about you?"  He studied her tight-fitting brown and black
shirt under a pale blue, dome-shouldered vest, with
fingerless gloves and combat boots to round things out.
"You look like... like...."

"A member of a secret revolutionary society led by a cool
and mysterious mastermind?" she supplied helpfully.

"An anime character!"

"What?" she spat.  "Japanimation?  You take that back!"

"Heh."  He crossed his arms, smug in his victory.  "An' I
thought those sailor suits looked stupid."

The girl seethed with righteous indignation.  "For this
insult -- no, because I was told to by Lord Il-Palazzo, I
never put personal considerations ahead of duty, Lord
Il-Palazzo, but that insult sure didn't help his case -- I
will challenge you!  I," she frowned suddenly, "wait, who am
I?  My given name is Excel, my surname is Excel, my code
name is Excel, that is to say, my name is Excel, but if this
is a secret mission, I shouldn't say that, but this isn't a
part-time job, so I can't be Dosukoi Hanako, but I need a
name to challenge him," she straightened and thrust her fist
in the air, "I, Celexay, challenge you!"

Ranma snorted and turned his back.  "Feh.  I don't fight
girls."  Akane stared at him, wide-eyed and sputtering, but
he ignored her.  Geez, just because he'd hit Shampoo, and
Ukyo, and Kodachi, and the take-out girl, and the lady at
the post office, and that old granny, and....

"Really?" he heard from behind him, and he smirked.  He
almost felt sorry for her....  And then, "Great!"

Eyes widening in sudden panic, he spun on one foot....

To take a baseball bat in the stomach.

Doubling over, gasping, he straightened himself, grimacing,
and the bat soared from below to catch him on the chin,
slamming him up into the air and dropping him in a heap.
Shaking his head to clear it, he turned towards the patter
of running feet, snarling and arms out to block the next
swing.  Instead, a jump-kick caught him in the forehead,
driving him back through the air to plow through the turf.

As he lay there, face down and fingers barely twitching, the
girl walked confidently up to him, nattering, "I don't know
what Il-Palazzo was worried about.  I mean, this fight is
really easy!"

She lifted the bat up high to deliver the finishing blow,
and suddenly Ranma was uncoiling from his feigned
immobility, landing a powerful uppercut that sent her
slamming into a tree.

As she slid to the ground, leaves tumbling about her, Ranma
rocked his head from side to side, and then cracked his
knuckles, grinning ferally.  "Normally I don't fight girls,"
he repeated, advancing on his stunned foe while the bat
clattered to the ground behind him.  "But for you, I'll make
an exception."

The blonde remained slumped against the torn bark of the
trunk; when he finally closed on her, she looked up weakly,
blood trailing from one corner of her mouth.  "A good hit,"
she said hoarsely.  "You're a strong opponent.  I have to
respect such strength, such power.  You could defeat me.
But I won't let you." She pulled something from out of her
jacket.  "I *can't* let you."  Wavering, she presented her
hand, and Ranma inhaled sharply.

A grenade.

"Um, Miss Excel...."

Yanking the pin out, the blonde let it drop, and then
slumped back against the tree.  "Sorry it has to be this
way, Ranma.  But if I have to lose... we both have to.
Hail, Lord Il-Palazzo...."

"Um, Miss Excel...."

Excel looked over irritably.  "What is it, Ha-chan?  I'm
busy trying to have a dramatic final death scene."

Ranma watched as the pale-skinned girl raised her head from
the immense pool of blood that surrounded her.  "Miss Excel,
Lord Il-Palazzo said we were supposed to defeat him in a
martial arts challenge."

"And?"

"I don't think grenades count as martial arts, Miss Excel."

"Sure they do!  It's part of the East Uruguayan School of
Don't-Hold-On Grenade-Jutsu!"

"Actually," Ranma interjected, "Don't-Hold-On Grenade-Jutsu
only works with the German Model 24 'Potato-masher'
Stielhandgranate.  What you're using is a US Army-issue Mk
II HE grenade."

"Oh, yeah," Excel exclaimed.  She laughed, scratching the
back of her neck with her free hand.  "Completely slipped my
mind.  I was wondering why it felt so strange!"

Ranma laughed along.  "Yeah, I did that once, too.  Throws
you right off, the balance is so wrong."

"Anyways."  Excel dropped the grenade and got to her feet,
dusting off her shorts.  "You win this round, Ranma, but I
will be back.  Train hard, because I will be!  Training
hard, I mean, though in retrospect, maybe you shouldn't
train hard, or at least not as hard as me.  In fact, it
might be best if you slacked off a lot, took up professional
ice-cream-eating, maybe, which I hear is a very lucrative
career, but slack off or not, I will be back, and we will
fight again, and I will win, or at the very least I'll lose
and go and train some more and do you know any good Korean
restaurants and hey!"  She looked around in confusion.
"Why is everyone running away?"

