Finally getting to the second part of this:

Steve Thesken wrote:

(continued from part 1)

                    ******************************

Nabiki sighed as she walked home alone in

probably ought to be 'through' instead of 'in'

 the darkened streets.  It was

a quiet night, the streets slick with rain.  After helping Yohko home,
all she wanted to do was get home herself, take a long soak in a hot
tub and then curl up in bed and go to sleep.  She wasn't far from home

three 'home's close together. Might want to change one to 'house' or reword

"And how are you this evening, young warrior?" Cherry responded with a
solemn nod, looking over at her and pulling the end of the long pipe
from his lips.  The smell of tobacco smoke

tobacco flavored smoke (perhaps, feels like something is missing)

"I am well," he replied, his eyes occasionally studying her as he
puffed on his pipe.  "It has been a most interesting day."

Cherry: For other people, thankfully.

"Damn, but you're a strange one, Cherry," Nabiki chuckled, looking at
him.  "What makes you think I'd want to talk about what's going on in
my life with a total stranger?"

"I'm a priest.  Helping people is part of what I do."  He gave her a
smile, a truly ugly sight.

Yes, his smiles always were more than a touch creepy

  "After listening to the words of the kami

in the winds, the water, and

Cherry: And in my head, since he does talk directly to me.

the movement of the trees, listening to

people becomes far easier."

"To ignore." he promptly fell asleep.

He studied her.  "I sense great anger in

you tonight."

Cherry: Given in to the darkside of the Force, have we?

"Anger, huh?"  She shrugged.  "Yeah, you're right.  I was in a fight
today."

"Did you win?"

"It was just a setback today," she grumbled, not quite answering him.

And thus, answering his question through evasion.

Cherry laughed.  "Such a fierce attitude you have, young warrior.  It
is gratifying to see in one so young."

Cherry: Kill all that stand in your way.

"Ranma's not a problem,"

Ranma: No, I am most definitely not a problem. You on the other hand...

"A few times," she said with a shrug.  "I've beaten him."

"I see.  And how did he take that?  Losing to you, I mean."

Nabiki: He cried like a little bitch.

"What do you know of the martial arts, old man?" Nabiki asked with a
chuckle.  "You some kind of ancient master?" she teased him.

Cherry gazed at her.  "I know a little something about the martial
arts, Tendo-san.  I wasn't always a monk, you know."

Hmm. Maybe Mike's right about the Happi connection.

"Well, even if you are some kind of master," she said, standing back
up.  "You're not like the one Ranma's got now."  Her eyes glittered
with envy as she looked at the old monk.  "He's become the student of
Master Jun Fan Li, the Dragon."

Cherry: Oh, you're certainly dead meat, then.

"A powerful warrior, I am told," Cherry acknowledged.  "He was quite
the sensation when he arrived upon the Arena scene."

And is cool even now.

"Yeah, he's Ranma's new master," she said, a bit bitterly.  "And even
though I beat Ranma squarely, Master Li didn't pick me as his student.
He said I had too much of an attitude."  She snorted.  "That's a laugh.
My attitude's fine."

Oh yeah, that's a convincing argument.

"Yes, Nabiki Tendo," he said softly.  "Your future does shine brightly
before you, as it does for young Saotome, but I fear it leads to a very
dark place for you both.  A great storm looms in the distance."

Cue ominous lightning and foreboding.

"Yes, the storm comes.  But there are still players yet to appear.  Who
will be the one to gather them?  And how do you know of Happosai, let
alone Cologne?  I wonder."

Curiouser and curiouser.

The twilight air was cool and rather

I'd drop 'rather'

Her name was Peh Fum

Wondered when she'd show up again.

"<That should be you in Japan, Peh Fum,>" said the new arrival, dressed
in a similar sort of outfit to Perfume, the woman's face and figure
almost identical to hers.  "<That should have been you.>"

Her name was Peh Yin, a Joketsuzoku Amazon and Perfume's mother.

The words were the refrain to an old and familiar song, one that
Perfume had grown more than a little tired of hearing.

I'd combine the sentence before with this one here. The information would be
given to the reader in a less expository manner.

"<You won the village's tournament this year, soundly defeating every
opponent, but it's still her they watch,>" Peh Yin grumbled.  "<Shan
Pu's nothing special,

Yin: It's only luck and the fact every other fighter in the arena is
incompetent, or she wouldn't be the top dog at all.

 not like you, my dear daughter.  Yes, she's a

talented warrior.  But talent in wielding one's fists and feet against
barbaric outsiders in that brutal spectacle back there does not equate
to leadership potential.  Despite your abilities, they would relegate
you to becoming Shan Pu's advisor.  Her advisor!>"

Yin: Like you'd ever be smart enough to be someone's advisor. :)

It wasn't fair!  She had spent months preparing to face Shampoo again,
and she had overcome so many trials that would have broken a lesser
woman.  But now, after finally returning to the village of her birth,
more powerful than she had ever been before, she had learned that
Shampoo had been gone for months.

gone for months and beyond her current reach.

defeat mar its length.  A fair number of outsider men from far and wide
had sought out their humble village, after seeing Shampoo fighting on
television or in one of the lesser arenas on her path to Tokyo.  Some
were simply curious about the amazons,

Amazons

Peh Yin welcomed such new strength being added to the bloodlines.  But
at what price?  Shampoo's career in the Arena had awakened the world to
the Joketsuzoku, but the outside world only saw them as quaint relics
and a source of single women, as if each warrior of their tribe was
just waiting around to be conquered by some man, ignoring the three
thousand years of history that had forged the Joketsuzoku into a nation
of heroic women.