                      *     *     *

Grenades are military hardware.  Specifically, they are
*simple* military hardware, and thus they are designed to be
low-maintenance and highly reliable.  Each undergoes
thorough quality assurance, a careful examination, and a
randomly selected few from every batch are actually tested
in the factory, though not, at least after the first batch
or two, on the factory floor itself.

Thus, all jokes about fifteen thousand dollar wrenches
notwithstanding, the point is that it is unlikely that any
given grenade will be a dud.  Extremely unlikely.  The odds
of a grenade not exploding are, in fact, roughly the odds of
getting two people together in the same place and finding
out that they both have trained in East Uruguayan
Don't-Hold-On Grenade-Jutsu.  Such things, as they say,
happen only in Hollywood.

So when they make a movie out of this, they'll have to edit
out that explosion.

                      *     *     *

The student body lay strewn around the blast crater,
moaning and covered in blood.  All of the blood belonged to
Hyatt, though, so that was okay.

"Are you okay? Can you get up?"

"I'm fine."  Akane shook her head groggily, and reached out
to take the proffered hand.  "Thanks," she said woozily, and
then froze as she looked at the person helping her.

It was a nun.

Well, probably.

Nuns wore wimples, as did this girl.  Nuns also wore high,
white collars, often with a cross pendant, so that was okay
too.  Leather high-heeled boots seemed a bit off, but then,
Akane hadn't seen many nuns as young as this girl, so maybe
that was just an age thing.  Fishnet stockings were
definitely iffy, though.  Akane was quite sure that even if
they were okay, they should be hidden under a skirt, rather
than rising up to grasp a pair of garters that left only a
few inches of bare skin before a pair of skin-tight latex
bikini briefs took over the job of providing a semblance of
decency.  Nuns were also to wear habits, rather than black
silk and velvet corsets, and form-fitting shoulder-length
gloves, even fingerless ones, didn't seem very ecclesiastic.

And nuns never carried bullwhips.

"Hurry," said the hypothetical nun, as she pulled strongly
and brought Akane to her feet.

"Wh-what?"  She looks a lot like me, Akane thought dazedly.
Except for the clothes.

"You're Akane Tendo, right?"  She turned to quickly survey
the area, and then held out her hand again to Akane.  "Come
with me if you want to live."

"Wh-what?"

"Hurry!"  She broke into a run, and Akane, still stunned,
found herself running behind as they fled the school
grounds. 

"Wh-what?"  In her confusion, Akane realized she sounded
like a broken record, but could do nothing to stop it.  Even
from behind, she could feel the nun's grimace.

"I'll try to explain.  Years ago, I fell in love with a
boxer.  It was a forbidden romance, of course, since I was
already a nun, but he was kind, and sweet, and with every
match he fought, I could feel my resolve wavering."  She
sighed mistily, and then pulled Akane after her down an
alley.  "And then I learned the truth.  Or, at least, a
possible truth."

She came to a stop so suddenly that Akane almost ran into
her, and then picked her up bodily and threw her sideways
into a nearby dumpster.  "Stay low!  Anyways, what I
discovered that was if I had left the order and married him,
we would have had two children.  And the older child, a
daughter, would have grown up to be powerful in magic, the
reincarnation of some ancient malevolent spirit from ancient
history.  With that power, she would enslave the world,
bending it into a dictatorial, inflexible regime in which
she would rule every thought and emotion and enforce her
idea of perfection."

Thrashing about in the muck at the bottom of the garbage
can, Akane found herself seized by the scruff of the neck
and heaved out.  The daring nun quickly brushed off the
worst of the coffee grounds, and then set her down again.
"Okay, the coast is clear.  Follow me!"  She set off at a
sprint down the deserted street, Akane at her heels.

"Of course, knowing this, I had no choice to not only spurn
him, but run away; if I had stayed, sooner or later he would
have won me over.  I thought that was the end of it."

Akane said nothing as tried to puzzle out how the nun could
keep up this brutal pace on six-inch heels.

"But my daughter-to-be wasn't out of tricks.  She sent back
her enforcer -- a heartless, evil witch with a mastery of
time travel -- to make sure that everything went the way she
wanted.  I've been on the run ever since."  The nun skidded
to a stop, grimly staring up at the rooftops ahead.  "Damn!
There she is now!" she growled, shaking out her whip.

Squinting up into the setting sun, Akane could just make out
an undeniably female silhouette, holding a massive
key-shaped staff, before her collar was seized and she was
yanked off her feet.

"No chance of fighting her now, we have to run!" the nun
barked, running full-speed for the nearest alley with Akane
flapping behind her like a flag.

Akane found herself on the verge of wailing.  "But what does
all this have to do with *me*?"

Surprised, the nun glanced back over her shoulder.  "Isn't it
obvious?  C'mon, let's go!"

"Noooooooooooooooo!"

                      *     *     *

A single sneeze brought Ranma back to consciousness, and he
struggled groggily to his feet.  "Where'd she go?"

Glancing quickly around, he realized that the
girl... Excel... had fled the scene, along with her really
sick friend.  He grinned.  It didn't matter.  She would be
back, and they'd fight again.  He was looking forward to it.
That had been a decent fight.  Plus she was pretty cute.

"Ranma," someone said, tugging on his sleeve.

Ranma shook his head ferociously.  No way!  He had enough
girl troubles already, foisted on him by circumstance.  He
didn't need to go *looking* for another girl.  Even a real
pretty one.

"Ranma," the voice said more urgently.

But she knew Don't-Hold-On Grenade-Jutsu, a voice whispered
to him.  None of his fiancees knew Don't-Hold-On
Grenade-Jutsu.  No-one he had ever met, in all his travels,
knew Don't-Hold-On Grenade-Jutsu.

"Ranma!"

Except Ranma, and....

Someone hit him across the back of the head.  "What?" he
shouted, annoyed.

It was Akane's friend, Sayuri, who seemed to be the only
other student awake.  "Akane's gone."

Ranma stared at her.  "What?"

Sayuri wrung her hands, tears beginning to cut tracks
through the grime crusting her face. "Some weird girl hauled
her off!  I don't know where they went!"

"Oh."  Ranma went back to staring at the crater.

Sayuri waited impatiently, while others caught in the blast
slowly began to shift and stir.  Finally, she prodded him
irritably.  "Aren't you going to go after her?"

"Why?"  Ranma sounded puzzled.  "She's going to come back
when she's ready."

"What?"  Sayuri gaped.

"Well, she challenged me, right?"

Stamping her foot, Sayuri shouted, "Akane!  Are you going to
go after Akane?"

"Oh."  Ranma waved his hand dismissively.  "Nah."

There was a silent, terrible moment while the entire student
body froze.  Then Sayuri stammered, "Wh-wh-what?"

"I gotta train.  Besides...." 

Besides, Ranma thought, staring up at the afternoon sun,
Excel knows Don't-Hold-On Grenade-Jutsu.  

                      *     *     *

Kodachi hated her English class.  She had a natural aptitude
for Physics, so that wasn't bad at all, and Literature was
filled with stories of heroic manly men sweeping beautiful
damsels off their feet.  It was in Gym class that she
demonstrated how her lofty status in the ranks of the school
had been earned, and, of course, Cooking and Chemistry were
tied for her favourite subjects, even if she sometimes got
confused as to which one she was actually in at any given
time.  But on the second day of school, she'd learned how to
say, "I love you, Ranma!" in English, and that, as far as
she was concerned, was the end of English's usefulness.  And
so, when her desk was crushed by a kendoka flying through
the window, she was rather more charitably inclined than she
might have been.  "Hello, brother dear.  How is my
darling Ranma?"

"I fight on!" Kuno explained, as he got to his feet and
dislodged plywood shards from his hair.

Kodachi stifled a yawn.  "Oh, that's nice."

"But needs must I elsewhere to continue my fight," Kuno
observed, "as my dishonourable foe would seem to have fled."
He ran a dispassionate eye over Kodachi's classmates, who
seemed to have gotten over their shock and gotten on to the
ogling state.  "Most likely he has taken the fair porcelain
doll off to bind her further with his vile sorcery!"

Snapping to her feet, Kodachi demanded, "What?  Some new
foolish girl is trying to put her hooks in my darling
Ranma?"

Kuno nodded gravely.  "Indeed, though it pains me to admit
it."  His eyes narrowed as he drew a new bokken.  "I can not
allow the foul cur to perpetuate this travesty!"

"Indeed."  Kodachi reached to the lace at the top of her
blouse, and with a sharp tug, tore her uniform into shreds.
She posed in her leotard, casually flicking her gymnastic
ribbon about.  "I will go with you, brother dear, and my
love will rescue my darling Ranma from the schemes of this
witch!"

He studied her with serene eyes, and then abruptly nodded, a
slow, secretive smile appearing on his lips.  "Indeed," he
echoed, and then seized her about the the waist and leapt
out the shattered window.

Startled, Kodachi recovered her wits just as he set her
gently down on the grass of the school's courtyard.
Staggering for a second, she busied herself making unneeded
adjustments to her leotard.  "Buffoon," she muttered, though
her heart wasn't really in it.

Regardless, he ignored her, and hefted his bokken, grinning
all the more broadly.  "Indeed," he repeated, "we shall hunt
together, sister.  Now, follow me, as we seek the vile
sorcerer!"