A nation dwarfed by Luxemburg in size. :)

Peh Yin smiled at the thought of how fiercely her own husband had
resisted her, not understanding his new role.  His victory over her had
given him a false impression of how their life together would be lived.
Like a proud stallion, he had bucked and fought her at every turn.  It
had taken her both tender coaxings as well as numerous painful and even
brutal beatings given him by her and by her aunts and female cousins
before her husband had been properly broken in, the carrot and the
stick.  But nowadays he was like a trained warhorse, still strong and
worthy of her love, only now obedient to her will.

What a pleasent woman.

saw her as some kind of substitute for Shampoo was aggravating, filling
her with a growing resentment of her nemesis' popularity.  She had
nearly killed the last man she fought, who had unwisely told her she
was 'just like Shampoo.'

Yeah, that would be a bad thing.

Off to one side, Peh Yin smiled.  How proud she was of her daughter.

Birds of a feather indeed.

                    ******************************

Asuka felt her body fold over the fist slamming into her gut, and then
her world spun as a follow-up punch snapped her head to one side.  She
lost her balance and sat down with a heavy thump.  Her eyes glazed over
for a moment.

"Get up," Nanashi, her master, said calmly.  "We're only just getting
started, Saginomiya-san."

Seems more like she's getting finished to me. :)

Nanashi stopped and nodded.  "You felt it, didn't you?  The moment of
no thought.  I could sense it."

Asuka; I don't know. I wasn't thinking at the time.

"I-I think so."  Asuka wiped her nose on the sleeve of her gi, and it
came away flecked with some of the blood oozing from her nose.  She
glanced at it and shrugged.  "I just let it happen."

"That is one of the key tenets of the Anything-Goes School of Martial
Arts, Asuka," he said solemnly.  "Acting without thought."  He smiled
grimly.  "Some students of the School have based their entire lives
around that principal, existing in the moment and responding without a
single thought about consequences.

Ranma: What? Why is everyone looking at me that way?

Asuka's gaze narrowed.  "Mikado Sanzenin is _not_ my boyfriend," she
huffed.  "As if I would have anything to do with such a womanizer."

"How odd," he said in reply, his gaze a bit mocking.  "I could have
sworn I heard his voice when I passed by your room the other night."
He dipped his head down for a brief moment.  "My mistake."

Asuka: I said he's not my boyfriend, not that I'm not screwing him.

Asuka's cheeks flushed for a moment.  "That is no concern of yours!"

Nanashi started to reply, but then he felt a familiar pain surge up
from within his skull.  He felt pressure building within it, and he
groaned, caught off-guard.  He dropped to one knee, his fingers already
pressing hard at pressure points on his skull and upper body.

Nanashi: Darn that Kenshiro and his Fist of the North Star technique.

Asuka silently watched him leave, wondering what had just happened to
him.  She then shrugged.  He would tell her, or he would not.  Men were
like that.  However, so long as his teachings gave her the power to
crush her rival, Kodachi Kuno, he could be as mysterious and enigmatic
as he cared to be.

At least she has her priorities straight.

Speaking of mysteries, where the hell had that womanizing idiot gone
off to?  Where was Mikado Sanzenin?  Her hands curled into fists at her
sides.  And why did she even care?

Because you regard him as your boytoy and want him to respond to his
mistress' desires. :)

"What are you doing here, Colt?" he asked, frowning.

And she reappears as well.

"After a fashion," she said after a moment.  "He knows better than to
try and control me."  She looked around at the Saginomiya grounds laid
out in front of the balcony they stood upon.  "But I see you've bounced
back after your fall from grace.

Forgot about that.

Colt nodded.  "I'll be in touch."  With a powerful flex of her leg
muscles, she leaped up to land on the roof.  She turned around and
grinned down at him.  "So long, my son."

"Goodbye," he said softly.  "Mother."  They exchanged a rather intimate
look, and then she vanished off into the night.

Heh. More mysteries abound.

"That's quite all right, Saotome-san," said Hinako, smiling at her as
she sat comfortably at the main table, her legs folded beneath her.  "I
think this will give us an opportunity to discuss your son's future,
woman to woman."

Hinako: I'm thinking of making him my personal stud.

Nodoka: Hmm, having you as a mistress would make any man manly. Deal.

"You speak of Kodachi Kuno and Nabiki Tendo?"

"Why, yes.  But how did you know of their names?"

Hinako: Hello. I'm with the secret police. I know everything that matters.

Hinako nodded.  "So he's never experienced the petty rivalries and
jealousies of his peer group."