Kodachi watched with a flat gaze as her brother charged from
the school grounds, and then turned to look up at the second
floor, where her classmates hung, gaping in astonishment,
out the window.  A smile tugged at the corners of her lips,
and she gave them a mocking bow.  "My pardon, teacher and
friends, but I have business elsewhere!"  Bounding after
Kuno, she left a soft storm of rose petals and a pealing
laugh floating behind her.

"Kodachi Kuno leaving early?"  Still standing in front of
the chalkboard, the teacher shook his head sadly as he
surveyed the wreckage.  "Yet another disciple who could not
take the magnificence of Great Teacher Largo!  Ph34r m3!"

                      *     *     *

"Where are you going, Ranchan?"  Ukyo's breathless voice
held a note of urgency.  She had been on the fringe of the
explosion, and was the only one, other than Sayuri, that had
made it to their feet.

Ranma looked back, one hand resting on the gate pillar of
Furinkan high.  "To train," he said levelly.  "That was a
close match.  I just about lost, and Saotome Ranma doesn't
lose."

Ukyo looked at him oddly, hands on her knees as she caught
her breath.  "Ranchan, you cleaned her clock.  Were you
standing too close to the blast or something?"

Grimacing, Ranma snarled, "Don't try an' make me feel
better!  I gotta get better -- a lot better -- or I won't be
so lucky the next time." He turned to go.  "I'm gonna go ask
Cologne ta help me; she's gotta have some good tricks left."
She had to; Ranma won all his fights, even though a not
insignificant part of him cringed at the thought of possibly
hurting Excel.

"She doesn't."

As one, Ranma and Ukyo turned.  The sun had almost set,
hanging low to blind them with reddish beams, but as the
barely-distinguishable silhouette took another step towards,
he moved into sharp focus when his massive, incongruous afro
produced a solar eclipse.  "Who are you?" Ranma gasped.

The man tightened his yellow tie, and re-adjusted the collar
on his red sports jacket.  "My name is Nabeshin." He grinned
at them, light glinting from his teeth, and then his face
hardened.  "Cologne is powerful, true, but she doesn't know
anything that will be strong enough to help you against this
foe.  I can help you, though."

Not entirely trusting him, Ranma asked cautiously, "Help me?
Do I know you? Why...."  He cut off suddenly, feeling the
ominous chill of a terrible presence.

"Hotcha!"  Happosai came bounding over from the direction of
the recent fight, a bag almost twice the normal size bouncing
on his shoulder. "Wotta haul!  Stunned insensible and flat
on their backs -- just the way I like 'em!" He caught sight
of the small party near the street and changed course,
waving enthusiastically.  "Ranma!  And... Nabeshin!"

Staring over Ranma's shoulder, Nabeshin's eyes held the
distant glaze of a man seeing time lost past.  "You are the
heir to Anything Goes Martial Arts, Ranma, and I once knew
-- and owe a great debt to -- the founder of your school.  A
man named Happosai."  His far-off look did not fade as
Happosai came to a stop, perched on top of his afro.

"Nabeshin!  Long time no see."

"We were comrades-in-arms -- no, we were friends.  We fought
together, we trained together, we drank together, we chased
girls together.  Well, he chased them; they just came to me,
but he never held the fact that I was far sexier and more
charming than him against me.  Ah, I miss those care-free
days!"

Puffing on his pipe, Happosai frowned down from his perch.
"Hey, I'm right here."

"And then we took that final mission.  We never should have,
but how could we refuse the heir to the de facto ex-Shogun
in exile?  We set off for Guatemala with nothing but three
pounds of rice and a bottle of glue, never expecting what
was in store."

"Nabeshin?"  Happosai used his pipe to tap Nabeshin on the
forehead, gently at first, but rapidly becoming more
forceful.  "Yoo-hoo, Nabeshin!"

Still ignoring him, Nabeshin wiped a tear from his eye.
"When the cannibal cybernetic Marxist psychiatrists from
JANERIKU had us surrounded, I was sure it was all over.  But
Happosai made me run, telling me that someone had to take
the news back, that someone had to let them know that
Grasscutter had been found!"  His fists clenched, knuckles
cracking.  "I watched as he fought on, despite four mortal
wounds and having his head cut off.  His death bought me the
time to escape, which is the only reason the world is still
here today."

By this time, Happosai had crawled down Nabeshin's front,
and was holding his collar in one hand, slapping him
repeatedly across the jaw with the other.  "Nabeshin!  Speak
to me!  Speak to... errrk!"

Nabeshin held the diminutive man dangling in one hand, and
roared, "Shut up!"  Punting Happosai into the far distance,
he turned to Ranma, dusting his hand clean.  "Anyways,
that's why I'm going to train you."

"Fair enough."  Ranma crossed his arms over his chest and
smirked.  "But why should I let ya train me?  How do I know
yer any good?"

Reaching his hand into his coat, Nabeshin nodded.  "Good
question." Shrugging, he turned and tossed a dark lump
lightly to Ukyo, who, taken by surprise, fumbled after the
catch.  "Here."

Finally getting a good grip on it, Ukyo took a close look
and blinked.  

"Don't hold on," Nabeshin suggested.

"But...," was all Ukyo managed to get out.

Ranma gaped as the dust from the focused explosion swirled
around him.  Coughing, he whirled and stared at Nabeshin.
"That... that... that was...."

Utterly unfazed by the blast, Nabeshin returned Ranma's
previous smirk with compound interest.  "Don't-Hold-On
Grenade-Jutsu Ultimate Attack: Reverse Psychology Hot
Potato."

Ranma prostrated himself before Nabeshin.  "Master!  I beg
you to teach me!"  He had never seen that attack done
before, only heard descriptions of it; never in a million
years would he have believed that any man could master
Don't-Hold-On Grenade-Jutsu to the point where they could
deliver it with such grace and perfection.  

"ranchan...."  Weakly, Ukyo's arm struggled free from the
detritus to tug at Ranchan's shirt.  "hurts so much,
ranchan...."

Such a martial artist could take him to his limits and
beyond, Ranma knew.  Only then could he be a match, a true
match, for the beautiful Excel.  

"ranchan?  'sall getting dark...."

Nabeshin pulled Ranma to his feet; neither paid any heed to
the grating noise as Ranma's sleeve was pulled free.
"Come.  For the memory of Happosai, I will train you, but we
have to start now.  Come!"  He took off a run, Ranma close
on his heels.

"can't feel my legs, ranchan... come back... please...."
Ukyo's hand groped briefly at the air, and then, with a
shudder, fell back to the bloodied mud.  Ravens cawed into
the now-full darkness.

"you jackass."

                      *     *     *

Excel and Hyatt, seated opposite each other, stared glumly
at the glass of water they were sharing.

"So what do we do now, Miss Excel?"

Excel pursed her face in contemplation.  "Well, what I said
to Lord Il-Palazzo was, 'So you want us to seek him out, and
challenge him to fair and honourable single combat, and
fight him, and lose, and go off and learn powerful
techniques in far-off, long-lost lands, and eat really good
Korean, the sort you can only get in Los Angeles, and then
return, stronger than ever,' and he said I was right, and
that's a moment I'll treasure for ever and ever, for it
shows that our heart and souls are truly as one, and one day
he'll profess his love for beautiful Excel openly, and then
take out a tube of cake icing, and... ah, Lord Il-Palazzo,
you're so dreamy!  You're all that a simple, innocent, yet
stunningly beautiful and incredibly sexy girl like me could
ever hope for!"

She looked at her fingers and starting ticking items off.
"Anyways, so far we've sought Ranma out, and challenged him,
and fought him, and lost."  She started counting on her
other hand.  "So now we have to go off and learn powerful
techniques in far-off, long-lost lands, eat Korean, and then
return."  She stared at her hands in surprise.  "Hey,
Ha-chan, we're half finished already!"

"That's wonderful!  But, Miss Excel, how are we supposed to
travel anywhere, or eat good Korean?  We don't even have
enough money to afford a soda."  Hyatt sighed.

"Good point, Ha-chan."

"Don't Koreans eat dog?"

"Hey, yeah, they do!"  No sooner did Excel speak than she
wilted again, resting her jaw on her fist.  "But we left
Menchi at home."  Excel's eyes fell on Gyoza, who she was
affectionately pinning to the table with one hand.  "What
about pork?" she asked over his frantic squeals.  Her
stomach rumbled loudly, and her grip slowly tightened.

Hyatt considered that, reaching out with a delicate finger
to playfully tap Gyoza's flailing trotter.  "I think so,
Miss Excel, but do we want to use our emergency food supply
already?  It's not really an emergency yet."

Excel scrunched up her brow.  "Good point.  After all, we
have a glass of water, so we won't starve to death, and we
still have to," she quickly counted off her fingers again,
"go off and learn powerful techniques in far-off, long-lost
lands."

"You wish to be trained?"

In perfect unison, Hyatt and Excel's heads snapped around.
Beside the table, a pillar of cold, white fire rose halfway
to the ceiling, swaying to and fro in the steady droning
breeze of the air conditioner.  Gaping, Excel leapt on top
of the chair back, hands slamming together as she bent her
head in reverent prayer.  "Ah!  It is a fire spirit come
from the Heavens, to give us divine inspiration so that we
may develop a powerful school of martial arts based on the
theory that the fist can be treated as the flint, and the
enemy's tonsils, the steel, which when brought together,
strike the sparks of pain, which will catch on the tinder of
the teeth, which will eventually ignite the logs of I'm not
really sure yet but probably something to do with pressure
points or massage therapy or high colonics or something,
which when fanned by the breeze of shouting loudly will
birth the fire of being kicked repeatedly, which will end
only in the ashes of victory!"