But he's learning fast. :)

Kodachi sat on the edge of her bed and tried without much success to
quiet the surge of butterflies in her stomach

perhaps she should not have eaten them alive. :)

 as she gazed down at the

telephone receiver in her hand.  She was dressed in a white silk robe
covering a black, sleek negligee.  It was almost time for Kaoru-kun to
call her,

can drop this 'her'

A name suddenly dredged itself up from his memories: Nanami Kiryu.  She
attended Ohtori and was another one of the well-bred young daughters of
nobility his family insisted on trying to match him up with.  She was
indeed attractive enough for his tastes, and she would do most nicely
for this, even on such short notice.  His family and hers would bend
over backwards to arrange it, so eager were they for him to marry a
girl of the peerage.  Perhaps he would even reward Nanami by bedding
her sometime, after he reached his goal of a hundred seductions.

I'm sure she'd be honored. *roll eyes*

Tenchi lay on the roof of the shrine and watched the stars overhead.
It was quiet in Nerima this time of night, and he liked being able to
relax and think.  He was leaving in the morning for his survival course
in the Australian outback, but he could not seem to sleep yet.

'sleep eluded him' (would be better, IMO)

However, he knew in his heart that he was an ordinary young man, albeit
one training to be an Imperial Bodyguard like his sister was, and that
alien princesses falling in love with humans was a fantasy.  Still, he
enjoyed dreaming about such things, even though he never mentioned any
of his imaginings to his fianc�e, Rei Hino.

I don't think that would go over very well, no.

  She was princess enough

for him in all the ways that counted, and he was happy to have her.

Lately he had started fantasizing about Belldandy, a goddess that lived
here now, watched over by his aged grandfather and a shrine priestess
assigned by the Mobius Institute.

Oh yeah. Forgot she was there.

He knew it was a foolish, one-sided

attraction, but she was so sweet and kind it was difficult to ignore
the tender feelings she awoke in him.  She was a creature of spirit,
and he was a being of flesh and blood so

blood, so

Even so, he took out his binoculars, the ones that he used to help him
in stargazing, and he focused in on the figure when it paused on a
nearby rooftop.  He was startled when he saw that it was a girl, and a
really cute one at that.  She agilely clambered down the roof of the
house she was on, one just on the other side of the wall separating the
shrine from that property, where the Saotome's lived.

Saotomes

Tenchi had met his mother's best friend only a few times over the
years, usually being too busy with his studies and his training.

And frankly, he didn't want to have anything to do with such old people.

Sparring with Ukyo after the shop was closed for the evening had been
interesting, the memories of other lives superimposing over the whole
experience.  This world's Ukyo was good, really good, and the friendly
match had become quite intense.  In the end, Ranma-chan had won, but it
was a somewhat

drop 'somewhat'

It was at that moment that she caught sight of herself in the mirror,
after reaching behind herself and undoing the somewhat snug sports bra,
another loaner from Ukyo, which had proven to be a bit too small for
her.  She removed it with a soft groan of relief, and then she saw
herself barechested.  A blush covered her cheeks as she hastily looked
away from staring at the sight of her half-naked body, feeling perverse
to be turned on like she was by her own reflection,

Yeah, he's a real freak. :)

Ranma carefully picked up the wet bar of soap, noting a slightly fresh
scent coming off it.  Whoever was making it had made it more like a
regular bar of soap one would find in a store, and the smell of it was
even rather

drop 'even rather'. They aren't needed

"Wow," he said softly.  He studied his reflection with a borderline
narcissistic interest, almost as if seeing himself for the first time.
His gaze roved over the image, taking it all in as he turned his face
from one side to the other.

Heh. Ranko is worse of a letch than him.

 He picked up the towel and finished drying himself, feeling tempted

again to indulge in looking at himself but resisting.  For now, 'Ranko'
would continue on as Ukyo's cousin, a valuable disguise he was grateful
for now.  It would allow him to get to know Ukyo on a more neutral
basis, without the engagement to clutter up the scenery, and maybe it
could work just as well with the other girls in his life.  Nabiki would
likely be quite hostile to his female form, unless he could somehow
make amends and become friends, and Kodachi's response to Ranko was an
unknown variable.

Oh, I think it's safe to say she'll be pissed at another  woman in Ranma's
life. :)

When he was dry, Ranma slipped on his undershirt and picked up the
bundle of clothing from the hamper, wondering how he was going to get
them cleaned.  Giving them to his mother to wash was simply out of the
question.  And if he was going to be spending periods of time in female
form, he would have to shop for some more clothes, and even feminine
undergarments too.  He would have to be careful where he stored them
though.  The last thing he wanted was for his mother to find them.

Yes, that would be BAD.

"I must be an idiot," she muttered ruefully.

Yes, you are.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx


Thanks to DB Sommer for his help in tightening up several scenes.

You're welcome. Lots of movement on Ranma adopting his new identity, and a
number of people now out for 'Ranko's' blood. It'll be interesting to see
what other troubles Ranma can get himself into. Already looking forward to
seeing more.

DB Sommer



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