The chair she was standing on suddenly vanished, and Excel
swan-dove to the floor, feet in the air and her nose nicely
cushioning the blow.  The rasping, gravelly voice said,
"Over here."

With a ratcheting, cracking noise, Excel's head rotated up
to face straight ahead, while her body gently levered down
to rest on the floor behind her.  Her slitted eyes stared at
the base of the flames, which seemed to be on top of the
head of a....  Excel's right arm snaked forward to point.
"You look like a tiny little foot-high wizened ugly horrid
troll or probably leprechaun dressed in green
clover-leaf-patterned leiderhosen with incredibly tall
almost-fire-like white hair but I think this is supposed to
be a martial arts episode which generally don't have any
leprechauns so I'm thinking instead that I've been hit hard
enough on the head that I have a concussion which is weird
because normally I don't get a concussion as that really is
Hyatt's role and when the characters overlap too much they
don't play off well against each other."

"Who are you calling a leprechaun?"  The tiny little figure
heaved the chair she had confiscated threateningly.

Excel blinked.  "You?"

The shriveled old lady tried to smash the chair down on
Excel's head, but the legs had gotten tangled in the
twisting locks of her massive shock of hair.  Struggling
briefly to try and free it, she gave up, left it dangling,
and crossed her arms in a dignified fashion.  "I'm not a
leprechaun."

"You look like a leprechaun," Excel pointed out.

The not-leprechaun shook her head vigourously, which
launched the chair lodged in her tresses off the side with
cannon-like force to explode through the restaurant window.
"I am not a leprechaun!  I am a martial arts master!"  A
thundering impact from the street outside was followed by
faint screams of, "Kobayashi is bleeding!"

"Really?"  Excel jumped to her feet.  "That's nice.  As she
brushed herself, she glanced over the table, and her eyes
widened in shock.  Dancing a jig of righteous outrage, she
shouted, "Ah!  Ha-chan, don't hog all the water!"

The entirely-not-a-leprechaun master sighed deeply, and
bowed her head as if to summon patience.  The act caused her
massive coiffure to drive Excel deep into the floor with a
ringing gong noise.  When she looked up again, the eyebrow
over one bulging eye twitching, the two were on eye-level.
"I said, I am a martial arts master."

"Yes."  Excel nodded firmly.  "I heard you say that, when
you were saying you were not a leprechaun, which I said you
were, but I still say you look like one, and is it possible
that when you said...."

"I am a martial arts master," she patiently interrupted,
"who can train people."

"Mmm-hmmm."  Excel's brow furrowed.

"Who can train people in secret, powerful techniques."

"I see."

"Secret, powerful techniques, like the ones you wanted to
learn."

"Right!"  Excel burst from the floor, and pointed
triumphantly at the crone.  "Ha-chan!  We can be trained in
secret, powerful techniques by this leprechaun in order to
fulfill the wishes of Lord Il-Palazzo and defeat Ranma!
Ha-chan?  Ha-chan?  Oh."  Her shoulders slumped as she
watched the crimson waterfall drip from the table-top.
"Ha-chan is dead."

With a sudden, sharp blurring sensation, Excel found
herself face-first on the ground again.  The little woman,
still holding on to her ankle, said evenly, "I am not a
leprechaun."

When she let go, though, Excel did not stand up.  Instead,
she sat cross-legged, rubbing her brow in worry.  "Wait.  We
might have a problem."  She peered suspiciously at the
woman, who was blinking in consternation.  "Where are you
going to train us?"

The shriveled master tilted her head in confusion, which
caused her towering tresses to rend a gaping slash in the
wall.  "At my house?"

"Is that far-off?"

"It's next door."

"Is it long-lost?"

"I forgot my keys yesterday.  Does that count?"

"Do you have any Korean food?"

"Nope."

Excel smacked her fists together.  "Close enough!  Don't
worry, Lord Il-Palazzo, we're getting closer and closer to
our victory!"
                      *     *     *

"A cunning foe," Il-Palazzo murmurs.  He stares, unseeing,
at the floor where his agents would stand to deliver their
reports and receive their commands, and then slowly turns
around.

Where once his throne stood, and the stool later followed,
is an immense pile of wood, plastic, upholstery, and
screws.  Hundreds of screws.

"A cunning foe indeed."  The episode has again reverted to
present tense, and the author has no idea why.  He changes
it back, and then goes to consult the manual or the warranty
or something.

Il-Palazzo opened his clenched hand and stared down at a
half-dozen hex wrenches.  None of them, he knew, were the
right size.

Slowly, he let them drop from his hand, one-by-one, each
one bouncing and ringing off the granite floor.  And over
the chiming clatter, his voice could be heard:  "Hello.
Ikea Shop-by-Phone?"
                      *     *     *

Toting Hyatt on her back, Excel suddenly stopped in her
steps.  "Hey, leprechaun, what should I call you?"  Her head
rocked back with a clanking noise as a projectile took her
between the eyes.

The woman reached down to retrieve her house keys from where
they had landed between Excel's feet, and when she
straightened again, she had a cold, vicious smile on her
face.  "I'm not a leprechaun, child.  You can call me...."

Excel leant forward.

"Moira O'Callahan."
                      *     *     *

Gy... no!  Ryoga knew that it was time to escape; time to
make Ranma pay.   It was *always* time to make Ranma pay,
of course, but now was a time to make Ranma pay *even more.*

A long time with his curse had left him no stranger to
people trying to eat him.  Heck, for the first few weeks
after Jusenkyo, he'd drooled whenever he'd caught his
reflection in a mirror.  This Excel girl, though... it was
like being with a twisted version of Akane.  She cuddled
him, and kept him close, and spoke to him in gentling and
soothing tones, and every time her stomach rumbled, her eyes
flashed butcher knives and her fingers reached for a cutting
board and drool dripped down her fangs.  Those fangs were
pretty damn disturbing.

They had dumped him in the room that the leprechaun crone
had set aside for her new students, and then gone off to
start training.  The room was stark, with nothing but a
couple of futons, a tiny, high window, and a Western-style
door.  More than enough to hold any ordinary pig, but -- he
grinned crookedly -- he was no ordinary pig.

The Bakusai Tenketsu would be more than enough to free him,
but it would make a great deal of noise, and he might not be
able to find his way out of the home before his captors came
running.  Besides, he admitted sheepishly to himself, he
really wanted to try out the Five Swallows Fighting And/Or
Mating Over Two White Oaks And An Elm With Dutch Elm Disease
Fist.  He drew himself up onto his rear feet, staring
intently at the locked door, flexed his fingers,
and... tried to flex his fingers again.  Staring in
consternation at his hooves, he counted, then blinked and
counted a second time.  He didn't seem to have Five Swallows
at the moment.  Which made it all the more vital to make
Ranma pay, since it was Ranma's fault that Ryoga couldn't
make Ranma pay.

Before he could work up to a Shishi Hokoudan, the door flew
open, and the other girl -- Hyatt -- stood there, in an
immaculate new karate gi.  The tableau was frozen for a
moment, as Hyatt stared, and Ryoga was uncomfortably aware
of the fact that he was on his hind feet and crouched in a
combat stance; behaviour no true self-respecting pig would
ever consider.

"What are you doing, Gyoza?" Hyatt asked, head cocked to one
side.

Bolting between her legs and trying to make a break for it
was an option.  So was squatting and doing his "cute little
piglet" routine, but Ryoga was also fighting an urge to
scratch the back of his head and laugh nervously.  Faced
with too many alternatives, Ryoga followed his heart, and
tried to choose all of them at once.

Hyatt watched the piglet writhe and spasm across the floor,
scratching frantically at his entire body, and then smiled
faintly as she clapped her hands together.  "Oh, I see.  You
have fleas, so you want to take a bath."  She scooped up the
near-epileptic Ryoga before the words had a chance to sink
in, and headed down the heart-stoppingly short walk to the
nearest bathroom.  "Don't worry, Gyoza.  We'll have you
clean soon."

About to squirm free, Ryoga paused.  For once in his life,
he realized, he didn't have to fear having his curse
revealed.  He would be dunked in hot water, he would be
human, he would apologize profusely, he would leave.  Once
it was established that he was not, in fact, a pig and hence
a food source, they would have no more use for him.

Slavering jaws danced across his mind.  Well, he amended,
Hyatt would have no use for him.

And so, when they reached the furo, Ryoga eagerly leapt from
Hyatt's arms and into the tub, creating a splash that was
greatly magnified as he grew to his human form.  Sloshing
about in the tub to face the entrance, he was careful to
keep himself as decent as possible as he bowed towards the
dark-haired girl.  "Ah, I'm really sorry about this...."

Making the mistake of looking up, Ryoga froze.  Hyatt, who
had been in the midst of kneeling down when he had dove into
the water, sat there, stunned, her thin karate gi soaked to
translucence.  The white fabric, steaming slightly in the
warm humidity, caressed her curves eagerly, sweeping up from
the flare of her hips to cup the outer swells of round
breasts, pulling away just enough to reveal a deep, enticing
valley....

'Oh, damn,' thought Ryoga fuzzily, as blood sprayed forth.
Then he realized that it wasn't *his* nose that was
bleeding, and befuddled, he could only stare as Hyatt's eyes
rolled back into her head, and she toppled, shuddering, to
the side.

Ryoga couldn't help but preen; Ranma only wished he was man
enough to get that reaction!  But Hyatt wasn't blushing, he
noticed after a moment, and the blood wasn't just coming
from her nose.  In a sudden panic, he leapt from the tub,
uncaring of his nudity, and cradled the comatose girl in his
arms.  Checking with trembling fingers, he found no pulse.

"Oh, no," he whispered.  His face hardened, and he swept
her into his arms.  "Don't worry, Hyatt.  I'll get you to a
hospital!"  Smashing open the wall with a single kick, he
leapt out onto the street, and ran off in search of medical
aid.

The street outside was mostly empty, save for O'Callahan,
who craned her neck to stare admiringly after the fleeing
pair around the shopping bags she was cradling.  "Girl's got
ambition."

                      *     *     *

O'Callahan's backyard was incredibly spacious for an urban
Tokyo dwelling, filled with rock gardens, koi ponds, little
bridges and gates, a half-size electrified barbed-wire
deathmatch cage, and a plaster lawn banshee.

"Tomorrow morning we will start your real training," the
diminutive master had announced.  "For tonight, you will
work on hardening your hands.  Take this stick, and practice
striking this oak tree, both on the left and on the right.
Do this until you can't do it any more, and then keep doing
it until you can, and repeat."

"Right!"  Excel grabbed the stick in both hands and gave the
inoffensive oak tree a hearty swat.  "I will do this!"
Spinning it over her head, she struck again.  "I will become
stronger!"  Strike.  "For Lord Il-Palazzo!"  A deft parry to
cut a flying piece of bark out of the air, and then another
cut.  "You can count on me, Lord Il-Palazzo!"  Pulling off a
triple combo, she added, "Excel will always do her best for
you!"  A blurred flurry of blows.  "This will make my hands
tougher, so I will be tougher, so I will be stronger so I
can fight Ranma and defeat him and stomach the really spicy
Korean food and then ACROSS will face no obstacles and I
will crush the world under my boot and smear it flat with a
rolling pin and wrap it up in pleasing yet not effeminate
ribbons and deliver it to you for Valentine's Day because,"
she held the stick up as a microphone, "Iiiiiiiii,
ye-iiiiiii, will always love youuuuuuuuuuu...."

The tree, groaning its indignation, toppled over onto her
head. 

"That," Excel pronounced flatly, "was not my hands."

                      *     *     *

Just before dawn breaks, the night takes on a luminous
appearance: a darkness by which you can see.  In this
not-light, Moira O'Callahan carefully studied her lined
visage in the bottom-most part of a full-length mirror.  "I
can do this," she muttered, and then fell silent again.
Abruptly, she nodded, her tresses leaning out to push
against the mirror until the glass bulged inwards and
cracked.  "Because I'm old enough, I'm withered enough, and
doggone it, people fear me."

Ignoring the glass shards cascading down around her, she
strode out through the door and down the hall.  Without
pausing, she smashed into the guest room and violently
attacked the empty futon.

"What are you doing, Teacher?"

Surrounded by drifting wads of padding and cloth, O'Callahan
turned to stare with slitted eyes at Excel, who was blinking
at her inquisitively from just outside the room.  "I was
waking you up so that you could being your training in
earnest," she said, and stepped closer.  Her hair raked
across the roof, and dislodged the "Caravan Kidd Babo
Exclusive Special Edition With Extra Bean-Induced Airbag"
light fixture.  "But you were not sleeping.  Why not?"

"There was a reason... let me see...."  Excel slumped, her
jaw slack as she scratched at an eyebrow with one finger.
O'Callahan leaned in, drawn towards the soft hum of painful
contemplation, and did not quite suppress a jump as Excel
suddenly slammed a fist into her palm, her face first
brightening, and then collapsing into a face of misery as
she fell onto her knees, grabbed O'Callahan's collar, and
sobbed down at her face.  "Oh, it's terrible, you have to...
This is not working."  She leapt to her feet, and ripped up
the flooring that had been underneath her.  Settling herself
down into the newly made gap with a grunt, she fell onto her
knees again, seized O'Callahan's collar again, and sobbed up
at her face.  "Oh, it's terrible!  Ha-chan is dead and has
dissolved into nothing but a pool of horrible blood in the
furo and I spent all night using ice and liquid hydrogen to
try and get her to re-freeze into human form and it didn't
work and you have to help me though if you could arrange for
her to be maybe be just a cup-size smaller I wouldn't
complain not that I think Lord Il-Palazzo has eyes for...."

O'Callahan quieted Excel by the simple expedient of stuffing
a third of a futon in her mouth.  "Your friend is not dead,"
she sighed.

Excel gurgled.

"Well, maybe she is," O'Callahan amended, "but no more than
usual.  My training and intuition tell me that she has simply
left you for a while, to pursue another form of stamina
training."

Excel gurgled again and tried to swallow.

"Don't rush your meal, student.  You won't get to eat again
for a while."

                      *     *     *

"What the h

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